Parents home!

The week after Glacier, my parents got back from their mission. They came home on Sunday July 2, and I took the whole week of work off to spend time with them and other family.

The last three years have kind of flown by for all of us, I think, but it was so nice to welcome them home. Aubrey, Tyler, and I made posters and there were a lot of family members that came to the airport to welcome them home. I surprised myself when I started to cry when I saw them coming down the escalators. I wasn't quite prepared for that. But lots of hugs, tears, and laughs ensued for all of us.

We then spent the first half of the week having a reunion with my mom's side of the family, and the second half with my dad's side. It was a little hard at times for me because I'm an introvert and need my alone/recharge time, and there wasn't a lot of that to go around. But it was really nice spending time with everyone and hearing stories, laughing, and catching up.

On Sunday before I drove back, I was able to hear my parents speak/report in the ward my mom grew up in. The chapel was packed with my parents' missionaries, family members, friends, and even some of my dad's former mission companions! I know there are so many stories to tell. But I really want to share some important lessons I learned from things my dad taught his missionaries that I think we can all learn from.

One thing my dad talked about was "so templo," which kind of translates to "only temple." Sometimes, it may be easy for missionaries (and us) to think about getting people to baptism and not past that, but that isn't the right focus. Our goal should be to help people make all the necessary covenants to return to live with their Heavenly Father--not just the first covenant. Our goal should be to get people (including ourselves) to the temple. He helped his missionaries to do that by having them teach a "Spirit of Elijah" lesson, where they could read Malachi 4:5-6 and then ask about close family members who have passed away. The missionaries are inviting their ancestors to join the lesson and use that Spirit of Elijah to bring the the Spirit into the lesson and increase the investigator's desire to make covenants and get to the temple to perform these ordinances for their deceased family members. Super cool.

Another thing that stood out to me is the importance of listening to the first prompting. My dad pointed out that spirits speak spirit to spirit, so we should be very aware of those "thoughts" we have, because they are likely promptings. As one of my uncles would tell his stake, "A thought is a prompting until proven otherwise." (Assuming it's a good thought, of course.) My dad shared some really neat experiences of following that prompting and the miracles that came from that. However, going along with that, Satan is a spirit, and he also communicates that way. So he will come after the first prompting and make us doubt it, make us think it's only our thought and that it was a silly idea. That's why it's even more important for us to hang onto (an do) the first prompting. I know it's definitely something I need to work on doing better.

I know I probably am not doing these concepts justice. I think I should just convince my dad to start a blog where he can talk about all this great stuff. (Hint, hint.) :-)