‘Tis the season to visit Temple Square lights if you live near Salt Lake City. Today I discovered two hidden gems to make your trip even better.
1. The Church History Museum is newly renovated and reopened, with a touching new exhibit.
Their current exhibit of “Tell Me the Stories of Jesus” is beautiful and sacred. It’s an international art competition and loaded with beauties that might bring tears to your eyes if you’re like me.
Our favorite was an awe-inspiring piece that tells many of Jesus’ stories through a sort of life size wooden Perplexus, for lack of a better description.
I mean, check this out. Can you imagine how many hours this artist spent cooking up this jaw dropping creation of telling Christ’s stories? You can watch a video of here.
The interactive children’s area is set up with activities related to the same theme of telling the stories of Jesus.
Here’s another one of my favorite pieces from the art competition. The artist, Robin Birrell, imagined an older sister preparing and making the hike to bring food to her younger brother, who was then able to offer his food to the Savior to feed the crowd of over 5000. If you go, be sure to peek at the explanation plaques. They make the artwork even better. Click here to see the beautiful pieces from the comfort of your home.
My son loved the international nativity collection. So did I.
2. The Church History Library has some treasures on display.
It’s the building just east of the conference center. I’ve been meaning to visit since it opened six years ago. Where does the time go?
The Foundations of Faith exhibit has some amazing stuff to see. They even give you a free booklet to guide you through the exhibit, and take home to soak up the details.
This one made me cry. It’s a tiny journal of Joseph Smith’s own handwriting. If you click on the picture to enlarge it, you can see that he wasn’t satisfied with his first explanation of the purpose of his journal, so he rewrote it. “to keep a minute account of all things that come under my observation … Oh may God grant that I may be directed in all my thoughts oh bless thy servant…”
Can you see Joseph Smith’s name inside the front page?
The volunteer missionary told me the fragment of papyrus of Abraham’s story of being saved by an angel was the actual one Joseph Smith had.
Here is an original first edition hymnal compiled by Emma Smith. I love Emma, Joseph, Brigham, Wilford, and the others whose items are on display there.
My son and I taking holding replicas of original version of Books of Mormon.
Of course there are tons of other things to do on Temple Square. I invite you to make a visit! You’ll be glad you did.
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