(Translation: Good afternoon, lovely family and friends, and acquaintances, and, and, and)
First of all, HAPPY ANNIVERSARY to the bestest parents a gal could ask for!
This week had a disproportionately large amount of doctor appointments and sleeping - but no worries, we're all feeling much better now and are back up to speed. :) We also had a lot of train riding. We had to truck out of our area twice this week, much more than usual. Sister Bishop has been stressing about how much time it takes to get to Landshut and München - she gets kinda antsy on trains. It's just really funny because that was me a month ago. :) Now I've come to terms with being on the edge of the zone.
But yeah, we got to go to München this week for interviews and training with President Kohler! Normally for training (it's with two distrikts) he has some specific things he wants to cover, but this time he decided to do it "Elder Bednar" style and we got to just ask questions. We talked about everything from consecration to pride to how to talk to people on the street when they are content and don't realize how the Gospel could bless them. My favorite part was talking about what it REALLY means to be a "consecrated missionary". That used to be something that really stressed me out. "Am I focused enough? Giving enough? Turned outward enough?"
There's this famous talk called "The Fourth Missionary". President said that he has never doled it out because people get SO STRESSED when they read it. (It basically describes 4 missionaries - from the first missionary who is lazy and disobedient and doesn't care about about serving the Lord, to the fourth missionary who is dedicated and focused and basically perfect.) President talked about how really nobody is the fourth missionary at all times. We hop between the different missionaries described on different days. Basically, the most important thing is this: where is your heart? At the end of the day, do you WANT to be here, and do you WANT to do good serving the Lord? That's the most important. Then breathe, do your best, and be happy doing the work of the Lord.
It was really nice. I want to be here, but I'm sometimes not very good at breathing while I do it, haha. :) My interview with President was also really nice. We just had a good chat and he answered some questions I had, and he got me endorsed to go back to BYU. Yay! I love the whole Kohler fam. They're so cool.
Sister Bishop and I started a new project for us to complete throughout this transfer. She has this voice recorder, and we have made a lot of voice recordings together just talking about what we are up to, etc. We've decided to make a voice recording every day. We try and talk about how we've seen the hand of the Lord in our work that day. We had a really cool experience where we felt that 100% the Lord had helped us out.
So, we have to do a lot of planning to get to appointments in Passau, because busses and trains only come so often. We needed to take a train in the early afternoon to make it to our appointment, but we weren't exactly sure when it came, so we ended up deciding for whatever reason that the most effective thing to do would be to go check the train times right at 8, then come back and study, and then catch our train. When we went to print out our travel itinerary, we decided that we might as well just buy our ticket for the day then.
When we came back to Bahnhof that afternoon, the office an Bahnhof was closed! There was a bit of a situation and the Bahnhof office was closed down for the afternoon. We could still go to our train, but nobody could buy tickets. If we hadn't bought them that morning, we would have missed our appointment. It was crazy!
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| At the train station |
I had a really great time studying the scriptures this morning. I studied about faith. I've been so fascinated about how faith and hope and love are SO connected. You can't be without faith and still have lots of hope for the future. You can't be empty of love and still be full of faith and hope. They're all linked. And I had a thought about faith. People often talk about how faith and the Gospel strengthens them through hard times. I think that there are two reasons for that. First of all, God blesses us with the tender mercies necessary to make it though our hard times. And, at the same time, I think that a lot of power and strength comes out of faith itself. Having that passionate confidence and trust that God is there and that he's looking out for us is incredibly strengthening.
We're never alone!
Love,
Sister Bushman
Sister Bushman's Mom here: More photos from the week . . .
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| "This statue commemorates 30 years of jazz in a little town near Passau; it reminded me of Kansas City (which is famous for its jazz)." |
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| A beautiful ironwork fence on a quaint German home |
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