Sunday, May 25, 2008

080525 District Conference

080525 2130
I have been in a quandary this week. I have to choose between a solid job offer from the nuns at the Chinese Catholic girls School or a "maybe-in-July" offer from the Marriott Hotels. The nuns at the Chinese Catholic School have been very kind to me in a bid to make me stay. They have done what every temporary contractor dreams of - they have offered me a permanent position. When I did not accept their offer right away, they offered me something that I was told simply does not exist in the corporate world. A thing so priceless and intangible that its value cannot be underestimated. It is a gift of such exquisite rarity that it is offered to royalty and visiting dignitaries. The lovely kind nuns at the Chinese Catholic School offered me a free lunch. Its persuasive power can not be underestimated.
The managers at the Marriott said that I have the job, they are expanding their team and I can expect to start in July. My current contract with the school ends on June 10th. I will be refusing a full time teaching job on Monday morning but it just doesn't feel right. I have never refused a job before - maybe because I have never had two jobs from which to choose. Also, the nuns are good at guilt - I think that guilt is their primary weapon.

I went swimming at night at Stanley beach. I have not been swimming for a while and it felt really good. I slowly remembered all the fun things that I used to do my pool - the "juggling jellyfish" and "the washing machine". Swimming for exercise has its advantages: there is none of that getting hot and sweaty that usually accompanies a good solid five kilometer run. The other is motivation - when running, when I get tired, I look ahead and pick a spot in the reasonable distance and tell myself that I can stop there. When swimming there is a tremendous amount of motivation to keep going, especially when the water is deeper than I am tall. There are reserves of strength that cannot be called upon until I am hit with a genuine fear that I am about to die. It is amazing how far a person can swim when their life depends on it. It was good not to have the worry about chlorine levels and water restrictions. I was underwater for a while and realised that I could hear snapping shrimp.

We had our district conference today.
Our visiting General Authority told a story about when he was a mission president.
There was a young girl who joined the church, went on a mission and served with honour. When she returned, she served in a few callings and all was well. Then she started to miss out on her daily scripture study, then she met a boy. After a while she stopped going to church and fell away. She married outside the temple, experimented with his religion, had some children and trudged through a good portion of her life. 30 years later after she left her abusive husband and alone in her one-bedroom flat she finally prayed. She prayed and said that she would like to start again and would Heavenly Father please send the missionaries. Please send them tonight.

Meanwhile, our visiting GA, who was at this time a younger mission president, was arranging the transfers and was inspired to send an odd companionship to a particular area. The companionship was a sister missionary who had just been made a senior companion and a young woman who was helping out for a few weeks. The missionaries asked why he would do that and told him that it was not right. He persisted and said that he felt that it would work out.

The scene shifted to two missionaries out on their bikes, it is getting late and they must be home in time. As he told the story - the two missionaries stopped their bikes at the same time and looked at the streets around them. They agreed that although it was late, they must go down a particular lane, there is something that needed to be done. They knocked on all the doors and with only minutes until they had to be home, they knocked on the door of our heroine. Our heroine was amazed and overcome and wanted the missionaries to start teaching her right away. They couldn't because it was late at night, but they promised to send the sister missionaries.

The "strange companionship" called on our heroine and they began the task of teaching. Our heroine recalls how she has been baptised but has fallen away and does not have the courage to return to church. The sister missionaries asked her to do one of three things: either pray every night until the next lesson, read the Book of Mormon, or go to church with them on Sunday. During the conversation, our heroine asked the name of the young woman who was helping the missionaries. It was a name that was familiar to her. "Who is your mother?" she asked. When our heroine heard the answer, she knew that this was beyond co-incidence and this particular young woman had been sent by a loving caring Heavenly Father. Our heroine said "I taught your mother."


references:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/289/5487/2114
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snapping_shrimp
http://news.bio-medicine.org/biology-news-2/Snapping-shrimp-drown-out-sonar-with-bubble-popping-trick--described-in--3CI-3EScience-3C-I-3E-11004-1/

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