Try a Little Harder to be a Little Better

Hällå Där Allihopa!

President Beckstrand: “I’ve seen a lot of crazy things here in Sweden, but I have never seen 3 bank robberies in the same day. And especially not when we are picking up new missionaries.”

So we got a new batch of greenies on Tuesday. Which is always fun to see there smiling faces and help them get situated and show them around Stockholm a bit. One of the things that we usually do as well, is take the greenies out and go contacting people on the street…. But not this time. We start to pull up to the Stockholm YSA Center to show them around and take them contacting. But there were police taping off the main street in Stockholm, police running around and personally interviewing everyone they saw.

So President thought it would be a good idea to maybe forget contacting and think of something else to do.

But other than that it was a pretty great week. A lot of work like usual and a lot of cool experiences. Wednesday night, we got the chance to send home some of the missionaries and I sent home 2 of my past companions…. So that was weird. (Elder Moe and Elder Knecht.) It really hit me hard because I really love those Elders, but in the same, I’m next. Just helped me realize that I don’t have the most time left. So I need to keep working hard, and do as Gordon B. Hinckley admonished, “Try a little harder to be a little better.”

This leads to one of those days, where we went out and started to hit the streets. We felt impressed to swing by this less-active member. The bishop has asked us to go by all the less-active members, just to see how they are doing and try to reach out to them. But we saw this guy on the list and went by. He opened the door, and had the most confused look on his face. He then replied, “I haven’t seen you guys for like.....(started counting on his fingers,) 15 years.” He kindly let us in.

He made us smoothies and we met his son and girlfriend. The girlfriend was from California. She was really curious why, “Two sharp dressed men,” from the US are in Sweden, in the cold. She also asked us why we were Mormons! So we were able to explain why we are missionaries and how much this message means to us. She wanted to learn more, and so we had the chance to teach her right on the spot about the Restoration of the Gospel.She after said that she just knows in her heart everything we said was true. She said she didn’t know why so many people are becoming Mormons, until now. Haha

She began to tell us the story of her life and how the Lord had prepared her for this moment. She had always searched for the truth. She even went to a school for nuns, to learn more about Jesus Christ. Eventually her life lead her to come to Sweden, and just as soon as she made it here, she meets us. So we are now helping her towards baptism. She will most likely be leaving soon, so she might be baptized back in California, but we will see how it goes.

I love this work, it’s just an explosion of feelings, happy, sad, frustrated, excited, joy, and everything in between. I love it. Thanks for everyone’s prayers, and just keep on, keepin on!

Love,

Elder T.D. Haddon

как ситуация!

как ситуация!

Nothing like some Russian to get you excited for an email! This Quote of
the week goes to our dear friend Zhixiang a.k.a. Bruce.

*“Hey dis guyz a babe.”*

He is a 17 year old, and wanted to learn some English slang. So we decided
to teach him some stuff. It just didn’t really stick… But he is still a
stud. But speaking of our friend Zhixiang and his father Ziping they were
baptized this last Thursday!

But before we had some preparing to do. On Tuesday, we had to get them
interviewed for baptism, and getting them ready for the baptism. We decided
to do it at the church, and little did we know that they were going to be
having a Zumba class there at the same time. So we are trying to have a
spiritual moment with them and all you hear in the background is Beyoncé
with all “dem single ladies.” But it ended up being really good. His wife,
who had no idea that they had Zumba, in her normal clothes, hopped in and
started dancing with them. So in the end it was perfect, even if we thought
I was going to be a disaster. The American instructor and his wife were
talking to each other after… kind of. One spoke Chinese and the other spoke
English. But they somehow managed to communicate with each

other. (I guess it was the language of dance.)

The baptism was on Thursday, It was unbelievable. We had speakers in
Chinese, and they were baptized by a member who could speak Chinese. It was
just wonderful. The whole time we had a member translating the Swedish and
English parts into Chinese for the wife. At the end of it all we had a
conversation with the wife and an interpreter and she wants to follow this
and be baptized. So now we are going to be teaching her actively, to get
her baptized as well.

