On the evening on Tuesday, March 17, we began what we called Phase 2 or restricted activity. That entailed basically no door knocking, no contacting face to face, no member visits or meals, no physical contact in any form, no face to face missionary gatherings with the exception of Sacrament Meeting, which we switched from a Zone to a District level to be in compliance with the no gatherings over 10 people mandate. We pushed all other meetings to an online format, including lessons and finding. And at this point we have now pushed even our Sacrament meetings to an online format.
I won't go into every detail of that very long week, but suffice it to say, we continued to get more and more hard news to swallow. We were told our senior couples who had all opted to stay, didn't have that option anymore. Only those who were critical to running the office and had no health issues were allowed to stay on. We had to make calls and tell 5 amazingly consecrated couples, (one of whom was driving here from the MTC that very day) who had the greatest desire to serve, that their missions were over and they had to go home. We didn't even get a chance to see any of them besides Elder and Sister Sumner before they left to go home. How we love Elder and Sister Johnson, Elder and Sister Chen, Elder and Sister Phelps and Elder and Sister Sumner, and know we would have loved Elder and Sister Brooks had we gotten the opportunity to serve with them. I am going to sound like a broken record, but it broke our hearts to have them leave. They were like our security net, and it had been taken away from us. We are so very grateful we get to keep Elder and Sister Mair, and Elder and Sister Bartlett. We don't know how we would survive without them.
Next heartbreak was learning that we were going to have to send home any missionaries who had health challenges that would put them in a compromised situation if they got the Coronavirus. That was most difficult! We thought telling 11 missionaries a few days before that their missions were cut short by 3 months was the hardest thing, but this may have been even more difficult. However, I do think we were given a tender mercy with this whole experience, for which we were very grateful.
We had a conference call with our Area President and the other Mission Presidents and wives in our area. They kept talking about a list of missionaries with health challenges that we were supposed to look at and get sent home. The list was compiled by someone in the missionary department, after they looked over the medical section on their applications. I feel for those in the missionary department, to do what they have done over the past few weeks is a herculean effort. However, we hadn't gotten our list as of yet. Most of the Mission Presidents on the call knew what they were talking about, but we did not. Long story short, I think we slipped through the cracks for a few days, and when we finally got our list, we had a little more leeway than those who got their lists first.
We had heard of missions sending between 35-60 missionaries home and we could hardly even process that. I know those in foreign missions sent many more than that. We have friends and family serving in other countries who sent 75-80% of their missionaries home, and I have the most love for them and compassion for what they had to do. Scott and I often say we are wimps, and I have never been more happy to be a wimp in all my life. I know the Lord sustains us all, because there is no way they could have done that without His help. It was hard enough sending those we had to send home.
It was a crazy weekend, once we got our list. I immediately looked up the health history of each missionary on the list, made notes, checked it against the medical issues they have had since they have been in the field. Scott called our wonderful Area Medical Advisor to see what was a mandatory condition and where we had some leeway. We were told some issues were non negotiable, but some were. We gave him missionaries to look up and if he said there was no hope of keeping them Scott just called their Stake Presidents. If we thought we had a chance of keeping them, he called them and then both he and I started calling their parents to get their input. We certainly didn't want to put anyone at risk, but we also didn't want to send anyone home who shouldn't have been on the list. We worked for a couple of days, sent in our recommendations and waited to get word on who could stay and who had to leave.
It was completely emotionally exhausting. This is what I posted on our Missionary Parent Facebook page that describes how we felt at this time.
"This has been the hardest week of our lives and we are so grateful for each of you. We can feel of your love and prayers and support. These are difficult times for all of us. Our greatest joy is sharing the gospel and working with your sons and daughters, whom we love with our whole hearts.
We have cried buckets of tears as we had to inform 11 Elders that their missions were going to end early after they hit their 21 months. We thought that was the hardest thing we'd do. Then we got word that our senior missionaries were to be sent home, besides two that can stay to keep the office afloat and the medical needs covered.
