Teaching the 11 year olds at their summer camp

Council Summer camp for our 11-year-olds got cancelled so Sister Allen develop one at her own backyard (and little farm). Ward members helped her with the program (July 20-21). I did two presentations, one on Citizenship and the second on "No Trace Camping" The latter was quite fun. We marched to an imaginary camp and set it up (200 feet away from water, and setting up waste disposal, etc. , using Leave No Trace principles.

Nathan employment

With Nathan’s permission and support, Matthew, Emilie, Scott and I have prepared a cover introduction to his employment resume, with the idea of distributing these through our three Spanish Fork and Mapleton stakes. Our thinking is that this method may identify some added options for employment, that don’t seem to be known by Voc Rehab or regular job search channels.

Thanks to Valerie for the picture. Handsome guy, isn't he?

At the cabin, July 5-10

This week at the cabin we had about everyone in our family part of the time. Nathan and Gloria stopped by Tuesday, returning from an anniversary camping trip at Jordanelle. Valerie and the three younger boys were there all week. Angela brought her three youngest up for the day Wednesday. Alison brought 6 for a couple of days. Emilie and all her kids came Thursday and stayed until Friday night. Matthew and Kimberly and all came Friday morning and stayed until Saturday.

It was cool at night, and there were afternoon thunderstorms every day.

Some highlights:
--Fishing (twice) at the pond by the Wasatch State Park Information building: All of the kids who fished caught something, about 20 in all. All of the fish were pan-sized except Jeremy pulled in a whopper Rainbow, 17 inches long and weighing a pound and a half. There was a lot of interest in cleaning the fish and Trenton was even brave enough to try it.

--Picking flowers

--Hikes

--Apple Pancake eating contest Friday morning–winners tied with record 17: Justin and Jonathan. Note Jamison’s look, presumably about the time that he dropped out of the competition.

--Erin celebrating her 14th birthday Friday

--Lots of playing and visiting

--Admiring the scenery and the clouds

The poetry of God

I awoke Thursday morning with the happy thought: “Today I will be able to go to the temple and say some of the greatest of God’s poetry.” I am grateful for this insight that I largely received in a conversation with Richard Dilworth Rust in the Raleigh temple, that poetry has been said to be “the highest form of expression” and the words of God and his prophets often can be seen to be expressed in poetic forms.

The temple being the epitome of spiritual instruction, a person should expect to discover in the temple ceremonies poetic expressions and language. I have not been disappointed in this expectation.

What are some of the poetic forms that one might discover, that increase the power of the temple ceremonies?
1) Rhythm and tempo in the wording
2) Alliteration, that is, the repetition of sounds usually in the starting of words
3) Imagery
4) Parallel expressions
5) Words repeated with stronger emphasis
6) Phrases of increased then shortened lengths that build intensity and then sum up a subject

Pictured: the new Kansas City temple

Roses and more roses

Our roses winter-killed and we thought we might have to pull them all out. I had pruned them down to about 15 inches last fall, but when Spring started to come, all of the sprigs were black. We just left them as they were, to see if something would come up from the lower parts of the plants. After a while some shoots started to grow. Still we didn't know whether these shoots were from above the graft or below. If the latter, the blossoms would be small and ugly. We had to wait until we had blossoms.

We got up the morning after returning from our visit to the Chandlers in Arkansas to the most beautiful display of roses blossoms. All of our roses had survived and were giving us a brilliant display.

The top two pictures are of our peace rose. Peace roses connect in my mind with motherhood, and one Mothers Day I gave each daughter and daughter-in-law a peace rose plant. I hope that some are still producing beautiful flowers. The next five pictures show a rose bed that I planted when I moved to Spanish Fork. It has several varieties,including a Peace and Love, a Barbara Bush, and John F. Kennedy.

The last pictures show a gorgeous display of pink roses at the Provo Temple this week.

Tornado devastation in Joplin, MO

On Monday, Valerie drove us to Joplin MO to see the devastation caused by the recent Tornado. The sight was very sobering.

Some things of interest: #3, notice what happened to the backstop of the ball field across from the high school;

#4 Holden is inspecting items remaining from our Stakehouse that was destroyed. This site was one of the early places that had been totally cleaned-up.

In the background is the high school. Notice the American flag flying in the breeze at half-mast from the school. There were hundreds on American flags at many sites, sort of like the flags that appeared at the WTC site after 9-11. I guess flags have taken on a meaning of "we shall persevere" at places of disaster and death.

#5 Closer view of the high school. One of the miraculous things that happened was that the high school graduation ceremony was being held just about the time that the tornado hit. But for the first time, it was not at the school, but some place else that was out of the tornado area.

#6 In addition to losing branches, etc., trees were stripped of all of their leaves. Notice the one tree in the left foreground that now is bravely trying to grow new branches and leaves.

#8 A stripped strip mall

Valerie's TO DO list

Valerie gave me a to do list, which I worked off and on all the time we were there.
1) Attach a sagging conduit to the soffit on the porch on the northwest corner of the house;
2) Fix a couple of drawers so that they open and close properly; also tighten drawer handles and pulls throughout the house;
3) Reattach some towel racks that have come off or are loose;
4) Fix a patio door screen that is bent, has lost a runner and its handle;
5) Stake up 2 Rose of Sharon bush trees that are tipping with the wind and threatening to uproot;
6) Do some family history research for a lady in the ward who is quite ill.

