Happy 4th of July!

July 5th 2017 HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!!!! What An Amazing Week!!!


Hello my dear Family! What an amazing and fun week! Thank you so much for your amazing email and pictures! I have been so excited for today to come because I have LOTS of exciting and fun things to tell you! I hope my email makes sense and I remembered everything. I loved reading your emails and looking at your pictures while we watched the fireworks and ate root beer floats yesterday! It was so cool to see your pictures of the fun party that you had yesterday! 

We had an unbelievable P-Day last week! I hope I remembered everything but I am pretty sure that I told you everything that happened. After we got back to the apartment, we had a quick dinner and then we went over to visit the Tsakpoe Family! We have had this lesson scheduled for a few weeks now and so we were anxious to go visit them. So we went over to their apartment and had a great lesson with Brother Tsakpoe and his daughter, Rachael. She has been going through some rough times and has been struggling with depression. We shared some scriptures from the Book of Mormon and told her to never give up hope and that though Jesus Christ, she can find hope and peace. The lesson was more directed at Rachael since Brother Tsakpoe really wanted us to talk with her since she was going through a tough time. We had a great lesson with them and said a prayer with them and then it was time to head back to the apartment for the night. It was an amazing day and I had such a fun time! I loved reading your email and looking at all of your pictures so much!

Thursday was another great and productive day! We woke up and got ready for the day. Then we did our studies and then we started our weekly planning session. But before we started our weekly planning we had some BIG.....BIG news!!! So we had a Conference Call from President Smith and he told us the really exciting news!! So we all listened in to the Conference Call and it was really great! He shared some of the miracles and cool stories that have taken place in the mission sent in by the missionaries. So we listened to all of the amazing miracles and then he told us that he had some news about the special Sacrament Meeting that we had on Sunday. There has been a ton of buzz around this Special Meeting because we knew that it was going to be something big since they were gathering every single missionary into 1 meeting. So he told us the travel information and when it would start, things like that. Then he said: "Elders and Sisters! We have a great opportunity to listen to a prophet of God this Sunday! We are pleased to be welcoming in President Dieter F. Uchtdorf to the mission and he will be speaking at this meeting!!!" We were all so excited and couldn't wait! So after the Conference Call, Elder Dick and I started to do our weekly planning session and then we headed over to a lesson with our good friend Mark! When we got to his apartment, we could tell that nobody was home. He doesn't have a phone so we weren't able to call him. So we then went to go check up on Banjo and see how he was doing! We knew that Heavenly Father wanted us in that area for a reason. We knew that Mark mot being home meant that we were needed somewhere else. So we went around the corner to visit Banjo and his wife, Michelle, answered the door! It wasn't a scheduled lesson with Banjo, we just wanted to see how he was doing and then schedule an appointment. So Michelle answered the door and was very nice and friendly. They are from Nigeria and have lived in the Bronx for about 10 years now. We scheduled an appointment with her and Banjo for the very next day! It was a cool and small miracle and we were grateful that she was home and we were able to find her. We briefly talked about the Restoration and gave her a Book of Mormon. Then after we talked with Michelle for a few minutes, we headed back to the apartment, did some more weekly planning, and then headed over to a less active member's house named Alvin Linton. We called him just a few hours before the appointment and he was excited for us to come over. He has been struggling with health problems and so he has been up and down down the last few years. When we got to his house, his Grand kids were outside playing and let us in. Alvin was asleep on his bed and one of his oldest Grand Sons tried to wake him up. He could never get him to wake up so we left him a card and wished him well. We were sad that he was asleep and couldn't get up for our lesson. Then we headed back to the apartment for some dinner and then we had another split planned with our roommates! The weather here has been so nice and beautiful these last few weeks! We have had only 1 day with a little rain but other than that, it has been very nice! So we came back to the apartment and had dinner, and then we started our split! I got to go into Elder Knudsen and Elder Jackman's area and Elder Knudsen cam into our area. I went with Elder Jackman into their area. It was really awesome to get to know him better! I have kind of a funny story. We had to walk all the way to the church for an appointment that they had with Oscar. Before I got here, an Elder named, Elder Dos Santos, lost his MetroCard. So he had to get money from the church to buy a new one half way through the month. So now, their MetroCards expire 2 days before everyone else's. Well, sometimes we don't get paid that early so they can't buy them until we get our MSF funds. So they waited until Friday to buy them since we got paid and since it was the end of the month. So now they are back on track and now their MetroCards are just like ours. So after we started our split, we walking to the church and had a great lesson with Oscar! He is from Honduras and has been living in the Bronx for a long time now. He is 44 years old and a really great guy! We got to know him a little better since I didn't know him very well and Elder Jackman has only been here for a few weeks and has only met him once. So we got to know him and his background. He then told us an amazing story!! He was actually working in Lower Manhattan on September 11th 2001. It was so incredible to hear an account of what happened from someone that was there! He was working and he and one of his co-workers went to go and get some breakfast for everyone in his office. As soon as they walked outside, there were people running everywhere. He asked random people what was going on and they said: "We don't know, we are just doing what everybody else is doing." Then he told us something crazy. His brother actually worked in one of the World Trade Center Towers. His brother survived. He talked about how horrible and crazy that day was. It was just amazing to hear it from someone who was actually here in New York. So after he told us that story, we talked about the importance of coming to church and why we take the sacrament. We had a great lesson and enjoyed teaching him together! Then after our lesson, it was time to walk back to the apartment for the night. We had a great chat and enjoyed each other's company!

