Missionaries Are Branch Builders

Attending the U.S. vs. Czech Republic volleyball game at the world championship volleyball tournament

Starsi Shirley gets a new haircut

July 3, 2017

Hi!

We had a lesson with our awesome investigator, Petr, today. He had the baptismal date for my last weekend here, but it is looking like he won't make it, just because of the lack of time. So the date was moved back two weeks today. I won't be here to see it, and he was a little sad about that, but it'll be better! I'll just have to get pictures. He is great though. He came to church this weeks and enjoys it.

I’m definitely getting excited to come home. Why wouldn't I right? :) I'm excited to see you and everyone again. But it'll be sad of course to say bye to all of these people and to leave a country and a people that I love. It has been really weird to be hearing about all my friends getting home...that definitely hasn't helped with the trunkiness, haha. But I’m not trunky enough to not work hard until the end!

Today for P-day we had a few lessons. So we didn't have a whole ton of time to go somewhere. But we did go up to the top of the big tower here in the middle of the city so that was cool. I'll send you pictures!

Church this week was pretty good! We had a good amount of people there and the chapel was about full! Our two recent converts are doing awesome and both have the Aaronic priesthood now and are full and active members. It is exciting to see the branch grow! With Petr's baptism coming up in a month and the Sisters here should also have a baptism soon, the branch with be seeing a lot of growth for this year. It is exciting to see missionary work making a difference and watching the church grow. That is what missionary work is all about! In the words of Elder Cook, missionaries are also "branch builders." 

A surprise this last week was that we got to go watch a volleyball match! The world championship volleyball tournament just happens to be taking place in this city. And the Sisters meet one of the American team coaches on the street who is a member of the church. We got to go to the game and watch the American team play against the Czech Republic. It isn't a usual thing to go to sporting events, but it ended up working out. It got me excited to be able to watch sporting events again!

Love you!

-Elder Shirley