Today is Tuesday, August 18th, 2009. We have now been on our mission for 6 1/2 months and we have seen winter, spring and a cool summer. Last week Bismarck made the national news with temperatures reaching 100 degrees. Wouldn't you know that we were traveling to Minot where it was only 97 degrees. We have come to be highly suspicious of temperature readings around here because there seems to be some exaggerations on the part of the populist. This may be the case with most places but maybe a wee bit more for North Dakota. When we were freezing at a -20 everyone told us that it was a -30. The other day when it was +97, someone told us it was +115. You can see why we are reluctant to accept some of the claims that people make. Most of the summer has been cool with temperatures in the 70s. We have had less than a week of temperatures over 90 degrees.
The other day, in a phone conversation, we were asked if North Dakota grew anything. How I wish that I had a camera that could take a picture of the vast fields of corn, wheat, barley, oats, flax, canola, sun flowers, every type of bean and all other varieties of crops. As far as the eye can see there are fields of beautiful grains and corn. Right now the sun flowers are maturing and one can see thousands of acres of "Yellow". There are also huge grass lands with cattle grazing. This year, because of the heavy snows and the later rains, the land is green and lush. Cattle have had all of the grass they could eat and they are healthy and fat. There are some worries over the crops because of the short growing season. Many fields were planted late because of the slow snow melt and the wet soil. The farmers and ranchers would like to have 3 to 4 weeks of high heat so the corn and sun flowers could grow fast and mature. 
This morning it was 43 degrees so we will see what happens in the next month. No one wants an early winter. (This is not a river- this is a field of flax)
Today is transfer day in the mission. Because of the many states and cities, within the Rapid City South Dakota Mission, the mission uses a 12 passenger van, with a large trailer, and they run through the mission, picking up missionaries and dropping them off in their new areas. This transfer van is called the Transfer Train. It will gather missionaries from Minnesota on the east to missionary in Sheridan Wyoming on the west and it will take approximately three days to make all of the stops. Tonight it will reach Bismarck where we will greet some hungry elders with a hot meal. Besides the missionaries on the Train we also have other missionaries driving to Bismarck tonight where they will make transfers and take missionaries back to their areas. We feed this "Train" monthly and have figured a way to feed them quickly without a lot of clean up afterwards. We have picked up a ham that is cooking in a Crock Pot and we will include a big baked potato, some corn, whole wheat rolls, and some fruit. To finish the meal we will serve cake and ice cream. The cake today is made from the zucchini squash which two of our elders grew in their garden. These elders live on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation and they planted a garden in back of their home. Among the lettuce and carrots they also planted about 10 squash plants, not aware of the law of the harvest, and are now feeding zucchini squash to all of Fort Yates, 25% of the Sioux Tribe. There have been a lot of laughs about the number of squash they have given away and so it is fitting that as these elders move on that we should feed Zucchini Cake for desert tonight. Along with the transfer we are also sadden to see a number of elders going home where they will be released by their stake presidents. This is what every elder looks forward to but when the two years are up they find that leaving the people whom they have come to love is very hard. Many tears are shed. In our area four elders, three of whom we have known since arriving in February, will complete their missions. They have served well and have been faithful servants. We will all miss them.
One of these elders has served 18 months on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. His father will be driving out from Seattle to pick him up later this week. Interesting enough his father also served on the same reservation when he was a missionary thirty years ago. This coming Friday, Elder Davis will be adopted into the Sioux tribe. He is being honored because of his service to so many people, in and out of the church. He is embarrassed over the attention and would rather not go through such an honor but it would be looked upon as an insult to the tribe if he refused. This young elder stated that all he ever wanted to do was to teach these people the gospel of Jesus Christ. He would have wanted to baptize a few more families rather than receive an honor. His father will be with him and he will see how much these people love his son. There are many social problems on the reservations but Elder Davis has never been judgmental and has just loved each and every one he ever met. I will include a picture of Elder Davis. Our summer months have been spent in preparation for the new Seminary Year, which will start next week. (We realize that Seminary started this week for those of you in Highlands Ranch.) During the summer is when "In-service" is taught to the teachers. Because of the distances involved in the Bismarck North Dakota stake we have put together in-service lessons which have been mailed to our teachers, followed up by a visit from us. It has been a joy traveling around and meeting with our wonderful teachers and discussing better ways to teach the Book of Mormon. We have made the rounds three times to teach in-service and one additional time to deliver materials and manuals. We have now put 24,000 miles on our Honda Civic since leaving Colorado. We think that we have traveled most of the roads in the western half of North Dakota and a number of the roads in South Dakota. No wonder we have seen so much of this beautiful land.
