"Beware of False Christs such as... Socialism" - Brat Pawlik (Week 15)

Cześć!

Well another week down here in Kraków, and it was awesome. I don't really know where to start talking so I guess I will start out with a highlight. On Friday President came down to Kraków to do interviews. It was awesome, I really like talking with President because he is just super cool and smart and nice. We talked about how I'm doing, about eating healthy and staying awake during studies. He is super cool. We also got pizza for free so that is definitely a bonus.

On Thursday we also had the opportunity to go on an exchange with Elder Hubbard. It was pretty cool, he came down and did a little AP district training thing which was basically about always trying to improve. He said that we need to always be trying to take the next step towards being perfect but not try to bite off more than we can chew because sometimes when we try to do more than we can handle we end up hurting ourselves more than helping.

We also went out and did a lot of contacting with Elder Hubbard. It's always fun seeing someone else do missionary work because you learn alot about how you do things yourselves. Na przykład Elder Hubbard likes to say to people while they are running "Czy Pan chce przerwę?" "Do you want a break?" then sometimes they stop, that made me think about where in Preach My Gospel it says that we need to be speaking to as many people as we can about the Gospel. I have been trying to do better at stopping larger numbers of people because I figure the more people I talk to, the more people will listen. Makes sense.

George Washington Street

On Sunday we had a really fun day at church. Church in Poland really varies from week to week, some weeks I will be struggling to stay awake and other weeks I'm on the edge of my seat the whole time. This week I was definitely on the edge of my seat, it was awesome. First of all, I met a man named Nathan Wood (I'm not sure on Nathan but his last name was definitely Wood) Brother Hart should know him, they served in Poland at the same time in '91. He is really cool, he knows so much Polish History because he is a professor of History at University of Kansas, specializing in Eastern Europe technology. It was super interesting talking to him about how Poland had a really rough transition from a Command Economy to a Free Market because it happened in a very short period of time. Poland has such a cool history, I can't wait to learn about it once I get home.

So then we had a really good sacrament meeting (It was probably just really good to me because I can understand more now. My understanding is Skyrocketing. But what was really prime was Sunday School. The lesson was about signs of the Second Coming and it was awesome. That is where my Subject Line comes from. Brother Pawlik is literally the best person in the world. He is the most Libertarian person I have ever met, and better yet, he is a Pole! He gave a really good lesson and I actually learned a lot.

Also amazing news from church, we might be getting a new Ukrainian family moving into the branch! Which will be awesome because its a family, they have 2/3 kids, not sure. They are either coming here or Warsaw, depending on where their kids are accepted to school.

Another fun experience: on our exchange with Elder Hubbard we had a sit down lesson in the chapel with a young man named Daniel, he was super awesome. We had Lukasz Jabłoński in on the lesson with us and it was sooo powerful. We were talking about the Book of Mormon and we had Lukasz bear his testimony about it and he basically said "Look, this book WILL change your life for the better, it is the most important thing in my life and I know that once you read it you will feel the same." I freaking love Lukasz. To this Daniel responded "Dang, I guess I really gotta read it" because we called him out for having the book for at least a week and he hadn't looked at it. Daniel is awesome.

We had a branch Picnic on Saturday, it was really fun, also really hot (90 degrees or so). We had a pretty good turnout, like 18 people (this includes 8 missionaries). We ate good food, played some good games and I think everyone had a great time. We did this sort of testimony meeting thing put on by Sylwia. We went around and shared some experiences. I was blown away by the testimonies of some of the Members. Brat Dziubyla (I maybe spelled that wrong) shared how he was a Catholic Priest for a long time, until he for some reason lost his faith and went away from the catholic church. Basically he found the church and it filled the void in his life that he had not realized was there. We also heard from Jan who is a somewhat less active member. He is way into American Indian stuff. He told us about how he joined the church and it was heavy. Basically his wife left him and he started "hitting the bottle" then he met the missionaries and they helped him get his life in order and made him realize how much more there was to the world. I love the members here in Poland, they are so strong.

I think that's all the big stuff that happened this week.

Cześć wam, was Kocham!

Starszy Everett