Dear Family and Friends,
For all of you who didn’t bother to email me pointing out my calendaring error on the picture of Christopher and Brother White with Sister Humphreys, The baptismal date was July (this year) not June.
So last weekend we got a reprieve on our two day notice to talk in church. On Saturday the Stake finally called the councilor to the Branch President and told him who was coming to speak in Sacrament meeting. Of course that automatically put us on the program for this week. So we spent the week preparing our talks in between going to district council and cruising the area looking for more members that never come to church.
We met a nice lady (Geraldine Lee) several weeks ago who was sitting on the porch with several members of her family who had come to help her cut her grass. We told her we were going to call her and we would like to come out and visit with her and get to know her better. This week we felt like we needed to call her and go see her. Sister Owens called her and reminded her of our visit several weeks ago and asked if we could come by. She told us she was in Boston to pick up the remains of her son who had been shot to death. She won’t be back until next weekend when they are going to have a memorial service for him in her front yard. We told her we would like to come and she said that would be all right. We visited several people in Greensboro during the week and asked each of them if they knew Geraldine. They all said they did and they already knew about her son’s death. They told us it was a drive by shooting and that there were about ten people standing on the street and her son was the only one that was shot. He was thirty-six years old. She had another son that was killed in an automobile accident just a few years ago as well.
So the two people that promised us they would be at church did not come today. But one lady (Donna) the Sisters met several weeks ago drove in alone from Bellamy (about 30 minutes) all by herself and was there. The Sisters met her in Walmart and did not get her name or number at the time. They got a call a few weeks later and Donna asked them if they remembered her from Walmart (they didn’t). She said they were so happy that she wanted them to come and see her. So they did. When she came to church today she asked if this is the church where Sister Humphreys comes. We told her it was. She said, “You all are so loving, but especially that little one.” (We really are missing Sister Humphreys).
Cedric and Tasha finally got there this week. Poor Cedric came once four weeks ago and then again today and probably thinks Brother Smith is the only one that teaches in Priesthood meeting and that he always talks about ministering. He doesn’t know we have a different teacher and different subject every week.
So we got to the church this morning at 8:00 AM for Branch Presidency meeting, then spoke in Sacrament meeting at nine. After the block Brother Morgan and I did finances and then came back for Branch Council. We got to come home for a bite of lunch and then we were off on a two hour drive to Bessemer to the Stake Center for a two hour meeting on ministering and got home a little bit after 9:00 PM. We had a bite to eat even though it is late and then took a few minutes to let you all know what we have been doing this week.
We did go to find a new move-in this week in Greensboro. The road was washed out so bad we had to park and walk up to the trailers. We had no idea which one was the one we were looking for. We could only walk around between the trailers (there were no roads or driveways). There were several young children sitting at a picnic table in front of one of the trailers so we asked them if they knew where the address was that we were looking for. An older girl pointed out a trailer and told us it was the one. When we got to the trailer there was a rather grumpy lady on the porch who informed us that the person we were looking for did not live there and that she had been there for several years. As we were walking on the sections of old carpet and a lot of old asphalt shingles that had been spread out to make a walking path that wouldn’t wash out, I couldn’t help but think that it was no different than if we had been called to a remote area in Africa to serve our mission. I wanted to take a picture of it but Sister Owens said the people would probably get upset with us if they noticed we were taking pictures. We will be back there this week and I am going to try to get a photo.
Brother White got some bad news this week that really got him down. As we have mentioned in the past, he drives himself to dialysis three times a week (he gets up at 4:00 AM). They told him this week that he has to have surgery on his neck to implant two screws. His skull is pressing down on his spine and beginning to crush some nerves and blood vessels and without the surgery he will soon be paralyzed from his head to his waste. Medicare and Medicaid will pay for all but $800 and they will not perform the surgery without payment of the $800 in advance. President James is checking with the Stake President about using fast offerings for payment of the bill. Our little branch is negative by quite a bit in our fast offering account. The need is overwhelming and the donations are very meager. I guess I shouldn’t have ended with such a depressing paragraph. I guess all in all it has been kind of a hard week. But we are going to bed and will be ready to start again in the morning.
We Love y’all.
Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon!
Elder and Sister Owens
No comments:
Post a Comment