Are You Ready to Convert the World?

I said are you ready to conquer the world to my companion and then changed it to convert—hence the phrase. 

Spiritual Stories

Devotional by Eldar Bednar

He taught about how to be a Preach My Gospel missionary, but really mentioned little about the manual and talked about how a PMG missionary is a missionary for life and taught us that we need to let the Spirit teach through our personal worthiness and remembering who we represent! The devotional was so good. It taught me that we have the power of God in us and for the first time it really hit me that for the next 18 months I will be similar to the Apostles, that I have been called to represent the Lord as the Apostles have and that I must always remember that.

Testimony meeting

I love everyone's testimonies. It is really special to sit in a room of 87 people who are all ready to dedicate their lives to the Lord and preach His doctrine (2 Nephi 31 and 3 Nephi 11). I love everyone here and really wanted to give them all hugs, but they are Elders, so I got handshakes and hand hugs 

Fun stories

Devotional on Christ like attributes

We had an amazing devotional about Christ like characteristics. It was so funny because we were split up into groups and then presented about our characteristic and had to "debate" it basically explain why it's the best characteristic. Elder Hartle’s group sang a song to us, and Elder Joyce started spitting off all the attributes and why they weren't the best and it was really really funny. Elder Sly literally rapped a song about why Faith in Christ is the best. The idea was that they are all the same and they all center around Christ.

No free time for the Germans

They didn't give us exercise time because everyone else got to go out proselyting except the Germans and the Greeks and then a teacher fought to get us exercise time and then it was overruled for the Germans because we had a tablet safety meeting to go to. So we had 30 minutes of free time to walk around but we weren't supposed to change. 

Free Holy Tabs

Sister Campbell ordered Holy Tabs but she ordered the wrong size so she gave them to me because I had the size scriptures that fit and I was the only one. 

Record Heat

Last Tuesday was the hottest day England has seen in 10 years and my district decided to walk to Tesco, a 20-minute walk away :/

Color Days

So we get so bored that we do Color Days. Picture below is Blau Tag but we also had Schwartz Tag. And other districts join in.

Sorry this is so short,
LOVE Sister Anderson

Has It Been a Century or a Day....

Hello all,

Wow it has been 2 weeks since I left home and 14 days in the MTC!

I am learning more than I thought I ever could, I know how cliché that sounds but it is so true and you can't understand until you go through something similar. It is stressful but rewarding and it's helpful to know that the others in my district are going through the same thing and they are the most supportive group I could have been blessed with.

FUN STORIES

Sport: The language learners all have sport together and it is so much fun because for the past few days we have played volleyball. Missionaries aren't allowed to be competitive and keep score, and every missionary has to participate, so we have teams of like 7-9 missionaries all playing on the court at the same time and because we can't keep score there ends up being no rules and it turns into a big game of keep the volleyball up. It is so much fun. People are hitting the ball with their legs and heads; it's crazy. The coolest part I think is we have people from all over the world and all walks of life. We have the rich British missionary (well he comes from a well-off part of the UK. I don't actually know if he is wealthy), the missionary from Wisconsin, the German, the Brazilian, and one missionary is from Taiwan. Of course the Utah people too. It's just so much fun.

Maxed out MTC: We were told that normally the MTC only holds one zone at a time, so like 40 missionaries. Right now there are 87! So things are a little crazy because the MTC is overcrowded. They have two meal times because we don't have room in the cafeteria for everyone, but I don't know any different so I think it works really well.

Escaping the MTC: We leave the MTC grounds to go to the store and get stamps, etc. But the pathway to leave is behind a pretty park between the stake center and the temple (picture a picturesque garden and you are pretty close). You go through this magical garden to a gate and then you are in civilization! It really feels like you are walking through a fantasy book and your character is going through two different worlds! And in some ways it's true.

The historical race reenacted: The Apostles came to England and taught many people here. It is amazing to hear of their faith and courage. When they set a baptismal date people flocked to the river and many raced across the bridge to be the first person baptized! So some of our elders reenacted the race and raced across the bridge. The zone leader, Elder Rickard, who is from Kent, England and going to Athens, Greece, won the race.

Spiritual Experiences

The Priesthood: So I had been feeling a little off and confused with a few things and just didn't know why I was focusing on something so much. So I got a blessing and then was able to talk with Sister Cain one of the sisters in my room/distict and was able to process through it, Was eine für Segnung!

Sabbath day talks: Will Jesus weep tears of joy for me? Sister Preston talked about the Book of Mormon and how it has changed her life and how she hopes that Jesus will weep tears of joy for her when the day comes and not tears of sorrow. I hope to that I can live my life in such a way as to have Jesus weep tears of joy for me.

Temple Trip on P-Day: I just love to see the temple. I'm going inside someday.... every P-Day until it closes for cleaning! AHHHH! It's amazing to see the eyes of the people in your district light up when they enter the temple. It's a beautiful and sacred place. I feel so blessed to have temples on the Earth today and one so close while I am here at the MTC. It is so beautiful. Hence I shared so many pictures.

Two new investigators: We have new investigators, Monique and Julian! They are our teachers acting, but it's great practice! I am learning to love people that I don't know and I am learning to listen to the spirit with my companion during lessons and planning for lessons. I feel like I am way super inadequate but I think everyone thinks that.

