Week 8 - Daylight Savings

 (Elder Denton entered the MTC and began his mission August 30th. Exactly 2 months ago today)

I got to sleep an extra hour this week! BLESSING. Also, the sun was sorta up when I woke up! Except now it goes down at 3:30 in the afternoon... Haha, you win some and you lose some I guess! Our mission president is making sure we are all taking enough Vitamin D to survive the approaching winter.

      This week is Zone Conference! I'll get to see Äldste Bringhurst! Unfortunately, we can't do splits this transfer, but we still get to see each other this Friday. I also get the super cool opportunity to play a musical number for Zone Conference. That is pretty awesome! I'm excited! Zone Conference is like four hours north by train in Umeå. It should be EVEN COLDER up there! I'll be buying a nice big coat and some boots pretty soon here to survive.

      Got to work on the good ol' farm this week. That was super fun. The district president for the Norrland District lives in Sundsvall and it was his farm we were working on. Super muddy. Super awesome. Got some pictures for you.

      We taught two new investigators this week! One of them is actually a Swede, and says he is atheist. He has two kids and a girlfriend. They are a super nice family. We talked to him about what faith is and invited him to check out the Book of Mormon we gave him and Thomas S. Monson in general conference. He said he was interested in that and said we could meet again so yay! One thing I've realized this week is that you can't learn more about God and faith by just examining other people that have faith in God. It's like trying to decide how a food you've never had tastes by just looking at it. You have to taste the fruits of the gospel yourself to really understand them. The way you taste the fruits of the gospel is not just by learning about it. You have to practice it. You have to have faith to turn to God to learn about God. You have to repent- change your life so that you can see His light in your life. Discussion and convincing words can only do so much, and it really isn't so much at all. That's missionaries aren't called to convince, but to invite. We want everyone to taste the fruit we have tasted so they can know for themselves that is a good fruit. 

Love you all,

Äldste Denton

Week 7 - Miracles already?

Carter's letter to me was so full of information about how and what he is doing, I thought that I would include it here. Still sounds like he is having a ball!!

Hey Mom!

     I'm settling in really well here. My companion is really awesome and my heart is set on the work. Sundsvall has an amazing Branch. I didn't have tons of time to email about the things you mentioned but I have more time this week so here you go: My mission president is amazing and his wife also. We stayed at their house and he interviewed all of us. He is tall, skinny, and takes missionary work seriously, but is also very practical and reasonable with us. He loves all of us for sure. I'm having interviews with him this Wednesday and the interview will actually be in Swedish so that should be interesting. 

      Elder Cook fits his name and likes to cook. We get along great cooking fancy stuff like fancy pantsy sandwiches, chicken fajitas, curry, meatballs and gravy... You name it. I sure won't go hungry as long as we're companions. 

Love,

Äldste Denton

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The general email from Äldste Denton today


Week 7 - Miracles already?

Hello everybody!

      

      Highlight for this week? We had a baptism! Her name is Nilza and she is from Brazil. My companion has been teaching her for a while so he did the honor of baptizing her. She is so wonderful. The first lesson I had with her was a little crazy since it was like the third day I was here. She speaks Portuguese and that was the language her Book of Mormon was in, we had a member translating what we said from Swedish to Spanish for her which she can also understand, and I was basically just smiling nodding the whole time and I couldn't tell you anything that was going on, but it was cool ha ha! That was miracle number one. Her baptism was so powerful. I got to play a musical number too and that was super awesome. 

      Miracle number two: we got back to our apartment last night ready to finish up our studies when we got a call from a number we didn't recognize. Elder Cook answered it and turns out is was a wrong number. But he did what missionaries do and asked if she believed in Jesus and told her about what we do. Turns out she DID believe in Jesus which is not so common over here, and she wanted to to know a lot of things. Like he said we represent Jesus Christ and she ask what gave us that authority. Elder Cook was like "Well let me tell you all about it!" ha ha. We told her about Thomas S. Monson and she said she'd give us a call when she was in Sundsvall and we could meet. Then the conversation ended. We went to look at her number in the call history and IT WASN'T THERE... our phone does weird things sometimes... but then all we could do was actually just hope she called us. So then we start our companion study and I offer a prayer. This was the coolest part. Have you seen The Best Two Years? If so, this might sound familiar. I prayed for her and that she remember to call us and that she would have the desire to call us. I get done praying and the phone rings. We answer it and and IT'S HER! So I wrote down her number so fast while Elder Cook talks to her. Turns out she called back just to ask "Now wait, can who is this Thomas guy again?" Ha ha, Elder Cook talked with her for like fifteen more minutes and then we set up an appointment with her. STRAIGHT UP MIRACLE. All because of a wrong number. 

      Elder Ballard spoke to Europe last week in a broadcast and said that miracles start on your knees. I'm a witness to that. 

I love you all! Have a wonderful week!

      

 Äldste Denton

                             Pictures

                                                             This weeks baptism

                       

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                                                         Fancy Pantsy Sandwiches

Week 6 - SWEDEN

Preface:  Before I could even recieve Carter's email this week, I received a message from his new companion's (Äldste Cook) Mother. She reached out to me and sent me some quotes from Äldste Cooks email to her this morning in regards to Äldste Denton and training him for a week. Kind words from his senior companion. Glad to hear Carter is doing well, and working hard.

 "The new guy is doing great! His name is Elder Denton from Pocatello, Idaho. He is a stud. His Swedish is crazy better than mine was coming out of the MTC and he is a lot less shy than I was too. He is super good at jumping in and being a part of the conversation or discussion. He knows his stuff about the doctrine too. He has made training pretty easy on me. He's a funny guy. Good at music. Also really into Mtn. Biking. We have a ton of fun together. " 

 "They gave me Elder Denton. He's a heck of a guy. He is very outgoing and pushes himself to do and learn more every day. It has been easy training him this first week. He is not afraid to jump into the conversation when there is a pause and he doesn't hesitate to bear his testimony. He knows A LOT about the doctrine of the missionary lesson. Probably more than me. He'll be leading everything around here pretty soon."

