Guten ​Morgen, 

How is everyone doing?  Well l I am doing just fantastic. This week we had transfer calls... anyone want to guess the verdict? ...................................

I guess you will just have to wait till the end to find out. However I am excited for this transfer it will be amazing. 

So yesterday we had two baptisms. Ophelya and Jacob. It was such an amazing baptism. I just love them both so much and am so excited that they have made this step in their life. They both were just so excited yesterday and I could really tell that they have just been so prepared. I don't know if I have already told you about them and their story, if I have sorry I am going to just tell them really quick again. 

So Ophelya is so cool. She is one of the friends of a new member who was baptized back in December. The first Sunday that I arrived here in Hannover Ophelya came to church and hasn't stop coming since. On that first Sunday though she approached our bishop and said that she wanted to be baptized. Since then we have been working with her. She is a wonderful mother of 3 children, and is from Ghana with that, it has been a very interesting experience to work with her. Her English is very limited and so we have had to overcome some challenges with the language barrier. However when they are prepared God will provide a way. It has been cool to see the gift of tongues working as we teach her. 

Jacob is also so amazing. He is from Liberia and we met him through an investigator name Tony. Tony had invited us over a few times and Jacob was there once. Tony really wasn't making too much progress, however Jacob was pretty interested in learning more about the church. We started meeting with Jacob more and only after a few lessons he said he really wanted to be baptized. The one problem was at the time he wasn't sure if Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon were true. We talked all the time about prayer and recognizing answers, finally we just asked him. "Jacob, do you feel as you read in the Book of Mormon?" he said he felt good and we said, "Jacob that is the Holy Ghost". After that he just said every time I pray about anything I know that is true and from God when I feel good. In his interview on Saturday he expressed how he knew this was his church. He said that he has explored and searched many other churches. But that this was the only one for him. Ah we just love Jacob he is really such a cool person. 

So here are some cool stories for the week. One of the elders in a new area called Erfurt, called us this week and asked if we could go and visit an investigator he had been teaching in Erfurt. Apparently he needed a knee operation and so he was here in Hannover. His name is Eddie and he is so cool. We got to teach him a few times this week, sadly he is going back to Erfurt this week. But keep him in your prayers that his knee will get better. It was fun though because both times we went and visited his roommates were there and I don't know how much they could understand or how much they listened but hey they got exposed to a little bit of a missionary lesson.  

So funny story of the week. On Saturday night we had our nightly call-ins from our district leader. After about 5 minutes he was getting another call on the other line from an unknown number. He called us back about five minutes later and expressed how creepy and weird the phone call was. That there was only weird noises and sounds in the back ground. It was kind of weird but we didn't think too much about it after wards. Ten minutes after we got off the phone with our District leader we received a phone call from an unknown number as well. We answered it and there was a faint girl’s voice saying hello. Then silence for a minute and a loud phone beep followed my creepy whispers. We quickly hung up. We were a little freaked out but again didn't think too much about it, until a few minutes later we started getting calls again from the unknown number. Finally we were so scared that I went through the whole apartment and locked all the windows and made sure the house was clear. We then started to say a quick prayer when one of our Zone leaders started to call. We answered told him what happened and he kind of laughed a little. We then maybe figured that they could have been pulling pranks on us. We questioned them for a little until finally we got it out of them. A bunch of the elders in our zone were trying to pull pranks on everyone by connecting two calls together. However I guess they were not trying to scare us but just trying to be funny. When they found out how much they scared us they felt really really bad. Really what a learned from this experience is that it was a good reminder that Elders are still 19 year old boys... ha-ha It is really amazing to me how much they do seem older here just because of the amazing abilities that we receive to talk to people of all ages. It is really cool... but they still get bored. 

 Well family and friends I need your help. Sister Walker and I set a goal to have 6 baptisms together before we are separated. Yes that is right she is staying. I am so stoked. However we have been having some hard times getting people to come to church. We have so many people who love the gospel and want to be baptized but they just won’t come to church. I know there are 3 more people who heavenly father wants us to find but we are not exactly sure how or what will happen. We are going to try so hard this week in our power to do all we can to be obedient, focused and ready for all. But please pray that we can start helping these people have the desire to want to come to church. I really am so blessed here and love Hannover so much. I am so grateful for all we have here and all your support as I am here. I love you all so much 

I just love this vs in Alma I want to share really quickly. 

