Looking Forward

(Our own photo of the new years sky tower fireworks from our flat)
 As we move into a new year we typically spend a bit of time remembering the past and then looking to the future year ahead.  Remembering is good for us, we learn much from our own experiences and the lives of others, and from history… 
George Santayana said, Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” (Reason in Common Sense, vol. 1 of The Life of Reason [1905–1906]). 
But sometimes we people do more than just remember, we try to LIVE in the past.   We all remember, in our own lives or the life of someone we know, times when months or years after, we are still trying to live in the past…  
in our high school days, in the memory of a by-gone relationship, in a glory day or event, in an old tradition, 
or even a painful time when we may have been done wrong, offended or hurt, and we keep reliving it, 
wanting it to be made right, and we won’t let it go.   

Don’t know if it was the beginning of a new year when Lot and his wife were told to “look not behind thee”…but she “looked back”, and it was not sweet, but pretty salty.  We loved the explanation Elder Jeffrey R. Holland gave as he spoke to some University students at the beginning of New Year in 2009 (BYU Speeches):

“Lot’s wife ….wasn’t just looking back; in her heart she wanted to go back. It is possible that Lot’s wife looked back with resentment toward the Lord for what He was asking her to leave behind…So it isn’t just that she looked back; she looked back longingly. In short, her attachment to the past outweighed her confidence in the future.”

This is a time of year when many of us write down resolutions, things we want to resolve to change or do better.  Maybe we know we need a change, or there is something we need to change, or maybe we may have even experienced, for a time, a “mighty change of heart”
…and we want it back.   
So, we resolve, in a New Year’s resolution, TO CHANGE.  
But then we find ourselves “going back”, getting busy with the same routine or the comfort of our old cozy ways, and we find we have wandered back to the same old ways.  
An old New Year’s song ,“Ring Out Wild Bells”, speaks of letting go of the old when it says, “The years is dying, let it die.”
How do we let go, change and not look back?  One of the first things that has to change is  OUR FOCUS…where our heart and eyes and mind feast and spend their time.  
Who and what is your focus?  And in that focus are you looking forward to the future with faith, or back with fear or envy and doubt.

Found a few quotes on looking forward:
“If you don’t leave the past in the past, it will destroy your future.  Look what’s in front of you, not what yesterday took away.  The best is yet to come.” – George Strait

“Don’t look back…you’re not going that way.”-anon.

Denis Waitley said: “Don’t dwell on what went wrong.  Instead, focus on what to do next.  Spend your energies on moving forward finding the answer.”

 If Cinderella had gone back to pick up her shoe, she never would have become a princess.

“As the year comes to an end don’t look back at yesterdays disappointment.  Look ahead to God’s promises yet to unfold.”  Buky Ojelabi

“Our destiny is not defined by the number of times we stumble, but by the number of times we rise up, dust ourselves off, and move forward.” -Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Johnny Cash said: …. Close the door on the past.  You don’t try to forget the mistake, but you don’t dwell on it.  You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.”


Its time to move on, to make the changes we resolve to make, to focus on our faith and our future, a day at a time.  

We lost a great prophet (and we testify he was called of God as a prophet) to heaven this past week. 
 President Thomas S. Monson taught great lessons in his life on looking ahead with faith.  He said: "Your future is a bright as your faith".   We pay tribute to an incredible servant of God.

Some of the Sunday meetings we attended on December 31 were in Mt. Roskill.  It's the home of Billie, one of our great YSA's from the University.  She is one of those studying to be a doctor.  She also works security and customs for the cruise ship port in Auckland.

One of the big ships in Billies port (the ships are a constant fascination to Elder Downs)

The holidays around here go on for two weeks and the beaches are usually full.  Here is a picture of the beach at Wenderholm.  Notice the acres and acres of sand.

 This past week New Zealand endured a pretty big storm.       

The beaches that had been full of sun and holiday campers and water lovers, cleared pretty fast when they a storm and dangerous tide alert.  People fled and didn’t look back.  Timing was such that some of the beaches experienced a “King Tide” in addition to the storm tide.   

(These two photos are from the New Zealand Herald) 

The ocean overflowed her banks spilling into nearby parks and covering roads.

Umbrellas were a must for all but the dogs.

Ocean, ocean everywhere.

This is the boat launch on Takapuna beach...you usually have to back down a ways to launch a boat.

The top picture is of the king tide and storm tide right up to and over the gates onto the lawns of the beach front homes. The acres and acres of usual sand disappeared under water.

The picture below is a day or two after...sand now back but full of debri, and a water line up on the grass where the water, now gone, reached in the storm.

Met this huge leonberger dog who was scouting the beach debri just like we were.

So what do you do after a big storm...you get together with some other senior missionaries and eat cookie pizza.  :)

On our beach debri hunt we made it our focus to find stranded creatures, like this sand dollar, that needed
to get back into their wet ocean home quick.

On the lighter side 2 positive notes:Found someone (or something) taller than Vance.

And ears of corn are now down to the lowest of the low prices, only $1 an ear, that's only $12 a dozen ;(

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Pictures of (l to r) Top: Keli,      Lou and baby Stanley

Top: Isi and several beautiful YSA's in the Tongan ward

A few nice moments from the week:

1.  As we walked into our first church meeting we realized it was a Tongan speaking ward. No turning back (keep moving forward-right).  But as we sat down who do we find ends up at the pulpit to briefly speak but one of our great YSA's who is headed on a mission and we thought we had missed seeing him and wishing him luck...yup...KELI!  (the first picture on the left is Keli.) Pretty sweet! THOTL for sure!

2.  (Vance will be embarrassed) During the big storm we had to go out for something and Vance dropped me off at the entrance to a store to keep from being drenched and blown away, when I came back out he had parked the car, got out his umbrella and gone out to help a young mother and her kids stay dry while they tried to get loaded into their car.

3.  As a young speaker in church was moved to tears, an much older woman in the congregation stepped quietly forward to hand the speak her handkerchief.  Simple but sweet. 

This is the YSA Sunday School Class in the Waterview Stake Ward we attended on Sunday.  Aren't they beautiful!!!  And they are all bio-lingual (except Elder and Sister Downs)!

We’ll end  where we began with another quote from Jeffrey R. Holland about new years and new starts and not looking back but moving forward:

 “So, as a new year starts and we try to benefit from a proper view of what has gone before, I plead with you not to dwell on days now gone, 
nor to yearn vainly for yesterdays, however good those yesterdays may have been. 
The past is to be learned from but not lived in.  
We look back to claim the embers from glowing experiences but not the ashes. 
And when we have learned what we need to learn and have brought with us
the best that we have experienced, then we look ahead, 
we remember that 
faith is always pointed toward the future.”

2018 is a great time to look forward with all the faith you can muster.  You are probably already doing that,
we’ll be working on that too. 
Happy 2018!
Love, Vance and Louenda
Elder and Sister Downs