Here is Äldste Denton's email this week.....   SWEDEN - Week 6

Helllllooooo everybody!

     SWEDEN. IS. BEAUTIFUL. I had pretty high expectations... I really did... and they were smashed to pieces by how much it delivered. On a scale from one to ten, I had to get a new scale because mine broke. I would live here in a heart beat. 

     I was assigned to labor for this next bit of time for... drum roll.............. Sundsvall! Which, don't worry, I also had know idea what that was or where it was or even how to say it when I read my paper thing (It's pronounced Soonds-voll) but It's about four-ish hours north of Stockholm by train... I'll send a picture with a map. We are in the Norr Land Zone, and guess who is a zone leader there... Äldste Nick Bringhurst! I'll get to go on splits with him this transfer! Ahhh! I have talked to him already when he called us to say hi for new transfers and we were super excited to find out that we were in the same zone. 

     I'm going to attempt to sum up my first impressions of Sweden, Swedes, and all things Swedish I have seen so far. Have you ever seen Lord of the Rings? You know the hobbits that live in Middle Earth? They're something like that. Ha ha, only in a few ways, for instance, they have what's called fika which is like a very serious thing actually. It's just a snack, but it's so much more. They have it all the time and it's serious. I've had three in one day already. Also, they're really clever, especially with like household things. Their showers, their soap dispensers, their everything... They really focus on details here. Everything is just the right size and no bigger. Everything works just the way it's supposed and they think of really cool ways to solve every day problems. Also, their ideals here are different. It's more about balance, precision, and functionality here than bigger and stronger like I think is of pretty high value in America. They're a very practical people from what I can see. 

    I have been learning a lot about faith. God can do so many things and I'm learning to trust Him and His power. Isaiah 41:10. That's been my scripture this week. Check it out. It's a good one. I'm really short on time, but I will tell more stories next week. For now, I love you all and appreciate your support. The language is coming great and my companions name is Elder Cook. He's awesome. I can honestly say I've never been happier. I love life. I'm learning every day and serving the Lord. 

Until next week!

Love,

Äldste Denton

   

   

    Seving in Sundsvall with Äldste Cook

 

                                          

 

                                                   

                                                                      

     

      P- Day

       

               

                 

                   

            

             

               

               

                   

                

                                                    

                                                   

Week 5 - Bye Felicia

Hej!

     This is my last week writing from the MTC​​! It's been a party! Something I've learned from my companion here is that life really is what you make of it. It's all about the perspective you choose to have. People all the time would tell me different things about the MTC. That I'd like certain things or hate certain things... Something my companion and I discussed is that if we told ourselves our time here would suck, it would be or if we told ourselves it would be great, it would be great instead. He's so passionate about what he calls "positive I am's". The idea is that if you stand in the mirror every day and tell yourself you are the things you want to become like, "I am humble. I am confident. I am a hard worker..." anything like that, eventually you'll start acting like it and they will come true. "You bring about what you think about," he's always telling me. Our whole district has made the goal of doing our I am's every day and it really does work! We'd write them out and then just say them every day. Now any time I start to think to myself how tired I am or how much I miss something from, my mind is in the habit of saying things like "I am wide awake. I am so pumped to be in class..." and so on. It has really done wonders for me. Moral of the story is, my companion is a stud. I'm going to miss him after we head to Sweden, but we'll keep it lit. 

     At the beginning of my time here, I was worried. Worried I wouldn't develop the relationships I wanted with my companion and my district, or that I would be too homesick to work hard and lots of things. Something I've learned here and especially from President Uchtdorf this conference is that you don't have to be anything more than you are right now to serve God. All it takes is willingness. You don't have to be smarter, more charismatic, or anything like that. The less I have worried, the more useful of an instrument I have become in the Lord's hands. I came up with a little formula for success I'm going to follow on mission. It goes like this: Love in your heart and faith in your step. 

     Some sad news this week: our sisters as of yet don't have there visas and have been reassigned to Orem, UT and Carlsbad, CA until they get their visas. When your heart is so set on somewhere, it's hard to push it off even longer, but they're taking it really well. Also one of my favorite missionaries in our district had to go home this morning for a month or two before he can come back out. We all went to see him off this morning and we're hoping to see him back as soon as possible.   

     Our devo this Tuesday was by Bonnie L. Oscarson and her husband who apparently served as mission president in Sweden when they were very young. Like seriously, she was twenty-five. There were probably some missionaries older than her in her mission... Anyways, she had all the Swedish missionaries raise their hands and told us stories about Sweden and then gave a message that was so needed with all the sad news that day about visas and stuff. She shared the story Hugh B. Brown gave of the current bush. Elder Christopherson gave a general conference talk about it and there's a cool video about it on lds.org, so go look it up if you're curious. But it basically talks about trusting that God knows us and letting Him lead the way. 

     I get to go pack now so that's all for this week! I'll tell you about Sweden next week! 

     Again, thank you for all letters and pictures sent my way! 

Love you all!

Äldste Denton

                          The Finns and Danes left on Monday. That's them with some of us Swedes. 

​                                 This is us seeing Elder Slaughter off. He's the one on my right.

 Some of our branch after some especially lit volleyball. 

The Elders in our district with o.g. lighting. 

​ New haircut. Kinda looks the same :)

Sunset from the good ol' MTC. "BeaUTAHful" as Elder Dumas says. 

                                                                Elder Holmstead!