Coming up in this episode on follow hip I feel like I should give your father...
It's not okay It's more than okay. I warn my parents Neil Maxwell is coming home with me and he wants to give dad a blessing Which he did after the blessing both of them were in a die the next month My dad asked Neil Maxwell when is it time to just Divop and say to the Lord. I can't go on any more and Neil Maxwell said
Hello my friends welcome to another episode of follow him my name is Hank Smith. I'm your host
I'm here with my pelican of the wilderness coast John by the way John I bet you've never heard that one
I've never been introduced as a pelican before, but a pelican in the wilderness is even better Yeah John we are privileged to be joined today by Dr. Michael Ballum Dr. Ballum Michael if it's okay if we call you Michael Thank you for being here. It is a pleasure to be in the presence of you to remarkable man
I knew that you were the perfect guests for this knowing your background John we've been studying Psalms for the last two weeks. This is our last lesson in the book of Psalms What if you love so far for part of my life? I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't really know what to do with the Psalms. I thought they were just some nice poems When you hear Jesus in the end of Luke say
There are things that are going to be referred to about me in the law and in the prophets and in the Psalms Here's Jesus endorsing the Psalms. I've always loved music This is like the ancient hymn book. I'm just excited to have an expert in music here with us today That is exactly what they are. They're in enormous hymn book and David actually wrote 4,000 of them We have in the Old Testament a hundred of them out of the 150 but in
1956 they found the densest scrolls and one was devoted to the Psalms of David and they're 41 new ones. One of them is my favorite of all
151 I'll explain why but what we need to understand first is that God's word was always sung
Did you realize that?
“I think it was part that you remember things that you sing ABC D. E. F. G. you can teach that to a child in 40 minutes”
if you teach them the first letter of the alphabet is a The second letter of I it'll take you a lifetime and they'll never remember it music causes us to remember and The most important right the spirit lives in inspired music the Psalms 4,000 my David they're all hymns they're all lyrics
We think of them as poetry. It's not poetry. It's lyrics which meant it was to be sung and Everything in the Old Testament was sung for thousands. Well, it still is for 4,000 years in Judaism everything is sung Let me show you something. I went to Israel to spend a year I want to learn Hebrew and translate the Bible I was successful. I got as far as Genesis chapter one verse one
Because I became so confused For example the word beginning is not in there The first word is
“Brushete which is a word that means the most important the chief the head”
Well, it's supposed to be created. It's not created. It's organized. The third word is Elohim Now, I had just learned in my kindergarten class in Hebrew that Hebrew words become pluralized When you put an I am on the end of it, Elohim is actually a plural Word Those first three words say the chief of the gods
Organized
Brushete, but Elohim, it's from I am it's a era now now think Moses never did that. This is what it looks like
Okay, you can see up there in the upper right hand corner. You have to read from right to left You can see the sheet, but I Elohim now he sang Brushete, but Elohim, it's from mine the epa erets all of the Old Testament with some
“Maybe so people to remember them. I think it's because the spirits can live in music isn't this beautiful?”
I got it when I was studying it the great synagogue of Jerusalem. I wanted to learn how to sing the scriptures and I couldn't find anybody who seemed to know how except from
Our old tradition our old tradition is not always the best way.
