From the Reed's Blog Jan 16th, 2013

Sunday Obiad

Posted on January 16, 2013 by tom

Another Sunday rolls around for the obiad! We guess these obiads on the second Sunday of each month have been a tradition of the Poznan Branch for quite a few years. We are glad to be a part of the tradition, and it’s always a wonderful time for people to get to know one another better.

Here's the group - there were some different faces at the table, and we always enjoy each person who comes to join us.

We have a family coming to the Branch, Ola and Andrew, and their two children. We certainly enjoy seeing them each Sunday.

These two women are from our English classes. It was nice they joined us for the meal.

The young man on the left is being taught by the Elders. Next to him are Elders Tingey and Stockford, Sister Nielson, and Elder Reed.

Jacek and Marian were chatting together during the meal. Jacek is being taught by the Elders. Marian is our Elder's Quorum President.

Our wonderful sisters - Marlena, Jola, and Regina

Sister Bezdjian, Malgorzata (our Relief Society President), and Grzegorz, who is our food expert

SARA SAID RAMONA IS LIKE A FUN POLISH "MOMMY B"

Sister Bown, Marcin (just recently baptized) and Ramana, who is being taught by the Sisters

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Children’s English

Posted on January 15, 2013 by tom

Last Saturday the Sister Bezdjian and Sister Bown taught the children names for colors in their English class. It was so much fun to watch the children react and respond to the lesson. The parents come to the class, too, and I think they also enjoy watching their children learn more English and interact with the Sisters.

The students had color cards and were exchanging with each other so that they had a rainbow (one of each color).

They went around the building finding all the different colors they could see.

Post from President and Sis Nielson's Blog

SUNDAY, JANUARY 13, 2013

Interview trips start....January 12, 2013

 Believe it or not, our interview trips have gotten SO MUCH easier because of signs like this:

                                       
 We love big, bright blue signs; because that translates to: BIG NICE FREEWAY AHEAD! (On the left is the old way to Lodz and Poznan.....on the right is the new way via A2.  On a snowy day like today, the NEW HIGHWAYS are so welcomed.

It wasn't even a choice....you ALWAYS follow the big blue signs!

 So over the bridge(s) we went! The only 'downside' to the new A2 freeway is the toll booths....of which there are many.....

....and they keep building more!  This is one that will be operating sometime in the future.  Another interesting thing is the Toll prices change for time to time.  But it is worth it not to get stuck behind great big (slow) trucks that you struggle to pass.  

The rynek at Poznan...even though Christmas is over, decorations stay up for sometime afterwards. They are still beautiful.

 Meeting the Poznan Elders (Stockford and Tingey) at a local restaurant for dinner. It was nice to visit with these good Elders.....who, by the way, were back proselyting by 6:00 pm as per the Missionary White Handbook!  They both have not been in Poland that long- Elder Tingey just over 4 months and Elder Stockford just over 2 months.  They are tremendous.  They are teaching some incredible people who we hope will have a desire to follow the example of their Savior and be baptized.  It was a little chilly out tonight.

 Meanwhile, after dinner, I was able to accompany our Poznan Sisters (Bezdjian and Bown) on a lesson.  Sisters Bezdjian and Bown really know how to do missionary work- they are incredible. We met at Jola's house and we were teaching Regina. Talking about the Plan of Salvation, many great questions were asked and answered. Jola and Regina are great friends....Regina is reading and praying about theBook of Mormon to find out if it is true for herself. Her son, Wiktor, is serving a mission in Detroit and will be very pleased to hear this.

We were able to attend the Poznan Branch for Church Sunday. President Nielson had a most important interview. Marta's missionary papers are being turned in. She is SO excited to serve the Lord in this capacity. She is a wonderful teacher and will be a great missionary. We will let you know where she will be called to serve! We love you, and we are very proud of you, Marta!  She will be our 7th missionary from Poland who is currently in the field.

January 14, 2013 - Poznan

Dear Family,

Thank you for the package and the many letters mom! You seriously are THE BEST and those letters just keep me pumped for the rest of the week. Thank you for keeping Sister Bown and me in your prayers. I love you all.

