Haag - Week 6

Heroes Get Remembered, But Legends Never Die

Hey Family and Friends, First person to get the movie quote in my subject line is a winner!

First of all, a little shoutout to my little brother who got his mission call this week and is headed to POLAND about a month after I get home.

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes. 20 feels old, but it's nice to have a PDay birthday. For my birthday, we actually hiked up to a castle here. It was closed on Mondays, but they left the gates open.... hehehe.

We went and walked through the whole thing, and were probably in rooms nobody should be in. We saw written documents from the year 780. How nuts is that??

Wow. What a week. I feel like an 80 year old man every single day. All of a sudden, the hardest thing I do everyday is try to wake myself up in the morning, and not fall asleep during studies. that's part of getting old on the mission I think. It's weird to think that I would be coming home in a month if I hadn't taken the extension. Glad I did though.

So this week, I got my new companion, my greenie. Elder Walter, from Frankfurt area. A GERMAN BABY. It's so cool training someone from one of the countries in your mission, there's something special about it. I'm starting to realize how much German I actually do know and how good it has become from my first few transfers. He's lived in Shanghai for the past 4 years, and it's really cool to hear stories from there, especially how the church functioned. He speaks pretty good English, I think. But, we haven't spoken a single word to each other in a language that isn't German. It's going pretty well. Naturally, there are some differences when you hook up a companionship from two different nations, but for the most part, we are doing just fine.

Elder Hadfield / Elder Walter

On his first day, we taught A together. We talked about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and it was a powerful, powerful lesson. Another top 10 lesson on my mission. I told Elder Walter before we started that when he felt the spirit really strong, that was the point to invite him to baptism. So Elder Walter invited him to baptism and he accepted. How about that for a first day, first teaching appointment of your greenie's mission? It was one of those lessons where I walk out, and just can't stop fist pumping and jumping around like I just won a huge baseball game. It was that good. I never pictured fist pumping as a part of the mission, but hey, when the adrenaline runs, what else can you do? The baptism date is on September 3.

I've been starting to realize how much this area has struggled in the past couple years. I can count on one hand the number of new investigators found in THIS area THIS year before I got here. The members have kind of lost faith in the missionary work, and personally, I would find it so much easier to just go from less active to less active having useless appointments every single day, rather than to go out and find new people, but that's not our job, is it? A is a big glimmer of faith right now for the whole ward and for us. Please pray for us and him.

I guess as a little spiritual side of the week, I'll add something. On Wednesday, Transfer Day, I was at Salzburg Hauptbahnhof, and I had to watch Elder Lyman and Elder Jensen, as well as a slew of other guys who have become my best friends in the mission, jump on the train to go home. As I held tiny little Elder Jensen, I realized how heart wrenching and cruel this is. Guys that I've lived with and worked with for 2 years have become my best friends, and all of a sudden, they're gone. Realizing that, and hugging guys who feel like brothers to me, the tears just came. Hard. They wouldn't really go away after a while either. Not after the train doors closed, not after the train started to go and Elder Apel and I ran the length of the platform with the train, tears flowing, waving goodbye. Not after a couple hours. It's still taking its toll on me. Realizing that I'm one of the next ones isn't too easy either. Life is all  about that I suppose. I can hardly wait to be with some of my brothers again, especially my real brothers (and sister). Heartwrenching to get ready to leave, exciting at the same time. I've still got a little while to think that all through though.

Just a reminder, Heroes Get Remembered, But Legends Never Die. My mission brothers are legends to me. People connected with memories that will never die.  

Love you all, have a good week.

Elder Sam Hadfield