Some of the tender moments of our ministering in the Jakarta Indonesia Mission is with the Elderly. The sweet Sister in the photo lives in a Kos which is a tiny sleeping room with a community bath room and area for cooking. This is a newer room that she has moved to. She was baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the 11 August of 1979. She was born 1 September 1937. Every Sunday she comes to church for 40 years. Her smile is ever lasting when you meet her. She has very little to offer a guest to eat and offers everything she has when we visit.
In April 2019 she will travel with our Church group to the Manila Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints temple. She has waited and dreamed about this experience. Elder Miller and I will visit and teach her and share with her in preparation for this travel and will accompany the group to the temple. When we visit the Kos and talk in the area outside her sleeping room, it is new tile floor and she rolls out a very special straw mat for us to sit on and visit. A very gracious hostess to her visitors. She often walks over an hour to church. She is very energetic and has a beautiful dispostion. She will look us in the eyes and talks so happily and speaks with a speed of a hundred miles an hour in Bahasa Indonesia and Javanese! We understand her words of happiness without understanding her language but we feel her message and spirit as she speaks. What a joy.
The elderly brother in the photo has another gigantic smile and the same desire to travel with us in April after waiting for many many years for this opportunity. When we met first with him in his home, he lives in the same home that he was born in. He is over 80 years old. The home has been re-built a few times. Just entering into his home told us many stories about his life. The walls were painted and defined in simple but lively colors and specific lines and separations; one yellow, one blue, one pink and in my opinion it is an artistic statement with a hand paint brush. Most of the paint is not of high quality that cover the walls. We felt happy the moment we stepped in the door with two young Elders. Every brick shape on the exterior of the home was individually hand painted yellow.
He showed us the beginnings of his written recording of his family history. He has the names of his parents and his children accurately recorded. . He doesn’t know the names of his grandparents, where they were born, or where they died but everything he knows he has recorded in the most beautiful neatly done handwriting I have ever seen. His printing was like the beautiful walls in his home. His wife died many years ago and he does not have a photograph of her. We talked about that disappointment and we suggested before we meet again he write in words a description of his wife’s physical appearance and about her personality for his memories in “Family Search”. He was thrilled with this challenge.
As we look around we see creative things that bring happiness in the lives of those we meet. Our lives are changed by the pure experiences we have meeting some of the wonderful elderly people in Indonesia.
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