Jesus Christ Understands Us: Frankfurt Week 5

October 24, 2016

Hi!

You all have been very busy at home! Yes, Elder Markle, who works in the Mission office with his wife, is also the mission medical adviser. When missionaries have health questions they should talk to him before receiving treatment. He's really funny. We joke around in the office and he's recommended good things like Doritos and reeses to us, Reeses, nuts, protein, right? Glad to hear that Austin's leg is getting better, when do you think he'll be up to full speed again, do you have a rough estimate?

Over here we had a good week overall. Busy with things in the office but going well. We also cleaned out a senior couple apartment that the mission won't be renting anymore. We thought we would have to clear out, take home and figure out what to do with a lot more stuff, but the family moving in said that they would be glad to have what we don't need, so we ended up leaving a lot for them in the way of dishes and furniture. That saved us a lot of hassle and was nice to be a blessing in their lives.

Being in the office we are confronted with time management and priority challenges that are more typically to home. Yes, we still have time to talk to people on the streets and have lessons, just not as much. Other things also come up often enough that dig into our time and prevent us from studying or preparing in a way that we're used to. I do a good job about working out hard and we do typically get at least personal study. This week I'm working on having more focused studies, so I read from Chapter 2 of Preach my Gospel this morning about studies. It focuses a lot on prayer to start studies and on having a strong desire to learn. What I really liked this morning were the blessings that accompany a quality study of the scriptures, "this kind of study prepares you for service, offers solace, resolves problems and gives you the strength to endure to the end". What blessings, through our studies, or because of the fruits of our studies, the Spirit can better use us to be a blessing to God's children. We are also given more strength to do one of the biggest steps (surely the longest for most of us) under the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel, enduring to the end.

We met with Sister R as well. Her daughter was sick, so we gave her a blessing. Afterwards we had a good chat with Sister R. She's still going through lots of hard things. I love her and her family so much and just want to see them be lifted and blessed by the Gospel. With so many hard things in life we can only turn to Jesus Christ for someone who understands us perfectly, loves us, and lifts our burdens.

I love you!

Hayden

An ice cream dish call Spaghetti Ice

Stay Open and Sincere: Frankfurt Week 4

October 17, 2016

Mom and Dad,

Things at the office are going well. I did my rough inventory and got everything organized in a day. I've probably mentioned it before, but after I'm done with these little projects my jobs mostly consist of maintenance. I'm definitely doing more with president than I've done before. We typically have office meeting once a week. He and the Assistants had a lot of zone meetings last week and will have a few this week, but after that I'll see President Stoddard at least once a week in the office. Yes, President is a neo natal intensive care doctor (or a title close to that) basically he is a doctor who worked with high risk babies. Elder Markle, another Senior missionary in the office practiced internal medicine.

Spending time with the senior couples in the office is one of my favorite parts of being an office elder, picture a bunch of awesome grandparents, working together to make the mission run and often spoiling missionaries who stop by with paperwork troubles or to get other things done. The Kirks, who sent you a picture of me at the airport a few months ago, are still here and will be here for my whole time here.

Most things that I do in the office are in English, I've occasionally proofread things written by my companions, but they also write well and don't need much help. We're checking if the area office will translate our mission website into German for us, but if not then I might be starting that this week. (Not native, but a lot better than not having a website in German).

The ward is in English and we have people from all over the world here, typically only one companionship goes to ward council. Yes, we were able to visit one of the families who the relief society president is also visiting. They have been really busy lately and move this week, but we'll be visiting them every other week. The family is from Argentina and the mother only speaks Spanish, they're really happy here though and work, language study, and other things are going really well. The lesson and time with the Rs was also a lot of fun. We met with Mr A too this week. He is actually from Columbia, just lived in Argentina for a few years. He speaks English really well, but Spanish is the language of his heart, so we teach in both. He is so open to the spirit and has a huge desire to come closer to God, I love it when he prays at the end of lessons because I can just feel his openness and sincerity with God.

Stay open and sincere,

Love you,

Hayden

Hadyen and his companions at the Frankfurt Train Station

This is at the Dom in Frankfurt

He Still Makes Time: Frankfurt Week 3

Monday, October 10, 2016

Mom and Dad,

I hope Austin and Emily get well enough to run soon, that's a bummer that they've had a slow start to their season. [Dad Note: injuries, shin splints etc]

Your relief society responsibilities are keeping you busy, I'm glad you're enjoying that, looking forward to saying hi nto Sister Rutherford again too :)

By the way, how was Dad's birthday? Which food was eaten, etc.?

