Sister Kyla Radke
Washington Spokane
Spanish Speaking Mission
Sister Radke got to trade in her
English tag for her Spanish tag a couple of weeks ago when she was transferred
to an older part of downtown Spokane. She now serves in both a Spanish
branch and an English ward. She enjoys teaching an English class to Spanish
speakers one evening a week. She and her companion live in a beautiful old
house that has been converted into apartments (see photo). The view from her
window is great. You can see that winter has arrived in Spokane!
Denmark Copenhagen
Mission
Elder Andrew Harker continues to
work on his tech calling as a missionary while trying to juggle his
other missionary responsibilities. He completed and posted his first
ad for free Danish classes, (see photo below) and they received a record 100
referrals in 4 days. They planned on leaving the ad up longer but had to
take it down, as they did have enough missionaries to keep up on more
referrals!
The Christmas ad he spoke of last
month will be released in a few days. Here are a few of his own words
regarding that project:
"Storrs and I did a lot of work ironing out
details for our Christmas advertisement...We're filming one scene in a forest,
and we were having difficulty finding a suitable location in this huge forest
near the mission home by the name of Geelskov. Suddenly, as we're tromping
through the piles of golden and red leaves under a canopy of pine trees, we
come across a perfect little clearing to film the scene in. The only problem
was that it was right in the middle of a mountain biking trail.
Storrs and I discussed the risk of just shooting
the film there without telling anyone, but I don't think the mountain bikers
would be too happy if they collided with a bunch of scrub Americans and some
camera gear. Suddenly, as we were talking, a mountain biker came zooming down
the trail. He stopped and we talked to him to ask about how we could go about
filming there. Then he said that he was the trail manager! He said that we could
totally film there if we emailed him the date and time, and set up a sign at
the top of the trail warning people.
It was perfection. No coincidences here. I don't
believe in those anymore. I'm glad I have this opportunity to serve as the
Lord's instrument. I love telling people how our ad got 100 referrals, but I
should be saying the Lord's ad. Everything I do isn't mine, I do it for the
Lord for the benefit of my fellow man. I think with that perspective being a
missionary is more rewarding."
I'm hoping Andrew receives his Christmas package
on time, seeing that Danish customs is very, very slow these days!
Texas Dallas West
Spanish Speaking
Mission
On the other hand, Elder James Harker will have
no trouble receiving his Christmas package on time, seeing that he is currently
only 50 minutes away from Plano haha. He was recently transferred to
a new area in southwest Dallas called West Bear Creek. He is excited
about finding new people to teach together with his new companion Elder
Frederick (a world-class speed skater who hopes to make it to the
Olympics. As a side note, this has been fun for James to learn about as
he has played some ice hockey and enjoys skating.)
From Elder Harker's last newsletter:
"The
Lord God truly works miracles. We happened upon an interested young man by the
name of Felipe. He was nineteen years of age, and originally from Mexico.
Felipe was struggling with a smoking habit and with alcoholism, brought about
by social pressures from his peers when he was younger. After observing the
predicament of his father, a drug addict and homeless man who was unresponsive
in every sense of the word, Felipe had decided that he needed a change in his
own life..
..At
the end of our first meeting with Felipe, I felt the Spirit of God guiding my
mind. A spiritual impression came to me that I needed to ask Felipe if he would
prepare himself to be baptized. At first I hesitated, because I felt he
did not know enough, and that he was not in the ideal position. to make such a
commitment. However, I decided to heed the words of the Spirit, trusting that
the Lord would place the right words in my imperfect mouth, and that His Spirit
would fill in the gaps I was not capable of filling. On Sunday, the 28th of
November, 2021, Felipe agreed to prepare himself to be baptized on the 19th of
February in the coming year. This was an unusually long period of time to
wait, but he had told us he would be in Mexico for a month and a half, so we
felt he needed some extra time to learn and progress towards his goal.
...Despite
our imperfections as missionaries, everything seemed to slide into place,
right when it needed to. God does work miracles in this day and age. I was
grateful for His help and Spirit in my life, and was willing and ready to to be
an instrument in His hands..."
