Transfers!

Hey Mom! 

So, we have had an incredible week! This week we had a German holiday, Christ-Himmel-Fahrt. Officially, they celebrate the day where Christ ascended into heaven after his resurrection. Unofficially, it´s called man day. It´s where all of the men go out and get totally drunk. A real German holiday :) Because of how crazy it gets here we had to be inside at 6:00 unless we were with a member. I hate being in our apartment, so fortunately a member invited us over for dinner! The Bobinger Family (you already have a picture with them). They are so nice. They made a giant feast for us and they grilled! Bratwurst, schnitzel, so much meat! It was amazing. So great. They also invited their nephew who lives in Hamburg, who is not a member of our church. As we got their the family wanted to play a game with us, and Elder Williams, being prepared, brought his Book of Mormon battles card game. It´s a card game where all of the cards are book of Mormon characters. It´s similar to the game War, but with a gospel twist. As we were playing, this awesome kid got so into it! At the end he was saying "Who are these people?? Where are they from??" Of course we told him they were from the Book of Mormon, and he then told us he wanted to read it!! We gave him one, and we took pictures with him and wrote our testimonies in the book. A great time... Except for the fact that they gave us WAY to much food! And as we were there, the Hubrich family called us and invited us over right after! Way to much food, but a great night.

This last week we´ve received several text messages from our zone telling us about miracles and baptismal dates in our zone. It was great to here that so many of our brothers and sisters are going to be entering into a covenant with our Heavenly Father, but these texts really made me think. All of these wonderful things were happening in our zone, in almost every other area, and I thought to myself "Hey, why not Freiberg?" So I said a prayer, and Elder Williams and I went out to work until we found a miracle, and we did! I was looking through the list of contacts that we have in our area book, and I decided to call a name I found. He didn´t answer the phone, but then he called back! I talked to him for a while, and he ended up telling me that he didn´t really have interest to learn from us, but his roommate did, and he set up an appointment for us. We came by for our appointment, and Y*****, the man we called, had made us a big dinner. Really tasty! After we ate, we were going to start teaching Y****´s roommate, D****. As we started, we did what Preach My Gospel says, and invited everyone there to stay for the lesson. At first Ya****was hesitant, but he agreed to stay. As we started teaching, he got more and more interested, and by the end we were all great friends. They´re scheduled to  be baptized on the 20 of June. Please pray for them!

Now today, we had a crazy adventure. We got permission to go to see the place where president Monson dedicated  East Germany for missionary work. What an amazing experience. I loved it so much, once we got there. The Hubrichs found out we were going and they offered to drive us out there. So we started off, and ran into trouble. Their GPS is really old, so we ended up getting lost, and it took 3 hours to find the place! So we got to the place where the walking path starts, and the driving path ends, but Elder Hubrich didn´t care! He drove right up the path! And then parked in the middle of  the forest on the side. SO FUNNY! But we had a great adventure together (This is why we´re writing so late today).

So... Transfers. Now, do you want to here a funny story? Two days before our calls I had a dream that I would be transferred to Leipzig, and serve with Elder Clark, one of the Elders we spent the night with when we went to Berlin. We got our calls on Saturday, and Elder Williams was transferred to Leipzig! And he´ll be serving with Elder Clark! Crazy. Sadly, We won´t be serving together anymore. We´ve become great friends here. My new companion is Elder Benitz, and he´s a GERMAN! He´s from Stuttgard, and just finished his training. Woo hoo! My German is going to get a lot better.

So can you also send me some Velcro stick things, and super glue? Thanks :)

Love you mom!

Elder Oliphant

Hey mom!

So, we just talked, and I´m not sure what to write about... oh well. 

We had interview with president on Friday. Usually when we have interviews we learn about them 1-2 weeks in advance, but this time, we learned about it the day before. So we had to cancel an appointment, go to Dresden, and have interviews. We had a great time though, and we found out a little more about the iPads. So President Kosak called Apple this week to ask where they are, and they told them that the shipment was on the way! On Wednesday it came, with a grand total of 1 iPad... out of 250. So really we have no idea when we´ll be getting them. Hopefully before September 2016.

We also had our stake conference this weekend. That was really cool. Coming from a district in Leer, to a giant stake here was a big change! There were so many people there, I thought it was America! Except everything was in German... of course. But yea, that was pretty cool.

We were also able to travel to one of the villages outside of Freiberg and we came in contact with 2 less active families that allowed us to meet with them, and wanted to set up return appointments. I really enjoy less active work, and it´s especially nice when we have a senior couple who also likes it and is willing to drive us out to the places that are a little too far for our bikes.

One more thing, do you remember how I told you about the girl that we helped? Well she contacted us this week and wanted a Book of Mormon! So we gave her one and set up a return appointment. I can start to feel the work picking up here in this area, but it´s only going to keep up if we work for it!

