(Talk given by Loraine Tolman Pace at William Odell Tolman’s funeral service).
My dear family and friends, I am sure that there has never been a time in my life when I have been more grateful for the knowledge that I am a child of God, that he has sent me here, has given me an earthly home, with parents kind and dear.
I have tried to be led by the spirit in preparing the remarks today so that they would be what Father would say if he could speak to us one more time. You know he could never pass up an opportunity for a captive audience like this to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ that he knew so well. I know if he gave us a talk today he would include some stories. He knew hundred of stories. He was the only man I ever knew that could get ten stories going at once, as one story reminded him of another, and still remember to conclude them all by the end of the talk; and those stories touched a lot of lives. He could make us laugh and cry and deeply ponder in the course of a few minutes.
I recently overhead someone express a dread of studying the Old Testament this year in Gospel Doctrine, and I thought to myself, if they only had Father as an Old Testament teacher their attitude would be different because he made the stories of the Old Testament live.
I will never be able to read some of the accounts in the scriptures without seeing pictures and hearing voices go through my mind.
One of my favorites is the story of King Saul and the Prophet Samuel. The Lord had just told King Saul to go and utterly destroy the Amalekites. And he goes out on that mission, but when he gets out there, he is enticed by those fat cattle, some of the things of the world that sometimes take our attention.
When he came home to report his mission, he says to the Prophet Samuel: “Blessed be thou of the Lord: I have performed the commandment of the Lord.” And then Samuel gives him a reprimand: “What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?” If you have ever heard Dad tell that story, he was raised on a farm, and you could sit there and hear the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the oxen as he so vividly portrayed everything like that; and after captivating our attention with his delightful way of presenting a story, then he would conclude with that strong reprimand of the Prophet Samuel: “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.” (I Samuel 15:13,14,22.) That has gone through my mind lots of times, that to obey is better than all the things the world has to offer.
I went to many missionary farewells with my dad. Many seminary students had him speak, and I liked the boys so I followed Dad around to the missionary farewells and heard him talk lots of times, but one thing he always said as he related experiences from his mission is this phrase, which is paraphrased from scripture: “If ye have not the spirit, ye shall not teach.” And I am sure that is why he was a great teacher because he taught by the spirit of the Lord.
I remember the first seminary teacher I had following my father. After he had endured me for a few weeks he kept me after class one day and said: “Loraine, if you learn nothing else this year in my class, you are going to learn that you can learn from somebody besides your dad.” And I think I became more teachable after that little lecture, but if anything didn’t sound exactly right, you had better believe I took it home to my dad to check it out to be sure it was absolutely correct.
Father gave us many great lessons in our lives. I wish there were time to tell you some of the miracles he helped bring about in my life. A lot of men hold the authority of the priesthood but not many exercise the power of the priesthood the way Father always did. I didn’t know it was possible for it not to come to pass after he blessed us because of the majesty with which he exercised the priesthood. There was only one time in my life I questioned a blessing which he gave me. I was having great difficulty in my freshman year at college. I had set out some plans and they were not working out the way I thought my life ought to work out, and I called Dad in Bountiful and asked him to come to Provo and give me a blessing and he did and when he got through I didn’t feel anything and I was so disappointed, but then a phrase came back to me that he said in that blessing and it was scripture as many things he said were. He said: “Loraine, ‘seek not to counsel the Lord but to take counsel from his hand.'” Of all the blessings I have received that has come back to me more times in my life. I guess because he knew me very well; and last night as I stood over him that came to me again. I wanted him to wake up for just a little while longer. Then I heard that blessing: “Loraine, ‘seek not to counsel the Lord but to take counsel from his hand.'”
Many things he taught me and my brothers and sisters never came in the form of a sermon. We learned them because we lived them. I didn’t know when I was growing up that you never debated about going to church or attending any meetings you were suppose to attend. I thought everybody did that.
As we have knelt in family prayer several times in the last two or three days, I thought of the hundreds and hundreds of times we have knelt in family prayer; and I don’t care how early in the morning it was, whoever was the first person who had to be out of the house that day we had to get up so we could have prayer together and then go back to bed if we wanted, but we always had family prayer.
And his great positive attitude is probably the greatest thing I have inherited from him and the faith that he had in God. I don’t think he ever said it to me but somewhere along the line I grew up with the philosophy: Loraine, you can do anything. You can do anything with the Lord’s help.
Probably the most outstanding attribute he had, if you could single one out, was the love he had for his family, for his wife and brothers and sisters, for his children, for his twelfth cousin three times removed, whoever it happened to be, he loved his family. I have never heard him say a critical word about any of you in my entire life. I have never heard him betray a confidence. I think I could confidently say that none of you in the audience has ever heard my father proclaim the faults of his children upon the housetops as many parents do. If we ever made a mistake or had a problem in our family, Dad called family council.
There was one thing he always said: “We must put our arms around them and let them know we love them.” We do love each other and we have always known that we were loved by our mother and father.
I have been trying to imagine the family reunion that is taking place right now. He loved family reunions. He would never miss one if he could help it, no matter which branch of the family it was.
