Hello Family & Friends,

This is the Neuschwanstein castle (which is the castle that the Disneyland castle is based off of),

Neuschwanstein Castle

and although I didn't get to see it this week, we are planning to go sometime before I leave! However, I feel incredibly blessed because I did get to go to two other beautiful places. 

It has been a week full of tender mercies! Sister Motto and I went to Nymphenburg schloss, one of crazy King Louis' works of art. 

It is only about 10 minutes away (by bus) from a lot of investigators that we have. I can't believe how blessed I am to live so close to so many beautiful things here in Munich! 

There is this beautiful area called Garmisch, which includes the Bavarian Alps, that is in our ward boundaries. 

Even though it is in our ward boundaries, it is a three hour train ride, so getting there during the week is pretty impossible. And the probability of being able to take the time out of a P-day to go to Garmisch, with everything I still have to organize and do, has seemed out of the question for me.

As my time is drawing to a close, I was getting pretty upset about the fact that I would never get to see the Alps on my mission- which would be sad considering I am serving in the ALPine German Speaking Mission!

Well, the Elders called us up on Sunday night and asked if we had Thursday evening free. We said yes, and they told us that one of the member couples in our ward wanted to invite us over for dinner, but that they lived far away and didn't want to pick us up. BUT since the AP's have a car (and we are conveniently in the same ward as the AP's) they invited us all over- and we were able to drive with them. The Elders didn't tell us where the members lived, they just said it was about an hour away by car and was on the border of our area. As we got closer and closer, it just kept getting prettier and prettier! Finally, we started seeing mountains...and beautiful green pastures...and signs saying ''Garmisch Partenkirchen'' and ''Zugspitze'' and we about FREAKED OUT!!!  

I had been praying to go to Garmisch, but knew there just wasn't enough time for a p-day! And then randomly, this close to the end of my mission, a member couple living in Garmisch decides to invite the missionaries over for dinner. Talk about tender mercies! It was the best eating appointment ever. Not only because of the experience and location but also because the Haueter's are amazing AND we ate American food like hamburgers, root beer and oreos!! 

As missionaries, we talk with so many people every day, and we even get a lot of phone numbers and addresses. But sadly, sometimes we will get phone numbers, but they never pick up, or addresses, and they are never home. It's kind of frustrating. Sister Motto and I had a really cool experience a couple of weeks ago- we had an appointment with an investigator (T), but when we showed up he was still getting his family ready for the day, and asked us to come back in about 15 minutes. We were trying to figure out what to do with 15 minutes, and Sister Motto asked if we could look for a bakery because she was hungry. Normally, going to a bakery for a 15 minute break isn't counted as the most effective use of a time, but we felt good about it and went. 

On our way there, we met an amazing lady from Egypt with the cutest daughter! We talked to her a bit, told her who we were and what we do, and invited her to our German class so she can learn to speak with more German. She was super excited, gave us her number, and we continued on our way. We got a little snack from the bakery, and went back to our appointment, super excited for the miracle we had just seen! But when we called a few days later, her husband angrily told us that his wife doesn't need to learn more German and he demanded that we never call again. I have to admit, I was a bit upset. She was such a miracle, how come it ended so bad; what was the purpose?  

