Finishing strong and having NO REGRETS!!

Another week down. I've been realizing that the fact that we're so busy is actually the answer to my prayers. I've been praying so hard that I would be able to finish my mission strongly and have no regrets and finish the work I needed to do here. We've been so busy that we don't have time to eat, or work out in the mornings, or actually have real p-days haha. We get a few hours today just to let y'all know that I'm still alive and that everything is well, and then it's back to the grind! good things are happening. 

This week was crazy(as before mentioned):

It's a little hard to remember what we actually did, because I'm looking back in my planner and realizing that our plans got shot(as usual hahaha), and we just got done what we needed to do that day, and didn't look back. Good things.

Monday: We went out and saw the national stadium, and went up to the... lookout point...(???) i guess at the top of the stadium. It was super sweet to get to see the whole stadium and be there. Childhood dream *check*.

Tuesday: Fixed a bunch of problems that popped up, and tried to get some studying done, and had district meeting. It was a good day. We met with our Ukranian peeps and taught them english, and about the gospel. They're great. Had dinner at the train station(or rather didn't have dinner), as we picked up Elders Fuhriman and Kriser from Wrocław. We had an exchange with them from Tuesday night until Thursday morning. 

Wednesday: Got up really early and played some soccer with the other elders in the district, and the Wrocław elders. It was super fun. Elder Fuhriman is originally from Ukraine, and balls pretty hard. we had a good time trolling the other elders. We had a good exchange with an english blitz at the college, some studies, a fantastic meeting with Klara at Nowy Świat, and then got flaked on a meeting directly after that. We did a bit of planning for zone trainings this week, and had a lesson with Agnieszka Ilnicka at the chapel, and she taught us how to speak polish. 

Thursday: Got the elders off to their cities, had some lunch, and worked on changing the english system. We had a meeting with Ren... at Nowy Świat, and it went really well. She's awesome, and we're just trying to help her get to church and trust God. Taught english after that, and got home in time for Elders Bebel and Garrison to come in for an exchange from Poznań.They're both bros, so we had a super fun time out on the grind. 

Friday: It was independence day, so centrum wasn't safe at all... which means that we spent a ton of the day out on the streets away from the center of the city, looking for people to teach. It's been cold as flip the last weeks, and it snowed almost every day, so that was pretty tough, but Elder Bebel and I got it done, and had a good time while doing it. Found a Browning store(biggest surprise of my mission), and taught a cool lady on the street who told us essentially had the gift of divination or discernment or something. Didn't know what to think, but she was open and pretty cool, so that was great. I conducted Bart's baptismal interview over at the Warsaw II chapel. He was ready, and the Spirit was there strongly, and that went well. Then I went out with Elder Garrison and we had a meeting with Andrz... and An.... They're so ADHD it's awesome haha. I love them, and we just have to work really hard to keep them focused. They gave us this nasty drink from Belarus that Elder Garrison was having trouble finishing(haha). He also wasn't smart about the speed at which he was eating this roll thing we were given, so he got another one, and was trying to make them give me another one too so that I would suffer with him. I won :) We read an awesome chapter out of the Book of Mormon, and it was a good meeting. Came home, and sat out in the cold because the other elders took the bus the wrong way and didn't realize until they were all the way at the end of the line... and they had the house keys. So that was fun. We had a good talk though. I love that guy. 

Saturday: The elders got themselves off to the train station, and Elder Mulder and I had a meeting with Jan... He was the investigator from Szczecin from my first mission that had a baptismal date while I was there. He just walked into English, and invited us over. We met with him and his friend, and they are coming to play soccer with us early saturday morning. It's a great opportunity to talk about the gospel and not scare them away. Then we went to english class and had a good time. We were waiting to hear back from our investigator that we were going to be having a meeting with, so we stopped in and got some warm food on the road while we could eat lunch that day, and ended up getting flaked... but while there, we english contacted two girls about coming to english class, and ended up having a super long conversation over lunch. They asked us out to a museum afterwards, and I realized that the whole "missionary" term hadn't made it very far with them. But maybe they'll come to english class and hear the gospel and give it a chance. We're just going to keep our distance haha. Came home and god some studies that we weren't going to get, and then went and taught our Ukrainians. It's interesting. We felt like we really really  needed to teach them english, and sometimes I wonder if it was just the Lord giving us an opportunity to try out our english system on them before we put it into practice next Thursday with all of the district leaders, zone leaders, and sister training leaders. We've been working on it non-stop... but there's still SO much to do, and we have every second of the next week completely filled already... which means that we might not get much of a pday next week as well, as we try to finish up everything monday night until wednesday morning. Pray for us. It's a big project, and we've gotten so much of it done, it all just needs to come together now. We need a miracle or two or three or four. (P90X joke).

