Update on P's Family from Elder Henderson

P's mother, A, is getting baptized this Saturday by her son, P. It has been an incredible week. The teaches have been incredible. There in her home, the heavens opened and you could feel the veil extremely thin. She gave the closing the prayer and the Spirit was incredible. We then taught her again and P gave the opening prayer and this time we had her friend over too that she invited to church and to this meeting. We committed her to be baptized and she accepted; she is doing so well. There is no greater joy than to see someone feel and see for themselves that this is true. I testify that it is, I love this work, I love the Finnish people. Thank you for your faith and prayers and I ask you to continue, it changes lives.

Huippus ja Laakso -- "Peaks and Valley"

March 22, 2010:
Here is a little bit about what is going on in Seinäjoki. My new comp is Elder May.

So now we have a progressing investigator by the name of T. She is really interested in the plan of salvation and has met a couple times with me and Elder Bradshaw. She even went to the library to find more information about our church! First time that has ever happened. Anyway, she was out of town this whole week, but should be back as of today.
We have three other investigators as well: a guy who is really interested in following God’s will in his life and is quite open about religions. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to get in touch with him this week. The second is "V". We, unfortunately ,just decided to stop teaching him for a while…he doesn't want to do anything right now, and so we will just have to check up on him in a couple of months to see if he will change. The third is another young guy by the name of "I". He has been fairly open to hear the message of the restoration, but in our last teach he was a little ify about doing anything like being baptized. As a result, I just invited him to come to church and read the Book of Mormon some more. We plan on teaching him again in the coming week or so. Say “hi” to Steven for me!

March 29, 2010:
Elder May is a quiet person and he used to play the tuba in band in high school. We are still learning info about each other, but he is very nice. He was telling me to be careful on the ice when his bike slid out from under him....he was ok, but the hazards of missionary work can make us humble.


So this week was an interesting one. Every appointment scheduled fell through and we couldn’t get out to meet with our “less actives” in the neighboring city. Our best investigator, T, moved out of town which was hard for us since she was very interested in the gospel. So, it has been a slow week, but this next one looks to be very promising. We have a couple of teaches planned, splits with Elder Jones and his companion. They are coming from Pietarsaari. AND IT’S General Conference. We are going to Kokkola to watch it.

It sounds good that Jason is doing so well in Soffe's class. But the essays portion is where I got nailed. Tell him “good luck”. “Best wishes” to the Celeste and Arica with new jobs, moving and baby …..thanks for the pictures.
Love, Trev

Zone Conference + New Investigators

Hey sorry for the short email last week. There wasn't a whole lot of information to give you. lol.
I did send a small post card the other day with some news on it…and if you haven't read it yet, Don't freak out... . It was about a dog incident. And in the end, I didn't get hurt.
So this week, I did the usual “finding” activities... door to door and out on the street contacting.
Which reminds me….the weather is starting to warm up. It got up to like 2 Celsius (36 F) last week and the snow started to melt. This being said, Sunday morning we awoke to a new fresh blanket of snow a couple of inches deep.

This week has been going good so far. We taught this young guy, M, who seems pretty open to the gospel and is really concerned about involving God in his life. If he would just read and pray about the Book of Mormon, he would be golden. There is also this young woman around 30 who has a lot of questions about life and religion in general. We have a meeting with her this next week. We hope that she is as interested about the church as she was the first time we went over. Anyway, that's about it for investigators.
















Elders Higginson, Christensen, Kaaria, Marlor & Henderson

We had zone conference this week, which took up about three days with travel and all. It was really nice to be able to see how we can do missionary work better and change the mission into a baptizing one. I just want to tell you a little info about the mission for you to see what we have been doing as of late. Last year, we had almost no investigators. Maybe like an investigator every 2 months per companionship on average. This year we have had about 1 a week per companionship just in January. That was pretty cool to see how much better we have been doing as a mission. We also talked a lot about how we can involve members better in the wards.

So how is the family doing? I, unfortunately, didn't get a whole lot of information back this week either. lol. What has Jason been up to? Also how is Arica doing? Is she close to having her baby or is she still waiting? Thank you for your care and prayers.
Love, Trevor

New Email Address

Dear Family,
Hey, thanks for the pictures. I was able to download them with my new email address mailto:tnchristensen@myldsmail.net It's powered by Google, so it's like a normal one almost. I got the attachments great.

Nothing in particular is happening here, but we have about 3 investigators. One is a lady named R. She is younger, around 30 years old. She is still in the process of finding out if the Book of Mormon is true. Oh tidbit of info...I gave the Book of Mormon you sent me with your testimonies in them to P's mother. I think it helped quite a bit. Maybe she will write to you. Elder Henderson emailed this bit of news: This last Sunday was great, we had two investigators--one being P's mom; P received the Priesthood and his grandmother came too.

Well, I am out of time, but thanks again for the emails. Love you all and talk to you next week.
Tell Grandma Helen "Happy Birthday" from me.
Love, Trev

Senior Companion for a Few Hours

Dear Family,

I am sending a few things home today. So keep an eye out for a couple of packages. We don’t have transfers for a couple of weeks. I don’t think I will be changed again, so you can send stuff to me at the apartment address. We found two investigators this week. We hope they both turn into baptismal candidates. That is way cool about Josh Jones getting baptized! Is he like 16, Jason’s age right?

Elder Bradshaw and I have quite a bit in common. We are both a little more quiet and reserved, but we seem to be able to talk to people when tracting. lol Yes, we are safe and warm…at least for now. It has been above freezing here for the past couple of days!! Everything is starting to melt. I’m glad the missionaries in Chili are all accounted for now.

Elder Higginson and Trevor
This past week, I had some splits with our district leader, and so for part of the day, I was with a brand new greeny. It was pretty interesting because he didn't say a thing, and I was just sort of left on my own to understand people and teach them. It was really quite fun to see what I could understand and say. Sometimes, I’m still relying on my senior companion to help with the Finnish. So, it was kind of cool that I could be the lead for a little while. I felt bad for the new guy, of course.

Thank you again for the prayers, loving support and advice.

Love, Trevor