Trip to Turkey with an excursion to Ephesus

Here's the first of MANY pictures of our conference in Turkey...two are Sherry and I on the balcony at breakfast time with the Aegean Sea in the background.  Another is of a few of the forty CES missionaries at the conference.  We just got home this morning and we're exhausted!  Combine traveling with conference meetings from 8 a.m. until 7 p.m. and we're wiped out.

It was very neat to have our Area President and his wife at the conference. President and Sister Lawrence gave three firesides which were awesome

Here are pictures from our hotel balcony.

One afternoon we took an excursion to Ephesus - the home of the Ephesians as in the book in the New Testament.  Turkey has been excavating the city and here are some pictures.  The area around Ephesus is the home of the seven churches mentioned in the Book of Revelation.  Pretty incredible to be where John and Paul have been.  There is a house nerarby where Mary, the mother of Jesus, was supposed to have died. Since John was imprisoned on the Island of Patmos - just ninety miles off the coast - and the Savior while on the cross had assigned John to take care of Mary it makes sense that she would be near him.

Here's a ruin that Mom took a picture of...one with him and Elder Walker and another of him sneaking over the edge of the amphitheatre.

Elder Walker - a retired firefighter and a kid at age 53 - ran up to the top of the amphitheatre and took a picture.  I'll try to get a copy.  I was going to run up there after him but we had to leave.......

The Book of Mormon is the keystone of our religion and a man can get nearer to God by abiding by it's precepts than by any other book.  A quote from Joseph Smith...here is a keystone in an arch in Ephesus.

Here is a picture of the amphitheatre in Ephesus and a couple of us conferencing lest you think we just played all week.  It was an incredible learning experience and Sherry and I will take weeks digesting all we were taught.

One beautiful shot of the Aegean Sea at twilight and another of an object lesson on repentance entitled "Why Live With The Pain?"