Sunday: Church went really well. Mar... came to church, and finally set up to meet with us on Wednesday(elder mulder will be with someone else at the meeting, because we have another exchange this week). We also had Józ.... at church, and he wants to learn about family history and genealogy, so we set up a meeting for wednesday in a week and a half. Miracles. Hopefully he wants to learn about the gospel as well. Met with President late that night and worked through ideas about the english system, and zone trainings, and mlc(mission leadership council) stuff. It was fun, and good to see the Turek's. 

Today we got groceries for the sisters because Sister A broke her foot and Sister Dekker dropped a drawer on her toe... so they're about as homebound as you can get. They're great, and have just had the worst luck in the world the past few weeks. Pray for them! Then we got together with the other elders and practiced a song because we're going to be singing in sacrament meeting on sunday. We get a few hours here to relax, and then we meet with the ukranians, and then go pick up elders ashworth and dooley for our exchange this week. After the exchange, there's a zone training on Thursday, and an MLC with President Johnson from the european area presidency. That'll be good. 

Pray that we don't get sick(ain't nobody got time for that), and that we'll get everything done with this english project, as well as the next upcoming projects. We'll need it! Praying for y'all! Love you!

Elder Q

Biggest week of our lives....and it's only half over!

So we've got a little extra time this week to email before we go out and get some kebabs with the office elders in celebration of us surviving this week, which is why I have time to explain my week a little bit. 

Elder Cowley and I had our last half-week last week. We spent the whole time meeting with investigators and less-actives, and taking pictures and such. It was really busy, and went by really fast. Then Elder Cowley shipped out to Germany to finish his mission on the border of Poland and Germany. Elder Connelly came to me to finish his mission away from the office, and to be my companion so I could stay in my area and not have to sit in the office for the weekend. We had a great time. Elder Connelly is a bro, and we had a lot of good talks and times as his mission was coming to a close. We went to church in Warsaw II this week so that he could give his departing testimony, and I was able to spend some time with the members there. i sure do miss them. I also got to help President with transfer calls again, so I got to talk to a bunch of missionaries this weekend as well. We had a last hooray with the district during a meal hour, and ate at a milk bar, and then said our goodbyes. I'm going to be staying in my same area in Warsaw, and finishing it out until the end(watch out... 7 weeks. Crazy)

Then Monday morning, elder Mulder, my new companion, got here. That morning, I spent getting all of the departing missionaries picked up from the airport, and getting all of their baggage to the transporter. Elder Mulder and I dropped off his bags real quick while they were getting lunch, and then we helped the departing group get the things done they needed to on their last day. We got back to the mission home, and helped with dinner, then ate, then cleaned it up for a pretty long time, then we all went to bed. I was laying there trying to sleep, and got a prompting to check the transporter that we were going to be needing to use the next morning. Turns out, it wasn't where we left it... it was at the office-elders apartment. So we flew out of bed and went and got the transporter back, and dropped them back off at their house(good times.... it's fun working with those guys). Got home at like 11, and then tried to get some sleep while the other elders were still up and about, excited to go home. 

Tuesday morning, we woke up at 2 AM to get them to the airport for their flights. It was weird seeing them go. It means I'm officially one of the oldest missionaries in the mission. It was hard seeing some of my buddies go, but I'll see them soon. We got back in time to get just a few hours of precious sleep, before we were back up again picking up the new missionaries at the airport. There were TEN of them, so baggage was crazy, and getting everything done. We had lots of "AP Adventures" as we call them. Things always go wrong, and need to be fixed. We got all of their pictures taken(had to do two groups between president interviews and office legal work), and then took them out contacting for their first time. I was with Elder Dickson(weird, right??) and he's a STUD. All of them are, but I was really really impressed. I love working with the new missionaries. Stayed overnight at the mission home. 