I have learned a lot from this experience, it helped me understand how much
the gospel and this church can help and strengthen families. To see them
come to church every Sunday, and to be praying together as a family, when
before the believed in absolutely nothing. You can really see how much
closer they have gotten with each other and the Lord. They still have a lot
to learn and grow, but it has been so great to help this fantastic family
be a part of this wonderful gospel. (Again this would be so much easier if
we just had Elder Anderson with us teaching in Chinese.)

It has been a spectacular week and expecting more fantastic and wonderful
things to come. Love you all and take care of yourself!

Love,

Elder Haddon

They're Real!

Sup!

This week’s quote comes from the sweet old lady Syster Rosenlund. “I
appreciate this act of service, there is a couple packs of wild boar, about
37 of them, who do this to my lawn every week.”

Ladies and gentlemen, the rumors are true… Wild boars aren't just on "The Lion King," they are real, and will absolutely destroy your lawn to find themselves some grub. (See picture.)

Well besides living with the harsh reality that wild boars exist and like
to destroy 80 year old ladies lawns, it’s been a fairly good week. We had
some fantastic experiences. We have been teaching this little Chinese family who is planning on getting baptized this Thursday, (Why Thursday? Very good question. Why not Thursday?) It is the dad and the son who are going to be baptized. The mother just moved here from China and speaks no English or Swedish. So our communication with her is very short. A couple
“Xièxiès” are all we can say. (Thank you.)

But last week we had to teach a couple of the commandments, but we had a little trick up our sleeves. We have a new member just moved in, who is fluent in Chinese! So we got to take him with us and teach two of the harder commandments to them. Tithing and the Word of Wisdom. They lived in a one bedroom apartment, with 4 people, and it only smelt of coffee. So we
thought this one might be a little tough.

As we started to teach, with our trusty member, the wife came in and
started to get engaged. They all started talking and by the end the wife said she wants to follow these commandments and know it is true….. The first lesson she comes in on is Tithing and the Word of Wisdom, and she wants to learn more. That is a prepared person my friends. At the end of the lesson, they all committed to following it and the father invited the
wife to pray. She said she had never done that before but would try. It was fantastic, even though I had no idea what she was saying, we could all feel it.

So the father and the son are planning on getting baptized next week, and we will be working more with the mom in the future to get her prepared for baptism. It was just one of those fantastic moments you have as a missionary. Get to see some of the fruits of your labors.

Had a lot of things to do this week, with transfers and some conferences coming up the office is getting busy. But I also got a tender mercy, with going on exchanges to Södertälje with Elder Allsop. Elder Faylor and Allsop are in a power companionship right now and doing some amazing things, so I
thought I would just come in for the day, and crash the party. It was
really good! Got to do some good old fashion missionary work with, a old
bud. Nothing better.

General Conference was fantastic, need I say more.(Shout out to Tim
Buckingham, You sang beautifully!) It helped me in so many different ways. It really helped strengthen my testimony that this church is run by men who receive spiritual guidance from God. I had several questions I needed answered and the most of the talks spoke directly to me. IT just reassured me that this work is real, this church is true, Jesus is the Christ, and I will always be his disciple.

Love you all, take care skött om

All Things Are Possible

Jaså!

Oh man! Vilken vecka! It has been a good one, this week is a “double whammy,” of quotes.

1)     1) Missionary I was able to go on exchanges with, “So like after your mission…. Are you going to date girls?”

Me:”... is this a trick question?”

2)     2)  (Explanation after.) “If you don’t get here with a laptop the blood of all the Iranians is on your hands.”

Background: So we have been helping a church service missionary with getting things set up for translation for Persian speakers. She is awesome and is doing a fantastic job but her work load is just a little too much. So we now are assisting her with that. She had been in the hospital, for different health issues, so we had come and given her a blessing the day before and she is now on the rise.

