Our darling church in Austria!

 We were excited to go to church in our branch in Bruck on der Mur (Bridge on the river!) today for the first time!  The Gemeinde (ward) sacrament meeting in Bruck begins at 10:00 AM. We left our apartment at 8:30 AM and made it there just before the meeting began!  It is usually a 15 minute drive!  We were lost for nearly an hour and a half!  The GPS in our car leads us astray on a regular basis and we can’t trust it.  Also the road signs are confusing and not clear!  We kept praying and finally arrived in time...miraculously!

We were so happy to meet many of the 17 saints in attendance and President Scheuch the Branch President!  The first to greet us was President Helmrich, a counselor in the Stake Presidency from Vienna.

Before the meeting began President Scheuch asked both of us to bear our testimonies.  I was so grateful I could bear a simple testimony in German!  Heidi, my German tutor had warned me that would happen and I was so glad she had helped me prepare.  Judd expressed himself beautifully as well.  We were grateful for the opportunity!

I was told by a number of people that I speak German well. So nice of them to say.  I still have much to learn!   Judd astounds me with his facility with the language!  We pray together daily in German and study the language together daily as well.  I admire Judd's ability and passion for learning languages.

We met after the Sacrament Meeting with President Helmrich, at his request.  He explained a lot to us about the branch and the state of the church in Austria.  He told Judd that he would be called as a counselor in the branch presidency, after the new president has been called!  He and his wife are in their 50’s and live in Graz.  He said they are wonderful and will serve faithfully!  The current branch president has been serving for eight years! This is very unusual. The stake presidency was seeking inspiration about who to call for some time now.  They actually prayed recently that a senior couple would be called to serve here.  They are so thrilled and surprised that we were called so quickly.  

President Helmrich is clearly a great leader!  He gave a talk in Sacrament Meeting and taught the 5th Sunday class based on a talk by Elder Rasband on miracles.  

When we came home Judd threw a tasty dinner together with a few things in the fridge and pantry!  Afterwards we took a long nap, went for a walk, read our scriptures together and had a delightful chat with Nathan and children.  Kristen was attending church meetings... so we missed her!  

We haven’t talked to our other children yet! They need to change our phone number in WhatsApp so we can talk without a charge.

It is late...Gute Nacht! (Good night!)