tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-48949054335780253032024-02-19T02:42:37.394-08:00Elder Daniel Squires, Frankfurt GermanyCarynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.comBlogger114125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-44995184254091764772014-05-05T12:23:00.000-07:002014-05-05T12:23:30.192-07:00Last Mission EmailHey Mom!<br /><br />Well, here we go, the last email on the mission! It is
ridiculous how<br />fast the time has gone, and I am really excited to see you
guys in a<br />few days!<br /><br />I had a really great last week of the mission.
Most of our<br />appointments worked out, and even though I was feeling kind of
trunky<br />the first few days, it got better by the end of the week. I
haven't<br />been thinking about it too terribly much, but I definitely have been
a<br />little anxious the last few days and it's harder to fall asleep since<br />my
brain just bounces everywhere and won't turn off.<br /><br />Monday was a good
P-day. The Unna Elders came and chilled with us at<br />the apartment, and when we
were done chilling, Elder Moore left for<br />Unna with Elder Pratt and I stayed
on a split with Elder Haskell in<br />Hagen. We went to our ward mission leader's
apartment for dinner, and<br />his wife hemmed the pants I got for the week you
will be here. After<br />we ate dinner, we drove to an old lady's house named Frau
Altmeyer,<br />who is a former investigator. She had randomly read in the Book
of<br />Mormon about physical and spiritual death, so we talked about that<br />with
her.<br /><br />On Tuesday, we had the final district meeting of the transfer,
which<br />was really good. I split back with Elder Moore afterwards. We then
had<br />to take a big chunk of time and go to Düsseldorf to get a new
train<br />card for Elder Moore. The chip in his old one broke, and we took a
45<br />minute train ride to go across the street of the station in<br />Düsseldorf,
have the guy program a new card for about fifteen seconds,<br />and then take
another train back to Hagen. It was kind of<br />inconvenient, but it was
necessary. We ended the night with our<br />English class and writing thank you
notes for the members.<br /><br />Wednesday was probably the slowest day of the
week. We continued<br />working on thank you notes, deep-cleaned the apartment
(cleaning<br />checks were the next morning), and went by on an investigator who
was<br />not home.<br /><br />Thursday was a little more eventful. It was the 1st of
May, which is a<br />holiday in Germany, so there were not a lot of people on the
streets.<br />We had a lunch appointment with a younger couple in the ward and
then<br />headed to the church to make the invitation for Moritz's baptism.
In<br />the evening, we drove out to Breckerfeld (a small town south of
Hagen)<br />to go by on a couple old referrals, but neither of them were at
home.<br /><br />Friday was when the week started to speed up. We had our studies
and<br />weekly planning (my last weekly plan ever haha) and then had a
lesson<br />with a newer investigator, Monica. She is having struggles with
giving<br />up smoking, and she also suffers depression. We gave her a
blessing<br />and told her that at the next lesson, we wanted to begin teaching
the<br />lessons since that will help her more than anything else in giving
up<br />smoking. After the appointment, we made a few batches of brownies
for<br />members who had birthdays. When we were finished with that, we
headed<br />to the west side of town for a short appointment with the Gens
family.<br />That was the last big thing we were able to accomplish that
day.<br /><br />We had a very busy Saturday. We cut studies short to go help a
member<br />couple move from one side of town to another for a couple hours,
then<br />went straight home to shower and go to Iserlohn to have lunch with
the<br />Gusts. We then headed over together to Manuella's apartment and had
a<br />lesson with her about life after death. A partner at work had asked<br />her
about it, so she wanted to know more so she could tell her how it<br />is. She
herself also was a little spotty with her knowledge of the<br />next life, so we
helped her understand that as well. After that<br />appointment, we rushed home
and then took a bus to Bruder Kramer's<br />house. We had a good time there and
showed him the new "Because of<br />Him" video on the church's
website.<br /><br />Sunday was awesome. We had a really great sacrament meeting, and
we<br />had three investigators at church. Moritz, Manuella, and, for the<br />first
time, Monica came. It was a really good fast and testimony<br />meeting, and I
hope it helped our investigators a lot. After the<br />meetings and some goodbyes
to members, we met in a classroom with<br />Moritz to discuss the Law of Chastity,
the Word of Wisdom, and<br />tithing. He accepted all of them and is way excited
for his baptism.<br />The cool thing was that we usually try and have members
present for<br />the teaching of lessons to investigators, and our stake
president,<br />Präsident Zarse, was able to assist us. Afterwards, he took us to
his<br />house in Lüdenscheid and we had lunch with him and his family.
Upon<br />arriving home, we used the rest of the night to finish our
studies.<br /><br />Well, that was the last week. We will be relatively busy for the
next<br />few days, which is of course really good. Tonight we go to
our<br />bishop's house for his less-active son's birthday. Tomorrow, we
have<br />district meeting, a member appointment in the afternoon, and then
our<br />English class. On Wednesday we have planned to have a lesson
with<br />Monica, and then we have ward council. It will be a quick bit of
time,<br />and then we will meet up in Frankfurt on Thursday!<br /><br />I hope you
have a good few days, I will see you in Frankfurt!!!<br /><br />LG,
Daniel<br /><br />Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-82661351834497832212014-04-28T06:25:00.001-07:002014-04-28T06:25:40.387-07:00OppositionHey Mom!<br /><br />Well, this last
week was pretty interesting and busy week.<br />I had one of the strangest appointments
of my mission on Tuesday. The<br />week before, we got a call from a woman living
in our area who said<br />she was a less-active member of the church, and she
wanted us to come<br />and talk to her daughter. She didn't speak the greatest
English or<br />German, so we couldn't find out exactly what the purpose of our
visit<br />should be or what we were supposed to talk about with her daughter.
We<br />drove over there on Tuesday afternoon with our ward mission leader.<br />The
woman was an Asian lady, and she invited us into her small<br />apartment. She
first asked us to look around the apartment and tell<br />her what we thought. She
then proceeded to tell us about how she had a<br />few kids that weren't allowed
to live with her and she didn't really<br />know where all of them are, she had
recently been divorced for the<br />third time and her husband had her scriptures
and member records, and<br />that she didn't want to get a job since the welfare
in Germany was<br />giving her more money than a small job in the town would. It
was all<br />just a strange situation, and we couldn't really tell her what
she<br />should do since that is not our responsibility. We later left with
a<br />prayer, and then she followed us all the way out of the apartment and<br />to
the car, which was a good distance away. When we finally drove<br />away, our ward
mission leader said he realized during the appointment<br />who she was and that
she tells a bunch of weird stories and doesn't<br />look for work so that the
church will pay for her to travel around to<br />visit her kids. It was a sad
situation, but we couldn't really do<br />anything. Anyway, later on
we had our English class, which went well.<br /><br />On Wednesday, I went on a
split in Paderborn with Elder Richards. It<br />was kind of a bad day; all of the
appointments they had set up fell<br />out. So we spent some time finding and also
updating information on<br />the referral manager system the church has
online.<br /><br />We had a back to back split with the Paderborn Elders, so I went
on a<br />split on Thursday with Elder Isham. This time I was in Hagen. We
spent<br />a good 4 hours on trains going from Paderborn to a town
called<br />Lüdenscheid. It is a long trip anyway, but our train got delayed
by<br />about 45 minutes so it took a while. We visited a less-active
member<br />there who is actually the brother of my old Elder's Quorum
President<br />from Langen. He is a cool guy, he is just kind of tangled up in
the<br />ways of the world right now though. We watched some of the
church's<br />new videos online with him, and he seemed to like them. We will
start<br />meeting with him a little bit more regularly, and hope that we
can<br />help him see the fruits of living the gospel.<br /><br />Friday consisted of
district meeting in Unna and then later on a<br />street display in their
pedestrian zone. We didn't see a ton of<br />success, but we were able to give out
4 copies of the Book of Mormon.<br />That took up the rest of the day, pretty
much.<br /><br />On Saturday, Elder Moore and I visited a member who is moving
next<br />week and helped him work in the garden at the new apartment,
getting<br />it ready to plant grass on top. As we were doing that, we got a
text<br />from Moritz, who said he had started to face opposition in his
family<br />against him getting baptized. I got kind of worried and thought
maybe<br />it would keep him from getting baptized on his scheduled day. He
said<br />his sister and brother-in-law said he is not old enough to make such
a<br />big decision so quickly and that if his girlfriend (a member) dumps<br />him,
he won't even want to be in the church anymore. We planned to<br />talk with him
about that the next day at church. We ended the night<br />with our weekly Bruder
Kramer appointment.<br /><br />We went to church on Sunday morning, and I had a nice
surprise there.<br />The Helzers, one of my favorite families from Solingen, were
at church<br />because a relative's baby was getting blessed. It was cool catching
up<br />with them and getting a picture together. Moritz showed up
during<br />opening exercises at priesthood, and we took him aside with our
ward<br />mission leader to talk about his situation. It was kind of intense.
We<br />shared with him the story of Joseph Smith being persecuted for
his<br />beliefs, and I also talked about Eric Corpuz's story when he
got<br />baptized. Moritz said at the end of the appointment that he was
still<br />planning on getting baptized on the 11th, and he prayed at the end
for<br />strength to overcome the opposition in his family. It was awesome.
We<br />had a really good Sunday with church, and later on an
eating<br />appointment with a cool family in the ward.<br /><br />Well, today is my
second to last P-day. The Unna Elders are coming in<br />a little while, and we
will chill and then I will go on my last split<br />with Elder Haskell. It should
be fun. We will meet with our ward<br />mission leader tonight and then have
district meeting tomorrow.<br /><br />I hope you have a great week, love
you!<br /><br />LG, Daniel<br /><br />Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-62913889996086849452014-04-22T12:21:00.000-07:002014-04-22T12:25:03.307-07:00Final Interview with Pres. Schwartz<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Hey Mom!<br /><br />Well, we had a pretty good week. On Tuesday, I had my interview with<br />Pres. Schwartz. It was really good but kind of awkward at the same<br />time, mostly when he got to the marriage portion. He did the classic<br />"it's not good to be alone" line, and at one point he leaned back in<br />his chair and said, "OK, I'm now prospective Sister Squires, we are on<br />our first date, ask me questions." Haha it was kind of funny. He told me I have to do </span><br />
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">power-datingwhen I go home, which is basically just laying everything on the table<br />in the first date and setting expectations, almost like in a lesson<br />with a new investigator. Yeah, we'll see how that goes. Other than<br />that, I learned a lot of good things from the interview and Pres.<br />Schwartz gave me a lot of good instruction. We spent the rest<br />of the day in Dortmund since it was our P-day.<br /><br />Wednesday consisted of going on a split to Unna with Elder Pratt. We<br />did service all day, helping some members transport a piano to a<br />member's physical therapy practice. It was a good day, but we didn't<br />get to do much of anything else since the places were so far away we<br />had to travel to. Meanwhile, Elder Moore and Elder Haskell met with an<br />investigator, Monica, to help her stop smoking. Apparently they<br />discussed the Atonement a lot with her.<br /><br />On Thursday, Elder Pratt and I took a train back to Hagen and there we<br />had district meeting. We did some roleplays trying to meet the<br />concerns of our investigators. Afterwards, Elder Moore and I went to<br />Iserlohn for an appointment with Bruder Kraft and his friend who plays<br />guitar and bass. The friend had questions about why we are called<br />'Elder' and what similarities there are between us and the elders<br />spoken of in the old testament. We pretty much just read the<br />explanation in the bible dictionary, and that was really helpful. We<br />also got to jam a little bit on guitar. I am super excited to play<br />more guitar when I get home!<br /><br />We did not get a lot accomplished on Friday because I got sick. One of<br />the kids in Unna, whose family was moving the piano, was sick, and I<br />am pretty sure that is the source of my sickness. I wrote my mission<br />history (a roughly 5 page document required from Pres. Schwartz) just<br />giving an outline of my mission, my areas, my companions, and the<br />people I have taught.<br /><br />There was a couple from the Siegen branch who got baptized on Saturday<br />in our ward building since they don't have a baptismal font in Siegen.<br />It took a long time, and we had to clean everything up afterward. The<br />guy who got baptized was a pretty big dude and it took him 4 times to<br />get baptized because he wouldn't go all the way under the water. The<br />fourth time, he just kind of fell backwards. It was kind of an awkward<br />baptism, but it's all good haha. After that was all said and done, we<br />took a trip to Iserlohn and had a lesson with Manuella. It went well.<br />She was not doing too well, so we gave her a Priesthood blessing.<br /><br />I started feeling more sick on Sunday. I was coughing a lot and my<br />nose was very plugged, but I still was able to get through all of the<br />meetings, give a talk about the Atonement, have a lesson with Moritz<br />about some of the commandments and his baptismal program, and have an<br />eating appointment with an older couple in the ward. After that, I was<br />pretty much done for the day and just rested.<br /><br />I was not doing too well on Monday, so it was another day of mostly<br />resting and getting some easy things done, like preparing the<br />baptismal program for Moritz. Other than that, I just kind of laid<br />around and took it easy. I am feeling better today, I still just have<br />a little bit of a stuffy nose and a little cough.<br /><br />Well, that was our week. It really is starting to hit me that I go<br />home in a couple weeks. I started packing so that I would not have a<br />last-minute scramble in a couple weeks right before I have to go. I<br />also sent home a big package today, mostly filled with books, letters,<br />and other random things.<br /><br />Anyway, I hope you have a great week! Love you!<br /><br />LG, Daniel<br /><br />PS For Moritz's baptism, we will be singing "A Child's Prayer" and "I<br />am a Child of God." I don't know yet if we have someone to play the<br />piano for the service, so could you practice those a little just in<br />case we would need a back up pianist? That would be awesome!</span>Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-30543442229633167222014-04-15T07:37:00.001-07:002014-04-15T07:37:30.749-07:00A Baptism DateHey Mom!<br /><br />Well, this week was really good and interesting. I will
start off with<br />the great news. Moritz, who was originally going to get
baptized on<br />April 26th, had to change his baptismal date. He requested to
be<br />baptized on May 11th (Mother's Day), and he asked that I would be
the<br />one to baptize him. That means you guys get to be there too, so
it<br />should be a great experience! Moritz is really excited about
getting<br />baptized.<br /><br />Anyway, now to the recap of the week. We had P-day
on Monday with the<br />Paderborn Elders who had overnighted with us because of
general<br />conference. We had a lot of fun. Elder Moore and I later had
mostly<br />paperwork to finish up in the apartment to get all of our records
in<br />order.<br /><br />On Tuesday, the weather was really weird and made it
difficult to know<br />if we could go outside or not. It would start raining
really hard for<br />5 or 10 minutes, and then get sunny again for another 5 or 10
minutes,<br />and then the cycle would repeat itself. We took the opportunity
to<br />completely finish some things in the apartment we had been putting
off<br />because there were just some higher priority things we had
to<br />accomplish. It was kind of a slow day, but we got a lot of things
done<br />that we now don't have to keep putting off and make the
missionaries<br />after us do. We did at least have English class that night,
though.<br /><br />We went by on a couple members on Wednesday, one of whom had
a<br />birthday so we brought by some brownies. We later on had an<br />appointment
with the Dietrichs, an active couple in the ward. They got<br />pretty excited
about missionary work seeing as Sister Dietrich has a<br />less-active brother,
and his daughter is also less-active and has a<br />semi-interested, nonmember
boyfriend. They said they were going to try<br />and make a little barbecue
get-together on the coming Saturday, so we<br />were excited for that.<br /><br />On
Thursday, we had a lesson with a woman named Monica that we had<br />found
contacting the previous week. She wants to give up smoking, so<br />we went
through the "Stop Smoking Program" that our mission has. She<br />also showed
interest in our message, so we should be having a lesson<br />tomorrow with her
about the Gospel if all goes according to plan.<br />Later that evening, we also
had a lesson with Moritz in Dortmund,<br />followed by staying there with him for
institute. We talked about the<br />Gospel of Jesus Christ with him, and it was
pretty easy for him to<br />understand and accept.<br /><br />On Friday, Elder Moore
and I did our weekly planning session before<br />heading to Dortmund for zone
training meeting. After the meeting, I<br />stayed in Dortmund and went on a split
with Elder Clark, one of the<br />zone leaders there. We did some home teaching
splits for a few hours<br />with a former German Elder who served in this mission.
