MTC3

Today is Saturday, June 10th.As we have reflected back over the past week we have been so impressed with the hundreds of young and old missionaries we have met and rubbed shoulders with. We have been amazed at all our family that previously walked these same halls serving missions and being there to support other missionaries and family members going on missions. We were getting ready to go to the Provo City Temple this morning with Merrill and Bernadette McCracken. Mom had gotten out of the shower and was dressing. I jumped in the shower and got out. I was drying off close to the door to our room. I heard a key in our lock and the door opened. I was standing there butt naked when a little older lady started to walk in our room. I said, “Hello!” It startled her and she shut the door. It was an embarrassing moment for sure. Mom put on her robe and walked out to see who it was. The little lady could not be found. There were some younger missionaries in the hall vacuuming and they said, “Oh no, we don’t have keys to the rooms. We can only clean a room when it is opened for us. Mom figured that the cleaning supervisor was an older sister and got mixed up on who was leaving on Saturday. After the embarrassment we laughed. We had a special time at the Provo City Temple. Our friends, the McCrackens wanted to go to the Payson Temple too. While Bernadette was at the MTC one of the missionaries told her a story about her uncle who was the Stake President in Payson. He told his stake that if they faithfully attended church and paid their tithing they would get a temple in their community. Sure enough, a few years later President Monson announced they would have a new temple in Payson. Bernadette was so excited to hear this story she wanted to go to the Payson Temple. After finishing a session in the Provo City Temple we ate lunch at the MTC and then headed to the Payson Temple. When we arrived there and were sitting in the chapel waiting to do an endowment session, the temple worker conducting the session came and asked the McCracken’s to be the witness couple. Bernadette was so excited to think of this tender mercy. There were 70 patrons there to do an endowment session, most from the Payson community, and the temple worker was prompted to ask Bernadette who was a relative of the Stake President that all the Payson community loved. The temple worker had no idea who Bernadette was. It was a good experience being in both temples. We came back to the MTC and did our laundry. We were waiting for Leah and James to arrive in Provo. We went to dinner with them at Cafe Rio. We had a fun time.

We had a great day on Friday. We had a cool presentation from an older couple, the Hawks. They have been on 13 missions. They shared several stories. One we particularly enjoyed was when they were in Santa Monica doing a CES mission. They were teaching Institute. The Institute parking lot was close to a local college so all the Institute students could park for free and go to both Institute and college. Each semester they would have 2-3 college students that would park in the Institute parking lot but not attend institute. Sister Hawks would leave a nice note on their car and invite them to Institute. The notes always helped and the students would normally start attending Institute. They left a note on one car and the young man didn’t attend. She left several notes and still nothing happened. Sister Hawks decided she would get there early so she could talk with his personally. She arrived at 5:00 am and waited for this young man to show up. Sister Hawks got busy at forgot. She looked up around 10:00 am and noticed his car was parked in the parking lot. She decided she would wait until he came back that evening. She waited until 6:00 pm and he still hadn’t come back. She went in to her husband and he said just park our car in the driveway so he couldn’t leave. Around 10:30 pm Sepi rang their doorbell. He said, could I get me car out. Sister Hawks said okay, if you come to Institute. Sepi agreed. He was a returned missionary and had lot interest in attending church. He started attending Institute and he started attending church. The Hawks left their mission and a few years later they received a letter from Sepi. He told them how much he appreciated them and through their encouragement it allowed him to find a beautiful wife; get  married in the temple; and have 2 beautiful children. It was a great story.