Maybe the title should read, "All missionaries are my heroes!" I have many heroes, including members of my own family, but today missionary heroes. Being on this mission has made me acutely aware of my missionary and personal weaknesses. I seem to never have the right words, or I don't seem to be able to do enough for everyone, or I never have a card to pass out with me when I need it, or I don't open my mouth enough (people who know me would be very surprised at that comment). Actually I open my mouth quite a bit, I just don't know what to say at the right time. I love to talk to everyone. When we were in the MTC, we role-played missionaries, we learned gospel concepts, we learned the importance of service and love (knew that before), but here on the mission I am in awe of everyone else, and Sundays seem to bring it all to a head.
 |
| Brother Neil McEwen, my new hero! |
Brother Neil McEwen from Huddersfield, England is my new hero. He has been at church the last two weeks, and has been coming to Guernsey for the past thirty years. He has a condo in Vazon, and has come the past two years alone, because his wife passed away. Last week, he came in a few minutes late, looking very dapper. It was Fast Sunday and he bore his testimony and with his testimony told a wonderful story about a young man who he was teaching the gospel to. He began by telling us that he had tried to call the Preston Temple that morning to put a name on the prayer roll. It was closed so he called the London temple and the man who picked up the phone was a man he knew. Back to the missionary story in Brother McEwen's own words; Tony
was a member referral who, with his wife Jose had received all of the
missionary discussions. But Tony was not prepared to accept repeated challenges
to live the Word of Wisdom and be baptised. Tony’s biggest problem was that he
was a big drinker. By his own admission he was an “eight pints a night” man. To
make his situation even more difficult, Tony played league soccer for a pub team
and all of his drinking pals were his fellow team mates. His whole social life
centred around his nights out with the other players. On the one and only visit
that I made to his home with the missionaries it was obvious to me that a
different approach was needed. Repeated endeavours to commit him to quit his
drinking and setting baptism dates had not worked. I happened to have this
little story up my sleeve which was tailor made for Tony.
The
story was about a member of the Church who was serving in the US navy during WWII
when it was a chargeable offence to have any liquor on board the ship. However,
some of his fellow servicemen had smuggled liquor on board with a view to
having a liquor party. Fearing that their LDS colleague may report them for
drinking on board they did everything they could to get him to join the party.
He continued to refuse until the matter got completely out of hand and some of
the group had him pinned to the floor and tried to pour liquor down his throat.
As they were doing so, one of the aggressors shouted in anger:
“What is the matter with you
anyway? Aren’t you man enough to take a drink?”The young Latter-day Saint bravely responded “It takes a man to refuse a drink, not to
have one!” At
which point one of the group said, “Let
him go. He is absolutely right. The only reason I am in this drinking party is
because I was not man enough to say NO.”
At
the end of this short story I respectfully suggested to Tony that in my opinion
his problem was not giving up his drinking but telling his friends the reason why
he had given up. To the overwhelming joy and surprise of everyone present, not
least the missionaries, Tony said to me, “On
Saturday night I will be at the Batley Variety Club and there will be a lot of
drinking going on and I will be doing as much as everyone else. But after
Saturday night I will never take another drink in my life and I will be
baptised!”
And
Tony never has had another drink! He and Jose were both baptised shortly after
that momentous evening and have been as faithful members of the Church as
anyone could hope to meet. Although they had no children at the time of their
baptism, they have since raised a family of six and at the last count they have
eleven grandchildren. All their sons have served honourable missions. Recently
Tony and Jose were released as full time missionaries at the London Temple. Tony
has since been called to serve as a Temple Sealer. Every year they send me a
Christmas card. Their handwritten message is always the same. They offer me
best wishes for the Holy Season and then thank me for what I did for them on
that when evening I visited their home with the missionaries and told them a
short story.
