Let's Follow Him

It's been a very busy and memorable week. We hope all of you have found meaning in your Christmas celebrations and traditions. We love the Savior and have tried to follow Him, especially this past week. 

Each day we've tried to follow his example by serving at the Employment Center during the days, and at the Temple Visitors Center in the evening. One of our job seekers is a retired house painter who is hoping to be a part-time janitor at the elementary school by his house, so we helped him with his resume, then wrote a recommendation for him to the Diablo School District. He was low on his food supply, so we helped him with getting food at nearby sources, and shared our own with him for his Christmas. 

It was so fun this weekend to celebrate Christmas by serving Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at the Visitors Center. We also found a Senior Care Center to visit with our wonderful missionaries in our area. We bagged some hygiene supplies, chocolates, socks, and handwritten Christmas cards and went on Christmas morning to visit with and carol to the residents at 2 different places. Such cute grandpas and grandmas.

We were able to attend a few fun events at Temple Hill. We ushered and got to watch a Jenny Oaks Baker Christmas concert and then a Polynesian Christmas celebration.

We also attended a Christmas Missionary Devotional and were inspired by our mission president's message and testimonies of the missionaries.

I love the Savior and echo the words of the brethren on how to follow him:

LOVE GOD AND YOUR NEIGHBOR

When asked which commandment was the most important, Jesus said, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37–39). When you replace hate with love, and anger with kindness, you’ll feel closer to God and notice more peace in your life.        

FREELY FORGIVE OTHERS

While Jesus was on the earth, Peter asked Him, “Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him?” Jesus responded, “I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:21–22). When we freely offer forgiveness to others, we can invite more peace and forgiveness into our own lives.

LIVE THE GOLDEN RULE

Jesus taught the Golden Rule during His Sermon on the Mount: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12). In other words, treat others the way you want to be treated. As you do so, you will strengthen your relationships and be happier.

Love, 

Elder and Sister Jerman 

Our Christmas Card ~ 2023

 

All is Merry and Bright

Hello everyone, It's that wonderful time of year!  Our weeks zip by as we continue in awe at how awesome this experience is for us. 

     Besides serving at the Employment Center, we try to fit in 3 different wards to visit each Sunday.  Some wards are English, but last week we went to a Spanish ward (which Roger loves while I catch a bit), and this week we went to a Tongan ward.  Though neither one of us knows Tongan, we love hearing those saints sing! 

     We find other things to do during the week like helping at the English Connect class where Spanish speakers come to learn English.  We serve at a Food Bank Distribution, then go on to help Pastor Kelly divide the food up in boxes to hand out to the folks who line up in cars to drive by and get food.  

     We get to serve at the Visitor Center where we both find opportunities to talk and share with people who walk in not sure why they are there or what they will find. We can help answer those questions!

     This week's bonuses included going to a Christmas dinner at the Mission President's home, the Messiah Sing In and The Nutcracker at the Temple Hill auditorium, and attending Zone Conference. 

     The highlight came when Jason, Taya, and their girls, Haven and Tillie, drove to meet us at Temple Hill where we enjoyed the Visitor Center, then walked around the grounds to see the Christmas lights and up to

the gardens on the 2nd story of the temple.  They slept overnight with us so we got to have some playtime with the grandkids.  

     We wrapped up today with a bell ringer concert at a local Catholic church.  It's been a fabulous week.  

     Someone said our mission would go by fast.  I thought, "Really?  To walk away from my home and family for 12 months . . . that's a long time!"  Suddenly 2 months are already gone as we've just been having a grand time.  Just so you know, we already talk about our next mission.  

     Have a wonderful week everyone.  Enjoy every day of this Christmas season and do something with intention to make it extra special.  

Merry Christmas! 

Love, Elder and Sister Jerman

Hallelujah!

 

by Roger - Hallelujah Bros and HO HO’s - Here’s Hopin’ y’allr Havin’ a Happy Hanukkah or Happy Holiday, however you celebrate. 

The beauty of serving a mission in California is the happy diversity! We love all God’s chillen’s this time of the year! And Y’ALL NEED JESUS! as a fellow volunteer at the food bank told us the other day. So here’s a quick looky see at what we’ve been doin’ as of late.

