Mon, Oct 24, 2011

Trisha and her companion

Hello dear family!!!

First of all I want to apologize for causing a scare! That wasn't my intention at all as I'm sure President reassured you. Everything is fine and I thought it was comical. You don´t need to ask for forgiveness, mom! Its really okay :) I wasn´t angry in the slightest, just felt bad that I scared you. But yes, we usually do emails at the church but lately the internet on one has been broken down so we don´t want to spend 4 hours at the church on Pday but I convinced Sis to come to church today because the internet cafe is ridiculously expensive. Like.... a dollar for 11 minutes. so an €uro for 22 minutes. Its kinda crazy. But yes! Everything is wonderful!

Thats super funny that you had your greenie teach the chastity lesson and he was embarrassed. I would´ve spoken, but I think Sister Martinz thought I would´ve been embarrassed too, but its as much part of the gospel as any other topic we teach.

Germany is a melting pot for sure! Seriously, I think people from every country live in little Celle! The people from the Middle east that we teach are Christian, but some don´t have their passports so they have a risk of being sent back to the Middle East so we´re not allowed to baptize them. But some do have passports and so we are strongly encouraged to baptize them.

As for the work on Texas straße, we had a lesson there yesterday and for some bizzare unknown reason Sister Martinz said as we were leaving "When you´re interested, call us and we´ll be glad to talk more about Christ" instead of setting a time we could come again. We never do that, normally we set an appointment, so I don´t know what came over her. Hopefully hopefully hopefully we´ll have a miracle and he´ll call us. Other than that we´re just going to go back in a couple weeks and talk to the other people that had interest so we aren´t too overwhelming. We´ll overwhelm them with the gospel later.

The physical therapy, when I´ve had time to exercise, has been good. This week has been so crazy busy that we haven´t even had time for study. So bad! I got registered as a Celle citizen one day so we didn´t have time to study or exercise, then we went to Hannover one day and then we went to Braunschweig twice. So we haven´t really had time to do anything in the mornings except get ready and leave. But the days we had time, I´m pleased to say that I have done the therapy exercises.

Just curious, who all reads my e-mails (besides the family that you forward it to) Just you and mom or do my dear siblings read them too?

Hallelujah that Rachel wore a different dress to church! Haha, how funny. You should take a picture and send it the next time she wears it, or are you still camera-less? How exactly did it meet its fate? I hope everything goes well with her anxiety. I knew she needed to be treated for it, its really extreme.

Are you called as a Relief Society teacher, mom? The word for Relief Society in German is so evil. It´s "Frauenhilfsvereinigung" meaning "women united to help". Cool huh! Crazy that you talked about the Second Coming. There was a bad earthquake in Turky yesterday, right? We were at an investigator´s house and they were watching the news and it was talking about the earthquake. It really is coming closer and closer to the second coming. I may or may not have slapped my forehead and shook my head when I read about your opera solo in Relief Society. But that´s my mom! I love you for it, even though I may act embarrassed :)

I´ve heard of missionaries being able to Skype, but I haven´t heard if I personally will be able to. We shall see.

Wow, crazy that Steven, Josh, Jeff, and Megan will all be in the MTC at the same time. By the way HAPPY BIRTHDAY MEGAN!

Well, we are really getting taken care of by our members lately. We had 4 eating appointments this week, which is so not normal, and they all sent us home with bags of food. All we need to buy today for groceries is bread and milk. Crazy huh, one lady gave us bags and bags of apples, cuties, tomatoes, etc. And one lady is a missionary mom and you can tell because she gave us warmer gloves, which has been so nice! There´s one member who sends us home with cakes every Sunday. Its so sweet. We´re hoping we don´t plumpen up. We have another couple eating apps this week too. Crazy!

I dunno if you´ve sent the package, but one last request (I think)- hot chocolate bitte? The hot chocolate here is NASTY and its nice after a long cold day to have a cup of hot chocolate. Thank you for always being willing to take requests! :)

Joelle is engaged. What the devil??

Random: we cornered and pet a hedgehog the other day. I have pictures. Its pretty cool :)

We moved Kenneth´s baptismal date to November 5th, but I still think it´ll be later than that. He needs a testimony of Joseph Smith still and needs to stop cancelling our appointments. He cancelled both this week. We stopped by randomly in the week and he didn´t even realize his baptism was scheduled for this week. Oh dear. We´re going to talk to him about it better tomorrow.

