Weeks 41 & 42: Feelings for Family

This entry will cover two weeks. We missed last week because we were enjoying our family and didn’t want to miss a moment with them. Then the day after they left we welcomed 28 new missionaries into our mission and had 18 leave. We are just catching our breath.

Picking blueberries

I’m including several photos of our adventures with the Merrells. We went to the Olympic Game Farm and the northern part of the peninsula one day. Another day we went to Seattle. The highlight was getting to spend a little time with Christopher. We enjoyed showing them some of our favorite spots and eating at some of our favorite seafood restaurants. We even found a new hidden treasure – Charlotte’s Blueberry Park – where we got to pick blueberries for free.  

Getting to see Preston was a bonus. He came up to spend time with his Grandma Shanna, but we got to spend a day with him as well.

Feeding Ivar's french fries to the seagulls

My heart was also turned to home and family as my mother has been critically ill.  The surgery she had to install a pacemaker device didn’t go as well as expected. She spent some time in the ICU and is having a rough recovery. I feel so incredibly helpless, but am incredibly thankful for my brother and sister and their spouses who have been (and still are) there to help her. Mom is home now, but very weak. She won’t appreciate me sharing her troubles, but I want her to know that I have been thinking of and praying for her continuously.

My heart was turned to my father this week as well. If he were alive, we would have celebrated his 81^st  birthday on Friday. Had I been in Vernal, I would have gone fishing in his honor. Instead, I ate a Salmon sandwich for lunch. 

Flippin' Chickens

Our P-Day activities included a matinee movie: Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. The movie provided some good food for though. We were particularly moved by the portrayal of the beauty of loving, caring family relationships.

Nearly all our children and grandchildren were able to gather this weekend in Kamas for a picnic and the Demolition Derby. We are so grateful that they make an effort to be together. How grateful we are for each of our children, grandchildren, parents, siblings, etc. We love each of you. O the wisdom of our Heavenly Father as he established, ordained, and organized us in family units. It is in the family that we learn how to be like. and return to, our Father. 

Our family is definitely a “work in progress”, but we shall continue to “Watch for Deer” and Keep Moving Forward.

Week 40: A "Hot" Topic

Elder Hadlock, Jr. (he's a "hot" Elder!

First a report on Elder Hadlock, Jr. (Benjamin) – some excerpts from his email this week: We taught a lady called Mrs. Duggie (but all of her neighbors call her the witch lady because she’s like 70 years old and has all these reptiles and lives off the land. She has lots of snakes and lizards. …We are struggling to find new people to teach. There are a lot of older people here who are set in their ways, but I’m working hard and having fun!

We loved hearing that last part – “working hard and having fun!” – what more could you ask.

The main “story” for us has been the hot weather. The temperatures have been in the high 80’s low 90’s. Nothing we’re not used to in Vernal. However, without air conditioning in our apartment, it’s been quite uncomfortable.  In fact, most homes don’t even have air conditioning here; it just seldom gets this hot. Thank heavens the office has air conditioning.

On Saturday we  took advantage of an air conditioned movie theater and saw Maleficent. Good movie, but popcorn was not so “hot.”  Even got Elder Hadlock to go to an air conditioned mall – took advantage of Coldwater Creek’s “Going Out of Business” sale. Hot buys there! The Apple Store proved to be pretty “cool” in more ways than one, too.

 

Our meals have been prepared with minimal cooking. In fact, Saturday night we had crackers & milk – one of my favorites actually. 

So, while sitting in church, I wondered what the scriptures had to say about being “hot”. Well it appears that sometimes hot is good and sometimes not so good.

“And they gathered it [manna] every morning …. and when the sun waxed hot, it melted.”(Exodus 16:21)  Moral of story: when the Lord says gather what you need early – do it – before things get “hot” and things melt and it’s too late.

Elder Hadlock, Sr. is "Hot" too!

Several references in Judges talk about “the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel” – and he “delivered them into the hands of spoilers” …drove them out before them of the nations, sold them into the hands of a king, and into the Philistines, etc. – It’s not good when the anger of the Lord is hot against us.

“And in his hot displeasure, and….in his time, will cut off those wicked, unfaithful, and unjust stewards, and appoint them their portion among hypocrites, and unbelievers.” (D&C 101:90)

“For after today cometh the burning … for verily I say, tomorrow all the proud and they that do wickedly shall be as stubble; and I will burn them up, for I am the Lord of Hosts; and I will not spare any that remain in Babylon.” (D&C 64:24)

But … ”he that is tithed shall not be burned at his coming.” (D&C 64:23). Pay your "Fire Insurance!"