Brazil Salvador Mission
Elder Barneck is in the final
countdown. Here will make the 12 hour flight home December 16th and arrive in
Dallas early in the morning on December 17th! Yay!
Elder Barneck is serving as a
zone leader for his last transfer and is working hard until the very end. Here
is an excerpt from his latest email.
God loves you. He wants to
bless you. He wants to help you. Miracles exist. You will see more miracles in
your life as you increase your faith. I know these things to be true, I know
for a surety that they are true. Let's all increase our faith this week and
watch the miracles fall into our everyday routine. Beleza?
"The answer to each of your challenges is to
increase your faith. That takes work."
Russell M. Nelson
Treinta y Tres Uruguay
Elder Ian
Santiago Shepley is still in Treinta y Tres (a state of Uruguay) and very busy.
It has a population of 48,134 in over 3,679 sq miles; that’s over twice the
size of Collin and Dallas County combined! He was recently made a senior
companion, and for a couple of weeks was training a new missionary that had
arrived in Uruguay from the MTC. His mission is planning on having the 56 local
missionaries train for one or two weeks at a time because 150 new missionaries
are soon to arrive from the United States by the end of December.
He currently has a new companion from the United States. His new
companion, Elder Rose, has been in the mission field for 16 months but is now
new to Uruguay. They are still traveling to Montevideo once per month for
meeting and planning sessions. He is feeling more confident now that he knows
most of the rules of the mission and he feels like he is starting to enjoy the
mission 100%. Besides doing missionary work, he has been working on his family
tree. We recently learned that one of his ancestors was born and died in Treinta y Tres.
Orlando
Florida
Chinese
Speaking
I
absolutely love serving the people here in Orlando. I've served almost my
entire mission in a little Chinese branch with about 20 members, and there
aren't too many Chinese people around. The work here is very unique in that our
finding and retention methods require a ton of creativity and inspiration. We
had some incredible miracles this week, with people that are super prepared to
progress showing up to Church. This is, without a doubt, the Lord's work!
Elder & Sister Bickmore
Senior Service
Missionary Coordinators
We are serving a 2 year Senior Service Mission. We are the
Senior Service Missionary Coordinators for North Texas and Oklahoma. We
act as a liaison between the Stake Presidents (36 stakes) and the Operation
Managers for the Church operations in our area (about 40) to make sure the
operations have the service missionaries they need to run smoothly. We
help prospective missionaries with finding a mission they would like to serve
and with their paper work so they can receive a call. Some of the
operations that missionaries in our area are serving in are the Bishops'
Storehouse, Employment Resources, Family History (records extraction), BYU
Pathway, Family Services (Addiction Recovery Group Leaders), and Temple
non-ordinance workers. And, lastly, we provide orientation and
training to Stake Presidencies, Bishops, and Stake Senior Service Missionary
Specialists to help promote Senior Service Missions among the stake
members. We are Senior Service Missionary Ambassadors and we love serving.
Washington,
Yakima Mission
Spanish
Speaking
Report
Date Jan. 10, 2022
Tuesday, November 2 was a very exciting day.
Ayden waited until evening to open it so his family could all be together on
Zoom to watch the excitement. Ayden will be home from BYU Hawaii in time for
Christmas and then it will not be long and he will be packing his bags and
heading north.
Brazil,
Belo Horizonte Mission
Portuguese
Speaking
Report
Date: March 28, 2022
Like Ayden, Matt received his mission call to
serve on Nov. 2nd and he too waited to open it with many friends and
much family on line. These are such exciting times.
in Plano 4th Ward
Our
3 Sister Missionary are now reduced to 2 sisters. Our Sister Stewart left for
Bulgaria on Nov. 11 and our Sister Hawley(left) is now in Brazil. Sister Pilling (right) welcomed a new greenie, Sister Hedrick from Oregon,(center) to the Texas Dallas East Mission. What fun it was to
receive a heart attack from the Sisters on Thanksgiving Day. How we love these sister missionaries!