It was kind of<br />cool talking to him. He trained Elder Fausnaught, my second
companion<br />in the field.<br /><br />There was a youth conference on Saturday that
missionaries were<br />permitted to visit if youth from their wards were going. We
got to go,<br />and our part in the program was to help the youth give out
invitations<br />they had created for the Easter Sunday service in Dortmund.
Elder<br />Moore and I accompanied two Aaronic Priesthood holders in our
ward.<br />They were noticeably scared talking to random people in public,
but<br />they did a good job. Upon returning from Dortmund, we had
that<br />barbecue appointment with the Dietrichs and the others they
invited.<br />It was a really good opportunity to get to know their friends
and<br />relatives a little better. We asked the one nonmember boyfriend of
the<br />less-active girl if we could call him that week to try and set up
an<br />appointment, and he said yes. We also shared a Mormon Message with
the<br />rest of them, and it seemed to be really helpful. the Dietrichs
were<br />really happy about how the activity went. Later on, we ended the
night<br />with our usual appointment with Bruder Kramer.<br /><br />Sunday was pretty
typical in terms of church services except that we<br />watched the last session
of General Conference for the last two hours<br />of church. Moritz came, and
after church, we had a short lesson with<br />him about preparation for baptism
and a few of the commandments. He<br />was still really excited about his baptism,
and he came to institute<br />and church even though his girlfriend and her family
couldn't come. He<br />is way solid.<br /><br />Yesterday, Elder Moore and I were in
Dortmund for a long time. Elder<br />Moore had an interview with Pres. Schwartz,
and afterwards we had a<br />meeting with Pres. Schwartz, the zone leaders, the
assistants, and the<br />district leaders in our zone to discuss the needs of the
districts and<br />the zone. When we got back to Hagen, we went to our bishop's
house for<br />FHE.<br /><br />I have my last interview with Pres. Schwartz today.
Normally<br />interviews last for 10-20 minutes, but the last interview takes
about<br />an hour. I have heard from other missionaries ending their
missions<br />that Pres. Schwartz talks about marriage a lot, so this
will<br />definitely be an interesting experience. Other than that, Elder
Moore<br />and I will have P-day for about the rest of the day since
yesterday<br />was all meetings.<br /><br />Well, I hope you have a great week! Love
you!<br /><br />LG, Daniel<br />Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-19407308831152920652014-04-07T09:53:00.003-07:002014-04-07T09:53:53.054-07:00Conference WeekendHey Mom!<br /><br />I am glad to hear everyone had a conference experience, and
am<br />relieved to know that Dad's shoulder is not anything serious.
Also,<br />thanks for the package, all the treats were really good for me and
the<br />whole district!<br /><br />Well, I once again am a little pressed for time.
We only have an hour<br />left of P-day and still need to get groceries across the
street, so<br />yeah, I have to hurry.<br /><br />Monday was my birthday P-day, which
was a lot of fun. After the games<br />and festivities, Elder Moore and I had FHE
with the Clemens family.<br />They are cool and they are big BVB fans, so I like
hanging out with<br />them.<br /><br />On Tuesday, we went to get Elder Moore's visa
and to train and get him<br />a new card for public transportation since his
broke. We later on did<br />some contacting and also had English
class.<br /><br />Wednesday was our last district meeting with Elder Waterböhr in
the<br />district considering he got transferred the next day to Solingen.
We<br />later on went by on a less-active member and<br />had a short lesson with him about charity. The end of the night
was<br />spent in ward council.<br /><br />Thursday consisted of getting permission
for a street display from the<br />city, going by on a less-active member to drop
off brownies for his<br />birthday, and translating an English guide to stop
smoking into German<br />for an appointment we would be having on Saturday
afternoon.<br /><br />On Friday, we didn't see a lot of success. We first did
weekly<br />planning, then went by on a few people who were not home. The
night<br />ended with our game night in the church with the ward, which was
fun.<br /><br />On Saturday, we had a lesson with Manuella before the broadcast of
the<br />women's session of conference was played. It went well. We also
were<br />going to have an appointment with a woman to help her stop
smoking,<br />but she had to cancel last minute. Then we had to run to the store
to<br />get some extra food for the Paderborn Elders, who had to stay<br />overnight
with us to make it to conference. Saturday evening we got to<br />see the live
broadcast of the Saturday morning session of conference.<br /><br />On Sunday, we
saw the Priesthood, Saturday afternoon, and Sunday<br />morning sessions of
conference. I really like the messages that<br />Jeffrey R. Holland, Randall L.
Ridd, M. Russell Ballard, and Gary A.<br />Stevenson had to share. The whole
conference was really good. After<br />the conference, we had a short talk with
Moritz (that 18-year-old new<br />investigator) about his baptism on the 26th. We
discussed everything<br />he would have to do to be prepared by that time, and he
seemed okay<br />with that. The only hitch was that he really wants to invite his
dad<br />to his baptism, and his dad will be gone on the 26th. He wasn't
sure<br />which date would be the best, but he really wants to get baptized.
We<br />gave him a couple days to think about a date and then to let us know.<br />I
hope he gets baptized while I am still in Germany, but if not, it is<br />not the
end of the world.<br /><br />Well, we had a good P-day today. Because of travel
issues, the<br />Paderborn Elders overnighted with us again. So we had a P-day
together<br />and just played a bunch of games. It was good also getting to
know<br />Elder Isham, the new Elder in Paderborn.<br /><br />That is all I have time
to report. I hope you have a great week!<br /><br />LG, Daniel<br /><br />PS Our P-day
will be on Tuesday next week, so don't expect an email till
then.<br />Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-32180684062514551112014-03-31T09:06:00.001-07:002014-03-31T09:06:12.026-07:00Miracle Sunday and a Good BirthdayHey Mom!<br />
<br />
Thanks for the birthday wishes! And you don´t have to worry
about the<br />
birthday package not getting to me, I will spend my last 5 weeks
here<br />
in Hagen with Elder Moore.<br />
<br />
It sounds like it was an eventful week
at home. I hope Dad´s shoulder is ok.<br />
<br />
Well, I have a restricted amount of
time to write my emails, so this<br />
will probably be a little shorter, but we
will see how fast I can<br />
type. We have to catch a bus in a little while to an
appointment.<br />
<br />
This week was pretty good in spite of some appointments that
fell out.<br />
On Monday, we had a pretty typical Pday followed by a member lesson
in<br />
Lüdenscheid. It was a pretty average Monday.<br />
<br />
Tuesday was our
district meeting plus a little bit of finding, all<br />
topped off with our
English class. Also an average day.<br />
<br />
We had to deep clean our apartment on
Wednesday due to the cleaning<br />
check we had the next day, and that took a
little chunk of time. Later<br />
in the evening, we had another member
appointment, this time in<br />
Herdecke, another city in our area.<br />
<br />
On
Thursday, after our cleaning check, we did some street contacting<br />
for a while
and then went to help a member with his home teaching.<br />
Later on, we were
going to have a member appointment, but it did not<br />
work out. The buses
drivers were on strike for Wednesday and Thursday,<br />
and the appointment was
too far away to try and take a train and then<br />
walk or anything. So that fell
out.<br />
<br />
On Friday, Elder Moore and I did our weekly planning, and we also
did<br />
some street contacting on the way to the grocery store so we could
get<br />
brownie supplies. We usually make brownies for our members when
they<br />
have birthdays, and two member had birthdays. On top of that,
Sunday<br />
was ward conference, so we made three sheets of brownies for a kind
of<br />
potluck after the meetings. In the evening of Thursday, we were
going<br />
to have a member appointment with an active family, but they
weren´t<br />
at home. We called them and they had forgotten, so they hurried
home<br />
and took us to a little Greek restaurant to eat, but we were not
able<br />
to share a message with them because of the time constraint and
the<br />
atmosphere in the restaurant.<br />
<br />
Saturday was filled with a little
bit more action. We had a street<br />
display in the middle of the city, and a
pretty decent amount of<br />
members showed up, as well as the missionaries from
Unna. We were<br />
there from 10 a.m. till 1 p.m. and gave out 5 copies of the
Book of<br />
Mormon as well as a ton of cards. We had some
interesting<br />
conversations and rejections from people, but anything for the
Lord,<br />
right? Later in the day, we had to cancel our appointment with
our<br />
investigator Manuella because no men in the ward could accompany
us.<br />
We did have our appointment with Bruder Kramer though, and it
turned<br />
out really good. We got to teach his son as if he were
an<br />
investigator, and I think it was really helpful for him. He said
we<br />
could practice teaching 2 times a week, and that is really good
for<br />
him.<br />
<br />
Sunday was probably one of the best Sundays I have had on the
mission.<br />
We were blessed with a few miracles. Moritz, our main
investigator<br />
right now, came to ward conference. We had a lesson with him
the<br />
previous week, and he said that he would be baptized when he
received<br />
an answer that the church is true. The talks in ward conference
were<br />
about acting in faith without a perfect knowledge, especially
with<br />
baptism. It was really good. We had a lesson later that evening
with<br />
him about the Plan of Salvation, and we invited him at the end to
be<br />
baptized on April 26th. He said yes! He just needs to clear it up
with<br />
his family so he is allowed to get baptized, but other than that and
a<br />
few more lessons, he is prepared. Another miracle that happened
at<br />
church was that an 18-year-old girl came who met with the
missionaries<br />
before and wanted to get baptized, but her parents didn´t allow
it.<br />
She still had that desire, and now is old enough to act for herself.
A<br />
girl in the ward who is friends with her in school asked her, "Why<br />
don´t
you meet with the missionaries?" She wants to meet again and we<br />
received
approval to teach her as long as it is her wish to be taught.<br />
We will meet
with her at a member´s home on Wednesday. It was a really<br />
great
Sunday.<br />
<br />
Well, I had a good birthday today. The Elders from my district as
well<br />
as some from Dortmund came to Hagen and we played games and hung
out.<br />
I also signed up for classes for Fall Semester at BYU, so I
think<br />
everything should be ok there.<br />
<br />
Anyway, I hope you have a really
great week, and enjoy conference!<br />
<br />
LG, DanielCarynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-87936861029468137772014-03-24T06:31:00.000-07:002014-03-24T06:33:40.514-07:00Last Zone Conference and SplitsHey Mom!<br />
<br />
It sounds like all of the Sundays leading up to my return home
are<br />
going to be busy in Vegas/Utah. I am sure it will make time fly
like<br />
crazy. Time is going by really fast here. It seems weird to think
that<br />
I hit the less than 50 days mark this last week.<br />
<br />
Well, we had a
relatively good week this week. We had to travel a lot,<br />
seeing as we had two
splits since the split we were going to have last<br />
week didn´t work out. Elder
Haskell got sick so we had to push the<br />
split until this last
week.<br />
<br />
Monday was a less than typical P-day. We had all of the usual
things,<br />
but we were in a hurry the whole time. The Paderborn Elders came
to<br />
overnight with us considering the next day was zone conference. So
we<br />
had a member appointment with the Kleinerts, and the Paderborn
Elders<br />
came as well.<br />
<br />
Tuesday was my last zone conference. Elder
Timothy Dyches of the Area<br />
Presidency (I think) came and spoke to us about
being master teachers.<br />
It was really uplifting and was really a good thing
for me to hear. We<br />
also heard from his wife who spoke a lot about genealogy
and using it<br />
with missionary work. Präs. Schwartz spoke to us about how we
need to<br />
keep our commitments to the gospel if we expect investigators to
keep<br />
theirs, and his wife spoke about the "unto what were ye
ordained"<br />
scripture. It was really good. Once we returned back to Hagen with
the<br />
Paderborn Elders, Elder Waterböhr and I got our stuff and headed
to<br />
Paderborn for a split.<br />
<br />
Our split on Wednesday went really well. We
had a lot of time to<br />
contact people, and we found two pretty cool potential
investigators.<br />
We also made these little origami white dress shirts and
delivered<br />
them to some members in the branch there. We split back later
that<br />
evening.<br />
<br />
On Thursday, we had a rather odd experience. We tried to
go by on the<br />
man who had spoken with us the previous week in the Döner shop
and<br />
asked us to come to his apartment to teach him. He and his wife
were<br />
home, and they let us in. The wife told us she was a Jehova´s
Witness<br />
and didn´t have interest in our message. We started to teach the
man<br />
about our purpose and the Book of Mormon, and he stopped us after
a<br />
few minutes, asking, "Wait, are you guys not Jehova´s Witnesses?"
