The Volger Family

P-Day at Moritzburg

So today we went to an awesome castle in the middle of a lake called Schloss Moritzburg, it was really cool! Sadly they did not allow pictures inside, so I took some pictures of the outside cause they can't stop me...rebel status! We also wrote some helpful websites in the guestbook!

Last night we got probably a foot of snow, and it's about time! 

Its kind of hard trying to tell you what happened in the last three days since I just emailed last Friday, but we taught some awesome lessons and we found a new potential investigator!

 




Elder Bretzing



Cinderella Lost Her Slipper



And it does not fit me :(

 

And here is a picture of the family we spent Christmas with, they are pretty awesome!

 

Christmas 2014

So this last week was Christmas, as you all know and I spent it:

Singing in a senior home!

Watching German children open presents!

Eating a ton of awesome food!

Learning and growing closer to my Savior! and

Teaching lessons and finding new investigators!

Christmas is my favorite holiday, I absolutely love it!

I can honestly say that this Christmas has been the best one of my life! I love being here in Germany and I love doing this awesome work. Hopefully next week I will get all my pictures and I can show you how awesome my Christmas was.

I hope you all had an awesome Christmas!

 

I found out that I will get to go to the Freiberg Temple I think the first week of January before it is closed for renovation :) and I am so excited.  I might still be in Germany when they re-dedicate it!

 

Skyping home was so fun:) and mom, I will start taking more pictures of myself.

Christmas Eve

Here are some pictures of our awesome Christmas Eve with the Volger clan (with opa and oma ortleib and also steffi). He is our branch president. We spent the night caroling at the alteheim (retirement home), and went to dinner at their home. This is what our dinner table looked like, and after dinner we all got gathered around and some of the members of the family prepared something for us to listen too. We got to hear stories about Christmas in the DDR time, and that was really cool.

 



P-Day Is Friday This Week...

but highlights from this past week were....

 

1. A huge gust of wind attacked me and blew my magnetic name tag into the river... identity theft by mother nature.

2. I spoke German (not exactly new).

3. We taught some Germans how to make Mexican food and sloppy joes to great success.

4. Oh and four new investigators!! (and you all thought I wasn't working)

 

So, you will hear more from me on this Friday!

 

Fröhliche Weihnachten! Merry Christmas!

Remember the reason for the season

 

-Elder Gavin Schmalz

Week Seven? Is it, I've lost count

So this week I turned 19 but that wasn't the biggest thing that happened this week.

On the 13th we woke up to a phone call from our mission president and we were told to be in Berlin by 3:00. It took five hours of train rides and walking through cities we didn't know but we made it to Berlin. The whole reason for the call and the rush to get to the City was some sad news. Elder Bretzing found out that his dad had passed away in a car accident on the 12th... My birthday.

He was able to Skype his family for a few hours and that helped him to decide to stay on his mission.

Elder Bretzing is a stud. Can you all keep him in your prayers this week? You can also shoot him an email to tell him how awesome he is! His Email is Matthew.bretzing@myldsmail.net

While my companion was Skyping with his family, the office Elders gave me a tour of Berlin and I got to see all of the sights. Loved it! When we got back, President asked me to help him give Elder Bretzing a blessing, the spirit was soooo strong. Yesterday we got driven back to Meissen by President Kosak and he went to church with us.

It's weeks like this that make me really appreciate the gospel of Jesus Christ and the plan of salvation.

We can live with our families again and that is why I am here in Germany. To help share that amazing truth with everyone I meet.

Thank you all for the birthday wishes! Thank you for the love and the support also!:)

 

Here are some pictures...

 

The Beautiful German Countryside

Weihnachtmarkt

My Birthday Haul

I bought myself a hat with deer fighting on it (pretty legit) and a Michael Buble Christmas cd.

The ward made me a cookie cake and gave me some chocolate and this really cool limited edition Meißner Weihnachts Käse (Meissen Christmas cheese) cause they know that I love cheese.

Elder Bretzing gave me a mug with a bunch of bears on it. (super cool)

and I opened my birthday cards! So awesome! I absolutely loved reading what everyone said 

and thank you for the birthday and thanksgiving cards in the mail:)

Here is our Christmas Tree!

