Come Fly With Us

It would appear that the reason the Sabbath day is so hard to live for so many people is that it is still written on tablets of stone rather than being written in their hearts. … (Spencer W. Kimball)

 Lillian Outcult and Diane in Skagway.  We spent a couple of hours with her orienting her to the Seminary Teaching and Learning Handbook and the S & I site on the web. 

Doctrine and Covenants 59, and pay particular attention to verses 15–19. Explore the great promise that “the fulness of the earth is yours.” How is the fulness of the earth ours? Does this promise refer to spiritual or temporal possession, or to both?

 15 And inasmuch as ye do these things with ^athanksgiving, with ^bcheerful ^chearts‍ and countenances, not with ^dmuch ^elaughter, for this is sin, but with a glad heart and a cheerful countenance—

 16 Verily I say, that inasmuch as ye do this, the ^afulness‍ of the earth is yours, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and that which climbeth upon the trees and walketh upon the earth;

 17 Yea, and the herb, and the ^agood‍ things which come of the earth, whether for food or for ^braiment, or for houses, or for barns, or for orchards, or for gardens, or for vineyards;

 18 Yea, all things which come of the earth, in the season thereof, are made for the ^abenefit‍ and the ^buse‍ of man, both to please the eye and to ^cgladden‍ the heart;

 19 Yea, for ^afood‍ and for raiment, for taste and for smell, to ^bstrengthen‍ the body and to enliven the soul.

And for further insight on keeping the Sabbath Day Holy you can refer to Isaiah 58:13-15; 13 If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words; 14 Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. 

You guessed it, our lesson in Institute consisted partly of the importance of keeping the Sabbath day.  I challenged those in attendance to put the Lord to the test by keeping the Sabbath Day Holy.  The promise is there.  If we do this, the blessings of the earth will be given to us.  We shall not want for food, for raiment, for shelter nor for healthy crops and gardens.  We will be blessed both spiritually and physically.  I think that is a great promise.  And as with all commandments, the Lord blesses us in greater abundance than we have the capacity to comply.

We also discussed the concept of eternal marriage.  Our most recent convert, Jaymi Lawrence, had all sorts of questions.  I had not planned on getting personal with the lesson but in the middle of it all, I felt this impression . . . "You have personal experience that can answer these questions.  Tell her your story."  So I told her.  I have been asked no less than a dozen times by different YSA members about the fact that Diane and I are not sealed for eternity.  How do we feel about that in the coming eternities?  I explained that Diane is sealed to Larry.  I am sealed to Judy.  When we were getting serious enough to talk about marriage Diane asked me, "What do you expect from a wife?" 

I responded, "I want a wife that will willingly help me get back together with Judy for eternity." 

When I asked her what she expected of a husband, she replied similarly.   "But," I said, "that doesn't mean we won't have an eternal relationship of some type in the next life.  We believe that Larry and Judy are pulling for us.  They are cheering our day by day progress and helping in any way possible for us to achieve available Celestial blessings.  We have made eternal relationships with each other's children.  These relationships are dear to us and we fully expect them to continue." 

Also explained was that all would be worked out in the end.  The Lord loves all of His children and none worthy willy be left wanting.

We had a wonderful turn out for our Thursday adult Institute.  Our numbers popped up to 10 from 4.  And our discussion of the first 5 chapters of Romans was exciting.  "For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek."  Also we got to discuss the unrighteousness in perverted behaviors.  It was fun to lead that discussion.

I can't take Diane's contributions lightly.  They all look forward to the food she puts together for them.  I think President Sekona is placing an item on the table each week too.  We love the strength he has brought to the branch.  The Tongans are feeling more a part of the branch I think. 

We took the slow ferry up to Skagway on Friday.  Lillian Outcult has accepted the call to be the seminary teacher for two incoming freshmen.  What a wonderful choice she is.  I asked her how a Moapa, Nevada gal came to be in Skagway.  She had been married for 32 years to a man who had even been a bishop.  He decided to return to his American Native Indian ways.  After 5 years Sister Outcult made the decision to end the marriage.  She then met Rocky Outcult on LDS singles and has been married since May.  They really are both wonderful.  She has a wonderful testimony and the two girls will love her enthusiasm and ability.  She was a school teacher in Moapa.

While waiting for our get together with Lillian on Friday, we strolled into a garden.  We paid the $7.50 per person to enter and met the most wonderful personality.  This man was from St. Petersburg, Florida and spends his summers in Skagway running his monument garden and art gallery.  There was lots of beautiful art in the shop.  He had a picture of Mt. Denali that was so life like and beautiful.  It was painted depicting the magical hour of dusk.  It just captured me.  I feel bad I was $100 short of what he wanted that day.  ($7500) 

He had pictures of Skagway from the early 1900's.  There were lots of descriptions of the legendary gangster of Skagway, "Soapy Smith."  And then the stories of a Mr. Reid and their gun battle in which they both died. 

We had all morning Saturday to wait for the ferry to leave for Juneau.  So we got on a "Beaver" prop plane that held six of us and flew over to Glacier Bay and back.  The flight was about 2.5 hours and we saw probably 50 different glaciers.  It was amazing to see from the air the recession that has been occurring as the earth is now in a warming period.  The amount of dirt that ice can pick up and displace is awesome.  This is the least amount of snow the mountains of Alaska have had on them in over 200 years.  The glaciers have receded as much as 50 miles in some cases.  We flew by Mount Fair Weather which was an impressive 15,000 feet high and quite close to the pacific ocean. 

La Parouse glacier is a glacier that flows directly into the Pacific Ocean.  Most calf far back into the fjords and canyons, or up the mountain crags and valleys.  But La Parouse calfs directly into the Pacific.

Lituya glacier was fascinating.  It flows towards the ocean and then a mountain juts up in front of it.  It splits at 90 degree angles sending some of the ice flow to the right and the rest to the left. 

It was an amazing experience.  It was pricey for us but we had decided that we would do something like this once before our mission was completed. 

A wonderful thing has happened in our branch.  Amanda Mosher is a young woman who recently graduated from ASE here in Juneau.  (Alaska Southeast)  She joined the church 15 months ago.  for about 7 months she was very active and eager to learn.  Her parents were making it quite difficult for her to be active and she had fallen in love with a non-member.  We seldom saw her through the next six months.  However, she has broken up with her boy friend and purchased a home of her own.  She has been attending church more regularly and institute has again become part of her weekly routine.  Yesterday she was sustained as the gospel principles teacher in Sunday School.  She is quite timid about it and yet excited to have returned to what she felt when she was baptized.  It is such a wonderful thing to witness someone grab onto the gospel and run with it.