 

6 Now ye may suppose that this is foolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise

 

I know that really and truly that these things are true, that through the small things will great things come to pass. 

I love you and hope you have an amazing week, 

 

Alles Leibe, 

Sister Toma 

Alles Gute Zum Mutters Tag

Guten Morgen 

WOW, WOW, WOW, I can't believe that it has already been 6 weeks already transfer calls are coming up... let us all pray that sister Walker stays :) 

There reason that I wrote three WOWs was not just because the transfer is over but also because this week was just WONDERFUL. So many miracles and wonderful things. 

So good news, this week Emma didn't feed us giant Bowls of Oat mill. :) That was a wonderful blessing. However like always the trains here were on strike again and so we had a lot of transportation problems. Blah, it always messes with our daily schedule. Early this week we got to me with one of our investigators named Nana. He is so so cool. It is taking him a little more time to accept to be baptized than most of the Ghanaians ;) but he really knows what it is about. It was just so cool because he just has so many good questions and Kind of Challenges us to do better.  To study harder and deeper. He is also just such a crack up and makes as laugh so hard. The other day we went to meet him and he was helping is GF move out of their house and we asked if we could help him and he looked at us and said are you crazy.. You are not strong enough that is obvious...that is very obvious! Ah man I just love my mission and being able to interact with so many different people. I think I just laughed so hard every day I am surprised I don't have a 6 pack. 

So we teach a lady from Papa New Guinea named Gaure. She is seriously the coolest I love her so so much. Last week we were talking and I found out she knows how to Hula, so we started talking about it and she agreed to teach us some daces. So last week she taught us a Hula dance, let’s just say that I have lost all my dancing skills on a mission I took a video of us and it was amusing to see us try to move our hips and fallow along with her ha-ha. She is seriously such a great person though and has so so much potential for the Gospel it just stinks because she is so scared. 

So Miracles of the week. On exchange, with Sister Bollwinkle, which was awesome because I just love her so much and am so glad she got transferred to be in my exchange group again. We just had miracle after miracle happen. To start off we had a great lesson with Ophelia this week about all the commandments and to our surprise she just understood everything and said she would fallow it all. Also our joint teach fell out with her which is hard because her English is not so good so she doesn't understand things very well, but someone she just understood and was able to respond back to us this time around. Just got to love the gift of tongues! 

Then we went by on a contact named Joseph, Sadly he wasn't there however there were five of his friends were there and we talked for a little and they all decided they wanted to come to church on Sunday. How cool is that. :) Then we went and taught Joanna. She has not been feeling so good so we thought that it would be so good if she could have a priesthood blessing. We brought the Elders with us and what was cool was Joanna had invited two of her friends to be there as well. How amazing. One of them we met with last week. Her name is Flavia and we gave her a book of Mormon and asked her to read a chapter in it. When we were there this time we asked if she has read in it and what she thought. She said she reads it every day and that she knows it is true and that she also wants to be baptized with Joanna in June. How cool? Then her other friend was there and she had never heard from us before. We were able to teach her the first lesson and talk about the priesthood and she got to see the priesthood blessing which was amazing. She was so excited to know more and said she is excited to meet and learn more about the church, as well as coming to church this Sunday. :) We are so stoked. 

Then this Sunday we went and met with a guy named Tommy who is a really really big non-denominational Christian and in a Christian rap band!!! Anyways he invited two of his other friends to meet with us and Tommy and his guy friend were really not too interested, other than debating about the doctrinal differences between, us and them. However the Spirit was just so so so so so strong. I just knew in those moments when we bore our testimony about the restoration, Joseph smith and the book of Mormon that all of this is undeniable true. It was amazing. That even though they were not open to listen all the way that the spirit was testifying so strong in the room. It was such a miracle because then one of their friends Louise who was there wants to meet with us again and agreed to take a book of Mormon and read about it. It is amazing how we can find the prepared people, because it is really true that the Lord does put his prepared people in the way of his prepared servants. 

I just love it. And can I say Mom, dad and fambam how awesome it was to see you yesterday. Skype was amazing and I miss you so so much. Thanks for all your support. I really do love you all. 

Just a little spiritual message for this week. We are preparing a lesson for our ZTM this week and we are talking about the promptings of the spirit and how it will help us in using technology. There was a quote from Jeffry R Holland that I just love so so much. It says 'The Children of God will not commit a serious sin without first having a warning from the spirit" So so true. We have his promise that the spirit will always be with us to guide and help us make right decisions in our lives. We need to think more on that promise from our Heavenly Father. The spirit will always warn us of danger spiritual or temporal. 

