Easter, MLC and the passion of missionary work

Easter Sunday was fantastic! We had a really good meeting.  The first counselor of the Stake Presidency came and gave a talk purely about Christ. It was fantastic, and just really a bummer that we weren’t able to get any investigators to come to church. However, afterwards we spent a lot of time out talking to people on the street talking about Easter! We had a nice old homeless man come and tell me that we don’t believe in the true Christ. After about 25 minutes of just yelling in my face, the police happened to walk by and I just basically, nonshallantly (don’t know how to spell that) pointed at the homeless guy and said "Help me"...in the end he left, but then came back about an hour later. This time however I asked him if what he was doing is what Christ would do. He got very quiet, and walked away....if I only I had thought of that before the 35 minutes of yelling. But, it does allow now for a funny story :) After he left, a lot more people were interested in what was going on. It was a blessing in disguise, and our district found several potential investigators. 

Then that night, we had halusky at the Pohořeličti home. Wow! It was fantastic! We got 5 kg of potatoes, 2 kg of bryznda, and 1.5 kg of bacon. Very healthy, and definitely very good. 

MLC was terrific on Thursday when we discussed finding new people to teach, and also about urgency in the work. It was a good, and very inspiring. President got fiery, in a good way, at MLC and really tried to inspire the faith of the missionaries. We had a mission wide fast and prayer, then we have been just brainstorming ideas. We have also tried filming contacts, practice runs within companionships, and so we sat with popcorn with President and the Sister Training Leaders watching 3 hours of film basically planning a training on contacting people. Most missionaries look really sad, and sometimes way too serious when they talk to people, or they do not get to know the person, I have named it the Robot Syndrome :) 

We sincerely hope that in the zone trainings in the following weeks, we will be able to focus and help these two aspects of the work. We talked about the passion of missionary work, and why our heart must be set into the work. My companion Elder Hanis has more heart for the work than anyone else I know, and I am excited to with him share thoughts in the upcoming zone trainings about this! 

This morning I was studying in preparation for a zone training and came across the story of David and Goliath, and I was reading about the tremendous faith and courage that he had even before he entered the battle field. 

1 Samuel 17:25-33

25 And the men of Israel said, Have ye seen this man that is come up? surely to defy Israel is he come up: and it shall be, that the man who killeth him, the king will enrich him with great riches, and will give him his daughter, and make his father’s house free in Israel.26 And David spake to the men that stood by him, saying, What shall be done to the man that killeth this Philistine, and taketh away the reproach from Israel? for who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God? 27 And the people answered him after this manner, saying, So shall it be done to the man that killeth him. 28 ¶ And Eliab his eldest brother heard when he spake unto the men; and Eliab’s anger was kindled against David, and he said, Why camest thou down hither? and with whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know thy pride, and the naughtiness of thine heart; for thou art come down that thou mightest see the battle. 29 And David said, What have I now done? Is there not a cause?30 ¶ And he turned from him toward another, and spake after the same manner: and the people answered him again after the former manner.31 And when the words were heard which David spake, they rehearsed them before Saul: and he sent for him.32 ¶ And David said to Saul, Let no man’s heart fail because of him; thy servant will go and fight with this Philistine. 33 And Saul said to David, Thou art not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him: for thou art but a youth, and he a man of war from his youth.

David faced tremendous amounts of opposition and lack of faith from those that he served. He was told that he could not conquer such a mighty man. But with faith in the Lord, using the talents and abilities he had been given, not someone else’s, we know that he was able to conquer the Goliath. All of us face modern day Gladiators, things that we don’t have faith that we can do, whether it be overcoming a sin, a difficult decision, or a life trial, and by having faith over fear we can also slay them. Faith is a true power manifested in those that give their all to the Lord and rely fully upon him. On my mission, I have seen it time and time again, I know that it is true. 

Have a great week!