 

 

 

 

Dresden, Leipzig, and Chemnitz December Zone Conference and Christmas Packages

Week Six

Another awesome week in the land of Germany!

This week my companion got something called a witches bullet. Its pretty much where a muscle gets so cold that it tightens and pinches your nerve and it lasts for 3-5 days, so that was an adventure. He woke up and he couldn't even move and half his body was numb, he got the witches bullet right in the lower back and he was immobilized for a day and a half!  This threw off our whole week, not only did we lose a day of proselyting but he cant carry any weight so I have twice as many books!
But I did learn two things... 

#1 Don't get cold in Germany.

#2 That this really is Gods work! 

 Although we had some set backs this week and even with my companions back problem, we still worked as hard as we could to share the gospel and we still found success!

While my companion was sick, I had the opportunity to clean and work on the area book and make some phone calls (super fun!), and while doing so I found two investigators from two or three years ago that had slipped through the cracks and stopped receiving lessons (most likely because of transfers) and we called them and set up appointments with both of them. They both are still really interested in the church and didn't know how to contact missionaries again. We are meeting with them this week and I'm pretty sure its going to be Awesome!

I just want you all to know that this church is true! I know that without a doubt in my mind. and I promise that if you earnestly seek to know that for yourself, that you will receive a testimony of it also!

Thank you so much for the birthday wishes! I will probably tell you more about my birthday adventures that are coming up next week!

Have a Great 3rd Advent

 

Love, Elder Schmalz

Week Five

Helige Kuh!

Germany is really cold!

This week has been a week full of canceled appointments and a drunk guy who insists my name is Eddie!

In Germany they celebrate the 4 advents. They are the four Sundays proceeding Christmas and they are a huge deal.  This Sunday was 1st advent and I was asked to sing in sacrament meeting for the branch and the mission president and his family so that was really cool! Also because of first advent almost all our appointments fell out and we spent a majority of this week tracting.... which Germans don't like at all, especially during Christmas/advent time.

It was still a great week! We found a new investigator named Michael , who needs help building his house, so we have a new person to teach and we get to learn about construction! We also helped the Weidlich family move. Rolf is Frau Weidlichs ex boyfriend and he likes alcohol..... a lot. He was put in charge of watching the children.....(worst idea in the whole world) he let them run into the street and climb on stuff and all and did a terrible job, so I ended babysitting a drunk man who was babysitting a bunch of kids. Super fun! He, in his drunken state thought my name tag said Eddie Schmalz and called me that for the whole 4 hours of moving and continues to call me that when he sees me on the street with all of his drunken friends so that is funny!

So yeah, super good week!

I hope you were all able to watch the video "He is the Gift", it is really good! I want to invite you all to think about what Christmas really actually means and what you can give to others.

I love you and I hope everything is going okay at home.
 

Love "Eddie" Gavin Schmalz

This week we will be looking forward to receiving a video of Eddie Schmalz eating the hottest currywurst ever. It has been described as "friggen hot"!

We also learned that he might get to Skype to us on Christmas thanks to some kind members in his area. Oh, I hope so. Keeping my fingers and toes crossed...

Pictures!

After searching and searching, a computer was finally found in East Germany that is compatible with Elder Schmalz's camera! Oh, happy day! Here are some sights of Meissen and Dresden.


Albrechtsburg and Cathedral in Meissen



Frauenkirche



The Opera House in Dresden



The Freiberg Temple

Week Four

On Wednesday we got on a train to Elsterwerda (a 2 hour trip) so that we could go and teach the Chege family (the Africans that I talked about last week) to find out if they wanted to be baptized.

When we got to Elsterwerda we had an hour to do some street finding. (walking around talking to people or doing doors) We found absolutely no one. All doors were slammed in our faces and we received some disgusted looks from everyone, a pretty normal day hahah. We did see a guy walking his dog and we had ten more minutes until we had to be to our appointment so we went up and talked to him.  At first he was very nice and talked to us, but then he went crazy and tried to prove to us that God isn't real and that even if there was a God then he hated us.... and he went off for like 5 minutes and finally I, being impatient and honestly done listening to him interrupted him and said "well I know there is a God and you can know too.... I like your dog have a nice day" and then I turned around and started walking to the Chege home because we were now late.... Elder Bretzing was so angry at the guy and wanted to go back and argue some more, but he realized we had a lesson and he needed to quickly refocus. 

