P.S.

Taylor really does know how to spell. He types fast so as to maximize the amount of time he has to email so there are errors. I suppose I could take the time to fix them all...or not.

A few days in the life of Starsi Knapp

 Here is an excerpt from Taylor's last email. He is doing great. He enjoyed Christmas in Prague and we all enjoyed talking with him for a few short minutes. Our allotted time went by too fast. He is happy and faithful.

 

Wednesday was great. We didn't actually teach any lessons, we had none on plan and a bunch of office work to do, but our contactin was grrrrreat! We found some really cool people, three acutally. One was a lady named Lenka, one was a yound kid from India named Alok, and our miracle Potential, Jana. Also young, and so prepared. She knew us before, not us specifically, but misionaries, and has a book of Mormon, and is excited to meet with us. We haven't set up yet because she doesn't know her next week's schedule yet, but we will. We were contacting on the metro, heading for a place called Jiriho z podebrad, but because we were talking to people we missed our stop. As we walked from the stop we got off at to the stop we planned to go to, we found her. That is not a coincidence! Do what you're supposed to, and the Lord blesses.

Thursday was a good day too. We bought three new cars for the mission, a process that has been going on since before I came to Prague, and everything went smoothly. That morning we taught a man, Jarda, and his wife. Whose name I don't know. but that's a family! They are very sweet people, and it was their first lesson and it went well. WE also taught a lesson that night, to an ooooollllld man. He's hilarious. His name is Mojmir. the lesson wasn't great because he took two phone calls during it, and that took up most of the time, but at the end he had us and the member with us sign his Book of Mormon we gave him. He's a nice guy, and felt bad about wasting the time. We're meeting iwth him again next week.

Friday was good too. This whole week was. We taught a guy named Jan Kristek who has been an investigator for almost, no over, two years. The lesson was about repentance, and it went really well. He liked it. He's been taught everything, but we thought that maybe there were a few things we could focus on, simple blessings of the Gospel, that would touch him. Repentance was one of our ideas, and it seemed to go well! I also had the privilege of conducting a baptismal interview. The APs have been teaching a Jitka as well, btw ours is still out of town, and her baptism was this morning,, so last night I interviewed her. It was wonderful. She's a great lady and has been well prepared for baptism. She has come to church every week for over two months.

So, a baptism this morning. It was a beautiful service. Elder Mullen and I sang Lord, I Would Follow Thee, and it went great. The talks were wonderful, the baptism of course was great, and we had three investigators there! Chris from Greece came, Jan Kristek, and Marie. They all really enjoyed it. One of President Irwin's ideas for this year is to emphasize exposure to the ordinances of the Gospel for everyone, new, less active members, and investigators. There's a reason for that. The Spirit is present, so people learn. We saw it today with all three of them, but especially Marie. It was great. she was talking after to Elder clyde, and said things like, "I've never felt like that before. I don't remember my baptism as a child at all, it's so much different as an adult. How long does it take to prepare someone for baptism?" She is totally in. She'll come to church tomorrow for the third week in a row, and be on date this week! Exciting.

Well, I love you all. Those emails didn't make me homesick at all, because there is no place I would rather be than right where I am. This is the place for me, for at least the next 13 months, maybe the next 70 years, who knows :) Send in your questions so I can write accordingly in my letter, the Church is true. 

s laskou,

Okey doke, the week. We had such a week on plan! Why do people misuse their agency? It was still a good week, but not as good as I would have liked.

Monday we had office meeting and stuff like that, then worked like crazy on the Christmas slideshow. We got the first stage done, all that's left is fixing anything that President doesn't like. Which is namely all the silly stuff we put in quoting him. He watched it and laughed in all the right places, but did ask us to take out one picture of him. It was of him holding a stuffed turkey, and we added text to it, quoting him saying, "The question is, which one is the turkey?" He laughed, but said Sis Irwin wouldn't like it. He said, "My wife always tells me I need to be more dignified. She says I need to act more like the President of a mission." I thought it sounded a lot like things that you say, Dad. It made me laugh. We had a kid that was going to come to FHE, but he didn't come because he had to leave town. He sounds so cool, he's a referral, and he's going to let us know as soon as he gets back in Prague. So, that immediately changed our plans for lessons this week. His name's Martin.

