Herrlich Einfach und Einfach Herrlich

Das Evangelium ist herrlich einfach und einfach herrlich. The gospel is gloriously simple and simply glorious! Yes?

I would have to say so myself. Its such an amazing experience being able to testify to everyone I see something so gloriously simple and so simply glorious as YOU have a father in heaven and he loves you! How glorious is that!? Or....There is a PROPHET on the EARTH! TODAY! What? Glorious...simply glorious. Another thing I have found gloriously simple and simply glorious is well....all of Germany and how these incredible German people live. Almost everyone is BLUE (color code reference, if you dont know what I am talking about, please email Bob Rasmussen for an appt to learn more:) seriously, from all the students to all these old people they all know where everything goes and everything has a place. From where they put their garbage (all separated, ew the food is the worst, a random bucket of all our leftovers..bleahhhhh) anyway to their baskets they take shopping. Zum beispiel (for example) i saw a man, walking his perfectly tuned bike, super european shoes, nice jeans, little man purse shoulderbag thing, ipod headphones in, new haircut....walking down the innenstadt of Freiberg. Or to the old lady all bundled up-looking good, rolling behind her, her little bag of groceries. Yeah we have to bring our own bags to the store, so all you see all day are old people (with what looks like roller backpacks but lighter) going to and from kaufland.. And they have a little place to tie up your dog while you are in the store, ill take a picture, yeah Germans actually walk their dogs...actually yesterday  we met a lady who was walking her cat. Floria was her name. (the cat, not the lady-you can tell what im focused on :) So they take care of their animals here. So they all eat healthy, ride bikes, here in Freiberg there are a lot of well to do people so audis all over and well, they just seem to have it all....except the gospel.

How do you try and get through to someone about the need for the gospel when they think they have everything they need? You dont, its definitely in this perspective that I see the Lord prepares people, and peopel have to be humble enough to listen. So its a blessing to know there are humble prepared people here, we just need to sift through the others to find them. And we have, we have finding goals, and scheduling appointments daily is of couse one of them, so we are constantlyfinding and scheduleingg, andwe have a lot going on, busy busy days, the kingdom is definitely growing here!

Sister Singer and I have recently gotton closer and laughed more often through our rejection. We decided REJECTION is a universal language. Doesnt matter what language you speak, the body language and facial expressions are (first of all hilarious) and of couse definitely get the point across. Hahahaha, I dont know why it is so hysterical to me, but especially the dramatic people...if we mention the words 'God' or 'Church' they immidiately well, almost throw up on you. It blows my mind how we can physically effect people by these small beautiful simple words. Haha, one lady made sort of a 'blleaahach' sound when we told her Christ visited the Americas- like she had just eaten something rotten. What? What is the big deal....  haha or, I ansprached this lady and she just said 'nie' over and over again, I said like 9 words and I think she said NIE like 38 times! Freak out. I really think they mistake what we are saying like we are saying something horrible, like offering cigarettes to a baby! Maybe its my German.....

Speaking of my German, the Lord is helping me immensely. (immensly?) Oops, welp there goes my English too. I can understand....almost everyone! And I can respond..sometimes I sound like a 3 year old, but more or less I get my point across. Actually to explain my point I'll tell a story.

THERE ARE PREPARED PEOPLE HERE... (that shall be the title of my story)

Sister Singer got a referral from some elders like a week before she got me. His name is Herr Himmel (Mr. Heaven in english)....and he had to cancel 2 appts cause he has been sick. Well we just met with him for the first time this last Friday. He is about.....50? years old. We just had a discussion about LIFE. The purpose of it, beliefs in God and Christ etc, he gave us all these lessons theories etc and they were all doctrine of the gospel! (more or less) example he said the world is just getting worse and worse, there are so many distractions, like on telephones these days, what is the phone for? To call people, oh but now there are  pictures, and emails, and games and EVERYTHING you would need, and yes thats nice, but its all for money and the basic function isnt that important anymore. Okay I butchered his theory but we talked about things to this nature, and it was all in German and I got it all! We taught him the first lesson and he really already knew all of it...of course God is our Heavenly Father, of course our families are from God and are for us to have joy. Of course Christs church and authority was taken off the earth when the apostles died. Oh and of course Joseph Smith saw God and Christ and translated the Book of Mormon. ... well okay that last one he didnt know, but he acted like it! He just accepted it and when we were done talking he asked, 'So where do we go from here?' Sister Singer said. 'Well we can give you a Book of Mormon and gottesdienst -Church service- is tomorrow and then Baptism etc' and he said Well first I definitely want a Book of Mormon, and I can't come tomorrow, but I will be here next week, and maybe a little bit later baptism. ON THE FIRST APPOINTMENT! He has 4 kids (never menitoned a wife and we didnt ask) but he said as he was leaving, the kids will enjoy hearing knew stories of Christ, so much action! We said, oh yeah there is A LOT of action in this book too! GOLD! We found GOLD in Freiberg.. So that was the miracle on Friday (we have miracles everyday incase you didnt catch that)

