Note from Mom: Sorry, again, this was buried in an attachment and it took a bit of finagling to get it out for posting.
Tuesday was a very good day.
As for the rest of the week, it was awkward. I have learned that I am an exceedingly awkward person. I thought I'd grown out of it, but it turns out I haven't. It's great.
Anyways, we had an appointment with a potential investigator we'd met last week so we went over to the Altstadt to go meet him. He forgot, and it was sad because we were supposed to have a member come to this lesson with us. Well, she was late anyways so we call her to let her know the lesson is ausgefallen and could we just meet with her (which was the original plan, but we had then asked if we could bring an investigator to the lesson on Sunday). She then responded by saying, "What? I thought you were just coming to my house for an appointment." Well, we can still do that! But she was actually at work and wouldn't get out until 4:30, so she asked (I THOUGHT she asked. This is the awkward part.) if we could meet another time. So I was like, "Sure thing. How about Friday?" Then she said something about Friday that I totally misunderstood and we went on our merry way thinking that we had just set up an appointment for Friday.
We did not set up an appointment for Friday.
We get a call about two hours later from this member asking if we were on our way yet and how long would it be until we got to her house. Oops.
Luckily, no major harm was done and we are making brownies to make it up to this member. But, lesson learned, next time I'll give the phone to my companion who can German better than I can.
I can speak German. Sometimes. Occasionally. On alternate Tuesdays. It's fine. Being humble is a commandment anyways and I still have a LONG way to go before my German is good.
Anyways, moving on! I'm moving fotos off my iPad to my flash drive right now, but I'll try and take a picture of the weather right now. It's SNOWING. Which is CRAZY because I got SUNBURNED this week. Yeah. If you think Utah has crazy weather, come spend a week in Germany. Please. It was pouring snow this morning, shorts and t-shirt weather when we went to get groceries at 11, and then back to snow an hour later when we went back to our apartment. It's crazy.
Splits! We did our first STL split this week with the Coburg sisters! Sister Carroll and I worked in Nürnberg and had some fun times contacting people on the way to the best Eis café in the Altstadt. Es hat viel spaß gemacht. :)
As far as working investigators, we went and started teaching the sister of a member of our ward and she is so sweet! She has two little boys and they're adorable and SUPER energetic. But she is really interested in learning more about God's plan for her and her family so we're going over this week and I am really excited. :)
We have a lesson with Elena today and I am so excited! Our lesson last week fell out so we haven't seen her for two weeks. But we called yesterday to make sure we could meet and she was so excited to meet with us. It's going to be so great. :)
An actual run-down of Zeynep's baptism...... It was so great. She had wanted to Skype a few missionaries who are home so they could see her baptism and we had gotten permission from Bishop to do just that. But then the day before the baptism the Internet crashed....... It was so sad! Also, she had invited every single companionship in the zone to attend! She wanted it to be just missionaries and no one from the ward.... But then President reminded us that the missionaries had to have an investigator to come, and they all tried to have investigators there but all the appointments fell out!!! It was so crazy, and we didn't know what to think about it. The only missionaries were us, the Elders who serve here with us, and the Elders from Ansbach. We were so worried that Zeynep would be so sad! But then the night of the baptism, literally THE ENTIRE WARD showed up!!!!! It was so crazy!!!! There were so many people and SO MUCH FOOD. It was incredible. Zeynep was so happy, and I think she finally realized how much the ward members love her. It was a great moment for her.
And then, ZEYNEP GOT BAPTIZED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Literally the best moment of the week. Then Sunday, she got confirmed and received the Holy Ghost. It was incredible.
I literally have no words to explain how joyful it is to see someone enter the waters of baptism and be completely ready to start a new, sinless life. When she received the Holy Ghost on Sunday, she was so filled with joy and happiness and she has such a bright future! I love it. It makes me so happy and really my only wish for her from the beginning is that she could have all the blessings in her life that I have in mine. And now, she can! She's already set a goal to go to the temple and she wants to serve a mission and it's so wonderful! It has been a privilege to be just one of the missionaries who got to teach her. :)
And to all of the missionaries who have taught her: THANK YOU. You laid the groundwork and provided the support that she need to make this important decision. I feel bad that I got to be one of the only ones who got to see the fruit of your labor, but you all played such an important role in Zeynep's conversion story. Thank you for your service. You are super heroes.
Man, this is a long email this week. Sorry about that. But last thing, I've been studying a LOT about repentance lately. Don't worry, nothing's wrong. But I have a Thema in District Meeting this week about what an investigator needs to do/feel/experience to experience complete conversion. And we had Zone Training this week and something that President Stoddard said has really stuck with me. He said, "Don't get a check-box mentality about your investigators. When they really truly want to repent and have repented, they will have the desire to come to church and make the changes necessary to be baptized." That just really stuck with me. Especially since repentance is JOYFUL because it means we can be clean again and do better and become better. It's great. I love it. Repentance is so cool and it is such a cool thing to be able to teach our investigators about because that's where the changes in their lives start. It's so cool. I love repentance.
Anyways, I love you all. Sorry this is so long. But I guess it's better than a super short email, right???
I love you! Have a fantastic day, and an awesome-filled week!!!!
Liebe Grüße,
Sister John
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