We<br />
told him we were not, and he said he didn´t have any further
interest<br />
in our message. It was kind of strange, but at least the wife
asked<br />
for a Book of Mormon at the end. Maybe someday they will get back
in<br />
touch with the Elders. A little earlier in the day we were also able<br />
to
find a man who accepted a Book of Mormon and gave us his number,<br />
and we are
still trying to get in contact with him. We ended the<br />
evening in Dortmund,
where we visited Institute. We had two<br />
investigators there as well as a
less-active who prepared the food, so<br />
that was a really successful
evening.<br />
<br />
I went on another split on Friday, this time with Elder Haskell
in<br />
Unna. We also had a pretty legit split. We went by on a few people,<br />
and the first guy,
a former investigator, let us in. He is active in the Catholic<br />
church and
said he thinks it is great what we do but there are just some<br />
points of
doctrine where we don´t agree. He had a friend from his<br />
church there, and the
friend asked us a lot of questions. Eventually<br />
we came to the Book of Mormon,
and it was probably one of the most<br />
natural intros to the book Elder Haskell
or I had ever given. The man<br />
asked if he could keep it and was very nice and
interested. It was a<br />
cool experience.<br />
<br />
On Saturday, after splitting
back and going to Hagen, Elder Moore and<br />
I had a lesson with Manuella in
Iserlohn. It went well for the most<br />
part. We talked a lot about the Holy
Ghost and his role as a<br />
comforter, and the lesson was relatively smooth until
the very end. We<br />
came to the part where we were going to bear testimony and
close, and<br />
Manuella asked kind of a random question about Elder Moore´s
little<br />
sister and it kind of got out of our hands. Manuella and one of
the<br />
people we had as a joint-teach just kind of started a
completely<br />
different conversation, not about our lesson at all, and it kind
of<br />
made it really hard to get back the focus and close. It probably<br />
wasn´t
the worst thing in the world, but it could have ended better.<br />
We then went to
Bruder Kramer´s like usual, and his son, Chris, was<br />
there this time. We did
some grilling and played a little bit of<br />
darts, and had some good bonding
time with Chris. Bruder Kramer had<br />
some heart pains after eating, so we
didn´t actually get to talk to<br />
him much.<br />
<br />
Sunday was a really good day.
We had church, and our investigator<br />
Moritz came again. He really likes the
church and how friendly<br />
everybody is. After church, Elder Moore and I had
lunch with the<br />
Bensches and then dinner/FHE with the Schumaiers in
Lüdenscheid, where<br />
we taught Moritz again. We watched the Restoration DVD
with him, and<br />
it went really well. He said before that he wasn´t exactly sure
how<br />
the First Vision went down, but now he understands everything
much<br />
better. He also had a good question about the Word of Wisdom, which
he<br />
had learned about during some spare time at work. He said he
believes<br />
he received an answer to a prayer through the Book of Mormon, and
he<br />
is just doing great.<br />
<br />
Well, that is pretty much the week. Transfer
calls are this week on<br />
Saturday, but I would be surprised if either Elder
Moore or I were<br />
transferred. We also have a street display in the middle of
town on<br />
Saturday, so I hope that all goes well.<br />
<br />
I hope you have a
great week! Love you!<br />
<br />
LG, DanielCarynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-12233857487271502882014-03-17T08:45:00.001-07:002014-03-17T08:46:45.938-07:00Doners and a New InvestigatorHey Mom!<br />
<br />
We
had an interesting week. It began with some bad news, namely that Lukas, our
main investigator, moved suddenly to another city in our mission without
telling us or anyone else. We only found that out from<br />
a member who talked to
his brother. We can´t get a hold of him but I don´t think it has anything to
do with us. Apparently he was just really stressed out looking for a job and
decided he would move to go<br />
live with his dad for now. Kind of disappointing,
but we should beable to give the phone number to another set of missionaries
in that city.<br />
<br />
Well other than that, the week was good. It started off
with a jamsession on Monday with a member´s friend. We shared a lesson about
the Spirit and asked him if he wanted to learn more and he said no.
We<br />
later found out from the member that he wanted to know how we
could both be Elders even though we are so young. We will have
another appointment with him next month to discuss that.<br />
<br />
Tuesday was
not bad. We walked a ways to a park to try and contact people, but
there weren´t too many people there. We walked back and later on had our
English class. We also took over the seminary<br />
class for a sister who was
stuck in traffic. On Wednesday, we tried our luck in a little city called
Hohenlimburg, but didn´t find anyone there. When we got back, we made our way
to the Hiemers, an active member family, to have an eating appointment
with them. It went well.<br />
<br />
Thursday was kind of a busy day. Elder Moore
and I had to work out his visa issues and were running around all afternoon
getting everything necessary done so he can stay in the country. We were
going to get a<br />
Döner (just an awesome food you will have to eat when you get
here) before taking a train to Iserlohn to contact a referral, but we
didn´t have time before the train was going to leave. Good thing there
wasn´t<br />
enough time because we later went to get those Döners and a
Serbian man talked to us in the Döner shop, saying he would like to learn
more about God and that he has never been baptized but knows it
is<br />
important. He gave us his address and told us to come by whenever. That
was a cool experience.<br />
<br />
We had zone training in Dortmund on Friday. It
went really well. We talked a lot about finding and working effectively. When
we came back to Hagen, we had just enough time to do a little bit of studies
and<br />
then went to the church for a ward game night, which was really
fun. Saturday began with a deep clean of the ward building, followed by
a lesson with Manuella and another with Bruder Kramer. It was a busy<br />
day,
and we got a lot done.<br />
<br />
We also had a full Sunday. We went to church, and
afterwards had choir practice and a member lunch appointment. After that was
all said and done, we took a train to Lüdenscheid to have a first lesson with
a new investigator, who is the boyfriend of a teenager in the ward. He is
a really cool guy and is really sincere in his desire to find out if
the gospel is true and if God really knows him. He pretty much
just absorbed the first lesson and then prayed at the end. The
member family is doing a great job with him. He has already been over
to their house for dinner a lot and prays with them and everything.
I think he will progress quite quickly, but we will be sure to take it at
his own pace and not rush anything. He is going to a young men´s<br />
activity
tomorrow, institute in Dortmund on Thursday, and we have another lesson on
the coming Sunday. We are pretty excited about all of that.<br />
<br />
Well, this
should be a good week. We have zone conference tomorrow. It will be my last
zone conference before I go home, which is a really weird feeling. I think it
should be really good though. I hope you<br />
have a good week! Love
you!<br />
<br />
LG, DanielCarynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-62099133404331887222014-03-10T07:00:00.002-07:002014-03-10T07:00:53.997-07:00Two More Months<br />
<div dir="ltr">
Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, we had a relatively slow week this week. It started off with Monday
being Karneval and everything, so we were pretty much just chilling
inside all day playing games and being bored.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tuesday was filled with a little bit more activity. We had district meeting
in Unna and afterwards had a short finding activity in the city
there. I returned to Hagen with Elder Pratt for a split. We taught our English
class and talked with the members who were in the ward building that night. It
was pretty fun.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
After splitting back on Wednesday, Elder Moore and I went by on a
less-active member and then later had ward council. It was a pretty effective
ward council for us this time. We talked about our street display on the 29th
and about investigators and everything. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I had an interview with Pres. Schwartz on Thursday that went really well. I
really like having him as a mission president. At the beginning of the interview
he was like, "wow Elder Squires, do you know how long you have left on your
mission?" He is good at messing with the minds of his missionaries
haha. I will have another interview with him within the next 4 or 5
weeks. It will be my "Leaver´s interview," and those usually last about an hour
or more. Later on, we headed to our bishop´s house, ate tacos, and shared a
message about missionary work with the family.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Friday morning kicked off with a member appointment with the
Klingers, an older couple in the ward. We then returned to the
apartment to do our weekly planning session. We spent a large chunk of time
later going to try and contact a referral that was pretty far away (who wasn´t
home) as well as deliver brownies to a less-active in that same city. He was
excited to see us and gave us his phone number. Hopefully we can start meeting
with him and his family in the near future.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Saturday, we were going to have a lesson with an investigator named Tim,
but he didn´t show up to the appointment. Later, we had a good lesson with
Manuella. We read Alma 9 together, which is where she is right now
in her Book of Mormon reading. We ended the night with our usual Kramer
appointment. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Sunday was a little slow. We didn´t have any appointments with the members
for the first time in a while. Everyone we tried to ask throughout the week was
pretty busy, so we just went home to have lunch. There was a really cool
experience at church though. A girl in the ward turned 17 last Sunday and her
boyfriend, who is 19, came to church with her. He showed up again yesterday and
was pretty excited to learn. He has even already downloaded the gospel library
app on his phone and was reading along during the different classes. The parents
of the girl who had the birthday are trying to set up an appointment where we
can teach the boyfriend, and he seems really interested and excited about that.
We hope that happens soon.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, I hope this coming week is more eventful that the last one. I had
kind of a hard time staying focused this week just because there was not much
going on and we had a lot of disappointments, but I think this week will be much
better. We have zone training on Friday as well as zone conference next Tuesday,
and it should be really helpful. Elder Dyches of the seventy is
touring the mission, so hopefully he teaches us some good stuff.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I hope you have a good and safe week! Love you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-36013494452622162412014-03-03T10:49:00.003-08:002014-03-03T10:50:26.768-08:00A Schedule to Avoid Karneval<br />
<div>
<div>
Hey Mom!<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, for the most part, we had a pretty good week here in Hagen. The week
started off with another P-day in Dortmund. I had left my coat there, so we just
stayed for P-day. I got a couple more things at the BVB store for
some people I forgot the first time, and we went to some other places to look
around as well. We finished off the evening at the Kleinerts again
for FHE.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we didn't have a lot happen until the evening where we had
English class and then a lesson with Lukas, our relatively new investigator. We
taught him the Restoration, and he seemed pretty excited about it. He even
accepted the invitation to say a kneeling prayer at the end of the lesson, and
he did a great job. </div>
<div>
Wednesday began with district meeting, and then afterwards I had a
split in Hagen with Elder Richards from Paderborn. We spent most of
the day in public transportation trying to contact a referral who wasn't home
and then went to a member's home for a Wednesday FHE. In total, we
were probably riding buses and trains for about 3 to 4 hours that day.
<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
On Thursday, after heading to Paderborn to split back, Elder
Moore and I came back to Hagen and then shortly thereafter went to Dortmund for
a lesson with Lukas and then Institute. It went really well. We didn't have a
ton of time to prepare for the lesson since we had been on a split, but it still
went ok. We taught him the first half of the Plan of Salvation.
Lukas has been keeping his commitments and asks a lot of good questions. He also
enjoys coming to institute, so that was cool to see him stay for that as well.
He was even asked to give the prayer at the end of the Book of Mormon class and
prayed in front of everyone even though it was his 3rd time ever praying in
front of people.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a pretty slow day on Friday. It was the start of
Karneval where a ton of people dress up in costumes and get
hammered, so the mission sent out a text and suggested we try to do effective
things in the apartment. We still had a member appointment in the evening, and
there was not really any craziness on the street, so it was kind of a boring day
with a lot of planning and organizing things in the apartment.</div>
<div>
Saturday was a day full of activity. After studies, we first had a lesson
with a potential investigator from Egypt named Kyrollos. He was a
cool guy, but seemed more interested in learning about American culture than in
our church. It was also hard to try and get him to accept a Book of Mormon
because he said he might not read it and it could go to waste, but we eventually
persuaded him to take it with. After that appointment, we headed to
Iserlohn to have a lesson with Manuella. It went
pretty well after a kind of shaky start, and she read out loud today in front of
us for the first time ever! She goes really slow in terms of making
progress, but she step by step moves forward. The evening consisted of going to
Bruder Kramer's son's apartment to help install a light fixture. We
ended up not really having an opportunity to help much, but we had good
conversation and food. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Sunday was a good day as well. Manuella came to church, but
Lukas didn't show up. We were kind of worried since our plan was to meet him at
church and then drive together to a member's home, eat lunch, and then have a
lesson there, but it ended up being ok. He had a lot of paper work
to do for applying for jobs and things so couldn't make it to church, but he
still came to the lesson. We taught him the last half of the Plan of Salvation,
and it went well. He will have a busy week this week, so we invited him to pray
to know if the plan was God's true plan for us, and he asked for a week to be
able to think and ponder, and then we will see us at church on the coming
Sunday. He is taking it pretty seriously, and I think there are good things in
store with him. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, that was pretty much the week. Today is Rosenmontag,
which is the day of the Karneval celebration where all of the
parties in the bigger cities go down, so we are pretty much just going to go
finish our shopping, and then head inside for the rest of the day since it is
going to be wild in the city. </div>
<div>
I hope you have a great week! Love you!<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-21143635577777953282014-02-24T08:32:00.002-08:002014-02-24T08:32:52.257-08:00A New CompanionHey Mom!<br />
<br />
<br />
<div>
I will try to keep my email a little shorter, I am running out of time
since I had to write some other emails and call some Elders for various reasons,
and also we are heading to Dortmund today since I accidentally left my coat
there after stake conference.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, this week was fast and slow at the same time. On Monday, after going
to Dortmund and getting some BVB gear as well as some new ties, we
had FHE with the Kleinerts in Herdecke,
which went well. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, I went to the dentist because I thought my front tooth was
cracking in half (which you can see in the right angle of light that there is a
huge crack/ridge in it) but the dentist told me it is not a concern right now.
We will have to see what American dentists think when I get back. A lot of the
day was spent with Elder Norman packing, and then we went to lunch with
Bruder Kramer so Elder Norman could say goodbye. We ended the day
with English class. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Wednesday was good. We had district meeting as well as an appointment with
a member of the ward, Bruder Kraft. He asked me if I play
instruments, and I said I play guitar. He got way excited and said he has a
friend who plays guitar who would want to jam with me, so he set up an
appointment with this guy so we can eat, have a spiritual thought, and then play
some guitar. But that isn´t until the Monday after next, so it will be a small
waiting period. We ended the night with Ward Council Meeting, and it was
ok.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We woke up early on Thursday to go to Frankfurt so I could
pick up my new comp, Elder Moore. He is a good guy and has good desires. He is a
pretty big dude and makes me look tiny. We are probably one of the more
interesting looking companionships in the zone haha.
But he is way funny and is a good comp. We drove with a travel bus back up to
Dortmund and when we got there, we almost immediately had a "setting
expectations" lesson with a potential investigator, Lukas. It went really well,
and he is now a new investigator. We stayed there with him afterwards for
Institute in Dortmund, and he had a good time. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Friday, we spent most of the day inside so I could debrief Elder Moore
on the area and the members and investigators, as well as make our weekly plan.
