Dear Elders and Sisters,
This week we will begin another round of interviews with
each missionary. Interviews are a significant means of accounting to the Lord,
through His authorized servants, for your personal progress and the progress of
the work in your assigned area. They are also an opportunity for you to seek
counsel and direction on personal matters and to learn how to succeed in your
calling. We try to create a schedule of interviews and planner/area book checks
that is efficient and minimally disruptive to your work. Please be on time for
your assigned interview and other activities on the schedule. After you have
completed your interviews and checks, please return quickly to your area and
continue with regular proselyting activities.
Your interview will be approximately 10 minutes. I will use
a timer and make every effort to adhere to the schedule that has been
established. Please be courteous to other missionaries by helping me to begin
and end interviews promptly. If you have a need that will require more time
than has been allotted in the schedule, I will reschedule with you in the near
future, as soon as can be arranged, so that you may have my undivided
attention. My experience has been that interviews are most helpful if
missionaries prepare ahead of time by carefully considering what they would
like to discuss during the short time that we will have together. By planning
and prioritizing, we can make sure to give attention to those areas that are
most needful.
Although interview days are often long and tiring, I look
forward to my time with each missionary. It is one of the ways in which I
strive to connect with you – to know you a little better, to build your faith
in the Savior and to encourage you in this most significant opportunity that is
yours to represent Him. I earnestly strive to prepare myself for interviews so
that I have as much energy and inspiration during the first interview as I do
during the last. I love interviews!
My dear fellow servants, as you know, Sister Blickenstaff
and I will complete our time as mission president and wife at the end of June.
I have received permission to inform you that Elder Michael John U. and Sister
Grace Teh have been called to serve as the next mission president and wife in
the Taiwan Taichung Mission. Elder Teh is a member of the First Quorum of
Seventy and is currently serving as the Area President in the Philippines Area
of the Church. This will be a wonderful experience for you as well as our local
leaders and members to work closely with one of the Lord’s especial witnesses
in the work of salvation. I invite you to begin praying for Elder and Sister
Teh as they prepare themselves for the challenging and rewarding experience of
serving as Mission President and wife. We look forward to welcoming them and
working toward a smooth transition to their leadership in the mission.
Although we know who the next mission president will be,
Sister Blickenstaff and I still have six months to serve in this place and
among people that we love so dearly. We will work hard to the very end and
still have much to do to establish the Church and “leave our area better than
we found it” (PMG, p. 137). We ask for your continued faith and prayers on our
behalf as we strive to finish our assignment and hand off a well-prepared,
obedient and diligent group of missionaries to Elder and Sister Teh.
President Blickenstaff
Sister Blickenstaff, who takes your photos? Do you have a mission photographer? You and your husband seem to be in many of them. Just wondering. Sister Lewis in Yakima
ReplyDeleteThat would be me! I invite missionaries to send me photos to place on the blog but I don't get many emailed to me:(
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