Missionaries in Japan are safe and accounted for

Parents of Mormon missionaries send their sons and daughters off to places near and far throughout the world, trusting that they will be fine while they are gone.  But the world can be a scary, dangerous place.  We sent Elliot to Oklahoma knowing that it is one of the world's tornado hotbeds but we're confident that he'll return home safely in one piece.

As parents of a missionary, we sympathize with the parents of missionaries serving in Japan.  The earthquake has been devastating, far more so than anything we have experienced in earthquake-prone Southern California.  The first official report from the Church indicated that all missionaries in five out of six Japanese missions had been accounted for, but eight missionaries in the Sendai area could not be immediately contacted.  A day later, the Church reported that all the missionaries had been accounted for and were safe, thankfully.  The Church website includes an audio interview with Conan Grimes, a missionary serving in Japan with his wife, Cindy.

The latest report included a message from the First Presidency:

We express our love and support to the people of Japan as they deal with this terrible tragedy. Our prayers, and the prayers of millions of Latter-day Saints across the world, are with them as they begin to recover from this disaster.

The Church is still trying to contact a few members and is assessing damage to Church property.  It is also discussing with government and humanitarian organizations ways to provide assistance.  Check the Church newsroom for futher updates.

Elliot's March 14 email and pictures

Here's the latest message from Elliot.  Sounds like he had a much better week last week and will be busy in meetings all this week.  And he sent some pictures, which you can see after the jump.

Hello!

Well that's awesome that Kyle's heading to the MTC. [Kyle Hill of Newhall First Ward is going to Rome on his mission. He reports to the Missionary Training Center this week.] He'll have a blast and we'll have a crazy amount of missionaries out from our ward. Like 10? That's a lot.

I'm actually writing from Oklahoma City today. There's a Leadership Training Meeting all week from Tuesday to Friday. I'm not quite sure why I'm going, I'm still a junior companion, but President Taylor knows what he's doing! It's weird leaving the area alone for a whole week, I just hope the work doesn't slow down too much. I don't think it will, we already have like 6 appointments set up between next Friday and Saturday.

We had a really awesome week. We set really high goals for ourselves to get 3 lessons taught to investigators with a member present and 9 more lessons taught to investigators with 3 new investigators. These were really high goals, but we really wanted to push ourselves, especially since the week before was so slow. So we went out in faith knowing that the Lord could help us accomplish these goals. We ended up teaching 3 member present lessons, 9 others, and we got 4 new investigators. On Thursday we even taught a total of 7 lessons, the most I've ever taught in a single day. It really was incredible. We've gotten a lot of things going now in our area, so things are looking up! We also got to get out to Dill City, a very, very small town in our area which was fun. There was a Rambo street. Pictures are included [after the jump].

We have this one new investigator in particular that I'm excited about. He has family that's Mormon in Utah that have been encouraging him to start reading the Book of Mormon and going to church. He's going through a lot right now: a divorce, money problems, and just general problems. But he is very excited about coming to church and learning more. I think that often we have to be brought low in order to be brought higher. So I have very good hopes for him.

Everything is going okay here. I'm healthy, happy, and excited to play some basketball today! And I did find my blue shoes, so no worries. I'll pretty much be in meetings all week, but sometimes that's just what you gotta do!

Love yall!

Elder Elliot Adair

Mormon Messages: "Why Mormons Build Temples"

Some time ago I posted two entries about the Oklahoma City Temple (here and here; the Los Angeles Temple is pictured at right).  I recently ran across a video that provides insight into the purpose of temples.  It includes messages from Jeffrey R. Holland, Ann N. Madsen, Boyd K. Packer, and President Thomas S. Monson of the Church.  Also featured are Frank Moore Cross, Professor of Ancient History at Harvard, and Krister Stendahl, Dean of Divinity Emeritus at Harvard (deceased), who share their non-Mormon perspectives on the Church's construction of temples in modern times.  Enjoy the video after the jump.

