Mission Backup

Last Sunday, we fell into bed about 10 PM, exhausted after a full day that included Sister Wells teaching part of the Sunday School lesson. (She did an excellent job!) Anyway, a few minutes after we laid down, the building started to shake. It was an earthquake! After it died down, only a couple of minutes passed and the building shook again! And, this time, it shook worse than the first time. We were actually pretty scared, not knowing if it would quit or get worse. After it stopped a few long seconds later, I got up to look out the window to see if everyone was running from the building. But no, nothing unusual was happening. Someone was jogging around the little park, but they seemed unconcerned. We had experienced one other earthquake since we arrived in Taiwan, but it was just a little one compared to these. The news report said the temblors were magnitude 5.8 and 6.2, on the other side of the island, so the effective magnitude in Taichung was only 3. Whatever the science, it was ...

The bishop of the Wuquan 3rd Ward, where we meet, asked us to serve in the Primary, teaching the "Sunbeam" (3 year old) class. It's an "assignment," not a "calling," since full-time missionaries can't have any other callings. And, we only teach every other week, as the regular teacher has a work conflict on those weeks. Sister Wells was apprehensive - not about teaching children, as she's done plenty of that, but of being able to communicate with the little ones in Chinese, since they don't have the vocabulary of an adult. Well, there was nothing to worry about! She had those kids in the palm of her hand! They were transfixed, sitting in a little semi-circle with their big eyes staring over their little masks, first at Sister Wells, and then at me and back again. She used a great visual with pictures of all the Easter story elements, along with a chick and an egg to explain how that fits into the story. They children ate it up - including t...

Our highlight this week had nothing to do with our mission. On Thursday, March 31, our daughter Mia gave birth to twin boys! You will understand our intensity of our joy better after I explain.  In December, after waiting three months, we finally got our visas, allowing us to travel in two weeks to Taiwan. We were excited and happy. Just days later, Mia began to have problems with her pregnancy while visiting family in Idaho. The doctor there told her that "Baby A" was doing fine but "Baby B" was badly positioned and dangerously low on amniotic fluid. He initially told her that "Baby B" would likely not make it, which would cause her to lose both babies in miscarriage. He said that she could just wait for them to die, or abort them.  With this dire outlook, we drove her to her home in California. There, she went on immediate bed rest, relying in faith on Heavenly Father's care. Friends and neighbors helped, and her family rallied around, as Mary, Katie...