Week #25-Ballerup

First week of the fourth transfer here in Balleup- Done! And haha it is funny that you mention how Lars and Teresa will put up with me.... funny story with that but you can wait! :) This week was another great week with splits with my boy Elder Ericksen from the MTC, and we got two more new investigators this week and a new district so it was a party!!!!!

Investigators

So the big new is that we got two new investigators this week! SO we have been teaching D and S, this couple who goes to the Apostolic Church, and oh little side note, D is like a boomerang master! How dope is that! He showed us all of his boomerangs and even gave us one that we could throw around inside! I am a master now and don't worry, nothing got broke in the apartment! ;) But they had they friend to the lesson for the second time, and we don't know his name yet... i know, bad Elder Reed! But it's all good! So we taught them on the Gospel of Jesus Christ and they pretty much believe in the exact same thing excpet AUTHORITY!!!! I think they believe that they have the right authority for baptism and i dont know how they think they got it but anyways... We have a little situation, so S and the friend are digging what we have been teaching them but D is like the boss to them. We asked them all if they would continue to read the Book of Mormon and S said jokingly, ''Yeah, i think we can do that,'' looking at D, while he starts going on a spill how he hasn't found anything special about the book yet and if the Holy Ghost tells him to stop reading, he will stop. And another example is that we asked them if they found out if it was true, would they be baptized, and immediately, S and the friend look at D to answer. So me and Elder Jensen fasted for them the next day that D could have a soften heart and so we will put that in the Lord's hands. Then our second new investigator is named Hugo. He comes from Yugoslavia, no idea how to spell that, and it pretty sweet! We taught him twice next week and are going to try to put him on baptismal date next week so lets see how that goes! He kind of believes in everything but he read the first 7 chapters of the Book of Mormon before we taught him the first lesson, and that is not normal here, so that is a plus! And he has like 6 kids so we focused on eternal families the next lesson which went pretty well! Other than that, we tried to get into contact with everyone and oh, hahahahahha, so we stopped by this old investigator from Italy the other night! Ha ha so we knocked on his door and we see a guy's face that looks like Albert Einstein kind of look at us through the window, and the next thing we know he is yelling at us through his upstairs window to leave or else he will call the police! Oh man that made my night! Oh and then we ate with Galena again this week and we had the ''right'' kind of beef strogenaf like how a Russian is supposed to eat it with a drink with chili in it! Hands down the weirdest thing i have ever eaten! But then she goes off about all of our missionary rules and calls them uncivilized, medieval, and haha, almost like Donald Trump like rules! Haha it was way funny! But we are going to start reading the Book of Mormon with her next time so lets see how that goes! Oh and we got in contact with Carolina again and will try to meet with her this week and Weinan is back from celebrating Chinese new year, so we will try to play soccer with him this week!    

New District

tSO i am not the baby in the district anymore!! Lets go! Sister Mann is training two new sisters at one time which is not normal and probs a challenge, and then the Ballerup Elders are all the same and we got Elder McDougall as our new zone leader and he was comps with Elder Gudmundson back in the day! SO the district is pretty lit!!! 

Elder Ericksen

jSo I saw my boy Elder Eriksen on Friday!! So he had to go home for two transfers to get toe surgery, but now he is back and is finishing training. SO once a transfer the ZL's and the DL's meet and talk about goals and all that fun leadership stuff and so me and Elder Eriksen had some time to kill, so we went out to contact around the church. Now this is legendary because Elder Eriksen is my boy from the MTC! Haha so it was way fun, i got to hear all of his adventures of being home and we even might get invited to a Bible group because of it, light work! 

Fastlelavn and THE CALL

So the fun with Lars and Teresa continue! Haha so we have a ward Fastelavn party on Saturday at the church. But before it starts, i see Lars and start talking to him and he told me that an Elder Jensen called him and asked how long ago he investigated the church and when he met the missionaries because he was going through his phone and didn't know who Lars Neilsen was. And if you know Lars, you know he is a prankster, and he pretended that he met the missionaries like a while back! SO i was like, oh that is probs my old mtc companion, call him back and see if you could get baptized! So we call him back and Lars says he read the Book of Mormon, and had a dream that he was baptized and he wants to come to church and was just acting like the perfect investigator. After they set up an appointment and hung up, I called them back and in English, i was like ''Hi Elder Jensen! How is it going!'' And he was way confused and then i was like, i am so sorry it was a prank... and then  he was like, ELder Reed!!! Hahahahaha it turns out to be the other Elder Jensen from my MTC group and it was pretty funny and a little mean, but i told him i would buy him a kebab to make up for it so it will be all good! Haha but that was a historical legendary mission prank right there! Haha then Teresa calls them and tells them that she is so disappointed in us and that they need to repent haha it was just a way funny situation! Then we had the actual party and what Fastelavn is, is like a none scary Halloween and i guess back in the day like the Danes used to hang up a black cat and like hit is in a barrel or something crazy like that, so we did that with candy and it was way fun! I dressed up as a soccer player, of course! 