It's good to remember these lessons, but there is a “positive” side of “burning.” Have you ever felt that “burning within”? I have, and I like it!  It seems to come most often when pondering, reading the scriptures, and gathered with the Saints. Psalms 39:3 describes it this way: “My heart was hot within me, while I was musing the fire burned.”

The resurrected Christ appeared to his disciples and taught them. Here’s what they had to say:  “Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?” (Luke 24:32)

Mount Rainier is "cool" on a sunny day!

And when a multitude of Nephites were gathered at the temple following Christ’s resurrection: “… they were thus conversing one with another, they heard a voice as if it came out of heaven; …. And notwithstanding it being a small voice it did pierce them that did hear to the center,  … yea, it did pierce them to the very soul, and did cause their hearts to burn.” (3 Nephi 11:3)

So it’s a“burning within” we seek and a “burning from without” that we want to avoid!  And …. It’s better to be hot  than lukewarm:

“O know thy works, that thou are neither cold nor hot; I would thou were cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.” (Rev 3:15-6)

Well, that’s the “hot” topic of the week. May this week bring a “cooling off” period.

Week 39: The Price of Freedom

Sister Blatter and her daughter flanked by two lovely missionaries

Nothing very “eventful” this week, at least as far as our work in the office goes. President and Sister Blatter, however, have a heavy load and a “loaded” schedule. Between now and July 18, they will be interviewing each missionary. It will require much of their time each day. Then they’re trying to go out with missionaries in the evenings. In addition to our responsibilities at the office, we’ll do whatever we can to help them, of course. But some things only they can do.

We worked on the 4^th of July, but were able to take off a little early. One of the service missionaries and his wife invited us and two other couples to their home for a BBQ. We could have gone to Steilacoom or Chambers Bay to watch fireworks, but chose to stay home instead; we were tired. Instead, we watched fireworks in Herriman & SLC via Facetime. That was a treat. There were fireworks going off much of the night all around us here in University Place. It sounded like a war zone. But, I’m glad folks were celebrating America.

I've never seen such huge hostas!

On Saturday, we went to the Seattle Temple. Had to take a picture of flowers there as well as of a statue of a woman and children holding hands in a circle.  We were missing our family a lot this week so the statue had special meaning. Elder Hadlock helped me get my mind off home by taking me to a cute little town called Issaquah (not far from the Temple) for dinner and chocolates! The Boehm Chocolate Factory is in Issaquah. We will return!

View coming out of Temple

Since we’ve just celebrated Independence Day, I want to share some ideas on freedom that I just read in a book called The Infinite Atonement by Tad R. Callister:

 “Without the Atonement, there could be no freedom. If the Atonement makes us free, we might appropriately ask,  “What does it mean to be free?” To be free is to be like God. Gods are the freest of all beings because “all things are subject unto them . . . [and] they have all power” (D&C 132:20). They “act for themselves” rather than being “acted upon  … free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death” (2Nephi 2:26-27).

Lehi then pled with his sons to “look to the great Mediator . . . and choose eternal life”; otherwise, he warned, the devil will have “power to captivate” you and “reign over you” in his kingdom (2 Nephi 2:28,29).

As we choose the Lord, he gives us more rope; as we choose Satan, he tightens the noose until we are in his grasp.

Brother Callister also quotes Cecil B. De Mille:

“We are too inclined to think of law as something merely restrictive . . . something hemming us in. We sometimes think of law as the opposite of liberty. But that is a false conception. . . . God does not contradict himself. He did not create man and then, as an afterthought, impose upon him a set of arbitrary, irritating, restrictive rules. He made man free --- and then gave him the commandments to keep him free. We cannot break the Ten Commandments. We can only break ourselves against them – or else, by keeping them, rise through them to the fullness of freedom under God.”

As we obey God’s laws we receive increased knowledge of God’s plan, and with increased knowledge comes increased capacity for freedom.… obedience is not the antitheses of freedom, but the foundation of it.

Gods do not live oblivious of laws, but through obedience have mastered the laws so that they might use them to accomplish their purposes.

We are grateful for this country and all its goodness. We know that America was established through divine intervention. Only in America could the gospel and true church of Jesus Christ have been restored. We are grateful for God's laws. Choosing to obey allows God to bless us. We are thankful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ. From personal experience we have learned that application of the Atonement gives us more freedom to become who we really can and ought to become. We are happy AND free when we obey.  

We will close with these lines from Bruce R. McConkie's I Believe in Christ: 

“I believe in Christ; he ransoms me. 

From Satan’s grasp he sets me free.”