Testimony time with mein Distrikt: It was amazing to hear the sweet testimonies of my district. I just love all of them so much! I feel like we are one big family because we all love and take care of each other like a family should. We pray together in the mornings and all throughout the day and at night. We are all constantly asking how we are doing and our district leader cares so much you can tell by the way he acts, always smiling at us!

Sehen Sie in 18 Monate.

Sister Anderson

 

Alma the Loudest, I Mean Best Distrikt

Hallo Welt,
This week has been crazy! I had no idea I could do so much and accomplish so much in one week. This week I was assigned my companion and district. My companion is Sister Howsmon and she is the sweetest kindest person. I don't think she has an evil bone in her body. She is an inspiration to me. She is always so happy and ready to serve our investigator Moritz.
Our District Leader is Elder Sommerfeld. He is so caring and sweet and he is the best district leader we could ask for. He constantly asks if we are okay and Haben Sie frage? (do you have a question?). 
   Other people in my district:
* Elder Joyce. He is so serious, at least that is what he wants you to think, but he so sweet and he is so spiritual!!!! 
* Elder Hartle. He is constantly singing and humming a tune, but it lightens the mood and he helps bring the spirit into the meetings. He loves to smile.
* Elder Ducker. He is really good with German grammar, which is super helpful since no one else is! He also tries super hard to follow the rules, which is good (we all actually are really  good at following the rules).
* Sister Cain. She is so funny. She always lightens the day and she is so sweet and is trying so hard to learn this difficult language
* Sister Rasmussen. She makes the best faces and she knows how to lighten up the mood with faces and noises. She is so sweet, she asked me and Sister Howsmon how we were doing, and we all care about each other so much.
* Sister Campbell. She has taken 6 years of German so she is really helpful with the language and pronunciation; it is super helpful! 
* Sister Peterson. She is so funny and athletic. It's fun because she is not really into skirts and make-up, but she loves exercise time. With that though she is the biggest push to get us to keep the mission rules. I love it!
* Bruder Wilkinson is so funny. He is one of our teachers. He served in the Frankfurt Mission. He is also our investigator Moritz. He loves the gospel, but he knows how to lighten the mood because it can get really intense since we are all so stressed with learning a language.
* Schwester Gäbler is our other teacher and she has the sweetest spirit ever. She is from Germany and served English speaking. It is so sweet because she puts in advice and suggestions in her German lessons and they are so sweet.
Both teachers are amazing at helping us learn the language but remember that we are not here to learn German, but to learn to be a missionary in German.
 

Big events....
1. I ate fish, it wasn't the best thing in the world but I am in England and that is what they eat so... fish and chips it is (they only had it once, over all the food is great) 
2. Sneakers.... so I didn't have any sneakers and when exercise time came I had nothing to wear and so I tried to find Sister Preston for some but she wasn't there so I found Brother Field (my pre MTC tutor) and him and some of the other teachers helped me find some they are featured below
3. It is the coolest thing when you can feel the spirit when we are singing in German. So because  the MTC is so small all meetings are done in English  and then classes are in German but my distrikt brings our song book to the meetings and we sing Auf Deutsch. Coolest thing ever. I felt the spirit so strongly when I conducted in Sacrement meeting, all those missionaries singing.
4. Our Gift of Tongues  classes are really cool, it includes us German speakers, 2 Greek elders (they are so funny, Elder Rickard is British and he is funny but hardly ever cracks a smile "only when he wants to" haha) and then 5 English learners (from Brazil, Spain, Taiwan, Czech, and Germany) Elder Freiman  is so sweet he is always wiling to help us with our language skills and answer our questions.
5. Gift of Tongues and Interpretation of Tongues is so real! It's hard to explain it but I just know more and more each day, we have been promised if we obey exactly we will receive the Gift of Tongues and it's also reassuring  that we are not the teachers the spirit is so if we mess up the spirit makes up the difference
6. DOCTRINE IS ALWAYS THE ANSWER Elder Bednar taught us that if we have a question we need to answer it with doctrine and especially with investigators because applications don't convert only doctrine. So being kind to one another  is an application love one another could be the doctrine. What classifies as a doctrine is kind of up to you AS LONG AS YOU CAN FIND IT IN THE SCRIPTURES AND IS SUPPORTED BY THE SCRIPTURES!
7. Temple- we get to run past the temple during exercise time, go take pictures during free time and go inside on P-Day! I love it! It's gorgeous!!!!

Fun Facts:
1. One missionary traveled for 43 hours to get here.
2. Elder Meza; I met him at BYU and had no idea that he was coming here. The first day I saw him, I was like wait,I know you. It's been nice having a familiar face.
3. I found the spot where Oma and I played with Paige, Claire, Erin, and Seth by the temple and I took a picture with my companion in our exercise clothes. That was cool.

I hope all is well in Amerika and you all can be assured that I am being well fed, haha. I miss you all but I know that there is no where else I could be!

Guten Tag, ich liebe dieses Evangelium,

Sister Anderson

Es tut mir leid, ich lerne immer noch Deutsch
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