Ludwigsburg - Week 9

Hey everybody!

Montag 13 Juli 2015

Today was pretty simple. We had PDay. We taught a new family named Familie Nesper, they seem super cool. Their whole family had baptismal dates about a year ago and just fell off the map since then. We'll see how it goes. Afterwards, we kinda walked around. I had to grab some stuff to send a package home, so we did that. Went shopping for groceries and what not, cleaned the apartment. President has been really ticked off with some missionaries lately with the apartment cleaning thing. Missionaries just refuse to clean and it's embarrassing. I've never lived in a not clean apartment, and it's pretty easy to keep it clean, so I don't see what the big fuss is with all that. Just clean the apartment!!! Fun day overall.

Dienstag 14 Juli 2015

Boy, I woke up this morning feeling like crap. I figured I would get over it and that I should just push through, so we went on a run, and while Elder Sorensen ran around the track, I just played with the soccer ball and shot around. We got back and got ready for the day and it just hit me. I was really not feeling well. My mom would be proud that my companion was right there to tell me, "It's because you've been eating too much candy!" I guess Birthday weekend took its toll. After studies, I laid down while Elder Sorensen ate lunch. Afterwards, we went out to Marbach, like the very corner of our area, and did Vorbei's. Everyone we wanted to go by on had moved. That was fun. We had one thing we had to do in Ludwigsburg, so we rode back there and got it done, then we came home and finished studies and that was our day! Tomorrow should be busy though.

Mittwoch 15 Juli 2015

So last week the crazy lady in our ward called my phone, which was weird because she always calls Elder Sorensen's phone. But she said she had a friend from Serbia that wanted to hear about the gospel. So we set up a time where we could go see her and her friend in the city park. This morning we went and did that. This lady was pretty much Communist Russian. We sat down and she goes, "Alright, if you want to change me, I'll say goodbye to you right now and leave." I felt a little spark of adrenaline rush through me, like coming on to pitch in the last inning of the game when everything matters. I got pretty bold and I said something along the lines of, 'I'm not going to change you, but you're going to want to be changed.' It got quiet and I was waiting for her to get up and walk away and for us to move on with our day, but she had absolutely no response for that. So she sat there kind of dumbfounded and we started talking about her beliefs as an Orthodox. They've got some funky stuff there I tell ya. I talked to her about her family and I tried to bring up the point that families can be forever and she shot that out of the air. She goes, 'I love my family, but I never want to see them again after I die, that would just be too long with them.' She was a tough nut to crack. We talked with her for a while about her thoughts on prayer and repentance. By the way, she doesn't need repentance because she's already good enough. But I started introducing the Book of Mormon and telling my story with it. That's a story for another time I guess, but her heart really got hit hard or something because she opened up and was very warm and open about it. She took a book and promised me she would read it and pray about it. So good deal! Then we parted ways. We had a few people to go by on. One of our investigators was sick, so we took her chocolate.... Because who doesn't love chocolate when they're sick? After that we got ice cream. I've just been so unhealthy this past week. A member had given us a gift card for ice cream. I love our members. Then we had a lesson with Rachel, our neubekehrt, new convert. We went through the restoration with her and it was awesome. She said something at the end that really touched me. She's a brand new convert of just barely a month, and she goes, "It's impossible for a 14 year old boy to have cooked up a story like that, and then written a book as powerful as this one. It has to be from God." You're dang right Rachel. You go girl. I felt like I should ask her for a referral, which we refer to as goldmining, and she gave us a name, so we'll have to look at that. Digging down that mine baby! That was our day summed up. Fun day. Donnerstag

16 Juli 2015

Today was pretty great. We had Zone Training in Stuttgart. So I got to see Elder Howarth again, as well as Sister Bishop and Elder Adam. I got to see Elder Dean too, my little brother. They're all doing well. Zone Training was a hit. Elder Hunt asked me to start it off with a couple success stories related to our zone goal. I think that really set the tone of the meeting and started us off right. There were two guys there from BYU to give us a language assessment. That went pretty well. We all got an idea of where we're at. Then we talked about iPads and the pro's and con's we've all seen already. It was a good discussion led by the Sister Trainer Leaders. Let me tell you, if any of you have questions about the role of women in the church, you should see Sister Ahlm stand up in front of 20 elders and lead a meeting. Hahaha that would resolve all your concerns. After Zone Training, which lasted over 4 hours, the district came to our apartment and had leftover cake and ice cream and we did language study together. That was sure fun. Great day overall.