Like Ezra move on. I said they're not written down and he said yes, they are In the original Hebrew There are little markings little dots and Titles a jot and a title not one of them would be lost
“We think if that was little teeny things they're crucial a jot and a titler really crucial”
This is gonna be a lot of fun. John
For those out there who don't know Dr. Ballum maybe later on in our episode. I can talk about my first experience because I
Went through the temple that first time and it had a profound effect on me. It does for many. I am holding in my hands an ancient cassette tape Called music in the mind. There's Michael on there This bios maybe dated as cassette tapes are Dr. Michael Ballum as an opera singer pianist clinician professor at Utah State University founder and general director of the Utah festival opera company
He holds a PhD from Indiana University. He and his wife larry have six children But what I love about Michael Ballum is last September We had a tough month Down at UVU some of those events as you all know Two days later. I was up at the Logan Tabernacle and what a comfort to look out and see my friend Michael there
And to look behind and see Ben Ballum Michael Sun in the choir his Countness calmed me down saw that he was there These credentials and accomplishments and degrees are wonderful, but I got the nicest email from Michael
After that event. I consider him a dear friend because of his kindness But also his love of music Speak's my language as I've sold you Hank my mom was in the Tabernacle choir my grandparents were my great grandparents were Michael's been a part of my home. I'm sure a lot of people will also see that countenance and think I know him We are so happy to have you here with us and like Hank said
I'm so excited just to hear you know so much about music and about the him so we're just excited to have you and welcome Great, and thank you for that introduction with my bio, which was all correct
“But nowadays I give people that and I say all you need to say is he's Ben's dad”
There you go. That's the most important thing to me
That's beautiful Michael before we turn the rains over to you. I'm gonna read from the come follow me manual and we'll be under The lesson this week is entitled let everything that half breath praise the Lord The traditional Jewish name for the book of Psalms is Tehelem a Hebrew word that means praises. It's related to the exclamation hallelujah meaning praise Jehovah or praise the Lord
If you had to choose one word to sum up the main message of the Psalms Praise would be a good choice some Psalms contain the direct invitation to praise you the Lord and All of them can inspire worship and praise the Psalms invite us to acknowledge the Lord's power his mercy
And the great things he has done we can never repay him for any of this, but we can praise him
That praise might take different forms for different people it might involve singing praying or bearing testimony It often leads to a deeper commitment to the Lord and following his teachings Whatever praise ye the Lord means in your life You can find inspiration to do it as you read and ponder the Psalms. That is perfect. It's almost like Michael was chosen for
“That introduction in this lesson with that Michael how should we go about this?”
You just quoted my second favorite That's 150 and in the Kennedy Center it's huge on brass because it says Before it says all who have breath praising it says praising with the symbol Pleasant with the trumpet praise him with the tambourine Those are all recorded in chronicles because David hired professional musicians to play instruments in the temple
He hired a hundred and eighty eight horn players now horn players in that period of time We're not the kind of horn players we think about So far where they call that thing yeah This is a horn and David's period. That's exactly what it is. It's a rams horn and it has significance because Josh were used it to fell the walls of Jericho
It is symbolic of Abraham and Isaac saved by a ramp if you cut the end of it off
That one is hard to play because I was the world's worth trumpet player
Wow
“You can hear that for five miles and to be in Jerusalem during russia from on when they blow the show for”
We lived on the Mount of all lives which is a long way for the great synagogue of Jerusalem And I could hear somebody blowing on a heart David is saying you can praise him in so many different ways He loved to praise him in music. He hired 4,000 Professional musicians to play in the temple
You can see who they are because in chronicles he lists That 125 of them because there were three families that were very musical one was us off One was Jitutan and one was Haman. They all had sons and daughters The sons were all musicians and you can read in chronicles what instrument they played and David
Pro cured their services he didn't upended and I'm using them because he was denied the opportunity To open the new temple but Solomon used those very musicians four thousand because everything in the temple was sung Now You mentioned they're
“Important to Jesus you bet your boots. They were important to Jesus”
Last thing he did in the upper room in Jerusalem it says and before he went out to pray They sang and him Think of that the last thing he wanted to do was sing a hymn what was that hymn? I suspect it was one of the Messianic hymns. I'm gonna find out which one it was Then
I'm gonna set to music. I've never composed anything including my own emotions
But wouldn't you like to hear that imagine Zef and I are says when he comes back He's gonna sing to us not talk to us. He's gonna sing to us and those of us who know him will recognize his voice I told you my second favorite one is that one 50 But my real favorite one is the next one which is not in the Old Testament It was found in the Dead Sea scrolls. It's label 151 a Psalm of David
He talks about how he was called how Samuel called him to be a prophet as a little boy Here's the second verse my hands made a harp My fingers fashioned a liar Then he says he sent a messenger to my father's house to anoint me king and he looked at my brothers Who were tall or handsome but the Lord did not want them
He wanted me because I had Music David was called in to the palace to sing for king Saul because king Saul was having emotional difficulty and they've told him there's this boy in Bethlehem Who plays and harp? Let me show you what it may be looked like It's called a solitary P.S.A.L.
