Today is July 24th.
Pioneer Day. A day when we Mormons take time to remember the sacrifices of
those that came before us. Today we watch parades filled with floats of pioneer
or western designs. We read stories of ancestors who may have been among those
brave souls that gave so much. We shoot of fireworks and have picnics. We maybe
even take time to go to the “This is the Place” monument. This year our family
started what I hope can be a new tradition for us. We didn’t have any real
activities during the day. In face, I worked most of the day. But after dinner
we made some popcorn and re-watched the movie 17 Miracles. It tells the story
of the Willie and Martin handcart company. They are probably the best known of
all the handcart companies to cross the plains. They left far later than they
should have and suffered greatly for it. It’s a very well made feature that, I
admit, I can’t make it through tearless.
One of my
favorite things to learn about is church history, and I really stand in awe of
what the early saints went through. I wonder how many of us today could stand
up to the trials that they did. And yet, I guess that we all go through our own
refiner’s fire. They had mobs and newspapers and we have protestors and the
internet. I know there have been times
that I’ve thought that I would have stood up to the mobs and proudly stood by
Brother Joseph or Brother Brigham. And yet, today, do I stand up as proudly
with Brother Gordon or Brother Thomas? Am I as ready to stand and be counted as
Latter-Day Saint as were those early saints? The threat to there lives may have
been so much more than ours of course, but shouldn’t that make it even easier.
There aren’t mobbers waiting to drive us from our homes into the cold of the
night, but we fear the “mobbers” of our generation with even more fear than
guns and ammo sometimes. I know that I’m as guilty as the next man in this. I
fear what others may think sometimes more that I want to follow the leaders. I
need to change that. I need to proudly stand and say who I am and what I believe.
I’m from Utah .
I’m a Mormon with lineage that traces back to Hyrum Smith and Willard Richards.
I’m proud of both my heritage and my religion and I will try to stand as proudly
today with Thomas Monson as I hope I would have with Joseph Smith. Happy Pioneer
Day everyone.