OH and Last email I mentioned Sister Singer was leaving me!?!  Well she did. We had a Tausch (splits) and ANOTHER GOLDEN came to me in Freiberg. Im going to try and attach pictures, and the random sister on the train with me-Thats sister Madsen. Shes serving in Magdeburg. We all met in Dresden and Sister Singer was staying there and I was taking Sister Madsen back to Freiberg. Well the next two trains back to Freiberg ...on the little flippy train times chart (those who have been to Europe know what Im talking about right?) well only on the Freiberg trains it said 'ZUG FÄLLT AUS' -TRAIN FELL OUT!???! What? So we took a picture underneath the sign, hope the pictures work so you can see.

Two poor goldens not going back home.. haha well we had about an hour to wait til our real train came so we went out in the platz in Dresden and got a contact some muslim guy his phone number and address for the Dresden sisters (youre welcome :) and then got back to Freiberg. We had a great time! I knew where I was going! We definitely had some Golden Power...we scheduled two termins (appts) and had some really spiritual conversations with people on the street. We went and met with Sandy, our new convert, and she enjoyed showing Sister Madsen her pictures of her baptism...well all in all, im still alive and us two goldens made it back to Dresden to our 'moms' safe and sound.

The weather has been AMAZING here...clouds are incredible as ever, Ill try and attach pictures, the one outside our window of the pink clouds..that was this mornings sunrise! AHH! Sunrise and sunset means- I LOVE YOU! I definitely feel our Heavenly Fathers love being in this gorgeous city of Freiberg. Someone (I think it was Richard Portwood actually) told me that 'the sunset is the Lords signature on the day.' Pretty cool thought yeah? Beautiful signature.

Im loving being a missionary, and if you know of anyone who has the idea of serving a mission going through their heads....KICK THEM IN THE PANTS AND GET THEM OUT HERE! It is the most incredible experience (haha, and I dont even know! Ive only been out in Germany for a wittle bit of time) But ive already met people I will know the rest of my life. For example this Chinese student Ding Ge...we taught her the plan of salvation last night, I dont know that the Lord has his store for her and her progression (for me its lookin pretty WET if you know what I mean ;) (get it...baptism...oh forget it. :) and she was like 'durften wir ein photo zusammeln machen?' YEAH! Of course we can take a picture together! (I took one too, hope you can see it) 

I know I will talk to her for a long time, and these people are so cool! The people I am going to meet . . . wow Im just speechless. And the spiritual experiences I ahve had, there is absolutely no reason in the world to not serve a mission. Nothing is better! YAY missionary work.

I wanted to write the lyrics of one of my favorite hymns ´that has meant a lot to me this week...

I stand all amazed at the love Jesus offers me

confused at the grace that so fully he proffers me

I tremble to know that for me he was crucified

and for me, a sinner he suffered, he bled and died.

oh it is wonderful that he would care for me enough to die for me

oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me.

We have been visiting this old 85 year old lady in the hospital Schwester Houschka, I think ive told you about her, well when she laughs she looks like Grandma Dot did. Identically, and I can almost hear 'WONDERFUL' the way Grandma Dot said it. (no of course she speaks mumbled soft German that I barely catch) but it has been such a blessing having her in our life, and remembering our dear Grandma Dot...So that has reminded me of that hymn I stand all amazed. And I do, I get to be here in GORGEOUS FREIBERG, talking and being hysterically rejected or sincerely listened to by these awesome children of God, serving with a stellar companion, being in a ward of incredibly dedicated members and yes, I stand all amazed.

Have a lovely week. Dont let the little things distract you from the big picture, EWIGE FAMILIE. Eternal families...thats it, lets all work every day to live the gospel of Jesus Christ to be worthy to stand before our father and creator and be able to stand with full confidence in our devotion to building the Kingdom, to live with our parents, siblings, children, friends all these loved ones forever and ever and ever and ever and ever! YAY! Tschüss!

-Sister Rasmussen