04 September 2007 – Tuesday

Slept well and put in an hour exercising. As I walked/jogged, I was surprised at how tired my legs seemed to get. It was only later in the day that I realized it was because I had started back on the stationary bike on Saturday. It uses some muscles that I have not been exercising or at least not as much as it demands. On the other hand sit-ups continue to be easier so it is a trade-off. I am sure if I keep using the bike, those muscles also will loosen up.

We read from the Kitab Mormon – we hit a couple of verses that had a number of words we did not remember, but all in all it goes well. Nehor and priestcraft was the center of our reading. Gideon fights Nehor with the truth and the only way Nehor can stop him is to kill him.

We go to the office and Mary works on her English class while I work on ERS matters. The Christensens are coming to visit us sometime next week. It will be good to see them again. They are good folks and we can learn a lot from them. We exchange a few e-mails to set up the plans for their visit. Tuesday is one of those days when I have Sam get lunch for the two of us. Mary makes a sandwich and we share a dessert.

We got a couple of letters from the family. Shauna is really faithful in sending us a letter each week. This one was especially good because it told about William escaping the yard and being brought home by the police. Also there was a funny story about a speaker at sacrament. I am going to include it so everyone can have a laugh.

“Kelli really liked one testimony this Sunday.  The new Seminary teacher bore his testimony and of course reminded the kids that seminary starts this Wednesday at 6:30 AM.  He said he’s been sleeping like a baby.  Going to bed early and waking up crying every 2 hours.  He also said he had a dream that seminary had started and the students were out of control.  Climbing out windows, slamming doors, racing down the hallway all except one kid who was very quiet and completely still.  The problem was that he was asleep on the table.  He should be a good teacher.”

We went to the mission office so Mary could teach her English class. While she was doing that I was able to spend part of my time with Elder Subandriyo. He is a very wise man and he gave me some good counsel. He also pointed out that while it is good to know the best schools in the country for different careers, those schools are usually very hard to get into. Therefore we should find the best second tier schools for those who can not make it into the best universities or trade schools. I had not thought of that and so now we will look at other resources. I did mention that if the graduates could not get jobs, it was a waste of their time and money to go to a university.

We also talked about a number of other things, including the new fund that is being set up to help with educational fees for children of members who can not afford them. This is the kind of fund we would contribute to on a regular basis. Also we talked a little about the PEF program. He said he did not think that the changes in the proposal were such that they should hold up the approval for very long. I hope he is correct – we really need to get it going so another school year passes without it being available.

After Mary’s class was over we went home teaching to our family who lives out in the Depok – a section of Jakarta that is about an hour’s drive away. That is if the traffic is good. If it is jammed it is 2 to 3 hours away. Luckily today it was about an hour each way. We had called to make sure the family would be home but when we got there only the mother was home. But that is good because the last time we came she was asleep. This way we were able to talk – through Sam of course – and let her tell us about some of her concerns. We suggested they hold Family Home Evening and talk about some of the things in a family council. I left the latest Ensign so her son could read an article on planning finances. I will need to get another copy so I can use some of the things out of it for our visit to the Tobings later this month.

We read another 3 pages from the Kitab Mormon – we need to read about 60 pages in the next 10 days to be on schedule to finish in 4 months. It is a great blessing to read the Kitab Mormon with my eternal companion. We have not often read together before we came on our mission. Mary has started to read president Faust’s biography.

Today is our Hump day – we have been out for 9 months and so we broke out our dark chocolate Hershey bar and celebrated by eating part of it. We carefully saved it for this occasion. It does not seem possible that half of our mission is over. It has just raced by. We have been blessed each day we have served. We have grown closer to each other, closer to the family – we think and pray about them each day, and of course we have grown closer to the Lord.

We have done things we never thought to have done before. We have started to learn a language. We have met wonderful members of the church and have been able to share their successes and their tragedies. We have served our fellow beings and in that way served the Lord. We can not say that we have sacrificed anything because the Lord has blessed us more than we can count.

I just hope that each of our children will start planning to serve as a senior couple with their spouses. The need is so great for more couples – the Sandbergs wrote how much they needed them in Russia and every mission president I have ever known have said the same thing.