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.
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