This afternoon/evening we've been having the Saturday portion of our stake conference. It's been generally pretty good. Here are a couple of highlights:
Elder Fisher is presiding. He's actually from our stake and is a pretty good speaker. I've been impressed so far. During the leadership session I attended this afternoon (and at which I sang!) he told the story of a woman in St George who was giving a talk about her fifth mission. She went on at length about how her mission was so wonderful and what the area was like. Then she finished up by talking about her 12 (!) children, how they were all married in the temple and that nine of them had served missions themselves. She sat down without ever having so much as mentioned Christ.
Then, out of the audience, another woman got up and approached the pulpit. The tension in the room was palpable - this was highly irregular. She slammed her purse down onto the rostrum and said - if that's what the Church expects of me, I'm not sure I want to be a part of it any more! and stormed out of the building. Elder Fisher said he wanted to stand up and applaud. I loudly said "amen!"
I think that we are so often caught up in the culture of the Church that we lose sight of the whole point of it all. The purpose of the Church is to bring souls to Christ, to be a repository for shared knowledge, to offer chances for service and learning, and (most importantly) to administer the ordinances of salvation. The rest is just the rest.
Then, this evening, a beautiful woman spoke about sending out missionaries. She started with saying that she was going to be honest and if she offended anyone that she was very sorry. She hoped that the message was something that the Lord would want her to relate. She said that when she dropped off both of her children at the MTC, it was not a glorious send off, or a tearful farewell. It was unmitigated grief. An absolute sense of loss. And she was NOT OK WITH IT. (I was totally bawling by this point. Her feeling was so real and raw...) She said she was not ok with sending her "babies" (using quotes because that's the word she used, and it was used in the sense that a only a mother who has feared for her children, who has loved them and then felt the gaping hole in her heart when they left to go out into the world...) to where they could be accosted and assaulted and cursed and mocked and even loved. She felt only grief. The world can be a very evil place.
And she would know. She's a social worker in some scary areas of Ogden, and has seen the emptiness of soul and heart and character that exists in some people. She said that the only thing that could make it ok was the thought that her babies would help to bring the light of the gospel to a darkened world.
Oh, it was powerful. I am still moved to tears thinking of it. Such majesty, dignity, and feeling! So rare and precious in our world - even in our Church. I loved it.
It inspires me to want to do better myself.
Elder Fisher is presiding. He's actually from our stake and is a pretty good speaker. I've been impressed so far. During the leadership session I attended this afternoon (and at which I sang!) he told the story of a woman in St George who was giving a talk about her fifth mission. She went on at length about how her mission was so wonderful and what the area was like. Then she finished up by talking about her 12 (!) children, how they were all married in the temple and that nine of them had served missions themselves. She sat down without ever having so much as mentioned Christ.
Then, out of the audience, another woman got up and approached the pulpit. The tension in the room was palpable - this was highly irregular. She slammed her purse down onto the rostrum and said - if that's what the Church expects of me, I'm not sure I want to be a part of it any more! and stormed out of the building. Elder Fisher said he wanted to stand up and applaud. I loudly said "amen!"
I think that we are so often caught up in the culture of the Church that we lose sight of the whole point of it all. The purpose of the Church is to bring souls to Christ, to be a repository for shared knowledge, to offer chances for service and learning, and (most importantly) to administer the ordinances of salvation. The rest is just the rest.
Then, this evening, a beautiful woman spoke about sending out missionaries. She started with saying that she was going to be honest and if she offended anyone that she was very sorry. She hoped that the message was something that the Lord would want her to relate. She said that when she dropped off both of her children at the MTC, it was not a glorious send off, or a tearful farewell. It was unmitigated grief. An absolute sense of loss. And she was NOT OK WITH IT. (I was totally bawling by this point. Her feeling was so real and raw...) She said she was not ok with sending her "babies" (using quotes because that's the word she used, and it was used in the sense that a only a mother who has feared for her children, who has loved them and then felt the gaping hole in her heart when they left to go out into the world...) to where they could be accosted and assaulted and cursed and mocked and even loved. She felt only grief. The world can be a very evil place.
And she would know. She's a social worker in some scary areas of Ogden, and has seen the emptiness of soul and heart and character that exists in some people. She said that the only thing that could make it ok was the thought that her babies would help to bring the light of the gospel to a darkened world.
Oh, it was powerful. I am still moved to tears thinking of it. Such majesty, dignity, and feeling! So rare and precious in our world - even in our Church. I loved it.
It inspires me to want to do better myself.
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