Adventures in Rotterdam

Goede Dag mijn lievling familie!!

Picture in your mind this:A dashingly beautiful sister missionary atop a brilliantly blue cruiser-style bike dressed in all the latest of european fashions gracefully rolling along the streets of Rotterdam- every once in a while ringing her little bell and saying such quaint things as "dag" or "avond" as she rides to yet another sparklingly beautiful appointment...

Pretty cool, huh? ok. So thats not AT ALL how the last week has been. Its more like me dressed like a black-colored abominal snow woman trudging up a hill about half-mile behind my trainers on a second hand bike in the driving wind and below freezing temperatures (Dad, whoever told you its not cold enough for the water to freeze over in Holland has clearly never been to Rotterdam), on our way to yet another cancelled appointment in the ghettos of Rotterdam where we get whistled at by little boys riding around on their bikes.

Overall, I am TOTALLY LOVING IT!!! Missionary work is the best. I will definitely be a LOT stronger as a result of all of our biking. We are on our bikes at least 3-4 hours out of the day riding around our area which takes in most of Rotterdam. I am in a threesome, and the first few days I was so behind on the streets that my trainer and other comp decided to start riding with me in the middle so I didn't get lost. I am improving in my speed, and my bike is pretty nice, so I shouldn't have any problems once I build up a little bike-muscle in my thighs.

The city of Rotterdam is very cool. It was hit very hard during world war II and has almost no remaining historical buildings, but still has a very Netherlands-feel to it. The diversity in the people we tract into is so cool. This week we have taught lessons to refugees from Rwanda, immigrants from Surinam, and people from capo verde, portugal, peru, aruba, and the Netherlands of course. We teach a lot of people who speak very little dutch, so I will probably pick up a little bit of portuguese, as english, dutch, and portuguese seem to be the most common languages of our investigators and members here in Rotterdam.The work is amazing!! Never ever believe that the work in Europe is slow in any way, because it is simply not true. Pres. Woodland told us that we are here to baptize and that we are in many ways building the future leadership for closed countries such as china and india, etc by teaching so many buitenlanders (immigrants). Thats not to say we don't teach plenty of dutch people. We have a dutch investigator (Lennika) who is super close to having a baptismal date- next discussion we're pretty sure she'll committ to being baptized in Feb. We also have another man, Andre, who will be getting baptized in Feb. The service is just after transfers, so hopefully I get to stay here at least two transfers to see the baptism!

I'm not even sure where to start telling you about all of the miracles I have witnessed. WE truly are instruments in the Lord's hands as we move about the city ending up in EXACTLY the right spot at the right time. Every time we show up to an appointment and get stood up, we just need to turn around and look up and down the street and we are guaranteed to see someone who is ready for the gospel, or who at least is interested in learning more. The other day we had a cancelled appointment and ended up running into a man from Capo Verde who made an appointment with us and asked us to pray with him right here on the street- which doesn't happen every day! The next day we were stood up for an appointment and as we were unlocking our bikes, a muslim boy abaout 15 years old came up to us and said that he wanted to be baptized a Christian-- that definitely doesn't happen every day! Of course we will have to get his parent's permission, but if we had not been there, he may never have had contact with a christian group for a while (he lived in a mostly muslim neighborhood). So many miracles! Every time we pray, pick a street, and go tracting, we find the elect here in Rotterdam who have been prepared to hear our message.

The Dutch is very hard, but I think biking might be an even greater challenge! I'm sure you can imagine me on a bike riding along busy streets ALL DAY LONG...My lack of skills is actually quite a comic relief at times. Well, I don't have much time- we still have our 30 minute time limit here in Rotterdam. I'd love to hear from you all! Let me know how life back home is. I miss you all tons! I love you lots!

Love, Zuster Cherie Gulliver