That would be crazy if i saw sister Fredericksen! And i haven't found any gloves yet, but i am still on the look out! Oh and i do have a video dancing with Bishop, i just don't know how to send it home. Aye baby Webely #3 is coming, watch out! Oh gosh, there is no way Weber State will win, sorry dad i don'

t have enough faith! Haha! Well, the sun is shinning, it is not as cold, and the work is progressing here in the great little town of Balleerup, I am in for a good week! I love you all and hope you have a balling week!!!!!!

Æ Reed

Ballerup Week #24

So am I staying or leaving.... I guess you will just have to find out at the bottom of my email... :) But this week was definately a fun one, with splits with Æ Hendriksen, seeing the top of Copenhagen and even dancing with the bishop!!!

Top of Denmark

So story time, Elder Jensen's families best friends live in Denmark, and they have stayed over with them in Utah a couple times. They live right by the Nørreport Station which is really close to downtown København, so on p day, we got to visit them! It was really weird for Elder Jensen because the last time he talked to them was in English, and now he had a normal conversation with them in Danish! Languages are a little weird, huh? Anyways, we ate the classic smørebrod, which is an open faced sandwich and it gets worse, they ate this sandwhich with a fork and knife... haha i love Denmark! After we ate they took us to Rundetårn which is like an observatory where you walk around this circuling path, for like ever, until you get to the top, where you can see the top of Copenhagen and even see Sweden in the distance! So sweet!!!! That was a pretty sweet p day not going to lie, and not everyone can say that they saw the top of Copenhagen!

Dance Battle

So eating appointments at Bishop's is always an adventure, with his ugly American sweater that he wears to joke with us, to playing with the kids! I was pretty sad too because it was my last time to eat there... But anyways, after we ate we somehow got into the conversation that I was, sometime in my past life, a dancer... Then the word got out that I clogged, which made bishop and his wife go crazy! They took a clogging class, maybe at BYU not sure, but i clogged a little and then bishop and his wife did this crazy clogging dance which was way way impressive! haha and thats not it, Bishop and Elder Jensen did the worm together, and Bishop was doing like round off flips in his dining area! All in all, it was a crazy last time at Bishops... :)

SPLITS

So splits with Elder Hendriksen, can i tell you, was the funnest splits I have ever been on! We had so much fun, of course while following all the rules! We hit up this candy shop together and then we went contacting people but there was no one out, then we saw these two girls our age and pretened we were two lost Americans from our church, and we asked them in English how to get to Copenhagen. It was really funny to see Elder Hendriksen pretend to be English, and it was a pretty chill contact, they didnt think we were weird :) Then we taught an Icelandic lady and talked with a member's athiest husband who was like the nicest guy i have ever met! It was a party on splits!!! After that we talked til like 12 that night and had crazy converstations!

Investigators

So Investigators!!! My favorite part of the week! Two big highlights this week have been meeting with a lady named Birgit, who is Michael Olsen's (In the Stake Presidency) friend. We ate and did family history with her a month ago to show her that missionaries are not that scary because she was worried to take the lessons. It turns out, me and Elder Jensen are not that scary :), and we taught her last week. We taught her the Restoration at the Olsen's home, and it was a fantastic lesson! The spirit was so strong and Michael shared his strong testimony and she said she will read the Book of Mormon, and she told us that she had questions like, what is the purpose of life, and where are we going after this life? We told her we could answer those questions next time, Plan of Salvation :), and Elder Jensen and I are way excited to start working with her! Another great thing this week was that we finally got in contact with the Philipino family. We taught them the Restoration and they said it was new to them. They are Christian and believe in the Bible, but Elder Jensen asked them if they found out the Book of Mormon was true, would they be baptized, and they said yes! And it gets better, the lady said that she has a couple friends who would like to hear our message so I am excited for that! And we have a couple great families in the ward to friendship them so they are looking pretty positive! I want to introduce them to Lars and Teresa Neilsen! Svend was sick this past week so we will try meeting with him this week. Derek was taught by Elder Poff and Jensen on splits, and I guess that it did not turn out too good because Derek explained for like ever to Elder Poff what he believes in. We are going to stop by the women from Spain and her friend Ricardo, who said that we should take a month break. My home boy Weinan will be back from celebrating Chinese New Year this week so we will get back to working with him! The man who fixed our bikes has time for this next while so we will meet with him! The young kid's friend texted us and said we can meet on Friday! We are meeting with Sarah and David today after we thought they didnt want to meet anymore! And we are meeting with this black dude today and this guys friend from Ghana who lives in Denmark, just got baptized! So that will be exciting! One thing I have learned on my mission is that in life, we have hard times so we can enjoy the good times even more. Without hard times we would never know the difference of happiness and there would be no purpose in life. I compared that to teaching people in this mission. I know that we dont teach as often as other missions, but after coming out of maybe the only appointment of the day, it just feels so great! Just that you have helped one person come a little bit closer to Christ after being rejected all day long by people. Just a little thought from Elder Reed

 

Way to get my email! You guys are so smart haha! With the gloves, that would be nice to replace them, they are pretty worn out not going to lie, I will look for something on sale today. That is sad to hear that the basketball team didnt make state this year, and I am way excited to see how soccer goes with Bishop! Who is the number one seeds this year for college b ball?  Is BYU doing good? Overall, I am doing great and I am loving serving the Lord everyday! And it is getting warmer! Finally! Well I hope you have a great week and remember that I love you all!!!!

