Note to Family

I am starting a Family History Blog for the Robinson and the Larsen Families. I am going to be adding family stories and pictures of our ancestors. You may want to use it if you need a story of an ancestor or if your kids are giving talks in church and want a story to tell.

Hopefully, more than just having stories to tell in church, it will be a resource for you to teach your children of their heritage. All of our ancestors were early converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I don't know how many people have such a rich background but we have been truly blessed. Most of these people sacrificed greatly so that we could have the gospel in our lives. What a blessing it is for our children to be able to hear these stories and realize that they are part of a great work and that they are not alone in their trials and persecutions as they stand up for what is right.

I believe these ancestors are of greater influence in our lives than we can even imagine. It would be a shame not to know who they are.

Pres. Holland gave a talk on angels in October 2008 conference. I loved these quotes from this talk:

"From the beginning down through the dispensations, God has used angels as His emissaries in conveying love and concern for His children. Time in this setting does not allow even a cursory examination of the scriptures or our own latter-day history, which are so filled with accounts of angels ministering to those on earth, but it is rich doctrine and rich history indeed.

Usually such beings are not seen. Sometimes they are. But seen or unseen they are always near. Sometimes their assignments are very grand and have significance for the whole world. Sometimes the messages are more private. Occasionally the angelic purpose is to warn. But most often it is to comfort, to provide some form of merciful attention, guidance in difficult times........

My beloved brothers and sisters, I testify of angels, both the heavenly and the mortal kind. In doing so I am testifying that God never leaves us alone, never leaves us unaided in the challenges that we face. “[N]or will he, so long as time shall last, or the earth shall stand, or there shall be one man [or woman or child] upon the face thereof to be saved.”13 On occasions, global or personal, we may feel we are distanced from God, shut out from heaven, lost, alone in dark and dreary places. Often enough that distress can be of our own making, but even then the Father of us all is watching and assisting. And always there are those angels who come and go all around us, seen and unseen, known and unknown, mortal and immortal."

I believe that our ancestors have great interest in what we are doing and especially what is happening here in the latter-days as we prepare for the second coming of Christ. I hope you will all take time to learn about them. It will strengthen your testimony and build the faith of your children.