Mission1

June 25, 2017 Today at our Stake Conference we had an amazing sister, Venessa Turek, share a great message on hasting the work of salvation. She began by quoting a talk by President Russell M. Nelson, titled, “A Plea to My Sisters.” She shared the following. “Thirty-six years ago, in 1979, President Spencer W. Kimball made a profound prophecy about the impact that covenant-keeping women would have on the future of the Lord’s Church. He prophesied: “Much of the major growth that is coming to the Church in the last days will come because many of the good women of the world will be drawn to the Church in large numbers. This will happen to the degree that the women of the Church reflect righteousness and articulateness in their lives and to the degree that the women of the Church are seen as distinct and different—in happy ways—from the women of the world.” My dear sisters, you who are our vital associates during this winding-up scene, the day that President Kimball foresaw is today. You ...

Today is Sunday, June 25th, 2017. We attended the Gulfport Stake Conference this weekend. It was a great Conference. President Dohm, Stake President presided. We have an appointment with him on Tuesday, June 27th. This past week we arrived in Biloxi, Mississippi. We live at 11059 Lamey Bridge Rd, Apt. 1208, D'Iberville, MS 39540. We met with President Bruce Olson, Mission President on Tuesday, June 20th and President Chris Morgan, Branch President the same day. On Wednesday we had District meeting and met with 4 other Elders and 4 Sisters. On Thursday, Friday and Saturday we shopped for household items in between flooding, tornadoes and tropical storm Cindy. Goodwill had a 50% of sale on Saturday so we really found some bargains. After Conference on Sunday we rushed to our Branch meeting which started at 1:00 pm. Diana and I both were assigned to talk. We had 13 service men and 1 Physical Therapy graduate student doing a teaching rotation at Keesler Air Force Hospital that attended...

Tuesday June 20, 2017 We arrived in Biloxi, Mississippi last night around 9:00 pm. The Lord blessed us with dry weather so our household goods in the back of our truck stayed dry. Monday we decided to go and eat some good sea food. Kevin Quast had told us to go to Bubba Gump’s for sea food. We went downtown Biloxi and found it. We didn’t realize it was in the middle of a gambling casino. It was a little embarrassing walking through the casino with our missionary badges on going to Bubba Gump’s. We ordered shrimp and salad. It was good. We came home and spent a few hours unpacking. Diana stayed up until 2:00 am unpacking. She is such an amazing energizer bunny. On Monday we woke up early (6:30 am) and continued to put things away. President Chris Morgan, Branch President of Keesler Air Force Base, texted us and said he wanted to take us to breakfast and have a biscuit. Diana and I thought, wow, people just go and have biscuits for breakfast. President Morgan picked us up and said we wi...

Today is Tuesday, June 13, 2017. We had a great time on Sunday with the Sadowski’s. Kim and Stan invited everyone that was in town over for dinner. We saw John and his family, Malia, Nick and Alison and their family, Leah and James and our friends the McCrackens. Kiana and Scott called about 10:00 pm and said they would meet us at the Maverick gas station so we could see the kids. Kiana didn’t tell them we were coming so when they saw us everyone was so excited (especially Mom and I). We visited with them for a few minutes and the Shipley’s left for Idaho. On Monday Mom and I continued our training at the MTC. We were taught by Seminary and Institute (S&I). It was a good class. Monday evening we went to FHE. Several missionary couples shared how they met and how we were converted. It was fun hearing everyone’s story. One couple, the Blackburn’s shared how their granddaughter was not active because her parents didn’t want anything to do with the church. She was baptized when she was...

Today is Saturday, June 10th.As we have reflected back over the past week we have been so impressed with the hundreds of young and old missionaries we have met and rubbed shoulders with. We have been amazed at all our family that previously walked these same halls serving missions and being there to support other missionaries and family members going on missions. We were getting ready to go to the Provo City Temple this morning with Merrill and Bernadette McCracken. Mom had gotten out of the shower and was dressing. I jumped in the shower and got out. I was drying off close to the door to our room. I heard a key in our lock and the door opened. I was standing there butt naked when a little older lady started to walk in our room. I said, “Hello!” It startled her and she shut the door. It was an embarrassing moment for sure. Mom put on her robe and walked out to see who it was. The little lady could not be found. There were some younger missionaries in the hall vacuuming and they said, ...

June 6, 2017 One of the training activities we participated in was to teach a Sunday School class to 16-17 year olds. The scenario was that two of the teenagers had never had an experience of feeling the Holy Ghost. We had to use the scriptures and come up with a lesson plan on how we would teach this class. We then had to teach this to another Senior Missionary couple. Diana had a great scripture found in Galatians 5:22-23. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. The senior missionaries setting next to us, Elder and Sister Pexton, went first and shared their prepared lesson on the Holy Ghost. They shared a scripture from 3 Nephi when Christ came and how the Holy Ghost can bear testimony of Christ and God the Father. Elder Pexton then gave a strong testimony that he knew, through the Holy Ghost that Jesus is our Savior and Redeemer. Sister Pexton then shared how she knew t...

June 5, 2017 Hi everyone. What a great experience we are having in the MTC. Yesterday we met a single sister who was called to Cebu, Philippines.  Her husband died 4 years ago. She has 10 children and is 70 years old. Her name is Sister Haywood. She is from Mesa, Arizona. She is a remarkable lady. She submitted her mission papers a few months ago and was really surprised when she received her call. She is going to the mission office to help. The mission president contacted her and said he would be leaving in July and they would have a new mission president. The new mission president was a local from Manila. She was very nervous going to the Philippines and really not knowing ay one or the language. About a month ago Sister Haywood’s son mentioned to her that a missionary that was in their ward, who was from the Philippines was coming back with her family to visit Arizona for a few weeks. The family arrived in Mesa and were staying at her son’s home. Her son called her and said you...