Day 5: All Day Temple

Friday, June 13th, 2014

Today we spent ALL day working in the temple! Connie and I spent 8 hours in the temple and participated in all ordinances there.  Baptism, Confirmation, Initiatory, Endowment and Marriage Sealings. This was something on Connie's “bucket list” and we were able to check it off! It was an awesome day!!! 

Connie has done some family history and had some family names that needed ordinances completed. We worked to get the temple name cards printed at the hotel but that didn't work. We then went to the Family History Center by the temple and they were able to print the cards for us. 
  

We thought we would start with the first ordinance, baptisms, and go through each ordinance. There was a youth group from a local ward/branch that we joined.  It was wonderful to see the beautiful young women dressed in white and watch them to baptisms as proxies for their ancestors. It was fun to see the excitement in their eyes to be in the temple. There are faithful members all over the world. 

We then participated in a couple of initiatory sessions and an endowment session. My spirit was uplifted as I learned new principles and felt the love of my Heavenly Father and my Savior, Jesus Christ. 

To finish our day, we participated in a sealing session.  This was the first time I had ever participated in this ordinance. We were able to seal 9 couple and a son and a daughter from our family name cards.  It was a neat experience.

After a wonderful day in the Temple

  

As we left the temple, we had a little challenge catching a taxi.  They were all full and just kept zipping past us on the road.  We finally found one that was dropping a person off at the church annex buildings across from the temple.  I ran down and caught the driver’s attention and we were set.  

We had the most hilarious ride from the temple to the Mega Mall.  Our driver asked us immediately if we were members of that church.  We of course said “yes” and then he pulled out a booklet that the missionaries had given him!  The missionaries had tracked into him just the Monday before and had invited him to church.  This man works driving taxi on Sundays so he said he didn’t know if he could go so the missionaries said they would go back next Monday.  We told him he should listen to the missionaries and ask them more questions.  We started talking about families and Connie told him she had 12 children.  He didn’t believe her.  He then asked her how old she was and she didn’t tell him right off so he kept saying he didn’t believe she could have 12 children.  Connie then told him how old she is age and he then asked how old she was when she got married.  She told him 21 and he quickly did the math and said she had to have had a child every year!  We just laughed!! She then told him they had 5 children adopted from Russia.  It was quiet for a while and I felt prompted to ask him if he had a family and he told us he had 4 children.  I was prompted again and was bold enough to ask if he would like to be with his children and family forever!  That made him think.  Not knowing how to speak Tagalog, I couldn't share my feelings very well. I really wished that I could talk to my cousin, Mason, who served his mission in that very area where we were at. I told him he should ask the missionaries about a forever family and the temple.  The taxi driver spoke limited English but we told him the missionaries could explain it all to him in Tagalog.  By the end of our ride, he seemed that he was planning on seeing the missionaries again the coming Monday!  We hope he does!

It was such a great day that we are going to skip our manicure and pedicure day and go back again tomorrow!!  We’ll get “manis and pedis” in China!!!

We had dinner again at the Mega Mall. I ended up getting a big hamburger. It was not as good as the one Connie had at Chili's. I could not eat all of it! That's the most meat I've had in almost 6 months! The french fries sure were yummy!

Thought this was a catchy slogan in the Mall