God is a God of Miracles (1st Baptism! )

​Delicious Lithuanian ice cream and amazing companions.

​Delicious Lithuanian food

Hello Family and Friends!

I cannot even express my joy right now or describe this past week in sufficient description. I guess I will start with last Sunday. We had two Nigerian investigators attend church, so we went to the english sunday school class taught by Elder Nuttal, the senior couple. The lesson was on fasting and how he saw amazing miracles on his mission when his whole zone fasted to be able to reach their goal of baptism. They saw miracles happen, and afterwards my compaionship decided to have a special fast for Danas our investigator. We fasted the day of our lesson with him, which was on Tuesday. In that lesson we were able to talk about the atonement of Christ and what he means to each of us. The spirit was definitely there, and I know that God lead that lesson. I can give no credit to any of us. By the end of it, Danas strongly desired to be baptized. His baptismal date was the upcoming Saturday, but we weren't sure if he would be ready. He had felt the spirit so strongly in many lessons before and could easily point it out. He was just not willing to accept that they were answers from God. He had prayed and immediatley recognized the happy feeling that he had received because it was so strong, but wasn't sure if it was really God. We had promised him that he would be able to recognize his answer from God before his baptismal date, and I truly believed that. We met with him again on Wednesday before our activity night at the church, where we played crochet and badmitton with members, investigators, and less actives. On Friday he had his interview with President Harding and walked out with a huge smile on his face. He was ready to be baptized! We had a lesson about the priesthood, and Arunas was able to help us. He is a new convert in the church and was able to explain the power of the preisthood very well. Afterwards, we did a lot of preparation for the baptism. We had to be inside by 5 that night because of the summer solstice celebrations. When we asked Danas about what he did, he said well nothing of course. I stayed inside because I don't drink :) We made a lot of calls to members to invite them to the baptism. On Saturday many more miracles happened. We were able to clean and fill the font in time. The faucet wasn't working and wouldn't turn the water on.

​Cleaning the font - we need water!

But a church member helped to take it apart and force the water on in time to fill up the font. The baptism was scheduled for 4, but not too many people were there. However, by the time it started almost the entire chapel was full. So many people came to support Danas. Many went up to bear their testimonies of the gospel and welcome him into the church. The amazing miracle was Danas' own testimony at the end of the program. He stood up to say that he didn't know he would have to say anything but would tell the story of his life. He had been into narcotics and did not believe that God existed. But after learning about God and his gospel, he came to this understanding of its truthfullness. Two to three days prior to his baptism he said that he realized that God had truly answered his prayers so many times. He had been there all along filling him with His spirit and speaking to Him. He knew that God was there, and that this is His restored gospel on the earth. It was truly a miracle that God answered his prayers so many times and helped him to realize that just as had been promised. His simple but strong testimony showed me the mercy and love of God. He truly is our Father and loves each one of us. He truly hears and answers our prayers. His spirit testifies to our hearts the truthfullness of His gospel if we allow Him in. Conversion is truly a miracle of God and does not come from us. I know that I have done nothing in this process but am so thankful for the opportunity to observe Danas and his conversion to the Lord. On Sunday he was confirmed a member of the church. It was an amazing experience. It was all from God. His hand is in our lives everyday. True joy truly comes from the atonment of Christ through his restored gospel. God truly is a God of miracles today, just like He was in times of old. We just need to expect them, and they will come. Not always how we want, but they are there. We were also able to meet with Karolina, who is progressing so well. She has such strong commitment to serving the Lord and makes me want to be a better follower of Christ. We are excited to help her prepare for baptism as well.  I know that God lives and loves us. I love you all, have a great week.
Love Sese Dzerman

Crazy Awesome Week

My crazy cute compaionsion.

Hello Everyone!

Life here is super awesome. The summer has been so pretty from warm sunny days to beautiful summer storms. We have gotten a little rain and lightning, which is so fun because you don't see too much lightning here! On Tuseday we were able to go teach our investigator Karolina. She is the most amazing investigator. Right now she is in the hospital, so we got to go there to teach.It is a psychiaric hospital, so that was interesting to say the least, especially here in Lithuaina. She is feeling much better now that she is on medicine. She has the strongest testimony of the Jesus and the Book of mormon. It is so amazing. She faithfully reads and knows that God has restored his gospel on the earth today. She teaches us more than we teach her. After our lesson, we may have gotten locked in the meeting room. We were a bit worried there, but after a few minutes they let us out :) it was pretty awesome. On Wednesdaywe got to travel to Riga for Mission Leadership Counsel.

