A wonderful start to the month on the Feb. 1, 2023 doing 2 ER trainings with our young missionaries. We are getting to know these young folks better and better and loving them more and more.
Bunbury District (Rockingham Zone) ER Lesson #3
Rockingham and Mandurah Districts (Rockingham Zone) Feb. 1, 2023
Como district (Southern River Zone) and Thornlie and Cloverdale completing Lesson #3 about healthy relationships Feb. 8, 2023
We did a couple sister's over zoom on the 10th because one was sick.
We developed Lesson 4, the last of our set of ER trainings: "Finding balance in your life and going forward with faith" Five weeks training of this lesson, and then we will start over on lesson #1. Some great new missionaries are coming in. We are now up to 108 missionaries including the 6 senior couples.
North Coast District (North Coast Zone) Feb. 24, 2023 The Elder on the top right is Elder Wright, President Gordon B. Hinkley's great grandson.
Joondalup and Heathridge Districts (North Coast Zone) Feb. 24 ER Lesson #4
Feb. 14, 2023
On Feb. 14th, we zoomed with Devin and Janill and had marriage training 2 out of 5 (part of our wedding gift). It is so fun! I saw this license plate while we were driving and I thought it was cool, even though the spelling is different Janill. We are loving getting to know our new family member Devin.
Morning Tea with Sister Gayle Grinceri, who wanted me to meet some of her non-member friends on Valentine's Day for her non-member sister's birthday. A very inspired connection as I was able to meet Trish Berryman, on the far left. (More about her to come)
We had a very sad experience happen this month with disobedience. One of the sisters who was to be in our departing missionary seminar was sent home early, along with a Zone leader, who was due to go home next transfer. That same week, President was apprised of elders and sisters texting each other, and breaking numerous rules that required some very frank counsel and more definitive rules. He gave very direct, clear counsel. We were super sad for many of the new missionaries who were companions of those who were disobedient. This was one of the saddest things we have experienced on the mission so far.
February 20, 2023 We gave our fifth departing missionary seminar today. We had 2 of the top cream of crop missionaries. Sister Holthe and Elder Cooke.
This is a recording of his incredible story and testimony. He was born in Russia. (20 minutes long)
These is our WSR team that is in Eastern Australia. Riki, Tukukino, our regional self-reliance manager, the Smith's and the McClellins. We have some awesome meetings 3-4 times a month.
We attended 3 stake conferences this month. Rockingham got a new stake president.
President Semu has been married for 10 years. He has previously served as a bishop. He has 4 children, the oldest is 8, then 5, 3 and 7 months. His favorite movie is "The Fighting Preacher". He said he might be "the crying preacher". He said "publicly and privately, I teach of Christ." "My family is first." The picture on the right includes Elder Mora (area seventy) on the left and Elder Wakolo (from area presidency) on the right.
We want to share a story from President Stone's talk (our mission president). He has a twin brother. They both were called to serve missions in England, but in two different missions. They had a healthy competition with how many baptisms each of their missions had. The first year, they both had about 120 baptisms. The second year President Stone's mission had about 120 baptisms. But his brother's mission had 1000 baptisms. How on earth did they get that many baptisms. The difference was that in his brother's mission, they were not allowed to teach a 2nd lesson without a member present. President Stone then announced the 5th indicator that has been added to the mission. There had been four indicators. Two more have just been added. Indicators are points of progress that the missionaries track: #1: People found #2 People coming to church #3: Have accepted invitations for baptism. #4: People baptized The new ones: Indicator #5: Lessons taught with a member participating. #6: Attendance at sacrament for 1 year after baptism.
CALLING ALL MEMBERS: Please be willing to participate in discussions for non-members with the missionaries. It will help in conversion and retention of new converts.
At our Southern River evening session of Stake Conference, we met Wendy, one of the sisters from the Narogin Branch who participated from afar on our zoom Emotional Resilience course. We were so excited to meet her in person for the first time. We also realized that we were traveling to Narogin the next weekend to speak in her branch. She wanted to know if there was any food we couldn't or didn't eat as they always plan a meal for visiting speakers. She told us the Branch President, President Cowley was the adopted son of the late apostle Matthew Cowley (of the quorum of the 12), who went on a mission to New Zealand and later became the mission president there. We were pumped to be able to meet him and hear all about his life. Unfortunately, when we visited the branch, he was sick that day. He is 84 years old. We learned that his dad (Matthew Cowley, died when he was 15 years old. The only other child the Cowley's had was a daughter that was 15 years older than President Cowley. We googled a talk about Matthew Cowley and read it as we traveled in the car. It was fascinating. Matthew Cowley served a 5 year mission in New Zealand as a young man. He translated the Book of Mormon in Maori.
