The Cursings of a Cantankerous College Kid

Fatten Me Up!! Are Eating Well and Being in College Contradictions in Terms?

2010-03-16T15:00:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I've now had several comments from people who knew me as a missionary saying that I look like I've actually lost weight since returning home! What is this all about?? Missionaries are expected to be either withering away or totally getting fat because of all the kind-hearted members living around them, but when a missionary comes home, their body is just naturally supposed to break back into stud mode, right?? I'm sending out a call for help on this one (On top of being overly skinny, my body hasn't seen the sun in years, so I'm super pale to boot, though I don't think I'm quite as white as this guy. Though that may just be denial talking...). Now, I don't want people telling me, "Oh, I wish I had your problem..." or, "Well, just eat a gallon of ice cream every day, that'll do the trick". I've heard enough of that kind of advice for a lifetime. I'm looking for legitimate, practical suggestions as to how I can add lots of calories to my daily intake. Here are my main challenges:

1) I'm on a kind of tight budget.

2) I don't have a lot of time to prepare stuff, and even when I do have the time, I'm usually exhausted or feeling like I deserve some lazy time, or I simply lack the motivation to make stuff to eat (especially when the kitchen is super dirty like it often is. So many times, making a meal for myself involves deep cleaning the kitchen before I can stand to work in it, which means that the time investment has now doubled). Also, it usually takes me 15 minutes to run home to make food, and I know that if I DO run home, I'll waste all kinds of time cleaning stuff or watching dumb videos online or checking my facebook for too long, yada yada yada... so sometimes, home is a total killer to my days' productivity.

3) I quickly tire of eating the same things (PB&J, other sandwiches, quesadillas, scrambled eggs etc.) and so sometimes I'll decide to make something, only to realize it doesn't really sound that good, and therefore it's not worth the effort even though I'm hungry.

So, who can solve my problems? Or at least, who can commiserate? I'm always down for some external pity. ;o) But really, if anybody has any suggestions that would address things mentioned above, I'd really owe you big time. I don't think it's an impossible task. I actually like to cook when I feel motivated to do so, and I know how to eat healthily, just having trouble with the application process.

Last Letter Home from the Washington DC South Mission

2009-12-14T12:14:00.001-08:00

Elder Hadfield and Elder Lassen looking in empty refrigerator
Serving in Leesburg, VA the last 11 weeks together..Elder Hadfields' first weeks and Elder Lassen's last weeks of their missions in Washington DC South
(they took this photo a few weeks ago to make thank you cards for members who feed them)

Monday December 14, 2009 – Last letter home.

Hey Everyone,

Wow, its starting to sink in a little bit that I'll really be home by the close of this week. Super weird. These last few days have been, and the next few will also be, very full and very good. I haven't really become emotional yet, or broken down anywhere, but I have been having more trouble sleeping lately. My mind won't seem to shut off the way it usually does. Thoughts of home, school, friends, decisions to make, future jobs, and many others have been keeping my mind active until at least around midnight for the last week or so. Haha, though, I take it as a good sign that apparently I'm still teaching lots of lessons in my sleep. Elder Hadfield is a pretty light sleeper, and every morning he'll tell me what the topic of last night's gospel lesson was. ;o) So, evidently, I'm still pretty focused huh?

This last week has been, in many ways, my best week ever. We had 2 baptisms on Saturday and then on Sunday we had one more . I've never had this problem before, but I liked it: On sunday night, for the baptism, we wanted to be early but my white pants were still drying from the day before. I felt like a Brazillian missionary for a short second there.

I've loved Leesburg. It's like Else once told me: Just when you start to figure out how to be an effective missionary, they send you home on a plane. I really have seen the Lord do amazing things in this area since I've been here these 11 short weeks. I wish every missionary in the world could have a last week as good as mine has been. I didn't expect the Lord to be so good to me, but I'm grateful that He has been. So here's a sketch of my last week. Check this out:

Fri, Dec. 11:
Picked up a tenor sax at the music store. First time I've played in ages. Felt awesome. Its a new horn, but a really cheap brand that I've never heard of before. Still, it works alright. I still haven't gotten to break it back out yet, so i'm hoping to do that later today. Later that night we taught and went over the baptismal interview questions with the sister to make sure she really wanted to have such an expedited baptismal service. She sounded really confident, so we scheduled her actual interview and then said we'd aim to have the service on Tues. the 15th. We went on a full split that night (I go with one member of the ward, E. Hadfield goes with another) and as a result we got lots of good work done. 3 new investigators, all of whom were member referrals. Awesome.

Sat. Dec. 12:
Baptism of two young people. It went really well, though it started 40 minutes late... whoops. Yeah, we forgot to tell them expressly that they needed to bring a towel and dry underwear to change into... But a lot of their family came to support them, and for a lot of them I think it was their first time in one of our chapels. So to keep them busy while we were all waiting, Bro. Guerrero took them all on a tour of the building, which from the sounds of it went really well. Later we were back at the chapel for the other sister's baptismal interview, and she was certified as being ready for the commitment. Then we headed over to a post-baptism fiesta! Food was great, and we got to have some really good conversations with some of those family members who had come from all over for the baptism. Later that night was our ward Christmas party, which was good, and helped us to coordinate lots of things with some of our members. After all that, we got a haircut from one of the members of the Spanish group who treats missionaries with a free haircut anytime. I was needing one pretty badly. It was kind of poetic really, cause it was to be my last haircut in the mission field, and my companion's first one in the mission field. Just as we were leaving the house, some of the family members (who haven't been active in a long time I guess) came in, and we asked if we could leave a blessing in the home. They all said that that would be nice, so I offered a prayer. By the end, the young mom who had just walked in was teary and her husband said that that was incredible, because she never expressed any sort of emotion. We could tell they were touched. Who knows what will happen now, but maybe something good. Also, this sister, who runs a kind of private salon in her basement, said that ever since she had started cutting missionaries' hair again (which was 10 weeks ago when I came into the area), her business had gone up noticeably. Nice huh? She's got good faith for sure.

Sun. Dec. 13
This was the day of all days. Church was awesome. I was running back and forth between both sacrament meetings (we have one in English in the chapel and one in Spanish in the R.S. Room, although we heard that this won't be the case anymore due to church policy or something) because I was supposed to sing in the Spanish meeting (the trio that Mom sent me, which we ended up translating into Spanish, and it turned out pretty well, except that I got sick and lost my voice two nights before... but it turned out pretty well anyway.), but I was also supposed to confirm one of the youth that was baptized the night before, a member of the church in the English group. Nothing was going according to schedule, so I was seriously going back and forth trying to figure out how to be in two places at once, but finally it worked out. I sang in Spanish with two Laurels from the ward, who both have great voices and were good on a short notice), then ran into English just in time for the confirmation. After church, a short correlation meeting and a quick lunch we headed off to the outlet mall here in Leesburg to try and contact some people. Our numbers were looking pretty good except that we had only made 6 contacts by Sunday morning :-\ when normally we're supposed to be in the 140 neighborhood. So, we rushed to the mall and gave out as many “Joy to the World” cards as we could. After a while of that we were up to 100 contacts for the week, and left just in time for our lesson we had with with the sister being baptized. Now, as I said before, we were planning on holding a baptismal service for her on Tuesday, but Sunday morning we found out that Tuesday wouldn't work because it was the other ward's youth night. So everybody in ward council just sort of looked at each other and Bishop said, “what about tonight?” So there it was... surprise baptism. So we went over to her home, taught a lesson, worked out some details and we were off again. We had a really nice dinner with family who are ward members, and the Sister , who's from the Philippines, even made lumpia (sp?) because I had told her that I liked it so much. It was really nice to have a nice meal on my last sunday. Haha, ironically, just as I'm leaving the mission, meals with active members have been given the ok again. Oh well, such is life. ;o) After dinner, we rushed back to the apartment, grabbed my barely dry baptismal clothes, and headed to the chapel (which conveniently is REALLY close to our apartment) for the express baptismal service. The baptism was nice. Light attendance, but important people were there, including the Spirit. The water heater hadn't worked as well as it should have, so it was a little bit of a cold baptism, which wasn't bad for me, but her body is really sensitive to cold and so it proved a little bit painful for her. Other than that, it was flawless and beautiful.
One thing that caught me by surprise is how many members of the Leesburg ward (including 2 members of the bishopric) turned all teary-eyed or choked up on me when they said goodbye. I really haven't been here that long, and it was just nice to know that 11 weeks in a place is enough time to make a difference. Actually, I think God just sort of forced the emotion into their voice so I'd think they cared about me ;o) I'll take it though. Poor Elder Hadfield has had to fight off a lot of thoughts of home since he's been with me. I try not to bring it up, but other people sure have, and every time they do, its just a painful reminder to him that he still has SOOO long to go.. haha. Oh well. It'll build character.
We were still short on our contacts for the week, and by the time the baptism was over and done with, we only had 15 minutes left in our night, so we rushed over to WalMart and between the two of us talked to 41 more people just as it turned 9:00. That night when I was reporting our week to our district leader, I really felt God had given me the perfect week, and I kept having to recheck things just to make sure I wasn't reporting false information. But sure enough, it all had happened.

Mon. Dec. 14 (today)
Pday has been good so far, but I feel like I've got tons to do still to get ready for this week. Tonight we're having a musical FHE at some members' home for members and non-members and I need to practice what I'm going to be doing. Still not sure what that is either... oh well. Should be fun. We're thinking around 12 planned performances, a couple of sing-a-longs, and also some chime-playing pieces will all happen, and that about 50 or 60 or so people will be there... Hope it works out space-wise.

Tues. Dec. 15 (tomorrow)
I've gotta run out to McLean for an appointment in the morning, then we've got like 6 appointments later. We'll probably have to go on full-splits again to cover it all.

Wed. Dec. 16
Mission-wide christmas conference at the Capitol building. I'll be playing sax there. Wish me luck. This'll be one of the bigger deals I've ever played now that I know its going to be in the Capitol and in front of some of the congressmen.

Thurs. Dec. 17
I'll be heading to the mission home with all of my luggage for my departing interview with President Albright. Later we'll all head to the Temple for a session, then have dinner in the mission home and then have our departing fireside at the Fairfax chapel at 7.

Fri.
Fly home... yikes.

What a week huh? Goodness. Pray for me. Pray that I'll get some sleep and that I'll do everything that I'm supposed to accomplish here before I leave. That's the tough part. How do I spend my time now that its so preciously short?

Well, I wasn't going to be this detailed, but I'm writing all of this as much for my sake as I am for all of you at home. I haven't had much time to write in my journal lately, so I figured I'd better record this stuff somewhere. I'm excited to see all of you at home, and I feel very grateful to have been so lucky as to serve here in the greatest mission in the world (there, I said it. ;o) I'll talk to you all pretty soon I guess. Until then,

With Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

Service Hours and Zone Activities Halloween Weekend

2009-11-02T21:45:00.000-08:00

Giving service in building a barn

Giving service

Elder Lassen

Elder Lassen and Elder Yazzie

Leaf-raking service is back in style. And this tree looked amazing, so I thought I'd share

New eye glasses for Elder Lassen...what do you think?

Zone Activity for Halloween

Barbeque with Zone

Well, We've had two zone activties lately, and that's been fun.

First there was Halloween where as a zone we scarfed down on pizza together and then watched "Kung Foo Panda" which was a really fun movie for a bunch of missionaries. I'm not sure how much I'd love it under different circumstances, but everybody laughed plenty of times by the end of the movie.

Then today the whole zone went over to our Ward Mission Leader's home for a BBQ. He has this gnarly-sized grill that he made himself and everything tasted great. (See the pics) This weekend we've got a couple of fun events happening. First of all, Kieth's getting baptized on Saturday, and that's going to be awesome. Then on Saturday night, we're holding a "Music Appreciation Night" at a member's house, where there'll be lots of good, live music, and food, and socializing. Hopefully it'll be a good opportunity for members to feel comfortable bringing their friends to meet other members of the church. Wish us luck for both of those and keep Kieth in your prayers.

P-day with Elder Yazzie into DC and Halloween

2009-10-27T21:30:00.000-07:00

2009 Halloween Jack-o-lantern from the missionfield

Metro ride into DC

Biking to Metro and then into DC

Elder Yazzie and Elder Lassen on recent P-day into DC

Yesterday's PDay wiped us out! We decided to take a little adventure, but first you need some backstory. This is, as you know, Elder Yazzie's last transfer on the mission, so he wanted to take one more DC trip. So right at the start of the transfer we put the request in, and then kind of forgot about it. We never heard back from the Assistants if it was approved or not, so we just decided that it probably wasn't going to be approved. Well, Sunday night, right around 8:00 pm, we get a call from our zone leaders telling us that the trip to go the next day on the condition that we have a member ride, cause we can't drive our car out of the zone to the nearest metro station (which is in Vienna), and we definitely can't drive our car out of the mission. So we scrambled and tried to find a ride, but given the late notice, no-one, it seemed, could take us. Well, about 10:15pm I got it into my head that we could ride our bikes to Vienna, then hop onto the Metro and get the rest of the way there on our own. I got out a map and found the bike trail which leads all the way there and figured out that it was about 13 miles from the edge of the Ashburn zone to the Vienna Metro Station.

I sort of had to convince Elder Yazzie that this was going to be fun, and the next morning we set out. It actually was a beautiful ride. The trail is paved and its surrounded by trees that are changing color right now. So I had a great time of it, but Elder Yazzie wasn't as enthusiastic. He was a pretty good sport about it in the end though. We got to Vienna, stopped real quick at Nielsen's Frozen Custard (An LDS-owned, amazing shop where they treat missionaries really nicely) for a treat, then hopped on a train with our bikes (you can take your bikes on the trains during the non-rush-hour parts of the day) and got into DC.

We went to the National Museum of American History where among other things the original ruby-red shoes from Wizard of Oz are kept, and then the the National Museum of the American Indian which is a beautiful museum, both inside and out, and was especially meaningful for Elder Yazzie who is full-blooded Navajo ?

We snapped a picture in front of the Capitol Building and then took the Metro back to Falls Church where we had our Ward Mission Leader pick us up since he was nearby and he owns a big truck for the bikes. It was a great trip and I feel pretty accomplished that we got all the way from Leesburg to DC using nothing more than our bikes and a SmartTrip Card (that's the card to get onto the Metro).

All-in-All the whole trip cost us less than 5 bucks each. Not too shabby huh? Haha, but like I said, we were exhausted by the end of it all. Good memories though. Last night we went over to Kieth and Joy's house and had FHE with them and with the Darrington's.

So FHE consisted of Dinner, a short, halloween-themed scriptural message (hard to do, but we managed ;o) and carving pumpkins. It was lots of fun and made me miss Halloween at home a little less. I was really grateful for that, cause I love Halloween at our house. Its probably my 3rd favorite holiday.

Well, I've gotta get running, but I love you all, and hope you all have a splendidly scary Holloween!

Spookily yours,

Elder Steffen Lassen

Elder Lassen meets Apostle Richard G. Scott and Elder J.E. Jensen while going to DC Visitors Center

2009-10-14T13:56:00.000-07:00

October 13, 2009

Elder Yazzie and Elder Lassen with investigators where they met Elder Richard G. Scott and Elder Jensen (no picture with them)

Elder Lassen and Elder Yazzie with investigators at DC Visitors Center

Elder Lassen with Lael Cox . Steffen says he is a good, good friend as he has worked with him for over a year in the Alexandria wards and he's the best member missionary ever!
Elder Lassen trying a coat at nearby outlet stores

All Elder Lassen's "stuff" as he prepares to pack and leave Alexandria for his transfer!

Hey Family and Friends,

Ok, so I just have time to tell a couple of stories.

First of all, my Spanish is coming along nicely. I just got out of an hour-and-a-half lesson where I handled 5 adult investigators at the same time by myself, none of whom spoke English. All I have to say is thank goodness for Spanish pamphlets and videos... :o)

We were going to have a member come with us, but she had to cancel last-minute. We have a couple of really good investigators right now. First is Kieth, who I mentioned when I sent you his picture. Then there's Jamie, who you also know a little about now. Then there's Roberto, who's our best Spanish investigator, but luckily he speaks really decent English. He's from Mexico City, and he's super sincere, and really fun to teach. He's got a good sense of humor also, and owing to many family problems, he's humble and down to earth. He's almost 60 years old I think, and unfortunately he and his wife have serious marital problems. He's a super good dad though, and he even had his two young kids (I want to say they're like 8 and 9 yrs. old) sit through 2 sessions of General Conference! Wow! That's dedication! We taught him the Plan of Salvation and invited him to be baptized this morning. He wouldn't commit to a date, but its definitely on his mind. During the lesson he mentioned that he used to ride bulls and work on a ranch and trick roping, so after the lesson he broke a rope out of the back of his truck and showed us some of his skills. He's pretty good!

Another fun story: While we were at the Temple visitor's center with Jamie and Ricardo, guess who popped in for a visit! Just someone named Elder Richard G. Scott.... Haha, Elder Yazzie asked Elder J.E. Jensen (who it seemed was one of his traveling companions) if we could take a picture with them, but Elder Jensen said that they try to avoid that kind of thing as a rule. So you just have to take my word for it. It was really great though for Jamie, our investigator to get to meet an Apostle. We all got to say hello to them and shake their hands. Of course she didn't know who he was, but she could tell he was important the way everyone reacted as he walked into the visitor's center. It was a good way to teach the organization of the church on the way home.
Mom, I've felt very close to your Mom and Dad lately because of two people I've run into now in the last week. The first is this Senior set of missionaries who work at the Visitor's Center. Their last name is Clark. (probably Leon and Peggy Clark from Ojai). They said they knew you and your parents well. They think you might have even been the one who told them of their passing. They told me a couple of good stories and paid great tribute to both of your parents.

The next person I ran into was a woman named Carolynn. I don't remember her Maiden name but as soon as she knew that I was from Ventura County she said "Oh Lassen's Health Food?" and that was fun. But what she didn't know is that the Beecroft family was linked at all with the Lassen family. She sort of off-handedly remarked on how she always hung out at the Beecroft home, and I was like, "do you know that my mom is a Beecroft?" She couldn't believe it! She said that she practically lived at your parents house as a young adult. She said that a lot of people did. She's a few years younger than you but she says that she hung out with Pam a lot and knew Lisa pretty well too. She's a good, good woman, and I know you'd like her a lot. She said she was going to get in touch with you soon. Maybe she's done that already.

Well, I've gotta run, but tell Mette that I'm happy for her good experiences that she's having, and I'm a little jealous. I go abroad to change diapers (he's referring to his service in Ecuador at the orphanages) and she goes abroad to have the red carpet rolled out for her for a couple months... haha, just playing, I wouldn't trade those diaper experiences and all that went with them for anything. (Even a vacation home in Denmark ;o)
Gotta run,
Love, Steffen

P.S. I asked him if he knew his release date yet and he said it is December 18th. I think he senses the urgency to work his hardest here at the end.

Photos from Steffen's Camera Card

2009-10-12T12:26:00.001-07:00

Steffen recently sent home 3 boxes of his belongings and his camera card was inside. I found these, amongst many others, and decided to post them.

He and his companion wore the yellow "helping hands" vests at a humanitarian booth Baptism of Ethan

Steffen's glasses broke recently and until he gets them replaced, he's doing with his contacts

Touring some DC sights on Pday

Study Time with companion

Transfer from Alexandria to Ashburn brought a change from being an English Elder to a Spanish speaking Elder.

2009-09-30T14:57:00.000-07:00

30 September 2009
Dear Family and Friends,
I can’t believe another transfer has come and gone, but such is the mission I suppose. Without further ado, here’s the news. I’ve spent 54 weeks of my mission in my beloved Alexandria (not straight through, but total time is that), but the Lord has finally decided to give those poor people at the King Street Metro station a break from Elder Lassen. Alexandria will always be a sacred city in a way to me. Starting tomorrow I’m a Spanish-speaking missionary! (only catch, I have an English companion…) Here’s how it’ll work. This is a piece of an email I just wrote to my mom.
Well, I'm getting transferred to a new zone called Ashburn, and specifically I'll be in the Leesburg ward. There are a couple interesting twists to this assignment though. Firstly, I'll officially be a Spanish-speaking missionary for the next 2 transfers. The Ashburn stake doesn't have a full-fledged Spanish ward or even a branch, so it’s just a Spanish group within the Leesburg English ward. Another twist to this is that my companion, Elder Yazzie (who I'm killing, or in other words, he's on his last transfer) is not a Spanish Elder. So essentially, when we find a Spanish investigator, I'll teach him or her by myself, and Elder Yazzie will patiently listen (or zone out maybe). Also, I'll go to Spanish gospel principles and to Spanish priesthood while my companion goes to the English side of things. This should be a really, really interesting two transfers there. (I'm almost positive I'll spend two[which will be my last two] there since Elder Yazzie goes home in 6 weeks). So I'm part of the only zebra companionship in the mission. I've served around Elder Yazzie a lot in the past. He was actually my district leader for 6 weeks when I was serving in Burke a year and some change ago. He's a good guy, and a capable missionary.

Big changes, big changes! I feel so grateful to have had all the time here that I’ve had. The members in Alexandria are incredible and want so much to live good lives and to share the gospel light with others. Here are a couple of events I want to share.
1. After not having any visitors come to church at our invitation for the last 2 transfers, finally, a sister came with us this last Sunday. (fyi, she in someone who’s door we knocked on a few weeks ago, and who’s been really kind to us ever since. She’s given us stamps, herbal tea for my throat when I was sick, and she’s feeding us dinner tonight. Awesome woman.) I hope and pray she had a positive experience. She’s already friends with a member family in the ward who live in her neighborhood, so they brought her and she seemed happy to be there.
2. On that same day, but later that afternoon, a part-member family had us over for dinner, where the wife (who isn’t a member of the church but who’s been coming steadily with her husband for over 2 years now) told us she wants to take the lessons since they’re having a baby in a few months. (I’ve been trying SO hard to meet with them, ever since I got into this ward, so this was a little miracle).
3. Later, that SAME day, one of our friends came to a fireside in which I was performing on the guitar (I would have been singing too, but I lost my voice to a cold a couple days ealier), and this was significant and meaningful to me because he hasn’t stepped inside a church of ours in almost a decade, and he swore to himself that he never would again. Its especially significant because he was spending part of his Yom Kippur there with us (which holiday he still holds very sacred it seems). The fireside was a good one, and I did alright on the guitar. Needless to say, Sunday was an awesome day.
4. The next day, Monday, one of our members had an event in her neighborhood which I thought was a really creative way to get to know her neighbors better. She invited them all over for a music appreciation night, and had 11 or so people perform songs. Some of them were kids, some were almost professional, and 2 were missionaries (myself and Sister Murray, who serves in Colonial 2nd ward). Around 40 people, many members and non-members alike, came to the event and it went spendidly. I got to talk to a man and when he found out that I was from Southern California he asked me for specifics. I told him where I was from, and he began naming off all of the beaches he’d surfed there in Ventura County. It was awesome, cause we’d surfed a lot of the same places. Then, on a whim I asked him if he was ever into the health food scene while he was out there and his wife replied that he was actually a raw vegan, so yes, of course he was. I ran the name “Lassen’s Natural Foods and Vitamins” by him and he grinned and said that he’d been there tons of times! He even knew who Gypsy Boots was! Haha, I almost died. It was fun to get to be so close to home in a way for a second. I said that they should have dinner with the missionaries in the future over at this member's house and they all agreed that that would be great. I’m so glad I got to make that connection before I left the area.
5. Then, just this morning, we went to drop off a Book of Mormon to a man who said that we should do so at such-and-such time. So we went by the address only to find that it was an apartment complex, but he hadn’t given us an apt. number. So while we were pondering what we should do about it a woman walked into the building and we struck up a conversation about Christ with her. Being a wonderful Christian, she said, “anytime somebody comes in the name of Christ, I’m ready, come on in”. She’s from Sierra Leone, and after we taught her a brief lesson, she agreed to have the missionaries back in the future. It was a reinforcement to me of the lesson that sometimes the people we intend to share the gospel with lead us to those who we’re really supposed to share the gospel with, and if we’re not open to that idea, we might miss the golden opportunities we seek.
Well, those are just some things I wanted to share with you all. I can’t believe I’ve found myself very much in the home stretch of my mission, but I knew I’d get here sometime. Now with this new, challenging assignment I’m ready to finish strong. Thanks for all the prayers and thoughts in my behalf. I hope you all are well, and please keep me updated on things that transpire in your lives.
Much Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Thank you for all the Birthday Wishes Everyone!

2009-09-15T08:41:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,
Hello! Thank you everyone for the fantastic birthday well-wishes! I had a nice birthday. Nothing too exciting, but nice all the same. Somehow (a young couple who recently got married) found out that it was my birthday and so they had a cake that they just handed me at church. It was a really good chocolate marble cake. We also happened to have 2 good meals scheduled yesterday, so I took the cake to one of those appointments. It was nice to get to share it with some members.
The (Yellow Helping Hands) vests were a hit at the Emergency Preparedness fair that we helped out at, so thanks. That package got to me really fast. I think I had it on Thursday actually. The oreos! Haha, good call on that one. How did you know? ;o) Now all I need is 3 gallons of milk for all of them and I’ll be set ;o)
Also, to all of you who sent cards/wrote emails, I wish I could reply to all of you, but I just don’t have much time right now. Thank you though. I saved all the cards that I got early and opened them all together on Sunday before church. 23 is old… I can already feel my body reacting to it. On Sunday my lower back hurt, and today my hip joint hurts! What the heck? Did my warrantee just expire?
We’re still trying to boost our teaching pool right now, so I’m trying to think of a good story to tell you all quickly from the week. Well, I went on an exchange in Belle Haven last week and got to teach some of THEIR investigators… ;o) haha, actually, it really was awesome. They have this investigator who’s an ironman triathlete. Unfortunately he has ADD and reading the Book of Mormon is really hard for him, but we made all these awesome parallels between physical fitness and spiritual fitness and it was really great to see this smile just come to his face as we taught him. Those moments where the light really turns on and suddenly a gospel truth makes sense to a person are what makes missionary work so worth doing.
Gotta run, but I love you all!
Elder Steffen Lassen

Mt. Vernon and Annondale Zone Conference

2009-09-13T20:11:00.000-07:00

Elder Geary and Elder Lassen

Fall is arriving in Northern Virginia....missionaries caught in the rain on their bikes!

2009-09-08T09:37:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,
On Sunday we got to have a great meal with the Brady’s in our ward. They made homemade calzones which were fantastic. It was also really fun because they have two little kids (a 3 year-old girl and a 2 year-old son), and it happened to be their son’s birthday. It was lots of fun to get to help celebrate with them. They gave him a HUGE piece of cake and took off all his clothes except his diaper and just let him dig in. They were both really cute kids. I even got to entertain them for a little while while Brother and Sister Brady got dinner ready (we were able to eat over there because it was before 5pm which is one of our meal stipulations). Brother Brady got out his guitar and I played them songs from the children’s songbook, and also read to them from Curious George which was really enjoyable. We found a new part-member family we hope to work with soon. They let us in last night and we invited ourselves back for dinner. Hopefully they take us up on the offer. The work’s a little slow right now, so we’ve been tracting a lot, which is fine, but teaching is always better.
Summer is officially over here in Virginia it feels like. Yesterday was the last day for all pools in Northern Virginia to be open, and today its cold, cloudy, and gloomy and I’m even wearing a sweater! Wow, its been a while. Yesterday we totally got caught in the rain on our bikes and got very soaked. But it was sort of one of those quintessential mission moments, and I just laughed, and when people in their cars looked at us like we were crazy, or maybe some of them felt sorry for us, I just tried to smile and nod their way to let them know we love what we do. We sought some refuge at Ethan and Laquinta’s home, and she let us in, but it seemed like she’d been having a hard day (or maybe a hard couple of days). They missed church on Sunday because everyone was sick I guess, and that’s never fun with 3 kids and a husband gone at work. I shared with her the scripture that mom sent me on a nice piece of paper that I could hang on my wall. It was D&C 123:17. I shared with her what Joseph Smith had gone through and what he and his companions were still going through as he wrote that section, and tried to encourage her to hang in there. Hopefully it helped. Mom, thanks for sending me that little note. It’s a good scripture to remember often.
Today our whole zone is headed up to the temple to do a session, and I’m hopeful that I’ll come away from that experience with peace and added knowledge as to how to do things better. This will probably be the last time I get to go through this temple other than the trip we take on our way out of the mission.