To answer some questions. My days in the office are good. I have a much better idea now of what my responsibilities are and how to do the various tasks that belong to me. I think I mentioned already what I'm in charge of. With the orders it reminds me a bit of Golden Spoon, sorting yogurt and taking inventory. Here however I sort different languages of the Book of Mormon and other missionary materials. I had probably 3 missionaries who needed new phones this week and I'm still working on organizing the driver's license materials so that missionaries can receive a translation of their American licenses. Exciting stuff in the office! Not really to exciting, but I enjoy it and it makes missionary work possible for the other missionaries in many ways. Emily mentioned a few weeks ago in an email how much she likes organizing things (in the things that she's involved in at school right now) and I enjoy the same privilege in the office.

Unfortunately we don't have as much time as we currently want to do typical missionary work, we've been learning and catching up on projects and tasks that need to be done. We had ward council this week and the relief society president gave us a list of people to visit. We're also starting to meet with the R family again (from Columbia) When I was here last time Elder Taylor and I worked with them. On an exchange Elder Passey (my district leader) and I taught a man from Argentina, Spanish and English mixed lesson. His name is Mr A and he is so open to the spirit, we had such a special lesson together talking about the plan, centered on the atonement of Jesus Christ. He is working on a German fluency exam, a masters thesis, has work and other things going on in his life, but still makes time to meet with us. We all have the same amount of time, life is just about priorities and what we choose to do with our time. We watched the last session of conference in church yesterday and I really liked the focus on service throughout and Elder Bednar's message about knowing the Savior. Not just knowing about Jesus Christ, but building a personal relationship to Jesus Christ. He listed 4 points, faith in him, following him, serving, and believing Him. All of this takes time and the personal relationship to Jesus Christ needs to be a conscious priority. I love it :)

Love you all!

Hayden

General Conf: Frankfurt Week 2

October 3, 2016

Subject: Re: October 2, 2016

Mom and Dad!

Elder Mejía stayed with the Zone leaders in Heidelberg until he also visited Frankfurt. He is currently training in Heidelberg Spanish. I honestly don't understand 100% why I had to go as early as I did. I had a normal P-Day on Monday, just in Frankfurt, and my predecessor shared a few tips and taught me a bit about my new responsibilities on Sunday night. Transfers have definitely changed since Taylor left, we are transferred typically on Tuesday now, there is no transfer call and we don't all have to go through Frankfurt and meet there how they used to do it.

Yeah, Elder Mejía and I had an amazing last week together. I'll miss him. He's planning, however, to live in Germany after his mission, so that will make it easier to stay in contact. I'll ask him how our Heidelberg friends are doing. As far as the work in Frankfurt: I'm coming into the Office Elder area which currently has 1 investigator, a Nigerian brother whom I found during my last time in Frankfurt. We're in building stages as far as the missionary work goes for the companionship. The ward seems excited and we heard some powerful conference messages about missionary work as well, so that will help. Working in the office we also have different responsibilities than other areas of the mission. I am in charge of cell phones, internet for senior couples, drivers license things and orders. We also set up new apartments and help with repairs throughout the mission. In this past week we helped with transfers, back to the rollercoaster of picking up new missionaries and sending old ones home, figured out what are jobs are, and set some sister missionaries up with a new apartment.

General conference was amazing. We are so blessed to have inspired leadership and be guided by Jesus Christ through his apostles and prophets. Many thoughts regarding the Great Plan of Happiness were shared. I love that as we prepare ourselves to live with God one day, prepare to return with him, we are also coming closer to him during this life. I haven't seen the Sunday afternoon session of conference yet, and there were so many powerful messages but so far my favorite talk was probably that of Elder Cornish. Without Jesus Christ we aren't enough, but we know that through him we are enough. Good enough, enough to achieve and be what we want to be, enough in God's eyes. God knows that we make and will make mistakes, but loves us despite our weaknesses and mistakes. His love and grace are amazing.

I love you too!