 

Æ Reed

 

Oh wait, i forgot to tell you were i am going..... haha Well... IM AM STAYING!!!! President told the Zone Leaders that me and Elder Jensen are doing too good of a job together getting this area going to split up so I am in Ballerup for 6 more weeks! Lets go! I will be in this area for a fourth of my mission and I am so excited! Well, love you guys again! 

Week #23 Ballerup

Hvad så alle sammen!!!! This might possibly, actaully most likely, be my last week here on Ballerup, so my mind is racing where I could go, but I will go hard in the paint this last week here, and who knows, I might stay one more transfer.... I have to wait aaaalllllllllll the way til Saturday to find out!!!!!

Family Reunion

So my grandpa came all the way from England to visit!! If any of you are confused, my grandpa is Elder or I guess, Brother Wilshure from England. He trained Elder Gudmundson, who is my dad, which makes Elder Wilshure my grandpa!!! If that makes sense.... haha! Anyways, it was Tuesday during studies and I got a call from a number we didn't know, and Elder Jensen answered it and he threw the phone at me, and he said it was my grandpa! Bro Wilshure went home two transfers ago and was just back visiting and he called me and pretty much told me he was bored and had nothing to do, so I told him to come to our district meeting! So he came and we had great discussions about his life after the mish and gave us some good words of advice! Then after we all ate with each other and then he biked with us to show us a jack pot place to knock! It is a place where a bunch of college aged kids live, and a lot of them dont even come from Denmark$$$ That was really fun, and all in all, it was a great family reunion with Grandpa!

PeriodeKort=Death

 Soooo what a periodekort is is a card that you have that you can get anywhere in our area for the whole transfer, in reference to the transportation and so the buses and the train. So we realized that our card expired two weeks before the transfer and we were just like, oh we can buy a two weeks one.... WRONG! You have to buy one for a month and guess what that means.... we pretty much have to bike from city to city and my legs are done!! Haha! We get to ride the trains with our rejsekort but that is if we have to, it is pretty expensive! SO moral of this story, is that I get to love biking!!!!!

Basketball!!!!

So Saturday nights are usually not to productive here to knock and contact on the streets.... so we have saturday sports nights now! And so we played basketball! So we all met at Dominoes, which was like a 45 min bike ride for me and Elder Jensen, and bought pizza! Then we all BIKED, i love biking :), to the church, where we realized that Elders Poff and HendrickSEN were giving a church tour to that Brazilian girl who I invited to baptism. So we snuck into the back door and ate pizza! Then guess who showed up?????? ROY! Shout out to sticky notes! We left a sticky note on his door to come to basketball and he came!!! Lets go!!! I was eating turned around, and saw Roy! Then he said, ''What is crack a lackin homeslice!!!!'' No one will probably get it but its what me and Guddy taught him! Then i gave him a HUGE hug and then we balled! Then I had a good talk with him after, and the ward is getting members to eat with them, and he said he will try to come to church so lets flipping goooooooooo!!!!

Investigators

Aye! Lets see who Elder Reed is working with!! But first, lets break the bad news.... my boy, that huge basketball player from chicago, texted us last night and said he has to stop meeting with us because his wife doesn't feel comfortable with us there, she's athiest, and so we are done with him:( That was hard but oh well, the work continues!!!!! Lets see, we couldn't meet with Svend or the young kid this week, but we did meet with Derek, the man from Scotland! He told us for a half an hour all of his glory days when he was our age in Scotland and he was a missionary for hs church back in the day! Crazy!! And he liked shooed away pigeons so the prince could shoot them or something! Crazy! Then we taught him about the Book of Mormon and real intent and asked him if he found out if this was true, would he get baptized and he said yes!!! So all we need him to do is if he actually reads the Book of Mormon with the mind set of actually joining our church if he got an answer! We taught David and Sarah from the Apostolic church and they brought a friend with this time! We taught the Plan of Salvation and that was balling! Sarah was digging it, she kept on asking what do we need to do to get to the celestial kingdom! The only problemo is that we dont think David is digging it because he wont soften his heart and doesn't want to switch churches! We finally got the number from the American dude who me and Guddy knocked into so we can make an appointment with! Tomorrow we will teach the first counselor's friend for twenty years, no ppressure right! Haha oh man! Oh, and we ate again with Galina, the old lady from Russia, and guess what?? We talked about cooking for like ever!! And hour and a half while she made us some chinese duck and pancake food! It actually tasted really good! We never got to talk about the gospel with her, but at the end she told us we were the first missionaries who were actual people and didnt throw scriptures on her and she really liked that, so maybe that is the key to get her back to church!  Elder Jensen and I contacted this man called Jacob, from Afghanistan, late one night two weeks ago, walking home from the bus stop to our apartment. We taught him once and then brought Elder Poff and Hendericksen to the next lesson because we realized he lived in their area. We all taught him yesterday and taught one of the most spiritual lessons I have ever taught. He talked a lot about getting him and his family in the right direction and we told him that the gospel is the right direction, and Elder Poff asked him if he found out that all of this was true, would he get baptized, and he said yes! Jacob is really really positive and I am so happy that the other Elders can work with him! And he fed us food and gave us juice! He is so nice, and his wife is going to give us haircuts later this week!! And when we left, he gave us all hugs!!!! Awesome guy!! Oh and shout out to Katelynn!!!!!! So we found a Filipino lady last week and she told us to come back, so we did on Tuesday and she told us to come back next Saturday so we can teach her, her husband, and like 6 or 7 Filipino women!! Like how sweet is that!!! ANd we will definately use Teressa for the lesson for sure!!!!! And Katelynn, i gave out my first Tagolag Book of Mormon so be proud!!!

