Early Morning Seminary, Comp Study, Auckland, Two Zone Conferences, Temple, and Song Fest

We started our week off teaching Seminary on Monday Morning. Leona had to work so we helped her out. We had a good lesson and good participation.  The rest of the day involved scripture study and family video calls. 

We enjoyed checking in with Season's family. The boys started school and are doing good. Garren was nervous to start high school. Season helped him by talking to him and listening to his concerns. The next week he started school, and it turned out much better than he expected. Since then, it has been great. Seminary turned out better than expected as well. Karsten is a senior this year. Apparently, he has been doing a lot of speaking assignments in Church in different Wards. That is good. He gave a really good talk at Stake Conference a few weeks ago. Now it is being sought after. LOL

Sister Brough saying
goodbye to her
trainer, Sister Jones

A little later, we got a call from Sean wondering why we hadn't called them. We figured out what happened. Sunday was the last day of the month. Monday was the first day of the next month. We make the calls on Monday so we can talk to our family on Sunday. We call one of our kids each week. I sent out calendar reminders at the beginning of our mission based on our Mondays. So, instead of being the third Sunday for them, it showed up on the second Sunday, but our third Monday. 🤪 We visited with them anyway. Before our call ended, MyLiege asked if we would still have our "regular" call next week. Hahaha.  We said yes!!! It was nice to talk to all the girls. We also got to see Andrew and Ruthie. That is ALWAYS special.

Tuesday morning started with Seminary again. This time the Elders gave the lesson.  They did an object lesson to start things off. Each person was blindfolded and given a putting golf club. A cup was put against the wall, and we had to try and hit the ball in the cup without being able to see. I had a very lucky shot and was the only one who got it in the cup. Next, we did it without the blindfold. Most of us still did not make it in the cup but were at least closer to it. One of our students got it in the cup. I didn’t even come close. LOL

They related this to how it is sometimes hard in life when we can’t see where we are going. When we have our eye focused on the Savior, it is easier to see where you want to go. The rest of the lesson was about the hardships that many of the Saints experienced when they were being persecuted in the early years of the Church. They held fast to their testimony of Jesus Christ and that helped them get through the hard times. That is so true. If we focus our lives on Jesus Christ, we will find much more joy and happiness, even when we have trials.

Because of several different factors, our DCM meeting was changed from Wednesday to Tuesday this week. After Seminary, we got our snacks ready for our DCM meeting. We had a wonderful DCM and a great training about using the Book of Mormon in our teaching. We also had an introduction before DCM started by a member telling us what we will be doing for the Restoration Devotional on Sunday Evening. It sounds like it is going to be good. I’m very excited about attending. 

After DCM, I took care of some administrative things. We also had Comp Study with the Riverside Elders. It turned out some of our scripture highlights focused on similar themes. That is looking for the positive instead of focusing on the negative. It went along with our Seminary lesson that morning.

Elder and Sister Higgins

We spent most of Wednesday doing prep work for Zone Conference and Seminary lesson prep. We also had another Comp Study with the Hikurangi Elders. We talked about the things we were studying for Zone Conference. We had a nice discussion. It worked out well for me since I had been studying that material that morning. We fed them lunch and talked about Temples during lunch. 

I prepared my Seminary lesson after the Elders left. It was our last lesson for this term. We have a two-week break and then come back for two more weeks before the end of the year. I wanted to make this lesson special. I sent Elder Wilcox out to buy some sweet rolls or something for a treat for the class. I also planned a fun activity for our class. 

Thursday was our 54th Wedding Anniversary! How did we celebrate? We served!!! We started with Early Morning Seminary. We talked about integrity and honesty, especially in school. After we read and discussed several scriptures, we decided to put one of the students on trial to see if there was enough evidence to convict them of being honest and full of integrity at school. I had nine students and made sure everyone had a part. We had a judge, prosecutor, defense attorney, defendant, and 5 witnesses. Each witness reported seeing something that showed the defendant didn’t cheat, or share answers, or sluff on a group project, etc. Then the defendant took the stand and shared several quotes from General Authorities about integrity and honesty and confessed that they try to live that way. In the end, the Judge convicted the defendant of being a disciple of Jesus Christ. After our trial, I asked them to seriously consider how they would fair if they were put on trial for being a disciple of Jesus Christ. 

As soon as Seminary was over, we headed to Auckland for our Zone Conference. They moved the north conference from Friday to Thursday to accommodate all the travel time for the missionaries in the northland. They had to be in Auckland on Wednesday for a missionary council meeting with Elder and Sister Higgins as well as President and Sister Allen for the Mission Tour. Rather than have them go back on Thursday, only to return on Friday it was decided to just switch our Zone Conference to Thursday. That way they could stay overnight with other missionaries and go home on Thursday. The other thing they changed was starting at 10:00am rather than 10:30. Consequently, we were a few minutes late before we arrived. They were just finishing the prayer when we walked into the building, so we didn't really miss anything.

