Ho Ho Ho!‏

Hey y'all! 

Well, another merry old week in the Christmas Capitol of the world! I
love Germany at Christmas time, it is literally the best! We've been
able to do a lot of work this week with the Christmas initiative,
#EinErrettorIstGeboren and we've seen some really positive feedback
from the people here from that video, and the message behind it.
Everyone here loves Christmas, and it's one of the only times where all
of the people here actually think about Christ and go to
church!(except for the members, they're doing that all the time 🙃🙃)

We haven't had a ton of time to share the Christmas initiative with
people in finding, but that's just because we've been teaching a ton!
I just wish we had more time in the day to find, teach, baptize and
keep! 

Things are going really well with Edwin. He's preparing himself for
baptism, but this week he'll be off to Spain to spend Christmas with
his family. We'll have one more lesson with him, and then he'll be
gone until January. It has been such an honor to work with him, and to
see his faith grow. Also, I've started learning Spanish so I can talk
to him better! El evangelio de Jesucristo es verdadero! Estoy
agradecido por el Evangelio!

Haha :) if any of you Spanish speakers have any tips, let me know!!

 We also had a zone conference, where we got our Christmas packages! I
got mine, but I haven't opened it yet, it's just sitting under the
Christmas tree.

I'm super excited for this week, and I'm just super happy! Oh, I also
sent my Christmas package today, so I hope you get it soon! Hopefully
before Christmas!

 Love you!

LG Elder Oliphant

Chase and his former companion Elder Williams

A reminder; these are still a bunch of boys

Christmas Market

Half of a house

Christmas Pyramid 

Another day, another transfer

Hey y'all! 

Well, another transfer down. Man the time just goes by too fast. But,
there aren't going to be any changes in my district, we're all staying
together! Yay! Haha, that's the first time on my whole mission that my
district hasn't changed at all after a transfer, weird. But I'm
excited to stay in Erfurt with elder griffin. We get along pretty well
:) 

So, the work. This week was a lot different, we had several
appointments fall out, and we weren't able to meet everyone in our
teaching pool, but we managed to use our time by visiting some of the
older less active members in the ward that haven't been coming to
church for a while. We had a lot of very spiritual moments with them.
We visited this one sister who it turning 86 in two weeks, and at
first she wasn't very happy that we came, but she let us in. We shared
the new Christmas video, a Savior is born, with her, and at the end of
our lesson she started crying and said a prayer for us, thanking
Heavenly Father for inspiring us to come help her, because he knew
exactly what she needed, even when she didn't. It's wonderful being
able to see the lord work through us to help these people!

Another example of this comes with our investigator, Edwin. Honestly,
I've never met anyone in my life who is more prepared than him. He is
making so much progress, and every time we meet with him we can see
his faith in Christ growing. I'm really excited for him, and for what
the gospel will do to him and his family. Next week he'll be going to
visit his family in Spain for Christmas, and he'll be there till the
new year, but when he gets back we're going to be having a baptism,
and hopefully we won't have to fill the font by hand this time ;)

Well, I love you all! Please pray for me :)
 

LG Elder Oliphant

The District

Thanksgiving... Chili and Burgers?

Hey y'all! 

Well, first of all, happy thanksgiving! I hope you all had a great
week and were able to think about what your are all grateful for in
your life :) I'm very grateful that I can be here on my mission, that
I have so many supportive friends and family members here and back
home, and I'm especially thankful for my sweet mother who is just the
best mom ever! I love you!! :)

Once again, we were super busy this week. We had a zone conference,
which means we had to drive to Berlin again! That's three trips to
Berlin this month! It's crazy, how many different meetings we've had.
They take up a lot of our time, but they are always wonderful,
spiritual experiences. This time we talked about the new Christmas
initiative, "a Savior is born" and we watched the new videos for it.
If you haven't seen it yet, then repent, and go look it up! Haha :)
but really though, it invited the spirit so strongly, just by sharing
a simple message about Jesus Christ. Wonderful :)

After this we did an exchange, and I got to go to Jena with elder
weber. Jena is a giant international university city. There are 60,000
students there from all over the world! No joke!! It is totally a
party! I was really excited for this, because the senior couple there,
the Ybarra's, were making a thanksgiving dinner for institute that
night, and it looked really good! But, elder Anderson, elder Weber's
companion wanted to be back for that, so we let him enjoy that, and
instead we had a nice thanksgiving chili with a wonderful family in
Erfurt. 

I'd also like to tell you about an experience this week that we had
with Edwin, our awesome friend with a baptismal date. On Friday we had
an eating appointment with an amazing family in out ward, where they
cooked us up real American hamburgers(well, close enough ) and they
also invited Edwin, and another one of our friends! We had such a
great night, and we were able to help our friends feel the love and
joy that comes from living the gospel. So great :) 

I am so grateful that I can service here in Erfurt, there are so many
wonderful things happening, and we are right in the middle of the
Lord's work! There can be no greater accomplishment or calling!