Thanks for the Valnentines package!! What did ya'll do for V Day??? It honestly isnt too big her in Denmark, my Valentines was Elder HendrickSEN and the Ward Mission Leader's 13 year son! Haha totally a joke so dont worry! ;) Oh and i found a nice jacket for spring, I bought it in København and it was a good sale too! haha zach was right, we just shared our spiritual experiences with each other during stake confrence!! No lie! That is a good message from Stake confrence! It is so simple honestly, that we do everything we do because of revelation, and the one way to find out is from Mormons Bog! And I hope the basketball team does good and represents in playoffs!!! And the weather is getting warmer and warmer so that is making me happy! I hope you guys have a balling week and maybe this is the last email from Sjælland for a while????????????

Æ Reed

Week #22 Ballerup

Kære alle sammen!!!!! So the work here in Ballerup is on FIRE!!!! Me and Elder Jensen are doing work, and this is the best missionary work this area has been doing for like 6 months!! Oh, and I found my ''golden investigator!'' ;)

Investigators:)

So we found 5 new investigators this week!! Two of them live in the other Elders area but it is still great! So lets start with the two that live in the other Elder's area! So late one night walking home from the bus stop, Elder Jesen contacts this man who turns out to be a guy from Morocco who believes in Everything! Haha He was way nice and we met him at his apartment on Saturday which ended up him like feeding us! The Middle East culture is soooooo friendly! It is great! And his wife is going to hook us up with haircuts!!! He just lives in the other Elder's area so we will hand him off, plus get a haircut on Saturday :)! Then we taught Svend last week. We taught him on the Plan of Salvation and said that if he found out that all of this was true that he would,''Absolutely,'' be baptized! The only worry there is that he doesn't know if the time is now to make a change in his life. But we will wait and see the spirit work:) We didn't get in contact with Nikolas or his girlfriend, or whatever she is this week so we will wait and see what happens with him. We met with the guy from Scotland, Derek, and taught him the Restoration and it was way spiritual. He had this crazy awesome dream that he was young and Jesus taught him about love which changed his life, and he was two weeks away from baptism when he went to a Unification church meeting and converted there :( BUuuuuuut, we are giving him a second chance and continue to work with him there! We got a referal on Monday from a guy named David who wanted a Book of Mormon. We stop by and we talk for a bit and he lets us in and we end up teaching the restoration to him and his wife! They are strong members of the Apostolic church and they just wanted to meet with different churches so we could unite together, little did he know that he referred the church of Jesus Christ :) Next, we contacted this guy from Ethiopia who cant speak English or Danish. We got his number some how and set up an appointment. We showed up and he was there! But he got sucked into an immigrant job thing so we were bummed.... But the next day we had to do something at the library and we saw him!! We told him to come follow us to the computers and we pulled up an Amharic Book of Mormon on the computer and he read the introduction and Moroni's promise!! So that is crazy that we are teaching him with a huge language barrier! Oh and shout out to Katelynn because we were knocking the other night and he knocked into a Filipino girl who told us to come back so we will bring Mother Teresa next time!!!! And finally, my golden investigator :)! Picture a 6 foot 7 inches black basketball player from Chicago.... well, that is him!!! We were knocking and this huge black guy ansers the door and he says he is Baptist..... wait there are not too many Baptists in Denmark, so we asked him were he is from and he said Chicago! He said he didnt have time he was busy, and so that was that. Last night we stopped by, he was not too interrested, then we started talking basketball!! His favorite team is the Bulls and he played college ball in the states! Then I dont know how but we started talking about the Book of Mormon and we are coming back next week! So overall, all i can say is that we are blessed here in Ballerup!! 

Looooooooooong Day

So trust me, this was the longest, most tiring day on my mission! We had no time to eat lunch or dinner and got back to our appartment like at 930!!! So what happened was first, we went to Harris, who was an old investigator's bike shop, who fixes missionaries bikes for free!! :) Oh, by the way, I dont need a new bike, he fixed mine and it is perfect now! So we go visit him and we talk with him about God for an hour! He is from the Middle East, was Muslim, and now doesn't have a religion. So we taught him, and prayed with him and just talked about his life with him! Oh, and by the way for all the non Washington state peeps, Washington is his favorite place in the USA!!!! So after that adventure, he went to teach Derek, then went to the library to teach the man from Ethiopia, and then had to take a bus to the church for mutual to help the young men with family history! I had a great time helping the mission leader's son with his and yea! But i am really not that good with family history but there is an excitement here for it! But all of those things took the entire day!!! Travel is nuts here on Sjælland but that day was sooo loooooong!

