Called To Serve : Elder Josef Ashworth: A Focus on Faith

Monday 19 September 2016

A Focus on Faith

Some cool things that happened this week:-

1) Tuesday we had the Warsaw Zone, Zone Conference in Warsaw, which meant another day of travelling there and back. I've travelled way over 1000km this transfer, just to Warsaw and back. It was good though, a good day spent with the missionaries in this zone. A good occasion to teach and learn from each other. I really like the way President Turek leads his conferences and meetings - very simple principles are taught, in a very simple way, most of it through reading passages from the scriptures - one of the best tools we have been given to increase our knowledge.

There's been a theme of the last two conferences, that being a focus on Faith. How we can have more faith, why faith is important, how faith draws us closer to our purpose, having power through faith. Something we also spoke about was how before we can teach, before we can bear testimony, before we can have power, before we can have the companionship of the Holy Ghost; we must have a solid testimony in three fundamentals of this church:

1)Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, The Holy Ghost

2)The Atonement of Jesus Christ

3)The Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ

When we build our faith upon these three things, we will have the power to teach and bear testimony to our friends and those around us. Power comes through belief.

After Zone Conference, Elders McPherson and White came back to Lublin with us as it was their turn for exchanges with me. We had to rush for the train though, we just made it in time. I ran ahead so that I could hold the train up, they call that the missionary style of catching a train. That evening we sat out by the Rynek in Old Town and had Kebabs, it was a perfect evening. We took a language study outside too and walked around the city talking with people and each other in Polish, it meant we had the opportunity so show McPherson and White the beauty of Lublin at night.

2) We had a district meeting on Wednesday morning after studies, lead by Elder Huffman in Polish, it was cool to see him just go for it, we spoke a lot about things we learned from Zone Conference.

3) I think I broke my own record on laughing, I broke down so many times during the day and then especially at night, we played games and were just chatting - Elder White is a character haha!

4) We've been working our butts off this week trying to get people to come to our English Club that started on Saturday. On Wednesday night we met a group of students from Morocco, they're all studying at the Politechnika here in Lublin. There were about 15 of them, and they all said they would come to English on Saturday, we kept seeing them throughout the week and each time they were happy to see us and assured us they would all be there. So the time came, 6pm on Saturday, time for English, they all came in waves, but they were true to their word - all and more came. We had about 18 students from Morocco there, it was mint, such a miracle! They're the nicest people too.

5) Another day in Warsaw for District Conference. We had a 3am get up, 1 hour to get ready and then we had to be at the bus station for 5am. It was so strange walking around the streets that early in the morning, people were still out partying. District Conference was good. Good to see all the members and missionaries again. We had a decent turnout too. We spent the day in Warsaw, with other missionaries during lunch and dinner. I had a walk around with one of Elder Huffman's old friends from his Warsaw days. It was nice to see, I hope to be able to see some friends I've made in other cities during the rest of my mission.

So there's a few things for you.

If I've learnt something in the 10 or so months I've been out here, it's that the hardships and trials are always outweighed by the good experiences and happy times - so don't give up!

Drugi List do Tymoteusza 4:7 - W dobrych zawodach wystąpiłem, bieg ukończyłem, wiary ustrzegłem.