Sunday, September 11, 2016

Dear Family,          

Well, we’re down to 11 months and 3 days. It is unbelievable how fast the time is going, and no, we aren’t trunky.  (A slang term used amongst Mormon volunteers, describing a volunteer who is excited about returning home as "trunky" as he has already packed his trunk).

9/11, what a day this is to remember. Dad and I were on vacation in Oregon with Dick and Jolene Potter and Dennis and Muriel Liggett when the twin towers came down. Dick was up early and called us to come in and see what he was seeing. We came in and saw the 2^nd tower collapse. It felt like it was the beginning of the end of times. I remember we were worried about even being able to fly home. The first thing I wanted to do was call all my kids. I knew you were far away from all the trouble but I couldn’t help but want to hear your voices.

The good news about this date is that it is also Grandma and Grandpa Stewart’s wedding anniversary. What a great example they were to all of us. I sure miss both of them.

The Ottesen’s were gone all last week to St. Petersburg for a Mission Presidents Conference. They got back at about 2:30 am this morning. They ended up coming to our NovoK branch. I was asked to give a talk. I told the story of David and Goliath. I took my information from a Jan. 2002 conference talk given by President Hinckley. I was how we are all faced with Goliath’s in our lives and through God; we all have the power to overcome them.

Elder’s Alley and Lytle are the Elders at NovoK now. I asked Elder Lytle to translate for me because he is a little more animated that Elder Alley is. I wanted dramatic. He did great. Dad and the Ottesen’s told me that I had them all on the edge of their seats.

Our freezer has been acting up for the past several months. We were going to talk to the landlord about it but then all the registration hassle happened and we decided to wait a while. The freezer is continually thawing and freezing. Anyway, when we paid rent this month Dad told him about the problem. He had someone come over the next day to fix it. It was a button problem. Anyway, it’s nice not worrying about what’s in the freezer.

The AP’s invited Dad and I to their sports morning on Saturday. We didn’t really want to go but ended up being glad we did. They ended up with 12 volunteers and 3 members. They played soccer on half a field because some kids were warming up on the other half of the field. President Blinkov plays with them. He is 51 and quite a character. Elder Johnston was telling us that President Blinkov would dive across the goal trying to prevent a score. I’ll be sending a group picture and he will be the one the Elders are carrying.

The volunteers had to leave the field when the game was ready to start. They ended up in an empty parking lot and played Ultimate Frisbee. Dad and I went for a walk around the park. It has an amusement park at one end but it’s all closed up now. Some fun looking kids playground areas. There is a pond with some paddleboats in it too. We actually saw a squirrel. That is the first critter we’ve seen since we’ve been here. We made it back to the Frisbee game and took more pictures.

When the volunteers finished their game, Dad and I took the bus to the reenik, which is the ultimate flea market. Dad was looking for a jacket that would fit him. We entered the place right where the men’s wear was. It reminded me of getting off the cruise ship in Mexico where you are accosted on all sides by vendors trying to sell you something. As we walked by, they would talk to us and try to get us in their store.

We did go into one coat store that looked like they might have Dad’s size there. They were showing us coats and we were finally able to communicate what we were looking for. They brought us what they called a sports costume. It was a tracksuit. The jacket fit fine. It came with pants too. The woman we were dealing with put a big piece of cardboard on the ground and motioned for Dad to drop his drawers and try on the pants. No dressing room. We told her we thought it would be fine.

Dad asked her Skolca, for how much. They told us 4000 rubles, which is about $60. Dad shook his head no. When they reached 3000 rubles, we decided to buy it. I have no idea if we were ripped off or not. I told him at least it didn’t cost him $300, like my dress.

After the Renick, we stopped at City Park, the big mall across from the Avrora Branch building. McDonalds was calling our name for lunch. After we ate, we went to a grocery store in the mall. I needed a few things for my Sunday dinner. When we got to the produce, Dad discovered you had to weigh and then enter the number for the produce and it would print out a label with the cost. So we did that and went to check out. As the clerk looked at our produce, and said something to us, which we didn’t understand and then put our cucumbers in a box to be put back. The same thing happened with our tomatoes, and bell pepper. They only thing we got was the lettuce. I don’t know what we did right or wrong. I just went to the market by our house and got what I needed.

