Jesus Is German?, Wrestling With Comparisons, and Coincidences

Hallo Leute!

This week was a lot of fun, and we had a lot of spiritual experiences!


On Friday we met with our friend Richard, and he decided to get baptized on February 11th! It's pretty soon, but he has been prepared by God for a long time. He is such an incredible person and is so ready to dedicate his life to helping others and serving Jesus Christ. 


On Saturday we helped some friends move apartments. The dad picked us up early in the morning and at the original apartment we helped disassemble a bed and a cabinet. Afterwards we went with him to pick up the rental van. Long story short, the dad ended up having to go to work so we waited in the rundown, filled with crumbs and water bottles, a European Ford rental van at the rental agency for about 20 minutes for one of his friends to show up and take over. And that's how we met Tarek. Tarek mentioned that two missionaries had talked to him about a year ago in Düsseldorf and he was pretty sure I was one of them. It could have been one of those exchanges I was on in Düsseldorf, who knows! He was amazed that he somehow ended up in a van with two American missionaries helping a person move. It was a big testimony builder to me that the Lord puts us in people's paths for a reason. There are no coincidences in life, and from every event in our life, great and small, we can learn something. The Lord loves us so much, he concerns himself even with the little details of our lives. Every single 7.5 billion of us. All He wants is for us to be happy. Tarek is such a cool guy, and we are staying in contact!

We had a lesson on Monday at the Steinke's house, teaching their 11 year boy Leon. They wanted to make sure that Leon wanted to get baptized because he wants it, and not because his parents want it, so Leon decided himself just recently that he wants to meet with the missionaries and get baptized! He is such a good kid!


I also got to see Marco from Dortmund this week. We all went out to dinner after he got his Patriarchal blessing. It was so good to see him.


We met with the Gul'kos this week. They are an older couple in the ward who had to flee from Ukraine. She was actually the one who translated the Book of Mormon into Ukrainian! We shared a spiritual thought with a video from Elder Christofferson called the "Will of God''. It talks about how sometimes we go through hard trials in life, but sometimes God cuts us down so that we can grow to be more. I highly recommend the video! We all really felt the Spirit


Something else I have learned recently is the importance of understanding your divine potential as a son or daughter of God. Too often we compare ourselves to others, or develop inaccurate thinking patterns telling ourselves that we aren't good enough, that we are worthless, that our efforts don't matter, or that you will always be worse at something than someone else. All of those thoughts are wrong. As we come to realize that we are Spirit children of Heavenly Parents, and that we have divine potential, we also come to realize how destructive and useless those patterns of thought can be. Because of our nature as children of God, we automatically have worth.


D&C 18:10 - Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God

All we have to do is to strive our best to be like Jesus Christ. Christ's Atonement makes up for our shortcomings and weaknesses. The race is not against each other, it is against sin, and as we strive to improve, we should only ever compare ourselves to former selves and no one else. No matter how fast you make progress, remember that God loves you!


We also were in charge of giving part of the 5th Sunday class this week on missionary work, and Elder Christensen and I emphasized WWJT - Was würde Jesus tun? (What would Jesus do). That is probably the most overused Christian statement in the world, but it is still my favorite. As we seek to become better people, all we have to do each day is ask "What would Jesus do?" And then do it.


Also we met with our crazy (but really nice) friend Dirk this week. He claims that Jesus was German. Thoughts?


Sorry for the long email.....

Anyways love y'all and miss yall!


Bis nächste Woche,

Elder Allan










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