Ich kann ein Lied davon singen:)

Hallo Leute!

After getting lost in a forest for a few hours, I finally found the time to write some things down from last week:)

On Saturday we headed to Michelstadt to help out with a intercultural fest that they were having and we were in charge of the family search stand. Michelstadt is the cutest little German village ever!

We got signed up to sing on the stage in front of a bunch of people and the acts before us were belly dancing. So it was a bit terrifying to go up there and to sing hymns after loud blaring music. Us 6 missionaries and a member got up there and I was like....uh...but as we sang I felt at peace and after the three songs, the DJ said someone asked what Church we were from and he gave me the microphone and I said "Wir sind von der Kirche Jesu Christi der Heiligen der Letzten Tage!"not

ashamed! The more I'm out of here the more I feel at peace with the path I am on. It's definitely not easy facing rejecting everyday, but the message is a good one and I know it in my heart! There are so many awesome things that come to pass through hard work and a positive attitude!

A scripture comes to mind, Alma 26:12:

"Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things; yea, behold, many mighty miracles we

have wrought in this land, for which we will praise his name forever"

Sunday was again another awesome day! We had four people in church, a few from Palestine and a few from Syria! One of our investigators(Abraham) brought his friend, Basharand we got to teach

him yesterday about the Restoration! He texted us last night to thank us for the lesson and told us he has a lot of respect for our church:) Really nice guy and is ready to learn about the Gospel!

We've had lots of cool experiences with handing cards out and people calling, one man we talked to in a Bahn told us that we were awesome people and that he could feel the good energy coming from us(Holy Ghost) we didn't get a number but we invited him to church and he said he would come. Normally people don't come or call, but he texted us on Saturday! It was so cool! We are going to be meeting with him in a few days now! It's so important to not give up the hope:)

This weekend is General Conference weekend!!!! So exciting! We are blessed to have a living Prophet today and to hear his words!

Have a great week!

Liebe Grüße

Sister Farner

Apfel küchle

 

Germany Sky:)

BMW bedeutet Bayrische Motoren Werke...?!

Hallo Leute!

I am constantly amazed at how amazing people are! There are someday where you face a lot of rejection and you wonder if you are ever going to find someone that has interest in hearing your message and then you stop someone on the street that makes all the rejection worth it! That happens every day to be honest:) We talked to two guys the other day because we noticed they were speaking Arabic and they were the COOLEST! Super open and friendly and had us laughing for like 5 min straight. We are meeting with them next week:)

We had our Zone Conference in Offenbach on Monday and what I took from it is that I should bear more testimony and promise/be more specific with the blessings we receive from the gospel! We stepped out of the church and Sister Lekic and I went to work and were able to find two people for the Elders to teach in 30 min because we were more personal with our conversations and promised them blessings! I love how we can always improve! That we can always find something to change in ourselves to become better.

  

I've started reading the Book of Mormon again in German and have made a goal to finish it before I come home which has me reading 5 or more pages a day in it and before I would have seen it as something I would do to get it done with and reach the goal and as more of a burden. But now I look forward to every time I get to open it and read in it! It's really something that brings you comfort in the hardest of times and I'm grateful for the Book of Mormon because it helps me see my purpose and it always puts me back on track.

I was reading in Jacob 5 and verse 74 popped out to me it says "And it came to pass that the servants did go and labor with their mights; and the Lord of the vineyard labored also with them; and they did obey the commandments of the Lord of the vineyard in all things" It's nice to know that when I put all my might into this work, that Christ is doing the same and with His might and with Him by my side there is no need to worry!

We met with some amazing people again this week and one in particular was Kate, she's from Nigeria and we shared the restoration with her and she added her testimony to the need of prophets and to end every comment she said "that's what I believe" She told us that she wants her daughter to see by her example, the importance of believing in Christ and she had her daughter’s birthday party in their church because she wanted her daughter to have a church birthday party always as a memory! What a cool mom! Haha she's great!

We are so blessed to be able to have this knowledge, to understand the importance of this life in our eternal progression and to have the duty to share it to our fellowmen! People are the coolest! They all deserve to hear how they each have a purpose here and that they are never alone and that they have a Heavenly Father who loves them and an older brother, Christ who is carrying their burdens along side them and that Christ's church is restored so that they can have a place to 

hear the revelations of God! We are trying our hardest to pass the good news on but we always need more help so my invitation to you all is to write the blessings you have gotten from the gospel and to help others see how they can be blessed too!!

Liebe Grüße

Sister Farner

Car Show

Ich gebe es euch, das Salz der Erde zu sein

Hallo Leute!

