The past two weeks have been incredibly busy. Elder Speirs left the office and so I have now become the senior assistant. The day that he left, I felt the very real weight of responsibility for the mission shift onto my shoulders. Last week, we worked on transfers all day, everyday. Transfers are when assignments to teaching areas and companions are changed, and it requires a lot of forward planning to make sure that people and things such as house keys and cell phone chips don’t get lost in the process. President Janzen sent us the list of where he wanted everyone to end up and we worked from 10am until 10pm coordinating everything for the travel plans and assigned teaching areas for the 150 missionaries currently assigned to our mission. Thankfully, everything happened as it needed to, aside from a couple of buses arriving 4+ hours late…
The mission recently sent missionaries to start up the church in Cafayate, a tourist destination. Due to rapid growth, the missionaries didn’t have enough seats for everyone attending their meetings in the house that they are using as a church. Elder Speirs and I got sent on an assignment to take more chairs out to them, which provided an excuse to go play tourist for a day. While it was really cool, I think that southern Utah is better.
This past week, 10 missionaries finished their missions and 25 brand new missionaries arrived. While it was sad to see some of my good friends leave, the energy that all of the new missionaries brought is so exciting.
The past 2 weeks have easily been the most stressful weeks of my life, but I am learning so much about both running organizations and my absolute need to rely on the Lord.
Thank you all for your love and support!
Elder Hansen