Lunes- We were counting our blessings instead of sheep ‘cause we spent such a fun time with “My Three Sons!” It was so great to have Brett, Jason, and Zac together over the weekend and even into Monday. Brett and Zac were able to drop by the office on their way to the SFO airport before taking off for home. GOOD LUCK SNOOPY- our Zac is headed to Uruguay for a year to find an education or true love and mucho dinero. (JK Snoop.) Here’s to smooth sailing ahead. 

En el Martes, practicamos español en la classe por la noche. Fue mucho bueno!

Miercoles y Jueves - Here I’ll get serious. Kaleen and I helped two brothers from Nicaragua. They have been in the US for about a year and a half, and are still literally flipping burgers at McDonald’s:-(  Not that that's a bad thing, I did it myself right after my mission to get me through the summer before college - and then I got a real job, working at a gas station:-). Anyway, William is a returned missionary, but left his family of a wife and two kids back in Managua to earn money and still is looking for a better job.

On Thursday, we met a group of Mam speakers. This is a completely different language of Indigenous Guatemalans that number over 650,000! In Oakland there is a large portion of the city, 40,000 inhabitants that are Mam and count the US as home now! And a bunch will come in at once to the Visitors Center without being able to speak Spanish because there are 4 different areas with 4 different dialects of Mam and they all are such different languages that they can’t even understand each other! We love to try to connect with them and share a Book of Mormon in the Mam language. 

Viernes- After working at the food bank, we listened to a “virtual party” that all senior employment missionaries across the western US were invited to attend. We did this hoping for a visit from Santa, some goodies, prizes, and Christmas Carols. Unfortunately, it was just another meeting with a lot of talking “virtually” speaking. Later that morning, we ended up going to the Family History Center which is in the basement of the Visitor’s Center. As we were leaving, a family of 5 came in with a cute little kid our grandson’s age. They were from Oakland, just having moved from Columbia. It so happened that the Spanish Sisters went home sick that day, so I had the opportunity to interpret and give a tour in Spanish of the Visitor Center. Well, I got the warm feelings and a tear in my eye when I told, or stumbled through an old missionary discussion on families, and the temple, and then I had to dig deep to remember the Joseph Smith story and related the visit of Jesus Christ to the Americas in the Book of Mormon. Surprisingly, they understood me, so I invited them to meet with the missionaries and they accepted!  So be sure to pray for Mateo and his family and please pray for William to have success in each of their separate journeys of finding the truth and finding a job respectively. 

Peace and Joy to the world. Remember Jesus was born to give His life for US- He bought and paid for us in a terribly painful way to give us a chance at life eternal - Praise be to OUR SAVIOR! 

Love the Journey.

Love, Elder and Sister Jerman

PS - after all that hard work, we got to spend the weekend with our Folsom Family for their ward Christmas dinner and then the Live Nativity on the Sacramento Temple grounds.  We topped off our weekend on Sunday at the Temple Stake Center by singing in Handel’s Messiah Sing-a-long! 

We are Grateful

 We are so grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission together. If you hope to go someday, keep talking about it, prepare all you can and then jump on it when the opportunity comes. 

We are so grateful for the gospel and for our Savior Jesus Christ. 

We are so grateful for the nice area we live in and our wonderful apartment.

We are so grateful for our family:  their love, support and efforts to stay close to one another, to be friends and enjoy spending time together.  

     This week we had a few bonus opportunities.  We got to feed the sister missionaries and we got to serve at the Oakland Visitor Center! We will continue to serve there at least one day a week during this busy Christmas season,  as the lights attract so many people to the temple grounds.  

     The best bonus was having our 2 sons, Brett and Zac, fly into the San Francisco airport to visit for the weekend.  We picked them up and enjoyed the rest of the day in Fisherman's Wharf, eating sourdough bread, seeing the sea lions on Pier 39, and walking to Ghiradelli Square to sample a piece of chocolate.  We drove over the Golden Gate Bridge and walked out to a cool viewpoint, then down to Little Italy for some delicious pizza and a drive along Lombard street, which is known as the crookedest street in the world.  Our final stop was to walk around the Oakland Temple grounds to see the lights on the palm trees, then up to walk around the second story on the outside of the temple.  We also went into the visitor center to see some displays and look out over the bay area.  

     We spent the next couple of days with Jason and his family.  We played with the grandkids, saw a display of over 500 creches, went on a bike ride, and shared good food and good times together.  

     We are so grateful to be able to spend time with our family.  We are so grateful to serve.  We are having the best of times here.  

Love, Elder and Sister Jerman