Carl Bloch: "The Master's Hand"

On Sunday, our favorite dentist, Larry Amelang, who is responsible for Elliot's toothy smile, spoke in church and mentioned his recent visit to an art exhibit at BYU.  The exhibit displays the works of Carl Heinrich Bloch, a Danish artist from the 1800s.  BYU has created a website for the exhibit, which includes five large altarpieces, which you can see here; I have also included them after the jump (below).  BYU Magazine also featured an extensive article about Bloch.  From the article:

From the New Testament scenes, Bloch moved on to large-scale religious paintings, including altarpieces for eight Lutheran church buildings in Denmark and Sweden. In altarpieces such as Christ Blessing the Little Child, Christus Consolator, and Christ Healing the Sick at Bethesda, Bloch highlighted the intimate, personal nature of Jesus’ ministry. By connecting the church altar to Christ’s focus on the one, says Gravgaard, Bloch’s paintings invite parishioners to contemplate their own relationship to the Savior as they approach the altar, which she describes as “the table from which we have our communion, where we take part in the meal together with Christ.”

If you happen to be in Provo before the exhibit closes on May 7, be sure to see the exhibit, but you must make reservations in advance.

"Abhorrence"

Can you spell abhorrence?  Parker Strubhar of Piedmont Middle School in Piedmont, Oklahoma, can, and he proved it Saturday when he won the Central Oklahoma Spelling Bee.  Parker, 14, was the big winner of a competition that started with 23,000 students from 225 schools across Oklahoma.  He claimed victory by correctly spelling abhorrence and now gets to travel to Washington, D.C., to represent Oklahoma in the Scripps National Spelling Bee on June 1-2, 2011.  Good luck, Parker!

And who knows, since Piedmont is in Elliot's mission, just outside Oklahoma City, Elliot and Parker may cross paths someday.

Elliot's March 7 email

Here's Elliot's latest email.

Hey!

Yeah I've been hearing quite a bit about college ball actually. All the members out here love it and one even bore his testimony about how good it is to stand up for morals like BYU. He's an awesome member too, Bro. Poteet. We're gonna go to his place after this and probably play some basketball! Speaking of which, somehow I lost my blue basketball shoes, but I'm holding out hope they'll show up either at his place or at the YMCA.

I had a really slow week this past week, not gonna lie. It seemed like absolutely no one was home all week long. It was tough because me and my companion had been really trying to focus in on the Spirit more to know what to do. I dunno, I think it was just one of those weeks. The Malibu even had to be taken in to get fixed, costing us another like 2 hours of work as we had to sit in the dealership. Our seemingly most promising investigator dropped us. But we had a few other things that seemed like they could move forward. Saturday finally came by and the one lesson I was most excited for (we were gonna teach a new investigator family in the church) fell through. We had even just cleaned up the church to make sure everything was in order. I'll admit, I could have just gone and slept all the rest of that day. But we just kept going. We tracted for a while, which even though we didn't have extreme success or anything, still felt better. When we finally had enough of knocking doors we tried a potential investigator we found the week before who seemed promising. We knocked and no one answered. I remember just thinking "What are we doing wrong?" But then someone opened the door as we were walking off. It was David's brother, Francisco. We taught him, thinking he was David for half of the lesson (lol) and it was going alright. I think we were both not in super great of spirits and we didn't really want to invite him to be baptized (we're supposed to invite everyone to be baptized first lesson unless the Spirit directs otherwise). But I finally just decided that I had to. I said (in Spanish), "When you come to know the Book of Mormon is true, will you follow the example of Jesus Christ by being baptized by someone holding the Priesthood authority of God?" He said "Yeah. I know the Book of Mormon is true. Otherwise, why would so many people believe in it?" Wow. I was so shocked. And I know I shouldn't have been. I should have had more faith. But it was just completely night and day difference from how our whole week had been. It was amazing. Then that night we got a referral for a guy who desperately wants to meet with us, and we have an appointment for tomorrow. It was just another example that we just need to keep moving forward. I really easily could have stopped after that appointment fell through on Saturday, but all the success we had that night and Sunday too would have been lost. We did have a pretty awesome day yesterday. We taught a total of 4 lessons. Just gotta keep on keeping on!

Anyway, I'm glad to hear everything's going well back at home! I've heard Five Guys is good, but In-N-Out is awesome. Although Braums out here in OK is something incredible too.

I love ya'll!

Love,

Elder Elliot Adair

Mormon Tabernacle Choir: "Called to Serve"

Today I found a video featuring the Mormon Tabernacle Choir performing "Called to Serve," a great missionary song.  It includes some footage of missionaries from all over and made me think of Elliot in rural western Oklahoma.  Enjoy the video.