Miracles in Croatia

This week, we received a nice letter from Ryan's mission president, David Hill, along with a photo of Ryan with President and Sister Hill. Ryan is having a wonderful time in Croatia. He is adapting well to his new environment and feeling the spirit of his wonderful work.  He asks for help from all of us: "Miracles are occurring here, and I cant wait to tell them to you!  Pray your hearts out for Croatia!  I really feel like many people are prepared!  Weve just got to have the faith, the prayers, and the work!  Try to remember Jasminka and Vladimir and Bljubašuc, and our Branch in your prayers."

Here are some more excerpts from Ryan's last email:

Welp.  Osijek is doing great.  That was really cool to hear about Sister Hendrickson!  Im going to have to look up her pic at the church here!  Thats sweet that she was a greenie here too.  She probably knew a couple of my mtc teachers on the mish, aka Sister Cassinat and Sister Harper.  Tell her hello...

Its true what she said in the e-mail about osijek, "it truly does have a lot of potential!"  We had the worlds most inspired zone conference on Thursday, i am convinced.  It was actually a mission tour zone conference.  Elder Wundra, an Eastern European area 70 from Austria was the main speaker.  He talked about how we need to break free of the influence of satan, basically liberate ourselves from the fruits of Satan - doubt, discouragement, fear, sin, low expectations, and complacency just to name a few.....  Along with that message, he said that we must align our expectations and our goals with God's -- to set our goals based on the desires of our hearts and the vision of what we hope to see happening in Croatia -- and not set our goals out of discouragement from past history and other sources.  This mission has had the "eastern european" reputation, and people tend to think like "i hope to bring 1 or two souls unto christ while im here".  Elder Wundra pointed out that that goal does not reflect the desire of our hearts, or the vision of what we can see accomplished. 

It was prophesied in the dedicatory prayer that stakes will dot this land, so God has that vision, and so do we, and we all want that.  What Elder Wundra was saying was that our goals, and also our expectations/hopes need to reflect that.  He added that as we eliminate Satan's influence in our lives through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, we can accomplish God's purposes.  When we sanctify ourselves of the adversary, we sanctify ourselves of fear, doubt, discouragement, and we are filled with love, meakness, and the help / power of God. 

As I sat there listening and being taught a little by the Spirit, I really felt as if that is the future of this mission.  With courage, faith, and work, stakes will dot this land...  The Lord can do his work here as we excercise faith like we never have before.  I just hope I can live up to that standard and be humble enough to submit to God's will...  Miracles are occuring here, and I cant wait to tell them to you!  Pray your hearts out for Croatia!  I really feel like many people are prepared!  Weve just got to have the faith, the prayers, and the work!  Try to remember Jasminka and Vladimir and Bljubašuc, and our Branch in your prayers.  These people need the fruits of faith to work on their lives!  They are such amazing peeps! 

Croatia continues to be tight.  We are going to the Osijek zoo today :]

Sounds like things are good at home!  Keep it real!  I love you all...  Thank you for your h-core support. I feel it out here.  When i have little tender mercies, i think its because of my awesome supportive fam and friends back at home.  Thanks for it all... You are in my prayers.

Ryan is in Croatia!

Ryan arrived in Croatia on September 30th.  Sorry it has taken me so long to post the good news to this blog.

He is stationed in the city of Osijek, in eastern Croatia, near the Serbian border.

The Church is really young in Croatia.  Osijek has a tiny branch, with just half a dozen attendees. What a thrill it is to have Ryan out there on the frontiers of the Church.  We are confident that good people will respond to Ryan's Christlike love and desire to learn about the restored gospel.

Here is an excerpt from his last email:



Puna pozdrava iz Osijeka.....

AKA many greetings from Osijek!!

It's Oh-see-yek, jtlyk. Osijek is sweet. Things are going well here. So the other day, Vladimir, one of our investigators, took us to get chestnuts roasted on an open fire!! They actually do that here. Do you know what's funny though?? They are kind of / really nasty. It's like mushrooms... Just a noch worse than having no taste at all. Heh!

