Nephi's Courage

I kind of want to start backwards this week, talking about yesterday, Sunday. A lot of cool things happened this week, but to be honest this week was HARD. I'm learning more and more that joy doesn't really come from external circumstances. Not much has happened on some of my favorite weeks of the mission, but even though cool stuff happened this week, it was rough. I just think Satan was snapping at my heels all week - trying (and sometimes succeeding) at getting me down and trying to get me to mentally beat myself up. How rude, right? So anyway, we finally made it to Sunday and someone who had promised to come to church didn't show up, and it had been a hard week, and so I was looking forward to being able to sit in church and not have to teach or really talk tons during the meetings. We went on splits because Sister Threlkeld needed to play in Primary because the normal pianist was sick, so I went to Young Women's. I love Young Women's. There's like 5-7 in this ward which is wonderful (especially since we had none in my last ward,) and so I loved being there. The lesson was about how we can always choose to be happy and find joy. It definitely was relevant.

Then I went and joined Sister Threlkeld in PV. It was junior singing time, and the kids are just so gosh-darn cute. They started singing Nephi's Mut (Nephi's Courage,) which is a song talking about the Book of Mormon prophet Nephi and how he chose to follow God and do what he was commanded to, even though it took a lot of courage and his brothers weren't totally on-board. I was singing along with the Children's Songbook (because lol I don't know those words in German,) and the third verse jumped out at me (but for simplicity here it is in English,): 

"The Lord gives us commandments and asks us to obey.

Sometimes I am tempted to choose another way.

When I'm discouraged and think I cannot try,

I will be courageous, and I will reply:

I will go I will do the things the Lord commands

I know the Lord provides a way, He wants me to obey"

On the chorus all the kids were marching around the room (so cute) and I honestly almost started crying. It was exactly the pep-talk I needed to keep going. It was really wonderful.

Anyway, we got transfer calls and Sister Threlkeld and I are staying another transfer together here in Stuttgart! Yay! It's so crazy because my first 3 transfers were all different and then my next 3 stayed exactly the same. This will be a big transfer. We both have birthdays, I hit my half-way mark, (entschuldigung, was?) and Sister Threlkeld goes home. Whoaaaaaa. Elders Sharp and Ridd are staying as well. Party! We're excited.

By the way, I don't think I talked about the crazy connection that's happening with me and Stuttgart ward right now. There are 3 Elders serving from Gemeinde Stuttgart right now. Two are in the Berlin mission, and one is in Frankfurt. Elder Frey, in Frankfurt just happens to be companions with Elder...ROBERTS from MY ward at home! And, to even add to it, they're serving in Gemeinde Erlangen, where the Stuttgart Ward's Bishop's wife is from. So when her family visits her in Stuttgart or the bishop's family visits her family in Erlangen...there's always someone who's like "Elder Roberts says hi" and it's weird how close we are even though we're all the way over here. The Primary kids wrote letters to the Elders this week. I snuck in a note to say hi. :) Crazy connection, right?

Anyways. At the beginning of last transfer, Sister Threlkeld and I made a goal that we wanted to try and get members more involved with the teaching of investigators - inviting them along as joint teaches, teaching in their homes, etc. It's been great because we've had more opportunities to do that, especially this week. Member lessons are great but they also give me anxiety. Like, it makes me empathize with my Elementary school teachers when the principal would just stroll in and watch them teach for a while. I'm always worried that I'll say something wrong and the members will like, lose confidence in the missionaries and be less inclined to invite their friends to meet with us. I was feeling this especially strongly before one particular lesson this week, but it ended up melting away during the lesson because (news flash,) they're there to help. Member joint teaches are seriously the best. They add so much to the lessons. Everyone text the missionaries in your ward like right now and tell them that you can help out if they need it. I can tell you that it seriously adds SO MUCH. (And that family even texted us that night and said that they really enjoyed the lesson and felt the Spirit - phew!)