Hayden

Back to Frankfurt: Heidelberg/Frankfurt week 24/1

September 26, 2016

Hello!

I talked to the Senior couples at the office and it's being changed to John Wayne [DadNote: flight home in Dec. Likely speaking 12/18 in church at 1pm], they passed the message to Salt lake. I have considered living in the FLSH, foreign language student housing, I don't know if or how complicated that would be... If that's not a possibility then WyView for sure.

I had an exciting transfer call this last weekend and an exciting week. Elder Mejía and I felt pretty sure that I was staying, then on Saturday morning we received a call from President. I was released as a district leader, called as an office Elder and Elder Mejía was called to train. So I came back to Frankfurt. I actually got here last night and started learning about what I'll be doing [DN: not usual to transfer before Tuesday/Wednesday]. I'll be in the English Speaking ward and my new companions are Elder Penrod and Elder Stiles.

On my last day in the Spanish ward I took pictures with most of the members and we set a baptismal date with our investigator who came to church. First time we had someone at church in the Spanish ward and it was awesome to watch the Spanish members helping him to feel welcome and making friends. It was our friend Da from Malaga, he loved hearing all of our members from Southern Spain. I love that ward and I'll miss it a lot. 

We also found a really prepared Cuban man in our last week, Mr D. He plays bass and many other instruments and is very close to God. When we were with him we could feel such a love an openness. He was so open to the Spirit.

Be open to the Spirit and humble to hear God's counsel at General Conference this weekend.

Love,

Hayden

Primary So Fun: Heidelberg week 23

September 19, 2016 8:50 AM

Hello Family,

Nice quiet week at home, post wedding and everything else that was going on. Mom, Happy Birthday! I thought of you but can't remember if wished you a Happy Birthday. Now you have time to celebrate too :) 

We typically only attend the Spanish branch, but if a German or English speaking person that we're teaching plans to come then we visit the German ward as well. In my second and 3rd transfer here I also did the translation during sacrament meeting. Elder Mejía does like Sport, exercise together on the back patio. Highs and low's of the week: Mr H is struggling with some personal things. High would be visiting primary.

Why was visiting primary so fun? Because kids are really cute, and missionaries are heros to primary kids. It really brought me back to those days, singing primary songs and imagining what it would be like to serve a mission. I also want to thank all or the primary teachers out there for your patience and love, I was so impressed by the sister who taught that lesson. This week I also had a split in Karlsruhe and a street display down there, gotta love that city. The people were friendly and we had some interesting conversations. One interesting conversation was with a psychologist. she is religious but has her doubts about answered prayers and how much we just make up ourselves. Science may be able to explain and measure effects or reactions, but in many of the discussions that I have with people on the street it fails to explain the why. I shared with her that I Know that God loves each of his children, that that is more than a belief in my life.

I love you too!

Hayden

 

Spirit Was Like a Bon-Fire: Heidelberg Week 22

September 12, 2016 8:57 AM
Subject: Re: Sept 11, 2016

Hello!

This week was solid. We didn't have loads of lessons or find a bunch of new investigators, but I felt the spirit so much this week. Fast and testimony meeting was really spiritual, I had a fun exchange with the zone leaders, I received many answers to prayers and the lessons that we had were wonderful.

On Wednesday night we had a lesson with Mr L and Brother Keil (the member with whom he has a really strong relationship) and the spirit was like a bon-fire there. Elder Mejía started by asking Mr L if he had any questions or concerns, things on his mind, and he said yes. Mr L had been thinking a lot about the spirit recently and asked how he can have the spirit with him more often. In response to his question and desire we talked all about the doctrine of Christ. Being cleansed of our sins through the atonement of Jesus Christ, having faith in Him, repenting, being baptized and receiving the gift if the Holy Ghost. These things as well our  life long process and foundational things that we do to strengthen the faith, repent and keep our covenants are reading in the scriptures, praying and coming to church.

That is what the Lord promises us and what we can have as we keep our baptismal covenant, take His name upon us, always remember Him and keep His commandments and the Spirit will always be with us. As we do these things we can always have the Spirit to be with us, there are definitely special moments like that lesson as well, full or love and where the Holy Ghost powerfully testifies to us that what we are doing is good, when we can feel the spirit simply fill our hearts.

I love it. Mr L does too.

Love you!

Hayden