1. The gospel of Jesus Christ is true no matter where you are living.
This seems so fundamental that you might wonder why I would list it. Living here among many different religions and the main one being 86% Muslim, every day we meet people of other religions. They are fine people, with great modesty and very clean, but they seem to lack a real purpose in life. They have “call to pray” about 5 or 6 times daily, and some go, but most just go about doing their thing. The church here just had a great milestone occur. We had our first stake in Indonesia created. It is here in the greater Jakarta area and comprises of 8 wards and 1 branch. Our President is President Djorots Subiatoro and our driver-friend Sandi Pagalla is the first executive secretary. Every single member of the stake presidency and our new Indonesian ward bishopric had to be made high priests before they could take their new positions. It is a very exciting time in the church. This is in a country that held its first really true free election in history only in 2005.
When Elder Bednar was here to create the Stake, Muriel and I had the opportunity to accompany his wife and Elder Pratt’s wife, Sister Groberg, Sister Grover and Bertha (who we suggested that we get to take us all) to a traditional market place and the largest mosque in south-east Asia. The mall Tanah Abang was huge, 9 stories high and packed stalls with different fabrics and vendors, but the real interesting thing was the Istiglal Mosque. It had enough kneeling room for 200,000 men and women of the Muslim faith. It was a beautiful building, all marble and brass and very open. We had a guided tour of the building. Read the Book of Mormon and you will believe in the Gospel. It was a great experience that we will always cherish. The Gospel is true and we can know this if we ask.
T The next great thing that I have learned is that I have not always been the greatest husband in the world (I’m not now either, but better than I have been at times). By this, I mean that in order for a marriage to be really successful, it takes each spouse to give 125% and only need 75% back. Doesn’t make sense? Give me a minute. All our married life, I have expected Muriel to drop whatever she was doing to wait on me. If I had a very bad day at work, I wanted lots of sympathy. I rarely considered her day, only mine. She might be tired also, but it was all about me. In all fairness, it can work the other way too. Sometimes she wanted me to console her bad day. If we are not willing to give of ourselves to those we love, who are we willing to give to? When we are together, we should always put our spouses first, no matter what. We have found that the days we get discouraged or feel sorry for our plight in life, it is because we are thinking of ourselves. I remember being in the hospital once and being a real jerk to Muriel because I hurt a little bit. I had some discomfort and was demanding things from her that I knew was wrong. It took a Granddaughter to remind me that no one in the whole world loved me more than she did and I shouldn’t be such a jerk. I regret the way I have been at times, because I should have been a better example to the kids. We should always be aware of our spouse’s needs and they in return should be aware of our needs thus the 125% and 75%. We know on the mission that as we help others with their needs, our needs go away.
Recently, we have been trying to help a young man walk for the first time (he is 21 and wants to serve a mission so bad). Here in Indonesia, there are lots of places that you can try to help others. Poor is a word that we in America do not even understand. Poor is when you can’t even try to correct a birth defect because you have not enough money to even clothe or feed your family, let alone try to fix problems. There are no government programs, every one you know is in the same fix and you just try to do the best you can. The people here are so humble, but because of their own needs, are not in position to help their friends. We have this wonderful NGO that provides artificial limbs for the limbless. You will experience true happiness when you see a small 12 year old boy that was born with no legs below the knees and learned to walk on his knees when he was 3 years old, walk for the first time with the help of these artificial legs. We also work with a lot of accident victims that because of lack of money they just cut a limb off instead of trying to fix it. Fathers that have lost a leg in motorcycle accidents often lose their jobs ( if they were lucky enough to have one), thus when we can place a leg, maybe a job also. We see many young people that are born without either legs or arms and yet have done the best they could throughout their lives. This is the first project we have had like this here in Indonesia and it is one of my favorite. When we in America have a disability, it is very sad, but usually we have a great support team to help, here there is no one. The great King Benjamin wrote that when we are in the service of our fellow men we are only in the service of our Father in Heaven.
We (Muriel and I) are so blessed because of the support we get from home. We know that we forget birthdays, anniversaries, baptisms, graduations, weddings, etc., but we thank each of you for your great participation with us on this mission. We hope you are feeling the great blessings with us. Every time I want to come home, it is because I quit thinking of others and only of myself. This past week we flew for the 15th time (that means 30 plane rides that I don’t even like) since we got here. We like to think that each had reason. We will keep you posted .
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