Thursday, November 27, 2014
Letter dated 22Nov2014
Dear family and friends!
We have preparation day today instead of Monday. So I hope this note finds you well surprised and generally well.
The week went really well. My birthday was really fun. I got the family letter as we came back home on Monday.
Said, who we met on the subway last week, is doing great. We had a really good lesson with him on Wednesday, he's excited for church and the Book of Mormon.
On Thursday we got a call from a great member, Sister Thylne, who said she wanted us to meet her Calina (this is a little funny, as we are also meeting with a man named Karim and a woman named Karina). The lesson was so good! She recently had an experience which has confirmed her belief in God, and she is excited to be baptized!
Yesterday we went to see Johan's baptism. There's a picture of me, Johan, Amrita (whom Äldste Bybee and I had taught in Eskilstuna), Äldste Jones and Äldste Orr, who are teaching them now. Amrita was baptized a month ago. It was so good to see them! It was also good to see other friends from Eskilstuna, and to speak about baptism.
On the way home, I saw our train had been delayed by 40 minutes. So we got some food and were eating on a bench, when I felt like I should look again at the time display. The display said the train was un-delayed and was leaving at the original time -- in less than a minute! So we ran to the train, and caught it. It started pulling away as we sat down. It fits John 14:26, where Jesus says "the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." It is cool that the Holy Ghost can teach us all things!
I love you all. I hope Brigitte had the baby!
Love,
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 17Nov2014
Dear family and friends:
The week went great! And today has been a really good birthday as well. Later, we will be going to Norma, Karina, and Gabriel who are giving us cake and a big dinner!
Speaking of Norma, Karina, and Gabriel, we met them this week! Karina just gave birth to Gabriel, and they live together with Karina's mom, Norma. Karina called us, said she hadn't been to church in a while, and wants to come back! They are super nice.
Sweet sak (Swedish for sweet thing) number 1: as we were walking to the subway in Stockholm Central, a Romanian lady who sits there and begs came up to me and asked for a Romanian Bible. We came back with a Romanian, and she wants very dearly to start coming to church, because she hasn't been able to do that in her time here. That evening she came to the ward talent show we put on, and even though she can't speak Swedish or English, she had a really wonderful time! Several members and we marked that she really has the light of Christ, and it's nice to be with her, because she is a wonderful lady. This was a sweet experience, and I am so excited to teach her!
Got to go, no time for the other sweet saks. But each day this week was great. The Lord provides our daily bread is a good summary of the week.
Love,
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 10Nov2014
Dearest family and friends!
This weeks pictures are of the state building across the ocean from Old Town (gamla stan). This is where the Nobel Prize used to be handed out each year, before Norway stole this privilege. But still, the Nobel Prize dinner is held here every year. Then there is a picture of us and Karim with brand new ABBA hats -- sick! Then, all the missionaries were at dinner with Sister Stenkrona and Karim. Great food! And there's a picture of some music of ancient date. We found this in our apartment under the refrigerator. Just kidding, it was in the city's cave of records.
Thursday was the first day of snow! We only got a few centimeters. That day we went to an island by the name of Djurholm, and helped a older couple hang up Christmas lights and plant onions. I suspect the onions will not survive the winter, but we will see whether or not our efforts were in vain. But the Christmas lights were fun, got us in to the Christmas spirit :D
Well, next week I turn 20! I cannot believe how old I am! I am definitely feeling this aging in my body, which lacks the pep it once had. Haha, just kidding... kind of :) I remember that when I was a tyke, it was so much more natural to live in the moment. I really miss this tendency, to make the best of each minute (because when you're a kid, a minute takes SO LONG!), which makes it easy to forgive, to be happy, and to be active. So my goal is to be childlike despite my advancing age. Interestingly, I have learned that the word "Muslim" means "childlike," so Islam is largely based off of having these childlike tendencies. (There are many Muslims who live in Sweden, and I have been impressed by how good these people are.) It's also something King Benjamin talks about, when he said that the Spirit of God helps one so that he "putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." That is my focus this week :)
I hope each of you has a terrific week! I love each of you.
Love,
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 3Nov2014
Dear family and friends:
This week was on the abnormal side of things, not even including the craziness of Halloween! It was really fun though :)
On Tuesday we had a great zone conference with all the missionaries from Stockholm and up! We learned good stuff from the Pres. and Sys. Beckstrand. Mostly centered on increasing our faith and raising the bar in missionary work. We each got some knitted mittens from the Beckstrands' friends, and they are way nice!
