May 7, 2012

You know, it´s pretty weird starting all of my letters, I never really know what to say other than this week was awesome haha, but.... it´s totally true every time =)  This week was awesome.  It has been way fun working out here with Elder H, we have already seen a bunch of success, and things are getting better and better every day, Düsseldorf is now completely turned around and is having tons of success again.  We had the opportunity to ride a train down to Frankfurt for a Leadership Training, almost all of my old companions are Zone Leaders; Elder A from the MTC, Elder J my second Companion, Elder Ch my Third companion and then of Course Elder H my current companion.  President shared a lot of the impressions and feelings that he has had for where this mission is going, he put up 5 numbers, 150, 20, 10, 5, 1.  The 150 is a goal he set for 150 Young single adult Baptisms this year in the mission, 20 is how many lessons he wants us to get in a week, 10 is the number of new investigators he sees us getting each week, 5 is how many people he wants prepared for an investigator before they come to church and 1 is all about focusing on the individual.  Each one of those actually comes from different prophecies that have been given, Elder Perry said he was thoroughly convinced that if we were teaching 20 lessons a week baptisms would double, re-activations would double and we would have "Real Growth."  President Kopischke came and gave his own little prophecy and said that if we internalized the first principles of finding, and got a good attitude, we would find 10 new investigators a week, 5 is something president Schwartz has been prompted to tell us, and 1 is about something Elder Bednar said.  He told a story about when he was in BYU Idaho as the... I can´t think of the position name haha, the dude on top =)  they had a fireside on a Sunday and there were 250 people.  BYU Idaho has 12,000 students.  Elder Bednar challenged them at the end, he said that an apostle will teach according to the preparedness of the group he is speaking to.  He invited them to prepare themselves, dress up in the best attire they had, and then invite 5 people to do the same, but, to invite those 5 to invite 4 and those 4 to invite 3... so on.  Tuesday came and over 12,000 people were there all in suits.  He said at the end this principle of focusing on the 1 will touch 1,000s.

    So.... we decided we had better get to that haha.  This last week we actually had over 20 lessons made out.... but only about 13 went through.  So we are going to do our best to really set an example for the rest of the Zone and show them that these super crazy high goals are possible.  Just so you know, the zone right now averages 4 lessons per companionship, and .67 new investigators per week per companionship.  Much work is to be done haha.

       We had a couple of super awesome miracles this week too.  So, one that was way cool actually has 2 sides.  So, we have 2 sisters in our area also.   They were crossing a street and passed by this kid.  They were all the way to the other end when one of the sisters felt like they should talk to him, so they turned around and just ran at him yelling excuse me.  She didn´t really know what to say so she just said God loves you.  The kid said that was really wierd haha.  But he then started to cry and said he had planned on killing himself that day because he did not feel any love of God.  He had gone to a Catholic church to pray but felt nothing so he figured there was no God and saw no point in living anymore.  The sisters made out an appointment and we were there so we could start teaching him.  It was one of the most spiritual lessons ever, he started to tear up a couple of times and of course the sisters cried haha.  It went way good and we´re meeting again on Wednesday. 

    After Church we were talking to some members.  One of them asked about an old investigator and said that this investigator had had a baptismal date and came to church every week for like 6 months.  We had no idea who it was, so the member said he would send him a text message.  Later that day this  random person called us up, it was that guy the member had been talking about.  He said that he wanted to come back, but this time he wanted to be serious.  So we´re meeting him again on Wednesday also. 

    We have an investigator named Siegfried F.  He has been slowly making progress but he has always had a hard time coming to church.  He has a lot of financial problems so he sleeps terribly and he has a hard time waking up.  We taught him about why church is important, it was a way awesome lesson, but afterwards he showed no greater desire to come to church.  On Saturday we called him up to ask if he would be coming, he said that if he wakes up in time he will, but he is not setting an alarm..... we went ahead and called up a bunch of members to pray for him so that he would make it.  Sacrament meeting started and he wasn´t there, but then right after the opening prayer, he walked in =)  It was so awesome, and the members got way excited too because they had prayed for him to come.

    There was also this way super drunk guy and girl that we talked to the other day, they didn´t really know what was going on... but they sure liked us for some reason.  They kept asking about what we do as missionaries and then they would tell us how much they liked that and respected it.  They went on forever about how terrible the world was and told us how wonderful it is that we have faith, anyway that was just kinda weird, but, our bus ended up coming we got in but quickly found out it was the wrong bus, the right bus was directly behind it.  We got out and that drunk guy had no idea what was going on, he thought the driver kicked us out because we were missionaries, he started yelling, "They are talking about faith!  They are talking about faith!  That is discrimination what you are doing! Discrimination!"  We got in the right bus and he put his head in the window and told us we didn´t have to take that, we could call the police haha.

