My birthday party

After touring the temple, the family came to our house for pizza.  While its not our requirement, most persons deposited their shoes by the front door.  I want to remember this huge pile of shoes, which was more than a foot high and three or four feet across.

Family Payson Temple tour

April 25, 2015

Payson temple progress

A lot of things have happened in the last several weeks regarding our service in the Payson Temple, when it opens the second week in June.  Let me document these things.

Early in March, Wendy got a call from Kelly W. (Temple Recorder, also counselor in the Blake’s Stake Presidency, also an acquaintance of mine from district scouting) to come to an appointment March 10. 

At the March 10th meeting, she was interviewed by Sister L. (Assistant to the Matron), and was called to be an ordinance worker. 

On March 12th, Brother W. again called on the phone asking her to serve as a Sisters Shift Coordinator for the Thursday midday shift.

Wendy attended three meetings for Shift Coordinators in March--the 15th, the 21st, and the 27th, all held chapels in Payson.  She received maps or floor plans and learned much about physical features of the temple, number of endowment rooms, initiatory booths, etc., and location of elevators, stairways, restrooms, etc., and also names of her assistants.

She was set apart as a temple worker by President S. on April 3rd at the Temple and had the opportunity to walk through the entire building for a couple of hours with her two assistant coordinators.

Sister R. (Assistant to the Matron) called Wendy on Wednesday, April 8th and invited her to be on a “small and select” committee that would help plan details of the procedures that would be followed in the Payson Temple.  Sister R. asked her to bring her husband, even though I had not yet been called and set apart.  Wendy explained my knowledge and experience in leadership roles in Provo Temple.

Wendy and I attended a meeting in the Temple of this small group of Coordinators on the afternoon of Friday, April 10th.   We arrived early and walked through much of the temple prior to the meeting start.  At the meeting we were in a group of 4 assigned to work on the second floor processes.  The second floor contains the chapel where patrons wait for endowments to start, the three endowment rooms, and the celestial room.  We received an introduction by President R. (Counselor to Pres. S.) and Brother W., then spent a long time walking though and talking through the processes for starting up and finishing an endowment session, and other functions and stations that are needed on that floor.  I finally volunteered to write up a draft of the things we had talked about after our group had discussed things as we walked through the entire floor.  We were in the temple for a total of over four hours.

I started writing on the process steps for the ordinance (2nd) floor of the temple, with help from Wendy.  I worked into the night and most of Saturday and also Sunday afternoon.

On Sunday night, April 12th at the SF Seminary, I was set apart as a Payson temple worker by President R..  In one of the tender mercies of that evening, we had a preliminary interview before the setting apart, with Sister S. (the temple Matron).  It turns out the she is one of the major movers as far as how the temple should operate.   As we visited with her, the conversation immediately turned to the work of the committee to describe temple procedure and process steps.  We had a wonderful 30 minute time that she extended to us, to ask and answer questions, to hear her philosophy and ideas and vision of how the temple should work.  I had received more clarity to my thinking, went home and started more revisions to the write-up I was drafting. 

On Monday, I called Brother S., the other brother on the committee, and went over and got feedback on several ideas we were working, the finished a revision of the write-up draft (it was nine pages long).  Also Wendy had scheduled time with the Sister R., the other sister on our sub-committee for later in the morning.  We went back to the temple and did more walking and talking and shared our draft with her and another sister coordinator who was working on First Floor procedures.  As another tender mercy, we also saw the Brother J., the man who was to receive our write-ups, as we finished working with Sister R., and got other clarifications and also a target date, this Friday, to give him some kind of product.

I took my laptop to the cabin Tuesday morning and kept working.  By evening I had an improved version ready.  Wendy and I drove over to The Homestead parking lot in the dark, where we could use their unprotected wi-fi and sent this version out to the other two on our sub-committee.  I continued to work on clarifications and to polish up the write-up to make it more presentable and readable.  After one more set of phone contacts, by mid-day today I believe we had a creditable work which could be more broadly shared.  We again utilized The Homestead’s generosity and sent out the new version.  It has 18 pages, including a table of contents and details about the new methods and roles for overseeing the chapel, loading the endowment room and starting and conducting the session, the veil process, and also the roles of sisters who will be stationed in the halls and the celestial room.  It has step-by-step process descriptions, detailed job descriptions for all workers functioning on this floor, and even a mock-up of a form.

This work over the last 6 days has been quite intense, but quite enjoyable,  to apply some skills I used extensively before I retired, both in the conceptualizing and writing such, but also working with people to get their ideas and their buy-ins.  And to do this in the service of temple work. Amazing!

We are so looking forward to touring the Payson Temple with family next weekend.

Ode to the Provo Temple

O Temple Provo, we leave thee
Filled with a thousand feelings--
For the masses of faithful Saints,
Entering thy door(1) with joy and quickened pulse(2)
Emerging through the shining lake-sun.
For our fellow laborers, left with double burdens
To cover our abandoned lines.
For dear Heber friends, our neighbors(3),
When will we see their sister sanctuary,
Shining brightly on the hillside by the river?
For young elders, supporting promises
With a resounding “Yes,”
And strengthening our commitments.
For young couples
Radiating love’s prospects.
For the words of life, God’s poetry,
Oft repeated, always fresh with glowing power.
For the spirits of the departed,
Rejoicing, encouraging,
Giving their approvals.

Thou cupcake with one candle,
Workhorse(4) among temples,
Born for efficiency not beauty(5),
But with a special majesty
To those many-millions,
Released from custody through thy ministrations.
Like Henry’s factory,
Every twenty minutes,
Churning out new liberty to the captives.
And like the duck on water(6),
Feet furiously flailing underneath,
Displaying peace and calm,
With nary a ripple to reveal the root of your locomotion.

You maverick,
Facing away from the East,
Where temples are thought to gaze(7)
But toward the missionaries(8),
Who fill thy rooms,
Becoming armed with power,
And making acquaintance of the angels,
Who will have charge over them,
As they bear great and glorious tidings
Unto the ends of the earth,
And toward the co-ed multitude(9),
That streams into thee in the dark of early morning,
And then emerges into the first dawn
With hope and glistening hair.

O Temple Provo,
What will now give meaning to our Thursdays?

     (1)As viewed from the recommend desk on afternoons
     (2)Its an uphill walk from parking
     (3)We have a vacation home in Midway.
     (4)Karen Ashton, Temple Matron and Robert Daines, Prior President
     (5)Hugh Nibley
     (6)President Larry Dahl
     (7)Hugh Nibley
     (8)MTC
     (9)At BYU and elsewhere

Temple service update

We were released, along with about 1500 others, as Provo temple workers on March 28th at 2 pm.  The time there was good to us.  I wrote a slightly silly Ode to the Provo Temple.  See it next.

I have an appointed to be set apart as a Payson temple worker next Sunday. 

Wendy has been called to be a women’s Shift Coordinator in the Payson temple, Thursdays, Shift 2 (about 10 am to 2 pm).  She has learned much about this temple in meetings the last several weeks-- schedules, procedures, layout, the new temple leadership.  She likes the new temple president a lot.

She had the opportunity yesterday to walk completely through the temple.  Very beautiful she says!