Shout out to my Dad! His birthday is Monday! He's the best! :)

S Láskou,

Starší Belshe

Prince of Peace

This week was a good week for us! Over the weekend, after watching the Sunday sessions of conference, we visited the Stake President and his family on a visit to show the Easter Video. They had another visitor from America with them there that also participated. There was a wonderful spirit there, and it was a great opportunity for us to build a better relationship with the stake president.

On Monday, we had interviews with President which are always terrific, and also we spent some time getting things ready for project for Easter in the Prague center square. On Tuesday, a sister missionary who was serving in Phoenix Arizona on visa wait, came and we were able to meet with her. It is exciting that she and Sister Hayden, will be serving in Ceske Budejovice, the same area where I started my mission. After that we went and visited a family named the Dustirovi. Brother Dustir is the Prague High Priests Group Leader, which group was just recently organized. Also a really good visit with them, and we were able to help them share the video with some of their family members. On Wednesday, we had an exchange in Plzen and helped them with their activity at the center square, and we were able to show the video and hand out a few copies of the Book of Mormon. As we hurried back, we brought the elders from Ceske Budejovice, who were also on an exchange in Plzen with the zone leaders (there were a lot of missionaries there in one day) and had them split with us to teach 4 appointments. We had set up the appointments to help members be better member missionaries by sharing the Prince of Peace video with their friends. All of them were great visits, and we are hoping that their friends will also be interested to learn more in the future.

Thursday, we had a special district meeting where we focused on Easter and on Jesus Christ and it was fantastic! The spirit was really strong, and it was the start of a mission fast so that the work could progress at a more rapid rate. We are still striving to reach our goal of a 100 baptisms at the end of the year. President Pohorelicky offered the mission prayer, and it was fantastic and very spiritual! Definitely the highlight of the week for us! 

This weekend we then had our own Easter project here in Prague as we were fasting, where we showed the video to people in the center of Prague. There were many tourists in the area, but many Czechs as well, and we feel that it has been a pretty successful event! It has certainly been a good week!

This week I don’t have a scripture, but I have a testimony. 

Easter is a time for us to remember the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ and what he has done for us. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior, Redeemer, and certainly the Prince of Peace. In some of the deepest struggles of my mission, and throughout all of my life, Christ has been the one to lift me on his shoulders and help me through those times. I know that he has the power to relieve sin, to make them from scarlet to as white as snow. I know that he has overcome death and we will all live again. And finally, he helps us to reach our potential, our eternal potential. Jesus Christ lives, and is a real being, not a list of attributes that we seek to obtain, but the living son of a loving Heavenly Father who gave everything so that we can obtain everything the Father hath. 

Have a great week! And watch this film! Then talk to your local missionaries and/or share it with your friends, so they can have the knowledge of peace as well! We need your help. We need your testimony.  

Elder Belshe 

https://www.mormon.org/?cid=HP_SU_9-4-2017_dMIS_fMORG_xLIDyL1-A_

Pics:

The first one is of the stand we had in the center of town for Easter. The others are of the tour Elder Hanis and I did of the center of Prague going and looking inside all of the cathedrals. I have pictured the Rudolfinum, Charles Bridge from one end, and a few other good views. 

Easter, General Conference, and…..the Foreign Police

This week has been a pretty busy one for us. We started out the week doing two exchanges back to back. One, with the Plzen Zone Leaders and one with Hradec Kralove Zone Leaders. This transfer we have 5 new zone leaders, so we have been working hard to try to strengthen them and help them in their new calling. We focused on understanding how to magnify their calling as zone leaders, and creating an example area, and what exactly that means. Both Elder Anderson and Elder Beazer are stud missionaries. I love working with both of them, since I know them so well serving in the same districts with them in two different times in Prague. This week we also created a general conference pass along card that the missionaries could use, and we spent a few “finding” blocks of time purely inviting people to conference. A few said they would try to make it for Sunday. We are holding our thumbs (same as crossing our fingers, just the Czech version). 

