Awkward Penquins, Succeed through Overcoming, Ascension, Ashington, Hot-Cross Buns

Be of good cheer!

Why are Penguins socially awkward?  Because they can't break the ice. 😂 This brought a smile to our faces one year ago as Mont was being treated at the Proton Beam center.  Our welcoming crew every morning was Ian Rice and Coulton Kray, who shared fun thoughts like this with us as we entered the facility for treatment.  It really helped us to be of good cheer.

Dallin H. Oaks (Oct. 2020) said, "In the final days of His mortal life, Jesus Christ told His Apostles of the persecutions and hardships they would suffer. He concluded with this great assurance: “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). That is the Savior’s message to all of our Heavenly Father’s children. That is the ultimate good news for each of us in our mortal lives."

“You may be facing overwhelming challenges,” Elder Richard G. Scott taught. “Sometimes they are so concentrated, so unrelenting, that you may feel they are beyond your capacity to control. Don’t face the world alone. ‘Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding’ [Proverbs 3:5]. … It was intended that life be a challenge, not so that you would fail, but that you might succeed through overcoming.”

Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game. 

Institute Class Now in Gateshead Chapel

We began teaching institute this last week at the Gateshead Ward chapel, which is more central for the young adults currently attending institute.  

Our lesson was on the Sacrament.  One of our favorite quotes from the lesson:

Elder Peter M. Johnson said "There is a spiritual enlightenment associated with the Sacrament -- it is personal, powerful, and it is needed."

We also like this quote from Sister Cheryl A. Esplin, former counselor in the Primary General Presidency, … As a priesthood holder extends his arm to offer us the sacred emblems, it is as if the Savior Himself were extending His arm of mercy, inviting each one of us to partake of the precious gifts of love made available through His atoning sacrifice—gifts of repentance, forgiveness, comfort, and hope.  The more we ponder the significance of the sacrament, the more sacred and meaningful it becomes to us. (“The Sacrament—A Renewal for the Soul,” Ensign or Liahona, Nov. 2014, 12, 13–14)

Jesmond Dene

In the English counties of Durham and Northumberland (where we live now) a dene is a steep-sided wooded valley through which a small river runs.  Jesmond Dene is a beautiful and old park right by our flat.  

We see crocus blooming all around us, a carpet of crocuses or a chorus of croci, beautiful anyway you call it. 

We Ascend Together

Thee lift me and I'll lift thee, and we'll ascend together. This quote was credited to John Greenleaf Whittier, an influential American Quaker Poet and ardent advocate of the abolition of slavery in the United States.  When we saw this winding set of steps through the dene near our flat we both thought of this quote. As we ascend in our progress towards our heavenly home, our Father will provide the path for us to follow and then we can go together lifting each other all along the way.

Ashington Branch Visit and a New Friend, Jerry

Sunday, February 26, we visited the Ashington Branch of the church and shared our testimonies.  We met Jeremy Enofua, a young adult in the Ashington Branch and hit it off instantly.  He is from Nigeria and recently graduated from nursing school.  He is now working in England.  All of his family are members of the church in Nigeria.  We will get to know him better in the coming weeks as we try to start a young single adult hub/institute in the Ashington Branch area.  

Hot Cross Buns

We finally found hot cross buns.  Remember the rhyme, hot cross buns, one a penny, two a penny... These were more expensive than a few pennies-- this package of 4 was about $3.50.  But, they are sooooo... good!

Funeral Service, One time Road, Yorkshire Pudding, Eternal Commitments

This last week we celebrated the life of Leona Fae Blocher Betteridge, Mont's mother, with a funeral service on Feb 18th, the day after her 93rd birthday.   Her passing was truly a gift to her.  She often expressed in recent months how she wanted to go and join her family on the other side of the veil, and so she did... passing gracefully and quickly on February 4th in the evening.  She had been so active and busy up to the day before her passing, and had gone to the theater with Ben's family just the evening before to view "The Chosen".