Wednesday morning, we were up early again, getting the missionaries to the urząd to get legal work done. We had to leave the mission home at 7, so it wasn't THAT terribly bad. After, we helped clean up the mission home, and loaded the transporter with luggage to get ot the Wiktorska chapel for the trainers meetings. Taught the trainees a language segment during the first meeting for an hour, then had the second combined meeting, and we had a 15 minute segment about the "First 12 weeks" pamphlet, as well as the "Adjusting to Missionary Life" pamphlet. It went well. Everything in polish. I wonder if it'll ever get easy to speak in front of a bit group of people in polish. Then we had to fix some problems, and get luggage to a sister that had left it upstairs in the mission home, while still getting home in time to teach our favorite Ukrainians english. We talked with them, and they agreed to let us teach about Jesus Christ at the end of all of our lessons. They are very Spiritual, and Christian, and I feel the Spirit every time we're there. I think good things are going to happen. 

Tomorrow is MLC, so all of the mission leaders are coming into Warsaw to have a counsel. I'm really excited for it. We have time Saturday and Sunday to meet with people, and then next tuesday, we have zone conferences. First on Tuesday in Wawa, then Wednesday in Poznań, then Friday in Katowice. It's going to be awesome. Elder Mulder and I are taking a road trip to get to Poznań and Kato, because President will be in another country for a mission president meeting of some sort. It's oging to be epic. I'm really excited to see all the elders and sisters!

That was our week. So many miracles happened where we got saved from trouble, or something worked out PERFECTLY so that everything fell into place. A really cool miracle was that I felt randomely like we needed to pray again before we headed home at one point this last week. It was weird, adn I didn't know why, but we just did it. Then, on the freeway, we came around the corner, and just a few seconds earlier, someone had crashed in the merge lane right ahead of us. If we hadn't said that short prayer, that could have been us. God is taking care of us!

The church is true! I'm so grateful to be a member of this church, and to know what I know. God is so good to me.
I sure love you guys! Have a great week! We'll talk soon!

October 24, 2016....No time today but maybe tomorrow

Hello fam,

Please still send your weekly emails. I would love to read them. However I will not be emailing tomorrow or on tuesday for sure... we'll see if I ever email for sure... but I will definitely read them. So don't worry, I'm still alive and semi-healthy(cold), and we're going to make it through this crazy week in one piece, and I'll let you know later when we survive. I'm serving with Elder Mulder. He's so flippin tall, and he gets here tomorrow. I'm really really excited. 

That's all. Love you

Miracles this week! Oct 17, 2016

Miracles: 

• zone training was awesome.-still all in Polish. The gift of tongues is real. 
• Far... finally met with us(less-active), and opened up and now we know what to work with him on.
• Exchange with E McPherson and E White. I love those guys. Good times
• Culture night-saw a polish ballet. Weirdest thing I've ever seen... good experience to have.
• Ma... is a girl and she's awesome! She lives with Nuns, and actually believes and lives her faith. She invited us to an opera she was singing in the choir for... so we felt good about it, and saw it during our dinner hour. It was SO COOL. (picture included). Europe is awesome.
• Sur... came to church after months and months of prayers and meetings. He is great.
• Mar.... came to church as well! He'll be there next week too.
• Elder cowley and I led a tour of 40-50 people through the chapel on sunday afternoon. There were questions, the Spirit was there, and it went really really well. 
• Someone is coming to church, 17 copies of the book of mormon are going to be read, and miracles are happening. It was so cool. I feel so blessed to be apart of these miracles!

Love y'all! have a great week!

The church with Chopins heart in it! Crazy huh?

Want to enjoy Poland while I can...

Hey fam!

I think these are going to be quick emails from now-on... I'm getting pretty close to the end, and would rather spend my time seeing poland while I can instead of sitting in a library! I'll tell as much as I can when I get home, but I'll just give you the generals. 

MLC this week. All in polish. Pretty awesome. it's more of a counsel... so we just get together with the zone leaders and sister training leaders and talk about the mission and what the missionaries need. The Spirit leading the conversation in those meetings is incredible. 