Now, flash to yesterday after church. We are in our car driving to a place called Åkersberga which is probably about 45 minutes north of Stockholm. On the way we get a call from her, furiously upset! Because she won’t be able to teach her Persian class because she is in the hospital. That’s when she cursed us with the blood of these Persian speakers if we don’t get her a laptop before 14:00. Well the thing is the call was made at 13:30. There was no physical way that I could pick up a laptop and get to the hospital before the class started.

We had the phone connected to the speakers in the car, so we could hear her yelling at us in surround sound. We are probably 1 hour away from the hospital. We don’t have a laptop. It was pretty much a game over. But then I remembered something in my patriarchal blessing, “You will been blessed to see problems and tasks, and prayerfully make solutions.” So I hung up the phone. Turned the car back around and drove directly to the hospital. In her yelling she said if we are late she won’t do the class because at that validity of the church would already be lost. So we had to get there in 30 minutes, (through downtown Stockholm), with a working device or the blood of the Persians were on us. So my companion prayed and I just drove.

Somehow the red sea of Stockholm parted and there were no cars. We made it to the Sjukhus in a 28 minutes. Then as we are running in the hospital we downloaded the app on our iPhone, got connected to the Persian group in the elevator and at 2 o’clock on the dot, gave the iPhone too her. And she just started going off teaching.

This was nothing short of a miracle. Helped us understand that literally anything is possible with the Lord, even if that is just getting us to a hospital in time.

This week has been a good one for the work. We have several people that we are progressing super well and we are just doing everything to raise the bar in our missionary work. (See attached file. It was our message for the mission.) Just loving live and loving being a missionary. It is so cool to see these people that we are working with change. We have a Chinese family that is preparing for baptism who only a few months ago met with us and wanted to learn about “The God.” Now is planning on getting baptized and absolutely love the church.

I love this work, I love being a missionary. “Vad mer kan jag saga?

Love,

Elder Haddon

Pictures:
(Our Message)
1) No Junk mail! Or we'll go crazy!!!
2) Nothing like a surprise carnival!
3) Viking graveyard.
4) Sister Beckstrand reading us a bedtimes story

Check out tannerandtaylor.blogspot.com
For our big news! :)

Member Missionary Work

Hej mine damer og herrer (Dansk)

Quote of the Week: “Nothing like running the streets of Stockholm, with a crazy Iranian in trash bags!”

We had a lesson with our good friend from Iran, and as we were about to leave, it was just pouring rain. So we were ready to just run about a mile in the rain to our car, but then she busted out some black garbage bags and made us some nice little ponchos! Still got soaked… but hey we tried. (See Pictures.)

This week was fantastic! It was like the week of “Member Missionary Work.” I throughout my mission have had the hardest time getting the members to get involved in the missionary work. People are too busy or have had bad experiences or just simple don’t feel like it! But this week we had I believe almost in every lesson with our investigators a member was there, or we taught at a member’s home. It was fantastic to see how much of a difference it can make, that when we all work together how much better things go! It also feels like our companionship got just a little bigger, now it’s not just Elder Mangum and I. Now it’s Elder Mangum, Täby ward, and I. It’s been so phenomenal.

Had a wonderful experience last Friday, which not too many people get to be a part of especially here in Sweden. Lennart Nyblom he was a man that I had the privilege to teach and baptize when I was in Jakobsberg, and I was able to go with him to the temple for him to go through for his first time. Not only that I got to be with Elder Allsop and Faylor. They had been taking care of him and really made it possible for him to be ready for this. I owe them a lot for that.

But it was just so cool to see him and it was like my mission flashed before my eyes. I remember the first time knocking his door and teaching him for the first time. Then when he came to church for the first time with his jeans and a flannel shirt on. Going through all the lessons, and commandments help him to stop drinking coffee and then to see him in White, the day of his baptism. Lastly getting to sit next to him in the temple, there is nothing that can describe the joy I felt. It simply doesn’t get much better than that!

