Our responsibility when serving our mission in Auckland, New Zealand (2014-2016) was to train and support humanitarian missionary couples in the islands. Petra and Matthias Leben who were from Germany, were called to serve in the island nation of Vanuatu. The Lebens came to Auckland and we spent several days training and preparing them for their mission in Vanuatu. They flew out on Monday afternoon and that Friday a category 5 cyclone (hurricane) hit Vanuatu. All those wonderful ideas and plans we had together were thrown out the window and Petra and Matthias spent their entire mission helping people rebuild their homes. They had a wonderful and important mission. Gary and I made several trips to Vanuatu and became good friends with the Lebens.
Upon arriving in Germany we phoned them and agreed that we would get together. While in Montenegro the end of March they called and told us that they would be coming to Frankfurt for conference weekend as Matthias had the weekend off (he is the bishop of their ward).
They arrived Friday evening and we went out to dinner at a lovely restaurant with authentic Germany cuisine.
Saturday morning we drove about 30 minutes north to Bad Homburg. Petra, a former teacher took us on a field trip to the Saalburg Roman Fort. We had a lovely time. It was wonderful to have someone to translate all the signs and explain the Roman outposts in our part of Germany. An amazing thing about the fort and living conditions then was how advanced the Romans were. They had trenches in the building
floors with warm water heating. Another interesting fact was a map showing the Roman built roads and the current Autobahn roads. The routes were very similar indicating that the Romans designed and constructed some of the best routes and roads over 2000 years ago.
We wrapped up our adventures here and drove down the road a bit to visit another site. See "Hessen Park".
"Do you want to be happy . . . Work to life and serve His sons and daughters. You will come to know a happiness that you have never known before . . . Let's get the cankering, selfish attitude out of our lives . . . and stand a little taller . . . in the service of others." Gordon B. Hinckley, Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley
No comments:
Post a Comment