Farewell, so long, auf....

One of the trials of tracting in the country!
Black headed sheep. They make white sheep look really boring.
September 15, 2011 Thursday

Yesterday afternoon we drove to Perth to the Mission Home for a farewell dinner for Sister Kruger (from England), who has been the mission secretary, and Sister Matuauto (originally from Samoa but has lived in SLC for 40 years), who has run the commissary (supplies) for the last 18 months. We arrived here just 3 weeks after they did. The dinner was an oriental dinner prepared by Jenny, the woman hired to cook for the mission home on special occasions. All the senior missionaries were there with the exception of the Curtis’s who are in Esperance which is at least a 12 hour drive from here. We were able to meet 2 new couples who are here. The Lanes are from Queensland and have been assigned to Geralton Branch where the Walkers served for a year. The Marsdens are from New Zealand and were sent to Broome for 2 months. They are now taking the place of Sisters Kruger and Matuauto in the office. After dinner we gathered in the family room to exchange some stories and hear the sisters’ final testimonies. They both spoke of how much they had learned. It had been hard for them to adjust to having a companion since Sister Kruger has been divorced for 25 years and Sister M has never been married. But they both said they’d learned to love each other after the “rough corners” had been knocked off. It’s so good to get together with the other seniors. We drove home after a prayer that we’d travel safely. The big risk at night on that road is hitting a kangaroo. We saw 4 but they were all standing on the side of the road waiting for us to pass :o)
Yesterday morning we gave a lesson to Maxine, a lady in her late 70’s who’s a Lutheran. She was very teachable and then her husband came in. He was full of questions which we were able to answer (infant baptism, etc.), but he couldn’t “get over the need for ‘the book.’” We were there 2 ½ hours! We told him he could go straight to the Lord and ask about its truthfulness. In the end, he said he wanted to keep his minister between him and Christ—go figure! We did get to testify to him and felt the spirit as we did, so now it’s all up to him.
We taught Amy the Gospel of Jesus Christ lesson today. By the time you get to this lesson on faith, repentance, baptism, Holy Ghost and enduring to the end, you’ve already discussed most of it anyway in connection with the other lessons. Bless her heart, she did say, “I just think it’s so nice that yous guys will let me get baptized.” What a sweetheart!
Tonight we are doing “institute” since we were gone last night.