Church History Tour- Which Plate Am I ?

Church History Tour: Brigham Young's Home

The Kitchen table in the Brigham Young home in Nauvoo
(Photo taken by Richard Rust, with permission)

B-A-C-K to the Church History Tour!  One of my favorite places of the whole tour was of coarse, Nauvoo.  I love that city and love visiting there.  It had been about 13 years since I was there last, so it was exciting to be back again.

While we were there we heard from various people and missionaries, "go see the Brigham Young house!"

We went inside and it was quaint and cute like all the other restored homes, smelling a little dusty, testifying to me that yes this place is old, and very authentic. 

[Update: The Atonement plates are in the Brigham Young home, but no longer used as a lesson for visitors coming in. They stopped teaching it because these plates were found on site before renovations, but they can’t prove they were Brigham Young’s. I decided to keep my post because the lesson remains powerful regardless of the ownership of the plates.]

At first I didn't quite see how it was "the best house in Nauvoo" or was any different than the other homes. I loved them all as there is some lesson or principle to learn in each house.

In the Brigham Young home the principle that they taught was the Atonement.  Just thinking about it now, I am taken back to the moment we stood in front of this table and were taught about plates and the Atonement.

The story: As they were beginning to restore the Brigham Young home, they found out by the cellar/or maybe in the cellar,  a dishes set, that was badly broken.  A Senior missionary serving in Nauvoo on a mission, knew about restoring plates like this and went about making these plates look as if they were  new and had never been broken. The process is interesting and remarkable how they can make something that is so badly broken and unusable, new again without even a mark or scar to be seen.

The missionaries compared these plates to the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  They explained how our Savior takes each one of us in a broken plate state, and through His mercy, grace, and the great power of His Atonement, redeems us, and makes us new again. 

I loved this lesson, and contemplated for days... Where  am I at in the cleansing process of the Atonement? Am I letting the Savior change me and redeem me? Which plate am I?

*All photos of the plates were taken in the in the Brigham Young home in Nauvoo
 by Richard Rust, with permission