Sometimes a Mission is Work!

Another month gone and a whole lot of things happened.  On March 2 we had the opportunity to go to a zone conference up at Wildwood Ranch near Ramona.  It is the site of a church owned camp.  It was beautiful.  It had a swimming pool, archery range, a lot of camping area, a zip line and was in a remote area.  And much to the chagrin of Diana, there were signs indicating to be on the lookout for snakes (even at the restrooms)!  We had some great instruction from the Mission President as well as some of the missionaries.  Later they were going to have some team building activities, but we had to get back and finish getting some other things done so we left after lunch.

One thing that we have been doing for both. YSA wards is to teach their Temple Preparation class.  We started one that we taught just before the Wednesday night Institute class.  This included Larry Chu and Michael Guevara, both who had been baptized about a year ago.  Larry is the one who has a mission call to Washington DC that will start in May.  We also began teaching one in the 1st ward during Sunday School that includes two engaged couples, Garrett Middleton and Janessa McCammon and Matt Starr and Kelly Kawamoto, along with a prospective missionary, Cameron Lapuaho.  We later were joined with Nguyen Ngo, a fairly new member from Vietnam.  While the names may be meaningless to others reading this blog, I need to write them down for my own poor memory. Another class started up in the 2nd ward and we have been adding participants on a ongoing basis.  Right now we have John Martinez, Limna Oteo, Khaliah Dillard, Ann Broman, and Leslie Rosas attending.  It has been a very satisfying class to teach.  And the fruits of it were evidenced last night, March 29 as we went to the temple with Larry for his first time.

Larry outside the temple before receiving his endowment.

It is always a wonderful thing to go to the temple, but to witness someone attending their first time made me listen more carefully to it and consider what it might seem to someone who had never been through it. The temple provides a tremendous opportunity to feel the peace and love that you find in that building.  The only downside of the experience was that there were not many people in the temple.  It had been closed for the two week maintenance and this was the first day it was opened and yet the sessions seemed to be sparsely attended.  With so much work to be done, it is sad that we can't fill every session.
On March 5 we decided to take some time and enjoy ourselves by going back to the zoo for the morning.  It was an enjoyable time when we just found some of the things that we wanted to see again.  The animals were really active for some reason and we saw the cheetah out which is one of Diana's favorites!

What a patient cheetah

We then were able to participate in Jose Montemayor's baptism.  It was great to once again see someone who has so readily accepted the gospel. 

Jose with us at his baptism

Elders Raleigh and Kunz with Jose and Spencer

Sunday the 6th was another busy day at church: going to both wards, teaching two temple preparation classes and then having dinner with Kylee, a non-member along with Lupe, Rylee and Nicole who were all there to fellowship her.  We had a good time, but it is uncertain how far we will get with Kylee.
The first Monday of each month is a time for all the Senior Missionaries to get together for a Family Home Evening.  One of the things that is becoming apparent is that we are fast becoming veteran missionaries.  Some of the missionaries that we have come to know are going home.  Between now and July we will have many more leave.  Our mission is about half over and that is really hard to believe.  The FHE is the time for newly arrived missionaries to be introduced and leaving missionaries to bear their testimonies.  It is always a good opportunity.
March was a teaching month for us.  Not only did we continue with our Institute class and our temple preparation classes but Brother Mackay had to go out of town and needed us to substitute in the second week.  It is always fun to teach and it was wonderful to add a couple of new lessons to our schedule.  However more lessons require more preparation and the following week we were faced with both more lessons and running the Institute by ourselves.  Our secretary, Lori was out for knee surgery and Brother Mackay's great aunt died in Mesa.  He felt compelled to go the funeral, as he should have and left us to deal with things from Tuesday through Thursday.  Not only would we need to teach, but we would need to maintain the Institute hours and do some preparation for the Easter program that Brother Mackay was preparing for his ward that Friday, which would later be brought to the Institute.  On Tuesday and Wednesday we were at the Institute from 9 am to 9 pm and Thursday was not much shorter.  We looked forward to some down time on Friday, but found that Brother Mackay was setting up the presentation alone at his church.  Realizing the need he had we then spent until about 7 pm helping him set it up.  It was a four room presentation and we really wondered if we would make it in time for the opening at 6 pm.  But the Lord was behind us and we were able to open it by 6:15.  To say that we were tired is understating it.  We were supposed to go to a Regional YSA activity at Wildwood Ranch, but we contacted the ward organizing it and told them we did not have the energy to spend another six to seven hours working there.  As we looked back at the past two weeks, we had worked a tremendous number of hours on each day with little tie down except for our morning foray to the zoo.  We were bushed!  That night we finally slept for over nine hours (and anyone knowing me realizes that I never sleep that long).
The week was over.  We looked forward to the week of spring break which would have the Institute closed for the whole week.  But even with that, we had to help make the Easter presentation better by making some changes to it.  This did require us to spend several hours on Monday through Thursday during that week.  We spent a lot of time this past month doing many things we didn't think would be part of our missionary calling.  I guess I've learned that your calling may be developed over the period of time you have to serve.  It can change with the needs of the areas in which you are called to serve.  Our varied experiences have provided some really interesting service opportunities for us and all of it is geared toward accomplishing the work of the Lord.
Well a week has passed since I started this and still it hasn't been published.  So I will just quit trying to add and put it on the blog! 