Losing Best Friends :(

So Roy and Joana. We finally met with them for the first time in three weeks and Roy said he has been slammed with work and that he has no time for church.  He said his first priority is work over the church and that made me so sad inside because i love him and i want what is best for him.  Elder Jensen and i bore testimony on the blessings we get for putting God in our lives first, but it didn't affect anything.  Joana is going to another church in Copenhagen with her Chinese friends because she thinks she will get persecuted for being Mormon in China.  We invited them to pray together every night, to still hold some what of a relationship with God and they said they will do that.  We will eat with them next week and we will focus on telling them that they can be married in the temple for eternity because it has almost been a year since their baptism.  But these were truly my friends and I love these tow soooo much and it just pains me to see them fall from the church, but we are not giving up on them!!!  I am determined to get them back before I transfer out of here!!

Elder Jensen is a balling kid!  He likes to snowboard and like do crazy stuff on trampolines! And I love working with him!!  He is such a hard worker and is so good at Danish, and my Danish has improved so much with him!  I am going to look for a new jacket today but it wont be that much money..  And I feel like I don't have enough time for my mission, it is almost a fourth over and I feel like I just got here!  And everyone is jumping on the family history bandwagon for sure!!  It is awesome how everyone is pumped for it!  That is good to hear that the basketball team is doing good!  And we will have to see in two weeks if I will still be in the area for uncle Matt!   That would be awesome to see him!  And I would have to ask my mission president if i could see him.  And everyone back home, remember that i love all you guys and have a great week!  Mom and dad, you guys are the best and keep being studs!!

AE Reed

                                        Ballerup District

                                          Alex has investigators!

                                         Alex and Danish friends

                                          Zip Line

Week #21 Ballerup

Hvad så!!!!!! This week went by so fast and like I invited two people to baptism and they both said yes!!! Lets go!!! That  doesn't happen all the time here in this unbelieving country!! This week was full of work, finding new investigators :), and even teaching primary!!!

Splits

So I am pretty much convinced that miracles happen on splits! So story time, the Elders on Amager contacted this 25 year old Brazilian girl and gave her a Restoration pamphlet, shout out to Joseph Smith! Then she ends up living in Elder Poff's area and they set up a lesson with her on Saturday, when we were on splits. We get there and she is talking crazy fast danish, like spanish speakers speak fast, but add that in Danish, and like wow! We needed her boyfirend-friend?? to translate what she was saying sometimes. But we go in and she says she believes in everything that the pamphlet says! Good start right. We go in with a lesson plan, but she is asking too many questions and so like that didn't happen. So we tauht her a lot of things, teaching people not lessons :), and then we got to the point where she said she wanted to bve a missionary!! Well, let me tell you (Elder Reed says) you got to be a member of our church to be a missionary, so will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized? YES!!! Second baptismal invition, second yes in Denmark, ill get to the other one later.:)Then Elder Poff set a date and that was just a great team efforrt by us, the Amager Elders, and of course, the Holly Ghost! The rest of the day consisted of soccer in the morning with the Gladsaxe wards, which was way fun and Elder Reed's fav ;), service with Bishop's bro plus Mexican food for dinner, his wife is American so it was good, and then Sports night at night! We invited Roy and Joana, but they didnt come, get to that later too :(, but the sisters Indian investigator came, and oh boy!!! Let me tell you, he was crazy! He never balled in his life before and he like did flips over people trying to get the ball, and i think the main cause of that was because he is vegetarian, so eat your meat people! So that ended a pretty perfect day of splits for me!!

Investigators

So like i was saying, I asked someone else to be baptized, actually my first ever invitation to someone! His name is Nikolas and he has a fro! He is really smart and never believed ibn God but said he had a good feeling, but hard to explain when he read the Book of Mormon introduction, aka the spirit ;). I asked him if he found out if the Book of Mormon was true then would he be baptized and he said yes!! Lets goooooo!!! Oh and he brought his best friend who is a girl and we are teaching her now too!! Then we have Derek, the man from Scotland. SO he was almost baptized a while ago, and he used to read the Book of Mormon and take walks around a soccer field and pray about it. His answer was to stay in is unification church. Wej taught him, and he shared his beliefs, and they are not too far away from the restored gospel and we invited him to read the BOM again and pray about it and give it another shot and he said he would! The counsleor in the stake Presidencies friend will be taught by us! We got the news this week so we will teach her in the future. We couldn't meet with Svend this week but we will meet with him this week! We havn't been able to teach Weinan yet,but we are working on it, like meeting with him. And we are way worried about Roy and Joana. They havnt came to church in three weeks and no one has contact with them. We let the bishop know, and last night we left a note at their door saying we miss them, we are worried, and that we love them and to text or call us so we will see how that goes. Oh and we started teaching this 70 year old ish lady named Galina who is from Russia and she is inavtive. She invited us over to eat, so we ate her food, way good, talked about cooking, shout out to the tv show Master Chef, for like a half an hour, and heard why she left the church. But we are working with her so that will be fun! 

Sick:(

I always get sick when it is cold and i dont get enough sleep. But i got sick this week with a pretty not fun cold, and slept a lot and did family history and now i am back from the dead so dont worry :) And the good news is that is is starting to get warmer so thats always good!