And finally, we got word that the missionary department is looking at all of the health and emotional issues of young missionaries and taking steps to ensure they are kept safe. We will be getting word on their decisions in the coming days. Based on their decisions some will be sent home. We want you to know that our first inclination is to fight to keep all of them here. However, it is out of our hands and we are trying to practice what we preach and support inspired decisions that are being made for the safety and welfare of these dear young missionaries.
The tears have not stopped and will not stop soon. But we are trying our best to move forward with faith and hope. We know there is purpose and that God in indeed in charge of this work.
We will move forward and become stronger in the process. I have shared this favorite scripture of mine with our missionaries on so many occasions, but it has never been more relevant as it is now.
'Therefore, dearly beloved brethren (and sisters) let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for His arm to be revealed.' D&C 123:17"
On top of all of this, we got word that we had to start sending home many of our foreign missionaries. We had to work quickly to figure out flights for several missionaries who were scheduled to go home at the end of April and their countries' borders were closing and flights were going to be cut or stopped altogether.
During all of this, Ethan, Camee and Preston, drove over to cheer us up, and to escape their own self isolation for a few days. I felt bad because we were pretty unavailable while they were here, but it was wonderful to have them here to at least eat dinner with and to have a little time with them. They came on Thursday night, and left on Tuesday morning. We did have a really special experience with them on Monday night. We were feeling a very heavy load on Monday, Scott had called all of our medical releases and we got word that church travel was too overloaded and it was up to us to get flights for all of these missionaries that needed to get home. I have to give SO. MUCH. THANKS. to Sister Mair and Sister Sumner in our office who worked tirelessly, not only getting their packets ready to go, but also booking flights, and rebooking cancelled flights I can't even tell you how many times. They were amazing.
But, Monday night it started getting to both of us. We were feeling very unequipped to carry the load. Our sons, Ethan and Preston, asked us if we would like them to give us blessings. It was a sacred experience to have Ethan give Scott a blessing, and Preston give me one. It is one of those parent paydays that will never be forgotten. And, how wonderful is the priesthood and priesthood blessings. Almost immediately, we felt renewed strength and hope and knew we were here at this time for a reason, God knew this would happen at the end of our mission, and he knew we were equipped to navigate this challenge. We were so grateful for their visit, that even though we were pretty unavailable to help them, they helped and ministered to us.
We got out twice while they were here. Camee found a great little hike that the four of us went on one afternoon. Since we have been here we have heard of a place called 'Mormon Island' where a lot of the members of the church who were part of the Mormon Battalion settled. We didn't ever know where it was. The first day we went on this hike, we met some members there and started a conversation. They told us we were at Mormon Island. It was fun that we stumbled upon a place on my bucket list without even knowing it. We loved it so much we took Scott back with us the next day. It felt wonderful to get away from our screens and out of our house to get outside and enjoy some beautiful fresh air and a beautiful place.
This is our attempt at social distancing
For many of our friends around the world sending missionaries home, they sent so many all at once which would have been so extremely difficult. For us, it was like a long, slow leak, we just kept seeing them roll out of here, one by one, or a few at a time. They just kept going. We had about 10 trips to the airport in about 9 days. And it broke our hearts each and every time.
We had a new banner that we were going to have all of our currently serving missionaries sign when we leave the mission, but times are different and so we took the new banner to the office and had everyone leaving sign the new one.
Within 12 days we said goodbye to the following missionaries
Sister Weckesser to Canada Elder Honey
Elder Cody Elder Barr back to Australia
The next morning, I thought it would be ok, because we had lots to do. We got them all to the church, had them sign our banner and our mission scriptures. I gave them all their birthday gift and their interview cookies and we were heading to the airport when they called us into a room. Sister Fifita said they had something for us, and they all started singing God Be With You Til We Meet Again. Just when I thought I was done crying. It was a tender moment that we will never forget.