Ok... Well I´m not sure what else to write about. Maybe a spiritual thought?

I was reading in Helaman 5 (One of my favorite chapters of holy scripture) and it tells the story of Nephi and Lehi, the son´s of Helaman. They went off to serve a mission among the Lamanites, and right when they got there, they were taken and bound and thrown in prison. Not the best start ever, right? Well, after a few days the lamanites came in to try and kill them, but when they walked into the prison Nephi and Lehi were surrounded in fire! Pretty cool, right? After the Lamanites saw this they realized they were in darkness, they wanted to repent, one thing led to another and they ended up converting a ton of people. Now, the part that I found cool was that Nephi and Lehi did nothing. They were just sitting in prison, and they converted all these people. So what do we learn from this? Nephi and Lehi were tools of the Lord, that´s it. They were in the right place, at the right time, and they were worthy to be protected and to have the holy ghost with them. God did all of the work. He converted all those people. It wasn´t the words of Nephi and Lehi, it was the spirit of God. So when WE want to be successful missionaries, we need to be the best tools we can be, so the Lord can do the most work possible through us.

Oh, can you also send taco mix? I didn´t want any more while I was in Leer because we had a bunch, but my taco stash is now (sadly) in Leer. 

I love you mom :) I´m really glad I got to see you yesterday. I hope you have a great week!

Elder Oliphant

After meeting with President Kosak

And That´s How I Almost Got Out of Giving a Spiritual Thought...‏

Hey mom!

So... This week was a little crazy. Ok, really crazy. 

Well, I´m not going to lie, this has probably been the craziest week of my mission. We started working on the list of part member families that our ward gave us, and this last week we had an appointment with one of them. They are a great family. The Husband was baptized about 3 years ago, but his wife had a really bad experience with the Lutheran church and now she really doesn´t want too much to do with churches. Well, that´s what she told us, at least. She had a ton of questions, some of which we could answer, and then a lot of others we couldn´t. She was hesitant at first, but then we ended up having a great evening together.

Now, right before this appointment I started feeling a little sick, and then afterwards I was just dead. I really don´t like being sick here, I just felt like I was wasting my time. But then when I tried to get up and do something I couldn´t. It´s awful! So I´m going to start taking better care of my body, eating healthier, exercising better, and then hopefully, with a lot of prayer, I won´t get sick anymore.

Dude, that tie

So right when I was fully recovered we had a very interesting thing happen. We had a member family invite us over for dinner! Frank Apel. Just a little background on him. He was the first stake president in East Germany. He was a Temple president, mission president, bishop, pretty much everyone in the book. He was part of the temple committee that build the Freiberg Temple, and he´s mentioned in a book written by President Monson. So, super saint. They invited us over for dinner on May 1, which is some kind of big holiday here in Germany, and it was the most amazing German meal I think I´ll ever have! Oh so good! Turkey, Rotkohl, Knüdel, potatoes, so delicious! They´re an awesome family. So, like after all eating appointments, the time came for us to give a spiritual thought. Right as I opened up my scriptures, my nose started gushing out blood!  It got all over everything, except my scriptures. Those were ok :) I went to clean up, and when I came back we said a prayer and were about to leave... Until brother Apel said "Warte! Wir brauchen noch einen geistige gedanken!" So needless to say, we still gave it. So close

One other crazy experience for the week. We had a potential investigator call us, and ask if she could spend the night. With us. In our apartment. Yea... That kind of threw us off a little. At first we thought she was joking, but as we were coming home for the day we saw her just sitting on the street. We asked her what was going on, and she told us that she had a big argument with her dad, and he told her not to come home for the night. We tried to be good Christians, and we helped her as much as we could, but there was only so much we could do. Eventually we convinced her to go home and try and talk things out with her dad. This was a crazy night, but we just tried to act Like we feel Jesus would´ve acted, and hopefully she´ll remember this and want to learn more.

ALSO! I almost forgot. Thank you for the package. I got it. The swedish fish jelly beans were cool, and I loved the pringles! Their definetly better than the ones they sell here! Why? because AMERICA!!!

One more crazy thing. There was a one day festival outside our apartment yesterday. They had a rock band, bratwurst, Ice cream, games, baloons, and a giant bunny and bumble bee walking around. The temptation to break the Sabbath was REAL

The week was short, but it was crazy.