After a few days I had forgotten all about it. But last week, Sister Motto and I were back at T's house to teach a lesson. He asked us if we met an Egyptian lady on the bus a few weeks ago. Confused, we said yes.  He then asked if we had called, and her husband told us to not call back. Again, confused as to how he knew this information, we said yes. Apparently, T and the Egyptian lady are neighbors, and the lady and her husband see us all the time coming into the apartment to visit T. The lady had always thought there was something special about us and was curious. But because her husband had also been watching us, He knew we are, which is why he got so upset when he found out that his wife given their number to us. This is also why he kept saying that they are Muslim and will always stay Muslim. The Egyptian lady had been very upset by this and went to T to ask for help. T was able to share with her his situation; he and his wife were Buddhist, and his wife was also really upset when he started meeting with Christians. It has taken time, but after a while she warmed up to his investigation and now she even sits in during some of the lessons. T gave her advice that she desperately needed to hear from a friend and someone who understood. He told her to respect her husband and that peace in the family was more important than anything else right now. He also told her that if she wants to learn more, she can always ask T her questions; promising her that one day her husband will come around. It was so cool to hear that story, about the background of WHY her husband told us no. In most cases we never would have known, we would have thought that it was just a mistake in finding her or doubted ourselves. But T was also an angel that the Lord has carefully put in her path in order for her gospel learning to continue, even if NOT with the missionaries. As missionaries, our role was small and subtle, but God knew what she would need and when. It wasn't us, BUT it was someone. And that someone was prepared when his time to shine came. That is all we need to do- prepare ourselves in all ways so when the Lord calls, we are ready to answer "Lord, here I am" . It really proved to me how the Lord's hand is in every aspect of the work, and He works everywhere!  It is awesome to be a missionary and see so many miracles that are worked through me; but it is just as awesome to see miracles that are worked through other people as well. Actually, it is even more fantastic to see miracles come through every day life, because I am going to be living in everyday life pretty soon! 

There are times when the spirit is pretty intent on helping us find our way, other times the spirit is pretty quiet and there are times when the spirit is neutral in our decisions. It can be hard to navigate what the spirit is trying to teach us in any of these times. Does He not care? Want us to make our own choices? Think we are making a mistake?? 

I think the trick to understanding what the spirit wants from us is humility and diligence. Humility so that we can recognize that our will might not be His will. It doesn't matter how neutral or opinionated He is or how loud the spirit is speaking, without humility, we wont hear His voice. And diligence, so that if it is neutral, we can still act without being told everything to do; we can still make a decision and move forward. If it is neutral, great, we keep going forward and we have made a wonderful and perfectly righteous decision on our own, exercising our free agency to become our own person. But if our course is wrong, I can promise you that the spirit won't be silent any longer!!  It is good to wait and study and listen, and there are answers that won't come for a while. But there is also nothing wrong with saying "okay, Heavenly Father, I would like an answer. I have been listening, and I have been studying, and I am going to try walking on water for a bit and moving forward. Please give me the faith to walk, and if I start to sink, please help me recognize your outstretched hand.'' I have offered that prayer so many times on my mission and anticipate offering that prayer many, many more times throughout my life. 

Well, love to you all! I've got a p-day to enjoy. I'm NOT counting down, but if you are, you know I don't have many left :(

Sister Peterson

Buses, Baptisms & Brrrr...

16 September 2013

Dear Friends & Family-

It's finally fall!!!  

My favorite season!

Brrr... it's getting cold outside

I cannot wait to see the change of colors and hope it happens while I am still living in the Black Forest! It has made me so happy to be able to put on my tights, scarves, and fall coats :)  

'Tis the season of tea, melted chocolate, and sweatpants :) 

But also 'tis the season of Rotkohl, Kartoffel Knödel, and interesting German food.  

I don't think Sister Henry will be enjoying food appointments for the next few months :P  

I have had a lot more time to get used to German food than Sister Henry has, but she will learn to love it!  

Considering the fact that Sister Henry and I are together 24/7, I am pretty sure that we tell a lot of the same stories in our emails home.  But its always fun to hear a funny story twice, especially this next one :P

Sister Henry and I were walking to the bus stop after an appointment, and we saw our bus turn the corner ahead of us.  It was later in the day, so if we missed our bus we would have had to wait a long time before the next one came, so we started BOOKING IT to make it to the bus.  

As we were running, a big van drives by and an old German man shouts something out the window at us.  

At first I thought he was just making fun of us, after all, we are two young girls in church clothes running after a bus.  

We almost made it to the bus stop in time, and we saw the bus pulling away before we could reach it...but then slowed to a stop.  Thinking that the bus driver had seen us and stopped for us, we kept running and started desperately pressing the 'door open' button to get in, but the doors weren't opening!  