I got here, and we had like a mini teaching pool. Elder Giberson had been here for 2 months, and the couple weeks before we got here, he was throughout Croatia doing visa related things i think, idk really. But not much was going down here. So, we don't have many people investigating the church right now, but its all good. We have a couple non-progressing investigators named Jasminka (Yasmeenkah), and also Vladimir (Vlahdeemeer). I don't know either of them really well. But ill let you know about them when i do... We also met a guy named Bljuvašuc (Blyoovashooch, heh! I cant really say it without repeating myself!) on a bench the other day. We decided we wanted to talk to him, so we walked over and elder giberson introduced us. I kinda felt like I should share with him a little bit about our purpose in life. So in H-CORE broken Croatian, I said something like, "our message is that we lived with God before this life. We are his children. We are part of his family. We have a purpose here on earth." Idk if he understood anything, but it was enough to get him listening to us/elder giberson. Elder Giberson talked to him for a while about our church,
and we got his number. He lives like 30 km away or so in a tiny town. We cant get a hold of him so far, but we'll see what we can do. Pray for him! He was such a nice guy.

So, Croatia is pretty crazy. There's so many things that are just randomly different. The door handles are all bar style - no knobbers. No windows slide up and down. Only in or to the side. Showers dont hang, there on a hose. Acura's here have hondas logo slapped on them. The prism would be like. big here. Almost every house is connected somehow. They drink alot of juice. One things not dif her though - our neighbors are american! Haha, and guess what... theyre missionaries too! Just for a dif church! Evangelists, i think. Random, huh?? Our apartment is pretty desent (sp?)! I sleep on this fold out bed thing, and Elder giberson sleeps on like a half of a twin bed. Like as wide as a crib, but long enough for 6'4" Elder Giberson. Theres no dryers, so we hang dry everything. I may be buying a dryer soon........ Jk! but hang drying is an adjustment, as it were.

The branch is tight. There's been like 4 active members that have been coming every week. But, there is a former branch president named Zoran (just Zorahn...) that seriously everybody loves who has been out of town forever. He comes back this week along with another strong member slash pigeon racer, named Irvin. Im excited. Its amazing how much a difference two people can make in a branch. It will be so good for these people to have these two priesthood holders back.

Last sunday, I gave a talk and blessed the sacrament. I talked about life on earth, and the importance of having faith in Christ. I read it off word for word. Afterwards, Nikola (Nickola), a member of the branch, took my talk, corrected the mistakes, and gave it back w/ and F+ written on the bottom! Haha, it was so funny man. If only you knew good old nikola. Hes not a mean guy, just funny. Hes like 65 or something and he schools me in chess every sunday.

We also have this guy in our branch who is just a 'friend of the church'. He is like 65 too, and used to be a normal successful pediatrician and musician from what i hear. But something happened to his family in the war i guess, and something went out in his mind. He sort of lost it mentally. You can talk to him normally and stuff but he will talk to himself sometimes, i guess, and stuff. But thats sort of beside the point. Ever since they extended the responsibility for him to play the piano at church,he has come everyweek. He remixes the hymns, changing tempos and playing the chords one note after another, ya know. Like the trill thing? its tight.

gtg, peace!

Room 417 has become my home

Ryan's stay at the MTC is in its final stages.  It sounds like he had developed a real fondness for the MTC, but the end of September, he will be in Croatia, having new experiences, living in a new place, and extending his trademarked love of everyone with the good folks in Croatia. We share his excitement as he eagerly await that day.

Eric gave Ryan an English "Elder Dixon" name tag to wear on his flight to Utah when he departed.  I'm sure that English version has been replaced by a Croatian one by now.




Excerpts from Ryan's last email:

Hey fam,

How goes it??  So time is flying @ the mtc.  I can't believe its almost time to go to croatia.  Oddly enough,the mtc has become a home away from home.  I won't necessarily be as emotional when i leave the mtc as I was @ sky harbor, but the room 417 has become my home.

