Tivoli Gardens decorated for Easter
"Spring" flowers
A pantomime story performed by a ballet dance troupe
Side view of Slot
Front view of Bjernede RundKirke
Mom in the cemetary of Rundkirke
Kære Familie Tuesday,
April 3, 2018
It is Tuesday already. Have you missed our letters? We just haven’t had time to sit down at the
laptops for any length of time. This
past weekend was one of those really busy ones, that we look forward to, but
was exhausting. Our Monday was more of
the same – rush, rush around - but you
will have to wait a week to learn more about that. Conference was great over here. It stands out in my memory as one of the best
ever and not just because of the momentous changes and solemn assembly, though
that was all a marvelous, spiritual experience.
I felt the tinglings of the Spirit as I stood with the High Priests to
sustain the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve. I am sure you had
similar feelings. I would describe part
of my feelings, as just a great sense of gratitude that we have a prophet and
apostles to follow. Like Clayton, I am
blessed with the spiritual gift of accepting and wanting to follow them to the best
of my ability. I am grateful for the
ease with which I think I do that. BUT
the thing that made this conference really stand out for me, was the suggestion
from zone conference, that we make a list of questions ahead of time that we
need answers to. I did that and hungrily
looked for answers throughout the conference.
I was amazed at the impressions that came to me, often from a speaker
who was not addressing my particular question, but a partial answer came to me
nonetheless. I guess I felt more
personal revelation than I usually do and that was a special experience. That was of course capped by the revelatory
changes that marked this conference as a time of accelerating preparation. I am excited to go back and study the
conference talks in more detail.
Our setting for watching conference was
the same for both days. We meet at the
YSA Center for the morning sessions at 6:00 pm, followed by dinner and then for
the afternoon sessions from 10:00 to midnight.
Mom prepared the dinners for both days. We brought the couch up front
and made the Center as hygglig as possible without lighting candles or
anything. It wasn’t quite as nice as
being in a home but it was definitely more functional for mixing a meal with
watching the TV. We had a small turnout
for Saturday. Only 8 YSA came for the first session and dinner and then 10 for
the last session. Sunday was a bit better with 16 for the first session and
dinner, then we lost a few and had 10 again for the late, last session. There
were some different faces both days. Since it was Easter weekend and school was
out all week for the Spring Break, many of the YSA’s went home to be with
families. The ones that joined with us
were mostly those who don’t have families close by. We were happy to provide a good atmosphere
for them to enjoy the conference sessions together. It is more fun than being lost in the stake
center. We missed the missionary dinner
that is traditional on Sunday at 4:30 between the Saturday pm session shown at
2-4:00 and the Sunday am session shown live at 6:00 pm, but it was ok. Mom told
them in advance that we would not be there and she did not have a food
assignment like she did last time, even though we did not eat with them. The priesthood session is shown here on Sunday
at 11:00 am. We did not view that as a
YSA group and I elected to stay home and watch it in our apartment Sunday
morning. In hindsight, I should have made the effort to go to the stake center
with the rest of the brethren. Because
we did not watch the Priesthood session live, we missed some of the buzz. We woke up Sunday and were just checking some
of the headlines on lds.org and saw a recap of the major changes. That made tuning in to watch it more of an
exciting event however as we wanted the details.
A week ago, Monday, we wrapped up teaching the My
Plan Class. Only Miranda Bradshaw (American volley baller) came and that was a
huge disappointment. We started teaching her and then her friend Robert Lohman from
Sweden came late, which was a bit better.
This was our last lesson as we had decided we have pushed as much as we
can to get everyone out. I had begged for a good turnout to wrap it up, but with
Spring Break, many of the YSA's had made other plans since they were out of
school all week. It felt like a good
lesson even with just the two of them and hopefully they enjoyed the discussion
and found it helpful to them. The focus
was on service as part of our life-long opportunity and duty. Our goals need to
include an element of service; indeed, we can pray daily for opportunities to be
of service to someone – it may be within our family that our service is most
needed.
On Tuesday, we
went to the Family History library about 11:00 until 1:30. Sister Krogstrup
worked with me and we found 7 - 9 ancestors who need temple ordinances performed. That was my main purpose in going to the
library but I also wanted to improve my skill at using Family Search by myself.
She went so fast with the mouse that I may not have accomplished much of the
2nd goal. Each time gets better though.
She resolved a few duplicate records in the process and that will also take
some practice to be able to do that as easily as she did it. She encouraged me to use the onscreen helps,
view the videos and take advantage of the Wiki Research, that is especially
good for the UK, in order to get better.
