"Are You Guys Mormons?"

Wow Mom, that's stinking awesome. Keep it up Mom, I'm praying for you. Lisa I'm not sure if I understand what you mean by "I watched Joseph and Olivia pooch Jax this week." For one thing I'm not sure what pooch as a verb means and the only Jax I can think of is the one in League of Legends. Gotta watch out for those 1 year olds; you may be interested to hear that even kids in Germany recognize that they can beat me up. This little boy in sacrament meeting one week came up and started attacking me and afterwards went to his parents and was like "I beat that guy up!" to which they laughed. Shocking (tehee). That's cool that Devin be staying for a few months Broseph. How's that chap doing? Smooching any babes? Yeah I'm not sure that I understand the whole grace/works thing either...all I can think to take out of it is to have the attitude of knowing that we are entirely dependent on Christ and His Atonement. I get it Wouard, sleeping in an extra half hour is more important than celebrating the pioneers, eh? Haha, nur Spaß. That's sweet that Allison got her baby blessing. Looks like Savvy is off to a good start if she's already lost 4 teeth. Maybe she won't have to get 12 baby teeth pulled out like me. Yeah Joey, I'll definitely have to work on my Engrish. How emburrising. In terms of struggling to find the the will and motivation to work hard consistently...it's probably no surprise to you that I can also relate to that. The desire to go out in the heat and have the things most important to me be mocked and rejected isn't always terribly large. But it's always nice to take a step back and look at the reasons that I'm here and to see those whose lives have been changed by the message we share. I imagine it's the same concept as your work; looking at the reasons that you do what you do. Dad, you better give Grandma a thank you from me! That's cool that you were able to find some stories about our pioneer ancestors. We sure have some awesome ancestors.

Well this week was pretty normal, up until Saturday evening. There we be, waiting for the bus to come to take us home, when randomly this guy pulls up at the bus stop in his car and calls out "are you guys Mormons?" and we be like "Yeah..." and he be like "Where do you guys want to go?" We were naturally pretty surprised at this point, as it's not every day that random people offer us rides. Anywho, he told us he had met the missionaries a few years ago in a city east of Bremerhaven and that he has a lot of respect for the church and the missionaries. So he gave us a ride and we got to know him a bit. To make a long story short, we were able to invite him to church and set up an appointment for Sunday evening. Well, he came to church and after a few minutes into our conversation with him we finally learn...he's already been baptized. However his Mom died a couple years ago, and since then he's found it hard to believe in God. Well unfortunately he wasn't able to stay afterwards, but we still had our appointment for that evening. We had the idea to also bring along another less active member; we thought it would be good if the two became friends: the two of them are around the age of twenty and the closest active member in terms of age to that is a girl in her 30s. Well that ended up not being the greatest idea, as their skepticism and issues kind of built upon each other, though in terms of becoming friends it worked out pretty well. But that's pretty much going to be the main goal of the next few weeks, is getting the two of them active. The branch here desperately needs active, young members.

Time is running short, so I guess I'll wrap things up. I know that the Lord blesses us when we have the courage to choose the right, even in the face of mockery, rejection or embarrasment. I know that when we stand by the Savior, He will stand by us; and we will not fall. God will reward us for our righteous behavior with happiness and peace in this life and eternal joy in the world to come. Have an awesome week!

Love,
Elder Larsen