In July when we were anticipating going to the William Alvin Tolman Family Reunion which we all look forward to every year we decided that Father was not strong enough to make the trip to Swan Valley, Idaho, and spend three noisy days in a lodge with all of us. But when I came down prior to the reunion, Dad asked me if I would be willing to make a bed in the back of my station wagon so that he could go. So as we talked it over as a family we decided it would be harder on him to make him stay home than to take him with us—if it was possible to make Dad do something he didn’t want to do. But we decided that he should go with us and I know that we are all going to be grateful for that. He was able to celebrate his seventieth birthday with all his brothers and sisters around him and his family and bear his testimony to them at that reunion.
I had been asked to speak at a sunrise service at the reunion and I had expressed my concern to my father as I wanted so much to do a good job. When I came down early that morning he was already out walking around the lodge and he came over and put his arm around me and said: “I have had a prayer for you this morning.” I would like to have had that happen this morning when I got up.
One of the first relatives I spoke with following the news of Father’s passing expressed concern that the family organization to which he has dedicated his life would fall apart. I suppose that possibility has occurred to everyone in this family at sometime, except for Father. He believed that the family organization was being held together by Bions and Russells and Verls and Deans and Richards and Genevieves and Luciles and a lot of you that are out there—if there were time to name you all; he thought you were holding the family organization together. Father always believed that everyone was as dedicated as he was. He always believed that each of us were better than we really were.
Sometime ago Father made a commitment to Thomas Tolman that he would straighten out the records of his descendants. I think it is kind of interesting today- we think of laying him to rest, but I can’t believe that we would ever lay him to rest. I am positive that he is organizing the family on the other side right now. There is a lot more of us over there, and I believe with all my heart, with all my heart, that if we will live close to the spirit the veil between the spirit world and this family will be thinner than it has ever been before, that we might keep that commitment to Thomas Tolman.
I asked Dad one time what the greatest quality of a family representative should be, so I could tell a class I was teaching in Washington. He said: “You tell them to select somebody who is a peacemaker.” It might take a hundred of us to replace that great peacemaker, but that is the quality we need to tie us together in the great family organization.
I think my feelings for Father are best summarized in this poem entitled: “Dear Earthly Father” and written just for him.
Dear earthly father who stands as patriarch and head,
How much easier it has been to follow where you have lead
Because you have lived as you have preached.
Your listening ear and counsel voiced, brought eternal life in reach.
Thank you for the right choice of our mother.
Thank you for prophetic blessings like no others.
Thank you for the paths you’ve daily trod, which mirrored an earthly image of our God.
My father believed and he practiced the patriarchal priesthood and he did it better because of the woman at his side, and he knew that.
My mother is the most liberated woman that I have ever known because she knew what her priorities were and she spent all her time being an excellent wife and mother.
One of the very last things that Father said to me was an expression of gratitude for Mother and her tender, tender care. I happen to know that she did things, in and out of the hospital, to make him more comfortable and happy, than any doctor or nurse was willing to do or was capable of doing. When it comes right down to it, she spoiled him. I don’t believe Father would know how to take a bath without Mother in there scrubbing his back, but he loved her and she loved him.
I think the casket that Mother has selected with the help of some of the children is most appropriate. When I was driving down from Logan alone the night before last, a statement came to my mind that was said at the death of one of our prophets: “A mighty oak has fallen in the forest today.” And I think it is fitting that our mighty oak is being placed in an oak casket. And the roses that adorn him at this time are symbolic of hundreds of roses that my Mother used to see her father pin on her mother and, following that example, that Mother has pinned on Father’s lapel as long as I can remember. There couldn’t be a seminary student that he has taught that wouldn’t remember Brother Tolman coming to seminary with a rose on his lapel as many months out of the year as possible. I even remember one year when they tried to grow a little rose bush in the house, so he could have them year round. And the parting words between Mother and Father are symbolic of forty-six years of love and devotion. When they kissed goodnight Wednesday night, Mother said: “Goodnight, Sweetheart;” and Father replied: “Goodnight, Sweetheart.”
The twenty years I lived in their home I cannot remember, I honestly cannot remember any other types of words passing between them than words such as that. The hardest thing for us as a family, as Shirlene indicated, has been to see his strength failing and watching his desire to serve and do more, increasing. We have prayed so earnestly the last few weeks that Father could be restored to his health and vigor, so he could accomplish the work that he wanted to do. And we know that our prayers have been answered, not quite as we had hoped, but we do know that he has been restored to his health and vigor, and that he is about our Father’s work.
If Father were here I know he would close with his testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He knew that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ, our Savor, and he loved them and knew them and served them better than most. He would tell us to follow the living prophet and he would tell us to keep all the commandments, and he would tell us to love one another as he has loved us.
And my prayer today, my dear family and brothers and sisters, is that all of us can live up to the vision that Father had of us and that we can become as good as he believed us to be, so that we may share eternal life together, and I say this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
(Contributed by the Thomas Tolman Family Organization. Excerpt from William Odell Tolman: Patriarch, Genealogist, Teacher compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, First Edition, 2009, page 521-525).
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