A week ago today,  Elder Uchtdorf came and talked to us....  he gave a CHOICE message.  He is Prophet, seer and revelator.  THe things that effected me the most were the words he said about prayer and sacrifice.. Ill paraphraze-ish...  He saidsomething like this ( or maybe this is just more of what i heard), 'Before you go to bed @ night, give a report to the Lord of what service you gave that day.  Put the sacrifices of the day on the alter, and ask the Lord to accept your sacrifice.  Ask for forgiveness for what shortcomings you had.  I promise that you will feel the love of the Lord as you sincerely seek forgiveness and repent with real intent.  THen, after you have offered your sacrifices before the Lord and asked him to be accepting of them and felt the love of the Lord, forget about those short comings.  Forget them.  Let your sleep be restful and rejuvinating.  THen wake up, and do your best the next day.'  I loved that message.  It helps remember who I serve and the reliance I have on the Lord.  I ought to offer all the sacrifice i can- time, energy, talents, strength, my selfish desires, etc - and concecrate it to the Lord, and try to do that better and better every day.  The Lord will make up for my shortcomings as i do my best.  He will do that for all of us.  It reminded me of that quote or saying or whatever that says, "Work like it all depends on you, but pray like in all depends on the Lord".  THat was such a good message, and it reafirmed to me the importance of hard work, the reality of a Living Prophet, and the importance of keeping the Holy Ghost as a constant companion.

Also, i have had thoughts floating in my head this week about how blessed i am to have the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in my life.  I think about what Nephi said, "My soul delighteth in the things of the Lord". THe gospel and faith in Jesus Christ brings peace to me that can come from no where else.  I've got some precious treasure...   As we talk about these things at the mtc, and as we talk to people at the R.C. it's apparent that we are out-of-control blessed.  It really makes me want to share.  THat will be so great to share that with the Croatians.

So, Holly dropped me a line and told me Willard may be up for grabs.  I'm not going to lie, the other day, i wrote tanner jones and told him that if he was looking for a sweet 98 prizm, my rents might be able to help him out.

GTG

Artistic Elder Dixon

Ryan is having a great time at the MTC and is getting excited to fly to Croatia in three weeks. Because we haven't received any photos from him yet, we pulled a couple of his artistic sketches out of the archives. He drew this first photo with regular crayons. Imagine that! I have to struggle to color between the lines in a coloring book!

Just another of his signature doodles!

Here are some excerpts from his latest email:

Dearest fam,

How are y'all? I'm doing just dandy here @ the mtc. Learning alot of tight stuff about life and the gospel slash croatian. THanks for the sickening package. I love packages!! pure joy!

BTW, im sending pictures via cd sometime soon. I am going to take a bunch and send them home. THere are some sweet audio visual tours as well.......

Welp, i didn't have time to tell last week, but we got released as zone leaders last week. It was the rubber chicken... Jk!! Our time was up after 4.5 weeks. We also got a new branch pres. Bres. Bancroft and his wife are going on a mission to South Korea about the same time i leave, so they got released. Pres. Rolfe, our new president, is the man. Another major change that went down @ the half way mark was the highly anticipated switching of the bunks. In other words, life is good @ the mtc. The bottom bunk status pretty much changed my life. I love it.

This last week, we taught lesson 1 in croatian twice. It was great. We definately have some work to do times infinity, but we are getting the message accross. We can testify, teach, and invite the spirit, which is what really matters... But we've got a long way to go. It was weird though, last sunday, I was asked to give the prayer in district meeting. So I got up to say it and almost said "Nash dragi nebeski oche" which is "our dear heavenly father", but then i caught myself and offered the prayer and finished. But while i was offering it, i realized that i have'nt given a full out English prayer for a long time, at least 2-3 weeks, idk. But, its cool that its wierd to pray in english. Also, my spanish is starting to fade, which is a good sign. I often speak the spanish in my mind on accident, but that's starting to be replaced by croation. Which is nice... :) Croatian is so rad!

THis past week, Elder Cook came and taught us in a devotional. His thoughts were focused on preach my gospel and how it came to be. That book is inspired of God. THe old 1st presidency had alot to do with the topics that were focused on in it. As i study it, it is very evident that it is written to help people come unto Christ, and to bring about the "immortality and eternal life of man". I love it.

One of my favorite things about the mtc is the referral center. We go there and answer phone calls for people who have seen an LDS commercial or see some advertisement who are interested in recieving some type of church literature/media. I was talking to a sweet catholic lady, who had called in for a Bible. The prompt encourages you to ask them what promted them to call for the literature, so I asked her, and she said she lost her old bible that she had had for a while, and she saw a commercial w/ a number and jumped on it. We talked for a little while, and she agreed to have the missionaries drop the bible off and share a message with her about Christ, rather than have us mail it to her. We got talking a little more, and she said that she had been "searching for the truth" for many years. She said she had always just tried to live by the bible to stay closest to the truth. I replied to her and said, "I want you to know that you've found the truth." I bore a little testimony that I knew Christ's true church was restored to the earth. Then, I told her that the issionaries could teach her more when they visited her. I wish I could be there when that transpired. She was so prepared. How sweet would that be for her to hear the story of Joseph Smith, somebody who also searched for truth and relied n the bible and faith, til it came??? So rad! Tightest woman ever. I know the true gospel is restored on the earth. We can know that by reading the Book of Mormon and praying to know of its' truth. I love you all, keep it real!!

