Ministering each day!!!

Hello Family & Friends,

We continue to learn and grow each day.   One of our main responsibilities is to minister to the youth and young single adults in our locations.   The Savior taught the importance of ministering to the one, which is what we are trying to do each day in the Vanuatu Port Vila mission.  Here's a few simple ways that we are finding to do this.  We had the opportunity to attend a seminary class taught in one of the units.  The class had some 16-18 students in this small room.  The teacher was a sister who does so much in the church, holding down many callings.   As she was teaching, Darleen and I were sitting at the back of the class observing.  At one point Darleen noticed that several of the young men were not actively participating in the discussion/message.  So she naturally just got up and sat right next to them and opened up her phone to let them read along with the scriptures that were being taught by the teacher.   It was so simple, but it caused them to get involved.   Observing is part of ministering, being able to see those that may need something.

Last week Darleen talked about the churches emphasis on improving the education of the youth, and as part of that they have an education program called "Succeed in School" (SIS) that is being rolled out across many of the islands in Pacific Islands.  It is a program to really help the youth in grades 4 thru 8th improve their reading, writing, and math skills.   We have been able to teach on Monday nights math class to the 6-8th graders and then we go to another class on Wednesday (math) and two more classes on Friday (reading & writing).  Not only are we trying to feed their minds, but the church wants us to also leave them with a healthy snack.   So we are helping to bring simple snacks to the classroom.  We will bring either juice or water, and then something simple for the students.   On Monday we brought cut-up apples and juice for the students at our math class.  To spruce it up some (not sure this is truly healthy), Darleen brought some Nutella that we had found at the grocery store.   Well, you would have thought the youth had died and gone to heaven.  They were scraping the apples into the Nutella and just going at eating this up.

Our SIS boys playing soccer barefoot
on the church basketball court

On Friday, we were with the same class members, but this time we substituted in the reading and writing portion of the class work.   Part of the writing exercise was for each student to write down a true or fictional story with a setting, characters, and plot.  Some wrote about being famous football (soccer) players, learning to drive, facing a fear of heights and walking on a sky bridge here, being a basketball player, to name a few stories.   However, one young man talked about his experience this past Monday and how when he got to class that when Sister Lovelace started serving the snack, she said it would be an “extra special snack!!”.   In his story he wrote about how he sat there wondering what the extra special snack was going to be.   Then she came out with a plate full of cut apples, and in front of them she placed Nutella.  He said he had never eaten Nutella with apples before.   He said, it was the best thing he had ever eaten, and he agreed with Sister Lovelace that it was extra special.   A simple thing given, yet it impacted him enough for him to pick it to write about.   Our love for the youth is growing weekly as we get to know their personalities and how best to just find ways to help them to become who they are meant to be.   We will have to bring back Nutella in a future class!!!

Banyon tree .. branches
supporting the trunk

In the US we sometimes have heard it said that “it takes a village to raise a child”.   Here we have seen that truly in action.   We have seen children who are
being taken care of by aunts while their sister and brother-in-law have been working out of the country for the past several years.  We see adults and youth scoop up the little ones and tend to them during church meetings to give breaks to the parents who are busy in other things.  It’s a very socially aware type of culture.   It reminds us of the local banyon trees we put in our blog last week.  How the trunk is supported by the many branches going down to stabilize and build the tree to its fullest potential.   The individuals here are helping to do just that for each other, they support and lift up others.

We continue to have meetings to help with the January 2026 Young Single Adult (ages 18-35) Convention.   We are trying to bring some 600 YSA from the many islands that make up the Vanuatu Port Vila mission.   Darleen and I are working on the logistics and housing committee.   For those who live on the Vanuatu islands of Malakula, Santo, and Tanna (plus some smaller islands) are all going to come via ferry’s that they will be on for some 1+ days on the ocean.  Those in the Solomon Islands and New Caledonia have to be flown here.   The challenge is we have some 100-150 YSA in these locations that will have to be flown here but who are yet to get their passports.   I’ve taken on the task of working with the local youth leaders to try and gather up as many passports as possible and then get flights booked before we run out of seats available.   Sounds easy, but they only have flights from Solomon Islands to Port Vila once per week, and the January time is their biggest holiday season as youth are out of school.   So, we will pray that miracles happen to open seats and other routes to get here.    We do believe in a God of miracles.  

The school we are renting for the week of conference is still recovering
from the 7.4 magnitude earthquake that hit this island back in December of 2024.  You see a lot of reminders of this terrible event across the city.   The school had been working to get their large kitchen repaired, but they informed us this past week that it won’t be ready in time, nor will the cafeteria be open.   So, the cooking committee will have the opportunity to cook in a smaller kitchen that has two ovens, and food serving will be done on an outside basketball court that we will need to bring in tents to cover.   Again, we will need miracles to ensure it goes off smoothly.  The Lord will definitely help, if we do our part.

