October 12 2015

This week has been great, many small miracles and tender mercies, I am learning lots here. It is all thanks to Conference though, or rather, the Lord, who has helped me understand the simplicity of our purpose as missionaries, and I'm already beginning to see the results of His personal revelation to me. During my entire time here in the mission so far, my experience has been one of learning and difficulty. I felt like God wasn't there, and that I was doing things all on my own sometimes. I of course felt His influence at times, but I was not feeling it "before (my) face, and on (my) right hand and on (my) left..." I just was not feeling it like I expected I would. But Conference has reminded me of so many things that I already know to be true, but I have just been continually falling prey to the Adversary and his cunning devices. He definitely likes to rip us down, and he likes to try to make us forget the things we know to be true. During General Conference I was reminded of several things that I have gained a knowledge of during my childhood, but I had forgotten, or at least, forgotten their meaning lately. Things such as: -God has called me to be a missionary, and He knows I'm weak, and He wants to show me and others that the weak things of the world are what He uses to bring His Gospel to the world. -When I look back on my life thus far, I realize where I am and I re-realize that God has always been there, even in my rough times, I have no need to fear, if I trust in Him. But I found myself asking, "how am I supposed to trust in Him if I don't know where he is in my life?" I found my answer at General Conference when they taught that, as His servants, we need to do our part, and (now this is important) let God do HIS part; which by simple understanding we realize is infinitely larger than anything we can ever do as mortals. But that principle: Trust God to do His part. I found myself asking, "what is God's part, and what is mine?" I realized, through personal revelation and through memories and such, that MY part, as a missionary... is to be a missionary. The Lord doesn't expect US to convince people, that's the spirit's job. We, as missionaries, are supposed to be there, so that the Spirit CAN convince these people. The words of the primary song continue to come to mind, "If the savior stood beside me..." Now when we think or hear about this hymn, we often (or at least I do) tend to think of if as a song to remind us to behave better, or to live a certain way, or to avoid sin. This song reminds us that, yes, the Savior DOES stand by us, and is constantly "nigh", we need only remember that truth. But during Conference, a different meaning came to me. It went something like this: "If the Savior stood beside me, would I do the things I do?" I thought about it, and then answered my thought, "No, I would not. My attitude would be different and I wouldn't need to worry about looking for Him in my life, because He would be Right There in front of me to see!" Then the truth, remember the truth, of the simple hymn came to my mind again, "He is always there" How true... Of Course He is. How could I have not seen it? I see how he's always there in regards to my sins, I know I cannot hide my imperfections from Him. So why, ever, would He not be there to also support us and be there, before our face and on our right hand and on our left? He wouldn't. He's always there to see our imperfections I know that for a fact, but He's not there just to chasten us when we mess up, he's there ALL the time, and often, we just need to Allow Him to do His part. That's what I mainly learned at General Conference this time. I've only begun to learn more about the great plan that God has prepared for us and I'm only beginning to learn about how God prepares us through allowing us to exercise trust in him. also, Elder boyce and I I just went to the zoo today for P day, don't have time to explain more but I'll send some pictures. Love you and talk to you next week! Sincerely, Elder Dean

