Just Like Heaven

It snowed last night so it was a beautiful morning when I walked over for branch choir practice. The sun was shining and the sky was blue, a great change from the foggy, pollution filled air that has covered the valley for most of the last week. It made for a great start to a wonderful Sabbath day.

Today at church meeting a talk was given that put into words what I have been feeling for some time. He said, "This (meaning being with us in the missionary branch) is just like heaven will be." Another speaker said, "Whenever I come to the Missionary Branch I always learn something. It's when the members get up. Some don't get up, but wheel in their chairs, some use canes, some use walkers, others are slow, but all are here to serve." I am so grateful for the ability we have to so easily serve a mission. Ed wasn't called from the pulpit in General Conference to go overseas for 3 years and leave us to support ourselves. I have healed so I don't have to stay in a wheelchair, I can get up (though some days I may be considered one of the slow ones....). I am sure that heaven will not have the physical frailties that were referred to, but the things of the heart, the sociality, will be the same. It is such a blessing to be serving with so many righteous men and woman who bring such varied skills and experiences from which we all learn and grow.

Last Tuesday evening we attended a fireside given by Heidi Swinton who wrote the Biography of President Monson among other things. She was amazing to listen to. She spoke for a solid hour without one note. She was well informed, engaging and humble. She told about her experience being asked by Pres. Monson to write the book and then working with him to complete the work. It was very interesting. She has a great love and respect for him. Ed gave me the book for my birthday but I haven't yet started it so he is reading it right now.

I have been reading some of the Tongan Orals this past week. We are getting ready to put online some of the English translations. I am so touched by some of these cute people and their words. I wanted to share some of them with you.

In one, the interviewer told the man who he was interviewing that there will be times in the future that his children will know him, after he has died. That they will "hear your voice from where this record is going to be and they will know you some day." He promised him that the tapes would be cared for until they found a good place to store them and it would not be there in Tonga. Then the man said, "I know that these are very important. If there are people who do good works it will not be forgotten. These things will be useful in time, maybe soon." He said that in 1973 when he recorded his family genealogy. I like to think that we are some of those people who are doing "good works".

Another woman who was born in 1896 and giving her genealogy was happy because her "great, great, great grandchildren will hear my voice...". She told of leaving her ancestral lands to move to another island so their children could have an education for a better life.

Many of these people bore strong testimonies of Jesus Christ. They were the first in their communities to bring the gospel to their people. Some who joined the Church had to leave their villages because of persecution. Other fathers and mothers saved so a child could be sent to live with a relative in the US to go to school and then one by one, after the first child was established, another sibling or cousin was sent to do the same thing. Some of these parents would never see those children again but others would eventually be brought here by their children to live out their lives in America.

It is a true blessing to be able to do some of this work. We gained another Tongan Church Service Missionary this week. He and his wife just returned from a full time mission in El Paso, Texas. (He says he was on a foreign mission, hahaha!) He will be helping with the english translations two days a week. We are very excited because we are losing two of our Tongans next month and we were very worried but we shouldn't have been. This is the Lord's work and He will always provide a way for us to accomplish whatever needs to be done.

Some of the little miracles that happen out on the floor of the Family History Library with the patrons are shared from time to time. I thought I would share a couple that I like that were sent to us last week:


A man from Michigan came to Salt Lake City to try to find information about his brother who was disowned by his mother when he joined the Church 30 years ago at age 18. He thought his brother was now living in California. He felt inspired that if he came to Salt Lake this week, he could find the answer to his brother’s whereabouts.

He explained the circumstances to Elder Roberts (a missionary on the 2nd floor of the Library). A man walking by heard part of the story and placed himself a short distance away to listen. After the Michigan man mentioned the full name of his disowned brother, the man listening in introduced himself as the long lost brother. He had overheard the conversation and recognized the story as his. They both happened to be in the Library the same day to do family history, one from Michigan and one from California. (There is more detail to this story, but this synopsis gives the impact of these two brothers coming together after so long. The Michigan brother had joined the Church after the mother died but the California brother had no idea because he had decided not to talk with any family because he had been treated so poorly by them when he joined the Church)

One more for tonight:

(Experience of Sister Camille Thomas, as told to Yvonne Sorenson on 22 Dec. 2010)
Sis. Camille Thomas on Tues. 21 Dec. 2010 had an interesting experience. She had been working on the 3rd floor and walked by and noticed a patron working on a family that had an unusual name. An hour later she was working on the 2nd floor. She noticed another gentleman working on his family that had the same name. As she talked to the patron, she suggested to the man on the 2nd floor that he might want to meet the man on the 3rd floor. She introduced them and they discovered they were cousins, both working on different parts of the same family. One man was from Oklahoma and the other from Florida. Neither of them knew about the other. She saw them the next day in the stacks on the 3rd floor, locked in conversation and working together on the family.

Have a great week.