Perhe!

Well, what a great week! Good luck with the Spartan haha glad I am not there to be forced into that! My body is pretty beat up from being a missionary already so maybe I will have to do that when I get back...

I cannot believe that the wedding is coming up and that Nate is coming home! Whaaaaat??? Totally ridiculous.. kuintenkin, a bunch of good stuff happened this week! So I will explain a few.

First off, I think one of the most special parts of being a missionary is seeing people change. To be honest, I haven’t seen it that much so far because we do I lot of finding and filing in and out of people. But a couple weeks ago we taught this man who we met on the street and at first he was asking a lot of political and factual questions like how we choose prophets and how many members we have and what not. After teaching the restoration he seemed more interested but still on a fact based level. Last week we met with him again and while we were talking about the Plan of Salvation we could not believe the change! He sincerely liked it and had really good questions and concerns. He said he first thought Mormons were a cult, and then he thought we were just a weird religion, but after our lesson he said he actually really likes what we believe and noticed how forgiving of a church this is! He said learning about it has almost made him want to believe in something again. Wow, we were so amazed! It was such a blessing to be able to see that. He is going to be out of town for a bit (like most people over the summer... they all have little summer houses or a möki that they go to haha) but hopefully we stay in contact.

It was Juhhannes Päivä (mid-summer) on Saturday, which is a HUGE holiday in Finland because it is bright all night long. That also means that it is a red day for missionaries so we cant talk to or call any people because a bunch of people get drunk. But a member family invited us to their summerhouse for dinner at their family reunion and let me just tell you, I absolutely love these people! I felt like I could have been at our own family reunion. Everyone is so nice and since half of the ward here is a part of the same family, they were all there hanging out. And it was BEAUTIFUL. I was almost brought to tears though by how much I love these members and how grateful I am for them.

Another miracle happened at church when 4 people that we had invited came! I love when people come to church! Being a missionary is the coolest. I am finally starting to be myself around people that we meet and using my personality as a strength. It makes talking to people that much better! Well, keep working hard, I am gonna send a lot of pictures so you can all be jealous that I get to serve in the most beautiful place on earth :) love yall!! :)