Love you,

Elder Oliphant

Mission Conference

Hey mom! So, we had quite a week! As you know there was a mission conference in Berlin on Friday. We were super excited for it! We got our travel plans, and because there´s no train straight from Freiberg to Berlin that would´ve gotten us there on time we stayed the night in an Apartment in Halle, a city outside of Leipzig. We bought our tickets to Halle, and from there to Berlin. The day after we bought them we got news from the office that the DB (German train network) Would be on strike Wednesday and Thursday, and that there weren´t going to be any trains running. NO TRAINS! This was not good. We needed to get to Halle on Thursday, and the train was really the only way we could get there. So we called the office and they found a bus that went from Dresden to Halle. Everything was all fine and dandy, and we were back on schedule. Sadly, Satan didn´t want that to happen, so the bus fell out! Our last hope was to have someone drive us, otherwise we would be walking to Berlin. This is where the great senior mission couple comes in to the picture. They were so nice, they volunteered to drive us all the way to halle! Our trip was saved :) Elder and Sister Hubrich, look them up! (they have a blog). 

So we got to Halle, and there had the worst nights sleep... ever. It´s a 2 man apartment, and we had 8 people staying in it. I ended up sleeping (or trying to) on the floor with a pillow and a blanket that´s too small. Elder WIlliams spent the night on a broken couch. We both slept for about 2 hours and were hurting the next morning, at 4:00 AM when we had to get up and catch our train to Berlin. Now, here´s where it gets interesting. We got to the train station in Halle, met up with the sisters that were staying the night, and went up to the platform just in time to see that out train to Berlin was cancelled! NO!! We didn´t know what to do, so we said a prayer, and went to the information desk. To make a long story short we found a train going to Berlin from Leipzig, so we went back there to catch the train. Funny, because 6 of the missionaries in our big group were actually serving in Leipzig! But anyway we made it! We were the last people there, but we made it! 

So, the conference. It was awesome! We had 2 great members of the 70 come and teach us. Haha, they were so funny! Elder Kearon is literally the most ADD person in the world! So funny! He was in the middle of bearing his testimony, and he just turned, looked at an Elder, and said "where are you from? Australia?! Sweet! Anyone else here from Australia?" My new favorite General authority. So we got all the training for ipads! We got training manuals, had a Q and A, and a long discussion about pornography. It was actually really cool and informative. A big reason for us having Ipads is to teach us how to use technology responsibly, and to help us "Inoculate" the next generation so Pornography isn´t such a big problem. Really cool. We got everything we need to use IPads responsibly... Except iPads! Apple made a mistake with the order. Hopefully we´ll be getting them soon. 

It was a great meeting, but it doesn´t end there! We still had to get back to Freiberg, and because of the strike we couldn´t really plan our trip back, because we didn´t know which trains would be going. So we bought a ticket back to Leipzig, and found a train that would get us back to Freiberg at a decent hour. Now just one more problem... The train coming in to Leipzig was a little late, and we missed the train back to Freiberg! So we ended up staying the night in Leipzig with 2 of the Elders there. We finally got home Saturday morning and just collapsed from only having about 5 hours of sleep in 2 days. 

So.. what´s the Moral of this story? Missionaries will do anything to further the work of the Lord with Technology, and I hate The DB.

Have a great week,

Elder Oliphant

Some answers to questions:

We write Emails late because it takes a long time to walk to the church, and it´s up a big hill, and we usually spend our work time up here anyways.

U.S. Snickers are pretty different. I´ll send you some. I´m planning to send a package next transfer, when I get some new nametags ;)

It has only rained once in Freiberg

We walk, or have the senior couple drive us :)

So with skyping. We should have our Ipads by then. When would be the best time for you? Do you have early or late church? I don´t remember. And I know that it´s possible to have 3 way skype calls, so you can set that up with Riley, and we can all skype together! :)

Also, we will be using facebook a lot with the ipads, so that means my facebook account needs to be more appropriate for a representative of Jesus Christ. Can you start deleting things and cleaning it up? I mean with everything. I trust you :)

Freiberg Temple!

Hey mom!

So It´s been kind of a slow week. Elder Williams has had really bad canker sores in the back of his throat for a while, and this week he really wanted to get rid of them, so he took some pills he had that are supposed to help with sore throats. Benedryl... He took Benedryl. In the middle of personal study he went, sat on the couch, and fell asleep for 3 hours... SO FUNNY! Haha, he was way upset about it, but I thought it was hilarious. So during his time asleep i got really good at solving a Rubik's cube. My record is 1 minute 7 seconds.

As far as work goes this week was pretty slow. We only taught one real lesson to an investigator named herr WOLF! Haha, he´s a funny guy. About a year ago he was walking down the street, looking all sad, and a guy came up and talked to him. He asked him what was wrong, and if he wanted to be happier. Unlike most germans, he said yes! This nice man then invited him to come to the Mormon Church with him. It turns ou this man was a member of the church, who went off  and left the church to join some indian religion. Even though he did this, he knew that the Church was good and could help this guy! He´s been coming to church pretty often since then, but for some reason has never read the BoM, or met with the missionaries. We went by and asked him if he had a little time to meet with us. He invited us right in and we taught him, and he accepted a soft baptismal commitment! We´re planning to teach him again this week, and hopefully get a date set.

