Moin!
It is really starting to get about that time where it gets harder and harder to sit down and write something. It is hard to put all your thoughts and experiences down after an eventful week. You are not sure where to begin or how to explain everything that has happened in a few
short paragraphs before times runs out and so you aren't spending your entire day writing letters. It is rather taxing on the brain, or at least for me. But as you all now this last week we just had Christmas (Woot!). And of course with that comes lots of thoughts and feelings
and also lots of events depending on the kind of person you are.
However on this very week I happen to find myself in polished black shoes, a tie, and a name tag. Not your average wear for the holiday season mind you. I naturally still have the same responsibilities of a missionary. There is no time to be looking for eggnog and mistletoes haha. But of course in Germany there are 3 days set apart for the Christmas holiday and they even open up there presents a day earlier
than us. But before we get to that lets take a step back for a moment.
What kind of things happened before this 3 day shut-down of the entire country. For the sake of time I will simply start with Tuesday. Once again because i find myself still in the lovely position of
District-Leader, I have the responsibility of going on exchanges. This time it was done more out of emergency than out of simple regulation. Because Elder Schulte has been in the apartment with Elder Stank all week. And it was driving him crazy, basically he needed some fresh
air. And it is strains the mind to sit in an apartment all week doing nothing when you are on a mission supposed to be going out there and doing something. So we had an exchange woo! Which honestly didn't bother me at all because I love Elder Schulte. We didn't have much
planned for the day other than an appointment with a man that we had
found the night before. But that didn't stop us from doing some wonderful things here in Cottbus. So it was your average white day meaning we had nothing but finding planned for the day except for this one appointment. But nonetheless Elder Schulte and I manage to have a good time and have a ton of great conversations, we even manage to get a couple of numbers which is actually a lot better than you might think. You can still get an appointment out of that later on. But anyways we are walking along and talking to as many people as possible because we are missionaries and I honestly think street contacting is
great when you have the right attitude about it. But we stop this lady and at first it seems as if she is just going to give us an excuse and then keep walking but instead she went on to explain to us that she had always seen the missionaries in the Bahn (tram) or on the street but she was never spoken to by one of them. But on this particular day she had the feeling that she would meet us today. You can imagine that Elder Schulte and I were quite surprised when we heard that. But yeah basically we got her number and we are going to make an appointment out with her after the holiday season. Naturally Elder Schulte and I felt pretty good about that and it just made us even more pumped to go and talk to people. Actually we went to the Christmas-Market and got crepes haha what?! We were hungry but don't worry we started up a conversation with the lady making the crepes for us. Haha shortly thereafter it was about time to head back to the apartment. But we thought why not we will walk a little bit more down the street and then turn around and head back home on the other side of the street.
And at first there weren't that many people and even less of those who would talk to us for more than 5-10 seconds. But just before turning around and heading back to the apartment there was one more girl on the street, and she looked kind of young but I thought aaw why not, and so I talk to her and she turns out to be only 16. So my assumption was right and then we began to ask her about what she does for the
Christmas and that is where things turned a little bit sad. She said
she didn't really spend Christmas with her family, and then we asked her if she was religious at all and nope not at all, and then we asked her what it would mean to her if she could know that there was a God.
And then she said she didn't really think much about it or would know what it mean if there was one, and as you can see this conversation is just going down hill. But I am trying to sympathize with her being born and raised in the east Germany so not a lot of religious
influence and she wouldn't really know what it would mean. And then she said well if I think if there was a God I probably wouldn't be in the situation that I am in now. And for a second I hesitated but then I asked her why she thought that way and that is when we found out that she hasn't even lived with her parents for the past few years and she is just living in a home with other kids despite her very own parents living in the same city as her. And I am not sure where the turning point was but we starting talking about God and giving testimony that he was there and that he loves us and has a plan for us and then we talked about prayer and that she should try praying to him and asking him if he is there. And then a couple minutes later we asked her again what it would mean if she could know that there was a God and she thought about it for a second and then she said, well I think i would look at the world differently if i knew he was there. It was really a tender moment and we ended up getting her number and setting out an appointment for this week. It is moments like those when I am really happy to be a missionary and to be there to try give
those hope who might be having a rough time. Sometimes it may seem like we are just trying to get people to join our church or take advantage of their difficulties in life. But I have never felt that
way I truly know that the message of the Gospel will be a light and a help in each and every persons life that decides to live according to its principles. Haha unfortunately I spent too much time talking about a few experiences and i am now out of time. But there were lots of
moments like that this week and I wish i could tell you all about them but alas i must go! We will see what comes out of this next week.
Anyways I love you all and wish you a happy new year!
Guten Rutsch!
Tschüss,
Elder Foster
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