A Missionary Thanksgiving

This week definitely got off to a windy and rainy start!!!  Welcome to the coast in winter!!  Well, perhaps winter is not officially here, but this certainly felt like it!  We had a steady wind of about 20 to 30 mph with gusts up there at 60 to 80 mph!  Our trailer was really rocking!!!  Luckily, Monday was our P-day so we stayed inside and did a whole lot of cleaning, studying and reading.  Tuesday was bad enough that we didn’t venture out much.  An umbrella wouldn’t stand a chance out there in the wind!  The trailer two spaces down from ours lost the awning that comes out with the slide out.  That made us happy we chose not to get those automatic awnings on our trailer. We sure didn’t get much sleep Monday or Tuesday night.  Holy Cow, Toto, are we still in Bandon?

We did head out at 5:00 p.m. Tuesday evening to work at the E.A.T. program at the Barn.  We surely thought not many would show up in that kind of wind and rain but what a nice surprise.  The Barn was packed with people hungry for dinner.  The lady pastor who is in charge of the welcome asked Elder Wels to bless the meal.  I do believe that is an honor that she recognizes his spirituality.  And, he gets a good introduction as “Elder Wels from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”  Cool!  It is very enjoyable to serve and clean with such a great group of people.

Wednesday we made lots of calls to go see people….. but everyone was either gone for the holiday, enjoying visiting relatives or home working in the kitchen to get ready for Thanksgiving.  Bless Lynda Sessions….. she was happy to welcome us.  In fact she called us!  She was working out a problem and wanted Elder Wels’ input as to how to best handle it.  She really has taken a liking to him and has great trust in his wisdom.  He is sure it is the white hair that leads people to mistakenly think he is so wise.  However, I do believe his advice was very helpful.  We also visited with our lovely friend, Ida Cluff.  We had received her Church records. Armed with her member number and her confirmation date we were able to get her up and running on the Church websites, especially new.familysearch.com.  We hope she has lots of fun and success with that one.

President Stockford and his lovely wife, Marita invited us to join their family for Thanksgiving dinner.  When I asked what I could contribute to the dinner…there was just a request for a forgotten jar of dill pickles and for us to pick up James Ornsby and bring him along to the dinner.  That sure called for a lot of work on my part, didn’t it?  What a lovely time we had.  We got to meet their son Shaun, his wife, Kelley and their children Parker and Lauren.

Parker is 16 and he made the cheesecake for dessert (there were also pumpkin pies and an apple pie) Very impressive Parker! And there was a special gluten-free Cheesecake from the Bandon Bakery for me.  Thanks President Stockford for the special trip to town just for me.  So much fabulous food!  Turkey, tri-tip roast, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, macaroni & cheese, Cranberry apple salad, relish tray, deviled eggs, sweet potatoes, and homemade rolls.  Then add all those desserts!  No one left hungry but we did leave with a big plate of leftovers!  We also enjoyed the 5 dogs!

There was Conway and Bogart, the English bull dogs; Xylo, a King Charles spaniel and beagle mix;  Cassie, a pit bull mix; and Drover, a English sheep dog who is as big as a horse! And he is absolutely gorgeous! We enjoyed the whole lot of them!  Thanks Stockford family!

We sure did miss our own family this Thanksgiving!  Though I am not sure they even thought about us.  Would you think of your parents if you were touring the Caribbean on a catamaran?  Well, that is where you will find the Skillmans this holiday.  Would you miss your parents if you were spending your very first Thanksgiving with the adorable “love of your life” new husband?  Yea, don’t think Steff thought about us either.  And, the Shumways had a house full of people to celebrate with.  Steve and Barbara Jenkins drove 12 hours from Utah to be with them, all the while knowing I would not be in town.  Luckily they are forgiven as they gave me a promise that they would come back when I am back in town.  And, I will hold them to it!  I can see the Shumways had quite a feed.  Just look what it did to Scott!!!

Newly engaged Kerry and Chris came down to Medford and we weren’t there either.  Hope they had a great time visiting with Todd, Amy, and Mary!  And I hope all of them missed us as much as we missed all of them.  