"You don't see this in the US"

Another thought.   This past week we witnessed several times when we would say:  “You don’t see that in the U.S.A.”.  Here are just two of those examples: 

Individual carrying the
USB drive to Santo

Example #1: After our Church General Conference there is a local team here that is responsible for translating the talks into Bislama language.  To get the translated talks to the many island congregations they put them on USB drives, especially given they don’t have the technology to just send it over the internet as many don’t have internet capabilities.   We had 40 USB drives/sticks that we needed to get to the island early last week for them to watch the conferences on the weekend.   Well, here’s the “you don’t see this in the US moment”.   To get the drives to the islands we wrapped them in zip lock bags and then Darleen and I went to the airport to find people going on flights to Santo and Malakula islands that day.   We would walk up to the person in line and ask, “are you going to Santo, and if so, would you be willing to take this to a person on the other end that looks like us?”.  I was not the most confident in doing this, but I did find the person that would take it to Santo, and Darleen found someone to take it to Malakula.  These kind individuals delivered as promise.  Kindest from a complete stranger.  We consider this a miracle also.

Example #2:   Darleen has been dealing with allergy issues and a combination of a little congestion from a cold.   Well last week she found she forgot to bring her singulair prescription from home.   We had heard you can sometimes just go to the pharmacy and tell them what you need.  That’s what we did.  She went up to the pharmacy technician and said she had forgotten her prescription and could she get it?  The lady said, “10 mg or 5 mg?” .  Darleen went with 10mg.   Again, “you don’t see that in the US”.  

A view from a from a restaurant
we ate at this past week

We truly appreciate the land where we reside currently.    The views are tremendous looking out into the blue ocean around.  Then you can look into the distance at the green tree filled mountains in the distance.   It is a very paradisical type of view you would see in a travel magazine.    The

Mountains in the distance ... 
we plan on hiking them one weekend

people are also so caring and humble.   We enjoy meeting them.  They all want to shake your hand when you see them.   Or say “moning, moning” (translation: “morning, morning”).   If you are driving on the roads and come from a small side road to the busy main road, you will find that after less than a minute someone on the main road will flash their lights and let you come into the traffic.   I could say this may be another “you don’t see that in the US” moment.  

Sunday the Stake President of the Port Vila Stake was in our ward we have been assigned to, the Etas Ward.   He was the concluding speaker and spoke about how they have been looking at splitting the ward, however, they also looked at the priesthood attendance.  He started saying there is not enough priesthood attending.  So he told those in attendance to go home and talk to their “papa” and tell him that they need to be there.   He was encouraging families to realize we want to be exalted together and can’t do that without everyone.    He was definitely bold.   Here’s the interesting thing, both Darleen and I understood a large amount of what he was saying, even though it was in Bislama.   The spirit of his words spoke to us.    Not sure it was a gift of tongue moment, but it felt like the Lord opened our ears to hear.

The ward building in Etas

After the Sunday Sacrament Meeting, Darleen and I taught at the Young Single Adult Sunday School class, which we do every other week.   We only had 5 YSA’s in attendance, which seems to be a problem right now in getting them out on Sunday’s and to other YSA events.   Earlier in the week, we talked to the YSA institute leader in the ward about how we can help her get the YSA’s more involved.   We talked about doing a fun, energizing event.  We volunteered to teach the Institute lesson, bring a meal, and organize game night.  At the Sunday lesson we asked the YSA’s to go and invite their friends and other YSA’s to be there.  They seemed to be excited to get together.   Now the challenge is we don’t know if we will see 5 people or 25 people (there are about 30 in our ward).  This will give us another ministering opportunity.  

I love the words that Elder Peter M. Johnson, a Seventy in our church, said during the General Conference at the beginning of the month.  He reminded us of the following; how we should minister by saying: "So how do we become and help one another become devoted disciples of Jesus Christ? We minister to the one. Ministering in the Savior’s way involves compassion, kindness, patience, and love without judgment. As we minister to the one, we invite the one to come unto Christ and to worship in the house of the Lord to receive of His redeeming power."

We challenge all of us to look for that one person this week to minister to.   They are all around.  Show them how you can serve them like the Savior would do if He was here today.   We love you all and thank you for reading.

Elder & Sister Lovelace … aka: Dad & Mom, Nana & Papa.

 

 

Bislama words of the week:

Yu oraet? - You good? 

Ale - Goodbye.

Tata - A cute goodbye you can say to babies and little kids

Lukem yu lo tomorrow – See you tomorrow

Lukem yu lo next week – See you next week

Additional views of Port Vila Bay

Free range chickens are a thing on the 
side of the road here

Baptismal font at Stake Center 
In the Courtyard