She exemplified following the Savior and loving and serving others as He did.  Here is a special excerpt from her journal that was shared at her memorial service:

  "I truly feel love comes and grows from serving others and sharing. I pray to be more spiritually attuned and more kind and loving, and helpful to others. I am amazed at the love Heavenly Father has for us. One truth I’ve learned is that when we serve others, we love them more, and then we appreciate life more. My heart goes out to our grandchildren and great-grandchildren and the coming generations. I pray for guidance for them and wise choices. I love them all so very much. I know our beautiful gospel  [of Jesus Christ] holds the answers for a happy and full life. I have learned or proven to myself that serving others is what makes us happiest in this life. I have truly been blessed beyond measure. I’m most grateful for our restored gospel which has been an anchor and beacon for me these many fulfilling, happy years. Gordon B Hinckley surely has touched my heart, and I especially liked a talk where he said, “there is no end to the good we can do, to the influence we can have with others. Let us not dwell on the critical or the negative. Let us pray for strength, let us pray for the capacity and desire to assist others. Let us radiate the light of the gospel at all times and in all places, that the Spirit of the Redeemer may radiate from us.”

A favorite quote that was posted in her grandmother's home (Bessie Hope Kauffman Blocher) impressed Lee as a child and so she subsequently posted it in her home for all of us to enjoy and ponder as we grew up; we pass this way but once.

When we welcomed our first baby boy, Jared Lamont, back in 1978, dear Mother Lee came to visit and made a sweet comment about his hands and their potential for good.  She pointed out that those little hands would be able to accomplish much good throughout his life.  We seemed to have come full circle as Sister Betteridge was honored to help prepare Lee's body for burial--  memories of the numerous acts of good service that Lee's dear hands had provided throughout her long, loving life brought tender thoughts of gratitude & deep appreciation for her life. 

 

All of Lee's children were able to attend the funeral service and some of her grandchildren and great grandchildren;  all of our children attended and most of our grandchildren.  We had several fun evenings playing games together and reminiscing.  

We express our sincere and deep appreciation to Krista and Tyler Shawcroft and to  Molly and Stefan Gehring for hosting our large family in their homes; they so impressed us with their kindness and generosity.  We will never forget this selfless act of service.

As we left from Leeds England to go to Seattle we were able to enjoy a fun Valentine's dinner at a pub/restaurant near the airport and loved our first Yorkshire pudding.  We love our forever marriage. 

It is important to mention that we had a chance to visit the Seattle Temple for an endowment session while we were in the Northwest for the funeral service.  After participating in this sacred ordinance and as we met each other in the Celestial Room of the temple, we each came up with the same word that summarized our experience: "Clarity".  The temple provides clarity from which to view life; it gives us greater purpose in our ups and downs throughout life and a blueprint for how to live our life.

 The Gospel of Jesus Christ is beautifully simple, and simply beautiful! 

(Sister Patricia Holland, January 2023)

Zone Conf, COSTCO, Devil's Causeway, Kissing Gate, Food to Help You Measure Up

ZONE CONFERENCE

Mission transfers are on a 6 week schedule here.  During the 6 weeks, the missionaries will have an interview with the president and have one zone conference.  We just completed the zone conference for this transfer period.  We have 44 Elders/Sisters in our Zone, the North Zone, and there are 4 zones in our mission. We prepared a lunch for all the missionaries in attendance, working with 2 senior sister missionaries in Hartlepool, Sisters Archibald and Frost.  We served Hawaiian Haystacks and cooked way too much rice!  It was a very exciting day for the missionaries to see each other and we were even able to join in on some of the training from the Zone Leaders (Elders Shurtliff and Winters), the Assistants (Elders Lindfors and Tuttle), the Sister Trainer Leaders (Sisters Kingston, Nielson and Flake) and President and Sister Clare.  These young Elders and Sisters are truly amazing in their faith and preparation for their missions.  They are seeing miracles every day and often testify of this in our mission communications.  

We are focusing on our belief and faith, seeking revelation for the outcomes we want and the goals we set; it is a process.  Here is a diagram the President and Sister Clare shared with us, that outlines this process.

The Zone meal consisted of Hawaiian haystacks, fruit pizzas and brownies! Yum!