Another exciting thing happened this week. We got a missionary couple in our ward! They´re here to supervise the Temple construction, but they want to help us out too! They´ve invited us over for dinner in an hour, and we´ll get to know them better/teach them how to do missionary work ;)

I learned something this week during my studies that I´d like to share with you. It´s Helamen 5:12. I´m sure you know this scrpiture, it´s a really good one. 

 And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.

Theý cannot fall. That doesn´t mean they shouldn´t be able to fall, or that it´ll be hard for Satan to make them fall, they CANNOT! It is completely impossible, no matter what anyone says or does. If we build upon the foundation that Christ is we are safe. Yea, we´ll still have trials, We´ll still have bad days, we´ll still have dates that don´t go well, but they are not enough, and can never be enough, to take us down.

One more exciting thing for the upcoming week. We´re getting iPads on friday.

Love you :)

Elder Oliphant

New City, New Companion, Elder Williams from St. George

Mom... Do you  know how many times I have sprained my ankle? You really went to the Emergency room? Is everything going to be ok?

Anyway, I made it here to Freiberg, finally! That train ride took forever, but fortunately I wasn´t alone. Elder Perez was with me for a while and Sister Kooyman, who was in my MTC group, travelled with me. We had a fun train ride, but I´m glad to be here. And it is a beautiful little town. There are mountains here! Well, hills, really, but more than Leer! It´s also in the heart of Erzgeberg, where all of the cool wood stuff comes from, like the smoking men and the Christmas pyramids. We have a really big ward here, and they are so cute. Yesterday we had our fast and testimony meeting, and they put up a little microphone on the stand and all of the primary kids ran up and bore there testimonies. Super cute! We also have, of course, the beautiful temple. Did you  know that when it first opened it was the smallest temple in the World? Then they remodeled it, but it was still the smallest? So now there adding on to the back, and making it bigger. I wish I could go in, but sadly I can´t. Not right now. Hopefully though it´ll be open before I go home and maybe I´ll be able to come back!

Well as well as having the temple here, I also have an awesome companion, Elder Dalton Williams! You should´ve told me you were going to st. George, because he´s from there! We were really good friends in the MTC, and now we have the chance to serve together :) I´ll really miss Elder Timmerman, I learned a lot from him, and he really helped me out a couple times, but this next transfer is going to be great :)

I really don´t know a lot about the Area, I´ve really only seen 2 streets, so could you look up some things to do here? Also things to do in Dresden, because we´re planning to go there for a P-day, it´s only like 30 minutes away or something. Thanks :)

I do know however that miracles happen everywhere. This last week a member was driving us to an appointment about 20 kilometers away, and we got there and the lady wasn´t home. Lame, right? We were a little upset, but the great member rose our spirits when he took us to McDonald's and got us a Big Mac. Did you know I´d never had a big mac before? I  hope the ones in America are better, because it wasn´t very good. But anyway, as he was taking us back, Elder Williams got the Impression that we should go by on an investigator that lives a little out of the way, and is almost never home. Fortunately, he followed the spirit and asked the member to drive us there, which he happily did. We knocked on the door and this woman was home! She let us in, and we taught her about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, and invited her to watch General Conference and pray to receive a testimony of living day prophets. Little Experiences like this are what really keeps me going sometimes. When we look for the miracles in our lives, we will find them. 

I love you,

Elder Oliphant

P.S. Tried Spaghetti Eis. Loved it!

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Transferred to the East!

Hey mom, so transfers. I´m getting on a train Tuesday morning, and going to Leipzig. I then have a train from there to Dresden, where Elder Williams will pick me up and we´ll go together to Freiberg! I´m really excited, except my train ride is as long as my plane ride was when I came here...

Just so you know, we had a bonfire because it´s an Easter tradition here in Ostfriesland! It stems from an old pagan tradition, where the people would make a big fire o burn up and scare away the evil spirits. It´s really just an excuse now for the people here to go a little redneck, but it was fun! I enjoyed it.

Elder Williams has been there for a transfer.

So did you enjoy general conference? I loved it! I really liked Elder Ballards talk where he talked about "raising the bar" and becoming a better generation, and also president Uchdorf´s talk about grace. Those two really spoke to me. I really liked the overall theme of the resurrection, and also the family, two important topics to always remember. 

Yea, go ahead and send the missionaries a text and ask them when they want to go (to Airborne trampoline park). I don´t know if they´re allowed to do stuff like that, they don´t have anything like that here in Germany. They don´t seem to like things that bring people happiness, like the gospel. 

We switched our pday because of appointments today. Last day in Leer. Wish me luck!

Elder Oliphant