Two-for-one temple trip

Guten Tag jeder, der diese Nachricht liest!

We drove two and a half hours to visit the Freiberg temple which is closed right now for renovations. It is amazing that an investigator and member were willing to take the time to drive down there to see a construction site. 

They turned the chapel next door into a quasi visitors center so the sisters took us in there and gave a lesson. Our investigator bore his testimony yesterday in church and said that he was grateful for the opportunity and that it brought him closer to the church. The bishopric has been complimentary because this is the most progress that he has made towards accepting the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the ten years of coming to church. 

We got a two for one as well--we were able to go to the place where President Monson dedicated Germany for missionary work in 1975! Super cool part of German church history.  See me at the plaque:

We had a really good lesson with the German girl this week. We talked about the creation and pre-earth life. I've really been able to notice a difference between the first time we met with her and now.  She is so comfortable and open.  And her attitude towards the gospel is very good.  She has lots of questions and when we answer them, she says, "Oh yeah! That totally makes sense."  Its a slow growth but I am always happy to meet with her.

We also met with the guy from Gineau Bissau whose family is living in Lisbon. He finished 1 Nephi this week and is still loving it. He watched that Freetown movie this week, the one about Mormon missionaries in Sierre Leone and was so excited. He was like, "Yeah they were baptizing people just like Jesus was baptized!" We invited him to baptism. He said he wanted to but that he wants to pray about it more to before he commits to anything.

Three really solid investigators. You gotta love a week with highlights like those.

Take care this week, everyone.

Love,

Elder Tanner Germann

Temple here we come!

Hey y'all! Hope everyone is doing well this week.

I feel like this week blew by.  We had interviews with President Fingerle on Tuesday night but that felt like forever ago. The interview went well--we had a good discussion getting to know each other and talking about the mission. 

Wednesday at district meeting I led a discussion about Christ-like attributes and why there is a whole chapter dedicated to them in Preach My Gospel. Obviously they are important so we should develop them on our missions! President Kosak once said, "If you don't learn it in the mission field, where else are you going to learn it?" Following district meeting we had a lesson with our long-time investigator. We had the feeling that we should hit the refresh button, define the ground rules, and state our purpose. We used an example of a basketball player to help us. We talked about all of the things that the basketball player must do to become a professional. A question that really struck him was, "Do you see us as coaches or fellow players?" I think the lesson was a real success. We asked him if he wanted to go see the temple with us this next week and he said yes immediately. The member who came with us who is a good friend of his is going to drive us down to Freiberg Thursday morning.  We are going to walk around the temple grounds and get a tour from the temple sisters. This could be a deciding factor for him. Think about all of five hours of travel time! Lots of time to feel the Spirit :)  I exchanged companions with Elder Greaves on Wednesday night. We went to a lesson with the German girl. It went really well. She had read the talk we had given her twice and took notes. We went through in detail the organization of the church. She wants to learn more about the creation next time.

Thursday morning we had a lesson with the German guy who is trying to quit smoking. He is having a really hard time right now because he is losing his apartment. Lots of distractions are not helping him quit. We talked about Christ-like attributes with the hope that focusing on those could help him overcome his addition.  Elder Greaves and I went finding that afternoon and found a new person to teach. We also contended briefly with a man for trying to tell us we were Satanists. He was saying stuff like, "You should really read the internet. Those Mormons are all Satanists." I don't think I would be here for two years if it weren't true. Is there a nice way to say, "I prefer to ask God, not the internet?"

We did a lot of service on Friday and Saturday.  One family is making their driveway and another bought a new apartment so they are redoing all of the walls.  Saturday night was a busy night of appointments. We got in touch with a man from Cameroon.  He has a Muslim background but very Christian views.  We are inviting the African guy that came to church the other week to baptism. He said he'd like to but he's not ready yet. Hey, it can still happen!

I am really looking forward to Thursday--this has to potential to be a miracle week. Pray for us!

Love,

Elder Tanner Germann

Change of plans

Hey family and friends, this week I experienced quite the change of
plans as I got a new companion in the middle of the transfer.
President Fingerle called me Monday afternoon to tell me that he would
be sending Elder Glissmeyer to Spandau and that Elder Williams would
be coming here to Marzahn to work with me. Elder Williams is 18 months
out on his mission and is from Utah. That night we had to be at the
mission office to make the transfer so Elder Glissmeyer only had less
than two hours to pack. I miss him a lot!

We had a jam packed day Tuesday with appointments everywhere. It was a
super productive day and we even found a new investigator in between
appointments--a single mom.