March was a blur!

One of our privileges as CES Missionaries is special broadcasts by General Authorities.  On Feb. 26, we were able to attend one by Elder Ballard.  What a privilege.  He issued challenges to those of us who teach the youth to be better studied, to be better prepared to answer their questions, as they will be facing harder and harder challenges of the world and will seek their answers somewhere else if we can't help them.  We see that so much with our students here.

On Saturday, we attended the baptism of Xi Huang.  What a miracle he is.  The end of January, the missionaries found him as a street contact. We first encountered him as he was waiting for them outside of the institute so he could have his first lesson. We were able to talk to him while he waited, and he told us he was a student here from China, and that he had no idea what religion was, especially anything about Jesus Christ.  He was an eager learner, and within a month was ready to be baptized.  He has such enthusiasm about the gospel, and will progress quickly in it.  It cements our testimony of how the gospel is spreading to every country, the Lord is bringing the people here to learn it if the missionaries can't go into their country.  This is the second baptism we have seen of people from China, who will go back to their country and take the gospel with them.

Xi with the missionaries and ward members

Wednesday, March 2, we had zone conference.  The mission president attended, which was nice.  I had to speak on what the purpose of my mission was.  That night we taught a Temple Prep Class. Both wards asked us to teach Temple Prep, so we offer it at Sunday School time in both wards, and also on Wednesday night prior to the Institute class.  We have loved that - we have about 15 students who are attending and planning on receiving their endowments soon.  

On March 4, we worked on deep cleaning the kitchen some more.  The missionaries helped us (for service hours), which is always fun. And then, on the 5th, we took a little break and went to the zoo.

Elder Kunz and Elder Raleigh

At the zoo

That night, we had Jose's baptism.  Another great young man, love those baptisms! (Elder McGuire will post a picture for us.) On Sunday, I prepared dinner at the Institute for an investigator, Kylee Webb, and 2 other sisters in the ward. She continues to make progress in learning about the gospel, but struggles with some of the anti-Mormon stuff on the internet.  Monday night was Senior FHE, it was a very interesting speaker, a mechanical engineer who develops affordable prosthetics for people in other countries.

Tuesday, we took a young man in our ward to the Bishop's Storehouse.  At 5:00 that evening was a special "Face To Face Broadcast" for the Young Adults with Elder Holland.  So, we set up the broadcast at the Institute building, and bought pizza for all of those who attended.  At 7:00 that night, we taught our evening class on the Book of Mormon.

Wednesday, March 9, we shopped for groceries for the Forum Luncheon for Thursday, then spent the afternoon in our work clothes, plastering a styrofoam stone (representing the stone rolled away from Christ's tomb).  Fortunately, the missionaries helped us!  We then changed back into missionary clothes and taught the Temple Prep class at 6:00.

Shopping at Smart and Final

Friday was a great day!  We wanted to see Elder Baloaloa once again before he left for home (March 14), so we took him and his companion out for Mexican food.  Love him so much!  It's hard to see these young missionaries leave - they become our adopted sons here! Saturday was our Anniversary, so to celebrate we went to dinner at a nice seafood restaurant, Bali Hai.

Elder Baloaloa

At the Bali Hai Restaurant

On Sunday, March 13, the YSA 2nd Ward held a special "Linger Longer" lunch in celebration of our 40th anniversary.  They made our favorite foods (pizza, beef stroganoff, german chocolate cake, and vanilla ice cream).  It was really sweet.  And quite amazing to most of the youth that anyone stays married 40 years (let alone lives to be that OLD!)

