Faithless Tomatoes

I´ll keep the nerd advice in mind, Mom. I met Elder Frost once, and just as I was dutifully explaining that his mom was my grandma´s home teacher, I was just about tackled to the ground by a certain Elder Peatross. I should be able to get a new suit in a week or two, just need to find enough time on a pday to go to Hannover. My ``ancient`` shoes died pretty quick, unfortunately. I´ve been wearing the new pair, which so far are working out pretty well. We don´t see too many members aside from on Sunday. A higher percentage in Germany basically just means 0.02% instead of 0.01%. Awesome that the ward dance went well, I knew you were a true dancer at heart, Mom.  I´ll have to read that article, Dad. I´ve only talked to her a couple times. Bigger ward makes it hard to talk to very many people. Better watch out with the "success" word Dad, out of the 36ish combined months that my 3 companions have been out, none of them have seen a baptism yet. Haha, sometimes it´s a tender topic in the mission. Sadly Lisa, I don´t seem to be getting any fatter. It takes a lot of effort just to stay at 145. I most certainly do love the new area. Not gonna lie, that´s quite the quality picture (see pic of Abby, Lisa, Savannah and their delicious breadtwist below). I´m not sure if I can condone eating bread twists without me though. Glad you had a "sick" week, Heidi, sounds pretty rad. I don´t seem to know what I´m doing with family history either. Every Sunday we now have an hour to do Family History work, and I´m kinda scared I´ll manage to mess something up if I try doing anything other than tinkering around and reading stories. Not bad Joey, Zeke can already say "nothing"? I don´t have a clue about the song/movie though. I´ll work harder at not enjoying soccer, though up to this point it hasn´t been much of a struggle.

Pretty solid week over here. Lots of traveling, lots of service, unfortunately not a whole lot of lessons. One of our lessons was in a city pretty far south. Took 4 hours of travel there and back, so working there was basically our entire day. On the way there the guy sitting by us on the train was talking on the phone, and accused whoever he was talking to of being a "treulos tomaten," or faithless tomato...gonna have to remember that one. Also we had splits this week, and while we were doing some service a member called my companion a fat egg. Germans seem to have all sorts of interesting food-related insults. 

Another random experience happened one night as we were going home from an appointment. These two drunk guys seemed confused as to which train they needed to take, so Elder Barboza told them. They didn´t believe him and told us that all we do (as missionaries) is "make crap." Well they eventually found out that Elder Barboza was right, and as we walked by they stopped and apologized. They ended up "escorting" us through Stadthagen and warned us about walking through certain streets at night, and were actually pretty friendly. So I guess the lesson is not to judge people by their appearance...or something like that.

The ward here in Stadthagen really is awesome. Before missionary work and member work seemed very separate from each other, but here the members really want to be involved and it´s a lot more of a team effort. It´s a good reminder that we´re all on the same side here. This isn´t a competition between which missionaries can get the most baptisms, or who can do the most on their own. This is about saving God´s children and bringing them to Christ. 

Love you all and hope you have a good week =)

A Whole New Flippin World

Interesting, so apparently the first paragraph of my email last week didn't disappear...for some reason it just wasn't showing up on my ipad. Bro, you´re gonna have to give me more information than "a ring box." Is this for the same girl who had the sign at the Timpview Car wash? And I see you´re already bringing shame upon the family name by not wasting everyone in frisbee. Tut, tut (tehee). Lisa, you´re just gonna have to blame Joey for asking such vulgar questions. If you liked my ol atheist friend, I´m sure you´ll enjoy this. A couple weeks ago we met this lady who was also of the opinion that we were enslaved by our religion. And yet you could hear how much smoking had destroyed her voice. Apparently not even obvious physical evidence is enough to convince people. That´s a rough way to lose a client, dad. The concept of being a friend to everyone and loving the Lord is definitely a topic I've thought a lot about. Well Mom, you may be interested to hear that I did indeed bear my testimony as well (granted, it was somewhat expected since it was my first week in a new city). Unfortunately there´s still little to see in terms of mountains. That 90 second crying thing should come in handy. I´m basically just bawling all day long, but with that I´ll be able to disperse it into 90 second intervals. I guess great minds think alike Joey, because my old companion also told me that I needed to make Captain Barbosa jokes. How about instead of dictating a letter from Jake to me, you just send Jake to me in person? Since you neglected to match the names, I suppose I can do it myself. The Spleen-Joey, Bowler-Michelle, Blue Raja-Smarty, Shoveler-Jake and Invisible Boy-Zeke.

