Brother & Sister Hughes - Vietnam

  June 12, 2023,   Xin Chào,  We are finishing up our second year serving as mission leaders. We have learned so much. It has been a calling that has really stretched us. There are hours of administrative work, that goes unnoticed unless it does not get done. The rewards are feeling the spirit in your life so often, being with amazing young men and young women who are willing to sacrifice for the Lord, working with members who are trying hard to do what is right and to see new members feel such joy with the gospel.  Last week two members of the Area presidency visited Vietnam. They took time to visit with government leaders, missionaries and have a member meeting. As we sang the opening hymn “Near my God to Thee”  in Ho Chi Minh district, I looked over the members and I felt such love for them. I know names now. I know some of their stories. I see them faithfully coming and making changes in their lives. It will be so hard to say good bye. Their faith, goodness ...

  Dear Family and Friends,   We love you! We miss you! We also love Vietnam and feel blessed to be among so many pioneers, They are faithful and so young the gospel. They are also very young in age. Each branch has very few to no married couples, mostly young single adults. They have very few older people. I love how much the members love and honor the older members. They are anchors and strength to the  branches that they are in. The area had questions about how primary is going in Vietnam. I thought you would be interested in some of my answers:   There are no wards, and there are 11 branches. 1 Branch is the mission branch and it encompasses all of Vietnam except our 2 Centers of Strength: Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. Hanoi has 4 Branches and Ho Chi Minh has 6. Everyone is a convert. No one has attended primary or seen it function unless they lived in another country or served a mission somewhere else and saw primary there. We have leaders who have been members les...

  May 1, 2023 Hello, I have been worrying about not writing and keeping in touch better. We are so busy. Most missions have senior couples to help and support the branches and mission leaders. We have 3 Humanitarian couples who are not allowed to do anything church related, they cannot even pray in church. They can go to church but not give a talk or prayer. They are doing good by organizing service projects that will help the country. They are also doing service by feeding members and missionaries. We have one Member leader support couple who are doing a great job helping with their branch and with English classes for the missionaries. We do not have a mission nurse, or finance secretary, or a housing coordinator or someone to do cleaning checks on apartments or someone to take care of referrals. We do most of those things because there is no one to help us. Senior missionaries are needed badly around the world. We would like a senior couple in at least 7 of our branches. We would...