We had a pass-off meeting with Ania. President asked us mission-wide to let sisters teach women and let elders teach men... which is hard because we have some really cool women who have huge potential. But we had the meeting and it went really really well. 

The Szczecin elders were with us for a quick exchange after MLC. Those Szczecin trains are ridiculously long, so they had to catch a train the next morning. It was really fun to spend some time with Elders Fetzer and Garrison. Unfortuantely we got flaked on all of the meetings that day, but that's okay! haha. 

Ziem... This guy is like 83, but looks and acts like he's 45. He was in the Green Berets.(gift of tongues understanding that one). He is super prepared, has bene reading the book of mormon since we gave it to him last week, and wants to prepare for baptism for the 12th of November. So we're meeting tomorrow again. Miracles. 

We taught english class as usual, as well as had religion course afterwards. It's awesome to be bold with people and invite them to Christ. 

Krz... We felt like we needed to meet with him again, even though he hasn't progressed yet. We ran into him miraculously a bunch, so I'm not surprised that there's things to be done! We felt the spirit strongly, and just went for it. He's a strong catholic, and we felt like we needed to get him thinking. It was so cool, and so amazing to see that we could be really really bold, and talk about really deep subjects with him, and that the Spirit was able to do what it needed to. It was epic, and he definitely saw some holes in his thinking. 

Friday we got flaked twice, but then had 2 really good meetings at the end of the day. Clara was on the lessons with us, and things went so well. Bog and Ana are our genius brothers, and I love them to death. Just trying to help them get to church. 

Bra isn't doing so hot. He feels like he needs to "go another way". He's rebelling against what he's felt and knows. We're going to meet again this week and see what he needs.(other than the Spirit and possibly a good conk in the head) :) love that guy. 

Yesterday we met with a guy from the Middle-East. We're not going to say any names here if you get my drift.... but he was epic. He brought a friend, and we had one of the boldest lessons of my mission. We testified of Jesus Christ, of the restoration, and of the prophet Joseph Smith. The Spirit was there so strongly. It was so cool. The problem was... Elder Cowley and i are just speaking polish 98% of the time... so we were teaching this lesson, and polish just started to come out a few different times and it was super embarassing haha. i'm not going to be 'that guy' when I come home that somehow forgot how to speak English haha. 

That's that. I sure love you guys. Have the best week ever!

One reason I came back to Poland.....the boys!

This week was a good one. It was one of those "trying weeks" where everything hit me like a sack of bricks, and I got to pick myself up off the ground a few times. I'm grateful for the experiences I'm having that are allowing me to learn patience and strength, and learning how to rely on the Lord. 

There's this guy in Warsaw... he's famous with the missionaries-we call him the anti-christ. He's essentially really good at(whenever he sees us), walking up and yelling a whole bunch of terrible things at us and those we're talking to. He ruins any street contacts that we have going on, and uses his three favorite(and only) english words he knows... which all happen to be swear-words. Usually we just switch really fast into English and ignore him until he goes away, because we've tried reasoning with him, and his heart is too hard at this point to listen to a single word we say. So this time, he was messing with our boy Bre... He actually has a baptismal date(more info to come), and was out in centrum with us while we were finding more people to teach. Well Bre... took him aside and was talking with him, and our anti-christ got in his head. So that got me going. I didn't see him that night, which is probably a good thing because I was going to let this guy have it. I hate when people mess with other peoples' salvation. Well the next day in centrum, of course this guy finds us there on the patelnia. He starts messing with the sisters, and I wasn't having that.... so I went over and started talking to them really fast in english, putting him right there next to me, closest to me. This guy gets mad and starts trying to physically get at me and stop me from talking. so first, all of the PTSD from my sketchy first-mission experiences kicked in, and then my adrenaline and self-defense tried to start kicking in. The only thing I could do to stop myself from going at this guy was I quickly switched into Polish and rattled off something like "don't you touch me-the police is right there." He was like "whoah, you speak polish??" and I answered him back a little bit, and then switched right back into english. He stopped trying to mess with me and the sisters, and went away, but I was still shaking from the stress and memories of last time. we finished out the finding activity, and I made it home and had some time to pray and work through some things mentally. We made it through that day, and have been working up from there. I'm grateful that the Lord is giving me opportunities to 'fight with my demons'. haha.

