Our Mission Continues

Sakhalinsk, Russia

We have visited many cities, but we are not always able to take pics. Here are a couple pics of our Sakhalinsk, Russia. This is a city on an island. Many Americans have lived here and worked here with their Exxon Oil Company. There are three families right now in this position and are such a help to the Branch.

It's good to say hello again. We hope all is well with our friends and family. Another month has almost come to an end, but this one is special, because it is our halfway point. Our mission is an 18 month mission and as of two days ago, we have been on our mission for 9 months. We entered the MTC for training on the 26th of January of this year. We arrived in Russia on the 13th of February. We have had many wonderful experiences, but we think the hardest part of a mission is teaching the people the Restored Gospel and for some reason - reasons - they choose not to accept and embrace the gospel. Life is full of ups and downs and the gospel enriches those ups and carries us and lifts us through the downs. The Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ is literally our life saver!!! THIS LIFE IS THE TEST...AND THE GOSPEL TEACHES US HOW TO PASS THE TEST!! We are so thankful for the many prayers of you, our family and friends, and for your kind words of love. Our mission is like any other righteous endeavor - hard, but rewarding!! Mostly we don't even label it hard, because it rarely feels that way. We have been humbled many times at the miracles we see daily. We know angels have attended us on this journey and we are forever grateful for their presence AND BEING ABLE TO FEEL THEM!!
We send our love your way and please know that we think of you often.

Night time in Vladivostok at the Pier

PICTURES OF VLADIVOSTOK ...THE PIER BY THE TRAIN STATION.


It's nice. The weather was beautiful also.

This is night time at the pier at Vladivostok. We had time before our train left, so we captured some beauty.

Visits to Other Cities

This is our wonderful group of saints in Usserisk. We felt the great love they share in their Branch. We visited Artyom first, but did not take pics.
We visited two other cities...Artyom and Usserisk. Artyom has saints meeting in a rented building also, but it is not a Branch..just a group. There were about 16 people in attendance at Sacrament Mtg. at which we spoke. Half of those in attendance were missionaries. Our office couple leaves Vladivostok each week with the assignment of attending in Artyom. This began with a taxi for us..but on the way home I don't know how many busses we rode??? I think it might have been three!! ..that is dedication when it takes you ALL DAY to travel to church, be there for two full meetings (a reduced block schedule) then travel back to your apartment!! Elder and Sister Magill are AWESOME!!! TOTALLY AWESOME!! [Kinda like a couple other Magill's we know!!!!]
Friends and Family --- The Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ is TRUE and is vital to our eternal salvation! We love you, we pray for you, we love the Lord and our Heavenly Father. May you be blessed to know of a surety what we must do to obtain our blessings of exaltation, we pray in our Savior's Holy Name, Jesus Christ, Amen.

Seminary and Institute Teacher Training

The first two pictures above are of our beautiful walk to church. Then the large building is where we rent space for church. The top building is the entrance for 'our church'.
This blog thing is still hard for me to wrap my brain around!!! I mentioned our beginning of our teacher training in the last post. I want to share some pictures of Nakhodka, Russia. It is a pretty city from the photos, isn't it? We walked to church and took these on our walk there. Our branch rents a few rooms in this large building of which our entrance is on the side. Notice how large the building is. I think it is Nakhodka's Culture Center or something like that. E/S Henderson said that the parking lot was busy every Sunday with the town's people gathering and enjoying the last good days of weather.

WE HAD A BAPTISM!! :)

September 5, 2009 our Khabarovsk Branch got bigger.....WE HAD A BAPTISM!!! Sophia got baptized! She is a very spiritual young woman and we love her. We only wish that we could speak more Russian to her and many others like her!! :( We are still learning and studying, but our counsel is also "do not teach the gospel in your country's language". As seniors who know only a little bit, it really would be dangerous!! I know that E. Sartori joked about knowing just enough to get into...or stay out of trouble...so we will do as we are told!!! We will continue to study the Russian language for the rest of our lives!!! Sophia is the lady in the red outfit! Her testimony is so sweet and she will be an asset to the Lord's work here in Russia. The evening of Sophia's baptism, our Branch had a special Spiritual Activity. We had the "409 Presentation". I know many of you will remember years ago this activity that strengthened so many of our testimonies.
We began training our teachers for Seminary and Institute. We began right here in Khabarovsk. Our dear sister, Galina, is a diamond!! She has a pure heart, a talent for teaching and loves everyone. Then we traveled to Nakhodka and trained Nikolai there. Nikolai is a counselor in the Branch Presidency. We stayed overnight in a beautiful, old hotel and attended our Nakhodka Branch. We spoke in Sacrament Mtg., friendshipped the members, E. Sartori trained the Branch Presidency then we visited with our Senior Couple, E/S Henderson's. What a delightful couple, what great examples of love, courage and strength to follow our Savior.

ELDER SARTORI IS CALLED/ASSIGNED TO BE 2ND COUNSELOR IN THE RUSSIA VLADIVOSTOK MISSION

While we were at camp with the YSA Conference, Pres. Pratt called Elder Sartori to be a 2nd counselor in the Russia Vladivostok Mission. This was okayed by our East Europe Area Presidency. Pres. Pratt said that this is more of an assignment with our missionary call than a calling. We are excited, because as we visit the branches with CES assignments, we can now represent the Mission Presidency. We have two cities that do not have branches that we will be visiting with this new assignment...they are Artyom and Magadan. We love to work hard and missions are definitely HARD WORK! We love working for our Heavenly Father. We love the humbling blessing of feeling His Spirit in this work. We are constantly helped and guided with impressions of what we should say and do. We are sure the people are the same all over the world...some are accepting and teachable and some are not! To our dear friends and family - may we always strive to be teachable as to the things of the spirit. It is so vitally important for our eternal salvation. May our Heavenly Father's choicest blessings be yours as we strive to be obedient to His commandments... we know this to be true. His servants, E/S Sartori

YSA Conference for the Russia Vladivostok Mission

We came back from Korea to our long-awaited-for YSA Conference for the whole mission. It was here in our Khabarovsk! We went to a camp just about 30 minutes from our church. Everyone was so excited to go and sleep in a dormitory at the camp. So many were involved in the planning and preparation and it was all worth it! Everyone who attended the conference was spiritually lifted, friendships were strengthened and new ones made. Even our Mission President and Sister Pratt with his 1st Counselor, Pres. and Sister Zviagolsky were able to attend. Bro. Drachyov, who is one of assistants to the Europe East Area CES Director, Henry Kosak, and lives in Novasibirsk, was able to come also. The YSA are AWESOME! We heard their talks, their testimonies, saw their talents and were constantly amazed at their service to one another!!!