President Nielson and Sister Nielson came to Poznan this weekend! It is always a pleasure to see them. They bought us dinner at the Siox restaurant in the rynek. But before the dinner we had a meeting with this really REALLY cute family! So the elders left and we came late and had to snarf it all down so unladly-like. Then Sister Nielson came with us to our meeting with Jola and Regina! It was a lot of fun and you can probably see some pictures on Sister Nielson's blog. We read 2 Nephi 9 and talked about the Plan of Salvation. Really great meeting.

That was Saturday so the next day President Nielson spoke in sacrament meeting. I really liked his thoughts. Our members love him and Sister Nielson. He talked about people who had heart transplants. He began by telling us about when the first heart transplant was successfully performed. And he told us that those people who had the transplants were supposed to go to the doctor every so often for check ups to make sure everything was going well. Well a few of these people started feeling good. They became casual about the miracle that they had a new heart. They started saying to themselves, well I feel great. I don't need to go to the doctor. And of course, because they didn't have those regular checkups, some of those people died. Which is so sad because it was completely avoidable. President Nielson then compared that to sacrament meeting, daily prayer, and daily scripture study. We all experience the change of heart talked about in the Book of Mormon (Alma 5) but we need to maintain good spiritual health by coming to see the Great Doctor often and regularly. Many people think they are doing great and don't need those daily but neccessary things and the results are spiritual sickness. 

I really liked President's talk and I hope we can all ask ourselves, are we taking our medicine? Are we visiting the doctor regularly? Do we really appreciate the miracle of the new heart the Lord has given us?

Sister Bown is doing great! She is such a quick learner. And she is so eager to learn more. I really like her receptiveness--that is very admirable. I want to be as teachable as she is. She is also a very calm person. I like that about her. I am usually freaking out about something or other but she handles things very calmly and even if she freaks out, she doesn't show it. She picks up on habits very quickly and this week we had some decisions to make and she often suggested one route which turned out to be much wiser in the long run. Foresight. That's what she has. Sister Bown is great.

Our Christ-like attribute for this week is: Faith. Diligence was really great to work on and I think these two attributes are very related. I think faith feeds one's diligence and when I study faith this week, I want to see how I can inspire others to increase their faith in Jesus Christ. One of our investigators would like to increase his faith but it is our job to show him how and help him have spiritual experiences on his own.

Something I learned from the scriptures this week: According to the mission schedule we all finished 2 Nephi 4 today. I think in these last few chapters, my admiration for Nephi has grown. He really is so faithful and desires to be righteous. I like how he is never complacent with how good he is; instead, he seeks to be more merciful like the Lord has always been to him and to all mankind.

Other things from this week:

* Bogusia's birthday was last monday so we had a little "party" with her. We ate cake and talked about the stripling warriors and obedience. She is still in bed and at home a lot because of her broken bones but I think she is doing well. Reading everyday and praying and she wants to come to church next week.

*Romana, our baptismal date is just making leaps and bounds. She met president nielson at church and is giving us referrals almost daily! I love this woman. She just needs to read more on her own--she likes reading with us too much :)

*We started doing a service project thing weekly at an old folk's home near our apartment. It is so much fun. We get to talk about YOU and our lives and they already love us. They want to know everything about our families and daily lives. So I told them the story about Dad's ancestor in Turkey who had the dream about the missionaries. By the way, they all think you're handsome Dad. And everyone thinks Mom is another sister. "young mom!" they all exclaim. 

*Welp. The year mark has come and gone. I have learned and will continue to learn a lot on the mission. I think the most important things I have learned are: to be humble and grateful in all things, and believe in miracles because they happened! Our prayers really are heard and answered by our loving Father in Heaven. 

 *One of our families is doing so great! We read the book of mormon together this week with the Reeds and it was a really nice discussion. They were in church as well and I just feel so good about them! I love these families. 

 

Thank you for all you do and for who you are.

Sister Bezdjian

Please tell Peggy thanks for the christmas card. I really liked it. 

please also tell aunt shell and cole I got their package and I am so thankful for the whoppers! everyone snacked on them in church. It was fun to share with everyone.