I hope you have a great week, we'll here us next week!

LG Elder Oliphant

(Editor's note: I asked Chase what he wanted for Christmas and/or missed.  I was expecting something like Root Beer or Mac & Cheese.  This is the list he gave me)

10. Being called Chase
 9. Movies
 8. TV 
7. Hanging out
 6. Driving
 5. Partying hard 
4. Music 
3. Girls 
2. Family 
1. Star Wars






Mustard

I Dreamed a Dream!

Elders in Black

Hey y'all!

Well... I have dreamed a dream! But, I wasn't that special. More
important is that one of our investigators also dreamed a dream! He
recently moved here from Spain, and we've been teaching him with the
Spanish speaking sisters in Berlin, through Skype! His name is Edwin,
and right before I got to Erfurt he just walked into the church on
Sunday and wanted to have a better relationship with God. We've been
teaching him for a while, and this last week we invited him to pray
about being baptized. Well, he did, and that night he had a dream
where he saw himself going into a pool of water, and going all the way
under. Then he got out and went into a big white tower. God totally
answers prayers!! We just need to have faith and a desire!! Edwin is
going to visit his family for Christmas, and then when he comes back,
in January, he's going to get baptized!

So yea! Other than that, We've been super, super busy this week! We've
had to run to and from several appointments because we don't use the
car in the city, and if we waited for the train we would've been late!
Haha, it keeps us in shape! We're teaching lessons every day, and
we've had a few service projects too! I Love Erfurt, the only Problem
though is that everything is super spread out! We have less actives
and investigators that live in the middle of no where, 50 km away!
It's really hard for us to teach some of them, and it's hard for them
to progress because they can't come to church. We met with another man
who lives in a tiny little village called oberhof, 40 km south of
Erfurt. He really wants to come to church and be baptized, but he
can't find a way to get to Erfurt right now :( it's really sad, but we
know that everything will work out! God wants all of his children to
have the blessings that come from baptism, ALL OF THEM! It doesn't
matter where they live!

But, judging by how fast the work is going here, we're going to be
opening up some new wards here. The other elders on our ward just got
a media referral from a woman and she's going to be baptized in a few
week! Jawohl!!

This next week we're going to Berlin, again, for a zone conference and
we're all really excited about that. Also, the Christmas market opens
up this week, so I'm about to have no more money... Woohoo

I love you, have a great week!


LG Elder Oliphant

All American Elder

Exchange is Life

Surprise visit from... Elder Ballard??‏

Hey y'all! 

So, as you can probably guess from the title, we had an interesting
week... Friday morning we got a text message from the mission office
inviting us to a conference call a little later, where we learned that
The Elder Kearon, Elder Christiansen, and elder Ballard would be
coming to Berlin on Sunday, and president wanted all of the
missionaries to be there for it. Haha, that was exciting! Elder
Ballard came, and we all got to shake his hand. As I did this, I truly
felt the happiness and joy that was radiating from this man who has
devoted his life to the gospel of Jesus Christ. He is truly a modern
day apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, and I am so grateful for the
opportunity I had to meet him. He shared several of his own
experiences and gave us his advice for how we could start baptizing
more and more. He reminded us that before we baptize someone we need
to teach them, and before we teach them we need to find them, and
before we can find them we need to talk to them! I feel like we do a
pretty good job of talking to everyone wherever we go, but I'm sure
that there's room for improvement. It's time now to take this
apostolic advice, and use it to make a change! That's what we should
always do when we receive counsel from our leaders. They receive
revelation for us, but it will only help when we choose to act! 

So, as for the work, we are really picking up in Erfurt! This week we
taught 11 lessons! Normally throughout my mission I've averaged around
five! We also found 5 new investigators! We have just been working so
hard, and we're actually seeing fruits of this now! Haha, we are so
busy with our 11 lessons, and Christmas is coming! They've already
started setting up the Christmas market here, and I'm so stoked! Haha,
man! I love Erfurt!

I'm having a great time here, and I can't wait to experience what's
coming this week! 

I love you all!

LG Elder Oliphant

Another picture of food, once again no vegetables

Erfurt, Leipzig, Berlin, Jena, and GROITZSCH‏

Someone gave flowers to the Missionaries to give to girls.  Needless to say they went unused

Hey y'all!