Then we watched Conference, and it was fantastic! (still haven’t seen the Sunday sessions yet. I also was very impressed with the conference talks during Priesthood Session, like always, Elder Utchdorf's was spectacular and I am going to suggest using it in our next MLC. Then Elder Eyring's was also fantastic! I appreciated the overall emphasis on the importance and reality of Jesus Christ. Elder Sabin's talk really struck a chord, purely because I know him really well. He came while I was a zone leader in HK, talking about being all in. "Turn from all sin, keep all commandments and covenants, all will be forgiven." I had time to personally talk to him, and he is one that really knows the Spirit and the scriptures. Another seventy that came here was Elder Adler, he is funny and much different than him, but both are fantastic and really good experiences to get to know them a little bit on my mission. Each district in the mission is preparing an Easter initiative to visit all of the members and have a large group finding activity where they show the new Easter video #PrinceofPeace and talk to as many people as possible about it. We are visiting a few areas next week to help them in their efforts. I am very excited! 

Finally, we scheduled a humanitarian project this last Friday which was a repeat of the project we did with Uklidme Cesko last year when I was here in Prague around this same time! It was great to work with the same individuals that we did last year. She is planning to watch the Easter Video so the service and talking to her were a success :).....then there’s the foreign police. We had an appointment this week for visas. Thankfully, I had a little experience, and my experience saved a return trip because of an error they had in their system. After many prayers, it worked out fine and nobody had to come back all the way to Prague for another round of appointments.

That was our week! We have had several first lessons with investigators, but not too many progressing at this point, Michal is doing well! So is Kristina, but she is mainly being taught by the Sisters here in Prague now, but her baptism on the 21st of this month seems really promising :) That is all the time I got!

Love you all! 
Have a great week!

Elder Belshe

Baptism!

This week I attached pictures of Michal's baptism. Michal was baptized by a recent convert, who he and Michal, invited over 10 people to the baptism! Very huge successful baptism! Such a great step for him, and a large step for the Prague Ward. After lots of effort and prayers, the member missionary work in the ward is growing and more and more people are willing to invite their friends to meet with us. It is a very, very, good thing! 

Today, we just had a lesson with a very strong person of a different religion, intent on destroying everything in our church. From the moment we set up with this former investigator, to the time we were in his house I did not feel good about it. We had no reason not to go, so we went, but the spirit was just warning me of the falseness of the doctrine. It was interesting hearing all of this information for the first time, and it just reminded me of the moment I received a spiritual answer while in the MTC, that Joseph Smith IS a prophet of God and just knowing all of this is true, it became a good spiritual experience. Because we had that lesson, we had a lesson with two students who were fantastic and very open. They are new investigators now as well. Opposition, then blessings come. They are searching for a religion in their lives to fill a gap that they felt was missing. Super awesome! Also are also team teaching Kristina with the Sisters and David, two more of Jara's friends and a nice mother whose name is Pavla. Our teaching pool has grown, thanks to being richly blessed in the last few weeks! 

This week we also had our conferences for the zones and also we had an exchange with the Brno Zone Leaders. It was a good week. The zone conferences were very, very, spiritual and focused on urgency and the importance of a spiritual foundation. We have challenged the mission to read a quote each morning from Elder Holland's talk: “The Miracle of a Mission” before they leave the apartment each day. We are hoping that the number of baptisms continue to increase in our goal to reach 100, where we are currently on 7 for the year with Michal's. It has been a good month so far, and we think that it will continue to improve! 

My scripture for this week:
2 Nephi 33:1-2
And now I, Nephi, cannot write all the things which were taught among my people; neither am I mighty in writing, like unto speaking; for when a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the hearts of the children of men. But behold, there are many that harden their hearts against the Holy Spirit, that it hath no place in them; wherefore, they cast many things away which are written and esteem them as things of naught.

This week (upcoming week in the Czech Republic) will be broadcasting General Conference. It is excellent time for us to allow the Holy Ghost to speak unto our hearts, but with our careful studying and preparation we can carry the message into our hearts. I know that the Holy Ghost can pierce the heart of all that listen to general conference to help confirm the truth of messages that are taught from the Lord's living prophets and apostles. 

Have a great week! 
Elder Belshe