Well, its June 16th and we woke up to it...SNOWING!
Can you believe it!? Yesterday we got DRENCHED in the rain, but today it was snowing! not enough or cold enough to stick, but it was still snowing! haha! It was so exciting/crazy! So while you are burning in the HOT Nevada sun, I will enjoy the snow/hail/rain/sun all night here in Tromsø :)
This week was really good. MIRACLES ARE HAPPENING IN NORWAY! Especially in the North! :)
Last Monday we went with the elders to an area in Tromsø called Sydspissen (the south point on the island) where we explored and dug for seaglass and cool shells! People that dont come from Alaska dont know what seaglass is, so I have had to explain and show quite a few missionaries what it is ;) No, but there was SO MUCH and it was GORGEOUS! I loved it. After pday we taught a man named Ingvald that we had found contacting. The eternal investigator, Janne, was our "member present"! haha there arent many members, so we used her! She was GREAT! Bore amazing testimony and helped a lot. I hope so much she gets baptized while Im here! After Ingvald, we took a bus to Lenas house (another investigator) and taught her a quick Plan of Salvation. It was amazing how the Spirit guided that lesson and how the Spirit really did tell us what to say.
On Tuesday we had a couple of lessons that went really well. We taught Pedros, who now has a baptismal date for the 2nd of August! And then taught Joseph! We have AMAZING investigators right now! WE ARE SO BLESSED! We had the language class later that night and shared the spiritual thought, which is always nice to share with the people that come. :) Also, we decided to do a Book Of Mormon contacting day. So we took specific languages and put them in our backpacks! Almost back to the church, we stopped a lady from Brazil. I had a portuguese MB! And we pushed so much to give it to her! I knew it was for her! But she wouldnt take it and it just broke my heart. Sister Rupp and I have been talking a little bit about this, well its been a theme for a while, that I just dont understand why people dont "try the cake." If I had a huge entire chocolate cake and said, "THIS IS THE BEST CAKE I HAVE EVER HAD!!!! You try it!" Wouldnt you try it?! Atleast try? Not that you have to eat it all or that you cant give it back, but just a taste? Sometimes people will say, "well, i have a piece of it already!" (I have happiness already, I am happy enough, I already believe in God, etc.) But why not, if the whole cake is going to be better than just one piece, why not take it all? It baffles me.
Well on wednesday, all the missionaries above the arctic circle came here for Zone Leader Training! Since it is so expensive to fly here, our zone has 2 Zone Leader Trainings. One in Trondheim for those in the north zone under the arctic circle, and one up here. ZLT was so good and a good pump up for everyone to realize that Miracles are happening! Sister Rupp and I also go to share something, with all the missionaries - who were actually all elders! We are the only sisters! It was so weird not having any other sisters here, ja vel! There will be 6 when we have Zone Conference in Trondheim next week! In the evening, we did not know what to do. To go home and call people in our phones, or to go out contacting. So I said a prayer that if we needed to find somenoe, they would be right outside the church on our way home but if not, we would go home and call. Because we could NOT make a decision! So we went outside, did a round about way home, and saw a man coming down the hill. We talked to him and we brought him intlo the church and taught him a short lesson! THE LORD ANSWERS PRAYERS!!! He is now a new investigator :)
I also think on wednesday...well I cant remember which day, but we were contacting and people were just not happy. I was amazed with how grouchy people could be! They were not nice. But we prayed a lot. MANY MANY TIMES! And in one of the last prayers we said, we told Heavenly Father that we knew that we were going to find a miracle. Someone that would listen to the gospel. And the last or second to last person we talked to in that contacting period, was at a busstop. We decided to talk to her. She is from Romania and had a sweet little daughter with her. We got an appointment, her number and address and we knew that she was our miracle. It is worth it to talk to a billion rude grouchy people, and then to find one, MIRACLE! It really was a miracle!