When we finally were able to go outside, we pretty much just walked down the
road where our church is and had a game night with some members in the ward. It
was fun, and it was a good opportunity for Elder Moore to meet some of the
members. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Saturday, we tried going by on some less-active members, but they were
busy and couldn´t let us in. We had to later travel to Dortmund for stake
conference. We were going to get there an hour early to have a lesson with
an investigator who was coming to stake conference, but it never happened. She
came, but she came in on the other side of the building. There was a guy there
doing the door service, and told us he would let us know if she came in. Turns
out she did come in, but the guy never came and told us. By the time we went
over there ourselves, it was too late to have a lesson, but we still were able
to sit with her for stake conference. It was really good. They talked a lot
about hastening the work and about loving others. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Sunday was another part of stake conference, but it was
broadcasted in Hagen, so we didn´t have to go to Dortmund again.
Lukas came, and he really liked the talks that were given. It was actually a
broadcast from Salt Lake City to all of the wards in Germany, and there were 4
speakers. I don´t remember who the first 2 were, but the 3rd was David A.
Bednar, and the 4th was Richard G. Scott. Elder Bednar
gave his whole talk in German which was pretty cool. After stake conference
ended, we ate lunch with an older couple in the ward, the Schmidts,
and later on went to Iserlohn to try and visit a former
investigator, but he wasn´t home. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That was pretty much the week. We have an eventful week planned out for the
next seven days, and I can imagine that it will go by very quickly. I hope you
have a great week, too! Love you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel<br />
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-21346418425494294652014-02-17T08:05:00.000-08:002014-02-17T08:05:46.357-08:00Training for the Last Two TransfersHey Mom!
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had transfer calls on Saturday, and I was called to train for my last
two transfers. I am excited. I don´t think I would have had a huge problem with
focusing anyway, but this will help me stay concentrated on the work since it is
such a big responsibility. Unlike other training situations, I already know who
I will be training. It is an Elder who was already in the mission being trained
but had to leave the mission for a time, and now he is coming back into the
field. That means I will kind of be re-training him, so that will be an
adventure! I have heard from other missionaries who knew him that he is a really
great guy and had a good impact on some members in the first area he was in. I
will pick him up on Wednesday. In other news about transfers, Elder
Hutchings is staying in Idar-Oberstein
with his comp, Elder Monson from my district is heading to
Gelsenkirchen and being replaced by an Elder Pratt, and Elder
Norman is going to Erfurt. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, we had an interesting week this week. We didn´t get to teach that
many lessons because there were so many crazy things going on. On Monday, we had
our typical P-day and then had FHE with our bishop and his
family.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tuesday consisted of helping a member family, the Clemens, build some
furniture for their baby that will be coming shortly. We also had our English
class, which is always good. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We were in Dortmund for all of Wednesday to help the zone leaders move from
one apartment to another. I feel bad for Elder Lyman, one of the zone leaders.
He was excited about the new apartment (which is a lot nicer than the old one)
and helped move everything and then just got called to be transferred to Essen.
It is ok though, one of the Elders who was helping got called to
replace him, so his work was not in vain haha. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Thursday, I went on a split with Elder Waterböhr. We stayed
in Hagen and tried to go by on three different people. The first, a less-active
couple, were on their way out the door, so we couldn´t meet with them. The
second, an old investigator, was also on his way out the door, so we walked
with him a ways to talk to him about his alcohol addiction, but we couldn´t do
much there. The last go-by, a birthday go-by, was also not ideal. The whole
family was sick, so we couldn´t go in and have a lesson. On top of all of that,
it was raining all night, so we got soaked. It was kind of a slow, lame
day. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Friday was better. We headed to Dortmund for zone training, and there we
did a lot of roleplays for teaching and talking to people in
trains. We also had a question and answer session with our Stake President,
Pres. Zarse. It was really cool and helpful. When we returned to
Hagen in the evening, we met with the Rajahkumar family.They are
originally from Sri Lanka, and Bruder
Rajahkumar is part of the bishopric here. We had a really great
appointment with them, and I learned a lot about the role of love and charity in
helping people come unto Christ. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was a busy day. The Elders in Siegen had a baptism,
and it took place in our chapel since their chapel is lacking a baptismal font.
We got everything ready for them in the morning, and then had the baptism around
12:30. It went well, and one of our investigators, Manuella, was
there. I think she enjoyed it. After the baptism and a little lunch put together
by some members, we had a lesson with Manuella about why bad things
happen to good people and why Joseph Smith was persecuted and
killed. She brought up that concern in the last lesson, so we resolved it at
this lesson. After that appointment and some studies, we had our classic
Bruder Kramer appointment on Saturday. Those are always fun.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Sunday, we had Elder Norman´s goodbye testimony. He was really sad to be
leaving. Hagen is a cool area. After church, we met with a less-active family
for lunch and then with Pres. Zarse and his family for dinner. He
lives in our area, which is really cool. It is the first time I have had the
stake president in my ward on the mission. He is a really helpful and loving
man. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, that was about it for the week. Not too crazy, but still alright.
Today for Pday, we are going to Dortmund to visit
Primark (best store ever) as well as a BVB
Fanstore so I can get some cool stuff for everyone. It will be a
lot of fun. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I hope you have a really great week! Love you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-19030251147653008902014-02-10T07:38:00.000-08:002014-02-10T07:38:04.996-08:00Prayers Answered, and Other Cool Things<br />
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Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a really busy last couple of weeks. I won´t give a big list of
things we did two weeks ago, it wasn´t really a crazy week with a ton of cool
experiences. This last week was really full of a lot of activities and cool
things, though.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Monday after P-day ended, I went on a split with Elder Robinson in
Dortmund. I got to do a baptismal interview for one of their investigators, a
Chinese girl whose name I will not attempt to spell. Usually the district leader
interviews baptismal candidates, but the district leader in Dortmund district is
German and the Chinese girl only speaks English, so they had me come in for the
interview. She did a really good job. After the interview, we had a
FHE activity in Dortmund with older, single people. It was a lot of
fun. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The next day, we headed back to Hagen for district meeting. We did some
really cool role plays there to help teach our investigators, and it was really
helpful for the companionships in the district. Once we were
finished with district meeting, we met with a former investigator, Tim. He had
been texting us all of a sudden throughout the last few weeks,
and we finally were able to have an appointment with him. He is a really cool
guy, and seems like he wants to take our message seriously. In the evening, we
had our English class as well as a lesson with our investigator,
Bernd. It didn´t go very well. He wanted to fight and discuss a
bunch of strange topics and would not accept anything we taught about without
bringing up some reason why the Book of Mormon is not important to read. We
ended up having to tell him we could not meet with him further if he is not
willing to read in the Book of Mormon because that is the only thing he can do
to find out if the church is true. He told us he would contact us again when he
decides if he wants to read the book or not. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Wednesday was a really awesome day. We went to the town hall to get
permission for a street display in the pedestrian zone, and as we were on our
way out, I simply said hi to a man standing near the door to the building. He
stopped us and asked us if we speak English, and we told him we did. Turns out
he just got to Germany (he is originally from Nigeria but lived most of his life
in Italy) and needed help to get his papers and everything worked out with the
government. He asked if we could help him translate everything, and we did. He
later told us that he had prayed the whole morning that someone would come
across his path that could help him in his situation. It was a really cool
experience being able to be the answer to someone´s prayer just because we were
in the right place at the right time. Later on that day, we took brownies to a
less-active sister in Lüdenscheid, but she said she doesn´t want to
come back to church. We ended the night with ward council, which actually went
really well. It was probably the best ward council I have been to in Germany so
far. We got a lot accomplished and the council was supportive and interested in
our efforts with investigators and the street display. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Thursday, I had a split in Hagen with Elder Haskell, who is usually in
Unna. We had to plan out a lot of logistics to get to an
appointment and also go by on some former investigators, and that took a while,
but for the most part, we had a good day. Our appointment was with the
Wächtlers, an active couple in our ward, and it was a great lesson.
We watched a video from "Hastening the Work of Salvation" with them, and they
seemed to be pretty excited about it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
After splitting back on Friday, Elder Norman and I headed straight to
Essen, a city in our zone. I had a district leader council there with the other
district leaders in the zone, the zone leaders, the assistants, and Pres.
Schwartz. It was a really good meeting, and I learned a lot about helping my
district get excited about finding new investigators. After the meeting, we
stayed in Essen and helped set up for a fireside/baptism there (the baptism of
the girl I interviewed). Missionaries were only allowed to stay for the fireside
if they had investigators there. We knew one was coming, but to our surprise, a
second one came with a YSA. This investigator, Marvin, is way cool.
He was meeting with the missionaries up until the week before I got here but
stopped because he had a lot of stress with different things. He is ready to
meet again though, and he said he already knows our message is true, he just
needs help to stop smoking. We are meeting with him on Wednesday to talk to him
about that. The fireside was great, and I think it was really helpful for all of
the missionaries and investigators who came. Our Area Seventy spoke, Axel
Leimer, and he gave a great talk about the Gospel of Christ.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was a great day as well. After completing studies and weekly
planning, we headed to Iserlohn with Bruder
Gernegroß (a member of the bishopric) to an appointment with our
investigator, Manuella. She was the other one who came to the
baptism. We had a really good lesson with her, and I think it helped her to make
progress. We just read in the Book of Mormon with her where she was at, and we
answered her questions. In the evening, we went to Bruder Kramer´s,
like we do every Saturday, and it was really good and fun. I had to prepare a
talk for the next day, and before we went over there, I prayed about what I
needed to talk about. I thought to myself, "I am a missionary, of course I am
going to give a talk about missionary work," but I didn´t have a good feeling
about it. As I went on my knees and prayed, I had a strong impression that I was
supposed to talk about tithing. I didn´t want to at first, but I eventually
realized that it was going to be important for some reason. At
Bruder Kramer´s house, I told him I needed to print something off
for the talk, and he also gave me a DVD of the old church video where Lorenzo
Snow goes to St. George when they are in a drought, as well as the church was in
debt at the time, and in the film, he stands before the church there and
receives revelation that the answer to both of those problems was that the
church needed to pay full, honest tithing. Once they started doing that, it took
a while, but the promise of the Lord was fulfilled and the rains came and the
church came out of debt. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a great Sunday. There were three nonmembers at church, one of them
being Manuella, the next was Endurance (the man we helped at the
town hall, and by the way, sickest name ever, right?), and the last was a young
man who has a ton of interest to learn about the church. He came with one of the
YSAs, and he wants to meet with us. The only problem is that he
doesn´t live within our mission boundaries, but he is trying to decide if he
wants to stay there or move to Hagen. I hope he moves haha! When
the time came, I gave my talk about tithing. It went really well, and I felt
good about the topic. After church, a lot of members came up to me to tell me
that it was a really good talk and several said they learned a lot. The bishop
talked to me and Elder Norman after church and said he was very impressed with
our work and the fact that we let ourselves be guided by the Spirit. He said the
talk was exactly what the ward needed. On top of that, Endurance told me that in
his church in Italy, he also pays tithing but he had not paid it the last month
and now needed to repent. It was cool. In the evening, Elder
Norman and I went to the Gruse´s for a member appointment. Overall, it was just
a great day.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, I hope this week will be just as good as last week was. Oh yeah, and
one other cool thing happened: since my birthday is coming up, as well as the
birthday for Elder Robinson, Elder Robinson asked Pres. Schwartz if we were
allowed to go to a BVB soccer game for our birthdays, and Pres.
Schwartz said "Elder, you are only on a mission in Germany once, you would be
crazy if you didn´t go to a soccer game." I am pumped! </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Anyway, that was the week. I hope you have a good one! Love you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-17833104877785900592014-02-04T09:26:00.003-08:002014-02-04T09:26:43.862-08:00Very Short EmailHey Mom!
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I have to keep my email short this week since I spent so much time just now
trying to register for summer term at BYU. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a good week this week. We had lessons with a few investigators, and
they went pretty well. I also went on a split with Elder Monson in Unna, and it
was a lot of fun. They bought a deep-fryer for their apartment a while ago, so
we tried to deep-fry some noodles. It didn`t turn out too great haha. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I have a split today with Elder Robinson in Dortmund (he is one of our zone
leaders) and then I have another split in Hagen with Elder Haskell (the other
Elder from Unna) on Thursday. It is going to be a very busy week. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I hope you all have a great week! Love you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-4908316956955142142014-01-29T13:25:00.001-08:002014-01-29T13:26:01.725-08:00An Effective District Meeting<br />
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Hey Mom!<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, we had a pretty
good week here in Hagen. It started off with P-day, after which we had a Family
Home Evening with a family in the ward, the Clemens. We watched a Mormon Message
with them, and it was really good.<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
On Tuesday, we headed out to a
smaller city to drop off some birthday candy to some members in the ward. Later
on, after also planning what we wanted to discuss in Ward Council Meeting the
next day, we had our English class at the church. I wasn't a part of it though;
Elder Norman and I did a split with Priesthood holders, and I went with a member
of the bishopric to help him with his home teaching. It was a good appointment.
When he drove me back to the church, we had a lesson there with our
investigator, Bernd. That also went well. We talked with him about
the necessity of the Atonement. We compared it to a Father asking all of his
kids to make a perfect table, patterned after the table of a master table maker.
