The Miracles of Jesus: Which is your favorite?

Lesson on Faith and Miracles

This Sunday it was my turn to give the Gospel Doctrine Lesson and it has been wonderful to study for it.  There is so much meat in these few chapters (Matthew 8; Mark 2-4; Luke 7) that there is no way to cover everything in an hour.  Elise posted these pictures on Instagram and I thought they spoke to the heart about the core of this week's message.  She had each of her family members draw a picture of their favorite miracle for one of their Come Follow Me lessons.  I asked if I could print them up and use them in my lesson.  I really enjoy teaching. We had a great class discussion.  I closed with the scripture Isaiah 53:5 "But he was wounded for my transgressions, he was bruised for my iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed." I used this scripture because this is one of my favorite miracles--that He took upon himself our sins, our griefs, our sorrows, our pains and our 

afflictions and He understands.  We can approach him with any of our earthly needs because He has all power and He can heal us.

           By Elise: How Jesus broke the bands of death;  Andy: When Jesus calmed the tempest.

                 Max: When Jesus calmed the troubled seas;                  Beverly:  When Jesus Hears me.

Harvey: When Jesus made the dinosaurs (Elise filled in the Savior and the dinosaur).

Mav: When Jesus walked on water.

Events of the Week 

We were able to go the the play "Titanic" at the Hale Center Theater. Sara saw it earlier and said she thought it was a good play--for a musical about a sinking ship.  I have to say she hit it spot on.  It was good, but a little weird, too. We took Ollie and Gunnar with us.  They did well and were very well behaved, even though Ollie was a little tired because of two late nights in a row.  We had taken him and Finn the previous night to the Jazz game with the Green's tickets since AJ is out of town heli skiing.

I'm not sure who came up with the idea of a musical Titanic, but it was pretty good.  However, in a play like this, Roy and I like it when you come to care about the characters.  There wasn't enough character build-up.  One fun thing was when we came into the theater we each got a boarding pass.  On the back was the name of one of the passengers or crew of the Titanic, and if you looked it up, you knew whether they lived or died.
After Sara and Ori saw the play earlier in the week, Sara found out something about one of her ancestors.  She sent us this story of her great grandfather who happened to miss his opportunity to sail on the Titanic and thus his life was preserved.  Thankfully.  Or we wouldn't have Sara here.

Jieun also shared her hard work of the past several months.  She liked the moose she painted for dad so much that she painted one for her family.  This one is a lot bigger.  She painted over a previous painting that had been in their living room.  The 2nd picture is a sunset over Flaming Gorge.

We're also very proud of Matt.  He's working hard to get his new business off the ground.  He shared this with the Rasband Clan.  It's also on his Linked In account.

Roy attended one of Ollie's games.  He plays so many different sports it's hard to keep up.  He loves it!  He said he wants to play for the NBL (National Baseball League) as his career when he grows up.  I think he can probably do it.

This is another picture shared on the Rasband Clan thread this week.  This is Yuli's sleeping attire.  Roy was pretty happy in church today when Yuli came to him first thing and cuddled on his lap until after the sacrament.  Usually she's pretty glued to her dad and only ventures over to us when she wants a piece of candy.

On a sadder note, a couple of my high school/ward friends passed away this passed week.  It's weird that I'm getting to that age...John Jenkins, who I think I must at least give partial credit to for my love of reading, was not feeling well and apparently collapsed.  I'm assuming a heart attack.  He was a genius, but also probably autistic.  He married a good friend of mine and all three of their children are autistic to some extent.  I know she has had a more difficult road because of this.  The reason I credit him a little bit for my love of reading is because I was always competing with him, knowingly or unknowingly, even in the first grade.  Also, Julie Horne Mahoney, who lived close to the church we went to growing up, passed away from early onset Alzheimers.  Knowing how hard that disease is, my heart goes out to her family.