Fountain by the dolderbahn; dolderbahn we ride up the hill to the mission home in; me standing in a rose garden (in the rain) in Volketswil with the rainbow in the background.

JUNE 2, 2009 TUESDAY

This morning we again had the opportunity to meet with all of the missionaries in our district for district meeting. Diana had the snack assignment and divided up the rice crispie treats. Elder Norris selected “Priesthood” as the theme for this week’s meeting and most of the assignments were related to that topic. I was first on the agenda having been assigned to select the opening song and give the opening prayer. I had also been assigned to pick a section from the Missionary Handbook and read it. I had decided to read the section on priesthood blessings, in particular the anointing and sealing/blessing of the sick. As soon as I started Elder Norris told me to stop and pick another topic. I thought that odd, but found out after a few moments that he had assigned that very topic to Elder Carrier to discuss. I randomly selected another topic, read and discussed it. The rest of the meeting was informative and inspirational with Sister Stoddard telling us her story about why she decided to serve a mission, Elder Carrier talking about priesthood blessings, Elder Pine instructing us why it’s important to have prophets and then Elder Norris gave each companionship a problem for which they had to prepare a plan to address it. Our problem was a new bishop had been called for our ward who was not very enthusiastic about missionary work. Our assignment was to work out a plan to help him become excited about missionary work, to get better acquainted with the missionaries and how best to use them to support the ward missionary effort. It was a fun exercise, but we would never have to work out a plan like that because our bishop is top notch. He’s more than a100% behind the missionary work in our ward. Diana excused herself from the meeting about twenty minutes before it ended so she could go to the kitchen to prepare lunch for everyone. The rest of the snacks Diana had prepared was lunch. When the meeting was over, we all enjoyed Mexican beans over rice. Very tasty.

Elders Harris and Nilsson asked us if we would help them put some furniture together for a non-member who is getting divorced from a member. After lunch we went home and changed and then rode to her apartment. Elders Norris and Carrier came also and worked for about an hour and then they had to leave. Before they left Susan wanted her apartment blessed and asked me to do it. I gave a short talk on the opportunity we have to be able to invite the Lord into our homes by dedicating them as sacred edifices where family members can worship Him and find safety from the world. It’s always a good experience when one gets to use the Priesthood to bless someone’s life. While Diana and the others put furniture together, I installed a hall light. There are more lights to install, but they didn’t have any more screw anchors and they needed to buy two more ceiling fixtures. We worked from 1:30 until 5:30 when Diana and I had to go to help prepare food and set up for Institute. There is still a lot more work to do and all of us are scheduled to go back on Thursday to finish the job. It’s great to do a little physical labor, however, we’ve been getting more than our share lately. Tomorrow we are scheduled to help the Rodriguez family do the same things. The person we helped today and Julio Rodriguez are non-members and so we feel we are doing the right thing by helping them. Susan is Elders Harris’s & Nilsson’s investigator and Julio is ours. Gabriella Rodriguez is beginning to come back to Church and as soon as they get settled in, we’ll be able to begin teaching them where Elders Ehlen and Roberts left off.

We made it to Institute a little after 6:00 and helped the Wichtermann’s set things up and prepare the food. It’s always fun working with them and getting to visit with the youth when they get there. Some come a little early to just hang around and talk with us and each other. We didn’t get a chance to stay tonight because we hadn’t gotten out to Volketswil to wish Livia Bianda a happy birthday. After things were all ready, we ducked out and traveled to Volketswil. In Schwamendingen it was nice and sunny, but in Volketswil it was kind of raining. We got off the train and walked the 10 minutes to Livia’s apartment . We only felt a few drops here and there on the way there. We were assured she would be home, but she was not. We left the gift in her mailbox intending to call her tonight after we got home. On the way back to the train station it was raining pretty good and we got pretty wet. But we are wash and wear kind of people, so it didn’t bother us too much. We even stopped and took photos of the rainbow that appeared in the sky.

We made it home, tuckered out again. I started writing our journal and Diana started reading. As we were doing these things, we got a call from Elder Pine. He said he needed us to do something for him and he also had a surprise for us. He said he’d be here in two minutes which he was. The surprise was that Elder Middleton was with him. Yes that Middleton who was in our district for the first six months as a companion with Elder Pine. That surely was a surprise because he is stationed in Germany right now. He said he had to come re-register with the Zurch government because you have to do it once a year. It was certainly good to see him again. Elder Pine had two other missionaries with him, also stationed in Germany. Elder Hargett had lost his wallet on the way down here from Germany and needed to contact his mother to put a stop on the credit/debit cards. Since he is not allowed to talk to his family, Elder Pine used our phone to contact his mother and let her know what happened.

One more thing that was interesting today was Elder Harris asked us if he could use our computer to watch the funeral of Truman Madsen who died a couple days ago. Elder Madsen was a relative of his and he’d also heard that three apostles we going to speak and he wanted to hear them too. We tried to find the service on the internet, but couldn’t.