So I got a letter from my branch president´s wife at the MTC because Elder Holland came and spoke the DAY after we left the MTC so she sent his talk. And I´m just curious because it says in the talk that we´re not allowed to give up on this because of all the people that have died for the gospel, the most recent being four hours ago.....what does that mean? Did someone die for the gospel on August 29th? Fill me in please!

The intense part of this week was that we had "Golden Tausch", meaning the trainers had training on how to be better trainers so the trainers were companions in Hannover and the newbies were companions. That means Sister Laubaugh and I were companions for a day in Celle. It was super intense, but I was pleasantly surprised at how much I could actually understand. I think I just became dependent on Sister Martinz speaking and didn´t really listen because I knew that she could speak to them. But I was forced to listen when both Sister Laubaugh and I have little German experience. We even were able to make an appointment! It went a lot better than I was anticipating.

Well everything is going well in Celle! I love the work so much and I´m so glad I can be here!! I can´t get over it. Even if I just make someone happier I feel like I´ve been successful! I know that Christ loves us and wants us to use the Atonement! Use it! I love my Savior and I´m glad I can serve Him.

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!

Love, Sister Niebergall


P.S. If you haven´t sent those letters yet, you should consider doing that. You have a missionary checking the mailbox every day anxiously waiting. :) Love you!

Mon, Oct 17, 2011

Hey family! Thank you for your e-mails! I love reading them every week they make me oh so so happy!!

So thank you for all of your support and prayers for our investigators. It makes me feel good that Sister Martinz and I arent the only ones praying for our investigators! Kenneth probably won't be baptized this Saturday, we still have some things we need to review just to make sure he knows how big the step of baptism really is and what he promises to Heavenly Father. But he loves the Book of Mormon. He always reads farther than we ask him to. Its wonderful it makes me so happy! This week we taught him Keuscheit....that means chastity. It was my first chastity lesson. Haha. I didn't say very much but Sis was really bold and did a good job. Yes, we teach him in English, which is nice. I love when we get to teach in English. But we're going to change his baptism date when we visit him tomorrow. I'll let you know what we change it to. Probably early November.

We teach several people. Not many are progressing, but we're teaching people from Iran, Iraq, Russia, England, Nigeria. We teach them in German.  Its pretty tricky sometimes when they don't speak good German and especially don't understand gospel vocabulary. Its like a whole new language itself. But! One of our investigators got baptized!! The surprising part is he is the one that always would say "i'm already baptized" The next surprising part is that he got baptized into the Russian Orthodox church and not ours!!! Weird huh! He said it was a good experience. We're tschssing him this week (Saying tchss = saying see ya).

You're right, it is getting chilly here in Celle. Some days the sun is shining but its still really cold. This week was pretty rainy though so I put on my boots and guess what I found. A NOTE FROM DAD! It made me smile from ear to ear and reminded me how great my family was! I enjoyed finding everyone's notes in my suitcase at the MTC and it was really great to find another note. Thanks so much dad. That made my day. And yes, I have been using my coat. Its very warm and puffy. So puffy in fact that when I sit down it pushes the air out of it and shoots my name tag off of it. That happened on a train on the way to Braunschweig and I didn't notice til I was off the train so I ran back on the train to find it and Sis just stood outside the train pushing the button to open the doors so it wouldn't leave with me on it. It was adventurous! But I found my tag and made it off the train, so all is good!

I love that you used the fruit vinigarette. Did Rachel cover her mouth and make a throw up noise when she saw you were using it on the salad? Haha, tastes like chicken. I'm not angry. I forgot about that. Toooo funny. But sad that my delicious Costa Vida didn't work out.

We don't spend too much time doing doors it seems like. We do more street contacting. But a few weeks ago we found "Texas Strasse" on a map so of course I knew I had to go look at it and take a picture! So yesterday we went there and figured we should do doors while we were there. And we found FOUR potenial investigators on this street!!! We made an appointment with one who was clinically dead but then came back to life so faith plays a big role in his life and others told us to come back (that happens a lot that they say they don't have time but to come back and they're not really interested, but this time they were sincerely interested!!) So thanks for getting called to Texas Jeff! Maybe Heavenly Father inspired someone to name the road Texas so we would go there!

