‘It Means Everything to Me’: Latter-day Saints Reflect on the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania Temple Dedication

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By Trent Toone, Church News

For William Jordan, attending the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania Temple dedication was a “truly humbling experience.”

Attending a temple dedication for the first time, Jordan, a member of the Cleveland 3rd Ward of the Kirtland Ohio Stake, said he was taught about daily repentance — “the process of striving” — and learned about finding forgiveness and healing in the house of the Lord.

He was touched by an invitation to bring others to “come and see,” something that weighs heavily on his heart and mind as his ward’s elders quorum president.

Jordan is grateful to have the Pittsburgh temple within a two-hour drive, but he is equally thrilled to know another house of the Lord is under construction in Cleveland. Seeing the growth of the Church in the Midwest fills him with joy and hope for the future.

“It means everything to me because there are other brothers and sisters out there who are struggling like I once was, and the Savior is the answer to whatever the problem may be,” said Jordan, who served for 15 years in the U.S. Navy.

Jordan was one of many Latter-day Saints who felt spiritually strengthened after attending the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania Temple dedication, presided over by Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on September 15.

“The Holy Spirit is strong here,” said John Zebley, a member of the Beaver Valley Ward in the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania North Stake. “There is a strength and dedication to the people in this area who really love the temple. I really feel that.”

Together at the Temple

Attending the dedication was a blessed occasion for the Terrence and Rachel Gifford family, members of the Morgantown Ward in the Clarksburg West Virginia Stake.

Terrence Gifford, a U.S. Army active-duty instructor with the West Virginia University ROTC, took the couple’s six older children into the dedication while mother Rachel Gifford remained outside with their 7-year-old daughter, who was too young to attend.

Despite not sitting together in the dedicatory session, it was still a meaningful day because it fortified the Gifford family.

“The experience of the family being together as the temple is being dedicated is the highlight,” Terrence Gifford said.

Blessed to Meet an Apostle

A week before the dedication, 14-year-old Brodrick Cratty was sitting in sacrament meeting of the Slippery Rock Branch of the Pittsburgh North Stake when he prayed for an opportunity to attend the dedication.

The young man’s prayer was answered a few hours later when he was able to get a ticket. He was also invited to assist his parents, who served with temple’s safety and security committee during the three-week open house.

Just being at the house of the Lord for the dedication was meaningful for Cratty, who serves as first counselor in his teachers quorum presidency. But then came an opportunity to meet and speak with Elder Uchtdorf, an experience that strengthened Cratty’s testimony of prophets and apostles.

“Being in the presence of an Apostle is just absolutely amazing, it’s different that anything else I have ever felt,” the young man said. “To have the blessing to be so close to one was unforgettable.”

‘I Can’t Wait’

Before the dedication of the Pittsburgh temple, serving in the house of the Lord was difficult for Alex Yothers, a member of the Greenburg Ward of the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania Stake. To attend the Washington D.C. Temple required an eight-hour round trip for the husband and father of five.

Standing with his family outside the temple following the dedication, Yothers said he couldn’t wait to begin serving more frequently in the house of the Lord.

“I just can’t wait, all the work we could do here, to be able to visit so often, to be able to feel the Spirit,” he said. “I can’t wait to sit in the celestial room and contemplate life’s problems. It’s exciting.”

Yothers appreciated Elder Uchtdorf’s message about bridges, a symbolic place where earth is connected to heaven.

“The bridge to Jesus Christ is right here,” he said. “I love that picture in my mind.”

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