So funny story from after that particular appointment. Sister Threlkeld and I were walking back to the Bahn station when we saw the Bahn pull in. They only come every 10-15 minutes, so we didn't want to have to wait for the next Bahn, so we broke into a full-on run after that Bahn. (We weren't super far, but we had a full flight of stairs to climb and a bit of a gleis [platform] to run.) I got a little ahead and this really nice man saw me sprinting and held the door so I could get on. So nice, right? So I'm standing there huffing and puffing and I turn around to make sure Sister Threlkeld was right behind me. She had just gotten to the Bahn and the doors started to close, but that happens all the time. You just push the button to open the doors again. Well, she went to push the button...and it didn't open. And the Bahn started to PULL AWAY. Ah!!!!!!!!! (For those of you who don't know...there is a rule that you have to stay with your mission companion 24/7.) We weren't super far from home so I just rode the 3 stations or so and sat on the Bahn Gleis. Alone. It was so weird. It was the first time I had been without any kind of missionary since June. Sister T got there like, 10 minutes later, but we laughed pretty hard. It was crazy.

A - L - O - N - E ! ! !

Remember Fasching, the crazy Mardi-gras-like holiday here? We got to go help with the Primary Fasching party at the church on Tuesday - it was so fun. It was Frozen themed, which was especially funny since Sister Threlkeld still hasn't seen it. There were snowflakes everywhere, and like 6 Elsas. The German soundtrack was playing and I found that I couldn't remember all the lyrics (awkward,) but it's okay. I ran the "Pin the Nose on Olaf" station, which was super fun. And, even better, a ton of kids/parents had invited friends, so we got to meet tons of people who had never been in the church before! It was so fun.

Sister Bushman and Sister Threlkeld 

We also had a really really cool experience dooring this week. Dooring isn't always the most fun thing to do, but as we were walking down the street I saw this one building and was like "Sister Thrrelkeld, we need to door that one." I don't know. Just had a feeling. So we went over and kinglet (rang) the top one, who let us up. He wasn't interested, but we decided to door all the way down anyway. The next 2 people weren't interested, but something way interesting happened...we asked if they knew anyone trying to find God or needed Hope, and they both were like "Oben, links". Upstairs, on the left. Two said the same door. They weren't home, but we're going back! Also, we knocked on this other lady's door who said she was Greek Orthodox and not interested and didn't know anyone who would have interest, but Sister T did something cool. At Mission Tour, President Kohler and Elder Kearon were both like "How great would it be if you just knocked on someone's door and asked if you could bless their home, ministered to them, and just talked about the goodness of Christ?" Sister Threlkeld asked if we could come in and pray with this woman. She said we could. She asked if I would say the prayer. We couldn't like bless the house in a priesthood-way, but we prayed for her health and safety and for her son, who had been in an accident a couple years ago. We could tell the Spirit had touched her. She thanked us, and said we are welcome to come back sometime. It was really, really cool.

Last P-day we went up to the outlook at Killesberg - basically you climb this really cool tower and then you can see EVERYTHING and luckily it was a clear day, so we really could see everything in Stuttgart - so fun. Today all the Elders and us are being taken by an American family to the Ritter Sport chocolate factory in Tübingen - we're so excited! So that'll be fun.

At Killesberg

Oh, random. I'm an official missionary because my shoes are falling apart. I feel like it's part of the experience to have ghetto shoes. Sadly I just barely bought these boots in Wien. Oh well. I just hope they hold up through this winter. Although I don't think the hole is repairable. Sadly.

Oh. And today I shared some Cheez-its I had acquired with our Bulgarian investigator and she thought they were disgusting. It was so funny, the face she made. It's interesting how tastes vary around the world.

Sending love.

Schwester Bushmann

One more photo . . .

Stuttgart!

Mission Tour!

This week was craaaaaaaazy, because we had MISSION TOUR! It was so fun. But I'll get to that in a second.

Since we got to trek off to München for a few days, we tried to cram and conquer as much as we would do in a normal week into 2 less days and ALMOST DIED. Well, not really. But Sister Threlkeld and I concluded that Tuesday was the busiest day that either of us have ever had on our missions. We had 4 appointments scheduled PLUS a really important person we needed to go by on and talk to PLUS Gemeinderat (Ward Council,) so we made a bunch of pizza the night before while planning and cut it into strips so we could just chew on pizza between appointments because we literally didn't have time to eat. Luckily one appointment had to be moved so we were able to do all of our studies and then eat proper lunch before we skidaddled out the door, but when we got home at 9:15 that night--having somehow successfully conquered everything that was planned--Sister Threlkeld and I did the mightiest high-5 that has even happened. And then crashed.