 

So weird thing just barely happened, we're at the internet cafe again today and a man came up really close to my name tag and then I looked at him and said "Hallo...." then he rubbed my arm, looked at my computer screen, and walked away. CREEPY AND KOMISCH! But funny! Hahaha!

 

I sent a letter from my mission president to you about packages. I don't know what it says, but you can get info about packages there. I would also love WHS cds (Christmas and not) if thats possible! At least my and Jeff's chamber and A Cappella songs. Also, if you could send me some more sheet music maybe from defordmusic.com or something that would be great. Or copy some more music from my efy books? I'd love that. If not its okay, but that would be wonderful if it were possible. Also, it would be great to have fast and easy recipies too. I'm a little tired of toast with ham and cheese on it.

 

Oh.... about physical therapy. I haven't really been doing that.. Its so hard in the morning to do any exercisy thingy! But I commit to doing it this week and will report back to you about it.

 

Also, I can't remember if I paid any of my loan before I left. Do you remember? Can you look in the yellow folder and see if there's anything that needs to be done? Also, will you call USU and see if my Spring 2010 semester is showing up on my transcript? I really don't want to retake anatomy and all of music theory. And will you tell me what you find out so I don't have to think about it anymore?

Random question- whats the population of Pleasant View, I want to compare it to Celle.

The man just looked at my tag again! I think he's writing down my name! Maybe in his journal or something. Weird!!!

I'll be sure to take some pictures of the half timber houses for you dad. And see if we could arrange on a different week to have P-Day a different day so we can go and see the sights of Celle.

I AM SO EXCITED TO HEAR SARAH IS PLANNING ON A MISSION! Stick with that decision, babe it could never ever be a bad decision. It blesses so many people around you and I could go on and on and on about how great a mission is. But I won't. But my advice is START NOW! Read the BoM and pray. Don't think its too early to start preparing because its not. There was a talk in conference fore preparing for a mission. I can't remember who gave it, but it was Sunday afternoon. You should look at that again when you can.

Tell Nick "Hello, I hope you're doing well and aren't too awkward" for me please! Tell him also that "I agree that its cool that I'm in Germany." Sometimes I forget that I'm not in America and then I see the beautiful scenery and think how could I forget!!!

Ohhhhhhh Pop's concert.... how I don't miss it. How were the choirs though? How's chamber sound. Probably different without a Wood son in it!

Tell Brittany hello for me and that I love her.

 

That's about all I think. I love you all! This gospel is the most precious thing on the earth and we are so so so so blessed to have it. I am so glad that I can share this gospel with those that are searching for the truth but know not where to find it. I know that Christ is my Savior and that He knows me personally and completely. Stick to the gospel! You can never ever go wrong with it in your lives. I love you all so much! Thanks for your support!

Love, Sister Niebergall

Ps. There is no way to attatch pictures on this computer at the internet Cafe. Sorry! Hopefully they'll fix the computers at the church soon.

Mon, Oct 10, 2011

Hey family!

Yes, yes, YES I´m doing so so well here in Celle! I love it with all of my heart! It really is the best. Its so weird that I´m a "real misisonary" Sometimes I forget, but I shouldnt, because its such a huge responsibility! But I´m so happy to be here having my own misisonary experiences, making my own memories, strengthening my own testimony, but most of all bringing others to Christ!

Not this Saturday, but the next we have a baptism!!! His name is Kenneth, he´s so great! He´s from Nigeria and oh man I can´t express how cool he is! He´s had a baptismal date since before I got here and he is progressing so much and is so ready for baptism. He hasn´t got a firm confirmation for himself that this church is the only true church, but I think he´s getting closer and closer to finding it. He used to say he was too busy to read in the Book of Mormon (oh, he´s english speaking by the way. YES!) because he has school and such, but we started reading with him, just from the beginning to show him how cool it is! We used to give him a verse a day and he wouldnt read, but since we started reading it with him, he has a huge desire to read by himself! We read about Lehi and the pillar of fire and I said "see! The Book of Mormon is cool!" And he started giggling like a little girl. I think that means he agrees :) I think thats the key to keeping someone a solid member of the church is the Book of Mormon. When they have a testimony of the Book of Mormon, its hard for them to fall away. He´s great. Please keep him in your prayers, when people get closer to baptism Satan hits harder. He´s great and we dont wanna lose him!