Tuesday was a nice day. We had district meeting, and it was good. It was on the Book of Mormon, which is my favorite topic. It's nice to teach about something you love, and know well. So, even though it was hard to plan for a little, it went well because the Spirit was present. One of my most recent goals is to use the Book of Mormon in every situation more, finding, teaching, study and planning, everything. That book has power, and the proper use of it will lead people to Christ. WE also started an exchange, us and the zone leaders. I was with Elder Gabrielsen, Elder Clyde's trainer actually, and he's great. We talked to some great people, including set up an appointment at this guy's house that we met on the street. We also taught Kamila, and of course it went well. 

Wednesday was traveled back to Plzen, where Elder Clyde was with Elder Osterloh, the other zone leader. We had five lessons on plan! That is an amazing day. Three fell through. But we taught this former, Jan Kristek, a really nice guy. We are going to baptize this man. We have to! We also met with an inactive guy named Philip, he's from Nigeria. He's great! He works a lot, but said that he was in the process of working out his schedule so that he can be free on Sundays. We're happy about that. The man we met on the street, who invited us to visit him, wasn't home, and his phone was off. Shoot.

Thursday was fun. We went to Bratislava again! This time to sing. We performed our various Christmas numbers for the branch there, and it was great. It was a little tough, because the space we were supposed to stand was smaller than we were, but oh well. WE sounded quite nice.

Friday, Jitka cancelled on us again, but promised to come to church. We're super worried about her. She just got fired, and we think she might be moving. She can't! She needs to stay here, because if she moves, she'll probably go live with one of her daughters, neither of which live that close to a branch. We're a little scared. But we also taught some good lessons. Two of the elders in the district are leaving early so they are home for Christmas, so they are figuring out who to give all their investigators to. We taught two lessons with them Friday to people they want to give to us, but one of them said that one meeting was good enough for him for now. But, we're teaching another one tonight. The one that's meeting with us is named Pavel, and we're meeting with Mario tonight.

For Pday, we just went around and looked at all the nice Christmas things that are everywhere. Prague at Christmas is quite pretty. I'll send you a picture I took last week. 

that's about it folks, I love you! I can't wait to hear from you soon. Remember what I said up top about the Book of Mormon. One of the most powerful talks, no two of them, were given about the Book of Mormon in the same conference, one by Elder Holland, one by Elder Callister. That book is true. It is, and must be personally, the basis of testimony. It is the testament of Christ, and the testament of His latter-day work. I know it to be true.

I love you all again,

Starsi Knapp

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!

Taylor got to travel with another missionary to Slovakia for a visa renewal.

Happy Birthday Taylor!

 In honor of Taylor's birthday today, I am updating this blog! His last email came on Saturday and here are some excerpts:

 

Monday. We had office meeting, as per the norm, then a very rapid meeting with President, me and the assistants. We ahve to put together a Christmas card, and it is hard. For me. I don't know computers! It shocked me when I got called to the office because I'm not one of those people who spent a lot of time arouond computers before the mission, and I certainly don't have any more knowledge about htem now. So basically, my role is to try and design the card, and then one of the assistants, Elder Mullen, will make it. So, Monday I prepared orders for conference and worked on the Christmas card. That is absolutely everything. 

Tuesday was better. First of all, we had end-of-transfer lunch, with all the district, the Irwins and other senior couples included. It was a blast. Then, we went and did a singing display. Which was less successful than previous ones have been. We as a companionship received one number, and he called us back the same day to tell us he wasn't interested. But it was nice at least to get out of the office and talk to some people.

Thursday was by far the bests day of the week. For a couple reasons. First of all, conference. I love conferences. They are just a feast.  But, right after the conference, we had to help other missionaries with some visa stuff, help the APs prepare some things, and do a lot of those kinds of things, all in less than two hours. But, in the middle of all that, President came up to us and asked us to go get the missionaries from Vysehrad, and area here in Prague, and then come back into his office and talk to him for a second. Now, Elder De Angelis and I found out on Wednesday that I would learn who my next companion would be very soon. With that, and other things the APs told us, we had a suspicion that the new office elder would be someone from our district. And sure enough, we went back into the office and President did indeed inform us. He had to do so, because he wanted Elder DeA to spend all of Friday training the new office elder. My new companion is...ELDER CLYDE! I am so stoked. And shocked. He is the greatest. I'm pumped that we are going to be together again. It is going to be just awesome.

