Sunday, December 17th, 2006

To frineds and family,

When you are on a mission, it is always a joy to receive mail and you can never receive too much. It is not always possible to respond to all letters immediately but we will do our best to keep up. Thank you to those who have responded and we promise to try to get back to those that are on the list but not yet at the top of the list. We have been kept very busy at the MTC and have loved every minute of it. You are in our thoughts and prayers.

As promised, I am sending off another weekly update on our experiences as missionaries. It is later in the morning on Sunday, 17 December and I have a few minutes alone, while Sister Kane is off at her relief Society meeting with the other women. We just left our last sacrament meeting at the MTC and we were thrilled to be able to spend it with the English as a Second Language group from the South Pacific. The young missionaries from Tonga sang as a choir again and it was another highlight of the week. I could listen to them for hours but it is hard to watch them through my tears of joy. We had a chance to teach several of them as part of their English program earlier in the week and it was a joy to be with them again. The only other two young missionaries that were in the meetings that were not from the South Pacific ( Tonga, Samoa, China, Japan, and the Philippines ) were a young Elder and a young Sister from the Ukraine; all of these young people will be serving in North America.

The past week has been spent with an explicit focus on the actual humanitarian work that we will be doing in Indonesia. It has been a busy schedule, full of fun and interesting things to do, see and learn. On Monday we toured the actual Humanitarian Centre in Salt Lake City, which is the central distribution centre for the goods that are distributed to the world through the regular ongoing humanitarian efforts as well as the disaster relief efforts that follow natural disasters around the world. We had no idea how much work is being done on a daily basis around the world. We also toured Welfare Square and visited with the Director to be briefed on how all of the church farm production flows through the Bishops storehouses to feed the needy and provide work, training, language skills, and employment development for legal refugees and other needy people. We sampled the food and dairy products that were manufactured there and learned about the principles and means that govern the Welfare system. In the afternoon we watch a movie called " The Restoration " at the Joseph Smith Building and we were deeply moved.
I had the opportunity to speak to those working at the Welfare Square and ask questions. It was a great strength to me to learn that the sole reason for the whole humanitarian effort around the globe, at the cost of hundreds of millions of dollars , was to follow the instructions of the Savior to " Love thy neighbor as thyself " . The church spends hundreds of millions of dollars simply being obedient to that commandment. We do it because it is the right thing to do. I always believed that the humanitarian work linked more directly into the commandment to "Preach my gospel " . The only link is that both commandments came from the Savior, who said " Whatsoever ye do unto the least of these my brethren, ye do unto me."
The rest of the week was spent in classes either learning or practicing the skills we will need to know to be of effective long term service to the people of Indonesia. The focus is to identify, worthy and effective local organizations around the world that are providing enduring and important services to the locals. The scope of the work was as amazing as it was inspiring. The church is working with a broad range of other churches, schools, universities, governments, non-governmental agencies and volunteer organizations providing services with the focus of health, nutrition, and education. The strategy and goal is to work with local organizations to enhance their effectiveness and capacity. These are the organizations that will be around in those locations for generations and they are in the best position to assist their own people. The major initiatives of the church usually involve the provision of pure drinking water, neonatal training to local doctors and nurses to reduce infant mortality rate and the provision of the relevant equipment, local training of doctors to alleviate blindness due to cataracts, the provision of wheelchairs to those who need them, and educational initiatives. There are a broad range of local small scale initiatives in each area where the humanitarian services missionaries serve.

The week was a great opportunity to learn and to focus. We did have some great but brief meetings with significant people. We met with Elder and Sister Bikker at noon on Wednesday. They are the missionary couple that we will be replacing in Bogor Indonesia.They gave us a brief but encompassing overview of the work and the situation that is waiting for us. They had arrived back in the USA the night before and had gone to the trouble and personal expense to come here too meet with us. It was a pleasure to meet them and it was both humbling and intimidating to listen to their report.

We had a chance to see Elder Jessie Nelson ( a new young missionary from our home Ward ) shortly after he arrived at the MTC for his trainng and it was really fun to see him.

On Saturday we had the chance to attend the temple, enjoy a great visit with family in the area and do a little packing and last minute shopping. The time for preparation will soon be transformed into the time of actual service. I pray that I can be a great companion to my wonderful wife and that we might lose ourselves in the service of others.
Pease keep us in your prayers as you will be in ours.

Love
Elder and Sister Kane