Wednesday March 5,
2014
Mike had yet another
great reunion at the temple today. Here
are his comments.
Today in the temple,
we were helping another group of youth in the baptistry when an elderly couple
came in and asked to be able to do baptisms for some of their ancestors.
As the sister came out of the font, she looked at me closely and said, “I know
you. Were you a missionary here before when you were younger?” I
confirmed that I was. She asked if I had ever worked in Colonia Suisa.
I said I had worked in Colonia and that I was the district leader over Colonia
Suisa. She got very excited and talked about the knowing that I was the
Branch President and how she remembered those times and the people that we both
knew. She was still in wet clothes from the baptisms so I hurried her off to
change with a quick hug. Later as I entered the office in the temple, I
encountered her again. This time she was even more animated. She
said, “You worked in the Deseret Ward in Montevideo”. I confirmed that I
had and she told me where she lived in Montevideo and reminded me that I often
stopped by her house and had often eaten dinner there. It was quite a
little reunion and I will never cease to be amazed at how important
missionaries are to the people they visit and teach. They remember them
and love them. End of Mike’s comments.
When it was time for
me to change clothes to go home, I had to go out to the foyer and tell Mike it
might be a while because my locker was being used. The sister in the locker was talking away,
very excited as she relayed her findings of Elder Burnett to the other temple
workers. I have been made very aware of
what a great impact my wonderful companion has had on so many people here in
Uruguay. He is my exemplar.
Thursday March 6,
2014
We had smaller
groups at temple today but a strong confirmation from the Spirit on the
marvelous blessing the Indexing program is for people. Sister Zanni is a temple worker and she
related the following story about finding her grandfather.
Sister Zanni, a marvelous, sweet, elderly sister that works diligently in the temple, quietly set 2 family cards
on my desk as we were doing baptisms for, and in behalf of the dead, an
ordinance performed anciently in the temples and also performed today.
When the time came to perform the baptism in behalf of this long lost great
aunt, I turned around to make sure she was there to witness it. She was
and was obviously quite moved and very happy at seeing this done. A short
while later as it came time to do the work for the great uncle, I turned and
saw that she had left to help someone. I had them pause and Debbie went
looking for her. She returned shortly with Debbie and was obviously very
grateful we had waited.
I spoke with her
after we had finished for the afternoon and she explained that 25 years ago she
had attended the temple in Chili, and while there the Spirit spoke to her and
told her to look up and note how the temple ordinance worker looked exactly like
her grandmother. She looked up and it was so true. She began to
wonder why she had been reminded of her grandmother. She realized that
she had not done the baptism or other ordinance work for her ancestors.
That set her off on a 25 year search for her ancestors, most of which had come
from Italy. She spoke of how her mother had come to visit her and ended
up passing away at her home and how hard it had been to take her mother back
home to her sister in a coffin. She lamented this and asked God why her
mother had come to visit her only to die at her home. Then she realized
that her mother had spoken to her of where their family had come from in
Italy. That was her most valuable clue and led her to be able to find the
records and do temple work for hundreds of her ancestors. There was one
great uncle however who had gone to New York and other than an Ellis Island
report of his arrival, she was never able to find anything else about
him. Then, recently her granddaughter called her crying with joy because
she had found the lost great uncle in the 1940 US census with his wife and
child and other family members. At that point I told Sister Zanni that
Debbie had worked hard to get people involved in indexing that 1940 census and
that she worked on it every day and even got me to help until it was all
done. At that point she again got tears in her eyes and said, “So, I was
praying to be able to find my great uncle and Sister Burnett and others were
working to answer my prayers. By that time we both had tears in our eyes.
I know how dedicated Debbie was to that project and to indexing in general for
decades. End of Mike’s entry.
When Mike relayed
this to me, my tears also came as another witness that FamilySearch Indexing
has helped so many people and I am grateful to be a part of that. I said to myself that who knows, but maybe
our Stake did index Sister Zanni’s long lost uncle.
When Mike relayed
this to me, my tears also came as another witness that FamilySearch Indexing
has helped so many people and I am grateful to be a part of that. I said to myself that who knows, but maybe
our Stake did index Sister Zanni’s long lost uncle.
Our Mission President and his wife, President
Cook met with us and the Pugmire’s this evening. They came into the airport this morning but
their luggage didn’t make it yet. After very brief introductions, we decide
that our zone leaders who are coming in for Zone Conference tomorrow needed to
be fed good meals. We are back to
cooking! We dashed to the grocery store
at about 8:30 pm and bought what we needed for tomorrow. We told the Cook’s not to worry about
anything. We knew they were
exhausted. They were very appreciative.
We got home about 10
pm and had some homemade strawberry ice cream. The recipe was called “5 minute
ice cream.” Just blend your cream, strawberries and sugar in a blender. Put it in the freezer for a bit. It was very
yummy.