We did a few visits on Friday and Saturday, but for the most part it was just Elder and Sister Wels enjoying the comfort and coziness of our trailer and each other.  Sunday was a Spiritual Feast at the little Bandon Branch.  We got to sit with our recent reactivated friends, Connie and Ida.  It was so good to have them with us again.  It was Fast and Testimony Sunday as next week is Stake Conference in Coos Bay.  They may be few, but they have such strong testimonies!  Our Gospel Doctrine teacher, Pam Hansen, is so knowledgeable and delivered a powerful lesson from The Revelation of St. John the Divine!  She actually made me want to cheer at the end of it!  She definitely helped me to want to be a better person.  Stephanie Reed taught the Relief Society class a lesson about the Final Judgment.  Just wish we really could applaud at the end!  Thank goodness the Book of Life is written in pencil and each of us has the opportunity to use the Atoning sacrifice of our Savior to do a little eraser work in that book.  I just hope my book comes with a BIG eraser and a willingness to recognize my need for the Savior.

Okay….. from the thrill of a little more victory over the cunning of satan…. To the agony of having an old brain with a very short memory!  In the blink of a brain burp!  While I was typing this I was hearing a strange noise… it was water but not a normal sound.  A quick glance toward the bathroom confirmed the horror of an overflowing toilet.  Guess who forgot to open the valve again as he was running water into the black water tank?  Hmmmm?  And now guess who gets to go back to the laundry room to, for the second time today, wash all the throw rugs and towels?  Oh the joys of P-day!!!!

Zone Conference

Tuesday morning, before heading off to Eugene for Zone Conference, we gathered up sweet Ida Cluff and took her on a special private tour of the Bandon Branch building.  We want her to feel comfortable when she comes to Church on Sunday.  The last room in the building we entered was the Chapel.  We stood there in silence for a while and then I asked: “Ida, do you feel it?”  She said; “Yea, the Spirit is here!”  Cool.  I asked her;  “How long have you  been inactive?”  I was blown away by her answer…. 45 years!  Welcome home Ida!

Since Zone Conference was to start at 8:00 a.m. on Wednesday, we decided to do the three hour drive from Bandon on Tuesday afternoon.  Once in Eugene, the first stop was Costco!  M & M’s, Muffins, and Cookies…. And you were thinking we were there for real food!  Next stop…… The Outback Restaurant for gluten free baby back ribs and some Chocolate Thunder from Down Under!  Thank you Outback for that delicious gluten free dessert!  There are joys in a big city!

Zone Conference was totally awesome!  It was District Meeting times 6! Here we had 53 beautiful Elders and Sisters! 

President Young is such a dedicated Mission President.  He is our cheering squad!  You can’t help coming away wanting so badly to be a more dedicated and spiritual missionary.  Such inspirational talks!  We took pages of notes!

Lunch time was fun time!  Great meal provided by one of the local wards.  After lunch we have some fun.  Each district got to write their own original song.  Elder Johnson wrote the one for our Pacific District.  Yea Elder Johnson.  But then we had to sing our song for the group.  We were a pretty sad as a choir. But everyone cheered for us and for each of the other groups.  So try singing our song to the tune of “God be with you till we meet again”….

Pacific District Song

--Elder Johnson

Baptisms are scarce here on the coast
We can’t find people to teach
It rains every single day
It’s always cloudy, always gray

Chorus:
But we won’t get down
We won’t show a frown
We will keep our spirits up
We will “Stand up Tall”
Because “P” Young knows all
We’re happy to be serving on the coast

We are ten Elders who love to teach
Even crazy hippie druggies
We will baptize young & oldies
And bring every one unto the fold

Chorus:
But we won’t get down
We won’t show a frown
We will keep our spirits up
We will “Stand up Tall”
Because “P” Young knows all
We’re happy to be serving on the coast!

Believe it or not….. we took second place with that one!  They also had been inspecting the mission cars and gave out awards for the cleanest cars.  The winner got a golden license plate frame put on their car!  It was just a time of fun and laughter!  Those young missionary Elders and Sisters are just delightful to hang around with!

