Thankgiving, Zone Conference, and Finishing Strong

November 28, 2016

   Well, glad to hear that you had a good turkey day, and that you did not over eat too much on that day as well. I really hope that the missionaries were able to have a good time at the house too--I know that spending the holidays with the members is always a fun time for the missionaries and I hope that it is for the members as well.

The weather has been pretty cold here and I cannot wait to have a short hit of warmth when I am home for a few weeks, I like the cold but working and doing stuff in it all day, every day is not my idea of fun.

   For Thanksgiving, we had a combined Zone Conference that they called “Ho Ho Zo Co” because it combines Zone Conference and the mission Christmas celebrations.  I really enjoyed it. For the zone conference part, they talked about a lot of stuff that will be happening with the mission next transfer so I listened to it but the whole time I was just kind of thinking, this stuff will have absolutely no part of my mission, so that was kind of weird to realize.  For dinner, they fed us potatoes, red cabbage, and pork. Very german, very good. 1) For our German Thanksgiving meal, we had potatoes, red cabbage, and pork. Classic German meal. Yes ma'am I got the packages that you sent for my birthday as part of the celebration and all of the food is gone already, between sharing it with other missionaries and all that fun stuff too.

   The work is going good over here and I am enjoying it for the most part.  This past week, my two favorite lessons to teach: we taught the 5th lesson in Preach my Gospel and we went through the first lesson with our baptismal candidate this past week. That is always good. We had companionship exchanges this past week with the elders in Bergedorf and I was with Elder Drazin who is an Elder from the same group as me and that was fun, we have served together a few times on the mission and we are pretty good friends.

My German is good—however, it depends, because everywhere in Germany, there are    different dialects and different words they use for different things, so I understand most German in a certain area of Germany, however if I were to go two hours southeast of here, I would understand very little of what they are saying. My companion’s German is pretty good, so that makes life easy, he has trouble at times understanding the members here because he has heard a different kind of German his whole mission so he is used to something completely different than what they speak here.

   My favorite thing to study this past week was writing a lot of stuff for finishers (mom note: missionaries who are close to leaving) about what I learned on my mission and the lessons I have learned on the mission and all that stuff that I give to President in Freiberg when I finish, it has given me time to really reflect and think about my mission a lot. It was nice.

   For Pday, we are going to practice instruments and play foosball and that kind of stuff at the church.

   They did not really announce tithing settlements but the active German members are pretty 

active about going to the Bishop about that kind of stuff I think.

   I hope that you have a good week too, and just so you know my plan for my last Pday, I am just going to send a mass email to everyone about what I have learned on the mission and feeling about the last two years and calling it good. If you have any questions you want to ask me you can, but I do not think I will feel too much like writing my last Pday on the mission between packing and taking care of stuff for coming home. Just so you know my plan.

   Scripture of the week: Luke 2:10 “And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.”

   Quote of the week: "We can feel joy even while having a bad day, a bad week, or even a bad year!" Russell M. Nelson

Love,

Elder Fisher

Elder Fisher and Elder Bullion next to the Christmarket in Lauenburg.
A tourist took this picture and sent it by e-mail to Elder Fisher's parents.

This is the picture from "Ho Ho Zo Co" in Hamburg---can you find Elder Fisher?

This is the picture from the "Ho Ho Zo Co" in Berlin

Birthday, Focusing on Missionary Work, and Abendbrot

November 14, 2016

   For my birthday, we had dinner at a member’s home. We had Abendbrot which consists of bread, butter, cheese, and meats. It is one of my favorite things about Germany and I will definitely be missing it as well when I am not here anymore. We also had something called Grünkohl this past week and Schweinfleisch, and Kartoffeln, another very classic northern German winter meal.

It's snow time!!

   My new companion is Elder Bullion and he is from Tennessee and has lived in Kentucky as well, he is a convert of about 4 years now, he is REALLY into music and wants to go into music education as well. Before the mission he graduated high school and he also worked for some sort of factory and that is how he paid for his mission.

