Temple Blessings

I am in Albuquerque, NM today. This morning I was blessed to attend the temple. I love to go to the temple. I love to just sit there and absorb the peace, especially since the world outside seems to becoming more and more tumultuous each day.

I have been trying to do some family history. I was really happy to find  a lot of information through the new Family Search program. I found one of my family lines. This program makes it easy to list any temple ordinances that still need to be done.

This morning I took my blue and pick slips of paper to the temple, and handed the blue ones to my husband. I took my stack, most of the names bearing my maiden name, to prepare to do initiatories. I waited for a few minutes before it was my turn.

When I entered the room to begin the ordinances, I could hardly read the first name. The Spirit was so strong that my eyes immediately filled with tears. It was overpowering. So much so that the women in the room also began to cry. One of the sweet women could barely utter the words to the ordinance. We all shed many tears in the temple this morning and I couldn't help but feel the presence of my family members.

I have been a proxy for the deceased many, many times before, but there's something different when I am there representing a member of my own family, even if that ancestor was born more than 100 years before me. Today, I was privileged to represent my great-great-grandmother. What a blessing to serve her--I wish I could have known her in mortality.

I kept thinking about the scripture in Malachi 4:6, "And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." Today my heart was turned to my ancestors and I believe their hearts were turned to me.

What a wonderful blessing we have to be able to do temple work for those who can no longer do it for themselves. Of course, those on the other side of the veil still have their free agency to accept or not accept the work we do for them, but I feel sure my ancestors were rejoicing in what happened today and I'm just so grateful I could be a part of it.