Week 23: Thundersto​rms, No Phone, and Sunday Miracles

Well well well...

I lost the phone this week... OOOPS! I accidently left it in the bus so it was extremely difficult to have lessons and what not because we had no way to communicate with the world. My bad! But luckily God loves us and the bus driver found it and we got it back a little over three days later!! SUPER blessed because we would have lost some potentials because I hadnt written down their numbers yet!

Nicole is in my time zone!! CRAZY to think that she is doing like the exact same thing that I am in the mornings when I am doing it! I dont really know where her city is but thats cool!!

So after the crazy heat wave we had... its just been storming like crazy! Thunder and lightening at night and during the day. One second its SUPER sunny and the next its pouring buckets.

Tuesday was Annicks baptism! The woman who has been coming to church for 30 years! It was amazing to hear here testimony and super interesting to hear why she had been coming to church and why she decided to finally get baptized.... i dont feel comfortabel sending her personal story to the world, but what it came down to was that she really felt like she needed the gift of the holy ghost, and boy is she right!

After the baptism the week was pretty slow but I decided to play my violin on church on Sunday and that was the best idea Ive ever had! I invited everyone and their dog and guess who came!!!! FATIMA AND PASCAL! The muslim lady who we had to ask permission to teach and president said we had to meet her husband and ask him and i was so worried and then we ran into them in the street and asked permission... that family! We've been visiting her for a long time, like 11 weeks and have only had a couple lessons because of the circumstances with each visit, but weve been trying to get them to church for forever and they came and Fatima LOVED IT!! She stayed longer than us after church talking to everyone and pascal had lots of questions and the whole ward was sooo excited to see a new family at church!! Early in the week we had  a BOMB lesson with her. We prayed together and she said that she felt like she was floating and we told her that that was the spirit testifying to her! I think that that lesson helped with her coming to church. She really needs some friends cause shes pretty lonely.

My Favorite Family in Rennes

Then afterchurch we had a rendez-vous with that family that picked us up in the rain and had read parts of the BOM.. the other family we found is on vacation. It was the most perfect lesson I have ever had... and good thing cause we practiced like all week for it! All of the kids were sitting there with the parents and everyone was interested and participating and commenting and answering the questions. We had planned to read the first three paragraphs of the fam proc but the dad loved it so much that he asked us if he could read more! He even said the closing prayer and we all kneeled together as a family to say it! It was amazing! We're going to see them again on Friday! They love us!

Sasrey, A Member of the Rennes Ward

Well, this week will be crazy so hopefully there will be some good stories! It is probably my last full week in Rennes!! SO SAD!

I love you all very very much and MISS YOU LIKE CRAZY!!

Soeur Kohlert

Week 22: You Know Your Serving in France When You Find a Snail in Your Fridge

Why helllooo there!!!!

So ummm yeah, there was a snail in our fridge this week. We couldnt decide if we wanted to eat it or not :)

Other than the snail in the fridge, you would never know that we're living in France because we are going to have a total of 4 baptisms within 10 days of each other!! What the what? Are you sure I'm serving in paris? So are you ready for a story???

So with Soeur Hilton being sick and all.....Ive been getting really really homesick because I've just had time to think, and ya its not good. Im sooo grateful that she's feeling better but I need to regain my motivation and she's been still having mad headaches, so we arent at full force. Yesterday night we had a completely empty schedule, so we definitely did some FINDING! We've been focusing on finding families as a mission because it is really what the church needs here....side note, the night before we did porting and we came out dry with nothing and it was a bummer. So last night we were walking down the street and it was SOOOO HOT, and sooooo humid. We just feel like were completely drenched in sweat the whole day and night. But we were frustrated and Soeur hilton wasnt feeling well and so we decided to take a break and sit down and eat an orange. Then all of a sudden it started POURING..... Like mad. So we found this tinsy tree to sit under and we were just getting SOAKED!  Ya okay, that's not all.....it starts to hail like bigger than the size of quarters. Just HUGE. We saw a little covering on the other side of the street and were going to make a run for it but we decided that the hail was too big so we just covered each other and hoped not to get hurt too bad. Then a car stopped and said GET IN GET IN! It was a man with his 4 children and he just said,
"Where do I take you??" and we just started talking and we were like thank you thank you..... he said, "its the least I can do for you sisters!" and I was like what? "How do you know us??" Ends up he talked to the missionaries a few years ago and lost contact. He read the Book of Mormon and did lots of traveling in San Jose and Portland! We were like... THAT'S WHERE WE'RE FROM! He was so excited and his kids loved us and were going to go visit them tomorrow!!