After all that we went through the Cheges then told us that they hadn't prayed and that they don't understand why we need to be baptized again....... as they said this I looked at Elder Bretzing with a face of just utter terror (we didn't plan for this)! I gathered myself and said a quick prayer and hardcore preached the restoration to this African minister. I actually felt bad after (for like one second then I realized the Spirit told me to do it) all he could say after was "my soul is so confused" and "but it makes so much sense and it feels right" We then told him to actually pray about it and we invited him to our branch Christmas party. As we left he grabbed me by the shoulder and said "you are my brother" (my life is complete) and then offered a prayer asking God to "protect us the servants of the Lord from the powers of the Devil and the acts of evil men".  That was my cool spiritual but not so spiritual experience.

I cannot believe that I have been in Germany for a month! That is insane!

Everything is going great. My German is actually coming along little by little. It's so sad that I'm not going to be having a Thanksgiving this year, but hey, I'm doing the work of the Lord and that is awesome!

Thank you so much for the love and support. Be watching out for the new video coming out on lds.org this Friday. It is SUPER good!

The church is true and I miss all of you!

 

Love Elder Schmalz

 

Other tidbits we've learned from our individual letters this week...

 

His branch president owns a crematorium and Gav and his companion went into his work the other day to meet with him. He saw real dead bodies being prepared for cremation. The smell was pretty hard for him to deal with.

 

All this new physical activity is starting to effect his physic. He has had to take a pair of pants in to be altered and is in need of a new belt because he is out of belt holes. He is wanting to buy a new European suite now that he is lean and mean. Hopefully that's what Santa will bring him :)

 

He teaches an English class every week and loves it.

 

He eats A LOT of chocolate. Most the pastries are apple flavored. And he loves the food.  

 

 

Dresden Zone Training Meeting

 

When a mom has a son in East Germany, she has to beg, borrow, and steal pictures of her boy :)

So thankful that I caught a glimpse of Elder Schmalz on the Berlin Germany Mission Blog today. Even though I can only see his cute face, this made me so happy!

Week Three

So this week we met with the Chege family, they are from Kenya and requested we bring 12 Swahili Book of Mormons to our lesson! Apparently, Clovis the father had received a Book of Mormon from some missionaries last year, then never talked to them again, but he has read the Book of Mormon and has a testimony that it is true and that Joseph Smith is a prophet, and he decided to preach the Book of Mormon to everyone he knew, so pretty much Clovis is awesome! He and his wife Rachel are so cool and they have two little girls named Princess and Success.......I though he was kidding but he was serious... The bonus of all of this is that we get to teach them in English!  Hallelujah!

The lesson was pretty much just us answering questions about the church including what the priesthood was and why only men could have it? Is our church sexist? What age can a child be baptized? Those are all good questions, right? And we tried our best to answer them with the Spirit. It was so nice to understand everything and to actually help them, and the spirit was so strong in our lesson. Near the end our the lesson I really felt like I should bear my testimony about all of the things we had talked about and invite them to baptism. I did exactly that, and it was so cool!

Clovis answered me with "I never make a decision this big without asking God first" and we said that that is great and asked him if he would pray to know if baptism was right for him. He said he would, but if he didn't get an answer he wouldn't meet with us again....... So this week is going to be a week of prayer and fasting for us!:)

Its things like this experience that make being here so cool! I know that it is why I am here. I am so excited to be here and to be able to testify of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, and I know without a shadow of a doubt that it is true!

Okay, so on to Germany and my new life here...

It's so weird when I walk outside and it is opposite of what it is at home. Instead of seeing  a beautiful white temple on the hills framed with mountains, I see huge black cathedrals rising out of the fog. It's going to take a while to get used to this! I have grown to love seeing the temple so much. This week I got to go on exchange with one of the Freiberg elders. Freiberg is where the temple is and it was so nice to be able to see it! I found out that next month I will get to go to the temple so I'm looking forward and so excited for that!

