Church

Our sacrament meeting was sooooo good today! A nervous youth speaker, who was dutifully praised by all who came after her, was followed by a High Council speaker, Brother Steven Towne. He gave an excellent talk about temple and missionary work. Our stake's main focus this year is on missionary work, so every High Council speaker's talk is tied to that topic. Then Summer Hill, our former Gospel Doctrine teacher sang a song that I am familiar with but cannot think of what it is called. She did a great job, and even Laynie was touched. If you know the song, please tell me the title! I'll probably try to Google the lyrics. Something about seeing him face to face... "if the world could [?] devotion..." Lots of "if..." Darn.

After Sister Hill, the bishop asked Brother Edwin Mulitalo, who was a member of the ward for eight years while he played for the Ravens but now lives in Michigan and plays for the Lions, to share his testimony. He was in town for yesterday's Faith and Football event. He briefly shared his testimony, because it was 10:00 when he stood up, and that meeting is supposed to end at 10:05. He told the story of when he proposed to his wife, traditional Samoan style, with a pile of hams, turkeys, and lava lavas in the O'Brien family living room in Atlanta, GA, to impress the family as he detailed his bloodline and qualifications as a husband. His pride in his Samoan heritage and culture was likened to his pride in his heavenly heritage and culture. I wonder if he has a book or video out. I would love to hear more from him.

Finally, one of the counselors in the Baltimore mission presidency, President McGinn, spoke. His talk was also brief, and I honestly don't remember a great deal of it. It was on missionary work, and he tried to impress upon us the importance of member missionary work, because 60% of the mission's baptisms every year for the past five years have been from member missionary work. I can't remember anything else he said. I did interpret that talk as best I could, but the noisy children around us were quite distracting. That makes it harder for me to retain what I hear, I guess. Or maybe I was still thinking about Brother Mulitalo's talk. Anyway, our sacrament meeting was great.