But for some reason the bus stayed stopped.  I then heard a lot of honking coming from the bus, so we peeked in front, and the van that had driven by us had pulled in front of the bus and parked in the middle of the road so that we could make it on time!  

It was a nice gesture, but the bus driver was still stubborn and wouldn't let us in! 

It was the funniest (and nicest) thing to see the old German man in the van stop a bus for two young American girls.  Teehee, old men love us :P

I also know how much people at home love language stories!  One would think that after spending 6 months in a foreign country doing missionary work, the language mistakes would cease to exist.  Nope, NOPE, NOPE!  

We were at an appointment with a less active member, and we had just shared Doctrine and Covenants 6:34-36 (one of my favorite scriptures EVER!) and we talked a bit about how the Lord is our Shepherd and how we should never feel like things are too hard, because the Lord is always there to give us comfort and help.  

The sentence I WANTED to say was 'What brings me comfort is knowing that we are the Lord's sheep', but the word Schafe (sheep) is really close to the word Strafe (punishment.)  

How sadistic I must have sounded to say 'I recieve a lot of comfort in knowing that we are part of the Lord's punishment!'  

Luckily, the majority of my language mistakes take place in members homes, so all she did was laugh.  I guess when you live in a foreign country and all you have to deal with is missionaries who are learning German as a second language, you become pretty used to language mistakes :P  Oh, no...But I swear I have been improving as well!  

We met this older lady this week, and she was convinced that I was German!  

I kept trying to tell her that I was born in America, lived there all my life, have only been here 6 months, and that I didn't learn any German until I came here, but she didn't believe me. 

She kept saying 'You must have ancestors from here, you just look and sound too German, I swear you are a German, look at that beautiful blonde hair and blue eyes!'  

I have never gotten so many compliments on my blonde hair and blue eyes until I got here!  

Its kind of funny :P  But it was a nice compliment to get that I sound like a native!

Our Favorite S-Bahn ride

When Freiburg Zone was first organized, there was (and still is) a lot of emphasis placed on turning Freiburg Zone into Freiburg Stake.  

President Miles keeps talking about how this area is just going to explode with baptisms, and how there is so much potential here!  

This idea has always given me hope and excitement, but this week we actually got to see this promised blessing in action. 

We just recently started teaching a Nigerian family, the husband and wife's names are "P" and "S". Sister Jenson and I would always going by on them, but they were always busy and never really interested.  

Just a few weeks ago, Sister Henry and I went by on them, they invited us in, we had a really great introductions lesson, they came to church (despite not being able to speak German) and told us that they want to keep meeting with us.  

Well, on Tuesday, we taught them the 1st lesson, about the restoration of this Gospel and the Book of Mormon.  At the very end, we invited them to be baptized and strive to become prepared by October 12th.  

They both accepted, saying that they want to learn more about what we believe and find out for themselves, but they would LOVE to be baptized into our church!  

President Miles has asked us to call him every time to set a baptismal date, just so that he can share our excitement with us.  

After we got out of the lesson, we said a quick gratitude prayer, and then we RAN to the church so that we could call President Miles!  

It's only about a 7 minute walk, but we ran the whole way from the "O" family house to the church because we were so excited to call!  We saw the Elders walking out of the church as we ran up, and they told us that they had set 2 baptismal dates for October 12th as well!  

We were all so happy, Sister Henry and I were jumping up and down and screaming and being typical sisters, and calling pretty much everyone we knew and sharing the news.  

It was a really exciting day, and it has been so great to keep working with "P" and "S", and their family.  And what a great birthday party it would be to have 4 people baptized!!  

I will leave my email on this note: Missionary work is the most rewarding and amazing thing I have ever done, and it is such a blessing to see the change that this Gospel makes in peoples lives.  I love feeling the Lord work through me, a weak and tainted vessel, in order to bring His children back into the fold.  There is just nothing else on Earth that can compare :)

Love you all,

Sister Peterson

That's quite the snail

Missionaries aren't always all business