    Anyway, I am doing great, thanks for all of your love and support!
Elder Collings

April 30 back to work!

Man, this week was awesome haha.  So, I was with Elder C until Thursday, and Elder K stayed with us a couple of days (His name in German means Cancer)  They were both going home.  We didn´t really get to get out and do much work or anything because Elder C still had a TON of stuff to pack and we had to do some other things to prepare him to go home.  But the last 2 days were way awesome because Elder K only speaks German, he is from Switzerland.  It got me used to only speaking German again, so, now with my new companion we are only speaking German again haha.  On transfer day, the Office bought the wrong tickets for some of the Elders, so when I sent Elder C and Elder K away on a train, I ended up alone for a couple of hours haha.  It was funny to think about, before my mission I wouldn´t care or anything, but, I´ve been out for over a year and always had someone right next to me, it was way super weird being alone for a couple of hours haha.

    Now I am serving with Elder Ho, I put a picture up there for ya, he´s the one in the apron.  He´s way awesome, I knew him in the MTC.  He just barely finished training, and Elder Ha, the Elder I just trained is actually going up to serve with his old companion, so my Son is serving with his Son, and the Dads come together haha.  Elder Ho is way awesome, he´s a solid worker and great at basically everything, it´ll be fun to serve with him.

   This week we had a street preach.  A bunch of Elders and Sisters and some members got together in a town called Wuppertal to sing, play some music and talk to people on the street.  About 10 minutes into it, some police came up to us and told us we weren´t allowed to do that because it was disturbing people in the City-Hall.... The City-Hall isn´t open on Saturday and there was a band right next to us being like 5X as loud... but, whatever.  It was awesome to finally get to work way hard, the last couple of weeks I haven´t had so much time to work.  We also got a random call right before that, my 1st zone leader, Elder A, called up.  He is in a group that studies around Europe from BYU.  He was visiting Düsseldorf for the weekend, so he came to the Street Preach.  He is also the one that trained my Trainer, so technically I am  his Grandson.  We actually went up and talked to people on the street together, it was cool because last time I couldn´t say a word haha. 

    Now that we can finally get out and do lots of work, its been awesome to see the miracles again haha.  On Saturday, we ended up making 7 lessons out for this coming week, and we found a family of 8 from Macedonia.  We taught the family yesterday and we get to meet with them again today.  No idea how old the mom and dad are, but their kids are 17,15,13,11, 9 and 2. They are way awesome, and they like basketball, so I´m going to bring them to the Church and play some ball with them all =)  

    The work is going great and I´m having a blast!  So mother´s day is in 2 weeks!  Guess we should start planning everything right now then.  If you call at 11.00 your time then that would be great, my address is:

Elder

Karl-Anton Str.18

40211 Düsseldorf

Germany

    Thanks for everything, you´re all awesome!

Elder Collings

April 16th and 23rd

April 16th

 

Wow, this was probably the slowest week on my mission haha.  Elder C was sick the WHOLE week.  He threw up a TON and was basically just feeling terrible the whole week.  He lost all appetite and ended up only eating 1.5 bananas and half a yogurt and a couple of mouthfulls of food in 4 days.  He has lost 15 pounds, but, now he is doing better =)  I can´t really say anything happened last week haha, I just read, ate and worked out all day every day, not much else I could have done.  This is Elder C´s very last week in Germany, luckily he is feeling much better, we´ll be getting some calls this week to find out who I will be working with this next transfer. 

    I don´t know if I told you how this area was when I came in, but, it was basically as dead as every other area I have been moved into, this last week we weren´t able to teach anyone because of the sickness, but, last night we made a ton of calls to get this last week going good.  We are expecting more than 20 lessons =) it was a way big change in just 5 weeks.

    Anyway, I´m doing great, thanks for everything, I´ll get ya some sweet pictures next week!

Elder Collings

 

 

 

 April 23rd

Hey Family!