Love, Steffen

P-Day spent in Washginton DC seeing the sights!

2009-08-20T16:59:00.000-07:00

Enjoying Alexandria 1st Ward with Elder Hill

2009-08-13T13:15:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

Thanks so much for all the letters and prayers and other forms of support. Things in Alexandria 1st are great. I love this ward. It feels like I get to see what life is like for many of my brothers and sisters and close friends because we have so many young married couples in the ward. Most are in law school (we have several to choose from in this area), and some neighborhoods in Alexandria are a very eclectic mix of peoples. We have this one neighborhood that’s a fun mix of BYU’s Wymount apartment complex and Little El Salvador. So you’re either a young married Mormon couple or you’re from El Salvador. Pretty funny really. The weather is not the most pleasant right now, but I still think Virginia is beautiful. We’re still trying to find that next person/family who’s ready for baptism, but the search is a good one, and many in our teaching pool have good potential.

Today we had a really fun activity at the Mission Home in Burke. At the outset of this transfer we set some goals and if we met those goals then we were going to get to have a BBQ at the mission home with the Albrights. We met the goals, and the lunch today was a lot of fun. It is strange though, cause this is my first time being in the mission home with its new tenants, and because the Albrights are so new and because we don’t know each other well yet, it didn’t feel quite as much like a home for me as much as it used to.

Elder Hill and I are still getting along well coming into what may be our last week together. I’m going to try again to send some pictures with this email, so hopefully it works. Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all.

Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

New Mission President, Transfers, New companion.... but staying in Alexandria 1st

2009-07-08T11:49:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

Thanks again for all of your letters and pictures. They mean a lot ;o) I don’t have too long, but I’m gonna try to fill you in on some things.

First, transfer news! I’m staying in an area finally! Alexandria 1st will still be my home for at least the next six weeks, and I have to say that it’s SOO nice to not have to worry about packing or moving a thing. My main job today will be to clean up after all the packing and last-minute moving is done so that the apartment is ready for 3 new tenants. That’s right, our roommates, (the Colonial 2nd Elders) are getting white-washed (much to their chagrin) and are being replaced in that ward by a set of sisters. A new set of Spanish Elders will be moving into the zone and they will be our roommates. So once again, I’ll have the opportunity to pillage all of the best things from the apartment ;o) My new companion will be Elder Kevin Hill who was actually in my last zone, so I kind of know him already. He’s a good-hearted, humble missionary who’s maybe just a bit shy. You’ll probably laugh when you see the two of us together. He’s tall and gangly like I am, and he wears glasses, but he’s blonde if I remember right. I’m sure people will confuse us for the geek squad, but its ok. If they ask us to fix their computers we’ll teach them about the gospel while we work. Its been one of my biggest weaknesses throughout my mission to talk too much and not yield enough to my companions in teaching and finding, so it’ll be really good practice for me. I’m really excited to be staying in such a good ward, where I can finally feel the effects of a longer term of service in a ward.
We had another great FHE with the family we are teaching, on Monday. They’re not baptized yet, because they haven’t been coming to church much (she has, but not him, and we really want to baptize them both together), even though every weekend we set it all up and they say they’ll be there, something ALWAYS keeps them from coming. The truth is, its hard for everyone to get to church at 8am, but I guess its especially hard when you’re not used to the routine, and when you have work later that day, and when you’ve stayed up too late the night before watching movies or something… ugh.. but don’t worry, the ward loves them tons, and they love the ward, so it’ll happe
Another man we are teaching is doing well. He voluntarily gave up all his cigarettes and tea to us the other day when we taught the full word of wisdom lesson. We’re going to try to get him to come to a fireside tomorrow night.
We also have another investigator who’s a 25 year old, African-American, 4-foot-10 single mother of 3 kids. She’s as good of an investigator as you could ask for as a missionary, and I’ll update you on her as things progress. It was great though cause she asked US if we could get on a regular teaching/reading schedule until she’s baptized. She had a really close friend just join the church, and now she wants to follow suit.
Our new mission president is great! Its definitely weird having a new mission president. He’s all positive energy right now, and in a way its refreshing because he has no bad opinions of any missionary in the field right now. As far as he’s concerned, we’re all perfect soldiers in the Lord’s army. Right now, I’m enjoying how optimistic and energetic and how accessible he is. We had a special conference just to get introduced to him, and then I had an interview with him even.
4th of july was fun. We spent some of it with our friend, the Judge.

Well, I’ve gotta run, but I’ll talk to you all soon!
Love,Elder Steffen Lassen

Great Family Home Evening Experience, visit from Mary, New Mission President

2009-07-03T11:01:00.001-07:00

Elder Periton and Elder Lassen in front of King Street Trolley in Alexandria
Taking Ethan and Laquinta to Washington DC Visitors Center

Dear Family and Friends,

A couple of significant events from the week:

Thurs: We had a great morning stroll and lunch with a less-active member of our ward whom we simply call “Judge”. We call him that cause he hates being called “Brother so-and-so”, and he happens to be a Federal Judge (which I guess is a pretty big deal cause there’s only a couple hundred of them). He’s one of the smartest people I’ve met out here in terms of scholarly knowledge. The breadth of his education spans several fields and disciplines (most especially history, of course), and he loves to educate others. It’s really pretty amazing. It was funny cause he took us out to lunch (I had ribs, which, as an aside, were the best I’ve ever had, and he spent way too much on us, but he insisted ;o), and there were a couple of police officers at a table nearby, and as those officers got up to leave, Judge started up a conversation with them and it came out that he was a federal judge. As soon as the officers knew that, and saw his badge and ID (which Judge was only too happy to show ;o) they immediately scrambled to give him their business cards. Then they became very flattering and kind and then left. You could tell Judge was enjoying himself with this whole scene, and I honestly can’t blame him. It would be sort of fun to have the whole of the United States police force in your pocket, and then to demonstrate that to a couple of wide-eyed missionaries. He’s a good, good man, and I told him that if he ever came out to visit California, that we’d take him sailing to the islands. He said he’d take me up on it someday.

Sun: This is the big one. I got to church on Sunday only to find that we had an unexpected visitor from Missouri! Mary Arnett (formerly Mary Zuback) stood at the entrance to the chapel with a big grin to greet me as we walked into the building. Crazy! She’s here taking care of her older sister who’s about to have a baby, so she’ll be in the area for a week and some change. Its pretty weird knowing that she’s so close by, but don’t worry, I’m not too distracted. She and her sister Sarah are taking us out to eat tonight, so that’ll be pretty nice to catch up. We’ve had some written correspondence, but I haven’t actually spoken with her or seen her since long before she was married. Weird!

Mon: We found a new investigator , and he’s a really good, humble man. He’s trying to quit smoking, and we promised him that God would help him out as he learned more and more truths about God. We invited him to baptism at the beginning of August, and he accepted that invitation. He’s still got a lot to learn and do before he’s ready, but we’ll get him there if he really wants it. It was a pretty awesome experience either way. I was actually on exchanges with a younger missionary that night, and I think it was really good for him to have that experience where, in our first lesson with someone we were able to teach such a good lesson, and make such a bold invitation, and then have it accepted. Love it!

Tues: We had the best FHE over at Ethan and Laquinta's house! It was so much fun and I think it did so much good for both their family, and the couple we brought along and introduced them to. The young married couple we took were just perfect. They clicked well, and were social, they brought the treats (oreo truffles… Mmmm…), they played well with the kids, and as we were leaving they said “If you two ever want some time to yourselves to go on a date, just let us know and we’ll take care of your kids for you”. They really meant it, and Ethan and Laquinta were really touched I think. Now that’s something we missionaries could never do. See how good members can be? ;o) It was definitely one of those highlight nights of my mission. For our lesson we acted out the story of Samuel the Lamanite (their 7-year-old daughter played Samuel on the staircase. She said, “In five years, Christ will come!” and then pointed to her Dad and said “Repent!” after which we all threw paper balls at her, and accurately enough, none of them hit her :o) It was great.). Then for our game we played “hot and cold” using the oreo truffles and hiding them around the room. Everyone involved had such a good night, and I couldn’t ask for more than that out of an FHE.

We officially have a new mission president and mission mom. We’ll meet them tomorrow in a conference and I’m anxious to see how he is.

Well, I think that’s gonna be it from me this week. Love you all!

Love,Elder Steffen Lassen

Wedding and Reception for investigators

2009-06-24T09:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,

This week’s been pretty good. We had our last interview with President Wixom and Sister Wixom (definitely bitter-sweet), (one couple we have been teaching) got married and their baptism has been postponed till July 4th for now. I was so proud of the Alexandria 1st ward for how hard they worked to put together a nice ceremony for them. I don’t think it cost them hardly anything for either the wedding or the reception afterwards. I was amazed to think that that was possible. Think of how good that would feel to have gotten married, had a decent party, and not to have any of the money worries afterwards. We truly have a great, great ward. We are getting to teach, quite a bit actually. Last week we had 8 lessons with investigators. One of them was a young single adult so we passed her over to those elders in my old ward (Colonial 2nd), and some of the others are progressing, and some aren’t, and a couple have dropped their investigation, and the work goes on.
One really good couple we’re teaching is this couple who, while on a layover in Salt Lake, went to Temple Square, and then referred themselves to be taught. They’re a great young, married couple, and they’re trying to decide on how to practice their faith together. They feel pulled to Catholicism, and that’s good, because Catholics are the easiest people to teach about the restoration in my opinion. You can use words like priesthood, or ordained, or apostleship or apostasy and they’ll know exactly what you’re talking about. Most Catholics also know their history fairly well, so the need for the restoration isn’t entirely out of reach in their minds, I think. We’ll see how far they go. They’d definitely fit in our ward in every way, so hopefully we can help get them to church.
I also got to go on an exchange with Elder Lutz the other day. He was my 2nd companion while I was still in the office. Now he’s in my district, and we had a great 24 hours together. He’s a lot of fun, and being around a happy Elder for a day was great.
Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all!

Elder Steffen Lassen

Essay posted here for BYU Application

2009-06-11T15:39:00.000-07:00

Elder Lassen and Elder Perriton tracting in Alexandria, VA

(He loves the beautiful, brick homes in Virginia)

Hey Mom (And Family and Friends when you read this later),

That was a good, long letter you wrote me last night! ;o) I appreciated every part of it though, so thanks.
Thanks for the compliments on the essay. I would love to have others' opinions on it. Send it around to whomever. I appreciate compliments (really, I do ;o), and yet, some constructive criticism would be great, especially since its still too long to send in.

Steffen wrote this draft of an essay for his BYU application that he is working on. He asked me to go ahead and post it on his blog:

Steffen Lassen Essay/Draft
2May 6, 2009
Spiritually Maturing
I just watched a man quickly carry his crying baby from the chapel where this Easter Sunday, my missionary companion and I await the sacramental emblems of Christ’s body and blood. I noted as they passed the look of total distress that plagued this child’s otherwise beautiful face. I also observed the note of genuine anguish in his boyish cry. His plight looked and sounded real; he really was in a state of crisis, no faking here. I imagined the source of such turmoil was a minor offense from some older brother, perhaps even a stolen toy. But amidst these observations, a chord was struck in my heart, and without warning, a conduit of connection had formed between this little boy and me, and suddenly I found myself relating to him on a very intimate level. I was thrust into his proverbial shoes (or booties in this case), and I knew that I was no different than this toddler whom I had never before met.

But why? Why this brilliant arc of connection? After all, over a decade had passed since I last needed to be removed from the chapel for poor behavior, so why was I empathizing with him? Before long, the answer came, accompanied by the familiar feelings of the Spirit, and I knew then that God was teaching me something of great value. Here was a boy who had everything he needed right within his chubby grasp: food, shelter, parental love, educational and spiritual cultivation – all were there in abundance. Yet here he was, reacting to some small disturbance with panic, fear and visible stress. God was teaching me here, that I am no more spiritually mature than this boy is physically so. How many of my basic and non-basic spiritual needs are generously met by a loving spiritual Father? And yet, how often do I see fit to meet that love with panic, fear, and sometimes blatant disobedience, all because of some minor disturbance? Sadly, I am no stranger to spiritual tantrum-throwing.

My task then, is to find out how to spiritually grow up. I know my attendance at BYU will assist me in this. I have faith that both this boy’s earthly parents, and my heavenly parents will patiently ride out the tantrums. I know they’ll administer with love and prudence the sometimes needed discipline. I know I will grow under God’s perfect tutelage, and it is for a closer association to that tutelage that I’m applying to BYU. I pray that this boy will soon learn to sit through church without a single episode of tears, and that I will be able to do the same in the larger-scale, yet strangely similar life tests God offers me.

I love hearing about how well Mette is doing right now. Congratulations Mette on your GPA after Ventura College classes this semester! Goodness, I thought I had a buddy in the family so I wasn't the only one with bad grades, but now you've left me alone... ;o) Its ok, its not a good camp to be in, really.

76 people there at the Beecroft Family reunion huh? Wow, that's a ton. I don't know if I could name everyone, but most people I think I could.

Elder Lassen's extended family on the Beecroft (mother's) side

Photo taken Memorial Weekend at Family Reunion held in Camarillo and Ventura, CA

Yeah, we have been getting tons of storms out here for sure. When it gets really wet we tend to ditch the bikes and hit up the bus system, or use our umbrellas and go around on foot. There's been a few times though where we got caught on our bikes and it just started pouring. Oy... on certain days that can be fun, you know, one of those quintessential missionary experiences, but sometimes, its just one more thing to deal with.

So Hans is in a skateboard class huh? Wow, that's great! Just tell him to be careful, sometimes skaters aren't the most positive influence on a kid. But I actually knocked on a door the other day and a 12 year old boy answered. Normally we don't spend too much time talking to kids cause parents can be pretty protective, but this one I felt ok about. He had his skateboard out front and I asked him about it and if I could try a few tricks. Well, I wasn't amazing, but he said "wow, I've never had someone talk to me about Jesus and skateboarding at the same time! What a role model!" Haha, that made me feel pretty good ;o)

Well, I've actually gotta run, I'm getting kicked off the computers here in a sec, but Elder Perriton and I are doing pretty well. Investigators are on the horizon it seems.
Love you tons!

Love, Steffen

Teaching and Biking in Alexandria

2009-06-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

June 3, 2009
Dear Family and Friends,
How’s the weather there in CA? It’s warming up here, that’s for sure. Riding a bike in the summer is a lot more pleasant in a lot of ways though, then riding in the winter (Granted, its not as hot as it will get I think, but still, its been really nice lately). We do come in all sticky and sweaty, but honestly, I prefer that to having to wear so many layers and being freezing cold all the time.
We have two really good investigators right now here in Alexandria 1st. They’re a couple and we’re going with them to the temple visitor’s center tomorrow morning. It should be a really great trip. They’ve been together for 8 years, and have 3 kids together, but they’re not married yet. However, they’re getting married this month on the 20th in part so they can get baptized! They’ve been investigating for a good long while now, and they’re getting very close. That’ll be amazing to see if it all goes well. They love the church and all the people in it, and they ask tons of good questions. It’s funny how much people trust missionaries sometimes. They’re both African American and in their late 20’s. She stopped smoking about 6 months ago, and ever since then, evidently she’s been steadily putting on weight. So last night we were there and we were reading Alma 34, trying to help them understand the need for the Atonement, and the laws of justice and mercy, and she says out of nowhere, “Ok, I have a question. How do I lose weight? I’ve been steadily gaining weight since I stopped smoking cigarettes 6 months ago, and I’m eating right, and doing Tae-bo twice a day and I can’t lose any of this fat! At one point I used to be skinnier than you!” she said, pointing to me . Haha, I just thought it was so funny, cause where else in the world would you find a twenty-something, heavy, black woman lamenting her weight problems to a kid like me and trusting in his advice? So I told her about “Body for Life” and suggested she read that, and follow its instructions. Our member suggested Weight Watchers because he lost some weight using that, and then we prayed and left. Haha, great lesson huh?
They’re really awesome, and even though they live in the projects , they’re a lot more sincere and dedicated than most of the people we find in places like that.

Elder Perriton and I are doing pretty well together. He’s got a lot of good in him. Also, I've got a great district: 2 other sets of Elders and one set of Hermanas (The spanish sisters, for those of you who 'no habla espanol ;o).

Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all tons.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Transfer again...back to Alexandria and on a bike

2009-05-28T11:03:00.000-07:00

May 27, 2009
Dear Family and Friends,
This week's been an interesting one for sure. There's a big push in the mission right now to clean the mission up really nicely for the new mission president who's coming in on June 30. President Wixom likened it to us getting a house ready for a new family to move into it. He said if we were doing that, we'd clean it, make all necessary repairs, and probably repaint. So in an effort to do that, we took a box around to all of our zone and told them what we were trying to accomplish and said that we wanted them to fill the box up with all of their things that weren't completely obedient. We told them that whatever they put in the box, no matter how bad it was, they wouldn't be hassled for it. We were especially focusing on getting rid of literature and music, but also gave a spiel about phone calls, internet use and some other things we've had some problems with in the zone. Honestly, we ended up being pretty proud of our zone other those couple of days we were doing this clean up thing. We don't think we got everything bad that anybody had, but a lot of missionaries did give up a lot of significant things. It showed their willingness to sacrifice and sustain our new mission president. We ended up with a box full of a couple hundred CD's, a few Qurans, a blowdart gun, a rubix cube, someone's ex girlfriend box (all the old pics they didn't want distracting them anymore ;o) and some other stuff. Good times in the Oakton zone.
Well, I'll just get right to the transfer news, I'm moving again! Wow... The best part, though, is where I'm moving to. Can you guess? Yep, back to Alexandria! This time I'll be in the Alexandria 1st ward. I won't be a zone leader anymore, I'll be a district leader again, and this is a special assignment from President Wixom.
Alex 1 is a bike area, and I'm pretty familiar with the area, because it was Colonial 2nd singles ward took Alex 1 into its boundaries. When I was in the singles ward, we spent a lot of time within this part of Alexandria because a lot of the young single adults live here. It has the more beautiful parts of Alexandria which will be nice, and also, I know a good few ward members there.
I'm very excited about my new location. (A little nervous/anxious about my new assignment, but excited about the area.) Its almost like I went on a little vacation to some other parts of the mission, but now I'm going back home. :o)
I think that's about all I've got time to talk about today, but I love you all, can't wait to hear how things are going there at home.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

My new companion is a Rodeo Star....

2009-04-29T19:10:00.000-07:00

Elder Lassen and new companion, Elder Ross

Hi family,

As far as mission life goes, we had zone conference yesterday and it was one of the best I've been to. Elders Shapiro, MacKay, Tobey, Knechtl, and Sacket performed in a vocal quintet a rendition of Come, Come Ye Saints that was probably in the top 5 musical numbers of my life. It wasn't flawless, but it was REALLY well done (lots of musical talent in that group) and extremely powerful. I think Elder Sacket might have even rearranged some of the parts to make it sound more interesting. Really good! We're teaching a few people right now, but no one who's really very close to baptism and that's weighing on me a bit, but we'll find them.

Elder Ross and I had a FHE in the home of one of our investigating families, and after all the gospel talk was over he pulled out some of his ropes (both full-sized and toy ropes) and gave a demonstration that was way impressive. You can tell he's done this kind of group demo before cause he was a pro at it. He had everyone spinning ropes and trying their hand at it. Then for fun he started roping their 3 dogs. The family got the biggest kick out of that. Fun stuff.

Well, I've gotta run, but thanks for forwarding all those letters.

Love you all tons, can't wait to talk with ya!

Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

First Week in Franklin Ward

2009-04-22T13:37:00.000-07:00

1. My new home in Franklin. We live in the basement, and its a really nice place.

Me and all my stuff the morning of transfers.... do you think its too much? I just hate re buying stuff after every move, so I take it all with me... :o)

Dear Family,

Sounds like you had a good Easter. 40 people!!! You guys are crazy! I'm glad the Elders got to be there for that. A little jealous, but I'm happy for them anyway. I've seen a couple missionary plaques out here for missionaries serving in the Ventura mission, so keep your ears open for any Virginians will ya?
Thanks so much for sending me Joel's letters. (His Cousin Joel just left last week for 10 weeks in Cuenca, Ecuador...working in the orphanages through the OSSO program Steffen did 4 years ago. )

I can't believe he's there! Ahh! I haven't read all of the letters yet, but I got through half of the 1st, and I can't believe he's working with the same kids, in the same places, doing the same things, only 4 years later! ;o) (I'm starting to feel a little old... the new missionaries are getting younger and younger...) I'm so happy for him though. I might send him an email or two.

Regarding my new area and everything: I love it all. The ward is fantastically supportive, and Elder Ross may be the warmest hearted companion I've had. (Mom, yes, I'm still a zone leader) Elder Ross actually has an amazing way of leading. I'm grateful to be his companion.

Franklin ward is a lot like Camarillo I think. Mostly houses, some apartments and town homes. Apparently there is a semi-poor part of our area, but I haven't seen it yet.

Our zone theme this transfer is "Having a Radical Conversion". Radical, it turns out, doesn't just mean 'extreme', but also 'from the roots of something', so we're talking about getting down to the roots of missionary work and making it extreme somehow. When we introduced it, it went pretty well. We're planning on having some 'radical' activities, going to the temple as a zone to help our 'radical conversion' out, and some other things. We'll also probably be making some radical zone tshirts and whatnot. It's gonna be an interesting transfer though for sure, I'll be honest. Fredericksburg was more or less a perfect zone (unless I'm being totally naive), and there wasn't much disobedience, but Oakton, though much smaller, has some work to do, and lots of history. Elder Ross and I have our work cut out for us, and I have a feeling I'll learn a little by fire here in the next couple months. We'll see though. I don't have too much to talk about with investigators, but I think I've babbled on too much already anyway.

Love,
Steffen

I'm being transferred again, up to Oakton area with Elder Ross

2009-04-15T09:39:00.000-07:00

April 15, 2009
Dear Family,
Transfers!!! Well, my tenure in Aquia has officially ended. Sigh… paradise couldn’t last forever I guess. So here’s what’s happening: Elder Shattuck will be staying here and will be getting Elder Gradin who I was roommates with for two transfers back while I was still in the singles ward. He’s a good Elder and I’m sure he and Shattuck will do well together. As for me, I’m headed up to the Oakton zone to be with Elder Jacade Ross. I don’t know too much about him but here’s what I know: he came out one transfer after me, he’s a national rodeo winner (he paid easily for his whole mission off of what he won in team roping at national rodeos or something), so I’m excited to learn even more about rodeos. Isn’t that funny that that’s been so common a thing out here on my mission? I’ve known some good ropers and riders out here. He’s from Morgan, UT, and from what I can tell he’s a good missionary, and generally seems pretty happy all the time. Oh, and he looks oddly like David A. Bednar.

What I know about Oakton: My area will be the Franklin ward, which used to be shared with Sisters a few transfers ago, but not anymore. Oakton is sort of the northwestern part of our mission, and it takes in Vienna which is a pretty great little city, and I think it’s a ton of suburban commuter families, but I might not be totally accurate on that. We’ll see. I’ll be living with a member for the first time, and apparently we live in the basement where we’ll have a microwave, a hot plate and some other small appliances, but no stove or oven :o( Its ok though cause I’m stealing the electric skillet that we have here in Aquia so I can at least fry eggs and stuff when I’m there.
As far as the area here and the investigators: A sister and her son that we are teaching are scheduled for baptism in two weeks (hopefully I’ll get to come back for that), and we had a FANTASTIC lesson last night. Before this its felt like we’re just a couple of uniforms that were teaching her but last night she actually used and remembered our names, she prayed with total meaning, she was happy when she saw us, she asked questions, and it was just great.
There’s also a part-member family that we’ve been working with. The mom is a member who found and read the Book of Mormon in Taiwan when she was twelve cause a missionary told her it was a good story book, and she read the whole thing and really liked it but didn’t know if it was just a story or if it was supposed to be real or not. Then she came here and found the church and joined it. Then she met a man who later became her husband and they have 3 kids, none of whom are baptized but two of whom are old enough. They’re such a good family! We had a good lesson in their home last night and are having weekly FHE with them. Teaching families really is the best thing in the world. I’m going to miss a lot of people here, but I’m excited about Oakton and what that will bring. Wish me luck! Gotta run.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Wasn't Conference Amazing?

2009-04-10T14:19:00.000-07:00

April 8, 2009
Dear Family, Wow, wasn't conference amazing? Mom, I remember last go around with conference, you wanted to hear my thoughts about all the talks, so I hope you don’t mind if I do a little conference review according to Elder Lassen. Unfortunately it’s not very fresh in my mind after a few days, but I remember LOVING so much of it. Elder Holland's was of course incredible. Talk about someone who feasts on the words of Christ huh? I visualize him just opening the scriptures and drinking out of them. His talk was interesting to me, because he didn't council much, or even teach doctrine much. Instead, he just beautifully retold and expounded on the last events of the Lord's mortal life. I remember feeling the Spirit very strongly as he spoke, and the funny thing was, where for every talk up until his I had been scrupulously taking down as many notes as my shoddiest penmanship would allow, when he began to talk, I just wanted to listen. I didn’t make a mark on my paper throughout his talk. It was definitely a different kind of address than most made during conference.
Another that I loved was Elder Christofferson’s talk. He sure seems comfortable as an Apostle, huh? :o) I’ve been fascinated now for a while with the idea that covenants provide needed power for us throughout our lives, but I haven’t had the chance yet to research it much, so I was grateful for the fodder for thought and study he provided in his talk. I definitely want to attend the Temple as much as possible now too. I can’t wait until the next time I get to go, which will hopefully be next transfer.
The talk that Robert D. Hales gave really impressed me, because it was the first talk from him where I remember listening very intently and connecting well with what he said. (I’ll be honest, some of the older apostles make me sleepy still…) He made me think a lot about the expenditures we make in this life, be they spiritual expenditures (sin) or temporal ones (money). He made me visualize my spirituality almost like a bank account, where the day-to-day tasks of life cause us to withdraw constantly from our spiritual funds, which is ok if we are regularly depositing money. As soon as we decide to commit sin, its like indulging in an unplanned for purchase which quickly depletes what we’ve saved up (like me buying a new pair of titanium designer frames from Denmark right before my mission for instance ;o) The parallel he drew between consumer debt and addiction was very compelling to me.
Elder Cook’s talk on the Plan of Salvation was chalk-full of power statements that I really want to use whenever I teach that lesson now. He was amazing!
My vote for “Best 70 talk” (or Best Talk Given by a Member of the 70) would go to Elder Pearson. His discourse on faith and the inclusion of the 6 Destructive D’s was very insightful. I like how he described both faith and doubt as being choices, and how just as faith can be enticing, so can doubt be. I think many who begin to doubt their testimonies think of themselves as helpless victims who are just suddenly overcome with this spiritual monster who, to their dismay just comes along and gobbles up their testimony. But in reality, when we doubt, it’s because we want to. We choose to, and we give in to the enticement of doubt. It’s easy to forget that there lives within each of us a very natural man who would love for all of these things of God to simply not be true, so that it could take over and have free rein.
Anyway, I hope this all comes across as me just sharing my insights, and not preaching. I’m not trying to preach to anyone, but it helps me personally when I get to write all of these kinds of thoughts out. They’re better formatted for my brain and more committed to memory, and hopefully they apply to someone else too, who might be reading.
Well, that’s my review. Hope you liked it. And, that’s mostly what I have to report from the week to be honest. Investigators are coming along, but nothing major to report just yet. The ward is full of good people, and I love being here. I’m not sure what’ll happen next week at transfer time, but no matter what, I know I’ll be in a place that’s good for me. I haven’t been disappointed with a single assignment yet, so I’ve determined it doesn’t really matter where I go.
On Monday night Elder Shattuck and I made the hour-and-change trek up to Burke for zone leader council which would be held in the mission home on Tuesday from 9am to 1pm. Because we live further away than anyone else we drove up the night before to avoid the massive south-to-north migration that happens every morning with workers headed towards DC. We actually spent the night with the assistants and the office elders in my old apartment, so that was a fun evening of nostalgia. I can’t believe it was a year ago that I was there as an office elder. The trees look just like they did when I was serving there: pink, white, purple and blooming like crazy.
To help all the zone leaders wake up (or at least that’s the semi-lame reason I was told), they all go to the fairfax chapel and play basketball starting at 5:30am. Elder Shattuck was proud of me, cause I actually played even though I’m not much of a baller usually. I had fun cause it was a friendly bunch of games that were played. Zone leader council was a good meeting; very spiritual. We talked a lot about how to prepare the mission and missionaries to get our “New Mom and Dad” come July (the Wixom’s mission call ends then, so we’ll be getting President Albright from Las Vegas).
Anyway, Aquia’s good, I’m well, and the Gospel is true, or, as Elder Gray used to say, “the gospel’s true and the book is blue”. Gotta run.
Love you all. Mom and Dad, I got your Easter Package! Thanks so much! I really love those scotchmallow and butter eggs. Wow. So kind of you. The office staff saw that it was a box from See’s and got very jealous. :o)I’m glad you had what sounds like a great trip to Utah. Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen
P.S. Elder Shattuck cut my hair this morning and its maybe the shortest its been on my mission…. A little hard to part and sticking straight up everywhere… oh well! :o) (The price was right) Maybe I’ll send you a picture soon.

