On Christmas Eve we went
Christmas Caroling with the two young missionaries in our branch. It turns out
that both of our current Elders have good singing voices, so I could go along
with the Elders and Sister Anderson and just kind of mouth the words and it
sounded pretty good. We picked out several songs that we thought we could do,
“Hark the Herald Angels Sing”, “Silent Night” and then as we leave “We Wish You
a Merry Christmas” For the missionaries Christmas Eve is a difficult time to
get into homes so the Elders came up with this idea of going Christmas Caroling
and invited us to come along. There were several people we wanted to go to and
they had some as well.
1st Stop, Our
Neighbors the Father and Son
We went to this house, they
invited us in and were very touched that we would do this for them. This also
gave them an opportunity to meet the Missionaries. The father had told us
earlier on the phone that his son was possibly experiencing some depression;
anyway hopefully our visit gave them a bit of a lift for the holiday. All
indications were that it did.
2nd Stop, A
person we contacted who was initially studying with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, we
had visited there and gave him a Book of Mormon but really had not done a lot
of teaching. Recently we thought we had an appointment, but when we arrived for
the appointment he was not home. We had also left him some peppy almonds
several days prior but again had not caught him home.
When we arrived at his home
and started to sing, he invited us into his home. He had a daughter and her
family in town for Christmas. He introduced us and we introduced him to the
missionaries. He thanked us for the peppy almonds and as we were leaving he
said, I have several more days of this job I am doing out of town, and then you
should be able to come by.
3rd Stop, A
nonmember family whose parents are members, they have had many health and other
issues. We have done a lot of ground work to hopefully teach them, especially
Sister Anderson has been very supportive of the Wife during some difficult
times. They were pleased that we came and sang to them.
4th Stop, A Less
active Member that has become very dear to us. Every corner of her house is
decorated to the hilt. She loaned us the little Christmas Tree and other
Christmas decorations in our house. She is a widow and has several
grandchildren and a great grandchild living with her. She also had a former
son-in-law who is soon to be a son-in- law again there, all of which are
non-members who we hope to teach eventually. She is everything you would want
as a matriarch of a family. As we sang she was in tears and the Great
Granddaughter watched in amazement.
5th Stop, A less
active person the missionaries had tracted out that was not on our branch
directory. She apparently was baptized
in New York some years ago, then became offended and stopped attending Church.
She has a granddaughter living with her that we see on Thursday since she is in
the reading buddies program. She actually reads to another lady that volunteers
along with Sister Anderson and myself. She had previously agreed to have the
missionaries visit and when she met us she invited us as well. That worked out
perfectly since I don’t believe the missionaries can teach her alone.
6th Stop, The
Security Officer at the Club house, the missionaries had tracted him out
previously and he was scheduled to meet with us but had a conflict come up and
we have not been able to reschedule with him.
We felt pretty good about
the evening and believe it was positive for those we visited.