Wednesday we had a lesson with the German guy who is trying to stop
smoking. We watched a talk from Elder Bednar, "Converted to the Lord."
He really liked the example of the Lamanites burying their weapons of
war (we need to bury the weapons we have). We also had a lesson with
the man who has been coming to church for over ten years. Our member that came
bore really powerful testimony as we talked about the pre-earth
life. There are many scriptures that talk about the pre-earth life,
including Revelations, Alma 13, and Abraham 3. That night Elder
Pilling and Elder Horrocks and their companionss spend the night. It was
really good to see them again.

We had Mission Tour on Wednesday with Elder Paul V. Johnson. He did a
really nice job tying together 1 Corinthians 12 (members of the body)
and that His grace is sufficient means. At the end he brought
everything full circle by talking about how even though we all have
flaws, they don't have to distract us from fulfilling our purpose as
missionaries. We were supposed to go out with the bishopric that
night but both appointments fell through and one counselor was sick so we
ended up making some surprise visits with the bishop.

Friday we had a service project at a member's house and then that night
we attended the priesthood activity. It was a really good chance to
build a better relationship with the members and for Elder Williams to
get to know the ward.

We also had a ward activity on Saturday. One of the members we see
often brought a friend so hopefully we call meet with them together
this week. That would be really cool.

Hope everything is going well on y'all's end!

Love,

Elder Tanner Germann

Genealogy

Hello family and friends! I'm sending lots of love from Germany. I
hope everyone is well.

The middle of this week was pretty hectic. Monday night the zone
leaders called and asked us to trade companions on Wednesday. Super
short notice but we made it work. Wednesday morning we went to the
chapel in Tiergarten in order to take an Introduction to
Genealogy class. A good thing since I haven't really done it in the past. 
We were taking names from Ancestry.com and trying to fit
them into our family trees on familysearch.org. My family tree is
pretty well filled in back to the 1500's so I had a really hard time
finding new names at first. I just found a lot of problems.
Fortunately I got a second chance at it. I went on exchange with Elder
Kreutz in Tiergarten. He had to be at another district's class session
Thursday morning so I took the opportunity to try again. I actually
ended up finding a handful of names that I could add to my family tree
on familysearch.org. These are names that I can now take to the temple
sometime and do their temple work for them. That's pretty exciting!

We were all over the place Thursday. We met with a guy that was just
baptized into the Tiergarten congregation last week. His story is so cool--he
found out about the church by watching Meet the Mormons on Netflix. In
addition, he quit smoking and drinking and walked into the church the
next Sunday and said, "I want to be baptized." I was really
impressed--his understanding of the concept of repentance is
top-notch. Right after that lesson Elder Kreutz got a text from a
random number saying something like, "Hey, I got this number from
Mormon.org. I have had contact with the church in the past and have
decided that I wanted to come back. When can I come?" We texted him
back and invited him to institute that night. He came! This guy is
legit. We got to talking and he was telling us about how he wants to
find out if the church is true. He said he has watched every general
conference for the past five or so years and this past general
conference really made him want to come back. I looked and a temple
was the background on his phone. This guy was also in his twenties so
that was pretty cool. Hopefully the Tiergarten elders will be able to
help him get that testimony. Institute Thursday night was really good.
President Kosak came and taught. It was the first time I have seen him
since he was released as our mission president. His topic was the digital age 
and he used the material we have gotten as missionaries and related 
them to everyday life.

We didn't get to meet with the German girl this week... She ended up
in the hospital... Not really sure what happened but she says she's
out and okay now. Just trying not to put too much pressure there at
this point. The German guy who has been coming to church for the past
ten years or so said he would join if he got an answer that the Book
of Mormon was true. That's pretty big. We have some good members
helping out there. He went over to a member's house last night for
dinner and they're actually going on vacation together at the end of
next month. Our African-Portuguese friend came to church yesterday! I
think it was a good experience though he can't speak German. We're
assuming the German will come at some point since he can already speak
three or four other languages. It's now going to be a team effort
trying to help this one German guy that the sisters have been meeting
with. We started meeting with him,too, this week. He has a real desire
to be baptized but is struggling to quit smoking so we are trying to
help be a more powerful influence for good.

The congregation here is instituting nights out with us every week which I think
is a great idea. Things in the mission have been hectic. The goal is
to get all of the people that have been baptized in the last year to
the temple next month. They realized though that it's a logistical
nightmare trying to organize rides, both temples in Germany will be
closed by the second week of next month, et.. Hopefully everything
can get worked out.

