August 16th letter

Elder Arko emailed pretty early this morning. The Elders had some scheduling conflicts so they have a teach in the middle of their P-Day. That's how it goes sometimes, but the Elders will still have fun today don't you worry :)

The Elders have a pretty eventful week coming up. They had an old investigator that has been meeting with the missionaries for a while come back and he has a baptismal date right now. It's set for this Saturday, but there is still some stuff that needs to be cleared up before he is able to be baptized. Elder Arko asks that we keep James in our prayers. Then, they also have Zone Conference this week so Elder Arko is excited to see the whole zone again.

Elder Arko is enjoying himself a lot in Karlskrona. It's very fun for him to be back with people he already knows and doesn't have to get to know everyone over again.

Time goes by so fast. Elder Arko realized something the other week. He and another sister from his group are the oldest people in the whole Zone right now...isn't that crazy?! It feels so very strange that just a little while ago Elder Arko was teasing people for that, but now...

Since the Elders travel quite a bit, they travel by train. It costs a little bit more than it would to drive, but it cuts down on the miles on the car so the mission can keep them longer. Apparently the church has a policy that they sell cars after they get to a certain mileage so for zone conference we're taking the train in.

So, the Elders had a totally awesome missionary moment this week! Elder Arko and Elder Werner were walking and saw someone walking on the other side of the road and Elder Werner said, "lets contact this guy." Elder Arko agreed and they started over toward him to talk to him. The man just kept pointing to his ears and his mouth. The Elders didn't understand at first and then it dawned on them...he was deaf and mute! Can you imagine their surprise? Elder Arko was actually able to mildly communicate with him through the sign language alphabet he learned when he was younger. It was the most silent contact Elder Arko has ever had in his life! It was really cool for Elder Arko to see something so small he learned from that long ago help them out.

So the pictures, this is from the Zone activity they had last week

This is for us to see how Swedish lawns areyep those are all dandelions...they are not "weeds" in Sweden, but very beautiful flowers. Ha! Crazy Swedes!

Okay, that is all for this week ladies and gentlemen. Elder Arko hopes you are all doing well and know that he is doing great!