Week 44: It was the best of times and the worst of times

Dear Family and Friends,

In her journal Sister Owens called Monday the day of minor miracles.  We experienced some tender mercies.  After our walk we decided we better drop the car off and get the oil changed before our Temple trip on Tuesday.  The shop is about half a mile from our apartment so we asked them to call us when it was finished and we walked home.  We just turned into our cul-de-sac when I realized our apartment key was on the ring with the car key back at the shop.  Then I remembered I was scraping the windows with the car running before our walk and Sister Owens came out of the house without locking it.  So we didn't have to walk back to the shop for the key.  That was good because Sister Owens decided to wear her new snow boots to walk and they were more like Frankenstein shoes than sneakers and she ended up with a very sore heel.  Later we were feeling badly that we were unable to get any initiatory work done so Sister Owens could take a family name to the endowment session with the mission on Tuesday.  We checked the new Family Tree app for the cell phone to check for names ready for ordinances and there was one name ready for endowments that we were able to print out so she could do a family name.  We delivered several invitations to branch members here in Demopolis for our Branch Conference on Sunday and then read the Book of Mormon with Ollie and Larry.

Tuesday was a great day spent in the temple with the missionaries.  We both got to do family names and they asked us to attend both sessions, once with our zone and then with the Tupelo zone after that.  They need all the senior couples because they don't have the young missionaries stand in the prayer circle.  The temple is open just for the missionaries so there isn't anyone else there but us.  They asked us to be the witness couple in the second session which is always a special privilege.  We didn't have the sisters with us this time.  All the missionaries had to drive their own cars because they were installing second generation TIWIs in all the vehicles.  We had to stop at Costco on the way home to have the tires rotated on our car.  We sat around there for two hours waiting for that which was not the most enjoyable way to end the day. We did see President and Sister Sainsbury there before we left and got to visit with them.  That seems to happen just about every time and it is always special.

Wednesday was about the lowest day of our mission so far for us.  We normally do not have district meeting in  the week when we have zone conference or mission temple trips but the sisters texted us Tuesday night and said the district leader said we were going to have District Council at 10:00 AM in Tuscaloosa anyway.  It didn't make for a very good day after such a long day on Tuesday.  It seemed to be a very discouraging day all around.  We decided something pretty special was going to happen on the weekend since Satan was exerting such a strong influence. I had tried to schedule ministering visits all week for the priesthood leaders to make tonight in conjunction with branch conference.  Out of six appointments I tried to schedule, nothing worked out except the first one I scheduled last week.  So I ended up driving to Greensboro to make that visit and Brother White was supposed to accompany me.  I got there and went to Brother White's apartment and he wasn't there and didn't answer his phone (the last thing in the world I thought would happen).  I went to the visit alone which I thought wouldn't hold up anyway.  I waited a long time at the door after knocking about three times and he came to the door just before I was going to head home.

Thursday was a much better day.  We had a good nights sleep and the sun came out for the first time in several days.  Our driving the past couple days was mostly in rain.  Sister Owens made some visits with the Primary President and invited some sisters to come to branch conference. We bought some things at the store for a gentleman the sisters have started to teach.  Sister Owens went with them Wednesday  night while I was gone to Greensboro.  He hadn't eaten anything since Monday.

Friday we fixed some things to take for the pot luck after branch conference on Sunday.  Then we went to Kamia's baptism that night (see attachment #1).  Her mother decided she was not going to be baptized because she didn't feel she would be able to live the law of chastity.  Her boyfriend is a truck driver and stays at their house whenever he is in town.  She said she was not going to marry him because that would end her benefit check from the government, and she didn't want to break up with him.  When we got to the baptism she told the sisters we could make next Friday her night.  We were all shocked.  She said  Tony asked her to marry him so she wants to be baptized. I guess we'll see what happens with that.

Saturday and Sunday were the best days of our mission so far.  We left at 8:00 AM to go to the temple in conjunction with branch conference.  We've been going back and forth all week trying to work out transportation.  President James wanted the branch council to attend the 9:00 AM session because Kamia was originally going to be baptized Saturday.  We had to change it to Friday so she could have some medical procedures done on Saturday so we wanted to change it to 11:00 since the rest of the council (Smiths) has seven kids and it would be hard to get there that early.  He said he was still going to go at 9:00 but texted us at 3:00 AM advising they were at the hospital in Birmingham with their granddaughter and weren't sure they would get to the temple.  Saturday was the day the temple invites any new converts to come to do baptisms for the dead.  So we took Ja'Nylia and the sisters (see attachment #2) in our car and Smiths took Cedric and Tasha and Zyreonia (correct spelling) in their car and they went to the 10:30 baptism session.  Brother Smith and his kids and the sisters stayed in the baptism session and Sister Owens and I were the only ones from the branch council that attended an endowment session.  We found out Sunday that The James were in the hospital for the birth of their great grandson, Zion.

