The Joy of Being on a Mission

One of the blessings of serving our mission in the Frankfurt area in Germany is the chance it gives us to become acquainted with the other missionaries and church employees who are serving in many assignments in connection with the area offices. These people often have backgrounds that allow them to serve in unique ways, such as in legal work, financial work, medical, Public Affairs, etc. We have people working in Humanitarian Outreach, and in an Outreach to the Young Single Adults. Each couple or single sister is in a position to work on pretty important projects that affect the progress of the Church. From time to time we hear some of them explain about their work. The legal folks who have, among other things, prepared the way for a temple in Rome have spoken to us. We’ve learned about how the Jerusalem Center came into being under almost impossible conditions – what many considered to be totally impossible conditions, except with the Lord’s intervention it happened. We have worked with people who have developed puppet shows to spread truths we learn in church, or who make video productions that are seen by millions. Here you can see some of our group. We had a chance to spend time with a couple of expert ladies who were the leading planners for the Salt Lake Olympics, and for the China Olympics, whose projects are the kind that take millions of dollars to carry out. We have listened to the stories of German members who have gone through the personal experiences that have given them the spiritual maturity that is evident in many members here now. These are the kinds of things that produced a President Uchtdorf. While it is true that we Mormons know more about the purposes for our lives than do other people, it is also true that it isn’t just what we know that sets us apart – it is really more a factor of what we do because of what we know. And when the Lord’s people learn to be obedient, then he causes the miracles to happen that are necessary for His work to move forward. It is simply a privilege for them to be there and see it happen. Such were our experiences in Kiribati, and that was why we wanted to serve another time in the mission field. And if we can, we’d like to do it again after this one.

The last couple of weeks have been very busy, but they have been rewarding. A week ago we were in Bielefeld, Germany, a little over 300 Kilometers away from Frankfurt. The largest gathering of Genealogists in the country was held there starting on Friday afternoon, and extending through Sunday with additional excursions and training experiences continuing through the following week. We left Frankfurt early Friday to get there and setup our display to be ready for the opening on Friday afternoon. Five were going from here, and two were women.
Our car was filled to the brim with the display materials, computers, etc., and there was no room for a third person. So Mom had to ride in the other car with the other sister, and I had a male rider with me. It hasn’t been often that we have been separated like that, and we were both glad when we had both safely arrived.
Because no one else had made definite plans of how we were to present our message about FamilySearch resources, I made my own plans along lines we learned from the Salt Lake visitors in Milan, Italy.

We had to first setup our display materials so people would know who we are. Then we setup tables and chairs to create an area where we could interact with the visitors. There we put four computers with a keyboard, monitor, and mouse facing the visitors’ side and the laptop computer on the other side with its screen, keyboard, and touch pad. In this way we could let people work on their own project with constant guidance from our experts.
In addition, we setup another computer on the visitors’ side of the table and connected to a projector so that everything that appeared on the screen of the laptop was also visible to passers by. This was Sr. Howlett’s workstation for the three days of the conference. She couldn’t discuss genealogical issues with the conference visitors, but she could Index German records so that the visitors could get a clear picture of how that was done. Her end of the table always attracted the most attention.
She is in the habit of asking me when she has trouble reading something in the German records, but I suggested she ask the visitors. From that time on, there were always at least three standing by her giving suggestions what to enter on the keyboard.

We had seven other people who serve in various FS responsibilities who were also there, and they were the ones who answered questions for the visitors and helped them work on the computers. I spent a lot of my time mingling with those who were passing by and just casually looking. I would encourage them to sit down and experience doing research on FamilySearch. I also walked around to the other booths and displays, and talked with the people working there. My message to them was that we needed to train up a lot of new genealogical researchers, and the best way to start would be to get them to do some indexing. I had prepared three handouts I could give them that explained my ideas. Almost all of the people I talked to would light up when the message finally became clear. It was obvious that they had struggled with the fact that there is more research to do than researchers to do it. All but one acknowledged that this was a good way to get people started. The one who rejected the notion was a bitter man who expressed the view that nothing could get anyone he knew to participate in any way.

Several of the people I met in this activity of visiting the other booths eventually came around to visit ours. Most of them watched the Indexing. One fellow, whose booth was close to ours, and who as far as I could see never had a visitor stop, eventually got his wife with him and came to watch the indexing. They stood there for about three hours, and were very active in helping with the reading of the text. I’m sure that we will get some help with our indexing from them. Another visitor asked if the Indexing program worked on a Macintosh. I did a search through the “Help” function and got three documents that explained the common problems Mac users experience and how to overcome them. I printed the three documents and gave them to him. The next day we got an email from him saying he got it to work and was now happily involved.

So in our little way, we too, are having an influence on the people, and doing something to promote the work to prepare a record “worthy of all acceptation” that must be completed or the “earth would be utterly wasted at his coming.”