Friday was such a great and scary day! It was such an amazing day and tons of stuff happened!! It was scary because of the shooting in the hospital just down the street. So we woke up and we were still on our split with Elder Jackman. So we planned out our day and then studied. Then we headed out for the day and went to a lesson with a less active member named Carlos. So we headed down into their area and it was really great to be in another area since I haven't been outside of our area much. So we went inside of his house and taught him about the Plan of Salvation and it went really well! Carlos has been going through some rough times with his family and is really trying to come back to church. His brother, lives in Poughkeepsie and is active and has a son on a mission. So it was really cool to see that desire for him to turn his life around. Then after our lesson with Carlos, we were really hungry and we were really far away from our apartment and so we decided on somewhere to eat out. We both decided on Wendy's! We always like going to Wendy's because on the 4 for $4.00 deal. So we walked into Wendy's and who was there......Elder and Sister Coleman, Jackie, Sister Robles and her Grand Son Manny! It was such good timing because it was a later lunch and so it was fun to see so many of the ward members there. Elder Colmean then came up to us and started to talk with us. During this time, the shooting happened. Then Elder Coleman did something SO nice for us! He gave us each $10.00and said: "Go buy yourself a Baconator!" He really wanted us to take it and then he said that Sister Robles bought their lunch and so he wanted to pass it on and buy us lunch! So we did just what he asked! We bought ourselves a Baconator! It was all so good and we thanked Elder Coleman and then headed back to the apartment to unsplit. We had a really fun activity later on that evening for a young men activity! So we unsplit and then we got the news. It was so crazy that we even found out. So, Elder Dick wanted some more information about our Young men activity that night with the young men. We were invited to come but we wondered if we could do anything to help. So we called Brother Gorman because he is the 1st counselor in the Young Men's Presidency and he then told us that there was a shooting. He actually works at the hospital just down the street. Brother Gorman is doing his residency right now and training to be a doctor and so they brought the people who had been injured to the hospital where he works. How crazy is that?? The hospital where the shooting happened is just less than a mile away from our apartment and right across the street from Fordham University and the Bronx Zoo. So it was a miracle that we even found out about it because if we hadn't called Brother Gorman we wouldn't have know about it. We were actually out and about when it happened but we were further north a few miles away. So when all 4 of us got back to the apartment we felt safe. Then after we had a quick dinner and talked about it for a while, we said a prayer and ended our split and then we headed over to the Church for the activity. It had just happened about 2 hours before we headed to the Church and so there was a TON of traffic and everyone was talking about it in the streets. The busses were so crowded! So we made our way to the church and Brother Gorman showed up right after we did. We talked to him all about it and he said that it was really crazy! He said that all of those injured were brought to him and his hospital to help anyone that he could. It was really crazy to hear the story from someone that was there. The activity went so well! Brother Gorman and the young men planned out an activity with us, our roommates, and the Spanish Elders. They wanted us to split the young men up into teams and have them pass out a Book of Mormon. It was a great activity and everyone enjoyed it a lot! So I got to go with Clifford Oti and Joven. We walked around the Bronx and found some people to talk to and they each handed out their Book of Mormon! It was a really fun activity and then we had pizza from Little Caesar's and talked about our activity. We had a great time and then we had to hurry to an appointment we had with Kay near our apartment. Brother Gorman lives right down the street, and he offered to give us a ride! So we rode to our appointment and talked with Brother Gorman. He is a great guy a d it was really fun to get to know him more. So when we got to our apartment we walked down the street for our appointment. We got to Kay's apartment and her son was outside on a bench and we asked if Kay was home and he said that she was in Manhattan and he didn't know when she was going to get back. We were disappointed because we really wanted to teach her. We headed to do a few lookups and then decided to head back to the apartment and then we had a miracle!! As we were walking back to our apartment, we saw a lady walking toward us and as we got closer....we realized.....it was Kay! We stopped and talked to her for a minute but we didn't have time for a lesson so we just talked with her and then headed back to the apartment for the evening. It was a great and productive day!!