 

I love Hilary Weeks!!! Thats nice that you tthought of me when you heard her song. I actually sang at a member´s house at dinner one of her songs. I cant remember if I mentioned that before. I was going to ask if its too early to start requesting Christmas stuff, haha! Because I want some cds! Our music code isnt very strict at all, just as long as it doesnt distract from our work. So I was wondering if I could have some Christmas cds that are on our itunes (i hope our itunes is still working) so I can get in the Christmas mood...yes...already. Any Christmas music will do, even Jingle Bells and things like that. It doesnt have to all be Christian Christmas stuff. Of course I want some Christian though.Haha. Also for Christmas I´d love to have some regular church music cds like Hilary weeks, efy, MOTAB, Voice Male, anything thats good in the religious section of itunes! If you could do that, that´d be great! Also I´d love some thermal garments for Christmas too. Its getting chilly.

 

For transfers we get told on Saturday and then we leave Tuesday so we have time to prepare. Thank goodness. I cant imagine being told the night before, packing, and figuring out train times. Its so weird to think i´m not the goldenest golden anymore! I think we have 22 sisters in the mission now. We played soccer in Hannover with the Elders. Sis Martinz and I were the only sisters and it was so fun. We were both really really sore for a couple days after though. Haha. How pathetic!

 

I look forward to getting those letters. Stick them in the mail box :) That will make my day to receive them since I havent received anything here yet.

 

I heard of President Uchtdorf´s talk in Relief Society but didnt have a chance to watch it. I´ll have to look for it.

 

I´m not the farthest north I could be in Germany but my mission is the northern part of Germany so I´m somewhat north. We don´t go into other countries either except I think one Elder city goes a little into Poland. One of my MTC district Elders is in that city now. How hard to have to speak German and Polish in your first city. Crazy!

 

Guess whats stuck in my head right now? "Hot cold, shy bold, lahahahaugh cry, wet dry, eeuhheavy light, day night, wrong right!

 

You don´t bore me with your school talk. I´m so glad that you´re enjoying it so much! I´m also glad they´re enjoying you so much! Of course they are! I seriously think you´d be the greatest 6th grade teacher cuz then you can show your personality better!

 

Our investigators are great. The one that broke his finger has a huge cast on and his hand is so swollen. He´s the sweetest guy ever. He gives us little treats every time we come and one time he ran out of drink when he was pouring it for Sister Martinz so she had some and I didn´t and he felt so bad and promised he didn´t do it on purpose. It was so funny. He´s the sweetest AND he´s German. Its rare to teach Germans. Weird, huh! We taught him the first lesson and normally I just sit and smile and nod since I can´t say much but we planned for me to share the Joseph Smith story and we practiced it and when I actually taught it the spirit was so strong and I wasn´t stumbling over my words like normal! I know Heavenly Father helped me. And Herr Hustedt is this man´s name, and he accepts everything so well. But he doesn´t ask questions so we hope he sees the importance of what we´re teaching. He´s so great. I can´t explain how cool he is. Everyone we teach is cool!

 

Oh could you find out where Bach played the organ so I can go see it? That´d be really cool if you could find the address!

 

I know this church is true! We are so blessed to know that our Heavenly Father really knows and loves us! There are some people that don´t know this! Why don´t we share it!? I hope you all will share it when you have the chances. Also, have you done any missionary family home evening thing? I would love to hear what you think of. Let me know!  You´re all the best family I could ask for! I love you!

 

Love, Sister Niebergall

Mon, Oct 03, 2011

Guten Morgen/ Tag/ Abend/ Whatever time of day you read this Familie!!

Oh my goodness who was not just filled to the brim with good stuff from Conference!? I didn`t get to see all the sessions so I saw the first 3 and I can´t wait to read the Relief Society and Sunday Afternoon sessions! I want to hear about everyone´s favorite talk! I forgot to prepare you to report before hand, but here it is! What was your favorite talk?? And what was the common theme you saw in the talks and what are you going to do to improve!? Ah! So much to improve on but I am so motivated right now!! Aren´t we so blessed to have living Prophets and Apostles on the earth today to edify us??? We are so blessed. I`m so happy.