An ordination and a baptism

While we were in Bentonville:

On Sunday, June 12th, Greg ordained Ryan to the office of Elder.

On the 19th, a baptismal service was held for Trenton. I gave a talk on baptism at Trenton's request.

Trip #3--Chandler's BYU tree

Wendy and I were at Chandlers in Bentonville AR from Friday June 10th until Tuesday Jun 21st. We flew by Southwest Air to Tulsa OK and rented a car one-way to Bentonville and the reverse to go home. We tended the house and kids, gave rides to swimming, etc. while Valerie was at Girl's Camp, visited, helped out. Wendy fixed a lot of meals, cleaned, straightened, etc.

We saw Andrew and Britain both Sunday evenings we were there.

When a big t-storm and wind came through last Monday night the 13th), it took out most of the Chandler's beautiful Bradford Pear tree. (See Valerie's blog.) Bro. Fife kindly sent up a crew to dispose of the tree. They cleaned up the fallen branches and proposed to leave what remained as a symbol of the family's sports allegiance (as a joke).

Temple-line upon line

As Dorothy, Wendy, and I drove to Glenwood and back, we spent a lot of time reading and discussing two articles about the history of temple work and about the influence of Wilford Woodruff on the temple ceremonies as we know them today. We found this material quite informative and inspirational. Wendy said that it made her want to stop the car and find a temple and attend a session right now. And we were able to attend a session at the Boise temple on Friday traveling up and the Twin Falls temple on the following Tuesday as we returned home.

I have viewed Wilford Woodruff as our family’s special prophet since I learned of his association with our ancestor James Townsend and family, including the latter’s service as a missionary companion with Elder Woodruff on Maine’s Fox Islands. President Woodruff was the Renaissance Man of the early Church, spiritual giant, bold missionary and baptizer of thousands, fly fisherman, historian and diarist, founder of educational academies, pioneer in Utah horticulture and animal science, etc. And now we learn that he was second to none in the establishment and regulation of the work in the temple that we love so much.

1) Although most of the references by Joseph Smith to ordinances for the dead are focused upon baptisms, there is solid evidence that he taught the broader principle of “receiving all the ordinances, baptisms, confirmations, washings, anointings, ordinations, and sealing powers upon their heads, in behalf of all their progenitors who are dead...” But it was a number of years later when the basis for temple work became fully developed.

2) Because of persecutions, the challenges of the exodus from Nauvoo and pioneering the Inter-mountain West, the unavailability of temples, and perhaps an incomplete understanding of temple ordinances on the part of Church members, it appears that only the following kinds of temple work took place prior to the dedication of the St. George temple in 1877:
a) Baptisms for the dead (Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, etc.)
b) Endowments for the living (Nauvoo temple, Council House in Council Bluffs IO, Presidents Office, Ensign Peak, Council House and Endowment House in Salt Lake)
c) Sealings of living husbands and wives, plus a limited number of couple sealings of a living man or women to a deceased spouse (Salt Lake locations above)

3) The first endowments for the dead in this dispensation were performed in the newly dedicated St. George Temple on Jan 11, 1877 (10 days after its initial dedication) under the direction of Elder Woodruff. He enunciated the principle clearly, “It takes as much to save a dead man as a living man.” From that time forward, in addition to baptisms, the saints were able to perform vicarious washings and anointings, ordinations to the priesthood, endowments, couple sealings, and sealing of children to parents, in the temples.

4) President Brigham Young appointed Elder Woodruff as the first President of the St. George temple, with instructions to develop and regulate procedures and practices. Elder Woodruff served in this capacity for seven years until 1884. The process of performing the endowment for a company of patrons was perfected. Exact wording for the temple ordinances was written and agreed upon and procedures for performing the ordinances were standardized. Also significantly, in 1894, while serving as the prophet and president of the Church, President Woodruff received a revelation that directed that the performing of “adoptions” to non-relatives be discontinued and that all sealings should be done along ancestral lines. Thus, Wilford Woodruff had a major role in establishing the temple ordinances as we understand and experience them today.

5) Out of these developments, there quickly developed among the Latter-day Saints a new understanding and “heightened consciousness” regarding temple work. It gave reason and opportunity to return often to the temple to perform these ordinances for the dead. “There developed a whole new attitude toward temple worship, a sense of what was now expected and in what proportions, and a sense of urgency. Women as well as men had new opportunities for temple work not seen before. What happened in St. George soon spread to Manti, Logan, and Salt Lake. [In the words of John Taylor] it was ... a whole [new] epoch.” (Bennett, “The Rise of Temple Consciousness”, pp. 247-248). Our own ancestors, George and Martha Ann Townsend Lufkin, were participants in this new commitment. They were in the St. George area during the time of the temple dedication there, and then retired to Logan to be able to regularly do temple work when that edifice was completed in 1884.

(Richard E. Bennett, “Line upon Line, Precept upon Precept: Reflections on the 1877 Commencement of the Performance of Endowments and Sealings for the Dead”, BYU STUDIES, Vol 44, No. 2, 2003, pp. 38-77; Richard E. Bennett, “Wilford Woodruff and the Rise of Temple Consciousness among the Latter-day Saints, 1877-84" in Alexander L. Baugh and Susan Easton Black, Eds., BANNER OF THE GOSPEL: WILFORD WOODRUFF, Brigham Young University Church History Symposium, 2010, , pp. 233-250.)