This morning started off pretty wild with a big thunderstorm. Our power went out while I was showering and stayed off for about an hour. We are staying at the Olive Branch Inn which is across the street from the Harry S. Truman home. When we got to church, we saw that a tree had been struck by lightning and had fallen just missing the church. I noticed there were a lot of Polynesians in the ward here, and of course they always have a lot of visitors attending.
After church we went to the RLDS (now called Community of Christ) temple. I was a bit surprised when I heard it is always open for tours, but I soon found out that it is more of an auditorium where they have a 15 minute prayer for peace every Sunday and also organ recitals. Other than that it is used as an administrative building and an educational building. They do not perform any of the saving ordinances that we do in our temple as far as I can tell. They do perform baptism, confirmation, priesthood ordinations, marriages (in their church building, not in the temple), (patriarchal) blessings, healing the sick, baby blessings, and sacrament.
The inside ceiling of the Community of Christ Sanctuary inside their temple. The C of C split from the main body of our church after the prophet died. When Brigham Young succeeded Joseph Smith, there were some who felt Joseph Smith III should succeed the prophet. This became known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Each prophet was succeeded by his son until Wallace B. Smith who did not have a son. He then felt inspired to give the priesthood to women in 1986 and then was inspired that anyone whom was chosen could be prophet in the 1990's and since then the prophet has not been a Smith.
We attended the organ recital at C of C and the kids got to go ask questions and check out the organ up close, then go behind it and see some of the inner workings. They thought it was pretty cool. I'm hoping it will inspire my boys to take organ lessons before they go on their missions.
Independence has several beautiful churches downtown...I think Spencer took photos of about ten of them.
The "Reflexions of Christ" exhibit was in the LDS Visitor's Center...here are a couple of my favorite photos.
My kids loved the translations of the Book of Mormon...77 languages.
Playing pioneers in the Visitor's Center.
At Liberty Jail, the Sister Missionary used Nate as an example of the width of the 4 ft. thick walls of the prison...so Nate wanted a photo of him and the wall. Of course he had to take of his sandals, because that would make him 1 inch too tall!
A replica of the gold plates in Liberty Jail Visitor's Center.
Messing around in downtown Independence.
The log courthouse where Mary Elizabeth Rollins, one of the young girls who risked their lives saving the "Book of Commandments (Doctrine and Covenants)" from the mob who burned down W. W. Phelp's print shop. The men saw them and chased them into a corn field where they laid down over the pages and could hear the men breathing they were so close.On the way back my kids saw fireflies for the first time and of course had to catch some which now reside in our hotel room in a water bottle!
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