We talked about how some would do better than others, but without the help of
the master table maker, nobody would be able to make a table as good as him. It
really helped him understand that concept, so hopefully we answered all of
Bernd's questions there. We also talked about the role of the Holy
Ghost and how you can recognize the Spirit. <br />
<br /></div>
We had district
meeting on Wednesday, which went really well. We planned a game together as a
district, based on something a different district in our zone did. We call it
the "Hagen Games." It is basically a way to help us get out of our comfort zones
and do the things that a lot of missionaries know they should do but sometimes
don't because it is uncomfortable or foreign to them. For example, some of the
things for Elder Norman and I include talking with people in buses and trains,
calling at least one member everyday to build trust, updating our records daily,
doing at least one role play a day during companion study, etc. There is a
points system associated with all of these things, and each area in the district
has different things they are doing as part of the games. The winner at the end
of the transfer gets a free tie from Primark (which only costs a
couple bucks) from both of the other companionships. We were
careful not to do things that directly effect the key indicators of the mission,
like lessons with a member present, new investigators, and so forth because
doing so would probably take away the spirit of missionary work and cause us to
do things to get points instead of to help people. So the things we do are all
things that only effect our own agency and help us grow. The
Paderborn Elders have already seen a lot of progress in their area
and in themselves because of the things they have undertaken to do, which is
awesome. Anyway, after that district meeting, I went on a split in
Paderborn with Elder Richards. We talked a lot about the area and
what things could be done to improve the situation there, and we also tried to
contact a couple of less-active members/former investigators at the university
there. It was a good split.<br />
<br /></div>
On Thursday, I went back to Hagen, and
Elder Norman and I visited some more members who had birthdays in a little town
called Werdohl. It took most of the day since Werdohl
is quite a ways out there, but missionaries hadn't made it out there in a while,
so we thought it was a good use of time. </div>
After weekly planning on
Friday, we had a lunch appointment with a member family. The husband is not a
member and also didn't want to be a part of the visit, so he wasn't there. The
rest of the family is girls (the mom and three daughters), so we had to have
somebody else there. The oldest daughter, Anne, brought her boyfriend there who
is 18. We had lunch and then watched a Mormon Message about the Book of Mormon
and finding out that it is true. At the end of the appointment, we were able to
give the boyfriend a Book of Mormon, and it was awesome. We didn't want to be
too pushy, but we hope that he reads in it and asks us or Anne some questions
about it. Later in the evening, we had a dinner appointment with a different
member family. It also went well, and we invited them to watch a
video from "Hastening the Work of Salvation" since they were running low on time
and we didn't get a chance to watch it with them.
<br />
<br /></div>
Saturday was a good, busy day. We had first a fallen-out
appointment at the church, which was unfortunate. A former investigator had
randomly sent us a text, asking us how we were doing, and through that we set up
an appointment. Like I said, he didn't show up, and he later said he couldn't
make it but wanted to come to church the next day. After that, we took a train
out to Werdohl again, and got picked up there by a YSA
in the ward to help him go home teaching in Lüdenscheid. That
appointment was followed by a lesson with Manuella, one of our
investigators, and that same YSA was our joint teach. We talked
about prayer and how it is a commandment that we pray, and we hope she can
eventually gain the courage to pray with us. She gets nervous and scared doing
new things in front of people, and I guess she still needs a little bit of time.
We ended the night by going to Bru. Kramer's, and we ate with him
and watched a super old church film as well as a short Mormon Message. It was a
good day. <br />
<br /></div>
Sunday was also nice. We had a good church service, and
Bernd and Manuella both were at church. After church
ended, we gathered up all of the YSAs in the ward and planned out a
YSA council between just them and us every second Sunday in the
month after Sacrament Meeting. We feel strongly that the growth in Hagen will
come through the YSAs, and they have a lot of good ideas and tools
to do missionary work that other members don't always have. We are excited to
work more closely with them, and it seems like they are pumped as well. After
that, we went to the Janßens, another member family in the ward,
for lunch. We watched a video from "Hastening the Work" with them, and they
really liked it. We finished the day with our studies and call-ins with the
members of my district. <br />
<br /></div>
Well, we should have another good and busy
week this week. We are heading to Dortmund for P-day today. We are going to hit
up Primark and see what is up there. It is a sweet store where
everything is super, super cheap but still good quality. We later on have a
FHE appointment with our ward mission leader. </div>
I hope
you have a great week! Love you!<br />
<br /></div>
LG, Daniel</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-55913424342032317492014-01-20T08:14:00.001-08:002014-01-20T08:15:38.937-08:00A Busy Week in Hagen<br />
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Hey Mom!<br />
<br /></div>
This
week in Hagen was probably one of the busiest weeks of my mission, if not the
busiest. There are so many things to do here. It is interesting how my whole
mission I was in areas where there was not much going on, and now that I am at
the end, I am just constantly super busy, and I know this time is going to fly
by. <br />
<br /></div>
We had a pretty sweet week here. On Monday, we did a lot of
shopping for Pday. I got myself some BVB fan stuff as
well as some new clothes that I have been needing. After we were done with our
Pday activities, we went to our ward mission leader
(Bruder Kleinert)'s house for FHE. There
was a former investigator that came, and we all read and talked about 3
Nephi together. It went well, but the woman who was there doesn't
really seem like the committal type. Bruder Kleinert
said she has been the same way for years, so we probably won't get her as a
progressing investigator any time soon. <br />
<br /></div>
Tuesday was really full of
small miracles. We went first by a member whose birthday was that day, and it
took a while to get out there. We weren't exactly sure where they lived, and we
saw them on the street as we were going toward where we thought their house was.
We had baked brownies for them, and they invited us in for a short time. They
said it was the first time missionaries had ever dropped by on their birthday,
so I think they enjoyed that. Later on, we wanted to have a lesson with an
investigator, Abraham, but we didn't have enough time to reach him. We just
ended up running into him on the street as we were trying to get a hold of him,
and were able to make out a new appointment. When we were all finished there, we
went to the church to talk with the bishop about missionary work and the ward.
When we were done discussing those things, we had our English class with a
member and a nonmember that another member had invited. We were going to then
have a lesson with another investigator, Bernd, but he didn't show
up. We gave him a call, and we were able to schedule a new appointment.
<br />
<br /></div>
On Wednesday, we went by on an older couple who is semi-active
right now. They were happy to let us in. They told us about their experiences
living in the DDR and then we shared a message with them about
holding to the Iron Rod. When we returned to the main city, we went to have our
lesson with Abraham. He wants to stop drinking and change his life, but he
doesn't have a lot of willpower and gives in easily to temptation. We taught him
about the Word of Wisdom and also offered him a Priesthood blessing, which he
accepted. We ended the evening by planning out how we were going to work more
effectively with the members and who we wanted to meet with in the coming
week.<br />
<br /></div>
Thursday was also a busy day. The members of my district came
to Hagen and we had a district planning session. There are various goals and
initiatives for our mission from now until June when President Schwartz gets
released, and we were asked to plan out some area goals in relation to them.
After doing that, we all got some lunch together. There was another member with
a birthday, so Elder Norman and I visited her briefly and gave her some birthday
treats. We topped off the night with institute in Dortmund, which was good. I
got to meet a couple more YSAs from our ward, and also our
investigator, Frau Carvahlo was there. </div>
On Friday, we
went to Dortmund again for zone training meeting. It went really well and I
learned a lot of things that I want to apply in my district meetings. When we
got back to Hagen, we had that lesson with Bernd. We taught him
about the Plan of Salvation. We may have taken it a little too fast, so we will
probably go over some of the points again when we meet with him tomorrow. We
ended the night by helping a less-active member move some cabinets in his
apartment. <br />
<br /></div>
We headed to Dortmund for the third day in a row on
Saturday. We had a district leader council where we discussed things that need
to be applied in our districts as well as some good ideas to boost effectiveness
in missionary work. Upon returning and after eating lunch, we had a lesson in
Iserlohn with Frau Carvahlo about putting our trust in
God like the stripling warriors, and it went relatively well. There was a member
that helped us teach who is from Mexico, and he has been in Germany for about a
year studying. He goes back to Mexico this week, so we all drove over to a
member's work place after the lesson and had a surprise party for him. It was
fun, and there were some nonmembers there we got to talk to as well as
strengthen the relationship with other members. <br />
<br /></div>
Sunday was another
busy day. We had church, and Elder Norman gave a great talk about the new ward
mission plan in Hagen and how we can work together to reach our goals. Right
after church, we went to an older couples' apartment for lunch, the
Langners (related to the Langners in
Langen). When that was all said and done, we met with a family, the
Gens family, who is returning to activity right now. It was an awesome
appointment. They have a 9-year-old daughter who suddenly said she would like to
be baptized that day at church, so we are going to work on getting her taught
and ready for that as well as helping the family return to activity. It is
difficult for them; the wife is from Brazil and apparently the church is much
more relaxed and fun over there, and here in Germany it is still good, but it is
a lot more strict and down to business, but they still have testimonies which is
awesome. It is a large family as well, so it will be really good for the ward
here. We had a short lesson about the Restoration, and afterwards, they talked
about wanting us over there every 2 weeks, which is a lot of progress. We are
really excited to work with this family more closely.<br />
<br /></div>
As you can
see, there is a lot to do in Hagen. I am super glad to be in this area. It is
just awesome. We are going to have an even more busy week this week, so next
week's email might be even longer than this one if everything works out okay.
<br />
<br /></div>
Anyway, I hope you have a great week! Love you!<br />
<br /></div>
LG,
DanielCarynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-50102720023804776652014-01-13T09:28:00.000-08:002014-01-13T09:30:24.525-08:00A Good Start in Hagen<br />
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Hey Mom!</div>
</div>
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<br /></div>
Well, things are
going well here in Hagen. The city itself is really awesome, and I like the
ward. I would say there are about 60-70 active members. We have a large
concentration of YSAs here, and they are all really cool. We have a
good apartment, a large church building, and lots and lots of people. It is
definitely the busiest city that I have ever served in. I also like serving with
Elder Norman. He is a really good missionary, a hard worker, and he is really
charitable. By the way, did you know that Tyler Jaramillo served in
Hagen? It used to be a part of the Hamburg Mission.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Elder Overall and I had a good few last days together. We went to the
Wagners after P-day for family home evening, which is always
awesome. After we ate and had a little lesson, we went upstairs and played
Foosball on their new table they got for Christmas. I was a little rusty, but I
did pretty well for myself. It was a really fun night. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we got to do service at the Tafel again, and I got
to say goodbye to all the people who work there. In the evening, we had one last
short appointment with the Grassmans, who are a really great
family. I spent most of the rest of the night packing my things.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Wednesday was our last district meeting in Darmstadt. We did a
joint meeting with the Elders and Sisters in Darmstadt, and it was
probably one of the best district meetings we have ever had. We talked a lot
about having a Christlike relationship with our new companions in the new
transfer, and it was great. When we returned, and after we finished our studies,
we visited Bruder Jungheim, one of my
homies in the ward, and then had a dinner appointment with the
Mühlmanns. It was a really fun night, and a good last night in
Langen. </div>
<div>
Thursday was the big transfer. I finished my packing and then we headed off
to Frankfurt around 11 a.m. We were there for quite a while, seeing as our train
didn't leave until around 2 p.m. The train ride was about three-and-a-half hours
to Dortmund, where I paired up with Elder Norman. We took a train to Hagen, and
when we got there, it was already dark outside, so I didn't really get to see
much of the city. We spent most of the night talking about the members and
investigators there, as well as unpacking.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
On Friday, we almost didn't leave the apartment before it got dark outside
again in the evening. We spent a huge chunk of time talking about all of the
members and the people we are working with, as well as making our plan for the
next week. We did luckily get out while there was still a little light outside,
and I really enjoyed seeing the city for the first time. It is big and has a ton
of shops and people all over the place. As we were walking around contacting, we
stopped a guy who was smoking and asked him if he would like to stop. He said
yes, and we traded phone numbers. Hopefully we will be able to get in touch with
him soon. We also had a sort of lesson with an investigator from Cuba, Abraham.
I actually talked more to his friend who was there, teaching him about what the
Book of Mormon is for. He was interested and said he wanted to read the book,
but didn't want to meet right now. Oh well, maybe later then. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was an eventful day. We met with this guy Steffan
after lunch for a little while. He had an accident in the past and now is a
little handicapped, and he kind of just talked a lot. We didn't get to share
much with him. He turned on this German gospel singer woman's music super loud
and we could barely talk with him. It was a sort of strange appointment, and I
don't know what the future holds for our appointments with him. After that, we
headed off to Iserlohn, a city in our area, and had a lesson with
one of the investigators here, Manuella. She is from Portugal, and
she is really cool. She doesn't like meeting new people, so at first she was a
little apprehensive towards me, but she started to warm up to me by the end. We
talked to her about receiving revelation through the Book of Mormon, and she
told us some of her concerns about being baptized. Hopefully in the next
appointment we can help her resolve those concerns more. To end the night, we
went to the Kramers. Bruder Kramer is a member that absolutely loves the missionaries. Apparently we have a weekly
appointment with him every Saturday evening, and it was a lot of fun going over
there. We ate dinner, talked a lot just about random stuff, and watched a Mormon
Message with him. It was a lot of fun.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
We went to church on Sunday, beginning with a quick correlation with our
ward mission leader, Bru. Kleinert. He is an older man
and seems pretty passionate about the gospel. Hopefully we can work with him to
bring the work up to a quicker speed. After talking with him and meeting the
bishop as well as a few other members, we went to Elder's Quorum.
When that was over, we had the YSA Sunday school in the same room.
The last hour was sacrament meeting, and it went well. Manuella was
at church, and she seemed to enjoy it. I got to give my testimony at the end of
the meeting, and it was good. After church, we had more time to just talk with
the members and get to know them a little better. I talked a lot with some of
the YSAs, and they are all really fun to be around. Elder Norman
and I want to start working closely with them so we can help them get pumped for
missionary work and going on missions. It should be awesome. <br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, that is about all for the week. There are a lot of differences I have
to get used to being in Hagen (like the fact that there are people on the
streets and that we have investigators), and I still need some time to learn my
way around and also to learn the needs and concerns of my district. The district
seems pretty cool so far, and there is some good work going on. Anyway, Elder
Norman and I are going to hit up some shops for P-day, and I am planning on
getting a BVB jersey if I can find one. It should be a good P-day.
We have zone training this coming week as well as some more appointments with
investigators, appointments with members, and institute on Thursday in Dortmund.
It should be a sweet week!<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
I hope you have a good week as well! Love you!<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-7383209861499821662014-01-06T09:56:00.000-08:002014-01-06T09:56:16.517-08:00New Area Transfer<br />
<div dir="ltr">
Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was really excited to hear that Dad got a hole in one! It´s about time
someone in our family made one. I think we have all gotten really, really close
from time to time, but until now, we have never seemed to be able to make it
happen. It sounds like all in all it was a good New Year´s celebration. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, I will cut straight to the chase considering I know you are anxiously
awaiting the news about transfers. I am getting transferred to Hagen (pronounced
"Haw-gin" kind of), a city just south of Dortmund! I am excited because it is
not a huge city, but I think it is still relatively big and will likely be the
biggest city I will have served in on the mission. Hagen is kind of close to
Solingen, so I guess at the end of my mission we could see both
cities in one day if necessary. So far as I have heard, the ward is around 100
active members, which some people would consider small, but for my mission so
far, that is really big. My new companion will be Elder Norman. I already know
him; he was trained by Elder Hunter in Gera at the same time that I
was there with Elder Watts. He is a cool guy and a hard worker. He will be going
into his 6th transfer. I am excited to head up north for what will probably be
my last area. I can finally choose a side between BVB Dortmund and
Bayern-München, which are the two biggest soccer teams
in Germany as far as I know. Until now I hadn´t served too close to either one
of them, but now it looks like I am going to have to root for BVB.
