To begin with, this blog has a little pressure, because we are introducing this to a new member of our family. By some coincidence, I hav3 been given the distinct privilege to introduce this Blog experience to the new member of our family… Our first grandson-in-law, Tyler Partridge. In our family, the in-laws are the same as our children. It is my understanding that Tyler is presently working to finish up getting his degree in economics. Unless some of you can help me out, I don’t know lots about his history. I know his Mom has a cookie shop and he has worked there for awhile.
My options for relating my options to Tyler, in some ways, coincides with his economic degree. For Tyler’s information, Kriss and I have spent 6 years of our lives in a country that is filled with poverty. The number one thing in the governments eyes is to put as much money in their own pockets as possible. Consequently, the poverty of the entire nation is much, muc h worse than our country. Kriss and I have been associated for 4 of the last 6 years of helping with the orphanage over in the Congo. Since we have come home, Kriss has talked a great deal about how we can still help a couple of the “Kids” from the orphanage. There is one young man that we helped a great deal to be able to go serve his Heavenly Father on a mission. What is a challenge to us is how to draw a line between enabling and making a sacrifice to help. Each one of the young men in the Congo have to raise a certain amount of money for their sacrifice for their mission. We were able to help him earn the money to go by having him clean our home for several months.
Jonathan has now returned from his mission and was informed that it was time for him to leave the orphanage and go out on his own, as the food is limited for the orphans. I am sure that his entire belongings were from his mission clothing, and they would fit in one suitcase. If you can picture this young man, coming home from his mission, with no family, other than the orphanage mom, who raised him, and her sadly telling him he would have to go out on is own. He had no place to go, no place to sleep, and no money. So economically, we have decided, thinking of our new grandson, to try to help this young man. We were able to help him financially get into an apartment, after him searching for a few months. In the meantime, we helped coordinate for Stan Houghton, the temple contractor, paid for Jonathan to take driving school. Once he graduated from driving school, he got a job driving for 2 hours a day taking a man to work and his daughter to school each day. He makes $5 a day, of which $2 goes for his transport. That leaves him $3 a day. Now, Tyler, our economic major… knows there is not much you can do to survive on $3 per day. Sideline, we knew several homeless children well, and became aquainted with them. Not wanting this to happen to this young man, who we became very fond of, who has adopted us as his parents Mutter Gates and Papa Gates. We realize that if a young man is able to learn English over there, that it can help immensely, for his future. Before his mission, he was self-teaching English. Sometime before he went on his mission, we made a loan to a US man who was starting an English school who was to repay us the money we loaned him. We could see that the school was not doing well “economically”, so we decided we would use some of the money the school owed us, towards Jonathan’s education in learning to speak English. We just received his report card this week that he has passed level three. Level six means he would be completely fluent.
After listening to a talk recently by Elder Uchdorf, he said "Through your efforts to help the poor, the needy, to reach out to those in distress, your own character is purified and forged, your spirit is enlarged and you walk a little a taller. I decided we would get fully on board to help this young man get a start in life. I realize that I have gone into some detail here, in something that is very foreign to you. This picture I am trying to paint is ingrained in Kriss and My lives, to know how blessed we are to live in the United States of America… to have a beautiful family, who we can relate to, who we can call for a chat to be cheered up, and to feel of the love of a family, of parents who love us… no matter what circumstances our children in. The freedom to jump in a car and drive from one state to another, without being confined to one place…. To have food in our belly, when we go to sleep. These are things Jonathan doesn’t have. But he is one of the strongest young men we have ever known. I never, ever saw one ounce of selfishness as we worked together side, by side, building the wall at the orphanage. He was about 16 years old at the time. He was the “Father” image in the orphanage his entire life. He was young men’s president at the time of 18 young men in his ward, that looked up to him.
So in conclusion, on behalf of our first new grandson… and him being an economic major, we will be economically supporting this young man by, (1) helping him with his deposit and rent and meager furnishings for his apartment (he uses his own $3 a day for food) and (2) helping him with his education in English, and (3) Helping him get enrolled in the University with a major in computer science technology. Economically, this is not a financial investment for us. But it is an investment in a special individual’s life… and building a leader in the gospel in the Congo.
Welcome to the family Tyler. We are looking forward to getting to know you better. Happy Holidays. Love, Papa Gates
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