“The RoseBouquet”

Last Tuesday, just minutes after I had posted my RoseBouquet for the week, I was having lunch downstairs with the other WTM staff that were in, Priscilla, and Joe. Suddenly Joe said to me, “How would you like to go to Millar this weekend?”

I stopped chewing my food, for I knew what he was referring to. Joe and his wife Penny are our mission reps and about this time of year often go to spend a weekend at one of a number of Bible Schools when they have their missions conferences. It’s a chance to put up a display booth, and make the mission visible and to do some recruiting. I knew instinctively that I would love to go, but this was rather sudden. “Why?” I asked.

Joe explained that they had put on 10,000 miles with all the driving they did in the States over Christmas and New Years, and he knew there was another missions conference coming up in Regina next weekend, so he was offering that I could go to this one in their place. He assured me that I would enjoy it, for Millar does up the best, the most fun missions conferences. They do dramas, like enacting a third-world marketplace right in and among the various missions’ booths, and so on.

When I caught my breath I said that I’d love to go but I had to clear certain items off my agenda, and one of them could eat up my weekend.

I hardly had time to think about it, never mind pray seriously. The next day I was staffing the memorial donations table at the very big funeral of one of my best supporters, Victor Nickel. At 2 pm, or as soon as I got back to the office, I had an appointment with my biggest client for web design. He left just before 4 pm so I had just moments to get a phone call in to the government offices in Regina about some taxes I should have charged my clientele last year but didn’t. (Oops!)

Finally, after 4, I went down to the director’s office where both Arnold, our Director, and Joe, our Assistant Director were waiting for me. But they had already, in faith, called up a couple of other mission reps to ask if I could catch a ride with them so I wouldn’t have to drive. They were leaving at noon the next day. So Joe loaded our WTM/SLM display luggage in my car to take home, and I gathered up what I thought I’d need, and headed home. I got my packing done the next morning, just before Gary and Dave arrived to pick me up.

Penny, next door, agreed to come over and feed and pet Snowflake each day. My biggest concern was that I was not used to such weekend trips and was not in practice for packing neat and practically. For instance, I took along a laptop (which now works), thinking I could at least check emails maybe late at night. There was no convenient place to connect to the internet, and there wasn’t time either. However, I saw how others reps used their laptops at their displays to present inter-active videos or games about their ministry. I just wasn’t ready for that.

I learned a lot and want to sort through all my experiences to find ways to improve the next time I get such a golden opportunity.

Above all, I can report that I had a wonderful time. I was given a room in the girls’ dorm, and the students were all so kind and full of thoughtful questions. I did not meet a single rebel in the whole school. The atmosphere there is very missions minded and most of the students were planning such careers.

There’s much more to tell you, but I’ll save it for my Ruthe’s Roses article below, okay?

By the way, when we left on Thursday the temperatures were still quite chilled at -25 C. When we got home Sunday night, it was something like +5 C. Saskatoon is in the midst of a January Thaw! That’s something we don’t get to see every year, where the snow and ice melt in the daytime, and freeze again at night. Some younger people have never experienced a January Thaw in their lifetime. It will probably be over though, by the end of this week.