Saturday was a great day as well! We woke up and got ready for the day, planned, did our studies and then headed out the door. We did lots of lookups and then we came back to the apartment for lunch and then headed back out to do some more lookups and talk with as many people as we could. It was lots of hard work and it rained off an on and was very humid. So then after lots of lookups, we headed back to the apartment to do our companionship study and language study then we had our dinner! Then, we did something really fun! We had planned that morning to go and visit the Kreig family but we couldn't get a hold of them so we thought that we should just show up and see if they were doing ok. Charlie Kreig got out of the hospital a while ago and so did Sister Kreig. She had some chest pain and went to the hospital to get it checked and it wasn't anything serious and so they let her go home. We knocked on their door and they were both home! We asked them how they were doing and she said that they were both doing so much better! We didn't want to take too much of their time but they REALLY love visitors and especially the missionaries because they don't get too many visitors. So we went inside and sat down and talked with them about how they were doing and if there was anything we could do to help them. She said that they have been taking it easy for the last few days recovering. Then Sister Kreig thought it would be fun to order some pizza! So she called a really nice pizza place and ordered 2 white pies! It's so funny to hear them say: "Let's order 2 white pies" in their New York accent! To give you an idea of what Sister Kreig sounds like, just think of the black cat in the movie "Bolt"! She sounds exactly like her. It's really funny to hear her talk just because she sounds so much like her! So she ordered 2 white pizzas and we had a nice chat and lesson with them! White pies are pizzas without any sauce. It has a really thick layer of mozzarella cheese and then ricotta cheese on top and that's it. It is so good and such high quality New York pizza. We didn't want her to feel like she had to order pizza just because we were over and she said: "Well I'm hungry and want some pizza! " So we had a great conversation with them and by the time we ate and finished talking, we knew that we had to hurry because of weekend traffic on City Island so we headed for the apartment. It was such a great day and we couldn't wait to hear from President Uchtdorf!