My next Stake conference story and highlight was President Richard's talk. He is the stake President in our stake (North Coast) and is also in our ward. I am good friends with his wife and hear a lot of fun stories. One of them is about her son who just returned from his mission, in Brisbane Australia, and was in the same mission that President Holland's grand daughter is in. Elder Holland came and did a fireside in his mission. Jacob asked a question about what the the 12 apostles thought about something and he used the words "you guys". Elder Holland raked him over the coals for being disrespectful in his casual use of "you guys." Jacob was so embarrassed. President Holland's granddaughter was evidently embarrassed as well, and sent Jacob an apology. Since their mission, she has been emailing Jacob and has expressed interest in dating him. I will keep you updated (funny pun) yet.
Anyway, President Richards gave the best analogy. He talked about learning to play Scrabble. He and his wife are very competitive. He was just playing with his family who played a lot, doing his best, trying to win the game. (He called this Telestial playing). And then he learned that there were rules that could change the outcome of the game quite substantially (like counting the left over letters, subtracting them for your score and adding them onto your opponent's score at the end of the game.) That's how his family played, using planning, strategy, knowledge. But their purpose was still to wipe everyone else out. (He labelled this Terrestial playing) But then he learned about how President Nelson and Wendy Nelson play, which he called Celestial playing because they do not play competitively, but they help each other.
So we now are adding Scrabble to our couple's games. (We have had fun playing gospel scrabble on Sundays with some of our grandchildren)
Our tomato plants are growing. I have been thinking of the key indicators relating to healthy tomato plants. I would like this to become a talk, and life analogy. We had to add soil as there is only sand in this spot of earth. We have had to add fertilizer, lots of water. The plants are growing and there are lots of little tomatoes, but I am concerned about some of the branches dying.
Introducing you to my physical challenge for February:
I was swimming in our pool, and I scooped up a flower bud from the water, and this snarky little bee put this humongous stinger into my index finger tip. Man, that hurt like the dickins. It took a few weeks for the swelling and pain to go away. A couple nights the pain woke me up.
My brother Doug, and his wife, Marcia are serving a mission in Holland, where Doug and my Dad also served as young missionaries. They found a goldmine - some pictures of my Dad when he was in Holland. These are priceless. How I miss my Dad!!!! I think of him often and praise my parents with all my heart and soul. I love them so much. My good looking Dad is in the middle. I'm so glad Elder Kahmann got to meet my Dad and Mom before my Dad died. I will never forget the happiness in my Dad's face when he came into our home for the first time after we were married and saw the happy life that we had been blessed with together.
Standing up. What a handsome dude!
Our Australia angel! Our adopted daughter. She is my daughter, Hannah's age.
Hannah and our granddaughter, Joanna, have become dear friends.
I was telling Cindy how many things she has accomplished, conquered, overcome, and become. She sent me this meme. She teaches us so much about love, dedication, and never giving up. We had her darling family (brother and parents) over for dinner and games. It was a delightful evening. We forgot to take a picture. She said that might have been our only chance. I told her we will get one of them when they are baptized. She doesn't see that happening, but we can. They are so kind.
We enjoyed dinner and introduced our wonderful new Senior Missionary couple, the Smiths from Logan, to the ocean. Together they manage mission housing. Sister Smith is also the mission nurse. We work closely together tackling the physical and mental challenges of missionaries.
This is a fun picture of a party of people who creatively made their own table and chairs out of the sand.
This is our sweet Oxana, from Russia who took out her endowments in the temple on February 3, 2023.
For a P-Day, we visited the Perth Mint. Super Fun!
This guy demonstrated melting bulk gold into liquid and making it into a solid bar of gold. This is one of the pots that finally burned through.
This huge coin with Queen Elizabeth engraved on it is a million dollar coin, but worth about $88 million in gold value today. It weigh's over a ton. It's huge. They have high security and lower it down into a vault at the end of each day.