Sunday was a great day that started at 7:30 AM (some of the stake leaders had to drive two hours to get here).  President Lewis (counselor in the Stake Presidency) came representing the Presidency.  He told us while he was in the Temple yesterday he was seeking inspiration as to what he should do to help the saints in Demopolis.  He said the question came into his mind, "Why can't Demopolis become a ward?" He kept thinking of all the reasons why it cant be a ward and the question just kept coming more and more forcefully.  He finally decided the Lord was trying to tell him something and he should pay attention.  So that is the question he presented to us today.  He told us miracles can happen.  We just need to pray with faith for the things we need to make it possible for us to be a ward.  We had sixty-six people in attendance.  More than 30% higher than we have ever had since we have been here.  I guess we have our work cut out for us for the next year.

Three tithing envelops were turned in today. One of them was from one of the Kirk girls, baptized two weeks ago.  What a group of special kids here!

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon.

We love y'all,

Elder and Sister Owens

Week 43: Winter is here but the tornado missed us again

Dear Family and Friends,

The week started off a little bumpy.  Sister Owens succumbed to the approaching winter weather and was fighting a bug for a couple days ( I think she spent a little to much time in company with the sick and afflicted).  She felt good enough Wednesday that we could go to Tuscaloosa for District Council.  As usual it was a very good meeting.  We are always impressed with the caliber of these young missionaries with whom we get to serve. Sister Owens was still fighting a pretty good headache so nothing much happened after we got home from Tuscaloosa.  Brother Smith had to have Coordination meeting Tuesday night instead of Wednesday so I had gone to that without Sister Owens.

Thursday Sister Nixon's daughter came to Book of Mormon class.  She was paralyzed from the chest down from a car accident a couple years ago.  She came to church the first Sunday of the year (the first time since we have been here).  She has seemed like a pretty hard case the times we have visited her so we are excited to have her in class.  Our non-member "regular" was trying to hold back her tears all through class. Her family is failing to provide the care they should be providing.  We might be paying another visit to Human Resources again.

Friday we got some prints at Walmart of the pictures we took of the Kirk girls at their baptism so we could get them framed and give to them.  We went to a book of Mormon referral with the sisters.  He was an older black gentleman.  When we went into his apartment he apologized because he only had two chairs.  They were wooden kitchen chairs.  He has been trying to find work and is hoping to move into a different apartment in the next few weeks.  He only had one table lamp on in the whole apartment.  There was no shade on the lamp, it was just the light bulb.  He was a very humble man.  He and Sister Owens sat on the chairs while the sisters explained the Book of Mormon to him.  He said a very sweet prayer before we left.  Then we went with the sisters to meet with the McGees who we have been taking to church the past few weeks.  It is a lady and her ten year old daughter.  They are both very excited about being baptized next Saturday.

The sisters were tracting in the rain this week and thinking they should be in their car making phone calls but kept going anyway.  They knocked on a door and a young lady opened the door and invited them in and said she had been waiting for them to come.  She was being taught a year ago by the sisters and was scheduled to be baptized but moved to Tuscaloosa.  She moved back here last fall and didn't know how to contact the missionaries because she had lost their number when her apartment was flooded.  She asked them to sit and read the Book of Mormon with her and said she wanted to come to church Sunday, which she did. President James remembered her from a year ago but never knew what happened to her.  She will probably be baptized before too long.

We have a mission temple trip next Tuesday and our Branch conference is next Sunday so we will be going to the temple on Saturday as well, as a Branch.  We have had several family names for a while and have not been able to do the work when we have gone because they needed baptisms and initiatory work done.  We have to schedule everything with the temple here because they are only open certain hours on certain days.  We decided we would go Saturday and get the work done so we can do family names in the upcoming endowment sessions.  Brother Kirk was baptized several weeks ago for the names I have.  Sister Owens has some names from a couple sisters in the branch that still have to have baptisms done so we were hoping we could get those done in one of the youth sessions and then we could both do initiatory work.  When we got to the temple there was only one parking place in the parking lot.  The day before when we called to schedule an appointment they had told us they don't do appointments anymore, that they have cards for all the sessions (initiatory, endowment, etc.) and you just come and if they still have a card you can get a session sometime during the day. Kind of a gamble for a two hour and twenty minute trip one way.  When we went in they told us they had a three stake youth conference from the Tupelo, Mississippi area doing baptisms all day (don't know why they couldn't have mentioned that the night before when we were talking to them on the phone).  We asked and they didn't think they could fit in any of our names for baptisms but they would try.  We decided to do an endowment session and then see if they got any of the baptisms done and then hopefully get an initiatory session.  They hadn't done any of the names when the endowment session was done, so I went and did an initiatory session for the names I had and Sister Owens was going to wait a while longer for the names from the baptismal session.  Two hours later I was finished and they still hadn't done any of the names.  Well, next Saturday is the day for new converts to do baptisms for the dead so now we have some names for the Kirk girls to do then.  On our way home from the temple we encountered some pretty gusty winds when we crossed a bridge and traveled most of the way in moderate rain but really didn't know anything about the tornado until after we got home and started getting texts wanting to know if we were okay.  So far all the really dangerous weather has stayed pretty far to the east of us.  I guess Montgomery had a tornado Saturday but that is about a hundred miles east of Demopolis.