Went to Marine Museum Today on P-day

2009-04-03T11:17:00.000-07:00

Part of the Vietnam exhibit. This has to be the gnarliest tank I've ever seen.
Elder Shattuck and I in front of the museum. The shape of the building represents the iconic photo of the flag being raised on Iwo Jima.

Hey Family,
Thanks for the letters!
Mom, I got one from you today which had the ward newsletter, a letter from sis. morris ;o) Thanks so much! I'm breathing again (financially) now that its the start of a new month ;o)
Well, things in Aquia are moving along. We had SOO many appointments last week, and found so many new people to work with. I think I told you about this little Marine family we found tracting right? They're so good and ready to learn, and they want to learn together! Awesome! Teaching a family is so much better than teaching people on their own. Not that teaching single people isn't vital, and fantastic, but families who are ready to learn are where its at. There are also some part members who may hold some potential for baptism. We'll see. I'll give more details when people start getting close to baptism. Unfortunately I'm really short on time today cause of the trip to the museum, but it was a great museum. I'll send some pics, and I got a couple short videos that you'll see when I send the card home.
Mom, you asked about the zone. In our mission we have 8 zones, and ours is the biggest with 12 companionships. And yes, the whole zone came. It was powerful and very patriotically inspiring. The Vietnam war exhibit was really amazing. You enter it through the back of a helicopter, and the air gets all warm and humid, and it totally puts you right into the action. I was thinking about Dad a lot.
Have fun at conference!! And Hans, good job on sharing the gospel! You'll learn when and where is best, but whatever you do, don't stop looking for those opportunities! Mette, congrats on a sweet granny mobile! I hope I can find a good low miles car like that when I get home. Talk to you all soon!
Love,
Steffen

A wonderful baptism and power of the Members

2009-03-25T13:26:00.000-07:00

Susie's Baptism

Well... its' just one of those things you see down here in the 'burg ('burg stands for Fredericksburg, VA ...very country compared to big city most of mission......) ;o) Why WOULDN'T you have a giant rooster on your lawn??? (The thing's almost as big as the house!)

Dear Family and Friends

The Aquia area is still doing great. We had the baptism of Susie Dodson on Saturday and it was a great service. She was worried about the actual baptism itself because of her bad joints and back and shoulders and legs etc, but it went flawlessly. Our ward mission leader, baptized her while Elder Shattuck assisted. She had 14 family members there who weren’t members, and the Spirit was very strong, and they all felt it. Baptisms are SUCH good things to bring non-members to. (At least, if the missionaries and the ward are doing things right, they CAN be). We asked a few people to bear their testimonies about the principles in Lesson 1 of PMG during the interim period where Susie was getting changed, and while a couple testimonies went a little long, it was a fantastic point in the baptism.

Last night we taught a lesson in the home of a man who’s a Calvinist, which is doctrine I have a hard time wrapping my head around. I’ve been in his home 3 times, and Elder Shattuck was away on an exchange the first 2, so last night was the first time he’s met him. We also had our Elders Quorum president there, who turned out to be a perfect exchange to bring along. He is pretty familiar with the Calvinist doctrine (which includes predestination, total lack of agency, God chooses who He wants to save and no one else can ever do anything about it, and if you are chosen to be saved then no works or anything you do –e.g. baptism – will do anything good for you). Anyway, we watched Pres. Monson’s segments in Special Witnesses of Christ and then the member bore his amazingly powerful testimony of the reality of the claims behind the Book of Mormon, and of the truthfulness of the church. Members humble me so often. I love how powerful and charged a member’s testimony is when they come out to teach with us. That’s why its so important for them to be there. As for myself, I know my testimony is there and its solid, but I think sometimes because I bear it so often that it doesn’t come out as powerfully as when a member, who’s testimony has just been aching to be born suddenly finds himself presented with that opportunity while teaching with us. I love it.

We have a couple other promising investigators too, and I’ll tell you about them little by little. One of the others works as security on the house floor for the House of Representatives. So basically if a member of the house tries to get on the floor when they’re not supposed to be there, he’s the guy that tells them to get lost apparently. Anyway, he wants to take us up to the Capitol and have a lesson with one of the LDS members of congress sometime. Wouldn’t that be great? I hope it happens. He said he loves and wants so badly to have the aura/glow he sees in certain members of the church. I told him to read Alma 5 where it talks about receiving Christ’s image in your countenance, and some other scriptures related to that concept. Hopefully something in there speaks to him.
Well, I’ve gotta run. Hope you’re all well.
Love you all.
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

Loving New Area in Stafford, VA

2009-03-18T22:42:00.001-07:00

Elder Shattuck (new companion in Stafford, VA)

all dressed up and ready to play basketball on P-day

1. I've become a bit of a cowboy on my mission actually (Mary would be SO proud ;o), and am learning lots about team roping and other stuff. Here's our toy calf, and me going for the horns ;o)

2.This is one of your first looks at Elder Shattuck, which he may or may not appreciate... ;o) This is on our way to Lori's baptism the other week, and he totally zonked out in the back seat of a member's car. Meanwhile I had a good time talking to Brother Brown about his plectrum 4 string banjo that he plays and records with all the time. Fun stuff.

3. Welcome to the country huh? I've never actually seen one of these before, but I had to take a picture of it. Its pretty close to one of the members we were visiting yesterday.

Hello family and everyone:

I don't have too much time to write today, but you asked me to tell you more about the area and people I'm teaching and what-not so I'll do a little bit of that. We had a good zone portion on monday (zone portion is a weekly part of district meetings which we have every monday. The whole zone shows up at the church at 9am, at which time we have what's called our Pre-game meeting for 30 mins as a zone. Then we break off into district meetings where the three districts in our zone meet for a 90 minute meeting under the direction of their district leader, then we all come back for our 30 minute zone portion meeting. So each week we have to figure out what the zone needs to do better at, then focus those two meetings, pre game and zone portion, around those needed improvements). We had each district prepare a musical number together, then perform it for the zone. We prefaced it by reading from the first presidency message in the hymnbook and talking about how music unifies us as a church etc, and then talked about the principle of dissonance and how composers take two notes that by themselves don't sound good at all, but using those in the midst of a chord, and using the right chord progression, this dissonance makes for much better music. We related it to how God can take two people, or multiple people in our zone and stick them together, and how those two people might not sound so pretty in and of themselves, but when we let God in, and when there's progression and movement and resolution, the music would be better than it would have had that dissonance not been there. The spirit was pretty strong, and that's a great feeling of course. We've got a baptism happening this saturday! This good sister is ready to go, and we're pretty excited of course. I'll be sure to send pictures. (the relief society president, and her husband are taking really good care of this sister. In fact, she has some really bad shoulders, and they are worried that she might not be able to get into a jump suit for her baptism very easily, so she offered to sew her a mumu type baptismal outfit. She's got to be one of the most thoughtful people I know. She even made us Corned Beef and Hash and Cabbage for St. Patricks day and dropped it off for us. It was delicious for sure.

Gotta go!

Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

Transferred to Stafford, VA..."Lord, how is it done?"

2009-03-11T22:23:00.000-07:00

Elder Lassen and Elder Tobey at Lori's baptism in Falls Church

Elder Marchant, Lassen and Gray

Dear Everyone,

Hello from Stafford, VA! (The ward is called Aquia, but the city is called Stafford) Wow, things are different down here! Where to start? Well, before I tell you about where I am, I'll tell you the best thing that happened this week. A (very special lady) that we taught was baptized and confirmed on Sunday! It took place at the Falls Church chapel, and I got to go! She asked that I perform a musical number, so I played and sang "Come Thou Fount" on the guitar. It started out a little poorly cause I forgot some of the words in the first verse, but I covered it all right and kept playing. The spirit was there I was told by others, and that's the important part right?

Aquia is quickly becoming my favorite area so far. I can't believe how great this place is. "Let me eslpain. No, that take too much time, let me sum up". I'll try to get the highlights in here.

This is the most missionary-minded ward I've ever seen. Not only do they love and treat well the full-time missionaries, but they do missionary work!!! YES!!! We got into our new apartment (remember, Elder Shattuck and I are both new to the area, so we know nothing and no one), to find that its a beautiful new apartment, never been inhabited by missionaries before. In a lot of ways, that's a VERY good thing. It was clean; it’s roomy (only Elder Shattuck and I live here. Two bedroom, two bath, two walk-in closets... awesome!), and the amenities here are like when I lived in Huntington Gateway. We even have this cyber café where I sit typing you my letter drinking hot cocoa that costs nothing and is made by this AMAZING little machine. I might make a video of it later ;o) The one con about living in a new apartment is that we walked in to find that the mission had furnished it. Problem: the mission has a VERY limited supply of furniture. We had two beds (if I was a whiner, which I’m not, I might say they are the worst beds I’ve ever slept on. Good thing I don’t complain ever huh? ;o), a handful of plates and silverware, a sofa, 2 desks, a dilapidated kitchen table (no chairs), and that’s it. Nary a skillet, floor lamp, or shower curtain in sight. As an aside, the first morning I couldn’t figure out how to cook the eggs I had bought the night before, but I got creative and found a way. Did you know that if you butter a plate, pour scrambled eggs onto it, then use the broiler in the oven you get a nice little egg dish after a few minutes? Haha, it was awesome. I was afraid the plate would crack, but it didn’t! So, wondering how we were going to furnish this place to be inhabitable we made a list of things we needed, then called the mission to see if they would reimburse us if we purchased things like chairs, kitchen stuff etc. The housing coordinator told us to ask the ward first, and then check back with him. Well, we won’t be needing anything from our mission anymore, thanks to our wonderful ward. We made a trip over to the Relief Society President’s home and met Sister Stewart (names have been changed) and her husband. We got to know them, showed them our list and asked if there was anything the ward could help out with. After looking it over they said, in essence, “Well, some of this stuff we won’t be able to get tonight (it was already 8:45), but come down into the basement. We’ll give you what we can right now, and then send an email out for the rest of the things on here. They sent us home with two boxes of supplies and groceries from their food storage (which I’ll say was very impressive), and over the next few days we came home to find all sorts of things that people from the ward had donated just sitting nicely on our living room floor. There were lamps, pots and pans, a table, a full-sized, framed print of the First Vision, cleaning supplies, this radical super plunger (I can’t really explain it well, but it’s like a mix between a pump and plunger and its called the JetPlunge. Haha, we’ve got the best plunger in the mission for sure), and so many other needed things. I’m overwhelmed with gratitude, and I hope future missionaries treat this apartment well because it was furnished with sacrifice and charity from our members.

Then! As if that wasn’t enough, we showed up to church to find that one of our recent converts had not only brought a friend, but that that friend was ready to take the lessons! But that wasn’t all! As we were meeting people before sacrament meeting Brother Stanton came up to us and said “Are you the new Elders? Good. We brought someone to church today and he’s all set up to take the lessons.” Two referrals on our first Sunday and we haven’t even gained anyone’s trust yet! We’ve taught one of those referrals, twice now with a 3rd appointment tomorrow, and the other referral we’ve got an appointment with tonight. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to make it back to the baptism because, not knowing anyone in the ward, it would be hard to know who to ask to make the 4-hour time commitment as a favor, but they asked in Priesthood and in seconds we had 3 people who said they’d be willing to go, each saying they’d be backup in case the first couldn’t make it. Its’ unreal, and it blows my mind, and I’m so totally grateful, but also, it’s how it should be in every ward. If anything, the sacrifices they’re willing to make only spur me on to become a better missionary every day, just so I don’t let them down.

Also, just in regards to the area itself, finding (i.e. tracting) is fun because people down here move at a slow enough pace to where they’ll actually talk with you, think about your questions and respond with genuine answers. Of course there are exceptions, but on Saturday all we did almost was knock doors, and people were really kind, if not interested, at least they were good people. And actually we did find a couple people who we set up appointments with, so there’s good potential for finding through that method. Yesterday was amazing. I’m on exchanges in my area with a brand-new missionary named Elder Williams and he’s going to make a great missionary. We had non-stop appointments yesterday and that doesn’t happen too often. I love those days where all you do is teach teach teach. I haven’t had too many, and so yesterday was a gift. Honestly, I think God set it up that way for this new Elder so he could see the vision of what a missionary schedule can be like if all is working as it should. Not only did we have 4 appointments, but they all held, and we had a member (3 different men from the ward mind you) at each appointment. That’s how its supposed to work! We make and set plans, and then they hold up! Oh that every day could be like yesterday… sigh… ;o) We’re teaching a woman named Delores (again, names have been changed) who has a baptismal date for March 21. She’s amazing! I think she’s in her 60’s, and she’s super humble and very ready to be baptized. She lives in a trailer that she keeps very tidy and clean despite her poor health and bad shoulders. She walks with a cane, has diabetes, and one arm is strapped to a cushion which keeps her arm at a 45 degree angle and which cushion looks terribly inconvenient and awkward to deal with. The lesson we had with her yesterday was one of the most simple, spiritual lessons I’ve had on my mission. It was the first time I think I can recall where I felt the Spirit, and I knew perfectly that they were feeling the Spirit too, so that I could tell them “That feeling you feel right now, that’s the Spirit, and God wants you to have that feeling everyday of your life”.

God’s truly blessing me right now, and I don’t know how long this streak of miracles will last, but I’m thankful for it. Its been everything a missionary hopes to experience and all I can say, like Enos, is “Lord, how is it done?”

I have to get going but I hope God has saved some blessings for all of you. I know this restored gospel is true. God really does ask much of us, but our sacrifices sit in stark contrast with what He wants to give us, and what He does and has given us.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

"Elder Lassen, I'm going to change your life, are you ready?"

2009-03-05T11:33:00.000-08:00

Hello Everyone!
Well, let me tell you a little about the week before I get to the news (maybe that way you'll all read to the end ;o) First of all, Mom, Dad, Ditte, Kirsten and Else, thanks so much for making sure I had emails today despite Mom being out of town.

We've had a good week. Lori's baptism was pushed back to this Sunday, and she's good to go. I'm really excited for her. I don't know if I'll be able to make it to the baptism or not now, because well... you'll see at the end of the letter I guess ;o)
We've had some interesting weather for sure lately. The other night it got down to 12 degrees, and the other day we had a good solid snow storm which dumped about 6 inches on Falls Church, and in some other parts of the mission like Burke, it dumped around 12. This'll probably be the only snow storm we have, and this weekend it'll be back up in the 60's or something.

We did some more cleaning at our investigators and also some moving for a partmember family. By now his house is coming together bit by bit. The main floor of his townhome looks like a woman might have lived there at one point ;o) Its hard to keep him maintaining it, but they knew right from the start that things weren't going to progress quickly with him.

All right, I guess I'll just get to the news. I got my call from President last night. He said "Elder Lassen, I'm gonna change your life! Are you ready?" Well he wasn't kidding. My mission's going to be a bit different in many ways, but I'm excited. The first big change will be the scenery. I'm headed down to an area in the Fredericksburg zone/stake called Aquia virtual map

Its a sizeable area, and Fredericksburg tends to be pretty rural (the Fredericksburg zone,

aka 'the burg' or 'freddy burg' is geographically almost bigger than the rest of the mission combined), so since I've only served in Alexandria and some of its surrounding cities, that'll be pretty different. This assignment also comes with a couple of twists. I'll be white-washing the area (where both the old elders are moved and two new ones come in at the same time), so we'll be learning everybody and everything at the same time, and I'll be one of the zone leaders down in Fredericksburg which is a big zone with a lot of missionaries I don't know yet. In fact I think we have 14 companionships, 3 district leaders and 4 new trainees. Elder Shattuck, my new companion has been a zone leader for a while so he'll be showing me the ropes even though he's been out one less transfer than me. I hear he's a really hard worker and from what I've seen of him he's also really personable. I'm really happy to have a companion I can be junior to again who can teach me lots of good skills and attitudes. It'll be an adventure to be zone leader, and I'm sure it'll be hard in some ways, but I need a good kick in the butt, and it'll be nice to have a companion who's in leadership instead of just being by myself as District Leader. Anyway, wish me luck. I hear Aquia is a good ward. I would have liked to have stayed in Falls Church for a while, but I had a feeling I wouldn't be here too long for some reason. It's an amazing ward though. Well, I've gotta run, but thanks again everyone for your love and prayers and letters. I definitely need them now.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

"If mom could only see me right now"...

2009-02-25T13:33:00.000-08:00

Hey Family,
I'm writing a little early today cause we're going to the temple in a bit, and after that we're doing some service for someone in our ward, and that's gonna take up most of PDay so I'm not sure if I'll get the chance to jump on the computer later for long enough to write a decent letter. I'll be checking my email later, but this'll be my main letter for the week.
A couple of main events from the week: Lori is still scheduled for baptism, but we pushed it back a week for a couple reasons.
Also, yesterday we spent a good long time house cleaning for a service to someone we are teaching. We cleaned his living room, his kitchen and even his bathroom. Mom and Dad, thanks for teaching me how to clean. I know it didn't do you a ton of good when I was living at home, and for that I'm sorry, but believe it or not, what you taught me has sunk in, and yesterday all I kept thinking was "if mom could only see me right now". It took 4 of us Elders (we had another companionship come and help us out) 4 hours to tackle just those 3 rooms. We had the owner go upstairs while we cleaned. It was something akin to the scene on "The Other Side of Heaven" where they take that one inactive guy and bathe him and shave his hair and get him to church, but this was with his house. We're not sure how long it's going to stay that way, but we gave him a goal to look forward to so it would motivate him to keep things clean.
We told him we wanted him to host a dinner and a lesson in his home and we were going to invite a member or two to come with us, and maybe one of his friends who comes by from time to time to check on him. Actually, that friend came by yesterday to take him to lunch and she was TOTALLY blown away with how clean the house was. I guess while they were at lunch she told him she thought he should get baptized (even though she's not a member herself) and she and her husband are actually going to sit in on the next lesson. Sweet huh?

I went on an exchange with an elder in McLean 1st on Monday. I came to love this elder a great deal on our exchange, and he's definitely a good missionary in a lot of ways. Their area hasn't seen a new investigator in 3 weeks (a new investigator means someone who you sit down with, teach a lesson, have a prayer, and then they still invite you back for another), and yet, as we started our exchange, while we were praying, we felt the Lord would help us find one that day even though we had less than 24 hours together. So we set it as a goal, and went out to work. We looked through the former investigators in their area book, and decided to forgo some of their previous plans to street contact so that we could drop by some of these peole who for one reason or another had dropped their investigations or had been dropped by the Elders.

Well, within one hour of that prayer and those new plans we had found our new investigator in a young man who is the son of one of these former investigators. He’s not sure if God exists but he said he was open to the idea, and willing to learn and try to find Him. He let us teach him about prayer and said we could come back the next day to teach him more. He accepted a reading assignment and said he would pray that night. YAY! It was a definite miracle, and I’ve since found out that they started teaching his little sister as well. Hopefully the parents will get back on board this time huh? That area definitely needs some new life, and this family might be it. I know that those times we set goals at the suggestion of the Spirit, they’ll be met every time. So the secret is just to be worthy of the spirit, and to constantly feel for those goals God would have us set. That’s not so hard is it?? ;o) haha, I also know that that’s the great struggle of life in a sentence, but it’s a good thing to have a testimony of anyway.

Later that night we also were let in to teach a Catholic youth minister. He had a lot of questions, and seemed genuine in his desire to learn. Normally, with Catholics, we don’t necessarily jump right into teaching about the apostasy, but this man wanted a straightforward answer as to why the restoration needed to happen, so I gave it to him, and he actually appreciated the candidness and we had a great lesson. He wanted a copy of the Book of Mormon, and we didn’t set a return appointment, but he said he’d have us again and that he’d feed us next time too. Lovely :o) (too bad I won’t be there cause it wasn’t in my area. Oh well.)

In other news, one of our new investigators is from Nepal, he came with us to the the Mission Presidents' home for their monthly mission home fireside. We think he had a good time, but his English is still really limited. Luckily we have a couple people in the ward who speak some Hindi, but theirs too, is very limited. I can’t wait till we’re all in heaven speaking the same language!

Aghh… oh well. He’s a really humble father who wants to learn and adapt in this totally new country.
I know this church will help him do all that he wants for him and his family, but its hard to get him to see that right now.
Well, that’s about all for now. I love you all! Thanks for the prayers and letters.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Two pictures from last week:

Visit to Arlington Cemetary on Pday

An investigator takes 6 elders to dinner and bowling

First Bike Wreck and First AA Meeting............

2009-02-17T19:01:00.000-08:00

So here's a little update:

I'm in the Falls Church ward/area, in the McLean Zone/Stake. It's a bike area that takes about an hour to traverse. Sadly we don't live at all centrally, but that's just how things go I suppose. We live with a companionship of Spanish Elders named Elders Felix and Cortez on the 6th floor of a high rise.
I serve in a great ward which is a little polarized in terms of age. There are a lot of young married couples (therefore also a TON of primary kids), and a fair few elderly members. We do still have some youth, and I'm happy about that. Youth are uniquely equipped and placed to share the gospel well. Plus they also add a lot of energy in a ward which is nice.We're really working hard to make sure members know Elders' Lassen and Tobey, not just "the missionaries".

Today we went to the Arlington Cemetery for a zone activity. The honor guard at the tomb of the unknown soldier is amazing, of course. If I decide to forego dentistry as a profession, maybe I'll consider going for an honor guard of some sort :o) It was fun to be with the whole zone doing something cultural. Our main investigator right now just set a date to be baptized!! We're planning for February 28! We're really excited about it. Her story is a good one. She was an investigator a couple of years ago with a pair of sister missionaries who were serving here at the time. For one reason or another, she dropped her investigation, but about 3 weeks ago, one of those sisters called her to see how she was doing, and encouraged her to look into the church again. She was so touched to know that this sister still cared about her 2 years later that she agreed to let us teach her again! It definitely pays off to keep caring about people and to be looking for the right time for an invitation. My companion's name is Elder Tobey, and he's from Beaver, UT. His big joke to anyone who's heard of Beaver is "Oh, you must have broken down there, or were you stopping in for the Cheese factory?" The funny thing is both apply to our family. One of our cars broke down there once, and I've been to that cheese factory at least a dozen times in my life for curd (squeeky) cheese :o). He's a very skilled missionary who's been out about as long as I have. It's really nice to be able to lean on your companion during teaching situations and not to have to worry about what they're going to say or in many cases what they're not going to say. We've got a lot going for us as a companionship.

Many of you know that since coming here I've experience my first bike wreck of the mission, which I'm hopeful will also be the last. It wasn't a bad one as bike wrecks go, but I'd like to keep it a unique experience in my memory.
Another first that's occurred in this area is I attended my first AA meeting! We're teaching a man who's trying to deal with Alcoholism. So the other day we walked over to AA and sat through a meeting with him. Much of what was said and shared was good solid truth. Per his request, we went in street clothes (this counts as service right?) while still wearing our name tags. The room was very full so, no, we didn't have to stand up and introduce ourselves with a "Hi, I'm Elder Lassen and I'm not an alcoholic", which is fortunate because I probably would have gotten a rousing "Denial!" as a response. I brought a water bottle into the meeting, and I was sure to drink it in a way that people wouldn't suspect it to be vodka (i.e. no swishing it around or loud clearing of the throat after a sip).

Well, I think that's about all I've got time for, but I love where I'm at, and I know it's where God wants. me. I love you all very much and I so appreciate the letters and prayers. I thank you sincerely.
With love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Hearing an Apostle of the Lord AND a Baptism in the same weekend!

2009-02-09T13:01:00.000-08:00

February, 4, 2009
Dear Family,

On Thursday night I got a call from our Zone leaders saying that the leadership of our mission was being invited to attend a special meeting on Saturday morning at the Temple Visitors Center.We, along with the leadership in the North Mission, would be hearing from someone who was just passing through the area and wanted to spend his Saturday morning with us. Any guesses who it was? Elder Holland!! I definitely didn't believe them when they told me, but it was true!
So on Saturday morning, we took the metro up to Silver Springs, then went to the Visitors Center where we, in a very intimate setting, heard from an Apostle of the Lord for what only felt like half an hour, but in reality he spoke for 2 hours. It was one of the best days of my mission!!
He spent a lot of time talking about raising our vision up and out of this world. He taught a lot out of John 3 and 4 and used Nicodemus and the Woman at the Well to teach us that our problem was that our vision was too much in the world around us. (Nicodemus and the Samaritan Woman and lots of the disciples couldn't help taking Jesus very literally when he spoke of being born again or having a different kind of water or meat. )
He then talked about how we, who study daily and pray all the time and who give all our time to the Lord, still have our heads in the world, how can we expect any progress from our investigators? Or from the missionaries we lead? He was, as always, a perfect blend of pointed authority and loving instruction.
Ever since I started paying attention to the different apostles and their words and their personalities, it's been a dream of mine to meet and hear personally from Elder Holland.
And I got to do both on Saturday. I'm one happy missionary!!! :-}
As if that wasn't enough, On Sunday, I got to pull out the old white pants and tie and lead someone who I've taught, down into the waters of Baptism. I'll get you some pictures as soon as I can. (my battery was dead, so I'm getting some copies from other missionaries. ) It was a good service. She has a desire to find peace and happiness. She also knows for sure what some of the feelings of the Spirit are and with those things, I know God can take care of her.
Well, I've gotta go, but I started an exercise competition in our district. (we have 30 minutes a day set aside to exercise as missionaries.) The grand prize is a Papa John Pizza card. It'll be fun.

Love you All!
Elder Steffen Lassen

First Week in new area and on a Bike Again.....

2009-01-30T13:36:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Thanks so much for the letters!

I got the replacement bike from CTR bikes. (Last weeks' letter he told us he was transfered to a bike area and that very week, his bike was stolen out of their parking garage, so CTR replaced it.) Its a great bike, and I'm very grateful for it. Haha, ironically, the day I got it and put it together (Monday) was also the day I had my first bike crash of the mission. Don't worry, it was just a little spill, and it had nothing to do with snow or ice (which started mostly on Tuesday). I was riding on a path and tried to go down 3 sets of steps with three steps in each of them. Its what skaters would call a 3-flat-3-flat-3. Well, I made it down the first two sets of three, but the last one got me cause I think I'd lost too much speed by that time so I went over the front handlebars and met the sidewalk with my hands and the side of my leg. Luckily the gloves took most of the impact and they didn't tear, nor did my pants, though I did scrape up my leg a little. Elder Tobey was pretty concerned for a second, but when I got up laughing he joined in and has given me the fair share of teasing since. (And Dad, yes, the bike is okay ;o)

Let me tell you a little about my new area, (Falls Church, McLean Stake). It's a decent sized bike area, and it would probably take an hour or so to get to the far end of it. I'm happy to report that its' not the hilliest of bike areas in the mission. McLean (is pronounced McLANE, and not McLEEN according to Virginians) Stake. My companion, Elder Tobey is really awesome. I've probably laughed more in the past few days with him than I have in the last 3 months combined. It's really REALLY nice to have a companion who I can be myself around. Also, I don't have to worry about over-powering Elder Tobey, who can easily and naturally take over a lesson and then give it back to me. In our apartment we also have a set of Spanish Elders who so far are good roommates.

It's a little weird being in a family ward (after the singles ward for so long) and trying to get used to talking to 55-year old, salty, state department employees, and newlywed couples , but our ward is great. I've already seen how helpful some of our members want to be. For example, a young married guy from England who's going through Law School, and who also has a young daughter at home (i.e. he's way busy!) has already come with us to two appointments, given us 2 rides home, and invited one of our investigators over to his home for dinner. Just as generous I'm sure is his wife, who would I'm sure rather have him at home and helping with their little girl. And you know what? I'm pretty sure that's the kind of sacrifice we need from members on a regular basis to really have the missionary work move like the Lord wants it to. I'm so grateful for members who look for opportunities to help without us even having to ask. And thankfully it seems like a good few members in this ward are like that. We've got a few investigators in our pool, but most of them are long-term investigators, and we definitely need to get some new ones.

