Week 60--Happy New Year

I want to thank people from my ward who sent gifts and cards to me for Christmas. It is always nice to hear from my home ward!

It is hard to believe that the year 2015 is almost to a close. It been a year of ups and downs, but for the most part, it has been a really good year. I haven't had anyone I have taught enter into the waters of baptism, but I have taught many. I have made great friendships along the way. I am sad to see this year that I fully dedicated to serving the Lord go completely into the past, but I am excited to see what 2016 will bring to me.

At this time of the year, most people look back at what they accomplished during the past year and make goals for the coming year. One of the best ways for the coming year to be better than the previous year is to make a to-be list. A to-be list is harder because we can never check off anything from the list, but it is more rewarding because it gives us goals for what we want to become. I'm personally going to consult with the Lord and create a to-be list of attributes that I want to develop this coming year.

On Tuesday, we had our Christmas Zone Conference. We went over what we were able to accomplish this past year and where President Anderson believes we can be in the coming year. The biggest thing President Anderson stressed is to get people who recently joined the church to do genealogy. Then they can take or submit names of their ancestors, who finished their mortal lives, to the temple so they to can gain the blessings of baptism. Another topic that was stressed was that as missionaries, we are called to preach repentance and to baptize the people who humble themselves and repent of their past sins.

As part of Christmas, missionaries are able to call home. It is one of the two times missionaries are able to talk to their parents and hear their voices. We are lucky today because now most missionaries are able to use Skype, so they can both hear and see their parents instead of just talking to them over the phone. I will only have one more opportunity to Skype my family on my mission and I am looking forward to being able to Skype on Mother's Day. After that, I will not have the chance to talk with them other than emails until I finish my mission and return home. I am thankful that I am able to use Skype because it gives us a chance to be able to see our parents in real time while we are on our missions.

Elder Bjerregaard
#ASaviorIsBorn

Elder Bjerregaard and Elder Riley with the Higbees

Elder Bjerregaard with Sister Higbee

President Anderson

A few of the Christmas gifts

Skype call picture

Week 59--Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone! May your Christmas be joyful and your life full of happiness.

This past week might have been one of the best weeks of my mission. We set weekly goals to help us focus on bringing souls to Christ, and we were able to meet most of them. I am not sure what we did differently, but I am going to say it is because the Spirit of Christmas is in the air and everyone is more willing to let us in their homes. Another reason is because we offer to show the video that the church put out for Christmas called “A Savior Is Born.” People love the video because it shows children from many cultures quoting Isaiah and bearing their testimony of the Savior. I invite you to watch it.

This Christmas season I will also invite people to ponder what gift they can give to the Savior this Christmas. What can you improve this year so you can be more Christ like this coming year? You can get some ideas from the Mormon Message "The Reason Behind Christmas", and also be reminded of the true meaning of Christmas. As you remember the humble beginning of our Savior, you will be able to feel the Spirit of Christmas and feel of His love for you.

Mom here--click on the links to watch the videos. 

Elder Bjerregaard
#ASaviorIsBorn

week 58

My companion, Elder Riley, gave a talk in sacrament meeting about having a Christ centered life. He chose to focus his talk around Christ like forgiveness. The story shared was about the time when William W. Phelps betrayed Joseph Smith to the Missouri mob. He spoke about how Joseph Smith and fellow church members found love in their hearts and forgave him without asking for any compensation. I thought that was a really good talk over all and Sister Jackson even asked Elder Riley for a copy of the talk.

We didn't teach many lessons last week, but we did talk to a lot of people. We talked to a guy earlier in the week and we scheduled a time to meet with him the following Sunday. When we went by yesterday at the time we previously said that we would, he was asleep. We decided to try to visit a less-active member that lived just down the street. It turns out that the less-active member doesn't live at the address we have anymore. The person we were talking to, Mike, said we can come back and talk to him a little bit about the church. We are planning on meeting with him this coming Friday.

Update on Brother Tomlin: So far he has said nothing about changing his mind. We are going to go through the last couple of lessons we have to teach him this week. We’ll go over the interview questions with him again and he will have his interview next week. It looks like the Sunday after Christmas is a go.

Elder Bjerregaard
#ASaviorIsBorn

Week 57

I would say that the most significant event that happened last week is that we invited Bother Tomlin to be baptized the Sunday after Christmas. He never felt comfortable before about being baptized. After we showed him that by the Lord's standards he is totally ready, he felt better and said that we should go ahead and pick a date for him to be baptized. I really hope that he follows through with this because Elder Riley and I personally think that he has been ready for a while now. I am glad that Brother Tomlin started to think that way as well.

A miracle happened last night. We were trying to find a less-active member that we have never met. When we got to the home, we talked to a person whose daughter just got dropped off. She asked us who we were trying to contact and who we were. We told her that we were missionaries, and she instantly told us that she was looking for a church. We gave her one of the new Christmas pass-along cards with our number on it, and we are going to be meeting with her and her husband next Monday. She also told us that the member we were trying to contact moved about three months ago. Even when people have moved, the Lord will still put people in our path who He wants us to invite to share the gospel. I totally believe we were being guided because if we came five minutes before, or five minutes later we would not have met her.

I am loving being in Linwood. I just love the members. They are just so good to us. They always make sure that we have what we need, and if we don't they go out of their way to get what we need. Even most of the less-actives treat us well even though they don't know anything about us. Sometimes I feel like the original twelve Apostles when Jesus sent them to teach the gospel without purse or scrip. I always seem to have enough to cover my expenses. When we keep our end and follow the commandments, we will be blessed and we can continue on.


Elder Bjerregaard
#ASaviorIsBorn