Work, work, work...and a Missionary Thanksgiving!

Work, work, work…has been our tune for the past two weeks…but it’s all good! Being busy is exhausting at times, but also keeps us going, and, as they say…never a dull moment!

The week before last we were involved in meetings every day, helping finalize our plan, as the Area Communications Committee, for rolling out the Area Presidencies’ 2016 objectives and goals to all the church in the Pacific Area. The Committee’s mission statement is “The Pacific Area Communications Committee aligns with the Pacific Area Presidency to facilitate sharing messages that deepen faith and trust in our Heavenly Father, the Lord Jesus Christ and His Atonement” (which our great committee members worked on for some time).

We built a calendar for the year’s communications to reach every member in the Pacific Area, paying special attention to turning increasingly to technology to help “spread the word” throughout the area, while keeping in mind those who do not have the tools to receive the messages that way, and getting the messages to them more traditionally.

It has been a challenging, but exciting assignment, and we have so much enjoyed working with our committee members who will now have the responsibility, through their church employment, to carry out the plan. And, best of all, the Area Presidency gave it the thumbs up!

Last week we turned our attention back to posting Mormon Newsroom articles. Barry wrote seven, including two related to the bombings in France, one on the Fiji graduates and another on Marama Elkington, an LDS rowing champion, plus he did the photographs for another. I wrote one on Primary Sacrament Meeting Programs around the world (much thanks to Leslee, Kathy, Amy, and Shar in Africa), and another on a welfare project in Tonga, helping the elderly and disabled there.

I have also been spending days trying to figure out hotel accommodations and some crazy flight itineraries to get our Public Affairs people,spread throughout the far-flung Pacific islands, to and from the Fiji Temple Open Houses in January without having them take four flights, through four different nations to get there. Sometimes it seems like a ship going directly from island to island would be faster!

I’ve also been spending time planning and shopping for our Senior Missionary Thanksgiving Dinner which took place the Saturday following the U.S. Thanksgiving Thursday. I was in charge of decorating…and that was a challenge!! Of course, they don’t celebrate it here (no Pilgrims or Pocahontas) AND, it is Spring here not Fall, so no Pumpkins, Indian corn, or colored leaves either!

Soooo…I had to “phone a friend,” and my good friend and neighbor, Sue Mika, ever so generously sent me a speedy “Thanksgiving in a Box,” she called it! She sent tablecloths and napkins (“serviettes” here) and paper turkeys, and VOILA! We had Thanksgiving décor. We were able to purchase gorgeous, huge, fall-colored sunflowers and gerbera daisies which Sister Buckner turned into beautiful floral arrangements. Eight sisters each took a table to set and decorate, which they did with creativity and beauty.

With shells abundantly available on the beaches here, these shell turkeys Sister Buckner made for each of her place settings took the prize!

Everyone had food assignments so the serving tables were covered with all the traditional foods we love. Cooking here has been a bit challenging since we are on the metric system and we are cooking at sea level. Everything cooks faster and hotter. So even though I turned my oven 50 degrees lower than recommended, my turkey was done in two hours instead of three. I turned the oven to warm, but by the time we pulled it out, at first glance, it looked like the turkey in National Lampoon’s Christmas movie! I was aghast! But as Barry began to carve, it really was fine, still tender and juicy. Whew!

Of course, even though I wasn’t assigned to bake a pie, I just couldn’t let Thanksgiving go by without my favorite pie crust cookies!!

With the Area 2016 Plan mostly behind us, the travel arrangements almost complete, ten new articles posted, and Thanksgiving Dinner decorated, cooked, and eaten, we were happy today to just attend church, teach Relief Society on self-reliance, rush back to the office to provide a luncheon for 20 or so multi-stake Public Affairs people in for social media training (THANK YOU Subway platters!), and return to our flat with the whole evening ahead to rest and enjoy.

YAY!! It was a good two weeks.

BUT…in the midst of all this, they announced the sudden and tragic death of one of New Zealand’s superheroes, 40 year-old Jonah Lomu. A former player on the All Blacks, New Zealand’s world champion rugby team, Jonah has been compared to our Michael Jordan, but in his legendary rugby performance. And nothing in the U.S. compares to the adulation and following given to the All Blacks! They represent the entire nation!! And they just won the world championship again…a world record.

In fact, Jonah was at the World Cup in England, and had only just returned home when he suffered cardiac arrest and died. He had been struggling for years with kidney disease, even while he was playing ball. But just a day or two before his death, his doctor had given him “a clean bill of health.” (Guessing the doctor feels kind of bad now.)

Though he was a bit of a “bad boy” by our standards, he obviously had a great soul, treating all his fans with kindness and attention, giving generously to the needy and less fortunate, and in 2012, finding the Gospel of Jesus Christ, being baptized, and becoming a great Dad to his two young sons.

Because he was a member of the church, we have become involved in the Public Affairs aspect of his LDS funeral, to be held as the fifth and last memorial service for this giant of a man here in NZed.  We have attended meetings discussing everything from press lanyards, parking passes, reserved seatings, ushering, press kits, VIP’s attending, photographing, not photographing, etc.

Thursday night we attended a three hour planning meeting at the church where the funeral will be held, with some 15 or so, including the Stake Presidents involved, his bishop, the mortician, the family representatives planning the program, etc. Jonah’s wife’s father, a member of the church, was there and we could feel his humble and great spirit, we felt the great loss this is to their family, and we sensed the overwhelming task his young wife has faced trying to honor the several different cultures, traditions, family, friends, teammates and nation who all want to have a part in saying their farewells to this man. As her father said, “She hasn’t been given a chance herself to mourn yet.”

http://m.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=11552889

So, our Monday and Tuesday will be filled with preparing items for and attending and assisting with the funeral. They are anticipating a very large crowd and the services will also be broadcast to four other church houses here in New Zealand and three in Tonga. They also expect people to stand along the route to the cemetery, waving their goodbyes to one of the most famous, well-loved sons of New Zealand.

So, as I said earlier…Never a dull moment.

We are sustained through all of our highs and lows by the wonderful opportunity to attend our ward each Sunday where we renew our covenants and are taught by humble, faithful, valiant saints and by our scriptures study each morning. We just finished reading the Pearl of Great Price and wanted to read more from the New Testament.

In James this week we were touched by these words, brought to our attention by our outstanding Gospel Doctrine teacher, Brother Couch, a close family friend who had just dressed Jonah’s body in his temple clothes: “Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”

Message to us: Treasure every moment…treasure every relationship…every opportunity to do good…every gift given by our loving Heavenly Father. That when we return to our Heavenly home we can feel that we did our best, kept the faith, and endured to the end. Thank goodness for the gospel of Jesus Christ and for His redeeming Atonement that gives us hope and peace, comfort and love.

With all our love to you, dear ones…Barry and Susan