Sunday was AWESOME!!!! Wow! What an amazing day! We all woke up so excited to hear from President Uchtdorf! It was such a great once in a lifetime opportunity to hear from someone in person from the 1st Presidency! It was SO exciting to travel to Manhattan and have our special Sacrament Meeting with every single missionary from our mission as well! We have all been looking forward to to it so much ever since we found out about it! So we all woke up at 5:15 and quickly got ready for the day and then headed out the door by 7:00. It takes about an hour to get there and we had to be in our seats by 8:30, so we wanted to make sure that we left plenty of time. So we all headed down to Manhattan really excited to have all of the missionaries together. One thing that we didn't know about this sacrament meeting was that it was with the regular ward that meets there at 9:00. Another really cool thing is that the members of the ward had no idea that President Uchtdorf was coming. Something really amazing happened after that I can't wait to tell you about!!! So we sat down in the Manhattan Temple Chapel at 8:10 and the meeting started at 9:00. We sat quietly and were so excited for President Uchtdorf to come in! Another amazing thing was that Elder and Sister Coleman's family was flying in for a visit from Missouri and got permission from President Smith to go! They had no idea that President Uchtdorf was coming either and so it was one big coincidence that they were visiting this very same week. So we sat quietly and it was so much fun to think that the ward members had no idea who was about to show up! When President Uchtdorf walked in, the room went silent and a few people said: "Wow!" and "Gasp". It was so amazing to see everyone's reaction! President Uchtdorf shook hands with everyone on the stand, including President and Sister Smith and then stood at the front of the stand and blew everyone a kiss. It was pretty funny and everyone laughed. He is such a great guy and it was so much fun to see him in person. He has a certain presence and a feeling entered the room when he did! So we started the meeting and the Bishop who was conducting said: "President Deiter F. Uchtdorf will be presiding at this meeting." I thought to myself "How cool is this!?!" We first heard a great talk by President and Sister Uchtdorf's Grandson and then their daughter. They both did great jobs! Then Sister Uchtdorf spoke and did an amazing job! She was REALLY funny and kept us entertained. She has a really cool German accent just like President Uchtdorf. Then....the moment we were all waiting for!! President Uchtdorf got up to speak and it was just like he was speaking or conducting General Conference! He spoke a lot about the Plan of Salvation and setting our expectations really high! He was really funny as well! He would crack a joke here and there about New York and just life events. It was a very good and entertaining talk!! It was interesting because he wasn't reading from a teleprompter like he would in General Conference. He is a very good speaker and did a great job! After he finished his talk, we closed the meeting. Then they did something really cool! Since we had every single missionary there, President Uchtdorf wanted to get a picture with us all! So afterwards, they announced that all the missionaries should stay in the chapel to take a picture. So we all got to go up on stage and every single missionary from the New York, New York North Mission squished onto the stage. It was quite the sight to see! I got to stand on the far right hand side and President Uchdorf was right in the middle. Well, after they took the picture, President Uchtdorf thanked everyone and then we made an isle so he could exit the building. Here is the really exciting part! As he was exiting, he shook a few hands. Then he shook mine!! It was such a cool experience to see him in person. I will never forget this awesome opportunity and the many things that we learned from him! Then, after President Uchtdorf left, we all got on trains to head back to our areas and then we realized that we would be able to make it back in time for the 2nd half of our Church. So we hurried over to the church and sat down in the middle of Elders Quorum. Then we had sacrament meeting and it was really good! We had some great testimonies. Elder and Sister Coleman's family was there and I really wanted to go meet them. So after church was over I went and introduced myself to them. They are really nice people! Their son is 9 and reminds me so much of Parker! And get this, his favorite NBA team is......the Warriors! They are visiting from Saint Louis. So after we visited with everyone at Church, we met with our Ward Mission Leader, Brother Danquah, to report on how we are doing and who we are teaching. Then after that, we had a dinner and lesson appointment with Dalton. So we quickly headed over to his apartment and had an awesome dinner! We were all still on cloud 9 from meeting President Uchtdorf. Dalton made us an awesome dinner with steak, salad, rice with beans, sangria, and a rose water cake. It was all really good! He says that he makes big dinners like that for himself and doesn't have anyone to eat with so he invites us over. We had a great lesson with him and talked with him about the Temple since he is preparing to go sometime in September. After our lesson with Dalton we headed over to see Sister Johnson and then we headed back to the apartment for the night ready for our split the next day! It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to hear from President Uchtdorf. I'm so glad that you got to see the pictures the day it happened! Also, thanks so much for sending them because I hadn't seen them yet. It was really amazing!

Monday was a really great day! We woke up and did our studies, then we went over to the church to set up for District Meeting. Elder Dick bought a cord to hook up his tablet to the tv so he could display our goals and play hymns. It was a really cool idea that worked really well! Then we had Leadership and District Meeting and then we had our interviews with President Smith! I can't believe how fast everything rolls around. I fell like we just had interviews and nowhere are having them all over again. My interview went great and he gave me lots of tips on how to always continue to get better. Then after our interviews, we headed back to the apartment to do our studies. We had a split planned with the Zone Leaders for a few weeks and Monday was the day! I have always wanted to go into their area and see how they teach. So I got to go into their area with Elder Stevens and Elder Davis came into our area. So we said a prayer and began our split! Then, the Colemans called us and invited all of the missionaries to a 4th of July barbeque! We were so excited! So we went over to the park across the church and the Colemans put together a really nice barbeque and tons of people showed up! They had lots of food like cheeseburgers, chips, and punch! It was a really fun time! Then after the party, I headed into our Zone Leader's area! It is down in Hunts Point and is a really cool area! So we headed over to go see a recent convert named Lisa. We just wanted to check up on her and see if there was anything that we could do to help her. She told us no but we knew that there was something that we could do to help her. Elder Stevens saw that she had a mountain of dishes and offered to do them but she turned us down cold. We insisted that we could do them to help her out. So we did all of her dishes for her! We love offering acts of service like that! Then after that, it was time to head back to the apartment for the evening. We started our split at 6:30 and so by the time that we ate and traveled to Lisa's house, it was time to head in for the night. I had never been to their apartment before and so it was kind of fun to see someone else's apartment. They have a really nice and we'll taken care of apartment. Elder Brown and Elder Munoz are the other companionship of Elders that stay in that same apartment. So I settled in and then we hit the hay. We were all so tired after a day of work!

