One in a Million: Apostolic Encounters

Yesterday I had an awesome experience meeting with a group of Sister leadership to hear Elder Renlund speak. According to Shaun Nelson, our stake president, the first presidency found that Elder Renlund had a free Saturday (Heaven forbid he take a day off) and so they contacted our area seventy Elder Nemro to see where Elder Renlund could do the most good in our area. After counseling with local stake presidents they decided to invite all the sisters holding leadership callings to attend a meeting in the afternoon. And to have Elder Renlund speak to the region youth in the evening. Sharlene Harsh, our Stake Relief Society President saved us seats on the 3rd row. My favorite quote of the day from Elder Renlund is “the church is an Atonement delivery system.” I’ve pondered on that idea ever since. Awesome. The second thing he told us, that I hope I remember the rest of my life, is that the only emotion that he has never felt when associating with the Prophet and the Council of the Twelve is fear. God is in-charge and we need not fear. Reflecting on this experience I’m in awe. There are 15,000,000 members of the church and only twelve apostles, so an apostolic encounter is less than one in a million opportunity.

I’m incredibly lucky because this wasn’t my first apostolic encounter, I’ve had several. I think my favorite encounter happened on the day Stacy got married, Thursday, April 12, 2001. It was a cold incredibly snowy Spring day—in fact, 8 inches of snow fell before noon. Because of the snow and cold, we couldn’t take pictures out on the temple grounds. Our photographer suggested we take group pictures in the lobby of the Joseph Smith Building, so we did. After we finished with pictures we went through the tunnel under Temple Square to get back to the temple so Stacy and Sheldon could change into street clothes. We had just passed the recommend checkpoint desk when a guard came out and stood at the end of the hall. We turned around to see what was happening when we saw 2 golf carts go by carrying the first presidency, and the entire council of the twelve—except Elder L. Tom Perry who was running behind trying to catch up. They were in the temple for their weekly meeting. What a thrill! Initially, Stacy was upset by the snow but she (and I) soon realized that Heavenly Father had this apostolic encounter tender mercy planned for us and He needed to send the snow to get us in the right place at the right time.

In 1983, Elder Boyd K. Packer came to reorganize the Highland Stake. To our surprise and delight Dad, Russell Charles Black, was called to be the second counselor in the new stake presidency. After the conference, we got to go down to the basement of the Alpine Tabernacle where Elder Packer set Dad apart for his new calling. Elder Packer went around and shook everyone’s hand. He called Keith and Stephen his “little missionaries.” After an encounter like that, how could the boys not serve missions. It was an incredible day.

While Dad was serving in the Stake Presidency, the Highland Stake had a tradition that between the Saturday afternoon Priesthood session of Stake Conference and the Saturday evening adult session the wives of the Stake Presidency took turns catering a dinner for the visiting authority, the Stake Presidency, and the High Council and their wives. When it was Mother’s turn to host she recruited her children and put us to work as cooks, servers, and clean-up committee—it was lots of fun. One time Elder Nelson was the visiting authority. After the dinner most of the visiting authorities would poke his head into the kitchen and thank us for our service, but not Elder Nelson. He came into the kitchen, whipped an apron out of his pocket, and proceeded to wash dishes. He said he met the very best saints in kitchens. We were thrilled, stunned, apprehensive (about letting an apostle do dishes), and richly spiritually fed. 

For several years I served on the Heber C. Kimball family organization board. During that time we raised funds and built the Heber C. Kimball family home in This is Place State Park. At the completion of the project the This is the Place foundation held a thank you banquet in 2004 at the Grand America hotel in Salt lake. I arrived and found a seat in the back. My good friend Lucy Perry spotted me and insisted I move up to the front and sit at her table. We hadn’t been seated more than a minute when President Hinkley, Elder Monson, and Elder Faust came in and sat at the table next to us. The back of President Faust’s chair was inches from the back of mine. In his usual friendly fashion, President Monson went around to all of the tables in the area and shook everyone's hand. Church dignitaries peopled the surrounding tables: Elder Ballard, Bishop Burton, the presiding bishop, Sister Smoot, the General RS president.  John was late—as usual, so I quietly phoned him and told him where I was sitting and by whom. He loved it! I, on the other hand, was so overcome with emotion and awe I couldn’t eat a thing. Local actor James Arrington played Brigham Young and the highlight of the afternoon was a conversation between President Hinkley and Brother Brigham.

