God knows best (week 28)

My firstborn, her firstborn, my secondborn and me

District lunch

Bielefeld

Sparrenburg (for District Pday today)

Sister Fulton!

Nienburg

Hello All! Glad to hear that all is going well.

So, for lessons this week, we had one with Schwester Heumann. It went
well, and she is growing in her faith. She has a crazy work schedule
as a nurse, so she couldn't come to church, but we are meeting her
with her visiting teachers this week. We also had a lesson with the
older woman who I wrote about last week. We brought a girl in our ward
who is going to the Manchester mission in Sept and it went really
well. This woman has so much faith in God! She is super open and we
gave her the Book of Mormon on CD. Also, I love Anna and I am super
excited for her.

We had our trainer/trainee meeting in Berlin this week! We left our
apartment before 6am and didn't get home until 21! It was a long day.
Our first train into Berlin was 20 minutes late, (aka we missed our
next 3 connections) which resulted in super-stressed-Sister Simpson
running all over Berlin Hauptbahnhof. There are 5 levels there, and we
ran up and down most of them. We ended up almost being on time, but
missed the last bahn so we were 5 minutes late. #embarrassing. (We
passed Elder Powell, from Mountain View. He was leaving as we were
arriving. A huge group of Turkish elders just came into our mission
because of the stuff going on in Turkey, and Elder Powell is comps
with one of them now. So he was there picking him up.) The meeting was
great, as always. We were split into groups, and I got to be with
Sisters Fulton, Boza and Sommerfeld. We talked about what we need to
be doing better as trainers. It was nice to just see friends and to
talk about missionary work. I had a long talk with Sister Fulton on
the way to Berlin Hbh, which was great. On the train ride home, a man
leaned over and asked us how our church feels about eating animals...
We read about the word of wisdom with him in Doctrine & Covenants 89,
and he really liked it.

We also had a lesson with Ismail, a very friendly old man we met on
the street. Es ist nicht sehr gut gewesen. Haha, I don't think he is
interested at all. He was an hour late (not very fun for us or our
joint teach) and we couldn't even talk because he would just go off on
tangents about the family line that Jesus came from, which is gut, but
yeah, not exactly what we wanted to talk about. Or about random things
in the Old Testament. It was not very Christlike of me, but at one
point I wanted to hit him with the Restoration pamphlet because he
would interrupt me and keep talking.. Haha. All three of us were
pretty fed up and Sister Koch exclaimed, "Ismail! Will you read in the
Book of Mormon and pray to know if it is true?" And to demonstrate his
level of Deutsch comprehension, he nodded and said "thank you" every
few seconds. Needless to say, we will not be meeting with him again,
bless his heart. After that ordeal, we took a much need ice cream
break.

On Saturday, we went to Nienburg, a bigger city in the northern part
of our area. We tried to go by on a former investigator, but I forgot
to write down the house number. So we klingled the whole street, which
ended up being a lot longer than we thought. By the end, I had
forgotten the name we were looking for and was just offering the good
news of the gospel to everyone. In one of the last houses, the man
told us we could come back next week. It wasn't until we got home that
we realized that he was the man we were looking for. It was a tender
mercy.

We got our transfer calls again (the sister got their calls 2 weeks
early because the transfer would have ended in the middle of the
temple open house). I was really hoping to be called to be a temple
sister, but we are both staying in Stadthagen for the next 8 weeks. I
would like to say that I accepted God's will right away, but I
definitely had a grumpy prayer with God (of which I have since
repented for). I know that God always knows best and that Stadthagen
is where I am supposed to be. It feels right and Sister Koch and I are
figuring things out and finding people to teach. I said a prayer that
night and asked why, but I was reminded of all the blessings that He
has given me. I am amazed at how selfish I am and how quick to forget
all that He has given me. I am excited for the next 8 weeks. Good
things are happening. A mission is hard work, but it is the best work
because it is the Lord's work.

I don't hear a lot about what's going on in the world, but I do hear
about some things. Crazy things are going on. A lot of people ask us
how God can let these bad things happen. I am so thankful for the
peace that Jesus Christ brings. I know that He is the solution to all
the problems in the world. People do bad things, and agency is an
essential part of God's plan. But I know that it is possible to find
peace amidst all the bad things going on through Jesus Christ and His
gospel.

Have a great week. Tschüss!
Sister Simpson