Elder and Sister Williams' Nevada Reno Mission: Tender Hearts and Tender Mercies

(This is mostly written by Diane, but I’m finishing it up for her while she’s at the eye doctor’s office.) We are excited to announce our big news: We are being transferred! The mission has had a large influx of new missionaries and there is a shortage of areas for all of them. So they have put a set of sisters in our ward. Since our ward is small, President Godoy gave us three choices. We could stay where we are and be assigned an additional ward, we could work in the Young Single Adult Ward, or we could go to Ely (pronounced e’-lee). We felt best about going to Ely, even though it is 5 hours from here. It’s only two hours or so from Salt Lake, so we’ll go to Utah for any critical medical appointments (or if we just can’t stand being away from Costco and Macys).

About 30% of the population of Ely are members of the church. But only about 30% of them are active so we will feel needed there. The stake president is excited to be getting a senior couple. We will be assigned to the stake rather than to a specific ward. We aren’t sure how that will work yet but will find out soon enough. President has also asked us to watch over the 6 elders who are there. They are pretty cut off from the rest of the mission so he feels like a senior couple will be very helpful for them.

We drove over to Ely on Monday to check out some apartments. It is a long drive over what is known as “The Loneliest Road in America”. Our GPS even calls it that! The eastern part of the drive is quite pretty with mountains, small pines and junipers. Ely is surrounded by mountains and we love it.

When we got there we checked out some apartments. The first was a very small house (about 660 sq. ft). The second was infested with carpet beetles (they were everywhere!) and the bathroom was somewhat third-worldly. We also checked out some complexes and talked to a realtor. Then we called a realtor named Angela who Elder Langston from the office had been talking to previously. She had a house for sale, but was very leery to rent it, since it was all fixed up ready for sale. She said she would ask her husband but didn’t think they would be able to rent it to us. She asked us to call in the morning, since he was out of town until later in the evening. It seemed there were literally no apartments available in Ely!

We went to dinner with heavy hearts not knowing how things could possibly work out and thinking we may have to stay in Reno. When we asked for our check, our server said, “Oh, your check has been taken care of.” We met a member from Sparks on our way out who denied paying our check but we are pretty sure it was him. People never know what an uplift they give to missionaries when they show them such kindnesses.

Sorry, this is such a long story, but I just have to share it. In the morning we decided to go to see Angela in person rather than calling. As we pulled up to the realtor’s there was a man just leaving. He was Angela’s husband. We talked to him and he invited us back into the office. We had a nice conversation with him, but he gave us the same story about a guy who was renting but wanted to buy the house across the street. We could maybe rent the smaller house (which wasn’t as nice) but it would be a while and was kind of iffy. Marc felt impressed to say, “Well, if the Lord wants us here He will provide a way.” Brad said, “Well, yes, we’d like to help with that if we can.”

I asked if we could just drive by and see the outside of the rental house (currently rented), so he gave us the address. We drove by and the rental house was VERY small and kind of dumpy. The other house they were selling was across the street, and we wished we could have that one. A few minutes later Angela called and said Brad had told her he wanted us to rent the nicer house! We were both quite emotional and stopped to say a prayer of thanks for our Father’s tender mercies! He really does watch over His missionaries and provides a way to accomplish the work He has for us to do. So, we’ll be going to Ely in a couple of weeks!

In the meantime, we are sharing our area (again), but this time with two young sisters. We met with them yesterday to get organized and split up the ward, the people we have been working with, and the dinner appointments (we mostly kept the ones they couldn’t go to, like single men.) They are living with two other sisters in an apartment the size of ours, so the sooner we leave, the sooner they can get settled. We have mixed feelings about leaving, of course. We are excited to start part two of our mission, but oh so sad to leave the people we have come to love!

Last Sunday was our stake’s Senior Mission Fireside. We were pleased with the program and the spirit that was there, but disappointed by the turnout. There were only about 30 people there who were not on the program. Even though it was mostly the ‘low hanging fruit’ (people who are already excited to go), we felt it answered many of their questions and hopefully got them excited to attend the four-session senior mission preparation course that will start on 10/27. We thought we would be teaching it, but now the stake will call a couple to teach and we will coordinate with them before we leave. According to the brethren, the missions around the world could use four times the current number of senior missionaries!

We went on a really nice hike the Monday before last, and I’ll add some pictures of the hike. It’s called the Hunter Creek Trail, and we really enjoyed it! A nice 6+ mile hike with falls at the turnaround point. This is a beautiful world, and we are so happy our missions allow us to see a little more of it. We are blessed and happy even when we sometimes feel our age!!