On Monday we had a meeting for all of the mission leadership, and two nights prior I got an assignment to lead a 20 minute discussion on this case study we've been studying from Elder Christenson of the 70. I was a little scared, cause I still feel like a very little fish when I go to leadership, but I think it went pretty well. I could tell I hit some soft spots, and talked about some things that our mission as a whole needs to do better, and I think that they received it well, so I was happy for that.

Thanks so much Mom and Dad. Love you both lots. Talk to you soon!
Love, Steffen

P. S. Debbie Pettit (Debbie grew up in Camarillo 2nd ward) is in my ward! Also, one of the Jardenes' (from Oxnard) grandsons and someone who served in Christian's mission at the same time as him. I can't remember his name, but I asked him if he was in the same zone as Christian when he got the whole zone grounded from driving 'cause of his car accident. He laughed and said he remembered hearing about it, but that he wasn't in the zone with him at the time. It's a small little Mormon World, that's for sure.

Transfer Came this week after 7 1/2 months!

2009-01-24T11:42:00.000-08:00

Steffen was transferred this week from Alexandria, where he has served for over 7 1/2 months.

He writes:

Dear Family,

Well, lots to tell ya, I think. First off, Transfer news!! I'm getting transferred to the Falls Church Ward in the McLean Stake. Its a bike area (of course, I would go back to a bike area, right when it starts getting FREEZING!! The other day it got down to 3 degrees. I wanted to take a picture next to one of the big signs that tell the temperature and call it "3 Degrees of glory". Sadly, we were in a pretty big hurry that morning.)

Other new: My bike got stolen. Of course it would get stolen right before I get transferred to a bike are!! Ayayay....So I called CTR bikes, and thanks to their bike replacement program that Mom and Dad paid the extra 45 bucks for, they're sending out a replacement bike for free. It actually got stolen out of our parking garage. I'm really sorry it got stolen! I still have my helmet though...I can take that up into my apartment.

Other news: I lost my zone leaders gloves. Of course I would become glove less right before I go to a bike area and right as it starts to get freezing. sigh...

Other news: I got to watch the inauguration! This was the first time I've watched the full thing. I thought it was pretty good. Two missionaries in our zone actually got to go TO the inauguration and they had AMAZING tickets! They were only like a hundred yards away! They were pretty tired afterwards, and they had to sacrifice their PDay, and they had to stand for over 9 and a half hours, but I'm sure it was worth it. They'll never forget it for sure. I like President Obama's speech. I thought it was pretty powerfully delivered, and I think he'll make a good president. That musical number had some big names in it, huh? Too bad it wansn't mixed very well, and actually I didn't really like the arrangement that much, even though it was by John Williams. Yo Yo Ma and Itzah Perlman though! You don't get them to come out and play in the cold for nothing. And it looked like YoYo Ma was having a good ol' time the whole time. Fun Stuff.

More news: one of our investigators, Kristen, is getting baptized on February 1st and she's asked me to baptize her! Yay!

More News: My roommates, as a transfer P-day Even prank, snuck almost a whole bottle of laxative into some ginger ale and got me to drink it. It's been a fun 19 hours since, let me tell you.!

Well, I've gotta run, but I want you to know that I'm excited about my new area and assignment. I'll be companions with Elder Tobey. I've served around him a little bit, but I still don't know a ton about him, other than that he seems like a good guy too. Gotta go, but I love you all.

Love, Steffen

New Years Eve

2009-01-08T21:44:00.000-08:00

December 31, 2008

Hi family and friends,

“Here’s a sweet story for you. My first transfer here, we met a girl at the Metro while we were coming back from a P-Day trip to D.C. We scheduled an appointment with her. It turns out that though she lived and went to school in Georgia, her parents actually live in our apartment complex. So we had a good first lesson with her, and then referred her down to the missionaries in Georgia. A couple weeks later, she called us and said she’d found one of our church buildings to go to down there and that the missionaries had called her. “Awesome!” I thought, but that was the last I’d heard about it. Well, 2 days ago, we went to the front desk of our complex to pick up a package for my companion. Guess who was visiting her parents over winter break! “Elder Lassen”, she said, “you’re still here…I thought you’d be gone by now.” (Steffen’s been in the same place for 7 ½ months). We chatted for a second, and then I asked her if she had kept meeting with the missionaries. “Actually, I got baptized in November” she said. Ha-ha, What an awesome tender mercy of the Lord, huh? Most of the time we don’t get to see the end of those kinds of stories, but we always hope they happen, and they do!

So tonight, being New Years Eve, we have another movie night with our Zone. So right now, some of the other Elders are playing basketball until 6. When P-day ends, then we've got pizza coming and then we're watching the new Narnia movie "Prince Caspian". I'm pretty excited about it.

Happy New Year, gotta run, but love you all!

Love, Steffen

Had privilage to sing an a capella solo at Mission Home Fireside

2008-12-31T16:52:00.000-08:00

December 28, 2008

Dear family,

Tonight, there was a fireside in the mission home that we attended with one of our investigators. I was actually asked to sing an a capella solo, so I sang Hymn 240, "Know this that Every Soul is free" except I borrowed verses 1 and 6 from Hymn 116, "Come Follow Me". Anyway, the song went well....

"Come follow me" the Savior said.
Then let us in his footsteps tread,
For thus alone can we be one
With God's own loved, begotten Son.

Know this, that every soul is free
To choose his life and what he'll be;
For this eternal truth is giv'n:
That God will force no man to heav'n.

He'll call, persuade, direct aright,
And bless with wisdom, love, and light,
In nameless ways be good and kind,
But never force the human mind.

May we no more our pow'rs abuse,
But ways of truth and goodness choose;
Our God is pleased when we improve
His grace and seek his perfect love.

For thrones, dominions, kingdoms, pow'rs,
And glory great and bliss are ours,
If we, throughout eternity,
Obey his words,
Come, follow me."

Elder Steffen Lassen has "elfed" himself for Christmas...actually his mother did it for him...he's busy being a missionary

2008-12-17T20:00:00.001-08:00

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Christmas Package from Camarillo 2nd Ward Young Women!

2008-12-10T16:54:00.000-08:00

My District
My Zone

Recent visit to D.C.

Baptism of John

Elders' Lassen and Baldwin

Package came from the ward Young Women and Ward Members

(The Reindeer Pooper and piece of coal were donated by Sis. Morris!)

Thank You Young Women and Camarillo 2nd ward !!!

The stocking and tie (which tie I LOVE! A Tommy tie? way nice. )I love the reindeer pooper. Quite a nice touch. Every missionary should have one. ;o)

Ok, transfer news! I'm staying for another one! And Elder Baldwin will still be my comp. 7 and a half months here we come! ;o) Bring it on!

Well, I've gotta run, but I love you all!

Love,

Steffen

Day before Thanksgiving/thoughts on gratitude

2008-12-03T23:00:00.000-08:00

11/26/2008

The people we are teaching are still keeping all of his commitments. Here's a little miracle for ya. My whole mission so far, I've never seen it happen where a person that I've found progresses any further than a first appointment. It hasn't gotten me too far down, but I really want to see someone that I've found progress. Well, that's pretty likely to happen here pretty soon and I'm excited. We found a young man at the Metro, exchanged info, but couldn't set up an appointment. Well, we got busy and I forgot to call him for a couple of days. Last night, during dinner, we got a call and it was him! A metro contact calling US??! I couldn't believe it. He's even a young single adult! So we met with him this morning and taught a short 1st lesson. He's coming to Thanksgiving with some singles tomorrow night, then to church on sunday! If both of those really happen, that will be a miracle to me.

Well family, I will absolutely be thinking of you tomorrow. I hope thanksgiving is totally wonderful as it always is in our family. I can't wait to hear stories and see pictures hopefully. Know that I'm thankful to be where I am, doing what I'm doing, and sharing what I'm sharing. More than that, I'm thankful for the knowledge that where I am right now is exactly, exactly where the Lord wants me right now. We don't often have the good fortune of that knowledge throughout our life, but I'd invite all of you to seek that knowledge for yourselves, and when you find it, I hope you're as thankful as I am. I read Mosiah 2:18-25 last night. I would invite anyone reading this to also read that, and to do it slowly, thoughtfully, carefully and with a pen and paper at the ready. I know you'll have the same gratitude flood your heart that I felt last night for God and all His love for us. I learned last sunday that Gratitude is actually a tool which God gives us, then commands us to use so that we can better keep our covenant to "alway remember Him". And if we can keep that covenant, He will "immediately bless us" as King Benjamin says in that scripture above. The ensuing upward cycle of blessings is staggering to comprehend. I love you all. Happy Thanksgiving.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

Baptism Coming Up this Saturday

2008-12-03T22:48:00.000-08:00

December 3, 2008

Dear Family,
Here's an update on the ol' area (really... it is the old area... I've been here longer than half of the ward :o) and actually, I'm ok with that, no complaints here) We have a baptism happening this Saturday! His story is a fun one. He called the mission office out of the phone book, and told them that he was an inactive member who wanted to see the missionaries. The Elders went by and found out that he's actually not a member, but was married to one once upon a time. They taught him some, and on the next appointment he told them that after their first visit he asked his mother what she knew about "This Mormon Church". His mother replied by laughing and saying, "John, your father served a mission for that church, and he and I were sealed in the Salt Lake City Temple!" So he learned a LOT of family history in a very short amount of time. Wish us luck for Saturday.

Our district meeting this last week was on having the faith to find, and I've been really trying to put it into practice (not just going tracting to do what we're supposed to, but rather to find people to teach), and the Lord has reciprocated. When we've prayed to know what the Lord will have us accomplish, we've seen it transpire. We've found some good new investigators in the last two days, and have high hopes for them and for those we have yet to find this week. The best part is that they've been YSA investigators!

We found a young woman yesterday who's 23, and who said with a big, sincere smile that our message sounded very interesting and that she thinks she'd like having the connection that comes because of association with something like our ward. She was probably the kindest person (yet also still interested) that I have met on my mission so far while street contacting. Pretty exciting stuff.

II was definitely sad to hear of Elder Wirthlin's passing, but it's funny (funny interesting, not funny haha) because I was thinking about him just a couple days ago and felt he might go soon). Hope every thing's well at home.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

Teaching Opportunities and looking forward to Thanksgiving

2008-12-03T22:38:00.000-08:00

Raking Leaves for a widow as Service...Virginia has no shortage of leaves in the Fall!

Like our new "mini-van"? This one's a 2009

Elder Kiley and I practice teaching our friend "Spalding"

Yep, 6 Elders in a Ford Taurus...(this is when we had our van broken into.....)

11/16/08
Dear Family,
I’ve written to help you get a good idea of how thing are going here. First of all, Trine, I’m happy you have a beautiful new baby. Congratulations.

Actually, Thanksgiving should be interesting this year. We’re having it with a recent convert , and his non member family. That’s exciting in itself, but to add to that, we’re having Dominican Food as that’s where his family is from. Fun huh?
The funny part is, although I’m in one of the most diverse places in the world, ethnically speaking; I haven’t had the chance to try much food from different places, so this will be a first really.
So, things in my area are still moving pretty well. I’ve been getting way more teaching practice in the last couple weeks than I ever have on my mission so far. It’s great. I’ve taught the lessons to so many different kinds of people lately! I do love teaching, especially when members come along and talk about how that was just the spiritual experience they had been praying for. I love to hear that. Still nobody with a baptismal date yet, but we’re having a zone fast this week and every companionship is fasting on different days…we’re pleading with the Lord that we’ll b e able to invite 12-15 of our zone’s investigators to baptism this week, and we had our fast yesterday (we had to give up what was looking to be an AMAZING pulled-pork sandwich lunch…) but it was all totally worth it! I don’t know for sure that god is going to answer our fast exactly like we hope, but what I do know is that the Spirit strongly told me as I broke my fast that the Lord had accepted my fast and that’s really all I needed.
Last time I fasted for an investigator ended up dropping us and it was way painful, and I’ve been a little less enthusiastic about fasting ever since, but yesterday helped me realize that God still really wants me to live that law. So I feel pretty good.

By the way, we had the opportunity to use those gloves you sent me yesterday when we did some leave-raking for a widow . They helped a lot. Even though leaf-raking doesn’t really require gloves, it has started to get pretty cold so they helped warm my hands while I raked and bagged up leaves.
Mom, thanks for sharing the e-mail about the temple (and protestors). Mary said something very interesting and true in a letter to me. She said she was in class when her teacher said that when facing the emotions that come from watching all the protesters, picketers and the like, no matter what, we’re going to feel a burning inside us. We just need make sure that the fire is coming from light, not heat. We can either feel the burning of anger inside our hearts or the burning of the Spirit teaching us. We decide which side we will listen to and thereby how we will respond. I really like that a lot.
Well, I’ve gotta go, but we’re off to teach what should be a great lesson with AJ, and we’ve fasted for him and for God to help us as we invite him once more to be baptized. I’ll let you know how it goes.
I love you all…. I hit 11 months today! Can you believe it’s almost been a year? Hump day here we come!

We had snow yesterday! What do you want to bet I’ll get transferred to a bike area next transfer so I get to freeze again J ?

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

New Transfer-New Companion-Halloween Zone Activity

2008-12-03T21:54:00.000-08:00

11/5/08

Dear Everyone,
Well, its a new transfer, and I'm pretty excited. My companion and I will get along well I feel. Like I said, his name is Elder Baldwin and he's from Las Vegas. He likes sports, especially Volleyball and Basketball. He's been on his mission for about 5 months now. Halloween was different, that's for sure.
Our zone activity started at 6PM and we all met down at the Mt. Vernon Building which about a mile or less up the Potomac from Mount Vernon itself. It’s a really amazing building that sits right on the river and provides for some pretty spectacular scenery. The reason I mention the building is because as we sat watching our movie, National Treasure 2, it was fun to think that one of the scenes in it took place almost right where we were sitting! Fun stuff. The movie itself was a bit cheesy, but as Dad says, “it was a good bed-time story” :o) We were treated to homemade chili and hot dogs (ok, so the hot dogs weren’t homemade) by a member of the Belle Haven ward. It was a fun night and a good way to keep a bunch of missionaries out of trouble on a night that would very easily afford lots of that. Last Saturday we had a great trip to the DC Temple Visitor's Center with an investigator. We saw the Joseph Smith movie, then went through the “Reflections on Christ” exhibit and then sat in the lobby of the temple and read some scriptures for a little bit. He said he felt the Spirit during the movie and the exhibit, which is great, because he said he hadn’t felt it at all since last time he was investigating back in 2002.
Tonight we have 4 appointments! So we’re going on a full exchange (i.e. I’m going with one member of our ward to 2 appointments and Elder Baldwin will go with another member to the other 2). It’s a little scary knowing that I have NO say in what gets taught in those other 2 lessons, but I guess it’s a good exercise in faith, which is something I’m trying to (or at least need to) focus on. I’ve been trying to figure out how to achieve balanced teaching between my companions and I my whole mission, but have yet to figure it out. My first transfer I was kind of dominated by Elder Gray (which is fine, cause after all, I was brand new), but ever since then, I’ve been the dominant talker almost consistently. It hit me then, when one of our zone leaders taught us that a companionship with unbalanced teaching is a result of fear (insert lack of faith here) on the part of BOTH companions. I always just thought it was fear on the part of the non-talker, but really, I’m only talking so much because I’m afraid of what my companion will say (or won’t say as the case may be). In either case, its an expression of pride, where I’ve been relying too much on my own skills and knowledge, and not enough on those of my companion, or more especially, of the Lord. So, I go to work. Starting tonight, I’ll just have to trust in my companion and the Spirit (like, literally, I’ll have to. I have to other choice).

Happy Halloween and Zone Transfers

2008-10-29T11:30:00.000-07:00

"original" Jack-o-Lantern of Elder Lassen entitled,

"Called to Serve"

another original Jack-0-Lantern by Elder Lassen

letter sent October 22, 2008

Hey Family, I took the opportunity to send you a picture of my pumpkin that I carved yesterday at our pumpkin-carving/tie-trading zone activity. Hope you like it. It made me happy to be part of our family tradition this year (I missed it last year while I was living in Mesa).

This'll be short but sweet. I'm doing well. The transfer is looking like it will end splendidly. A new investigator walked into our lives out of nowhere named AJ. He's going to be solid, and its great, cause without us even inviting him, he's made it to church, FHE, and institute (including institute choir which meets ealier) twice each now. We've only met with him once, but we're pretty excited. More to follow. I'm going to include some pictures of our zone activity today of carving pumpkins. Enjoy. Thanks for the letters everyone!

Love you all.

Steffen

Letter from October 29th, 2008

Dear Family,

Hello, and Happy Halloween! Ditte, Happy Birthday! For Halloween we get to watch National Treasure 2 I guess. We were pushing for Newsies, but it didn't make the final list. Anybody know if that's a good movie or not? Well, it'll be more exciting than any other movie I've seen in the last 10 months. Wow, it looks like Camarillo is more of a politically exciting place to live right now than DC is. Talk about ironic. That is pretty crazy that the church has taken such a stance on something so controversial in politics. At the same time, I kind of like knowing that while the church stays neutral on most issues, its not afraid to lay it down and make some noise when the Lord wants it so. I hope it all makes a difference. Mette, Mom, sounds like, and looks like you had a great trip. I would DIE for some fish tacos right now. Good Mexican food is much harder to come by out here. I mean the real stuff, you know, like tacos y tortas and good horchata. We’ve got lots of Tex Mex, but its not the same as a good asada taco from some hole-in-the-wall kind of place. The Hispanic population around here is primarily from El Salvador and Honduras. So its pretty funny, cause when I actually meet a real Mexicano I get really excited and generally tell them so. They seem to appreciate that some gringo actually appreciates the difference between all the countries south of where he lives.

Well, things are pretty exciting here! We have transfers happening tomorrow, so we got our calls this morning. Here’s the low-down. I’m staying put for another transfer as a district leader and getting a new companion named Elder Baldwin. He was in the last group that I picked up from the airport while I was in the office, and other than that I don’t know much about him, but I’ve heard good things, so it should be a great transfer. Elder Kiley is off to the Chancellor ward down in the Fredericksburg Stake which is a really rural part of our mission. It’ll definitely be different from what he’s seen the last 3 months. When he first got here I don’t know if he liked being in a Singles Ward much, but now I think he’s really going to miss it. I won’t lie, I love being a singles missionary. Hopefully my new companion does also. My roommates are BOTH getting transferred (an anomaly they call getting “white-washed”). Elder Harder is going to the “eternal P-Day in the sky”, (i.e. he’s going home), and Elder Marchant is off to McLean Zone. So essentially, I’m getting 3 new roommates, and one of them is a brand new missionary getting trained! Talk about a domestic change! Well, hopefully it’ll be a fun change. We’ll see. On the bright side, I now have plans of pillaging all the best things in the apartment. Currently, Elder Kiley and I sleep in the child-sized room in the apartment on a bunk bed where my head is about a foot away from the ceiling when lying down. The first few nights I slept there I hit my head during the night many times before I learned. (Christian I’m sure can attest to the fact that I’m very active in my sleep, frequently sitting straight up and saying something completely random only to lie back down. When I worked at the Apple store I would sell computers in my sleep and now I teach gospel lessons complete with scriptural connections that I’m sure apply full-well to my nocturnal investigators.) So now I’m claiming the master bedroom for our companionship, taking Elder Marchant’s full-sized bed, the best desk and study chair (we’ve got some pretty bad ones in the apartment) and any food they leave behind. Mwa-ha-ha! I’m like Elder Vulture. :o)

Well, things with our investigators are going really well. We’ve got two right now who are actually keeping their appointments and their commitments! I’d almost forgotten what that was like and then in a week it all changed! It was amazing. So to all who are reading this, if a missionary ever invites you to do something and you say you will, know that his day, his week or even the overall mood of his mission is made or ruined depending on whether or not you follow through with that. So no pressure. :o) At the same time, that’s not to discourage anyone from making commitments to missionaries. The commitments we invite members and non-members alike to make really do lead to a fullness of joy and eternal life with God. I’ve gained a real testimony of that, and of the fact that it has very little to do with the talents or capability of the actual missionary leaving the commitment invitation. All we can really hope to do as missionaries is to get ourselves out of the way of the Lord who can work through us. Well, I love you all. Wish me good luck with my new companion.

Love,

Steffen

This is our zone picture from this transfer. We were going for a general authority type pose. How'd we do? :o)

Service and Miracles and feeling success while being on a mission........

2008-10-15T09:32:00.000-07:00

1. Elders Lassen, Kiley, Marchant and Harder. Do we look ready to take on the world or what?
2. Sister Madson is a widow in the Belle Haven ward who can't get around without her walker, so taking on something like this (her side yard) wasn't really feasible for her.
3. This is the "almost done" phase
4. Ta-da! This is what we were able to get done in a couple hours. We'll go back and finish up soon. All I've gotta say is thank goodness for bug spray, leather gloves, and that we didn't get poison ivy ;o)

Hey Everyone,

Next Tuesday we've got apartment inspections, so its time to deep clean today, which is why we wanted to run all our errands early, get it all out of the way and then just clean as long as it takes.
Also, I and 3 others have been asked to sing an a capalla quartet at the funeral of one of the grandsons of our mission doctor this Saturday, and 3 of us are getting together this afternoon to practice. I'll tell you how that goes in next week's letter.

Well, I guess my blog's getting read, cause this week I got a letter from someone in North Carolina! Haha, I thought, who do I know in North Carolina? Actually I haven't mentioned this yet in any letter, but I put a restriction on myself this transfer in an effort to stay more focused on the work, and less on mail from home. I found I was looking just a little bit too much forward for the mail truck and not enough to tracting, so I decided that any letter I get from friends or family doesn't get read until Tuesday Night (or if I happen to get mail on Wednesday I'll read that too), and that I'll let my roommates check the mailbox everyday, cause I won't. Actually its helped quite a bit. Weekends aren't such a drag anymore :o)

But I bring this up because I got this letter from North Carolina a few days ago and my curiosity's been killing me! So last night I eagerly opened it and lo and behold, I have a new friend as a result of my blog (So to that friend, and you know who you are, thank you for your thoughtfulness, you'll have a reply very soon).

Evidently, my new friend has a very good LDS friend who just left on his mission and she wanted to know more about what he was getting himself into, when she stumbled upon my humble little site. Its crazy when I stop and think about the vastness of the internet and how public it really is. Just when you think maybe only a handful of people will ever see what you have to say, you get a letter from North Carolina.

Well, the work is moving forward. We worked our (tails) off last week, talked to a ton of people, found some potential investigators, and we'll just have to hope and see if any of them catch a glimpse of how much God can do for them if they are humble enough to turn to Him instead of turning inward.
If I've learned anything so far (and really its a lesson I'm still learning), I've come to realize how important the Spirit is in all this. Missionaries (or members who want to share the gospel) need to understand a few fundamental skills, but if the Spirit isn't in a person..... not a person in the world who really looks into his eyes will believe him when he says he knows that the Book of Mormon is a true account of scriptural nature, as it says it is.

A ward mission leader out here once told me that the 2 miracles that happen to a missionary are when others change their lives around and when God changes the missionary's life around. I guess I didn't really need someone to tell me that, but it got me thinking, and I don't know which miracle is more important, but I can say that if one or the other or both are happening, then that missionary's mission is a success. I just want you all to know that I feel that the Lord is letting me see success.
I love you all.
Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

Personal thoughts of General Conference..........

2008-10-08T10:50:00.000-07:00

Hello Family,
Conference was AWESOME of course. Actually, before I get into the talks themselves, I had a surprise visitor come find me at the last session on Sunday (see picture). This is Lisa Bulloch, and she was a really good friend who lived at 5 East Hillside in Mesa (The same house as Lindsey and Erin and others). Evidentally she was out here visiting and she ran into the Sister Missionaries at a ward crepe party the other singles ward was having. She asked them if they knew me, and they did, so she asked if they'd deliver a note, but they just told her "Well, he'll be at the chapel for conference, you can just go there". Haha, so she came and it was fun to see her and talk for just a couple minutes. Of course I got harassed (all in good fun) by fellow missionaries (the whole zone – about 20 missionaries – was there for conference), but it was worth it to see her. So basically, I've seen every one of the girls who lived at 5 E. Hillside while on my mission except for Shauna, who I hear is married now, so that's probably not gonna happen regardless. I guess I could feel bad about it, but hey, I'm not breaking any rules right? I can't help it if I'm loveable :o)
But yes, Conference was incredible. Elder Aidukaitis just laid it down didn't he?? Holy Cow, He was really intense though. I loved his little simile about how people who have the Book of Mormon explained to them, then still refuse to read it are like spoiled children, refusing a warm, cooked meal prepared by their tender mother. Haha, wow! Then there was Elder Corbridge who talked about how any other way whatsoever was madness. Man, sometimes they don't hold anything back. But besides the talks that stood out because of their intense delivery, a great many of them spoke more directly to me spiritually. I loved Elder Holland's talk on the doctrine of angels. I love how he pointed out that if we seek the aid of angels, we need to try and be more angelic ourselves, so that others plight for heavenly help can be answered through us.
My prayers have been more thanks-filled because of Elder Bednar's talk. I came to love Elder Wirthlin more than I did before because of his talk (I don't have my notes on me so I can't remember what exactly they said that stuck out to me, but I remember feeling some of these things very distinctly). President Uchtdorf's talk during priesthood was very timely I think, on "Staying close together and lifting where you stand". I have to remember that often, because anytime we start thinking we could be more useful in some other place, assignment or calling, we just have to remember how much more we can do to fulfill that which the Lord has asked of us. It really was a great conference, and I could say much more, but those are some of my thoughts.

A little about my area. Things are a little frustrating right now, just because people aren't following through with their commitments much. We had a great night planned last night with a couple of good appointments, which both fell through (that's been happening a lot right now... even our ward mission leader feels sorry for us ;o), and then when we went to visit a less-active instead, she was home, and we sat down with her, but was too lazy to even go and get her scriptures so she could read with us (she's tried my patience more than anyone my whole mission...) and I just wanted to walk out right then and there. We didn't. Instead we let her borrow some of ours, had a little spritual thought and then asked her to pray. She didn't want to, but I was just like... Nancy, we read, now you are GOING to pray. And then she did ;o) sigh.. Its hard enough to talk to a couple hundred people in a week and only have a handful say you can come by, but then to have that handful give you a fake number, or not be there when you come by with all these great plans and a member and so on... well, its all pretty frustrating. I'm sure many of you can relate. I've been staying pretty positive in letters home I think just because I don't want to whine or anything, but I figure you might want to know, like was said in conference by Elder Cook "I hope you know we've had a hard time" ;o) So, I hope you all know that "We've been having a hard time" Still, Elder Eyring's (I think it was in Priesthood) helped me remember that if you start to think that your mission is hard, just wait till you're a young, married student trying to keep your head above water, and then just wait until you're the father of a family, trying to serve in difficult callings and trying to support everybody and everything around you and so on and so on. So, I guess I'll just lift where I stand and leave the Lord to what he does best, and I can't do.
Well, I've gotta get running, but thanks for all the prayers and everything else!
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen
PS Elder Gray says hello. I can't believe it, but I'm as old in the mission now as he was when he trained me, and he's almost ready to go home... crazy!

"Be Still My Soul"....solo sung at Zone Conference

2008-10-01T16:43:00.000-07:00

Today we went to the District and saw some good sights. We went to the National Portrait Gallery and the National Museum of American Art. They're actually both in the same building, which building is the 3rd oldest in DC, it served as a hospital during the Civil War, and Abraham Lincoln hosted some HUGE ball there as part of his inauguration. It was really awesome and has a very unique roof over the central courtyard. Elder Kiley (who as I mentioned has his degree in architecture from USC) was totally as happy as could be to see so much great architecture. Its like when I go to a good jazz concert and I can't get over what the guy on stage is doing with his sax or like taking a kid to Disneyland. He kept on telling me all about tilt-up concrete and a thousand other architectural terms I can't remember. He was seriously grinning from ear to ear :o) The portraits were fascinating, and included ones of Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, Edgar Allen Poe, and Steven Colbert, who, at his request was placed between two bathrooms over a water fountain. They also had an AMAZING Ansel Adams exhibit in the Art side of the museum. Loved it. This was also my first time riding on the Metro here, and I thought it was pretty fun actually. WAY better than riding on a bus.