Everything about Conference was great. I loved the three 3-minute talks given by three missionaries who were just called up to speak in the meeting. They were all supposed to be prepared to speak. All three talks were great. We heard beautiful musical numbers, and we heard wonderful training from President and Sister Allen as well as Elder and Sister Higgins. We had a delicious lunch and met a new Senior Couple who will be taking over for Elder and Sister Michaelson. They leave in about a month. We sat with the new couple (Elder and Sister Holmes), the Carlisles, and the Michaelsons. It was great getting to know everyone better.  After group pictures, we headed by for the closing session. 

We heard beautiful testimonies from the leaving missionaries. They are always so touching. We have quite a few who will be leaving.  We had a couple of musical numbers and then closing remarks from Elder and Sister Higgins again. I think we ended around 4:30. After the closing prayer, we sang our farewell songs to the departing missionaries as we all greeted each one to say goodbye. Several people brought candy leis to place on the departing missionaries. I always cry at this part of conference.  Several of our previous missionaries are going home as well as Elder and Sister Michaelson. I’m happy for them, but I’m also going to miss them a lot. 

On Friday we attended the South Zone Conference. It was basically a repeat of Thursday's conference. We heard from three different missionaries. They all spoke in their native languages of Tongan, Samoan, and probably Mandarin. One of the Elders sang a musical number that was so beautiful. I can’t believe his voice. Elder Higgins teased him after he finished saying he wanted to be his manager and make a million dollars with him. It was funny.

We had a different set of missionaries going home from the South area. We knew a couple of them. It was very fun to see so many of our missionaries who used to serve in Whangarei. It was so worth going. 

We ended around 4:30 again, but with Friday night traffic it took over an hour to get back to our temporary flat. We had to pick up some laundry soap so we could wash the sheets and towels before we went home on Saturday.

Saturday had been another long day. We were up pretty early for our 8:30 Temple appointment that morning. Our session was completely full. I’m so glad we were already in Auckland and didn’t have to get up at 4 to get there in time. 6 was early enough. It felt really good to be in the Temple. I think I really needed the peace that I always feel there. Things have been a bit hectic lately.   

We headed back to our temporary flat after the Temple so we could finish cleaning it. We washed the towels and sheets that we used and put them back on the bed or in the cupboard before we left. Our flat was very nice, and we were so happy to be able to use it.

We headed back to Whangarei but had to head straight to Hikurangi for our Song Fest activity that started at 4:00pm. I had to run a report for the Missionaries before the activity, so I was hoping to get their early. We were only 15 minutes early, but it was enough.  

We invited the Te Horo Branch and Punaruku Ward to join us. Everyone did such a great job. We had all kinds of numbers from solos, duets, and line dancing. We had a piano and cello duet by Elder and Sister Carlisle and hula dancing and choral numbers by the Hikurangi Ward. Punaruku did several songs including a medley of popular song tunes with fun words about their Ward. It was great. Elder Wilcox finished the night with one of his weird songs that made everyone laugh. It was a song by Johnny Cash called “Dirty Old Egg Sucking Dog.” We were so tired, we didn't hang around very long before we went home. We still had laundry to do before going to bed.

Sunday was another busy day. Church was great. We had two delightful primary girls give the best talks that morning. They only had to share a scripture, but both girls gave regular talks. They are both 8 years old. One of the girls gave her talk in Māori and then interpreted it into English for the rest of us. We also heard great talks from a sister in our ward and our high council speaker. 

Our primary kids took over the Chapel the second hour in preparation for the Primary Program, so our Sunday School class met in the Primary room. I liked it better than the Chapel. It was much more intimate. We talked about sections 97 through 103. We especially talked about how much the Lord loves us, notwithstanding our sins, He still extends His mercy. 

Elder Wilcox had another meeting after Church, so I worked on some things like the Ward Council Minutes. 

It was later than usual after we got home. Since we had a devotional that night, we decided to have a late lunch/early dinner. Shortly after that, it was time for our Personal Finances Class. I sure love our class. We have so much fun together and we learn things too. 

Not long after our class, we headed to the Stake Center for the Restoration Devotional. All the missionaries had a breakout room where they presented different people that were important in the restoration of the Gospel. They all did a great job. The final piece took place in the Chapel, where Elder Ihaka and Elder Hunter presented the First Vision. I enjoyed the devotional very much.

All our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox