May 22, 2011 Sunday
Tonight we went hunting more “unknowns.” The first two were bad addresses. The silly inactive people move and don’t tell anyone. Nobody knows them or misses them, and they become lost. The biggest problem the church has here in West Australia is that nobody has taken the time to find everyone on the ward list. (Today we mentioned John, the guy we bought some food last week, and the bishop said, “Who’s that?”) At one house tonight, the people said they’d been living there for 3 years and do get mail occasionally for the woman we were looking for. So no one in the church has made an effort to locate her for at least 3 years. Obviously, she hasn’t been assigned home or visiting teachers in that period. It’s amazing how many people we find who haven’t had visits from the church for years. Very sad.
Now that I’m off my “soapbox,” I’ll proceed with my story. The third visit we tried to make was to William McKiddie. The list said he’s 39 and is a deacon. A guy came to the door; we asked for William. He opened the door, held out his hand and said, “I’m John.” So we asked if he was William’s brother, and he told us that he is William but goes by John. We asked if he had a minute and he invited us in. We met his non-member wife, Chris, who is a friendly, sharp lady, and also Tommy, 5, and Abby, 7. And they are cute, blonde kids. John was really upbeat; he was born in the church and had great experiences growing up and in the youth programs. He even went on bus rides to the Sydney Temple for baptisms—one way=3 days. However, he’s just drifted away. We think Chris may have had something to do with that; she was wearing a cross around her neck. He mentioned that if he ever went to the states, he only wanted to go to the south. He’d take a box and fill it with car parts! He’s a car nut. Right now he’s working on an 84 Bronco, and he says car parts are super cheap in the southern US compared to over here. He buys all kinds of things through E-bay. It’s cheaper to buy something from the US and have it shipped than to get it here in Aussieland. Anyway, it was a great visit, and he told us to feel free to call on him if anyone in the ward needs help with something. What a nice guy.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Wow! You will have to have 'car' troubles at church ;) Then you will know how to call for help. hahaha
ReplyDeleteMel
Oops! I mean 'Then you will know WHO to call for help.' Plus, it will get him out to church.
ReplyDeleteMel
That was a neat story about John (William) Maybe he will want to return to the church. His children certainly need it. Three days to get to the temple is really something!!
ReplyDeleteIn Korea they have the same story trying to find those less actives.The missionaries would come and spend days in the office with maps and try to find where people had moved to. It was impossible. Many sets of elders really worked at it but no one keeps track of the move-in's and outs. We were supposed to have 900 members in our ward but we had about 70 active. I think this is a problem world wide; especially where you have lots of apartment buildings.