Our awesome Australia Brisbane Mission Leaders

Elder Nelson and I have been so very blessed with two sets of amazing mission leaders while we are here in Australia from May 2025 to November 2026.

Our home base for our mission assignment as Area Medical Advisor for the Australia Brisbane Area, is Brisbane. We arrived in Brisbane on May 27, 2025 and on June 2^nd we got to meet our Brisbane mission leaders, President Tum and Sister Jamie Vongsawad, from Vista, California. We love them and feel grateful for the warm welcome they gave to us! They invited us out to dinner that night of the 2^nd to an Italian restaurant called “Marinara,” near the mission office, and we had a great time-sharing stories, experiences and getting to know them! They are both wonderful, gracious and have deep faith and testimonies of our Savior, Jesus Christ! The Vongsawads were at the end of their three-year mission service and so we only got to serve with them for four weeks until the end of June.

Wednesday, June 25, 2025, was the day that our new mission leaders, President Leo and Sister Kendel Gomez arrived in our Brisbane mission office for the turn over with the Vongsawads. It was really fun to meet President and Sister Gomez who greeted us with big smiles and hugs! That morning of the 25^th, while in the mission office, we had a mission wide Zoom meeting to give a big welcome to the Gomezs and to sincerely say our goodbyes to the Vongsawads and express our gratitude and wish them the very best in the future.

Elder Nelson and I love the Gomezs and felt an instant bond, connection and friendship with them! They are wonderful and we are very excited to serve with them and be with them! Elder Nelson and I hung around/near the mission office that day (the 25^th) for our meeting later in the afternoon.  The Brisbane mission medical team had a meeting with President and Sister Gomez around 4:00 p.m. that afternoon in the conference room of the mission office. Our mission health advisor, Sister Hancock, had just finished her mission and had flown home and our new mission health advisor, Sister Burst, had arrived on the same flight from San Franisco that the Gomezs were on. Our medical team is now Sister Keil, our Area Mental Health Advisor, Sister Burst, mission health advisor and Elder Nelson and I. At the end of our medical team meeting, I asked the Gomezs if it would be O.K. to treat them to dinner in the next few (several) months once they get settled…that we would love that. They said yes they would love that…haha.

What a BLESSING it is to us to have both sets of mission leaders in our lives! We feel they were/are hand picked for us! We feel so much gratitude and love for our Savior, Jesus Christ who knows and loves us completely. He knows what is best for us and what will thrill us or help us grow. We are so deeply grateful for our Savior and for His Infinite Atonement and for all the hope, faith, and trust He brings into our lives! Our Savior is everything to us! Elder Nelson and I are completely and utterly full of gratitude for this mission opportunity, to wear the Savior’s name on our heart and feel the magical awe that we are here serving all of Australia and Papua New Guinea!