My MtC group!!! in Riga, Latvia with Elder Ballard

We talked about what we learned from the spirit when Elder Ballard visited. It is so exciting that we know that there will be more people to teach. I know that God is opening up and giving us more of His children so that they can receive the blessings of the gospel as well. The ultimate blessing of being sealed in teh temple to our families for time and all eternity. On Thursday we met with Danas who is progressing towards baptism. We hope that he will be ready soon! I know that by listening to the spirit we can know for ourselves that God speaks to us. He truly does answer our prayers, we just need to learn how to recognize them. That is still something we are trying to help Danas see. On Friday we were able to meet with Karolina again, and she is progressing so well. It is a testimony to me that I am nothing, but that the spirit is where conversion comes from. Through the spirit we come to know God and his plan for us. On Saturday we were able to meet with Ali who is from Pakistan I think. He has been an investigator for quite some time now, but is recommitted to read the Book of Mormon again because of the feelings. On Sunday we once again met with Karolina who is amazing. She is doing much better health wise and will return home from the hospital Thursday. We are so excitied to keep teaching her. We are also excited to continue working with Danas and hleping him see God's hand in His life. I know that God answers prayers. We are hoping that Danas will be able to see that in order to accept baptism. That is the gate to eternal life, to the temple and all of God's blessings. i love you all so much!

Love sese Dzerman

The other trio in Vilnius

Love Lithuania!!!!

Summer is Here!

 Me and the trainees :)

So Happy Days!
This week we were able to eat at the kat Kafe very first, which is super awesome. It is a cafe full of cats. You sit at the tables and a ton of cats are just walking around, climbing on the tables, and sleeping in their baskets. It is pretty sanitary, so no worries :)

That night we were taught how to make little meat dumplings, which Lithuanians love. We met with these less actives and they are super great. Then on Tuesday we met with a sweet recent convert who really desires to have the pure love of Christ in her heart. She is an amazing example to me as she strives to strenghthen her famliy by sharing the gospel with them. We also met with an investigator who will be leaving Vilnius this summer but is still interested in learning more. We hope to meet with him whenever he can return. On Wednesday we got to travel to Riga to listen to Elder Ballard speak!! He spoke to the Latvian and Lithuanian missionaries, and it was amazing. The spirit was so strong as he bore testimony to each of us. I was even able to shake his hand :) i loved his happy and upbeat attitude even at that old of an age. He is also super funny. He answered questions about how to better to do the Lord's work here in the Baltics. It was so amazing. Then we traveled back on home to do the work!! The next day I had an exchange with a sister who is super awesome. We were able to meet with Danas, who is progressing well. She did awesome of testifying of the importance of reading the book of Mormon. He actually read from it this weekend which is huge progress! On Fridaywe attended fhe with the young adults and Danas. On Saturday we had a small conference to be trained about how to help people overcome addictions. It was such great revelation! I learned that we all have even minor addictions in our lives that of course can be overcome through the atonement. Satan does so much to try to take over our bodies and agency. Once we become aware of that, we can conquer them through Christ. We were able to meet with Danas again, and he is planning on baptism in two weeks from now! We are so excited for him. He is so receptive to the spirit, receiving super happy feelings in church and meeting with us. In our last lesson he described it as the smiley feeling :) i love that! The gospel and spirit truly do make us happy and smiley!! This is the gospel of pure joy. 

On Sunday we were able to sing Our Savior's Love in the Russian branch. We attempted to sing it in Russian, but I am not even sure that the members could recognize that we were trying to sing it in their language, haha. It was great though. I also had the awesome opportunity to conduct the music while we were there. I couldn't say any of the words and could barley even lead the right timing. It was a happy meeting :) That night we met with a girl from Napal who is seeking God through prayer. She is really sincere and super happy. We love her a lot. I am so thankful for this opportunity I have to serve and work with God's children here. I know that as we act on the smiley feeling that we get from the spirit, the Lord will bless us with more happiness. True happiness is continually partaking of the atonement, the fruit from the tree of life, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I love you all, have a great week!

