Nope, the holidays aren't over yet!

Hey yall!!

Hope you are all doing well and that everyone is having a good time.

To start off this week right, we had a prayer circle. This sounds a little bit interesting, and we went there to see what exactly was going on. It turned out to be a really cool and spiritual experience. Apparently, a lot of things have been going down in Iran lately. In our ward, we have a lot of refugees who have family or friends in direct consequence of the things going on and it has been a huge stress on their shoulders. Brother Ausobskie, one of the members of our ward, is good friends with a lot of these people and organized this night so that we could come together and strengthen one another. He shared the story of his experiences with the fall of the Berlin Wall. He also shared a story from the Book of Mormon of Alma the younger and how things were changed through the faith and prayers of the saints. We then all knelt down and those that wanted to had the opportunity to offer prayers to Heavenly Father. Most of the prayers, were in a language that I did not understand (Persian for the most part I believe), but the Holy Ghost was clearly there. He speaks across language barriers. It was very good and will continue every week on Tuesday for the foreseeable future.

To explain the subject, there was another holiday this week! Although in America, we are done with Holidays by now, we still celebrated Heilige drei Könige (the three holy kings day). It is a Catholic holiday and since most people here are catholic, it is a very big holiday. It was the last holiday of the season and per the norm for holidays, all of the shops closed down and everyone spent time with their families. Very few people were on the streets which made contacting a little difficult. However, this is the last holiday of the season, so after this, everything should be going back to normal.

Also this week we got to meet with another member family, Walter Mayer and his wife. They were very nice and they taught us a lot about the church history of Austria. It is amazing to hear the stories of peoples' sacrifices and what they have done for the church or to stay in the church. That is the kind of faith we as missionaries are both building in ourselves, and trying to help others to find!

To close off this week, I thought I would include some "modern scripture" from President Monson. (Thanks for sharing it with me Mom). It is said to hear that President Monson passed away this last week, but we are glad that he was able to do so much good while he was with us. I am sure that even now he is helping people learn and is plenty busy on the other side.

President Monson's final General Conference address: "If you do not have a firm testimony of these things, do that which is necessary to obtain one. It is essential for you to have your own testimony in these difficult times, for the testimonies of others will carry you only so far. However, once obtained, a testimony needs to be kept vital and alive through continued obedience to the commandments of God and through daily prayer and scripture study. My dear associates in the work of the Lord, I implore each of us to prayerfully study and ponder the Book of Mormon each day. As we do so, we will be in a position to hear the voice of the Spirit, to resist temptation, to overcome doubt and fear, and to receive heaven's help in our lives. I so testify with all my heart in the name of Jesus Chirst, amen."

I know that President Monson was a prophet of God, and when we follow his words, we will obtain the promised result. We need simply do and try our best. I hope you all have an amazing week! I love you all!

Elder Wiser