Had another cool experience as well, we were teaching one of our investigators that has a baptismal date, he has a small family of 4 with 2 sons. No one else except for the dad has been interested, until last week. We would always go in and chat with the kids and then when we would start to teach they would go into the other room. But not on Wednesday. We watched “Finding Faith in Chirst,” in Chinese with them and after as we started to teach the father. The older son just asked us, “Can you speak in Swedish so I can understand the way of God too?” (In Swedish.)

 So at that point we were able to start teaching him as well. He came to church and we had a member who could speak Chinese there and he helped translate and teach. After it all the 17 year old boy just looked at us and said, “I believe everything that you said, it is all true.” We will be working on him and his father for baptism in the next month or so.

(Funny side note: The kids’ names are ridiculously hard, so I gave them nicknames Bruce (Lee maybe racist) and Kobe (Bryant he likes basketball).)

Love you all and take care! Hope to get many packages and letters from you all this week! (hint hint)

Elder Haddon

Hold On and Buckle Up

God Morgon!

This has been a fantastic week! But first the quote of the week goes to Elder Bednar and Sister Bednar, they were speaking to us and she had made a joke in her talk earlier about how the picture we used for the program was when he first became an apostle about 10 years ago. He kept making comments the rest of the conference that, “I’m old, my wife says.” Or “I just don’t understand that because I’m old.” Finally after he makes another comment, she runs up to the stand and grabs the microphone and says, “No, I said you are GOLD!”

It was very funny and cool to see how they interacted with each other, and how much they loved and cared for each other. And even though they are in the 60’s they still flirt and joke around, which is great. He also said, "You don't find a good marriage, you create one." (Why does everything worth it take work! Gosh dang it! ;))

Like I said this week has been great, we had a lot of things going a Mission Leadership Council that we had to train in, then the day after we had Elder Bednar. But we got some amazing things done in the Proselyting side of things. We have 3 people set up for baptism in the next couple weeks, one of which was a man who’s name we will say is Tyson, (for security purposes.)
He was a taxi driver and a vivid video game player for the majority of his life. He had really been living in a way that he was only searching for pleasure. Games, Girls, and drugs was the way he was going with his life. In the last couple of years he had felt the need to change that. To start to grow up and give up those things. (This is his preparation.) He about 2 weeks ago, was driving this couple from the Airport to a church. He said there was just something about them, he wanted to be around them. He finally dropped them off and right before he left the church Tyson asked them to talk to them a little about the church. The couple started to give some information to him and then said, you should talk to the missionaries, and they can help you. So they got his information, and promised him they would contact him that night. Which we did but had a very hard time getting a hold of him.

But finally this week, because of his schedule and things was able to meet with us and we just had a fantastic meeting with him. He gladly accepted baptism, and wants to follow this. They was something that he said that I found to be very special. The reason why he wanted to know more about this church was from the light in the eyes of that couple. He wanted that. He went to church and said he could see it in all of the people. It was fantastic. I just want to say that there are prepare people in every part of the world. No matter where we are the Lord is preparing his children for the gospel.

I just want to quickly talk about the Bednar Conference, it was one of the most powerful meetings that I had ever been a part of. Words of wisdom in these coming days. “Get in, Stay in, and Buckle up, because the fight is coming. The storm clouds are no longer on the horizon, they are here.” He was a voice of warning, and of hope. There were a lot of things that he said that hit me to the heart and are going to change how I do a lot of things. That is really all I can say. It was terrific!
At the Mission Leadership Conference, (MLC,) we trained about not letting expectations and weak goals from keeping us from achieving greatness. So what we did is we got 3 people, Elder Allsop, another Elder and another Sister, got them to stretch out because they were going to be doing some major jumping. We walked out with a broom and said we are going to hold it and you all have to jump over it. So we brought it to the front and dropped it on the floor. Told them to get over that broom stick. The first elder kind of chuckled and stepped over it, the sister the same, and then Allsop came in like a wild banshee and ran and jumper as high as he could over it. We then asked the two who just stepped over it.... Is that as high as you could jump? They said no... Then asked, why didn't you jump higher then? “Because we didn’t have too. The bar was set on the ground.” Then asked Allsop why did he jump as high as he could? He said, "Eh just wanted to show everyone how high could jump..." 
But the principal is the same with life. We have our low expectations, small goals and weak quotas. We can easily just step over them and keep going on with our lives. But we have so much more potential. We can't let those things bring us down, every one of us has the potential to do some amazing things! We can’t let the low bar from us achieving our full potential!!

