The Passing of President Nelson, Eric, DCM, and Housing Coordinators

I spent much of the week reflecting on President Russell M. Nelson this week. He has served as the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for the past seven years. And he was sharp as a tack when he died at 101 years old. I think we all thought he would serve until the Savior comes again.  I was really hoping we would get to see him one last time at General Conference, but it was not meant to be. He has been a wonderful President and Prophet of the Church. He has been a fantastic example of lifelong service to the Lord. He was the epitome of being a Peacemaker. He spent his life loving and serving others. He was a renowned heart surgeon in his distinguished career. He was a wonderful husband and father to 10 children. And he touched the hearts of millions around the world as he led the Church. Whatever he did, he did 100%. He will be greatly missed. 

On Monday, we had a nice video call with Sierra. We had a few technical difficulties for some reason, so our call was a bit shorter than usual. I wasn't feeling very well, so we kind of took it easy for most of the day.

I studied section 109 of the Doctrine and Covenants on Tuesday morning.  It is the dedicatory prayer for the Kirtland Temple. I gained a lot of insight. Bottom line is I need to do a better job of preparing myself when I go to the Temple if I want to receive some of the promised blessings from the Lord. 

We had a wonderful comp study with the Riverside Elders after that. After we shared our highlights, we decided to study Jacob 5 from the Book of Mormon. It is the allegory of the Tame and Wild Olive Trees. We spent a lot of time discussing the first half of the chapter and basically just read the second half. All in all, we had a good discussion and shared insights we all found. 

After lunch, we visited Eric from our ward. He lives pretty far out from town. His daughter and son-in-law are in Australia for 10 days, so he is a bit lonely. We said we would check in on him a couple times while they are away. We had a very nice visit with him. I helped Eric with a little problem he thought he was having on his computer in Teams. He uses Teams to talk to her other daughter in England. We did several tests, and everything seemrf to be working just fine. I told him the problem may be on his other daughter's side as his side was working perfectly. It was kind of fun going to his house. He has a very long driveway and about 30 chickens ran to the closest corner of the fence when they saw someone coming up the drive and followed us all the way to the top of the driveway before we turned into the house area. If we slowed down or stopped, they stopped. They were hoping we had some food. They followed us all the way back when it was time to leave. So funny.

We had a wonderful DCM meeting on Wednesday. President and Sister Allen were here to hold interviews with the missionaries after our meetings. Sister Allen attended our District and President Allen attended the South District.  We had a great accountability discussion. Sister Allen then shared some statistics about the Mission and asked if we could help her figure out why there was such a huge increase in new friends from the previous month. We talked about several things that may have contributed to the increase. She took notes to discuss at their MLC meeting in a few days. After our meeting, everyone enjoyed our pineapple upside down cake and other snacks. 

At home, I started on the first of several Seminary lessons I need to prepare for next week. I’m hoping to get them all done this week, so I only have to review them before each lesson. We have a very busy week next week and I’m not sure I’ll have time to prepare them if I don’t get them done this week. 

After I finished that, I took care of a few things for the Bishop before it was time to go to our Book of Mormon Reading group. We had a pretty good turnout again. Some new ones showed up, and we missed a few from last week. We are hoping it will become a habit moving forward. Everyone seems to enjoy it. We have some good discussions.

I studied section 110 on Wednesday morning about the visitations of Jesus, Moses, Elisha, and Elijah to the Saints in the Kirtland Temple. I couldn’t help but think about all the promised blessings in that section that pertain to the Temple of the Lord. Verse 10 says “And the fame of this house shall spread to foreign lands; and this is the beginning of the blessing which shall be poured out upon the heads of my people. Even so. Amen.” I just love that.

For SPF today, we watched the tribute to President Nelson. I enjoyed it very much. The music was beautiful, and the talks were heartfelt. You simply cannot say enough good things about President Nelson. We could feel the Spirit even though we are thousands of miles away.

Shortly after that, the Zone Leaders showed up for our Comp Study with them. Because the tribute was an hour, we had a shorter time with the Elders. However, we had a wonderful discussion about President Nelson and the Temple. We discussed his October 2024 conference talk entitled, “The Lord Jesus Christ Will Come Again.” We focused on the things he said about the Temple. We then shared our thoughts and experiences with the Temple. It was a very spiritually fed experience, and we were all edified after it was over.

On Friday, we spent the morning getting everything ready for our dinner Friday night. The Mission Housing Coordinators (the Hursts, and Elder Seeley and Sister Watson) arrived around 11:20. The Carlisles showed up about 20 minutes later. They decided who was going to stay with whom and separated to the different houses/bedrooms. We got the Hursts, and Elder and Sister Seeley (she goes by Watson) stayed at the Carlisles.

The weather eventually cooperated with us. For a while we weren’t sure. When they went to get their stuff from the van it was pouring rain. By the time we got to Whangarei for the afternoon activities, the sun was shining.

