JANUARY 1, 2009 THURSDAY NEW YEAR’S DAY

Today was New’s Years Day and we were allowed to sleep in. That did me no good since I woke up at my usual time. We did our usual stuff and I worked on the member list some more. About noon we got ready to go out and visit the two members who had birthdays today, one active and one not active who we hadn’t met yet. We’ve decided to give each member this year a birthday card on their birthday. Just as we were getting ready to leave we got a call from Elder Pine asking if they could come over and do some goal-setting for the new year and also to do today’s combined study together. I told him that after we completed our visits that we’d love to get together with them. After being invited they decided to come with us. We had to wait an hour for them to get ready and then we met them in Schwamendingen. We took the bus to Stettbach and then the train to Schwerzenbach. It was about a ten minute walk through the snow, ice and slush to Andreas Odermatt’s home. He recognized we were missionaries and was surprised and happy that someone remembered his birthday. It didn’t change the fact that when we left, he didn’t want to see us again. He said he hadn’t had contact with the Church for over ten years, had gotten married and was satisfied with how things were. We asked him if we could visit and teach him to see if he could get his testimony back. When he answered no, we asked him if he had a BM and would he read it. He said he had a copy in the basement so I told him to go get it and read it. He thought that was pretty funny. He was pretty nice and polite and when we left, my parting shot was for him to pray and ponder about his decision. Who knows, maybe sometime later he’ll find the desire.

We still had Stephan Schmid to visit so we had to take the train back to Zurich Hauptbahnhof and catch another train to Basserdorf. When we changed trains in Zurich, we had a sixteen minute wait. Elders Pine and Middleton said they wanted a snack and went up the stairs. When they came back, they said they had made an appointment with a less-active for 6:00 and so wouldn’t be able to study with us after we got through. We made it to Basserdorf and then came the problem of getting to the Schmid’s. It’s always difficult to get around in the small towns on holidays because the buses run only once an hour or not at all. Elders Pine and Middleton could tell we were going to be a long time in getting this last member visited and they had an appointment to go to. When the bus came, they bid us adieu and we went our separate ways. Fortunately we got on a bus that took us part way to the Schmid’s. After that we had to get off and walk for about twenty-five minutes. The temperature was about twenty degrees and as night was coming on, the slush froze making it very slippery. We finally made it there, wished him a happy birthday, gave him a small gift (cookies) and made it back to the bus stop in time. In fact we had about a fifteen minute wait for the bus and Diana recognized a not-active member lived a few steps away. We had been there a couple of weeks ago and nobody was home. So while waiting for the bus, we made a visit. She was home this time, but had a cold and could only whisper. She didn’t want to visit right then so we asked if we could come back later. She said we could which is a welcome change to what we usually receive. By the time we got home it was way dark and freezing cold. It was really good to get out again and do some contacting work. While I work on the reports, Diana is always studying either German or the scriptures or both. Tonight it was reading the BM in German.