More Holiness Give Me (Monday, August 10)

Dearest Family,

As I sit and write my letter for this week, I am filled with gratitude for the fact that I have the gospel in my life. I know that it has blessed my life more than any other thing in the world could do. I am grateful for the examples I have in all of you of strong testimonies of our Heavenly Father and His Beloved Son Jesus Christ. Thank you for the letters, the thoughts and I'm sure the prayers that you all send up in my behalf.

As I sit here and write this letter, I am also a little saddened. One of the investigators we have been meeting with, and who has come to church 3 times already called us just a little while ago this morning and told us that he has decided he doesn't want to meet with us anymore, and doesn't want to become a member of the church. What has been so interesting to me, is that I don't feel bad for myself. I don't feel discouraged about the fact that we will have one more hour open every week. What I am so sad about is that he has chosen not to accept the most important thing in life...the fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As I said already, it has blessed me more than I can describe, and for him to choose not to want to know more, and accept it. I just hope that at some point, he meets again with missionaries, and is more ready to accept the gospel. There is timing in everything. I hope all of you have thought about in the last little while what a blessing it has been....for most of you...like me, to be born in the gospel. We didn't have to search for it, we were blessed to be born into the blessings of the gospel, and grow us with a knowledge of the Plan that God has for us, and everything else. It's worth thinking about...that we are so incredibly blessed.

Otherwise, on a much different note, my week has been wonderful. We were really busy this week. We have taught several Less-Active members, had Zone Conference, met with new investigators, gotten a Baptismal Date....which I'll talk a little more about in a minute...and we have just had a really great week in the work.

One of the highlights of this week was Zone Conference. On Thursday, we went to the Stake Center in Gubbängen, just a little ways outside of Stockholm to meet with not only the Stockholm Zone, but also Stockholm South and Norrland Zones. It was awesome! The entire day we focused on the First Vision, and Joseph Smith History. It was amazing. What is so awesome about the fact that we believe that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and His Son in the grove is that there lies the absolute necessary knowledge of the beginning of the Restoration of the Gospel. Before we went to conference, we wrote down some of the thoughts we had about Joseph and what is written in his history. One thing I noticed more when I studied it thoroughly is that Joseph was genuinely confused. He had really thought about which church was right, he wanted to know, so he talked to everybody of authority in different sects to ask them for the answer he genuinely wanted. He was absolutely lost when it came to knowing what church was right. More than that, he was willing to do anything it would take to find an answer. Even go through years of persecution after the vision, and being murdered because he had only told the truth about what he had seen, and followed the commandments of God to bring the Book of Mormon to the earth, and receive again the priesthood authority on the earth. I guess my point is, Joseph was a man of God. I know without a doubt that he did see God and Jesus Christ, and even though it may sound crazy as I testify of that to people on the streets here in Sweden, I know it's true. I have had it confirmed to me by the power of the Holy Ghost many times that Joseph was a prophet. The best part of telling people that is that I always can tell them that they can find out for themselves...they don't have to believe me. That is why this church is true. We don't have to convince people it's true...they can find out for themselves.

Another really awesome thing that happened this week was a young man named Walter, who Sister Swenson met at Odenplan...the place where we do our utställning (an exhibit like thing) who said he would meet with us. We taught him one lesson, and invited him to a baptism that was held on Friday night. At the baptism, he said, "I want to become a member of your church." AWESOME!! So then, as we talked a little more on Saturday, he decided that he wants to get baptized in 3 weeks. Yahoo!! The only tragic part of this story is that we found out that Walter doesn't live in our area, so the Zone Leaders in Gubbängen will be teaching him and getting him ready for baptism. None the less, he is awesome, and it goes to show that there are people ready to accept the gospel!

On another note, I am doing well. Sister Swenson is doing well. We are keeping busy, talking to a lot of people all the time. We are continuing to search for those people who have been prepared for us, and we love the work. My health is good. I am happy. It sounds like everything is going well at home, and I hope that those of you I don't hear from often are doing well, and happy as well!!

I hope that you all have a wonderful week. I look forward to hearing from everybody every week, and I know that the Lord will bless us all as we are obedient to the commandments, and try our best to become who we were sent here to become. I am so far from perfect...that I am always seeing ways I can be better. Keep trying in whatever ways you can to become more like the Savior. He is the perfect example for us.

Love,

Sister Suzanne Wood

P.S. Instead of one Swedish word this week, I'm going to write a little something på Svenska...Jag är helt övertygad att Gud älskar oss. Jag har ingen tvivel om att vi ska återvända till vår himmelske Fader nå'n dag. Jag vet att Jesus Kristus vill att ve följa honom och försöker att bli bättre. Jag vet att den här kyrkan är sann. :)