44 Days: Holy smokes!

It has been quite some time since I have written on this blog, but I am going to try and make several posts before I leave on the mission.

I would like to relate to you a quick experience in which I had this past week while at the Salt Lake Temple when I was taking my endowments out.  When I checked in, my name-tag listed that I was a missionary, and at the check-in desk, they asked me, "So what mission are you going to?"  My response was quick and with joy, "The Poland Mission."  The men sitting there excitedly said, "Really?  There is another young man here who is going to the Poland Mission….let me look up what his name was."  after a few seconds they responded, "His name is Brother Tingey."  My excitement was great, and it was a great experience to know that we would be doing this great thing at the same time.  He and I have exchanged information and I can already tell that we are going to be great friends & it was a great sneak-peak to the mission.  I look forward to seeing him in the MTC and in the mission-field.  There are great coincidences that our Father in Heaven orchestrates.

I am headed to the Bountiful Temple in the morning and I wish that all of you have the greatest of all days!

May God bless you and heal you of all of your ailments & remember that it is through your faith in Jesus Christ that you are healed and sanctified.

Sincerely,

L Baranowski

Where have I been for the past week??

Where have I been?

Well, it has been the last few days of classes (Monday-Wednesday)


Monday:  Second-to-last-day of classes.

Tuesday:  Last day of Intro Information Systems Management & Book of Mormon II

Wednesday:  Last day of Stats, Calculus, and Environmental Biology

Thursday:  First day of preparation for finals ~ Study sessions & catching up on some sleep before finals

Friday:  Last day to prepare for finals!

Saturday:  Took my Calculus Final, Book of Mormon II Final, Environmental Final, & Powerpoint Final

Sunday:  Well, it was busy with the last day of Church with my singles ward.  We had a missionary fireside in which I was able to bear my testimony of some things I am grateful for.  I am grateful for my family & my Polish grandfather who converted to the church many years ago.

Monday:  Intro to Information Systems Final & Stats Final (Means I was done with finals FOR 2 YEARS!!)

Tuesday:  Arrive home & get my wisdom teeth out!  It has been a pretty crazy past few days, but I am enjoying every minute of it being home.

71 Days: Last minute preparations for school

Ay-yai-yai!  Where does the time keep going?  Well, on the bright side:  I ONLY HAVE ONE MORE DAY OF CLASSES!

Things completed:

• Passport application:  submitted
• Missionary acceptance letter:  submitted
• Mission Deferment (BYU):  submitted & accepted

Things still to come:

• PWS Midterm & Final Exam
• Information Systems Final Exam
• Calculus I Final Exam
• Book of Mormon II Final Exam
• Powerpoint Final Exam
• 5 Online Calculus Homeworks
• Stats Final Exam
• Typhoid Shot
• Book of Mormon Take-home Final
• Move out of apartment

Quite a few things left to do ~ but I still have some time!

Send me a message to let me know how you're doing!

Sincerely,

Logan

78 Days to Go: School & Roadblocks

School

My, my, my where has the time gone?  I have a mission call and only six days remaining in the semester.  It has been almost a week since I opened my mission call, making it one week closer to me leaving for the MTC, and then following several weeks at the Provo MTC, I will be headed to the great county of Poland.


My classes are soon going to be ending, starting one week from Saturday, I will be taking two finals (Calculus & BOM) , followed by two finals on Monday (Environmental Biology & Information Systems), and my final final (Statistics) will be on Tuesday, April 17th in the morning.  Then, I will be checking out of my apartment at BYU, and bringing the rest of my belongings home to Salt Lake.  Then, at 3pm, I will be getting my wisdom teeth out!  YAY!

Roadblocks:

I believe in the principle that basically says that Satan will try to influence our lives when we are doing what is right (what the Lord wants us to do).  The more you try to do right, the more it is important for Satan to attack your lives.  Let me include an excerpt from Joseph Smith--History 1:15-17

The Sacred Grove

15 After I had retired to the place where I had previously designed to go, having looked around me, and finding myself alone, I kneeled down and began to offer up the desires of my heart to God. I had scarcely done so, when immediately I was^aseized upon by some power which entirely overcame me, and had such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I could not speak. Thick ^bdarkness gathered around me, and it seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction.

 16 But, exerting all my powers to ^acall upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into ^bdespair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of ^clight exactly over my head, above the brightness of the ^dsun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.

The Two Personages that appeared

 17 It no sooner appeared than I found myself ^adelivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I^bsaw two ^cPersonages, whose brightness and ^dglory defy all description, ^estanding above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other—This is My ^fBeloved ^gSon. Hear Him!

I truly love this passage of scripture, and think of the picture of Joseph Smith when our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appeared unto him in the Sacred Grove.

