Thursday, December 6, 2012

Missionary Update


 Here are a few pieces of Taylor's email. He was called to be the district leader, as you will read. For those who don't know, as district leader he will help teach and train the other missionaries in his district and have other leadership responsibilities.

Anyway, the week. It's been a good one, an interesting one, and one where I've grown a lot. As I surely hope you know now, you should have received a letter, I am the district leader. It's quite an experience. Prague district is the biggest one in the mission by far, and it's quite the responsibility. It's given me a lot more to do, but I've had some grrreat experiences, especially in studies while preparing for district meetings. That's my favorite part. 

Tuesday was my second district meeting of the transfer. It went okay, we talked about the role of the Holy Ghost in conversion. There was one really cool part of it, for me at least. I had separated the role of the Holy Ghost into three parts: What role He should have with the missionaries in preparation, His role in the lessons, and His role with investigators between lessons. I faced a problem. I asked three different missionaries to each talk about one of those, but also had some things I wanted to say. I was worried that they would give their bit, then it would seem like the district leader was saying, "that's nice, that's nice, but I'm going to say what's right." But, the Lord knows. It was so cool to hear how each of their things fit so perfectly with what I had had in mind to say, that we didn't contradict each other at all, but just supported each other in all of it. It was awesome. We then had a singing display, and we got six numbers! In case you don't know, that is a ridiculous amount in one display. We were pretty pumped up.

Friday was a good day, but also a little frustrating. We had a fantastic lesson with Jitka, all about baptism and what it is and why it's important and why she wants it, and it went soo well. She says for her, remission of sins is the most important. She says she knows that baptism cleanses us, and that's what she wants. She also said she was almost afraid of being baptized because she doesn't wnat to be clean, then make mistakes and be dirty again. Which was great because our plan was to talk about the sacrament and how the promises are the same and we can experience the blessings of baptism every week when we partake of the sacrament and renew that covenant with God. The Spirit was there. Now, she did say that she wants more time to prepare spiritually, so she wants to wait until the 15th. We weren't stoked on that idea, but it is her baptism, and it does no good to try and force her. But, since we know she is ready, we won't let her postpone again. More time for temptation, and we don't want that. It was a little frustrating, because both lessons with new people fell through. We received more potentials this week than any other week in my mission, and by far more than any other companionship in the district, and we got exactly nothing from it so far. Oh well. It happens.

That is about the run of it. We went to this monument/park/cool view of Prague thingy today, and I have no pictures. My camera is dead! But, I'll be getting pictures eventually from other missionaries, so you'll see them someday. Also, a cool moment in studies today. I was again preparing for district meeting, and I had had tons of good ideas, but wasn't sure how to connect them all. The topic is Revelation through Prayer. The cool thing was just that I was lead to some things in Preach My Gospel and in the Fundamentals booklet (Kaitlin, do you know that) I got when being trained and when training that let everything just fall into place so beautifully, it was awesome! I love studies.

I also love all of you, keep the emails coming, and letters if you feel so inclined


The Church is true, the Lord is it's Head and our Savior. Love you guys,

Starší Knapp

P.S. In the pictures, the small one in white is Kamila, the older, bigger one is Jitka, and the tiny little guy by Kamila baptized her. He's 29. Yep, I know. Unbelievable, right? 



 
 And in the above picture, far right, is Taylor's former companion Elder DeAngelis. He is from Italy. They got along great. He even recorded an Italian tongue-twister for us!






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