Well, in case the title didn't make it obvious enough, Stadthagen is quiiite a bit different from ol Berlin. After spending p-day at a Holocaust Memorial (since I guess it´s important to leave on as depressing of a note as possible), I got shipped off to West Germany. Met Elder Barbosa in Hannover and then we were off to Stadthagen, which so far hasn't stayed very true to it's name...haven't met anyone named Hagen yet. But aside from that this place seems pretty great. I didn't really notice it until leaving, but everything in Berlin just seems a little bit drearier. Here things seem to be a bit more alive. Rowdy teenagers, sarcastic members, friendly strangers. The only downside is that there are no longer a billion people on the streets to talk to. In Berlin over the course of an hour you could try talking to dozens of people, whereas here you might get a solid 20... and some of those may be from trying to talk to the same person 2 or more times. So basically it means we do a lot of dooring.

Elder Barbosa is also pretty great. Definitely miss Elder Burns and his constant hilarious sassiness, but Cap´n Barbosa is pretty solid too. He can sing, play piano, speak good German...basically everything that I can´t do, haha.

In terms of the work, we had a few pretty solid lessons. 2 of our investigators are teenagers from Afghanistan, who want to be baptized but still haven´t gotten long-term visas. Right now we´re going through the 5th lesson and working with President Fingerle on what we can do to speed things up. After our lesson we took them with us to the ward sports night and played some soccer. Unfortunately a year of not playing soccer hasn´t made me any better (oddly enough, it´s almost like I´ve gotten worse! shocking...). It was still pretty stinking fun though. We also taught an older lady, who is making good progress but has trouble coming to church because of work. Other than that, finding central over here. We did manage to find a new investigator, a guy who has been going through some difficulties in his life. He´s got some interesting ideas (reincarnation, dead bodies turning into starts, etc.) but he´s open to change and to a better life. Which just happens to be what the Gospel helps people with, what a coincidence! :)

That´s about it for this week, hope y'all have a good one!

Elder Larsen

Berlin to Stadthagen

I was confused for a second there Mom, Lubbock looked a lot like Lubeck, which is the city where Elder Peatross is right now. I too had some fun with "kiddies." We played with 2 little boys at an eating appointment while the food was being prepared. I just had to pretend they were Marty and Jake. Fortunately even kids in Germany know that it's ok to beat up Elder Larsen.

We'll have to compare your English dinner to the typical German meal Andy. Pork chops, cool potato ball things, "rot kohl," which I'm not even positive how to explain, and then breads/soups/whatever. I was also slightly sick this week, due to a massive package of junk food Elder Burns got from a member in his last area. I think you hit the nail on the head Lisa. One of my battles so far on a mission has had a lot to do with taking care of problems immediately and directly, rather than just being passive or "going with the flow." It's quite the challenge sometimes, hopefully I'll get better at it. So does this mean you're also going to go try out that Larsen Home video place in Springville or wherever? Larsen is obviously quite the honorable name. Glad to hear that Zeke already knows what's up, Joey. Unfortunately I haven't had the privilege of messing my pants yet, though there have been a couple close calls. One time I was walking on pretty thin ice. If I had been a little less
lucky, a toot could have ended up being a squirt. Ahem, anyway...I also failed at smiling this week Heidi. Our ward choir, which we go to about every week with an investigator, insisted that one of the most important parts of singing is smiling. Well, during our song in sacrament meeting, I gave up on that after about 4 seconds. Make sure not to get too ahead of yourself Wouard, by the time you hit 40, I'll be married with 4 kids. Sounds like Bro Henderson was quite the family history champ, Dad.

Well, despite being certain that I'd stay in Berlin for at least one more transfer, Saturday we got the news that I'd be going off to Stadthagen, a little city (a solid 12,000 as opposed to the 3ish million in Berlin) in West Germany. I suppose I should have seen it coming, the moment I get comfortable in Neukölln is the moment I get transferred. On the bright side I'll be able to meet tons of new people (and actually make a decent first impression now that I can speak some of the language, haha) and enjoy all kinds of new experiences. I've also heard that Stadthagen has, or at least had the biggest ward in all of Germany. It'll be rough leaving Elder Burns
(the guy's pretty flippin awesome) but my soon to be companion Elder Barbosa seems pretty cool. He's only got 3 more months, so I may end up being the one to "kill" him.