Elder Bonzo Elder Bradt
Elder Watson Elder Larsen
Elder Grant Elder Sasser
Elder Wells Sister Fifita
Sister Peters Hermana Williams
Sister Graham back to England
We thought we were sending Elder Geng back to China, he had several flights cancel and we thought this one was going to be the one to get him home. We dropped him at the airport and sent him on his way one evening. We got a call from him around midnight that he couldn't board his flight in LA for reasons I won't go into. Scott got church travel (bless their hearts) on the line and we were told he couldn't get in to China so they would just fly him back here. He spent the night in the LAX airport and we picked him up the next morning. His companions were happy to have him back after his little vacation in L.A.
Sister Kim to Korea
We had two days last week where we had missionaries on 6 a.m. flights, which meant leaving our house about 3:30 to pick them up and get them to the airport. The hardest part about that, and all of these goodbyes was not being able to hug these missionaries goodbye.
Hermana Speas
Hermana Udall
During all of the goings, we did have one wonderful 'coming'.
Hermana Smith was in the MTC for 2 weeks learning Spanish when they decided to clear it out. She got to come here a bit sooner than she was planning. We were grateful to say hello in the middle of all of our goodbyes.
Elder and Sister Sumner (middle) stayed until all of our missionaries were safely on their way and then they left us as well.
In the middle of all of this people moving we were trying to figure out how to keep the work moving forward and our missionaries engaged and happy, hopeful and focused on their missionary purpose. They have been using social media more than ever before and teaching as much as they can over social media. We hope to keep their teaching skills sharp. I had some missionaries do video lessons with our kids at home who are also cooped up with their little ones and they loved it.
We also started a Daily Devotional over zoom that we do every morning with the entire mission. Scott and I have done some of them, but we are afraid they were going to get bored of just hearing from us...
and so we have had some wonderful friends step up and help us out. It has been fun to share our missionaries with so many wonderful people. Our hearts have been so touched that people just want to help out any way they can. But, who wouldn't want to spend an hour sharing thoughts and looking at a screen full of bright, happy missionary faces?
Brother and Sister Ron and Becky Craven
My cute parents, Elder and Sister Sheldon and Joan Child
President and Sister Scott and Robin Kanzler
Brad and Shay Robins (from the singing group GENTRI)
Elder and Sister Patrick and Jennifer Kearon
We bought all of our missionaries the book The Infinite Atonement by Elder Tad Callister so each zone could have a little book club discussion every week. Imagine our delight and gratitude when one of our missionaries called and told us she had a connection and could get Elder Callister and his wife to join us for one of our devotionals to teach us about the atonement of Jesus Christ.
This coming week we are studying the last week of the Savior's life together and we are having our kids all take a day. I'll post pictures of this week in my next blog.
We also started a weekly institute class that we do on Wednesday afternoons. Our daughter in law's dad, Stephen Clark is an institute teacher and graciously agreed to teach our class once a week. It has been amazing.
We have become quite proficient with Zoom Meetings. Last week we held Zone Conferences Tuesday through Friday over zoom.
This picture was one of our devotionals, but it is what we see every day, and it is what our zone conferences looked like.
It's amazing that, although we can't gather in person, until now, we have rarely had our whole mission join together all at the same time. It has been a blessing to connect with them each day, and although it is through technology and isn't maybe as personal as we would prefer, it has been a wonderful blessing to all of us. We all look forward to seeing each other every day, and have loved learning together. I am SO grateful for the technology we have that allows us to move forward in this way.
We've also been able to connect with our family through technology. We have been able to attend virtual primary for the past few weeks with our kids and grandkids. And we even had a virtual game night with our kids last Friday night.
During this time I also had my birthday. I was so blessed to hear from friends from home, friends from here, and of course my wonderful family. It was a beautiful day of connecting with those I love.
