Baptism in Denmark - Elder Kolby Madsen

Written by Elder Kolby Madsen, serving in the Denmark Copenhagen Mission of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, speaking Danish.

Mor!

Well first of all, have you had a chance to see Meet the Mormons? I want to see it so bad, but you know European missionary problems, haha. I can’t believe Josh is leaving already. Is Sister Avery freaking out that she will have three kids on missions?  I am sure that he will start emailing me weekly. It's funny when people go on missions, they just magically start writing every week. It's because they want more letters, haha. I am still amazed that Lindsey will be home in 10 days. It's crazy. If Sabrina wants to learn how to make a real pastry, she needs to come to Denmark. I have actually thought about coming back for school for just a semester or so, but I don’t know. We will see. She could come and learn from the real pastry chefs here. I think she should aim for it.

What a week. If I could describe this week in two words it would be Arbejde og dåb!(work and baptism). We had a great week. The highlight was defiantly the baptism. We had so much fun this week working too. I have never done so much work in one week. I really like the pattern we have going on here. We are trying to keep it going better and better every week, work, work, work! That’s how we do it.

We met with some really great people this week. S** is great. We went over to do a practice run of the interview before he got his interview with the district leader. He did very well, and it was great because he had his girlfriend there as well. We got to describe the law of chastity to her and she heard all of the baptismal questions. She also had some questions and, long story short, she has requested to visit with us. So we will be teaching her this week as well. We also had some really good visits with some of the old investigators. We were able to talk to them and they have requested a visit from us as well.

It’s been a great week. Elder Child is so great. We get along so well. We both like to work out, so we get some nice ab workouts in the mornings, haha. At the baptism we had most of S's family there. We talked to his parents again. They are so great. The ward really stepped up and helped. We also talked with the family, and everything went way smoothly. They even came to church during his confirmation.

We have some really great plans for this week. We are going to try and capitalize on all the opportunities of finding new investigators through the baptism and all that jazz. I am just feeling really blessed and really looking forward to meeting with people this week. We have this friend who is from Brazil that we were able to help with her bike because one of her spokes broke. We had a fun time figuring that out.

This week we also had a great experience with one of the less active members who we have been working with. He has been to church 5 out of the 6 Sundays I have been here. He is a good man. The only problem is that his wife and kids live out of town and he stayed behind to sell his home. With the separation, he has become unfaithful to his wife and is now in a rough situation. He has some really good goals and want to come back and be fully active in the church again. While we were at his house doing service, we were really trying to find out about his goals, what he wants, and what he needs to do to get back with his family. We talked with him about all the things that he could do to start making baby steps to come back, and to reach his goals. We had an appointment right after him, and it was about 45 minutes away.

As we started to wrap up our chat, he began to tell us about how hard it is to get out of the situation he is in. We needed to go so it was a little stressful, but then all of a sudden the clock meant nothing. We continued talking with him and started to be very bold. Both of us were just inviting him to stop what he was doing with his lady friend, to come unto Christ, and to turn back form that which is making his situations so hard. The only way to  progress is to move forward. You can’t move forward without leaving the things in your way behind you. To reach your goal, you have to let things go, focus on your end goal, and do whatever it takes to get there.

After our invitation, we looked at the clock and realized that we now had 15 minutes to get to our appointment 45 minutes away. The room was full of the Spirit, which was weird because it was not a supper happy thing to talk about. But we recognized that the Spirit was witnessing to him that what we were inviting him to do was not from us it, but was from our Father in heaven.

After we closed with a quick prayer and were walking out the door, I got a text message saying that our appointment had to cancel because she was not feeling well. Everything fit right into place. It was weird because I usually am not willing to be late to an appointment, but he needed us to be there, and the Lord needed us to extend the firm but loving invitation to become a better husband and father. We drove home that night feeling very happy, knowing that God has a plan and He is the Almighty. He knows who, what, and when things need to happen! Follow Him.

Go see Meet the Mormons. If you can, bring a friend. I am so jealous of the opportunity you all have to see it. You better go and watch it!

Med Kærlig hilsen,

Ældste Madsen

Blessings in Denmark (October 6, 2014)

House of God  (October 20, 2014)