"I am speaking Czech!" October 5 2015

So yeah, I'm having an interesting time lately, and I'll be telling more about what's been happening lately: So this last week we had our first official Training in Brno, a larger city where Elder Boyce and I went to by "auto bus (awtoh boos)" and we met with President McConkie and his wife and they spoke to us, and we met up with some friends from the MTC and such, it was awesome. It was only our zone though, so only about 20 missionaries at the meeting. After training I was blown away to see how scattered my notes were, I'll never be able to read them in the same order I wrote them... but whatever, it's the info that's there that I wanted. After training, our Zone Leaders, Elder Britner, and Elder Kliner came back to Zlin with Elder Boyce and I on Exchanges, so that we could update our mission on the progress in Zlin, as well as get our monthly or whatever interview with our zone leaders. It went well. I was assigned to be with Elder Kliner and we worked well together. When we first arrived in Zlin after coming back from Brno, the 4 of us went to our church building and grabbed a table and some Book of Mormon's and brochures and such and walked out onto the Namesti. The Zone leaders had come to Zlin with a plan in mind and told us, "we're going to get 10 Other Lessons today!" Elder Boyce and I were Shocked... we hardly ever get more than 3, or maybe 4 Other Lessons in a day, and here they were telling us that we were going to get Ten! well... long story short, we all separated individually into the square and we all individually contacted and tried to find the Elect. I walked around, of course, always within site of another Elder, and then we proceded to talk to as many people as was possible... and... Mom and dad, I have to tell you something... I am speaking Czech... I talked to as many people as possible and I found a woman to whom I started talking and told her who we were and what we were doing and why we were here and then I asked her if she believed in God. This older lady told me that, yes, she believes in God. She told me that she is Catholic and that she goes to the Costel every sunday and that she reads the bible and that she is happy. I told her about the book of mormon and such and she was not very interested at all. "ne mam zijem" she said, which is to say, "I don't have intrest." she proceded to tell me that because she's already a believer, she doesnt need any more, and she was convinced that there was no need to continue talking about this further. Then I asked another question, "You're a believer, right?" "yes" she replied then I asked, "if you are a believer, then you'd be willing to do what God asks, right? If God were to reveal new scripture, would you read it?" She thought about it for a second... then she said, "Ano" (yes) Long story short, I gave her a book of mormon, she took it and looked at it and then I asked her, "can I see it for a second?" "yes" she handed the book back to me. I opened the book to Moroni 10 and asked her to read verses 3 through 5 and she did. after that she said that she would read more. I asked for her phone number and she gave it to me and then I asked her to read the Uvod (introduction) and she said, "ne, I'll read the whole thing, call me in 3 days" we did call her 3 days later and she said, "i'm in the hospital, i've had an accident, I'm okay, but I read the book of mormon and I know it's from God." we're going to talk to her more later. Another experience, we were about 20 minutes walk away from our appartment and we were out contacting and tracting and we recieved a call from one of our members, Bro. Mikulanka, and he needed us to come down to the church building quickly so we could unlock the door so that he could get his bike which he had left inside. we started running down the hillside on the coblestone paths and then halfway down, he called us and said, "eh, I don't need your help anymore, thanks!" we stopped running, caught our breath's and looked around, we were on a path in the middle of the woods and we had no idea where we were. I had a thought, "I think God wanted us to be right here right now for some reason" I said. then we looked further down the path and saw a lone man walking up in the opposite direction as us. we talked to him. long story short, he's super interested in God and has been a believer in god for only 3 years and he is anxious to learn more. we talked for over 30 minutes and then gave him a book of mormon. he told us, "do you think that I'm the person who you're supposed to give this book to?!" he was shocked and honored that God would want us to talk to Him! and we looked at each other, (elder boyce and I) and then I said, "why of course, I think you're the ONLY person qualified to recieve this book right now!" longer story short, we will likely be meeting with him in a couple weeks, he's gonna do his best to read it. out of time..... sad... I'll quickly send some pictures. Love you all! Elder Dean

September 28 2015

So this week has been significantly better than last week. I've been going through some learning experiences in regards to the spirit and how The Lord uses us, His missionaries, in His work. I've had several small instances where people have just constantly rejecting us it seemed, and I just was beginning to develop a sense of failure due to not being able to find people. We've been trying to establish appropriate goals for our success as missionaries and we were constantly falling short, and that was very difficult for me. I felt like we were trying to do what was right, and that even though we were trying, we were not having any success! (that was my thought) Well I was wrong... I realized, or rather, re-realized, that the Lord has his own plans for us and for his Father's children. We only see a small piece of the entire picture, which means that we need to just do our best. Also, as a missionary, I almost felt as though we're entitled to success because of our sacred calling, but how wrong I was... or at least my point of view. The missionary truly is a servant of our Father in Heaven, but that doesn't mean that we're angels that have 100% and continual contact and understanding with God. As a matter or fact, the scriptures tell us that the Lord wants men to do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness. The Lord wants us to make decisions for ourselves, and the way it works is that we'll be able to have His spirit to guide us when we're actively making decisions and performing labors based on our own understanding of what is right and wrong. But we're imperfect, and that means that we won't always have the best ideas for what is right and wrong, but that, I believe, is when the spirit will come in and correct our thoughts if we are open to receiving those promptings. Another Thing I've noticed is that when we are feeling down about something, the Adversary loves to take that opportunity to come in and try to break us down even further. The Key is to notice that is is him, and when we notice that it is him, we can tell him to leave us, and we can fill that space in our heart where he's trying to dwell, with things from God, and when we do that, Satan cannot dwell there any longer. I have had experiences with this several times over the last several days and this is what it has been like for me. The Other day, I found myself worrying about something trivial, I can't even remember it now because I've chosen not to, but whatever it was, I was allowing it to bother me, and I wasn't allowing myself to move on. I let the Adversary creep in and I was feeling down and sort of depressed about it, bu about 10 minutes after I had begun to feel this way, I realized that the Adversary was trying to break me down, and I obviously was not happy about that. In the midst of my hour of weakness I was still able to recognize that I was being acted upon by our greatest enemy. I knelt down and began to pray. And I remember telling my Heavenly Father what I was feeling, and I remember telling my Heavenly Father that I would not leave any place in my Heart for the Adversary any longer, and that I would only fill that space with what HE had to put there, and I felt my gloomy feelings begin to go away. But I knew they were going away, that's the funny thing, I had consciously made that decision, to say, "no, I don't have time for you Satan." and if I don't have time for him, then he can't be there. And so Yesterday, when Elder Boyce and I were out contacting/Tracting Ponoloks (the buildings that were built for housing during communism, they look like cubes), while we were out tracting them yesterday, we had decided on a specific goal and it felt like we were not achieving our goal. we were trying to find a young family who wanted to hear and learn about the Gospel of Jesus Christ topic, and we were just not finding ANYONE who wanted to hear about it. Elder Boyce was busing ringing the ponolok that we were at... (every ponolok has a small place next to the entrance with the names of every family living in each of the small apartments in that ponolok. Sext to each family name is a button that when pressed, rings a telephone in that particular appartment, and when somebody answers the phone, we can talk to them through a speaker next to the entrance to the building, so often we go "tracting" ponoloks, and just stand in front and call every appartment and speak to whomever picks up the phones or answers.) anyway... Elder Boyce was tracting this ponolok and while he was ringing the separate apartments, I was about 20 meters away, speaking to and stopping people who were just walking by on the cobblestone pathways next to the building. I stopped and talked to a family who told me about somehing, and (through my broken Czech) I understood that they had had some negative experience or SOMETHING with the Book of Mormon, and they were just not interested in out message, but they were patient with my Czech. I continued to try to talk to them and see if I could find any way to get them interested but they were adamant about their decision to move on. This type of contacting happened for the rest of the 45minutes that Elder Boyce was tracting the ponolok. Continuous rejection and people actively telling me, "NO, get out of here!" and other people who actually just waved me away like I was some stray dog or something. I was beginning to develop a habit of people just saying, "no." cause That was all that I knew... ever since coming here, I've never heard a person whom we've contacted say, "yes" it's always been either, "no" or "maybe" or "don't have time" or "don't have intrest" or "don't be mad, but, no" Occasionally we recieve a "maybe" but that's a rare occasion. it was habitual to just accept those responses. Then, right before we were about to pack up and go home, I stopped another woman, who looked just like any other person whom I'd stopped yesterday, and I explained who we were and what we were doing, and I explianed that we have a message about Jesus Christ, and then I asked her, "would you like to learn more?" expecting the standard... i hear... "ano" then I flipped out... "ano" mean (yes). I didn't know how to explain in Czech what I was feeling so I just said, "super!" (which is exactly the same thing in English as "awesome!"). Then I looked over towards where Elder Boyce was and called out, "Starší!"("Elder!") Elder Boyce looked up at me, and I said, "Půjd!" ("come!") he walked over and we began talking to this woman more and then we were shocked to hear that, Yes, she legitimately had interest! She then explained that she didn't have very much time. I was so excited, I just kept looking over at Elder Boyce while we were talking to her. I was just so excited that I whipped out a Book of Mormon, Restoration pamphlet, Plan of Salvation pamphlet, and a Gospel of Jesus Christ pamphlet... there I was holding 4 books, about to hand them all to her, and then Elder Boyce looked at me and asked, "what are you..? Just chose 1..." I took a look at what I was holding and... yes, asking this woman whom we'd known for 2 minutes to keep a commitment like THAT would not be a good way to start. we ended up just giving her a book of mormon, and getting her email address and found out that she lives in another city so we won't be able to teach her. so we're going to send her info to the elders in Olomuc. anyway, that's my funny story that happened Yesterday (sunday) Some other Interesting things that happened this week include: - I helped make, and we ate Halushky ( I spelled that using english so that you can pronounce it correctly) Elder Boyce:Before I forget we also had culture night last week. Thursday night we went to the philharmonic. It was a great concert! We listened to Dvořák, Bruch, and Beethoven; Dvořák and Bruch were my favorite, but especially Bruch was excellent because of the soloist Vadim Gluzman. We saw the opening concert of their 70th concert season so it was a big to-do. Before the beginning of the concert they baptized their new CD by sprinkling some champagne on it. There was a Catholic priest and everything :) Mom:I love that Connor didn't even mention going to the philharmonic.

September 21 2015

This week has been interesting, and I've been having a lot of trials and such, and there've been days this week when I asked myself, again... "Am I really doing what the Lord wants me to be doing?" and, "Am I worthy to be here?" (Everywhere we go over here in Europe there is pictures of people wearing almost no clothing and it's nearly impossible not to see it) Sometimes I feel bad because it's sometimes difficult to get certain things out of my head, and It makes me feel like crap. I've even asked myself this week, "Is God really there, and do I really mean a lot to Him?" I've just gotten into 3rd nephi and I'm reading the ministering of Christ to the Nephites and I'm just not feeling it (the spirit) the way I prayed that I would when I got to this section of the Book of Mormon. I've felt these kinds of feelings: "That's great that God's doing all these amazing, inspiring, miraculous things for these people in this book, but where is He in MY life?" and the like... Yesterday however, while we were walking along a very long and confusing to follow street, looking for a man who we never were able to find, and having had zero lessons yesterday, and having zero's all across the board for our key indicators, I found myself feeling like dirt, and like I was not pleasing my Father in Heaven, and as I sit here, I'm still not sure if he's pleased with me, but I know that He's merciful because while we were walking around for 3 hours, I found myself thinking that I was hungry and thirsty and that I needed something to suck on or I would just lose my patience completely... I thought of the movie Meet the Mormons, and the story of the mother who walked into a gas station and eventually received a blessing from the elders, and she felt that, "God was trying to tell me to, 'hang on, just keep going, you're almost there!' " and I was thinking about that, and then just as I was thinking about this, we passed an older woman walking her bicycle, and surprisingly, she stopped us... "you're mormon's right?" she asked. We replied that, "Ano(yes), my(we) jsme(are) mormoni(Mormons)" we spoke with here for a little while, and she told us about how she actually knows some members of our Branch. she told us that she respects us and asked us if we needed any help. we said that we didn't know if she could help us but that we were looking for an address, and she volunteered to get on her bike and go down the street beyond us and look for the address. we accepted her offer to help us, and then she thanked us and gave us each a hard candy, I got the brown one that tasted like flat root beer. Funny thing was, I had just been thinking that I could use some food, because we had actually not eaten lunch. I again heard the words from the Meet the Mormons movie, "hang on, I'm still here just keep going". We never actually found the man, and so that was a disappointment, but I was slightly reminded that God is there. Earlier that same day (yesterday, sunday) we ended church and a member asked us if we'd come with him to go visit a sick member who has not been to church in a long time due to his sickness. We went out to visit him, and when we got there he was just getting home. no, literally, we got out of the member's car exactly when Rudolf exited the passenger seat of a truck as he was getting home from somewhere. Rudolf is his name. When he saw us, he immediately said, "hey boys"(in english) with a smile. We'd never met Rudolf before but he welcomed us with a warmth that I thought only somebody who I have known for years could have. his lips were blue. Being an old man, and with the Czech people having the culture they do, he told us that his legs were blue too, and then immediately dropped his pants so that we could plainly see that, yes... his legs had become a little blue too. He put his pants back on and then we basically, thought czech and some broken english, and yes my broken czech too... we basically figured out that he wanted a blessing, so we went inside his old garage, which had a big barn door, and when we walked inside, it was clearly both a garage and a barn... and in the corner by the big, rotted wooden door was a recliner chair, where Rudolf sat down and waited for us to give him a blessing. "in Czech?" I asked Starší Boyce. "of course in Czech" he firmly reminded me... I swallowed hard, I don't have much experience with blessings anyway, and now I was supposed to anoint somebody's head with oil, in Czech. Elder Boyce pulled out a card, with instructions in czech for how to anoint somebody with oil. So I used that. it went very well. Elder Boyce gave the blessing after I anointed and afterwards Rudolf stood up and nearly in tears told us both, "thank you" and then gave me the most tender and sincere hug I've ever had from a stranger. This old man, Rudolf Gaba, told us that because of his age and health, he cannot work in his garden. He is the last member in his family who's still alive. his parents, dead, his sister, dead, he doesn't have children, and he's Lost his taste. he can't taste anything, and his heart only has 30 percent oxygen when it's supposed to have 50 percent, so that's why his body is turning blue... long story short, he's gonna die soon. he explained to us that even though he's been unable to go to church, this Church has stayed with him, and then he thanked us, for giving him Hope again. "you give me Hope." is what he told us. After one last hug, and as we walked away, down the street, we didn't look back because it just felt right to end well. then, about 2 minutes after we started walking away, right before we turn the corner on this long street, we here a whistle, and turn around, and he's still standing outside his door, and is watching us walk away,still. when we turn to look at him he waves for the last time, and we wave, then we turn the corner, and we're gone. we went to the train station and then THAT is when we begin our 3 hour journey to find the missing less active member talked about earlier in this email. but I have never felt so much love for a complete stranger. gotta go, this is my weekly email, love you all, Chow! Elder Dean

September 14 2015

Elder Boyce-Overall we feel that things are going well here in Zlín. Elder Dean is still doing well. His Czech is improving, but I'm trying to find more ways to help him get integrated into the conversations that are going on around him because he feels like he gets lost. I'm kind of struggling how to involve him more in that way, but overall he's doing well and growing and he loves our members a lot. We're looking high and low for people on our branch, and we found a couple of people last week that are according to it. We're just trying to keep adding to that!! Elder Dean: we have been experiencing a lot of rejection, and it's hard on the soul. but there is plenty of good news too, and that being, I am still just as lost in the language, well that's not true, i'm learning, slowly, but i'm happy here, I've never felt the Lord so Close and i'm only begining to understand His infinite love. I am so happy to hear about that Family night, and I love hearing how the Lord is blessing my family back home, I pray for you every day. in regards to Jack, I don't know what to say other than just be there for Vikie. How she does need the comforter now more than ever, I'll keep her in my prayers. I'll send some pictures off real quick and i'll answer some of your questions dad... --- - we are not living in a high rise, those pictures were taken from atop a tall buidling overlooking Zlin. our appartment is in the middle of town right next to the big town square, we are on the ground level floor with our door facing north. -the owner of the computer server company is who took us out to lunch today, he is not a memeber, but was at one point a former investigator, which is a fancy way of saying he did not accept the Gospel, but he is not discriminatory against it. -elder boyce and I will watch conference in Engish together in the branch president's office most likely which is on the same floor as the church building floor where the branch comes to have church each week. this building is not owned by the church, but the church rents the 3rd floor, the 1st and 2nd and 4th floors are NOT owned or rented by the church. we will likely watch conference again in Czech with some members a week after we watch it in english. it takes a week to translate or something idk for sure. -no native elders or sisters in this mission. -my companion and I speak czech together whenever we're with somebody else who speaks czech, when it's just us together we typically speak english but that should probably change. -i had the $140 from when I was supposed to use it at the airport for luggage checking, funny thing was the airline decided to check our bags for free so I had the cash on hand, then I converted it. (considered personal funds) -Have not and will not ever go to get fast food with this companion, does not like it.