While in line at the other market, there was what looked like, a tabloid. It had a woman on the cover. I could read what it said. In Russian, it said “About husband Sergey and child Marsha”. I thought it was cool that I could read it.

So, this morning after getting out of the shower I asked Dad to trim my hair. The last time I got it cut, the woman made it the same length all the way around. It just didn’t hang how I’m used to. I usually get it in an A line cut. Dad warned me that I’d get what I get and I couldn’t throw a fit. He actually did a good job, at least from the front view.

Nancy asked me what the Volunteers do now with their time since the new law became active. It has really changed everything. There is no more contacting. They can’t teach non-members in members’ homes. They do their usual morning stuff, exercise, language study, personal study, companion study. They take time to plan. They are contacting less active members. They go to their homes and touch base with them but can’t really bring up religion. They can invite them to activities the branch is having. They can do a culture day or night for themselves where they go somewhere in Russia to learn more about the culture. They do service for members, less actives and non-members. A lot of the people here have Dochas, which is like a vacation home but not as nice. The volunteers would help pull weeds, harvest food, and whatever the member needed help with. One Sister recently asked for help it getting a winters worth of woodcut. Our AP’s and Zone leaders did that for her.

The Volunteers are planning and carrying out more activities such as Family Home Evening, Temple Preparation, Mission preparation, game night, Family History, etc. They are trying to bring the branches closer. For instance, our NovoK branch has over 100 people listed as members. We don’t know if they still live around here or not. We normally get 10 to 20 members, counting kids but not volunteers, every Sunday.

We are slowly seeing the results in a lot of our branches as more and more less actives are coming back to church. It also helps us keep the members we do have because they feel closer to each other. The members always remembered the old days fondly, when the volunteers did activities with them. Then it got to be that the volunteers only went out tracting and didn’t go to branch activities. Some of the branch presidents told the Area presidency in Moscow that the way we were doing missionary work doesn’t work in Russia. The members needed to feel a connection with the volunteers and that wasn’t happening. So it’s interesting, like the Lords hand was at work, the changes in the law have made it so the volunteers are more a part of their branches and wards.

Last week the President’s letter to the volunteers really touched me and I wanted to share part of it with all of you:

My dear Sisters and Elders!

I’m not a military guy but for as long as I can remember, I have always loved reading military history. In fact, if you are ever unlucky enough to be trapped in the car with me on a long drive, be prepared to talk about military trivia and life lessons to be gleaned from Custer’s defeat at the Battle of Little Bighorn, the great WW2 tank battle at Kursk, or the Battle of Midway in the South Pacific. There are plenty of life lessons in each of those battles. I have especially loved US civil war history. In fact, at home in San Diego, I have a sizable collection of rusty civil war swords, old cannon balls, and piles of spent rifle bullets that have been excavated from the Gettysburg battlefield in Pennsylvania. I should have brought some with me to Russia.

The Battle of Gettysburg lasted 3 consecutive days in July 1863 and involved almost 100,000 soldiers from the North and the South. It was the pivotal battle of the Civil War. The war was several years old when the North and South fought at Gettysburg. Up until that time, the North had never won a major battle.

On the first day of the battle, the two armies bumped into each other by accident just south of the town of Gettysburg and fought there on several miles of broad, level grassy farmland. All previous battles fought in the war had been on similar flat ground. The Southern soldiers (aka Confederates) were experienced soldiers and skilled marksman—and for that reason easily swept the Northern soldiers (aka Union) from the field that first day. Unfortunately for the Union, they were so inexperienced and outmatched by the skill of the Confederates, that on day one they threw down their rifles in panic and simply ran from the field. The Confederates celebrated enthusiastically. The beaten Union soldiers then tried a new tactic—they took up defensive positions on the tops of large round hills just outside of town. There they dug in and waited for battle the next day. The Confederates received reinforcements after dark and now outnumbered the Union soldiers.