Like in Psalm it was an instrument he'd be used to accompany The Psalms and David was good at it So he goes into the palace salt is healed by it. It says in Samuel he played for the king and the king was made Well, it was so pleased by that that he kept David around in the palace and he became like a son to him Samuel knew that when he was a little boy that his musical gift was going to make him king of Israel
I liked the fact that Music has power it's not there just to entertain us
Sometimes it is but when it's really powerful is when it enlightens us
“Endows us with the spirit. I think music has those three ease and the most important one is the third one”
It Endows us with the spirit inside of us and Moses knew that That's why he sang God's word every bit of it It has been doing that ever since then when Catholicism was born Guess what they did same thing In fact they're doing it still the priest sings them. I wanted to learn how to do that
So I started the great synagogue Jerusalem and I learned how to canter the scriptures it's called a kazon out
It was just amazing to me and imagine
Being able to do that. I don't have all of the holy scriptures that I can sing them but I know how the Psalms
Some other went by how I would love to know what Jesus saying
Yeah, I think it was Psalm eight. I think he sang one fifty Bruce Armaconky called music God's most eloquent language There's a reason for Michael you talked about music being healing I want to tell you of an experience that directly
connects to you that I've never told you about
We have an our stake a memory care bridge We used to have assignments to go and speak there I listened to your tape and thought will can I come and sing Instead I took my guitar it's very sobering the spouses come attend with their spouses who are maybe some sort of dementia or Alzheimer's or something I just started playing I'm a child of God on the guitar and I'll tell you a people who are slumped over begin to sit up
They started saying the words with me There's something and you talked about this in your presentation The form of music of good music that reformats the mind every time I go there now I don't talk I sing God bless you
Those memories come back you'll see people sit up straight and be with you
“They can remember the music they learned in primary”
And that song it in particular because they learned it to the child music is not just entertainment President Monson asked me to come down and sing for the 15 Brother and it was a Christmas time and He wasn't there and he's the one who would ask me to come I said where is he?
They said well He's in difficult situation Francis had a stroke and she's just hanging on in fact She's in a coma
Why went to the L.S. hospital? I went to the room there was President Monson and Francis and his wonderful daughter
I said I'm gonna sing for her I knew she loved the student prints so I started you know overhead the moon is beaming Why does blossom on the bow? I knew she loved that I went to the practice of the whole thing And I said can you join me in some of the hymns and both of them joined with me? I could sense she was hearing me. I could see a flicker and her closed eyes
the next morning his daughter started singing the hymns and Francis awoke That music lived in her mind But more than that in her heart and
It brought life to her no grandfather is able to do that with a little girl singing. I'm a child's of God Who'd been in a coma for three days? I got a call from her dad in London to California
“And I said you need to sing that for her. He said I can't sing”
But my father's coming and he's a singer. I said have him sing and drop out some of the words Any ground father? Can you picture it sitting there singing to this little girl in a coma? She was at yours all he sang. I'm a child of God and he dropped out of word and Mindy put it in there She came back
About ten years later. I was a BYU education week and the hostess came up to me and said there's a little girl out there that wants to talk to you And I said now I'm about ready to start. What's her name? Mindy me I said you're kidding. She's 18 years old. No, I went down there and
She said I had to relearn to walk and to talk But I'm okay and I said have you built enough courage that you could come up in front of five thousand people And tell them what happened that night She said if you will help me because I'm still having a hard time walking so I brought her up to the microphone She told what happened that night she said I could hear my grandpa
I was there but I wasn't there I could hear his voice and the spirit That lives in that song brought me back It's the spirit that lived in that song that brought me back It's not just entertainment a Moses knew that and David knew that and all of the prophets knew that by saying
The Psalms are not poems they are to be some
“I remember being in a meeting once and all they're all and said we need to”
Sing and pray a lot more and talk a lot less Yeah
That's right
It's the only time we do something together think about that
“We say amen together and we sing together we all participate very important”
My wife and I had a tradition we kind of dropped to the ball but we used to go down tell To the Messiah singing every Sunday after Thanksgiving
The thing I loved about it was you've got this incredible score of handles Messiah
Sometimes the solos would sing Sometimes the Utah Symphony chorus would sing sometimes the conductor would turn around and all of us would sing When everybody is singing for on to us a child is born on to us as son is given his name shall be called wonderful Counselor I'm looking around going nobody's performing for anybody here This is praise as Hank pointed out. Yeah, you probably know this but at the end of the performance the coolest thing happened
Because the conductor he would do this every time He would have the orchestra stand up and we'd all clap you guys were great and the Utah Symphony chorus and yeah, you guys were great Then he would look at the audience and the chorus and the orchestra would clap at the audience with the oh bless your heart type of a look Then the conductor did the coolest thing he picked up the score of handles Messiah