Well I love you all and wish you a great week, 

Sister Toma  

Happy Mother's Day

Dear Family and Friends, 

How are you all doing? Well this week has been very long and tiring, but so so so so good. I just love hitting the bed after a long hard day of work. Hannover really is so wonderful, Miracle city. 

Something really special about Hannover is that this is the first area I went on exchanges to when I started my mission. So this week I got to visit a new member named Kim. I taught her last August with Sister Lartey on exchange before she was baptized. It was so cool to be able to see her again and now get to teach her all the time. We went to a member’s home, the Knobe's they invite us over every Thursday for food and let me tell you best experience ever, :) I just feel so blessed on a mission. 

You will be happy to know that Emma fed us a giant bowl of oat mill again this week. Right before we had another eating appointment. Luckily this time we came prepared and asked her if we could take some of it home with us to eat later. After we went home we calculated that each bowl of Oats were about 1 kilo gram each. YUMMY that is how much yogurt I can eat in about a week... haha we just love Emma though she keeps ceasing to amaze us. Along with Jacob. He is someone we are teaching and on Saturday we told him we needed to meet him at the train station at 8:45 to pick him up for church, however he heard us wrong and thought we meant 7:45 and called us to tell us he was on his way. He told us he had woken up at 5:30 to get there on time and everything. And for anyone who knows Africans that is some true dedication. the best part is everyone asked him at church when he was getting baptized and he was so excited to tell them that he was getting baptized on the 17th.. Why are we so blessed... they really are the ones teaching us, not the other way around. :) 

This week we went on exchanges with the Stadt Hagen sisters. I was with sister Medley she was so great. I just learn so much from exchanges. Just so much about how I can really grow as a missionary. I learned this week about how we really are chosen and called to not only serve in our specific missions, but also in our specific areas. That we are really called through revelation. We need the learning experiences and everyone needs to learn the lessons on their mission differently. I am still figuring out though why God has blessed me so much on my mission with the areas that I have had. Sometimes I just don't feel like I deserve them, or that it is too good to be true, so for that I am just truly grateful.

 

We had interviews with president Kosak this week, and they were so so good. They were our last one before president goes home, so it was sad as well. However, I would say that it was one of the best interviews that I have had with him. He asked me a question in my interview this week that really stuck with me. He asked, "How has your mission gone through you, rather that you just going through your mission?" I would say that the answer that I gave him was part of it, however this week as I have pondered more over that question I have come to really realize what my mission has done for me. I can't even say how much my mission has done for me. I can't even say how much my mission has humbled me, through all the hard and the good times, naturally but mostly it has shown me how little my knowledge of the gospel really is. And how much more I need to learn. I have learned a lot on my mission, but that is only a tiny portion of what our potential really is. We have the responsibility and opportunity to really use this time we have on earth to learn about God, and Christ. To continually study the words, pray, and go to church. I just love 2 Nephi 31:20 

 20 Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastnessin Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a loveof God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall pressforward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure tothe end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternallife.

How true these words really are. We much press forward with a steadfastness in Christ. Never give up on him. His hand is always stretched out towards us. Use the atonement and rely on him. The price as already been paid. We just need to accept it. Read in the scriptures and going to church and praying. These I know are the basic primary answers, however they really are the 3 most  important steps or things that we can do it insure a strong unwavering testimony in Christ and our Father in Heaven.. 

The learning and growing never ends. Never stops. 

Thanks for all of your prayers I feel them every day here in Germany. Please can you keep Martina, Joanna and Kim in your hearts and minds this week? 

I love you all so so much and am So grateful for your support here 

Happy Mother’s Day, 

 Sister Toma 

 PS here is the flood or pictures from the last 4 weeks sorry finally could get some uploaded. :) 

Disciples in a Digital Age

Sorry for last week, I know I didn't really write too much. I will be a lot better these coming weeks. Actually Sister Walker taught me something..really simple. Write out your weekly email before we come to do them. I think that will help a lot. To keep my thoughts organized and hopefully I can make my emails a little more spiritual that way. 

I hope everyone had a good week? We sure did, let me tell you it really was one filled with miracles. 

