Dear
Family and Friends,
On Thursday, May 26th we
received our mission call to the Fiji Suva Mission (Suva is the capitol city). We will be at the Provo Missionary Training
center from October 3–7, 2011 and will serve for a total of 18 months.
When we submitted our mission papers we
said we were willing to go anywhere the Lord wanted us to serve but we never
would have guessed such a far away spot in the southern Pacific Ocean (north of
New Zealand and east of Australia). Mission
boundaries include the many Fijian islands (300+), west to the island of New
Caledonia, and north to the islands of Vanuatu and Tuvalu (all lie just west of
Samoa & Tonga and the International Date Line). You can read on the Internet to your heart’s
delight regarding Fiji, its rainy warm climate and equally warm and friendly
people (except for the fact that they were notorious cannibals in the not so
distant past). The major languages are
Fijian, Hindi, and English.
We also indicated in our mission
application that we would do any type of mission service that was asked of
us. We have been called to serve a
“Member and Leader Support” mission that is described as “the senior missionary
equivalent of the proselyting assignment normally filled by younger
missionaries. Senior missionaries
establish and grow the Church throughout the world by teaching the gospel, retaining
new converts, strengthening unit leadership, rescuing less-active members, and
encouraging young single adults.”
We’re still letting this all sink in. We couldn’t have imagined this as our call and
we really don’t know what to think but we’re filled with faith and love of the
Lord, and trust that all will work out for the best.
Sincerely,
Annie
& Tom Sherry
On September 28, 2011 the Corvallis Stake President - Wade Haslam - came to our home to set us apart for our missions. He has been a dear friend, with whom Tom served as 1st Counselor to for the past 6 1/2 years and it was a privilege to have him officiate.
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