The Journey Begins in Earnest

We apologize for not pulishing anything since leaving Vancouver a couple of weeks ago. We hope that you have not given up on us. We are still here. We have had very limited access to the internet and extremely limited time. It has been a wonderful couple of weeks and we are really enjoying ourselves, but we miss you all.

September 22, 2013

We met with the stake president and were set apart as full time missionaries this morning. It was a very spiritual experience. He promised us great blessings for our family as we serve. He also promised us that we can impact the saints and souls in Arizona. I am really looking forward to serving and hope that we can be a blessing to the folks at Ft Huachuca.

                                                 President Shafer following setting apart

This has been a very busy week trying to get things ready to go. Yesterday, Paul and Brian came to help us do the heavy lifting by moving the furniture. RoLayne has been busy cleaning every nook and cranny of the house as we get ready to leave tomorrow.

It will be wonderful to be able to dedicate all our time and efforts to the Lord, knowing that our family will be under his watchful care.

September 30, 2013

Well, here it is, our first day in the MTC. There is so much to tell and so little time. We left Vancouver Monday, September 23 at about 11:00AM. We had a fairly uneventful trip to Boise to spend the night.. We got up bright and early Tuesday and went to the Boise Temple and attended an endowment session. The Boise Temple has recently been remodeled and it was beautiful. It is an elegant building and we enjoyed the session. We then drove on down to Logan and stayed with Grandma Jane Heninger. She is doing so much better since we saw her last. It was very nice to spend some time with her. Wednesday, I told grandma and Linda that we would do whatever they wanted. Linda wanted to go to a temple session, so we did. Dave also came along and we then enjoyed lunch afterwards at the temple. We spent the afternoon going through Linda’s family pictures. It was so nice to spend time with both of them. Linda seemed to be feeling as well as I have seen her in a while. Thursday, we went to my aunt and uncle’s home. Laprele prepared such a nice open house for us. My dad’s brother Harold came over and we spent hours talking. His daughter Carolyn, whom I have not seen in many years also came over. It was nice to see her. Linda came down, her son Eric and his wife Lisa came over, as did our daughter and son in law Lisa and Eric Wood. Amy and Christian were there as well. We had a wonderful evening!

Linda, Uncle Harold, and Carolyn

Christian and Amy

The next day we drove to Orem and stayed with Kim’s family. Saturday afternoon they had an open house and several other family members came. It was very enjoyable to spend time with each of them.

Today, we got up and came to the mission home. RoLayne was very nervous. I could tell, because she was talking a mile a minute all the way from Kim’s place. She was worried about the length of her skirts. When we parked and came into the building, the first sister that we met was a Sister Skousen. She was a very sweet lady and ask if we were related to the Logan Heningers. I asked which Heningers and she said Jane Heninger. As it turns out, she and Jane were very close friends in college. We were off to a good start and the tension was broken. The very next man that we met, who was directing us around was Elder Sherwood. He looked very familier. I asked him if we knew each other in a previous life. About that time RoLayne said, Colorado! He said Colorado Springs 7^th Ward. I said yes, then I had another memory flash and dropped a bit of a bombshell. I said, I think we bought your house in Colorado Springs, he said Windward Circle? I said yes! Some coincidence eh? I do not think so. We then attended an orientation with about 70 other couples. It was very nice. They divided us into Districts. They assigned me to be the District Leader of our district. 

Below is a picture of our district. They are wonderful people who have been called to serve across the world from Cambodia to Iceland to Tucson Arizona. The young man on the left is Brother Meyer, our afternoon instructor. He is a great young man and an awesome instructor.

We are now at the Marriott Hotel where they housed us and are preparing for tomorrow’s classes.

October 1, 2013

Well a new month has dawned and we are in day two of the MTC. We had another good, long, tiring, but rewarding day. We spent most of the day in classes learning how to teach the gospel to investigators. Tonight we had a devotional and Elder David S Baxter of the Seventy spoke to us. It was amazing to be in that building with more than 2,000 missionaries, not sure exactly how many are at the MTC. We did not get back to our room until about 9pm and we need to be back in class at 8am, so I will close for now.

October 4, 2013

We have completed our first week at the MTC. What a wonderful experience this has been. The last couple of days we have done some teaching with local volunteers from the community. Wednesday we taught a lady named Sister Harris. She played the roll of a non-member. She had lots of questions and we tried to get to know her and determine what we should teach. RoLayne was pretty quiet the first day, but on Thursday with our second “investigator” Elaine Cuoll she was very involved and it went very well. This has been as spiritual a week as I remember experiencing in my life. The instructors, who are all very young returned missionaries are incredible.

October 5, 2013

At lunch today, I met a young man who is an army veteran. He served 4 years in the army and served in Afghanistan. It confirms to me the importance of what we are about as military relations missionaries. His name was Elder Gould, he was raised by his grandfather, an air force veteran. He was a great young man who was really happy to be here. I am convinced he will be a great missionary. He had a wonderful spirit about him.

October 7, 2013

Today, we met with the Church Education Services folks. They have begun to try to teach us how to teach young adults the gospel in a seminary or institute environment. It has been excellent training.We will continue this training tomorrow. Wednesday through Friday we will meet with the Military Relations Department for training and then Saturday we will be heading south. We miss you all and pray for you daily.