    This week was pretty awesome.  It was actually pretty weird haha.  Elder C leaves this week, so he has been packing, doing paper work, and saying goodbye to all of the members and people he has met.  So this last week we met with TONS of people.  We also had a couple of awesome miracles.  There have actually been 2 people baptized the last 2 weeks by the sisters in this ward, and one of the ladies that was baptized loves doing missionary work.  She asked if she could go out and do doors with the sisters.  She can´t speak any German, but she really wanted to do her best to tell people about the gospel.  They sat on a train and some guy apparently smiled at them.  This girl looked at the sisters and said, "He smiled over at us.... I´m going to give him a card"  so she just walked over and tried to say something in German and give him a card, he actually spoke English and gave them his number haha.  So he came to the baptism on Saturday and we got to meet him.  He is like 6 foot 4, like 220 pounds, and it´s like solid muscle haha.  He worked for the special forces in Egypt for a long time.  He is way open and told us he knows Christianity is the truth (He was born and raised Muslim)  He liked the baptism, came to Church the next day, and wants to learn more.  Our Mission President came to  our ward and talked to him.  A is way nice and said he would love to help with anything possible, apparently he has a bunch of connections, so people can travel easily to Egypt and stuff.  President Schwartz asked him what talents he had to see how he could help out, A said, "Well..... I don´t think you need anyone killed, but, I can do that"  He laughed a bunch, but.... I believe it haha.  So, we´ll be meeting with him Tuesday, I´m excited =)

    We also had a great lesson right before the Baptism with Herr F.  We found him a little while  ago and haven´t met with him too much.  But we taught him about prayer and scripture study and it was an AMAZING lesson.  At the end he offered a kneeling prayer and in his prayer he told God that he thinks he has found the right path for his life.  Then at Church our members were super awesome and nice and talked to both of them for about an hour after all of the meetings.  I´m way excited =)  We have been seeing a lot of cool miracles, we had a random guy come up to us and basically say he loved coming to church 5 years ago and now wants to learn more, but now he´s married with a kid.  So, good things will be happening in Düsseldorf =)

    I am doing great, I´ve only been working in Düsseldorf 5 weeks, and one week was spent in the house haha, but I´m excited to take it over.  My new companion is also a new Zone Leader, it will be his first transfer as a zone leader.  I actually already know him from the MTC, he is VERY quiet, but a spiritual giant.  It will be fun to work with him.  Things are going great and I´m having a blast.

    Thanks for everything you do!
Elder Collings

April 10th FINALLY!

Hey Family!

    Wow, it was a crazy week.  We basically were way busy every day, until Saturday came around.  We had a split last Monday, were in Frankfurt on Tuesday and Wednesday, another Split Thursday and another split Friday.  To make it even more crazy, none of the travel plans really worked out well, so the earliest we got to bed was around midnight, and we  had to wake up around 5 every day.  It was super crazy, and it had its toll, Elder C got sick =(  He has been sick since Saturday.  They say he has a virus and could be out of it until Friday.  The doctor said to take it easy and don´t leave the house for more than an hour.  So, he has been sleeping, throwing up, etc. all day, and I have just been trying to keep myself busy.  But, things are good haha.  I don´t really know what I will do the rest of the week..... But, I´ll figure it out. 

    Although we were really busy the whole week, we were still blessed with much success.  We found 4 more people to teach and got some of the other areas really excited.  We actually even got interviewed by these 2 guys in Iran who have a youtube channel haha.  Anyway, I am doing great, hopefully I don´t get sick.  Gotta go now before Elder C throws up!

 

Love ya lots!

Elder Collings

April 2, 2012

Hey family!

    Wow the weeks fly by.  I was only in Düsseldorf for 3 days of the week because there are currently a lot of problems in the zone and we get to go and meet with missionaries and encourage them.  It is so crazy, even though we are always gone doing something, the Lord still blesses us with success and new people to teach!  We are still having tons of success and seeing lots of miracles.

    This week will be amazing, so we just had General Conference, then today we work with the Assistants for the Day, tomorrow we drive down to Frankfurt to go through the temple (about 3 hours away)  Then we spend the night in Frankfurt (Maybe Offenbach) and then all day Wednesday we have a meeting to with President to talk about the zone and our plans, then we get back Thursday night and go on a split with some Elders, and then Friday night we go on one more, and then we have time Saturday and Sunday to work =)  Lots of work! 

    Elder C only has 3 weeks left on his mission, he is doing very well, but, he has a lot of anxiety so the last couple of days he has woken up really sick.  He´s a trooper and working way hard, mornings are just tough and Mondays are way rough because of all the contact with family and what not.  He's doing great though!