COSTCO

When the missionaries discovered we had a COSTCO card and that the closest COSTCO was only 20 minutes away, they couldn't wait to go with us.  So we made a district trip out of it on their preparation day and stormed COSTCO with all 8 of us full-time missionaries.  It was Sister Giannini's (from Italy) first time ever being in a COSTCO.  She is at the far right in the pictures below.

DEVIL's CAUSEWAY HIKE in LONGFRAMLINGTON

We attended an Alnwick branch (northern most church unit in England) hike on Saturday and witnessed some beautiful views as we hiked along an old Roman road called the Devil's Causeway, but we are not sure what the devil had to do with it?!  The first picture below shows President James Perry, the Branch President, with his youngest, a son, in the foreground.  He works for the church and has been writing and editing "The Saints" church history series.  He is an amazing young father and church leader working remotely for the church and lives in a small village where his wife grew up.  (The Kays, his wife's parents, also are in the branch).  Brother Kay is the Elders Quorum President and is from Cheltenham near Gloucester where the Betteridge family is from.  We will compare family history notes with him on another day.  We are scheduled to speak in the Alnwick Branch on March 19th. 

PIANO MIRACLE

Most everyone knows that Sister Betteridge loves to play the piano and organ.  This is one of the first times in our married life that we have been without a keyboard in the home.  This just wasn't going to work for us, so we looked on Facebook Marketplace, and were pleased to find a touch-sensitive, inexpensive, good quality YAMAHA keyboard for sale just 30 minutes aways and it even fit into our small mission car.  Sister Betteridge is overjoyed and will often play hymns, classical music, and children's songs several times during the week.  It was a breakthrough for our goal to have HARMONY in the home.

INSTITUTE

The lesson this last week in institute class was "Ministering Like the Savior".  We loved the simplicity of this lesson.  President Russell M. Nelson taught that “ministering means following your feelings to help someone else feel the love of the Savior in his or her life."  Another one of our favorite quotes:

We shared with the class a little bit about our dear mother Leona, who passed this last week, and how she was such a wonderful example of someone who ministered to others in quiet, simple and meaningful ways.  She was so excited about our mission to England and often spoke of wanting to be here with us.  So, we brought her over and shared her with the class.  She posed for a picture with some of the institute students!  

KISSING GATE and BEAUTIFUL COUNTRYSIDE

As we were on our hike with the Alnwick branch we came across a "Kissing Gate", pictured below.  The gate is shaped like a "V" and only lets one person pass through the gate at a time and prevents sheep from passing through the gate.  In the process of one person following the other through the gate, you can get very close to each other, close enough to grab a kiss.  It is a delightful find in these wide open fields; no wonder many youth groups here want to take hikes through the sheep fields. 

 

FOOD to ACHIEVE YOUR FULL POTENTIAL

We finally found some food that has helped Elder MONTY Betteridge measure up!

YSA Errand, Balls & Pudding, KISS - Keep it Simple Sweetie, Conversion Story, Leona Says See you Later

We were pleased to receive news this week about our assignment here. We received confirmation from our Sunderland Stake Presidency that they want us to primarily work with the YSA  (young single adult) age group.  They had started us down this path when we arrived in December but had wanted some time to confirm this.  It is now confirmed;  our errand from the Lord will be serving the YSA by teaching institute and reaching out to these lovely saints.  We will also take on MLS (member leader support) assignments as we have time.  

We have full-time young sister missionaries supporting the Newcastle Mandarin branch here and they had 4 friends at church on Sunday and our full-time young Elders in the Newcastle English-speaking ward had 3 friends attend.  It was a great day for friends at church.  After church we made rice-balls with Jade, one of our visiting Mandarin friends .  She taught us how to make rice balls with roasted sweet sesame filling and sweet red bean filling-- really good stuff!  Here we are making rice balls with the Mandarin branch. 

Speaking of desserts, we had 'sticky-toffee' pudding this last week with yellow custard vanilla cream sauce over it-- a real treat!

We taught Primary sing-time this last week. The song, which most of the 15 attending had not heard of before, was fun to teach.  We (Heather) taught them "I Know that My Savior Loves Me." 

We are very fortunate to have a park that abuts our flat complex.  We are now just beginning to explore it for our morning walks.  

