D&C 18:10

(Aldste Cummings)

Tjena!

This week has been pretty busy and things are only going to get busier. We had zone conference on Thursday and it was so great. President Youngberg is most definitely inspired. The big takeaways that Elder Martineau and I have started to apply in our own work is experimenting with new contacting approaches on the street and working with local church members individually on personal mission plans so they can start getting more involved. Elder Martineau and I have a vision for Skövde. The only sad thing is that one of us is probably transferring to another area next week.

Yesterday, we witnessed a miracle. About 10 weeks ago, Elder Martineau randomly visited a less active member we found on the phone. His name is Amir, he's about 25, from Iran, has been living in Sweden for 7 years, and was baptized about 3 years ago. He doesn't actually have "uppehölls tillstånd" which is actual permission from the state of Sweden to stay in the country so his boss sort of takes advantage of him by forcing him to work nearly 100 hour weeks in his pizza parlor. He can't quit because without a job (which is very difficult for an immigrant without tillstånd to get), he won't get any money, and will most certainly be denied tillstånd and sent back to Iran.

Well, he found the time to come to church two weeks ago and absolutely loved it. He told us that he had decided to start coming back to church regularly. Within that week, he received tillstånd from the government! Now he can quit his job, go to school and get a degree and start a real profession. Yesterday at church, he was ordained to the priesthood and I could not have been happier. It was so amazing to see how much God loves His children. Seeing Amir there, seeing how happy he was, how much faith he had, and his desire to come closer to God made me feel just a tiny bit of what I imagine God feels when He watches us take steps to come back to Him.

It was such a beautiful experience. God really loves each and every one of us regardless of who we are or what we have done. His greatest joy is seeing His children returning to His arms and becoming purified in Christ.

Love,

Äldste Cummings