Fall has definitely arrived! Rain makes its way everyday and I'm so happy about it! Pretty sure everyone thinks I'm crazy for loving it but naja life. Because it's cold out that means we got our share of hot chocolate this week as in every appointment our investigators bought us hot chocolate so I'm running on a solid 5 cups from last week:) 

Friday, Saturday and Sunday were pretty cool! They do something here every year called Space Tagung and it's for all of the members 18-30 years old in Germany! There had to be around 300 people there all together and church was a mad house! Meaning that they used the gym as

part of the Chapel in order to sit everyone in there! It was so cool to be able to catch up with my friends from the Dortmund and Düsseldorf stakes! It was so cool also too see more people are age

that are valiant in the Gospel. I got to talk to a few people who have gotten their mission calls and got to bear testimony of Missionary work and how awesome and rewarding it is!

Duisburg friends

On Friday we were on the bus on the way to go dooring and we talked to a girl our aged named Jignasa, she asked us about our church and if she could come with us to it so we changed our plans and road the bus to the church and were able to give her a tour and everything! That's never happened either on my mission but it was so cool to be in the chapel with her and explain how we worship God.

We've been working on being more bold in our lessons and letting our investigators know why we meet and what the blessings are that they can receive when they accept the Gospel of Jesus Christ and yesterday we had this awesome lesson with Abraham. We met him my first full day in Darmstadt and he's been kind of wish washy the last couple weeks so it was nice to meet with him and explain the Priesthood Power and how there is only one true church on the earth and the need for a living

Prophet in these latter days. And it clicked in his head! We've taught him multiple times about prophets and this time he understood how we need one told too! It really was a testimony to me of the power of the spirit because as we taught the lesson things kept coming to my head to teach him and how to explain everything. That has happened before in other lessons but it was even more apparent to me this time as we spoke and taught together with the Spirit. So thankful for it!

To wrap it up, we had a lesson on Sunday about the verse in 3 Nephi 12:13 that says "Verily, verily, I say unto you, I give unto you to be the salt of the earth; but if the salt shall lose its savor wherewith shall the earth be salted? The salt shall be thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men" The teacher talked about us as being salt. First time I've heard a lesson

about this. She told us that if we, as salt, stayed together all the time we'd have really no purpose because salts purpose is to enhance other things. So it's our duty to spread the gospel to other people

and help them improve their lives. I've talked to a lot of people that said that they are happy without God or that they don't need God to be happy and after the lesson on Sunday I thought about how the Gospel can enhance everyone's lives and give them even More happiness and More purpose!

So my invitation to you is to be Salt and go out and talk to people about the Gospel, serve others and work on becoming the best people you can be!

I hope that all made sense...:)

Trying to give a Book of Mormon to the Russian Orthodox Church :)

Liebe Grüße,

Sister Farner

---

Schlagsahne Oder Butter

Hallo Leute,

The days just keep getting better and better! Literally so happy to be doing missionary work everyday!

We got to go to Heidelberg for a split (my first split not as a STL in a solid 6 months) and I got

to work with Sister Jenkins and do a lot of finding on the mall stretch. It was way fun just being able to talk to people for an hour straight and I got to meet so many cool people ready to hear the

gospel, I'm excited to see where they will be in a few months.

Heidelberg

We had a district finding activity and it was raining so we decided to go door the university apartments and Sister Lekic and I were not feeling good about it so we left early from that and as we were walking away from it we saw a huge building and were like, we have to Klingel it! So we step up to the front door and start ringing each bell and none of them answered or had interest when they did and then we get to the second to last one and a woman comes out asks us what we were doing and we told her a survey and she let us in!!!!!!!  Whatttt?? For those of you who don't know, it's extremely hard here to get into someone's apartment to share with them a message about God, it's happened only twice on my mission, anyway she lets us in, offers us something to drink, we start going through the survey about belief and she then goes on how she lost her faith in God but how it was restored a few months back after an experience she had and she told us that if we had come 4 months earlier she would not have let us in. It was really cool to be able to share the Book of Mormon with her and the Restoration of Christ's church and we will be going back next week to see her! It's so cool how we are lead by the Spirit to those God has prepared!

Also the members in this ward are so nice and it's so cool to be able to get to know them, even though there are like 200! We ran into 4 of them at different times today all around town, so cool!

Hope everything is going well for you all!

Liebe Grüße

Sister Farner

Whipped crème so hard turned it to butter!

Der Vogeldreck

Hallo Leute,

Hard to believe that I'm already writing my second email from Darmstadt! We  recently got lost in a forest and ran like chickens with our heads cut off but now we are safely seated in a bus so I can

focus a little better on this email haha. 

Pres Uchtdorf's favorite Eis place

Church on Sunday was absolutely crazy! There were so many people so that we sat packed shoulder to shoulder and they had to bless more bread for the sacrament because they ran out! There were so many members coming up to me and introducing themselves and I was silently crying inside knowing that I wasn't going to remember their names ahaha but wow what a strong ward with so many amazing people! I'm so excited to get to know them all better! Also Darmstadt was the first

ward in Germany and a group of people around World War II time built a church to start worshipping at. It's cool to see the history of the ward and to meet people who helped build up the church and the church building! It gives me a lot of hope to see that by small things great things come to pass. They had built a huge church with a big parking lot at a time where there were only a handful of members and people thought that was crazy, but now the parking lot is full! 