The day after we had an appointment with this woman named Frau Baur, whom Sister Erdenetsogt and I met while on tausch. She's 80 years old and lived through the war, and told us all about it. It was so crazy - she's from Augsburg (shout out, Sister Smiley!) and she talked about when she was a little girl, all the school kids were shipped out away from the city into the countryside to protect them from bombs. She said that a nun tried to leave her with this one family but she refused to stay because they had had a daughter die in the exact bed she would have to sleep in...understandable. So she went to a different family. But it was really cool because when we were teaching her she said she was Catholic and staying Catholic - and that we all believed in Christ, and what was the big deal if people were Katholisch or Evangelisch or Zeugne Jehovah or Mormone or whatever. I answered with a story. When I was a kid, I LOVED vanilla ice cream. Peter always liked chocolate, with chocolate sauce on it. People would always ask if I wanted chocolate sauce, but I said no, because I didn't like it. (I had never actually tried it - I just had somehow convinced myself that I would hate it. This is a totally true story.) One day, I gave in and put hot fudge on my vanilla ice cream and almost DIED because it was SO GOOD. The Gospel is a lot like that. People often say "I have my faith and I'm happy." And it's a difficult place to be, because you don't want to be all like "Nu-uh," because they do have faith and they do feel joy. But it's like hot fudge. They're eating the delicious vanilla ice cream of the Bible and of Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father. But what about the hot fudge of The Book of Mormon and modern-day revelation and eternal families sealed in the beautiful temple?! You never know until you taste it! It was really cool because she totally understood my point. 

But the biggest excitement of the week was definitely MISSION TOUR! We woke up early on Thursday, overnight backpacks in tow, and headed to München. It was really fun to chat with all the missionaries on the way. We don't actually see each other that often - so this was like, the most social 48 hours of my whole mission so far. We arrived in München, where I got to see a huge chunk of my MTC group (including Sister Angeloudis who took my place in Wien and whom I haven't seen since we first got here,) and have a beautiful day with Elder Patrick Kearon of the Europe Area Presidency. He took the time to meet every single one of us, which was super cool. He knew the Bushmans, which was really cool. He had lots of nice things to say. He focused on 2 primary themes, which were both really beautiful and inspiring and uplifiting.

The first thing was obedience. He talked about how when obedience becomes our GOAL, it becomes less of a "stumbling block" and more of a "building block." It was really fun, because he not only brought the Spirit, but made it very discussion-oriented and laughed a lot. He talked about how a lot of things on a mission are out of our hands, but the one thing that is 100% in our control is our mornings. He went on this really funny rant about how we should not only be obedient, but obedient with real intent, (so like, really meaning it.) He was like - "We're up at 6:30! And then we pray! Pray with real intent! And then what's after that? Exercise! Exercise with real intent - you need to sweat! And then SHOWER. Shower with FULL INTENT. And eat a breakfast with VITAMINS!" We were all laughing with him as he went because it sounded really funny but was actually totally true. We can control how obedient we are with our normal routines, and they make a difference over time.

The other theme is that we are Children of God. I was a little surprised about the theme, but it ended up being absolutely beautiful. He talked about how what we said has a "currency value." Things we say often start to become less valueable to us, because we've heard them over and over and over again. A big thing is "I am a Child of God." We say that so so so so much. But how often do we really think about it? The Salzburg Elders shared an experience where they were teaching this girl and they were like "You are a daughter of God, and He loves you." And she started to cry. And they were both kind of taken back by it because they're so used to that, but she had never thought about that before. When that mere knowledge becomes a part of us - it changes us. Knowing that we are quite literally beloved daughters and sons of a Heavenly Father - that makes a difference. It's an experience more than knowledge. It was absolutely beautiful. It truly got me thinking.

Also, I got to lead the music which was SO FUN. It was really loud as we sang "Auswerwählt zu Dienen" (Called to Serve). I love that song!

This is what an army of Elders looks like . . . 

. . . along with a couple of Sisters!

With the Parkers, from Wien

After Tour, most of the missionaries went home and the Zone Leaders and the Sister Training Leaders stuck around to find some dinner before we came back to watch an Elder Holland MTC devotional that evening. I did some math with Sister Freeke in Switzerland - there are  comps of sisters in Switzerland and 11 outside...meaning that this transfer, there are literally 36 sisters in the WHOLE mission. That's crazy. But it fluctuates, so it'll surely come back up. :) Anyway. Tangent. So it's a TINY sliver of the Elders, and almost half of the sisters in the mission that stayed. We went with the Wien Sisters and the Salzburg Sisters to this burrito place that almost tasted like America, and we caught up about life and how Wien is doing and it was just WONDERFUL. That night, watching an MTC devotional in the dark next to Sister Wilkes, I literally felt like I was back in the MTC again. It was really familiar and really nice. That night we went to a hostel - I was really excited because I remember learning about hostels in my German class in high school. It's basically a low-quality hotel that you can rent really cheap. It was nice. We just got there and basically hit the sheets because we were all really tired - but the been-a-while-on-a-mission part of me was like "Oh my gosh we're sleeping in the same building as Elders" but like obviously nothing happened so all is well.

