11 November 2007 – Sunday

This morning was very special. As we were reading from 2 Nephi 8, where Jacob is warming up for major Isaiah quoting, I started my usual complaining, I do not see how Mary puts up with it for almost all of 2nd Nephi, on how impossible it was to translate it well. Mary pointed out at one point that we should not be surprised that we do not understand it in Indonesian when we can’t even understand it in English. I started to agree with her when some thing caused me to pause. It did not feel right.

After we finished I started thinking about this problem when it came to me that the Lord did not include these section in the Book of Mormon just so I could complain or so we could make jokes about it. I thought back almost 50 years ago when I came out of a stake meeting complaining to those who came with me about what a waste of time it had been. As I said that I got the message that the Lord did not send us to any meeting to waste our time. If I had found it a waste of time it was because I did not come prepared to hear the reason I needed to be there.

From that time on I have tried to make sure that I did not ‘waste my time’ by paying attention to what was being said or taught. Seldom have I been disappointed. Something comes up that is important to me or brings up a thought that leads me to ponder on.

As I considered this I decided that I would read the Isaiah chapters in English and ponder what was said and what about them I need to ‘liken unto me.’ This is one of the main ideas of the section on the Book of Mormon in PMG. So I started a study journal – another important PMG idea – record what I read and what thoughts the reading and pondering brings.

The first scripture that caught my attention is in 2 Nephi 6:7 where at the end it says ‘for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me.’ The promise is that patience will be rewarded, but also that we must not be ashamed of what we know is true. That we should share it at all times with those we meet, even casually. So while we wait patiently for Him, we are to proclaim his gospel to others.

I am not going to write all that I find to ponder in this blog, but I trust that I will learn much as I read and ponder Isaiah. But that does not mean that I am going to enjoy trying to translate Bahasa to English.

We go to Jakarta Raya for church and we are the greeters until the elders get their with their investigator. He is a young man of 20 and this is his first time at church. He is very neatly dressed and seem to know quite a bit of English. Elder Erikson and Elder Simatupang are teaching him and have set a baptism date of December 9th. Since Elder Simatupang will be release either Monday or Tuesday, he will have to come back as a civilian for the baptism. But since he is in the Selatan branch that will not be hard.

Since he is about to be released, I talked to him a little about what he would do when he was released and suggested he come to the office so we could talk about it. His English is quite good – we had him translate for us during sacrament meeting – and he seems very sharp, so perhaps we can get him in an educational path that will lead to a good career.

During SS, while we were in the Gospel Principles class. The electricity went off and since the windows of the room we are in is covered by the security doors, we were literally in the dark. But we continues to discuss the Holy Ghost and I put in a couple of comments to keep things moving along. During Priesthood, brother Kancana was made the Quorum president with Lukito as his first counselor. After church we caught a cab back to the apartment. It turned out that the driver had enough English and we had enough Indonesian to get to know each other a little. It makes the drive much more interesting that way.

We have our normal Sunday afternoon and evening. We had naps and read for a couple of hours from the Kitab Mormon. I studied PMG, wrote in this journal and continued to spend a lot of time making vocabulary exercises. I am really convinced that this is one area where we can really help our students. I think Mary is correct about the grammar lessons. We are not going to work on tenses very much but work on their writing and speaking correct sentences so they just learn what is correct as we did when we learned as children. Before turning off the lights I read more Isaiah from the Book of Mormon.

It was a good day – I especially feel blessed for meeting with the missionaries and members in the Gospel Principles class. They had a good discussion about the Holy Ghost. I also feel real good about the vocabulary work I am doing. It may not seem very spiritual, but hopefully it will help to change lives of some people here in Indonesia long after we have gone home.