In other words, I think she was saying that I need to get ‘self-reliant’
with my family history research and it isn’t that hard with some effort. Message received! I am surprised, that every
time I use Family Search (especially with some expert help), I am able to find
some temple work to do, despite my family lines being “all done” as I heard for
years growing up. To be fair, the names I am finding are all out in the cousin
lines. Mom worked for about an hour with
another sister on her Polish genealogy before she went upstairs to practice the
piano. There is supposed to be a worker in
the library who is good at Polish research, but I don’t think she has found her
yet. Mom was kind of frustrated after
her session and did not find out anything new.
Mom has
mentioned our dinner with the senior missionaries. We enjoy these breaks from
the routine. It turned out that the
Wheelers occupied most of the discussion as they talked to us about South
Africa and Moscow, their 2 previous missions.
It was evident that they loved their missions and each has been a very
different experience. They were good
salesmen for a mission to Africa and for the experiences that come from every
opportunity to serve. I asked them if
they would repeat a mission and go back to the same place and they feel that
the personal enjoyment for them is different cultures, new people, new sights,
and perhaps a different type of mission. We are definitely planning on another
mission if our health holds – a reason to keep up the daily exercise. The
temple president here has “invited us back” in the summer of 2019. We’re not
sure if that is the right thing for us. Mom has expressed a desire to use our French
language. I am leaning towards anyplace
that speaks English or a form of it! The
timing will work itself out as will the location and language. We need to have
the faith that the Lord will take our talents to where we can be of the most
use.
Here are just a
few thoughts from zone conference that have stuck with me.
· We cannot stand between a person and the blessings they will receive
from obedience to commandments. President taught us that this appears most
often in relation to the Word of Wisdom, but applies to many commandments (such
as chastity). Missionaries get shy and
wishy washy in their invitations to live a commandment and in the commitment to
obedience. What they are doing is
standing in the way. They need to be
bold and promise blessings.
· Being bold comes from having confidence in our message, communicating
the ability to obey and promising blessings they will receive.
·
We have the entire plan of salvation and a
pathway to eternal life that will work for us.
Other churches only have pieces and thus it is easy for them to be led
astray because they can't fill in the gaps or understand how wonderful God's
plan is for us. They “see through a glass darkly” (1
Cor 13:12) and it is
like a jigsaw puzzle without a picture to follow and with many pieces
missing.
· Agency would be a curse without the atonement of Christ. We would be lost because in exercising
agency, we are all sinners and thus would not be able to return to our Heavenly
Father.
Finally, as we
all seem to be teaching a lot and are trying to teach as the savior taught, here
are some insights:
What made Jesus Christ an incredible teacher?
He addressed current issues
He loved whom he taught
He used parables and analogies
He had empathy and compassion
He understood those he taught
He asked great questions
He taught truth plainly and clearly
He invited his listeners to act and be changed
He promised blessings
At the temple, I
did Initiatories from 4:00 to 5:35. It
is a long time to be on your feet and constantly talking. I get very weary each time we do that, to the
point of being tongue-tied and making some mistakes. We rotated booths only 3 times and did not
have any breaks. Mom tells me the sisters do it much smarter. The sisters
rotate every 5 names and if they are all temple workers, which is most often
the case with the men, they rotate the patrons into the rotation as well, so
the workers get a rest every few changes.
That would help the session be much more enjoyable in my opinion which
would lead to more spiritual experience. Why can't the men do something
similar? Would I be steadying the ark if
I suggested this to the temple presidency?
The mission
baptisms for the year are stuck on 7.
With a goal of 75, we should have 18+ by the end of March. For some reason, they have really slowed down
this year. Maybe the cold weather has
something to do with it? This is
supposed to be the coldest winter in 30 years.
We feel so blessed to be part of it!
Really, it has not been that bad but we are definitely ready for
Spring. Yesterday was quite a lovely day
to be outside with sunshine and blue skies – not that warm but the sun made it
seem warm unless you were in the shade. Today we woke up to more snow! We are being mercilessly teased!!
Dad
Kære familie, (Began)
1 April 2018 (Finished) 3 April 2018
Happy Easter! Easter
is a big holiday in Denmark, but like the rest of the world, the true meaning
of Easter is lost on most of the people.