With all that was going on last Sunday, I forgot to mention that Brother white was ordained an Elder and set apart as the first counselor in the Elders Quorum.  I asked him today if he talked to President James about when he could go to the temple.  He said President hasn't said anything about it to him.  I told him he is the one that wants to go to the temple and he has to ask President James about it.  He was just waiting for the President to say something. We got to visit with President James for a few minutes after church.  He had interviewed the Kirk girls for their recommends for baptism for the dead and told us how impressed he was with their gospel knowledge and the depth of their testimonies.  He had been a little skeptical about their preparedness for their baptisms.  There are some really neat kids in the branch right now, mostly under sixteen and several actually primary age.  They seem to be stronger in the gospel that a lot of the adults.  Two nonmember kids call the James about 6:00 AM every Sunday morning asking them for a ride to church.  A little cousin of the Kirks, Aliah (the one wrapped up in Ja'Nylia's arms in attachment #1), has been coming to church longer that they have and is just waiting for her Auntie to give her permission to be baptized.  She is nine.

Sister Owens liked the cloud we saw on our drive home from the Temple (attachment #2 looking to the west away from the bad stuff).

We are seeing a lot of good things start to happen here.  We are glad we're here.

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon every day.

We love y'all,  thanks for your support.

Elder and Sister Owens

Week 42: Sour milk cake and egg drop soup and the crazy little white Grandma

Dear Family and Friends,

Monday was our zone conference.  They had us go to Montgomery again to save fifteen minutes driving time for us.  We kind of miss meeting with our own zone and the rest of our district but the drive to Montgomery is much better than the drive to Birmingham.  It makes for a very full day anyway.  We left town at 6:40 AM and got home at 7:30 PM. Conference is always a very encouraging experience for us.

It seems like we are becoming the financial advisors for a number of the members of the branch.  President James had us do a Needs Assessment for one of the sisters on Tuesday.  She assured us when we got there that her outgo was definitely more than her income, which it was.  The whole state seems to have an entitlement mentality.  It is hard to convince people that they are actually supposed to work at getting to the point where they can be self-sufficient.  A lot of them just look to the church as another source for ongoing benefits to pay their expenses.

Wednesday we went to Tuscaloosa for our district council.  On the way home we took the sisters to the West End Grocery again for lunch in Eutaw.  Sister Weaver (from Chicago) was a little more comfortable there than Sister Shreeve was last time we went.  Poor Sister Tennyson just kind of goes along with anything we do.  Ruthie Brown (from our branch) is the cook there and we have never been disappointed with the food yet.  We had chicken and I really felt bad we weren't coming the next day when she said she had to start the meat marinating for the next day.  She was doing a Boston Butt and meat loaf for tomorrow.  We wanted to get by there to see her because she is really stressing over some dealings she has with the courts over her finances.  She has to go to court next Thursday.

I am having a hard time accepting the fact that the two of us do not get through a whole gallon of milk before It goes sour.  Of course only one of us ever drinks it anyway (that might have something to do with it).  Milk is about $3.85 a gallon now and we are having to pay ¾ of the price for half the milk when we buy a half gallon so we can finish it before it goes sour.  So we had half of the last gallon of milk go sour and we were going to make some sour milk pancakes but never did get around to it.  The milk got about as thick as rice pudding and Sister Owens said we had to throw it out but I wouldn't let her.  We got a recipe from Tami for sour milk chocolate cake and made one for Book of Mormon class (they will eat anything)  It was not the easiest thing to make with soda dissolved in boiling water and all, but it ended up being a very good cake.  We are keeping the recipe.  We also had to make some chicken noodle soup for the RS luncheon on Friday.  The noodles were only supposed to boil for twenty minutes but by the time we got to that point we were out of time and had to leave for class so we put it in the crock pot and figured they could go a while on low.

Friday was a very big busy day.  The monthly meeting for Relief Society included a presentation by Elder Owens on budgeting (we'll see how much good that does) and then we had the chicken noodle soup and French rolls from the "made too much" rack at Walmart for a Budget meal.  One of the sisters complimented Sister Owens on the soup and told her it reminded her of Egg Drop soup at Chinese restaurants (so much for cooking the noodles on Low in the Crock Pot).  Of course we had to make our run to Greensboro to bring the sisters in for the meeting but one of them was not home when we got there to pick her up.  That ended up being a good thing because the other sister decided to stay in Demopolis for the afternoon so we didn't have to take her back to Greensboro.  We had a baptism in the evening.  Cedric and Tasha Kirk's daughters were baptized.  They had told the sisters when they were teaching Cedric that there was no way they were being baptized.  They are turning seventeen and fourteen this year.  We took them to the temple with Cedric and Tasha when they were baptized for the dead.  The younger one, Ja'Nylia, cried all the way to Birmingham because she did not want to go the temple.  She was the one that bore her testimony on fast Sunday and asked if she could speak after she was baptized.  There were between thirty and forty people there and she got up and thanked everyone for coming and told them that she hoped they would get baptized just like she did.  There were a lot of her cousins that came for the service.  Before the service Sister Owens told her she would be her crazy little white grandma.  We took a picture of the family (Attachment #1, this was after I coaxed them all to actually smile) and Ja'Nylia whispered to Sister Weaver that she wanted to have her picture taken with Sister Owens (Attachment #2).  It's so neat to see how much the girls have changed over the past several weeks.  They are both so excited to be with the youth in the ward.  They are registered to go to the Youth Conference in February.  They will have five stakes involved.  It will be quite the experience for both of them.  Ja'Nylia's sister is Zyeronia.  A couple more of the very interesting names they have here.  Sister Owens commented once that they give everybody such exotic names here and then end up calling them Kiki or Cecee or Pepee or Tata, etc.  Very interesting. The Kirk girl's names are pronounced Janyla and Zereyawna.

