Splendor of Dawn
Kona March 4 – 10
A warm Aloha dear family and friends!
We just realized that all you ‘mainlanders’ have moved
another hour away from us with the beginning of Daylight Saving Time. To us, it seems simpler to just go one way or
the other permanently and quit changing the clock twice a year. Hawaii does not participate in DST but our
clock radio thinks we do, so now we have to double check the time to make sure
we don’t get up before we have to.
Another week has hurried past and we enjoyed the opportunity
to serve in the temple with the Saints from the Lahaina 1st Ward in
Maui. It was good to greet many familiar
faces we’ve served with during their previous two visits since we arrived last
May.
On Thursday, they completed their morning sessions and had
left for lunch. We were completing our office tasks and preparing for the
afternoon schedule when the doorbell rang.
Yes, the Kona Hawaii Temple does have a doorbell! Due to our small size and limited staffing,
we usually lock the entry doors after scheduled sessions begin and rely on the
doorbell between sessions. In this case,
there were two young men from the Lahaina 1st Ward with a box of Subway
sandwiches, chips and cookies for the Presidency, Matrons, Sister Elwood and
myself, compliments of the Bishop! It
was a sweet and welcome gesture that symbolizes the love and generosity of the
Saints we have the blessing of serving with in the Temple.
Saturday afternoon, we packed a bag, left our apartment and
headed for the Hilo-side of the Island to fill our speaking assignments at two
more Big Island wards. We had been
invited to stay overnight at the home of the First Counselor in the Presidency
and his wife to avoid the need to arise early on Sunday morning for the two and
a half hour drive to Hilo. They live in
a town called Kea’au on the outskirts of Hilo, spending the week serving in the
temple in Kona then returning to their home in Kea’au during the weekends.
Harvesting Oranges
Harvesting Bananas
Mountain Apple Blossoms
They are such wonderful hosts and have been a blessing to
serve with them in the Temple. Each week
when they return to Kona, they always bring us a bag filled with whatever fruit
is in season (which is usually year-round); oranges, bananas, lemons, and
pineapple! In addition to spending Saturday
evening with our gracious hosts, we were able to visit the source of all those
bags of fruit! The bounty of this land is remarkable!
This morning, we visited the Keaukaha Ward at 9:00 am and
the Ainaola Ward at 11:00. While we organized
and printed our talks when we began this ‘speaking tour’, we seldom give exactly
the same message each time we speak.
Sister Elwood speaks on the topic of “I Love to See the Temple” while my
subject is “The Temple, A Priority.”
We are always pleased to see many of the Ordinance Workers
and Patrons that we have come to know and love during their service in the
temple when we visit their home wards.
They greet us like family (‘Ohana) and make us welcome. We have visited 6 wards now and have only 3 more
wards to visit.
What we know of in English as “The Big Island”, is called “Ka
Mokupuni Nui” in the Hawaiian language. This
really is a ‘Big’ island and our journey this weekend was over 230 miles
roundtrip! The variety and diversity of
this island is amazing with eleven of the earth’s thirteen climate zones. We had a safe and pleasant trip around the
southern part of this beautiful land, plus our trusty Buick delivered over 31
MPG!
We are looking forward to catching up on a little sleep this
coming week as we return to our regular temple schedule. Hopefully, we will be able to store some of
this energy because on March 19th, we will begin two weeks of visits
by four wards from Maui. Perhaps the
blessings and opportunities we receive from temple service explain why time is
going by so quickly. In any case, we are
so blessed to be able to serve in this very special place!
Love and Aloha from Paradise!
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