December 21, 2023: Those Christmas Lights

 Keep shining on


Frohe Weihnachten Zusammen!

Im currently on a 1.5 hour train on the way to Köln, that one city with a massive cathedral. Turns out they also have a massive Christmas Market, so we're meeting the district there. 

I got my new companion! Elder Hill is his name. He's like a large Teddy Bear full of positive energy, and for the most part we both love it here in Wesel still, other than the bikes. 

The Omas of our ward are doing everything in their power to help us have a Merry Christmas, and it's incredible. We have hardly had to cook or buy anything the past week because we've had so many meal appointments, and they don't seem like they're going to stop. We are also recieveing way more candy and chocolate than two guys could ever reasonably eat. 

They celebrate Christmas for 3 days here, so we're going to have 3 meal appointments/celebrations in a row, and we're hyped. We get to go to the Netherlands (again!) For Heilige Abend (holy evening or Christmas eve), then we're by the Polish Oma Schwester Piotrowski for Christmas day. I've always asked myself, if Christmas was so good, where's Christmas 2? I'm here to proclaim the glad tidings of great joy, that in Germany Christmas 2 is real. Its literally called the second day of Christmas, on the 26th, and we're celebrating it with the Bäder family. So we're getting a Netherlandish, Polis, and a German Christmas all at once.

We got mislead into doing a service project yesterday, that was literally just Housesitting for 5 hours for the Oma below us. It felt like Home Alone, or as we like to call it "Jackson und Tage allein zuhause" because the German name for the movie is "Kevin Allein zuhause" for some reason, which sounds really funny. 

The super old Oma turned 100 yesterday tho! That was why we were house sitting, so they could celebrate. She's crazy.

We have a baptismal date again! Ich drücke die Daumen, dass es passieren wird 🤞.

We had our ward Christmas party, played trivia, ate food, and watched an Ice Age Christmas short film. We're not sure if that's allowed but it happened.

We had DRat on Tuesday this week, and we have a German in our district now! His name is Elder Berndt, and he's from a small town in Texas called Berlin. He's dying this transfer tho, and we didn't get to eat Sucuck&Chill :( Just kidding, I'm kinda getting sick of it after 18 weeks. It's for tradition though!

That's about all that happened, everybody's still super confused why I'm still here but I'm just glad I can spend Christmas somewhere I'm familiar with :)

Alma 7: 10-13
10 And behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem which is the land of our forefathers, she being a virgin, a precious and chosen vessel, who shall be overshadowed and conceive by the power of the Holy Ghost, and bring forth a son, yea, even the Son of God. 

11 And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. 

12 And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities. 

13 Now the Spirit knoweth all things; nevertheless the Son of God suffereth according to the flesh that he might take upon him the sins of his people, that he might blot out their transgressions according to the power of his deliverance; and now behold, this is the testimony which is in me.

He is the light and the life of the world, and the reason for the season. I'm not sure where I would be without the strengthening power of his atonement.

Frohe Weihnachten! 

Elder Tage Rex

Oh yeah, and there's a random tractor parade that we ran into the other day. You'll see 😅








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

November 28, 2024: I need something more than only me

Image
  First- Happy Thanksgiving!!  Second- I did not write last week. There may be some lost content but it's been a great couple weeks since my last email! We've been teaching a crazy amount of lessons and it is awesome. We have a very nice variety of languages, backgrounds, and people we're teaching. It's probably about 33% German, 33% English (often from Nigeria) and then 33% other where we have to involve translation, wether Turkish, French, or Arabic. It's super cool. We have a few people making a lot of progress: Alex: I was calling up old contacts a couple weeks ago and a Turkish lady named Alex picked up the phone and we made an appointment. We ended up meeting with her but she couldn't speak much German at all. We set up another appointment and got some translation there, and then God worked some insane miracle! We learned that she used to be Muslim but she had been reading the bible and known something was special about Jesus that she couldn't deny. Sh...
Read more

October 19, 2023: I hear there's a new hero in town

Image
  Challenge me, if you dare. This week was great! I saw a lot of little miracles, so it was nice to know God is looking out for me :)  We had interviews on Thursday! We had to head out pretty early to make our way to the city of Düsseldorf, where our stake center is located. We got to play with logos and eat candy while we waited, and it was nice to forget how old we are for a few minutes. My interview went really well actually, last time it was very short but this time my mission president, President Cropper actually helped me with a lot of what I've been struggling with. To be fair I didn't really know anything for my last interview. Our president calls the food döner (sounds closer to doo-ner) "doner"(doe-ner), but nobody's told him how to say it right for the past 3 transfers, and its pretty funny. We we did some street contacting for the Düsseldorf Elders, and did our studies there as well. As soon as we finished, we got a text from our Bishop, asking me to g...
Read more

July 26, 2023: IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII

Image
  IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII "Revenge is a dish best served cold" The Ping Pong Bandit Today I bring you rad tidings of great joy. It rained like 4 times this week! With lightning and everything, it was wonderful. Reminds me of my days long past in the state of Oklahoma, with howling wind, skies ablaze, and lightning in the air. Tis all yet but an old memory. In all seriousness, during one of our 10 minute breaks we got to run all the way downstairs and outside to play in the rain for just a few minutes. That seems like such a little thing, but you really learn to appreciate the little things when you are here. Every normal thing you get to do is just filled with wonder and amusement. Also, The sky was almost literally on fire yesterday. Sundays are incredible here! I used to not look forward to Sundays that much, but they're such a good breath of fresh air in the MTC. You get to hear your fellow missionaries bear testimony, knowing that they are going through ex...
Read more