Nauvoo Tidbits and Treasures

Monday, April 4th 2022

ALL IN!

How has another week gone by! This was our first week with the temple closed and it was pretty eventful.

We went to lunch in Fort Madison with a few other missionaries, We toured a few sites and took a wagon ride around old Nauvoo on a beautiful day, we watched the demonstration of a prairie fire, Kae and Kent Servoss from our neighborhood in Bountiful came for a day and we went on a few site tours and had lunch together and a very enjoyable time and the biggest event was right after Saturday morning conference we get a knock on our door and it's Margie and Tom Wright from Bountiful! He was working in Omaha and she flew in to spend the weekend and they decided to drive to Nauvoo to surprise us and surprise us they did!!! They stayed for the afternoon conference and dinner then went on to her brother's who lives a couple hours away. It was wonderful to spend that time with them!

Conference was amazing for me and for Dave but since I write this, I can only express my feelings most of the time. I felt like we were being told to "be ALL in" if we wanted to be able to experience lasting joy. All of it is our choice. We choose our future lives and Jesus is THE way and because of Him we will all be happy where ever our choices take us. There is a beautiful, happy place for ALL.

We are grateful for the Prophet's counsel to remove the conflicts in our lives and we want to diligently work on that. We are grateful to be on a mission. Karaia, our granddaughter begins her mission a week from today!

We were told by someone that when the Nauvoo temple was announced in 1999 that Tee shirts were made that said " Mormons: we drove them out once, we can do it again!" It is a sad thing that feelings like that still exist here. Talking with a patron one day she said " Some people feel like Nauvoo is a sad place, because of all the persecution that happened here." The tours of the sites most always speak of how the saints were driven out and abused. The plaques on main street telling of the history of Nauvoo start in 1849. No mention is made of how with Joseph Smith's vision and encouragement and all the saints hard work, Nauvoo was drained and cleared and made habitable and beautiful. So, it can be a very sobering thing. The population of Nauvoo at it's peak was 12,000 people. In 1846 it went down to 1,100 and has basically remained there.

Nauvoo is a sacred place and it is a declaration of commitment to Truth, a consecration of lives to God and a rock solid belief in our Savior, Jesus Christ. They were ALL in! Being here and learning all the stories of real people, some even my own family, makes my resolve to be ALL in stronger! Listening to all, every. single. one. of the conference talks, makes my resolve to be ALL in stronger. It is a privilege and a blessing to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! We are ALL in!