Daily Miracles

Dobry Den!

Life here in CBud is glorious! This week has been really out of control. First off I forgot to tell you some great stuff from last week so I will start with that.

The Relief Society thing in Prague. So like I mentioned we had the cool money miracle. But other things, our sweet Vera is deathly afraid of escalators so it was a struggle to get her off and on them. But of course there aren’t many options when you are headed between trains and metros, you have to get down somehow and we didn't have the time to search for elevators. So she would cling onto my arm and step right on the line where the stairs split and freak out as the stairs raised and she lost her balance (although she was holding the railing and me). I tried to explain to her to not stand on the line but then she put feet on opposite sides of the line and then the stair would raise and cause her grief again. I tried to get her to have both feet on the one stair but out of the dozen or so times we tried this she failed. Poor lady! Then when we got to the end she would try to step off as the stairs are disappearing under her and she is freaking out that she won’t get off. I worked with her getting her to wait but you know my Czech abilities aren't the greatest. But it was quite the event.

Then on the train ride to Prague Vera and Jana (the elders’ investigator) got into an argument as they were talking about gospel. Now picture this: Two greenie missionaries, two ladies in there sixties and a lady in her forties with a mental handicap. Story continues. They were discussing religion and the disagreement comes from Vera saying, Bůh je člověk (God is a person) and Jana saying that is false it is Bůh byl člověk (God was a person). Realizing that they are arguing over their definitions we tried to explain that they are both right. Jana thinks person means human like us and imperfect which God is not, he was but is now a God, whereas Vera sees no difference between it. Vera is getting defensive because that is what the missionaries taught her and she knew it was right. After getting our message through (them understanding but not stopping) I said, Sisters let’s read from the scriptures. So we pulled out the scriptures and read Moroni 7. It was great. We had everyone reading from the scriptures, no more contention and they were helping us with our reading! And before we finished the chapter we were in Prague. It is amazing what the scriptures can do! Love them to death. If you aren't reading them you should be, they are such a support and strength. I don't know what I would do without them in my daily life, especially as a missionary!

So really funny story I forgot to tell last week about my companion. It was her first Friday, which meant it was her first time meeting Brother Sir and getting to eat his delicious food. So we got there and he decides to serve us spaghetti: lots of liquid sauce on some noodles and then a slab of meat. Really good! So we were eating and it was a few minutes in when I see Sister Cooper has a little red sauce on her tan sweater. Upon further inspection I see she also has a lap full of noodles and red sauce. Luckily her skirt was deep purple so it wouldn't stain. But she picked up the food put it on the plate, Brother Sir grabbed napkins and I grabbed my tide to go and we were back to eating. When what do you know I look over and see Sister Cooper has attempted to cut her meat and now has a big splotch of red sauce on the chest of her sweater. So she gets up thoroughly embarrassed and goes to the bathroom. When she comes back she begins eating. The elders were almost done by this time but I had eaten slower so I still wasn't. Then what to my surprise but she does it AGAIN!!! She now has a nice red spot down the left side of her sweater. She once again gets up and leaves and when she comes back she finishes the noodles and leaves the meat, it hadn't been eaten at all. So Brother Sir took it out to the neighbor’s dog to eat. She was so humiliated and her sweater was very wet. I had forgotten how hard it is to use butter knifes to cut slabs of meat, especially when there is a lot of sauce on tour plate. Well needless to say she was humiliated and sure she had insulted him (as you clean your plate here). So that was a funny event, hopefully that doesn't ever happen to me though!

I have loved the past few weeks working with Sister Cooper. While we are both new and struggle to remember EVERYTHING we need to be doing, we are slowly but surely improving. It is really neat to see how similar our goals are and how much of a blessing that is in our work. We work so well together as we push each other just enough to be better. We both feel like we are to be working with the less actives in the branch. We have so many! This Sunday we had about 11 total people in the building and there are over 100 on the branch list. So we have our work cut out for us be we truly feel like that is where we are supposed to focus. After this crazy week I think the Lord is trying to tell us that we need to have a little more emphasis on them and a little less emphasis on new investigators. Our mission goal is for each companionship to get 21 lessons a week. We were stuck on getting that this week as neither of us has yet. So we planned really well and set up our appointments. One day we had 5 lessons in a row. We were so stoked! We planned and prepared the lessons and one by one they all canceled! Well all but one. But that one showed up 15 minutes late and only had 15 minutes to be taught. So we tried to give a decent fast lesson but it wasn't the greatest. Throughout our week we got a total of 9 lessons, 9 of 21! Wow, I can't believe how many people didn't show up! Not to mention the fact that some of the lessons we taught were to members who were supposed to help us teach, but when the investigator didn't come we just taught them! So yeah we had a really crazy week. But no need to fear, the Lord still loves us! We have seen so many little miracles throughout the day and that is truly what helps you to carry on and push forward.