Other than transfer calls this week wasn't terribly eventful. Had appointments with new investigators, but unfortunately I was on exchange for all of em and only got reports of what happened. Our current investigators are a bit quiet at the moment, on vacation, "busy," and all that good stuff. I guess to be fair, not quite everyone in the world has time 24/7 to talk about the Gospel. Taught a few less actives, and one came to church for all 3 hours for the first time since I've been here.

I did have something of a reality check on Saturday, in the form of this dude I talked to on the bus. He used to be a member and had even served a mission. But somehow over the passage of time he slipped into inactivity, eventually to the point that he is now atheist. His main complaint was that the church is too strict, and that as a member he didn't feel "free." Specifically with the law of chastity. Well, now he has no family, no faith and his only companions seem to be his addictions. Unfortunately he still seems blind to the reality of things. I thought it was a pretty solid wake up call. The devil doesn't stop working against you just because you've served a mission or have a powerful testimony. The only way to really be free is to follow God's commandments to the very end.

Hope y'all have an awesome week!

Elder Larsen

Want a Hippopotamus For Christmas?

Very interesting. On Friday we got a text saying that some of the emails didn't go through, and that we could try to resend them. I went to my email and saw that somehow my letter magically sent itself again on Wednesday...I was very much confused. I guess I should have known when I got that picture, Mom. I be like "what does she mean, 'Since we didn't hear from you yet'?" I suppose there's another pretty big advantage of being a missionary, mom. No dances! I'll have to enjoy it while it lasts. Good idea Lisa, hacking into my account. That one week when we had to change our email time president Fingerle asked me, "so does your family force you to write them each week?" Haha, I suppose so. I've had some similar thoughts to yours Lisa. Today during personal study I was looking up references for charity/love, and just thought about how literally everything in the Gospel has to do with love. And yet it's one thing to know something is true, and another to constantly act accordingly. It's certainly a process. "Small but promising interactions," eh Andy? Are we talking about some babe giving you a smooch, or something more like a girl making 1 second of eye contact? Can't believe y'all are going on all these trips without your own bro, bro. Brother Henderson died, dad? That's crazy, last I saw him he was still doing his daily rounds up and down the street with his walker. Think it's probably for the best though, I sure wouldn't wanna go on any longer than that. You enjoy the smell of smoke and chemicals Heidi? And rooms with no air conditioning (only heaters)? Then you sure would love it here in Berlin! Haha, it actually isn't all that bad. I'm glad you'll be able to be a bit more comfortable while watching tv all day, you'll have to make up for my absence. Alright Joey, I'll try my best. How many hamburgers do you eat without (?). Do you speak German? What kind of (?) cat are you? Rivers are long. Tell Marty he'll be getting a big ol spoof when I get back. That picture at the temple made me think how when I get back there's gonna be Marty, Jake and then some 6 year old who claims his name is Marty.

Quite the finding-full week! Typically it's a bit more exciting to have more appointments, but we had a pretty above average amount of success with it this week. Made out appointments with 6 new people and a less active, which is certainly a new finding record for me. If all goes well with the appointments we made out, this next week will be prettyyyyy awesome.

With all the finding this week we met a lot of people with a whole lot of different views. One lady found the concept of eternal families ridiculous. Instead, she believed that after dying she'd simply come back as a tree. Another guy believed that God is a woman, many think that there's no one correct way to worship God and others (this has been pretty common lately) decided that the wars going on are proof that there is no God. And to be honest I can't blame them! Without the Book of Mormon, or prophets, or personal revelation, I'm sure my own beliefs wouldn't be so different from theirs. I've been reading in the Old Testament lately, and without JSTs and other forms of modern revelation, there are so many things that don't make a lick of sense. But we DO have these things, and as members of Christ's church we can find answers that no amount of worldly "knowledge" can give us. And we have the awesome privilege of sharing these things with the world.

I think that's about it for this week. Have a good one!

Elder Larsen

The One Without a Jacket

Yeah bro, fortunately the chances of any love sign referring to me is
about zero.  Also, I don't suppose any of those sledding fans of yours were
babes, were they? That's pretty awesome that the Provo Temple is up
and ready to go. The Freiberg Temple here in Germany should reopen in
August or so, which will be super nice. Both temples here are
currently under renovation. Funny that you mentioned the suits mom.
You may be interested to hear that one unfortunate day as I was
putting my suit jacket on I heard an unpleasant ripping noise. The
zipper of the pants belonging to the same suit also managed to
break...so I've been surviving with one suit. The next pday that we go
shopping I'll start the search for something new. My respect for ctr
clothing is pretty low...or maybe I really am just a fatty. If that's
the case, then perhaps I'll be able to learn the same lesson you've
learned Joey. Maybe fat people are people after all. That drawing is
pretty jinking awesome. Heidi, you better have put that little girl in
the chokey. Back in my day teachers didn't tolerate such disrespect.
Or pigtails. Don't let Steve work too hard. If I'm lucky dad, I'll be
able to attend the Mormon tabernacle choir thing. Just depends on if I
stay in Berlin. It would be awesome though, cause Marcel bought
tickets and is going with his family.

