This is a picture of the building where we'll be going to church. I don't know exactly when it was built, but it is very new. And yes, this is the whole building, consisting of the chapel area, a kitchen, a classroom, an office, and the bathrooms. (And it took me at least six tries to upload this small picture file!) I guess there is another chapel in a town farther away, but all the people attending there were from this town, so they finally closed that distant one and opened one here.
Today I got to speak in church. I think they were so excited to have a new speaker, which surprisingly made me less nervous about whether they would like what I had to say. Of course they would like it: I'm a new face, right? We misjudged how long it would take us to get there and arrived right when it was supposed to start....I bet they were getting more nervous than I was!
But they still had some nice prelude music playing even though no one plays the piano: they have a player piano with all the hymns programed into it.
Last week when we stopped in town and met the church people, I was asked to speak for about 15 minutes this Sunday about "us". I waited to hear what gospel topic I should also incorporate,but no such conversation was forthcoming. So I ventured the question, "Aannnd anything else?" Again I was instructed to just talk about us, and maybe "what the church means to me". Yeah. I don't like telling people too much about me, at least at our first meeting. And I know I don't have 15 minutes worth of "me" to talk about in church.
So I decided to dedicate half the talk to a recap of our lives (the condensed version) and the rest to something that somewhat related to our family: "Coping with trials." I felt a little pretentious , as I typed it, because really, no one in our family has died, no one has cancer or suffered a terrible accident and we actually found a job and aren't homeless! We are in pretty good shape! Then I felt a lot less sorry for myself, and more optimistic about everything in general.
The talk went pretty well, except I felt weird talking about us when half of the congregation was visitors who didn't really care: an older man, his two college-age sons, and their friend. That did make me glad I'd added a gospel topic too!
I was worried the kids would have a hard time realizing they were in Sacrament meeting, what with the small group and unusual circumstances. They did pretty good the first half, when I was still sitting with them. But when I was speaking it wasn't so great. They weren't loud or crying (thank goodness) but they kept wandering up to where I was speaking! The stand looks similar to other church buildings, with the low wall separating the speaker from the congregation, but there are no stairs at all, and everyone is sitting in the same padded folding chairs.
While Joseph took care of Jonah (I guess that's what he was doing?) Josh came and stood by me, giggling and looking around. After a few minutes, Elora decided she would get up too, and she stood next to me, walked around behind me, and eventually just sat down next to the Branch President and his councilor!
At least twice during the talk I paused for a second to quietly urge, "Go sit down now, please," thinking Joseph would get the message and maybe grab them back to their seats. Yeah right. But they were only a little distracting to everyone, right?
After my talk (I'm not sure how long it actually was, I couldn't see a clock) we sang the closing song and closed the meeting! They only have one hour of class instead of two, so the primary kids (my kids and the two others) went back to the classroom with some teachers, while we took turns reading a Conference talk for our lesson. A very old man was the teacher, and he kept calling me "Sis", it was cute. His wife kept telling me how excited they were to have us there, as did everyone else. After the lesson was over, everyone talked for quite a while, but when we got out to our car and I saw the time, it was only 11:30......church had started at 10:00. So I guess my talk wasn't that long, huh?
After church the Branch President kindly invited us to their house for lunch. Their house was about 16 miles north of town, ours is about 25 miles south east of town. But it was very nice to be able to sit and visit, even though Elora kept saying, "Yuck! I don't like this!"
Whose rude little girl is that, anyway?
4 comments:
That's great that preparing your talk helped you feel better about what you guys are doing and where you're at.
Sorry Elora didn't like the food. I hate when we're at someone's house and my kids say they don't like it, but I was a picky eater when I was young, so I kind of know how they feel. I had an aunt who forced me to eat stuff when we visited. It was really annoying, as I truly did not like it.
Hope things continue to pick up for you guys. How is Joseph's job going?
I was going to say the same thing. It's nice that your talk helped you feel more blessed and positive. When I read that, it also made me feel really blessed and positive about my life, even though I have trials.
I always think it's so nice when people invite others to their house for dinner. I want to be more like that someday.
Did Joseph give a talk, too? What was his topic?
I enjoyed hearing about all of this... even if the things you mentioned weren't all enjoyable.
Thanks for the comments guys. Its hard to come on here too often, because everything is so sllloooow. Joseph gave a talk the next week, and it was a surprise but he was somehow prepared. It was weird.
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