There are church services in the churches and probably Danes attend at
least the Sunday services, but it would be interesting to know about the rest
of the services. Thursday is Skærtorsdag
or the day of the Last Supper; Friday is Good Friday; Sunday is the first day
of Easter; and Monday is the second day of Easter. Most (95%) stores (including grocery stores) are
closed those days and I had to do my shopping for food this weekend on Saturday
(or earlier in the week). Even the
Mission Office is closed on Monday. The
children are out of school the whole week.
We have noticed very light traffic all week, but Tivoli is open for 10
days to celebrate Easter so there are mobs of people there. The weather has not cooperated, and we
continue to have freezing temperatures and snow some days.
Another Easter tradition is writing gækkebreve or secret
snowdrop letters. The letters are papers
with patterns cut into them (kind of like cutting a snowflake) and have small
poems or riddles written on them. You
give the letters anonymously to loved-ones a few days before Easter. In place of the sender's name, you're
supposed to place dots (or other drawing) - one for each letter in the name.
The recipient has to guess who the sender is. And if they can't, they owe him or her an
Easter Egg and vice versa. A typical riddle is: Mit navn det står med prikker, pas på det
ikke stikker. (My name it says in
dots, beware it does not stick.) We did
these for FHE this week and I had the hardest time making a rhyme in
Danish. Dad made two gækkebreve with
English rhymes which is what I should have done—much easier. The Danes also color eggs. Often, they blow out the yolk and color the
shells, but they also use hard-boiled eggs.
I enjoyed conference so much. I love the talks focused on Christ’s death and
resurrection and on the love He has for us.
My thoughts of late have been on the Plan of Salvation and how blessed
we are to have this great plan. It has
been a comfort for me in the past few weeks.
I appreciated Elder de Feo’s talk about this. I really liked Elder Durrant’s talk about the
family—he taught some important principles—good reminders. I liked the talks about forgiveness, and I
especially liked Sister Oscarson’s talk and Elder Holmes’ talk about the
youth. I felt they were telling us that
the youth can do more and as adults we should include them in all aspects of
church service. So, when President
Nelson announced the changes to ‘Ministering’ which will now include YW as
companions, I felt like Sister Oscarson’s remarks were a prelude to this
announcement. I had a conversation with
some of our YSA girls who thought that Sister Oscarson’s remarks were just what
we needed to hear—they have been wanting the YW to receive the same ‘status’ as
the YM. I was excited to hear more
temples announced and enjoyed the spirit of the whole conference. It was up-beat, moving the work forward,
accomplishing the Will of the Lord, and seeing His Hand in all that is
happening. It is hard not to feel
President Nelson’s enthusiasm and energy for the work. It is marvelous and gives me a kick-start to
doing more as we usher in these last days.
We need to follow our prophet’s example and quicken our step and be
excited about the blessings and opportunities we have in these last days. We live in a great time and I felt that the
conference was reminding us to be optimistic and “press on in the work of the
Lord.”[1] Surely President Nelson has been preserved
for ‘such a time as this,’ and is exactly what we need today. The Solemn Assembly was a very special
experience as well. Even in our YSA
center with only 10 people present, it was a privilege to stand and raise our
hands in a sustaining vote for the prophet and for the first presidency and the
Quorum of the Twelve. I think everyone
there felt the spirit and recognized their sacred duty to publicly sustain the
prophet. For me, it is another
indication of God’s love for His children that He allows us to participate in this
process.
We attended our last Zone Conference on Thursday—I can’t say
I will be sorry to not be preparing any more meals for Zone Conference. We had Café Rio salad bowls and I made the
pico de gallo. It was a huge hit with
the missionaries, so I can’t really fault them for wanting to do such a
meal. It is a tradition during Zone
Conference that the training companions introduce the new missionaries (who
arrived a week ago). Then those new
missionaries bear their testimonies in Danish.
Following that, the departing missionaries bear their testimonies. Somehow it had not occurred to us that we
would be among those departing missionaries—but we leave just one day before
the next Zone Conference. Luckily, we
could bear our testimonies in English.
There is only one elder going home next month; the Jenson’s are leaving
in two weeks; and we have about 5 weeks left.
It was a difficult testimony to bear and I was impressed to talk about
the Plan of Salvation—because of my mother’s death. I don’t know how many of the missionaries
know about my mother—I didn’t specifically say, but I could share that the Plan
of Salvation has brought me peace and understanding. I said it is a Plan of Love—truly a
manifestation of God’s love for His children.
I did not realize then that the whole conference training would be on
teaching the Plan of Salvation.