Freitag 17 Juli 2015

Today we went on another run. Came back, got studies done, and I ran to a shop real quick and sent my package, and then we went over to a less active who told us to come back later. Dang. So we came back and did weekly planning. Afterwards, we had a lesson with Bruder Cataldo scheduled. He's a less active from Italy. He enjoys calling me Elder Sammy. Because I guess Hadfield is just too much. But yeah, he's got quite a bone to pick with a couple members. He's got a really strong testimony, and loves the gospel, but it was too much for him when a member left his wife and 4 kids to have an affair with his secretary at work, and then a couple weeks ago, a college kid in our ward stood up to give his testimony, and told the whole ward he was gay, and described in very vivid details the situations he had been in. With our 60 primary kid sitting right there. Great. But Bruder Cataldo really didn't like that. He called one of them one of those words my mommy told me not to say. He even said it in Italian and I could understand. That's when you know your language study has been paying off. Gift of tongues baby. But yeah... He also ordered us pizza. When I say ordered pizza, don't picture the typical American family ordering 2 pizzas for the whole family. In Germany everyone gets their own huge pizza. Jawohl!! It was awesome and he gave us some groceries too. Just a super generous guy. We love him. We read 3 Nephi 11 with him and when I say we read with him, I mean he read it to us in Italian. He gets going when he reads the scriptures. You can't stop him. I love that guy.

Samstag 18 Juli 2015

Today the weather couldn't decide what it wanted to do. It was very much like a teenage girl. It rained all morning throughout studies and lunch. Then as soon as we went out, it got blasted hot. Today was rough. There was a city party and so there wasn't many people around or at home. Kind of a weird day. The Ehepaar found out I could play the piano though, so they brought us over a keyboard which was really nice of them. I'm going to really enjoy that. That's my stress reliever. We had a cool experience though. We were almost done for the day, but we still had about 20 minutes. Elder Sorensen had been whining about how sore his body was and I wasn't feeling very good, and I think we were both ready to go home. But I felt like we should do one more Vorbei. It was received with whining and what not, but we did it. On the bus, a lady with a cool dog talked to Elder Sorensen about the church. She was super cool and it really forced an attitude change there and it was a good example to show him that we don't waste time here! The guy wasn't home, but the lady made it all worth it. Super cool. Sonntag 19 Juli 2015 Today was great. I love going to church here. We got out of the apartment around 8 to get over to church. We rode the S-Bahn down to Ludwigsburg, and umsteiged there. In Ludwigsburg, it started raining and it was awesome. I love the rain. When it rains, I get as giddy as a 3 year old on Christmas morning. We got on our next S-Bahn over to the church, and I talked to a poor old lady who was going out hiking in the rain. I was worried that she might get washed away off the trail or something, but all she could say was, "Ich freue mich über den Regen!" Too funny. Church was great. It was the Hoffmann's last week in church. Dang. They're headed to Singapore for his new job this week. I enjoyed the Priesthood class taught by Br. Stein about the importance of Temples. For those of you that didn't know, (so all of you), the Frankfurt temple is closing in September for renovations, and the Freiberg temple is already closed for maintenance. That means the closest temple for these members is around 4 hours by car, and is a very very small temple. I sure did take for granted living around so many temples. I miss the temple a lot. We got home afterwards and ate lunch and did studies. It's been raining for a while now, I just love it. That was pretty much the day.  I also figured you would all enjoy a few pictures from lately.

Elder Albrecht's Birthday