Then it was back into the Chapel for more spiritual feeding and testimony time.  We ended at about 4:45 p.m.  and, it was already getting dark and raining.   It was a long 3 hour drive back to Bandon in the rain and wind with windshield wipers that did not work so well.  It was a miserable trip, especially for Elder Wels, since he was driving.  Note to self… if it is that kind of weather come our next Zone Conference in February….. we will stay over another night.  Sad to admit it, but we are getting older and prefer the day time driving!

We received our very first referral from the mission office!  Apparently it was a referral from Temple Square in Salt Lake.  So what to do first?  Okay…. Rule #1… contact them within 24 hours of receiving the referral!  You want to contact them while the “iron is still hot!”  The referral was to deliver a Book of Mormon.  Zoom!  We were on it!  We called Leo and Allen Lewandowski and set up an appointment to see them the next evening.  Leo and Allen?....  A cause for worry?  Not when we got to meet Leo and Ellen!  A lovely couple who had been to Temple Square LAST spring!  The iron was definitely cool already!  But we had a lovely visit and did give them a Book of Mormon with our testimony and picture in it and a written invitation to read certain parts of it combined with prayer.  We will check back with them after Thanksgiving.

We made a lot of visits to members and non-members this week.  So sweet of everyone to welcome us and say that having senior missionaries is a treat for them.  We had a lovely evening with Fred and Kim Yates and their adorable daughter, Cassidy.  Kim is the sister of Cynthia Wright, wife of our Central Point Stake President Wright.  Kim is an absolute hoot!  She certainly tells some fascinating family stories.

We worked at the Family History Library Thursday night and two of the three computers are now up and running!  It was very exciting.  We hear through the “grape vine” of Pam Hansen, the Library director that we are going to be called to work a set schedule in the Library.  It will give us an opportunity to work with the community through family history work.  We are excited about that!

Our week ended with a smile! The sun was shining today after days of rain!  And, Ida Cluff came to Church today!  She was so warmly welcomed by our branch members.  She got to meet her new Home Teacher/Visiting Teacher couple, President and Marita Stockford.  We definitely got her the best.  She is a lovely lady and deserves the best.  May this be the first of many Sundays we find her in attendance!  Can I also wish that the sun keeps shining?

Two More Talks and Two More Visitors

A busy week in a certain trailer parked in Bandon, Oregon!  

We had two talks to give this week.  A 7 minute talk at Thursdays District Meeting in Coos Bay.  Elder Wels’ subject was Good Works and mine was on Love of Family and Family History Work.  I loved this quote by President Spencer W. Kimball;

“I hope to see us dissolve the artificial boundary line we so often place between missionary work and temple and genealogical work, because it is the same great redemptive work!”  

Those talks written, we then could start on our talks to be given in Sacrament for Invitation Sunday.  Lee’s subject there was Eternal Families and mine was The Plan of Salvation.  Elder Wels and I both struggle with talks.  It is definitely uncomfortable territory for both of us.  Though me thinks we are going to get plenty of practice here so perhaps we will eventually become more at ease with the process.  Remember, I am just talking about the writing part of a talk……. the actual giving part of the talk is a whole other matter!  I will deal with that later.

District Mtg. attendees: Elder Plumb & Elder Carlson, District Leaders:

(Elder Plumb is my Mitchell look-alike!)

 

Elder Jones & Elder Johnson, Zone Leaders:

Elder Jones & Elder Johnson, Zone Leaders

But first, we started our week by helping out and speaking at Corbit Stuart’s funeral.  His wife was in attendance but she was not quite grasping the situation.  It was so sad.  Her oldest son, Greg, was on the stand to deliver the eulogy.  The two other sons were with their Mom to try to comfort and calm her.  She was not crying…. She was angry!  At one point during the funeral she yelled out; “This is not real and I want to go home!” At the end of the funeral she wanted to see her husband and when they opened the coffin she told him to stop this nonsense and to get out of that box  and take her home.  This has been a very rough time for her.  I know that if she knew the Gospel, she would have felt some peace from that knowledge.  We will go check on her soon.

