January

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It is cold. Not as cold a Nome Alaska but still cold. I guess it decided to snow here just in time for… the 6th of January. We did a lot of walking and talking as usual. Wednesday we had all 4 elders in our district over in Bernburg for a “finding Palooza!” which made for some fun. We didn’t find anyone but all 4 of us were able to meet with some less actives.

In church I gave a talk on covenants, as well as Bruder Schütze . It went well but it was interesting to speak about covenants right before a man who served as a temple president.

We found the Russian lady! She was busy for the holidays but is now back, we finally got her a Russian Book of Mormon, so now we just need to get her to church.

Tomorrow we give our lesson in zone training meeting. Paul will be our focus, he was the man. I imagine how he must have felt during his discipleship, he was alone, but yet he wasn’t, he was filled with a burning testimony of our redeemer Jesus Christ, and he knew that the Lord was with him, as he is with us. That is what we want the missionaries tomorrow to REMEMBER. That faith in Jesus Christ is what’s important and that if the spirit is with you our mission and our lives will be guided in the direction of eternal salvation.

LG,

Elder Winkel
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New Year’s Eve

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New Year’s was insane. Literally hell breaks loose, and a straight riot is started in the streets. Bombs.

New Year’s Eve we were invited to a member’s house for lunch, and then a member in a branch next to ours invited us over for the night. Interestingly enough we ate lunch at the same member that we ate with on Christmas Eve, the member is great and so nice.

That night we went to the other member’s house in Köthen and I got to hang out with my boy Elder Burns! The members drove us home at 9, it was a merry ol’ time.

Next morning we woke up early (too early) and headed to Leipzig for our mission 5k, to kick off our morgen sport for 2016. Luckily it was a fun run so our inconsistent technique of sprinting/walking made for some fun.

Well New Years. New goals. Want a good goal? The Book of Mormon. Yeah that’s a good one. It’s the “keystone to our religion” and “a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book”. Make the goal, read it, ponder it, and be strengthened.

My good friend Elder DeMass down in the Frankfurt mission had Christmas with a couple seventies, while talking about questions of the gospel and life, one of them told him that:

“I am not brave enough, to NOT read in my scriptures every day.”

It’s not just that we SHOULD read the scriptures, it’s that we NEED to. I hope and pray that we all will.

Love you all, Happy New Years.

Elder Winkel
NewYearsStreet

Ho Ho Ho

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Quite the week, nice to have it over and hopefully things can get back to normal! On Monday we accompanied the Köthen elders and their 8 or so youth (7 young men 1 young women) to Leipzig to spend our P-day with a Christmas market, because for some reason our tiny market in Bernburg decided to close 5 days before Christmas… But ja, we got a little taste of what a German Christmas that you imagine looks like. Also we ran into the Groitzsch elders.

Tuesday I received 4 wedding invites… one of which was to my boy Kevin who sealed the deal that same day so big “LIEBE GRUß/ ALLES GUTE .USW” to him and his new wife!

Wednesday we met with one of our less actives, and we had no idea what to share with him because he’s mostly less active because he’s super sick. But on our walk over we decided to show him all of the music numbers from the Christmas devotional because boy, they were good! Well he loved it even though it was in English, because the spirit works however it would like 😉

Late Saturday night we found out one of the Köthen elders was in the hospital for appendicitis, and so that meant the one and only Elder Burns (my trainee) had to come crash with us for a couple days! That mixed stuff up a little bit, and made for some fun.

Christmas went well, and skyping was wonderful. It was great to reflect on our Lord and Savior and his unending love.

Happy Holidays,

Elder Winkel

-I was never scared of Santa until now.

-cozy Christmas Eve district meeting with the 4 elders
BernburgSantaDistrictChristmasEve

