7th letter from Hengelo, Netherlands -- Week 43

A windmill in Geesteren where some of my ancestors lived

Sign at the Steenblik farm with the date 1893

This was at the Steenblik farm

Hallo mooi mensen!

Transfers were this week, so Elder Frisby is gone! I am now with Elder Hunter England from Afton, Wyoming.  He has been out for about 20 months, so yet again, I got a seasoned veteran.  We get along super well and have already had a great week together.

There is a member in the ward named Broeder Kabel.  He goes super hard with family history and everything, so last P-Day, he took Elder Frisby and me to see some of the places where my ancestors lived.  We drove out to a town called Geesteren.  There was a big church building where many of the Steenblik’s were baptized before they converted to the church.  We then went and found the Steenblik farm.  There was still a sign on the farm that had the name “Steenblik” with the date 1893 underneath it.  That is where Fredrick Steenblik lived when he was young.  Frederick was the one who would later accept the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and be baptized.  He then migrated to America, and now here I am! It was super cool to see all of that.

On Elder England’s first day here, we kept busy with 3 lessons.  We also found a new investigator named Don Carlos.  We met with him in like a bar/cafe thing and it was super chill, but he was a bit coo-coo. The whole lesson he kept telling us how Jesus was racist because he wasn’t black and about how George Bush was worse than Hitler.  Oh, the people you meet on a mission.

We taught Belloh the “Plan of Salvation” again this week.  She doesn’t understand why it’s so important to know what happens in the future.  She is worried about what choices and things she has to do now and we explained to her that because we know of what happens to us when we die, that affects the decisions that we make now here on the earth.  We explained that all of us will have to stand before the Lord and be held accountable for what we did on this earth.

We met with the Torosian’s again.  They still haven’t heard from their family in Syria to see if they are alive or not.  It has been really tough on them, but they were really happy to welcome Elder England.  I truly do just love this family! They are the most amazing and loving people I have ever met.

On Sunday, I had to give a talk, in Dutch! As if giving a talk wasn’t bad enough.  Now I have to do it in a language that I don’t even speak.  Ha, but it went pretty well.  It was actually a cool experience and I guess I better get used to it because I will be doing it for the next 14 months.

Things are going good.  Hopefully the weather will start warming up this week! Our investigators are all doing great.

Thanks for all of your prayers and support.

Tot ziens!

                                                         -Elder Steenblik