I was so happy to read about Brycie’s (Opps, I mean… Elder Shumway’s) great week.  There is such a sweet spirit of happiness when a missionary has success in bringing someone to Christ.  We got a little taste of that sweetness this week.   I went to visit with the Ida Cluff, the lady I met in the RV Park office last week.  I don’t think she has been to Church in a very long time.  She and her husband were a long haul truck driving couple.  She has certainly seen this great country of ours.  But her husband was a non-member and they drove every day of the week.  Her records are no doubt in the “dead letter file” somewhere in Salt Lake.  She has one daughter and several grandchildren who are all active in the Church.  She is very proud that her daughter is a seminary teacher.  So after visiting a while I said to her; “Ida, you know the Lord sent me right here to the Bandon RV Park to find you and bring you back to him, don’t you?”  She smiled and said “Yes”.  She told me she didn’t know why she asked me about which church I belonged to.  She said it just popped out of her mouth.  By the end of our visit she told me she would come back to Church and she gave me all the needed information so we can send to Salt Lake at get her records sent here to Bandon.  I made an appointment with her to take her down to the Bandon Chapel and give her a very private tour of it.  I know that when she stands in the Chapel with the quiet surrounding her, her heart will be touched and she will know that she is returning home.  I left her house feeling so light and happy.  Thank you, Heavenly Father for this sweet moment.

This week we had some really good visits with Branch members.  We had a lovely visit with President Stockford and his wife, Marita and their adult daughter, Jill.  Talk about a talented family!  He makes furniture and pet beds.  Marita quilts and carves cypress knees into beautiful figurines.  And their Daughter, Jill has a beautiful talent to paint and do ink drawings.  This has to be the most talented family ever!  It was a lovely visit.  Likewise, we enjoyed Ron and Kathy Lecce.  He is the Elders Quorum President and she is the Relief Society President.  She also plays the piano for Primary and is the Seminary teacher.  Talk about triple duty!  The joys of a small branch!   Friday night we spent the evening with Tammy and Gerry Greer, our new non-member friends who were once the neighbors of our fab friends, Bob & Rita Phair.  We played Pictionary and both Elder Wels and I actually enjoyed it.  We gave them an invitation to Invitation Sunday also.  

We also had opportunities to serve… Tuesday night at the Barn and Thursday evening at the Family History Library.  Friday we helped Linda Sessions move all the furniture in her living room so she could vacuum it.  Elder Wels actually did the vacuuming!  Then he scrubbed all her floors .  I dusted and swept off her deck and washed the things up on top of her refrigerator.  We also cleaned a bit in the yard and burned her garbage in a burn pile.  She has quite a lovely 1 ½ acre property there.  She took us to lunch with her non-member friends to thank us and so we could meet them and extend an invitation to them. 

Saturday we helped the Cyr family clean the condo they had just moved out of and then helped the Brother Salt move a great big headboard bed thing out so he could put his new sleep number bed into the bedroom.

Last Sunday after Church I felt impressed to go back and visit with non-active Connie Jones and give her our little thought about the Atonement.  She needed to know that she had done all she could to forgive someone who had offended her at Church.  It was time now to hand that offense over to the Savior and let His healing spirit heal her.  Later in the week she called us and asked Elder Wels to go give her friend Neana Bergeret a blessing.  She had back surgery and she was really hurting.  Connie came with us and afterwards told me that she was going to come to Church on Sunday.  Yea Connie!

Neana Bergeret, on the other hand, is a completely different story.  That story is impossible to tell at the moment.  Our prayers are with her and we will check in with her soon.   We also went around to all the less active members that we had met and gave them a special invitation to attend our “Invitation Sunday” Sacrament Meeting. 

Wednesday we went to the Bandon Baking Company in Old Town and let the Powell’s serve us lunch.  I had mentioned to a Branch member that I did not want to take advantage of the sweet invitation from the Powell’s to come and have lunch every day.  When asked if we had gone yet, I told her no.  She said we had better get down there or Sister Powell would have her feelings hurt. That is her way of serving missionary work.  Guess we had better go once in a while.  Elder Wels had a lovely meat wrap and soup and I had her delicious baked potato soup and one of her most fabulous cheesecake things in a muffin paper.  Oh, my goodness.  That dessert could make me go every day!  She is so sweet to do this for us.