The training was specifically about how the missionaries can
more effectively share the doctrine of the Plan of Salvation. President O’Bryant would ask a question like
‘What do we know about pre-earth life?’ and when the missionaries responded, he
said, “Show me where that is explained in the scriptures.” It was a good exercise on scriptural
understanding—backing up the principles we teach with scriptures. President said that we would be engaging in
scripture chase—and so we were. All the
missionaries were challenged to memorize a scripture from the New Testament
each week and share in District Meeting how that scripture supports a principle
they teach with investigators. They can
cross-reference the scripture with other scriptures in the Book of Mormon. The AP’s followed up with the importance of
saying nothing but ‘faith, repentance, and baptism.’ This should be the topic of every lesson,
regardless of what else is being taught.
To help the missionaries see how this can be done, President O’Bryant
would throw out a topic, and then choose a missionary to give an impromptu
1-2-minute message about the topic, relating it to faith, repentance and
baptism. His topics were anything from
tithing, the apostasy, to the restoration of the Ten Tribes. I was impressed with our missionaries who
could think on their feet and do this so well.
At our last Stake YSA meeting, we discussed getting together
to watch General Conference. The
leadership thought it would be a good idea to go to someone’s house to watch it
together and have a meal. We have done
this for the Sunday session at the October 2016 and April 2017
conferences. One of the ward YSA
parents hosted the dinner and conference in their home. It is very nice. But when they were released from their
calling, we were asked to host Saturday (Oct. 2017) and we watched the Sunday
session in the YSA Center. We offered
our apartment again, but they wanted to ask a young couple in the stake. Well, the one couple couldn’t do it, and it
seems they made no effort to ask anyone else.
So, we were at the center as a default.
I didn’t think we would have a good turn-out because of Easter—many of
our YSA’s went home for the week (because they had the week off) and enjoyed
Easter with their family. But there were
others who either didn’t go home or didn’t have family here—like our American
friends, or YSA whose families are far away.
I felt it served a purpose for those who would rather gather with other
members than sit at home and watch it alone.
I spent a lot of Saturday shopping and preparing meals. We had quiche on Saturday night (eggs were
very cheap this week), and frikadeller on Sunday. Two of the YSA came to help with the
preparations on Saturday, but I did most of the preparation for Sunday’s meal
at home.[2] We didn’t have a huge crowd, but I am glad we
could serve those who did come. We
watched all sessions (except Priesthood meeting, which Dad and I watch Sunday
morning) in the center. Because Monday
was the 2nd Easter Day and still a holiday, the YSA elected to stay
up on Sunday night[3] as
well to catch the last session between 10 and midnight. It made for two very late nights for us.
The Halls came in two days early for Zone Conference. We love their visits, but it definitely
changes our schedule--we spend a lot of time just visiting. On Wednesday night the senior couples decided
to go to Tivoli for Easter and then out to eat.
It was FREEZING and not very pleasant to be outside, but we enjoyed the
beautiful decorations and flowers despite the cold. There should have been more flowers, but I
think all the bulbs the gardeners had planted didn’t want to poke their heads
through the snow on the ground. Still,
there were gardens with tulips blooming and hyacinths and pansies and daffodils
on the rooftops of the food-stands.
There were two mama sheep with 4 young sheep, ducks, chickens, and a
peacock. There were even performances on
the stage—two different pantomime stories performed by a ballet dance
troupe. But it was very cold, and I
wondered why there were so many crazy people like us wandering around the
park. People were even riding the
various rides. We finally called it
quits and enjoyed a nice dinner in a warm place. I enjoy being with the other senior missionary
couples and I am beginning to regret that the Wheelers came to Denmark so close
to the end of our mission—I think we would have been great friends. They are super excited about the temple in
Russia, where they served before Denmark.
Hope all the birthday people (Haley, Carter and Matt) had
wonderful birthdays, and that everyone had a fun Easter. We love the kibitzing that goes on in the
letters and we love the pictures you post.
Did I tell you how much they are our life-line to ‘home?’ Maybe a few times already—but they really are! We love you all so much and pray for your
safety, your happiness, and that you will receive all the many blessings the
Lord has for you. We truly are blessed
as a family and individually. Have a
great week.
Med kærlighed,
Mom
[1]
Jared, all those trips in the car to and from piano lessons when we sang “Let
Us All Press On” were not wasted. It is
to be our marching song, our battle song.
[2]
The preparation was with singleness of heart, but it was still time-consuming. Luckily, I could listen to the Ensign while I
worked.
[3] In
the past, we have not watched this session until Monday night for FHE because
the YSA have school the next day. It was
a momentous session, so I am glad we stayed up to watch it.
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