Received September 6, 2011
Yeah, so this past week has been about the craziest thing ever. We had a regular P-day on Monday, but from Wednesday on we had a whole slew of not so regular days. There was a lovely opportunity to go up to the great city of Munich for Zone Conference. Most of the instruction there focused on working with people who are less active in the church. As part of the Europe Area Plan for the church between 2000 and 2020 they want to double the active members of the church in Europe. We intend on doing this by placing a prominence on work with less active members and bringing them back to church and then asking them to refer us to their friends to teach them. If we did this in our branch (for example) and even half of the less active members (most of whom are men) came back to the church and referred their friends, we would become a ward and almost double the attendance at church. It's no wonder that they are putting such an emphasis on this facet of the work. It was wonderful to spend some time there at the conference with all of the wonderful Elders and Sisters that I have met in my time in the Mission Field. At the end we had a testimony meeting in the chapel and Sis. Anderson out of nowhere asked me to sing Be Still My Soul with her. With about 10 min to prepare and a bannana in my mouth (of course) I said yes and we came up with something simple and it turned out lovely.
After the meeting I was hustled into singing with the Munich District in their special musical number that they were preparing. We sang a lovely arrangement of I Need Thee Every Hour by none other that the woman, the legend, (the free) Sally De Ford. It was a fun little thing with Sis. Miles on the flute. I finished that day and the next with an awesome exchange that found me working in Munich with Elder Phelan, one of the Zone Leaders. Munich is preparing for the one and only Oktoberfest and it was interesting to see all the work that goes into putting up that huge festival in the Theresienwiese. The next morning we woke up and after studies walked all the way to the main train station because the monthly cards had expired and could only be bought from one of the ticket machines there. We had a great time working together and I came back to Ingolstadt at about 3 or 4 in the afternoon. We went straight to teaching our investigator family the Wilczoks. It was a great lesson but they really can't find a way to pay tithing. We are going to have to try to get a member to tell them about the blessings of paying tithing.
Yesterday we had the opportunity to have a special meeting with Elder Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. It was one of the coolest experiences to just sit there with him less than ten feet away conversing with us. He spoke very fankly with us and he really doesn't beat around the bush on anything. He was just really blunt and told us how we can help people to act as agents and not as objects. Shortly explained, agents act and objects are acted upon. Which one are you when it comes to the gospel? Do you pray and then wait for the blessings expecting that God will give them to you, or do you explain that to God and then go out and work for it? We all had a wonderful time there learning. In the evening we had the opportunity to stay for a special fireside for the members in which he asked them to pose questions which he would then answer. Some were more awkward than others like, "Since John the Beloved is still on the earth and working among us, does he have contact with the church?" Some, however, were amazing like, "What does it mean to be a special witness of Christ?" (posed by an 11 year old boy) and "What can I do to prepare myself for baptism?" (by a 7 year old boy) It was a great evening and, despite how hot it was in that building, we all learned a lot. We ended up getting back home and in bed by about midnight last night (with permission of our mission president) and fell right asleep. It has been an awesome week.
Happy news, Lederhosen will probably be a little cheaper and more in the range of 200€-250€ for the whole deal: lederhosen, shirt, socks, and shoes. I will keep looking for deals.....he he he. Anyway, it won't be quite as bad as it may have seemed. I bought a Franzl Lang CD the other day and we have listened to a good amount of yodeling. It's fun.
I hope you have a great week and that you have fun in your new job and everything. Tschüüüüüüüüüüß!
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