President and Sister Hammon in the Germany Frankfurt Mission

We know that efforts are still being made to get us into Germany.  We are hopeful that things will fall into place for us to go as soon as possible.  We received notice that our personal effects that were shipped to Germany in May have arrived and are being held in customs storage. We received this notification: "Unfortunately, German customs will not clear the shipment until an arrival date has been set and an appointment has been made at the local town hall to register. The shipment can remain in customs storage for up to 90 days.”  We are not exactly sure when the 90 days expires, but it is probably mid-October.  We certainly hope to be in Germany by then.  It would be a shame for the items to be shipped back to Utah and arrive here in December. On a brighter note....  Dan and I were invited to participate in the training of missionaries who have begun their virtual Mission Training Center experience.  The first week we were helping with two En...

We were so disappointed to learn today, July 23, that the Church’s request for an exception that would allow us to enter Germany has been rejected.  No reasons were given. It may have been the result of the spike in new Covid-19 cases in the United States with 1/4 of the four million cases occurring in the past two weeks.  It appears we will have to wait for the borders to reopen to U.S. citizens before we can enter. Needless to say we are crushed.  Our hopes were so high that an exception would be granted.  We just want to be there with our missionaries in Germany.   I often turn to the scriptures when I am overwhelmed by sadness. My favorite scripture came to mind--Proverbs 3:5-6  :  “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”  This scripture is so much easier to read than to apply.  BUT I am going to try to stop attempting to unde...

July 16 Email from Dan - An Uplifting Story Family and Friends, I just sent an e-mail to BG at the Church Missionary Department.  She has been our main contact during our call as mission president.  This was a cool story that I wanted to share.  I know they are working hard in our behalf and I wanted them to know how much their work is appreciated. About 15 minutes after I sent the e-mail I received a reply from the legal department in Germany.  They told me that they just submitted my application today so we have renewed hope.  I spent the morning sending birthday greetings to all the missionaries beginning in July.  I just got the birthday list so I was behind.  Many of the missionaries are still pending. Sister Weser in the story is the first missionary from the USA to get into Germany for over 5 months. We will keep you updated.   We appreciate your prayers, Dan Dear BG, I wanted to share an uplifting story from the Germany, Frankfurt mission....

President and Sister Cziesla were kind enough to invite us to join the testimony meeting via Zoom for the 6 missionaries who completed their missions in the Germany Frankfurt Mission today.  What a blessing it was to hear Sister Greenhalgh and Elders Barney, Peterson, Jameson, Halling and Goulding share their testimonies in German.   We were amazed how fluently they spoke German.  We realized we have a long way to go to speak the language this well.  How we wish we could have been there to see them off.  Still no word on when we will be departing...  More time to study our German!

We are so excited to serve as Mission President and Companion in the Germany Frankfurt Mission. President Hammon served in this mission 40 years ago. When he was set apart as Mission President recently, Elder Uchtdorf indicated the Lord was granting him this great blessing to return to the country where he had served as a young missionary. We were scheduled to fly to Germany on Monday, June 29. We were devastated to receive an email last evening telling us our flights to Germany have been cancelled because Germany is still closed to citizens of non-European Union countries because of the Corona Virus. Although our hearts are truly broken, we will trust in the Lord “and lean not unto our own understanding.” (Proverbs 3:5) The Church has called an interim Mission President to serve until we arrive. Elder Michael Cziesla, an Area Seventy, and his wife Margret will begin serving July 1 after the departure of President and Sister Boyer and their four children. We just spoke with El...