So Bre.... is on date! He's 22, and a stud. He like to talk a ton, which means that it's a bit tough to keep our lessons on topic, but he's excited and willing to do what he needs to in order to come closer to Christ. We're excited. He hasn't answered his phone today, so be praying for us!

Also Ren... is on date! It was a miracle. She has known and been meeting with missionaries for ages. She knows the church is true, and just needs the courage to be baptised, and give up some of the traditions of the catholic church. She can get there. Be praying for her as well. 

So we got to do some service yesterday. Ula(that member from Warsaw that I met on the train during my first mission as I was getting close to coming home-the one that gave me the Poland Warsaw tie...), has been telling me for a year and a half about her boys. They aren't members. Her husband is super less-active, although he used to be super super active.  I've been wanting for like a year and a half to get to meet them. At the beginning of this second mission, I felt strongly(as well as she did) that a large reason I needed to come back was for her boys. Well they needed some service to get done yesterday, and I told her that whatever she needed, we would do. They picked us up, and it was her and her husband and her oldest son, K.... He's a bro. We worked alongside them, cleaning out a storage unit that they bought from the city after someone stopped paying rent. We spent the entire morning with them, and a large part of the afternoon. It was awesome, and I think we did what we needed to do. So that was awesome. She was super grateful, and I'm excited to see if anything comes of it. I think her husband really liked us. Prayers please!  That's about it. I sure love you guys. Have a great week. 

Craziest and busiest weeks of my mission so far....and that's saying something!! Sept 12, 2016

What a week!!  We had one of the craziest, busiest weeks of my mission this week. It was absolutely FULL of miracles. The Lord is pouring out blessings... we're doing our best to catch all of them!

So early in the week, we had Mission Leadership Counsel with all of the zone leaders and sister training leaders in the mission. It happened in warsaw, and everything went so well!. It was really good to see all of the elders and sisters, and get to counsel together with them. It's also pretty cool having all the meetings in full polish. That always keeps things interesting and active. So Elder Garrison and Fetzer from Szczecin had an exchange with us immediately following MLC. We had a great time, and it was awesome to get to work with both of them. It was way fun to see and serve with elder fetzer. He's changed a ton since I trained him 5-6 months ago...and he's doing great! He's had some trials and health issues that he's getting through. He looks good. Elder garrison is an absolute homie as well. I really like that guy. So they had a train that left Thursday afternoon, after studies. Elder Cowley and I had just about no time to get so much done, because elders Hill and Liechty from Bydgoszcz were getting in thursday night. We planned as much as we could, and had to get a bunch of other random things done, but it went well. We had a meeitng with Re.... our investigator(she's awesome, and she knows the church is true... she's just searching for a baptismal date, and the courage to make the step), and Clara came on the meeting with us. She's perfect for Re... because Clara has no fear. I freaking love her. She is one of those huge blessings of my mission. So Re... is praying for a baptismal date, and we have another meeting on Thursday. We then had our last english course that night, and said goodbye to all of our old friends. (we told them they can visit us at church if they want to see us lol). Then the Elders got in, and we had a great night. On Friday, we did some weekly planning with them, and had a finding activity on the patelnia. I was with Elder Hill before that, and we had some extra time, so we walked over to the side of the road, ad nprayed for direction about where we needed to go and search for prepared people. We felt good about heading to a huge park in the middle of Warsaw. we got over to the park, and started teaching in the direction we felt was right. We stopped this kid who was our age, and had a fantastic lesson with him in the park. Elder Hill(a trainee) was testifying using all the polish he had, and the Spirit was there so strongly. That elder has the spirit. He's going to do awesome things in Poland. We got done, gave him a book, got his number, and talked about meeitng this week. after wards, elder hill looked at me and said "that was one of the first times someone's actually stopped and really talked to me on the street." It was pretty epic to do that with him. Then we went to the patelnia to find people. there were all the missionaries from warsaw 1 and 2 there. We were everywhere, and talking to everyone. I teamed up with elder white(he's one of my favorites... he's elder mcpherson's trainee, and he's ijhlarious I've talked about him before in my emials), and got him hyped about missionary work. He is still adjusting to missionary life, and like everyone, didn't want to talk to people at the start. So I started pushin his buttons and getting him pumped up, and by the end, he was going out of his way to get to people and track them down and stopping them. It was epic. He looked at me at the ned of it and said "thank you, elder quackenbush". It was a cool reminder that we actually do make a difference. I love that guy!