Saturday we thought we were finally going to have a day to ourselves to get our cleaning and laundry done.  Not so.  A sister in Greensboro called and said she was out of food.  President James asked us if we would take her some necessities and do an Needs Assessment while we were there.  We got one grocery list from her and one from President James.  She was probably a little disappointed but she got the items on President James list and not hers. We did get our wash done before we got to bed.

We were looking forward to resting up a bit tonight but the sisters needed us to take them out to some teaching appointments.  They had four backup appointments and we ended up actually getting in with a mother and her daughter that are planning on being baptized in two weeks.  We read a chapter in the Book of Mormon with them.  We managed to reschedule two of the other four appointments.

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon (and read your Come Follow Me lesson)

We Love y'all,

Elder and Sister Owens

Week 41: Happy New Year from Alabama, what season is this, really!

Dear Family and Friends,

We had a great start to the New Year.  We went o  a team up with the sisters to a Book of Mormon discussion with a very receptive man that advised us that he has always attended church.  His father is a deacon in his church and he has several uncles and cousins that are deacons or preachers in different churches.  He was interested to find out about the Book of Mormon and said he was definitely going to read the introduction.  He was excited to make a follow up appointment for Friday and looked forward to seeing us again.

Wednesday morning we went with the sisters to a couple of appointments in Greensboro, both of which fell through.  So we used the time to look for some more of the inactive members of the branch.  We drove five miles out of town to try to find one of them and they weren't home (what a surprise – see attachment # 1)  I guess it's been a while since they lived there.  On the way home we took a picture of the flooded pasture that we photographed five days earlier and sent with last weeks email (this week's pic is attachment #2). We went in the afternoon to read the Book of Mormon with Larry (the Viet Nam vet with PTSD).  He always has so many questions about what we are reading.  We hope it is making a difference for him.  Sister Owens thinks he is seeming a little more mellow than before we started reading with him. After coordination meeting we went back to help Ollie get her bills paid for the month and get her bank statement balanced. She shakes so badly she can't write checks and Ross charges her $40 dollars to write them for her (what a place).

Thursday was Relief Society Presidency meeting for Sister Owens and then we had the Book of Mormon class in Greensboro.  We haven't had food for the last couple weeks and a couple of the men didn't show up this week (don't know if that is because we are just finishing up the Isaiah chapters or because we didn't have food for two weeks).  It was neat to get to chapter 25 of II Nephi and read how Nephi glories in plainness.  That chapter was much easier for them to understand.  We suggested that maybe everybody might read two or three chapters on their own before we have class because Sister Owens and I would like to get closer to the end of the book with them before we go home next year.  They have only been reading a chapter each week and at that rate would only be somewhere in Mosiah when we leave.  We'll have to see how that goes.

Friday we followed up a second time with a fellow in Linden on a team up with the sisters.  Last time was not a good time and this time he was gone shopping in Demopolis.  Sister Weaver said she has no problem with rejection but really resents people that just waste her time standing them up instead of saying they really don't want to talk to us.  They keep going back just in case.  It is Alabama and nobody wants to hurt anyone's feelings.  We went to the follow up appointment with the fellow we met with on Monday.  His father was there and he was going to go see about buying a car, so it  wasn't a good time for him.  He will have us come back next week.  Gee, someone in our branch with a car that could drive to church.  I think we are dreaming.

We had to pick up Andrea for church so we weren't available to get the new people that the sisters have been teaching.  They called a sister from Eutaw that just bought a car to see if she could get Andrea and her mother so we would be able to get the McGees, but they said they never could get in touch with her.  But the mother of the new family wasn't coming so we could just go by and get her daughter after we picked up Andrea and her mother.  Well, interestingly enough, Andrea's mother was having Vertigo and didn't come, so we just had Andrea and Kamia and we weren't late for church.  Sister McGee was "doing hair" but said she is coming next week.  The sister they tried to contact to pick up Andrea and her mother showed up at church with her inactive son and his non-member "wife."  Sadly, we found out why they were there later when the Branch President showed me the overdue power bills that they wanted us to pay for them (I guess that's not nice to say but it's so often true). The Kirk girls that wouldn't join in on the discussions when Cedric was being taught and said they did not want to be baptized are planning to be baptized this Friday.  The youngest (13) stood up and bore her testimony today in Testimony meeting. It is so neat, they seem like totally different girls than when we first met them.  On the way home from church today we had to turn on the AC.  Seventy-two degrees is kind of warm with all this humidity.  We sure miss all that snow and freezing weather (yeah, right).