I will remain a district leader there, and the other Elders in the district will
be Elder Monson and Elder Haskell in Unna, as well as
Elder Waterböhr (another missionary from Gera I knew)
and Elder Richards in Paderborn. It should be a lot of fun, and I
have heard that the work in Hagen is going quite well right now. I hope I can
keep it up. Elder Overall will still be here in Langen and will be
working with another one of the Elder Browns in our mission.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a really good week packed with member lessons. Monday started off
with a pause in our Pday to have a lesson with Carlos. We basically
just went over everything once again that we had talked about when we had the
nonmember guy translating for us, just to make sure he understood everything and
that he didn´t have any false ideas taught to him. It went well, and we think he
will keep moving forward in his learning the gospel. After that, we finished up
our Pday, and then went to the Dietsches for dinner,
which is always great. We talked about the year 2013 and what we could do to
make 2014 better and to make progress in the gospel and in missionary
work.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we had a lunch appointment with our Elder´s Quorum Pres. and
his wife. We talked with them about new goals and things for 2014 as well. We
had to be in that night at 6 p.m. since it was Silvester (New Year´s Eve). We
live on one of the two busy roads in Langen, so there were a lot of
fireworks that went off like gunshots all night. We fell asleep eventually, but
were reawakened at midnight when the real fireworks began. We opened the
shutters to watch them for a few seconds and then went back to bed. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had district meeting in Darmstadt with the zone leaders
(Elder Stimpson and Elder Wardrop) in
Darmstadt, and that was followed by a split with them. I went to
Heidelberg with Elder Stimpson. Last transfer I went on a split to
Heidelberg, but we didn´t get to see much of the city, so I didn´t think it was
all that great. But this time we went down more into the heart of the city, and
it was amazing. After the mission when you pick me up, that definitely is a
place we need to go. On the split, we tried to contact a referral, but he wasn´t
home. After that, we went to the home of some Hispanic people whose 9-year-old
son just was baptized. We watched the Restoration with them in Spanish, and then
promptly had to leave seeing as it was going to be tough to get home if we
missed our train. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We split back the next morning on Thursday. After eating lunch and doing
some study, we had a great lunch appointment with the Voglers. We
talked with them about the new year and about how faith is pointed toward the
future. They have a potential referral family they have been trying to invite
for over a year, so we decided to fast with them that 2014 would be the year
when something positive with them finally happens. Later on, we went to the
church to have our first English class again, this time with Steven
Langner (one of the YSAs) and his girlfriend. It went
well, and hopefully Elder Overall and Elder Brown can keep that going. We ended
the night by visiting a referral from a member. The man was very nice and was
pleasant to speak with, but he was not interested in our message. We gave him
the opportunity though, and that is all we are asked to do. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Friday morning was when I found out I was going to Hagen.
Präs. Schwartz calls missionaries with new leadership positions/who
are getting released on Fridays. He called during personal study, which is a
little earlier than normal. Needless to say it was really hard to concentrate on
studies after that happened. After all of that was said and done, we made our
weekly plan. When we finished that, we headed to
Neu-Isenburg to try and find some people at home
there, but they were all gone unfortunately. We got back in the evening to what
we thought was going to be our Bibelkreis, but we had forgotten to
get the lesson to the sister who was teaching, and then she forgot to come
anyway, so we just ended up watching a Mormon Message with everyone who
came. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was the official transfer call throughout the mission. There were
a lot of weird things that happened this transfer, like Elder
Bruneel is training in Darmstadt and Elder
Bonzo is also coming down to be in a companionship with them. Elder
Hutchings is getting a new comp in
Idar-Oberstein, Elder Smith from England. They both
were trained by Elder Hathaway, so that means they are brothers (according to
missionary family trees). Elder Smith is really cool, and I know they will enjoy
serving together. After the call, we went to the Noacks for lunch
and talked about the simplicity of the gospel of Christ. Later, we walked to
Schwester Sonn´s and talked with her about receiving the blessings
of the temple. We couldn´t get a priesthood holder to come with on such short
notice, so we just talked for ten or fifteen minutes at her apartment door. To
end the night, we went to Peter Rojas´ for dinner. It is always fun going over
there and hearing about experiences from his mission in Spain. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Sunday, we had church and I had to give my last testimony and say my
goodbyes. It was kind of sad. I really liked this ward. After church and a lot
of pictures, we went to Gary and Yvonne Hess for lunch. They made us steaks,
beans, and potatoes (Gary is an American). Sister Hess asked us if we were still
hungry, and I said no but Elder Overall said yes. He just wanted a little bit
more steak but wasn´t sure how to say it and so Sister Hess ended up giving him
all of the remaining steak, an entire tomato, and several toasted pieces of
bread, some with cheese on them. After that we had a pumpkin pie, so needless to
say, Elder Overall was super full. We then headed to the Kempeners
for a light dinner, and we just had a really good time with each other. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Today has been a good day. We did our shopping and then headed off to
Darmstadt to check out an old hunting castle, which actually turned
out to be kind of lame, but there was a pond and some forest next to it so we
just chilled there for a little while. We have an appointment with the
Wagners right after we finish emails, and I am sure it will be
great. I can´t wait for you to meet the Wagners and the
Kempeners and Mühlmanns and everyone else in the ward
when you come and pick me up. It is going to be great.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, I hope that you have a really good week, and I will update you with
how things are in Hagen with Elder Norman next week! Bis dann! Love
you!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-55917775695510616062013-12-30T07:18:00.000-08:002013-12-30T07:18:42.606-08:00A Good Christmas Celebration<br />
<div dir="ltr">
Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I felt like the Christmas season went by really fast as well. This whole
year has gone by really fast. I had a great time skyping with everyones. I am glad that everyone had a fun Christmas
season.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a really good Christmas celebration here as well. We pretty much
just had 4 days of relaxing and having fun in the beginning of the week. Monday
was P-day, and then we finished the night by making brownies to take to various
members. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tuesday (Heiligabend) was the ward Christmas service, and it went really
well. After that, we were taken to Frankfurt by Bruder Stübe so that we could
pick up Sister Bass and then drive back to Langen to have dinner and celebrate.
When we arrived, the Christmas service in the Frankfurt ward was still going, so
we had to wait in the car for a good 45 minutes before we finally left again,
but that was alright. When we got to the Stübes, we had a delicious dinner of
Spätzle and this brown meat sauce followed by an awesome raspberry creme and
meringue. It was awesome. We
shared a short lesson with them about being like little children and then
surprised them with Kinder Eggs with the little toys inside. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Christmas day was great. We went to the Kempeners, of course, where we
skyped. We had a simple brunch with them as well as a small gift exchange. We
did that same lesson with the Eggs there, and they seemed to enjoy it. We were there for a while, and we had just a simple day of
celebration.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The 26th was also a really good day. We were with the Mühlmanns for almost
the whole day. We had a turkey lunch with them and they gave both Elder Overall
and I a nice tie and a Santa Räuchermännchen. After that, we just talked,
relaxed, had a really good ice cream cake sort of desert, and then watched an
old, cheesy, animated church film called the 4th wise man. You may have seen it
before. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Friday was kind of back to work, but still was a more relaxed day. We went
to Darmstadt for district meeting, and we watched the mission Christmas DVD (a
compilation the mission sends out of pictures taken by missionaries throughout
the year) and traded gifts with each other. It was really fun, and afterwards,
we went to lunch at Vapiano, which is definitely a place we need to eat when you
guys pick me up. Later in the evening, we tried to go by on a less-active member
in Walldorf, but he was not home.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Saturday, we did part of our weekly planning, and then took a train to
Götzenhain to try and get in touch with two older referrals that we don´t have
contact with, but neither of them were home. After we got home, we had a lesson
with Schwester Sonn, the less-active sister, and it went really well. We talked
about Lot´s wife and how this new year is a great time to look forward and make
a new beginning to reach new goals. Bruder Sauer, our ward mission leader, came
with us. Afterwards, he took us back to the church and we coordinated missionary
work with him there. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Yesterday was a pretty good Sunday. Carlos came to church, which surprised
us. Peter Rojas, our member translator, also was there again. We told him what
had happened with Carlos, and he went and talked to Carlos and Schwester Murcia
to see what the situation was. He came back up to us after church and said that
Carlos never said that he didn´t want to meet or learn anymore, but just that he
thought getting baptized on Jan. 4th was too fast and he wanted to know more
first. So basically the guy that translated for us either didn´t understand what
Carlos said or he changed it on purpose because he is not interested in religion
and tried to sabotage us in a way. When we found that out, we were really happy
that Carlos wanted to meet still, but were kind of angry that the translator had
lied to us and also probably didn´t translate everything we tried to teach
correctly. We have a lesson with him actually in a couple hours, and Peter will
be there to translate everything correctly. We are just going to start over from
the point we left off at when Peter was there the last time to make sure there
is no confusion or false doctrine that was taught. Anyways, the rest of Sunday
was good. We pretty much just had our studies and then tried to deliver some
brownies, but no one was home. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That is about it for the week. This week is going to be really awesome
because we are teaching Carlos again and we have a ton of member appointments
scheduled. Transfer calls are on Saturday, and there is a decent chance that I
could get transferred, so if this is my last week in Langen, at least it will be
a good one. I will let you know the results of transfer calls in my email next
week.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I hope you have a great week and a happy new year!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-6399173452034410262013-12-23T12:29:00.001-08:002013-12-23T12:29:49.208-08:00Christmas is Coming<div dir="ltr">
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Hey Mom!</span><div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Thanks a bunch for the Christmas package, I guess I had either forgotten to write about it or I didn´t have a chance to pick it up from the neighbor until after last <span class="">Pday</span>. I can´t remember. But I really like the ties everyone got for me, along with candy and letters and stuff. I am really relieved to know that everything I sent got to you guys safely and that you like it. The <span class="">Schwibbogen</span> (that nativity-<span class="">ish</span> wooden thing I sent) looks really cool lit up in the dark! A bunch of Germans have things like that on their window sills, except they usually aren´t as fancy as the one I sent home. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">This week was <span class="">ok</span> in the beginning but ended kind of poorly. We had <span class="">Pday</span> on Monday and we went to <span class="">Darmstadt</span> to play games. Because of the travel times and all of the things we had to get done, we were in a huge rush all day and just barely got our grocery shopping done by the time <span class="">Pday</span> ended. After that, we went to a city called <span class="">Rödermark</span> to try and make contact with that old referral. He wasn't home, but on the train ride home, an older man talked to us and we helped clear up some false beliefs about Mormons (plural wives, etc. etc.). We ended up giving him a Book of Mormon, and he wanted to give us 10 Euro for it really bad but finally accepted it simply as a Christmas gift. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">We did more service at the <span class="">Tafel</span> on Tuesday, which is always a good part of the week. When we were finished and had showered, done studies, and tried to contact a former investigator, we went to part of a school concert with the <span class="">Wagners</span>. They invited us to come with them, and we asked Pres. Schwartz for permission. He said it was up to us if we were going or not. We then asked the zone leaders to see what they thought, and they said to do it if we felt like it was something good to do. We took it as a sign that the <span class="">Wagners</span> are gaining more and more trust in us, so we went. While there, we got a sort of referral from one of the sons, Felix. He asked us if we would come play pool with him at the church the next day because he was about to move to <span class="">Wiesbaden</span> a few days later. He was going to bring a friend along who he had already given a Book of Mormon a while ago, and wanted us to kind of just start talking about the gospel while playing. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Wednesday rolled around, which started off with the usual studies and lunch. When we were finished with that, we headed to the church to work on a few things on the computer and after that, we headed to <span class="">Neu</span>-<span class="">Isenburg</span>. We went by on a few people, including a less-active, a former investigator, a random name who showed up on the ward list, and a member. Unfortunately, none of them were home. We saw the member on her bike (<span class="">Schwester</span> Murcia) and asked her to give her nephew, Carlos (our investigator) some questions we had written up and then translated into Spanish. Once we had done all of that, we headed home to the church to play pool with Felix and his friend. We only had an hour to play, and for some reason, no one ever started talking about the gospel. We at least got to know his friend, so hopefully we will be able to get his number or address from Felix so we can come in contact with him now that Felix has moved away. We only had an hour for that because we had an appointment with the <span class="">Mühlmanns</span> after that and we had to catch our train to<span class="">Götzenhain</span>. We had dinner with them along with a few friends of the daughter,<span class="">Zinnah</span>, and that went really well. After dinner, we watched a Mormon Message about Christmas and then headed over to a neighbor of the <span class="">Mühlmanns</span> with <span class="">Schwester</span><span class="">Mühlmann</span>, <span class="">Zinnah</span>, and her friends, and gave him some cookies for Christmas. We are going by on him again <a href="x-apple-data-detectors://4" x-apple-data-detectors-result="4" x-apple-data-detectors-type="calendar-event" x-apple-data-detectors="true">tonight</a> to give him the "Joy to the World" DVD and a Book of Mormon. Hopefully that goes well. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">On Thursday, we had district meeting in <span class="">Darmstadt</span>. We were there for almost the whole day because Pres. Schwartz was here doing interviews, and Elder Overall and I were the last ones because we were the only ones who didn´t have appointments in the afternoon. Ours were in the evening, so Pres. just asked us to stay and wait, which we did. My interview with him was relatively short considering the fact that I had an interview with him recently. He did give me a interview for a temple <span class="">recommend</span> though because mine expires in the end of January. He wrote on the <span class="">recommend</span> that the interview took place in August of 2012 so that it would expire shortly after I got home. That way I could have an interview with my own stake president after the mission. Once we headed back to <span class="">Langen</span>, we just stayed on the train and headed to the <span class="">Dreieich</span> <span class="">Bahn</span> so we could go to <span class="">Dreieichenhain</span> and have a lesson with Michael, our older, German investigator. He had listened to his assignment we gave him, but told us that it didn´t really mean anything for him. We talked about that for a while and also about faith. We listened to the recording of Alma 32, and he told us at the end that he had little desire to change or do anything, so we mutually agreed it would be better if we didn´t visit him much after that. That was kind of lame, but we saw it coming. He said he still wants to listen to the whole Book of Mormon, so maybe something will happen there when he does that. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Friday began with the <span class="">Tafel</span> again. It was the last time we will do <span class="">Tafel</span> this year. It is shutting down <a href="x-apple-data-detectors://5" x-apple-data-detectors-result="5" x-apple-data-detectors-type="calendar-event" x-apple-data-detectors="true">until January 7th</a>, so we will return at that time. After that, we went to the church to practice singing with the ward choir. We practiced and then went to sing in an old person´s home. That went well, and there is an old, sick member in the ward who lives there, so we got to visit with her as well. In the evening when that was all over, we headed to <span class="">Neu</span>-<span class="">Isenburg</span> to have a lesson with Carlos. We had planned to talk about the Plan of Salvation, but he had some concerns and misunderstandings about baptism, so we focused our lesson on that. <span class="">Schwester</span> Murcia´s friend was there to translate for us, and while it was not the greatest that we had a nonmember translating for us, it was our only option. The lesson, we thought, went relatively well. We also got a lesson scheduled with some more of <span class="">Schw</span>. Murcia´s friends who just happened to be at her house.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">On Saturday, we had a kind of slow day. We were in the church for church tours, but no one came. While we were waiting, we got to watch the Christmas Devotional, though. When that was all over, we did weekly planning. It took a long time and we had a hard time focusing. After that, we went by on <span class="">Schwester</span> <span class="">Sonn</span>, a less-active sister, and made a new appointment with her. We finished the day by updating our area book and brainstorming for the mission finding day. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Sunday was kind of a shock. We had planned to have a lesson with Carlos during church, and that happened. <span class="">Schwester</span> Murcia was not there; she felt sick, so she stayed at home. Her friend took Carlos to church to translate for us again, which was nice of him. We did teach the Plan of Salvation this time, and it seemed to go well. At the end, we asked Carlos to pray, and he did. We were <span class="">ok</span> with how the lesson went and thought that it would have been helpful for Carlos. After he said the prayer, we started packing our things to head down to sacrament meeting, and the man translating for us said that Carlos had something to say. He then said something in Spanish, which the friend translated. Carlos said that he had thought about it and no longer wanted to be baptized or meet with us. It was really abrupt and kind of a surprise. We were kind of sad, but that kind of thing happens on the mission. We did our part, and did everything we could, but for whatever reason, Carlos didn´t want to continue to learn. After church, we went to the <span class="">Langners</span> for lunch, which was followed by caroling at another old person´s home and some elderly members. We finished the night having dinner with the <span class="">Kempeners</span> and a former missionary, who served for 9 months in <span class="">Langen</span> a few years ago, along with his wife. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Well, that was the weekly report. It was kind of unfortunate week, but there were still good things that happened. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">I am excited to <span class="">Skype</span> in a couple days. I will see you on Christmas! Love you!</span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">LG, <span class="">Daniel</span></span></div>
<div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; font-family: UICTFontTextStyleBody; font-size: 17px;">
<span class=""><br /></span></div>
</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-20462919349260390972013-12-16T07:31:00.000-08:002013-12-16T07:31:15.511-08:00Following a Prompting<br />
<div dir="ltr">
Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It sounds and looks like you and Valerie had an awesome time in New York. I
would love to go back or even live there one day. I like that big city feel,
which is funny since all of the cities I have served in on the missions are some
of the smallest. Kind of ironic in a way. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, this week was really great. On Monday, we went to the Christmas
market in Darmstadt to do some Christmas shopping. I was the only
one who bought anything really big (out of all 9 missionaries that were there, I
was the only one who was celebrating his second Christmas on the mission. I am
old!). It was really fun and I hope things get to America safely. After P-day
was over, we went back to Langen for a YSA family home
evening. It was all the YSAs from Langen and
Darmstadt, and two of the Darmstadt Elders were there
as well. It was pretty fun. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we did our service at the Tafel again. Some of the
ladies who serve there started asking us about the church and we responded to
their questions, but they did not agree with what we had to say. One lady talked
about how there are so many different religions and they all have parts of the
truth and in their own way lead you to God, so we explained that thanks to
Joseph Smith, all truth is to be found in one church, but they couldn´t
comprehend that there could only be one way to return to God. It was kind of one
of those situations where people just want to state their opinion without trying
to understand why we believe the things we do. I was kind of frustrated. Even
one of the women supported the other one and said that the truth radiates from
her while what we say is not true, but they are just confused and didn´t really
open their ears or hearts to what we had to say. We did end up giving one of
them a Book of Mormon though, so hopefully she reads in there and sees what we
were talking about. Anyway, after coming home, showering, and studying, we had
a lesson with Schwester Sonn for the first time in
about two months. It went well; we talked about 2 Nephi 31:20-21,
and it seems to have helped her. She still says she is not ready to come to
church, and she has said that for years now, so hopefully one day things will
change. To end the night, we went to an appointment with our older, German
investigator, Michael. Bruder Jungheim came and helped
us teach. Michael is still trying to find out if he even wants to start finding
out if there is a God. He is kind of comfortable where he is at and doesn´t
fully comprehend the importance of our message yet, so we will see if he comes
around some time. He had trouble reading the Book of Mormon because his eyes
aren´t that good anymore, so we said that we would stop by on Saturday to drop
off an audio version of the Book of Mormon in German. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Wednesday, I went to Michelstadt for a split with Elder
Phelps. It went okay. We were going to have a lesson with an older, active
member, but we got to his house and he wasn´t there. We got back in the car to
map out a path to get to some potential investigators, and the man we were
supposed to have the appointment with walked up to the car and said we would
have to repark somewhere where it was legal. We thought he
understood we were going to have an appointment still after we moved the car,
but when we closed the door, he just walked down the road and disappeared. It
was kind of strange. So after that, we hit up some potential investigators, but
no one was home/no one had interest. The last appointment for the evening was
with a member and her nonmember husband. We talked about family
history and how it helps us do work for our dead ancestors, and it seemed to go
well. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I drove up with Elder Phelps to Offenbach on Thursday for zone conference,
where we split back to our normal comps. We had a really good meeting, talking
about asking inspired questions and listening with empathy, as well as extending
and following up on meaningful commitments. Afterwards, we took the subway to
Frankfurt and sang Christmas songs on the Zeil while giving out a
ton of "Joy to the World" DVDs. It was a lot of fun.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The next day, we went and helped at the Tafel again. We didn´t
have as many conversations about the church this time, but that was okay. One of
the things we do at the Tafel is sort out old fruits and vegetables
and throw away the rotten stuff (which there is a lot of, it smells awful). For
some reason, on this day there seemed to be an endless supply of bananas, and
they had Elder Overall and I sort them. I didn´t like bananas in the first
place, but now I really don´t like them. Rotten bananas stink. When the
Tafel was over and we showered and studied, we had our
Bibelkreis. We talked about Exodus 1-2 and how Moses´ early life
played out. It went okay, but once again, not many people were there. We talked
with our ward mission leader and the other members about how we can get more
people to come because the branch presidency will not let the
Bibelkreis die out (they said very specifically it was going to be
a long-term activity). Hopefully we start having better attendance there. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was a really cool day. The beginning of the day was really boring
and slow. After our studies, we went and got some blank CDs so we
could download the audio to the Book of Mormon onto one and give it to Michael.
It took a little while, and just sitting down all morning and early afternoon
made my tiredness catch up to me. We eventually got onto the train to head out
to a town called Rödermark. There is an old media referral out
there from 2011 we wanted to get in touch with. Our plan was to go first to
Rödermark, contact the guy, and then on the way back, get off the
train in Dreieichenhain where Michael lives to drop off the CD and
a Restoration pamphlet. Michael had told us beforehand the he would most likely
not be home, so we could just leave the stuff in the mailbox. We wanted to see
him another time within the week, so we hoped we could, through a miracle, find
him at home. As we were on the train to Rödermark, we started
pulling into the Dreieichenhain train station. As the train was
stopping, I had a thought come into my head that we should get off. I shrugged
it off a little at first since I was tired and not too l pleased with how the
day was going so far, but then it came more urgently: "get off the train now." I
told Elder Overall and we got off the train before it started moving. We walked
in the direction of Michael´s apartment, and I prayed in my heart that we would
find out why we needed to get off and do this plan first. We didn´t have many
good opportunities to talk to people on the way there, but between Michael´s
apartment and the train station is the Fußgängerzone, which is
decked out as a Christmas market right now in Dreieichenhain. Right
when we set foot on the market, Elder Overall said, "Hey, isn´t that Michael?"
Sure enough, Michael was standing at the first booth on the Christmas market. We
approached him and spoke with him for probably half an hour. He told us how he
still struggles to know if he wants to learn about the message but he enjoys our
company. He said he had trouble reading in the Book of Mormon because of his
eyes, and he also didn´t understand some of what he read, so we were able to
give him the CD and comfirm our appointment for the coming week.
Right after we parted ways, we saw some members at the market and told them what
had just happened, and they thought it was great. They bought us some crepes
after that. It was an awesome day, and Elder Overall and I
were both really thankful for that prompting we received and that we followed
it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Sunday was just as good if not better than Saturday. Actually, it started
off really stressful though. We got a call from a YSA who had
forgotten to tell us we were supposed to give the lesson in Priesthood, so we
had maybe 30 minutes to prepare a lesson out of the "Teachings of Lorenzo Snow"
in German and then give it to the collective Priesthood in the ward. It turned
out alright, though. Our other investigator, Carlos, showed up near the end of
the class. For the second hour of church, we had a sort of investigator class
where we watched the Restoration in Spanish. At the end, we talked about it and
talked about how he felt. He said he felt good about it. We invited him right
there to be baptized on Jan. 4, 2014, and he said yes! It is going to be a
struggle getting everything in place for that and teaching him all of the lesson
because our translator is going to be gone until the 27th, so we are searching
out other opportunities to make up the difference (members who speak Spanish in
other wards, Spanish friends of Carlos´ aunt, who is a member, etc.). We are
praying that God will help us find a way to accomplish this great feat if the
time is right. After church, in the evening, we went to the
Kempeners and had dinner with them, as well as watching the new
Mormon Message about Christmas. They also had us watch Mr. Krueger´s Christmas
with them. It was an awesome day.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, we are about to head to Darmstadt for a board game P-day
as well as to hit up the Christmas market for one last time, and we have to
leave now to catch the train. I hope you have a great week!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-53437097427484220982013-12-14T08:19:00.000-08:002013-12-14T08:19:41.142-08:00A Spanish Speaking InvestigatorHey Mom!<br />
<br />We had a really great week this week. We just had
Pday on Monday, and then in the evening didn´t have any
appointments, so we checked up some information about old referrals in the
church´s referral manager system and then prepared some materials for the rest
of the week.
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tuesday was a really good day though. We woke up early and went to the
Catholic church here at 7:30 a.m. to go do service for the Tafel,
which is like a place where they take all of the groceries that are about to
expire, clean them up, and then give them out to poor people. We got to do some
really good service and a lot of people asked about what we were doing there and
it was great. There was also a potential investigator there that just happens to
serve at the Tafel as well. The best part is that they want us to
keep coming back, so we get to do this service every Tuesday and Friday morning.
Later on, we went and contacted that referral from Bru.
Jungheim. The guy let us in, but he has some weird opinions about
religion and is not super interested in learning about our message. We read in
Alma 40 about the next life and he told us he hopes there is no next life, no
matter what kind of life it is. He is not suicidal, but he said he hope his life
ends soon even though he is only 57. So that was a little strange. After that,
we visited the Jungheims and told them how it went in addition to
sharing a lesson with them. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Wednesday, we headed out to Dietzenbach to try and get
Elder Overall´s visa stuff taken care of, but unfortunately, the place was
closed. We had only the information for the 2014 hours of operation, but they
didn´t turn out to be the same as 2013. After we got back, we helped the ward
set up tables and things for the ward Christmas party. When we were done there,
we walked to Erika Jochum´s apartment, an investigator who has been
meeting with the missionaries for 12 years or so. We straight up told her that
if she wasn´t planning on getting baptized eventually, we couldn´t teach her.
She said she still wants to meet but probably won´t get baptized. We most likely
won´t go over there again. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Thursday, I had a split with Elder Schmidt from
Michelstadt. We were in Langen, and we had a really
good split. We gave a lady a Book of Mormon who said her daughter went off with
some gambling addict that gets in trouble with the cops, and now she has little
contact with that daughter. We promised that the Book of Mormon will help, and
she took it gladly. She didn´t give us a number or address though, so hopefully
she reads it and calls us. We later headed to Gravenbruch where a
member couple lives, the Mohrs, and had a good lesson/dinner with
them. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We headed to Heidelberg on Friday for our zone training meeting, and that
went relatively well. We learned a lot about meeting and working more with the
YSAs in our wards. Since then, we have set up an appointment with
our YSAs for tonight to talk about those things, and they are also
coming to Pday activities today (going to the Christmas markets in
Darmstadt). Anyways, when we returned from Heidelberg, we went to
the church to help with more Christmas decorations. As we were there, we walked
past the entrance of the church and saw an old man reading the poster we have on
the door saying what activities we have and when they are. We opened the door
and he told us he wanted a tour through the church. We let him in briefly and he
just talked and talked and talked about a lot of random things. After inviting
him to come back the next day for a tour, he left. We finished up the night with
our Bibelkreis, where we talked about Isaac and Rebekah. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was an awesome day. The first part of the day was actually not so
fun, though. We went to the church, and that old guy came for the church tour. I
have never heard someone explain and assume more random things that don´t have
anything to do with our church´s doctrine before that tour. Every time we took
him to a room in the church he just would go off about how we must do this and
that with the various rooms, pictures, chairs, etc. for the longest time. At the
most, a church tour should take 15 to 20 minutes, but we were in there for an
hour and 15 minutes. It was brutal. An example of what I am talking about was
when we went to the basement where we have Priesthood classes. At the front of
the room there happened to be four chairs set up and he asked eagerly what the
symbolism of the four chairs was. We told him that usually the bishopric sits
there and presides over the meetings. His response was that there must be a
reason for the fourth chair and then proceeded to come up with this elaborate
story about how the 4th chair must be symbolic of a person of high authority
that is no longer alive but we set a place for him anyway out of respect. Our
response was that what he said was not the case and that it just happened to be
that four chairs were set up. That is how the entire tour went. At the end (and
all throughout) we invited him to read in the Book of Mormon. He finally
responded that he doesn´t need to read books, but that instead he holds books
between his hands and just believes, then he knows everything he needs to know
about that book. It was really weird, but at least someone came for a tour. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Later on was when the day got awesome. We had a lesson with the nephew of a
member from Columbia. His name is Carlos, and he doesn´t speak German or
English. We set up an appointment with him last Sunday through a member from
Spain who speaks English, and we had him there to translate everything. It went
perfectly. Carlos accepted basically everything we taught and was excited to
read in the Book of Mormon and come to church and make out a new appointment.
