Welcome Elder & Hermana Bertoch!
We left a lot of good friends when we came to Arequipa, Peru to become mission leaders. These friends have loved us and served us well from home. Some have kindly cared for our family while we are away, and others have actually become remote service missionaries to help our young missionaries with travel arrangements, medical advice, doctor and dentist appointments, as well as emotional care. These friends of ours have eagerly made huge sacrifices because they just want to help in any way they can. We appreciate each one of them so very much!
We want to introduce to you our newest addition from home, Elder and Hermana Bertoch. They happen to be our long-time friends and neighbors who started re-organizing their lives to come serve with us immediately after we got our call as mission leaders. They are our newest and second senior couple and they arrived on February 6. Those of you who know and love them, will recognize how truly fortunate we are! Thank you for sharing them with us!
For those of you who haven’t met them yet, here are a few details about who they are.
Elder Bertoch grew up in Boise, Idaho. After a semester at BYU he entered the mission field and was assigned to the Chile Osorno Mission. He served from 1978 to 1980. His older brother was serving in Peru and a younger brother in Argentina overlapping his time as a missionary. After his mission he returned to BYU and graduated with a degree in History. He has spent the past 30 years working for a private family investment office in Denver Colorado. His greatest achievement was convincing his wife, Jalene Johnson, to marry him! They were sealed in the Los Angles Temple in 1984. Elder Bertoch has served in many callings in the church and all of them have been a great blessing in his life. He enjoys playing tennis, traveling and hanging out with family and friends.
Hermana Bertoch grew up in Laguna Niguel, California. She graduated from BYU in social work in 1985. She and Elder Bertoch met at BYU through their respective roommates. Despite her social work degree, Hermana Bertoch worked as a legal secretary until they moved to Denver, Colorado in 1994. There she worked as an office manager until their youngest son was born in 1999. They have a total of three children – a daughter and another son, and 5 grandchildren. Hermana Bertoch served as a service missionary in the Colorado Denver South Mission recently as the housing coordinator. She loved the experience of working with the missionaries. She and Elder Bertoch have always planned to serve a full time mission and are super excited about this opportunity.