The man at the London Temple was that young man forty years later. This week, Brother Mcewen, dapper again, was at church and President Hewlett asked him to share another missionary story. He is again my hero. He said his life has always revolved around missionary work. When he was seventeen and a fairly new member of the church, he served for two months as a missionary companion to who would later become the renowned motivational speaker and writer, Steven R. Covey. It was the beginning of the Korean War and the eligible men were required to go to war and few were being allowed to serve missions. Wards were sometimes allowed one or two missionaries. Steve's father did not serve a mission for that reason. He told told about a young man Michael Wright. Brother McEwen and his wife were teaching Michael and his wife Millie. Michael was, a self proclaimed atheist. It was difficult to teach Michael because he didn't believe in God and knew nothing about God. They knew they had to get Michael to pray, if Michael was going to feel the spirit. If you want to know if God exists you need to talk to God. They had taught Michael the four steps of prayer and decided that they would have a kneeling prayer. Michael was to pray, but as they kneeled nothing came out of his mouth. Brother McEwen said that they would wait all night, if he needed that time. Nothing came out. Finally Brother McEwen asked Michael if he would repeat the prayer as Brother McEwen said it. Michael agreed. Brother McEwen said, "Our dear Heavenly Father" and Michael repeated it and so on. When they finished Brother McEwen said they had just finished their first family prayer, then asked them who would say the prayer next night and Millie said she would and the next night, Michael said he would... The next Thursday when they returned the family had prayed for a week together.
Brother McEwen is a very successful businessman and a very strong member o f the church and my new missionary hero. He joined us for lunch today and I made sure I sat across the table from him. .I wanted to hear more stories and learn about he and his family. Missionary work aside, he said that he had returned home for a few days this week because he had four tickets to Funny Girl in Manchester and that he wanted to go to New York just to see Bette Midler as Dolly Levi in 'Hello Dolly." Melt my New York loving heart! He said he thought about Barbara Streisand playing the role and felt Bette with her voice would play it so well! This seasoned "gentleman" was discussing Broadway with me at Second Sunday lunch (or whatever they call it! Off topic. As a side note, we went to lunch again today with Brother McEwen ... I wanted more stories and I got them. Steve's grandfather Irwin Clawson and his wife Anona Kunz Clawson went on a senior mission to England in the spring of 1964. He closed his law practice and moved out on a Saturday and they reported to the mission home in Salt Lake City on Monday. As they were going to leave for England Elder Mark E. Peterson asked him to serve as the Bishop of the Halifax Ward in the southwest corner of Yorkshire. Sounding familiar at all. They too were sent to live in a large home for awhile and he and Nona spent their entire mission in the Halifax Ward, Leeds Stake, England. Well, Brother McEwen lives not far from there and thinks he remembers Grandpa. We were with Brother McEwen again for lunch on Thursday as we needed to pick up some pages we had given him of Grandpa's missionary journal in Halifx area. While at lunch he called Mary Walker (I think that is her name.) Mary is an older woman he home teaches and he asked Mary if she remembered Irwin Clawson. Mary said she did and Brother McEwen said that he was just "now having lunch with his grandson, who is the Branch President on Guernsey.)vWe were also telling him about John Rowe Moyle, from Plymouth and he said that he knew someone else who was related to Moyle ... John Preston Creer, who was on a mission in Nottingham, where Brother McEwen lived as a young man and they would preach on the town square together. He had remained close to the Creers and even visited them in Salt Lake City. Small, small world! Because both John Preston Creer and Barabara Hewlett come through the Moyle line. John's mother Sara Moyle Creer and Barbara's mother Bertha May Gray were first cousins and every November we still meet as Moyle granddaughters.
President Peter Cope, second counselor in the Poole Stake Presidency came to visit this weekend and to also conduct an audit. Steve picked him up at the airport and we had the pleasure of having him stay at our home. Saturday afternoon, just before lunch he sat down with two of our missionaries as they told him about the people they were teaching. He pulled up his phone and looked at the latest report. He asked them why they hadn't been recording church attendance for these people, especially if they already had committed to baptismal dates. The he proceeded to teach them the importance of having members go with them as they taught, so that the investigators would have a connection with someone in the branch. And if they felt connected to someone they would feel more comfortable at church. But in order to have members come they had to have appointments in advance as people had busy lives and you just couldn't call them at the last moment to go with them. He asked them who they had appointments with next week. He talked individually about people they were teaching and asked questions about them. His interest and concern was so evident. He knew the names of all the members of our little branch, even the recent members, and he knew about them, even though he lives across the channel. We went to visit Nicky on our way home from dinner, as Nicky has been sick the past week and I wanted to check on her and wanted him to come with us. He sat close to Nicky and talked to her in a quiet, caring voice. He is in the pharmaceutical industry and understood some of what she has been going through. He too, has always been involved in missionary work.