The night before the conference we had the Äldster from Skellefteå (the second northernmost city in Sweden) staying with us in our apartment. They had flown in on Monday night, and were waiting at the airport to go back up when we found they had left their keys in our apartment! That was quite problematic, as the closest missionaries with whom they could stay live 2 hours from them, and the airport was an hour away from us... But their plane did not come for a few hours, so it worked out! Tender mercy :)
On Thursday we had a surprise visit during open church by a friend, Anne. She is literally a little crazy, but really funny. We helped her with family history, and then watched a bible video with her. Unfortunately in the Bible video, Jesus mentioned a milstone to be hanged about one's neck. Anne reacted by dramatically putting her hands around my neck, which I thought was quite funny. Luckily she did not try to actually strangle me. I'll just be more careful next time we get to that point in the movie.
The White family was baptized in a neighboring ward on Saturday. It was so good to be there!! It was terrific to see their big step.
Halloween was terrific! Äldste Mott and I went all out on our costumes. I've included a picture.
There's also a picture of Alla Helgons Dagen (all saints day), where everyone lights candles at their deceased family members' grave sides. It is very beautiful. There's also a picture of our Thai friend Mark, who has fantastic hair.
I love you all! I'm very glad to hear that all the family is doing well. I know that Christ is side by side with us in this work. We have been meeting one of the nicest guys, Karim, who is working toward baptism. It is so good to be able to teach others about the gospel of happiness. It is so wonderful to be a missionary! Thank you for you support, prayers, and love.
Love,
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 27Oct2014
Dear family and friends:
I can't wait to tell you about this week!
It is very fun to be with Äldste Mott and in Stockholm. We live in Östermalm, the eastern part of Stockholm. It is a beautiful area, rich with history and architecture, and even the occasional odd-looking statue. We work as well in Old Town Stockholm, which is also very nice looking. I put in a picture of the large state building that in in Center Stockholm, between Östermalm and Old Town.
Äldste Mott's really great to work with. He has a lot of energy and enthusiasm. There's a picture on this of him and me. There's also one of Äldste Bybee trainee), Äldste Haddon (trainer), and me! Äldste Mott's a really hard working missionary as well as very fun to be with.
One of our friends here is Joy, who's from India. He's a professional chess player, and he taught me a little today. There's also a picture of that! In our first game, he beat me in about 30 seconds!! He's really good.
We met Ammar this week. We taught an exciting lesson to him, where, when we gave him the Book of Mormon, he was extremely excited and appreciative, and he said that he is going to read the whole book! He put it in a special cabinet, because he felt it was such a special book. Not such a typical response!
In other exciting news, I met Nabeel, who's friends with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Nabeel was a fellow body builder in days past, and hails from Egypt. Unfortunately, when we were scheduled to meet and exchange a picture of Nabeel and Arnold for a Book of Mormon, Nabeel didn't come. So He is not a confirmed friend.
We also found a woman named Harriet, who's a member, and her roommate Avor, who's not a member yet. Avor is really positive toward the church. We are really excited for her progress! They are both about 60 years old.
The Bible Videos on lds.org are so good! We were watching the one of Paul talking about unity of the faith with Mike, and it helped him accept baptism in the Church. It was a really special moment. All of the videos are so good, especially the one with Theresia in it :D
I really enjoyed reading Proverbs 3 this week. I would definitely suggest it!
Love,
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 20Oct2014
Käre Familj och Kompisar:
On Monday and Tuesday we mostly said good-bye to many good friends in Lund.
On Wednesday I took the speedy train up to Stockholm! It was very quick.
I am with Äldste Mott, who's from Vernal, Utah. He is one of my very favorite companions already. He's really down to earth and hard working. In Stockholm, because there are so many people on the streets, we get to talk to loads of people, and just the pace of missionary work is higher. It's really fun.
Also nice is that we have been praying more frequently and sincerely together and individually and in the companionship, a direction from President Beckstrand, and that has been making it much more fun and miracle ridden!
Through talking to loads of people on the streets and subway we met four new friends this week interested in learning more about the restored gospel! An interesting phenomena in Stockholm is that everyone is very busy, which makes talking to people on the street hard because 80% of the time the person will not talk with us. (Subways are an exception, because they are stuck with us there :P.) But I think a solution will be based off of what Benjamin Franklin said, that you should do everything you can to receive a favor, because if someone gives you a favor they automatically like you. So hopefully asking people for directions\Swedish help will improve these conversations.
We met a beggar on the street who didn't know English or Swedish. But he said "Jesus, Jesus." Luckily we had pictures of Jesus in our bags, and gave one to him. This made him remarkably glad, and he motioned that we should give his wife, down the street, one as well. It made her really happy too! It was so neat to make these two friends!