Sisters Angeloudis, Bushman, Fenton, Wilkes, Threlkeld, Cherrington

We had MLC (Mission Leadership Council) with Elder Kearon the next day. It was really wonderful - it was again, pretty discussion oriented and there was this moment where things got super real and Elder Kearon picked up that we were all kind of down on ourselves. And I can't adequately rephrase or restate what he said, so I'll just say that he showed us a lot of love and encouragement and leave it at that. It was nice. We then headed home - but it took like, 3 more hours that we thought because we had to get off our train in a tiny town in the middle of Augsburg area with the Freiburg missionaries because someone had jumped in front of a train down the tracks. :( That seems to happen a lot here. It's really sad.

Wow, this email is getting really long. Did I mention that it's Fasching right now? Well, it's actually tomorrow. Fasching is basically Mardi Gras - except it lasts like, 2 months and you dress up like it's Halloween and eat Berliners and kids have the whole week off. I couldn't figure out what the heck it was for the longest time, but all I know is that tomorrow Sister Threlkeld and I are helping out at the Primary Fasching party tomorrow and it's Frozen themed...so that'll be fun. :)

Eating a "Berliner" -- a jelly-filled donut, popular during Fasching

Remember how I mentioned a while back that Sister Threlkeld and I were going to sing in church? haha. Well. We did, but there was a bit of a scurcuffle where we thought we had an accompanist but didn't really adequately confirm and then thought we didn't but couldn't find anyone else because it was last minute and then we were going to do it a cappella AND THEN we thought nobody really knew so we could just like, not do it...and then as we were sitting in church the 3 of us were called up to the stand to perform, so we just explained what we wanted to do right there and did it. It definitely wasn't as polished as what we sang on Christmas Eve, but some people were still really nice and said they felt the Spirit as we sang and that's what is important, so we were happy that it went well.

Happy Valentine's Day from Sister Bushman and Sister Threlkeld!

I love you! Happy Fasching! Happy life! Have a nice week!

Sister Bushman

The Miracle of the Mongolian Steamer

Liebe Freunde u. Familie,

You're probably wondering why the title of my email is so absolutely odd - it's because we went on TAUSCH (exchange) this week! I often feel really jealous of the Elders because they get to tausch so much more...they'll often go on 3-6 tausches in a transfer, while we just go on one, since there are so few sisters in the zone (and the mission, for that matter.) BUT we went this week! I worked in Stuttgart again, (I still have never seen Tübingen,) but this time I worked with Sister Erdenetsogt! Sister Erdenetsogt is from Mongolia and kind of a super-star in my eyes because 1. I read her companion's blog (dork) before my mission and therefore knew who she was, and 2. She submitted her mission papers from Wien where she previously lived, so everyone in my first area knew her and talked about her all the time, so I was super excited to work with her. 

Anyway, so the crazy story from tausch. The 4 of us met up at a station at the edge of Tübingen's area, so that we could switch comps and drive back. We have these really fancy (and expensive) year-long cards that let us ride around our area without having to buy tickets every day or week or whatever. We had only like, 2 minutes between when our train showed up and the next one left, so we were booking it on and off the correct platforms. Sister Erdenetsogt brought this Mongolian food steamer thing with her, she borrowed it from this Mongolian lady they're meeting with in Stuttgart, and was planning to bring it back that night. As soon as Sister Erdenetsogt and I got on the train and breathed in and out, Sister Erdenetsogt asks, "you have Sister Threlkeld's card, right?" Shoot! She was totally schwarzfahring! (Riding without a ticket - yikes!) We looked down the train and saw big security people who worked for Deutsche Bahn - ahh!!! They were security gaurds, not ticket-checking people, but still! We got off at the very next stop so Sister Erdenetsogt could buy a ticket, but the train left so quickly, we realized that we would have to wait half an hour for the next one to come. And then Sister Erdenetsogt realized that she FORGOT THE STEAMER ON THE TRAIN. I called Elder Ridd and Elder Kroes (also on tausch,) and asked what they were doing. They were near Hauptbahnhof, so I asked "Do you want to save the day?! There's a train showing up at Bahnhof in 20 minutes with something Sister Erdenetsogt needs." They agreed and headed off for Bahnhof, while we awaited the train and twiddled our thumbs. About 20 minutes later they called and said they had found it!!!!!!!! I love Germans. They so seldom steal stuff. But it was a total miracle, and she returned it that night. I wanted to take a picture of the Elders posing with the steamer (they were so proud,) but forgot my camera. Bummer. Still a great story!

