11 August 2014
It was the biggest group of arriving and departing
missionaries I have dealt with so far....49 total. It is quite exciting to see them come in and
sad to say good-bye. The arriving group,
even though very large is more quiet, sit on the sofa, and feeling exhausted. The departing group is laughing, playing the
piano and up moving around. Sadly
within 3 days two of our new missionaries had gone home. .
I feel I have gotten the hang of all
there is to do. Sometimes the Mission
President will ask me to play detective and find out why something has or
hasn't happened....i.e. why he received notice of a certain visa waiter to be
transferred to Brazil....the mission he was called to.....but then so much time
had passed and we had yet to receive his passport/visa or flight
itinerary. Usually our work is the same routine from
transfer to transfer,
We went to the Iowa State Fair this past weekend. This fair is geared toward
farmers....mostly. Lots of
tractors....new and restored. I found a
small Ferguson tractor like my dad had and I used to drive on the farm. We could never afford the big John-Deere
tractors which is what you see in Iowa and the Case II.
Huge ones! Also, they have all
the animals and 4-H groups you could think of.
Big horses, miniature horses, sheep, pigs, cows, etc. Pork is big in Iowa. A lot of the food stands had some kind of
pork to see. Bacon was baked with fries, chips, eggs, around the steak and pork
chops. We were there about 3 hours and
then we got tired of walking so went home.
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| This Idaho farmer never had a tractor like this! |
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| Old restored Ferguson tractor like my dad had. (to my brother, Myron....this was the kind of tractor I was driving on "that"day!) |
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| Cool sand sculpture at Iowa State Fair (you can see how important pigs, corn, soy and Mcdonalds are to Iowans) |
17 August 2014
We are having a Mission Tour (with Elder Godoy of the
Seventy) in September . It's a big deal
for the Mission....I hear. He send us
his agenda. They have a couple of Zone Conferences
to be able to meet with all the missionaries, he goes out with some of the
missionaries doing their work (that would be awesome and scary at the same time). He chooses 4 missionaries from each Zone
Conference to interview. The office staff
and APs meet with him for a short while.
His job is to encourage and uplift the
missionaries. Sounds good!
This mission is doing well in finding people who want to be
baptized. I think people really are
looking for more in their life and seeking for truth.
Elder Stringham and I visited the Winter Quarters Temple,
visitors center there and also the Kanesville Tabernacle in Council
Bluffs. It is very humbling to visit
these places. The temple has art work
depicting the pioneers as they crossed the plains....on the walls as pictures
and also in their stained glass windows.
There is such a reverent feeling there.
The temple grounds contains the cemetery where many pioneers were
buried, having never reached the Salt Lake Valley. Two names that stuck out were a 90 year old
woman and a 1 day old baby boy. Some
buried there were never identified.
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| Outside Winter Quarters Temple |
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| Reading names of those buried there. |
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| A special tribute to the "unrecorded dead". For some reason this choked me up a little. |
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| This statue to me symbolizes the hardship and the sacrifice made by so many! |
Here is a sweet story sent to me by the couple that we
replaced in the Mission Home, Elder & Sister Gardner: (Sandee...you met them when they stopped in Colorado)
If You Think The Lord Isn't Aware Of His Children,
You Gotta Read This!
"A
member of our ward shared this amazing experience that he had this week. He was
in an airport and was trying to find a kiosk that would allow him to charge his
phone. He still had plenty of battery strength, but felt he should charge it
nonetheless. He found several kiosks, but they were all full. He finally found
a place and was sitting across the table from a young Chinese woman who seemed
visibly upset. She was on the phone with an airport employee trying to explain
her situation. The problem was that she spoke very little English. He heard her
repeat the word 'Mongolian'. The employee did not speak Chinese Mongolian. My
friend wanted to help, but did not speak Mongolian either; however, he had a
friend who had served a mission where he had to learn the Chinese Mongolian
language. My friend (Russ) called his friend (John) and explained the situation
and asked if he would be willing to help translate so that this young woman
could get her problem resolved. John agreed, so Russ gave his phone to the
young lady (YL) & said "Mongolian" and pointed to his phone. The
YL hesitantly took the phone and soon began chatting very rapidly while Russ
just looked on. After a few minutes, the YL began crying almost hysterically.
Russ was wondering what John could have said that made her cry, but just
waited, knowing there was nothing he could do. The YL would stop crying and
seemed to gain control over her emotions, only to start crying once again. Russ
was totally bewildered! The conversation lasted about 15 min. & a smiling,
teary-eyed YL handed back the phone to Russ. John was pretty emotional too as
he explained to Russ that this YL was a girl he had taught while on his mission
and he had baptized her and her whole family! She was on her way to the MTC in
preparation for a mission!!! He had also helped her resolve her airport
problem. "
Missionaries
are noted for collecting special conversion stories .
We
love you all!
