Monday, May 30, 2016

I Have A New Companion, Elder Rial

May 30, 2016


Hello Everyone!


Well this week has been jampacked with a lot of different things. To begin, I hit my 11 month mark this last week. That was SOOOOO weird. Norway is home to me. I can't imagine being anywhere else. I feel like I've always been in Norway, but at the same time, I feel as if I just got here. I was having this discussion with another missionary about reaching the halfway point in a mission. At around the halfway point, you feel as though you finally know what you're doing. You can speak the language without too much of a problem. You feel as though you just finally figured it out. Then you realize that you don't know anything. You realize that there is so much more you need to learn and do and become. It's a very strange point, but it's quite humbling. It's a point where you can look back and see all of the progress you've made. I see how I'm a changed person. I'm a better person now than before I board the plan to leave home. I can look forward and see my potential for growth in the year to come. It's really cool to me. Weird, but great regardless.


Elder Tangen left for a city called Mo i Rana this week. So I dropped him off at the train station and waited with some missionaries in Oslo to get my new companion! Needless to say, I picked up Elder Rial (my new companion) from the train station and brought him back. Elder Rial was just barely in Mo i Rana, so him and Elder Tangen switched. That was a pretty ironic haha! Elder Rial actually started his mission here in Sandvika, so he'll most likely be finishing it here too. If I'm lucky I'll end up as Elder Rial's last companion! haha


This week we spent a lot of time visiting different members. I just am amazed more and more how awesome they are. Everyone here is just so kind and helpful and just incredible people. I don't think that there really is any other way to describe it. I just know that I can't do it justice in attempting to explain it.


In church yesterday we talked about the parable of the sower. Because it's so long I won't send it in an email, but I encourage all of you to read it.  There were a few things that really impacted me. I do believe though that the biggest thing that I took away from it was the impact that the sower had on the harvest. The sower went everywhere, sowing seeds (hence his job description). But along the way, seeds feel wherever he went, regardless of whether he intended it or not. Ideally he would cast seeds on good soil, places where the seeds would have a chance to grow, but that isn't always the case. Seeds fell wherever he went. I believe that is the same for us. We have an effect wherever we go. Our "seeds" in life is the impact we have on others by our example. We leave an impression wherever we go. All of us are sowers in life. We just try to sow the best seeds we can. Hopefully it's a good example we leave for others. There comes at times when those seeds of our examples fall in good "soil". They leave an impression for others and it changes their lives. Everything we do has potential to influence others' lives for the good or the bad. It's up to us to do our best to make it for the better.


I hope you all have a great week. Take care everyone!


Sincerely,

Elder Mickelson

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