On Wednesday as I was eating dinner, I saw Äldste Mott put all the dishes in the cupboard under the sink. I thought it was an interesting technique to store the dirty dishes there so as to procrastinate the day of dishes. But to my joy I found out quickly that we have a small dishwasher there! It is so nice! Our apartment is pretty posh, which is fun.
On Friday, Amrita was baptized! She is a friend from Eskilstuna. I and Äldste Bybee knocked on her door, and even though she did not get a testimony very quickly, it was always nice teaching her when we could. Äldste Barnes and I also met her once in Lund when she visited with her boy friend. She is SO happy now! It makes me really glad to see this.
Yesterday I met a wonderful Stockholm ward. The Gueras are in this ward. It was so good to talk with Syster Guera, who lost her son a year ago when he was on a mission in Provo. She talked about how she knows they will be together again. Such a strengthening testimony, and it made my understanding of it grow so much because it was so dear and strong.
I love you!
Love
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 13Oct2014
Dear family and friends:
Next Wednesday I will be heading to Stockholm! However, it is very sad to leave Lund (where I've been for 6 months) and Elder Barnes (with whom I've been for 5 months). But I am nonetheless super excited to go to Stockholm! I will be in inner Stockholm, and our area will cover all of proper Stockholm. There are about 600,000 people who live there, so there will be LOTS of people and it will be very beautiful. I also know that there is already lots of peanut butter in our apartment there from the current missionaries. This makes me glad!
We were talking to our friend Joynul the other day, and happened upon the fact that he is studying Developmental Studies at LU, which makes him the fourth person we've met in that small class of 33, pretty weird, huh?! We have met each of the four by contacting them on the street. This is something that was really scary to me at the beginning of my mission, but now it is way fun and fruitful.
Kevin, who's also in that class, is progressing in the gospel so well! It was really neat to teach him the Plan of Salvation, because he knows the Bible SO well that he each element of the plan of salvation was something he already suspected (except for baptisms for the dead). It was so cool to confirm those wonderful parts of the Bible with the Book of Mormon! So great!
It was a very busy week! On Tuesday we had district meeting with the 12 missionaries in the area. Then I went on exchanges with Elder James. We took a long bus to the Kanolds and helped them more in their garden, and that night's when we taught Kevin.
The next morning I was back with Elder Barnes. We visited a member from Barcelona who has three young boys. Then we watched some general conference talks with Tomas, and talked about fasting. He fasted for the first time yesterday! Then we met Brother Klang and his friend and watched "Finding Faith in Christ" before the ward talent show. For that, Elder Barnes and I played "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief" on trombone. It was so fun to play trombone again!
On Thursday we met our new friend, Marie. She is really smart, and she has a question to every second thing we say. She has thought about religion a lot! Then we met Carl. We brought our trombones and got to jam with him. We then went to Patrik and Ole. We helped Patrik mop his apartment. It felt good to serve! Then we met another new friend, Matilda! She is way nice.
The rest of the week went about the same, just with different people.
I love being a missionary! I'm so glad to be able to give people the message of the restored gospel. Nothing better in the world!
Love you all!
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
Letter dated 6Oct2014
Dear Family and Friends:
The mission is so great! Hard, but great.
This week was no exception. On Wednesday I felt like Daniel in the lions' den. We went to a high school to give a presentation on faith. Turns out, they weren't too lion-like, rather were really nice and fun to talk to! We want to do it again, because it was very fun.
A definite highlight of the week was a baptism in the neighboring ward on Saturday. Martin was baptized. He is a 21-year-old Swede, and he has such a strong testimony of the gospel! He was studying to be a priest in the Swedish church, but didn't feel comfortable with that path. Then he found a Book of Mormon, read Joseph Smith's testimony in the front, and felt a clear spiritual prompting that it was true. His journey has been long, but he is so happy to have found where he feels God has led him. I was able to talk with him for his while and hear his testimony and experiences. It was so strengthening and uplifting to hear how his new-found testimony has blessed him! Kevin came to the baptism as well, and loved it! He wants to be baptized too! Both Martin and Kevin are like a just-add-water-ready-mix. Martin's already got the water added, and once Kevin gets baptized, he'll be a fantastic member!
Lots of other great things happened as well, but I'm short on time. Conference was terrific!
These pictures are of a hedgehog, Syster Carlsson, Äldste Downing, Äldste Barnes and me; all the Lund ward missionaries saying bye to the sisters a week ago; the marching band from last week (Tomas is the one behind the saxaphonist's sholuder), and the Brother Schanner and the deck we all built.
Have a great week!!!
Love,
--
Äldste Daniel Schindler
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