Love Sis Dzerman

Elder M. Russell Ballard visits the Baltic Mission

Elder M. Russell Ballard spoke to the Lithuanian and Latvian Missionaries in Riga, Lativia on June 8, 2016.  Afterwards, he greeted each missionary and here is a video from the back of the room..  Kayleigh is in mint green after the men sing acapella at 2:45.

Copy this link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfyrZxOpcqE


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfyrZxOpcqE

It's Already June!!

The tv tower

Us inside the tv tower on Monday. 

A view from the tv tower.

Hello everyone!

It has been a super awesome week over here in Lithuania! On Monday we ran over to the Prisikelima Baznycia to finish seeing Kaunas for our last time. Then we had a skype lesson with Rojus. Luckily he is doing better than before and is not so full of doubt. We hope to see some progression with him :) We were then able to play sand volleyball and strett hockey with our district which was a blast. That night we helped to teach family night over at the Bruce's. A few older single members came and also our investigator Raimondas. He has such a solid testimony of the gospel, it is incredible. He blows me away. He was found and taught about 3 years ago but is still waiting for parental approval. I know that a path will be prepared for him!

On Tuesday we had district meeting and then traveled to Vilnius so we could pick up my passport, woops :) Then we headed off to Riga where we met the Latvian sisters that night. We got to be with Sister Webb, my mtc compaion! It was so great seeing her. We stayed with her that night and then we all got our trainees that next morning!

My cute new trainees in centre coming to email today :)

I am serving with Sister Wuthrich and Day! They are the best companions ever; I love them so much already. Sister Wuthrich is from Bountiful and is super amazing. Sister Day is from American Fork, and they both are super hilarious. They definelty make me laugh every day :) After our training we headed back to Vilnius. That night we met with Indre for the first time. When she learned that we wanted to meet with her to talk about the gospel, she was not interested. But after about a week she texted saying that there was something she felt she needed to change in her life. We were like, okay! That has definintely not happened before, so that was super awesome. She really wants to read the Book of Mormon to figure out what is in it, so we are excited to meet again.

On Thursday we met with an investigaotr from the north area, the elders old area. There are only two Lithuaninan elders now in Vilnius, so we will be taking over one of their old areas. The two still here are also covering two areas, center and west. He  basically tried to convert us to his religion, but it was good. We also met with Danas, who plans on being baptized in three weeks! We are very excited. He is making good progress, still not solid on accepting that he has received his direct answer from God but willling to move forward and keep working. That night we met with a girl who is also an investigator from the north area. She has multi personality disorder, so that kind of came out int he lesson. It was pretty interesting and quite an experience for my new trainees to say the least. She was herself and she spoke as God. When she is just herself, which is most of the time, she is an amazing investigator who is ready to be baptized. We will have to keep meeting with her to figure out the severity of her condition. But it was pretty great :)On Friday we did service at the food bank by bagging up corn and grain for animals. No coffee! Then we went to family home evening that night with Danas to play croquet. He gets along with evryone so well and is super awesome. He is really funny and super easy going. We met with him again on Saturday. He stopped drinking black tea and is faithfully keeping God's commandments even though he is still not sure. Such a great example to me. We hope to help him progress in his testimony of God so that he can receieve all the blessings taht come after baptism for the rest of eternity. On Sunday we met with a girl named Season from Napal. She is so cute. She wanted to come and pray with us in our church, so we were able to teach about prayer. 

I truly do know that we can communicate with our Father through prayer and that he does respond to every question and concern and feeling that we have. He cares so deeply for us. He knows us so much better that we know ourselves. I know that He is our Father and loves us more than we can ever know. Through daily repentance we can become clean and change for the better. This is so crucial in our lives every day. I love you all so much Love Sese Dzerman :)

Note from Pres. Harding

Dear Brother and Sister Jerman,

We welcomed a number of new missionaries into the Baltic Mission this week and your daughter, Sister Kayleigh Anne Jerman, has been called to serve as trainer for Sisters Day|Wuthrich. They are serving in the Vilnius 1 District.

Training a new missionary is a very important responsibility and impacts the new missionary throughout her mission. Sister Jerman is a great missionary and will be a wonderful example of obedience and faithfulness to Sisters Day|Wuthrich  .

Warmest regards,
David P. Harding, President
Baltic Mission