Stokes Sounds Off: President Nelson to Visit the Pacific Northwest in September

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Wednesday, August 8, 2018

President Nelson to Visit the Pacific Northwest in September

Hello again, everyone! I am pleased to pass along to you all today this press release from Mormon Newsroom, which details plans that President and Sister Nelson have made to visit two cities in the Pacific Northwest in September. President Nelson's Second Counselor, President Eyring, will accompany them.

The purpose of that trip will be to hold two devotionals, which is detailed further here. The first will be held on September 15 in Seattle Washington, and, since it will be held at Safeco Field. With a capacity seating of almost 48,000, that will give President Nelson an opportunity to address the largest gathering of Church members to date.

Then, the following day, the Nelsons and President Eyring will cross the Canadian border to address a congregation at the Langley Events Centre. Langley is a suburb of Vancouver. It appears that both devotionals will be held at 6:00 PM local time.

This will be the fourth major trip President and Sister Nelson have taken in what, by that time, will be the first 8 months of President Nelson's prophetic administration. As I am sure you all will recall, the Nelsons were joined by Elder and Sister Holland for a Worldwide Ministry Tour in which they visited Africa, Europe, and Asia.

Then in June, President and Sister Nelson were joined by Elder and Sister Rasband as they visited Edmonton, Calgary, and Raymond Alberta. Later this month, the Nelsons will return to Canada, accompanied by Elder and Sister Andersen, with stops planned in Winnipeg Manitoba, Montreal Quebec, and Hamilton Ontario.

And now, we have this planned trip. This development suggests a few things: First of all, President Nelson is fulfilling his promise to be out among the people for as long as he can be. Second, President Nelson is following the tradition of rotating through having different apostles accompany him on such trips. And finally, with the apostolic traveling companions he has had, he is taking time to demonstrate to his fellow Brethren how a prophet ministers to the one.

Some have said that Elder Holland could potentially become President of the Church himself in the coming years, which makes sense, since he is currently the 4th in seniority among the 15 current apostles, but is the 7th oldest. It is a little more difficult for now to determine whether or not President Eyring or Elders Andersen or Rasband might become President of the Church.

This is because President Eyring is the 5th in apostolic seniority but is the 4th oldest current apostle. Elder Andersen is 10th in apostolic seniority currently and is also the 10th oldest current apostle. And Elder Rasband is the 11th in apostolic seniority at present but is the 9th oldest current apostle.

I have previously offered my opinion that, whether or not President Oaks ever becomes Church president (which will depend on if he outlives President Nelson, who is almost 8 years older), it is almost certain that Elder Holland and Elder Bednar (who is the 7th in apostolic seniority but is the 11th oldest currently-serving apostle) will more than likely serve as Church presidents in the future.

That said, the Lord controls both the process of succession, so nothing may be off the table in the coming days in terms of which of the other 14 apostles might potentially go on to serve as Church presidents. The Lord is very much at work with the day-to-day administration of His Church, to say nothing of the way He is clearly sustaining the Brethren He has called to be our prophets, seers and revelators at this time.

One thing is certain: With President Nelson having made known his plans to take this fourth trip at around the same time he will be marking 8 months as Church president, I have no doubt he will continue to make such trips, and that he will also rotate his companions for such trips among the apostles (with perhaps special focus for trips in the near future on having new apostolic companions until he has rotated through each of the other 14 apostles). I continue to monitor all such news and will bring word of those to you all as I become aware of it.

In the meantime, I also wanted to announce that, if all goes well, I am hoping to post later today with my updated annotated list of locations around the world that may have a temple announced in October. If not today, then that will likely occur tomorrow, after I publish a post in honor of Elder Andersen, who will observe his 67th birthday then.

Stay tuned for all of that. That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. Thank you for the privilege of your time. If you enjoyed what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly-added content, please feel free to subscribe. Until my next post, I wish each one of you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.

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