We met at the Sun Dial shop in Whangarei. Elder Wilcox left to give a blessing to Dean, Leona’s foster son who is pretty much bedridden. Leona said he wasn’t doing very well today. The Hursts were with us, and we watched the mechanical clock for a while. Then we headed to The Quay restaurant for lunch. The Carlisles, Watson, and Seeley showed up right after that. We ordered our food. I called Elder Wilcox to see what he wanted. It took a while before they brought out the food. They no sooner set Elder Wilcox’s lunch down, than when he showed up. Perfect timing.

After lunch, we walked around the harbor for a while. Next, we headed to the Boat Shed, which is a nice souvenir shop. After we finished shopping, we headed to Whangarei Falls. We took a nice hike around the falls. Some of us hiked longer than others. Elder Wilcox and I were the two who didn’t hike as long as the others. LOL I actually went pretty far, but between my foot, and my back, I finally gave up.

We stopped by Bunnings on our way back to our flat so the Hursts can buy some bins they need. We used them on Saturday to help pack up the Russell Road flat.

We had Hawaiian Haystacks for dinner and brownies and ice cream for dessert. We played a very fun game called Bank for a while. I came in second or third. Sister Carlisle was the other second or third. I think I was third. Elder Hurst won by a LONG SHOT. We all had a lot of fun.

Saturday was a long and busy day. We were up early to fix breakfast for our guests. The Carlisles came early to make waffles while we fried bacon, baked hash browns, and scrambled eggs. Everyone seemed to enjoy it and we had a lovely conversation over breakfast.

We were on the road by 8:45 to clean out the Russell Road flat in Punaruku. With eight of us working we were done in about 2 hours. We were a little behind everyone so we could take care of cleaning up from breakfast and then picking up the Carlisles since they had to take their left-over batter home. And we didn't have a lot of parking space at the flat.

There was a slight problem when we got there. The Russell Road driveway is a NIGHTMARE, especially if you are driving a big van and pulling a trailer as Elder Hurst was doing. Elder Seeley was in another van, but there was no trailer. Somehow, Elder Hurst got into the mud on the right side of the driveway while he was trying to back into the driveway. When we got there, they hooked the other van up to Elder Hurst’s van and tried to pull him out. Apparently, that didn’t quite work but it helped. With a little back and forth and turning the wheels, he was able to get traction and got the van where it needed to be. Whew!!!!

It didn’t take long to load the furniture into the two vans and pack up the kitchen. I went to wash the drawers and cupboard only to find out there was no water. They have water tanks, and they were basically empty. There were two big jugs of water left in the flat, so we used that to wet some towels so we could wash the drawers and cupboards. It worked pretty well. We swept and vacuumed and we were done. We took some pictures, hugged everyone and said our goodbyes. They headed back to Auckland, and we took the Carlisles home. Not long after that the rain came, and it poured for a while. We were blessed both Friday and Saturday to do what we wanted to do and what we needed to do without any rain. ❤️

Before going home, we stopped by to check in with Eric again. He appreciated the visit, and we enjoyed our time with him. After about an hour, we headed home.

Once home, I started on study and Seminary lessons. I need to prepare a lesson for Wednesday because Leona had to work. I also needed to prepare my next Thursday lesson today. Surprisingly, the lesson prep went very well.

Sunday was an extra spiritual day for me. I don’t know if it was because President Nelson was on everyone’s mind and in the testimonies that were born. We had a very uplifting Ward Council in the morning. I think it started with our training from Kea about Sustaining our Leaders. All our testimonies were very heartfelt and testified of the love and leadership of President Nelson and of course all that our Savior has bless us with. I think I cried halfway through our Sunday School class too. We talked about the tremendous blessings that come from the Temple. That, of course, led to all the Temples that President Nelson has announced and how so many have been dedicated since he became the President. It was all just a very tender and spiritual day.

Once home, I took care of a few things for the Bishop as well as studied another talk by President Nelson in my scripture study. It was the talk he gave in the April 2023 General Conference called, “The Answer Is Always Jesus Christ.” It is such a simple statement but so true. No matter what the question or problem is, the answers IS always Jesus Christ. I would save myself heartache and frustration if I would just remind myself first to look to Jesus for the answer instead of wallowing through the frustration or trial.

Sister Wilcox, Elder Wilcox, Elder Seeley, 
Sister Watson, Sister Carlisle, Elder Carlisle,
Sister Hurst, and Elder Hurst

After almost finishing my weekly recap, we had to go to a special meeting with the Stake Presidency. It was for the Hikurangi and Denby Wards. They realigned the boundaries between the two Wards and gave Hikurangi a large chunk of the Denby Ward. It is the coastal area that is fairly sparce, but there are a number of active families in the area. It should really help to boost our Ward enthusiasm as well as our active numbers.

All our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox