Thank Goodness

We had a really nice trip to Sibu last week for our Senior Conference.  It is always fun to get together with the other "old folk" out here.  We had a nice surprise too.  One of the new senior couples is an old high school classmate of Ben's.  It is Bob Brady and he and his wife Mary are serving in the city of Mukah and arrived here about three weeks ago.  It was so fun for Ben to see an old classmate.  Thank Goodness for old friends and new ones too.

We had a great time at Senior conference and really enjoyed hearing from our Mission President, Pres. Clark.  He and his wife will be leaving June 30.  We will miss them. The new President is President Manes and we will be serving with him for the majority of our time here.

After Sibu we flew over to Kuching to take care of some welfare/humanitarian business.  Here we met with Francis Johen who is with Cheshire Homes from the UK who we partner with to provide wheelchairs.  He took us on a tour of the city.  Kuching in Malay means "cat"  and they have lots of cat statues throughout the city.  The even have a cat museum.  It is a very nice city.

This is a picture of Francis Johen.  When he was a young man of about 15 or 16 he was very athletic.  One day he started to run a high fever.  After a few days he had lost the feeling in both his legs and it left him paralyzed from the waist down.  He had know place to go so he ended up living at the Cheshire home for 4 years.  They took excellent care of him.  Now he uses crutches/wheelchair.  But he kept up his education and went on to become a lawyer and now is a very high ranking lawyer with the government.  It is a very inspirational story of never giving up and over coming what life may throw your way.  He also is now giving back to Cheshire homes by serving on their board.  Thank Goodness for people who continue to serve and give back no matter what life hands them.

Francis Johen is in the front and some of the others who work at the Cheshire home.

Sorry.  Just lie down sideways to look at it.  This is a picture of the new Kuching church house which was just dedicated the first of the month.  It is really a pretty building and they are so happy to have an actual church house to meet in.

We also had some meetings with the person, Patrick Panai, who is helping us with some water projects in the "interior".  It was a very successful trip and we really enjoyed it, but it did put me behind with other things going on.

When we got back from our trip our AC was broken.  We were able to make do by staying in the rooms that also have AC.  Two techs came and fixed it for us on Friday.  Thank Goodness!  Then on Friday afternoon our clothes washer broke.  I really had a lot of laundry because of our trip.  I felt guilty complaining about the washer being broken when 75% of our branch members probably still do all their laundry by hand.  Anyway, a repairman came and was able to make a temporary fix until he orders in the parts to fix it permanently.  Thank Goodness!

Thursday night Ben awoke about midnight in excruciating pain and vomitting.  He had a kidney stone again.  I asked if he wanted me to try and drive him to the hospital.  I think he was more terrified of me having to drive than he was of the kidney stone.  I gave him some Tylenol and after awhile the pain eased up.  On Friday he said he was sore but not in terrible pain anymore.  Again Friday night he awoke in terrible pain and again I gave him some tylenol.  Again it took the edge off so he was able to get a couple of hours sleep. On Saturday we went to a friendly pharmacist we know here and she gave him some pain medication to take and advised him to see a doctor if it didn't clear up.  Whatever she gave him really did the trick, it killed all the pain and he has been doing fine all Saturday night and all day Sunday.  Thank Goodness.  Just pray that it stays away.

We are continuing with our teaching of new converts.  They are all marvelous people and they teach us much more than we teach them.  It is so wonderful to see the light in their eyes because they now know the truth.  Thank Goodness for the gospel.

I wanted to mention a book I just finished reading that was left here by the other missionaries.  Heads up to all you book club people too.  It is a wonderfully written book that I just thoroughly loved.  It is called "Corrag" and is written by Susan Fletcher.  It is based on a true story.  Give it a read and let me know what you think of it.

Also, Kathy made me the most wonderful video for mother's day.  I just sobbed and sobbed it was so touching and so good.  If you get a chance you can pull it up on YouTube.  I guess you'll have to ask Kathy how to do that as I'm tech illiterate.

Thank Goodness for all of you!  I wish we could hear from more of you but I know your lives are busy just like ours.  I do appreciate those of you who have dropped a line or left a message.  It really helps.  Sometimes I still get really really homesick.  I love you all      Sis Read