So we felt pretty bad for being downers and all....because God just took care of us big time and blessed us with a FAMILY OF 6!!!!

Then we were like wow, that was cool. We said an awesome prayer and decided to get on th metro to do some contacting. We didn't like the first tram we saw so we waited for the second one.... we aren't allowed to contact men and we were surrounded but them and young girls. But the man accross from us said... "Hi" ...ha, we were like "how did you know we spoke english? We didnt even say anything." He said it was Soeur Hilton's last name. He said Kohlert could have been german but he put his money on Hilton. So we started talking and we got off the tram and he was with his 2 daughters, son and wife coming back from mass. IT WAS POURING outside and so we all waited in the metro and talked for like 15 or 20 min. The girls just LOVED us and the 18 yearold son blushed when we told him he was intelligent for knowing 4 languages. We gave them a family proclomation and they said we could go visit them... unfortunately the number isn't working so that's a bummer.. but we didn't know that last night. They were SUCH A SOLID FAMILY!

Then we were like wow we stil have over an hour left of th night to go.. So we did some more contacting and got a phone call from the elders. So there is this woman in the ward who our mission president's wife found while she as serving in Rennes. She has been coming to church for 30 YEARS and hasn't wanted to get baptized... I told Soeur Hilton that which ever soeurs get to baptize her are the luciest soeurs ever. Ya, well yesterday, she told bishop she wants to be baptized and that only the two of us, the elders, and the ward mission leader can be at her baptism because of her anxiety problems..... HOW COOL IS THAT!!! WE GET TO BE THERE TO SEE the one and only ANNICK get baptized. Not even Soeur Poznanski gets to go! IT'S TOMORROW! Ya we definitely canceled all our plans to be there.

Then while I was on the phone, the lady walking next to us started to slow down her step so I pointed at Soeur Hilton to go talk to her and after I got off the phone we ended up sharing half of the first lesson and she too said that we can come back and talk more with her!!

AND.... on Saturday we had 2 BEAUTIFUL baptisms. Lucy was beaming the whole time and her husband and friend came. She was 10 minutes late so we were worried but it all went well. Gladys also told me that she was too afraid to go infront of everyone to get the Holy Ghost, but after a long convincing session; she decided to do it. Im nervous about her. I really feel like she wont stay active. Im trying to get her involved, but she has to do her part too!



Lucy's Baptism

 

Gladys' Baptism

So all in all, with Shainas baptism 2 Saturdays ago, Gladys and Lucy's last saturday, and Annick's tomorrow, that equals 4 baptisms in 10 days.

.......and there was a snail in our fridge..........

How cool is that?

God blesses us in our hardest times. I am sincerely grateful for the pioneers and the strength they give me.

Thanks for all of the support from everyone! Its been really needed!

LOVE

Sœur Kohlert

Week 21: A Wonderful Baptism and a Trip to Paris

Hey Family and Friends, This week was insanity! Ha well on both ends of the spectrum!! It is getting hot! Its super humid and it takes a lot of energy to do anything! But its great because people are outside! Unfortunately everyone and their dog is going on vacation for the whole month of august. its like everyone in the city just picks up and leaves its insane!!

