July 28, 2014

Hey everybody,

Things are continuing to go well here in Brive. Tuesday we were in Bergerac all day for zone conference. Bergerac is actually inbetween Brive and Bordeaux ( where the conference usually is held) but due to the layout of railways we can get to Bordeaux faster. For this reason we actually slept in Bordeaux the night before and took a train from there to Bergerac in the morning. Conference was great as usual. President mentioned that Bergerac was the last ville he served in when he was on his mission and that it was there where he went to midnight mass on christmas. He remebers the church being packed and hearing everyone sing angles we have heard on high. This became his favorite song after listening to it there and for that reason it is our mission song that we always sing at conferences. There was also a brother and his family who were here visiting france who spoke to us. He served with President Roney way back when. It is always cool hearing about the mission years before and seeing how things have changed since then.

I have to say that the ward in Brive is probably one of the best in the mission member wise. They all work very hard and love helping the missionaries. This is like the only ville where alot of the members invite you over without you having to go up to them and ask. Also we have multiple members come up and ask if they can help teach with us during the week. Yesterday we spent the evening porting and visiting less actives with a really cool brother who always volunteers to help us each week. Member missionaries are the best.

The weather here has been continuing to cycle between pouring rain or scortching hot. There was actually one day where it had been hot and sunny all morning and then randomly for about 10 minutes it poured rain on us. It was one of the heaviest rains I have ever been in. It was like we walked under a waterfall. Afterwards it instantly changed back the the sunny 100 degree weather as if nothing had happened and yet it looked like we had just jumped in a pool with our clothes on.

Any way I love and miss you all! Until next week,

Elder Swenson

Pictures!!

These are some pictures from the baptism a couple of weeks back. Sorry I didn't post them sooner!
 

July 21, 2014

Hey everyone,

This past was super hot. It was over 100 multiple days and we had plenty of rdvs fall through so we were out contacting for many hours. With the time of the year there are now more british tourists than ever before and less and less people who actually live in Brive. It still baffles me why there seem  to be so many tourists in Brive as there is litterally nothing to do or see in this city. The time that wasn't spent contacting was spent serving members by helping to garden and helping to build a house. Both of which were very exhausting in the heat. The contrast in color between my upper and lower arms is at an all time high. Lukily it should be cooler this week.  

Our amis are doing well and we are doing our best to keep them progressing. Due to vacation though it has been harder to see them as of late. Keep us in your prayers!

This week is zone conference so we will be heading to bordeaux tonightand sleeping there for conference tomorrow. I always enjoy Zone conference and it is one of the hight lights of each transfer. The good news is that we don't have to take a 9 hour bus ride this transfer. 

Any way I appologize for the lack of exciting content in this weeks email but it was just one of those weeks where nothing to exciting or out of the ordinary happens. I will do my best to have more exciting stuff happen for next week.

I hope that you are all having a great summer and that those of you who recently had birthdays had a fun time. I also hope you forgive me for never remembering all of the dates. I love you!

Elder Swenson

July 14, 2014

Hello hello,

Happy July 14! (It's basically Frances 4th of july) (It's also not so happy because it's our P-day and everything is closed and there are no busses).

So work in Brive with only one equipe has been going well. This week we were able to see and meet a ton of amis, members, and less actives. We ended up passing by one less active family and they were really cool. They actually have a son who is going to be turning 8 soon and said that he wants to be baptized so we set up to come and teach the family the lessons really simply to help him be more prepared. Hopefully we can get them coming back to church here soon. 

Working with Elder Ahlemeyer has been great. We have been getting plenty of comments due to the fact that he is German and with the world cup and what not. At the beginning of the week Elder Ahlemeyer asked about the weather in Brive. I told him that it was generally hot and didn't rain much during the daytime. Since I said that it has litterally rained on us every single day.

One cool thing that happened this past week was that we had set up a rdv in the afternoon and our ami texted us and said that she was going to be a little late. So while we were waiting on a bench in centreville another girl comes up and starts talking to us and pretty soon we start talking a little about our beliefs and such. Then our ami shows up and she said it would be ok if the other girl joined in on the rdv. Just like that we ended up teaching two new people in one single rdv. It was a cool unexpected miracle. Some days you are searching for people all day long and not a single person will talk with you. Other days a new ami will just pop up out of nowhere. Mission life.

I love you!

Elder Swenson

July 8, 2014

Hey every one,

So for this transfer I am staying in Brive and will be serving with Elder Ahlemeyer. He is from germany. The other equipe of brive missionaries actually got taken out this transfer so now we are the only here. This means that the work load just doubled which is good. I am writing this tuesday because i was waiting in the trainstation in Toulouse for 7 hours yesterday since elder Ahlemeyer was coming all the way from switzerland. We left Brive at 7 in the morning and got back at 7 in the evening.

This past week was great. Our ami bello was baptized and it was a great service. Because it was up in Limoges we carpooled with members to get there. On the way up the member we were driving with decided to pick up a hitch-hiker. He was about 18 years old and had hitch-hiked his way down to france for vacation and was now headed back home to Belgium. After talking to him for a while we ended up teaching him about the restoration and giving him a book of mormon. He was really cool and it was a fun experience. 

Because the other 3 elder were leaving we got to visit quite a few members this week. It was fun being able to visit all the the families here. There are some awesome members here in Brive. One cool thing that happened while we were visiting a family was that we recieved a text from an ami who we hadn't been able to contact since my first week here. We had seen taught him a few times and had even engaged him to baptism but then he just disappeared and stopped responding to our calls or texts. We had been praying that we would be able to get back in contact with him and then he just randomly texted us saying that he was sorry that he hadn't responded because he had been having family problems but said that he knew that God was there for him during his trials and asked if he could see us again. It was a cool little miracle that was an answer to prayers. We are seeing him this week and hope that we can get him progressing nicely. 

I am looking forward to this transfer and hope that we will be able to accomplish a lot here in Brive. There is a lot of potential here at the moment so we are very hopeful. Anyway I hope that you had a great 4th of July and that you are enjoying the summer time. Love ya,

Elder Swenson 

June 39, 2014

Bonjour,

This past week was great. Our ami Bello passed his baptismal interview so that means he will be getting baptized this saturday. We are pumped for that. The service will actually be up in Limoges because there isn't a baptismal font at our church. It will be the first time I've ever been up there so that is cool.

This past week we had a talent night at our church. Of course we had to do something as the missionaries so i played guitar and we sang As I Have Loved You in english spanish and french. It was basically just a music night since everyone sang or played guitar. The Bishop sang some intense karioke songs and it was pretty funny. Then because there was still some time at the end they announced that the missionaries would be coming up again which was a surprise to us and we didn't have anything prepared so elder Hunt and I just sang another song on the spot. It was a fun evening and we had a good number of amis who came.

For some reason transfer calls will be on tueday this week so I will find out tomorrow what is happening next transfer. I imagine that I will be staying but I have no clue. I'll let you know next week.

Love ya,

Elder Swenson