Presidents and kings...

It has been a huge week—very, very busy for both of us.

 On Monday at staff meeting I shared Addie Loraine Casper’s picture (William and his wife Nakya had a baby girl. making Elder and Sister Casper Great Grandparents) Everyone was duly impressed.

Every 6 weeks every mission has transfers, new missionaries come in and new leadership is called. New companions and sometimes new areas or districts or zones created so it is a LOT of work.

Tuesday afternoon we received 16 new sisters and Elders to serve as missionaries in the Great Tennessee Knoxville mission and 1 Sister and 3 Elders who are visa waiters, they are going to Brazil.

 We have two Elders and one couple who have finished their mission and are leaving.
Plus we had 23 missionaries from the North Carolina mission join us on the first of July. It has been an interesting experience.  You have to have some place for these missionaries to stay and to serve and that takes time and effort.

Wednesday was transfer day .  Last Saturday, every missionary who was going to be involved in transfer changes in anyway received a notice to be on a conference call. They were told to be at the stake center for the 11:00am meeting on Wednesday with their bags and bikes and happy faces No one was told where they were going or who their companions would be, but you know how speculations begins as soon as you know you are getting a new Bishop?  Well this is the same.
Both Elder Casper & I have some pretty hefty responsibilities. We both have presentation’s to make to the new missionaries. Elder Casper gathers up the keys to the cars, the cars stay in the area, they do not move with the missionary and then has to get the right keys/car to the right companionship (he is dealing with 80 cars).  I do a small snack for the ward members who drive the missionaries to the meetings and then take the new missionaries back to their new areas.  We have missionaries as much as 3 hours away from the mission office.  That is a huge commitment on the part of the members to help out but they do and love it.

Elder Casper and I got bagels sliced and ready to serve with flavored cream cheese, an apple/orange juice drink, and some trail mix that we just put into snack size storage bags – just kind of laid it out for the members to take as they liked.
 
THERE IS AN 8:00AM FOR THE NEW MISSIONARIES. They all stay at the Presidents house the night before which is a block away and walk to the 8:00am meeting. It is so incredible to see the coming down the street, led by President Irion. I handle it like I do everything, lump in my throat and tears in my eyes. (It runs in the family)

 At 8:00am we did our presentations – Elder Casper does a little quiz on the history of Tennessee – Tennessee has produced 3 presidents and 2 kings – no one ever knows – do you?

PRESIDENTS –Andrew Jackson, John K. Pike, & Andrew Johnson (Lincoln’s VP)
KINGS – Davy Crockett King of the Wild Frontier and Elvis Presley, King of Rock & Roll. 
If anyone ever guesses – they guess Elvis.

Then he talks about safety in driving and riding their bikes and show a video with Elder Holland about safety.    I talk about mail and supplies and baptism reports and getting the forms into me so we can get people on the records.  In June we had 27 baptisms and so far in July we are up to 17.  We are going to one tonight, the sisters who live here have a baptism this week and next and have asked us to come.

We went back to the office after the 8:00 meeting – got the mail and then back to the stake center with mail so the kids can pick it up and it doesn’t get lost in the transfers. 

For the 11:00am meeting, we meet in the chapel. All the missionaries are sitting on the sides with the center section totally empty. Ward members who have driven are along the back, those missionaries  who are going home are seated on the stand.  We are on one side on the front row as office staff.

At 11:00 one of the AP’s conducts the meeting, announces we will sing CALLED TO SERVE and who will give the opening prayer. We all stand and sing CALLED TO SERVE and the other AP brings the new missionaries in and has them sit in the center section. Really big lump in the throat and I only get about 3 words out and then I am totally in tears.

This time was a REALLY, REALLY big lump and lots of tears as Elder Laws Casper, new AP in the Tennessee Knoxville mission led the missionaries into the meeting. That was one of the really big speculations – Elder Robinson will be going home and so everyone knew we would get a new AP. Elder Casper looks and acts the part.  It is amazing!

Of course now we have two Elder Casper’s and we are having fun. Papa called Elder Hales, a Missionary Elder Laws Casper had trained, about a car issue and said “this is Elder Casper”.
Elder Hales said “no its not – I know Elder Casper and you are not him”. Papa said this is Elder Casper the Car guy and Elder Hales started to laugh. They laughed all through the telephone conversation,don’t know how much they were able to get done.

One more thing about the transfer meeting. The mission theme is Hope of Israel and so we always stand and sing that as a closing song. President has a sword the he raises overhead and swings every time we sing sword of truth and might, it is kind of cool.

We have been assigned 5 sisters to find, we have to see if they are still in the ward area. We have found another one! She has moved but the note I sent to her was forwarded on and I had our phone numbers in it and she called! This is going to be a long process but we are working on it.  Now we just need to start with the young adults – all 34 of them.

Now onto laundry and the rest of our Pday.