On Thursday we had weekly planning and then taught Pedros again at the church! But this time we had a man that recently got baptized in Skien, who is from Eritrea (where Pedros is from) on skype! the sisters were there too and Pedros and Senai were able to talk! (pedros cant speak great english and not really any norwegian. Anyways, it was nice to be able to get real understanding. haha from what Senai said, Pedros wants to be baptized, but first wants to keep learning! Language class was that night again and went well like always :)
Friday we met with Livia! (the romanian girl at the busstop) We went to her house and taught her, one of us teaching and the other keeping her daughter distracted :) We love her and are going to meet again with her this week!!! We met with a man named Million later in the day. The first thing he did was show us his baptismal certificate and other certificates that he has gotten in church related things. Then he wanted to know a lot, but never really let us talk enough to answer! haha we will meet with him again this week :) We think it will go better next time. Then we taught Tidros! (the miracle that we found walking home). We taught almost the entire first lesson in Norwegian, and then he told us - I think that I will just read it and get back to you because I cant understand you that well. So we taught him (the lesson again) in english and it went better :)
Saturday we taught a man named Simon from Kenya. Elder Crabtree knows history so well and so we took him on this teach to help. The rest of our plans fell through so we went banking!
Then it was sunday :) We had our first Relief Society in this branch! 4 americans, 2 norwegians, and a chilean that lives in Svalbard on skype :) It was SO nice to have R.S. though :) Then in Sacrament Meeting, I played the piano and spoke! I know there were less than 30 people there, but I could see my heart pounding through my skirt, Yes my SKIRT! I was nervous. haha Rose and Janne came to church and that man that we talked to on Saturday when we were contacting came!!! He left during my talk though...oh well :) My talk was about Standing up for what we believe in and it went well! Sister Rupp and I are doing a musical number next week, and ill make sure to record it before hand so that i can try to send do you all on dropbox. By the way, did you look at that video that i posted on it a couple of weeks ago?
Anyways, there was SO much mingling afterwards! That is when I just felt the LOVE for these people here. I love Tromsø! Rose, or referral from a referral, hit it right off with a member! It was SO GREAT! We then met with her and Sister Crabtree helped :) You will never believe it...SHE LISTED TO THE ENTIRE BOOK OF MORMON IN FRENCH ON YOUTUBE IN THE PAST WEEK!!!!!!!!! INSANE huh!? She is amazing and I am sure she is going to be baptized soon! Her question was, "Where are the three Nephites?" haha! She is great! :)
Then last night we went contacting. We were going to go knocking but didnt feel good about it. We got DRENCHED.
After we said some prayers we decided, after not deciding to do this once or twice, to go an talk with a boy in the military that stood next to the mall to stay out of the rain. It was direct revelation from Heavnely Father to talk to him. He doestn live here, but we gave him a Book Of Mormon and our contact info. I realy hope he ctontacts us. The things that were said were exactly what he needed. He was going to try to say things like, knowing God is there wouldnt really help him, but as he thought he askwered truthfully. AHHH I just love him! One day he will accept the gospel. He said if he lived here he would have "tried the experiment of reading, praying, meeting with us, church, etc. But I know that he will accept the gospel at some point.
And later that night we got 2 appointments! The Lord really blessed us. We also talked to Joseph that we saw walking! The Lords timing really is perfect.
All in all this was a great week! It is snowing golfballs outside now, Im living the life!!!
LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!
Have a great week!!! :)
LOVE, Søster Chapman :)
p.s. one extra story. I think on friday we were contacting, again in the rain. We didnt have an umbrella but we were fine :) We talked to a norwegian man for a while about the gospel and then he said, "I have another question. Are you two doing ok? Do you have money? I have tlaked to missionaries before that are away from home and its hard on them...etc. etc." haha YES WE HAVE MONEY WE JUST DONT HAVE AN UMBRELLA! ;) This was the same man that came to church!
LOVE YOU!
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