The Golden Week

Heeeello my Family :) It's good to be writing you on this Wednesday morning. It's so good to be back in my Katowice, with my District, at least for the day. Tomorrow, I'm going back down to Warsaw for the Standard of Excellence Dinner, from when Elder Hughes and I achieved it. So that'll be nice- it's kind of a drag leaving the area again. But, i'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited for Sister Engbjerg's cooking ha. I read your letters on my train back to Katowice last night, and you all sound like you're doing wonderful, per usual. It's wonderful to know that the Lord is blessing you all down there every day, just as he's blessing us up here. I think your prayers are coming through, for sure. This last week has to be the most amazing one we've had as a companionship, and I feel as if it's got to be one of the coolest weeks I've had my whole mission. So much good happened. :)It's strange, because I think of my life in week-periods, starting from Monday to Sunday...and here i am writing you on a Wednesday, so I'll do my best to remember all the goodness, but I surely will miss some. First of, we finally achieved our goal of 20 lessons. We actually had 26 lessons this week. Which is a whole lot of lessons in my eyes. When I first got into the country, 15 lessons was, sincerely, legendary. Now, companionships all over the country are getting 19, 18, 20 and this last week we got 26. We were kind of freaking out :) The Lord blessed us so much with these amazing investigators. We couldn't have been happier with these meetings we had as well. So many of them were epic, golden and will be left as standards of what a meeting can be like, for me. We visited Ela 2 times in the week at her little shop at NeoNet, and they were good little meetings. THe second of the meetings, actually ended on a slightly bad note, as the Director of her company walked into the store, gave us a slightly terrifying look, and then shook Ela's hand. I figured that was our cue to leave, and we did with a nod and a small smile from Ela. The abrupt ending was only disconcerting because we were in the middle of a concern she had that was taking some time to properly explain...I was kind of bummed as we left, but I knew it would be ok. I called her that night and she set up willingly for the next day. I asked her if everything was ok with the Director, and she said, it was more than ok- she had recieved a raise!! Very very cool. We drove up there the next day (meaning we sat on a bus freezing our bottoms off, a lot) and walked to the place we had last met Ela. This was a big deal, because often, it's hard to start and end with prayer in Ela's store, and these outside the store meetings are when we can really sit down and talk and pray. So, we went there, and across the street, Carlos drives up, with Ela in the passanger seat and Nathan, their three year old kid who is cute as can be, was there. They told us to jump in, and that they had a surprise for us. "Do you like Batman Elders?" Carlos says. "Is he one of your favorite Super Heroes?" We agreed that Batman was incredibly Boss (really cool). So, we arive at this place called 'Pizza u Batmana" Pizza at Batman's. It was quiet, we went in, they ordered pizza for us against our protests. We started with Prayer and had a fantastic lesson with Ela. She used to be a Jehovah's Witness, but because of things that happened, she believed the insitution was not God's. She loves being around us, and loves talking to us. She is so open to the Spirit, and knows the Book of Mormon is from God. She considers the truths as we present them to her and she feels they are true in her heart, and then we find in the scriptures, the foundation for the Doctrine, and it is just an amazing thing teaching her. The Spirit was so strong and our joy was full sitting there with that little family who are truly on the road to becoming an eternal unit. They understand what it means to love eachother and are just truly progressing. Ela has such pure intentions it is unbelievable. We left the meeting with a deal to do that every Saturday with them (such an amazing way to spend the Saturday evening) and on the Bus home, we didn't even feel the cold. We were so happy and so glad that the Lord had blessed us with such people to teach. Sorry that was so long, but it was epic!We met with Sebastian, Ania's son and he has decided to prepare himself for baptism for the end of November. He has lots of week, lots of changing to do, but he sincerely is changing and that is amazing. We're working with Ania a lot. She has been struggling here and there with understanding the changes she has to make as a member of the church. We're trying to help her the best we can- and I think sometimes we don't give her enough slack- I just so badly want her to be able to be accepted into the Branch and excel here as a human being, as a member of the church. It just takes some time, to really change. She's coming along though. Martyna - the amazing 18 year old new convert from march of this year, has been having some troubles herself. Her homelife is as disfunctional as they come, but she rises above it. Sometimes it brings her back down, she doesn't feel she can escape her circumstances, but we know she can. She has so much aspiration to succeed in life, and to be a good person and to help everyone; sometimes she just forgets how much the Lord is grateful for that and how far she has come. We had an amazing lessons this last Sunday with her where she listened as we taught from a talk from 2006 conference. It was powerful, and emotional. The next day she sent us a text, how she had quit school the last week, but went back after the lesson we had. We had no idea she even quit. She helps us and the branch and so many other people so much, and just deserves to feel happy. As Zone Leaders, we're responsible for helping our Zone perform their best in their respective cities. So, we had a mega exchange down their with the Assistants, Elder McRae and Elder Hughes, and then Elder Brown (who was trained in Kielce) and I went down there. So every single missionary was on Exchanges down there. The point was to excite and revive the teaching pool, and it was a major success! The Lord blessed everyone so much that day (Monday) We worked hard as we could and everyone was so blessed. I think we were all blown away with what had happened. At the end of the day, there were about 30-35 contacts made, several of them seeming solid as can be. The Kielce Elders were so excited at the end of it, and we were all giddy ourselves. It was wonderful to serve one day in the city that Elder McRae could never stop talking about. He loves that place- and now I know why! We ate at this milk bar, called TEMPO, and ate Placek po Węgiersku (Potatoe pancakes after the Hungarian Tradition...meaning Gulasz sauce was poured all over it with chunks of Roast beef!). Elder McRae also never could quite stop talking about that food ha. It was scrumptious. I wanted to eat three of them. But I didn't, no worries ;PWe've been visiting Gosia, Ania's daugter in the Hospita quite often this week. She's there for this skin disease she has, it's a bummer. But we go out there, share a scripture with her, keep her company and laugh a bit :) She really is like our Sister. We gave her this little notebook, and wrote in it "Times when I have seen the Hand of God in my life". We told her she has to write three things each day, that in someway testify of God acting in her life. It's been great:) Everytime we would come over, we would write our 3 things too. She's doing well. Just dealing with the troubles of being a 14 year old girl in Poland. Not always easy stuff, but nothing the Gospel can't help.The week was fantastic as can be. I loved every day of it. It was so busy and so full of good meetings and conversations and insights, I was eating it all up. I've been studying lately from the New Testament and I love it so much. There are so many amazing insights that I can't get enough of. It also says some way confusing things too though ha. One concern that Ela had, was that it says that women need to cover their head when they pray in public (Corinthians 11)...it's pretty blatant, and I was so confused as what to say to her. There's tons i couldn've said, but she was pretty confused...because it said it right there in the Bible. So she wouldn't prayer at first when it was Carlos, Elder Strobes and I. So I read farther where it says that a woman's hair is her covering and showed it to her, and she said that made sense- next meeting she prayed for us! And she prayed so well! It feels like my own family being with them a bit. I think that contributes to my love of teaching them. :)Well Family, I love you so much. Sorry the letter's so random. Sometimes there's just too much to say ha. I love being here so much. I love preaching the Gospel, and I know without a doubt this is what the Lord wants me to be doing here.Have a marvelous week, enjoy yourselves and remember who you are. Every day's another chance to be better and grow stronger spiritually and be a better person. I love y'all so much. Have a wonderful week! Pray for us here in Katowice, and like Spencer always tells me, Change some lives down there. z miłościąElder Michael J Rushton Jr. :) p.s. I got an awesome tape in the Mail from Christine- it was hilarious. And Elder Broadbent spoke to me in Polish in it and I almost wet myself.