Yesterday was the anniversary of the death of the Prophet Joseph Smith. My Sr Team reported from Mission Prep that the closing song for their class yesterday was one to never be forgotten! They were told to sing so that the Prophet could hear them i the heavens. They all said it was just that! President P played the organ, and they said he played the first three verses loud - like 3/4 of what the organ had, but on the last verse, he pulled all the stops. B reported that the vibrations in his hand were so strong he had to consciously question whether they were from his own body or from the organ. They all said they would never forget it - it was truly Praise to the Man who communed with Jehovah! Thank you President Smith! We love, appreciate, and revere you for your sacrifices for the Gospel! Thank you for the priceless gifts you made possible for me and my family!
Sr. team spent the weekend in California making memories never to be forgotten! They went scuba diving for two days off the coast there! They all raved about how cool it was, but lamented that they didn't have a waterproof camera to document the experience! I hope they write it about it on their own!
Jr. team and I decided we were up for our own adventure, so after hustling on Thursday to wrap up our jobs, we headed to Manti to see the beautiful Manti Pageant. It was a miracle we made it as we tried to cram too many jobs into that one day so we could spend the next couple of days in Salt Lake. We got there just as they were saying the opening prayer and sang the Star Spangled Banner. The evening was cool in Manti, a beautiful setting to teach my young people about the history of the Church and the Book of Mormon!
It is an outdoor pageant presented on the temple hill with hundreds of actors reenacting the story of the Prophet Joseph, a perfect time of year to remember and show respect to him, and then they tell the story of the Book of Mormon while telling the story of the saints being pushed out of their homes, and trekking across the country, testing everything they hold dear.
Along the trail to the west, they depict family members dying along the trail, and the pageant ends with a beautiful testimony that families will be reunited through the covenants of the temple! This last picture shows the angels on the hill of the temple, come to welcome valiant saints into heaven.
I love the pageant, I think even more because my Dad was in a similar pageant which takes place on the Hill Cumorah in upstate New York while on his mission. He played the part of General Moroni, a detail which would later testify to my mother that this was indeed the man prepared for her! They met after his successful completion of his mission, and return to Utah at a party where a former missionary companion introduced Val as "General Moroni." Kathryn was a young girl, and had decided that General Moroni had all the characteristics of the man she was looking for to marry. She had on her want board, a painting by Arnold Friberg of General Moroni. Here he was now be introduced to her. It took some time dating and assuring each other that he measured up to the image, but he did, and he does! I love this pageant because it is not far from home, and a similar reenactment of the same history! It was beautiful! The shows starts after dark 9:30 p.m. and goes until about 11 so it was a late night getting to our Sandy home. My cell phone died on the way there, and in our rush to get there, in a different than normal car because Sr. team had the rig in California, I was flying solo with four little kids. They did great - slept most of the way through the show, but that's ok, we enjoyed the evening and made it safely thanks to Divine Providence! Another memory making weekend! We all met up again on Saturday evening in St. George. I cleaned the house in Salt Lake, mowed the lawns, and planted the garden! We hope to have sweet peas soon, cucumbers, tomatoes, and zucchini's! Yum! Too bad we didn't get the garden in here in St. George, but it is way too hot now 107 degrees when we rolled into town! Wew! Head North!