One of our days after a few lessons fell through, my sidekick mentioned how it had been a horrible day! I smiled and said well at least we have one behind us. That is one less to deal with on the mission! That made her laugh and ask how many there would be?! Then a few minutes later we were tracting our street (first time tracting and it was glorious!) and we ran into this man who was really friendly! He was interested in the gospel and wanted us to come back and teach him. His name is Jarda and he perfectly fits the description the elders have on their vision for the next branch president. We are headed back to teach him tonight hopefully. He told us to stop by next week as his schedule is kind of crazy, but that evenings work best. So we are trying.

So on fast Sunday we decided to have a fast for our less active work that we are pursuing. It has been amazing to see the difference! It was really neat because Sister Cooper and I had discussed fasting for the less actives and then in district meeting the Elders said something about how they felt we needed to focus more on our less actives. The Lord knows how to inspire people to do His work. Anyway, since our fast we have seen some mini miracles, the best kinds of miracles! We taught the Tuckovi FHE (the family we live with) and they usually are all over the place and not really responsive and hard to get involved. Well we felt we needed to talk about the importance of the scriptures and just get them to read out of them with us. So that is what we did and they were really involved and giving answers and then at the end the dad had us kneel to pray. It was so awesome! (That probably sounds lame to you, but really it was a miracle)

Then we had a lesson with Ctibor and we wanted to figure out where the foundation of his testimony was. We had a lesson all planned out and then he answered our question before we even asked it. We had just asked him about his reading. He was so prepared by the Lord it was wonderful! So we talked to him about his testimony and expressed our need of his strength at church on Sundays. He told us he couldn't come for a few weeks but would start in 3 weeks. Not sure why, kind of missed that in the translation but in the closing prayer he asked for forgiveness for not coming to church. It was a really amazing experience.

 

Then we were out contacting and I saw a less active family. We stopped them and chatted for a little and confirmed plans to meet with them this week. I have only seen them once or twice in passing on the street but their name has been in my mind a lot and I know that we need to be working with them. It has been so great to see things starting to fall into place with the less actives even if all the new investigators are falling through. There have been hundreds of little things like this throughout the past few days and it has been really neat. I know that the Lord loves us and trys to help us be the happiest we can be.

The greatest miracle of the week I feel though was when we got a phone call in the morning from Michal, our former investigator. (I had the thought a few days earlier that I needed to call him and check in on him as it had been a while since we talked. I didn't want him to think we didn't care for him and just wanted to convert him and if he wasn't interested goodbye to that. So I had tried a couple of times to contact him but his phone was off so it wasn't working.) SO needless to say I was ecstatic to see that he was calling us. So I answered and as we talked I was in shock as the first few words out of his mouth were I want to learn more about the Book of Mormon and that he had been reading it! AH!!!! I can't even explain the joy and excitement I felt as I heard this news. He went on to say he was out of town but would contact us when he was back. (Which he will as he has always set up his own appointments anyway.) So that was such a neat experience for me.

One final little thing that I can think of right off the top. So last transfer we contacted a guy who said that he only knows French and a little German and then went on his way. At the time I thought too bad Sister Cooper isn't here. Fast forward a month or so. Sister Cooper is here. The day she got here I saw a guy a few different times as we were hauling luggage and headed to lessons. I asked Sister Smith, who is this man, he looks so familiar. She had no clue and we moved on. Since then I have seen him from a distance a few more times and then this week we were walking past him and I couldn't for the life of me figure out who he was. As he walked passed I realized I should contact him. So I turned around and stopped him. As I began to speak I immediately remembered he was the French man. I finished the intro and just looked at Sister Cooper. She looked at me oddly and then she registered that it was French. They spoke and she gave him our card and we are waiting to run into him again as Sister Cooper is brushing up on her French. I know we will run into him if he doesn't call us because there have been so many little things that have happened that just fit together that we are to help him. In the MTC she found a French text book for the gospel someone had chucked and she picked it up and has been feeling the past little bit that she needs to brush up on it. So who knows what will happen there but we are excited to see. The Lord truly does guide our every step if we will allow Him. I know that this gospel is true. It brings me so much joy and happiness. Even in church when I don't understand what is being said. :) The church is true!

Love you,

Sestra Hicken