Mavis Ione Baglien

1925 - 2020

The Life Testimony of Mavis Ione Baglien
The Lord God brought Mavis (Christianson) Baglien into her earthly pilgrimage on April 23, 1925. She arrived at her heavenly home on January 17, 2020. She lived a full life of 94 earth years but was still a youngster in her eternal life with Jesus in Heaven. She is survived by four children, 12 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.
Mavis was born into the family of Andrew and Mabel (Bruton) Christianson who farmed in the Red River Valley of North Dakota, near Hillsboro. She was the youngest of five children and the only girl. She said her four older brothers treated her like a princess, well, most of the time. She grew up during the Great Depression and learned to live by the adage “Waste Not, Want Not”. She confessed though, that the Lord provided most everything they needed through their farm, raising chickens, hogs, cows, growing grains and beans in the fields and vegetables in the garden, and sharing among neighbors in the community. She was baptized and confirmed in her Christian faith at Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in Hillsboro.
Soon World War II broke out and life began moving fast. After graduation, her Hillsboro High School sweetheart, Dick Baglien, went to Georgia to join the Army. She decided to leave family and farm to marry Dick on September 2, 1943 in Gainesville Florida. They not only loved each other deeply, but shared their love of the Lord. One night when Dick was on guard duty at the base, he had an encounter with Jesus who opened his heart to a call to ministry. Mavis supported him in this call and they began to wonder how God would bring this to pass. Dick went to serve in Europe and the Battle of the Bulge. He chose to be a medic without a gun, comforting and tending the wounded on the front lines. He himself was wounded and received the Purple Heart. Mavis served the war effort back home by sewing duffle bags for the Army. Their first child Rosalie was born in 1944 in South Carolina during the war.
After the war, they followed Dick’s family to Riverside California where Dick went to college and began assisting in a church. Mavis gave birth to son Samuel (Bud) in 1946 and to daughter Linda in 1947. During this time Dick felt the Holy Spirit confirm his call to the ordained ministry. So they moved to Rock Island Illinois where Dick attended Augustana Lutheran Seminary, one of the few seminaries at the time that would accept married students with children.
In 1951, Dick was called to serve two rural churches near Prosper North Dakota, just west of Fargo. Son Paul was born here in 1951 and daughter Becky rounded out the family in 1953. In 1955, they moved to California where Dick served churches in Stockton, Bakersfield, Camarillo, Santa Monica and Yorba Linda. When Dick began serving as a chaplain at California Medical Center in Los Angeles, Mavis got a job there also as secretary to the Auxiliary. They enjoyed commuting to work together until they retired in 1988.
They moved to Orange CA to be close to family and grandkids. After that family moved away to take up ministry in Indiana, they decided in 1998 to settle in Oceanside at Ocean Hills retirement community. There Dick had got sick with cancer and was called to Heaven on January 22, 2009. In 2010, Mavis moved to Fallbrook to be close to her church family at Christ the King. In the next 11 years that she survived Dick, she had her own bouts with cancer, a broken hip, strokes and swallowing difficulties.
The Lord comforted and sustained Mavis with her trust that He had more goodness and mercy ahead for her, and through the loving support of her family, her devotion to prayer, Bible study and participation in the local church, and through her Ladies Prayer Group that prayed for one another for over 40 years. Thank you to Christ the King Lutheran Church, to Pastors Mark and Steve, and to her extended family and friends who knew and loved Mavis. We celebrate that Mavis is now enjoying the presence of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and seeing Dick and all her loved ones who believed in Jesus and have gone before her.
To God be the Glory!