Scott’s company, Cropper Medical/Bio Skin has a yearly planning meeting for the heads of all their departments.  They usually go somewhere for the week.  They plan out their next year’s goal, working Monday through Thursday.  Their wives come on Thursday night and they play on Friday and Saturday.  This year…… months ago before our mission was even a thought… they rented a house in Bandon!  How cool is that?  So Saturday late afternoon Scott and Wendy came to visit and spend the night with us.  We went to Old Town and Scott bought dinner for us at the Minute Café.  We spent a fun evening with them back at the trailer.  Scott gave us a most excellent teaching moment on bringing the Spirit into our lessons with less-active members and non-members.  Wendy took great notes for us!  Thanks Scott and Wendy!  They spent the night with us, sleeping on our fold down but not too level couch.

Invitation Sunday was a success!  There were ten less active or non-member people there!  Way to go Bandon Branch!  You really worked on giving out those invitations!  And, Connie was there!  The entire Sacrament meeting was turned over to Elder Wels and me.  We chose the speakers, knowing that 2 of them HAD to be us!  We chose Liz Olive to be our 3rd speaker.  Such a good choice!  Liz and Elder Wels spoke on the importance of family.  And I was in the middle with a talk on the Plan of Salvation.  Liz gave such a superb talk.  She is an elementary school principal so how could her talk not be great?  The actual giving of a talk up at the podium and microphone is very intimidating to us.  Both of us were so nervous.  We both worked very hard on writing our talks, wanting to say just the right things.  We so wanted our talks to reach out and touch hearts.  When I finished my talk and sat down, I looked at Wendy and she gave me a big smile.  Then I looked at our Stake Mission Leader, Brother Olive, and he gave me a big smile and an “okay sign”.  Thanks, you both made me feel so much better! Elder Wels gave a great talk too!  We also chose the music.  “I believe in Christ” for the opening song.  Does that not just sing that Mormons are actually Christians?  Our Sacrament hymn was “As now we take the Sacrament”.  We had a rest hymn in between my talk and Elder Wels talk on family…”Families can be together Forever” and the closing song was “Teach me to Walk.”  Thankfully we got a “job well done” from our Branch President and from some of the members of the Branch.  We are happy it was successful.    Elder Wels and Elder Shumway went after Church to take the Sacrament to Brother and Sister Roufs and to give them both a blessing. Bro. Roufs  called President Stockford and asked specifically that it be Elder Wels who would come and serve him. How cool is that?  Wendy and I stayed behind to have a lovely visit with Kim Yates, Cynthia Wright’s sister.  Wendy was enthralled with her family story.  Then home to warm up dinner for our boys.  A short visit and they were on the road back to Ashland and we were off to a Stake Mission Leadership Training meeting in Coos Bay.

We are definitely taking ALL OF MONDAY for P-day!  And there is definitely a NAP on Monday’s schedule!

Paying it Forward

This week we began to feel like we are definitely in Bandon by the Sea.  On P-day, after all the chores were done, we went for a walk on several beaches in search of the perfect shell for a little parable on the Atonement we want to leave with those we visit and it was cold and windy. Brrrr!  Welcome to winter in Bandon.  Alas, there was no perfect shell to be found on the beaches of Bandon!  Luckily our perfect shell needed to be a perfectly imperfect shell.  Elder Wels found just the right one, which was good because by then I was frozen.  I literally ran back to the car!  Whoever invented heated car seats get a big hug from me!!