Then after the lesson, we all went upstairs to the ward Christmas party, which
was a lot of fun. For an awesome end to the day, we tried to call a bunch of
these old referrals again who never seem to answer the phone, and one guy
answered, not having had contact with the church since he was referred 3 or 4
years ago, and he said he is still interested in learning our message and taking
the lessons in our church building. He doesn´t have time until January, but he
said he wants us to call after the holidays to set something up. It was a great
day.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Sunday was also good. We had church (Carlos came) and later on a lunch
appointment with an older member couple, the Grassmans, and then a
dinner appointment with Peter Rojas and his fiancee, where the
Dietsches were also present. It was a good Sunday, but we had to
eat way too much haha.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, things are going well with Elder Overall. We are heading to Darmstadt today to check out the Christmas market
and get some cool things, which should be fun.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That is all for the week. I hope you have a great one!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-7266875935060657792013-12-03T08:46:00.001-08:002013-12-03T08:46:55.184-08:00Thanksgiving and Voradventsfeier<br />
<div dir="ltr">
Hey Mom!
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It looks like everyone had a really good Thanksgiving over there! The golf
looked fun as always, and I guess it won´t be too much longer until I am back
doing that as well. We got to have two Thanksgiving dinners here, so that was
really cool. One was with the district after district meeting (the senior couple
in Darmstadt prepared it) and the other was the
"before-advent-celebration" with our Elder´s Quorum, which was basically just
Thanksgiving. It was really good. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, this week was ok. We started with a sport
Pday on Monday in Darmstadt, and that was pretty cool.
We later on headed back to Langen, and we had a really good lesson
with the Kempeners (the Branch Pres. and his family) on Monday
about the Priesthood and how God wants us to use it. The Kempeners
are really cool. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we had lunch with an old member couple, after which we spent
some time writing thank you notes to all of the members. In the evening, we went
to Peter Rojas´ (an awesome member from Spain) place for a dinner appointment.
When we got there, he asked us if we had a little bit of time, and we said yes,
to which he responded that he wanted us to help him decorate his Christmas tree.
It was a lot of fun. After that and dinner, Elder Brown shared his favorite
scriptures with them as kind of his "goodbye."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Wednesday was pretty great as well. We went to Darmstadt for
district meeting. It was a joint meeting with my district and the
Darmstadt district. Afterwards, we had the Thanksgiving lunch I
mentioned earlier. When we got back, Elder Brown had to pack his stuff until we
had an evening appointment with the Mühlmanns. We watched the new
"Wrong Roads" Mormon Message with them, which is really a good one. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Thursday was transfers. We headed up to Frankfurt, and I got to see a lot
of missionaries I didn´t see for a long time, including Elder
Proffit, Elder Fowler, and Elder Goodrich. I am pretty excited;
Elder Proffitt got transferred to Speyer which is in
my zone, so I will be able to have more contact with him. I also picked up Elder
Overall, my new companion. He is a good guy. We got back and went to
Egelsbach to deliver some of the thank you notes Elder Brown and I
had written, and then ended by having supper with the Grassmans
(the Elder´s Quorum Pres. and his family). We watched the Mormon Message "Men's
Hearts Shall Fail Them," and that went well. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Friday, we delivered some more thank you notes around
Langen and then did our weekly planning. After that, we went to the
church and helped set up and later participated in the
"Voradventsfeier" (pre-advent-celebration). It went
really well. A few members brought their nonmember friends, one of which became
a referral. We are visiting this man, Michael, tomorrow evening shortly before
we visit the guy who brought him to the activity. We also hoped to have that
investigator Jonas there. We got in contact with him again, and he wanted to
come, but he didn´t show up and now isn´t answering his phone again. It is
frustrating. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Saturday, we did a lot of work in our area book, scanning through
records of people we could try and contact who were investigators in the past.
We decided to pick some out from Egelsbach since we still had a
thank you note to deliver there. One of the addresses didn´t exist, but the
other two were valid. Both of the people seem promising, but they both said to
contact them after the holidays. I can imagine we will hear that from a lot of
people. In the evening, we had our correlation with the ward mission leader, and
that was good. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Yesterday was a really good Sunday. Bruder
Grassman blessed his newborn baby, and there were a ton of
nonmembers there. It was fast and testimony meeting, and the Spirit was really
strong. I also got up and bore my testimony, shortly describing what
missionaries do. It went well. We haven´t gotten any referrals from this yet,
but there were some people who seemed to have good questions and a good
experience in the church. After church, we went to the Langners for
lunch and talked with them about charity. We later finished the evening with
studies. All in all, the week was good.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We have a lot of stuff planned for this week with members and with a couple
nonmembers. We need to help the YSAs set up all the Christmas
stuff, and we also will have a lesson before our Christmas party with the nephew
of a member who is in town. He speaks only Spanish, so Peter Rojas is
going to be there as well to translate everything. I hope it goes well, and then
we could possibly send the referral to Columbia (I think he is from there) when
he leaves in a week or two.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, that was the week. I hope you all have a great week and that things
continue to go well!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra">
<br /></div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-66749052835921753812013-11-25T22:48:00.000-08:002013-11-25T22:48:01.171-08:00Fantastic Tuesday, Disappointing Thursday, Rotten Food FridayHey Mom!
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had transfer calls this week, and I know you will be interested to
know what happened. I am staying in Langen, but Elder Brown is
getting transferred already. He is going up to Mülheim, and
replacing him as my new comp is Elder Overall (I am pretty sure that is what his
name is). He is only in his 3rd transfer, so it is just another young comp for
me! This will be my second time golden busting (being the next companion of a
missionary who just got trained) for Christmas. Last time it was Elder Fowler in
Solingen. Probably the most interesting news of transfer calls was
Elder Hutchings though. He is going to
Idar-Oberstein! I am glad he finally gets to
experience the small town life I have had pretty much my whole mission,
considering he has been in these huge cities and wards his whole mission. This
will help us relate to each others´ missions a lot better
haha.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had a strange week this week. It was kind of hard.
Monday was a good day though. We went to the Wagners for
FHE and talked about having a testimony of the Book of Mormon.
Brother Wagner is my favorite, and their whole family is really awesome and
funny. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tuesday was actually fantastic. Since we are so close to
Offenbach, we got to go there to hear Elder Osguthorpe, the President of the Sunday
School for the church, and Elder Ridd of the General Young Men´s
presidency, speak to us. The only missionaries that got to go were the
missionaries in Frankfurt Zone, and then my district and Elder Hutchings´
district, just because it is easy for us to get there but expensive for the
other missionaries. It was awesome. Elder Osguthorpe talked a lot
about ways to help investigators and less-actives, and also about Ammon´s 3 D´s
of success (desire, decision, determination). Elder Ridd spoke of
having real intent in all that we do, including praying, doing morning exercise,
eating breakfast, study, etc. It was very informative and helped me a lot. Elder
Leimer, the area seventy, was also there and spoke about being
clear and honest about our purpose as missionaries, especially in expressing the
importance of and the goal to get other people baptized, and letting them know
it. The best part of the day was that after the meetings, we came back to
Langen and had a lesson with a potential investigator, in which we
got to apply everything we had just learned. The lesson went really well and
this guy, Jonas, knows exactly why we are teaching him and what we expect of
him. He was excited to read in the Book of Mormon and was rethinking his
decision to get baptized in another church.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Wednesday was also a good day. We went by on a family that I thought was
less active, but it turns out that they were just really old and can´t
physically make it to church anymore. They were workers in the Temple for 14
years and take the sacrament every week, so that was cool. They were surprised
that we had not been over in so long. Later on, we had an appointment fall out
with Eva Sonn again. It sounds kind of weird, but I like working
with less actives and there are not a lot here in Langen, and
sometimes I wish there were more who were willing to meet, but the activity rate
in Langen is one of the highest in the mission, if not the highest
(around 85%). We later on had a dinner appointment with the
Dietsches, and that went well. We shared the Mormon Message about
the currant bush. </div>
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<div>
Thursday was the day that things started getting hard and disappointing. We
were supposed to have another appointment with Jonas, but he didn´t come to the
appointment and now hangs up the phone when we call. We went on a split with the zone leaders as well. I went to Heidelberg with
Elder Stimpson, and we had a good split. We got to talk to a lot of
people because there are people all over the place, unlike in
Langen, and we had a couple good appointments. On the way back from
the split, we got a call from President Schwartz, who told Elder
Stimpson that he would be getting a new zone leader companion,
Elder Wardrop, who is Breck Naylor´s cousin. The other
zone leader, Elder Lindsey, just got called as assistant to the president. On
his split with Elder Brown, he said we needed to spend more time with the
members, trying to have 9 to 10 appointments a week with them. That will be
really hard to do since most of the members have a ton of work and work shifts,
but we need to try and do something else than what we have been doing because
what we have been doing hasn´t seemed to work very well. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Friday, we had some service at a sister's house,
where we were cleaning our her basement. She is 92 years old, and she is a pack
rat. The basement is full of thousands of jars of preserves and a lot of other
junk from the last 30 years. It was really disgusting. We filled up an entire
dumpster with old junk and only cleared out a third of the basement. There was
also one of those big freezers, like a lot of people have in their garage, that
was all rusty and not plugged in. It had probably been shut off for about 25
years, and they opened it. It was full of boxes of food that has been rotting
for the last quarter century, and some people were having a hard time not
throwing up from the smell. It was awful. We later on had the
Bibelkreis, which was good, even though not many people
came. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
On Saturday, we had our weekly planning session in addition to transfer
calls. I also spent some time preparing a talk about missionary work that I had
to give the next day. It was kind of a slow day. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I gave my talk on Sunday, and I talked about how we and the members are all
on the same team. I mostly just quoted the apostles from the broadcast
"Hastening the Work of Salvation." I also spoke of the need to perk peoples´
interest and then not just answer all of their questions, but instead invite
them to talk with us since we are called and set apart to teach with power and
authority. I used the example of saying that I had something in my pocket that
none of them had ever seen before and would never get to see again except at
that time, and that after the meeting they could come up to me and see what it
was (my American driver´s license). I briefly showed it just so they saw that I
had something and then put it back in my pocket. I then read the story of
Abish from Alma 19, where Abish perks peoples´
interest and then the people are taught and baptized by Ammon, who
was called to preach the gospel. It went well, and there were several members
that came up afterwards and said the Spirit was there and wanted to see what was
in my pocket. Later, after church, we went to the Stübe´s for lunch and then had
a fireside about genealogy, which was cool. It was a good day.</div>
<div>
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<div>
Well, that is pretty much it for the week. We are having District Meeting
on Wednesday, after which the senior couple in Darmstadt is making
us a Thanksgiving dinner, so that will be really good. I hope that you have a
great week and a good Thanksgiving!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
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<div class="gmail_extra">
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Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4894905433578025303.post-80287602920410895202013-11-18T06:51:00.002-08:002013-11-18T06:51:30.058-08:00It's Getting Cold. . .Hey Mom!
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<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well, this week was kind of a hard one. Elder Brown and I kind of went
crazy just not knowing what to do since it is getting cold and it is getting
more difficult to come into contact with much of anyone, but we are fighting
through it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Monday was pretty good. We went to Neu-Isenburg to buy a couple things for
P-day, and then came back to Langen afterwards for a member appointment. As we
were in Neu-Isenburg, we saw Rosel Von Stauß, that investigator we had. She told
us that she was going to the Philippines this next week for a few months, so I
will probably never see her again unfortunately. We invited her to continue
reading in the Book of Mormon, so hopefully the missionaries can help her when
she returns, or even while she is in the Philippines. We had that appointment
afterwards with the Mühlmann´s, which was good. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Tuesday, we went to Sprendlingen to try and find people, but it didn´t
work out too great. There was one old guy that said he had no interest but then
turned back around and put his arm around my shoulder, putting his face right
next to mine explaining how he left his church years ago and then came back in
2008 or so. It was kind of awkward. We later went to the Schwarzes (not the
mission president) for dinner. We talked with them about going about and doing
good like the Savior. On the way there, a man approached us and said he had met
with missionaries before. We got his number and made an appointment for Saturday
evening.</div>
<div>
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<div>
On Wednesday, we went to Erzhausen to try and give away a Book of Mormon,
and we were there for over an hour and a half and probably saw 4 people on the
street. We probably won´t be going back there any time soon. Later on, we went
by on the Millers, that family from a while ago that Sister Mühlmann introduced
us to, and we caught the wife at home, but she was the only one there and had to
leave anyway. So we will go by again this week. We ended the night participating
in the missionary prep course for the ward and then had our correlation with the
ward mission leader.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We had district meeting in Darmstadt on Thursday, and after that went to a
restaurant called Vapiano for lunch as a district. It is way tasty. I had a split with Elder Phelps in Langen
when we returned, and it was alright. We didn´t have the most eventful day in
the world, but we did deliver invitations to a ward acitivity to members and
also had English class.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
After splitting back on Friday, Elder Brown and I had our weekly planning
session. In the evening, we had our Bible study course at the church, and a
small number of members came. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Saturday was a really good day. We woke up early to go to the temple, which
was really great. It was the first time in over a year since I was there. They
don´t have the new film there yet; they haven´t translated it into German yet. I
got to take part in confirmations after youth in the ward were baptized for the
dead, which was cool. We did a session afterwards. After the temple trip, we
went to Groß-Gerau so that Elder Brown could get his Patriarchal Blessing. It
was a cool experience to be there for that. When we got home, we pretty much had
only time for studies. We went to the church for that appointment with the guy
from Tuesday, but he didn´t show up.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Yesterday was a good day. We had good church meetings, and then went to
Peter Rojas´ place for lunch afterwards. We taught a lesson about the Book of
Mormon, and then when we were done with that, we hade a dinner appointment with
the Kempeners. We talked with them about forgiveness, and it went well. We ate a
lot of food yesterday haha.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Well, that was about it for the week. I hope you have a good one!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
LG, Daniel</div>
Carynhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623123446954854355noreply@blogger.com0