The One with Salzburg

Hey fam!

Thank you for the birthday wishes! They all made me so happy! Saturday will be odd, but I will still feel your guys love!

This week was crazy we have set the goal to work harder on helping our investigators come to church because they just aren't! So, we work SUPER hard and we made plans for their trains: how they could afford the trains, we arranged members to pick people us, and we were going to walk with a couple. In total, we had complete "fool proof" plans for 8 investigators to come to church! We were so pumped! Annnnnnd one by one each plan fell through and only one person made it to church. But we are still so happy about the one! It was Fred. He is progressing so much. In fact, he is so solid, and we have taught him basically everything (We are just waiting on permission from Utah for his baptism) so we started using him as a Joint Teach for our other investigator Steven! He bore the sweetest testimony on fasting. We taught him about fasting a couple weeks earlier and he tried it for himself on fast Sunday. He told us that he prayed throughout the entire 24 hours and he felt the spirit. Then before he closed his fast, he opened up to God about all of his inner struggles as he has to wait an undetermined amount of time for his baptism and he was just overwhelmed with the deepest peaceful feeling. He said that all of his concerns were put to rest and they were replaced with the sweetest joy. After the lesson he thanked me for being here to teach him and it made my heart soar. 

Being on a mission has definitely helped me to grow a deeper testimony, but even more than that, my eyes have been opened to how a testimony of the restoration and the Gospel of Jesus Christ can bless other people's lives. I see random people and I can tangibly feel the potential for stronger family relationships, peace in this life, and happiness for eternity. 

We got permission from President Brown to go to Salzburg, Austria for P-day today! It was SOOOO worth it! We did a 3.5 hour "Sound of Music" bike tour and it was HEAVEN! I just soaked in all of the mountains and the beauty as our tour guide played the entire soundtrack and showed us all of the famous movie scenes. Later we went into some Catacombs and walked over The Lock Bridge (which has always been on my Bucket List). It was a fantastic birthday celebration 

Love you guys! I will send more pics next week!

- Sister Reay

The One with Alma 7:12

Hey Fam!

I hope everything has been going well with going back to school and everything! I know that is a pretty busy time around the Reay home!!! This week was pretty great! Princess, Fred, and a new investigator named Friday came to church and we were soooooooo happy! Princess is progressing really well. Right now, she is praying about when her baptism should be. I think she will choose a date in late September or early August, but we will see! Right now, her kids are out of school for summer so lessons are always interesting because Sister Pitcher and I have to take turns keeping them occupied with coloring while the other teaches Princess the lesson! Her kids are 7,5, and 2.

We have been teaching this other man named Issac for a LONG time. He was always progressing enough that we continued teaching him, but our main focus was usually on those who had a strong desire to baptize. I was so happy because he kind of had a little change of heart experience that caused him to ask us about commandments and why we should keep them. We got to teach him about the Word of Wisdom and he went from 15 Cigarettes a day to 2 and this week he agreed to try and cut them out completely! We are trying desperately to help him come to church this Sunday because he is a refugee that lives about an hour from the church.

I wanted to share something from my studies this week. I was reading Alma 7:12 and it said, "And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities." I read the institute manual about the word ‘succor’ and it means "to run to". How cool is that? And in German it is "Beistehen" which directly translates to "stand by". Because he performed the atonement, he can run to our aid, stand by us, and care for us.

I love you guys! Have a great week!

Love, JJ May 

The One When She Understood

Hey Fam•damily!

I cannot believe that 1/3 weeks of this transfer is already done! I remember my first transfer literally felt like an Eternity and my second transfer felt like a lifetime and every transfer after that just keeps getting faster and faster! 

We are working really hard here is Rosenheim! Sister Pitcher and I are warming up to each other and figuring out how we work best together! We have definitely felt the blessings that come along with hard work. Do you remember me telling you about Princess? (She is the woman that has the kids and makes us African food) Well, we taught her the Plan of Salvation this week and she LOVED it! She was so happy that it answered so many of her questions that were weighing heavily on her heart. We asked her in that lesson if she would want to be baptized and she said yes! So, she has a baptismal date that we are going to help her work towards!

We were finding on the street this week and I saw a cute girl with a bright orange hat that I wanted us to stop! We had a nice talk with her and she was really excited for us to come teach her this week because she said she has family that are members, but she doesn’t really know what we believe! Her name is Claudia and she is from Madagascar. Our lesson was very special. She is alone here in Germany so we had fun looking at pictures of her family that she misses so much. Then, we started teaching her about the restoration and the spirit was there. Her family had actually taken the lessons when she was really little so she could remember some things, but a lot of things were pretty cloudy. She has been learning German for about a year and we have only been learning for about 8 months, but she just kept saying "I understand... I understand what you are teaching me." We could see the light bulbs go off as we taught her about prophets, angels, gold plates and Joseph Smith. Near the end, she teared up as she thanked us for coming and asked if we could come again. 

I can see the Lord preparing the hearts of people. Sometimes, I know I am planting those seeds for him and sometimes we meet people like Claudia that have been being prepared for a long time. I pray that this time around, she will be ready to receive the truth! 

I love you guys and I am so grateful for you!

Have a blessed week!

Love, JJ

Randoms:

- The Dzierzon Family treated us to cake from a well-known bakery that people travel long distances to just get a piece of cake! It was called Cafe Winklstruberl. The pieces were giant! I got a "      " which has a layer of Marzipan on the outside and I almost died!

- Some members bought us These Gingerbread cookie things. Honestly, I cannot remember what they are called, but you see them everywhere! It is a really common gift to give. I find that it is the equivalent of giving someone a mug. For example, you can find some that say like "#1 Grandma" or "Congratulations"

- We went on a hike with the Relief Society this week and it was beautiful! 

The One When I Didn't Have Enough Time to Think of a Title...

Hey guys! 

I am still holdin’ down the fort here! Sister Pitcher is really cool! We are kind of opposites in a couple of days which will take some getting used to, but I think she will help me be more outgoing! 

We tried SOOOOOO HARD to get our investigators to church this week and it did not happen. It is so hard with them being so dang far from the church building. I guess they call it missionary WORK for a reason because we have to just keep working, brainstorming, and helping these people come to know their savior by keeping commitments! Fred (the previous member we are teaching) did surprise us though! He thought he was going to have to work, but he got the day off! It filled my heart to see his sweet face light up the chapel! Plus, the Stake President was there so Fred got to meet the man helping him with the paperwork necessary to come back into the fold!

Sorry I do not have more time this week! I love you guys and I hope all is well at home!

Love Sister Reay

Randoms:

- Picture 1 Sister Pitcher rocking her bold red lipstick! #goals 

- Picture 2 Fred with the stake pres

- Picture 3 I loved biking with Sister Grundvig so much that I asked Sister Pitcher if we could start doing it for sport in the morning and she was totally game! 

- Picture 4 We went out to go streeting and literally no one was on the street... sad day!