However, It was a crazy time and both Scott and I forgot it was even my birthday until just a few days before. There were no stores open and no time to online shop, and I don't need anything anyway, so I told him not to worry about anything. But he gave me the best gift I could have ever asked for. He got in touch with a few of our former missionaries and asked them to pass the word along that it was my birthday and he would like my phone to blow up with texts on my birthday. I was overwhelmed with 100s of texts and messages from former and current missionaries. A few of them had the idea to send out a call for video messages to me. One sweet former sister compiled all of the video messages into one, and sent it to me. There were the sweetest video messages from over 60 of our former missionaries telling me something they learned from me, and sent such heartfelt messages of love. I was overwhelmed with such love, it was amazing. About halfway through the day there was a knock on the door and a sweet sister from one of the wards here was standing at my door with hundreds of roses and a card that said 'Happy birthday from your missionaries around the world, those who no longer wear a name tag'. Another sister had somehow gotten word to everyone to donate to the flower fund, and got ahold of this sister here to purchase and deliver them to me. To say I was overwhelmed was an understatement. I felt like I was in a movie!
I also had a knock on my door and opened it to these darling sisters who serve in Folsom. They practiced social distancing but sang happy birthday to me and left me flowers and chocolates, dark chocolate no less. It doesn't get better than that! They also heart attacked our door during all of this. How we love them!
What a beautiful sight to open my door to these darling, smiley, happy faces!
I also got the sweetest gift ever from Sister Hamilton and Hermana Freeman. In one of our devotionals I talked about Joshua and how he had to do things in a different way than had ever happened before. He had to follow Moses, but was told to be of good courage, several times along with some other really great advice. Then I talked about how God told him to take the city of Jericho. They circled the city, carrying the arc of the covenant, 1 time every day for 7 days. Then on the 7th day, they circled the city 7 times and then blew their horns and shouted and the walls fell down. They had never taken a city that way before, but they trusted in God, they had courage and they followed his commandments and saw miracles. We are no different. We are doing missionary work in a way we haven't had to in the past, but as we have courage and do it, we will see miracles in ways we haven't before.
In the next devotional we did, I taught about the middle part of that story. About how the Lord told Joshua, and Joshua told his people to 'sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you'. As God was with Moses, he promised to be with Joshua and he doesn't fail to keep his promises. Then God has them do something unusual. The priests took the arc of the covenant and waded into the Jordan River. They were told to stand firm on dry ground. This was a story of covenant. And the waters parted, just like they did with Moses. The miracle wasn't of the magnitude it was when the Red Sea parted. It was a river, not a sea, but it was the miracle they needed, and 2-3 million people walked across on dry ground.
Joshua then had the head of each of the 12 tribes get a stone and put it on the spot where they had crossed over on dry ground. Joshua 4:21-24 are some of my favorite scriptures in the Old Testament, well, in besides all of my other favorites because I really love the Old Testament. Anyway....
"When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones? Then ye shall let your children know saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land. For the Lord your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before you, until ye were passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red sea, which he dried up from before us, until we were gone over. That all the people of the earth might know the hand of the Lord, that it is mighty; they ye might fear the Lord your God forever."
They placed stones in a place where miracles happened. They were to remember the miracles. I told our missionaries that in time to come, their children may ask what it was like to be a coronavirus missionary, and we will tell them of the miracles that happened while we were here. We need to look for and remember the miracles, because we worship the same God that parted the Red Sea and the Jordan River, and as we sanctify ourselves, stand firm on dry ground, keeping our covenants, and remember the miracles, we will be able to testify that we saw the hand of the Lord and that He is mighty.
So, these two darling sisters, who are serving at the very bottom of the mission, got permission to go to, or through, all 11 of our zones, where they got out and collected a stone from each place, wrote the name of the place on the stone where they got the stone, and on the 12th stone wrote Cal Sac Mission with the Joshua scripture reference. They put them in a jar and left them for me with this note for my birthday.
This gift meant more to me than I can ever say because when these are displayed in my home for years to come and someone asks me 'what mean these stones?' I will not remember the sorrows of the past few weeks, I will remember the miracles. I will remember how God carried us, I will remember how he parted the waters for miracles to happen, I will remember that the hand of the Lord is mighty. And I will be grateful.
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