So they shipped out saturday morning. Elder cowley and I finished up weekly planning,and went and hit a few language stores for Prezydent to try to find the best dictionaries for misisonaries. They're wanting to change the dictionaries that the misisonaries are getting in the mtc(they're so bad that noone uses them), and to figure out good pocket dictionaries for the road, and good home dictionaries. So we visited a few shops, and are trying to find the best dictionaries. So then we went to sports saturday. My hips weren't feeling particularly good, and there weren't a bunch of people there or investigators... so I was standing there in the field, praying for the Lord's help to be productive, and this older gentleman walked by with his dog. I saw that he was well-put-together, and not too old, and had his life in order, so I just gave him a "good evening" comment as he was passing by, and smiled. He got about 10 steps, and turned around and asked if we knew eachother. I said "well not yet!" So he had me go on a walk with him, we sat on a bench, and chatted. We talked about the church, and I learned that he is a colognel in the army, a doctor, and a professor. He wants to do a presentation for the churhc-members with his students, and we want to go to his college and teach all his students about hte gospel. We're thinking about doing a trade. We're talking with prezydent turek about it a little bit later... so that's cool. We also met with this guy named Zdzi.... He's a dual citizen of the US and Poland, and he's pretty cool. The church really helped his good buddy get over his alcoholism, so he's very simpathetic to the church. We met with him , and had the most amazing lesson. it was led by the Spirit, and we just testified  about the things we know to be true. He could feel it. He is reading the book of mormon, and we're going to meet when he can find time! It was awesome, and the Spirit was SO STRONG. The gospel is so good.  Sunday was the biggest miracle. If you remember. you probably don't), I had that miracle that happened like 2 months ago with that guy named Pio.... We were standing at a zebra waiting for the crossing light to turn green, and he walked up with a bunch of bags. I  just looked at him and said someting stupid like "wlel you've got a lot of bags there, huh?" And we tlaked and he gave me his number and wants to meet. So we've had contact for a long time, and I don't know what it us, but I feel a connection with this guy, despite barely knowing him.  So I felt like I needed to call him saturday night, so I did, and he set up a meeting with us for sunday the next day, out by the river. I explained our purpose and all, just to make sure he knew we weren't just trying to hang out or something haha. And we met out there. We sat down on some stadium seats leading out o the Wisła, and we talked. The lesosn was completely led by the Spirit. I felt so ogod the whole time. We testified from the bottom of our hearts about the gospel and about how it has chnaged my life. He opened up. He told us that he's 20 years old, that for 10 years, he was a ministrant in the catholic chruch.(the definition in our dictionary is an altar-boy... which goes along with what he explained) he said that he knows he probably shouldn't have done it, but the day before he met us, he had prayed to God and asked for a sign. he wanted to know if God really listens to Him. Then He met us the next day. he told us that it wasn't a coincidence, and that god led us to eachother. We taught a large part of the restoration, and he ate it up. At the end, he opened up again. He said... "i'm scared". I asked him what he is scared about. "I'm scared that God is changing something huge in my life". If that's not real intent, then I don't know what is. He knows that God is leading him, and he knows that God is wanting to change his life. He's already thinking through the consequences of this road he's begujn. We bore testimony about the power of God, and about the truthfulness of the gospel. He asked if we could meet again soon, and this time at the chapel. I think we can make that work.. ;) haha. it was a miracle. We walked away, and you couldn't have wiped the smile off my face if you tried. I just felt the Spirit so strongly, and the love of God, and the truthfulness of this restored gospel. I am so grateful that I am so grateful to be a member of this true church, and to be able to share my testimony with the people of poland right now. I know that this church is true. God is good, and God has an individual plan for each of us. I am so happy to be a part of it. Love y'all. Have a great week!