Epilog: Wieder zu Hause

Back home on August 23rd, 2017

That's it.

A lot of missionaries write their final email they want to send out a couple weeks before they leave haha. Well I've been pushing it back and pday is coming to a close so I'd better start writing even though I don't know how to really capture how I feel in words.

I'm so happy. Really the happiest I've ever been.

The baptism was on Saturday and went wonderfully. I was pretty scared there because Satan was giving one of our investigators all these doubts and it was so frustrating, but he kept his eye on the prize and made it.

The whole ward came to the church building in Singen in Germany, because we don't have a baptismal font in our building. We organized all these rides for different investigators and we had like 7 different investigators and their families come. It was incredible. Such good vibes, you know? I was asked to give a talk again. Haha again. I think the ward is tired of hearing me talk all the time but I'm grateful for the opportunity, especially to speak about such a beautiful and simple principle as baptism.

I haven't written too much about Florian and Iliya who were baptized because I know that this blog is public and I don't want to write too much personal stuff, to answer the question of some people asking who they are haha :) I'll tell you all about it in person though, don't worry. 

I feel like I should be writing this amazing last email, but this week was just normal, except extremely happy. Like we still had to do Finding and had Fall appointments, but Sister Fullwood and I were just so happy and excited for Saturday. Do you know what it feels like to invite someone to baptism and help them to get there without having to beg or bother them because they're actually really searching for it? It's incredible.

Every night before going to bed, I would sigh as I thought of how the Lord has poured down blessings upon us, with this blessing, the kindness and involvement of members, continuing to find new investigators, continuing to meet with people we have found and who are improving and feeling the spirit, slowly but surely.   "Heavenly Father, I don't feel that I deserve this happiness, but I thank you for the many blessings nonetheless."

Pday today was getting a lot of stuff done and going to IKEA. Apparently Sister Fullwood and I are the same person and love this place. We understand each other. And we're very happy.

Hahahaha a relief society activity where Schwester Järmann was showing everybody how to aid elderly people if they've had a fall and can't get up (#lifealert) as you see, everyone is laughing because it was all very uncomfortable. I decided to leave the more intimate looking pictures out.

Hahaha she picked me out to be the demonstrator because I was the lightest one in the room. Apparently. But then as soon as I sat on the fold-out bed it literally bent in half, closing me inside hahaha. Light weight....yeah right.

The baptism. Florian is the one with the beautiful mustache. You can't see it here but he has a mustache, curled in perfect c's with wax, everyday. He's German. Iliya is the one with the hair I tried pulling off senior year. Haha. These two didn't know eachother before or anything, we just had their baptisms on the same day.

Out investigator Brigitte. Lover of the Bible. On and off church attender. Our mom away from home. And one of the most faithful Christians I know.

Our funny little district with Zurich, Dielsdorf and Schaffhausen

Flammia family. Filipo and I had an ongoing teasing battle. Susanna could only laugh and roll her eyes :)

Our nice American family the Pedersons. And their daughter Emily who we had to talk to for 5 good minutes to get her to hide behind her parents for the picture. Loved her though. She's awesome.

Michaela, Jörg, Silvia. Michaela is the best hugger of all time. Jörg has plane connections and upgraded me to economy priority on my flight home. And Silvia. The best unofficial ward missionary I've ever had. So ready to help. One of the most Christlike and spiritual people I know.

The lovely Wigger family. The guy with the red hair's name is Andreas. Felt weird everytime I had to write in my planner to call Andreas...

Pilatus Last pday

The amount of sweat I lost was disgusting. But so worth it. We hiked some of it and took the lift/trains on other parts.

Carried some sparkling cider to drink and celebrate at the top. Haha

Saying goodbye to the incredibly brave Asma.

Winnie, one of our investigator's daughters, and Vivi, the Wigger's daughter. So fun. Winnie has sass I tell you what. She invited me to her birthday party and in the same sentence asked me what I'm going to bring her as a present. I told her she owes me a present cause I'm leaving. So she danced to the prelude music for me haha. She does have moves though, I'll give her that. Definitely going to be one of those Disney channel kids someday.

Lovely Lea. Loved her mission and loved helping us with ours.

Balthasar, the theologist and preist-in-training.

Sola and Winnie

And last but not least Alba. Been a member since 5 years now and has an amazing testimony. She has a blind son who married a blind women and they have two kids now. She selflessly helps and serves them all the time even though it's really trying for her. Best Colombian accent when she speaks German haha

So there you go. That's it. That's my mission.