And that's the biggest cheer of the night was look what George Fetter at Kendall did Every year that brought me to tears saying all right here's the master work right here
“So that he makes me emotional right now to remember”
The first time I ever experienced to Messiah sing along was in San Antonio, Texas. I was the tenor solos
They got to the part Where the angels and there's and suddenly there was with the angel amongst the two of the heavenly hosts praising God and saying Then five thousand people saying glory to God I was blown out of my chair All of that sound from unpaid singers coming up on the stake it blew me away in fact the review the next morning
Said that that tenor solos was blown away by the experience. I was and when it was over I said to my one of my friends who lived in San Antonio. Oh my think of that experience Think of what it must have been like in Shepherd's field
That night she said well, we were all there
“We sang it you think we had something better to do”
Of course we were part of that heavenly choir that Opened out because we were so joyful we couldn't just talk we had to sing and we had to praise him for the birth of his son Glory to God I want to hear that again That's beautiful
Is there any specific of these songs we want to look at a world's favorite one is the 23rd It's gotten me through some very difficult times When Ben was born was buying a bifida It was really tough and we were down there in the University of Utah Medical center went back to the room we were staying with as Ben was being essentially reconstructed in surgery
We were in bad bad space I said that's your sight the 20th song the Lord is my shepherd The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want He make it me to lie down in green pastures
It's a song of solace It is so beloved that it's living in our hearts now. It's not living just on the page It lives in our hearts and Their moments when life becomes so Problematic and we have nowhere to turn
The 23rd song reminds us He'll get us through He will lead us through clear water Pastures he will restore our soul All glory be to him for that. That's song alone
It's worth making a book about it. There is this book called the Psalms It's the largest book in the entire Old Testament. It represents 10% of the script of the Old Testament
What a powerful 10%
Imagine if we had all 4,000
“That David wrote what I've got about 141 and they're all glorious”
Their prophecies There's songs of hope songs of praise There's something for everything we need in life in the book of Psalms And imagine in Cumran when that little shepherd boy tossed I know a little rock down into a cave and heard something break
He went down and there was a big queue Sealed immensely and there were 41 new
Psalms many other scriptures were there and they were there in a perfect state because they were in a desert and diamond
They were in excellent condition. It would take
“11 years to translate them now we have them”
You can see them in Tel Aviv and parts of them in Jerusalem God save them for our day In Psalm 119 this beautiful language Your word is a lamp for my feet
A light on my path. I've taken an oath and confirmed it that I will follow your righteous laws. I have suffered much Preserve my life lord according to your word Accept lord the willing praise of my mouth and teach me your laws Though I constantly take my life in my hands. I will not forget your law the wicked have said a snare for me But I have not strayed from your precepts your statutes are my heritage forever
Beautiful they are the joy of my heart my heart is set on keeping your decrease to the very end You are the light under my feet you're the guiding force One nineteen is one of my favorite as well as you can see They move me so deeply because they live in here and just hearing you Sight them
brings it all back to me your own lap onto my feet How much more beautifully could that be said the Psalms are priceless They're not just a little bit supp poetry they're priceless and many of them are prophetic The messianic one they tell us who he's going to be I'll sometimes ask my students what they do to help them stay focused during the sacrament
Many times they'll say I just read the sacrament hymns Since I usually have the book open and it keeps them right there They can feel it and they can hear the words in their mind or hear the music in their mind Something is speaking to their soul Brutal macamica said your copy of the hymns needs to sit next to your holy scriptures because they are a form of scriptures
Once in my life I was in Philadelphia Pennsylvania and I was singing the role of Hoffman in a five-act opera
Where he never leaves the state it is so tough after the second act I came off and I was so
frightened and all of a sudden I read the tabernacle choir singing fear not I am with the O.B. He not just made but I am the god and will Suhun give the aid I'll strengthen the help the uncaused the up to stand up held by my right Just so nipperton hand I heard it and I went out in the hallway and I could still hear it
“I thought who's playing that one of my colleagues was walking by and I said who's playing that?”
She said playing what it was there for me So that I could make it through a very difficult time They're there for us and they live inside us forever I'm just thinking about thy word as a lamp and to my feet and I was Thinking of a benedite they're trying to ask him a gotcha question when they quoted Isaiah saying
What does this mean how beautiful upon the mountains of the feet of them that bring good tidings and publishes peace when a benedite answers them? I think it's Mosiah 15 Where he says how beautiful are their feet in the past tense how beautiful are the feet of those who are bringing good tidings now And how beautiful upon the mountains will be the feet of those who are in the future And I think of all these missionaries out there who are bringing good tidings right now
How cool that was that a benedite took that thought
Of feet which indicate a direction and here in the Psalm the word of God is a...