So, sorry about last week, I don't know why, but the letter got
deleted and didn't send... Schade :/ but, it's ok. I'll fill you in :)
I came into Erfurt, which is awesome, and we went right on an exchange
with the zone leaders and I had to give a baptismal interview to one
of their investigators. We were on exchange from Wednesday to Friday,
and I got to meet a great guy, Gustav! He's a student, and is super
cool! I was able to have a great conversation with him about faith and
what baptism means, and he loved it! He was very ready for baptism.
Now, because they don't actually have a church building in Jena, the
city he lives in, they wanted to come do the service in Erfurt. No
problem, we just had to find a key to the maintenance room in the
church so we could turn the water on... Well, long story short we
couldn't find a key, so my new companion and I ended up filling the
baptismal font by hand with buckets and water from the bathroom
sinks... YOLO! It was crazy, but in the end we had a great service for
Gustav, and he was baptized!


Now, for this week, we also had a crazy time, and I was actually gone
most of the week. We had leadership training in on Friday, and we had
to stay the night in Leipzig Thursday, then we after the great meeting
on Friday we didn't have enough time to drive back to Erfurt, so we
spent the night again in Jena, then Saturday/Sunday we had stake
conference back in Leipzig! So, haha, I haven't been in my area for a
while. But, I learned a lot of great stuff at stake conference and at
leadership training. It's funny, Elder Griffen and I looked at our
planners for the first two weeks of our companionship, and we realized
that we've really only had four complete work days together... What??

We still got work done though! This week we found two new
investigators his week. Haha, one of them called us, because somehow
he new we were American and he thought that we could help him
immigrate to America! Haha, we politely explained that we couldn't do
that, and then we explained a little about what we do as missionaries,
and he was actually really interested! We got to explain to him about
the Book of Mormon and then We gave him one. The other person was
actually really funny. We were texting an investigator, asking if we
could make out an appointment, and we accidentally sent it to the
wrong number! But, the woman who answered our text said "absolutely!
I'd love to have you over!" We went over, she had made dinner for us,
we had a member there, and it was just an amazing lesson. We taught
about conversion and what we need to do in my order to receive answers
from God to our questions.

Well, yea. We're also teaching a super cool family from Albania! Half
of the family has already been baptized, and we're working on the rest
of them! They're super close too, and I love them so much!

Man, I love the gospel, and my mission, the church is so true! :) ah! Haha :)

Erfurt is a wonderful place. The ward here is so nice, and so
supportive, I really just feel right at home :) this is really where I'm 
supposed to be!

I Hope you have a great week!

LG Elder Oliphant

Singing in the Choir

Good thing for Google Translate

Chase did not have time to write this week so he forwarded the letter he wrote to his mission president.  I did find a picture of him on another blog which I think is adorable

Elder and Sister Hubrich, Chase and Elder Teuscher

From the Hubrich's blog:

Here we are in Dresden with Elders Oliphant and Teucher.  Elder Oliphant was our "trainer", because he was the first one we met and worked with as far a the local full-time missionaries is concerned.  He is a wonderful missionary and love our association with him.  He is a BIG BOY, with a heart of gold and Elder Teucher, from Logan is such a great missionary too. What a dynamic duo.

Hallo Präsident!

Diese Woche war ganz anstrengend. Wie Sie wissen, es gab diese Woche
eine Taufe in Jena, und weil ich der Distriktsleiter bin, habe ich dem
Täufling die Taufinterview gegeben. Das war gut, wir haben einen
Austausch gemacht mit den Zonenleitern um das zu tun, und ich hatte
eine ganz gute Zeit mit Elder Anderson, und mit dem Täufling, Gustav.
Ich habe sehr viel von Elder Anderson gelernt über wie wir Kontakt mit
Untersuchern jeden Tag haben können, durch das Handy. Er benutzt es
ganz gut, und ich hoffe daß wir das auch in unserer Arbeit anwenden
können.

Elder Anderson

Diese Woche war anstrengend weil wir diese Taufe hier in Erfurt
hatten, und, natürlich, das heißt dass jemand die Taufbecken füllen
müssten. Wir haben versucht und versucht jemand zu finden, der einen
Schlüssel für die Taufbecken hat. Endlich haben wir jemand erreicht,
der einen Schlüssel haben sollte, und wir haben ihn am Samstag vor der
Taufe getroffen, und seine Schlüssel ging nicht! Wir hatten keine
Ahnung was wir tun sollten, dir Taufe war in vier Stunden, und wir
konnten niemand erreichen mit einem Schlüssel dafür. So, Elder Griffen
und ich haben es selbst gefüllt mit Wasser vom Waschbecken mit Eimern.
Haha, es war ein bisschen schwer, aber wir haben es geschafft, und
dieser Mann hat sich taufen gelassen!

Ich freue mich aber hier in Erfurt dienen zu dürfen, und auch über die
Leadership Training Meeting diese Woche!

Bis dann!

Elder Oliphant

Sorry, it's in German.. Google translate?? Or bishop?? You'll get a letter soon.

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