A Long Lost Treasure

Sunday, as I sat between meetings, a friend of mine stepped up to me and mentioned that my scriptures were in the lost and found. I quickly looked to my side, and saw that my lovely new scriptures that I had received as a Christmas present from DramaMama were right where they should be.

I tried to think about any other of my scripture sets that could possibly be there. My previous set I knew was sitting in a basket to the side of our poofy chair in our front room.

I was stymied. My friend asked what my middle initial was, and I told him it was "R".

"Yeah, that's what it said. I'll go get it for you."

He returned a moment later and handed me an old Bible with a black zipper cover that I immediatley recognized.

The meeting began at that moment, so I mouthed "Wow!" to him. Right there on the front was my name in gold letters. I struggled with the old zipper and was finally able to get it opened. It fell open to the first page, where I recognized my father's handwriting in a note he had written to me over thirty years before.

I was holding the Bible that my parents gave me for my 12th birthday.

I was completely flabbergasted and bewildered as to how this book could have found its way to where it was. When I last saw this book, I lived in Utah, and I would have been 19.

I left on my mission then with my scriptures I had used in Seminary. I have no recollection of donating my old Bible to the church. DramaMama suggested that perhaps while I was on my mission that my parents might have done it.

Inside the front cover, a woman had written her name, address, and phone, and a note "This book belongs to:".

I looked again at the gold letters on the front, and could see that an attempt had been made to scribble my name out.

Now considering that I lived in Utah, and that it was most likely donated to the Ward library there, I found that the odds of my old Bible finding its way to Arizona, to my very church building, and accidentally being left behind, and brought to the lost and found there, are staggering.

I am considering calling the woman whose name is in the front to see if I can get some info on its journey here. I would gladly buy her a brand new set to replace this. I really don't want to let it go again.

I flipped through it and saw all the scriptures I had marked, several notes I had written in margins and in the lined pages in the middle. The handwriting style was decidedly teenage boy.

I found it interesting that the black zipper cover was still on it after all this time. I would have thought the woman would have disposed of that right away.

So, 30 years later, I once again received the gift of my very first Bible.