As for the rest of the week, well, we're working a ton with members still, trying to find people who have friends ready to be taught, and trying to get them excited about, and the know-how to share the gospel effectively. We're hearing lots of talk that suggests we might be teaching some good referrals soon, and we're still trying to find people through our own efforts too.

Monday's district meetings were great, and I'm grateful to have a wonderful district this transfer. Then yesterday, we had zone conference which was even better. Zone conference lasted until about 2 thirty, and the best part was the last part. After a wonderful lunch which was kindly made for us by the Crystal City ward, we gathered in the Chapel and had an hour-and-a-half long meeting which was totally directed "by the Spirit". The assistants started the meeting by standing up and saying "First we're going to invited Elder Lassen to come up and sing a hymn of his choice, then Elder Swensen, prepare your thoughts and preach to us about faith. Then we'll invite Elders so and so and Sister So and So to bear their testimonies, and We'll go on to that point." So, totally and completely cold, I went up and sang a capella "Be Still My Soul". I though it appropriate since at that point my soul was anything but still. Aside from a pitch problem or two, I think it went all right, and you know what? My soul and nerves were still by verse two, and the Spirit was very present for the rest of the meeting. There were other testimonies, musical numbers (though I was the only one asked to perform alone) and sermons, and it was all quite marvelous really.

I've never been a part of something like that, and I hope I experience it again. I always leave zone conference feeling pretty pumped, and yesterday was no exception.

Well, I've gotta run, but enjoy the picture I'm going to send. I love you all.

Love,

Steffen

Tracting, street contacting, member referrals.....

2008-09-24T11:54:00.000-07:00

September 24, 2008
Dear Everyone,
Hello! Again, thanks for the great birthday cards and gifts, I got a couple more this week too. Yesterday and today I’ve been on exchange with Elder Gray (my trainer) who is now my zone leader. It’s been a lot of fun, and I’ve gotta say that it’s much easier to be good friends with someone when you’re not in a trainer/trainee relationship. Those can get a little strained at times, but the past two days have been awesome. I think we’ve both grown a fair amount in the last 7 and-a-half months as well, and that helps things out too.
It was kind of a bummer last week to miss out on transfer meetings (if both companions in a companionship are staying put then you aren’t invited :o( but Elder Kiley and I had a good day of service and trying to find people that day. The rest of the week hasn’t held too much excitement, but I feel like things will start picking up soon. Right now we’re spending lots of time tracting, street contacting, talking to members and trying to get them excited about sharing the gospel, and stopping by people who potentially could turn into real investigators. We did get a member referral last night, and so we’re pretty hopeful about that, cause he’s actually a Young Single Adult. Our appointment with him is tomorrow night. Woot! We are working with an awesome little family right now, and we love and care about them a ton, so it’ll be sad to have to pass them to the family ward elders, but I think they’re coming with us to a fireside at the mission home this Sunday night. Those are usually a GREAT thing for people to go to, because the Spirit is extremely strong. A recent convert will start off by bearing his or her testimony, and the story of how it was gained, then someone will perform a musical number, and finally the Wixoms teach a gospel principle in a discussion-type setting. They’re one of my favorite things to take people to.
Despite the semi-shallow teaching pool, I love this ward, and I’m excited to stay another transfer. Elder Kiley and I have some good work to do here yet, I can feel it. Franck is doing great. He just called me a few minutes ago “just to say hi”. He wants to get in touch with one of our ward members who’s a councilor at NOVA (Northern Virginia Community College. NO=North and VA = Virginia. Took me a while to figure that one out…) so he can get signed up in an English as a second language course or something. That’ll be SO good for him. He’s totally not a shy person by nature I don’t think, but he is when he’s around people who don’t speak French, cause his English isn’t so hot right now. Ditte mentioned she was teaching an English class of sorts. Is that course something we could use over here to help some of our investigators who need help learning English? That’s a real need people have over here, but they’re from all over the world, so they might speak French, or Twii or Spanish, or Romanian you know? I’m just always mulling over in my head how we can fill that need, because its pretty prevalent. I wish I had the training they use in ILP (International Language Program ,because I heard they had a method of teaching English that doesn’t require a knowledge of the student’s primary language. That would be really helpful.

I just remembered something else I wanted to include in my letter home that was awesome from this week. I conducted my first baptismal interview on Monday, and it was amazing. I felt maybe just a fraction of the humility Dad feels when he works with some of God's choicest children. This young man (about 22, getting baptized into the Colonial 1st ward) was SOO ready to be baptized. He's waited and looked all his life to find the one religion that felt right and now he's found it. He's from India, but spent the latter part of his adolescence in Ireland, so he's got a really awesome, unique accent. I told him his next two goals after baptism were to go to the temple and to get his patriarchal blessing. He didn't know much about either, so I had the opportunity of teaching him and the Spirit was there testifying to both of us the truth of what I was teaching. He felt it and said "its one of my greatest life's ambitions to enter the temple". Haha, what more could a missionary want to hear from a soon-to-be member?

I think that whatever else one might have to do or deal with as a district leader, that one interview alone would make it worth it. Thought I'd share.

Well, I’m gonna run now, but I love you all. Thanks for all the great things you do for me.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Special trip to the Temple for Birthday!

2008-09-17T16:49:00.000-07:00

Hello Everyone!

This week’s been full of good things.

First of all though, Mom, Dad, and everyone else who sent me either cards or gifts, thank you SO much! I so appreciate all the thoughts and kindness directed my way. The Medisterpolse was delicious, and its already gone ;o) We had it on Saturday and Sunday, and then on Monday we cooked the rest for FHE at Jaunetta’s house (the house we played the flour game at). For my B-day we broke out the party favors and it was a mighty fine evening :o)

That day was special for lots of reasons:

First, I got a rousing rendition of “Happy Birthday” sung over the phone by President and Sister Wixom, who are both great, and enthusiastic singers.

The one of the other things that made it especially memorable was that I was invited to the Temple that day to witness the sealing for time and eternity of two of my favorite people I’ve met on the mission so far. Brother Tom Bullock is the ward mission leader for Alexandria 2nd ward (where I was trained), and his wife is a convert of just over a year. So when I was there, we were still teaching Sister Bullock the new member lessons. Well, every missionary who’s served with them was invited to their sealing, and it was my first time witnessing that particular ordinance. How awesome is that? I don’t think sealings are something many missionaries get to go to.

So that was my birthday in a nutshell.

Other than that, we had a fire down the street from us, where a Hotel they were still constructing caught fire somehow and sent flames 100 ft into the air. That was pretty intense, cause we could see the flames from really far away as we were on our way home in the evening. We were afraid our place had burned to the ground, but thankfully not.

And finally, today we got our transfer calls! Looks like Elder Kiley and I are staying together for at least another 6 weeks, but this time I’ll be a district leader. It’ll be a new adventure, that’s for sure. Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all so much! Thank you again for all the cards, gifts and well-wishes.

With Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

Working hard to receive promises from the Lord....

2008-09-10T16:27:00.001-07:00

Elder Kiley and I spent about 45 minutes listening to one of Elder Holland's talks today. Isn't it funny that that's what we feel like doing on "our day off"? I love Elder Holland SO much!! We actually were able to go to the CES fireside he gave on Sunday evening, which was wonderful. He spoke on Lessons we can learn from Liberty Jail.

Other activities today included getting my tooth filled this morning, a new haircut at a good barbershop (another missionary gave me my last one, and it didn't turn out super great, although the price was right. But this time I decided to let a licensed professional do it ;o), writing a couple letters, playing tennis (Elder Kiley, who was on his school's varsity tennis team destroyed me... I think he was even being nice), and now emailing.
Its been really nice Pday so far. Well, other than that things have been going really well. We don't have much of a teaching pool, but we're working really hard to get one. We've promised to the Lord to talk to at least 30 people every day, no exceptions, to read Preach My Gospel at least 30 minutes every day, no exceptions and to invite every Young Adult we meet to church. So far we're keeping our promises, and we've been promised in many places including PMG, the scriptures and from Pres. Wixom that the Lord will return in "good measure" that which we give. We're praying for 1 new investigator (which means someone who we teach a principle and set up a return appointment with) every day, and 1 investigator to attend church each week. So... here we go to work!
Yesterday Elder Garn from the 2nd quorum of the 70 visited our mission and gave a great conference. Learned lots and were inspired much. Well, I've gotta run,

Elder Lassen

Family Home Evening with new member

2008-09-09T16:39:00.000-07:00

1.The Kickball game we played with our zone last week2. Elder Marchant (my roommate, the one in pink) and Elder Pulham (One of my zone leaders, the other one with the rope) are both Cowboys and were giving us a team roping demonstration after the picnic we had last pday. Elder MacGreggor is the steer. It was pretty awesome, cause they're both pretty good at it. Elder Marchant's dad owns a ranch is Oakley ID, and Elder Pulham was on a full-ride rodeo scholarship in Texas before his mission.

Well, today’s been a good PDay so far. Our apartment is clean, we’ve done our shopping, had lunch and now we’ve got the rest of the day to write and play racquetball. Today is also Elder Kiley’s birthday, so we went to a real authentic crack-in-the-wall kind of Mexican Place where no one speaks English and they have the most AMAZING tacos de asada. He’d never had tacos like that, and hopefully he’s converted. Actually, its been an international sort of day all around. We found this new place to shop called Bestway. It’s like a Hispanic version (a lot of Asian stuff too) of Giant or Shoppers (both places I’ve never heard of until I came out east, but think of your basic supermarket). Most of the cashiers are from El Salvador or Honduras, and most signs are in Spanish. They have AWESOME produce prices, and lots of other good stuff you can’t find in American stores. For instance, when I was in Ecuador, there were these guys or girls that would walk around in a white and blue jumpsuit uniform pushing a cart and wearing a hat, all of which bore the name “Bon-Ice”. Essentially Bon-ice was like an otter pop, and they sell for 10 cents each. The BEST though, were the Yogoso Bon-Ice which had an element of Yogurt in them, and they were delicious. Well, I found something similar today. Mmm… ;o) (Bonnie will know what I'm talking about) I also found some of the Korean ramen Erik used to send home, Guava/Guayaba Juice Concentrate and for good measure a whole, frozen octopus. (Okay, so I didn’t actually buy the octopus, but only because it was too expensive. Much better to buy them in the winter, but its good to know they have it! Just in case…).

So, needless to say, we’re doing all our shopping here from now on. Going along with this international theme today, while we were at lunch we decided to explore this one store in the same shopping center called “Asia Bazaar”. We were thinking it would be all Asian stuff, but really it was all Middle Eastern stuff. Pretty interesting store. I just wish I knew what to do with half of the intriguing-looking food we saw there. It’s pretty fun to live in a place where I can feel like I’m serving a foreign mission if I want to.

Elder Kiley and I have become really good friends I think. We laugh a lot together (mostly cause he’s hilarious) and he helps me want to work harder. Last night while we were tracting was the first time on my mission so far that I’ve been let into a door right then and there and allowed to teach a full first lesson. It was pretty exciting for sure. It was just like in the MTC where they have you practice knocking a door, then the person lets you in, you ask them to turn off the TV, ask for others to join the lesson, and just start teaching. The best part was the fact that the guy who let us in was a young single adult, and he wants to come to church on Sunday. Sweet huh? Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all so much. Keep praying for us. Talk to you soon! Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. I’m attaching some pictures of this Family Home Evening we had at a Jaunetta’s house on Monday (Jaunetta was just baptized a little while ago). She wants to start having FHE with her family from now on, so we came by to help give her an idea of what a typical FHE could be like. We decided to start them off right by playing the “Flour Game”. It was a huge hit ;o) Thanks Mom and Dad.

(note from Steffen's mom...we learned to play this flour game when I was a little girl during family home evenings and then John and I taught our children. You carefully tip over a packed cup of white flour onto a cookie sheet after you have placed a coin in the bottom of the cup. The coin ends up sitting on top of the flour. You take turns with a butter knife carving off little pieces of flour until the the coin falls. Whoever made it fall has to retrieve it with their teeth...no hands. It's lots of fun :-) NOT!

Picture Updates from the Mission........

2008-08-27T21:04:00.000-07:00

Chef Elder Lassen

"Restoration" Message on back of a Van

Newly Baptized member, Franck

Inspirational experiences..........

2008-08-27T20:51:00.000-07:00

August 26, 2008

I had the opportunity to take part in a pretty amazing blessing last night. I didn't pronounce this blessing of comfort, but the blessing was powerful for several reasons. We were at institute (One of my favorite parts about being in the singles ward is going to institute ;o), and one of the members of our ward came up to us afterwards and asked us to join another guy in our ward to give him a blessing. This young man requesting the blessing has recently returned from his second tour in Iraq, and is having a hard time adjusting to life back here. Before I participated, I had a little second of inventory to make sure I was ready, and I got a very clear feeling that the Lord wanted me to be a part of this blessing. Zach pronounced an amazing blessing to this other member of our ward and the spirit there was incredible. I felt privileged to be part of it.

Testimony of Fasting........

2008-08-27T20:33:00.000-07:00

August 19, 2008

We had a great week I think. Elder Kiley and I get along really well, and I'm totally grateful to have him as a companion. This last sunday was one of the best days of my mission so far I think. It was just one of those days where all that could happen well does happen well. Elder Kiley and I started a fast after dinner the night before. He was fasting with Greg (Greg's a recent convert. He was baptized shortly before I entered the area) in preparation for Greg recieving his patriarchal blessing the next day. I was fasting for Heather , one of our investigators, to obtain a witness of the truth of the Book of Mormon, and for us as missionaries to know what and how to teach her with the Spirit. So Sunday came around and the ward's meetings were great. Then we decided to go to another ward to see if we could get a lesson in with Heather while she was there. We had been debating using the miles because we weren't even sure if we'd be able to teach her due to the fact that she was in charge of Todd (Todd is the stake president's 19 year old son who has autism. Heather works with Todd on an almost daily basis, and since the family were out of town this weekend, Heather was in charge of taking him to church) that day, but we felt prompted to go, so we went.
Well, we were able to have a great, hour-long lesson in the foyer of the building and the Spirit was very much present. Up until this point she had expressed some doctrinal concerns and we'd been preparing to help her through those more, but during this particular lesson she asked us, sort of out of the blue, how the stories from the Book of Mormon helped us in our daily lives. We talked about 2 different stories and their applications. These two stories didn't really do anything for her, so I felt prompted to share the story of Enos, because its something I've been studying lately. As we read from Enos, she began to smile, then to get emotional and teary. She then said "this story helps me out a lot. Forgiveness is what I've really been wondering about. How does forgiveness work in your church?"
It turns out that her real concern is that ours is a church for perfect people, and that when someone doesn't live up to the expected standard, they are less loved. WOW! That took us by total surprise. So we switched gears entirely. We were short on time but we tried our best to assure her of the infinite power of the atonement (shared from 2Nephi 9), and how much the Lord loves those who stray.
I really believe that my fasting and prayers were answered during that lesson. She let us in and told us her real concerns so we could help her understand, and on top of that, she found comfort and spiritual substance in a story from the Book of Mormon. During our next lesson with her tomorrow we hope to schedule a baptismal date, so we'll see. After our lesson with Heather we hurried back to our apartment to meet with our exchange who was coming with us to an appointment with a new investigator . Her story of being found is a pretty remarkable one too, and I'll have to share it with you sometime. Her appointment went very well also. Then we hurried to the church where we met up with Greg who had invited us to come with him to his patriarchal blessing. It was pretty special to be there with Greg as he recieved that. I hope that that was an ok thing to do with our time that night. Greg feels very close to missionaries in general and I think he really appreciated us being there with him. Also, it was pretty awesome to be there and realize that this was the calling my father is fulfilling back home.
One more miracle from the evening - a simple one though it may be - is that I gained a testimony of fasting that i've not really had before. I've always fasted the requisite 2 meals, but generally, the night before I always would eat late, and in great quantities so I wouldn't feel the hunger pangs the next day. This time was different, and my heart was in it because I want so badly for Heather to have the blessings that accompany a testimony in this restored gospel. So this was (ashamedly) the first 24 hour fast I've ever completed, and because our day was so completely full of the work we had at hand, I didn't even care that our fast actually went on till about 9:15 pm (we missed sunday's dinner because Heather's appointment went over a bit). Literally, the last thing I cared about on Sunday was food. (I DID still care about it, but it was the last thing on a much longer list ;o)
I'm doing well, and this transfer will be a good one.

Love,Elder Steffen Lassen

Answers to Questions about Mission Mysteries.....

2008-08-19T11:36:00.000-07:00

I got a letter from Steph where she asked me a couple of questions:"how do you get your mail? i can't figure it out. does the post office forward it to you? does it get hand delivered? do you get it in a bulk package? I'm so curious. it's one of those missionary mysteries that i can never figure out. like how transfers happen and what you guys do from nine, when you have to be home, and ten thirty when you go to sleep." she also asked "how do you like your new companion?"

So I'm going to include parts of my response to her for use in the blog, cause I figure a lot of people might have these same good questions. Here goes:

"Ok, so lemme answer your questions.

How do I like my new companion? He’s great! He’s 22, graduated from USC in architecture, a convert of 2 years, quotes movies and Seinfeld like nobody’s business, has a strong testimony and is really easy to get along with.

How do I get mail? You send mail to the mission office (not to be confused with the mission home). Sister Good (the mission secretary) then takes a black marker to every piece of mail and crosses out the Lyngate Ct. address and any other bar code info the post office has put on the envelope during the process of getting it there. Then, she goes to the computer and prints out new address labels for each piece of mail (all the missionaries and their respective real addresses are stored in a program called Mission Office System or MOS and there’s a label printing function), sticks ‘em on, and the mail man picks them up later that afternoon. No extra postage is required for letters and packages sent through the US Post Office, cause they’ll forward mail for free. So I usually get mail one day after it gets to the mission office. Its pretty efficient actually, even though it is a way big job for Sister Good. Oh well, that’s why she’s so good. ;o) That’s also why family and friends aren’t supposed to send us packages through FedEx or anything, cause they don’t forward stuff for free, and then they have to stick it in our zone box which only gets to us whenever someone from the office is headed out to our zone. WAY less efficient.

As far as transfers, well, you’ll see, and it’ll probably make more sense to you then, but in our mission they have what’s called the transfer board. It’s a really big 3-sectioned magnetic white board that has a transfer card on it for every missionary (see diagram). These transfer cards, because they’re magnetic, can be moved around at any time. They’re arranged by zone and then by district and then area (see diagram…the crummy one).

Anyway, so a week or so before transfers, the Assistants to the President and the Mission President start moving the missionaries around according to the Spirit and according to the various needs around the mission (e.g. Sister So-and-So and her companion are ready to kill eachother…). It takes a lot of prayers and a lot of work to finalize everybody (during this whole week the transfer board is closed and locked while they’re not working on it.)(most of the time its open so the office staff can use it for reference). Then, they open it a couple days before transfers, the office elders input all the changes into MOS, and calls are made to the individual missionaries the day before they get moved. They find out their new companion and new area. If they have a new assignment (like Zone Leader, District Leader, Trainer, Office Elder, AP, or a special assignment, as in, they’re to be companions with someone who’s not an easy missionary to work with), they’re told that during that call as well.
Then, the day of transfers, all the missionaries affected by the transfer (anyone who’s been moved or who’s companion is being moved) go to the Fairfax Chapel in Burke for Transfer Meetings. This is where the new missionaries come in (having slept at the mission home the night before) and meet their trainers, the companionships are switched around, luggage and bikes are exchanged, hellos and goodbyes are said and then everybody, with their new companions gets instruction from President Wixom and others, gets to hear the testimonies of the departing missionaries, and then leaves to their new area. So that’s transfers. Like I said, you’ll see what I mean soon enough I suppose.
As for what we do from 9 to 10:30, well, we usually plan for the next day, (half an hour), talk to our district leader when he calls (5 minutes), eat something (20 minutes), then brush our teeth, wash our faces, get into our pj’s, swap good stories from the day with our roommates, pray as a companionship, then individually and go to bed (35 minutes). Trust me the time goes by quickly. Well, hopefully, that answers your questions.

Well, I love you all, and hope to hear from you soon!
Love, Steffen

Doing Great!

2008-08-01T18:20:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,

I’m doing great. I hope my letter last week didn’t sound like too much of a complaint, although it probably did. I’m definitely not starving, and it wasn’t a plug for more love or money or food. It was just a commentary meant to be funny. I’m sure anyone who’s served a mission can relate.

And actually, we asked our ward for a little help and the next week we got a REALLY nice donation of groceries from an apartment of girls in our ward. They even gave us peaches, apples and bananas! ;o) Unfortunately, (or fortunately depending on who’s reading this) this letter’s gonna be short, but I really am doing very well.

If all goes well, Frank should be baptized on Saturday. We’ll see. Love you all tons, sounds like California’s gotten a good little shake, how strong did it feel in Camarillo? Oh, and I met a girl out here from Agoura Hills who knows the Broughtons. That was pretty neat. All sorts of connections in the Mormon world, especially among singles as transient as they are. Love,

Elder Steffen Lassen

The Soup talked about in last week's post!

My roomates (Elders Esplin, Marchant and Braun), an investigator and I all crammed into an 80-something Toyota Celica on our way back from a scripture study group we have every week.
The 3 of us who came out in the same group having our 7 month party (really just an excuse to bake a cake and take a picture).

Why Mom's and Girlfriends want RM's as Sons and Husbands

2008-07-23T10:10:00.000-07:00

I'm starting a series on my blog about things I've learned on my mission that I think mothers and girlfriends want their young men to learn while on missions.
So here's part one. Hope you enjoy:

I never appreciated a good home-cooked meal more than I do now.
Missionaries don't eat well. Surprised? Probably not. A lot of people are quick to point the finger of scorn at missionaries, attributing their deplorable eating habits to their immaturity and their unwillingness to prioritize their health over their taste buds.
Now, sometimes, this is true. However, some of us deserve a voice of defense. See, I know how to eat healthily. I know that I need whole grains in my diet, and lots of produce and all that. But the simple truth is, when you live in a ward that can't/won't help with that, we missionaries can't really afford to eat well. Believe me, I still try. I buy good bread, and vegetables and so on, but 3 weeks later, I'm out of allotment money, and stuck looking at the community shelf in our kitchen which is stocked with stuff like Ramen, Chef Boyardee and "U.S. Senate Bean Soup" – I kid you not, this stuff is for real. Actually according to the can, this bean soup is the very same bean soup they serve in the U.S. Senate dining hall. Incidentally, it contains nearly the entire daily recommended value of sodium, (about 1,900 mg). Personally I think this bean soup is actually an evil plot to bring down Capitol Hill. Think about it. Old lawyers, high blood pressure and 24 grams of fiber per can. It's a veritable concoction of death.
Speaking of fiber, missionaries don't get enough fiber. It's pretty funny, cause there's actually a pretty sizeable club out here for missionaries suffering from hemorrhoids and other painful intestinal problems as a result of insufficient fiber intake. (I'm happy to say I'm not yet a part of that club, just in case you were wondering).
So anyway, reason number 1 for the women in our lives wanting us to serve missions: We'll appreciate the food we've taken for granted our whole lives.

Update on Frank, our investigator

2008-07-23T10:07:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,

Sounds like you had a blast on your vacation. Thanks for all the pictures and stories. Thanks also for praying for Frank. We’ve been good to our word on not calling his house, and thankfully we haven’t had to yet because Frank keeps reaching out to us. We’ve met with him a couple times since that night on the phone with his dad, and he made it to church on Sunday. He had his baptismal interview yesterday with Elder Shapiro (if you remember, he’s my district leader now), but Elder Shapiro said he felt that Frank needed to be taught a little bit more. Frank feels the Spirit a lot in church, in the scriptures and during our lessons. He just doesn’t quite understand that this is God’s one true and living church yet. To him it seems like a great Christian denomination, but he still needs to pray about the Book of Mormon and receive an answer that its completely true.
Our ward mission leader, Lael, had a great idea that will probably help Frank a lot. On Sunday, we’re putting together a French Speaker’s Dinner where everyone in our ward who speaks French is getting together with Frank and having dinner. For the whole night, only French will be spoken, and they’ll be talking about the Book of Mormon and probably some stories from their missions and so on. Hopefully it will be really helpful for Frank. Frank’s actually taught me some French and I got to use it the other day during a street contact. I can say “What’s your name?”, and “I’m a missionary and I would like to share something with you.”. Also, we’ve got a couple lessons scheduled with him and we’re just hoping they go well and that his dad doesn’t stop him from coming. So that’s the update with Frank.

Putting this problem in the hands of the Lord.....

2008-07-16T10:28:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
Thanks for the postcard! That was very thoughtful of you, and I hope you're all having a great time on vacation. Life here's been pretty good. We did hit a wrinkle with Frank though, and I'm kinda worried about it, though I know I shouldn't be cause its all in the Lord's hands anyway, but we told Frank that until his baptism we were going to call every day to see how he's doing, what he'd learned from the Book of Mormon that day and if there was anything we could do for him. He was pretty excited about that actually. So Sunday night we called him and his dad picked up the phone. "Hi, is Frank there?" I asked. "No!" *click*, came the reply as Frank's father hung up the phone. We had known that Frank's dad wasn't all too keen on his son spending so much time with us instead of working (Frank has a liver problem right now and can't go to work these days, and in his father's mind if Frank is well enough to meet with us, he's well enough to work), but thus far he hadn't presented too much of a worry.
Well, we called back the next day, this time earlier so that hopefully Frank's dad would be out of the house, but as luck would have it, he answered again. This time he was very clear. "I didn't bring my son to this country to go to church! Do you understand? Don't ever call my house phone again, do you understand?" What could I do? ugh... so, we're just praying that Frank will call us back soon, cause otherwise, we don't have a way of contacting him. I worry what showing up at his house might do. :o( But as I said, we're letting the Lord do what he will, and I know that somewhere down the road, Frank will recieve the blessings of baptism. I, in my natural impatience just want it to be sooner rather than later you know?
So keep him in your prayers if you would. His original date we scheduled for Baptism is July 26th, and we really don't want to postpone that of course. Who knows? The Lord's done harder things than this before.

Other than that things are going on like usual. I've gotta run, but I love you all tons. Talk to you soon!
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Teaching Frank..........

2008-07-14T16:51:00.000-07:00

Wednesday July 9, 2008
Dear Family,
Wow, so you’re up in the redwoods eh? Well that’s pretty exciting. Just tell Hans to not step on any hornet’s nests. Bad idea.
Also, you asked why we were driving a mini van. Well, there are a bunch of bike elders in our zone and they all need rides to district meetings every Monday, so the mission invested in a mini van for that purpose. Fun huh? :o)
Well, lemme tell you about my week. On the 4th of July we, like your ward missionaries, went to a breakfast/patriotic event. It wasn’t quite like the one we have at home. The singles ward doesn’t have anything going on that day, but the Belle Haven ward invited us to their activity. They start off by having a 1.5 mile walk that somehow raises money (maybe through pledges or something I don’t know). It was a pretty nice day, and what the heck, missionaries are no strangers to walking, so we led the pack as they asked us to. Then there was the pancake breakfast and a water balloon/sponge fight after that for the kids (Don’t worry, we didn’t participate. We just had fun watching in quiet dignity ;o) Then we had an appointment after that with a less-active, then we went street contacting in Old Town Alexandria (people weren’t very nice that day, not gonna lie…) then we went with the Crystal City Elders to their area and worked a neighborhood with them, then we checked up on some investigators who’ve been hard to contact, and then we got special permission to stay out till 10 to catch some fireworks. Because of the trees here you have to be pretty high up to see any, so we managed to get onto the roof of our old apartment complex and saw a couple shows around the area. We were able to see about 5 different shows going on, but unfortunately all of them were really far away for some reason, so it was kind of a let down. Still it was fun.
On Sunday we met with Frank and set a baptismal date with him for the 26th. Frank is from the Ivory Coast, and speaks mostly French, but his English, though broken, is do-able. What we’ve done a couple times is relied heavily on the movies the church puts out because they have them in so many languages. He loved the Restoration, and especially loved Finding Faith in Christ. He said something pretty great the first time we met him: “I want to see a different Frank when this is over”. He’s very humble, and we love that. He also keeps asking “What do I have to do to get baptized?” Haha, so we told him that he just needs to keep meeting with us and learning. Then we asked him when he wanted to be baptized. He said “How about Friday?” (Meaning the next Friday a few days away). “Well, Frank” we replied, “We’ve still got some things to talk about but how about the 26th?” After our lesson which was in a guy’s home who just got off his mission, his family invited us to stay for dinner. I was pretty happy about that, let me tell you ;o) Not just because we got to have a member dinner, but because these members were helping us out so much just by reaching out a hand of friendship to one of our investigators. It really makes all the difference when members are doing the right thing.
The last two days have been fun cause I got to go on a 48-hour exchange with Elder Shapiro, who’s now my district leader (remember? He was my first companion in the office?), in Alexandria 2nd ward’s area (remember? Where I was trained? ;o) It was fun to be in my old area with an old companion who I love so much. It was also fun because one of Elder Shapiro’s roommates, Elder Colson has a great voice, so there were three of us there who could sing pretty decently. So this morning for companion studies we spent about 20 minutes just going through the hymns and singing parts. It was a really fun, rare experience, and the Spirit was actually pretty strong as we did it. Well, I think that does it for my week.
Love you all!
Love Elder Steffen Lassen
P.S. Thanks for all those scriptural references on Patriarchal Blessings and the role of the Patriarch. We actually have a recent convert who is getting ready for his patriarchal blessing who we’re teaching a lesson to soon about them.