Tuesday was Shaina's interview and she passed with flying colors!! She is so cute! While she was in her interview i was talking with her mom and I asked her if she wanted to take the missionary lessons, and she said yes!! She said that she feels like its time and that shes been discussing the gospel a lot with Shaina! Its wonderful how much influence an 8 year old girl can have on her family!! We've been really trying to focus on finding families as a mission because they really are the support of the church! There are like 2 or three strong families that really just run the church here in France.

We saw Gladys on Wednesday, I've been worried about her because I don't want to just baptize her and then she goes inactive right away... but we did a pre-interview with her and she is good to go... and I can't deny her the blessings that she can get from the gospel. If we don't baptize her, she will never even have the chance to grow.

We worked hard this week getting things ready for the baptism and inviting everyone! Then on Thursday night we went to Paris for Soeur Hilton's legality. We stayed the night and we barely slept, then on Friday her legality went too long so we missed the train. Soeur Hilton is so cute... She ran all of the way back to me from legality because she didn't want us to miss the baptism. We ended up having to stay the night in another city where we didn't sleep at all because we were on these tiny tiny air mattresses and it was FREEZING because they had no blankets and the fan was blowing straight on us.

Quick Trip to Paris for Soeur Hilton's Legality

So we got back to Rennes Saturday morning at like 11... ran home and got ready and ran to the chapel to get it ready and practice since I was playing the piano and we were both playing the violin. We cleaned and cleaned and filled the font and I accidentally started the heater..... which is on an automatic system and stays on for three hours before in automatically shuts off... IT WAS SO HOT IN THERE! Ooopsss

Shaina's Baptism - With her parents

But I was soo impressed!! Her family are not members and they were all there like an hour early!! They had driven in from like Normandy! How cool is that. It was so amazing to see them all there. They even came to the reception du don du saint esprit (confirmation) on Sunday and stayed after for the ward picnic.

Soeur Hilton is sick; right after the baptism she slept all day and then after church all day and today all day. I hope she gets better soon. I feel bad that she feels awful. We are still going to our scheduled appointments this week but were going to take it easy and just focus on these 2 baptisms these week!!!

LOVE YOU

Week 20: Ummm I am so glad that I dont ever have to be a bishop

Thank you aunt Amy for the package!! I loved it so so much! Tell the kids thank you! I need to send yall something! I hope youre enjoying Utah!

This week was a rollercoaster!! But I really enjoyed it!

Monday Marie Delacourt took us around to see Rennes. I live in the sweetest city ever, so much history and cool things that I didnt ever really know exsisted until she showed us! Then we took her to a French families house for dinner. She had never met a french mormon family that was "normal", so that was really good for her. But she left for the summer, I am sad.

Tuesday was so cool. So Marie-Annette and Abdias accepted our invitaiont to have a soiree familiale with a family! I told them that we needed to leave at 18h30 and we got there and they were standing at the door all ready to go in their best clothes and they were so excited! We had a great night and they loved it. Unfortunately they are going to paris for the summer i had to say goodbye and it was really hard. They have grown alot and i will really miss them.

Wednesday we had a ROCKIN lesson with Loma. She is the chinese student i met on the metro and we had a soiree familale with her on sunday. She really opened up to us and explained how lonely she felt here in france and we talked about prayer and the plan of salvation and scripture reading and it was just wonderful. Strong spirit. We called her to ask her if she wanted to come to church and we didnt even have to ask her! She answered and said "you go to church tomorrow?" Hahah she had a good time and we got a text from her that said "thank you for telling me about gold" she meant God ha. So cute. We are going to set a date with her this week!

Thursday was sweet. Had dinner with a member whose house is like.... a mansion like HUGE.and ALL of the ceilings are double decker and they have a pool and it was just weird to see space. I didnt know how to handle myself ha

Lucy and Gladys are doing well! We had a crazy lesson with Lucy where we taught her like all of the commandments, but she accepted all of them including tithing and she is just great i love her. Gladys didnt come to church and i am worried. She is progressing but more slowly. She needs friends and I dont know exactly who is her best fit in the ward. but she loves us and promsed to continue to read and pray to get a strong testimony. I hope all goes well there.