This last week we taught institute on the subject of "Finding Pure Truth in the Teachings of Jesus Christ". President Nelson taught that one of the plagues of our day is that too few people know where to turn for truth.  We had about 10 people in attendance.  We found two favorite quotes, one from Daniel Judd, former counselor in the Sunday School general presidency, and the other from Sister Holland, which she shared at the YSA devotional last week. 

“While the gospel of Jesus Christ embraces all truth, not all truths are of equal value. The Savior clearly taught that His gospel, first and foremost, is His atoning sacrifice. His gospel is also an invitation to receive the blessings of the Atonement through faith in Christ, repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring faithfully to the end … It is vital that we nourish those we teach and lead by focusing on the fundamental doctrines … instead of spending precious time on subjects and sources of lesser importance.” (Daniel Judd “Nourished by the Good Word of God,” Ensign or Liahona, Nov. 2007, 93–94)

Sister Holland said, “As I look back at my life, and if I could live any part of it over again, I would do one thing differently—very differently: Simplify! It seems to me that everything is better when it is simplified—our food, our clothing, our furnishings, and our schedules. What I regret most in my youth is that I didn’t see the simple beauty of the gospel; I made even the gospel too complex. I felt it was too overwhelming, too difficult, and sometimes even too mysterious. It seemed to me that even as a young adult I had to climb a mountain of righteousness, go through a fiery furnace of purification, and unravel every doctrinal controversy known to mankind if I were ever to be acceptable before God…” (YSA Devotional January, 2023)

During our running around we learned to watch for the big "L" posted on motorcycles and cars, which means "Learner".  Elder Betteridge feels like the big L should be stamped on his forehead to warn others that he is still learning and is highly likely to offend or make mistakes.  Sister Betteridge says she will try to give him a break 😜.

On one of our trips this last week we stopped by Seeham, a small shoreline town and had some world famous fish and chips.   (No picture of the fish and chips we ate it before taking a picture), But, here is the shoreline right across from the fryer's shop.  See the light house and the full moon?

One of the Elders in our mission posted a conversion story on our mission facebook chat.  Fun to be in the very same mission where this happened:

"A conversion story from the Leeds mission.  My grandfather, James William Betteridge, served a mission in the Leeds area of the British mission  in 1901-1904.  He met a girl (born in Scarborough in 1880) named Emily Ness.  Emily and her family had moved to Leeds in 1894 where my grandfather was serving a mission in 1902.  One of Emily’s brothers, John Ness,  had joined the church and so my grandfather as a missionary visited the Ness family and taught other members of the family including my grandmother-to-be, Emily, who joined the church in 1902 with many other members of her family.  Emily emigrated to the states in 1904 and subsequently married my grandfather, the returned missionary, James William Betteridge. 

I share this with you because this is a conversion story from our mission that led to me being who I am today and came as a result of a faithful missionary serving here in the Leeds mission visiting a part member family.  We cannot know the impact of our missionary service on future generations. Thank you all for your service here in the Leeds mission and remember your influence and efforts will be felt for generations to come.   

I have felt the love and influence of my ancestors as Sister Betteridge and I have started our senior mission here in England.  They are praying for us as missionaries, that other members of their posterity might be found.  I am 86% of UK ancestry.  If you come across anyone with the following last names, we may be distantly related so I am happy to help in making a warm connection with them:  Betteridge, Coulson, Burbidge, Ness, Jones, Paskett, Pidding, and Thornton.  Signed,  Elder Betteridge"

We enjoyed a visit on Saturday to the Tynemouth Castle and Priory.  This historic site dates back to the time period 1090 AD and has a lot of history involving Viking and Scott invasions and even defensive fortifications during WW I and II.  A small 13th-century Percy Chapel has survived all the invasions and remains intact to this day.  (Archaeological excavations on the site indicate that this site was used and occupied during the Iron Age, which started between 1200 and 600 BC; old sacred ground indeed).

The last bit of news from this week is the most significant. My dear mother Leona Fae Blocher Betteridge passed peacefully at the age of 92 on February 4th, 2023 into the world of spirits, to greet her many ancestors who she loved so much.  She was so anxious to move on and we are very happy for her, though we will miss her greatly and her humble, loving disposition.