Monday night, March 14, our other ward, YSA 1st, held a regional FHE to celebrate Pi Day.  We organized the Senior Missionaries that worked with these wards, and we ran the "games" and served the pie.  It was exhausting (just like most of what we do with these kids!)  But it was good!

Aaron (Schmidty) and Elder McGuire

Tuesday, we taught our evening class, and Wednesday night we taught Temple Prep.  After Temple Prep, Elder McGuire and I walked down to the soccer stadium to watch our LDS players on the SDSU team.  On Thursday, March 17, we held a special Forum Luncheon for St. Patrick's Day.  We prepared an Irish meal - potato soup, biscuits, and shamrock sundaes (mint chocolate chip ice cream with chocolate topping).   It was really fun, and they ate every speck of it!

In our special green shirts!

Our St. Patrick's Day decorations

Friday we did apartment inspections for 5 of the Elders' apartments.  I made raspberry jam to take to each of the apartments.  We came back to the Institute afterwards, changed clothes, and worked some more on plastering and painting the stone and canvasses.  It was my birthday, so we went to a movie later.

Let me tell you a little about this project we were working on.  Our Institute Director was in charge of putting together an Easter activity for his ward.  He decided to do a self-guided multimedia presentation about the symbols of Easter that would take people from room to room, So, we decided we would help him with it, and plan to bring it over to the Institute for a week also.  Wow - it turned out to be lots of work, and occupied every drop of extra time for about 2 weeks.  Fortunately, the missionaries helped us as much as possible.  And one of our students worked on scenery for the drama department at SDSU, so she helped a lot!  I'll post just a few pictures I took of what we worked on.

The Tomb room

The Stone which was rolled away from the tomb

The Crucifixion Room

The Garden of Gethsemane

The Upper Room for the Last Supper

Each room has a presentation in it.  It's very touching.  We have it set up at the Institute right now, and it will be available all next week for the students to see and bring friends and investigators. Plus, we will use it for our Senior Missionary FHE on April 4 (we are in charge).

On Monday, March 21, I was in charge of the Missionary Departure Dinner at the Mission President's home.  My Senior Missionary neighbor downstairs helped me.  We fed about 30 people.  That week, Bro. Mackay had an unexpected death in the family, and had to leave for 3 days, so we covered all of his classes.  Then, Friday afternoon, we set up the Easter Presentation at his ward building. It came together, although we were praying for miracles until the last minute.  And miracles happened, too numerous to mention.

With extra classes to teach, and all of the prep for this presentation, we worked night and day at the Institute that week.  Saturday came, and I decided to watch the General Relief Society Meeting from home. On Easter Sunday, a member of the bishopric from the YSA 1st Ward invited us to dinner.  So grateful!  Along with all of this, they have been replacing the windows in our apartment, and had it all torn up for several days (plus yesterday, the roof leaked all down the wall inside, so they came in with big fans and heat lamps to dry it out.)  Cooking has been an impossibility here. 

This week was Spring Break at the Institute.  Monday and Tuesday, March 28 and 29, we did repair work on our presentations canvasses. We took the missionaries to dinner at a little Taco Shop Monday night.  Then Tuesday night was payday.  We were able to accompany Larry Chu, one of our graduates from Temple Prep, to the temple to receive his endowments.  He is an amazing young man - a convert of almost a year, and already has a mission call for Washington D.C. (leaving in May).  

Thursday, we set up our presentation at the Institute.  It took all day by the time all of the PVC pipe frames were set up, and the canvasses were hung.  So excited for next week though - it will be awesome! Yesterday (for fun) we went to see the Old San Diego Mission and to the Cabrillo Monument. Tonight we are having dinner with 6 other couples after the men go to Priesthood Meeting. And tomorrow we are setting up Conference watching at the Institute Building, and I will be helping the Bishop's wife with cooking waffles between the sessions.

Meanwhile, back home:

Grandchildren at the Air Force Museum

Our mission has been a lot of work this month.  We're so grateful that we have had the strength to do what we need to do here and I know that each day He sustains us .  There is a lot of rescuing to do, and each little thing we can do contributes to a piece of the work. This Easter, I have truly felt His Spirit and can without a doubt declare these words, "Oh, what joy this sentence gives, I KNOW that my redeemer lives!"