Finding Africans Starts Up!!

And it starts up!!!! Agian, we took a little break, but ladys and gentlemen, finding Africans is back. So it all began when we sat on the back of the bus and there was a guy from Africa behind us. Me and Elder Jensen look at each othere and we get the message.Elder Jensen starts talking to him and he ends up knowing a guy from Bikerrød, who is getting baptized from Ghana! Small world. Then after we talked to him and taughtn him on the Book of Mormon.  That night we contacted and saw like way more Africans then I have in a while!! They are all humble and love Jesus so lets go!!!!

Sunday= Primary!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My hardest investigators yet......Primary!! So it was the fifth sunday so like everyone was together so all four elders had to teach primary and it was so fun! We asked them all how their week went and then preached the good words to like 15 Danish kids! They have so muchg energy and it was so fun! I sat by our mission leaders son who is my boy and whispered answers in his ear and made him stop messing with his friend right by him! Elder Reed taking charge! haha after the kids like took all my name tags and planner so we ended the day at church with me and Elder Hendrickson just chasing these kids around the church getting my things back haha! Oh and a little Sunday miracle wass that we were taking an S tog to Herlev and i had this weird thought to leave a Book of Mormon on the train seat, but then i was like, noooo, thats just weird. Then Elder Jensen asked me if i ever left a BOM on a train before and i was like, holy cow, i was thinking the same thing! So we left a Book of Mormon and just have to hope that someone takes a look at it, but that was a really cool inspiration that we both got!

Oh, I love Seattle, and MAginano's killed me! Their chocolate cake is a heart attack! And haha dad played during the teaching meetin!! And i LOVE the pic of the garden gnome! I havent seen any at all here so maybe that there are no danish garden gnomes :(! And ilove the danish food, and of course i got my cake!!!! Two things, i think i am going to look to buy a light jacket for spring and summer time because after this month it will be time to retire my coat! And my bike. I might have to buy a new one, Guddy left his old one so i could buy that from him, but my bike is not working right now so i think i am going to go to an investigator's bike shop and see what he can do with it. But I am doing great, just balling out here in Denmark, trying to make the unbelievers to believers!!! Love you guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Æ Reed

Week #20 Ballerup

Happy Birthday Dad!!!!!!!!!! I hope you had the party of a lifetime!!! So guess who got a new investigator this week...... Me!!!! This week consists of family history for days, and a special return to the infamous, BALLERUP HOUSE!!!

Family History

So our ward mission leader wants us to go hard with family history in the ward to get some referals and all the good stuff. Sooooooo on Tuesday we texted President Olsen, who we had Christmas at, and was like can we help you and all that good stuff. But sadly, we were hours too late, because the sisters in the other ward like were going over to his house or something like that and teaching one of their friends. So i was like noooo! So while Elder Jensen and I were chilling and taking our dinner, and after President Olsen's son tried to fix our toilet which hasnt been working for like three weeks, haha forgot to mention that ;), we got a call from Olsen and he said that Sister Mann was sick and get to Veskø station as fast as posible. SO we did and got to their house and right after we ate dinner in our appartment, we got to eat dinner again there with his family and their like 20 year friend!!! Food!!!! And so we pretty muched talked and laughed with everyone all night and even did family history! Their friend wanted to hear the missionary lessons but was a little scared to meet the missionaries, but like, Elder Reed and ELder Jensen are not that scary right..... Of course not!!! Oh, and shout out to mom and Croatia because I busted out the family tree and told them that my family comes from Croatia and then President Olsen was like, that is why you have such a big nose! Haha I told him I loved him so all was good!!! That was a way fun family history experience!!!! 

Splits

Miracles always happen on splits! So I went on splits this week with Elder Bateman, the new zone leader who is going to die in like 2 months. And we did work! We were contacting around Ballerup when we contacted this 17 ish year old kid with a fro! We gave him a little overview of the Book of Mormon and set up an appointment for later that week! #blessed! Then after that we took lunch and continued the sister missionary work!!! We made a whole bunch of cookies and stopped by a bunch of inactive ladies! That ended up with us getting an eating appointment with an old lady on Thursday!!! Jo Tak!!!!!!! SO i am pumped for that! And some old ladies rejected our smiling faces and our cookies! Like what! How could you deny Elder Reed and cookies! haha jsut kidding! And our way fun splits ended with a great famous kebab! 

The Broadcast

The Broadcast. That sounds pretty intense right. Well it was a huge missionary broadcast that every missionary in the world saw at some point. The whole Sjælland zone was there and it was a party to see everyone!!! The main subject of the broadcast was to teach repentance and baptize converts. The whole thing was just a bunch of spiritual goodness but the things that i loved the most was teach inactives the 1st vision again. That was a great idea because there is in inactive family that left the church and was a bishop, relief society pres, and with a son who served a mission. And i am convinced that they will feel the spirit if we teach them that! Also, we are going to focus more on working with members because that brings miracles!! SO we are going to ask members at every eating appointment, who do you know.... Oh and this week we have an eating appointment everyday!! I love my ward!!!!! :) So with also getting fat, I will hopefully get some referals! After the broadcast, the DL's and ZL's all had to meet, so me, Elder Tompkins, and Elder Francais, went to a pizza shop and got like five pizzas for everyone to eat which was a party!!! The day of THE BROADCAST ended with us eating at our ward mission leaders house, which their family is soooooo dope and i love them all to pieces!!! The night ended with a huge miracle! So we were walking- and joking around with elder poff and hendrickson, when we saw the bus we had to take at the bus stop down the street, so me and elder jensen take off in a dead sprint, full of danish hot dogs, trying to make it to the next bus stop. We realized 100 yards away from the bus stoop at we were not going to make it, so we started to just walk. We would have gotten home around 10, but the bus stopped right at us and the bus driver let us in, and let me tell ya'll, that that does not happen here in Denmark!!! So i just love seeing the hand of the Lord everyday in my mission!

THE INVESTIGATORS

So if anyone was wondering, the work is starting to pick up pretty great here in Ballerup! So first our big problem is with Roy and Joana... They cancelled all appointments and didnt come to church for the past two weeks.... Not good. So we let the ward leaders know so there is nothing we can do about the situatiion but wait and pray. Then Weinan didnt come to basketball last week and was busy the whole week so we will teach him next SSaturday, family history, and then go hard on the Plan of Salvation and eternal marriages and temples!!! Then we changed our appoinatment with the Irish old guy to tomorrow. Carolina, the women from spain, told us that we were pressing too hard and she doesnt want to change religions. We challenged her to read the BOM and then agreed that we could stop by in a month to see how that is going, but honestly i dont know how much she can understand english. But we found out yesterday that there is a guy from south america in the other ward that we will use for sure! Then we have the 20 year old kid named Svend, who we will meet with on Thursday and we might commit him to baptism! So that will be exciting. Then the new investigator, Nikolas, we is about 17 and he is sweet! He never believed in a God but we asked him if he wanted a world with a God or without, what we he choose, and he said a God of course! So we committed him to pray with a sincere heart and to read the Book of Mormon! And we are meeting with him this week so i am excited about that!! And we are still trying to get in contact with Ricardo, the Indian guy! So the work is definately piking up here in Ballerup!

Balling

So of course we have our basketball saturday, which i just cherish so much haha! SO we waited for Roy and Joana, but you know that  story, and they didnt show so it was just our district, so we just started playing with each other. It was way fun just messing around. Then it was time for one last game and so we did the first ward against the second ward. Loser makes cake on Tuesday for district meeting. Now cake is Elder Reed's real motivation and so lets jsut say i went hard haha! ANd lets just say, our ward gets the cake!!!! YES!!!

THE RETURN 

The return.... So on Saturday night we were leaving our eating appointment when Elder Poff said he thought things were still in the Ballerup house, my true love :)! So we called the AP's and they said go for it and check it out. And we had a stop by who lived right by the house so we got to the house and we were looking for the spare key and couldnt find it! We called the assistnats but we could not find the spare key.... so i got the idea, i remebered that Guddy gave me a key, and so i checked my bag and it wasnt there and then Elder Jensen tried Elder Gudmundson's spare bike key and BAM! It opened and i was back home! There was sadly nothing left and someone was going hard with the renovations!!! But it was so nice to be back at THE HOUSE!

So no it wasnt snowy and it is actually getting warmy thank goodness!!! I need some sunshine in my soul today! SHout out to the hymn, but it is supoosed to warm up so i am pumped for that! Tell the Baker's I say HEJ in Danish back, it is the same:) And I love Elder Hendrickson!!! He is my boy, we have so many laughs together!! And there isnt too many young single Danes around, and it is way hard to be a member and that age here in this country! And they usually go to school here in Denmark. And dad is not old!!!! And what did you guys do for his birthday!! I want pictures!!! I love you guys so much and I am loving my companionship with Elder Jensen, he is such a great guy and we have a great spirit in our companionship!!!! 

Ældste Reed

                                                           District Meeting at the President's                                             

                                                                        Zone Training

                                                               P-Day=Basketball

                                                                 Alex still got it!

Last man standing (sitting up)!

                                                               
                                                               Study time -Danish!

 
                                                                     More study time....

                                                       Alex and his comp

                                                                    Super cute!

                                                                          It's cold!

Week #19 Ballerup

Hej famalie og alle sammen!!!!!!! So my new companion is Elder Jacob Jensen from Utah somewhere, everyone here comes from Utah haha, and he is so dope!!! I love him already and we get along great and teach together great and it is just a great time with Elder Jensen! THis week has been full of working with Chinese people and doing work and even doing some sister missionary work!!!!