The rest of tausch was seriously good though - we only doored like, 10 people and found 2 really promising potentials from it, and I got to hang out with Sister Erdenetsogt while she taught a handful of Mongolian people. It was really fun. It's a cool language. 

Crazy thing, though, during tausch Sister Kohler called! I was freaking out because very often when President or Sister Kohler call randomly, one possibility is that something tragic has happened...yikes. But instead, she asked if I would lead the music during....MISSION TOUR! I haven't really mentioned that Mission Tour is this week, so I might as well now. Basically, what Tour used to be is that someone from the Area Presidency would visit and tour around for fancy Zone Conference with each zone...but this year, Elder Kearon is coming, and we're all going to München!!! It's divided up into 2 days since our Mission is so large, but Switzerland is combined with Freiburg zone one day, and the other day Stuttgart, München, Salzburg, and Wien will all be together! We get to learn from someone who's totally awesome AND it'll be like a family reunion. Then, that night we'll stay at a hostel (that'll be a new experience,) and the next day we'll have MLC lead by Elder Kearon. I'm so excited. Also, funny enough, somehow 5/6 Sisters in my MTC group area are all STLs. Don't know how that happened. (The only one who isn't is Sister Cook...who is training like a boss in Freiburg.) But I can't wait to hug and handshake lots of friends, feel the spirit, and have 4 zones of missionaries singing "Called to Serve" at me. :) It's hard to have meetings in München because it takes away from time you COULD be having appointments, but luckily for us the rest of the week is pretty busy. So hopefully we can still adequately prep for everything despite that, haha.

By the way this is super random but is the Flu really bad this year? We keep picking up random signs that it is. Like, we were looking for a joint teach last week and called around people in the ward, and like 80% of the people we called were like "We would love to, but I/my kid/everyone and the dog are sick." Also, when we were at our favorite Döner shop this week, (background on the Döner shop, we've befriended this man and his family who own this deliciously lovely Döner shop - so now they're always happy to see us and the daughter had us write in her Freunde Buch) the poor youngest daughter was so sick. Sneezy, sneezy, sneezy. We sat with the cute daughters and chatted for a while, but bought like 4 liters of Orangensaft on the way home. 

Funny sidenote about Europeans and their beverages, I get really stressed out because we'll go to eating appointments and they'll have like 2 liters of saft and 1 small jug of water for like, 8 people to drink over 2 hours...where, at the same time, Sister T and I drank a whole liter of juice in like, 20 minutes. It's just funny.

Sister Bushman and Sister Threlkeld with their O.J.

I feel like this letter has been so all over the place. Sorry! Maybe the endless gray sky is starting to make me crazy? I dunno. I've always liked Winter the best...but I've liked it 3% less since going everywhere on foot. :)

By the way, ATTENTION: everyone in Germany. Or anyone with google. We need help finding fun stuff to do on P-days. Stuttgart is a pretty decent sized city, but it's hard because most museums are open Tuesday-Sunday, and it's not as much fun to go to Schlösser (palaces, etc.) when it's cold and the gardens aren't overflowing with beauty like in the summer. Any ideas are appreciated, haha. :)

This week, Sister Threlkeld and I were looking up how to get to the house of a potential in a tiny little dorf (village), when we made the mistake of seeing if there was anything new on Mormon Channel. Don't do it! This series about how the grace of Christ helps people is beautifully done and simply just...good.

http://www.mormonchannel.org/watch/series/his-grace

I love you so much.

