Elder Heilmann: Adventures in Serving the Lord

We had a short but perfect chat with Elder Heilmann today. He had a pretty epic week. So epic that Pday got moved to Friday instead of the regular Thursday Pday.  It all started out with a gathering of Elders in Elders Heilmann and Chamberlains' apartment for the week. What would you call a gathering of Elders? A Testament? That works. A Testament of Elders gathered in preparation for another Mission Conference in Frankfurt. This is really something because some Missions don't get to have General Authority visits at all, and the Frankfurt Mission has had TWO!   The Mission was visited by  Elder Alliaud , a member of the General Authority 70. Elder Heilmann was genuinely delighted by his visit. He told us that Elder Alliaud is very fun, funny, and energetic! "It was just him running around with a mic." He talked to the missionaries about setting proper goals and expectations for the people they teach. He said to teach with the end goal in mind. It really helped. Elder...

Missionary Work Another glorious week in the work of the Lord, another chance to talk to my sweet boy! This week was better than last week, but he's still missing home. It's just hard being in a foreign country, trying to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who don't want to hear it. They aren't always kind about their refusals, and it can really wear on his tender heart. He said, "Whenever I get emotionally strong, I get yelled at. 'Hey, I want to talk to you about Jesus!' 'Hey, you're a Satanist! You should kill yourself!' People don't like the Mormons here much. If American's see us, they say, 'I thought we escaped you.' 'Nope, we're everywhere!" It's disheartening and sad, but he perseveres with the Lord's help and support.  I inquired after his friends (the term they use for investigators of the Church), and he told me the texting girl blocked the missionaries. She was afraid they were going to hur...

Missionary Work We had a quick call this week. Just so grateful to get any connection weekly, so it was still amazing. Elder Heilmann reports that his health is "completely fine" now. Just still dealing with that horrible homesickness. He really misses being in America.    However, he continues to work really hard. He finds that the harder he works, the less homesick he feels, so now he is just tired from working so hard. He's just having a weird time. He says he's been in a funk where he thinks the Gospel is the only thing that matters, and that just isn't true. "Fun matters, relaxing matters, family matters." He's trying to not separate the definitions. He said, "The Gospel is ALL those things together." Finding the balance is what he is struggling with.  Elder Heilmann also told us that he has 49 days until he is a quarter of the way through though his entire Mission. He's been out for 134 days! He said, "I have counters on my p...