Prophets I Have Known

by Joyce DiPastena

While I was praying one day this week, reflecting on the passing of President Gordon B. Hinckley and thanking Heavenly Father for the opportunity to have known this wonderful and outstanding leader, I found my mind drifting with gratitude not only for President Hinckley, but for all the great prophets I have had the privilege to “know” in my lifetime.

David O. McKay was the prophet of my childhood, but aside from recognizing his picture on the Primary table week after week and knowing that his name was the answer to our Primary president’s question, “Who’s our prophet?”, I didn’t know anything more than his name and picture until many years later.

Joseph Fielding Smith was the prophet of my early youth. My mother would tell me stories about him, but beyond her words and pictures once again, I never heard him speak and didn’t feel like I knew him, either.

Then came Harold B. Lee…came and went so quickly, that once more, it was only through my mother’s words that I learned anything of the man.

Thus, President Spencer W. Kimball was the first prophet that, thanks to the evolving wonders of modern technology, I came to know beyond a frozen picture and other people’s words. By radio, TV, and ultimately a stake satellite dish, I finally heard and saw a prophet in action. And truly, President Kimball was a man of action!

“Lengthen your stride.” “Do it.” “Do it now!” Much of the foundation that President Hinckley has built on was laid (at least, in my memory) during the tenure of President Kimball. The creation of the Quorums of the Seventies. (Presdient Hinckley filled them.) The extension of the priesthood to all worthy members of the Church. (President Hinckley built temples in Africa.) And speaking of temples, after a long interlude between temple building, President Kimball set in motion a new temple building program involving smaller temples…not as small as President Hinckley pursued, but surely a step towards that future, and an exciting time of new temple growth in the 1980s. He called for an unprecedented number of new missionaries to carry the gospel to the world. And while the size of the Church was smaller then, President Kimball, too, was a “man of the people” who loved to travel the world to meet the members of the Church. He was not a young man, and he had many health problems, but he remained a “man on the go”. I still vividly recall a talk in general conference given by one of the Seventies who had traveled with him on one of his journeys. At the request of one of President Kimball’s doctors, the Seventy encouraged President Kimball to try to take things a little easier, to slow down just a bit. He said President Kimball stopped, turned to him, and said, “Elder ? (can’t remember his name, sorry), if you knew what I knew, you wouldn’t ask me to slow down.” When illness finally overtook him towards the end of his presidency, I remember thinking to myself, “I wonder if this was the only way the Lord could find to make President Kimball finally slow down and rest?”

I remember President Ezra Taft Benson’s “classic” talks on reading the Book of Mormon and bewaring of pride. But I also remember his love for the members of the Church, and his recognition that within that membership were distinct groups with distinct sets of needs. I remember over a series of general conferences, he focused one talk to the women of the Church (I presume he spoke to the men in the general priesthood meeting); another talk to the youth of the Church; a talk aimed at singles in the Church; and even a talk especially aimed at the children. And to this day, of all the testimonies he bore while a prophet, the memory that still gives me chills to recall is the one that he bore at the press conference following President Kimball’s death, when he was introduced as the new President of the Church. I can still hear the way his voice trembled…yes, undoubtedly from age, but more from force of conviction as he declared boldly to all the world: “I love this work with all my heart.” At that moment, I knew without shadow of doubt that “the work” was true, and his testimony burned into my heart.

President Howard W. Hunter was prophet such a short time. I often feel just a wee bit cheated that he wasn’t allowed to serve longer, for I loved this humble servant of the Lord. He challenged us all to make the temple the great symbol of our membership of the Church. To qualify for a temple recommend, even if we thought we’d never be close enough to a temple to use it. (What a prophetic challenge, given the temple growth that followed under President Hinckley!) But I also hear his voice urging us to be kinder, more gentle, more forgiving, more tolerant with one another. And when speaking of the Savior, I remember him saying, “We need to know Him better than we know Him.” On days when I struggle with a sense of self-worth and wonder “Why would God love me?”, even—perhaps especially—when I see so much evidence around me that He does—I can hear again these words of the prophet, and I know the answer is, “I need to know the Savior better than I do.”

If you are like me, you have spent a weekend richly filled in memories of President Hinckley. I have no need to remind you of them here. But on this day, I say not only:

“I thank thee, O God, for a prophet…”, but, “I thank thee, O God, for all the prophets who have guided me in these latter-days.”

By Small Means

By Liz Adair

I’m teaching Old Testament this year in seminary, and as we read through these ancient stories, I realize most of these people, the characters in these stories, had no inkling that they would become immortal. Oh, maybe Moses or Samuel or Isaiah or one of the prophets privileged to see into the future, but surely not Rachel and Leah, Dinah, Hannah, Agag, Boaz or Elimelech. I have an idea that each was just trying to get through a tenuous life the best s/he could. Some made better decisions, some had purer motives. A few may have aspired to be remembered, but I doubt that Agag wanted to go down in history as the king who was hacked to pieces by Samuel. He probably had something more regal in mind for his legacy.