Well once again, I love you guys, thank you for everything, i know I am weak in writing, but I hope that you got something out of it!

Love y’all,

Elder Haddon

PICTURES:
1) 10 lbs on my wife.... CRAP!
2) Same ties..... But look at the elders in the background.... What an embrace. 
3) Elders took my car.... The White Knight, had a nervous breakdown. But i'll be fine.
4) That was something some elder made us for our iPhone background... pretty sick
5) Celebrated a good week, with American hamburgers

Meeting True Disciples

Chello! (Got yourself a Bass)

Herro! Great to hear from you all! We’ll get down to the nitty gritty.
Quote of the week goes to Elder Mangum. (Last night when we got back at 12:00 PM.)  ”It’s official…. This week we have racked up a total of 26 Hours of driving! I never want to see a car again!” We had the opportunity to do a super-secret mission and drive all the way to the most northern area and back. Which was about a 20 hour trip. But while we were there we went on Exchanges with the Elders up there.

I was able to go with one of the greatest people I have ever met. It was Finnish elder who was a convert of about 3 years. He was a street contact, so it is something is very good at doing, just talking with everyone on the street, in cars, stores, wherever. It was so cool to go with him and to learn from each other. But we had a specific experience together that was
just amazing.

We had the chance to teach this lady who referred herself online, and kind
of lived in the middle of nowhere. But we talked to her and she was very interested and we felt prompted and good about meeting her. We traveled out there and she lived in one of these immigration camps that they have here in Sweden. It was an old hotel that they switched out into a refugee center. We met her and walked through this camp, which had people from everywhere. Iraq, Iran, Siberia, Lebanon, Eretria, and other war torn countries. We got to go through and everyone was just so friendly coming up and giving us hugs and handshakes. The majority of the people there were Christians, and that was the reason why they were there because people all
over the world are killing them and persecuting them.

But we get through and meet with this woman from Iran. She was about 35 and just a cute small lady. Something we noticed really early on was she shakes, quite a bit. She said it started when she was a little girl because of the terrible upbringing she had. We felt so bad for this woman. She just explained to us that has only wanted to follow Jesus Christ. She had explained to us for the longest time she had been going to all of the churches around trying to learn more of Christ, but none of them were ever opened or would speak to her. Until we came and visited her. The spirit was
so strong, it was hard not to tear up. We just taught her about Christ, and
all the things we can do to get closer to him. She was just so happy to
actually have someone to be there to help her and teach her more about Christ. She accepted following Christ’s example in being baptized, and now they are going to be preparing her for that.

It has been a fantastic week, we also went to Göteborg again for a
missionary meeting which President Hallstrom was able to come and do some instruction. As well this week Elder Bednar will be coming and visiting with the Northern Zones. So that will be great.

The work here in Täby is going fantastic. We were only in the area for about 3 days, but had some fantastic experiences in teaching some of these families we have met. Having our recent convert Jeremie come with us and he is inviting people like crazy to baptism. "I did it, it was the greatest thing in my life. Do it man!!!" We have a goal that we all will baptize a family into the Täby ward, and teach them together all 3 of us. So we are working towards that!

I’m so thankful to be serving. I know I say that every week, but it is
true. I really don’t want to go back. I love this land, the language, and
the experiences I have here. Love you all and hear from you soon!

Ha det Gött!

Elder Haddon

(Wow, we are so blessed to live in America and worship how we believe!)