July is over. It was amazing! This little town was buzzing with people and activities. Around 55,000 people attended the Pageant performances. Our tours at the Sites were very large every day. Many Stakes brought youth groups to Nauvoo for their youth conferences. Several of the groups had 200 people - I can remember groups from Georgia, Tennessee, Florida, Idaho, Alabama, Utah, Minnesota, Kentucky, Texas (several), Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Colorado and Arizona. The weather was warm (85-95) and moderately humid all month. The heat index, which takes the humidity into account, was over 100 several days. The worst day I remember reached a heat index of 115. We are handling that part OK.
We are called to be Site Missionaries. As I think back about the experiences, especially at popular Sites like the Blacksmith Shop and Browning Gun, it was not unusual to have days where we led 400 people through the tours. At each Site in addition to telling about the people and their activities we always share a spiritual message regarding the restored gospel relating to Jesus Christ, Christ's atonement, faith, obedience, the temple, families, the Priesthood, modern day prophets, repentance and baptism. What a wonderful opportunity to meet so many people and share our messages. Even though many of the people are members of the Church, I know that they go home more inspired to try a little harder to be better disciples of Christ as they learn about the experience of the Saints in Nauvoo.
There were two Pageants. The British Pageant is the story of the Mormon missionaries who traveled to England to preach the Gospel. They had tremendous success. The Nauvoo Pageant is the story of building up this city and completing construction of the temple. They are both excellent. We saw them several times as we attended with visiting company. Each time was better than the time before. There is something special about a spiritual message delivered in music and dance. Here is a sample of two of my favorite scenes from the Nauvoo Pageant:
It was a blessing to have many visitors in July. Our son Clint was here later in the month. The Vaughn's from P2 and the Sy's from YL 4 were in town. Leah's cousins, the Pittard's came for a visit. For a few days there was a reunion of 7 of the 14 original Young Ambassadors who were on a 90 day tour of Asia and the Pacific with Leah 46 years ago.
We are loving our mission and the opportunity to meet so many people coming on our tours. It seems like every day in July we met someone who was here visiting and had no idea we were here. We are meeting so many outstanding new friends serving with us as missionaries.
I will close by showing a picture of a famous Nauvoo sunset over the Mississippi River.
Love to all,
Elder and Sister Rober