Just a snippet of it anyway. There's no way to capture pictures of or write about everything and everyone. But just know how much I have LOVED the past year and some months of my life. Boy did I learn all kinds of things. Faith, repentance, humility, sincerity in prayer, using your brain, following the Spirit, depending on the Lord, getting over fears, looking out and not in, accepting people as they are, having joy in difficulties, making friends, being bold and strong in your standards and beliefs, the Gospel and its doctrines, but ultimately, the Savior. I just know that He is real and that He is the Savior of the world. I know it.

I may have shared this quote but I'll share it again:

"The truth is, those who diligently seek to learn of Christ eventually will come to know Him. They will personally receive a divine portrait of the Master, although it most often comes in the form of a puzzle--one piece at a time. Each individual piece may not be easily recognizable by itself; it may not be clear how it relates to the whole. Each piece helps us to see the big picture a little more clearly. Eventually, after enough pieces have been put together, we recognize the grand beauty of it all. Then, looking back on our experience, we see that the Savior had indeed come to be with us--not all at once but quietly, gently, almost unnoticed." -Präsident Uchtdorf

Have a wonderful week.

Sister Lehmann

Missionary Spirit in the Air

Hey there!
This week was really nice again.

We're really looking forward to our baptisms this Saturday.
We had exchanges and I exchanged in Singen with Sister Lundgreen from
the MTC which was way fun. I don't know if you remember but I only
came with 2 other sisters from my district in the MTC and we were
pretty tight so it was fun to work together and see how far we've
come.

At church on Sunday I felt the spirit so strongly, not for any
apparent reason, but I was just so happy. I was so so happy. I thought
about why I was happy. I think it's because I love the people here so
much, investigators and members. It was funny actually, on the way to
church we met up with all our investigators along the way, a little
unplanned. When we arrived at the church it felt like it was the
church bus showing up haha.

It's been really incredible working here in the ward. We've had almost
every member helping us with another investigator. You can smell the
missionary spirit in the air. They are all so so excited for our two
boys getting baptized. It was especially nice in ward council. Someone
at the beginning was giving a spiritual thought. He said that he
wanted to share a spiritual thought about missionary work because
there's definitely a missionary spirit in the air.

Do you know how that is just music to your ears as a missionary?
But yeah they've been inviting them over to eat and to do stuff
together and to ride together to institute, which is all stuff we've
had to organize for people in the past on my mission.
The work is moving forward here and I'm so excited. Keep praying that
the baptism service goes as planned!

Sorry about the lost text from last week's email, I don't know what
happened to it....

Sorry about the lost text from last week's email, I don't know what
happened to it....

Photos, and more Photos

Last week's pday road trip. Looked like the Norwegian fiords...

Our lovely office elders that hooked us up with a new ride and more supplies

Sneaky pic, foto cred Elder Weisler. Me teaching at the last zone conference

Visit from my favorite Esther ❤️️❤️️❤️️

Street food. Her 12 franc Gyro and my 15 franc burger. Oh Switzerland...

Some Sunday lunch from my dear sister

Sprint up to Neuschwanstein

Our box broke down on our front porch and all our new supplies kind of died.

I liked the picture of the man throwing away his stuff while striking a pose.

My friends Michaela and Cane❤️

Don't worry it's totally alcohol frei.  Haha but definitely not sugar frei.  We were up all night laughing and talking about the meaning of life.

District lunch at the Aartichoke

Candy cake

Awesome all the time

Making the comp go do the work. Just look at her. So proud. She'll baptize nations.

An Invitation to do Something

Hello!

This week was once again super solid and awesome. As my mother said
there was a chainsaw attack but we were in Zurich that day anyway, kind
of random and weird for Schaffhausen.  To be honest though sister
Fullwood and I weren't that worried. I feel like on your mission you
have a certain safety force field; obviously things can still happen
but for the most part God makes sure to direct his missionaries to
safety so don't worry, we're ok. 😊 

This week we had Zone conference with our new mission President.
He told us crazy statistics: 1:1000 people that missionaries
find get baptized, 1:3 that members refer and1:1.5 when a
member is present in the lesson, that really shocked me.
First of all, it shocked me that missionaries have to work so hard just for
1 baptism. Second it shocked me that we have the opportunity to baptize
1 of the 1000 in just 2 weeks. Lastly it made me think about how many
more people could be brought to know of God's love and also to make
covenants if each member invited just one friend to meet the
missionaries. In my immediate family alone according to that statistic
2 people would get baptized and be able to experience those blessings.
Food for thought. But not just food for thought, that's an invitation
to do something. 😊

Well with this in mind, sister Fullwood and I are talking about how to work
better with the members. Our mission president told us he would rather
us spend two hours earnestly working with members and their friends
then street contacting.