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon every day.

We love y'all,

Elder and Sister Owens

Week 40: A very merry Christmas in Alabama

Dear Family and Friends,

Monday was our District Council in Tuscaloosa.  It was the only day this week we could have it.  We are having to change the day because our District Leader and his companion have been designated the technology specialists for the mission so they will be traveling most of the time on Tuesdays to help other districts with technology problems.  Sister Owens just rescheduled her monthly Relief Society meeting to Friday so our Branch President’s wife could attend.  The district chose Friday to start having District Meeting (just our luck).  We told them of the conflict and it might be changed to Thursday.  The meeting was later than usual and everybody took a dinner break before going caroling as a district along the river in Tuscaloosa.  I heard the sisters from our area explaining to the other sisters that they came with us and would have to go to dinner with us.  Then they went to Sister Owens and asked her very timidly if they might be able to go to diner with the other sisters in the district.  She told them she thought that would be okay (yippee, only two for dinner tonight).  It was so funny that they felt so apologetic about asking.  We got to go with the Hursts (the other senior couple).  We went to the Cook Out restaurant.  We got to have our traditional hamburger supper for Christmas Eve.  They had a hamburger, two sides, and a drink for $5.  Not bad.  I ordered a double burger with cheese and Sister Owens’ single had more meat on it than mine did.  We were excited that we got two sides for such a reasonable price until we got our order and noticed that the side of onion rings was four onion rings.  But all in all it was a pretty good deal.  Everybody was supposed to be back at the Institute by 6:00 PM but nobody showed up until 7:00.  It was already dark for two hours and we still had to drive home.  Our sisters were good to be willing to leave for home instead of going caroling with the rest of the district so we didn’t get down to the river.

We spent most of Christmas day preparing the turkey dinner with all the trimmings that Sister Patterson delivered to feed us and the sisters.  It was a fifteen pound turkey.  We had Turkey, yams, dressing, gravy, brown and serve rolls, canned cranberries (we gave those to the sisters) and bags of frozen black eyed peas in every stage of growth you can imagine.  There was also a bag of frozen whole okra which Sister Owens gave to the sisters as well, so we don’t get to try it now.  Sister Patterson also gave us one of her award winning buttermilk pecan pies for desert.  The sisters had their lunch appointment at noon so we thought they would be over by 5:00 since we had an appointment at 7:30.  They called about 4:30 and asked if they could come for dinner at 6:00.  They were going to the church to skype their families at 5:00 so we were pretty sure they wouldn’t be over by 6:00 for dinner (which was ready to eat at 5:00).  We texted them at 6:07 and asked if they would mind if we started without them.  They showed up about 6:15 and we all ate cold turkey (see attachment #1) and headed to Greensboro.  We were all invited to the Merrills to see their twenty-four Christmas trees that they have set up in their antebellum mansion (see attachment #2).  We visited with the Merrills  until 9:00 so we got the sisters home a little late.

The Branch President got a call from one of the branch members on Monday advising him that their water was going to be turned off that day because their bill hadn’t  been paid.  More times than not President James usually pays things like that out of his own funds because we are always negative in our Fast Offering fund.  They had done a lot for different members for Christmas and Sister James called us to see if we might be able to help in some way.  We told her we would look into it and take care of it.  We couldn’t get an answer when we called the member so we called the water department and they weren’t open.  If they weren’t open we were pretty sure they weren’t going to be turning off anyone’s water on Christmas Eve.  Wednesday we made some calls and went out to Livingston to pay the bill as it would be turned off the next day.  We found out the members daughter and fiancé are living with her and had agreed to pay the water bill.  When they were advised that it would be turned off the member asked her daughter why she hadn’t paid the bill.  She said, “Nobody reminded me.”  When we went to pay the bill we learned it hadn’t been paid since October.  It had two late payment fees of $50 each and 10 percent interest on the unpaid balance each month.  If we hadn’t paid the bill when we did there would have been another $50 late fee the next day and it would have been shut off.  It is so frustrating that almost everybody here knows they can just ignore their bills and when they threaten to shut off the utilities then the church will step in and take care of it and it is always at least twice as much as it would have been if the bills were paid on time.  Anyway, we certainly appreciate so many of you that sent us funds (which you really shouldn’t do) this month which made it possible for us to help several people this season.  We took the sisters out to Linden to keep a couple of appointments in the evening after our coordination meeting.  Both of them said it wasn’t a good time and rescheduled the appointments.

Thursday we went out with the sisters to help with an eagle project for one of the Smith boys.  The Smith family along with their grandparents and the sisters and us were the only ones there, but we accomplished quite a lot of work.  We were  clearing a birding trail at one of the parks in the area (see attachment #3).  We also put up several markers identifying different trees along the trail. Sister Owens got to run the leaf blower for the first time in her life.  She was pretty excited about it.  One of the park caretakers followed along with her and spelled her about every ten minutes so it went pretty well.  We had Book of Mormon class in the afternoon and drove home in a torrential rain storm.  At 11:55 PM  we received a flash flood warning on our cell phone.  We have a weather radio in our apartment that is supposed to come on and warn us of dangerous weather situations.  It has never gone off even though people in the area have asked us a couple times if it went off because theirs did. It was raining so hard when we left the building in Greensboro I didn’t even bother to hurry going to get the car.  I was totally drenched as soon as I went out the door.

