When in Czech : "Tired in the Lord"

Nazdar!

This past week was EXHAUSTING. Every night Sister Boza and I would come home and say to each other, "I am soooooo tired in the Lord Sister." Hahah A quote adopted from our awesome district leader, Starší Petty:)

10 days in between P-days is NOT okay. ha ha too long for us little missionaries to go without a day to catch up and breathe. All is well though and we made it out alive with so many miracles!

Shoutouts:

I went a WHOLE DAY without eating a treat/sweet! Go me! haha!

Congrats to the Boo Boo for racking in 3 more W's on the bball court. Takin' state baby! ;)

Mladá Mysteries:

---> We grocery shop at Kaufland. Kauf comes from a German word Kaufen, which means to shop/to buy. So, we shop at shopland! haha!

---> We have NO carpet in our apartment. It is alllll wood floor and gets dirty really fast.

---> Czech mommy's tend to leave their babies out front in their strollers while they hurry on in for some chleb (bread).

---> Mladá has a soccer arena!

Pounding Pavement:

Sestra Boza and I were alllll over this tiny town of Mladá this past week. We have been praying A LOT. More than usual. ha mostly so that Heavenly Father will soften the hearts of these people and so that we will have the spiritual eyes to recognize those who are the prepared and elect. We were so blessed this week. We found so many people who were open and willing to hear our message! We picked up a handful of new investigators and are really looking forward to working with them and helping them progress towards baptism!

We put 2 on date this past week. 1. Miloš. He is an older gentleman that we found Tuesday night, while street contacting. We had a lesson with him on Thursday. We explained more of who we are, what we do, set expections (CPR = Church, Prayer, Read), and put him on date! We invited him to be baptized on the 27th of February and he said, "No, I can't do that day. I have work. But I can do the 20th." haha it was quite cute. We had a lesson with him on plan for Friday, but he didn't show anddd we haven't been able to get ahold of him since. :( So, keep him in your prayers! 2. Jakub. Jakub is a stud. He is 24 and is finishing his University studies the end of February. He has been an English student of ours for the past little while and on Thursday as we finished with our english lesson the conversations naturally turned towards religion and with not even planning it ahead of time, Ses Boza and I were bold with him and had a really good lesson on the Gospel of Jesus Christ focusing on Baptism. It was awesome! He was eating it up and repeating everything we were saying to him. ha ha but we have a few roadblocks. He's super busy with writing his Thesis and such and then once he finishes with his exams he is moving to New Zealand. :( We told him though that we totally believe that he can be ready for baptism by the 13th of February. Our plan is to get him in the water before he goes to the New Zealanders so he can go and be amazing with the saints over there! ha So! about that we shall see. Keep him in your prayers as well. :)

Our third miracle investigator this week is Nelli. Nelli is soooo sweet. She is from Bulgaria, has two little boys, and lovessss lovess lovesss her family and husband. She has the most romantic proposal story. ha ha I will have to share that later with her consent. ;)

Nelli met the missionaries almost a year ago and has been off and on with them ever since. On Friday we had a lesson set up with a gator, who is now a former, ha but the point is, that person dropped us and then we had Nelli on our back up plan. It was definitely divinely inspired. We got to Nelli's home and rang her Zvonek and she let us right in. She told us that she KNEW we were going to come. The whole day she kept reaching for her phone to respond back to all the messages we had sent her, but she knew that we would show up. She had just put her little boys down for a nap so the 3 of us gathered in her little hallway. We shared 1 Ne 25:26 with her which reads, "And we talk of Christ, we rojoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins."

After we shared that she got super emotional and the spirit was flooding that hallway. Sestra Boza and I testified of Christ and how he truly is our ULTIMATE SOURCE, whom we can look to for strength, for peace, for understanding, and the list goes on and on. It was one of the most spiritual experiences that I have had on my mission. She thanked us so much for coming and set up to meet with us this week. Best part is....

The following day, Sister Boza and I are just getting home to have dinner and Nelli calls. She says hey, do you have a second, I'd really like to meet. We dropped what we were doing and met her at our office where we have lessons. When we got there she said to us, "I had to get out to get some fresh air and to talk with some people. Only problem is, I don't know anyone here. So I thought to myself, I'll call the missionaries!" hahah it was so cute. She also told us that ever since we had come the before, "everything just shines." That was a tender mercy for us to hear. Nelli is awesome and we expect great things from her!

Church:

Church was amazing. Tomasz Gnewick, a Less Active we have been working with, came to church on Sunday! It was such a huge miracle! We had met with him on Saturday and had a really good lesson with him. Invited him to church and told him that even if he doesn't come he can't cancel on us the following week. (He's been known for that in the past.) He promised that he wouldn't and that he was ready to come to church for reals. After our lesson we walked with him to Bondy (the mall) and we asked him what he was doing and he said he was going to grab some lunch. The thought came to my head that we should join him. So we went to KFC and had a really good time with him. He opened up a lot. When we said goodbye he kept thanking us and thanking us for spending our lunch hour with him. It was a blast and something that I think was really needed for us to really earn his trust. We surprised him and were there waiting for him at his doorstep Sunday morning. hehe. He was happy to see us. On the bus ride over I sat next to him, while Sister Boza sat next to Enka (recent convert, which was also a sweet miracle!) and we had a really good conversation about the types of friends he has at work and how he knows that he needs to come back to church and start creating relationships there so he can have good friends and a good support system. It was pretty neat. The members were so good with him. There was someone there to greet him the minute we got there. That was one of Tomasz fears of coming back, because in the past he felt as if he was just another person there, but after watching him with the members yesterday, I don't think that it was a problem at all for him. :) It was so amazing and such a tender sight to see him interact with the members. He had a smile painted on his face the entire day. God is so good. We really truly believe that Tomasz will be ready to receive the priesthood by the end of this transfer. That is our goal for him!

Sestra Boza and I have been frustrated with not having any real solid investigators or this or that, but we truly are seeing small miracles everyday in the work. There is no doubt in my mind that the Lord is right behind us in all of it. I know for a fact that I couldn't get up each morning and do what we do without his help or strength. I love this work. I love the Czech people. I love learning this language. I love it all! I know that Christ is our one and only source of never-ending happiness. I love him!

S laskou,

Sestra Fred

Me and my companion Sestra Boza