Yesterday was such an amazing day!!! First of all....Happy 4th of July!! I loved your 4th of July email so much and I loved hearing all about your fun week that you had! I am so excited to say that I kept the tradition alive and we had root beer floats in your honor all the way in New York as we watched the fireworks over the Manhattan cityscape! It was all so incredible! So we woke up and then we finished our split later in the evening at 5:00. I had a great time! It was really fun to be in a different area and see so many more sights of the Bronx. So we woke up and did our studies then we went to go see a man who ordered a Bible named Silbert. So we knocked on his door and he answered and welcomed us in. He was a very nice guy! I noticed that the people in our Zone Leader's area, are so much more willing to meet for some reason. Elder Stevens would call someone and set up an appointment so easily. But with our area, people will tell us that they are so busy and can't meet. I thought it was interesting. So we talked with Silbert and gave him a Bible and Book of Mormon and set up another time to come over and teach him some more. Then we went to another lesson with the Cortez family. A lady named Sandra said that they were not available to meet with us today because they were replacing their cabinets in their kitchen. So we traveled back near the Zone Leader's apartment and went to Subway for some lunch! It was really fun to get to know Elder Stevens better! He is from a small town of about 300 or so people called Bicknell. It is right by Loa. He is a great guy and only has a few more months left on his mission. As we were walking and traveling, I loved to see all of the red, white, and blue. It was cool to see so many people all decked out in 4th of July gear. So we took our sandwhiches back to the apartment and then we started our companionship study. Then we went to a few more lessons with Benevolence and Isael. We had great lessons with them and enjoyed teaching them! So after we got done with our lessons, we came back to the church to finish our split. We had something really cool happen! As we were coming back to the church, we noticed a deaf man sitting on the train signing on a FaceTime chat. So after he was done, we remembered that we had 2 videos that the ASL Elders had sent us to show people. The videos just explain that we are missionaries and what we do. He had to get off at a stop pretty quickly so We took down his information and as he was getting off he gave us the "Thank you" and "Love you" signs. It was a really cool experience! We both had a great split and enjoyed getting to know each other better. So we unsplit and then we got a text from the Zone Leaders saying that all missionaries had to be back at their apartments by 8:30 to keep everyone safe. So we ended our night by compiling a list of all of the less active members that we needed fo visit in our area. Then by that time it was time to head back to the apartment for the night and watch some fireworks! We were really excited! So we stopped off at C-Town Supermarket and I bought some ice cream and root beer for everyone and explained that it is a tradition in our family to have root beer floats on the 4th of July! It was really fun to have them and keep the tradition alive! So we headed back and there were TONS of huge parties going on. You can see in one of my videos one of the parties that was going on right across the street from us. So we waited for the fireworks to start and then we enjoyed our root beer floats. It was all really cool and I still couldn't believe that I was watching fireworks over the Manhattan skyline! Elder Knudsen said: "Did you ever think that you would come to the Bronx and watch fireworks in Manhattan?" We have the best view of the whole city! We watched the fireworks for a little while and then I checked my email and saw that you sent your weekly email! I was so excited to read It! I loved reading it so much and looking through your pictures! It was a really fun day! We went to bed excited for P-Day!

Today, we are still trying to decide what to do. We will do our regular laundry and shopping but we want to do something fun! I am so excited that I get to email you back and forth today!

Well everybody! I am so glad that you all had a great and fun week! I loved reading all about it and seeing all of your pictures. Thanks for all of your emails throughout the week as well. I am so glad that you got to do so many fun things! I just want you to know how much I love and appreciate you all! I have felt so much love and so many prayers! I appreciate everything that you do for me! I miss you all tons each and every day. My testimony has grown so much and I have learned a ton! I have been doing just fine but missing you a lot. It is always hard to be away from you, home, and everything t hst you have going on. I know that you are all having a blast and t hst makes me so happy! I hope you have a great and fun week everyone! You mean the world to me! Tell everyone hi for me and give them a big New York hug! LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL TONS!! ♥️



Love Always!
~Elder Lindberg


P.S: The picture of Elder Dick, Elder Jackman, and Elder Knudsen was how we watched the amazing fireworks last night. We all had to take turns "ooohing, and aweing".