Part of the plan

Hello and thanks for looking at this representation of our experience as old missionaries in Poland. 

As our life becomes more familiar, it's harder to notice what might be interesting about it. Our missionary nephew, who disappoints his mom by not writing, replied when she asked him what he did this week: "We talked to people and did missionary stuff."

Succinct.

Our mission president and his family have been touring the several branches around Poland, familiarizing themselves with the people and the work. They visited Gdańsk this Sunday and they invited the two of us to join their family on Saturday for a p-day. President Chandler served in the Gdańsk area as a young missionary, so he wanted to recreate some of his mission experiences and pictures. One picture was of him at the train station in Hel. We spent the day there with their awesome children and are happy to report we made it there and back. We did have to pay the boatman, though.

For our excursion on Saturday, in her usual way of thinking of the kids, Sister Bridge had brought along some treats and a couple of card games to keep them busy on the boat ride home after a long, hotter than Hel expected day.

Somebody found a book at our church building with names of former missionaries back to when the work started in Poland in 1990. President Chandler's was the first companionship listed in the book. Sister Chandler started her mission about a year later, also in Poland. At the time they were not allowed to proselyte, but they could talk to people who talked to them. If a person showed curiosity about their name badge, that was a way to get into a conversation. We've found that's still true. Our Sister Halina (92) joined the Church before 1990 and thus we had three real pioneers together this Sunday.

Our friends, Mateusz and Natalie, the young couple who are half baptized (Natalie will be baptized this week now that she has delivered their second baby girl), happened to be reading in the Doctrine and Covenants 20 and saw "Every member of the church of Christ having children is to bring them unto the elders before the church, who are to lay their hands upon them in the name of Jesus Christ, and bless them in his name."

They told the missionaries they wanted to be obedient to everything, so asked what do they need to do for this to happen. I told Mateusz that, like going to the temple to be sealed, he would have to wait a year to become an Elder which is required to bless children. Anxious to keep this commandment, they asked me to bless their babies this week. I asked Mateusz to think about what he would say if he were to bless his daughters and he shared those thoughts with me. I mentioned this as part of our plan for sacrament meeting Sunday while with President Chandler on Saturday and he enlightened me that I was wrong on that point; receiving the Melchizedek priesthood does not have a time requirement after baptism. With this new information, I immediately encouraged Mateusz to change our plan, that in the long view and from my own experience, his blessing of his children would be significant in his life and theirs.

Incidentally, Mateusz's mother had planned to attend that sacrament meeting for the baby blessings, and the bonus is that she did come and was able to see what our meetings are like, She also was able to hear Mateusz talk about the importance of family in God's eternal plan for His children.

Because we had the new mission president and family in our meetings, our attendance was off the charts. I had prepared more than double the water cups for the sacrament, 30 this week. As the passing of the water got to the end, I could see there were only two cups left and Sister Bridge and the two priesthood holders were left. I realized I would have to walk from the front of the room out the back, go to the kitchen area and prepare just one cup of water to bless while everybody waited. As the tray came to Sister Bridge she reached into the bottom of the tray, pulled out a used cup, poured half the water from one of the remaining cups into it and drank it, leaving half of that unused cup and a full one for the men.

Solved.