Elder Dance, New Zealand Hamilton Mission

  Highlights this week: 1. Meeting his new companion, Elder Smith 2.  Meeting the members 3. Nerf wars in his flat with his companions 4. Bearing his testimony in church 5. Fun cultural ward party on Friday—so much food, super loud music, cultural dance show  6. Leaving the MTC “prison” 7. Finally eating good Samoan, Polynesian food 8. Moving into a super nice “flat” Challenges this week: 1. Losing a person they were teaching from a hard experience  2. Getting the door slammed in their face 3. Door knocking rejection

The fact that it has been almost three weeks since I left home for New Zealand is crazy to think about! The amount of memories and friends I have made here is incredible.  Aside from all of the fun that I have had in the past few weeks and all the rugby I have played, I have learned so many lessons that have changed my life and grown my testimony which I can use to help change other's lifes and bring them unto christ.  As I leave this training experience behind, and move to the field, I am so excited to share all my adventures and experiences I will  have over my mission with all of you!   I just want all of you to know that your Savior loves you so much and is always there for you! He is there for you in your trials, when you feel alone, and he suffered spiritual and physical death as an act of love and compassion towards all of us so that we can be saved and redeemed  through him.  I know that if we have faith and turn to christ in our lowest of lows...

Evan got special permission to call and chat with Mom for her bday yesterday.  Best birthday gift ever! Then Evan called again tonight for his weekly p-day call.  We got to chat with him from our date at the fair.  He was pretty jealous of our good food.  He is sad to say goodbye to his MTC buddies this week, but he will not miss the food, haha.  Highlights this week: 1. Learning to play rugby 2. Getting better at teaching  3. Having fun at night—messing with the Tongan kids in the halls 4. Having fun in class 5. Getting a haircut 6.  Favorite thing to teach: repentance and faith 7. He has all the principles and lessons memorized  Challenges this week: 1. Final assessment for teaching 2. Being sick with a cold 3. Trying to eat the bad food 4. Learning to teach about the pre-mortal life 5. Someone stealing his markers

Dear friends and family, It has only been two weeks and my life has literally flipped 🙃!  Throughout this experience almost every aspect of my life has changed. From little things like sleep schedule to what I wear. Other than the little things my life that has changed my life has changed in big ways too! like having little time to myself, and how busy my day is.  However, the biggest aspect that has changed in my life is my testimony of this restored gospel and the book of Mormon.   I have found that reading the book of Mormon whenever I have a little bit of time to myself during the morning or at night I not only learn more and more about it but I learn just how truly amazing this book is. This week my mtc district has started doing practice for teaching with variety of scenarios . One of these scenarios we have been practicing is when someone asks a question like, "what is that book?" Or "what is special about it".  From this, we answer by talking about the ...

Evan said he’s getting really good at volleyball.  The food is not great, and he misses mom’s cooking—“The beans are flavorless.”  He’s super upbeat and positive and loving his MTC experience!  He says he’s hardly been homesick this week.  He’s had a really productive week.  He says the Auckland Temple is the prettiest he’s been in.   Highlights this week: 1. Going to the temple  2.  His testimony of the Book of Mormon growing 3. Teaching lessons, giving a talk on the Restoration Challenges this week: 1. Teaching a lesson for the first time “Things have been so good and the spirit is so strong, I can’t think of any other challenges.  Preaching the gospel, you forget all the bad moments.”

Dear family and friends, Wow! It has already been nearly a week in the mtc and now I am sending my first email home. How time flies.  Over the past week I have already had an amazing experience at the MTC and despite the food 🤢, I have had many amazing spiritual experiences and I have felt my testimony grow in such incredible ways  One of the things that has grown my testimony is realizing that I will be spending 24/7 serving the lord!  The realization of this has not only given me more joy to serve a mission but it has also made my day to day life better. It has made me become  more accountable with morning and evening study and it also has given me inspiration to pray whenever I have the time and opportunity to pray! Because of this my testimony of Jesus Christ has strengthened and has made me more excited to serve!🙌 I am so excited to build my testimony more and more each day and to continue you to send you all emails of the experiences that I have in the f...

We had our very first call with Elder Dance today!  He called around 4 pm (10 am NZ time).He has been in the Auckland MTC for 4 days now.  He will leave for the mission office on September 4th.  It was so good to talk to him!  He loves his MTC president, President Young from SLC.  He and his companion lucked out with a big missionary married couple room and a big bathroom—he’s living in the lap of luxury.  He also scored a seat with a lot of leg room on his long flight.  Evan’s Highlights this week: 1. Walking past the temple on the MTC grounds 2. Meeting his companion, Elder Moody, from Maryland,  and meeting other new friends from Australia, Tonga, South Korea, Canada 3. Playing sports—soccer with the Tongan missionaries  Spiritual Highlights: 1. Realizing what life will be like as missionary 2. Devotionals 3. Prayer and study with his companion  Biggest Challenge this week: 1. Stressed about not getting Facebook messenger to work to b...