But these people live on! How many millions, down through the ages, have read of Rachel’s beauty and barrenness and Leah’s plainness (fine eyes notwithstanding) and fecundity? Any woman who has ever loved a man can identify with that story, whether the love was requited or not. And what mother reads of Hannah’s promise to give her son to God––a promise made before she held the baby in her arms––what mother reads that and doesn’t ache for Hannah as she takes Samuel to the temple and puts him in the care of the old priest, Eli? Can you not picture her making her annual pilgrimage to see her son, carrying with her a coat, bigger than last year’s by her best guess at how he would have grown in this year?

I’ve been immersing myself in the words of other people long dead this last week. I’m the only one who has these writings, for they’re family letters that have been passed down to me through a series of deaths. I sat on the floor yesterday surrounded by a pile of them written in the first three decades of the twentieth century. As I picked up one and then another, I was struck by the legacy left in those pencil scrawls on pages from a lined tablet. I watched the round schoolboy penmanship of a fourteen year old boy, beginning with four lines that he sent to his mother along with part of his cowboy's wages, grow more fluid over the course of the dozen years his letters spanned. His writing matured as well, and that narrative opened a window on a time and a place in my family’s history that is chronicled nowhere else.

That was the setting when I sat down to read scriptures with my husband last night. We’re plowing through the Book of Mormon again, and we came to the place where Nephi is talking about the Liahona, and he says: And there was also written upon them a new writing, which was plain to be read, which did give us understanding concerning the ways of the Lord; and it was written and changed from time to time, according to the faith and diligence which we gave unto it. And thus we see that by small means the Lord can bring about great things. (1 Nephi 16:29)

I have read those words before many times. In fact, I often quote the ‘by small means the Lord can bring about great things’ phrase. I’ve always connected it with things other than writing, but here is a note from my great aunt in 1965 telling me about the route her family traveled by wagon train to get to New Mexico, and there is a letter where my grandfather writes about his college experience. Small, simple things. My intent is to make this information available to the family in a form that will last for many generations.

I’m sure that the young cowboy, sitting at a remote cow camp tending a windmill and writing to his mother by light of a coal oil lamp, never thought that his simple words would be set down for strangers to read hundreds of years later. But he, like many of us, was driven to set his thoughts to paper. And by that small act, repeated over and over by people like you and me, great things are brought to pass.

A City of Books

by Christine Thackeray

I am currently co-authoring a book with my sister Dr. Marianna Richardson about C. S. Lewis. She did the first part and I did the last and then we are doing the middle together. I thought I had all my sources together when I found this wonderful quote that says "joy is the serious business of heaven." It was from Lewis' last book called "Letters to Malcolm" which he wrote shortly before his death and is esoteric to say the least. Well, I'm a real in context sort of researcher and wanted to see what came before and after that quote so that I'm not just relating the words but his true intention. But when I started looking for the book, I couldn't find it anywhere.

I did every type of internet search I could think of and came up with NOTHING! I went to all of the bookstores within a half hour drive and they didn't have it and my library didn't have it. Now I could have ordered it from Amazon but that would take time and I was hoping to get that chapter done by tomorrow. Then I remembered a radio ad that lodged in my sub-conscious while I was in the car doing errands. Something about the biggest bookstore in the world being in downtown Portland.

Well, a few clicks of the mouse and my mouth dropped open. POWELL's City of Books is in downtown Portland and it is the largest bookstore in the world (they say). With the lure of a good meal I talked my husband into taking me there on a DATE tonight!!!! By the time I got the kids fed and my daughter over to her friend's house it was after 8pm and I think my husband was hoping the store would be closed but it stays open until 11pm six nights a week. It was raining when we turned down the crowded city street and from the outside, it didn't look like much. Greg had to go around the block twice before we found a place to park and we soon walked up to the old boxy building with a neon Powell's across the front and a crowd of assorted characters milling around the front sidewalk. As we walked in, you could tell that what had once been an entire block of separate stores was now a maze of delight with elevators, and staircases leading to endless shelves of books of every kind. Used, new, collectors editions and other paraphanalia all mish-mashed together in an incredible smorgesbord of heady mental fulfillment- I was in heaven! My husband wasn't.

I began at the information desk which to my husband was my first mistake (he never asks directions.) They told me that C. S. Lewis was in the Children's section, Fantasy/SciFi and Religion, Shakespeare in Drama upstairs and my lastest Book Club selection, Thunderbolt Kid, in new releases. I literally danced through the aisles. They did have "Letters to Malcolm" (I got the last copy) and the Collected Letters of Lewis AND an incredible anthology AND George MacDonald's Princess series that inspired the Narnia series AND an awesome Shakespeare book that reviews archetypes and... and...

So I left with a pile of books over my head and my husband pooped out in the SciFi section and told me to find him when I was done. I did and he helped me haul my stash to the checkout. As the cashier ran the books through I noticed one that I hadn't chosen. I assumed I had picked it up by mistake when my husband stepped in. "No, that's mine." I picked up it up and looked at the cover. It was an instruction manual on how to fight off Zombies. Now I want to know who is the bigger Zombie, him or me? Well, it doesn't really matter because I know how I'm going to spend the next week- reading!!!!