    So, I´d love to write that letter for Dad, I´ll be on the computer again on Friday doing some  graphs and stuff, if you want it done this week let me know by then and I can write in on Friday, if I have time, I´ll write it next Monday, but, right now we get to go and move all of the furniture and paint the apartment and kill all of the mold in the bathroom (this place has sent about 6 Elders home in the last year.... it´s pretty thrashed).

    I´m doing great, thanks for your love and support
Elder Collings

March 25, 2012

Hello Family!
    So, I have been in Düsseldorf for the last 2.5 days, and it is
super crazy and not at all what I expected haha.  I am working with
Elder C, he only has 4 weeks left on His mission.  I was pretty
excited to go into an area that was doing good with Investigators and
everything, but, that wasn´t the case haha, they didn´t have any
investigators and basically the entire zone is struggling.  In the
entire zone right now, the companionships average 0.3 New
Investigators every 6 weeks.  There´s definitely a lot that needs to
be done haha.  We´ve been way blessed already though, in the 2 days of
work we´ve had, we have already found 5 new investigators =)  There is
tons of potential, and I´m way excited to see how everyone improves
the next couple of weeks.  I´ll tell ya about Sunday just so you can
see how awesome things are going.
    So basically the Sabbath day is the best day in the world for
missionary work, so it all started at Church.  The Sisters had given
us a number for this guy named K, he told the Sisters he would come
to Church and he wanted to learn more.  We gave him a call at 10.00 he
had forgotten to change the time(daylight savings), but, he came to
the Church as fast as he could, he came for a while, really liked it,
saw the sisters and told them a promise is a promise haha, and then we
made out another lesson with him.  Then later that day we did some
street contacting, we contacted this guy by a potential investigator
who I´ll tell ya about pretty soon, made out an appointment for him 10
minutes later in a restaurant, taught him, and made out another
appointment. Then right after that we went by on a Chinese family that
we had found the day before, who just happened to be the Potential
Investigator we wanted to go-by on before, they let us in, we taught
them, they are awesome and want to learn more.  And then there was
this other guy we contacted on the street and talked to for about 20
minutes, he wants to learn more, so we made out a lesson for today.
And then doing some more street contacting, we contacted these 2 guys,
one from Essen, the other from here in Düsseldorf, we asked if they
had 15 minutes to hear our message, they said yeah, but, there was no
bench!  So, we walked for about 15 minutes looking for a bench, found
one, taught them and it was super legit.  It was a great way to end
the week, and really strengthened our testimonies that there really
are people out there willing to hear our message and learn more.
    So.... that´s kinda how things are going now.  The difference with
the work now is that we have to do a TON of stuff with the numbers to
see where all of the individual areas are at, so I get to learn how to
use Excel and Word really well, we also have to send these reports to
President Schwartz and talk to him about it every week.  Other than
that, everything is basically the same.

    I got some more pictures for ya, those are other investigators
that we had been teaching in Offenbach. 
The last lesson with F, we actually
talked about Baptism and he said he had been thinking about it.
Things are going great, thanks for everything you do for me!
 
Elder Collings

March 19, 2012

Hello famly!
 I´m getting transferred! =´( I´ve been here for 6 months, I didn´t think that I´d ever get kicked out haha. I´m getting transferred down to Düsseldorf as a zone leader now. I´ll be serving about 15 miles away from my very first area, and my companion is in his very last transfer, and this transfer is a 5 week transfer, so I have 5 weeks to learn one of the largest cities in Germany haha, it´ll be fun. These last couple of days have been basically going by on old investigators and inactive members and saying goodbye, it´s weird, like 5 of them still say that they want to be baptized and that they know the Church is true, they just can´t give up smoking, hopefully they can get over it soon. I also had the opportunity to go on another split this week, we had to go and get their car inspected at 7 in the morning in a little small town in the middle of nowhere. We dropped off the car and then looked for a place to do our study, the only place we could find was a Catholic Church. So, we studied in the Catholic Church haha. We also took some time to get up on the preacher stand and preach the Book of Mormon and sing some songs out of their song books haha.

    This week we also had a big combined district meeting, my district
and the Frankfurt district came together and had a super awesome legit
district meeting.  We got our Ward mission leader to come and talk to
us about working with the members and worked on a lot of the problems
that we had seen with our 2 districts, I think everyone had a really
nice time and learned a lot.


Anyway, I´m doing great, hope you like the pictures, thanks for
all of your love and support!
Elder Collings