Friday we went back to Greensboro to deliver oranges, Theraflu, and chicken soup to one of the sisters from Book of Mormon class that has a really bad cold.  We got a picture of the pastures where the cattle were feeding the day before the rain storm (see attachment #4).  Since both of us spoke in church today we spent Friday afternoon preparing our talks.

Saturday we got to do our laundry and cleaning and finish preparing our talks and pack up all the dishes, etc. that we used for our Christmas dinner.

Brother White had his interview today with a counselor in the Stake Presidency.  I didn’t get to find out from the President when he is going to be ordained but we think it should be soon.  We are excited for him.  The sisters called us this morning before Branch Presidency meeting.  They needed us to pick up some people they started teaching this week.  Luckily Andrea called us before that to say they weren’t coming so we didn’t have to pick them up as we usually do.  It was a lady and her nine year old daughter.  We had quite a fiasco in the third hour trying to set everyone up with accounts at Family Search and Ancestry.com.  Probably not the best introduction to the church.  And we had to explain that it is all going to be different next week with the new meeting schedule. Her daughter came out from primary and asked her mom if they can come back again next week.  When we took them home the mom asked us what lesson we wanted them to study for next week and said they were planning to come again.  It may prove to be a bit of a logistics problem if we are picking up Andrea and her mother next week as we usually do.  We are sure it will all work out some how.

We hope y’all had a merry Christmas and wish y’all a happy new year.

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon and study Come Follow Me this week with your family.

We love y’all,

Elder and Sister Owens

PS.  Brother Hurst says if y’all means you all then w’all should be what you say for we all.

Week 39: Ministering to the sick and afflicted and The Work and The Glory revisited

Dear Family and Friends,

Transfers came a week early this month because of Christmas.  Monday we took both the sisters to Tuscaloosa.  Sister Shreeve went home this week so she went to the mission home a day early and Sister Tennison spent the day and night with the sisters in Tuscaloosa before going to Gardendale to get her new companion.  After we dropped them off we were so excited to be someplace with just the two of us that we went to Panda Express for a late lunch all by ourselves.  It was nice.  When we got home Sister Owens had her daily phone conversation with Beth and then for home evening we read another chapter out of "Reality and Refuge."  It is a book by John H. Groberg about experiences he had as president of the Idaho Falls Temple.  One of the senior couples in the mission gave it to us for Christmas.

Tuesday we spent ministering to the sick and afflicted in the branch.  We didn't really have time to make chicken soup so we had to buy cans at the store along with oranges, Theraflu, and some apple juice and then we delivered it to different sisters in the branch that are suffering from bad colds or flu.  One had been to the emergency room the previous day and we took her to the drug store to get a prescription for some pretty powerful medication.  Later we cooked up some butter beans with the ham bone we boiled from the Branch potluck on Sunday.  We will take it with us to Book of Mormon class on Thursday in Greensboro.

We asked a couple of times whether we would be needed to help with transfers in Gardendale but everybody just kept saying they would let us know.  Tuesday night Sister Tennyson texted us to see if we got the text about transfers.  We had not so she forwarded it to us.  They told her she would pick up her new companion and return to Demopolis and that the Owens should be able to give her a ride.  So I guess they decided they wanted our help.  We decided, since we were going without sisters, we could go a little later because we just had to be there to pick them up and bring them home.  We didn't leave until after 8:00 AM instead of 6:30 when we usually go.  We got there about twenty minutes to eleven and noticed all the missionaries were just arriving.  We went into the chapel and found out they never start until eleven o'clock.  Every time we have gone until now one of our sisters has been getting a new missionary to train and they always have to be there by nine o'clock.  We were glad we didn't decide to go at the regular time.  Sister Tennison's new companion is African American and has been out about six months. She is from south side Chicago. I think she can handle about anything they can throw at her here.  She seems like she will be a really good missionary.  We are excited to have her here.  Of course she received the standard initiation.  We took her to Costco for a hotdog on our way home.

Back in September right after we moved into our new apartment we met a man in Walmart who is a member of the church and also a member of the National Guard.  He doesn't live in Demopolis but has duties here at the armory.  We found out he was seeing a doctor here and would be coming a few weeks after that with his wife to one of his appointments.  We were so excited about our big, spacious apartment that we told him to call us when he got to town and we would have them over for lunch.  We didn't get his number and the mission scheduled a Zone Conference for that very day.  We had no way to tell him we could not have them come.  We got the call from him the day of the conference and had to tell him we couldn't have them over.  Fast forward to about two weeks ago.  We got a text from him that the guard sponsored a toys for tots and had several toys left over.  He said they would like to help some kids in Demopolis and thought we might know of some families that could use the assistance.  We called Sister James and came up with a list of ten names and sent the list to Mark and said if he needed more we could give him several more names.  He responded that we did not need to give him more names, he didn't expect nearly that many.  He texted us Wednesday on our way home from transfers and said they had the toys at the Armory.  We told him we would be home by 4:30 and could come over and pick them up.  He said he would stay as long as he needed to.  When we got there he took us back to a huge room with about four six foot tables loaded with toys.  I thought it was a little strange that they still had so many toys because he said he wasn't expecting such a big list.  It looked to me like they still had plenty more toys.  The toys were all divided into piles and I thought he was showing us the pile that was ours.  Each pile was for one of the ten children.  Everything in the room was for us.  We were overwhelmed, we were expecting one or two toys for each of the kids.  He told Sister Owens while we were there that his mother-in-law called them and said she wanted to do something for him and his wife for Christmas.  He asked her to spend the money on the kids in Demopolis instead of doing something for them. He had reached out to friends and several other members of his family to come up with all the toys they gave us.  He and his wife have no children.  He is retiring from the Guard this next year and they are going to start fostering children.  Our Thursday was pretty full before Book of Mormon class. We and the Branch President's wife were wrapping Christmas presents (see attachment) for eleven children in the branch.  Every one of those kids are having a nicer Christmas from the National Guard than any of our children ever had while they lived in our home.

Our new neighbors are from Tennessee.  They met 30 years ago when they were both white water river guides.  They are old now, like us, but they still canoe.  They have a Suburban and it has two very long canoes strapped on top of it.  We wrote our testimony in a copy of the Book of Mormon and took it over to her with a little plate of banana bread.  When we offered it to her she told us that she and her husband were both extras in the movie a few years ago (The Work and The Glory) and she has read the whole series.  We assured her the series she read was not the Book of Mormon.  She said she knew that but she is Christian and she would never convert to "Mormonism."  Sister Owens asked her if we could leave the book with her anyway.  She said that would be fine but she won't read it.  They own some land in Sumter County which they are going to be developing.  They are gone back to Tennessee this weekend to pick up some more of their belongings.  We will just have to be friends while we are here and see what happens.

Friday we got some of our Laundry done (well Sister owens did) since we are going back to Birmingham again tomorrow to have dinner with the other senior couples at President and Sister Sainsbury's home.  Later in the day Sister Owens went with the sisters to a couple of appointments in Greensboro.  We were both going to go but I remembered the last time I was in a room full of four women and decided it would be better all around if I stayed home.  So they went to the appointments and I stayed home and prepared dinner so we could feed the sisters after their meetings.

Saturday we only had to drive to Tuscaloosa.  The Hursts, the YSA couple at the Institute, drove from there to Birmingham for the dinner at Sainsburys. We had a chance to fellowship with all the seniors in the mission.  A new couple just arrived last week.  They are assigned to the military base in Montgomery.

We had a really good Sacrament meeting this morning.  Ollie Wilson spoke for the second time since she was baptized.  She read the Christmas story from Luke 2.  Sister James had a nice message on improving ourselves as a gift to the Savior  and talked about how we can change our lives based on the beatitudes that were taught by the Savior.  Our Elders Quorum President, Brother Smith, spoke about the Savior and the Atonement.  We had 30 people there and only one of them was a non-member.  That was Chris Grice that has been coming on and off to our Book of Mormon class.  The neatest thing today was President James submitting the recommendation for Brother White to be ordained an Elder.  If all goes well a councilor to the Stake President will come next week and he will be ordained.

We are so grateful for this season of the year when everyone commemorates the birth of the Savior.  It is such a privilege for us to be here to serve him.  We are especially thankful for all of you and all the support you give us.  We hope the Lord will bless you all and that you will all have a very merry Christmas.

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon.

We love y'all,

Elder and Sister Owens

Week 38: Too many parties, I think my wife is joining the Baptists

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was so busy we didn’t have any time to do missionary work.  Monday Sister Owens had her Relief Society Presidency meeting……from 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM!!  I guess they did plan out next year through April.  Then we did go read the Book of Mormon with Ollie and Larry.  We finished that just in time for Sister Owens to get to the Fair Haven Baptist Women’s annual Christmas meeting…that included dinner, door prizes, and a special speaker.  They had over one hundred ladies in attendance.  You can just imagine how long that went with that many women there.  Sister Owens was quite impressed with Judy, the guest speaker.  She is the Bargainomics lady who spoke on having a Christ centered Christmas and how to find bargains (??). She told about how she was very upset with a church in another community that she found out was using her copyrighted name (Bargainomics) and finally decided she was going to have to call them and explain that they could not use the name because she had paid for and owned the exclusive right to use that name. The lady she talked to was very upset and just didn’t know what they could do.  The woman that was coming to speak to their group used the name and that is why they announced it that way.  She asked them who was coming to speak and they told her.  She said, “Wait a minute, that’s my name” and asked when the meeting was scheduled.  They told her and she said she didn’t know anything about the meeting. The women both thought the other had called and made the arrangements and no one had made the call. She said it was just impossible for her to clear her schedule to be there on such short notice.  Then she explained how the Lord intervened and everything worked out so she could be there for the engagement.

We had interviews scheduled this week with the President so we didn’t have our weekly District Council meeting on Tuesday.  Unfortunately, I was being very efficient six months ago when I scheduled my six month follow up exam for my eyes and set it for early Tuesday morning before District Council, so we had to go to Tuscaloosa anyway. The doctor said everything looks good and I don’t have to go back for a year. We stopped at the transmission shop before we came home so they could check out the transmission.  It was about a half quart low so they topped it off and asked if we could bring it by sometime and let them “play around with it a little.” We were sent to the office to schedule a time and they took our number and said they would call us. I doubt we will hear from them.  When we got home we went shopping for the RS luncheon on Wednesday and the Branch pot luck after church on Sunday.  Then we went home and made chili for the luncheon in Relief Society. We were up quite late and some of the beans were still a little too firm for Sister Owens (I thought they were just right).

Wednesday was our full day of taxi service for the Relief Society meeting.  Out to Greensboro and back to the church then over to pick up Andrea and Helen and back to the church.  The turn out was pretty good (14 sisters).  Between them and the Smith children they consumed 40 servings of Chili (attachment #3).  There was not a bean left in the pot.  Sister Owens says it was more like a special ed class.  Half the sisters needed one on one help and the other half helped them.  They embroidered a simple manger scene on canvas (attachment #2).  Sister Owens is not saying whether she was giving or receiving the help.  The day was pretty well gone by the time we finished the clean up and got everybody back home.

Thursday was our Zone Conference/Christmas party in Birmingham.  We were wondering what a Christmas party was going to be like with about 50 to 60 missionaries (half of the mission).  It was really quite nice.  We had instruction from President Sainsbury in the morning and a few musical numbers from the young missionaries and testimonies from some senior couples and the President’s councilors and their wives.  There is some really great talent in this mission.  After a tremendous lunch served by the stake Relief Society there was a talent show put on by the missionaries.  Very entertaining (attachment #4)!   Then we watched the movie Coco.  That was the first time for us to see that movie.  After the movie we went to the chapel and had a devotional and the President asked us that no one talk after the devotional but that we just leave and get in our cars and drive home and not talk in our cars either.  He just wanted us to spend time contemplating on the things that were presented in the devotional.  He and Sister Sainsbury shared the scriptures that they read every year in their family and had us sing different Christmas hymns between the scripture passages.  This is the third time they have done it at Christmas in the mission.  We left Demopolis at 7:45 AM to get to the Conference and got home at 8:00PM.  Very long day.

Friday we went back to Tuscaloosa for interviews with the President.  We waited for all the young missionaries to be interviewed (in the district).  Two of them were extended interviews because they are going home this transfer.  When the President got done with them he shook our hand and said, “Are we good?”  We told him that we were fine, though we always look forward to visiting with him for a few minutes. He had to get on to another district for more interviews and as always with interviews, they were running late.  On the way home we stopped in Tuscaloosa and took the sisters to Olive Garden for a late lunch (Sister Shreeve’s choice, since she is going home this next week.)

Saturday was P-day.  We finally got a break (for a little while).  We got to do laundry and house cleaning and then started preparing food for the dinner after church on Sunday.  We peeled, cooked, and mashed ten pounds plus of potatoes, cut up a nice big fresh pineapple and made a big batch of gravy. We bought some little mini lights for our Christmas cotton tree (attachment #1).  We were going to make some fresh cranberry sauce for the dinner but only had half a package of cranberries by the time we sorted them (I swore I would never by off brand cranberries from Walmart several years ago but since they are the only store in this town I gave in…never again).

We had several new people at church today.  Our optimistic Elders Quorum President said we had over sixty people, but I counted during Sacrament Meeting and never could get more than forty-seven.  We had six people in the Gospel Principles class compared to none for the last four weeks so that was pretty good.  The Relief Society Instructor didn’t come today so I got to teach the Gospel Principles class and combined Elders Quorum and Relief Society (probably a little hard on the visitors).  But it had to go well since the topic we covered was “Believe, Love, and Do” by Elder Uchtdorf.  The dinner went well but we found that the black people here really aren’t big on mashed potatoes and gravy.  We brought about five pounds of them home.  That’s okay.  It will make good quick meals this coming week (or two).  Cedric Kirk’s father passed away last Sunday.  We went to his funeral after the dinner.  It was a packed house at the Baptist church.  There had to be between two and three hundred people there.  Quite a production, and very loud.  We visited for a few minutes with Tasha and Cedric after the service before they went to the cemetery and who should walk up to say hello to all of us but the good Baptist librarian that we had deliver the gift card last week. We definitely have some stiff competition here numbers wise.  The Baptists and other protestants are very religious and out number us here the way the members at home out number the protestants.  It is easy to see that the only ones that are very interested in investigating the church are the ones that are actually dissalusioned  with their church.  Otherwise it is hard to get them to listen, unless they are the very poor and see an opportunity to get financial assistance.  Very sad but very true.  It has been a long day.  We are going to end our day and get some sleep before we have to take the sisters to Tuscaloosa tomorrow for Sister Shreeve to be transferred home.

Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon every day (finish by the end of the year)

We love y’all

Elder and Sister Owens