Well I just wanted to close with one cool story: this way cool kid
found our church online and decided to show up at church last week. He
wasn't all too ready to meet with us two but luckily we have great
members that offered to pick him up for the next Sunday, and he did
come. 😊  We actually had a lot of investigators at church this Sunday.
We may or may not have had a freak out.  JK.  We did and jumped up and
down when we got home. The amazing comments from our students in the
class included:
- one of Heavenly fathers traits is that he is grateful
- so does that mean that Jospeh smith was foreordained in the pre-
mortal life to be a prophet
- in order to develop God like qualities we must be baptized

I tell you what I could have gotten up and kissed each one of them.
God is real and this is his work and I am so grateful I get to be a part of it.


Sister Lehmann out.

The Gospel is Real and Works!

Hey!

Wow what a wonder week I tell you what. Seriously so many incredible experiences and miracles, wish I could write them all...

One cool story was when we were doing street contacting and met this really sweet 18 year old girl. We talked to her for a bit, briefly explaining the Book of Mormon and then asked her if she had time for us to explain more and she said yes! So we went to the shade and took a good 20 minutes to teach her a lesson, about the first vision. Haha her boyfriend was with her and it was so funny, when we asked if she had more interest and time, he shyly shook his head no, and she energetically nodded her head yes. They looked at each other and she grabbed his arm and said, "We're going to listen to what they have to say!!" Yes ma'am! And they sure did.

She was sooo touched by it, it was absolutely incredible. She was speechless and kept saying "wow....I just don't know what to say....I have goose bumps....I don't know what to say...." and then she began to cry she was so touched.  I'm going to blame it on the fact that I only have brothers but I felt a little uncomfortable and unsure what to do or say because that was definitely a first. But thank goodness sister Fullwood has 4 sisters at home so she gave this nice stranger a hug and it was a touching moment really. 

There were many other such experiences this week where our investigators really kept their commitments and came to our meetings exclaiming the amazing spiritual experiences they had had in our time away from each other, and how the Lord answered their prayers. Do you know how good it feels to have your investigators actually converted to the Lord and not to the company of missionaries, or members? It's absolutely amazing. The gospel is REAL and it WORKS if we do the WORK that makes it WORK! 

Last thought I wanted to share was an experience we had on Saturday. 

We decided to drive a little ways to a small village where we'd found someone one time who gave us their address and number and set up an appointment. They were a cute little family. Well they texted us later canceling the appointment so we just decided to stop by. Sometimes people seeing our pretty faces is better than just texting :) She answered the door and looked soooo embarrassed and shocked to see us. "How did you get my address??" she demanded. We told her that she had given it to us... but it was all so awkward and weird. She glanced all around the empty street as if someone was watching. It was so interesting because she wasn't like furious, more just very embarrassed and acting as if we were little pests that had in some creepy way found out what her address was. We told her we just wanted come by and see if she was still interested and she kind of said some small excuses and it was all so weird. Later on, as we just began dooring around the area, we finally met one nice lady who talked to us for quite some time. She didn't recognize us as being from the same church as "those two young boys with suits and name tags that come around here every couple of years that everyone hates" until the end of our conversation. She kindly but very honestly told us that her neighbors will no doubt be talking about her and criticizing her for having spoken so long with us. She was nice though and said, "But that's so silly because you two are very nice and just have a message you want to share."

I just find it funny sometimes that people get so scared of two very young and inexperienced 20 year olds that quite honestly have no idea what they are doing. Sister Fullwood pointed out that it's the nametags. It's true. And that for me is even sadder that the name of Christ on our chest should have such a negative connotation. But that's normal. Christ and his apostles and prophets in all ages had the same problem. And someday these people will realize that we're really quite harmless and that the message we share will make them happy and change their lives forever, not because of us, but because of Jesus Christ and his loving sacrifice. 

Well, have a wonderful week. It's so beautiful and rainy here, absolutely love it. And luckily my English comp loves the rain too which makes it all the more enjoyable. Thank you for the prayers; they are definitely being answered. 

Sister Fullwood cooked us a real English dinner

Rigid again...