A GREAT DAY

December 5, 2010 Sunday

After the party last night, Marcella told us she would like to come to church today. So we picked up Carolyn Shires, Samantha and her son, Beau, and dropped them at church then picked up Marcella. On the way there she told us that she’d attended church with her friend in Ireland and even gone to her house to listen to General Conference once. She described the men who spoke and the big organ and everything. It was testimony meeting today, and on the way to church we explained it to her. Part way through the meeting, she leaned over and said, “I want to get up, but what if I don’t do it right?” I assured her it would be just fine. She went to the front and said how when she first came to Australia she was all about material things, but while she’s been here she’d come to realize that it’s family that’s most important( in her darling Irish accent). And then she sat down. I gave her a Kleenex. It was so great.
After church we brought her over to our place because she had indicated that she was having some relationship problems in her life and Orson has a presentation called “The Choice” which helps people sort out some of those things. We had lunch and while we were waiting for another branch member who has some issues at home, we showed her “The Restoration” DVD and explained the Book of Mormon. She promised to read and pray about it.
When we started into The Choice, it quickly became apparent that she has been hurt badly by someone outside her family talking badly about her family. You’ve heard of the Irish temper? We saw evidence of it today. She was so full of anger at this person that it was tearing her apart. Aaron, the other member who was here, helped explain some of the damage that anger can do to a person (he’s an MD). After he left, we talked to her for a bit about forgiveness and how she needed to forgive the person because he was literally consuming her life. She finally could see that was important. We took her home and both felt like we truly had been able to help one of God’s choice daughters today. She’s coming back on Wednesday night for more. Bad news? She’s leaving Broome on Saturday to continue her travels. But she has promised to stay in touch and was happy when we told her we would make sure other missionaries pick up where we leave off. I mentioned something about living the commandments and she asked what they were. I told her the 10 Commandments, chastity, alcohol and tobacco and she finished with “tea and coffee.” So she’s not walking into this blind. She said she wasn’t really ready when her friend presented stuff about the church but she is now. She’s 26. How we wish she were staying here longer!
Tonight we went to the Broome Churches’ Christmas Caroling. It seemed so weird to take some camp chairs and sit in a park and sing Christmas carols with no coats on! Christmas caroling always means freezing to death back home. The sun went down, we saw bats fly overhead, and then the program began. A small choir sang, words were projected on a screen so we could sing with them. They were selling glow sticks and candles so folks could wave them in time to the music. A choir of kids for St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School did a re-enactment of the Nativity. (They explained first that Gabriel would be a girl since none of the boys wanted to be an angel.) We laughed because the boys in our church all know about the angel Moroni and he’s a man! A few of the words in a few of the carols were different but it felt good to be singing the carols with a large crowd. There were a couple of “up beat” songs we figured the Motab wouldn’t touch, especially when the last verse of one of them was done in rap. They passed a couple of collection baskets near the end. All in all, it was a good way to finish a great day.