Funny story. While we where on exchange we were approached by a very drunk man. As he got closer he pointed directly at me and said "I know who you are.....you are the secret service! You have ruined my life!". All of this was in English so I could understand him perfectly. He continued to tell us a story about how the communist secret service (us) made him an alcoholic and that we were going to go to Hell for what we had done to the world?!! I was so very confused and was trying not  to laugh. He was very drunk and couldn't stand up straight or talk very clearly. He then grabbed my shoulder and said "I want to show you guys something" but he was no longer angry and had apparently switched personalities mid sentence. He showed us a building that he believed was built by the Free Masons and now was occupied by the Illuminati? He then shook our hands and walked away. Yeah, that was a good day for journal writing! haha

It hasn't gotten cold here yet which is really surprising. I still go out just in a white shirt and tie for most of the day, Elder Bretzing wears like two coats and a scarf, he is from California after all. I'm excited for it to snow, and so excited for Christmas. I hear Christmas in Germany will be incredible. They have started setting up the Christmas market in Dresden and the Christmas tree is the biggest Christmas tree I have ever seen! I wish that I could send pictures...  I will figure that out this week
one way or another. I might just have to get some pictures developed and send them snail mail. All the computers are ancient here in East Germany and it's hard to upload anything on these things.

So yeah, those where the highlights of my week. I'm doing great! Thank you so much for all your love and support!

Week Zwei!

Hello!

I want to start off with a really cool spiritual experience that I had this past week.

We have an investigator named Frau Meiwald and she is what we like to call an ewige untersucher (eternal investigator). She has been receiving the lessons for the last 4 years and has made huge progress but she wont commit to be baptized. We decided to teach her about prayer and how prayer is such a huge gift. After we talked to her about prayer, I had the random thought to talk to her about her praying to know if things are true and I asked her if she had prayed about the Book of Mormon. After the question left my mouth I was just praying she would understand what I had said. She responded with "no, I haven't? no one has ever told me to do that" and then she said a bunch of stuff that I didn't understand, but we asked her to pray over the Book of Mormon and I hope that goes good. I'm super grateful for the Spirit, and for this opportunity to be here, the church is true!

Here is what happened the rest of the week...

This week was supposed to be very successful... We were going to get three people on baptismal date and we had like eight appointments and Elder Bretzing and I were both really excited with our prospects. Of all the times for the German train workers to decided to strike and all the trains shut down here in Saxony! The only way we have to get to all of our appointments was by train. Here in Meißen you can't really get anywhere without either the train or an hour long bus ride. So our planned successful week quickly turned into a high stress week of running to catch buses and walking miles and miles to get to places when we missed those buses...

I am loving it here! Even though I can't understand a word through their super thick Saxon accents and they can't understand my broken German (that is still correct, thank you Brother Garlick and Sis Allman!) I'm still enjoying it! 

Or even when the homeless guy yells at me or the punks that don't really do anything but sit on the corner all day throwing insults at us, I still come home and lay in my bed and I am happy! The only thing I will never be happy about is that there is no ice to be had in Germany! All of our drinks are lukewarm and disgusting, because ice is the only way to go... other than that, I'm enjoying it!
Also, the other thing that has been worrying me is that I think I might get hit by a car while I'm here! I am serious! All Germans drive really too fast down cobble stone streets that don't have any safe side walks, and as a missionary, you kind of have to walk on those cobble stone streets to get to places... Luckily that's just in the city center, out in the country they drive even faster, but we have sidewalks and paths to take... Pray for me!

Hopefully this week I can find a way to send pictures and you can see how beautiful Dresden and meißsen are.

Thank you so much for your prayers and for writing and emailing me. I appreciate all the love and support I can get!

Love, Elder Schmalz

The scripture that has buoyed me up this week...
D&C 121: 7-9
My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes. Thy friends do stand by thee, and they shall hail thee again with warm hearts and friendly hands.

My First Week In Germany

So I'm here and it took forever! After three flights that added up to a total of 15 hours of flight time and going into a different time zone, I made it!

 

Right when we stepped off the plan we where picked up by President Kosak and he is really cool! He can speak English which is a huge relief. He also can kill a man in a variety of ways with his bare hands (he lived in East Germany and Russia before the Berlin wall came down).

We spent our first night in a cool little hotel above a bakery. That next morning we where given our areas and our new companions. My companions name is Elder Bretzing, a very big goofy guy from Anaheim California! He has only been out for 3 months but an interesting fact, he used to work at Disneyland! That's all I know at the moment, but more to come next week.
 

