May 19, 2015

Dear Family and Friends,

Hello, it is a very cool, windy day here in Concordia. It feels like late Fall instead of early Summer. The heat will be coming soon enough, though, so we will enjoy this nice weather while we can.
We had a wonderful visit home to see our mothers for Mother’s Day. They are both doing well, and it was great to see them. We took Grandma Gorden out to eat on Friday and then spent a few hours shopping with her. She will be 91 in June, but she can shop like she’s 30! On Sunday all of Grandma Blackwell’s children and some of her grandchildren went to her church at Barton (Mississippi) Baptist Church. It made her so happy.  

We all went to Grandma's Church on Mothers Day.
Ron, Susie, Tom, Grandma Joyce, Logan, Steve, Sarah and Andrew (left to right)

We also enjoyed seeing a few of our other relatives, including three of our children and six of our grandchildren. If anyone is worried, we are not breaking any mission rules. Our mission president often tells the senior missionaries to get away - so this time we did!

It's not as bad as it looks!

A couple of nights ago Elder Gorden and the young missionaries were helping our next-door neighbor move across town. While unloading Elder Gorden stepped off the trailer backwards and fell causing a trip to the hospital emergency room. He injured his shoulder and had a laceration in his head that required eight staples, and there are several other large bruises and scrapes. He will be fine, just sore and achy. From what the missionaries say a fire truck, two police cars and the ambulance came! (Mom wasn’t there, and Dad doesn’t remember.) That was some big action for the little town of Concordia. We keep waiting to see if we made the front page of the local paper. :>)

The mission office intends to rent the place next door to us for the young missionaries to move into. It will be fun to have them closer, and it is nicer than their current apartment. They are sharp, obedient elders, and we love being around them. We enjoy spending time with them and having them over for meals, and they love to eat!

We previously reported about helping the Community Resource Center serve meals on Wednesday nights at the local First Christian Church. When we showed up for work the second week, we met the pastor who had not been there the previous week. He was very rude to us and took us into his chapel where he said we “need to talk.” Although the people who volunteer there and the people who come for meals are mostly not members of his church, he made it clear that we were not welcome there. He did not turn on the lights, and he was not nice at all. He never gave us a reason, but he seemed to think he knew more about our church than we did. It was sad to us that he harbors such anger.

Both of us still have the same companion
 after transfers were announced. 

Our first class at our new Wednesday night study group went well last week. It is fun to teach, and we look forward to seeing the attendance increase as the weeks go by. Dad has also been asked to prepare a 45 year-old brother to receive the Melchizedek priesthood in June, so he is enthusiastic about working with him for the next few weeks. 

We got a sweet letter from Brad and Karen Beard, the couple we met while serving in Lamar, Colorado. (See our letter from March 4th.)  It was great to hear they are doing well. She is healing from her surgery, and they are now fully active in church and both have assignments for serving in their ward. They are planning on attending the temple soon, and we will go with them. Our time with them was a wonderful, unforgettable experience for all of us.

Transfers are this week. There are no changes in Concordia, and only two in our Salina District - both because their time is up. We have the largest District in the Mission with twelve missionaries. It is fun to be with them. District meetings are every Tuesday in Salina, and we always have lunch together afterward. 

That is about all the news we have for now. Be good to each other. 

Love,
Elder & Sister Gorden