7 May 2012

Did I tell you that Joanne was successful in quitting smoking?  She said it’s still hard, but so far she has not had any fall-backs.  It worked!  We’re excited to talk to her about the Gospel, but it will have to be when we come back from Bridgetown and Perth.  We held a little “party” for her with her friend, but we were not able to teach her anything there because the friend was so anti-American and anti- children!  Imagine her disgust when she heard that we have 22 grandchildren! 

Now I’m beginning to understand why there are so few children here, even in the Church, and why I need to keep my mouth shut about my most precious blessings!  Isn’t it the way of Satan to twist things around so that the good looks bad, and the bad looks good?  He has done it with marriage, with sexual morality, with abortion, etc., and even with the size of families!  People here who have large families must endure some measure of persecution!  How sad, when those children will likely be their most treasured joy, now and later in the eternal worlds!  I couldn’t part with one of my very wanted children or grandchildren!  The more, the better!  Each is a jewel in my crown, so to speak!  I must seem so uneducated and naïve to others…

I am thankful that our prophet leaders have emphasized families to the world, and what a blessing they are.

We have been making some progress with the Bansoy family, but can only meet with them on Sundays.  That makes it hard, because like yesterday, they are not always able to make it, and like next Sunday, we will be gone.  So three weeks pass in between.  It’s not ideal, but at least they are still willing to meet with us, and we give them DVDs to look at in the meantime.  The same thing has been happening with Krystal and Andrew, Jason and Alisha, Mark and Belinda.

On Saturday we did some service at the meeting house, cleaning out the library with the Sisters Doherty.  We got rid of a lot of old stuff that had accumulated for years.  It gave our library a lift, as well as the librarian!  Now they need to have the shelves restocked with current materials.  The Church is thankfully simplifying things, though.