Sunday, December 21, 2008

Palmyra temple


Hi everyone, These are two pictures are from our busy Saturday. One is of the Ortega family from Texas.  He will be deployed on the 28th of Dec. to Afghanistan with the 3rd Brigade as a medic.  They have been here just about a month and wanted to get married in the temple before he left.  I think we told you the story of their busy Sunday. On Friday, in a major snow storm, (Mom was a nervous wreck}, we drove them down to Palmyra. We left on Friday because we were worried about not being able to get there Sat. morning because of the storm, this is the only window they had.  The Ortega's had a 7:45 appointment at the temple for endowments and sealing.  We stayed over night at the Palmyra Inn and got up to more snow but the temple was less than 5 minutes away. It was a great experience to be with this faithful young couple fulfilling their righteous desire.  They were so excited.  It was still snowing when we got out of the temple. We quickly showed them around the sites and then raced home to a baptism in Watertown, the other picture. Mom was doing the refreshments for after the baptism social.  Sister Santiago is also a deploying soldier in the 3rd Brigade.  Her finance, in the picture is in the second phase of Special Forces training and will be gone most of the year anyway.  They decided to get married before she left. They are going to be married by the Bishop on Christmas eve.  Mom will help with some light refreshment, ya right. I was asked to baptize and confirm her, it's what the mission calls a white Christmas (clothing). It was a very busy but a spiritually uplifting day for all involved. We could not have done the temple thing without Melissa's help on the temple clothing.  Everything fit perfectly and the Ortegas were very happy.  The Lord really wanted them married in the temple because of how things worked out.  Only in the mission field!  It has been snowing all week.  Today after church I took the Elders to Syracuse and then to Utica, one is going home tomorrow. I went alone because Mom was just not up to another nervous storm run.  It was a good thing too because the roads were snow packed all the way down and on the way home things got really bad fast. I drove for 20 miles in almost white out conditions, snow packed roads with temperatures in the low teens, talk about a prayer in one's heart.  Our car has been super, it has really been snow tested, I can't imagine driving conditions being any worse.  We are loving the work, especially the people.  We love and miss you all, have a great Christmas and at some point read the Bible story in Luke of Christ's birth.  Mom and Dad      

2 comments:

Claudine Cable said...

I love to hear what you are doing on your mission. I totally understand Sister Larsen's reluctance to go on another white-knuckle ride. I have experienced many of them here in Wales, not because of the snow, but because of the extremely narrow streets, not knowing where we are going and taking so many wrong turns, and not being able to figure out the round-abouts. We are loving the people, the young students and the missionaries. They are spiritual and so good to us. Your experiences inspire me, but I will never be the cook-hostess Susan is.

Mark & Melanie said...

We missed you Christmas Eve. We had a great time at Mike and Jen's. Matt read the Christmas Story from Luke 2 (courtesy of Mike's iphone Bible) It was just perfect and the kids loved the evening.