I'm now in an area called MeiBen, in the heart of East Germany. If you google it you will learn about the MeiBen Dom, a giant cathedral and the MeiBen porcelain. What you wont see is our apartment, mainly because it is so small and smells really weird! Also Meissen has the strongest dialect in all of Germany so pretty much every thing I learned in the MTC is somewhat worthless here. I actually taught a whole lesson in nearly perfect German but they didn't understand a word....... yeah! (sarcasm) but that is okay!

Albrechtsburg and Cathedral

 

Meissen is south of Berlin on this map really close to Dresden right on the Elbe River

 

We went finding yesterday which is pretty much talking to everyone and anyone you see on the street and we got yelled at a lot and we talked to some drunk guys. I did talk to this guy named Herr Hönege and I just asked him what brought him joy in life and he answered his family. He went on to tell a story about how he lost his whole family and he doesn't know if he will ever see them again. I bore a short testimony about eternal families and set up an appointment with him tomorrow, so I will let you know how that works out.

We also taught a Christian preacher from Kenya who in the past was on the investigator list. Apparently missionaries had talked to him a few months ago but then he moved and had lost contact with them. He has read the Book of Mormon and had been preaching about it on the streets, so hopefully that will all work out too!

I want you all to know that I know with out a doubt in my heart that this church is true, and that it can help anyone in any situation!
 

Oh hey, my new address is
 

Kalkberg 6

01662 Meissen

Deutschland

But...if you want to send me a package ;) my address is

Germany Berlin Mission
Zerbster SraBe 42
12209 Berlin
Germany
 

I took a ton of pictures but this sketchy internet café wont let me send pictures I will figure out how to do it though.

I love you and thank you for your prayers and for your letters and emails!

Elder Schmalz

Willkommen in Deutschland!!!

Elder Schmalz with his new companion Elder Bretzing and President and Sister Kozac

...and he's leeeeaving on a jet plane...

Don't they all look so official hanging out at the airport killing time waiting for their flight to Seattle...then to Amsterdam...then off to Germany? It was so awesome to be able to hear our missionary's voice today. The highlight of my day, for sure. Having my entire family gathered around the speaker phone this morning listening to Elder Schmalz share his testimony with us in the language he has been working so hard to learn these past seven weeks made us all so happy. I know I wasn't the only one standing there with a few tears in my eyes. I am so proud of all of his hard work. I am so excited for him!
Part of my heart just left for Germany today... I hope it takes some great pictures and writes every detail in it's journal so when it gets back I will know what my hearts been doing, because that little part of my heart isn't very good at writing letters. Maybe it will get better with practice... :)
I love you Elder Schmalz. Always and forever! 

 

Our district with Sister Allman, one of our German teachers

My Last Week

I'm not even sure I can call it a week, can I?

I only have 5 more days until I board a plane heading to....... Seattle, and then a plane going to Amsterdam....and then finally a plane to Germany!

I have enjoyed my MTC experience but my dad pretty much summed it up in his letter he sent me when he said, "The MTC is great, but you were not called to serve there, you have a great work to do!", and that is exactly how I feel. I am so excited to get to Deutschland and to meet the people that I am going to serve!

Concecration week went great. All German...all week...I pretty much got through 3 hours and realized I had used up all that I knew.  Needless to say, I learned how to say a lot of things this week and that is great.

Hopefully I will have more to write about once I am in Germany. Here in the MTC everything is the same, all of the time.  It's like being in the Twilight Zone!

I love all of you and I know this church is true!

Next email I will be in Germany!

-Elder Gavin Schmalz

The Start of Week Six

Sorry about last week, the MTC servers were crashing so they kicked us all off of the computers!

Life is pretty much the same. I'm still here learning German, and I'm still learning to be an awesome missionary ;)! Really though, I have learned so much already.

 

Since I got kicked off last week I have to tell you about 2 weeks of MTC life...

 

Last weeks highlights:

I got to see Colton at the temple! That was really cool, he is going to do great things in Chile!

