Some Heaps See Fall at Its Finest - Mission Leadership Seminar in Palmyra - A New Granddaughter!
Dear Family and Friends,
Happy Thanksgiving! The Third Annual MLM 5K Turkey Trot was run yesterday. We improved our time by 30 seconds since last year (we only run a 5K when on a mission in Michigan) and over 3 minutes faster than our first run in 2020. Older but faster. 😂
All the Michiganders are saying fall 2022 has been the most beautiful one they have seen in many years, and we believe it! We felt so blessed to have our three sons, their wives, and seven of our grandkids come for a week - the week we've had cold, wet weather. Stacy, who was pregnant, was very happy to be cold for a change. We had a great time together - cider mills with corn mazes, pumpkin patches, and of course, the best donuts, apple cider, and Honeycrisp apples (living in Michigan has turned us into apple snobs). The boys went to a Big 10 Football Game in Big 10 Country - thank you to Jill and Dennis Rinner for the tickets! We also spend a few days Up North enjoying beautiful Mackinac Island, Petoskey, and Harbor Springs. These places in Michigan are so beautiful that you can hardly believe it's real and not the charming set of a Hallmark movie. We loved sharing it with some of our family. I think my favorite thing that happened while they were here was the mission-wide devotional that Gavin, Marnie, Tyler, Lizzy, Andrew, and Stacy gave to our missionaries. It was inspirational and such a blessing for our missionaries. I think Tyler, Gavin, and Andrew would say their favorite part was when the Padres beat the Dodgers.
I really wanted Stacy to have her baby while they were here. Wouldn't that have been fun to have a Michigan grandchild? But it was a little early for the baby to come. On November 15th, Andrew and Stacy welcomed Alice Carolyn Heap into the world. She was 20 inches long and 7 pounds 13 ounces. We think our opinion is objective, and she is absolutely perfect.
The last week of October, we flew to Rochester, New York to attend a three-day Mission Leadership Seminar with all the other mission leaders in the North America Northeast Area, our Area Presidency and their wives, and Elder Patrick Kearon of the Presidency of the Seventy. Some of the highlights:
- Singing "An Angel from On High" on the Hill Cumorah with President and Sister Harding (Pennsylvania Philadelphia Mission), President and Sister Nye (Maryland Baltimore Mission), and President and Sister Brough (Massachusetts Boston Mission) at the request of President Harding who served in Palmyra as a young missionary.
- So much laughter and joy visiting with other mission leaders whom we love and getting to know Elder Vai and Sister Keala Sikahema and Elder James and Sister Laurel McConkie. We didn't know really them before this seminar other than from Zoom meetings, and it was such a pleasure to spend this time together. We are also grateful for our continued association with Elder Mark and Sister Angel Bassett (who acted as our chauffeurs for a day) and Elder Allen and Sister Deborah Haynie (who we knew from our time in San Diego when Elder Haynie and Elmer served as stake presidents at the same time).
- Spending time with President Gary and Sister Melissa Riding, who are the new mission leaders in the Indiana Indianapolis Mission. Gary and I were friends our freshman year at BYU with a great group of people. We felt a little like the sons of Mosiah in the Book of Mormon - both of us happy to see that we were still all in.
We are in the middle of trying to do hard things to truly bless and help others in Michigan - setting goals that have never been tried or achieved before and trying to accomplish things we know we can only do with the Lord’s help.
As we were talking to the mission about how at one time the adversary tried to separate us from God through sin - and that is still a powerful tool he uses to make us miserable - now we see Satan attacking people’s faith. As Elmer was contemplating this, he started to think about basketball, of course. To the missionaries, he explained that in basketball, you can play defense a couple of different ways. You can pick it up at half court and play a zone or man-to-man defense, or you can use the full-court press. While the adversary at one time may have been playing the half-court game, we are now in the days of the full-court press. And how do you break the press? By going on the offense. By taking it to the rim. Elmer definitely slipped into “Coach Heap” or “President Hype” mode here and got everyone pretty excited to invite others to come unto Christ and help them receive the restore gospel through faith in Jesus Christ! There’s a recording out there somewhere. Here’s what he actually said, “We attack Satan. We attack the rim. We throw it down. In his face. With Christ.” If you hear they are sending us home early, this display of Elmer’s enthusiasm for the gospel is probably why. Tyler and Andrew supported this imperfect but pretty sweet analogy even further when they heard about it by adding that in most cases, the press is only brought to bear in certain situations, most often at the end of the game. You break the press by getting the ball to the middle of the court and using the whole team to do it. These are the last days. Jesus Christ, the perfect press break, is at the center of all we do.
You can imagine the missionary journal entries that day! At several district councils follow this instruction, missionaries wanted to know if I knew President Heap was going to say what he said, because they know I am an advocate of dignified language and didn't seem to lose my composure. I did know about the full-court press analogy because he had shared it with our departing missionaries the night before (in a calm, dignified manner), but I didn’t know he was going to go OFF! It was a funny and yet great moment.
We laugh at these times while we recognize the tremendous opportunity presented to us to be involved in missionary work. President Dallin H. Oaks said: “We do not preach and teach in order to ‘bring people into the Church’ or to increase the membership of the Church. We do not preach and teach just to persuade people to live better lives … We invite all to come unto Christ by repentance and baptism and confirmation in order to open the doors of the celestial kingdom to the sons and daughters of God. No one else can do this.” (Missionary satellite broadcast 1995.) I was recently visiting with one of our newer missionaries and his trainer. The new missionary told me that while sharing the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the man they were speaking with spit on his shoes. They left. While sitting in the car, he and his companion were quiet. Then the more experienced missionary asked him how that made the new missionary feel. “Sad,” he said. “Just sad. I wonder what has happened in that man’s life that he thought spitting on my shoes was the response he should give to a message of hope and faith.*”
When the trainers come into East Lansing to pick up their new missionaries each transfer, I ask them to share three things: 1) What they love about being a missionary. 2) What they love about Michigan. and 3) Something that helped them adjust to missionary life. The most common thing shared that they love about Michigan is the people - they are usually friendly and nice and talkative (like you wouldn't believe). But every missionary meets a few mean people.
Every day we are inspired by these missionaries. I could tell hundreds of sacred stories that would fill your hearts with joy. That’s mainly been our experience here - hearts full of joy with some glitches along the way.
We love you!
Elmer and Amy
*Let it be noted that I was also appalled that someone who lived through 2020-2021 would spit! 🤢🦠
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