Snow!

Sup fam? So its been snowing so freaking much here.....  It just keeps snowing.  As soon as I think it is going to warm up and melt a little, another storm comes in and dumps another foot or two of snow!  Its ridiculous.  ha ha but I like the snow so its all good. :)

Well I miss you all, I hope you are doing great! This week was pretty great.  We had some great lessons that helped our investigators that are on date become more excited about their baptism and truly understand why they need to be baptized.  It is pretty simple to explain it in english, but as it is translated it is hard for them to understand... but we are making progress. 
We had zone conference on Thursday.  It was very uplifting and inspirational. I have so much to learn and do to become a more powerful missionary.  We talked a lot about working with the ward leaders and about having an increase of faith to invite and to see miracles.  There is work to be done. 

I did some baptismal interviews for some investigators being taught by missionaries in our district.  I love having the opportunity to do that.  To see how someone has grown to understand the gospel and is prepared to be baptized.  I love hearing their testimonies and what they have come to know through the spirit. Most of the time it is pretty simple, but strong. A simple declaration of truth (which is basically the definition of a testimony) can be gained through the experience of reading the Book of Mormon and praying to know if it is true.  That is why we as missionaries are ALWAYS inviting people to read and pray.  Once they have a conviction of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon everything else in the gospel will fall into place.  That is why the Book of Mormon is the strongest tool we have to use as missionaries.  I love it. I love reading it and I know it is true.
Word.

Anyway.... what else happened this week? Hmmm. Oh! So we ate dinner with a family on Saturday. The Fathers name is Amram Musungu (known as President Musungu.)  He is the man who started the Swahili Branch!! He has done so many cool things for the church. We were talking to him at dinner and he was telling us how he was converted when he was younger, maybe 16 or 17. Then he went on a mission when he was 18 years old. He served as a full-time missionary for 27 months. Pretty cool right? It gets better.  He came back and since he knows Swahili and English so well, he played a big role in the translation of the Book of Mormon into Swahili!! He also did a major part of the translation of the triple combination.  He actually had some of the transcripts of the Doctrine and Covenants at his house when he was translating them into Swahili!  He also has been translating General Conference into Swahili for years now.  He is such an amazing man. He does so much for the church!  And to top it all off, he is in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir!!!! ha ha he is one of the few black guys. I know there is the famous one from England, Alex Boiea (I have no idea how to spell his last name! haha) And the other one is President Musungu!  He is a boss.  He is helping us a lot with our investigators and giving us a lot of ideas of how to help to members of the branch become strong members and prepare for missions.  So I thought that was a pretty cool thing to share with you all.  I feel pretty lucky to be able to meet some awesome people on my mission.

Well other than that not much else.  We are trying to find a translator who speaks Maban and English so that we can teach a woman that wants to be baptized this weekend! So I hope we can find someone!

I love you all! I hope you are all doing well. 
Have a good week.

Godspeed.

-Elder Hansen

Peak The Strategy

P.S. Here is a picture when the snow is coming down really hard but it doesn't do it justice.  I was kinda cold. ha ha :)