To actually start off, let us rewind back to last Sunday. Emma was baptized on Sunday How amazing is that It was probably one of the most spiritually baptismal services that I have been to. She was just glowing and smiling the entire time. She was so happy on Sunday and when she got in the water you could tell how big her desire was to serve the Lord. One experience that I will never forget. Now her children will one day also be able to be baptized. She really truly has stated a wonderful new life for her and her children. 

Last week, we also had an investigator come to church whose name is Nana. Nana is so funny, he had a great time at church, In fact he said that it was so great that he wants to come back every day, and that if our church was a girl he would marry it. What a crack up. We invited him to be baptized this week and all he said was I am indifferent. So pray for him to receive and answer that baptism is the right thing. 

On Wednesday we made a surprise baptismal date with an investigator named Joanna. She is really great and comes from Uganda. She needs a lot of help these next few weeks, as we help prepare her to make her goal to be baptized. So again please pray for her to be able to make the necessary steps to change her life. 

Another Miracle we set a baptismal date with a kid named Jacob, he is from Liberia. Jacob is seriously the best. He just does things because he knows it is true. He has such great faith and already knows how to do the things necessary to gain a testimony. His only thing is he really wants to have a testimony of Joseph Smith however he is hung up on seeing some kind of vision or something. So we are working on that. However he is golden and shows me so much what having faith is all about. 

On Thursday we just saw so many miracles. We just fallowed the spirit to guide us where we needed to go. We ended up just meeting with the right people. Also that day we had a pretty great eating appointment experience. Emma our recent convert loves to feet us....A LOT... so on Thursday she decided it would be nice to feed us so breakfast, a nice bowl of oat mill. Doesn't sound too bad however it was not just a nice bowl in was a HUUUUUUGEE bowl. Now when I mean huge I mean a giant salad sized bowl of oat mill with condensed milk. YUMMMMMY...We steadily ate the food for about 20 minutes without breaks and still didn't make a dent, by the time we were finished we were in so much pain that we were praying to still be able to teach a lesson. Just gotta love the Africans. 

Right after we headed to a Mission Conference in Berlin. :) It was so nice to be back in the city I really didn't realize until I left how blessed I was to be able to live there. What a beautiful beautiful city. We got to see some sites and even made a little pit stop at Post Damer Ice. :) (Presidents favorite ice cream shop) 

In Berlin we got to hear from Elders Nielson and Kearon from the 70. They came and spoke about Technology and how we will now be using I pads in our mission. That is right GMB is now an Ipad mission. We will be getting them this week or the next. That is also a question I have for you. Those of you who have had ipads on your mission how have you found the best way to use them? 

It will be interesting to see how they will effect missionary work here in Europe. There are a lot of amazing Ideas they have already given to us and I can see how it is already helping spread the gospel so much in the countries that already have them. How it will help the work here, to bridge the gap between us missionaries and the people of Europe. 

Another Really cool thing that I liked was how the church is using the ipads as a tool to help the young adults and missionaries to know how to continue to do missionary work when they go home. Also that we will be prepared against the harmful uses of the Internet as well. To learn how to make plans to avoid the "dark side of the Internet" It really was an amazing spiritual meeting. 

We also had a great MLC with president Kosak right after and talked about what we learned and how we will move this into our mission and help the other missionaries. One thing that I just loved that was really emphasized during the meeting was the importance of these three words "Agency-Faith-Repentance" I really enjoyed how they used this topic to help us understand the change that is needed in order for us to become digital disciples. One sister in the Mission quoted this scripture, I think it applies perfectly. 

Alma 5:13-14

 13 And behold, he preached the word unto your fathers, and a mighty change was also wrought in their hearts, andthey humbled themselves and put their trust in the trueand living God. And behold, they were faithful until theend; therefore they were saved.

 14 And now behold, I ask of you, my brethren of thechurch, have ye spiritually been born of God? Have yereceived his image in your countenances? Have yeexperienced this mighty change in your hearts?

We have to be willing to change ourselves in order to become the disciples that God needs us to become. These tools that he is given us a really amazing powerful things. They will bring the gospel to all the world we just have to learn how to use them.. 

When we got home all we could think about it how amazing of a day and age we live in. I mean I just found out a few days ago too that Azerbaijan is now a new mission. What an incredible miracle. For Olga who now as the opportunity to continue meeting with missionaries and can finally now go to church. God is truly leading this church. And it is truly true. 

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week, 

Love, 

Sister Toma