RYan

Halfway through the MTC!

Last Sunday, during our weekend visit to California, we met Emily Hendrickson, who recently returned from serving a mission in Croatia. She loved Croatia and the Croatian people and had a wonderful experience serving there. She was excited to hear that Ryan will soon arrive in Croatia for his mission.

Emily graciously sent us a few photos of Croatia. The following photo is of the first LDS meetinghouse built in Croatia. It is scheduled to be dedicated in October, soon after Ryan arrives. How wonderful to see this significant milestone in the history of the Church in Croatia!

Here are a few excerpts from Ryan's last email:

Hey fam...

So the mtc continues to be tight. We are mor than half way through. Insane in the membrane. I will have pics for you soon. Croatian is coming along. We are progressing. THis thurs, we teach the message of the restoration in croatian. I am nervous... ish... we'll be alright though. I ll most def let you know how that goes.

I am still learning alot while I am here. THese past couple weeks we have been teaching and learning about the plan of salvation. I have thought and studied alot about who I really am & where I came from and why that really matters. The scriptures teach us that God is our loving spirit Father in Heaven and we lived with him before this life. So, we are his spirit children, and always will be. we also have an earthly body. Knowing that has helped me understand our purpose a little better. We are here on this earth to excercize faith and gain experience and to return back home to him... We are spiritual individuals having a mortal experience. God wants us to return to him. THat's why God gives us commandments -- to focus on spiritual things... to have an eternal perspective. We have to take care of our bodies and treat them properly, as God-given gifts, but we must nourish our spirits and have an eternal perspective and faith and use our bodies to do good. To be spiritually minded is life eternal. It's so important that everyone know who they are and where they came from, and where to turn so that they can return to heavenly father.

this week, i was chillin before a devotional and reading about the life of William Wilkinson Dixon [Ryan's great-great-great grandfather]. He is the man. I want to be just like him. With an orchard and all... I learned something important from what i read in that document. I noticed that they mentioned his membership in the Mormon church, but never really mentioned his testimony or conversion story. Only alittle at the end. But, even though little was said, I new he had a testimony of the Savior and his Restored gospel on earth today by his actions. THere was no question in my mind. He was dedicated to the church and his family and endured to the end. He is the man. I can't wait to meet the man. WHat a stud.com

Well, I love you all, K? k.

love ryan

Still Missing the Boy

We are thrilled that Ryan is on his mission and are confident that he is in the Lord's hands. But we still miss him. Holly mentioned at dinner tonight that she saw his car when she got home from school and for a moment thought he would be there to meet her.

In her head she knew he wasn't here, but in her heart ????

These photos are special because they capture a bit of the precious feelings we have for Elder Dixon.

Excerpts from Ryan's last email:

Hey fam,

Thanks for the dope package. We all loved it. the rubber chicken may have been the best part. Haha where did you get that one. Actually, where did we get the other one?? Trade show?? Haha my b. president came in and saw me open it and was all, "now is your family sending you stuff that i'm going to have to have you send home". I explained my fam is just tight and funny and it was all good. That was tight.

So, the mtc is tight. The more i get to know my companion, the more I realize he is a remix of spencer campbell. They are different in so many ways, but sometimes their manerisms are out of control similar, separated-at-birth style. It just makes him even easier to love... ha. There are some other look alikes. Sister Bott - a wife of a man (who teaches m prep and d&c at byu) who is in our branch pres., is Grandma Dent #2. Not that she even approaches how tight and perfect grandma is, but she reminds me so much of her, looks and personality alike. It's tight, she's a little bite of dent here at the mtc. Also steve redd number too. Picture steve like 2 ft taller w/ dark hair, and that is elder smith. He just left. He is a stud.com.