Friday I went on an exchange with Elder Rhees while Elder DeA trained Elder Clyde. It was good. We actually got to do a little missonary work! I didn't have much to do in the office, and it didn't matter anyway, because President banned me from the office that day so that we didn't disturb the intense training going on there. So, we did some finding, had lunch with the rest of the district, did a singing display, taught a few lessons, studied the language... A good day all in all. One lesson was with Kamila, we talked about eternal families and temples a little more. She's great. Also, we taught one of Vysehrad's potentials, this girl named Anna. She's probably 20, and she is soooo cool! She isn't an investigator, but she is awesome. The lesson was good, but she said she can't meet right now. The reason is this: She says she is still a very new Christian - she's been a believer less than a year - and she is too focused on getting comfortable with her new faith to be involved in too many things right now. Even though nothing would help her more than meeting with the missionaries. She did at least take a Book of Mormon and promise to read in it, and also said we can definitely stay in contact with her. She really is great. Down the road, she'll see. She'll have a desire to meet and she'll be baptized. 

Well, boring, I know. It was an okay week, but probably not the most exciting read of your lives. Thank you for your patience. I hope to have some nice pictures for you next week, we're going ot tour Prague today using the same route we did on our first day in the country. Fun!

I love you all, the Church is true,

Starsi Knapp

Kamila was baptized Nov. 10! She is happy and excited to be a member of the church.

More From Prague

A continuation of a story from last week...

Okay, so quickly the tire story.  But anyway, we weren't going to change them due to the clothing situation, but as we walked away, I felt like we should. So, I convinced my comp that we should go back and do it, even though it had started to rain a little. The next day, Saturday, the same missionaries were back again for the baptism. Thus, they had somewhat of a long drive there, and...it was all in the snow. Early early Saturday morning it started snowing, and snowed all day until 10 or so at night. So, I don't know if their winter tires helped them at all, but I have been really working on trying to recognize the prompthings of the Spirit. I decided that it takes practice. Sometimes, we aren't sure if something is from the Spirit or not, but as long as it is a good thing, I believe that at the very least we will grow from the experience, even if we don't directly see the evidence of our action. I was blessed enough in this situation to see that I had been led to change those tires that afternoon. I'm not saying that they would have wrecked or something if I had ignored that prompting, but I did get to feel the peace that comes from following the Spirit.

As I've contemplated the difficulty of this mission, this past week in particular, I was thinking about a talk I heard from Elder Holland. He said we should never, ever expect life to be easy, because it was never, ever easy for Him. I watched it in the MTC, and it has stuck with me since then. And of course, it's absolutely true. If we want to be true disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, we must be willing to suffer all things for Him. If we are not willing to endure all the trials of this world, why should we expect or deserve to enjoy all the glory of the world to come?

Starsi Knapp and Starsi DeAngelis have TWO baptisms scheduled this week!! Kamila and Jitka are both scheduled. According to Taylor, they are "golden" and "solid". He and Elder DeAngelis had decided maybe they should put off the baptism because there were quite a few lessons they hadn't taught Kamila, but then when they met with her she was so excited to be getting baptized on Nov. 10 because that is her birthday! She said, "Nov. 10 is my physical birthday and now it will be my spiritual birthday!" So...Taylor and his companion decided they couldn't put it off. Instead they are having daily telephone teachings with Kamila, as well as meeting with her when she can. 

Taylor's district also does "singing displays". Some missionaries sing while others contact and teach and it seems to be quite effective. He is busy helping the missionaries with visas, supplies, changing tires, etc. but he and Elder DeAngelis have lots of time for teaching still. He loves Prague. I will attempt to put some pictures on the blog!

Taylor is happy--that is evident. When a person lives the gospel and serves, how can he help but be happy? 

The picture of me gesturing at the ground with the sweet statue in the back is me standing on the...Prime Meridian. Yep. I could cut the world in half.

(He didn't say what the statue in picture #1 is all about...)