I felt home... It was a weird feeling, but being out here for a year now all the unusual things are becoming more normal

Hey everybody!  I can't believe how fast the time is flying by!  2014 is already rolling and its just gonna keep rolling faster and faster...  It sounds like you all had a great week though.  I wish I could've seen the super bowl with you guys!  Im glad the seahawks won.  Keep me updated on CHS Rugby as well.  Im glad that it is such a good turn out!  But anyways.  This week was incredible just like every other week.  We started off last Monday going to an all you can eat asian restaurant with an inactive member and her son who is not a member.  Elder Cooper and I put down so much food!  it was super good and we got a really good relationship with the lady and her son as well.  The lady loves the piano and we talked a lot about it a few weeks ago.  I told her that I love Chopin so she brought a book full of chopin pieces to the dinner and gave it to me.  I wish I had more time out here to practice it, but I will just have to wait until after the mission.  It was a great dinner though.

Tuesday we were busy making pin buttons for the members of the zone.  It is something that goes along with the zone training we gave a couple weeks ago.  We all came up with "titles"and we got them printed witha  cool Amsterdam logo on the buttons.  They should be here next week.  We felt like it was a great idea to unify the zone and also help the missionaries remember what we taught.  I will send a pic when we get them.  That night we had one of the funniest dinner appointments ever!  Me, Elder Cooper and the Hoorn Elders were at a families house, and they are SUPER dutch.  They are nice, but the mom is a little crazy, ok, a lot crazy.  We had a nice spiritual thought planned for our new stake plan and wanted them to each make a dutch mormon.org profile.  While we were eating, she just went off about how we shouldn't use the title "mormon".  We told her we understood but then we explained that it is a website for nonmembers and when non members want to learn more about our church, they type in 'mormon' more often than they do 'the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints'.  We also explained that at the top of the page, our church logo is there with the full name of our church.  She still didn't understand though and just went on and on about how that was a big mistake from the church.  Elder Cooper and I were laughing so hard because we knew that the other two elders would be giving a spiritual thought about mormon.org right after dinner.  Throughout dinner she kept doing really weird things and during the spiritual thought (The Hoorn Elders were smart enough to share something else) she kept feeling the pages of our scriptures and saying how nice they felt compared to hers hahaha.  She started bashing on Utah and was just weird.  Elder Cooper and I are like little girls who giggle at everything too, and when one of us starts giggling, we can't stop!  It got so bad that Elder cooper had to leave the room for a second!  It was seriously one of the best dinner appointments I've had on my mission.

Wednesday we started our exchange week.  I was with Elder E who is a younger missionary. He is really cool and we got along great.  We had a great appointment helping this old couple move.  They are both members but the husband suffers from severe alzheimers. (I think that's how you spell it).  He is 87 and the wife is 80.  She is doing great though and was helping us move things outside.  It was sad to see the man though.  He kept repeating himself over and over again.  It was so sad to see her help him do everything and give him medicine.  True love.  But she cooked us some really good Indonesian food.

thursday we were on exchanges again and I was with Elder K.  He is also a younger missionary and  He is also a great Elder and we had a killer appointment!!  We taught this guy named N.  He is from Ghana, His faith is incredible but he struggles keeping commitments.  He was baptized Protestant and has the typical question, "Why do I need to be baptized again".  We did our best to explain it, but he got off topic a lot and talked more about the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  It got very spiritual at that point though and so we went with it.  We talked about how God loves us and he wants to talk with us through prayer.  He shared a spiritual experience about prayer and we asked him if he believed that God could answer his question about baptism.  Of course he answered yes, so we knelt down right there and he prayed.  after is great prayer we sat in silence for about 10 minutes.  The Spirit was so strong and he finally broke the silence telling us that a picture kept coming up in his head.  It was the picture of Peter, James and John giving Joseph Smith the priesthood.  We told him that was why he needed to be baptized again, because it needs to be done with proper authority from God.  It was such a great lesson and he is a lot more positive now.  he still has a few questions but is a lot more positive.  It was another testimony confirming that God DOES answer our prayers!  I have had so many confirmations of that principle out here.

Friday was another exchange, this time with the Assistants.  I was with Elder V here in Alkmaar and we had a good day.  We had a dinner appointment with a cool family (only the 20 year old daughter is a member) but her family was nice.  She plays the saxaphone and they had a piano there so we had fun playing music after dinner, and they really enjoyed it.  Its not the same as Utah where every other person can play the piano haha but its pretty unusual if you can play the piano.  it was a fun night and Elder V and I had a good time together.

Saturday we were back in Alkmaar just me and Elder Cooper and we were exhausted from the back to back to back exchanges, but we somehow made it through and had a nice dinner appointment that night with the De B Family.  They are the older couple who are also very dutch, so we had a very dutch meal, Potatoes, sausage, Baked chicory with cheese, and some cold salad.  She has an organ in her home and played us a few songs, and thats when I realized that I really like the organ!  I want to play it more and more so I can get better.  It was weird that night.  I was sitting down on the couch, listening to her play the organ, and just looking at a painting of flat ground with windmills.  I felt home...  It was a weird feeling, but being out here for a year now all the unusual things are becoming more normal. 

Sunday was also really good.  There are 4 elders in the branch now.  We were asked to give a musical number before everybody bore their testimonies.  (In small branches 45 minutes is usually too much time for testimonies, so they like doing other things that help take up time)  But anyways, we sang Blijf bij mij or Abide with me.  I was on the piano, and the other three were singing.  Elder C and Elder P have great voices, but the greenie  has a terrible voice so we had him stand in the back hahaha.  it was really good though and the branch really liked it.  After that, we got back and contacted some people and then had a great dinner appointment with the other De B family.  (He is the son of the older couple).  They feed us soooo much and we laughed soooo hard.  They are my favorite family in the branch.  It was a great week.

Today we were in Amsterdam for Pday.  it was fun, but now we are just resting for our crazy week coming up this next week!  I love the mission right now, and I am having so much fun and making so many friends!  the weather is really nice too!  Hope you all have a great week as well.  I miss you and love you all!

Veel Liefjes,

Elder Bishop