I strongly have a testimony of Joseph Smith, and of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ ~ this part of scripture is a foundation to our religion, in which the Book of Mormon will later be translated by Joseph Smith, a prophet, is a keystone of our religion.  Without this experience, the restored Gospel would probably not be anywhere today.

With this passage, it is not to say that I am tempted like the Prophet Joseph Smith, yet I know that there has been some opposition in my life following my mission call.  I know that my mission was determined by a prophet of God in this dispensation on this great earth.  It was divinely inspired, and I know that if I was not meant to serve a mission, there would not have been a call extended unto me.

If any of you that are reading my blog are not members of our religion, I greatly appreciate you and thank you for your support.  If you have any other questions concerning my religion, email me (and I'll try to answer) or check out lds.org .  Also, anyone who would like me to post any topics on my blog, let me know.

I hope that you all have an enjoyable rest of the week, and I wish many blessings unto all of you.

Sincerely,

Logan P. Baranowski

79 Days to Go: General Conference & More

Fun fact about Poland:  Poland is approximately the size of New Mexico.

Not about my mission, but about my roommates mission to Adelaide Australia.  When I was leaving Priesthood session last night, I ran into one of my past bishops (left) and notified him where I would be serving my mission.  Then (knowing that he would be serving as a mission president) I asked him where his call was extended to.  He replied with, "It will be to Adelaide Australia!"  I reacted with sheer excitement because, my roommate, from Round Rock, Texas (right) will be serving under him approximately one month after he gets to the country.  What a small world we live in today!

I am still working on learning some of the language.  It is difficult, but I thought I would review some of things that I have learned.  Particularly, the alphabet is strange, even though they use the same alphabet.
Some strange things, just about the alphabet:

• There are no Q's, V's or X's
• A 'w' makes a 'v' sound
• This funny letter (an 'L' with a slash through it) Ł or ł makes a 'w' sound

GENERAL CONFERENCE

General conference was quite enjoyable!  I particularly enjoyed Priesthood session.  They spoke much of setting a good example for those around you.  It was notably mentioned that it is our priesthood duty to set an example/standard for those around us in which all would want to follow in our footsteps.

Also, during the Sunday Morning Session, President Uchtdorf's talk was all about judging others.  His recommendation:  STOP IT!  We all find ourselves from time to time judging others, when we should be mostly worried about ourselves, and taking care of our own issues.  In conjunction with this talk about judgement, he made a bold statement when he said, "don't judge me because I sin differently than you".  This is so true, because we all have our own problems, and we need to fix/solve them in our own way.

I hope to hear from you all,

Sincerely,

Brother Baranowski

82 Days to Go: What to do?

I think that I will try to post daily to this blog in preparation for my leaving to the great land of Poland on June 20th 2012.

I thought that I would list some fun facts about June 20th and why it is significant in my life:

1. My nephew Max's birthday will be then.  He will be turning 8 at the 'hump' (year mark) for my mission, where he will have the opportunity to be baptized!
2. 1877 – Alexander Graham Bell installs the world's first commercial telephone service in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
3. It will be summer solstice (a beginning to my favorite season)
4. 1975 - The movie "Jaws" was released (even more reason to stay away from the water on the mission)
5. I will be leaving on my mission! (The greatest event ever!)

FYI - General Conference begins tomorrow!

Au revoir!

Mission Call & Blog Intro

Hello All,

I have been called to serve as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Poland Warsaw Mission.  I will be reporting to the Provo MTC on June 20th 2012.  I will be preaching the gospel in the Polish Language.

My hope is that I can fill this blog with things that I am doing to prepare for my mission.  I want everyone to be aware of the incredible amount of things needed to do to prepare to serve a mission.  Also, I am hoping to have my letters and/or pictures posted to this blog while I am away.

I have quite a few temporal things to do in preparation for my mission.
#1 Priority:  Get a passport!
#2 Priority:  Get Typhoid Shot (The only one I need!)
#3 Priority:  Defer my college education at Brigham Young University
#4 Priority:  Start packing up my things
#5 Priority:  Survive finals while being excited about the mission :D

I am also still in the process of letting people know where I will be heading.  Two of my great friends Elder Michael Campbell, and Richard Fetzer are already leading the way in missionary service and I need to let them know of this great landmark in my life that I have reached.

I wanted to share a quick quote about the Book of Mormon from the Prophet Joseph Smith:
“I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.”
History of the Church, 4:461; from instructions given by Joseph Smith on Nov. 28, 1841, in Nauvoo, Illinois; reported by Wilford Woodruff.

Please keep me in your prayers as I continually day-by-day keep preparing to go forth.

Sincerely,

Brother Logan P. Baranowski