September16, 2013, Hamburg

Dear family,

Thanks for the Birthday wishes it meant a lot to me!

 This was another really fast week. It honestly went by like a blur and I have to look at my planner to remember what we did. Our Chinese investigator, S, is making so much progress. She told us that as she was reading in the Book of Mormon and thinking about the things we taught her, she felt love, peace and warmth in her heart! She's so excited about everything and just wants to learn more and more. She also said her first prayer! It moves me seeing people having their own experiences like this and finding out truths for themselves and being excited about it. I invited her to baptism of course, but found out that she'll be leaving back to China on Oct 15th, and the last sacrament meeting when she could be comfirmed would be Sept 29th...because of Stake and General Conference...yeah...so we're trying to figure that one out!! 

We did a lot of member work this week with a new DVD program that our mission came out with. It's called the Work of Salvation/ “Das Erlösungswerk”.  It is the missionary broadcast from a couple months ago cut up in segments that we can use at member homes. We've used it with 4 families already and invited them to do their own missionary work by starting with names that they pray about. It's so effective because in the clips living day prophets promise blessings of member missionary work and their efforts. It invites the spirit which moves the members to do something. We made sure to have return appointments and so far it is working really well. We also don't take their names. On our next appointment we plan with them and help them set goals with a time frame about what they want to do with the names they prayed about. It's not totally different than what we've done before, but so much more effective with the DVD and a little bit more planning on our part to know exactly what we will do with which members. I love it here in Hamburg. The work is moving forward. I'm not thinking about the time too much, I'm too busy, and Elder Mc. helps me stay busy, lol.

Love you all,

Elder Lüning.

PS 

Hey, thanks for the advice Dad, and for the support Mom. I love you both, and I'll see what I can do with the Elders for my birthday lol. So far we had our studies, cleaned the apartment, went grocery shopping, ate lunch, looked for a new vacuum for the apartment, and for some new missionary appropriate CD's (no luck) and emailed. After emails we'll be heading out to Oma and Opa’s. We'll be BBQ next week because a Sister missionary in our district has her birthday this week and we'll celebrate together. Love you and have a great week! I hear good things about you two every week. The ward and members really appreciate everything you do!