GREAT, BAD, GREAT!

August 30, 2010 Monday

This morning while we were preparing the FHE lesson for tonight, Tony dropped by and had the kid from Germany who works with him along. They came and sat down, and we just chatted with them for a while. We kind of waited to see if Tony had a question or anything specific he wanted to talk about. He didn’t seem to and eventually somehow we ended up talking about the Book of Mormon. I wish I could remember how we ended up there but my “train of thought” has gone into a tunnel concerning it and hasn’t come out yet. Anyway, we started to explain it to Martin, the German guy, and then I remembered we had a German Book of Mormon and the Joseph Smith pamphlet in German. So we got them out, and I gave him the story of the first vision. It was so cool because the scripture in James about “If any of you lack wisdom…” was in the pamphlet in German (and I could recognize it in the pamphlet), so we had Martin read that. Then we continued on and explained about Joseph Smith getting the plates and translating them. When we got to the part about Moroni 10:4-5, we had him read it in the German Book of Mormon. He’s leaving Broome tomorrow to finish his trip around Australia, and he was willing to take the BoM and the JS pamphlet and read them. We are hoping we planted a big seed there this morning. After we finished with all that, Tony said they had to get to work and they left. What a great unplanned visit. We are so glad we had the materials in German. We had ordered them because we would run into German backpackers frequently when we took bread to distribute over at Towne Beach. We also requested some French ones, but they haven’t come yet.
So then I headed to the grocery store while Orson took a nap. I needed some oats for the No Bake Cookies I was going to make for FHE. I picked up a few other things and headed for the car. I’d backed the car into a parking place so that it was up against a tree and planted area. So I backed the shopping cart (trolley here) between our car and the one next to it. I got the keys out of my purse which was sitting in the cart, opened the car, and put the groceries in the back seat. When I got home, I reached down to get my purse and it wasn’t there. I realized I’d left it in the cart. So back I went praying that God would make it invisible to anyone who saw the cart, but the cart was gone from where I’d left it. I went into the store and asked at the Customer Service desk, but no one had turned it in. I left my name and home phone number (the cell phone was in the purse). I drove all around the parking lot and shopping center hoping to find it discarded somewhere or to see someone going through it. No luck. So I came home and told Orson what had happened. We called our US Credit Union to cancel the credit card. Then we called the Australian bank to cancel the debit card. We called the mission office to get the service to the mobile phone that was in the purse stopped. Then we got in the car to head down to the bank to get some cash because we wouldn’t get a new credit card for a while. Orson decided we should stop at the shopping center and report it to the security folks there. Also I realized I’d given the Customer Service lady the wrong home phone # when I had asked at the store. When we got out of the car, we saw the guy out collecting carts from the parking lot. So we went over and asked him when his shift had started. He said 10:00. So we told him about my purse, and he got a big grin on his face and said he’d found it and turned it in. We went in to Customer Service and sure enough, my purse was there. The lady there said she’d tried to call me but the phone # hadn’t worked. WHAT A RELIEF!!! We gave the cart guy $25 for being so honest and turning it in. Oh, I feel so blessed to get it back. So we went home and called the bank and the mission office with the good news. Hurray!
Tonight we had FHE. We gave a lesson on prayer. The Lord inspired me to make a skit out of the story in the FHE manual. It worked so well. The kids loved it and really paid attention. We had 2 non-member YW here. We invited the older one, Dale, to the scripture study class tomorrow and she said she would come. She’s 17 and has heard the lessons when her sister who was baptized was taught. We have had 5 people say they will be here tomorrow night. We are going to study the Book of Mormon with them. It was an idea we picked up from the other senior missionaries. We had 11 people at FHE, 3 adults and 8 youth. Dale & Tammy’s folks had sent a bowl full of mulberries over and some whipped cream. Raffey brought some shrimp flavored crackers. With my no bakes, we had plenty of treats. We were done by 7:45 and I was ready to take the kids home. They begged to play until 8:00. They entertained themselves outside playing something like hide-and-seek. Dale stayed inside and helped me clean up. She’s a neat girl.
What a day—we are exhausted but happy :o)