Shaina is getting baptized this saturday! We are excited! She is so cute. She drew me a cute picture and just loves us! She is ready! Ill send pictures of that next week. She just is going to be a great example. She comes from a crazy family and we are going to start working on her non member mom who comes to shainas lessons.

Saturday our friend Fatima broke down and told us how lonely she is here in France. We are going to try to be there more for her and bring in a member who can be with her, we fasted for her before we saw her and maybe it was our miracle that she broke down because she really opened up to us. Then there was sunday...... we had 5 amis there again but Mart told me she didnt have a place to sleep... it was stressful and no one was helping me... so finally the relief society president stepped up to the plate to help us. I feel so bad for these immigrants.

Anyways i said i dont want to be a bishop because having everyone tell me there problems was hard!! I understand what mom was feeling as RS pres. Its just hard and all you can do is pray because you cant do very much.

I love you all!!

Soeur Kohlert

Week 19: A little bit of good stress

I got the package from mommmy!! Thanks I LOVE THE SKIRTS and the stickers were perfect, especially because shaina LOVES Hello Kitty! I am going to give Tugsuu her bible ASAP! I need to get her going on her geneology.

We had another 5 people at church this week! This time it wasnt so overwhelming! The elders helped along with the members. I was very grateful and remembered how completely overwhelmed I felt the last time we had that many investigators at church.

Sad news... Mandal has decided that she doesn't want to be baptized :( Her son wants to come to France and so she is stressed trying to find work to make enougth money to bring him here. It's so sad and so disappointing because I KNOW that she felt the spirit.. she even said so herself, but we cant make her do anything. Its hard because we cant talk to her without Tugsuu and we dont have an address for her.. We're trying though. Pray for her!

Shaina got written permission from both her parents to get baptized on the 13th! We are so excited! She is too darn cute! Ha last time she asked me why Jesus had to die for her... its really hard to explain to an 8 year-old the atonement with VERY limited french and a TERRIBLE accent. She has a light about her. I hope she can continue to grow up in the church with her grandma... she has much potential unlike the rest of her family.

Lucy is just a wonderful person. I am having a hard time getting her integrated into the ward because she is just so busy! But we talked about the Word of Wisdom during gospel principles.... ha thanks to the poor teacher who i asked to completely change his lesson plan half way through the lesson to talk about WOW... I was so grateful because she had so many concerns that I simply would not have been able to answer with the french that I have... And the TIME that we have since we only have 2 more lessons with her till her baptism!! Thats insane. Her husband is still not interested but she did mention she is starting to share the gospel with a friend! It was cool though because she didnt agree with all of the WOW but said that she would keep it if that is what god wanted.

Loma is a chinese student who came to church. We had a wonderful FHE afterward with a family from the islands. I cried during her lesson. The mom was the PERFECT FHE lady ha... for lack of better words. She brought the spirit and just expressed how much she is there for Loma.. she gave her a picture of Jesus and her phone number and gave us ALLL the leftover food and was just so welcoming... exactly what we all need to be like as LDSaints.

Then there was Gladys. We asked her to pray about the BOM to know if it was true earlier in the week and she said no. We asked her why not and she said because she already knows its true. Then our next lesson we planned to teach the Law of chastity, but the spirit totally lead us back to praying about the BOM. We finally got her to understand the importance of praying to know if it was true. She thought that praying and asking would show doubts, but through a serious of inspired questions, she agreed to read and pray. I was relieved because I have been really worried about our investigators. I dont want to just baptize them and they just leave. it is my worst fear. i am going to try my absolute hardest to help them recieve the testimonies that they need to stay strong in the church no matter what difficulties they may have as they move forward through life!!


I LOVE YOU GUYS
until next week!