We have a Mission Tour this week. Elder Paul V. Johnson is coming and
we will be at the zone conference in Berlin on Thursday. Lots going
on, just trying to stay organized and focused. Until next week!

Love,

Elder Tanner Germann

Lehi's dream and lessons over the phone

Hey family and friends! I hope every is going well! Here is a picture of the sunset over my part of Berlin:

I'm going to keep this note short so I'll hit the highlights.

The German girl wasn't feeling well this week so we had two lessons
over the phone. It's not the most effective thing but it was the best
we could do. I really do notice that she has a sincere desire to get
an answer. We're able to be very open and up front. She has done all
of the homework we've given her, we just need her to come to church
more.

One of our investigators came back from visiting his wife and kids in
Portugal this week. He showed up to our lesson and said, "I'm so
sorry, I forgot the Book of Mormon in Portugal but I read it and I
love it!" We had a great lesson about Lehi's dream. He really
understood it and liked it. He even said that he walked up to the
missionaries in Portugal and told them that he is meeting with us in
Germany. We just need him to come to church as well!

We are also going to be taking over the teaching of one of the
sisters' investigators this week. He has the desire to be baptized but
he is struggling to quit smoking so hopefully we can help him get
there.

This coming week will be busy. We are trading companions with the zone leaders
again. We also have a genealogy training on Wednesday. We found a
family this week and are supposed to meet them tomorrow so hopefully
that goes well.

Take care this week!

Elder Tanner Germann

Sachsenhausen, Frankfurt Oder, Baptismal Commitment, New Transfer

Hey family and friends! I hope you had a good last week of July! Can you believe it's already August again? For me, this week was all over the place but I got to do some really cool things and see some really cool places. 

On Tuesday we went to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. That was a really cool experience. First of all, there is not a lack of information. For someone to go through the whole place and read every single thing they would need about a week. But nonetheless, very informative. Aside from the sick feeling you get in your stomach when you walk through there, I was extremely surprised at how that place ran. As you learn more about it and see more of it, you realize what a nightmare it was. The whole thing is mind boggling. I'm really grateful for the experience though. I'm able to understand and appreciate what happened during WWII much better now.

The design of the concentration camp was an equilateral triangle with
all of the barracks set up in a half circle facing Tower A, the main
tower, which had a machine gun mounted on it capable of firing on the
whole camp.

We had a solid district meeting on Wednesday where we prepared and role-played for specific lessons each companionship was going to teach in the coming days. We traded companions afterwards and I went to Frankfurt Oder with Elder Allen. He is a really good guy. Just finished his training this week actually. We did a bunch of contacting that afternoon in between an English class at the university and an appointment with a member. The next morning we got up to go to an appointment with another member but that fell through. We had some really good conversations on the street and actually ended up finding a new person to teach. An 87 year-old woman was awesome. I actually heard from the Frankfurt Oder elders the other day that they went by in her and had a great lesson. They were talking about the Book of Mormon and she said something like, "when people give me something like this, I just feel like the best thing to do is educate myself and read it. Do you have a specific chapter or section that I can read?" Perfect.  Elder Allen and I also got to stop by a couple of contacts just over the river in Slubice, Poland. We got some pizza for my one year mission anniversary!

You can see that there's no border control. The missionaries are
allowed to go over the bridge when they have contacts/investigators
over the line but they are not allowed to actively proselyte. We went
by on a couple of contacts. Also, pizza in Poland 👌🏽

Friday was a great day! We committed the German girl to baptism! We decided to talk about the temple and then we led it into baptism and setting goals. She doesn't have her answer yet but she agrees that setting a goal is good so that she can work towards that. We are praying that she will get her answer in the next three weeks! We took another member to our lesson with her. He did a good job. Then he took us afterwards to two home teaching appointments. 

Our new mission president has really been laying out the new plan and direction he wants the mission to go in. The focus is to get everyone we teach to the temple so that they can partake of the blessings that come along with that. Little did we know, our lesson with the German girl went right along with that. There are no changes in our district for this upcoming transfer but there are definitely changes to other areas. They are putting more man power in the Freiburg area which is where the temple is. Also, the new trainees and those that are finishing their missions will now go to Freiburg so that they can begin and end with the temple in mind. Another big focus is trainers. The most important leaders in the mission are trainers so quite a few older, more seasoned missionaries will be training this transfer.

Interesting changes but they sound super exciting.  I'm looking forward to another six weeks in Berlin. Hopefully we will be seeing a baptism in the next couple of weeks!

Sincerely,

Elder Tanner Germann