"The Police Crashed Our Ward Party"

Ahoj, my peeps!

First week of the transfer down, and it's probably been the smoothest first week of the transfer I've had so far. I kinda like being the one to stay in an area haha. The trio's going great. It's been so much fun. It's definitely something this area needed. 

Highlights of the week:

We were talking to this random dude on the street, and all of a sudden we hear, "cirkev je pravda!" (The Church is true!"). One of our members comes walking up shouting her testimony at this dude. This is the same member that walks up to groups of teenagers smoking and shoves a Word of Wisdom pamphlet in their faces and starts telling them about it. That woman has no fear when it comes to sharing the gospel haha. Anyways, she starts telling the dude on the street all about how the Book of Mormon is life changing and how he should get baptised. She didn't scare him off completely. He still responded when we texted him later, but he didn't have interest. Škoda. Probably one of the funniest moments on my mission though haha.  I love the people here.

On Friday, the youth had a pizza making party. Czechs make some insane pizzas haha. One of them had 5 different types of cheese on it, and they literally just cut huge blocks of cheese into smaller big chunks and threw it on the pizza. I'm a fan. It was really good. During the activity, a random dude from the street who was probably high walks in and starts trying to steal stuff. It was kinda cool seeing on the men in the ward get all tough and surround the guy so he couldn't leave. The police had to come and make sure he didn't steal anything and then they took him away. Love me some ward parties haha.

We went and helped some members in their garden. A lot of Czechs have a piece of land that they buy just outside of the city where they have a huge garden. It's my favorite thing. I'm gonna have to buy my own garden at some point. I'm obsessed. It was really fun to just work in the garden all day and spend time with some of my favorite members. Those are my favorite kinds of days. 

One of our friends taught us how to make Gulaš. It's technically originated in Hugary, but it's been adopted by the Czechs. It's basically a stew, and it's so dang good. One of my favorite meals here. We're making Halušky (my favorite Slovak dishes) with him next week. Pro tip: asking peeps if they can teach you to make classic Czech food is a great way to set up with people. 

For pday we went to a castle in Slovakia with the elders and senior couple in our district. We went to the castle and had a picnic and played volleyball and frisbee in the field right next to it. Then we went and stormed the castle and played Skipbo. Literally the most classic výlet I've ever been on. So. Much. Fun. I love our district. 

I. Freaking. Love. This. Area. I love this ward. I love these people. I never want to leave this  place. Missions are so dang cool. You get to meet the best people and build such good relationships with them. Man I love being a missionary. 

Spiritual Thought:

I just found this quote this week that I really love:

“Hang on the walls of your mind the memory of your successes. Take counsel of your strength, not your weakness. Think of the good jobs you have done. Think of the times when you rose above your average level of performance and carried out an idea or a dream or a desire for which you had deeply longed. Hang these pictures on the walls of your mind and look at them as you travel the roadway of life.”

I think this is such a good quote to live your life by. It can be really easy to be too hard on ourselves. We just naturally pick out the things we do wrong. But we should focus on the good things we do. I think as we start focusing on all the things we'll do right, then we'll surprise ourselves with how much we do right. 

Alright, my peeps. Thanks for all the support! Love you guys! Have a great week!

Sestra Lewis 

"Christmas in February?"

Ahojjjjj!

A lot of stuff happened this week. We made Christmas dinner, we started building a fence around the Raj, and we got transfer calls.

We have this awesome member family that is basically our best friends. Their daughter came home from her mission in Canada this week, so we went to help her mom get stuff prepped for when she came home. They planned to make her a traditional Czech Christmas dinner, so we got to help her make all the food for that. I thought it would be another year before I had to make carp again. Unfortunately, I was wrong. The member also gave us some lard on bread to try. Never thought I would purposely put a ton of lard in my mouth. The things you do for members. It wasn't terrible, but it definitely isn't something I'm planning on snacking on haha.