Well, more missionary heroes .... the four missionaries who live with us. We currently have one from Sterling, Alberts, one from Christmas Island (near Hawaii), one from Sheffield, England and one from Brasillia, Brazil. This is a hard work and they study, and plan and go out talking and teaching people every day. They are young, but they are men of great faith, and they are or are learning to be great teachers. Most people are kind to them but not all people. We were listening to a MP3 file and then watching the same message on youtube, 'Missionary Work and the Atonement," a montage of two talks, one by President Henry B. Eyring and one by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland. The one quote that struck me and I am sure most everyone else is , "
Missionary work is not easy because salvation was not a cheap experience, salvation was never easy... Why would we think it would be easy for us, when it was never, ever easy for Him. In turn, how could we possibly bear any moving, lasting testimony of the atonement if we have never known or felt anything of such an experience" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6FKiNVbw3Y ... He made sure to quickly follow up that what they and we are doing doesn't come anywhere close to the suffering in Gethsemane or on the cross, but difficult things refine us, and in even little difficult things we appreciate the Savior's sacrifice even more. More heroes, the YSA that we have in this branch. We have seven, five of whom are active members of our branch and three who are returned missionaries. They also are amazing and I will talk about them in a separate post.
And we just got in the mail a letter from the CTR 5 class in our ward., Bennett, Porter, Lucy, Chloe, Audrey and Jameson. They are now my heroes. Primary children have always been my heroes! They each colored a picture of them as a missionary. They will all be wonderful missionaries. With the good news come the sad news as one of our favorite families, Brandon and Kristie Pierson and their soon to be six children are moving from our ward. They are amazing and I look up to and love them so much. How can people move when we are away!
 |
| Porter |
|
 |
| Chloe |
|
 |
| Molly |
|
 |
| Lucy |
|
 |
| Bennett |
|
|
We are surrounded by all kinds of missionary heroes, including our own children and grandchildren, who have been great examples to us and many others. We love them and miss them, and our extended family, our friends and neighbors, our peaches (Anthony just sent us a picture) and the ranch, but most of all we want to be good missionaries ourselves, so really we don't miss the peaches and the ranch too much, because we have plums here and we are living on an island with wonderful people and doing what we know we should be doing ... not anything to complain about and lots of reasons to serve and rejoice. We need the lessons of salvation much more than most!
The statistical report of the British Mission reading June 1, 1850, stated that the Channel Islands Conference had 5 branches with a total membership of 253. In 1861 there were two branches with 80 members. In 1862, 13 were baptized and 14 emigrated to Zion for a -1. The June 30, 1863 account says 10 had emigrated to Zion and December 31, 19 had emigrated to Zion. We currently have 45 on our records and we get about 20-25 at Sacrament meeting, of which 6 are us and the four missionaries. But, the church has been on the island since at least 1850 and we just got our name in the telephone directory. Yahoooooooo! We are recognized! President Hewlett and I also visited the Guernsey Food Bank to see if we or the missionaries could help sort or pick up food. The food bank is only the size of a walk in closet but last year they served and handed out L19,000 in vouchers. Not much to do, but we became an official food bank drop off location and now we have our name on the website with other churches in the area. I was teaching the lesson in Relief Society using Elder Holland's talk "Songs Sung and Unsung." Elder Holland states, The chorus, ,"blessings which God gives me now and joys laid up above," cannot be fully, faithfully sung until we have honorably cared for the poor. Economic deprivation is a curse that keeps on cursing, year after year and generation after generation ." We can all do more, even here on Guernsey. 