January 7th, 2013

New hair cut now all the same length

Dear Hannah, Andrew, Dad, Mom,

Thank you for the year mark package! That was so nice.

 

Sister Bown is really great. She is a really good example of calmness. Which is good because that is something I lack. More than once I have been stressed out or worried about our investigators or feeling rushed. And she in her quiet, unabraisive way reminds me that the Lord is in control. It's really cool.

How Sara and Sis Bown celebrated New Year's Eve

 

Something I learned from the scriptures this week: Well I completely forgot to mention last email. We are reading the Book of Mormon together as a mission until April. Everyone is welcome to follow! On Sister Nielson's blog is the reading schedule. (Not sure of the site but just googling 'poland warsaw mission blog nielson' should bring it right up.)

So the reading this week was in 1 Nephi. Contemplating about Nephi's visions this week was just great. But something stood out to me this morning. Today was chapter 15 when Laman and Lemuel ask Nephi the meaning of their father's visions. We had a similar situation this week, when an investigator and a member asked us about the scriptures. Nephi is a perfect example of how to handle this situations. He reminds his brothers HOW to get personal revelation and not just WHAT everything means. But then, beyond that, he calmly explains the vision's meaning. I love how Nephi doesn't selfishly hold back the information God has revealed to him. He is willing to share it and encourages his brothers to find out for themselves and he does it in a way that inspires them to humility.

 

Our Christ-like attribute for this week is: diligence. Great planners make great missionaries and I am really focusing on chapter 8 in Preach My Gospel this week. I know that if we plan well and work hard, "we will have the Spirit...and we will touch the hearts of the people" (Preach My Gospel). I still have a lot to learn about planning but the mission has definitely helped me think about planning more. I think I would be a lot better at doing my homework and organizing my life now. Planning really does make life more efficient.

 

In other news:

*Romana, our baptismal candidate is doing just great. She loved church yesterday and is inviting all of her friends to her baptism.

*Last night, we had a really cool meeting with this older man named Bogdan and his daughter and grandson. His house looked a lot like Baba's and he started out complaining about communists, and capitalists. I was thinking, oh man. How are we going to pray and start the lesson...But sooner or later we started and the atmosphere completely changed. Soon his little grandson was reading the scriptures out loud for us and helping us with the lesson. It was really cool. And they both prayed at the end! So I hope they'll be excited to meet again and read the Book of Mormon.

 

Thank you for all you do and for who you are.

Sister Bezdjian

 

p.s. Please tell Aunt Hollie thank you for the letter and the package! Sister Bown and I love the pj shirts and it was so nice of her to send it. Thanks!

Notice that a priest would be in the area to bless their building

Dearest Hannah, Andrew, Mom, and Dad,

 

AHHH! Can you believe that less than a week ago we were talking on the phone? That was so great. Really. I'm so grateful we got to do that! It gave me so much energy and happiness to talk with you. Yes, I know I already sound like one of those weird annoying sister missionaries. I'll be weird when I get home. Oh well. But seriously your voices are great! I also finally got to hear those recordings you sent on the zip drive so that was fun! You all are seriously the best. So funny thing: Sister Bown cried when she heard us talking. She was like "you and your family are so amazing!" And then the funny part is that she didn't cry when she talked to her family. Ha ha.

Sis Bown (pronounced like the color Brown without the r) and Sara on a sunny day!

 

Zone Conference was really fun! I loved spending time with the zone.

This Zone did a great job with finding the quotes as shown by Elders Zelezniak and Finch.  Sisters Bezdjian and Bown, Elders Cieslak, Stumpf, Raines, Dodge, Stockford and Tingey were all outstanding.

Sara got to be with her MTC companion Sis Masters at Zone Conference!

 As you probably saw on the blog we had a white elephant exchange, 

Elder Zelezniak received those special house slippers he wanted...

as did Sister Bezdjian.

Sara could use the slippers as her heels are peeling off - yuck
note the healing pox on her hands

really good lunch,

Thanks to 3 crockpots that were borrowed from other Branches around Poland, a delicious Christmas dinner was prepared by Elder and Sister Reed.  A big THANK YOU to them for a great meal!