Another good week, again kind of all over the place. On Wednesday we
had an exchange with the Berlin Spanish Elders. I went with Elder
Fitch into their program, which basically meant (once again) wandering
around Berlin searching for last names on doorbells that look Spanish.
In the evening we had an appointment with a less active that
unfortunately fell out. It would have been cool to practice my
pathetic amount of Spanish. Although, according to duo lingo, I'm 52%
fluent in Spanish (in reality I'm probably about 5% fluent). We then
had a Spanglish. lesson about the restoration with one of their
investigators, which went really well. At the end Elder Fitch asked
him to say the closing prayer and he was like "No, please no." But
after a little pressure he did it. Seems pretty small, but if people
don't make prayer a habit they ain't ever getting a testimony.

After the exchange we had zone conference. The zone has seen a lot of
change since I've been here, a lot of my old buds are off in other
parts of Germany now, including a Elder Racine from the mtc district.
It's always a lot of fun getting together with big groups of
missionaries, but there is also a bit of a high schoolish feeling to
it. Anywho, the focus of the conference was the theme this year,
teaching repentance and baptizing faithful converts (not sure if
that's exactly what the English version of it is, but close enough).
President Fingerle taught us about the importance of helping people
make restitution in the repentance process, which was really good. Not
something I had put a ton of thought into before when teaching about
repentance.

Bus Ride with Schwester Tyx

Also this week, we spent quite a bit of time with a less active old
lady, who's house is something of a wreck. She's about as hilarious as
old ladies come. We went to go help her buy paint, and when we took
the bus she insisted that we all go (keep in mind this is a
hunch-backed old lady who has trouble walking) to the very back of the
bus, so we could all sit together. After getting to our stop we had to
cross the street. So rather than find a crosswalk ol Schwester Tyx
slowly walked right across the busy street, followed by 4 bemused
missionaries. It was quite the adventure. Oh and also, the first time
we met she chastised me for not wearing a jacket. And since then I'm
now "the one without a jacket." "When was the birthday of that one
without a jacket?" "Did the one without a jacket get enough to eat?"
Pretty great, haha.

Other than that, things in Neukölln are pretty normal. This week we'll
finally be able to stay here (no exchanges or conferences) which
should be nice for the work. Life is the bomb, the gospel is true and
God is our loving Heavenly Father. Have an awesome week!

Elder Larsen

Yo

Heidi I think you should consider making a commercial. "I'm squatting
and I can't get up!" I'm glad the international messaging worked out
Lisa. Here's another random connection for you. Elder Nearon (who
trained my bro Elder Racine from my mtc district) is currently in some
sort of email correspondence with the sister of your German friend.
Pretty weird. I like your thought mom, it's like the 4th missionary
talk-thing. If we want change, peace, happiness, or whatever, than we
gotta stop fighting against He who wants to bring us change, peace,
happiness and whatever. That's awesome that you got in contact with an
old companion Dad. Keep up the tips, Joey, I need em. At what point
did you come to that conclusion, that fat people are people too?

So this week was kind of all over the place. Wednesday we went on
exchanges, so me and Elder Vellinga from Tiergarten rocked it up in
Neukölln. The day before a less active member kind of panicked and let
us know that he was planning to leave the church. We met with him and
were able to have a really good discussion. He felt that because of a
mistake he made that there was no hope for him; that because he acted
against what he knows to be true he's going to be punished. We talked
about how naturally sin has its consequences, but we can never go so
low that God won't forgive and help us, and allow us to repent. Jesus
Christ already suffered the punishment, so that we don't have to. He
still has his doubts, but he came to church on Sunday and made out an
appointment with the bishop.

