Week of Miracles!

Wow, this week was amazing!

 On Thursday we met a man named Stanislav. He was in our English class we taught prayer and after he stayed and was interested. He talked about how religion makes sense in his head but he has never felt it before, so we set up to meet. Friday morning we got a text from him saying, I prayed and felt amazing, thank you so much! We decided to move up our meeting and so we met Saturday we meet on a bench in the park. We switched plans after talking to him for a few minutes and knew we needed to teach him the plan of salvation, so we did. He loved it! He kept saying it just seems right. Before we even taught it we asked him what he thought the purpose of life is and what happens after this life, he nailed it on the head! After saying it perfectly he ended with, but I don’t know, that is just what I kind of think. In the middle of our lesson, one of the other students from English showed up, he is not a believer. He kind of was anti and I was a little worried that it would cause us problems with Stanislav but Stanislav just backed us up and after the friend left Stanislav looked at us and said some people just aren’t ready. He is SO AMAZING! We invited him to church and he said he would love to but he didn’t have the money this week to make to trip. He thought about it and told us what week he’d have money to do so. We told him if money isn’t a problem will you come? He said yes, so we made it so money wasn’t a problem. He told us he had been to church before but it was at a catholic kostel. He talked about how everyone always takes the sacrament, but he doesn’t understand why people do it so he has never taken it. Everyone always looked at him weird but he didn’t want to do something without knowing the why. So we explained it to him and he was excited. To end our lesson he wasn’t really sure about prayer. He was struggling a little with the fact that it could be anything, it didn't have to be something specific so Sister Schoen said the prayer and then he said one after.

 Sunday morning we took the bus with him. Before we got on, we asked him if we could say a prayer for safety, he was all for it. Since he couldn't take a Book of Mormon yesterday (he has crutches and didn’t have a bag with him to carry it in) we taught him about it with some restoration on the bus ride there. He asks great questions and comprehends his readings really well. At church he took the sacrament. At the beginning of Sunday school we asked for a volunteer to pray, and he raised his hand and said I will. He then stood up and made his way to the front of the room and prayed! During Sunday school, comments covered the spectrum of topics. The original topic was Heavenly Father. We managed to get the word of wisdom explained in detail. Then Stanislav was reading the wall and it said, "Charity never faileth". He wanted the real translation into Czech, our make up things weren’t good enough so I opened to Moroni 7 to find the verse that says it. As I did, he started reading the chapter heading of Moroni 8. He then asked me, "what does it mean that baptizing children is an abomination?" So we read on and then he said, "oh because of the atonement children don’t need to be baptized! That makes so much sense!" Later on he was talking with the elders and they asked him if he wanted to get baptized, he looked at them and said, "well I guess I had better, evidently mine as a baby didn't count!" So they told him he could work towards a date. He asked them when the soonest he could be baptized would be. They told him he has to come to church three times first so February 1 would be the soonest so they told him to pray about it. Well he said he would and he said coming to church won’t be a problem, I love it, I want to come every week for the rest of my life! He kept saying how good it felt! Because we had another lesson the Elders walked him out to the bus stop. When they got there, Stanislav asked them if they could pray before he left on the bus. I think that he is going to keep us in line, doing what we are supposed to. That night we got a text from him telling us how amazing church was and how grateful he is for what we are doing for his soul. It is so exciting to see him progressing! He asked if he could be baptized on February 2. I don’t know if Sunday baptisms work, but we are going to have to find a place we can do a baptism here or we will have to head to Prague!

Lenka, we got another investigator this week, she is the elders former. She came to church and is a sweetheart. She said the closing prayer in Sunday school and it was an amazing prayer, it blew me away. If I didn’t know better I would have thought that she has been a member for years. She is a young mother, she has a 10 year old daughter. She really opened up to us and gave let us know that she doesn’t understand why her baptism into a different church a few years back doesn’t count. We now know what we need to teach. She is hungry for new information and is just so happy and sweet!

Sister Marksova is one of our amazing less actives. She really opened up to us this week. We went in and were planning to teach something completely different than we did. She opened up to us telling us why she isn't active anymore. It was so heart wrenching for me to see this woman in pain and need. It was so great to be there for her, to help lift and comfort her. She is such a good woman, she knows what is right and she reads and studies the scriptures and prays daily she loves the temple and taking the sacrament. I am amazed at the great love i have for this woman. She loves our visits and sees us as her daughters.

 Tomasz our less active is amazing! He told us that he had questions with the plan of salvation and that he was forgetting the basics. He asked us to come teach him more about it. Well we went with an amazing member and started to teach him. We hadn’t made it very far, he had lots of questions and concerns. We had only made it to the atonement. The member had kind of gone off on marriage, the celestial kingdom and the temple somehow…so we were looking for a way to pull it back in and wrap it up. Tomasz was showing interest in the temple so I basically ended up saying if you want to prepare for the temple (I was planning on saying you need to come to church weekly) but it came out you have to have a strong testimony of this plan, the plan of salvation. Well at that point he sat up straight and finished teaching us the plan of salvation. We committed him to read in 2 Nephi 2 and to come to church. He is really stoked on church, he came last week and LOVED it! Unfortunately his little girl was sick and his wife and family couldn’t come over to watch her so he didn't make it. But he texted us today and said he really wants to strengthen his testimony and asked us to come and teach him more. He has a great desire to go to the temple.

 Sister Semianova also has a great desire to go to the temple. This is a lady that we were told had no desire to even come to church. She was too old and sick and Jicin was just too far and she had been going to a different church instead. Well, we finally showed up when she was there and she let us in. I told you about that and how she came to church last week. Well I don’t think I told you that she had given her Book of Mormon away to a friend and so she hasn’t had any scriptures to read from. So we gave her one. But it was a miracle that we had one because we hadn’t received anything for our apartment yet and we only had one Book of Mormon in Czech between my companion and I. Well right before we met with Sister Semianova, we met with our catholic investigator Marie. She is a talker. Well she had gone and talked to her priest and basically told her not to read the Book of Mormon. This was probably one of the hardest things for me. Have our investigator come to us and say she won’t accept the Book of Mormon and forced us to take it back. Then out of a bag she pulls a book she had just bought that wasn’t even written by prophets or apostles or anyone with the priesthood power or prestige. She isn’t willing to take this free book that will bring her the most joy, she can’t even have it at her house and not read it, she has to give it back and go buy this expensive book that is like 5 times larger than the Book of Mormon that her priest or one of his friends wrote. It was a hard lesson. BUT we then had a Book of Mormon to give to our less active. When we visited her this week we asked if she had been reading and she started telling us all about what she had read and how she was loving it. She also told us how she had called Sister Zajickova (another less active) last week to pick her up to take her to church. She told us she would love to continue to come to church but she can’t ride the bus so she will just come every other week with Sister Zajickova. That was a surprise to us. She had told us she wasn’t coming yet she did and got the other less actives to come too! Everyone was surprised to see her, it had been years since she had come! We talked to her about the temple and asked her if she had ever been. She said no, but that she would love to go. We asked her if we could help her work towards the temple and she said yes! WOOT! So excited to see how the Lord truly is preparing people to be ready to teach and to move forward! I love this work and I love this gospel!

 Wish I could write more but I can't! Love you tons and know that the lord is with us, helping us every step of the way!

I love you!

 Sestra Hicken