Zone Conference

Dear family,

Excerpt from my letter to President Condie: "We are still doing well and excited to apply all that we learned in Zone Conference and the Sisters' Conference into our teaching and finding. We met with Susanne this week, who is the daughter of a woman in the ward. She was a lot more interested than we were expecting based upon our information from others and we hope that she can become an investigator. She prayed at the end of the lesson and her step-father (also in the ward) told us that was the first time ever. We were so happy.

Frau Varga prayed at the end of the lesson! She paused for nearly two minutes during the prayer and said "I don't really know what to say now..." but we just waited and she continued. She has readily accepted everything we taught and we invited her to really know for herself that what we have taught is true. She told us at the end that Alex (her son who gave us the referral) was really sad he could not be there since he had to work."

So, this week I went to Munich. It was so beautiful and wonderful. We have 24 sisters in our mission (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) including two senior sisters who are also in Wien. It was wonderful to see my former companions Sisters McGuire and Anderson and to hear of their areas and experiences. It was even better to learn all that we learned. We had learning from 9 am to 9 pm for the whole time we were there. I came with many questions and was able to have many answered.

We learned more about our Einführungslektion (introduction lesson) given to us by the area presidency. This is the first lesson we teach to establish prayer in each lesson, an overview of what we teach (in 4 minutes), writing down the investigators "questions of the soul", meeting 3 times a week for 4 weeks for 30 minutes each, and invite them to be baptized. I learned this from President Condie the first day I arrived, but it was great to hear it explained again and testified of. At Zone Conference, several Elders who were initially skeptical of the Einführungslektion and simply "proved the Lord" in applying it, powerfully testified of its effect. I can see already the difference when we do everything in our first visit we are told to do and when we don't. The Lord truly sets out His way to do things through Preach My Gospel (the Einführungslektion really comes from ch. 10).

The big thing I learned from this Sisters' Conference is that I need to take ONE thing at a time and have a vision of the missionary I want to become. I am aware this is my first transfer and I have a lot to improve, so I know the Lord will guide me as I review what I learned often and make every day better than the one before.

We also had Zone Conference. The timing of my arrival is perfect as everything is changing. :) As is happening in every mission in the world, Zone Conferences and interviews will now be quarterly (every 3 months) instead of every transfer. Because I sung in the choir for the Mission President Training, we were given the privilege to watch President Monson speak to these new Mission Presidents, where I heard the Prophet tell of these changes. That gave me a nice perspective to all of this. Oh, Sister Borcherding, Elder Gneiting (from Colorado, Parker ... or Englewood), Elder Ray and I sang in Zone Conference "I'll Go Where You Want Me to Go". I kind of made up the arrangement and had an expert pianist (Sister Hansen) do an unwritten accompaniment. It was good, but I did not get it recorded. We also got about 75 new copies of the Book of Mormon (we only had one left in German and we often need other languages). That was fun to take back to our apartment. :)

I am excited to celebrate my companion's birthday on Saturday (and Monday, because Saturday is quite busy). The sisters from Germany are almost always older because if they stop their schooling at 21, they have to start all over. We are excited and will make cookie dough ice cream to celebrate.

--

Sister Carla June Carroll