After the exchange, rather than reuniting with Elder Burns, I came
back with Elder Schofield from Marzahn to ward choir practice (our
investigator Eckehart comes every week), while Elder Burns went to do
a baptismal interview with Elder Nearon in Marzahn. After choir we
rushed back to meet with the other Elders and spent the night in
Marzahn. The next morning Elders Burns and Nearon went to a leadership
training meeting while me and Elder Schofield stayed in the apartment.
They've been having problems with their bathroom and kitchen, so we
had to stay there while some worker dudes tried to fix it. We then
went back to Neukölln to do a joint teach with the Sisters, since they
can't meet alone in the church with a male investigator. They ended up
not needing us, because they brought two sisters whose companions were
also at the leadership training meeting (they tried to let us know but
Elder Burns had the phone). So we had a pretty awesome 6 missionaries
vs 1 investigator lesson. The guy took it pretty well, haha. It could
have potentially been a pretty intimidating situation for him. To add
to that, one of the Sisters there was Sister (Jennica) Baird from
Timpview, who apparently got called to this mission like a month after
I left. Soooo flippin crazy. After that we went to Tiergarten to pick
up our companions and FINALLY, Friday night me and Elder Burns were
back in Neukölln together. Just the process of writing all that was
exhausting, let alone experiencing it :).

Other highlight is that we got to teach Marcel, the former
investigator we started meeting with last week. The guy is out of this
world. The Gospel is putting together a puzzle in his mind that he
didn't even know there was a solution to. He believes, and wants to
move forward, but work and a not so supportive family are holding him
back. But God will provide a way.

Hope y'all have an awesome week!

Elder Larsen

Hallo

Well bro, at this rate that's probably the kind of girl I'm gonna
marry. Been out for 4 months and I've already gained 16 pounds.
I'm with you though, bro. The first 12 hard weeks have made
these last couple weeks pretty sweet. Lisa, you should find out a way
to send me that talk. We have a similar talk in our apartment about
consecrated missionaries that's pretty awesome. I'm excited to hear
the true Lisa has finally been unleashed. The world better watch out.
Well, well, well, if it isn't Wouard. Good to hear things are going
well. That's a pretty crazy story, couldn't apply more to missionary
life. So many rules and so many ways to stretch them. But getting on
the wrong path can lead to consequences that can harm your entire
future. Joey, I've had similar feelings this week. One of our
investigators "is working out to be tons of work and very difficult to
work with." But Elder Burns and especially the Lord will be
instrumental in helping me through it (tehee, but really though). I'm
not sure about the 10 commandments thing, though it reminded me of a
finger thing we did in US history for learning the bill of rights.
Also: mortal kombat. Also also: the package would be nice around
Juneish I think. Your perspective is interesting Mom. You saw a
patient and compliant "sweet boy," where I see a lazy, unhelpful,
selfish boy. Things that I hope to be rid of after 2 years. Eventually
you'll have to get that hillbilly selfie Mom. Don't lose the
opportunity! Yeah Dad, typically we go out earlier now. It's actually
quite the refresher. With the extra hour of comp study and then
language study and lunch, it seemed to take ages before we got
outside. Gospel Study is going well. Elder Burns suggested that I
switch my personal study to 100% German, which is taking a little bit
of time to adjust to. Memorizing scriptures is definitely something I
need to start doing better. Every week at district meeting we're going
to start sharing a memorized scripture, which should help a lot.

So we had quite the week this week. Hours of finding and hundreds of
people, with seemingly little success. On the bright side it means we
get a looooot of practice. Either way, God definitely blessed us in
other ways. We started meeting with a former investigator who's
basically one of the the coolest people I've met in Germany so far. He
lives like a member, he believes the Book of Mormon is true, and he
wants to be baptized. He had met with the missionaries a few years
ago, but lost interest because he refused to accept that one church
could have the fullness of truth. Well the Lord has been working with
him, and he seems to be very ready to make progress. Still some
foreseeable obstacles, but this guy has tons of potential.

We also had quite the tender mercy at church yesterday. This guy
randomly came in right before Sunday School and wanted to meet with
us. After a hard past he wants to change his life...well, he came to
the right place! We had a solid lesson with the restoration and we'll
be meeting again this week. Also this week, we spent a nice chunk of
Saturday helping a member move. Nothing too out of the ordinary, but I
did find it interesting how back at home helping someone move on a
Saturday was basically the last thing I'd want to do. But on a
mission, nothing could be better! Though it would have been a wee bit
nicer if the lady didn't live on the top floor of her apartment. After
maneuvering down 2 couches, my arms could hardly even handle a few
boxes.

Anywho, keep rockin on y'all. Focus on the good, fight against the
bad, and keep making the world a better place.

Elder Larsen