ZONE CONFERENCE: PHOENIX N/DEER VALLEY 5/14

 PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINE FOR ALL PHOTOS OF THIS EVENT!

Our second day of ZONE CONFERENCES was in Phoenix North Stake with that zone and the Deer Valley Zone.
Zone Conferences are a chance for us to train with a couple zones at a time and they are a real favorite of the missionaries.

President Taylor started the day with a doctrinal discussion about THE HOLY GHOST.  Look in the Bible Dictionary under "Holy Ghost" to really learn more about the many roles of this member of the Godhead.  It was the perfect introduction to our entire day...we kept coming back to the role of the Holy Ghost in our daily lives.

Our wonderful Executive Secretaries in the Mission Presidency, the Kings, shared their testimonies and encouraged all missionaries to turn in copies of medical insurance cards and email addresses for our database.
They keep us organized and are the best people in the world!

As is customary,  in Zone Conferences, we have HEALTH PRESENTATIONS, where I train on common health issues.
Today was BACK, NECK, ANKLE and KNEE!

Our wonderful Assistants, Elders Weiler and Bryant, introduced the topic with a skit.

 And President Taylor had his own solution...rather than
Rest
Ice
Compress
Elevate

He says "I have a rusty hacksaw and I'm not afriad to use it!"
Yes, he is holding a bloody foot!

 We had a beautiful musical number by one of the zones...

 ...with Elder Longhurst on piano!
Music brings the Spirit into our meetings (Especially after something like a health presentation)


Next we discussed FAMILY HISTORY AS A MISSIONARY TOOL and talked more about the booklets your missionary should be asking you to help gather information for!  MY FAMILY:STORIES THAT BRING US TOGETHER booklets are available at Church Distribution and along with FAMILYSEARCH.ORG are a great tool for members to invite friends to learn about the Gospel.
We shared a couple of great videos of missionaries with ideas on how to do that.  GREAT DISCUSSION!

 Lunch is a favorite time of day to visit with old friends and make new ones.  We always forget that President and I are about the only ones who really know all the missionaries in the Mission.  Unless you serve in the same zone as other missionaries, you don't get much chance to interact.

 After lunch, we first sing our thank you song to the wonderful ward/stake helpers who provided lunch, and then we rush in to sing our MISSION FIGHT SONG!
Missions are encouraged to develop a strong "esprit de corp" and this rousing song does a good job of encouraging that!  They love it so much!

We celebrated our MAY BIRTHDAYS!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO:
me ;)
Elder Thomas
Elder Shin
Elder Sharon

 We sing in English and then in any languages of our missionaries.  Today we had Korean, Spanish, Norwegian, Navajo...
(The Portuguese by our two Visa-Waiting Elders headed to Brazil one of these sad days, Elders Thomas and Stults)

 ...and we heard for the first time ever, President Taylor sing the Venezuelan Birthday Song!!!  The missionaries loved it!





Here are the great DEER VALLEY and PHOENIX NORTH ZONES!
Front: Sisters Brown, Moore, Magee, Connell, Brewer, Wooden, Jenson, E Walker, Meyer, Coleman, and Sister and President Taylor.  Standing on fllor: Elders Parsons, Leonhardt, Baker, Thomas, Stults, Burbank, A Smith, Shin, Allen, Handley, Linkogle, Salas, J Hall and Luke.  Sitting Stage:  Elders Barrus, Jeong, Elliott, Ure, J Cook, Parks, Goldsberry, Sillcock and Canny.  Back:  Elders Murdock, Kirk, James, Lower, Wainwright, Sharon, Burton, Longhurst and T Anderson.

After lunch, we had the Assistants train on NIGHTLY PLANNING...sorry I missed a photo.  I am often taking care of medical when I am not teaching so I miss some things.

My next training was on SPIRITUAL AWAKENINGS.  Pretty much, all I can say is I WISH YOU COULD HAVE BEEN HERE!!
I began with the story of Alma the Younger and his experience of a powerful spiritual awakening...and then invited your missionary to open up and share one of their spiritual awakenings...oh, my...when they started sharing it was a spiritual feast.  They felt so safe, that they were sharing very personal and sweet aspects of their conversions.  It was an experience that I have not had yet on this mission and one for which I will be eternally grateful.
I had an awakening myself just recognizing the power of the Spirit in conversion and witnessing to me the potential of these great young people and who they are, who they represent and where they can go with that!
It was most interesting to be in front and to watch the missionaries as others were speaking.  There was one elder in particular that I could tell the Spirit was really working on.  It was apparent in his facial expression and body language.  He finally stuck up his hand to share an powerful experience in his life.  I told him later that if he had not volunteered, I would have been constrained to ask him to share something, it was that obvious to me as facilitator. Very Powerful Spirit!!  Ask your missionary about their feelings on this day!  We discussed the common elements that had made an impact in each persons awakening experience...things like reading the scriptures, praying, someone else praying for us or asking us questions, a trial, being humble, having desire, having to defend our faith, etc. etc. Think about some of your experiences and how they came to be.  It is fascinating!

President Taylor put the frosting on the cake by teaching the the TEACHING MODEL taught to us by Elder Bednar and which I had just used in the previous discussion.  This model, based on PATTERNS in teaching from the Savior and in the scriptures, teaches us the principles and patterns I photographed from our discussion.
It is totally "HANDS-ON" teaching and learning and I testify that it works.  The new Sunday School program is based on this kind of teaching.  We come prepared to learn, we ask good questions and have a safe environment where there are no wrong answers and the SPIRIT IS THE TRUE TEACHER!
This Gospel, this Doctrine of Christ, is the only way we can be truly happy and have lasting family relationships.  I testify that anything we can do to share this with others is a valiant effort.  Today we recognized that the natural reaction of one truly converted is to TURN OUTWARD and to try to share it with those that spiritual eyes now recognize as brothers and sisters.  We pray that your spiritual eyes will also be opened and you can help wake up someone else!  Have a great week!  Sister Taylor