09 March 2008 – Sunday
Sam called early to tell us that he was very sick and from his voice I would say that was an understatement. Without a driver we decided to take a cab to Jakarta Raya. Actually I suggested we go to the English branch but Mary thought we should visit one of the other branches and I agreed that she was right. It is too easy to go to the English branch and they are not our assignment.
With some help from us, the taxi driver made good time to the chapel and so we got to greet most of the members as they arrived. Elders Thiemann and Suseno are serving there and I always enjoy talking to Elder Thiemann who we have known since he was in the MTC. He agreed to be our translator for the meetings.
All the meetings went well. President Anthony was the main speaker in Sacrament meeting and he spoke on the Atonement of Christ. Lukito’s wife also spoke on the same subject and quoted a lot of scripture. She is an older woman with an Indonesian smile and lots of energy. You can see where Lukito gets all of his drive.
In Gospel Principles there was an investigator and a number of newer members. Elder Suseno taught the lesson on Faith in Jesus Christ. We ended up touching on all the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel. The investigator had a number of questions and seemed very interested in the answers. Near the end of the class I told him that 50 years ago I was an investigator and that it was not until I sincerely prayed about the truthfulness of what the missionaries were teaching that I came to know the Church was true. I also bore testimony of the Book of Mormon. I could feel the spirit bearing witness and I hope that he could also.
PH was on lesson 4 and 5 in The Teachings of Joseph Smith and tied the coming forth of the Book of Mormon to Repentance. Although I followed along in the English manual I did not make any comments. It was a rather straight forward lesson and there was not many questions. The investigator sat in on PH but did not say much – I hope he understood what was being taught. Especially about the importance of repentance and the role of the Book of Mormon in the Church.
We had a quick taxi ride back to the apartment where we had lunch and I took a nice nap before we read again from the Kitab Mormon. We finished up with the Lord leading Ammon and the people of King Limhi back to Zarahemla.
We got a call from Elder Walker saying that President and Sister Marchant’s plane was delayed and they would be late. We agreed on 6:30 as the time for dinner. When we got to the mission home, we found that they still were not there but we did get to meet the Baldwins from Snowflake Arizona who are the Humanitarian directors for our part of Asia. They will be here for a whole week.
When it was evident that the Marchants were not going to be home any time soon, we sat down to dinner with the Baldwins, the Walkers, the office elders and the A.P.s. It was a very nice dinner of beef stroganoff, steamed veggies, salad, rolls and lots of fruit. We learned that the Baldwins were almost the same age as we are – his birthday is exactly one month before mine. They would have been out on a mission earlier but he was stake president and the brethern did now want to release him. Since they seem very healthy, I would not be surprised if they go out again. He is a CPA and I think he said that his son-in-law is running their business while they are serving. We told them something about our work with English classes and shared some of our plans for the future.
Soon after 8:00 we left with the Baldwins to see them safely to their hotel. As we walked out we saw the Marchants getting out of a taxi. This surprised us because Elder Walker had been trying to call them for some time to see where they were. The Baldwins and them had a quick introduction and will meet again tomorrow. We took advantage of having a taxi right there and piled in for the trip to their hotel. Unfortunately when Mary said ‘Marriott’ the driver thought she said ‘Meridian’ and took us there instead. Luckily it was not too far from the Marriott so it only added about 15 minutes to our bidding the Baldwins good night.
So ended a good Sunday with a couple of spiritual experiences, reading from the scriptures – I also read the latest Church News – and meeting another missionary couple. Not to mention talking to the members of Jakarta Raya where a large part of the people have excellent English. The only sour note of the day was that Sam was sick. When I called him in the evening, Annie answered and said that they were at the hospital where the doctors said that he had food poisoning. He thinks he got it from the fish they served at District Meeting. I am glad that neither of had any. I told Annie to tell Sam that we would not need him tomorrow and to rest and get well.
