Our new friends, the African saints, are an inspiration. They rely on God every moment of their lives. We wish everyone could hear their prayers. They have truly embraced us. They love to hug and show their kindness, a very pure, Christlike love— truly a marvelous experience.
Our first day in the temple was amazing. We arrived an hour early to meet with President Baldwin. We had been set apart as missionaries by our Stake President at home, but today President Baldwin set us apart as ordinance workers in the Durban South Africa temple.
One of the highlights from today was doing sealings with 2 African families from Mozambique. We did the initiatory, endowments, and sealings all in one day using Portuguese interpreters. The
Church pays for their housing, travel food and temple clothes the first time they come to the temple. There was a time when people would sell their homes and all their possessions to be able to afford to come to the Lord’s house, a huge sacrifice and many were financially unable to attend. They come great distances to finally receive their ordinances. To watch these little African children, all dressed in white, kneeling at the alter, getting sealed to their parents brought tears to our eyes—so incredibly beautiful— melts our hearts every time.
We will never be the same.
Life’s good here, doing the Lord’s work. We get up about 5:30am, (jet lag helps with that) and have breakfast, go for a walk, read our scriptures and off we go to the most beautiful temple we’ve ever seen. Life is simple and maybe that’s why it’s so good — no TV, no distractions—just the two of us. We feel the love of our Heavenly Father so deeply being around these humble, faithful Saints. They are a beautiful example to us and we feel blessed to be among their large spirits.
We love serving in the exquisite Durban SA temple
Beautiful, vibrant colors in the stain glass windows reflect the African culture
Our new friends, Mike and Linda Loveridge, have taken us under their wing and made us feel at home immediately. They were the first to arrive of us 3 first-wave Durban senior missionaries. The third couple, the Laytons, will be arriving in 10 days. There are several other young, full-time missionaries as well.
Unique to this temple, we have monkeys, vervet monkeys. They thrive in the urban jungle next to the temple. We were enchanted to see them, but the locals call them “Vermin” monkeys because they will ravage your food pantry if you leave the window open. This cute little guy was intrigued by us all leaving the temple today— he and his wife and five little monkey children!