(sorry my sister Olivia will post last weeks post sometime later this week)
this week was a beautiful mess.
haha so to begin. We mixed things up and for Pday went to a small little village outside of Kassel called Fritzlar. It has some amazing history including:
- home of Germanys very first rathouse (town hall? idk what it is in English)
- a burial place that dates back to 3000 BC!! A man found it while plowing his farm one day. alrighty then.
And a cool story:
Back in the olden days the little city believed and worshiped THOR the God of thunder.
I feel ya people... I'm a believer
Until one day a catholic missionary came along in hopes to prove to the villagers that Thor doesn't exist/convert them to become catholic
In the town square they had a Magical Tree of some sort that was believed to be "protected by the spirit of Thor.."
The missionary decided to cut down the tree to prove them wrong.. (something they believed that in doing so would get you struck by lightning...)
YOLO
He successfully cut down the tree thus proving to the inhabitants that Thor WASN'T real.
I'm still a believer. Don't phase me one bit.
Come to think of it... I'm beginning to think the makers of Avatar completely ripped off their story from this one..
awkward.
The city then was then completely converted catholic.. And thus beginning certain...
traditions?
for lack of a better word..
Surrounding the city is a Huge stone wall.. We paid a few Euros to go inside the wall which actually turns out to of been a giant torture chamber/prison.
We got to see all sorts of contraptions, torture treatments, cages prisoners were put in and placed in the streets so the villagers could throw things and spit at them... as well as stand at the bottom of pitch black 60 foot deep well, where food would be lowered down to you until they forgot about you or you died.
As we were walking through the exhibit we were reading a small description of which people were brought here and why
witchcraft. hahahahaha not even kidding. "wizards and witches"
We were all DYING of laughter and began reading the names of the 50 or so recorded people who were brought here.
Wolf
Schäfer
König
Meier
Diederich....
o_O
Nooooooo
hahahahahahahahhah we all completely lost it.
TEAM DIEDERICH
BABY J YOU NEVER STOPPED BELIEVING YOU WERE A WIZARD!!!
Shout out to them hatersss
It was a beautiful city and so fun to be at the heart of so much German history. While we were walking through I noticed a doorbell with the name
FRITZ DIEDERICH
Exact spelling. Everything. Ahhhhhhhh
I rang the bell but no one answered. but we plan to go back in a few weeks.
FAMILIES ARE FOREVER
We found two new investigators this week. We've really been seeing the blessings of literally talking with EVERYONE we meet.
It's been actually been super nice being lost in a new city.. asking people for directions is the best way to strike up a conversation.
- do you know where this building is? ( give address of church )
" yes actually I've seen that building before.. I'll show ya its right around the corner"
- Thank you!!!
- So.... ya wanna come inside??
Let's see what else..
OH
With school starting back up. Our neighbor that lives below us decided to buy himself a nice back to school present.
a marijuana plant.
Nothing like early morning study and getting a nice whiff of Mary Jane to start your day off right.
He smokes weed like a weed. Like i am LEGIT becoming concerned that our Wohnung is beginning to smell like pot.
imma give it a day or two and if it doesn't stop then imma go give him a STOP SMOKING WORKSHOP pamphlet.
The work goes FORWARD!!
We have made these little photo cards with a picture of us and a scripture for members/WA/ investigators.
It's been so great for " thinking of you, birthday cards, thank yous etc"
We've seen some success!
We get let inside.. share a thought.. get to know them.. get lied to.
Number 1 thing German senior citizens lie about :
" drink this hot tea it will help your insides cool down "
lies. all of it
..... NOW FOR THE ALMOST WORST EXPERIENCE OF MY MISSION/LIFE
At one particular appointment this week...
We went and visited a less active Sister whose name no one knew on our Ward List. It was her birthday and we paid her a visit.
Pull up to the address... old folks home.... awesome.
All we knew about her is she is all alone, already lost her husband and son the nurse said.
She was super super....old. I am not sure if she understood who we were, she is 97 and kept making odd noises.
We shared a spiritual thought about Gods plan. I bore my testimony that I know God loves her and that one day she will be with her husband and son again.
We closed with a prayer and then..... she started making that sound you hear on Discovery Channel right before the animal dies.
She legit STOPPED BREATHING!!!!!
all that was going through my head was CRAP!!!!! ( censored version )
I know I said you'll be with your family again but I didn't mean right this second!!
Sister Tolman and I had a silent freak out so I tapped her hand/ shook her a little and then she snapped out of it.
GEEZ LA FREAKIN WEEZ
Now that would've been an awful birthday.
Visiting all these people we do see success.. but there are still many that slam their doors and play fugitive.. It's like their legit scared of us.
If your scared go to church
Oh... just one more awesomely awful story for the week.
A man came up to us on the strassebahn this week saying he had some words of wisdom for us " believers "
" Noah.. forgot a few animals...like dragons.. thus we learn it is okay to live a life with mistakes..or in Noahs case a big one"
Welllll that was about as moving as a one man flash mob.
thx.
All is well in ZION. We need your prayers to help us find more wonderful people, and to help those we do have to progress! AND so I can have more to report on than dragons, marijuana and killing senior citizens.
Were working hard. Keeping the faith and enjoying every minute along the way.. Even when weeks are filled with these kindof treasures.
I've never felt so happy before and the spirit so strong as i have these last few months. Were going full speed and loving the adventures Germany has to offer.
It was pretty amazing this week.. Sister Tolman and I talked about who our next investigator would be... What he/she would look like etc.
Then after a crazy awesome referral... WE FOUND HER!!
To a T like we imagined!
haha it was surreal but a testimony builder that GOD puts PREPARED people in the way of his PREPARED servants.
White washing and training is hard.. Done it a few times before..but each time has its own challenges.. we have some great things goin for us but I know we can find more!
Just gotta keep my knees down and my chin up
Line of the Week:
Background: the night before DCM this week we called our district leader to ask if he wanted me to make my nutella brownies or chocolate chip cookies for him (we owed him.. can't even remember for what anymore) and before we hung up he says..
" so the elders told you that DCM is in kassel tomorrow not in Gottinghen right?"
- " uhhhh nope? "
" oh well.. Ya I told them to tell you.... Well now ya know"
---instead of just leaving it be.. seeing how this is a reoccurring problem... i decided to use it as a teaching opportunity---
( For ex: last week the
Elders told us to get on the train number ICE8946 to hannover... they had our ticket.. Train pulls away... they told us wrong... and were on a totally different train. With nooo ticket on a N ICE train your looking at a couple hundred dollar fine... no worries I talked us out of it and later was able to get on the right train.. (don't pretend your surprised)
next morning:
( placed phone call )
" hey Elders!! Were on the train already.. where are you guys sitting so we can come sit by you!!
" OH CRAP!!!!! DCM IS HERE
IN KASSEL TODAY HURRY GET OFF!!! GET OFF THE TRAIN"
" what do you mean get off!? It just pulled away and the next stop isn't for another hour!?!?!"
I then hung up.. and let it burn for a minute.
Then we walked into the chapel where the actual DCM was 10 min. later hahahaha you should've seen the look on their faces.
smooth move ajax.
wait mom..
What do you mean Jensen broke his leg long boarding!!
Real question is:
Is my longboard ok!?
No comments:
Post a Comment