A UNIQUE REUNION After 30 Years

Mark in the Full-Time Ministry

In 1976, Mark, along with thousands of other  young American men who fled to Canada to escape the draft, was granted amnesty by the U.S. government. He and his wife, Kathi, also desired to keep their lives simple in order to devote more time to their ministry.  So Mark worked part-time as a surveyor, and he and Kathi gradually paid off the bills they had accumulated before their baptism. 

In 1978, when the Witnesses in Canada were planning to build a new branch complex near Toronto, Ontario, Mark and Kathi were in a position to offer  their services.  Since Mark had experience in surveying, they were invited  to participate in the construction.  They worked on  the project  in Georgetown until its completion in June 1981.  Afterward, they moved back to British Columbia and for the next  four years helped with building an Assembly Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses there.  When it was completed, they were invited back to work on the expansion of the Canada branch. 

In 1986, after a few months in Georgetown, Mark and Kathi were invited to stay on as regular members  of the Canada branch staff.  They have served on the staff  ever since and have also had extensive opportunities  to share in the construction work in many other countries.  Thanks to Mark's experience in surveying, he began to be used to do surveying for branch buildings and Assembly Halls of Jehovah's Witnesses in South and Central America and the islands of the Caribbean. 

Over the years, he and Kathi served in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, Guyana, Barbados, the Bahamas, Dominica, the United States (Florida), the Dominican Republic.  This special form of the full-time ministry caused the thread of Mark's life to cross that of Dennis' life once more. 

Next time: A UNIQUE REUNION After 30 Years - Reunion in the Dominican Republic

From the Awake! magazine, 2002