Sestra Madison Ratcliffe: Exhaustion to a whole new level

Honestly looking back at this week, I am not sure if this week was the longest week of my life or the shortest.

all I know is that it was jam packed with stuff.

starting at the beginning of the week we met with this really cool guy who told us that he came only to see if we were air heads in our faith or if we were deep believers.

It was hilarious because we explained a couple principles and he said "wow I am surprised that girls your age think this deep."

HALLELUJAH I AM NOT AN AIRHEAD!

Then that night we had English and our branch presdent came to english and he had been to Prague when the czech republic became a stake and we were asking him who his bestfriend was and he said "my first best friend is my wife (pausing for the AWWWW...) my second best friend is my extended family and my third best friend is the Bratislava district and the Czech stake (and then he got all smiley and sat up in his seat a little higher) " then he starts going on a rant about how incredible it is to finally have someone that can give them a patriarchal blessing that they will be able to understand. I sat there and thought about how easy it was for me and how much of a blessing it was to have these things readily available to me when I need them in my own language, and I just thanked my father in heaven that the Czech and Slovak people can now experience those blessing that I took for granted.

Then we did service this week and my district is just IN LOVE with wildlife and I am just not, so my companion finds a toad and I totally avoided that situation and then one of the elders comes over to tell me that the toad just peed on my companions hand. and I said thats what you get when you pick up a random toad in the middle of the forest. hahah

Then the week picked up speed like it was nobodys business...

One day we were at the branch president house helping his wife to prepare for the Trencin dedication. Which is where Dieter F Uchtdorf 10 years ago dedicated Slovakia for the Preaching of the Gospel and every year, we go back to that place and remember the blessings that we have to be there and what we have recieved since that day.

So that happened on saturday and we went up and I was supposed to play Brightly Beams our Fathers Mercy on the piano and they forgot the sheet music, but luckily I had played it so much I could play it by memory, but the task was playing the piano by memory standing up with everyone watching. but it worked out alright, the nerves never went away until after it was over, but it worked out.

and we just hung around with everyone for a long time and hit some pinatas and played some games and it was wonderful to just feel the spirit and to see everyone gathered together.

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is Matthew 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

I know that the Lord was there in the midst of us. The spirit was tangible.

But the weekend doesn't end there, we were able to have a spirit filled branch conference and the next day followed zone training.

So I am not really sure if I am exhausted from working so hard or if I am exhausted because of the spiritual overload, or just a combination of both, BUT I KNOW THAT THIS CHURCH IS TRUE.

I have felt it this weekend and know that our Father in Heaven loves each and every one of us.

Have a miraculous week.

S Láskou,

Sestra Ratcliffe

Trencin dedication