The LDS Church office complex in Colorado Springs, CO seen at left. The CCSM office is part of this complex.
Then we traveled over to the mission home where we soon met President and Sister Anderson returning with about twenty missionaries who were having their Mission Jubilee, the same as we were. That means the missionaries have reached their half way mark in their missions and they are gathered to the mission home for some special experiences and they get to go to the temple together. All the other missionaries were able to go to the temple at the same time we were going to our doctors’ appointments. So we were allowed to go to the temple on Wednesday, Oct. 19, instead of Oct. 18 as the others did. Most of the missionaries were young elders, but there were also 5 sister missionaries in attendance at the Mission Jubilee. (We have several missionaries in the CCSM who are from Tonga, or their parents came to America from Tonga, and it is always fun to talk with them. One of the sisters celebrating her jubilee was one of these from Tonga.)
Sister Howlett pointing to the Colorado Colorado Springs Mission home, to the right.
That night we had dinner in the mission home with President and Sister Anderson then we had a special meeting about the missionaries' experience at the temple and what some of the covenants mean to us and how we can have special spiritual help from those covenants to guide us on our missions. It was a beautiful meeting. Sadly we didn’t feel well enough to remember to take any pictures of these special meetings, but we had great enjoyment from being in such choice young missionaries’ presence and that of President and Sister Anderson. President and Sister Sparrow came to help, and we also enjoyed visiting with them. Pres. Sparrow is a counselor in the mission presidency and Sister Sparrow serves in many different capacities. They usually travel with the President when they go to mission conferences etc., so we have seen them here in Garden City several times. It was a lovely evening and extremely spiritual. After the meeting we were given a very comfortable bedroom with an adjoining bathroom there in the mission home, which was very nice.
Elder and Sister Howlett at the Denver Temple
The next day, at the temple, was wonderful. We planned to meet Sister Howlett’s cousin, Joanne Gillmore there, but we later found out that she couldn’t attend the temple with us because she mistakenly forgot to renew her recommend a few days before. That has happened to all of us and it is a sickening feeling to not be able to go in to the temple. It is a small taste of the feeling we might have to see some of our family and friends go to Celestial Kingdom to be with God, but we didn’t do what we needed to do in order to qualify and we will not be allowed to go. How tragic it would be.
However, we were able to attend two endowment sessions to do some family file names, including some names from Joanne’s files, so she got some of the work for her family done anyway. Elder Howlett also got to do an initiatory for a family file name and we turned in some names for youth to do baptisms and confirmations. So it was a spiritually fulfilling time and so wonderful to be in the Lord’s house doing work for some of His children. We wish we could go much more often.
Wednesday night we stayed at the home of some gracious people in the ward down in Pueblo, Colorado. Brother Jim and Sister Robin Brewer were very humble and gracious hosts for us in the home they were actually “house-sitting” for another member family in the Pueblo ward. It was fun to get to know them. Robin Brewer has Fibromyalgia and suffers a lot from pain at different times, but she keeps going and is the car driver of the couple. Jim has Parkinson’s disease and has had several treatments to help him be able to walk again and somewhat control his disease, but he has a great positive attitude about life. They are rebuilding their own home in a special way with rectangle straw bales as insulation inside the walls. It sounds like a very innovative idea. He served at least four terms as a city commissioner of Pueblo. There are so many interesting people in the world, and it is a privilege to get to know as many as we do.
Jim and Robin Brewer, the couple who let us spend two nights with them in Pueblo, Colorado
On Thursday we had a “mission tour conference” for our half of the mission. (It was repeated on another day for the other half,) It was held there in Pueblo with Elder Paul V. Johnson of the Seventy and Elder Hilliard, the Area Authority Seventy who serves our mission area as the visitors who were “touring our mission.” We also had talks by our mission president, J. Patrick Anderson and all their wives. We had a wonderful conference with very spiritual counsel given to all the missionaries in the southern and eastern half of our mission. The main topic was to help our contacts learn enough about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ so that they want to retain their activity in the Church. If all investigators were taught according to the instructions given in that conference, there would be less need for work like we do to seek after the less-actives. What a spiritual feast it was!
After spending another night with the Brewers we left Friday morning to travel back to Garden City, Kansas, where we look forward to the second half of our mission with renewed energy and commitment. We are grateful we can serve the Lord here in Kansas.
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