Tuesday we got a call in the afternoon from a member named Greg Muzzy who lives in Ontario, California.  His non-member mother and step-father live here in Bandon.  He told us his step-father had just passed away that morning and his mother was alone with no other family in town.  He was very much worried about her and would we go check on her to see if she was doing okay.  Instantly memories of needing help for my own mother flashed through my mind.  My father was in ICU at the Fallbrook hospital in Southern California.  My mother was on oxygen 24/7 and was legally blind because of Macular Degeneration so she could not drive.  Nurses at the hospital could not give her any information over the phone.  And, I lived in Oregon.  I wanted to go down to help her but she wanted me to wait until she thought she would really need me.  So knowing how great and loving LDS members can be, I called my Bishop to get the name and phone number of the Bishop in Fallbrook.  I gave him a call explaining her situation and he said he would call some members that lived near my Mom. I called my Mom back and was telling her that someone would call or come by the next day when her doorbell rang and a sweet couple who lived down the street was there to help her now.  “Pay it forward!”   We immediately went to find his mother.  We found the most adorable little lady being cared for by two of her sweet neighbors.  Mom seemed to be doing fine though I think the events of the day had not completely engulfed her yet.  She was certainly a character and a real hoot to visit.  When I told her we were from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and that her loving and worried son had asked us to check on her, she immediately said, “Oh, I love your church!”  She then turned to her neighbors and told them how the Church had cared for her son in his time of need.  She was so grateful that we would come to check on her.  We had a lovely visit and were able to report back to her son that she was doing fine and was well cared for.  Greg arrived in town on Wednesday and by Thursday the funeral had been planned for Monday.  Yes, one of the great strengths of LDS people is that we are there for one another in times of need.   Elder Wels was asked to give a talk about the Plan of Salvation at the funeral.  Luckily, I was just asked to give the opening prayer.  I can do that.  Lee is now busy working on his talk.  I give my sweet companion big high fives for so quickly and sweetly agreeing to give this talk.  I know it takes him way out of his comfort zone.

I went into the RV park office to pay our November rent and met a new lady substituting in the office by the name of Ida Cluff.  We had a sweet little chat.  She introduced me to her beloved dog, copper and told me she is a recent widow.  As I was about to go out the door she suddenly asked me what Church I was affiliated with.  I told her I attended the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  She said, “I thought so, you look like a Mormon”.  What does a Mormon look like?  Turns out she was once a Mormon but she has not gone to Church in a long time because she gave 24/7 care to her cancer stricken husband.  We got interrupted by a phone call and a gentlemen walking in the door.   I think Ida and I are going to become friends and I am going to do what I can to bring her back into the fold.  Perhaps she is the one we were sent here to find.

We had more fun get-acquainted visits with active and non-active members this week.  We went back to visit with Brian Vorwaller, the chain saw artist because we saw that his wife and kids were down at his studio.  We enjoyed our visit and talked more about having his eight year old daughter baptized.  He now has a web site up and running.  Check him out at artistbrianvorwaller.com.  Good family.

Friday morning we helped Elwin and Julie Bissell move into their new place in town.  And then in the afternoon Todd, Amy and Mary arrived for a visit!  We went for a fun walk with them on the docks near Old Town and got to watch people crabbing.  Those little critters are ugly!  Some were having great success and some were getting skunked!  We ended up at La Fiesta for a Mexican dinner and then went back to the Inn at Face Rock to watch Mary swim in their indoor pool.  She is a little fish!  She can dog paddle clear across the pool the long way! 

Saturday we went to Cranberry Sweets (see I said it would be my very favorite store) and toured a little of Old Town.  Then it was off to the beach down at the Jetty.  Not the most beautiful day.  It spit rain off and on all day.  But Mary loves the beach.  She is very wary of the waves.  She has been knocked off her feet several times and Oregon waves are not warm!  These are definitely not your Southern California beaches!  But you can have fun building castles in the sand.  We also went to the Bandon Lighthouse to walk a bit on that beach.  Then it was nap time for everyone!  In the evening they came to our trailer for dinner and a little early birthday party for Mary.  We can’t believe that she is turning 4 years old on the 9th.  We so enjoyed their visit.  Come back soon!!!

It was our first Fast and Testimony Sunday in the Bandon branch.  In a small branch I thought there would be a lot of quiet time when no one was getting up to bear a testimony.  Thankfully today I was wrong.  We heard some great testimonies and the hour just flew by!  Yes, Elder Wels and I both bore our testimonies.  Our little branch needed to know how much we appreciated their loving welcome and how we, just like them, love the Lord.  We are most grateful for the blessings of belonging to His true Church.