My favorite talk, since I asked you I should report, was President Uchtdorf´s. I know Heavenly Father knows me, loves me, and is so aware of me!!! I didn´t pray for anything in particular to receive at conference, just for the speakers to be inspired. When the time for conference came that talk was just the icing on the cake. It was so good. Oh, I began listening to conference in German and it was a little tricky to understand, but then they set up the English in a different room for me and a man from England who speaks...well... English. My companion is completley fluent in English so she watched too. We also went to Hannover so we could see the Saturday Afternoon session in English on Sunday morning. It was so cool to see the Pleasant View/ North Ogden choir. I´m pretty sure I gasped when they announced it and ran to the front of the room where the TV was so I could be closer and look for Rachel, because I figured she would do that. But I didn´t see her, obviously. Oh, it was only missionaries in the English session, so I wasn´t really making a huge scene. But cool!! Made me happy! We will get copies of the conference reports when they come.

Thanks for Grandma and Grandpa´s e-mail, but weirdly enough I want their home address so I can send *GASP* snaaail maaaail! I don´t know if you are familiar with it because e-mail is so predominant. :) They do send me occasional notes and I rather enjoy them! But can I get their home address please? I want to send them a picture of their missionary granddaughter!

Yeah our district only has 2 elders and they`re both German! Funny huh! They´re great. We`re going to Hannover today to play soccer with our zone. It shall be fun. Our District Leader is being transferred to Neubrandenburg though. Crazy that I`ve already been here for a Transfer. But I´m staying in Celle and Sister Martinz and I are still companions! I haven´t met Elder Sheppard yet that I know of, but maybe some day (Insert cheesy choir song)

 I can´t believe Jeff is buying missionary stuff already. Its nuts!! Soon you´ll be a double missionary mom, mom! Thats exciting. I´m so excited for him and his experiences! What was your fav talk, Jeffy? I realized you and Megan will be in the MTC at the same time! Cool!!!!!! Take a picture together and send it to me! I love pictures!

Sarah! You hotty! Way to get asked on a date! But, way to stick to your standards and realize that listening to the prophets is much more important than going to a silly theme park. What was your favorite conference talk?????? I WANT TO KNOW HOW YOU´RE DOING!!!

Crazy that Grandma may move up! Let me know how that works out! I don´t blame her, that would be super lonely!

Thats so so funny Deej! How are you liking choir? What other classes are you taking? What songs are you singing in choir? How is play practice? How does it feel to be in high school? It is so weird to me that you can date and you look way too young to date in your homecoming picture! Heehee. So crazy. What was your favorite conference talk?

Rae, I was sad to see that you weren´t in the choir, that would have been so cool to sing where the prophet was! But thats okay, it might have been hard to sit still and be reverant the whole meeting. How is school? How do you like your teacher? How are your webkinz? Any new Webkinz that you`ve gotten since your birthday?

Oh mommy, that is the coolest note that someone could give you! And words mean so much to you! So great! Always remember that! I think about you and how you believe in me a lot too and it keeps me going! You really are such a great influence to people!

We had Tausch this week and I can´t remember the English word for it but I switched companions for a day and went to Magdeburg for the day. It was way fun! Good to meet another missionary. I feel like I don´t know any missionaries here!

There is a person we teach English who is a dress maker.... So I´m taking him my shoes to see if he can do anything with them. We´ll see.

All of our investigators were sick one day. It was crazy. One has a brain tumor and she is very forgetful because of it. She forgot we were coming over. She had a new phone number to give us but she didnt know if the number she was giving us was her new one so she had us call it to see if it worked and it did. Then when we left she called us and asked us why she called. Wow. Poor lady!

Then we went to an investigator for an appointment and when we got their his finger was completely broken and bleeding. He apologized and promised he didn´t break his finger on purpose, but offered us cookies and fruit and chocolate even though he was on his way out to the taxi to take him to the hospital. He is the sweetest old man.

Then we had an investigator tell us he was working out and had a stroke type thing and they found out he has a cyst in his brain and he doesnt find out if its malignant until November. SO he has to wait awhile. The Celle folk need prayers for health!

