1-6 May 2011

Here is Sister Fritz, who went home in December and who is now Jillian, who came back to visit with her mom last Sunday in the Antwerpen Ward. Andy Thomas is on the left and Joseph Tunde, the man who brought him the gospel, is on the right. It was so good to see her again. The members were so happy that she would come back and bring her mother.

Oh happy day! Here is Anja and her son Djamal, standing next to Loel on her baptism day last Sunday. She requested that Loel baptize her. Djamal was baptized by a wonderful priest in the ward who was so pleased to do so. The other woman in white is Kate, the mother of the family that got baptized recently, so now their family is completely united in the Gospel. She asked Richard to baptize her. He's a new convert of last November and is now a ward missionary and is doing so well and is so strong.
Anja's family is Armenian but they've been living in Russia for years and immigrated to Belgium for political asylum reasons. She's been attending church for 5 years and finally was granted permission by her husband to be baptized. We feel sure that her oldest son will soon follow in baptism.
We have been visiting with Anja and her family ever since they moved here last July and have grown to love them so much. I felt very strongly that we were supposed to work with them from the very first day I met her. Nine months later, her dreams were realized. This was the most spiritual baptism I think I've attended. She was crying with happiness much of the day. I was crying so much, too, as it was our last day in the Antwerpen Ward and it was so hard to say good-bye to her and so many others.
Andy Thomas bore his testimony in fast and testimony meeting and thanked us for being his "father and mother in the church." Victor, confirmed this day, mentioned things that Loel had said to him at times when he was struggling and how much they helped him. So many nice things were said to us. We don't feel like we deserved them as we were just the office couple who mainly saw these people on Sunday at church with a few times outside of church where we helped the young missionaries teach a few lessons. Yet it was so obvious that we were put in this ward for this period of time to help move the work forward. As we drove home from church, I said to Loel, "These are the kinds of days that make senior couples go on mission after mission after mission."

Here we are with Anja and her three boys. She kept crying and say, "Thank you, thank you, for everything." Little does she realize that we are the ones who feel such gratitude for the blessings of getting to know her family and feel their love and their spirit.

Me, Anja, and Toki, a wonderfully loving African sister with 5 great kids.

And in the midst of moving the office up to the Netherlands, we welcomed a new senior couple, the Bushes from Ogden. They've already served a mission to Kenya and several temple square missions - pretty amazing people. He's 73 and I think she's 68. He's an avid tennis player and we had fun talking about the senior games he participates in. He's quite an active guy. They are heading up to Deventer to run a young adult center.

I know we have lots of pictures of cool churches, but this one was pretty unique in the little town or Weerde (pronounced Veer-da, not weird), near Brussels. The light tan stone contrasting with the gray slate roof is unusual and, I think, quite beautiful. The tall, thin spire can be seen over the tops of the town buildings and attracted us to this spot.

We've had a busy week unpacking tons of boxes up at the new office and actually getting it looking so good that the President was able to hold zone leader and district leader councils there on Thurs and Friday in the cleaned out conference room. Now we're back in Brussels, packing and cleaning our apartment to make the final move permanently, to the Netherlands tomorrow, Saturday.
It's interesting that we thought we'd be moving to the Netherlands right when we got here a year ago, but it is finally happening. So many times I wished we could be up there where people speak more English and where we'll be closer to the rest of the mission, to our ward, and the other senior couples. Yet now I see the wisdom in us staying here in the Antwerpen Ward, doing what the Lord wanted us to do.
When we first arrived, President Brubaker asked us to attend the Antwerpen Ward and, because of the large English speaking African community, become involved with them. We think we've been able to do that. It's been an incredible experience and one that is now very hard to leave. Good-bye Brussels (and Belgium)!

However, because of our responsibilities for apartments, we'll be back to Belgium often.