Merry Christmas

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Well well, Merry Christmas to all! Honestly, there is no place like home for the holidays. But you become more thankful for what you have when you go without. We’re also still dreaming of a white Christmas. Northern Germany normally doesn’t get any snow, so we’ll make the best of what we have… rain.
This week was filled with handing out some more cards for our choir concert, and a lot of walking around in the dark. But that’s okay, we made the apartment as festive as we could which means about 70 feet of lights, and two oversized Christmas trees we found in the road. (squirrel free)
Tuesday we had exchanges with the ZL’s so that means I went to Leipzig for a day. After my two hour train ride to Leipzig we reached the apartment just in time to realize that the ZL that was back in Bernburg with Elder Perkins still had the keys to the apartment, too late to wake up the old couple to let us borrow the spare, we went and crashed with the other Leipzig elders across town. It was nice to be in a big city, we had some appointments and we were able to meet with some cool people.
Toward the end of the day, we went to do some finding on the streets and we talked to this really cool African kid and his Asian friend. They were both about 17 and come to find out they both LOVE basketball and would love to play with some Americans… Luckily the ward has an activity planned for basketball! And SADLY I will be back in Bernburg, so my streak of 14 months without basketball continues… oh well.
The joke I made in ward council of me being Santa for the branch turned into a reality on Saturday, I terrified 3 of the 6 children, and gave all the old people a good laugh with my sorry attempt to be the big man in red. Elder Perkins described it as a half drunk half Chris Farley Santa, so ya. (Interpret that how you want haha)
Our choir concert on Friday was amazing, we only had 3 more places left in the theater we rented out, and a lot of the people were non-members/less actives. It’s probably the biggest activity that the branch has each year, so it was nice to have a good turnout.
The work is still slow, the cool Russian lady we had contact with dropped off the face of the earth, and so we spend most of our time wandering and trying to talk to people.
This last week I went to work in the “what lack I yet” area, I got my answer and it was to really dive into the scriptures, so I will be going in head first.
“Ask and ye shall receive”
I testify that that is true, no matter how painful or painfully simple the change is. It’s for the better, and it’s for our personal progression. Christ made it possible, and there is no better time to make a change than CHRISTmas.
27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them. (Ether 12)
Happy Holidays,
Elder Winkel
preconcertbranchpartyLilSt.Perkins

Wahoo 20

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Well it was a good birthday, ate some Subway, and played some ping pong. Alles gute!

It was a slow week for us, but ya know, the work goes on.

We spent most of our week handing out invites to our choir concert composed of our members and missionaries. We had our first one on Sunday and it went well, we had over a hundred people crammed into the little Köthen church. Next Friday the concert in Bernburg, can’t wait.

On Friday as we were out, we started to follow this random crowd, next thing you know we were in this weird bombed out church with a bunch of little kids singing in a choir… we honestly had no idea how we got there so that was pretty funny.

Saturday for the Branch Christmas party, I will be playing Santa… I don’t know how/why but I got a suit and everything so I’ll roll with it!

This morning I read a talk given by Elder Ballard, and he talked about Hyrum Smith, what a man he was! I always love reading more and more about him and Joseph. While Hyrum was in Liberty jail, they both understood, they both continued on, with a “thy will be done O Lord” attitude. As we have that, there is no reason to fear. ”

“Only believe and move Forward in Cresendo.”

Elder Winkel
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Blades of Glory

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Currently we are in Magdeburg waiting for Elder Casperson’s
new companion who will arrive tomorrow, Elder Brimhall! We sent off
Elder Barrios home today and so to mourn we went ice-skating! It was a
blast! We couldn’t get ourselves off the ice for a couple hours and I
could say we’d probably win gold in the Olympics by now!

So this week we were able to meet with the Russian lady. She met us at
the church and she was super cool and had a lot of questions, we
taught her the first lesson and it was a really great experience to
have.

Wednesday we were invited over for lunch by an older couple in the
branch and they fed us just as much potato salad as they always
do… too much. And this time they thought they hadn’t given us
enough last time so they decided to make extra. Well to say the least I
probably won’t be eating very many potatoes when I get home…

Saturday morning Bruder Schütze and his wife invited us over for our
Thanksgiving dinner! Every year they invite the missionaries over
and make them the biggest most American meal they know how and all I
can say was it was pretty great, they did quite the job.

Saturday evening we went to Köthen and had an activity with the young
men there. We played soccer, made pizza burgers, and then we finished
off the night with “Meet the Mormons”. It was really cool and there were
a lot of young men there. Even one of the boys brought
homemade firecrackers… So that made it interesting.

On my mission I’ve really learned to be thankful to be busy. Hopefully
this week we can keep it that way! Also I know if we trust in
the Lord we have no reason to worry. That has helped me a lot on my
mission to not to be so stressed about the hard times because I know the
Lord will provide away.

Continue in Crescendo

-Elder Winkel

BladesofGlorySchützeThanksgivingActivity

Mormonism is Optimism

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Berlin again last week… This time we had to wake up at 4 so it was a bit of a long day. But because our train got to Berlin at 7, we had some time to do some sightseeing. We went to the Brandenburger tour, not very many tourists out at 8 so it was a cool sight to see. We also passed the French Embassy.

Thanksgiving was a little different – last year was McDonald’s, this year our ward mission leader took us to a Chinese buffet, and told us stories of when he was a mission president and such.

A little miracle we saw on Friday was as we were doing some street contacting we talked to a Russian lady and she told us “I was wondering when one of you would talk to me, I’ve seen you and other people like you walking around the city and none of you have talked to me yet!” Moral of the story, we have an appointment tomorrow and I’m pumped!

I’m grateful for the peace that the gospel brings to the soul, no matter the circumstances, it’s always there.

