West Indies Mission: Happy Missionaries

Monday, January 5, 2009

Happy Missionaries

This picture was taken by Elder Lauritzen on September 27th - what does that tell you?

West Indies missionaries have FAITH

I have to admit that I occasionally doubted they would reach their incredibly high goal this year (oh ye of little faith) and, during the last week, I started thinking about how to console disappointed young missionaries.

You see, the elders and couples of the West Indies have never once missed reaching a mission goal and I worried over the fact that this might be their first time. But, they continue to amaze me. In our 2 1/2 years of service they have set significant mission-wide stretching goals five times. Notice that I say 'they'. Except for the first goal of having a White Christmas of 100 baptisms in December 2006 set by President Robison at the prompting of Elder Mickelsen of the seventy, the missionaries themselves have come up with their goals and they own them. Then we do our best to help them get there. And they always do! They believe in faith, obedience, hard work, and then miracles.

I am working on the next slideshow and as I look at the pictures the missionaries gave me, I have renewed respect for their hard work and sacrifice. The young elders and couple of the West Indies are incredible!

They are also very happy right now.

Elder Mundy

Elders Daines, Cotton, Damm, and Jones - are they saying 2008?

After reaching such a milestone, now what?

We just "keep on keepin on" as Elder Mask, our former area president used to teach us. The work goes on. This week is transfer week so changes will be taking place with new leadership (many new zone leaders and a new assistant) and movement to new areas. At 10:30 tonight four brand new elders land in Port of Spain to start their missions and Wednesday we must say farewell to Elders Beute, Richardson, and Nielsen.

President Robison has asked the elders to look forward and set personal goals for the new year. We hope to keep up and even accelerate the pace of baptisms and, at the same time, work hard at retaining the new members of the church - quite a challenge in some areas where hundreds have been baptized in the past year. Senior couples do an amazing work in helping new members settle into the church.

What a privilege it is for me to serve in such a stunningly gorgeous place, among the sweetest people, and side by side with the most amazing missionaries in the world (in my extremely biased opinion)!