THe devotionals continue to be so tight at the mtc. Elder Dallin H. Oaks stopped by and gave a life-changing talk on the sacrament and how that tied w/ having the holy ghost as a constant companion and teaching by the spirit. That man is an apostle of the Lord. I know that. He set the perfect example of teaching by the spirit. He said in the beginning that this was a subject that "weighed heavily" on his mind for the past year or so. As we discussed after as a district, Bro Vernon (branch presidency) said that that must have been what the savior wanted us to hear. As we shared our thoughts about what we had heard and shared our testimonies, it was apparent that each of us had had an answer to prayer or at least the settling of a worry. THat's because the Spirit was there. WHen the Holy Ghost is present, Heavenly Father and the Savior can let us know individually what they want us to know. Not only was that message what we needed to hear collectively, but individually as well. THrough faith, repentenc, baptism, and then partaking prepared and ready of the sacrament, we can be cleansed of all our mistakes and sins regularly and live clean lives. THen we can have the Spirit as a constant companion. One thing i remember and was touched by was that he invoked the blessings of the President and Prophet, Thomas S. Monson, on us missionaries. THen he closed and left the room. WHen he left, I didn't feel the spirit leave, or feel it any less than when he was in the room. I still felt good, happy, peaceful, calm, etc. WHen someone carries the spirit with them and share a testimony through/ w/ that spirit, the other person is left feeling better. I want to leave everyone I meet better than when I saw them first.

Welp, I love you guys. Have a good day!

love
E dix

We are Following the Spirit

Ryan is having a wonderful time in the MTC. The following photo captures the essence of why Ryan will be a good missionary - taking the time to read to his nephews before he left to walk down the concourse to his flight. I think that is called "serving the one."

Some excerpts from Ryan's last email ...

Dobar Dan moj obitelj!

aka good day my family! What is up! How is everybody? It seems like AZ slash colorado slash everywhere else is doing pretty good.

I keep learning all kinds of stuff. This past sunday @ our devotional Pres Breinholt from the MTC presidency and his wife gave the devotional about music focused on hymns. He began by talking about the importance of hymns and the blessings that can come from hymns. I realized that it had gone unnoticed what an important roll hymns have played in my testimony slash overall happiness. He referred us to the 1st presidency address in the front of the hymn book that describes all the blessings that can come from them. It's tight. Then he had like 14-15ish random elders slash sisters come up to a mic and share their fave hymn and why it was their fave and then we all sang one verse of their choice. It was choice... I wasn't anticipating it, but singing hymns with missionaries has become one of my favorite things.

We taught the first lesson in the Teacher Evaluation Center aka TEC this week. Usually, you teach people (usually members) who come as volunteers and act as if they are looking into or investigating the church. THen we would teach them according to their kind-of made up profile. This week, our tight teacher, Sister Harper, decided to change it up. This weeek, she had us teach THAT person, the way they were, LDS or not. We were pretty sure the person we were going to teach was LDS, so we felt a little wierd / nervous about that. Like, how would we teach and LDS person about the restoration and it be like a real lesson? IDK, we thought it would be kind of wierd. But it wasn't. We got in there, and for the first few minutes, just got to know her. It turns out she was LDS, was a student @ BYU, and was a convert to the LDS church when she was a little girl. Her family joined the church when she was 6 and she got baptised when she was 8. When we knew who she was, we taught her principles from lesson 1 based on HER needs. We found ourselves not following the strict outline we had practiced in our study time. We asked her questions, heard her testimony, shared our testimonies, and we ALL learned and were better slash more fortified in our testimonies after we were done. We hadn't wandered aimlessly with what we taught. We are following the Spirit. It was Preach my Gospel style. It was sweet. It was the best lesson. I learned that ALL of us, whether members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints or not, are on a spiritual journey back to our loving, living Heavenly father. We can all benefit from the message of the Restored Gospel and the testimonies anytime, anywhere. The church is a huge support system, not just a gathering of perfect people. It's far far from that actually. I know that this church is true and it was restored by the power of God through a humble servant and prophet Joseph Smith. Because of that truth, there are Prophets, or God's chosen servants and leaders, who know the will of God for men, so that they can guide us back to him and have peace/joy in this life. THe Book of Mormon is convincing evidence of those truths. It's a wonderfully importent message, eh?!