A Time To Be Thankful

Last week we had to say goodbye to Sister Schulz.  She and her companion, Sister Hodges, were the ones who taught Jan the Gospel of Jesus Christ and about the restoration of His church.  What a blessing they were to him.  What a blessing it was for us to be involved in the process.

Sis. Hodges, Sis. Schulz, Diane, and me

It is impossible to say goodbye without remembering the fun times.

We had so much fun with our Wednesday evening seminary class.  Each Wednesday our seminary students and students from another seminary class get together for a gospel subject discussion.  We had about 14 youth there that night.  The topic we were assigned was priesthood and priesthood keys.

We started off talking about the difference between the priesthood and priesthood keys.  We were amazed that some of them knew that.

Then the fun started.  We had all the offices in the priesthood represented by an actual representative standing in line from lesser priesthood to highest: Deacon, Teacher, Priest, Bishop, Elder, High Priest, Patriarch, Seventy, Apostle.  We were going to have a Seventy there, but he had to go out of town.  So we took his picture and a picture of an Apostle to represent those offices. (The office of Deacon can be held at age 12; Teacher, at age 14; and Priest, at age 16.)

Next, the kids were given individual pieces of paper which had duties specific to a priesthood office. They taped each duty on the person it belonged to.  It was interesting to see the ones they got right and the ones they didn’t.

Then we gave them other pieces of paper with duplicate duties to tape to these men and boys.  This was to show them that as you advance in the priesthood, you retain the duties of the lower priesthood. Some of the men were just covered with pieces of paper.

Then we gave them pictures of keys and the students were asked to distribute them to the correct priesthood holder.  Of course we had to explain that keys would only be given to a Deacon or Teacher or Elder if they were the president of that quorum.

Elder De Feo

After class a lot of the youth came up to us to thank us for that lesson. It was just as much fun for us and the priesthood holders who helped us.

Thursday was Thanksgiving for us as it was for ya’ll. However, it was a regular workday for us. For dinner, the 50 some senior missionaries, having fixed their assigned traditional Thanksgiving dish, met at the church to have a wonderful dinner together. Other Americans were invited and the local young missionaries. Also, Elder De Feo, counselor to the Area Presidency, and his family and Mission President Boyer and his family.  We probably had close to 80 people there.

Not eating sugar, it was especially hard for me to walk past that dessert table but, poor Diane. There wasn’t anything there, dinner or dessert, that she could eat.  She was prepared, though, and had brought her own food.

Last night we group Messenger’ed with my siblings.  It was wonderful to see them all together and be able to talk to each other. Having a loving family is such a great blessing.