SITTING AT THE FEET OF AN APOSTLE...

We had an unique opportunity to sit at the feet of an Apostle of the Lord last night. Elder David A. Bednar has been touring around Australia for the past 10 days and last night they had a fireside. The very unique thing was that they broadcast it all across Australia live, and it originated from our Stake Center. Because they were broadcasting it live they said we could bring kids but if we were in the chapel you could not leave to go to the bathroom or anything and you had to be reverent. They even made those sitting in the Chapel sign a release form so that their images could be used. It was truly a big deal around here. We decided to get a babysitter and enjoy the evening without them. We were glad that we went it alone. The doors opened an hour and a half before the fireside was the start, at 5:30, and we were there close to opening time. We still were in the gym. I overheard one girl in the bathroom telling a friend that she had gotten there at 4:30.

The very unique thing was that Elder Bednar opened up the evening to questions. Sounds crazy right? A live broadcast and he is allowing people to just get up and ask questions. Another cool thing was the the questions came from all over Australia. They would hand him slips of paper as he was talking with more questions on them. It was such a great experience to hear his answers.

I was not brave enough to go up to the microphone and ask an Apostle a question - but Kev was. He was going to ask him how to get the Elder's fired up to do their home teaching. He also wanted to hear his answer to a question that he gave as an example - what could he share from his experience of seeing a new prophet called. He went around to the Chapel and they had him sit on a pew in the back. He didn't get a chance to ask though - too bad. About 10 minutes before the fireside was the end someone came up to the four people who were waiting to ask questions and said, "You were supposed to raise your hand in between questions so he could call on you!" That would have been helpful information about an hour before.

The fireside was great. He gave some great advice. Here is some of what I learned.
1~ My favorite answer that he gave was to this questions, "What advice would you give to those who are less active?" He said simply, "come back!"
2~ He also talked about how if you are committed to the gospel 100% and it is part of who you are completely missionary work will not be scary. You will just do it.
3~ Also someone asked how can the Lord love me for who I am and yet want me to change? What a great question. I have wondered this at times in my life as well. He simply said because God sees who we can become.
4~ A almost 12-year-old boy in our stake got up and asked how he could prepare to receive the Priesthood and what he should do to become like Elder Bednar one day. It was really cute! Elder Bednar, who has a great sense of humor I learned last night, told this young man that he didn't want to be just like him and then proceeded to tell him how to honor the priesthood. He mentioned that people wonder how we can give such a responsibility to young boys and his response was because someday they are going to be Men of God. I also liked when he said that when you bless or pass the sacrament it isn't about you. The young men should do nothing that will distract those partaking of this sacred ordinance. They should dress appropriately and they should be very reverent. He said the priesthood is not done for selfish reasons it is for others.

There was so much more in this two hour conversation with an Apostle - but those are the things that really struck me.