Sister Bushman

Some additional photos:

Sister Bushman with some young girls in their ward (congregation)

The baking skills continue . . . Sister Bushman with some homemade bread

Backerei Missionaries

Liebe Welt,

I think I've decided that my favorite moments as a missionary are those moments when you watch the Holy Ghost working in someone, and you see something click in their head and in their heart. These moments don't come along every day or even every week, but when they do, they always make my journal. It's really humbling, actually. This past week we were teaching this really awesome man about The Word of Wisdom. He was a little worried about it, because he smokes. We were talking about ways he could strengthen himself to be able to resist, and we said that if he prayed to God for strength, God could help him to stop smoking. His eyes got really wide and he was like, "God would help me to stop smoking?" That had never occured to him before, that God would want to help him in that way. It was so cool. 

We actually had a really good week this week. As far as appointments go, we had a bazillion. Well, not a bazillion. But quite literally over double the average of my whole mission. We aren't sure why all of a sudden we're meeting with more people more often, but we're just really thankful to Heavenly Father for putting people into our path! Even then, (of course,) we're always trying to do finding - or leave little pass-along cards and such around so that maybe someone who needs it will come upon it sometime. :) We found a Book of Mormon in our apartment that had a really long note written to someone in the front from an old missionary who has been home for a while - I guess the book was never delivered? We can't exactly give it out, so the book just laid on our table for weeks and weeks and weeks...UNTIL a few weeks ago we found this London-style phone booth right outside of a library/U-bahn station. But this is no ordinary phone booth - it's full of books that you're free to add to or take. SO, how about a testament of Jesus Christ? We dropped it off. And took too many photos with it. We'll see if one day someone calls the number on the pass-along card tucked inside. ;)

Random funny story: I remember before my misssion lots of returned missionaries telling me how when you're learning the language, you just have to be patient and laugh at yourself because everyone experiences the realization at least a couple times that you've been saying something totally incorrect for a while...and you've been talking with strangers, members, etc. Well. I had one of those moments this week. So for the prophet Moroni, in German it's spelled the same, and it's even pronounced pretty similar - Moh-roh-nee. Earlier this week Sister Threlkeld and I were in companionship study and discussing a scripture in Moroni, and she goes "Sister Bushman. MOH-ro-ni. Not MAH-ro-ni!" I had gotten a little lazy with the vowel. Normally this wouldn't matter, except that in German, Moroni is a prophet. MAroni...is a chestnut. I've been telling people that a chestnut buried gold plates into a hillside that were later uncovered by a modern day prophet for who KNOWS how long. Yikes. Oh well. It made us laugh!

Also, this week Sister Threlkeld and I became our own restaurant. Seriously. Thanks to the bread pan we finally went out and bought and some recipes stolen from people who have generously fed us, this week we made french bread (thanks, Sister Gassin!), Zimtschnecken/cinnamon rolls, pizza, fried bread, and dumpling soup. They all turned out so great - we're so over Toastbrot! Haha. But that was really fun. I forgot how much I missed the smell of yeast proofing. 

Sister Threlkeld and Sister Bushman eating their homemade pizza

Speaking of doing old stuff, Sister Threlkeld and I are still trying to sing. We ended up joining ward choir in our ward, which is really fun because our ward choir director literally works for the Stuttgart Oper...like, no big deal. Basically, he's really good. And being in choir with him reminds me of being back in Chamber Singers or vocal rehearsal for a show or somthing. So that's really nice! Also, when you've had a frustrating day or an investigator didn't show up - it's so nice to just sit down in choir and feel the spirit of the music. Sister Threlkeld and I are also singing a duet in sacrament meeting in 2 weeks! Don't ask us what song, because we have no idea. We'll figure it out! And it will give us an excuse to invite people to church. :)

This morning I was reading in Luke. President gave us the challenge to read the Book of Mormon, looking for the Doctrine of Christ (faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the Holy Ghost, enduring to the end,) in the first 6 months of the year, but I'm trying to read the New Testament again, albeit it ein bisschen slow. I read the 6th chapter this morning, and came upon a verse I think I've heard, but didn't really remember that well. Basically, Christ sits down for dinner and the scribes and Pharisees are like, "why are you eating with the publicans and sinners?" And Christ says...

And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick.

Isn't it cool that Christ calls himself a "physician"? Because that's exactly what the Atonement is - medicine for our souls. It heals us when nothing else will.

I love you so much. Have a wonderful week.

Love,

Sister Bushman

Sister Bushman's mom:  The title of the blog "Backerei" means Bakery!

A few more photos:

Pizza dough in the shape of Austria, and the Austrian flag in sauce!

A beautiful church in Stuttgart

Sister Threlkeld and Sister Bushman waiting for the train in the snow