On day two, the Confederates saw the Union soldiers firmly dug in on top of the round hills. Despite the steep grade up the hills, and despite the July heat, they were certain their superior military skill would push the Union soldiers off the hills. The Confederates, led by a fearless general from Texas (Gen. John Hood), complained to the commanding general (Gen Robert E. Lee) that the steep ground was too difficult to fight on ---but he was overuled and nonetheless ordered to attack. All day long the Confederates sent waves of soldiers up the well-defended hills without success. The smaller group of Union soldiers who occupied the “HIGH GROUND” on top of the hills had the clear tactical advantage of shooting down the hills as the Confederate soldiers who lumbered slowly up the hill in the July heat. Finally, near the end of the day, the Union soldiers on top of one particularly high hill (named “Little Round Top”) totally ran out of ammunition. The Confederates were tired, but realized they now had their first good chance to finally breach the Union line on top of the hill. So they determined to come up the hill one last time. The Union soldiers had no bullets to shoot with so, taking advantage of the HIGH GROUND on top of the hill, they fixed bayonets and charged quickly down the hill just as the Confederates were coming up. The maneuver so completely surprised the Confederates that they surrendered. Although the armies fought one more day, the Confederates lost so many soldiers trying to take the HIGH GROUND, the battle was essentially decided that day. Military strategists have studied Gettysburg battle tactics extensively. All agree the Confederates should have won that day---they had a bigger army, more cannons, more experienced soldiers, and more experienced commanding generals. What was the critical difference that day? It was the HIGH GROUND they chose to fight on. The Union soldiers were wise enough to fight from HIGH GROUND instead of the level terrain they had unsuccessfully fought on in previous battles.

There is something powerful about finding the HIGH GROUND in your life.

In the Book of Mormon, we read in Alma 47 about how Lehonti and his men anticipated a battle with treacherous Amalickiah. Lehonti wisely and strategically placed his army on top of a mountain so he could fight the next day from the HIGH GROUND. That night, Amalickiah urged Lehonti to "come down" and meet him in the valley. At first Lehonti resisted, but ultimately weakened and left the safety of the HIGH GROUND ---and you know what happened---he was poisoned "by degrees" until he died. AS a result, Lehonti’s entire army fell into Amalickiah’s hands.

Trust me, your entire life long, people will urge you to leave the safety of HIGH GROUND. What will you do? I can assure you that Satan has declared war on you. He is experienced. He is fearless. He is used to winning. You have seen some of his victories among our fellow brothers and sisters here in Russia. Please trust me, if you try to fight Satan's power on ordinary “level ground”, you will lose every time.

So, what can you do to put yourself firmly on spiritual HIGH GROUND? What will you do?

Shortly after our mission call to Samara last September, I was feeling overwhelmed. I had a business to wrap up, a house to sell, and an endless “to do” list of minutia that never seemed to shrink. I was well out pf my typical daily routine of scripture study, and I felt my spirituality slipping. I then went to the Lord with that same “HIGH GROUND” question. He helped me remember important things. As I pondered the question, he reminded me of specific conversations I had in church counseling sessions where I had someone in front of me who was in spiritual distress. I was able to remember that every single person I ever counselled who was having a crisis of faith, or who was having a spiritual problem---was NOT reading the scriptures. It never failed. Not even once. The Lord helped me see that if I wanted to find the HIGH GROUND in my own personal life, I would need to go to the scriptures. I began to re-read the Book of Mormon and the spirituality began to return to my life. President Kimball said it much better:

“I find that when I get casual in my relationships with divinity and when it seems that no divine ear is listening to me and no divine voice is speaking to me, and I am far, far away--- that if I immerse myself in the scriptures, the distance narrows and the spirituality returns. And I find myself loving more intensely those whom I must love.”

I urge you ask the Lord what YOU need to do right now to find the HIGH GROUND in your life. The most important commandment you need to work on right now is the one you are having trouble keeping right now. The Lord will help. He is waiting for your sincere request for revelation. Have you ever noticed how he expects you to make the first move? You know the pattern. He says “draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you” (who draws first?), “knock and it shall be opened” (who knocks first?), “seek and ye shall find” (who seeks first?)

I invite you to ask the Lord where he wants you to start. He knows exactly what YOU need to do. He will help. If you ask in faith, He will help you with that question. I believe that is a very important question to him. Ask Him.

I’m sending you pictures of Sports Morning and the park, a picture of a picture of the food Shawma that I’ve told you about.

Keep those letters and phone calls coming.

Love,   

Mom