In January of 2020, members of our stake were invited to
join a stake choir to prepare for a musical fireside honoring the 200th
Anniversary of the First Vision of Joseph Smith. We practiced for two months
and then Covid came and shut down all events and gatherings.
Two and half years later, we started up again. We started
practicing every Sunday afternoon in September and performed the musical
fireside on December 11, 2022.
I invited Barb Salmon and Kathryn Parker from our ward to
come and sing too.
Patty Bielert is the Stake Music Director and had the vision
for this program. She was the director of our choir. We love her in every
way. She is so smart about music and so
musically talented. Every practice was like a free music lesson filled with
singing the songs of the Restoration along with a testimony tidbit every week.
Barb and I began carpooling, and she would pick me up on Sunday
afternoons. On October 2 as were leaving the choir practice, we said to Patty,
“Thank you. It’s our favorite time of the week.” And Barb said, “It’s like
going to the temple.”
Less than 5 minutes later, Barb and I were in a head-on
collision where the other driver slammed on his brakes and slid into our lane
and we collided. The young man lost his life. We were miraculously saved by
angels and airbags. We were sore and injured, but we were alive. Barb did miss
a month of practices, but then she was able to start coming again and finish
with the choir.
As the performance got closer, the practices got longer. We
were there for 2 to 3 hours. But the miracles kept coming. And the opposition.
After one of our practices, I text Patty and suggested that
we invite everyone to include the success and miracles in their fast the Sunday
before the performance. On the Sunday before the fireside, two of the four
soloists were really sick and couldn’t come. Three others had Covid and were
sick and others with colds. We practiced and prayed for miracles. One of the
Sundays we all drove to the church for practice in a complete blizzard.
But the fireside was starting to come together. Just a few
weeks before the fireside, Patty was still trying to decide who should be the
narrator representing Joseph Smith. She had prayed and pondered for a long
time, and finally it came to her. Of course, Tim Eaton was the one. He did so
good. His voice was perfect for the part.
Cheryl Millward was the main narrator. She did such a great
job. She is Barb’s cousin, and she was telling us that she felt overwhelmed but
honored with the task. She said she kept thinking of other people who would be
better at it than she was. Then she would think, no she asked me, not them.
I was talking with one of the soloists who sang the song as
Joseph Smith’s mother, Lucy Mack Smith. She had been one of the soloists too
sick to come the week before the fireside. She said that she had been really,
really sick for about 3 days, and then she quickly recovered. She said she
usually takes a lot longer to recover, you must have prayed for me or
something. Yes, we did.
The fireside was well-advertised for several weeks, posters,
flyers, social media posts, announcements in Sacrament Meeting, and even the
Vet Clinic posted it on their sign. It was Patty’s vision to have the Cardston
Alberta West Stake Center filled to the stage with people everywhere. Her
vision came true. When we got to the church on the day of our performance, they
had only set up chairs a third of the way into the gym. They didn’t want it to
look empty if people didn’t come and fill the chairs. I said to Barb, I think
more people will come than that. We need to fill to the stage. She said, they
will come, and they will figure out the chairs as they come.
We had a final run through on Sunday night right before the
fireside. Then we went to the Relief Society Room for a break before the
performance. All of the women got matching flowers to wear with our black
dresses. All of the men got matching blue ties to wear with their white shirts.
We looked awesome.
As our line of singers filed in right in time to start the
fireside, the church was filled to the stage and they were still setting up
chairs on the edges of the gym. They came. And there were so many stories of
people who came – the non-member student teacher, the grandpa who is not a
member of the church, the sister who hadn’t been to church in years.
I text Austin a few weeks ago, and said we should invite
Joel and Kaela to come for a steak dinner and come to the fireside. Kaela is
our niece who hasn’t been active in the church the past few years, and her
boyfriend Joel who is a Born-Again Christian who grew up in Bahrain, a small
island off of Saudi Arabia. They came and Austin grilled steaks and we had
dinner. I had to leave early to go to the last practice, but they had such a
fun visit. Joel asked questions about the Book of Mormon and they said they had
a great discussion about it. Joel is an amazing musician, so he played our
piano, and Joel and Kaela sang.
They all came to the fireside, and they said they loved it.
Joel wanted to clap so bad. They felt the Spirit. I don’t think you could come
without feeling the Spirit. The music was powerful. The narration was so good,
and there were videos of Joseph Smith played during two of our songs.
The day of our accident, I had honestly had the thought
during Spirit of God that Linda Burwell was probably in heaven having a
heavenly choir practice to sing with us, “We’ll sing and we’ll shout with the
armies of heaven, Hosanna, hosanna, to God & the Lamb.” We prayed for
angels to join us. Patty told us that she hoped our benches would feel crowded
with the angels who were there.
During the fireside, I listened for the angels. Then as the
prelude started for Spirt of God, I could feel a new energy as I felt like the
angels were filing in to sing with us. The tears came. I was able to sing most
of the song. There were only a few seconds where I was crying so hard that no
singing was going to happen.
Because of Barbs’ broken foot, she just sat during our choir
songs. Then during the last song of the night, “Praise to the Man” she stood
and sang with the choir.
We ended up with about 60 members of the choir. I bet at
least 50 more people had come for a practice or two but hadn’t stuck it out. A
couple weeks ago, Patti thanked us for being part of this choir, and that each
of our voices were important, and that she knew we were exactly the group of
people who were supposed to present this fireside. It was such a privilege to
be part of it.
On the way home, Austin told me about the miracles he had
seen that day. First, he had been up sick in the night in the bathroom from 3
to 5. Then he laid on the couch from 5 to 6, and then he prayed and told
Heavenly Father he needed help as it was too important of a day to be sick. Not
only did we have church, the dinner and the fireside, but Carly was able to
receive her patriarchal blessing on Sunday afternoon.
When he had gone out to cook the steaks, it started to snow,
and it was starting to get heavy. He
came back in and knelt by this bed, and pleaded for it just to be a light snow
so people would still come. The elements were tempered and there was such a
light snow for the afternoon and evening.
He also felt it was a miracle and blessing to have Joel and
Kaela come to dinner and come to the fireside.
As I turned in my choir binder, I was sad it was
over but so thankful to have had the experience.
