November, 2013
Dear family,
One more letter, this time from the
U.S.A.
We might have mentioned that they
sent a couple from Kinshasa to replace us.
Elder and Sister Bybee from Provo, Utah.
They are serving a “Public Relations” mission and are concerned about
managing both missions. They are hoping
a couple will soon be found to fill the vacancy we have left and they can then
return to Kinshasa. We spent ten days
with the Bybees: showing them around town; what was expected of them by the
Elders; how to pay the bills; how to meet the needs of the branches, etc. We never received a lot of instruction or
information from our mission president about what was expected of us, we just
learned from the previous couple and did our best. Hopefully what we shared with the Bybees will
not be to far afield..
We continued to feel of our Saviors
“tender mercies’ to the very end and even on the way home felt him meeting our
needs. The last few days all seemed to
run together. We were able to fulfill
one of Sister Wheatley’s dreams and take a tour of the “Africa Mercy
Ship”(Sister Wheatley posted a little about the visit on her blog). The Africa Mercy ship is a huge ocean freighter
converted into a hospital. It travels to
underdeveloped nations in Western Africa.
There is a crew of 400 volunteers who give freely of their service. They specialize in removing facial tumors,
taking care of cleft pallets and re-constructing
bones in the legs of children under the age of 16, and doing reconstructive
surgery on women who have suffered extreme physical trauma during long and
difficult childbirth. They must pay for their room and board or obtain sponsorship from individuals or corporations to pay their expenses. One man told us that among his sponsors were
a couple of members of our Church. The ship was to be docked in Pointe Noire for at
least six months.
Sunday found us bearing our testimonies
in two of the branches. The members were
very kind to us and showered us with gifts, such as brightly colored dresses
for Sister Wheatley, a bright red ‘pajama’ set for Elder Wheatley, and and several
pieces of African fabric to bring home.
A youth choir in the Mpaka Branch had us stay after Church so they could
sing to us. We got very teary eyed listening
to them reailzing it was to the last time.
Monday finally arrived. While Sister Wheatley finished packing, Elder Wheatley took
Elder and Sister Bybee on one last tour of the city. Elder Bybee still didn’t have a valid driver’s
license but felt he would never understand the town unless he was behind the
wheel. We had tried to get him a license - and so far had been waiting for 10 days for the paperwork to be finished at the government office. Sure enough a policeman waived us
over. I wondered how we would get out of
this one if he wanted to see Elder Bybee's license. I was riding shotgun and he came to my
window. I told him I was a missionary
and didn’t speak French. He was amused
and Elder Bybee, who speaks French but didn’t admit it, said he asked if I had to use an interpreter to
give sermons. Anyway he laughed and
waved us on.
We finally headed to the airport
about 7:00P.M. to catch a 9:00 P.M.flight.
They made us check a bag that we wanted to carry-on but as we toted the
bags they let us carry on through the airports I came to appreciate the fact
that we were dragging one less piece of luggage. It is against the law for us to take their
currency out of the country, so it is always interesting that when you have no
money that they still want bribe money.
It happened twice before we got to the waiting area.
The first leg of the flight was from
Pointe Noire to Frankfurt. Enroute we
stopped in Libreville , Gabon, where passengers deplaned and other passengers
came on board. A young professor of
music from Newark, New Jersey sat with us.
He had come to Gabon to watch a total lunar eclipse of the sun. We so
enjoyed his company. It was especially
interesting to hear him talk about the places he had gone in the world to watch
lunar eclipses. In Frankfurt we crossed
paths with members of the Church returning from a trip to Israel. Once again what could have been a boring lay
over turned into a time of sharing and learning.
The long flight from Frankfurt to
Chicago was made easier as we shared our seat assignments with a young medical
student returning from doing an internship in Zambia. A long layover in Chicago was made easier as
we happened on to an old friend of Colin and Karl's (Billy Griffeth who they
attended school with and ran track with). We also connected with Elder Graham,
one of our missionaries whom we served with in Pointe Noire, in Chicago. I was so grateful for these people who made
a long 30 hour flight into an interesting experience.
We were greeted by Justin and
Camille, Sophie and Wren, Liz, Jackson and Kai at the Salt Lake airport. It was so exciting to see them! They had posters and balloons and smiling
faces to greet us and make us feel welcomed back home.
We found our home clean and in good
repair. We were so blessed to have the
help of family and friends to take care of our home and yard while we were
gone.
Today we sang, “Count Your Many
Blessings” as the opening song in Sacrament meeting. As we sang I thought about blessings. I wondered about what we think about when
thinking about blessings. Do we think about
the material or spiritual blessings, or maybe both?
I thought about what we have.
Once again I was reminded that we had just come from a country where
people are happy because they “have so much of what matters most,” and “so
little of what matters least,” to a country where we have “so much of what
matters least’ and so “little of what matters most.” We will be eternally indebted to the African
people for teaching us that happiness is not rooted in obtaining the material
things of life. Happiness seems to be
rooted in praising God and acknowledging
our dependence on Him who gave us life.
Happiness seems to be rooted in accepting everyone as a Child of God .
Thanks once again by participating in
our mission, without your faith and
prayers, and your encouragement, we never
would have made it.
Love Mom and Dad