I had a sad apostolic encounter when my cousin's, Jaime Porter, son took his own life. Uncle Jim, Jaime's dad, is married to Sue Cook Porter, Elder Quinton Cook's sister. Elder Cook was at the viewing and funeral and was so gracious meeting, greeting, and comforting family members as we come into the room. Uncle Jim took John and me over to meet him. His kind and gracious spirit poured a healing balm over the sad occasion.

We’ve had several opportunities to have apostles attend our stake conferences and to feel of their tremendous love. When we lived in Murray Elder Maxwell came and concluded with an Apostolic blessing on the stake. When we were serving in the Inner-city mission Elder Anderson came to stake conference. In our experience when an apostle is coming you better get there early or you don’t get a seat. At the Saturday night meeting, John insisted we go an hour early; so, we picked up our friend, Larry, and were sitting in the dark chapel, on the 3rd row, an hour before the meeting was scheduled to begin. No one else came until about 20 minutes before the hour. When Elder Anderson came in he came right over to us and wanted to meet Larry. It was a thrill to meet Elder Anderson and to shake his hand. The next morning at the general session we again basked in his presence. After the meeting, Larry wanted to go up to the stand and shake Elder Anderson’s hand again. When he went up Elder Anderson asked him, “Where are those missionaries?” When Larry pointed us out in the back of the chapel Elder Anderson waved to us. Incredible.

Elder Dallin H Oaks was the speaker at my graduation from Salt Lake Community College. The president of the college award the diplomas. About three students before me Elder Oakes stood up and gave out about ten diplomas before sitting back down. I'm pretty sure someone told him that Stephen was the SLCC institute president and that he wanted to award Steve his diploma but I got into the action by default.

Also one day Sister Susan Gong, wife of General Authority Gerritt Gong, gave me tickets to a BYU basketball game. Susan and I went to grad school together and I really enjoyed her company. At the ball game in the Salt Palace Elder and Sister Oakes sat 2 rows in front of us. It was so fun to watch them interact with the students who came over to meet them.

When we were on our inner-city mission we participated in a production of the play "Savior of the World." Elder Oakes attended the final performance and then came backstage and shook hands with every member of the cast--twice. It was such a thrill.

In 1998 I traveled to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic to help Mom and Dad prepare to come home from their mission. While I was there Elder Scott came to the groundbreaking for the Santo Domingo Temple (it would be horrible to have a favorite apostle, but if I had a favorite apostle Elder Scott would be at the top of the list). We attended a special meeting just for the missionaries and then we attended the actual groundbreaking. Although Elder Scott’s address and the groundbreaking were both in Spanish the spirit was so strong. I’ve been to groundbreakings before overseen by apostles at this one I was right up front soaking up the spirit.

When Samantha and I graduated from BYU President Henry B. Eyring's daughter was the speaker at the History Department's graduation (we wanted to walk together and Sam wouldn't walk with the English Department). After the graduation we went to lunch at Mimi's--and so did the Eyrings (we like to say that we had lunch with the Eyrings but they didn't know they were having lunch with us).  We finished lunch and walked out just after the Eyrings left. As we crossed the parking lot President Eyring almost backed over us. When he saw us he braked and then asked Steve to direct him out. It was so fun to spend time with an apostle in a non-church setting.

One day, many years ago I actually had a prophetic encounter. It was a Friday morning and Sherrie and I went to do a session in the Jordan River Temple. We were directed into the session room where we just sat and waited several minutes. Finally, the officiator stood and said, “Brothers and Sisters please be patient, we are waiting for the prophet.”  I was shocked! About 5 minutes later President Benson, Sister Flora Benson, and several other church officials and body guards came in and took their seats. Sister Benson sat in the seat right in front of me (the session was really small). After the session, the officiator asked us to remain in our seats until the Prophet and his party had exited through the veil—they wanted the prophet to exit quickly for security reasons. When we entered the Celestial room there was President Benson shaking hands with each patron as they entered the room. He said he’d received a promoting from God that someone in that session needed to shake his hand. I was overwhelmed with gratitude for the love my Heavenly Father has for me. I’d been going through a rough patch in my life right then and I know that President Benson’s prompting from my Father in Heaven was for me (Sherrie thought it was for her but what does she know). I can’t describe what it felt like to shake the hand of a prophet but I can testify beyond any doubt the Ezra Taft Benson was a prophet of God.