   Our plans for Pday are once again, emails, lunch, and naps.

   So we are going to have Zone Conference on Thanksgiving and they do usually make us food, but it is not a Thanksgiving traditional meal but a traditional German meal. I will be getting my packages on Thanksgiving.

   We met a very nice lady from Ghana this past week and we taught her the first lesson.

The Christmas Markets will be up in a couple weeks here and we will be going to go and see them and I am super excited to see them again, I love these markets.

   The investigators are coming along pretty good, we are hoping to get at least one in the water before I head out and so we are working on it. The companion and I are doing pretty good, I knew him from my MTC group.  I think that we have both changed since the MTC. I am trying to make the last few weeks good by not thinking about going home. I have actually gotten a lot better since my last companion left since all he talked about was home and kept saying that I am going home soon. I liked my last companion but that made it difficult to focus.

   It sound like the missionaries are doing some work over there, I would love to stay in California just to help them get people to church and stuff--that is a huge thing I am going to miss after my mission, missionary work. I know I can still do it, but it won't be the same.

Scripture of the week: 3 Nephi 17: 21 “And when he had said these words, he wept, and the multitude bare record of it, and he took their little children, one by one, and blessed them, and prayed unto the Father for them.

Quote of the week "whom the Lord calls, he qualifies." Thomas S. Monson

Love,

Spencer

Celebrating a Birthday on a Mission, Bad Bentheim Ward, and Thanksgiving plans

November 9, 2015

Elder Fisher’s dad asked: “Well, you're a year older but the question is, are you any wiser?  Did your companion sing happy birthday to you in German?  Any cake?”

Elder Fisher in his new suit.

And here is Elder Fisher’s response:

   Well the wise man built his house upon the Rock and I haven't even built a house yet so that might be saying something dad. My companion and most of the Germans sang the Happy Birthday song in English so that was pretty cool I guess. I didn’t get cake—but I got an apple pie from a member in my ward like 3 days after my birthday so that was good. As for the rest of my birthday, we spent it at a district meeting and the district sang Happy Birthday to me. We then had a lesson with a less active member and it was super spiritual and good.  For the last part of the day, since my companion had a meeting the next day in Hamburg, we drove somewhere and overnighted in a place called Leer (about 80 miles from Bad Bentheim) and those elders made dinner for us and it was a fun day (just not a lot happened).

   As for the Bad Bentheim ward, yes, we do have a branch ward mission leader. We are not sure what we are teaching in our monthly Sunday school (which is next week) but I am sure it is something good. We usually check it a few days before so we are not quite sure yet. Our ward does have the annual Primary Sacrament Presentation--it is next week here and the whole ward is so excited about it too.

   Since our ward covers so many cities, we work a lot in certain cities.  We decide which city we are going to visit and we go and work in one city for a few hours.  Then we switch cities after a few hours and basically, we set up our appointments to go with the cities we are.

   As for Thanksgiving, Germany doesn't really celebrate Thanksgiving but we have a zone conference that day so it is kind of a celebration for the missionaries.  However, there is a lot of Christmas stuff out already but the stores are not enclosed malls here--I would say everything it set up pretty close to how the W_______ Shopping Center near home is set up—all the doors open to a central area and the center area is open.

   I am looking forward to our Christmas call—you asked if I could read part of the Christmas story…can I read the scripture from Luke when the Angel visits the shepherds in the field?   I am excited to meet my future sister-in-law at Christmas during our Skype call.  I hope that they can get everything for the wedding planned, too.  Instead of holding up my pictures for the photos, I heard of these things called cardboard cut outs and that might work for me so I can be in the family pictures.

   Scripture of the week 1 Corinthians 13:4 "Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up," 

Quote "I don't know many things, but I know some things" -someone

   Thanks for all of the stuff and the birthday email, I hope you have a good week. Love ya mom and dad.

Love

Elder Spencer Fisher