Once in a lifetime!

I had a once in a lifetime experience last Saturday. Our stake presidency and 11 others plus the bishops from each stake were invited to a 'field training' meeting with Elder Dallin Oaks. Elder Oaks brought as traveling companions Elder Rasband and Elder Gonzales of the Presidency of the 70. There were about 100 men in the Lake Oswego stake center chapel. We spent 4 of the shortest hours of my life literally 'at the feet of a prophet' as he instructed us on several matters. Each stake was assigned to sit in a specific place and I was amazed that we were on the second row of the chapel. Elder Oaks spoke from the area in front of the podium for most of the meeting so I could literally reach out and touch him (not that I did!). At the beginning of his remarks he was quite specific to say that he didn't want to have the internet suddenly ablaze with "Elder Oaks said....." so I'm not going to quote him here. I do feel comfortable to share in my own words my feelings about a few of the things he said.

Perhaps I was most impressed with the discussion about teaching the rising generation. There were some specific areas discussed which included:

• Teaching our families the gospel so they develop testimonies of their own. We need to be sure they know of our testimonies of Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, the Atonement, Joseph Smith's as a prophet, the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, the restoration of the priesthood and living prophets. He observed that the church is always just one generation away from extinction.
• Teaching our children the importance of marriage. There are certainly highly visible and vocal opponents of traditional marriage. We need to be sure our children know this is wrong and why. However, these may not be the most significant detractors from the sanctity and dignity of marriage. How will our children ever get the message that marriage is important and sacred when they look around them and see broken marriage after broken marriage, people living together outside of marriage and families with only one parent. And then there are many who simply choose to be single. These attacks on the sanctity of marriage are much more subtle and may do more harm in the end than the extremists. Our children need to understand that Heavenly Father's plan to provide bodies and a temporal experience for His children is through marriage. That it is sacred and holy and the right thing to do. They need to know that they can only experience the greatest joy in this life through marriage. If we do not teach them, they will not learn it from what they see around them in the world.
• Teach our children the importance of having children. Too many in and out of the church choose to have no children or significantly limit the number of children they have. Having children in our homes is also part of Heavenly Father's plan to teach and exalt His children. There are so many wonderful experiences to have as parents and children and as brothers and sisters. Children need siblings to help them grow and develop the skills they need for living. The home is a wonderful laboratory for life but it needs to have some others for experiments!! Parents need to both practice and teach these principles to their children. They won't learn it elsewhere.

I suppose blogs are intended for lighter topics. I don't even know if my kids will read it. However, I do know that I consider myself extremely fortunate to have had the chance to spend the afternoon with one of the men I have raised my arm to sustain many times as a prophet, seer and revelator. My witness of that was refreshed and strengthened by the honor of being in his presence.

PaBell