Right now we talk to people on the street and get a handful that are interested but I know that our work is not in vain and that by working with the one we will affect the lives of many. We had another lesson with Abraham (met him last week) and he brought a friend a lot who wants to learn more about Christianity! He told us that he just had a thought come to mind to bring his friend with so he did! Moustafa is his friend that he brought and he's the coolest!  He's only 15, but has incredible faith and the day before he lost his phone and told us he's been praying to find it. He then asked me what he needs to do in order to receive answers to his prayers! It was so cool to be able to bear testimony to him of God's love for him and how when we put the effort in He makes up the rest. Also just being able to explain the Atonement to him was amazing!

Great week here in Darmstadt! So much to do!! So great:) Thankful for the opportunity I have here to serve:)

Liebe Grüße

Sister Farner

Darmstadt a.k.a. The City of Intestines

Hallo Leute,

Yes I got transferred this week:((( Really hard to leave my friends in Duisburg but I'm excited for the opportunity to serve here in the beautiful Darmstadt. Yes, it does mean intestine city in English so we

are just going to be using the German name for now haha. Fun fact about this place is that President Uchtdorf grew up here in our area and we attend the church he went to! Also Sister Kleiner( my trainee) served here after I trained her before she went to the Temple square mission! So already this place is pretty awesome:) Sister Lekic(pronounced Lekich) from Orem UT is my new new companion! She just got finished being trained and is a fireball for sure haha we've already laughed enough to last the millennium so we will see how the rest of the transfer goes! She's an incredible missionary and I'm already learning tons from her, she loves cooking too so I guess I'm done making noodles for dinner every night...hahahah thankful for that!

Sister Lekic and me

The first day in Darmstadt was crazy awesome we made a goal to fill up the next day with appointments and we accomplished it and now we have two new investigators! The people hear are so ready and willing to meet and I know I've only been here three days but man the work is just getting started! Cool story from the other day..We had just finished a lesson with Klev, new investigator, and I was talking to Sister Lekic about how I just wished I could tell people exactly how Christ can help them in their lives and that they'd understand it too! Well in the process of me explaining this to Sis Lekic a girl had sat next to us in the bench and after I spoke she cut it and asked if we believed in Christ (in English) and then said she couldn't speak a lot of English but we switched to German for her and she just bore powerful testimony to us about God's love and how He listens to our prayers and she explained to us how she was having a rough time with her boyfriends family but that she prayed and fasted and they allowed her to keep dating him and she said she loved how

knows our needs so perfectly and helps us even when it's just with the little things. I've never met someone so happy to talk about God but she said she loves to because it makes her happy and gives her energy. She belongs to a different church but said she'd come check our church out on Sunday!

You never know who is watching or paying attention to you here and it was a real testimony booster to me about making sure I keep my actions and words focused on the Savior! It's cool to see how God works in mysterious ways to help us find those ready to hear the truth:)

View from the apartment

Thankful to be here and serve the Lord!

Liebe Grüße

Sister Farner

Eis Eis Termin

Hallo Leute!

We had yet another great week and I think my favorite Sunday of my entire life! We had 5 investigators in church and that was literally the coolest thing ever! Esther and Isaac came for the first time and Maya, Elena and Ali also were there. I was just so excited and they all had a good time and Esther told us later that she felt like she was at home:)

Later on Sunday we went by Elizabeth, a person that I found in the area book(where we write all of the numbers of people we met on the street) and she's from Bulgaria! We shared the restoration with her and after Sister Catherall prayed at the end, we looked over and she was crying! We asked her what was up and she said that the sisters met her over a year ago by the bus stop and had tried multiple times to come by but she said she always said she didn't have time. Then her sister told her that God was trying to talk to her and she should listen. So she decided to meet with us and when I asked her if there was anything we could do for her she said " you've already done so much!". We got out of the apartment and we're literally overwhelmed with the love that God has for her. I love moments like these and the Restoration of the Gospel is just something so important that can help

us see that God still loves His children and yes we have hardships and sometimes life isn't fair but we need these challenges because they are what shape us into better people. God doesn't take our problems away, He gives us the strength to work through them.

Sister Weiler and me

I was with Sister Weiler on a split and we got Eis hahaha(for the second day in a row) and we went to the same shop as the day before and I noticed that the same people were working there and I was a little embarrassed but we went anyway and two of them we had given pass along cards to a few weeks prior. One of them apologized for not coming to church and he asked me if we meet during the week haha so I explained to him what we do and he asked if we could meet on Friday! So we are meeting tomorrow and I'm so excited! It pays off to get Eis;)

Anywho we have transfers this weekend so please pray that Sister Catherall and I train here in Duisburg haha that's the dream but we will see what happens.

Have a great week and remember to smile:)

Sister Farner