Going Berzerk

By Kristine John
(written originally in August of 2006)

Have you ever heard the Ray Stevens song "The Day the Squirrel Went Berzerk"?

It tells the story of a squirrel getting loose in church and wreaking havoc among the churchgoers. It's very funny. That is, until something like it actually happens to you. I'm not kidding, and I assure you, not one bit of this is made up.


Last Thursday, we had Cub Scout Pack Meeting. My oldest son, Stephen, had earned his Webelos badge and Arrow of Light before he turned 11 mid-month, so we were excited he would be receiving these awards. Pack meeting was to start at 6pm, so it was imperative that we leave home by 5:45pm to get there on time.


5:25pm
All the kids are at the table. Dinner is underway and we are making progress toward our goal of leaving on time. I finish my dinner and walk outside for a minute to turn our internet antenna for better reception. Our cat, Orion, is chasing a small rodent-like creature down the edge of the house. I silently cheer him on and pride myself on having a hunter in the family that rids our home of nasty pests. I know we're on track for the night, so I am feeling confident and unrushed.

I head back inside, and leave the door open momentarily behind me. After a brief minute, I shut the door, and try to verbally hurry the kids along, telling them they still need to find their shoes and get their hair combed.


5:28pm
"Mom," Emily says, "Orion has a tail hanging out of his mouth."

My immediate thought is: "What?!? Orion is inside?"

It only takes about 2 seconds to connect the dots. I know that he has just been chasing a 4 inch rodent outside, and now, he is inside, presumably with WHATEVER that rodent was, IN HIS MOUTH!! He must have caught the creature and slipped inside to share his prize with us before I shut the door. So, bracing myself for a dead offering, I stoop down to see what kind of carcass I needed to clean up. All of a sudden I hear, "HE LET IT GOOOOO!"

"IT'S ALIVE!"

"Oh, GROSS!"

"WHAT is it??"

Lo and behold, Orion, brave and mighty cat hunter he is, had grabbed a chipmunk by the tail and brought it into our home, ALIVE.


So at 5:30pm, chaos ensued.
Every child is either chasing me to try and see the chipmunk, screaming or screaming and standing on their chair around the table. I chase this chipmunk from guest room (where part of the tail actually came off), to the piano (underneath it, in fact, so I'm quickly clearing the top of the piano and trying to move it enough so that Orion can recapture his prey), to a corner in the TV room, up underneath the recliner (where he chose to stay for a couple of minutes until I totally tipped over the chair and shook it), to a newly washed pillowcase next to the couch.
It is finally here that this little, bleeding-tailed chipmunk, buries it's head and half of it's body, trying to find security and peace.


While this is all taking place, I'm frantically trying to decide what I can do if I can't get Orion to catch the LOVELY prey he was so anxious to show us. So the following things are racing through my mind: Would it be completely stupid to leave a chipmunk in the house when we weren't home? Where would it hide? (There are lots of places for it to hide for a really long time in my house.) Of course I quickly come to the following conclusion: No way, I can't leave a chipmunk unattended, to have free reign in my house while I am gone. So I decide, I'll just miss Pack Meeting. Immediately I reverse that decision, No, that won't work, Bug is getting his awards.


In the middle of this internal dialoge, I'm YELLING orders to everyone, "Get your shoes on, NOW!"

"There's a tail on the floor?! YUCK! Stephen, get a Wal-Mart bag and pick it up with the plastic, BUT DON'T TOUCH IT!"

"Where's Samuel (the 18 month old)?....Emily, GO BUCKLE HIM IN THE VAN!"

"EVERYBODY!! Get your shoes and GO BUCKLE UP!"

"Stop screaming and chasing the chipmunk, GO TO THE VAN, WE NEED TO GO!!"

Once the kids listened and all went to the van, I was actually able to concentrate on the rodent at hand.


When it finally ran into the wadded up (but clean) pillowcase, I was relieved. It didn't seem to be moving much. Again, my thoughts ran rampant. Maybe I can catch it. Put it in a box or a jar or something. Yes. That is what I will do. Wait, what if it runs away while I am getting a container? What if....I just pick up the pillowcase? That's it! Surely that will work.

So I grabbed two edges of the pillowcase, and walked as quickly as possible to the door. Relieved to be outside, I sent a huge "Thank You, Lord!" heavenward, and started to let the chipmunk go.

Then from the van I heard, "Mom! Can we see it's tail? Where it got bitten off?"

"Cool!"

"You caught it! Awesome!"

So after a short show and tell, I let Orion sniff the back of the chipmunk...and the chipmunk literally jumped 18 inches from the pillowcase to the ground a foot away from me and took off, as fast as it could go, Orion on it's heels.


I didn't stay to see the hunt resumed, I just walked to the van, started it up, and drove away, truly thanking the Lord that I have never had to deal with that before, and praying I will never have to deal with it again, either.


Oh, and just in case you were wondering, they didn't have Stephen's awards ready. They'll be presenting him with them next month. At another Pack Meeting.

I'll be praying it is a chipmunkless night.