Elder Roberts, Sisters Masters, Bezdjian, Bown, Forsey, Elders Finch and Gladun. 

 and lots of discussion from 3 Nephi 1 and Luke 1-2. We also watched some really cool videos from lds.org and the Christmas Devotional. I think every time we have Zone Conference I get a headache from the spiritual overload of goodness (plus lots of food).

The Bydgoszcz Zone: Seated: Elder and Sister Reed.  Middle Row: Elders Stumpf and Cieslak, Sisters Masters, Forsey, Bown and Bezdjian, Elders Roberts and Gladun.  Top Row: Elders Finch, Zelezniak, Dodge, Raines, Gudnason, Tiner, Stockford and Tingey.

The Poznan District: Elder and Sister Reed, Sisters Bezdjian and Bown, Elders Tingey (District Leader) and Stockford.

Everyone headed out and the "clean up committee" took over...the home town district...The Poznan District.  It was a great Zone Conference.  We had fun, enjoyed a wonderful Christmas program, received and gave gifts and most of all appreicated Christmas a little more.

It's back to Warsaw to get ready for the weekend.

We love our missionaries and just being with them.  They are so talented and valiant.  

These are days never to be forgotten

Something I learned from the scriptures this week: I studied President Uchtdorf's talk about regrets and resolutions. It is such a good time of year to look back, look ahead, and set goals and resolutions. Some of my goals are for this transfer, some for the rest of my mission, and some for the year in general. I can't wait to start the year afresh and see the miracles.

Sis. Bown is wonderful. I am having a great time with her. She is such a positive person and willing to work. She is from St. George, Utah and is really tall. She has 1 brother and 4 sisters and if you guys thought the parents were strict, meet the Bowns! She had curfew at 10 ON A GOOD DAY. 10 pm! Crazy. 

Morning run!

It is fun being around her and I like learning together. She is a good example of humility because she is pro at tennis and piano but doesn't brag about it at all. Oh and she has handwriting like Hannah too so that's nice. We get along really well and we set a bunch of goals together for the transfer and the new year. 

She taught me something way cool this week. We talked about the stripling warriors and she made a good point--they were warriors, not soldiers. So what's the difference between a soldier and a warrior? Soldiers fight because they're paid, and warriors have their heart in the cause. So we as missionaries are going to work like warriors rather than soldiers.

Also we talked about teaching the doctrine clearly and simply and she had a good analogy. When we teach well and invite them to make commitments, it's like we passed the ball to their court. But you can't cut the ball in half and expect them to bounce it back. We should teach simply and thoroughly.  

And our Christ-like attribute for this week is: humility. We are lucky and blessed to be teaching so many families and finding so many people. I just want to work on giving the Lord the credit and not wanting people to be baptized for my own selfish reasons. Because Irena set a baptismal date! And so did Romana. Let me tell you about her. She is crazy/awesome. So the Elders got a phone call on Christmas from Romana saying she wanted to come to our services. Well Christmas was a Tuesday so they told her you can come on Sunday. Then they set up at did a trade-off because she is a single woman and living in our area. So we went over there and turns out she met the missionaries 9 years ago and really wants to be baptized. Talk about a miracle out of the blue. So her date is the 9th of February and she's studied tons of religions and she thinks we are great people, loves to talk a lot, and is so excited about all of this. We're meeting with her again tomorrow and hopefully Marcin, our recent convert (as of 9 days ago) will come with us!

 

Things I forgot to tell you about on the phone:

*It gets DARK at 4 pm.

*I am working on the splits! I'm almost there. I was super close to the ground but then I did it too much and kind of hurt my leg. But I think I will get there in the next month or two!

*My cooking skills are improving. I can officially make Jesus Bread, polish salad, pizza, and fish tacos and delicous pasta sauce :) I only have ruined a few things so far.

*Also: we had a meeting with our Australian doctor friend with Elder Reed and it was great! He is really loving the Book of Mormon and I think he is feeling the truth of our message.

