Kirmes with our investigator MehrdadHello! Today was awesome, we went to a Kirmes (German carnival) with the district and our investigator Mehrdad came with us. He was asking me questions about what he had read in the Book of Mormon and about our life as missionaries throughout the whole time. He told us that he was super happy he could come with us and that he had a ton of fun. I have really high hopes for him. He's been to church twice now and has read in the Book of Mormon. He showed me his whole list of questions that he needed to ask us, some of which he asked us today and some of which he will ask in our next appointment. He wanted to make sure we find a time to meet if he can't make it to church on Sunday. I am loving it here in Essen. I finally can say I feel comfortable here and I feel like I know my way around the Gemeinde (ward) and the city. Elder Sanders has also made a ton of progress and has grown in so many ways. We didn't have it easy for these 11 weeks together, but we survived. And we both grew through it. Love you all! Have a great week! Essen district with MehrdadMore pictures from KirmesPictures with Bruder Huhn, who loves the missionaries and had us over for Eis (ice cream) Things are looking up for us now, it seems like those first few weeks of hard stuff are paying off. We have an appointment tonight with a guy who randomly texted us and said he wanted to meet with us and come to church. His name is Mehrdad. He came to church on Sunday and said he felt very comfortable there and loved it. We ended up handing Hatem over to the Sisters, because she was connecting better with them and we had the feeling to after praying about it. Other than that, we have had some really fun days full of appointments where we go from one appointment straight to the next. I like finding, but also really like seeing the results of our work and seeing our efforts pay off. We also had an appointment with Lyon and Colea, member who are both retruned missionaries and about our age. They are super funny. They helped us with our essay that we are going to send to the university to get let back on the campus. We invited them to give out a Book of Mormon to someone, and Colea said, "Oooooo, a challenge!" Thanks for reading, and have a great week! Cool church we sawThe Sisters in the district making a human tableWith YusefHello everyone! I want to start out with a story that I forgot to include in an earlier email. I was reading in Preach My Gospel with Elder Sanders as part of the new missionary training. I glanced at the section called "The Book Answers Questions of the Soul" and I saw that I had written an extra question of the soul at the bottom that people had brought up to me a lot: "Can science and religion coexist?" I had written Alma chapter 30 as the reference for the question. I had written that down after a close study of that chapter and finding that Alma answers many of the doubts and questions of atheists and scientists today. Later we were street contacting and we talked to a nice guy who said he was an atheist. He asked, "Why should I believe in a God?" I thought of how Alma flipped that question around in Alma 30 and said, "What evidence have ye that there is no God, or that Christ cometh not?" (Alma 30:40) I paraphrased that quote, but the youth we were talking to was not having it. So then I wanted to find where it was in the scriptures that Alma said, "all things denote there is a God." The image of what I had written down in Preach My Gospel came to my mind and I flipped to Alma chapter 30. I shared Alma 30:44 with him, which says: But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye tempt your God? Will ye say, Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy brethren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator. It was a really good scripture for the situation, and I knew that God was giving to me what I needed in the moment I needed it because of my study. The guy wouldn't meet with us, but he was now interested in the Book of Mormon and we gave him a Book of Mormon download card. I don't have time to talk much about Yusef's baptism and confirmation, but it was all just awesome. I played a musical number with Andrea, an American violinist who recently moved into the ward. Elder Sanders baptized him. I got to lay my hands on his head for when Bruder Linnemann gave him the Holy Ghost, and that was such a happy moment. Well, I love you all! Have a fantastic week! Elder Kimball Germany Frankfurt Mission With Shahin (a friend of Yusef's) and AndreaWith AndreaElder Sanders wearing the leg warmers that this random lady gave us to give to the Sisters.There's something super exciting happening in our ward! Yusef, who has been coming to church for over a year now, is getting baptized! He moved here from the Middle East, where he was involved in protesting the unjust government there. The only thing keeping him from being baptized has been that he could be sent back to his country. President Boyer made a special exception for him, because he would be killed if he got sent back, regardless of if he belongs to our church our not. Yusef is super awesome and his baptism is on Saturday. He was taught by the Sisters, but we will be helping out at the baptism. I will be playing the piano with Andrea Hughes, an American violinist who recently moved into the ward.
Yusef is one of the most solid, committed people I know as far as the Gospel goes, and he came to church for months and months while knowing that he couldn't be baptized (we thought). In Presdient Boyer's words, "That guy is awesome." So the whole ward is excited for him! Not much is new for our investigators, Junior, Andreas, and Hatem. All three are super awesome and are really trying to find the truth. Junior has told us he wants to be baptized, we have just waited to set a date until we know he can stay in Germany. Essen DistrictElder Sanders was way sick from Sunday through Tuesday, and so we weren't able to do much on those days. We did have an awesome day on Friday, with three lessons! We taught Hatem, Junior, and Andreas. We're really excited about Junior, he had already visited the church in Ghana. He wants to be baptized, but we are supposed to take things slow with him and make sure he can stay in Germany. We've gotten in enough contact with the people on our potential investigator list that we have had time to go street contacting and dooring, that has been fun. Lots of crazy people, lots of little weird things that are funny in the moment but that we usually forget. Yesterday I got this woman to keep talking to us who had a boss who was a Mormon. She kept trying to leave, but I kept asking her questions and she stayed and talked to us for a little bit. That little conversation attracted the attention of another man who asked us a question about prophets. It ended up being that he wanted to tell us about Mohammad and how he was the last prophet. Then while I was talking to that guy, someone asked if we were the Mormons and Elder Sanders talked to him for a little bit. None of those interactions ended up leading directly to finding someone who wanted to meet with us, but it was funny and at least we got some conversations. Yesterday we helped Andrea, an American member who is playing with the Essen Philharmonic, move into her new apartment. It will be cool to have another JAE (young single adult) in the ward who we can work with. We're ready for some action coming up here in the next few weeks or so. There a quite a few people who have told us that they will have time then. Right now we are mostly working with the three that we met with on Friday: Junior, Hatem, and Andreas. At the lesson on Friday we invited Andreas to live the Word of Wisdom, and he said no. He said he understands why he should do it, and he knows coffee and cigarettes are bad for him. His excuse was that he knows that he sometimes does things that God doesn't like, but God does things that he doesn't like too. We really hope that he will change his mind by the next time we meet. Elder Sanders and I are getting better at not hopping on the wrong train and accidentally leaving our area. It sounds really dumb, but you would be surprised how easy it is. That's about all I have! Have a great week! Pretty park. That's about all I know about it.Food we ate on Elder Sander's birthday on Saturday |