July 9, 2012

Dear Mommy,

                I am glad that the package finally arrived! Sorry it took so long. And sorry the chocolate was melted. I guess no more Swiss chocolate for you :) oh well. And man, that is crazy. 7 fires? IT IS THE END OF THE WORLD!!!!! DECEMBER 21, 2012! I knew it was going to happen! That is not so good though. Have any houses burned, or is it only forest so far? Sorry the air is no bad, the air is really nice here in Switzerland. :) I will try to send you some Swiss air in my next package.

                This week was rather interesting. We had another super meeting with all of the district leaders in the mission in München. The zone leaders all had to go on Wednesday, and the district leaders came on Thursday and we stayed until Friday afternoon and got home Friday night at 10:30. Yeah, we pretty much lost 3 days of missionary work in Bern, but it was okay. This meeting went a lot better, we were able to get the district leaders involved, and hopefully it will help to get our excitement level as a mission up. Our zone is doing really great. We had 3 baptisms last week, and hopefully we will have 3 more this week :)

                Also on Saturday we had an 8 year old baptism from a family from Utah that lives in Bern now. It was really cool. We also were able to meet with I__________ a couple of times this week. She is doing great, and can be baptized as soon as she is able to come to church regularly. She asked for Sunday off, and her boss said that she can`t have Sunday off until August, but we had the feeling that she needs to explain that she wants to go to church, but she is afraid to do that. So please include her in your prayers. Her cousin A______ came to church again yesterday, so that was really cool, and H_______ came as well. We are excited to have so many prepared people and we are always looking for more.

                BTW I cut my own hair, but I had an accident as I was cutting it, so that is why it was so short, it is actually a lot longer now, but still the shortest it has been in a LONG time. And I don`t really need anything, I am doing good here in Bern, we have transfers this week, and Elder Sanderson will probably be transferred, we will see... hahaha I will let you know what happens next week :)

                Oh we are going to the temple tomorrow! We haven`t been the last 3 transfers because we are so busy (and we only live like 5 minutes away. Isn`t that how it always is? The closer you are, the less you have to plan and focus to make it a part of your life, and the more likely we are to take it for "granite" :) except the temple here isn`t build out of granite so it isn`t as funny.

                But we truly are blessed to have the temple so close, and man, the temple is so awesome. I am so grateful for all of the blessings of the gospel, but most especially for the blessings of Temples. There is a peace and a serenity there that brings me so much comfort. It truly is the house of the Lord. And there are billions of people, living and dead, who desperately need those blessings. And that is why being a missionary is the best thing EVER! YEAH! I love it, and I hope everyone gets the opportunity to serve one, especially RIKER! YES!

                Well have a great week, I love you bunches, and DON`T get burned!

Liebe

Elder Terry