Anything is Possible with the Power of the Lord

In Tubigen - by the riverside and some really pretty instadt homes.

Family! 

Oh it was a great week this week! It really was so great full of wonderful blessings and miracles! Pretty great to be seeing it so early in the mission, my mind is wide open so I can learn all I can right now and so I can improve everyday. So important always be striving to be more and more humble and thanking the Lord for all we have. None of this would be possible without him so we must remember him when great things happen. And there are those struggles and there always will be to keep us humble and willing to improve. Im glad my german is a weakness of mine right now along with others things and as we recognize what they are and rely on the Lord to make them strong they will through His power! 

We had two exchanges this week which was really fun to visit other areas and be with other missionaries to see how they work. Tuesday I was in Stuttgart working with one of the zone leaders and then Thursday I was in Tübigen with and Elder from Switzerland. We had a really great time together and we had the coolest experience ever! It was like one of those stories you always hear about but this time it actually happened to us! We arrived in Tübigen which is such a pretty area, ah it was just gorgeous. Exactly of what you would imagine Germany! The plan for the night was to go finding. We had about 4 hours to talk to people and try and find people interested about learning more. The day before at District Meeting we learned something cool that when you go finding to call a member in the ward and asked them how many "potentials" we can find in our amount of time and then ask for them to pray for you as you are out finding. So thats what we did and the Sister said we could find 5 potential investigators. Which is cool because that is the number Elder Escher was thinking about the night before when he was planning for the day. So 5 it was. We headed out with Book of Mormons in hand ready to tell the good news to Tübigen. For the first 3 hours we got no one that was really interested and we were feeling pretty discouraged. We only had about 50 minutes left and so we decided to try a different part of town and we knew we had to get 1 every 10 minutes. We never lost faith though and the Lord did bless us. We actually found our first 2 together and they came up to us asking if we needed help in English because I guess two young guys going around talking to people must look like we need help. But we started talking and and they had interest and so we got their information to meet again. That was a great start and it got us pumped to get going. We found our 3rd one and she was simply interested in learning more about the meaning of life. We got to the end of the street and turned back around, we got to a intersection and I had the feeling to go a different way. We looked down the road and there wasnt many people so we questioned it but we finally just to go for it! Right when we crossed we starting to talk to a guy that we noticed and got him interested! We had 4 and one more to go! We knew we could do it! And with about 5 minutes to go we did indeed find the last potential investigator. We were so excited and could not believe we did it. It was such a great feeling that for 3 hours we got nothing but because we didnt loose faith and endured to the end we were blessed in achieving our goal set by the member. We called her back afterwards and told her what had happened and it was great to get the member involved in this work and then tell her about our success. She said that she had prayed with her kids and so neat to know that they believed we could do it, the Lord knew we could do and so then with our prayers and action of faith we did it! 

Another great experience this week was the baptism for our invesitgator! That was Friday night and a really cool thing to be apart of especially so early in my mission it is a blessing to see first hand what a powerful work we are involved in. It was a great service and really neat to notice that when we see people the way God sees them as his children and that their is hope for all of them. We can give his children the hope that God sees in them. I really cant take apart in this baptism, I am just really lucky to see the end result and learn that it is possible for anyone. 

We were also able to watch General Conference this weekend so that was a great blessing as well. We went to Stuttgart along with other missionaries and an even greater blessing was we got to watch it in English. German was of course avaible for the ward and branch members but we watched it in English so we could understand and really just get to listen to the real voices of the Apostels and Prophet. We watched Saturday Morning at 6 pm live on saturday night and then Sunday was just jamed pack of General Conference and I loved that! We had Priesthood Meeting at 11 am in the morning and then Saturday Afternoon at 2 pm and the we had Sunday Morning live at 6 pm Sunday night. Hopefully in the near future we will be able to listen, watch or read the Sunday Afternoon. It was a great conference and I really want to work on my love with my Savior and the best way to do so is to Love the children of God by serving them in all I do. There is not a better opportunity than a mission to do so and to love and serve Gods children. By doing so we draw closer to him and our love for him grows. The work is great and as we our thankful for all we have and strive to be obedient the Lord will pour out his blessings. 

Elder Jerman

Tubigen