Week #18 in Oldenburg (1 December 2014).  A joyful week for Reese.  Thursday was a delightful, Reese said "legendary," American Thanksgiving at Brother and Sister Benson's home.  Here are a couple of photos:

                                                     Bro. & Sis. Benson with table set

                                       L to R:  Elders Wilde, Smith and Youngblood

The following day Reese wrote, "freitag gings richtig los," which, roughly translated, means, "on Friday things really took off."  That day they felt prompted to tract in a particular complex and found a woman who had been searching for the truth.  She came to Church on Sunday, had a wonderful experience, and asked to be baptized and so they set a date for just before Christmas.  Then, Saturday was a joyful day because of the baptism of the two daughters of a wonderful sister who was baptized a couple of weeks ago.  Reese was excited to see the whole family so happy.  They will be a wonderful addition to the Oldenburg branch.

The other big news of the week is that Reese is being transferred to Berlin for the last five weeks of his missionary service.  The mission lingo is that he is being "ghosted."  I suppose this is because he will be such a short-term presence in his last area.  This was probably necessary because Reese is coming home one week early to enroll in BYU, albeit a couple of days after the semester has started.  In Berlin, Reese's new companion, Elder Borgholthaus, should be able to work in a threesome for that last week.  Reese is excited to make the best of it.  His new district actually includes two former companions from Oldenburg (Elder Schaal and Elder Savage), the Oldenburg ZL who Reese replaced and who introduced him to the area for a couple of days, as well as Sister Blake, another Timpview High School alum, and Sister Toma, both of whom, like Reese, served in Osnabruck in the Oldenburg District.  As Reese described it:  "It is pretty much the Oldenburg Hall of Fame."  Here is a photo of Elder Borgholthaus from when he entered the mission in July 2014.  He's on the right.

Reese closed his letter:  "Oh Oldenburg, I will miss you!"  He surely will.  He has loved the members and those who have investigated and in some cases joined the Church while he served there.  He took several photos of beloved branch members who have been so kind to him.  The photos convey something of what a joy it is to be a missionary in Oldenburg, Germany:

 

    The Fulda Family

                                                                   The Hermann Family

                                                                  The Tulp Family

                                                                  The Schlalos Family

                                                                  Brother Brederhorn

                                                                   Brother Lehmann

                                                                       Brother Schoppa

                                                                           Ijeh