The Mission Office

The mission office is on the same campus as the Johannesburg MTC. We rarely see the missionaries. For this photo I was standing on the steps of the mission office building, pointing the camera at the MTC.

This is the mission office building. It is new and was completed three months ago.

This is a new walkway that was completed last week. The workers kept tearing it out and redoing to get it perfect. If you continue on the path, it leads to the CES building. 

These are very new stairs. When they constructed the mission office there were no stairs and you had to go over to the CES building and follow a veranda to get to the front door. They will add railing to the sides sometime.

Elder Allred at his computer. He is working on flat inspection assignments. The senior missionary couples will have around 14 flats each to inspect every six weeks. 

One end of the store room where we prepare the supplies for the elders. The boxes with orange dots are full of copies of the Book of Mormon that elders have ordered. There are 40 books in each box. These elders are truly dedicated to share and invite others to come unto Christ! We are impressed by their testimonies of the truthfulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The opposite end of the storeroom. It is a work in progress. We are still waiting for shelving to be installed so the boxes can be unpacked and placed on the shelves.

There are many translations of the Book of Mormon that are passed out here in South Africa. I was surprised to see this one. Zulu, Setswana and English are some of the  most requested.

The AP's desks, back in the corner.

Elder I. He lives on a very small island that only has flights in and out two times a week. He has been waiting to go home for nine days because of a very complicated series of layovers and delays that would make him miss the plane. Many, many phone calls and emails failed, and finally President Dunn made the winning call! He started his long journey home on Thursday! He was a trouper as he bounced around the mission staying with various elders and the mission home. Elder Thompson told us of a letter Brigham young received from a mother that said their son served faithfully in his call in...I think England, and they were wondering if he could come home and get married and start his family. Come to find out he had served for nine years...somehow he had been forgotten, but served so well that he continued to be committed to the work and baptized hundreds of people and organized wards and stakes that are still going strong today! Now THAT is a committed missionary!!! By the way, at the bottom of the letter someone wrote, OOPS!

Photo of Sister Hansen's yummy ice cream dessert. It was a hit.

Sloppy Joes and Sister Thompson's delicious salad were served also.

Shelves stocked and ready for the zone leaders to pick up and deliver to their zones. They have been working very hard this week!

More...

...and even more...

Ordered household supplies are set on the veranda for zone leaders to pick up.

The South African sky on Thursday evening. There is supposed to be rain on Saturday, and the clouds are a sign it's coming. The wind was blowing like crazy in the night, rattling windows and doors with branches and pods from the trees hitting the flat.   

Spring and Summer are notorious for some crazy thunder storms. We'll share our experience when they come.

Sister Hansen calls this a bottle brush tree, which is an appropriate name, as you can see.

We are very grateful for the support from all of our family and friends! We love you all and pray for you daily. Remember, life is good. Heavenly Father loves each one of you. Each one of us are blessed so richly! As we travel through areas here in Africa, we see such poverty on one side and abundance on the other. Please appreciate what you have been given. Give service and share generously your gifts, talents, and means with those who have not. Most people are trying to make a living honestly. They are so creative, recycling by going through trash cans and selling what they find to recycle companies, creating beaded items and selling them, selling bagged avocados, oranges, sunglasses, hats, and various items at the robots.  We also see people handing out advertisement flyers for companies instead of pan-handling. We've only seen two or three pan-handlers!

Sometimes our service and giving is right in our own home. Please watch this great video from the Church that I found this morning as I was getting ready for the day. It made me rethink what I was doing as the busyness of life happened. Enjoy!

Highlight the below link, right click and it will give you the option to go to the video. 

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2014-00-008-you-never-know?category=mormon-messages/mormon-messages-2014&lang=eng