Elder Larson and I had an awesome week! The past three days have been really awesome. Friday we had a Zone Conference, and Saturday and Sunday were Stake Conference for the Whangarei Stake. President and Sister Balli came, and President Going and his wife Matron Going (Hamilton Temple President) came to Stake Conference as well. It was awesome!!
I spoke at the Saturday night session of Stake Conference, with President Going and President Balli. It was an awesome experience. It was cool being in the presence there with Sid Going. He talked about his mission, and about the mission he and his wife went on. He also spoke about his experience as he served in the temple! He's AWESOME! His wife is also a great lady, she talked about how Sid playing for the All Blacks wasn't going to get him into the Celestial Kingdom haha!
Zone Conference was also great, President Balli's youngest son finished his mission about a two weeks ago, and he has been traveling with President and Sister Balli, taking a tour of New Zealand, and participating in Zone Conferences and other meetings. He's an awesome guy. He'll be going to BYU this winter. He served in Mexico somewhere.
Andrew Snowdine is progressing really well. He has began to read from the Book of Mormon every day, and is really starting to grow in his desires. A huge reason he his getting baptized is because he has seen the gospel bless his daughter's life for years, and it has softened his heart. Good man!
It has been cool to see how the Lord has helped strengthen my testimony! There was one day this week where we had two back to back lessons with very anti-Mormon people. They tried to convince us that we were wrong, and that the church was wrong, and they used a whole bunch of different ideas and evidences to try to convince us. At first it was a little bone-rattling, but as the day progressed on, and over the next few days, it was confirmed to me more than once that the Church is true, and that everything is going to be just fine. It's true!
President Balli told a really awesome story in the Saturday night session of Stake Conference. This is how the story goes:
There was a man who stood on top of a very high cliff. As he stood overlooking the cliff, a large gust of wind picked him up and blew him off the cliff. As he was free-falling, he managed to reach out and grab a tree growing out of the side of the cliff. As he was hanging from the tree, he heard a voice which asked,
"Do you believe I created the wind which blew you off the cliff?"
"Yes" the man replied.
The voice asked again, "Do you believe I created the tree you are hanging on?"
"Yes" the man replied again.
Then the voice asked, "Do you believe that I can create a strong enough wind to blow you back on top of the cliff?"
"Yes!" the man answered.
Then there was a long pause, and then voice said, "Then let go."
WHAT AN AWESOME STORY! I love the principle it illustrates. President Balli said there are three things that we need to let go of in order to do the Lord's work.
1. We need to let go of sin - Not large and serious sins, but the sins we commit each day, and previous sins. We need to have faith that through the Atonement we can be forgiven of sins and move forward.
2. We need to let go of fear - he said that when his oldest son was young, they took him to take swimming lessons. After he had gotten the basics down in the shallow end, the teacher asked his son to jump off the diving board. President said his son was terrified to do so, and it took a long time before he got the courage to jump of the diving board. He said his son didn't progress in his swimming until he jumped of the diving board.
3. We need to let go of priorities - To have correct priorities!
At Stake Conference we had a missionary couple from the Hamilton mission come up, and they showed all the american missionaries the score from the byu-virginia game. BYU sounds like they are tearing it to shreds! It was funny to see all the utah elders huddled around this senior man.
It was an awesome week!
I love you all very much, and I'm thankful for you! Keep up the great work, and remember to help each other! Love ya!
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