New Area, New Aparment, New Companion in Alexandria

2008-07-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

July 2, 2008
Hello family!
Here's an update on things around here:

Well, life has definitely taken a few turns for me lately. I have a new area, a new companion, a new apartment and a newer apartment (I’ll explain). But let me start by talking about my old area. Elder Lutz is still in the office, and his new companion is Elder Packer (who, incidentally is my little brother (in mission lingo that means we had the same trainer: Elder Gray). He was trained in Alexandria 2nd by Elder Gray right after I was, and it’s kind of funny that he replaced me in Alexandria 2nd when I left there, then also replaced me in the office when I left there. Maybe someday we’ll actually be companions).
So, my new companion is Elder Braun from Pocatello, ID. He and I came out together and he’s a lot of fun; we’ll have a great transfer together. He’s very into acting and musicals and good writing. One of his greatest loves in life is directing, and apparently he’s pretty good at it. He’s also a great missionary. He loves being out here, and he’s got a lot of good skills with regard to people and teaching.
My new area is fun and very different. It’s really thrown me off to have been referred to as things like “dude” and to have been talked to about things like how “Arizona girls are where it’s at”. (Don’t worry, I neither started nor contributed to that part of the conversation). It’s also different though, because before my mission, people in singles wards treated me like an RM, whereas now, it feels like some people treat me like I’m just out of high school. Funny huh? It’s sweet though, and I’ve met some really great people already. I was asked to do a musical number for a fireside at the mission home, and I decided to use a guitar and play “Come Thou Fount”. Well, I was asking around the ward to borrow one and I was referred to this girl named Lisa. Her guitar cost a couple thousand dollars so she said I couldn’t borrow it, but she said she’d be willing to drive it out to Burke (25 mins away), let me play it, and then take it back home. How great is that of her? It was a way nice guitar and the musical number went well.
As for my new and newer apartments: The apartment I moved into upon my arrival was scheduled to be closed as a missionary apartment this week (truthfully it should be condemned and scheduled for demolition…), so without getting too comfortable, I moved in. But on June 30th, we began to move stuff over to the new NEW apartment, and the contrast is staggering. We’ve moved from a total rat hole on the 1st floor of a nasty, dingy, bug-infested sky-scraper apartment building to a luxury high-rise apartment with all the amenities of a 5 star hotel: 24 hour racquetball, 24-hour gym (a NICE gym too!), Underground parking garage complete with a bike garage, tennis courts, a pool, sauna and steam room, a 24-hour concierge and even a free continental breakfast Mon-Fri in the Lounge. Crazy right?? Haha, I’m not sure how we ended up in this place (it probably had something to do with the fact that the new senior office couple are just really excited to help missionaries out ;o) but it’s called Huntington Gateway in Alexandria and you should check it out online. You’ll probably see what I mean.

http://www.huntingtongateway.com/home.html (comment from Steffen's mom....I'm amazed that missionaries get to live in an apartment complex like this! It's really, really nice. I'm secretly hoping his next apartment will not be so nice...sorry Steffen!)
So, we’re in the process of finishing the move, but we’re all pretty stoked about our new place. Hopefully missionaries don’t turn this one into a rat-hole too.I REALLY like being in Alexandria again where people will actually give you the time of day (even if they don’t speak your language which happens on a pretty regular basis). Our area is actually a really big one though, ‘cause we cover the singles in both Mt. Vernon and Annandale stakes, so even Burke is still in my area. Sweet huh?
Well, hopefully that gives you an idea of my week and a half. I love you all and I'll talk to you soon I hope.

Love, Steffen

View from new apartment. You can't see it in the picture probably, but we can see the Capitol Building from here...across the Potamac River. Sweet!

Getting boxes from grocery store to help move apartment. Elder Toby made it all the way from the car to the apartment like this!
New Apartment after getting moved in (notice my desk is set up already, neat and tidy)

(Below):

Elder Burtoch (One of my last zone leaders) getting his legs shaved for an object lesson (our bad excuses are as numerous and hairy as elder Burtoch's legs, so we have to use faith (Shaving cream) and works (razor) to get past them. Pretty funny stuff.

Our zone at our last district meeting/zone portion.

Transfered Back to Alexandria!

2008-06-25T13:51:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,

You probably weren't expecting to hear from me today, but I sure wasn't expecting to hear from Dad the other night either! :o) (John called Sunday night to talk to Steffen's mission president, but instead, Steffen was working in the office and answered the phone which surprised them both! ) Dad, thanks for calling and letting me know about your new calling. I'm sorry if I sounded less than warm in any way, I was just so shocked that I was sitting there talking to my dad you know? :o) I really am SO happy for you and your new calling. I'm sure you feel a fair bit of pressure to be equal to the task ahead, but I know you'll make an amazing patriarch. You're spiritual sensitivity has always been remarkable to me.

I was allowed to write a short email just to let you all know what was going on with transfers. And, well... the Lord's taking me back into the field full-time. I'm actually really excited. I get to go back to Mt. Vernon Zone (That's where alexandria 2 is) but this time I'll be serving in the Singles ward there! Haha. Funny stuff, I can't wait. My companion's name is Elder Braun. We came out at the same time and he was actually one of my roomates back in Alexandria. He's a really good guy and we always had lots to talk about so I'm pretty stoked. I still haven't had a hard companion and I'm just holding my breath for when that comes. A couple funny things about this new assignment and then I'll go: 1) I'll still be driving a van, but now its a mini-van, so its just a downgrade from what I've been doing ;o) 2) You know how much moving I've done in the office? Well, the apartment I'm moving into is scheduled to move to another one in a few days... :o( sigh... one more move.. here we go. Actually, this is one I can be happy about. The Colonial Singles 2nd ward apartment right now is TERRIBLE. Probably one of the worst in the mission. Its similar to what alexandria 2nd wards apartment was like, but slightly more dingy. Supposedly the new apartment is going to be very nice and we won't have to pay for laundry like they do right now. I'll be in Elder Shapiro's district, so I'll get to serve around him again and I'm pretty excited about that. I think it'll be fun and a good missionary experience to serve in a singles ward, so I'm looking forward to it. Wish me luck in my new assignment.
Today we're off to pick up the new missionaries, and then transfers happen tomorrow. Talk to you next wednesday!
Love you lots!
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

June 19th-6 month mark out on mission!

2008-06-24T17:21:00.000-07:00

Hello Family and Friends, Boys and Girls!

First off, thank you sooo much for the great package; I wasn't expecting it and it made my day. It got to me on the very day that was my 6 month mark, (June 19th) so way to go on timing and thoughtfulness. It was funny because the roll of quarters you sent actually busted somewhere along the way and so the package had a nice jingle to it. Everybody in the office was like, "Whoa, what's in there I wonder?" I can't wait to make the pumpkin chocolate chip bars. Thanks again so much. I'm going to use the money to have lunch today with one of our less actives that we're working with named Hsim Chen. We're going out to Sushi in a half-hour and I'm really excited about it. So thanks! I hope you approve of the little splurge :o)

So Dad got a new calling huh? Wow… can I join in the speculation? Well, I don't think they'd call him to be 2nd ward bishop again, 4th Ward's only had Bishop Malan for a couple years now, so he's stuck there for a while unless he's moving or something, He's already on the High Council… Patriarch Martin is in that call for life, and as far as I know his vitals are still good right? I'm guessing he's gotta be going into the Stake Presidency as a counselor or something? Well crazy. Good Luck Dad, whatever it is; I'm guessing I'll get to find out next Saturday. Mom, I'm glad your trip to AZ went well. I'm sure it was very nice to see everybody again. I think I need to write some of them soon.
Could you get me email addresses for Lisa, Julie, and Dustin? I'll start there, and then start writing others.
Also, I'm excited you got Betsy's (Valliant) graduation announcement. I'd love to see it if you would forward it to me. Also I've been thinking about her a lot, and I'd really like to write her but I don't have her address. Can I get that from you as well? Also, that's crazy that Emily Kitchens and the Bacons are still working there at PV pool. Tell them hi for me will you? Emily was dating one of the Bacons last I checked, how's that working out? The three of them are some of my favorite people I remember from High School.
I'm glad you're having the missionaries over for dinner. Tell them they need to really count their blessings because we don't get member dinners over here. Its hard to hear about these wonderful meals they're getting fed by my family and not to be a little jealous, I'm not gonna lie. But I'm happy for them as long as they're appreciative.

Mom, also good luck with Youth Conference. By the time you read this you'll be back already, and probably very very tired. I hope you feel ok. As for me, I'm doing very well. I can't believe its already been 6 months, but at the same time I can. I know a little something about how time keeps seeming to move exponentially faster as the years pass by, only because the last 4 since high school don't even seem to have happened, and yet so MUCH has happened since then. And also, I'm excited that time is moving right along because it means I'm not clockwatching my mission away, and that's a good sign I think.

Transfers are coming up this week, and this time they bring a little more anxiety than they have the last couple times. For the last 2 transfers, I've been pretty much positive of where I was going: nowhere. However, this time my chances for change have gone up. Elder Lutz would be ok to take over as Senior Office Elder, and so now it feels like anything could happen to me. I'd be perfectly content being here another transfer though, just because I love the Burke Ward and our investigators and the office staff so much. (Speaking of Office Staff, if you look really carefully at that picture I sent, you can see Jewel's wedding announcement just behind Elder Good's left shoulder. Can you see it? That's cause we're standing in front of my desk :o)

Here's the mission office staff including the Davis's who were just released, and the Groscosts who just arrived.Back Row: Elders Lutz, Zollinger, Lassen and McKenna
Mid Row: Elders Davis(finances) and Groscost(finances/housing), Sister Groscost(referrals/housing) and Elder Good("Car Czar" (Vehicle Coordinator)/Supplies)
Front Row: Sister Davis(referrals/housing), President and Sister Wixom, and Sister Good(secretary).
The Davis's are actually from Virginia so even though they were released, they still live within our mission boundaries which is sweet cause they're amazing. The Groscosts were brought in from Salt Lake at Presidents request. They apparently knew eachother quite well before all this mission stuff. The Goods are from Mesa which is fun cause I can talk about the local things there and they know exactly what I'm talking about. You know, like Flor de Michoacan, and the Taqueria next door. The BEST jugos, helados and comida you can get in Mesa.... Mmm.. I miss good mexican food.... anyway. Hopefully this gives you something of an idea of who I'm working with and who they are.

….ok so I left for a while to go eat sushi with Chen but I just got back. Mmm.. Whoever thought up all-you-can-eat sushi is a friend of mine. Chen's a cool guy. He's 21 and everyone's hoping he'll go on a mission soon. He wants to as of right now so we're praying hard that that desire will remain and strengthen. Well, I've gotta run, but I hope you're all doing well.
By the way, Ditte I got your package this week, and I've gotta say, the night that showed up, you were just about my favorite person in the world. I love you SOO much! I hope you know that. The T-Shirt was a big hit around the apartment, and I can't get enough of that CD you made me. It's incredible, and SUCH a breath of fresh air to have such great new music to listen to. You seriously gave me one of the best things you could have given me. Also, thank you for the money. You said it wasn't much, but to me it was a great blessing. I won't soon forget your thoughtfulness. I'll be writing you a real letter soon, but I couldn't wait to thank you for that. Also, Stephanie, I got your package as well (this week has been a REALLY good week with regard to packages and mail :o) and I'll be giving you a proper "Thank You" in my next letter to you. I love you all, and love the letters and pictures you send and the prayers you say for me. I'll talk to you soon!

(Here's a couple of silly pictures he included in his e-mail.....)

I Spy something green, extinct and lovable... :o)

Love, Steffen

Tracting: the cure for the common cold?!

2008-06-14T12:30:00.000-07:00

June 14, 2008

Dear Family,
Well, today I'm finally feeling mostly recovered from being sick all week. I don't know if it came from maybe overdoing it last week or something, but last sunday my body temperature went up to 102. I got to bed a little early that night (10:00) but woke up an hour later drenched in sweat and unable to get back to sleep for a little while. I was pretty bummed to be sick because that night, Elder Lutz and I had just finished making our weekly plans, and they included LOTS of proselyting time to make up for last week. The next morning (monday) I woke up, and it seemed my fever had broken. My temp was down to 97.
I was feeling pretty good, so we went to district meetings where for some reason my temp went up again. Haha, as a quick tangent, it was actually pretty funny because at district meetings, the zone leaders had decided to play a game outside involving questions from Preach My Gospel. They had everyone bring clothes they could get wet in so that if you got the question wrong you got cold water thrown on the back of your head. Everybody enjoyed it a lot, because its been pretty hot and humid here lately. But as for me, I was having serious chills at that point so I opted to stay in my full suit out in the sun. It just looked pretty funny cause everyone else was in their gym shorts and t-shirts sweating and I was shivering in my black suit. (Don't worry, they didn't throw water on me :o)
So after district meetings we went home for lunch and I just crashed in bed for 45 minutes or so. I woke up, covered in sweat again, and we headed to the office to take care of a couple things. Now, on our plans were some streets to tract, but I wasn't so sure I was up for it. But I knew my companion really wanted to go find some people to teach, and so did I, so I prayed, and we went out. I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty gross and we gott REALLY sweaty, but we did it, and you know what? Before too long I started feeling better. By the time we went in for dinner my temperature was back down to 98.6 exactly, and it had been at 102 when we started. We went back to the apartment for dinner and after another nap (this one shorter), I started to feel the headache coming on again and my throat was starting to get sore. But we went out again, and before long, I was feeling good again. I was feeling well all the way until around 8:30PM. We headed in at 9 and my fever came back full force. So that was monday. Because of other office things that came up through the week, monday has been the only "finding" time we've had so far and it seems that the Lord wanted me to have that time to tract. It was interesting because it felt like He wasn't removing the illness entirely, just holding it off long enough to get some good work done, and then He let it back in. It was a faith building/testing experience for sure, because that afternoon, its not like I felt better, then went out. Rather, we went out and started working, and THEN I felt better. Pretty amazing stuff I think. So, moral of the story: if you get sick, go tracting. :o)
Heather is doing well, thanks so much for praying for her. She's really busy right now in preparations for a couple of trips she's taking to different places around the world, but hopefully we'll get to meet with her this week and then we won't see her for a month for so. She actually wants us to put together a good list of stuff to read while she's on the plane, and so Elder Lutz and I were thinking we'd put together a care package of sorts with different talks, maybe some printed, and some audio, some sort of Book of Mormon scripture search activity maybe to help her get familiar with it? I dunno, if you have any ideas, let me know.

Happy Father's Day Dad!

Love to you all,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Missionary Moving Service is wearing this elder out!

2008-06-07T13:18:00.001-07:00

June 7, 2008

Dear Family,

Wow…. WOW I'm tired! Ugh.. We just moved our apartment and you know what? I've decided I'm not the biggest fan of moving residences, whether my own or someone else's. Wow… Like, every part of my body just yearns to stop functioning right now. It seems like that's pretty much all we've done this transfer is move apartments around. Last week it was that town house I showed you, this week first it was the Groscosts' (the new office couple who just got here) and then for the last couple days it was our apartment. Let me tell you, for the senior couples, the mission only gives the best. And you know what high-quality furniture means: HEAVY! For their new place we moved a two-piece china hutch, a kitchen table and 4 nice chairs, a really heavy hideaway sofa, a king-sized (I never appreciated just how big those things are until this week when we had to fit one into our van) bed and box spring, an area rug (also heavier than I had anticipated), a beautiful, solid-wood corner desk (yeah that's right, it's a corner desk, which means two pieces) and a few other incidentals. Oh yeah, did I mention the Groscosts' new apartment is 2 flights up? :o) Keep in mind that all these things had to come from somewhere just as much as they had their respective destination. The china hutch and table came from that town house we moved last week, the hideaway sofa came from a sisters' apartment which was 3 flights of stairs up, the king-sized bed set was donated by a member, the rug came from the mission home, and the corner desk had to be dug out of the storage shed (literally. It was totally buried under a vast array of furniture which meant even more moving). Then there was our apartment today and yesterday. I won't even go into how much stuff is in there… sigh…

Also keep in mind that much of this has been done in slightly less than ideal weather conditions. We've had some CRAZY storms (complete with fallen trees, broken power lines, failed electricity, lightning strikes and even tornado warnings), and then the past two days the infamous humidity has finally made its entrance. I know I haven't felt the worst of it yet, but the fact that my glasses literally fog up to about 80% opacity whenever I walk outside is a bad sign I think :o}

PLEASE don't think I'm complaining or that I want out of my assignment as an office elder. I just want to you know why I'm so ready to dip out of existence for a short time :o) I know that many of you with kids can appreciate that feeling (likely way more than I can in fact) As a result, proselyting and even teaching has taken a bit of a back seat this last week, and that's unfortunate.

I did have an awesome exchange with Elder Center though (one of my zone leaders), where I learned a good few things from him. I've been struggling lately with the balance between diligence and temperance.

Alma tells Shiblon in Alma 38:10 to be both, and recently I heard a BYU devotional by the then Elder Eyering called "Good Judgment and Common Sense" where he takes great pains to expound on this concept. He makes the correlation between diligence and intensity with regard to obedience. He said that people who are diligent are often described as intense. Then he talks about temperance meaning not moderation in efforts toward complete obedience, but rather, a love of God so strong that it manifests itself as total humility, which then turns into a love of our fellow man. I've decided that a person can be either diligent or temperate for the wrong reasons. A person might be diligent (or intense) self-righteously because those around him are slackers and his pride wants him to be better than them. This is the point Elder Center brought up to me. A person can also appear temperate (or humble/meek), but more out of a high value placed on the opinion of those around him than out of a love of God. In other words, pride again. But to be BOTH of these things, it HAS to be for the right reason: humility. On my mission I've found myself sliding from one quality over to the other. I've been self-righteously intense, and I've also been "meek" for the sake of pride.

What an undertaking it is to try and be completely diligent and temperate! Try it. I know that its what we need to be if we're to become faithful servants of the Lord.
So I guess that's my spiritual thought for the week. I've gotta run.

Love you all so much!

Elder Steffen Lassen

Grateful for package from home!

2008-06-03T21:39:00.000-07:00

May 31, 2008
Hey Family,
Wow, thanks for the care package! GOOD timing! My grocery cupboard has been a bit scarce lately and the new month hasn’t started yet so our allotment isn’t in. Thank goodness for Cliff Bars and Turkey Jerky! :o)

Well, you asked about Heather. I can’t remember all I’ve told you, but she’s pretty awesome. She’s keeping her commitments to read and pray, and she loves pretty much everything she learns about the Church. She’s lived with high moral standards and followed the Word of Wisdom her whole life. And actually I admire her a lot, because I think holding to those standards would be much more difficult for someone like her that it is for LDS kids. In the case of a Mormon, when somebody offers you a beer and you turn it down, all you have to say in most situations is No thanks, I don’t drink, I’m Mormon”, and they’ll be like “oh, ok, nevermind”. With her though, when people ask her why she doesn’t drink she’s had the really difficult task of explaining to her peers the imbalance of the cost-to-benefit ratio of drinking. It’s not an issue most people (especially young people) are willing to see through different eyes. So when we read her D&C 89 she was like “well, it’s nice to see that all this is actually written down somewhere”. We’re kind of sad because she’s leaving the country in a couple weeks for a month or so and so we won’t see her for a bit. But we’re confident she’ll have the spiritual confirmation she’s looking for in the Book of Mormon. Can’t wait to see her experience that!

Other than that, the missionary life is treating me well. My companion and I get along well, we’re staying really busy all the time, and we’re headed into another Stake Correlation weekend (I think I’ve told you about that before).

Well, I’ve gotta run, but again, thanks so much for the package. I got it in good time, it actually came yesterday. I love cliff bars, especially the peanut butter ones. The Turkey Jerky is great thanks. I love you all tons. Talk to you soon.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

Hey Mom,
Just thought you'd enjoy a couple pictures of a move we had to help out with this week. The Prince William and Bristow elders were moving out of what the missionaries all refer to as "the Mansion" cause it was a 3 story townhouse they had all to themselves. Needless to say, over the years a LOT of things were accumulated there. So it took two trips with this U-Haul trailer we rented and then they made a couple more the next day with their little Mazda 3. Fun stuff!
Steffen

May 24th- Quick Message

2008-06-03T21:34:00.001-07:00

Sorry this one's gonna be a quick one cause Pday's almost over and I've still got one more errand to run this week. I scanned the letter you sent but haven't gotten to read it fully yet. I look forward to reading it in a little bit.

Let me just say that the work here in Burke is going forward SO well! Heather is praying about a baptismal date. She's so awesome! Andrew (someone else I haven't told you about yet) is praying about the Law of Tithing and I told him Bedstefar's and Bedstemor's experience in learning that it was truly from God.

Also, we're going with him to the Visitor's center next week when his wife (who's a member) will be going through the temple for her first time. It'll be awesome we think. We've got a couple other really great investigators and we're really stoked. Know that I love you all.
Love,
Steffen

Unexpected Visitors from the West...........

2008-05-17T16:56:00.000-07:00

Family!

It sure was nice to talk to all of you who happened to be home when I called last week. Thanks for being so wonderful :o) Mom, I'm glad you got my card, sorry it was late, but hey, it was probably even more of a surprise when you got it huh? :o)

Well, a few things are different here and worth mentioning. I survived transfer week, and yep, I the new senior office elder. Elder Shapiro left me :o( But guess where he’s off to! Alexandria 2nd ward! Sweet huh?? I was pretty stoked cause I was able to give him a sort of brief overview on what he could expect from the ward there, and about some of the investigators. He’ll love it there I think. My new companion’s name is Elder Lutz. He’s from Springville, UT and he’s easy to get along with, and a good teacher. He also has lots of good music I can copy ;o) He’s excited about his new assignment in the mission office and we’re both really looking forward to a great transfer together. Have I ever mentioned what transfer week is like? Probably but I’ll give you a quick overview of some of the highlights. Monday and Tuesday are pretty normal for the most part, except that on Monday night Elder Shapiro and I found out what our new assignments were. But Tuesday night is when things really start to get interesting. We went into the office around 8:00PM and one-by-one input all of the new missionary’s assignments into the computer. Luckily MOS (the software we use) didn’t crash this time, things went pretty smoothly, and we finished by 11PM or so. Wednesday we picked up the new missionaries at the airport and took them street contacting at George Mason University. I don’t know if you remember but last transfer’s new missionaries actually got kicked off campus by the police. But this time they worked it out with the Administration and got express permission to be there. It was lots of fun. I paired up with Elder Loppe from Spain/Texas and helped him give away his first Book of Mormon and we also set up a return appointment for the Fairfax elders to keep. Fun stuff! He did great and was all enthusiasm. This group of new missionaries was a really good one (there were 4 Elders and 5 Sisters I think), and its interesting that there really is such a different feel (you might say a different spririt) within each group. This one was full of great missionaries and it was inspiring to be there. After street contacting we went to the mission home where Sister Wixom had a great meal ready for us. After some training from the Assistants they went to bed and we went to the office to solidify plans for Thursday’s transfer meeting. On the media side of transfer meetings we had a slideshow, a powerpoint presentation and 2 movie clips to put together. I’m actually pretty proud of the movie clips, and maybe sometime I’ll send them home for you to check out. Thursday we had transfer meetings, bikes to run around the mission and the departing missionary fireside in the evening (do they have those at home?). After the fireside closed up the building and then we headed off to the mission home for dessert with the departing missionaries, after that it was off to bed. Friday morning we took the departing missionaries to the airport, went home, caught up on some lost sleep and then became normal missionaries again. That night we had an AMAZING lesson with a new investigator at our stake president’s house. Her name is Heather and we believe she’s been very prepared by the Lord throughout her life to receive the fullness of the Gospel. It was actually pretty awesome because I was able to connect with her in a few good ways. Every year she does volunteer work in Honduras similar to my experience in Ecuador. She also works with my stake president’s son who has autism using Applied Behavioral Analysis which is what I did with CAPyschCare. As I said, we can’t wait for her to start gaining her own testimony of the Gospel, and we’re so grateful to the Lord and also to President Erickson and his family for being good missionaries. I definitely hope to keep you posted more on Heather in the future.
Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all, and I pray for you all the time.

Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. I had an unexpected visit from a few friends this morning. Haha, you might recognize some of them. For anyone reading this who doesn't know these girls, they're pretty much the best friends I had out in Arizona and they were in DC on vacation so they dropped by the office to say hello. It was really fun to see them.

DISCLAIMER!!: I tell this story because it was something very notable that happened in the unfolding of this week. I do not however tell this to encourage this kind of behavior from anyone else at home. I actually got a pretty stern talking to by one of the Assistants (he was afraid I had asked them to meet me there). They took a chance, came and saw me and it was fun (even though I was really only able to say a handful of words before I was told they had to leave "now!") but its not something I would suggest trying.

That said, thanks Lindsey, Erin, Amanda and Tessa. I love you all tons ;o)

Pollen Count in the Thousands....Kleenex my best friend!

2008-05-17T10:32:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,

Thanks so much for the good letters :o) Sounds like its been a fun week! I’m going to keep this one short today, just because I’ll be talking to you tomorrow (I think the morning would be best. I’ll call around 11AM here, so 8AM there? Does that work?) Just a real quick story and then I’ll go. Yesterday we had 4 appointments! Sweet huh? Well, 2 of them kept and 2 fell through. Fairly typical so we weren’t devastated. One of the appointments was with someone Elder Shapiro and Elder Strikwerda found last week while we were on exchanges (I was in Fairfax for the day, Elder Strikwerda came here to Burke). Evidently they had been tracting, then were on their way to the car when Elder Shapiro saw a man getting out of his car behind them. He said he felt like he needed to go back and talk to him, so he did. The man (about 29 ys. Old) pretty much started by blowing them off and said he was really busy. But he seemed to give it a second thought, got a smirk on his face and said something like “hmm, you know what? I would like to meet with you guys sometime. I’m actually a pastor at George Mason University”. Well, what he said and the way he said it sounded a bit ominous, but they set the appointment up regardless. So, yesterday, we went back for the appointment. As we were walking up to the house, we both stopped dead in our tracks. There were no less than 9 cars or so parked in front of it. It looked as though this young pastor had invited some friends. After considering turning around and leaving, we decided to go anyway. We knocked on the door and this man came out quickly.“I’m so sorry” he said. “I didn’t have any way of contacting you, but I forgot that I had something going on today. Can we reschedule for another time?”
Haha, we were SO relieved. It actually turns out that his intentions are much more sincere than we’d given him credit for. He assured us that he really just wanted to know more about us, that we would be meeting one-on-one (really one-on-two), and added that if we felt comfortable with it, after meeting privately he’d like us to come to one of his youth bible studies and give a presentation. PHEW! Haha. So we went from being skeptical, to worried to excited. Good stuff.
Well, I’m doing well. I do have what they tell me is hayfever, and its getting pretty old, I’m not gonna lie. They say the pollen count is in the 2,000’s range this year and normally I guess it’s in the hundreds or something, so allergies are off the hook this spring. But, aside from having to use a million Kleenex, having a sore throat and the voice of Barry White (can’t get enough of your love baby… ;o) its not all too bad. I can’t wait to talk to you all tomorrow. I love you tons.
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen
P.S. We’re coming up on transfer week and its very probable Elder Shapiro will be leaving the office which means I’ll be going senior comp, AND training someone how to be an office elder! Wish me luck, I’ll probably need it. I’ll know for sure by next Tuesday.

Elder's Moving Van Service

2008-05-05T13:51:00.000-07:00

Hey Dad (and Mom and everyone else when you read this),

I want to share a sort of painful learning experience from this morning.This morning I got my hair cut by a lady from Vietnam. She was more chatty than many of the women I've had cut my hair so far and so we talked. She noticed right away that I was a missionary."So you're on a mission this morning?" she asked. I laughed and said,"yeah, well, actually for two years"."Oh, so on the weekends?" She asked."Nope, every day, for 2 years" I replied.She seemed really interested in that and asked things like if I got paid and what not. Eventually though things got quiet and then out of nowhere she brought up the Law of Tithing and she didn't think it was right for any church to ask that of its members. The reason I bring up this conversation is because it was significantly different from almost any Gospel conversation I've had so far on my mission. As missionaries we initiate at least 99 percent of all gospel conversations. This one was different. She had started it all on her own, and I realized quickly how out of practice I was with this kind of gospel sharing scenario. I was sharing the gospel defensively. When we as missionaries start the conversation, we do it with questions, and get people to think. If they ask us a question, instead of simply giving them a statement, we answer with a question. This works really well as long as they're willing to have a conversation with you. But in this case, I didn't do it right at all. I was defending, but not asking questions. And I think the whole reason is that I went in there to get a hair cut. I wasn't proselyting and my mind wasn't in proselyting mode. I think this is the mindset of many members of the church. We go about life, most of the time trying to just mind our own business, hoping someone will take interest in our gospel, but when they do, we share defensively.

Here's an example of what the conversation went like:"Mormons are the ones who make you pay 10% of your paycheck right?""Well, yeah, but its our choice, we don't have to""I just don't think its right. We should give money to church, but we should give more or less depending on what we can do""Well, there are blessings from giving money to the Lord you know..."She just kept talking about how she disagreed with it and I just awkwardly smiled as she finished my hair and then we left.
Lame, lame Lame. Ugh. I share this at my own discredit because I wonder if this kind of conversation is familiar to anyone else. This how the conversation could have gone if I was more prepared to share the Gospel with good questions:"Mormons are the ones who make you pay 10% of your paycheck right?""Yep, we believe that its a commandment from God to give 10% of all we make back to him""I just don't think its right. We should give money to church, but we should give more or less depending on what we can do""Well let me ask you this: If God wanted to fund something, how would he do it? And what if God wanted his people to learn something along the way? How would he do it?"
It would have been much less of a defensive situation. And it would have been a more equal conversation, and we both could have learned.

So, moral of the story. Be prepared to share the gospel at all times. And don't just respond to good, legitimate questions with statements that simply answer the question and leave room for a hasty end to the conversation. Get them thinking by having good questions prepared for each of the principles we get asked about most. These are all things I already know, but that I learned even better this morning. I wanted to share this, because if I didn't then it was just a conversation that went bad and it was good for nothing. But if I learned, and I could share what I learned with others then maybe I wouldn't feel so bad for what I'd done wrong.

Well, things were busy this week, that's for sure. Monday was our official first day in the new office and as such there was a TON to do. Computers had to be set up, the supply room with all the Books of Mormon and pamphlets and pass-along cards etc. had to be restocked, shelves were put up, and all the other joys of moving were experienced in great quantity :o) I don't really remember what happened on Tuesday, but I know we were busy then too. Wednesday was a lot too. There were some Sister Missionaries serving in the Algonkian ward who lived in an apartment. But as I'm sure you know, the church is trying to get missionaries (at least state-side missionaries) into member homes to save money (especially out here in Northern Virginia where rent is crazy). There's a member of the Algonkian ward up there who was kind enough to open her home to these sisters, so Wednesday we spent all afternoon helping out with the move (remember, we drive the van and the assistants have a truck). Well, the problem was, the new place, because its some one's home, is already furnished, so a dilemma came when we tried to figure out what to do with all of this furniture that had accumulated in this missionary apartment over the years. We thought the van would be enough hold it all, but had no idea going out there because we didn't know what the apartment had in it. Well it turns out that when all was said at done, and much life-sized tetras was played, we just barely fit everything into the van AND the truck (see picture). But THEN to top it all off, we had nowhere to put it all! Our storage shed that the mission has is already filled to the max with other stuff that's been building up, so now what do we do with all this stuff?? Well, we decided to worry about it later. So we went and had dinner with the Wixoms, then split up to do some real missionary work (we had a sweet lesson with Andrew who's our best progressing investigator) and then at 9 o'clock that night we met up at the storage shed to figure this whole thing out. It took a while but we finally came up with a solution: There's a new missionary apartment opening up in Warrenton which is roughly 45 minutes south of us. Its a tiny studio apartment and DEFINITELY doesn't need this much stuff, but they need some things there before they can move in. We figured we'd take all this stuff there, have them go and decide what they need and don't need and when we helped them officially move in we'd take all the unnecessary things back. So, starting at 10:05 PM or so, we took both vehicles, headed toward the nearest Taco Bell (believe me we needed the energy for this one), and then down to Warrenton. We got there around 11, dumped all this stuff inside and booked it out of there, getting home somewhere just past midnight. Actually, despite the late night, we all had a lot of fun along the way. The 4 of us laughed a lot that night at the ridiculous circumstances and our ridiculous solution to the problem. Fun stuff.

Well, Gotta run. Love you all. Elder Steffen Lassen

Busy week of inspections, meetings, interviews and moving the office!

2008-04-28T12:34:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,
Hooray! New nephew! Congratulations Cristin, I'm so happy to hear everything went well with the home-birth.
Mom, the email worked great, I got to see all the pictures of baby Charlie. What a great name. Lindsey Burnham should be especially happy to hear that you decided to name him Charlie. She wanted so badly for her first nephew to be named Charlie that before he was even born they were referring to him as Charlie, but alas, he was named something else. So she'll either be really happy or really jealous. :o) www.talesofanordinaryhousewife.blogspot.com

This week has been full but great. We finished up zone conferences, had return and report (three weeks after the new missionaries enter the field they go back to the mission home and get some further training as well as the opportunity to share their first weeks' stories and their testimonies with each other). Monday was our apartment's apartment inspection and our interview with President Wixom. Every 6 months, the President, the assistants, Sister Wixom and Sister Davis (the senior missionary who's in charge of housing) go around to EVERY apartment and member home where missionaries live in the mission (all told about 70 dwelling places) and inspect for cleanliness, maintenance issues etc. While the inspection is going on President conducts his interviews for the transfer. I'll just have you all know that our apartment received the "Celestial" award :o) Mom, you should be happy about that. I've made a few more videos this time, including some walk-throughs of the mission home, and our apartment. Maybe I'll do one of the new office which we'll finish moving into on Monday. That way you'll know to what I'm referring when I talk about all these places.
So yeah, it was nice on Monday to meet with President Wixom one-on-one. He said he had great expectations for me and that he was going to "ride me like a horse" haha. Yeah, you tell me what I should feel after hearing that one. Excitement? Fear? Who knows? :o) I love President Wixom. We're all placing bets as to when he gets called as a general authority, cause that's how dedicated he is to this gospel. Its really incredible to get to be around him as much as I am. Tuesday was zone conference for the Spanish zones, so I got to practice my Spanish a little bit, and Return and Report was that afternoon. On Wednesdays we have staff meetings (all the office staff meet together and discuss the various needs of the mission with regard to their specific roles i.e. Sister Davis talks about housing needs, Elder Davis about Finances, Elder Good about Cars, etc..) Wednesday night we had a wonderful first lesson with a new investigator named Andrew. He's married to one of the ward members and the story is a pretty good one. She joined the church while the two of them were still just dating. So when they started talking about marriage she laid down very firmly the condition that he come to church with her every Sunday, because her kids would be raised in the gospel. So they were married on a Saturday and the next day they were at church. Even the Honeymoon had to wait. Pretty awesome huh? So he's been coming to church now for a couple years I think but never was ready to talk to the missionaries. But last week he said he wanted to start taking the lessons so we were there! He's approaching everything with as open a mind and heart as we could ever ask for and we're excited to teach someone like that. All we have to do is not mess something up big time and he'll come to know its true. Thursday we had District meetings (yep, the 14th article of faith applies on a mission too. I'd never heard of that particular article of faith until I came out here and saw it posted in our bishops office: 14. We believe in meetings.), then in the afternoon got the storage shed ready to hold more stuff (there's a video of this on the card too), and then in the evening we had a really awesome night of teaching. I don't have time to go into too many details, but in short we've learned that if an appointment falls through (which all 3 did), we need to trust that the Lord still wants us there, and we need to look for a miracle. In this case the miracle teaching experience was sitting on his porch next door to our last appointment that fell through. We hope to go back and teach him more, and if we do I'll try and tell you more about him next time. Even if we don't though, I learned a new role of the Holy Ghost as we taught this man. I've always known the comforting side of the Holy Ghost, and even sometimes I've felt warned, but as we taught this man I felt very strongly prompted to promise him a specific blessing that otherwise I wouldn't have if he did as we invited him to do which was to read some passages from the Book of Mormon. Its awesome to come to know for myself the different ways the Holy Ghost can help forward God's work. Friday morning is when we plan for the upcoming 10 days, and then we went on exchanges with the zone leaders, so last night Elder Fuapau came to Burke and Elder Shapiro was off to Annandale. We had a good exchange, and did a lot of street contacting. Today is P-Day but we've spent the morning getting the office ready to move, and I think that just about brings you up to speed on things.
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

By the way, Thought you might like to know. President said I was doing such a great job as an office elder that he wanted to show his appreciation somehow. Well, he couldn't really assign me to something glamorous like Zone Leader or AP just yet seeing as how I'm still so young in the mission. So instead he just had Salt Lake get us a new car. What do you think? :o) Elder Lassen

P.S. I promise I'm not really gunning for leadership, it just made the story better :o) The AP's can keep their crummy assignment and TOTAL lack of sleep. I don't want it . Wouldn't mind a sweet car like this though... :o)

Gladys Knight Concert and Record Keeping Crisis in one week!

2008-04-19T14:43:00.000-07:00

Hey Mom, Dad, family and friends,

This week was JAM-PACKED! Wow. Zone conferences every day to go to, a major baptismal record crisis and a Gladys Knight Concert to help out with is a good summary.
The baptismal record crisis came because this year we've had about 80 baptisms YTD. But Salt Lake only had record of about half of that because missionaries haven't been sending us the completed records so they don't get transmitted. Well, President Wixom has a meeting tomorrow with all the mission presidents in this area of the US and a couple general authorities and according to Salt Lake, our stats were way down from last year when in truth we're actually doing about 40 percent better than last year in terms of key indicators like baptisms. Anyway, so long story short, picture the scene in "The other side of Heaven" where Elder Groberg is going crazy trying to get all these records together and what you have is a more cinematic version of what happened to us this week. It was nuts.
Then we had a Gladys Knight Fireside (not a concert, because it was in the Chapel but we affectionately called it a Fire-concert instead, or a concert-side). She brought her Saints United Voices Choir and did a really awesome fireside. Her and her husband bore great testimonies and there were a ton of people from other faiths there. It was a lot of fun; there was standing and clapping and a band and everything.
Well, I've gotta run. But I'll talk to you soon! Love you all!

Love, Steffen

More miracles from tracting..........

2008-04-14T21:43:00.000-07:00

Wasn’t conference great? All the time, we meet people who totally fail to see the significance of having a church complete with prophets and apostles, and I just wish everyone of them could just watch a session or two of conference. I LOVED Elder Bednar’s talk on getting more out of prayers. We all appreciated his plug for more member missionary work, and we pray that the members heard it too. Sounds like you did at least mom :o) I also really liked Elder Holland’s talk on why we believe in continuing revelation. I used his example of how the early saints must have rejoiced when a new epistle was circulated in a discussion the other day. It really helped out. It’s so sad to see that for so many people it seems the Bible is the Alpha and the Omega, instead of God Himself. I think it was Elder Holland who said that true scripture or a true prophet points away from itself, and not to itself. Good stuff.

I can’t remember if I told you about Tammy and Dwayne? They’re an awesome family we’re teaching now. Another miracle of tracting. Tammy is working on her Master’s in Biblical Counseling, and Dwayne is in the Marines. She wants to be able to provide biblically based counseling to marines who’ve been through combat. Pretty awesome huh? They are SUCH good Christians, and we know that if we can just help them feel the spirit through our testimonies and faith they’ll start to open up a little more. Keep them in your prayers if you would. Like I said, they’re such a beautiful family, and the Gospel would only further than they’ve already come. Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all. I’m sending a few pictures of the scenery around us which is breathtaking. Hopefully they’ll do at least a small bit of justice to what things really look like around here.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

April 3,2008 Busy Life of an Office Elder.........

2008-04-06T20:05:00.000-07:00

Hey Mom, Hey Family,

Let me tell you about transfer week. Its all pretty blurry I'm not gonna lie.

Monday morning we finally got to go to district meetings (we only went twice this transfer because of all the zone conferences we had to be at). Later that night we had a really good appointment with our ward mission leader's family and Justin who was just baptized. Justin has somewhat of a predicament because his dad who isn't a member has him play in tons of sports and most of the time sundays are full. So after the lesson Sister Grundvig (our ward mission leader's wife) did something awesome. She very simply and boldy asked him how he felt when he came to church. He said he felt great and that it was the right place to be. She then asked him if he would tell his dad how much he liked being at church, and how much it meant for him to be there, because if the dad heard it from him, and heard how important it was to him, he would be more inclined to get him there. As of yet I think the dad thinks its just something the Mom wants. I could have hugged Sister Grundvig because he said he would talk to his dad, and this has been an issue we've been trying to figure out for a while. Hooray for solid members!
On Tues. we spent all day in the office working on Stake Correlation packets (a packet about an inch thick that contains all sorts of data and statistics and graphs and pictures, much of which is our job to generate and ensure its accuracy), and then that night we got to find out where everyone was going for transfers. This is one of the perks of being in the office. We find out a day before everyone else. The drawback to being an office elder, however, is that for that knowlege we pay the price of sleep, all week long. Tuesday night we stayed up till 2:30 am entering all the new data into MOS (Mission Office System, the software that runs everything in the mission i.e. referrals, transfers, etc.). There are about 180 missionaries in the mission, and so you can tell that that would take some time to put in the computer. Plus we didn't even get to start till about 8:30 pm because we had an appointment with a family in the ward. PLUS guess what! MOS decided to crash at about 12:30 am! Ugh... So, after 4 hours of sleep, we started Wednesday.
Wednesday is when the new missionaries arrive. So we prepped and cleaned the van and truck, then headed to the airport. It was pretty entertaining to see what I was probably looked and acted like only a couple months ago. It happened to be my day to drive (Elder Shapiro and I take turns switching off), and one of the new elders made a pretty funny comment. He was talking to Elder McKennna, one of the Assistants, and was like “So, I guess it doesn’t take too long to work up to leadership positions in this mission. He’s only been here 4 months (referring to me) and he’s already driving the van!” Haha, I replied by saying something like “Yep, all my aspirations of leadership and rank were fulfilled once I was entrusted with the keys to this sweet van here”. It was pretty funny to us. Once we picked them up it was straight off to George Mason University to place their first Books of Mormon, just like I did. Unfortunately for them someone called the police and we were all chased off campus. At least they had something to write home about. Then we took them back to the Mission Home for dinner (which was fantastic), and for Orientation. While they were busy with that we snuck out to get some tracting done. We found a new person to teach who we’re pretty excited about. He’s from Vietnam and we have high hopes for him. Then we went back to the mission home, caught the tail end of orientation, helped clean up, and then (its 9 pm or so at this point) went to the office and finished getting ready for transfer meetings the next day.
After another late night and again about 4 hours of sleep we were at the mission home the next morning (Thurs) by 6 am to help make breakfast for the new missionaries. Transfer meetings were good. We spent the afternoon getting missionaries and their luggage to their new areas, and the evening with the departing missionaries at the departing missionary fireside. It was another late (not so bad but still late) night because we are the ones to lock up the building afterward, and we started Friday nice and early again (6 am to make breakfast this time for the departing missionaries). We helped them get off to the airport, and then the afternoon was devoted to driving down to Dalghren (check a map it’s a long ways away) to deliver luggage, a bed and a desk to a missionary who had to go a whole day and night with no bed and none of his stuff.
Anyway, I’ve gotta run, and I hope that even though this is pretty long it gives you a good idea of some stuff that being an office elder entails.
I love you all so much. Have fun watching conference. I know I’ll enjoy it.
Love, Steffen

Office Elders freak out when asked to break White Handbook Rules......

2008-03-31T12:32:00.000-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,

This week’s been great! :o) Where do I start? I’ve only got about 15 minutes but here we go. For the second time so far being an office elder has meant breaking rules in the white handbook. (Does that sound auspicious or what? :o) Do you remember the first week when President gave us express permission to sleep till we woke up because transfers meant going with so little sleep? Well this one’s even weirder I think. This last Monday, we got 4 new mission vehicles to replace some of the older ones. They were 4 brand-new Chevy Malibus. Now, seeing as how the Malibu is the fleet car of choice for SO many companies, and seeing as how I drove a million of them when I was a Valet, they’re not my favorite car. They fall apart quickly and most of the ones I’ve seen have just been treated horribly to boot (the mission cars are no exception). That said, these ones were actually pretty decent. Anyway, we had to go down and get them from a dealership in woodbridge. Now, there’s a rule that only the senior companion drives for the most part. However, since I’ve now been certified to drive the mission van (did I tell you about the certification I had to do just so I could drive a van shorter than the one we own? Ugh.. kill me), Elder Shapiro and I take turns driving every other day. So, first off, its weird enough that I’m driving period. Second, how would you feel if I told you my companion and I drove back to the office in separate cars? By ourselves?? Weird huh? Yeah, it was pretty weird. Elder Shapiro said he was flipping out big time and that he felt like the biggest sinner. But there it was. Its what we were told to do. Oh well, I guess it means they trust us.

We’ve found a TON of new investigators lately! Elder Shapiro and I made a goal to proselyte AT LEAST one hour a day, if at ALL possible. Since we’ve made that goal and prayed for help to achieve it, the Lord has blessed us with the time, and with people to teach. Its awesome. Let me tell you about a couple of our investigators. Edyth is a recently widowed woman, probably in her 70’s. We tracted into her a while ago, but while she’s been happy to have us over, she’s hesitant to keep commitments. Finally we called in the calvary and had a married couple from the ward come with us to a lesson, and let me tell you, having members there made it 110% better. It was awesome, and I could have just hugged the sister who came with us. She was so warm and friendly and by the end of it she told us she wanted to come to church, and also wants to come to the Temple Visitor’s Center. Another man we found just the other day and his name is Franz. At the door we left him with a For the Strength of Youth because he has teenage kids. He said he was excited to read it because he knows a really solid mormon family and he knew those standards had everything to do with their family’s strength. We came back the next day for our appointment and taught him the Joseph Smith story and about the Book of Mormon. After hearing the first vision he basically told us he knew Joseph was a prophet. There are more stories to tell, but sadly the clock is against me.

Easter was nice, and although normally members aren’t allowed to feed us, Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving are the exceptions. So we had breakfast with one family, and Dinner with another. It was SOO nice to leave a meal so full :o) The members who fed us dinner were actually kind enough to also make us Easter Baskets as well! It was great. Well, I’ve gotta run, but I love you all so much. Wish me luck, cause this week is transfers, and if Elder Shapiro gets transferred, I’ll have a CRAZY week trying to figure out how to lead my area and the office. Ugh… Hopefully he’ll stay another transfer. Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P-Day this week spent on bike in DC

2008-03-24T12:01:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
Ok, so I'm trying to attach some photos from today's trip to DC, I've got a few more minutes before PDay is officially over so I thought I'd add an addendum to my email. DC was really fun. Every building there just looks so important! What we did is we drove our van out to Arlington, parked it near the Hiroshima monument, then took our bikes out of the back and rode around DC. It was actually probably the best thing we could do, because driving in DC looks like a nightmare, and walking everywhere would have taken forever. We got a TON of stares from people as the four of us peddled past. It was really fun though and we got some pretty good pictures, so hopefully you'll enjoy those.
Haans, I thought of you a lot today cause we found the Monument to the Seabees. I took some pictures of this statue of a really buff Seabee reaching down to a little kid and I thought, "Huh, I didn't know Haans had a career in modeling for sculptors!" :o)
We didn't get to spend a lot of time at most of the places, but I'm sure I'll get to go again sometime within the next couple years. I'd like to see Arlington National Cemetery more. We stopped in and saw a little bit of it, but I really want to see the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the guard who's always on duty there. We did stop by the Lincoln Monument, the Vietnam War Memorial (Dad is your name there or is it just soldiers who died?), the WWI and WWII Memorials, the Capitol Building, the National Cathedral, the Washington Monument, and we passed by countless other things I would have loved to have stopped for longer, but PDays are only 8 hours long you know?
On the way home we stopped by Nielsen's Frozen Custard in Vienna. Nielsen's in legendary around here and since the owner is a member we get a 50% discount. Sweet huh? All in all its been a really nice PDay.
Anyway, I've gotta run. To everyone who wrote me this week, if I didn't get a response off to you individually I'm really sorry, but I hope you understand. I love you all and I'll reply next week for sure. Again, Happy Easter!
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

ELDER LASSEN'S FIRST MISSIONARY BIKE TRAIL

2008-03-20T15:48:00.000-07:00

In Steffen's post of January 16th, he describes his first night in the mission field and being taken on this bike trail in pitch dark by Elder Gray, his trainer. (probably some sort of initiation to the mission field for new elders). He was on a borrowed bike that night with no brakes or lights and it was pitch dark. He thought he was going to die and he was really scared....but Here's a video clip of the trail later in the daytime.

"2 for 1 Special Missionary Mishaps:Spanish Edition"....

2008-03-17T21:21:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

I'm glad you got my handwritten letter. I'm sorry about the power outage. (refer to last week's blog).It was definitely a bummer, but what are you gonna do? Again, thanks so much for that package I got last Saturday. Its been great having some alternatives to the 1 CD I used to have. :o) Speaking of CD’s, I found a new perk of being in the office. There are a couple hundred recordings of BYU devotionals on the computers here in the office, so I burned them all onto mp3 CD’s. Our van’s stereo can read mp3 CDs which is nice, and so can Elder Shapiro’s portable CD player, so we’ve been enjoying talks by Elders Holland, McKonkie, Eyring etc. in both the van and the apartment. Its great! :o) I’ve come to LOVE Elder Holland. He doesn’t play around (like in the last session of conference “A Trinitarian notion never set forth in the scriptures because it is not true.”

Here's the first of two Missionary Mishaps that occurred this week to us:

First:

For our zone activity this last Wednesday we went bowling in a part of town that’s heavily Hispanic. We were driving in the Assistants’ truck (see picture)

down a road that was just LINED with Hispanic people waiting around for work. Unfortunately most of these people are illegally here, and so they wait all day for people to come by who need help with odd jobs. Well, Elder Gleave (one of the Assistants) has been in the Spanish program his whole mission and now that he’s an Assistant he doesn’t get to use his Spanish as much and he misses it. So any chance he gets to use it, he does. So, at the sight of all these “his” people he rolled down the window and as we were driving past yells “Orale Amigos!” or “hey, what’s up?” Well, keep in mind, we’re in a truck, which is what most people who give them work drive. So without a moments hesitation they’re up and running after us with excitement in their eyes. :o( Sad huh? They chased us for a good little while then finally stopped. Elder Gleave felt SOOO bad… Moral of the Story: Don’t yell anything to a bunch of Latinos who are waiting for work unless its “Oye! Tengo trabajo!” and you really do have work for them to do.

Second:

This one’s on me, and its at my expense that you’ll probably have a good laugh. As you’ll see from the pictures, we had a baptism this week! The mother of the boy who was baptized is from Peru and has been letting me practice my Spanish with her. As we were leaving her house the other night she offered us a can of peaches to take home with us. I thanked her but refused. Having nothing to give us she opted to hug me instead! AHH! So of course I was awkward and stiff as a board (kind of like how I normally hug only worse :o) and she sort of recoiled and asked what the matter was. I wanted to reply in Spanish and explain that we couldn’t hug people but the verb for ‘to hug’ escaped me for a moment. Thinking it was close to the English word ‘embrace’ I said “No puedo embrasar.” Well, as it turns out, I don’t think ‘embrasar’ is really a word, but it sounds a LOT like ‘emBARasar’ which means to impregnate. So in essence, here’s what happened: She goes in for the hug, I’m awkward then say “Oh, I’m sorry, but we’re not allowed to impregnate”. Her and her son both had a pretty good laugh as I sheepishly ran-walked out the door.The worst part about the whole thing is I KNOW better. Ugh… I know what that means, and I know a ton of missionaries learning Spanish make that mistake, but there it was. I fell right into it like an idiot. Oh well. So yeah! We had a baptism this week! This is Justin.

Justin is 10, and he’s part of a part-member family. He’s WAY into sports (so much so that its been hard to teach him or get him to church.), but he also plays trombone, so there’s hope for him yet. :o) His baptism was great. Elder Shapiro and I did the musical number and then I was asked to talk on the Holy Ghost. The music went fairly well; we borrowed a guitar from a member and did a version of “Baptism” in the primary songbook with harmony. My talk was actually pretty decent until the end when I for some reason kicked into babble-mode. Ugh… oh well. Well, I love you all, even those siblings from whom I don’t often hear… ;o)

Hope you’re all well. Keep praying for me, I can feel the affects, I promise, and I need those prayers so very much. Have fun with Easter. I’ll talk to you soon.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. just to explain, the man who baptized Justin is our ward mission leader ,and then there are Justin's parents and his older sister, her fiancée and her son.

Power Outage Letter

2008-03-08T10:00:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Well wouldn't you know it, I was half-way through an e-mail when what should happen but the power went out? I'm sure it was weather related, because the rain and wind were nothing short of torrential earlier. So, here I am, writing by candle-light.

This week was fun for a lot of reasons. We've had zone conferences almost every day and its interesting how even though the prepared messages are the same, the feel of every conference is different for various reason. One zone, (actually my old zone), basically got called to repentance for several things, but others have been more light-hearted. I also had the "opportunity" to drive a Mexican-born elder to take a 5-hour-long English proficiency test so he can come to the states for college after his mission. So, I got to sit in the writing room for 5 hours straight :-} I'm actually not bitter 'cause I'll be happy if he does well on it. That'll mean a huge difference in his future.

Also, I had my first "fun-tracting" experience in the rain last night. It was pretty fun. I've gotta cut this letter short.

Also, Sampson was baptized! (Refer to blog on January 16, 2008).I got to go, even though it's now out of my zone. You can see his pictures on the(memory) card.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

Another Moment of Missionary Mishaps.......

2008-03-04T10:16:00.000-08:00

Here's another story,

So, some elders in our mission were apparently working with an investigator who was having some trouble keeping commitments like coming to church, and also having a hard time with some of the commandments. So the missionaries wanted to encourage him by sharing 1 Nephi 3:7 which of course reads:"And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them."An appropriate scripture right?

Well, sadly they accidentally turned to and read 3 Nephi 3:7 which, because its a direct quote from the Gadionton Leader says:"Or in other words, yield yourselves up unto us, and unite with us and become acquainted with our secret works, and become our brethren that ye may be like unto us—not our slaves, but our brethren and partners of all our substance."Yeah... NOT a good scripture to take out of context and share with someone who's hesitant to investigate the church further...

Begining the Sabbath with Seventh-Day Adventist Family.....

2008-03-04T10:11:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
As always, thanks so much for the wonderful letters. Not to be trite, but they really do keep me going sometimes. Thankfully, Elder Shapiro and I have gotten to do some actual missionary work. Last night we found a family of new investigators while tracting. They're incredible. I don't know how far they'll progress simply because they are so devoted to their seventh-day adventist faith, but it was SO refreshing to find a family who claim Christian beliefs and actually practice them. We caught them last night (friday) just as they were starting their sabbath. They invited us in, asked Elder Shapiro to start their sabbath off with a prayer (he gave a beautiful prayer), sang a song for us (The family is a husband and wife both from El Salvador but their English is perfect and you can't even hear an accent, and a 4 yr old boy and a 6 yr old girl) in parts (who really knows how to do that?) and wished us a happy sabbath. They asked us tons of questions about our faith, about what life was like as a missionary, and we set up an appointment to come back. It was really really awesome. Like I said, I think they may just be curious, but the Spirit can fix that real quick :o)

Becoming an Office Elder at First Transfer!

2008-02-24T11:19:00.000-08:00

Elder Lassen with "golden" investigator, Mark Gibbons... refer to posting from Februay 13th .
Lisa and Joe, a part member family who we love tons, and who threw me a farewell party...the #1 candle on the brownies is for my 1st transfer!
Elder Shapiro, left (my new companion ) and Elder Reynolds, right (the old office elder). I guess I meet the "physical type" standards to work in the office :o

Just a sweet old Fairlane I thought dad would get a kick out of. It's nice to see the odd old car in VA. Usually though this is the condition they're in (the other sides' got a big ol' dent from an accident) :o(

Dear Family,

Wow, being an office elder has been interesting! And its only my 2nd day! Lets see where to begin. Thursday was the actual transfer day. So we got to the Burke Chapel, and it was good to see some of my friends from the MTC again. After a little while we all went into the meeting, and President Wixom, his Wife, the Assistants and all the new missionaries came walking in (A little moment of déjà vu for me). Some words were said and then we went to get our luggage exchanged. This is where I officially became Elder Shapiro’s companion, and I haven’t seen a dull moment yet. He told me to leave my luggage where it was and help set up the screen and projector (pretty much every meeting has a film of some kind that we make with the AP’s having to do with this transfer’s theme or focus. So there’s one of my responsibilities right there, and I’m kind of excited about that one. So while we’re setting stuff up, all the Greenies stayed where they were and got a pep talk from the AP’s. It was just so funny to me to be sitting off to the sidelines getting to witness all of this from a different perspective. Eventually the trainer’s were called in to meet their new Trainees. Elder Gray is now training Elder Packer (Boyd K. Packers grandson :o).
After transfer meetings I don’t remember much, but basically its just this lengthy blur of loading stuff into our truck (bikes, luggage, random things that need to go random places etc.), and driving around dropping it off ALL day! In fact, we moved a couple sets of missionaries into completely new apartments which involved the moving of TONS of furniture and personal affects (we’re still not done with all of these kinds of tasks yet). That night the departing missionaries had their departing fireside and we went to set up chairs. I was pretty impressed with a few of the missionaries and not so impressed with some of the others. One Hermana (I say Hermana cause she was in the Spanish program) really gave an amazing testimony. Her comments were all in Spanish and I think the Lord helped me to understand because I got almost all of what she was saying which is pretty unusual for me. I don’t remember all of what she said, but by the end I KNEW she had given her everything to this mission, and that she loved the people more than the ability to breathe. It was incredible and moving and I hope I can be that sort of missionary someday. I’ve got a long ways to go, but miracles happen right? We still had tons to do after the fireside and we didn’t even get home till 11 pm. The next morning we had to help get those same departing missionaries to the airport at… yeah, you guessed it… 4am. Fun stuff eh? Thankfully, president is a VERY understanding man and on our way home Sister Wixom called us to say that president wanted us to go home and go to sleep until we woke up. Sweet right?? I didn’t think I’d EVER get to do that on my mission, yet here it was: express permission from on high :o) So we slept for a couple hours and then it was back to driving around. Over the last couple days (which has felt like 3 or 4) I’ve seen almost all the mission and moved at least a couple houses worth of furniture. Again, last night we didn’t get in till 11. Its weird though, cause I really haven’t felt like a real missionary until this morning when we got back onto the regular schedule of things. We finally got to work out, study and the whole bit. We went shopping and then FINALLY got to do some real missionary work… or at least we thought we were going to get to do real missionary work. A family in our ward put 30 invitations out to neighbors to come over for an open house. Good for them right? Sadly, no one showed. People in Burke are pretty wealthy, and I think when you’re that comfortable, its too easy for your whole world to become a bubble that no one can enter unless invited. And you don’t leave that bubble for anything. I know not everyone is this way just because they’re financially secure, but I think it’s an easy thing to do if you’re not careful. So we had a fun time playing music with their kids. It reminded me of one of our Lassen talent shows. And we got a ton of food to take home too.

Well, I’ve gotta run. I know I’ve got a tendency to be long-winded but I hope that’s ok. I love you all, and I feel so loved every time I get a letter or even a note from you. I’m trying my best to reply to everyone, but if I miss someone on accident I’m sorry.
Love you all tons.
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

First Transfer since coming from the MTC!

2008-02-21T14:09:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Wow, so many things to tell you this week! Well, let’s see. Valentine’s Day was fun. The sister missionaries who live in our apartment complex left us a nice valentine’s day surprise; (see pictures) it was pretty sweet of them. Then I got your Valentine’s Day package a couple days later (Saturday I think). Thanks so much for doing that. Mette, no I didn’t feel lame getting a bunch of valentine’s cards from my family, just special, so thanks. :o)

So, today is the last day of my first transfer! Crazy huh? I’m not the greenie anymore! There are people here newer than I am now :o) All last night we were speculating on what might happen, who would go where etc. This morning we got our calls from President Wixom. Elder Gray is staying in Alexandria 2nd ward, he’s training again and he’s becoming a district leader again. Its so funny because he’s been telling President Wixom he wanted to train since he came on his mission. And when I first got here he was saying all kinds of things with this big grin on his face like “Oh, we’re gonna have so much fun!” Now he’s saying things like “oh man… I can’t believe I’m training again”, and there’s a tiredness in his voice that tells me it was a lot harder than he thought it was going to be. Poor guy, I really gave him a run for his money. :o) I hope he gets some guy straight out of high school, scared to death who just lets him take over. With me it just didn’t work that way you know? ;o) I sure did learn a lot from Elder Gray, and I know as I go on to other companions I’ll come to appreciate things about him that I didn’t even notice with him being my first real comp in the field.

Ok, so for my new assignment, you ready?

Drumrole…

I’m going to Burke to be an office elder! Weird huh? I mean, I’m excited, because I think it’ll be fun, but I’m also kind of wondering what that’s going to be like. I just have this impression that I might turn into kind of a wuss of a missionary in the office, and I was expecting something that would really make me stretch. Like a total drill sergeant of a companion who worked me into the ground or a totally lazy senior companion where I had to “drive from the passenger seat” as President Wixom would say. (He hinted I might have to do that soon) Maybe this will make me stretch in other ways I’m not aware of yet. Who knows. Either way its pretty nice because I’ll get to see President and Sister Wixom every day, I room with the assistants to the President and I think I can learn a lot from them (Our AP’s are pretty awesome), I get a car now with unlimited miles, I get to go to every zone conference, I get the mail as soon as it comes into the office… tons of perks, just not what I expected.
Oh well, I’ll just enjoy basking in all the knowledge around me every day for a while I guess and see what I can learn.
Do you know if that’s spoken for already? I would love to have that one thing from her home. Just let me know ok? By the time you get this you’ll probably be back from your trip to Mesa. You sure have been making that trip a lot. I hope you’re feeling ok and that the service for Grandma Hancock was a nice one. I’m excited for you to see Shiloh and the rest of the Flakes. Tell him hi for me and give him a big hug around his stomach (that’s probably all you’ll be able to reach). Also, thanks for attaching that nice note from the Goodmans. I love them so much.
Anyway, I’m attaching some pictures for you (sorry, no bike ones). One of them is the Mt. Vernon Zone, there should be a couple of that valentine’s day surprise from the sisters (read the sign, its pretty funny), One of Elder Ludwig (one of my zone leaders who I was on exchanges with) and I (we got tired of riding our bikes so we commandeered a car), and one of our apartment missionaries (plus the sisters who live in our complex). I’ve gotta run, but I love you all so much. Thank you for everything, every note, letter and picture. Wish me luck in my new assignment.
Love,
Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. I guess for office elders, Pday is Saturday, so you’ll hear from me again very soon!

Cars and Bikes don't mix well!

2008-02-13T10:50:00.000-08:00

February 13, 2008

Hey Family,

Good timing on the letter! I was just about to finish up my emails and start writing my hand-written letters when I decided to refresh my inbox one more time and lo and behold, I had a letter from Mom! It made me pretty happy. :o) (<-see?) Haha, so you saw the weather report huh? Yeah… yesterday was pretty fun let me tell you… Actually, we weren’t on bikes yesterday, we were walking and I’ll tell you why. Elder Gray rides a Liahona bike (which is sometimes affectionately called a Piece-a-hona) and its equipped with disc brakes. Now, disc brakes are nicer than the conventional brake pads, but the maintenance is harder and the pads are harder to find. So for some time now Elder Gray has needed to replace his brakes, and I’ve been trying to get him to place a higher priority on it but being the hard worker he is he just keeps saying “no, we’ll wait till next p-day” (he’s been saying this for probably about 3 weeks now). Its gotten so bad that I’ve been literally just waiting for something to go wrong (especially with the amount of hills we ride down), and sure enough it did. The other day we were riding down Beauregard toward Seminary Rd. (you can check google earth if you want :o) and we had the right-of-way crossing this little street just past the shopping center near our apartment. But just before Elder Gray (who’s riding in front of me) gets to the corner, a Toyota Camry pulled into the cross walk getting ready to turn right on Beauregard. Now, the car was stopped, he was just trying to see around the corner you know? But Elder Gray couldn’t stop in time so he just ran right into the car. Elder Gray is fine, but the Camry sustained a pretty sizable dent in its passenger-side front fender, and actually the passenger door wouldn’t open afterwards. The man driving was from Pakistan, didn’t speak much English, and basically after we talked about our options said that he would just take care of it himself. So we’ve been on foot the last 3 days just because he finally decided that we shouldn’t be riding around anymore until we find him some new brake pads. Unfortunately like I said, those are sort of hard to find, at least around here, so I’m glad we got regular brakes on my bike after all.
Yesterday with all the rain/ice we almost ate it pretty bad about 10 times, even though we were on foot (EVERYTHING was slippery!) but luckily, and thankfully we never actually hit the ground. Phew! I bought an umbrella yesterday and it was definitely a life-saver. After a little while the whole top of the umbrella, much of my jacket, and parts of my shoes and pants were covered in a layer of frozen water. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. But, as long as I wear my 13 layers of clothing like I’ve been doing on the cold days, its not too bad really :o) I am definitely jealous of your recent beach day though.
Mom, I’m proud of you for still doing Yoga! I think that’s great. Actually its pretty funny, cause Elder Gray and Elder Braun (one of the other elders in the apartment) have sort of “hired” me as their personal trainer. So I’ve got them on the Body for Life workout plan right now. I love hearing them complain about how sore they are, but that’s just the sadism in me coming out I think. Maybe look into personal training when I get back as a way to work through school or something.
Here’s some good news: In three consecutive days last week we got three people scheduled for Baptism! Pretty sweet huh? It was funny, cause the week before in our Ward Mission meeting there were 0 scheduled, and then we reported 3 this week and everybody was like “What?? We were here last week, what happened?” So Marge Boyd, Mark Gibbons and Sampson (who’s last name I can’t remember) all made the commitment this week. Marge is a sixty-something year old member referral who’s been taking the lessons for a while. She’s feisty and we love her. We finally asked her to fast about a date, as we fasted with her. She called us and said March 22 sounded good. Mark Gibbons was tracted into by the sisters who were here before I got here. If ever there was a man prepared for the Gospel its been Mark. He’s just incredible. Everything we ask him to do he does. The sisters who met him gave him a Book of Mormon and a week later when we got there he was already in 2 Nephi 10 on his own. By this last Sunday he was in Helaman (keep in mind we’ve only taught him for 3 weeks now). This last Wednesday we taught him the Word of Wisdom and he hasn’t smoked, drank coffee or beer since and he was pretty heavy cigarettes and coffee, so that’s incredible. Seriously, this man is transforming his life. I’ll have to tell you about Sampson next time cause this letter is already WAY too long. Sorry about that.
P-day today hold nothing too special, just letters and cleaning and maybe a nap. You asked for a pday schedule and basically it’s the same up till 10 am (wake up at 6 thirty, exercise, eat, shower, study, comp study), then from 10 to 6 its pday, at six we work again. Hopefully next week I’ll have some pictures for you. Gotta run. Love you all.

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

Prep Day at Washington DC Temple

2008-02-11T15:37:00.000-08:00

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Hey Mom and Family,

Guess what I got to do for P-Day today! Yep, I got to go to the DC temple! How sweet is that?

There’s a member in our ward named Brother Spomer who’s an ordinance worker there. He’s half-crazy (ok… maybe more than half…) and I thought we were going to die a few times on the way there because of how he and the rest of Northern Virginia drive (ok, so really it was just because of how he drives), but we made it. It was so great. I feel like I’m finally to the point where I’m learning and not just getting used to it. On the way back Brother Spomer wanted to stop at the Bishop’s storehouse because the Peanut Butter they had there was just “the best!”. So we took a 30 minute (well, ok so maybe it was longer because we actually got lost) detour so he could get this glorious Deseret Peanut Butter, only to find that you can’t buy things from the Bishop’s Storehouse. He got pretty worked up about it, tried calling our bishop to get an override, but eventually we left, completely devoid of what promised to be the most exquisite of all sandwhich spreads. Sad huh?

So my car’s gone eh? Well, a little sad, but actually I’m really happy that you don’t have to worry about it anymore. I felt so guilty not being able to take care of it before I left, and so that’s a relief to me too. Thanks so much, and again, sorry for the trouble. I’m happy you got a good price for it too.

On superbowl Sunday I was thinking it would be a pretty rough time to tract, but actually it was awesome! There’s never another time when we find so many people at home, and even though as soon as they opened the door their initial reaction was one of annoyance, all I had to do was ask them how the game was going and who was winning and a few postulations on who I thought would win and who I was rooting for and they softened right up! Haha, I loved it. I’ve never watched a full game of anything-ball in my life, but I got pretty good at (smoozshing) by the end of the night. It was seriously so fun.

The Weather has gotten really warm these last couple days, and its weird, cause I’ve gotten so used to toting around all my cold weather gear, and so I’ll go outside with all this stuff on and end up sweating like crazy. I don’t trust it though. I think ol’ Jack frost is just messing with us. Be that as it may, I’ll take it. The work is going along really well. I don’t have time to go into stories about anyone, but just know that its going really well. I love what I’m doing. Mom, I’m sorry that this is such a stressful time for you right now, but I hope things start taking care of themselves and falling into place like they did with the car. I love you all so much, and I can feel your prayers on my behalf. I’ll talk to you soon. Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. Thanks to all those who leave comments on my blog. Tell Aunt Lisa hi and to all her family.

Did you know Virginia has lots of hills...read on.......

2008-01-30T09:13:00.000-08:00

Wednesday Jan. 30, 2008

Dear Family, All right… I’m determined this time to make this work. The first week I had a problem because evidently the computers shut off after 30 minutes of inactivity. So my Elder Gray told me if I wrote the letter in Word, the computer would recognize the activity, but if I wrote the letter in Internet Explorer and never opened or closed a window, the computer would shut off after 30 minutes. So that was my first lesson learned. The second lesson was stupid-user-error on my part. I went to attach those pictures I sent you and when I closed what I thought was the attachment window, I was actually closing the whole email window…. Sigh… anyway. So, lessons 1 and 2 having taken place, lets try this again. I’ve decided that Virginia has a lot of hills. Ok, so that’s not so much a decision as it is a statement of fact. Virginia has a LOT of hills. Hills are awesome to ride down. Not so much fun to ride up. See? I’m learning tons on my mission :o) My legs are getting nice and toned though I think. Pretty sad stuff about President Hinkley huh? What an amazing prophet he was. That being said, when we got the call from one of our members my first thought was “You know what? Good for him.” I’m so happy for him. He passed his test, and now he’s with his incredible wife. I can’t even imagine how taxing the past couple years have been on that wonderful old man, and it makes me appreciate all the more of just how much he was the living picture of what it means to endure to the end. I’m so grateful to have lived under his stewardship. Yesterday was what was called “Return and Report”. All the missionaries who came out this last transfer got to go back to the mission home, eat a great lunch, hear from all the senior missionary companionships, hear from Sister Wixom, President Wixom, the assistants to the President, and then each one of us got to bear our testimonies. It was nice to see all my friends from the MTC and hear their stories from these first 3 weeks. You can tell in many of them how much growth has occurred in just 3 weeks. Its really awesome. Unfortunately, my MTC companion, Elder Patton is sick, so I didn’t get to see him. The next time all of us will be in the same room again is when we leave for home, and I’m sure that will be quite the experience. I’m going to give you an excerpt from my journal and then I think I’ll have to close this letter.
Sunday, Jan. 27 2008Dear Journal, I got to use my priesthood authority 3 times today. It was humbling but nice. First, a recent convert named Robert Menxah received the priesthood and I got to stand in the circle to confer that upon him. Then, Brother Braniff asked us for a blessing and I got to anoint him with the oil. Then his wife asked us for a blessing and I stood in as Brother Braniff gave the blessing. It was incredible because I could actually feel something course its way through my body as we blessed those individuals. It was a subtle feeling, and some may say it was just my imagination, but I believe it was real, as I believe now more than ever that the priesthood power is a real thing. Also, after I anointed Brother Braniff with the oil and as Elder Gray was proclaiming the blessing, I have no doubt that the Spirit was the moving force behind his tongue and lips for those few minutes. I’m so grateful for these amazing testimony-building experiences. The Braniffs have quickly become my favorite couple in the ward (he was the one who drove us and our bikes home from the Metro the night it was 19 degrees and my face had stopped working). They’re a young couple working through school and so far have no kids. Sister Braniff is so kind and has this amazing brightness in her eyes as she smiles at you, and Brother Braniff is just a neat, kind, smart man who is always willing to help us out in any way. I’m so glad they asked us to administer those blessings. I hope and pray I will one day find myself in such a good marriage as that one.
All right, so that’s it for me today. We’ve got a couple appointments later today that I’m really excited about. First we’re meeting with a single mom named Mary who lives with her dad. We tracted into her last week and she seems really nice and pretty interested in the Gospel. Then we’re doing something that President Wixom came up with. We’re taking one of our other investigators, Mark (who is TOTALLY golden and almost too good to be true) on a tour of the church building where we’ll explain what a typical Sunday consists of, how the sacrament service goes, what the classes are like etc. Then, when he least suspects it, I’ll break out the duct tape and we’ll tie him up and throw him in the font! Mwa ha ha! Its brilliant! ….haha, ok, so I’ll probably have to repent for that last little part, but minus the whole surprise baptism, the rest is true. I think the church tour will be a good way to make him more comfortable when he comes to church with us his first time this Sunday. Well family, I love you all, and I’m trying my best to reply to all your letters individually, so keep them coming :o) (By the way, in case any of you were worried about me being too spoiled because of how things were at the MTC, i.e. 5 pieces of mail in a day that one time…;o) just know that its definitely leveled off of late, so please don’t be afraid to write me. :o) Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

2008-01-26T14:43:00.000-08:00

1/23/08

Dear Family,

Ok, So I decided I don't trust the computers here at the apartment complex enough to try writing you again, so you get to decipher my beautiful handwriting instead.

Ok, so, to answer all your good questions...

Yes! It's been SO cold the last few days! The other night we were street contacting at the metro station and despite the many layers of clothing I was wearing, my face muscles literally stopped working! Elder Gray was laughing at me for a good while ' cause I'd approach people, give them a really awkward-looking half-smile and say something like "Excuse me Ma'am, have you ever heard of the Book Of Mo-Mo?" Yeah, you can imagine how spiritually invoking that was for my would-be investigators:-} The bike ride there almost killed us both and so luckily we got a member with a truck to take us and our bikes home that night. That was definitely a tender mercy of the Lord. That day with the 8 inches of snow was really the only good snow we've gotten; the rest of the time its just COLD!

Regarding music, our guidelines are that it can't pull our focus away from our calling, be romantic or just merely entertaining. It should invite the Spirit etc. So, basically I think classical is good and anything spiritually uplifting is appropriate. Everything on my Ipod is fine (except for Afterglow...what's up with that???) :-} I can get snailmail anyday, but can only respond on P-days. Honestly, I think I might prefer it over email 'cause it'd be nice to get it throughout the week instead of all on P-day, plus the computers seem to have it out for me down at the computer room at our complex activity center. Email, of course can be read and replied to only on P-days. You can just send any snail mail to the mission office. They'll get it to the me usually pretty quickly.

My coat is serving me very well. It's really only been my legs, feet, hands and face that have gotten cold a couple of times, but for most part, I've been fine, whenever I really bundle up. There's an interesting rule about dinners here. Members are asked to sign up to feed us every night, but they have to drop it off at our apartment. We're not allowed to eat at member's homes. If they're less-active, investigators, or recent converts, we can, but I guess missionaries were just spending too much time at members homes. The members in our ward are awesome, though. We have a meal almost every night delivered to our apartment. It's pretty nice, really :-} We generally ride our bikes everywhere, but the day it snowed really hard, we walked.

Elder Gray is a great trainer. He came out a little late like I did, and he takes missionary work very seriously. He's a convert of about 5 years and comes from a Southern Baptist Background. He's a self-proclaimed McKonkinite (as in Bruce R. McKonkie), and loves deep doctrine discussions, but is pretty good about not going overboard with it.

As far as actual missionary work goes, it's great. We talk to about 175 unplanned for people a week (ie. street contacting). We teach a ton, both on the street and in people's homes, and we work hard. We do a good mix of street contacting and tracting. Dad, you would LOVE the houses out here, cause they're all made of brick and they're beautiful. I'll send you some pictures some time. I think everyone thinks I'm weird cause I just keep talking about all these awesome brick building and no one else seems to care. The church building is out of our area boundaries (probably about 5 miles away, so we get a ride there very week. Church starts at 8 am and our meetings start at 6:45 AM...ugh....but our ward, ward mission leader and Bishop are all AWESOME. Yes, we have cellphones. You want the number? haha.. just kidding...:-} I'm trying to stay healthy and I'm doing okay, but honestly I've been a little under the weather the last couple of days, but I think I'll be on the mend soon. Yeah, we exercise 30 minutes every morning. Our complex has a gym (not a very good one, but c'est la vie....) and sometimes we run.

Well, that about does it. I think I answered all your questions. Thanks so much for your prayers and letters. I love you all tons! The Gospel's true isn't it? Then what else matters? :-}

Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. Mom, I have an idea for a new blog name. Ready? "The musings of a Merry Missionary". What do you think? Could you make that change for me? Also, are people still reading/commenting on the blog? I can't check it myself, cause we're only allowed to go to the MyLDSMail.net. Thanks!

Here is a letter handwritten by his trainer, Elder Gray, and sent to us this week also. This letter brought lots of tears of joy to our eyes and we could hardly read it outloud to each other...just want to include this with Steffen's letter this week.....it makes us, his parents so thankful.

Brother and Sister Lassen,

Well, first off I owe you all the thanks I can express for making my job 10 times easier. You raised an incredible son who was born to teach the Gospel. In these few short days, I have learned to love him very much. He, by far, is the greatest companion I've ever had. I don't like to sugar coat things usually, so I'm trying to be honest. It was my idea to write you and there is no deception in the words I wrote above concerning the great qualities of your son.

We have witnessed many miracles and have been blessed with a great number of people to teach. Things are going very well. Elder Lassen should have great things to share with you in his journal when he returns home.

To my excitement and relief, Elder Lassen makes being obedient a thing worth seeking after rather than an irritating rule it is our duty to follow. His heart is in the right place and I feel he is here for the correct reasons.

Thank you for rearing such a mature young man. I know he prays for you two often in addition for the rest of his family. Take care---Elder Marcus P. Gray, Jr.

Elder Gray

First Big Snow Tracting Experience

2008-01-23T10:59:00.001-08:00

Guess who this cold Elder is? Alexandria, VA had a big snow storm this past week, dumping over 8-9 inches in a short time. Here' our California/Arizona boy trying to get acclimated to the weather on the East Coast!
Elder Gray, his trainer from Arkansas and Elder Lassen

First Area is Alexandria, VA-5 miles south of Washington D.C.

2008-01-16T15:45:00.001-08:00

http://www.mountvernon.org/

Dear Family, Ok, so I got another chance on the computers today, but I’ve gotta hurry. So yeah, I’m in Alexandria, VA which is really exciting because its one of the top baptizing areas in the mission, and the mission itself I learned is the top baptizing mission on the east coast. Cool huh? Not that numbers are what its all about, but it is a good indicator that at least people around here are willing to listen, and from what I can tell so far, that’s the case. Also cool is the fact that it’s a bike area. 1 out of 3 areas in the mission is on a bike, and I’m glad I’m starting out that way, because if I started out in a car I’d get really spoiled and then if I got moved to a bike area I’d probably get all grumbly and whatnot. Yeah, so the first night here Elder Gray (who I’ll talk a little bit more about in a bit) took me down this really steep pitch black trail right after it had rained and I was pretty scared, I’m not gonna lie. I hadn’t had a chance to assemble my bike yet, so I was on a borrowed one with no lights. I really thought I was going to die my first night out on a mission. “oh well” I thought “I’ll probably go to heaven if I do”. Thankfully I made it through. Speaking of the first night, if you thought it was funny for them to take us street contacting the first day here, get this: the second day we had an assignment to commit someone to baptism! Haha, they don’t mess around here in this mission. So I did. One of the last people we talked to on the street was named Axle. I told him about the restoration, Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and asked him if he would be baptized. Haha, he actually said yes, but then a couple days later told us his mom would let us come talk to him (he was only 17 or so). Its cool though, maybe someday. Let me share another quick miracle and then I probably have to go. The other night we were at a less-active’s house with his home teachers who had given us a ride. The appointment went well, but we were running late for our next appointment which was with a new investigator we had street contacted two nights prior. For the purposes of the story I’ll say this less active member lived on 5910 Duke St. Apt. #610 or something like that. So after the appointment is over we rush out of there and before we even get in the elevator we ask the home teachers “hey, can you take us to Duke St. for our next appointment?” “We’re on Duke St.” one of them says. “ok, can you take us to 5910 Duke St.?” we ask. “That’s the building we’re in” they reply. “Really? Well, ok, awesome, where’s Apt. 606?” we ask. “Right over your shoulder” they point. Sure enough, right down the hall from where we were was our next appointment and we had no idea. We knocked on the door, and there our investigator was, all smiles and happy to see us. His name is Elias, and he’s from Etheopia. He’s Greek Orthadox, but very open to learn about these modern day prophets we told him about. We taught a great first lesson and Elder Gray and I had a lot to be thankful for that night in our prayers. Elder Gray is Awesome. He’s a hard worker, very good with the scriptures, and he’s pretty dorky like me :o) He’s from Arkansas and actually knows David Giles and Jacob Blickenstaff. Sweet huh? Anyway, its time to go, but I’m so happy I got to write this letter again. I love you all so much. Anyway, gotta run. Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

President and Sister Wixom Welcome Elder Lassen

2008-01-14T17:18:00.000-08:00

Here is a picture that Steffen's Mission President sent in a letter we received today. Here is the opening lines of his letter to us:

Dear Brother and Sister Lassen:

Sister Wixom and I are very pleased to have welcomed your son to the Washington DC South Mission. It was a wonderful experience to see his enthusiasm and we are happy to have him serve with us in this misson. Elder Lassen has been assigned Elder Marcus Paul Gray Jr. as his trainer. Elder Gray Jr. is from Pine Bluff, AR and will do all he can to help him develop the skills needed to be an effective missionary. ....

We are enlcosing a photograph of Elder Lassen with my wife and me. We are excited to have him here and we, along with the other mission leaders, will work closely with him and will pray always for his safety and success. We are grateful to you for sending him to us and pray that the Lord will bless and strenghten you and your family as you support him.

(He advises us that ALL mail is to be sent to him by way of the Mission Home, not to his apartments):

Elder Steffen Lassen

Washington DC South Mission

5631-H Burke Centre Parkway

Burke, VA 22015

Sister Wixom added this nice note at the bottom of her husband's letter:

Postcard from Elder Lassen

2008-01-14T17:11:00.000-08:00

January 9, 2008

Steffen wrote home this Postcard when he reached his Mission Home in Burke, Virginia:

Hey Family, Just got to the mission home and had a great meal. My mission President and his wife are awesome, friendly people. Right from the airport we went to George Mason University to do some street contacting. Gave 3 Books of Mormon out, and got 2 names and phonenumbers to follow up on. One of those guys only spoke Spanish, so I got to use that right off the bat. Just want to let you know I'm here and well. :)
Love, Elder Steffen Lassen

P.S. I don't know where I'll be specifically, but I should know tomorrow.