Elder Winkel??

 

In front of the French Embassy

Chinese Thanksgiving

FrenchEmbassyBerlinChineseThanksgiving

Nice Week in Bernburg

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A nice week here in Bernburg, we managed to stay somewhat busy and that is always a blessing.

First off on Tuesday we had an exchange with the zone leaders and luckily our cozy little 4 man district is doing well, so I had plenty of time to do finding with the ZLs. It was a long day but in the end we ended up with 4 new contacts! One of them was a teenager that I think that just got scared and gave us his information… but hey, that works!

Another highlight this week was we were able to make an appointment with a woman that we met on the street in Ascherleben. So on Saturday we went over and taught her and her son the first lesson. Here’s the thing… SHE’S GERMAN. She’s educated, Christian, and open to talk about religion! Her 16 year old son also had interest, and sat in with the lesson. They found the Book of Mormon interesting, and we committed them both to read. I really believe the spirit was there, and I can’t wait to go back again.

This week we will be back in Berlin for a Zone Conference… don’t know how the mission can afford to move us all around like this but I won’t complain!

I studied in John 6 this week, a good one, you all should read it.

Häppy Sanksgifing!

Elder Winkel

How Firm a Foundation

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This week we had the special opportunity to have Elder Ballard visit
our mission, we heard on Friday morning that on Sunday night he would
be coming so figuring out how to get there was a fun ride. The mission
rallied together in Berlin! Always rad to see all my friends from the other side of the mission!

Well first off I’ll tell you, he’s a short man… also pretty funny.
We got to shake his hand before the meeting and of course I forgot my
name tag on my backpack… but it was alright only Präsident
noticed.

It was a great meeting, Elder Ballard mainly focused on making sure we know chapter 3 of PMG, through and through, and also that as we strive to always become better teachers, we will find ourselves having more opportunities to teach.

Well after the getting to the meeting was only half the fun… Our
train home left at 9:15 and we weren’t supposed to get home until
12:00. Unfortunately we had a 20 minute delay with one of our trains,
but we ran through the Bahnhof like madmen with the Köthen elders and
made it to our next train just in time, but the train wasn’t there
because it was also 20 minutes late… So it finally came and we took
it an hour or so. It was about midnight by the time we hit the
halfway point. We got off to switch trains to find out that because our
train was late, the other trains we had to make had already left…
And the next one didn’t come until 4:00 so we scurried around and
found a taxi. 65€ later and at 1:00 we got home… Yes, tired, could have been worse.

The closing song we sang was “How firm a foundation” and it was really cool (and nice to hear it in English). But I remember how I should remember my foundation, it doesn’t matter that I’m tired, that a church policy was updated, or that I haven’t worn my retainer in a while (I’ll make it fit mom), because I’ve got a foundation. And a pretty solid one at that.

The soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose
I will not, I cannot, desert to his foes;
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I’ll never, no never, I’ll never, no never,
I’ll never, no never, no never forsake!

-Elder Winkel

So on P-day we found an abandoned warehouse in the forest…

warehousebikes

Hectic Week

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Well the hectic week came to a close. But it was a good one. So Thursday we were in Magdeburg for district meeting, then we had to go home and plan for English class, but then we had to go check on our member from Nigeria who was getting ready for ankle surgery, and it turns out that he got stabbed by his roommate the day before in the refugee housing. He was pretty shaken up about it. He got it right in the leg. But he’s a champ, and he’s doing okay now.

After we went and visited him, we ran back to the church and taught our English class. Then to the train station, and caught our train to Berlin, We spent the night in Spandau with my boy Elder Glissmyer. We ended the night with a couple party buckets from KFC.
The next day Elder Perkins went with two other missionaries and went around Berlin while I sat in meetings for about 7 hours… then we caught the train back to Bernburg.

The next day we had to catch another train to Leipzig for Stake Conference, we were a little late and I had to buy our ticket, and Elder Perkins put our bags on… well as I went to open the train door the train left… I had a nice little hour long wait before the next train came, later we met back up in Kothen. haha.
Stake Conference was wonderful, and I got to see all my members and friends from Zwickau!

After the Saturday session, we traveled to Halle where we got permission to spend the night in the old elder’s apartment.
Then back to Leipzig the next morning for the Sunday session! They had a little girl give a talk and it was probably one of the cutest things I’ve seen. Also Elder Dykes was there and gave a great talk about the Sabbath and scripture study. It was also nice to hear a talk in English, and having to be the one translating!

I’m thankful for a busy week!

I have a testimony that it is through those small things that we can make real progress and have joy. I’m grateful for all your prayers and pray for you as well.

Elder Winkel

Reunited with our boy Jared from Zwickau!

JaredinZwickau