We want to tell you of a Sister in Fort Yates who has now read the Book of Mormon 18 times. She was baptized about 18 months ago and has never stopped reading the Book of Mormon. A quick calculation shows that she completes the reading of the Book of Mormon every month. About a week ago she received her endowments in the temple. Before she was baptized she had a history of alcohol abuse. She now is running a 12 step program in Ft. Yates for alcoholics. She believes that the Book of Mormon was written to her people and that it has given her the strength to keep sober. I can tell you that she will read three chapters today, and every day. Her testimony is that it was written to the Lamanites. She loves this set of scripture.
We are enjoying our preparation for Seminary, which will be a study of the Book of Mormon. The story that we have just related is a perfect example of how we should all be searching for the truths found this book. We have been memorizing the "Scripture Mastery" scriptures and have done better with our memorization than we had anticipated. Out of the 25 scriptures we have about 17 memorized. By doing this we have come to appreciate the beauty of the wording and phrases in this great book. The writings of the Book of Mormon are masterful and filled with beauty. We marvel over it all. We are also reading and we would like to complete the book by the end of the year. We are taking it slowly so that we can study in detail and not just read. We want to be prepared for our teachers and students. We are encouraged to spend two hours studying a day. If we did this faithfully we would have completed the Book of Mormon by now. We had better focus on this great study.
It is a great blessing to be able to work in the temple here in Bismarck. We are so thankful for the training and experience that we received in the Denver temple. Even though there are always things to learn regarding the ordinances of the temple, we came into this mission prepared to do temple work immediately. We have explained too many of you before that working in a small temple has its challenges. The majority of temple workers for the Bismarck Temple come from one ward, the Bismarck Ward. The closest town outside of Bismarck is Minot, two hours away. You can imagine that most of the work that is done in the Bismarck Temple is done by the Bismarck ward. This does not take anything away from the other wards and stakes in this temple district. Those who come from Rapid City or Sioux Falls have to drive 6 hours to get to Bismarck and then return or stay over night. With that said we would like to say that we have never seen the temple closed because of a lack of attendance. We understand that even during the severe blizzards that local people still showed up at the door, willing to work. Well, we are blessed to work with these wonderful people. Everyone wants more people in the temple but we need to be grateful to those who make it all happen. Our temple presidency works very hard to keep everything working and we so admire them. They are always happy and excited to see us and take every opportunity to greet us and thank us for coming to work in the temple. We are thankful for this part of our mission.
We love our time while serving in this area. So that you know that not everything that happens in North Dakota is "wonderful" (That is how this news update sounds) we want you to know that we also see a lot of heartache and sadness. Our missionaries want to teach and baptize. They plan and prepare only to be forgotten or turned away. I cannot say how many times we have gone out to work with the missionaries only to find that their appointments are not home or will not open the door. We see them at the door of the chapels waiting for their investigators to arrive only to be disappointed. On the reservation we drive to the homes of members to transport them to the church and find that they have slept late and are not ready to go. There is far too much of this but all of these things do not take away from the excitement of the "Work". We have also seen baptisms of families and individuals. The story that we related to you above is most precious. We love the service and the time together and we are happy being here.
We miss you all. We pray for you at home but we know what capable leaders you have and how strong your testimonies are. We encourage you to support the missionaries in your stake and wards and especially the new converts. May our Father in Heaven bless each of you.
Love from here,
Elder and Sister Harris