On of the largest gold nugget found in Western Australia
The kiln that purifies GOLD through the furnace of affliction. The melting point of gold is 1,948 degrees fahrenheit. The boiling point is 5,173 degrees fahrenheit. Gold is the most malleable of all metals. An ounce of gold can be beaten out to 187 square feet. Gold leaf can be beaten thin enough to become transparent.
One last super special story. I, (Sister Kahmann) have been working with a sister (I will call her Sister Belle) in the mission who struggles with pretty severe social anxiety. Zone conferences have been the biggest challenge for her because of all the people. She had prepared for the upcoming zone conference and felt pretty well armed and excited. She totally enjoyed the morning and was feeling so good. She had been reaching out to people and was not feeling as self-conscious and anxious. The last thing that was done in the afternoon is what they call Real Play. This is where the missionaries practice their teaching and doctrinal points with each other. They usually split up and do this in small groups. In this mission all missionaries are expected to memorize the 42 doctrinal points from Preach My Gospel lessons, 1, 2, and 3. For this particular zone conference, President Stone asked all the missionaries that had their doctrinal points memorized to raise their hands. Then, to have them prove it, and to their surprise, he had all those who raised their hands come to the front to be quizzed. Belle did not raise her hand. But everyone was asked to come to the front. A big wheel that spins and lands on any one of the 42 doctrinal points from lesson 1, 2 or 3 was put on up on a big screen. Each of the missionaries were given the opportunity to have the wheel spun to random doctrinal point headings and to quote from memory the doctrinal points out loud to the whole group. Many of the missionaries where quite embarrassed when they were caught off guard by not being able to quote them when the president had seen them raise their hand. He was extremely disappointed with the Zone leaders, trainers, and those who had been out for well over a year. What causes our President more frustration than when missionaries are not obeying rules and expectations, is when they lie about it. When it was Sister Belle's turn, and she couldn't quote the point the wheel landed on from lesson 3, they spun it again for her. Again it landed on a point from lesson three. The president asked her if she had learned lesson 3. She admitted that she didn't know lesson 3 points yet. President told her as she was standing there in front of everyone, that she needs to do better. She was so embarrassed that she began to cry which led to complete humiliation. She tried to turn her face away from the group to hide her tears. She was ready to die. President Stone had her try another point from lesson 1. She clearly knew this one, but by now she could not focus at all or hardly remember her own name.
Elder Kahmann and I had left the conference before this occurred, so we didn't see it happen, but I had seen how President had done it in the other 3 zones. She called me that night and told me what happened. She could not get over her embarrassment and humiliation. And her personal six week interview with the President was happening the next day. She was beside herself. In my mind, I was kind of thinking, "Oh, president, of all the people to chastized in front of the group, NOT her!!!" She is the sweetest sister. Long story short, in my talk with her she admitted that she wasn't as prepared as she should have been. She struggled with being a trainer. I helped her process the pain, encouraged her to talk to President in her interview and tell him her feelings, but also commit to him that she desires to do better, and will. I said, "Your best plan of action is to get back in the saddle and shine." She committed to do that. I told her, "In, fact, I have decided to memorize them myself, before the next zone conference, and I will help and support you." So for almost 6 weeks, we both have been busting our brains, preparing for the next zone conference, by memorizing the doctrinal points, knocking them out one by one. We have had some good talks and some good laughs. I told her, "Sister Belle, when you have passed to the next life, it is NOT going to written on your tombstone: "Here lies Sister Belle, who messed up on her doctrinal points in Zone Conference." This is such an unimportant thing in eternity!" "Maybe this: "Here lies Sister Belle, who took responsibility when she messed up and turned it into an opportunity to learn, change, grow, and get back in the saddle and shine. And shine she did! Just like Gold!"
Tune in to the March Blog post to see how the Zone Conference experience turns out for Sister Belle and Sister Kahmann, and learn the rest of the story.
A concluding gold nugget thought shared by Miriam Johnson in one of our precious conversations with children:
"I am trying to renew my baptismal covenant each Sunday by partaking of the sacrament by immersion."
Love you all! Thank you for taking time to check in every so often. We pray for our family and loved ones heaps, and appreciate you so much!
Excellent post, I’m so happy for you guys.
Love Dave