Week 4 in Plzen

24 Feb 2014 Ahoj! This week I saw soooo many miracles. First of all, Constantin's wife got baptized :) I just got a picture. So happy. But in Plzen, I decided to take your advice Annica, and just decide once and for all that I will just talk to everybody, and not be afraid about it, instead of having to make that decision every morning. So I did it! It started with the exchange with Sister Donaldson on Thursday, that was SO fun. We went running for the first time since Fall and she's so easy to talk to. We had a goal of getting 6 numbers that day (to put this in perspective, we had gotten 7 numbers in the first two weeks of the transfer). I really wanted to work on tram contacting so we planned a lot of that, and we wanted to teach an other lesson to someone we would find that day. So we went to work, and at the end of the exchange we had not only taught that lesson, but gotten 6 numbers for gospel interest and 4 for English. And I gained a testimony of tram contacting and goal-setting, and spiritual finding. We prayed about who would be looking for us the next day and S. Donaldson said, ok I think it's a YSA guy, wearing all-black with brown hair. I was like ok...we'll try it. But she totally found him, exactly as she had described him! I don't know why I doubted--I mean if God knows everything and we are doing His work, why could He not help us recognize the people we need to talk to?? And so I've really been trying to follow the spirit in finding, and have found the most prepared people I've ever talked to. One of them told me she envied my faith and wished that someone could help her to develop it, so of course I told her that's what we do! And then yesterday I saw this girl in a yellow scarf about to cross the street and I talked to her--turns out she had literally just had a two-hour conversation about faith with a Christian friend and she wants to know how to develop faith in God and how she can believe. She just kept saying, wow that's such a coincidence! It was amazing. To think that I've probably been passing all of these people that the Lord has placed in my path, but because I didn't open my mouth, we didn't get to teach them. In the last 4 days we've gotten 18 numbers. 18!! It's been a miracle. And all it took was an exchange with an inspired sister trainer leader and greater trust in God. Plus I studied Elder Bednar's talk about tithing, and how we should ask for strength to change our circumstances instead of waiting for them to be changed by someone or something else. So I decided that I wasn't going to think of my area/city as dead, but that I was going to do something about it. And it's been so neat to see how it's just exploded. I think Heavenly Father was just waiting for me to decide to be all in, so that he could bless us with success. We met with someone who contacted us the first week of the transfer, someone from october texted us and wanted to meet, someone else met with us the same day we called him...and an investigator who comes to church but wouldn't meet with us is suddenly best friends with the coolest member ever and she got us a meeting this morning! She is so cool and has 10 year old triplets that we are going to teach too, we have a meeting on Thursday. It's been crazy. The Lord really does labor with us!!! I think she will get baptized this transfer, and hopefully the girls too :) I've never taught kids before, but I'm so excited. Good things are happening in Plzen! love you!!! Sestra Cooper