Here is a bit of a letter I wrote to President Pimentel this week:

"Sometimes its easy to lose faith. Sometimes its easy to lose sight of the real goal. Its easy to make assumptions about what will happen according to what we´ve experienced. In a way, it becomes easy to walk by sight and not by faith. We´ve seen before that a person has a hard time accepting the Word of Wisdom, so we assume a different person will have the same problem. We´ve seen before that a 17 year old boy seems interested in the gospel, but he really is pretending to be interested so he can meet up with 2 cute girls. From what we´ve SEEN before, we may be able to guess how something may work out. But we are told to walk by faith, and not by sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7)

When Christ beckoned Peter to walk on the water, Peter began to work a miracle. Normally Peter´s experience with walking on water was that he would fall in. But he began doing something that normally would have been impossible. He walked faithfully towards Christ- comepletly focused and doubting nothing. But its when he "saw the wind boisterous he was afraid." Its when he awlked by sight and not by faith that the miracle of him walking on water stopped. Its when he let doubt creep in that he began to sink. When we begin to doubt is when miracles cease!

In Moroni 7:37 it says "for it is by faith that miracles are wrought...wherefore if these things have ceased it is because of unbelief...if these things have ceased, then has faith ceased also. We need to walk by faith trusting that Heavenly Father will provide miracles. Because after the trial of our faith is when we get the witness. After we trust in the Lord and believe we can work miracles is when we see miracles happen.

Faith is hoping for things which are not SEEN which are true. Its interesting how faith and sight are always linked together. Because the Brother of Jared had such great faith, God couldn´t hide his finger from the SIGHT of the Brother of Jared. It was after his faith that the miracles were wrought and he SAW. But as it says in James 1:6, we need to have faith, with nothing wavering.#

We need to go from place to place- believing with everything we have, that we´ll be able to perform the miracles he wants us to perform. Believing that we can walk on water, see God´s hand, part a sea- or at least that we can learn German, or our appointment will show up at the park, or that our investigator will progress. We must BELIEVE in the people we come in contact with and most of all we must believe in Heavenly Father´s ability to lead us to those prepared. With every person we meet we must believe that THIS is the person Heavenly Father knows is ready.

Its easy to base our life on what we´ve experienced and SEEN, but it is when we walk by FAITH and not by SIGHT that miracles truly will be wrought."

I know that with faith we can do all things!!

I LOVE YOU!

Love, Sister Niebergall

Sorry this is long.

Mon, Sep 26, 2011

Hello, this week we`re at an internet cafe and so we have a time limit. So sorry if i don`t respond or make as much sense as normal.

 

I´m glad you were able to share some missionary experiences, mom. Thats fun, i wouldve loved to be there in the primary and here missionary stories. theyre my favorite.

 

It is beautiful outside here! Especially since i bought my coat its been really really warm! I don´t know how to describe my apt. you walk in and first thing you see is the bathroom. you walk farther and to the left is the living room with our desks and some couches with a table in the middle and then to the right is our kitchen. then walk some more and then is our bedroom with bunk beds and then we have a bookshelf with many many different language book of mormons...... yeah book of mormons and pamphlets and such. I´ll send a picture sometime. And of Celle sometime too. I still need grandma and grandpa´s email address

 

I gave away my first book of mormon while speaking german and without any help from my companion. it was a very big accomplishment. i think he just took it cuz he felt bad, but oh well. as long as he reads it and finds out its true it´ll be a good story for him to tell.

 

 

I think it´d cost a lot to send my shoes home. Maybe more than buying new ones. I dunno. i dont have time to thihnk about it so you figure something out and tell me what to do and ill do it.

 

We had presidents interviews this week and it was very motivational and so so so good. He talked about the atonement and how its like a gift certificate. its already been paid for. we can either use it or we can just let it sit in the drawer and collect dust and it does neither person any good. the giver of the gift would want us to use it.

 

I think i should send this so the computer doesnt shut down on me. i don´t know if i´ll be able to write later or not. But if not, I know the church is true and I am so so so so grateful for the atonement! I love all of you so much and hope all is well with you! thanks for all writing. i promise i´ll write to all of you next time. it may be later today and it may not. i dont really know. I love you!

 

Love Sister Niebergall