*We had a christmas obiad with members/investigators after Marcin's baptism on the 22nd and it was so much fun! see the reed's blog for pictures.

 

Love you all! keep the emails/letters coming :)

 

Sara

 

p.s. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!

from the Reed's Blog....

Christmas Day

Posted on December 28, 2012 by tom

We again had the missionaries over for Christmas dinner, along with three of our Branch members – Marian, Bozena, and Arseni. Turkey, yams, and pumpkin pie were not on the menu, but Sister Reed did produce some sage dressing along with chicken for the occasion. We had a great time together, and after our meal we played one of our favorite games – Bonko. There are no language barriers in this game. We were so glad that our three Branch members could come to help us celebrate this very special day.

Elder Tingey, Elder Stockford, Arseni, Sister Bown, and Sister Bezdjian

Marian, Sister Reed, Elder Reed, and Bozena

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Wigilia

Posted on December 25, 2012 by tom

Wigilia – Christmas Eve! We had a American Christmas Eve with our missionaries, Sisters Bezdjian and Bown and Elders Stockford and Tingey. We didn’t have a 12 course meal as is the Polish tradition, or watch for the first star of the evening to appear in order to begin our festivities; but we still had a great time. We enjoyed our dinner together with lots of conversation, and then the Elders and Sisters planned a little skit to perform for us – we had to have an audience, so we were the perfect audience.

They had a great time planning the skit.

The skit was a great hit, and the audience couldn't stop its applause! They responded as actors do after a spectacular performance.

After the skit we watched one of the Tabernacle Choir’s Christmas performances of Music and the Spoken Word. That was a special Christmas treat for the missionaries and for us, too. We ended the evening with a candlelight reading of the beautiful story of the birth of the Savior found in the book of Luke and the singing of Christmas carols. We all shared our testimonies of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Redeemer. It was such a wonderful Christmas Eve to be with our much-loved missionaries with whom we serve here in Poznan.

Merry Christmas from the Poznan missionaries!

Posting from the Reed's Blog (the senior couple in Poznan)

Branch Christmas Party

Posted on December 23, 2012 by tom

At this time of year in Poznan our days are pretty short. It starts getting dark around 3:30, and the mornings aren’t totally light until 8:00. The skies are usually gray and overcast during the winter. But in spite of all that, there is a lot of holiday joy going around among people. It’s a beautiful time of year as we celebrate the birth of our Savior. We had a wonderful Branch Christmas party last night with a large group attending. Over half the group were visitors or investigators, thanks to our missionaries. We started the evening with a wonderful dinner of contributions from the people in attendance. We then sang Polish carols (very beautiful carols, we must say), followed by a “white elephant” gift exchange. The gift exchange brought a lot of laughter with each gift opened. There was such a warm spirit at this gathering, and everyone seemed to have a great time.

Most of the group as we enjoyed the meal. We had about 34 in attendance, which made the evening very festive.

Regina opened her gift and found a meat hammer. She's got great plans for this untensil!

Grzegorz received this fuzzy scarf, which brought the house down. He was in charge of the party set-up and did a great job.

We are sure this gift will be most useful!

These boys had a laugh out of their gifts - a gorgeous tie and a packet of tissue!

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Baptism for Marcin

Posted on December 23, 2012 by tom

Saturday afternoon Marcin was baptized and confirmed as a new member of the Church. What a wonderful occasion this was! He has been taught by the Elders for several months, and his testimony has grown through those months and continues to grow. He has just graduated from one of the universities here in Poznan, and we hope that he can find a job here in order to stay in the city as a member of our branch. He is a wonderful young man and is a great addition to our branch.

Elder Tingey (who was just transferred to our branch), Marcin, and Elder Stockford

This is the group attending Marcin's baptism. Five of Marcin's friends attended this special occasion for him.

We also have a new Sister in our branch. Sister Bown has joined us, and we are so glad to have her along with Sister Bezdjian. Our missionaries are working so diligently and are very busy contacting and teaching. The seeds of the gospel are being planted in Poznan by these wonderful Elders and Sisters.