We went to help the member in his orchard again. He named his orchard "Raj" (Paradise), and it literally is paradise. I'm obsessed with that place. One of my favorite places on the planet. We started building a fence around the orchard, and almost all the old trees are cleared out. It's starting to be spring weather too, so we're gonna be able to get a lot more work done. Dang I freaking love the members here. The Czech Republic is gorgeous, but it's the people that are the best part about it. 

It's time for transfers again! I'm staying in UH, and I'm back in another trio! This time it's with Sister Ray and Sister Ockey. I'm pretty stoked. I feel like a trio is definitely what this area needs, plus both Sis Ray and Sis Ockey are pretty chill, so it's gonna be so good. It's gonna be a freaking party. 

Spiritual Thought:

I found a quote this week that I really like.

"The unexpected is God intervening...His whole purpose is to bring us to the best things."

Sometimes we get curveballs in life, and it can be hard to understand why things happen the way they do, but I love the thought that the unexpected is God intervening. It's Him giving us something better than what we want. His whole purpose is to bring us the best things. He's not gonna do anything that prevents us from getting the best things. We just have to trust Him, and everything will work out. 

So I guess a lot of stuff happened this week, but a lot of it wasn't that interesting haha. I'm also kinda short on time, so I can't really go into detail about the stuff that did happen. Life is good though! I love the mission life. I love this mission. 

Thanks for all the love and support! Have a great week!

Sestra Lewis

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"We Should Start Doing Background Checks"

Ahoj!

I honestly don't remember anything that we did this week. I swear the weeks just keep getting faster and faster. Good thing we have planners so I don't have to remember haha. 

We went to a Catholic charity this week to see if we could offer some service. The head lady sat down with us and was kinda hesitant. She gave a whole speech about respecting their religion and how we can't try to convert anyone if we help them. We told her we were just there to help and we wouldn't try to convert anyone, but she wasn't buying it. That night a member told us that she's actually a member of our ward. She just went inactive because she would lose her job if she didn't. What the heck, lady. We have her house address in the area book. Who votes we show up at her door with a Book of Mormon? Haha kidding. I definitely would only do that if I had a death wish.

We had district council and for lunch we all made a huge pot of Halušky together (klasické). Good times. I get to serve with the best people. 

We're working with the members more to get them to be more effective in their missionary efforts. It's been a project that has been in the works for a few weeks, but I think this next week it will finally be time to introduce it to some of the members. I'm not sure how they'll react, but I'm hopeful that we'll see some good results. If the members are down, we can definitely see some miracles come from this. I'm pretty stoked. 

We teach a lot of English in UH as well. I think those are the most effective ways to find in this area, English and the members. We've got a few potentials from our English classes, and we're excited to hopefully get them interested in the gospel as well. It's definitely going to take time to start seeing results from both these finding methods, but I think we eventually will start seeing results. 

It's my comp's last week before she goes home, and we went to visit a member this week. When the member opened the door she had her iPad and she was blasting "It's the Final Countdown" and she sang the whole song for my comp. Hahahaha we have the best members.

Turns out the dude that stopped us on the street and asked to meet with us the other day is a former investigator. Definitely gonna give him crap about not telling us haha. Why do peeps always hide their association with the church from us?!

We went to the Raj (the one member's orchard) again this week and did service for him. That place is probably one of my most favorite places on the planet. I always leave freaking exhausted, but it's a good exhausted. It's always the highlight of my week. I just love the people here so much. This ward has got some good ones. 

I'm learning that the whole history of Communism in this country makes it really hard to teach some people. It breaks your heart just a little (spíš a lot) when someone who taught atheism for 35 years won't believe in God because the guilt would be too strong if they did. It's a little rough when someone who you know would benefit so much from the gospel tells you to not even bother with their generation because Communism wrecked them religion wise. Sometimes I wish people would just give the gospel a chance. 