Chinese

So Joana has been telling us the past month that she has been going to this Chinese Bible group and that they have told her that our church is wrong and we are not Christians and we have a bunch of wives and just the usual attack on our religion.  Then last Tuesday we met with two of them because they wanted to see what our church believes in and "what did Joana get herself into".  So we taught them the Restoration and one of them would not really humble himself and even went against testimony.  He said my spiritual confirmation came from the devil or something and that he knows the Bible is true because of the artifacts on it....  Haha that made me so happy.  There was a lady there who seemed interested and i think she could feel the spirit and she had a bunch more questions.  We said bye to them and them see you tonight Joana for our twice a week home teaching with them.  Then when we went over to Roy and Joana's house that night though the window i saw our boy Weinan and then I saw the Bible group friends were there again!  We ended up teaching the plan of salvation to them and they still had a lot more questions .  There was a man whose heart was harder than cement and he thought everything that we said was trash or something, but the lady who is a Chinese Canadian felt the spirit for sure!  The next day we asked Roy and Joana what they said after, and they said that they told them that the Book of Mormon and the Bible contradict each other.  But they didn't ever read the Book or Mormon!!!!  Joana isn't sure on her testimony of the Book of Mormon because she said she can't really understand it because the translation in Chinese is way hard to understand, so we got to go hard with them on the Book of Mormon!  I love it when our religion gets attacked, haha, not really, but that puts you to the test to your testimony if you can defend your religion when your back is against the wall and have Christ like attributes of patience with these people.  Oh, and Roy is having a grad time at work because he is getting overworked and he was way stressed so i gave him a priesthood blessing.. It was my first blessing in Denmark and I could definitely feel the spirit so strong so that was a great experience for me too:)

Sister Missionary Work

So I am ashamed to say this, but I did some sister missionary work this week.... Don't judge but ummmm i kind of made cookies and took them to old ladies. It was Elder Jensen's idea and it was a brilliant idea! We have a bunch of old inactive ladies in the ward that we had to visit and so we made cookies!!! We didn't find any of them home so we are going to have to try again this week! But we did give the cookies to the older lady from Spain, Carolina, and Roy, Joana, and Weinan! Oh and cookie dough is such a temptation in the fridge!! 

Random Fun

So some just random fun this week is having our first district meeting as a new district! Oh and we got Elder Hendrickson in the district who is from Julan and he is my favorite!! I love that kid already and we just got a beast district!! Ummm lets see, oh, we were doing some family history contacting the other day, and some other guy told us that family history is a joke.... haha!!!! That made me laugh! 

Saturday!!!!!!!!!!!

So Saturday means basketball!!! Yea!! So in the morning we balled with our boys Weinan and Roy which is always a party! Then we got ready to stop by a whole bunch of people in one of the coldest days i have experienced in Denmark! That consisted of me wearing to pairs of socks, gloves, and scarfs to stay warm!!! The end of the stop by night was a success with an inactive guy letting us in, and getting to know him. He said that he doesn't like all the rules of our church now and doesn't really believe in God. So we challenged him to pray and prayed with him! Then we stopped by this sweet couple who has been taught in the past. The man is from Ireland and the women is Danish. They are some kind of Christian, nor really to sure, but I guess they have been to Washington before! So that was sick to talk with someone who actually knows what Washington State is (because everyone thinks i am from DC). And we talked with them for a while and have an appointment with them this Friday!

Sunday Festivities!! ☺

So Sundays are so awesome, right!!! So we started the day with the usually, going to choir, my personal fav ;), and then church. Then we went on the missionary grind til Lars og Tersesa Neilsen came and went with us to go to Roy and Joana's house because we were worried about them because they weren't at church. SO we stopped by them to see what is up! Then after that we went and ate with them! Which is always a party and just a great time!! Then i don't know if ya'll remember but I was talking about this Chinese fireside at President's house. Well, Weinan was going to a party and Roy and Joana couldn't make it, and so we had no Chinese investigators there, so Pres just turned it into a missionary fireside with his friend from back home. He was some kind of big time pastor for like 20 years and then started to investigate our church and could feel the priesthood power from our church. It was a crazy conversion story but we listened to him on Skype, and then we just had a great chill, fireside about the Book of Mormon. IT went til nine thirty ish, when we were supposed to be home, woops, and then we waited at Pres's house til like ten to get a ride home from him because there are not too many buses and trains that go on a Sunday night. But it was a party with about 10 missionaries and the O'Bryants!!!!!! Oh, and we did make it home at 10 25 if you were wondering, so you can still trust Pres O'Bryant haha!!! ;)

And no!!! I don't do that, i actually forgot about that, but thanks for the reminder! I will remember that for my next appointment!!! And i love the choir conductor, he is my boy!!!!!! ..... So we taught the 20 year old, Svend, the other day which went way good and he is going to pray to see if the book of Mormon is true!!! :) And we will meet up with him next week. The older lady from Spain..... we invited her to church and she said she doesn't want to change religions.... but the thing is, all she does is reads her Bible inside all day. I felt so sad when she said that, because i knew this is eternal life at stake! But she said to stop by sometime next week so it is a do or die lesson with her! And aye!! We studied the tree of life too!! What a great analogy! I love the part of Lehi partaking of the fruit and wanting his family to have it! Who could that be like.... Oh, me! I love this gospel and i want to share it with everybody! (Even though like any Dane believes in God or like church but that means game on!!) Jeg elsker jer familie og jeg håb i have en god uge!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ældste Reed

                                                  At the President's house with his district

Loving the food!!!!!!

                                             
                                                        Getting ready for a cold day!

                 
                                           Alex says "best chocolate pastry ever"...wow!

 
                                                    It's really cold in Denmark!

                                                 Alex and his new comp!