September 7 2015

Elder Dean is doing well. He's finding out that missionary work (and learning Czech) takes a lot of constant persistence, but he's learning a lot. We're learning a lot together while preparing for our teaching appointments and the other things that we have going each day. His Czech is improving, though he seems to want it to go a little faster. On Saturday we were coming back from an appointment and he felt a little down because he couldn't understand an old man that we were talking to and I told him that at day 10 or 11 in the country he shouldn't be worrying about it (at least not until he gets to day 600 or so...). He's a hard worker and he's already really dedicated to our branch. We've been learning a lot together about the Savior during our studies and it's been great to use that as we teach people during the day. He's also really excited to help the branch get more excited for missionary work.-Elder Boyce wow, I can't believe it's already September, Clayton's birthday is coming up! and so Is my Dad's! heh... so they both missed my birthday cause I was at the MTC, and now i'm missing their birthdays becasue i'm in the mission. guess we'll have to put up with that for now, i'll make it up later. So our appartment is in the middle of town, and each city in the Czech Republic has at least 1 "namesti" which is the same thing as a 'town square'. on these Namesti's they host public events and anyone can gather and sell things or play music or... really, anything. they just need to have a permit to do anything that would draw attention. for example, sometimes we (starsi boyce and I) will go out on the Namesti next to our appartment and will have a table set up with Book of mormon's on it and such, then he'd stay next to the table and contact people while I would walk 20-30 feet away and contact people and try to get them to come over to the table and take a look at what we have to offer. we have stores all over the place over here and it's quite funny because right next to the Namesti there is a McDonalds and a KFC of the opposite side of the Namesti! perhaps i'll have to get a "small fry" one of these days, huh Mom?! We go to this grocery store called KaufLand, which is German for "BuyLand". we just went there today and spent over 1600 crowns! (that's the currency over here) just to give you an idea of just how much a crown is worth, I had about $140 in 20's about an hour and a half ago, I went to the exchange place and turned all $140 into crowns the and conversion gave me a lot of crowns: $140 - converts to about - 3000 Kč we each spend about 1000 crowns a week over here and so that'll give you an idea. we have no trouble walking to the grocery store, about 10 minute walk. the Cobblestone... THERE IS COBBLESTONE E V E R Y W H E R E OVER HERE! it seriously is quite amazing really, we have asphault in the US and instead of asphault they use cobblestone, i'll send you more pictures next week. the branch over here is the Zlin branch, there are about 20 people that come each sunday the church building is on the 2nd floor of a building about 4 minute walk from our appartment. Elder boyce has been here for a year and a half and has 10 baptism under his belt 2 were people that he taught, and after he left they got baptized, so he counts them as his. there are about 80 missionaries total in the Czech Slovak mission, and only 20 of them are in slovakia. anything I need? hmm... my golden toe socks are shrinking... think i need to be more carefull about the temperature at which i wash them. my ear is fine. we currently have... i think 7 investigators but i've only met 2 of them becasue everyone is so busy. have not tried peeing on my ear yet, no... have not ate at a memeber's home yet... we'll see... i'm not sick of the questions but i'm definitely running out of time... we eat chocholate granola with banana slices and apple slices with milk (for me) and yogurt (for elder boyce, he's lactose intollerant). we eat lunch at home 6 out of 7 days of the week. (elder boyce is a good cook). we have a maly (small) washing machine, it's litterally the size of 3 microwaves stacked on top of each other... but it works, sometimes it gets stuck on a cycle and just goes and goes and goes until we stop it hahaha! we went to a resturaunt just the other day and ordered pizza... cause there are pizza places EVERYWHERE over here. have not had any authentic czech food yet though other than the svíčkova which was the meal photos i sent you last week, was really good! we travel Everywhere by foot, but we also take a bus about 1 time each week to go to district meeting. we wake up each morning at 6:30am we have taught a few lessons but nobody is making much progress, the people are very hard hearted over here... just gotta keep looking for the Elect... have not met james bond yet.....