Spiritual Thought:

One of my most favorite things about being a missionary is helping people. For 18 months I'm literally set apart to help people 24/7. It's honestly the best calling (although primary pianist is a close second). It's the little things about helping others that I love. The thrill of knowing you made someone's burden just a little bit lighter. The excitement on a little boy's face when you show up at his door. The opportunity to not only help someone else, but to get to spend time with some incredible people while you do it. The hope that comes to someone's face as you let them know that there still is a chance to make things right. All these little things bring me so much happiness. I remembered the other day that I'm currently doing the same work that God is doing, just on a much much smaller scale. But that thought got me thinking. If I can find so much joy out of helping just a few people during the week, then how much joy does God feel knowing He gets to help the entirety of the human race 24/7? If it's even just a fraction of the joy that I get to feel helping the people of the Czech Republic and Slovakia (which we all know it's much much more than that), then I don't think there's anything that would get in the way of Him helping us and Him loving us. His entire work and glory is centred on us. 

"Surely the thing God enjoys most about being God is the thrill of being merciful, especially to those who don't expect it and often feel they don't deserve it." 

I love the fact that we worship a happy God. It makes me want to help just one more person so I can feel just a little bit more of the joy He feels. 

Whelp. To je všechno, co pro vás mám. Have a great week. Do me a favor and give a stranger a compliment sometime this week. You all are the best! Dík for all the love and support! 

Sestra Lewis 

(Remember when I said that Czechs pronounce my name "Lehvis?" Well that's also how they pronounce the brand "Levi's." I've been asked so many times if my family owns that brand haha) 

"Once Upon a Time a Shoemaker Built a City"

Ahoj Ahoj Ahoj 

So we had a pretty sick week. We got to see a lot of other missionaries and some old friends. 

We went to Zlín with one of our friends. Zlín is a city about 30 minutes from UH. Our friend took us to the very top of the Zlín skyscraper and told us all about the history of the city as we overlooked it. There's a dude named Tomáš Baťa that built the city. He was a shoe maker (the missionaries are all obsessed with buying his brand of shoes), and he turned the little town into a factory city. He also built over 2,000 houses for all his workers. There's all sorts of history behind what happened to his factory when Communism took over too. He's a pretty cool dude. The history of this country is so cool.

We had exchanges this week, and I got to be with Sis. Alvord (she was in my MTC group). So much fun. Kinda crazy that a few months ago we were in the MTC together and now they let us loose in the Czech Republic by ourselves. Not sure why they thought that was a good idea, but it was so much fun ,haha. My MTC group was such a good group.

We had zone training in Žilina, Slovakia. It's always way good to get together with the rest of the zone. I always learn so much from the trainings too. We had a few really good trainings on setting goals and how to keep them, and I'm stoked to see the progress that our mission makes because of it. 

On Saturday we got to go back to Brno because one of the people that the elders taught got baptized!!! Man it was the best. I'm literally so stoked for him. He has so much faith, and I'm so proud of the progress he's made. It was so cool to get to see all of the peeps in Brno too. My whole district in Brno was back together. Dang, I get to serve with the best missionaries. 

So crazy story. While I was on exchanges with Sister Alvord, we had some extra time to go finding. We were just walking around a park and talking to random people. We walked past this dude that was talking on the phone, and we were kinda bummed out we couldn't talk to him, but we kept on going. After awhile we hear someone yell after us asking if we speak English. It was the dude on the phone! He followed after us and stopped all the people we talked to asking them what we wanted. He talked to us for a little while and then gave us his card so we could meet with him and help him with English and he's going to help us with Czech. He came to the building that night so he could set up with us. We talked to him a little bit about his religious beliefs, and it's gonna be a little tricky, but I think we could get him interested. We're stoked to see where it goes. 

Spiritual Thought:

One thing that I like about the story of Nephi building a boat is the very first part. Nephi finally makes it to the land of Bountiful after being in the wilderness for many years. After many days in Bountiful, God says to him "Hey dude. You're too comfortable. Go climb that mountain, say a prayer, and together we're going to make miracles happen." Just as Nephi was getting comfortable, God took him out of his comfort zone. The same thing happens in our lives. Growth doesn't happen in the comfort zone. Growth happens when you're put into situations where you're forced to rely on Heavenly Father to get you through it. So next time you're uncomfortable, just turn to God. He's right there, ready to get you through.

Love you all! Have a great week! 

Sestra Lewis