God's Hand

Just to preface, I wish I was a better writer. These situations today were pretty profound but I just don't know how to do them justice. I wish you could have been there to see it.

Today was a day to watch the hand of God at work. We took the children to Temple Square in Downtown Salt Lake City. It was important to us to have Scott have a spiritual experience and hopefully find someone that spoke Mandarin that could communicate with him about God. Most children from China don't know that a God even exists so we weren't sure how to help Scott understand.

The very first thing we did was go see the Christus statue. There is a recording of many of the things Christ said like, "Come unto me, In my house are many mansions" and so forth. There is a strong feeling of peace and love in the room with the Christus. Some missionaries played the Mandarin version and then the English for the rest of the kids. I wasn't sure how much of it Scott was understanding but in the middle of the English version Doug told me Scott asked to have our picture taken in front of Christ. It was Scott's idea. We all stood in front and Doug took some pictures. A nice guy offered to have Doug stand in the picture and he snapped the camera.

In the Visitor Center there is a presentation on families and the importance of them. We were able to watch that and you could feel the Spirit very strong. While changing rooms Scott would stay right on Doug and hold tight. A couple of times he sat by me too. In one room I sat down next to him and put my hand on his knee. He took my hand and interlocked fingers with me. I have noticed that is a very personal thing for Scott and I was honored that he would trust me so much.

We decided to ask for Mandarin missionaries because we couldn't find any. They front desk texted some and we started looking around again. We were under the impression that the missionaries would find us because we were right in the same room. No one came so we assumed that they were all busy at the moment. We moved on to another building. About 15 minutes after we left the first building some missionaries asked if we had paged for them. Amazingly they had found us. They told us that they had waited but couldn't find us so they said a prayer and felt they needed to come to the same place we were. They were so impressed how they were led to us.

The sister missionary that spoke Mandarin got down on Scotts level and began talking with him. She had him writing, which he doesn't do for us, and she wrote on a paper for him. After some time she explained what she had been talking about and let us know they had a tour they needed to get to. I had asked the other missionary if they had time to take us to the viewing area of the Salt Lake Temple. They had a few more minutes so we hurried over there. We wanted Scott to know that we had the opportunity to be a family forever and that even after we die we will be a family. We wanted him to know that that ordinance is performed in the temple.

I was with the children and the other sister missionary so I didn't get to see Scott's reaction when she explained that we wanted Scott to be in our family forever. I wasn't sure what he would do knowing he would be in our family forever. There was a possibility that he could have reacted very negatively. When all was done the Mandarin sister told us that he was excited to be part of our family and liked what he had heard.

For the rest of the evening Scott was very attached and interacted well. After the children were sent to get PJ's Scott brought me a picture of Christ and handed it to me. I wasn't sure what to do. Did he want it or did he just not care? Creed said that he had given the picture to Scott after church. Scott came back to me and gestured that he wanted to hang it up and for me to come with him. I went and got some tape  and he took me to his room. He pointed to his wall just above his bed close to his pillow and had me hang the picture there. He had a very big grin and was so pleased.

I am so grateful for how receptive Scott is. He is doing so well! It has been very important to us to teach Scott about his Savior and for him to learn to read. The scriptures are where he will understand who his Savior is and feel His presence. If Scott can learn nothing else we pray he will gain a testimony of how much his Father in Heaven and brother Jesus Christ love him and the ability to feast on their words.

We will be going back in 2 weeks because all the kids want to see the parts we missed and go to the Church History Museum. We are excited to go.

 

In front of the Christus. Scott had to stand right by me

and pulled everyone in as close as he could for the picture.

 

Notice the guy in the background of the picture.

In this area there are wax figures of prophets of old.

Scott saw this guy in the back and tried to get his attention.

After failing he started waving his hand in his face.

Everyone laughed at that. When Scott realized what was going on

He laughed pretty hard.

 

Scott is always hanging on Pierce.

Pierce deserves the brother of the year award for his patience!

Scott told the missionary that he liked it here in our family and

that he has fun. That's good to hear.

 

Niya, Hannah and Emma.

 

I don't know who had the camera but Malia was being a ham.

 

The view from the window of the visitor center.

The Salt Lake Temple.

 

Crossing the street to go back to the bus.

 

After a very late dinner of hot dogs and watermelon we played Quirkle.

Scott beat us!

I helped him a little because I couldn't explain the rules.

I would point to a piece I would recommend he use

and he would decide where to place it on the board.

In some ways he is so smart.

 

About those hot dogs. We went through 25 hot dogs a full very large watermelon and a loaf and a half of zucchini bread for dinner and I still had kids asking for more food.

For the mom who could not cook in small quantities and always had

 leftovers I will need new recipes.The days of leftovers are gone.

I am now up to 3 lasagnas at a time and the next time we have hot dogs I'll cook 3 packages.

That equals 36 hot dogs. Maybe we will have a couple left over with that.

I'm going to have to get better convection ovens or a third oven.

I already am in desperate need of a larger refrigerator.