"Some days are diamonds and some days are stones" - a phrase from a well known country song seems to describe our week. We have had some diamond days worth writing home about! Every missionary will tell you that there are "ups" and "downs" in a mission, lately we have had "ups".
Last Monday we had dinner and Family Home Evening in our home for three LDS soldiers who are without family or single. One of those had just contacted the Church through www.mormon.org the Friday before asking for a priesthood blessing before his deployment to Iraq. Sunday we learned about it and Monday he was in our home. We don't think we would ever have found him otherwise. All three of these men are prospective elders, with the hope of obtaining the higher priesthood. We had a very delicious meal (I love it when everything turns out! says the cook) and a spiritual message and then watched a video. The message from Elder Karn was about Captain Moroni in the Book of Mormon and what kind of soldier he was. The video was from the BBC series The Planet Earth. It was a wonderful evening and they all seemed to enjoy it. We hope to continue this Monday evening event as long as they are here in Baumholder which will be about 3 more weeks. Now we have board games! The only problem will be if they get assigned duties on Monday evening.
The next day we had a visit with an inactive family who had been offended by some things someone in the branch said. We are all imperfect and will probably offend someone sometime. Please tell us if we offend you because we definitely do not mean to and we would like to say we are sorry! Anyway, the family has been visited and encouraged and loved and prayed over. Today they came to Church. Hopefully they will continue to come as we need their perspective and personalities to round us out.
On Wednesday, our German elder, Elder Kalmring, the same one that was hospitalized last week, invited us over to the meeting house. He and his companion prepared a wonderful sit down German lunch for us. We were served Eier mit Schinken (scrambled eggs and chopped ham), Spinat mit Sahne (chopped fresh cooked spinach with heavy cream), over Kartofel (potatoes). He told us to mash the potatoes, put the eggs on top, and pour the creamed spinach over it. Sounds like green eggs and ham, doesn't it? But it was delicious and he worked so hard to prepare it. And then we had a German dessert - kind of a pudding and yogurt mix that was delicious. They cooked and served the meal and did the dishes. I was very impressed! And there is one missionary that knows how to cook! It was such a sweet way of saying thank you to us.
Thursday we had interviews with our mission president in K-town (a short way of saying Kaiserslautern - which means the king's fishing resort). It was a great meeting. That same evening Sister Karn went with the Relief Society sisters to a joint RS meeting with the Ramstein Ward (another trip to K-town). That was a lot of fun. And of course on Friday we played at the Art Center in our volunteer positions. Elder Karn has now been assembling frames in miter clamps - a challenge for large frames. The lady in charge said it takes most people 6 weeks to learn how to do that. Elder Karn learned how to do it in a day.
Our investigator continues to attend Sunday meetings and become more involved with the members. It is a thrill for us. She is a bright and outgoing lady whose husband is a seargeant major here at the post. She is busy entertaining because of his position and also has a very responsible job with the MWR on post (Morale, Welfare and Recreation). We can't describe the joy we feel to see her discover the truth.
We have had a great week! The time change doesn't occur here until March 30th. We understand today was the big day for most States. So we are closer in our time difference for a few days. We still see evidences of our approaching spring and hope you are also getting some relief from winter and the snows.
With love,
Sister and Elder Karn