I had the awesome opportunity to teach a Skype lesson to an awesome sister named Andrea Novak who lives in Frankfurt Germany. While we were teaching her the craziest thing happened...... I could understand her (barely) but I was able to communicate with her! We taught her about how much Heavenly Father loves his children and the ways that he shows it, and at the end of our lesson we sang her a hymn in German. I thought it would be awkward to sing a hymn in a language I don't know super well and to a person I didn't know at all, but if there is one thing you guys can learn from this email is that the Holy Ghost doesn't care about those things. As long as you are trying your best and giving it your all, the Spirit will testify of the truth, Even over a Skype call!

So yeah, that was pretty much the highlight of last week (plus conference!)!

So this week was Good. We had a devotional from the church media director and he showed us the new Christmas video, and Heilige Kuh (holy cow) Its awesome! It comes out the day after Thanksgiving so just keep your eyes peeled for it.

He also taught us how to use media in our lessons and it was very helpful.  Elder Vellinga and I put it to use in our last lesson with Amo. 

Also we get our travel plans tomorrow, and there is only 13 days until I'm on a plane to Germany!

Starting tonight at 6:00 is Consecration week. What that means is that we are only speaking Deutsche for the next week!!! Pray for me haha because I think I will need it. I know I will be able to do it. My German has improved so much in the last 5 weeks. Wow, that is weird to say,  and I cannot wait until I get to leave the MTC and head to Germany!

So yeah, that's pretty much what's been happening. 

Oh, I also have two more weeks that I can write you a letter that wont take 2 weeks to travel, so write me, and I will respond. I have 20 US stamps I've got to use!

One last funny thing. The one time people can pronounce my last name correctly and they have to point out that it means something funny... Schmalz in German means LARD........ and every German person I have seen has laughed at that for 10 minutes or more! Hopefully it can and will help me in Germany. Whatever it takes...

 

I love all of you! and I hope you are all doing great!

The Church is true!

Elder Alexander Gavin Schmalz

OCT29 GER-BER

2009 N 900 E Unit 175

Provo UT 84602

Priesthood Session

We all felt like we were able to spend the night with our very own Elder Alexander Gavin Schmalz as we were intently watching the Priesthood Session for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints just trying to catch a glimpse of his cute face. He had the most incredible opportunity to get to sing in this sea of white shirts and ties with other missionaries from the Missionary Training Center. I am pretty sure I could hear him in every song they sang, and I am pretty sure that we weren't the only mother, father, and siblings that jumped up and down and screamed and then spontaneously burst into tears as soon as we saw our missionary, and I am also pretty sure that the music in the Priesthood Session has never been quite this good before.
Oh, how I love my missionary son. I am so grateful that he was able to take something that he has loved doing for so many years and who happens to be pretty talented in and share it with the world. We LOVED every single minute of it!

Rachel nailed it! Gav is still fiercer than ever!

MTC LIFE

 

First things first. I want you all to go watch the mormon message "The Hope of Gods Light".

I just have had some promptings to tell all of you to watch it and must listen to promptings...

The MTC is awesome! I'm learning so much every day! 

 

So just to clarify the whole investigator thing. We don't actually have investigators, we teach return missionaries that are acting as one of their investigators on their missions. Its actually one of the first things you do when you get here.......... in 100% German. but I have learned to love it so much.

 

Right now we are teaching this sister named Birko, she is 24 and she is a Geology student at the university of Munich. She actually contacted us after she came and visited Utah and went to temple square.

Amo is our second "investigator". He is from Syria and his brother and his father died in the war. He is a refugee in Berlin and he doesn't have any papers (passport or ID) or a job and his mother is really sick with cancer......

 

So as you can see missionary work isn't something that is cookie cutter, it is personally tailored to every person it touches and that is why I love it!

 

We also do this thing called TRC and I have no idea what it stands for, but its basically us teaching members Family Home Evening lessons in German. most of them are elderly couples from Germany and Austria. This week I took the lead and pretty much did most of the talking.  I decided to teach my two TRC families about eternal families. It was my first time teaching them and I was having a super hard time getting them to interact with me until the thought came to my head to show them a picture of my family and just talk about how happy I am that I can live with them forever........... and it worked! My family is my favorite subject so of course it worked! So thank you for helping me teach a lesson to a small German woman and her large intimidating German husband!:)

I love all of you!

The Church is true!

Elder Schmalz