I have a few more minutes today then I had last week, and I hope that I will be able to use them well.
Zlín is still rather beautiful. Almost all of the snow has melted in the past few days and it has been quite a bit warmer than it had been for the past two months. It is nice, but it was interesting to go tracting in the rain last Saturday in the middle of January. It was a good experience to write in my journal, although I likely forgot to write it down.
Elder Bown is a very patient missionary. Hopefully I have not done anything to require him to use that gift, but he is very patient and sincerely full of hope. He really wants to see all of the people we work with (many less active members) come back to full activity in the church. He has already been here for almost five months and he really has a wonderful love for the people and the city. It is a pleasure to be serving with him.
The main square is much further from my apartment than in Třebíč. I mention this fact to other missionaries, who then get a little mad at me, stating that although it may be about five times further, one hundred meters is not much further than the twenty meters it was in Třebíč. Then I just smile as they struggle to understand my humor. The church building is right off of the main square and just around the corner from McDonalds (I have been there about four or five times already, once three days in a row). I should probably stop going so often, but it just tastes so good.
The branch here is rather wonderful. We have a great branch president, President Večeřa. He has been a member of the church for about six years, but I can tell that he applies the principle that he is trying to impress on the members, including daily scriptures study. I have rarely seen men who can speak as well and fluidly during church about the gospel and from the scriptures. He really is a giant spiritually (as well as physically; he is rather tall and very muscular (he works in construction of some sort)).
We are building up the area here, so unfortunately, I do not have very many other people to describe to you. One family that we are teaching is rather great, they have two young boys and they lived in Australia for several years, but I still do not know a lot about them. Although I did play some sort of Monkey board game with them last Monday after our meeting. It was rather fun, but we really could not justify playing for more than a couple of minutes.
We were also pleasently surprised that one of the member we home teach brought a friend to our lesson. We taught them about the Restoration, and then this member brought her friend to church. We have second meeting with them tomorrow and we are looking forward to that a lot.
If you have any more information on Joseph Schindler, especially about his life before leaving Europe, please send it my way. [This is Joseph's great great grandfather who was born in Bohemia -- which is part of the Czech Republic.]
I love you and good luck with everything this week.
Love,
Elder Schindler
ps- I live in Zlín , not Zlin (there is a difference, although it really does not matter). [This is important to those of us who have a keyboard that can actually make this mark!]
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