Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Amazing weekend Part 2



note: I am sorry for the hast putting this video together. But if I don't publish this soon, it will be really old news. I may come back and edit and add more video when I have more time. And I may not.

I mentioned before in Part 1 that we attended a ceremony in the nearby Ward house. This is the building that Thomas S. Monson started. My daughter lived in his Ward for about a year, then she moved a block down the street and was in another ward, but the same building and Stake for another year.

President Monson had served as Bishop and Stake President in this Stake. The plan was to have a modest ceremony, open a time capsule and replace it with another. They were advised to make sure and find it before the ceremony, and they started about a month ago. And as they looked for the old capsule, they couldn't find it. They found a place they thought it was after studying the history and documents on the building. They opened it and found a cinder block. They thought they had found it, but when they pulled the cinder block out, the only thing sitting there was another cinder block. They tried to get the x-ray machine from University of Utah to come look, but it was in Canada, for some reason and was broken besides. They will continue to look as soon as the x-ray machine gets back to Utah.

In the new capsule was, among the current books we are using in Church, the most recent Church Magazines, Relief Society Manuel, Church News, Deseret News papers, and other stuff was a Stake Roster. D2 and SIL2 are listed in that roster. So 50 years from now, they will have to attend the ceremony. They will be almost 80 by then. . . whew! like the commercial says, "Life comes at ya fast!"



This was the weekend we moved D2, SIL2 and their two children to Denver. The men had driven the moving van, our car and their car and had left at the early hour of 5:30. We met at D2's apartment at 7 and walked up the hill to the church. We got there by 7:15 and were surprised to find only about 20 people standing around. There was a breakfast being prepared in the parking lot and a few chairs set up by the place where the time capsule was supposed to be. There was a lectern with a microphone in front of the 10 or so chairs. I was amazed that word hadn't gotten out more, or maybe the people were complacent. But by 7:30, the appointed time, all of a sudden the crowd grew to about 150 or so.



President Monson arrived with his sweet wife, Frances. They made their way to the front, shaking hands and being so cordial.
They had an opening song, which was, of course, "We Thank Thee, Oh God, for a Prophet", we had an opening prayer and the ceremony began.
They told of how they couldn't find the old time capsule, but they had done some research and found some things and pictures that they knew were in the capsule, from historic records. Then President Monson spoke.
He is in his 80's now, so he was only in his 30's when he was a Stake President. He remembered their old building had looked out at a cow pasture, and he remembered as a boy how he thought he learned more from the cows than he did from the teachers. He loved the view, but when the Stake grew too large, he realized it was time to construct a new building. He was involved in the purchasing of the plot, in the planning of the building and the actual building of it. He recruited people, whether or not they were active in the Church at the time or not. He would ask them, "which days can you come? Tuesday and Thursday after work, or Saturday? I will be there along side you on the days you choose." And he was there.
He spoke of the old-timers. He spoke of his calling as a Mission President to Canada. He spoke of his home teacher who was there at the ceremony. How would it be to be his home teacher? Wow, that's all I can say.
He told the children here today to put this day in their diaries and come back in 50 years.
He said, "the attitude determines the altitude". We are beneficiaries of other people's work.
I held D2's new baby and she took care of her two-year old son. We made sure both got to shake his hand. We also spoke to his sweet wife.


Then we ate breakfast and headed back down the hill to continue with the cleaning and moving.
It was amazing and yet very sweet to see the Prophet, shake his hand and feel his spirit. He is such a kind man.
Here he speaks of recruiting people to help build the building.


2 comments:

HiHoRosie said...

How exciting! Or should I say AMAZING! :) Pres. Monson has always been one of my faves. How cool to be there at the ceremony and meet him.

RisibleGirl said...

Again, an amazing time you had. I'm so glad that you appreciate and feel blessed that you get to have these experiences. Some people take things like this for granted. I never understood those types of people.

I guess that's why we're friends.

xo

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