His light to which way I should walk and ought to walk. I love Isaiah too because he was a poet
Michael I have a favorite remember how President Oopdorf's gave a talk called it's better to look up Psalm 121 begins. I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from once come with my help Now I have heard that put to music
“Yep beautifully. I will lift up my eyes unto the hills from where it's come with my help. Oh, I think good John Rutter did it maybe”
Yes, yes, he's inspired no question about it Oh, I has prepared a table before me in the presence of my enemies that will notice my head with oil My car promise
Truly goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life Hims do the same thing and primary songs do the same thing. I went to speak up the state penitentiary I was very nervous to do that What do you say? I got there and I thought I got it at the piano I need to play something to get in the hospital or I need to say as somebody shouted
We can sing you a song
“Really you have a chorus here. No, well, I'm sure every man here knows I am a child of God”
And they started to sing it Still remembering it were children of God It was their all their lives I am a child of God. It's a Psalm It lingers forever
Powerful powerful I was offended when the new hymnol and 1985 was brought out because I didn't put me on the committee
I realized they were inspired but were inspired not to be on the committee or the hymnol would have been a 13-volume set Because I love so many hymns They just can't fit on the pew in front of you. Let's see where volume 12 right now. I can't believe You know about the Psalm how great no art They did not put that in and President Benson's read that and he said
Where is how great no art? Nice to we felt like it was so evangelical it belongs to Billy Graham President Benson said this church is mature enough now To realize that we don't know the only truth we have an abundance of it But there's other truth out there our job is to seek after it and when we feel it
Cling to it cleave to it put it on page 86 How great there art is there because of President Benson insisting that it being included I think of the lives it has changed I want to speak of one because I know both of you have as everyone have deep feelings for your children
This is 127 it says low Children are a heritage of the Lord As arrows are in the hand of a mighty one so are children of the youth happy is the man that Hat his quiver full of them
When I think of my kids should you catch me on a day that they're not being overly difficult John you have a missionary i have a missionary Will you think of them out there teaching the gospel or have a daughter who's married you see them progressing This speaks the truth they are a gift from Lord of really is a gift to be to be a father We need to be reminded of that that song does just that happy is the man at Hathith quiver full of them
Now some of our kids are straight arrows and some aren't You still are happy with the quiver full. That's fun. That's a fun one
“It's a poetic image you see it in your mind's eye and that's why it stays there”
I remember Elder Cook talked about a funeral he went to and he was in his 20s It was kind of decided which direction his life was gonna go and he said he went to a funeral of a grandfather And there was 30 grandchildren up there singing the primary songs and he said I knew what I wanted I knew what happiness looked like
It really changed the direction of his life hearing those songs on at a funeral by grandchildren
Grandchildren
Beautiful many many years ago. I was hired to sing a very difficult role in
“Michigan. I went to the conductor. He said you're from Utah”
You were born in Utah, weren't you, and I said yes He got to be a Mormon I said yeah Would you like to know more about us? He went to the piano And he started playing back and he said I went to a long church once and I heard that him
I never forgotten I said that him It's the reason I'm here In America
Because my great great rank father
He had missionaries come to see him for years and he was a Bible scholar and he
“He put them in their place when they didn't understand 19-year-old boys from Benz and Utah”
He would have found them One day he was in Randestown, Mark and he was walking down the street and he heard that Being sung by congregation I'm sure they didn't sound like the tabernacle choir But he stopped dead in his tracks and he went up to the door
I saw who were these people on the other side of this door and then he read the church of Jesus Christ of Latter in his saints And he thought I need to be with these people a couple of weeks later he was a member of the church and determined to leave Denmark unto come to Utah My great grandfather was converted to Mormonism because of my father
There's something about music That as much as I love to teach John and I both love to teach You can't replicate it with the spoken word you get pretty close But you add the music to it and it's a vehicle that will carry the spirit with those words That's why we remember them
They're poetic, they're powerful, oh my father my Eliza are snow It's scripture It is It describes what makes us different, heavenly parents Imagine that we can go and dwell with them
Do you know all of Eliza snows him's we should?
I've always loved Psalm 130
It says out of the depths I have cried unto the oh Lord Michael John and I frequently talk about we hear from listeners Who are in some really hard places? I've had people say as I was grieving the death of my spouse I would listen to your show not necessarily because I wanted to
Be taught Hebrew or Greek but I felt better hearing Someone teach about scripture This is out of the depths have I cried unto the oh Lord Lord hear my voice Let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications if the oh Lord should As mark in equities oh Lord who shall stand but there is forgiveness with thee that that may as be feared
I wait for the Lord my soul Doth wait and in his word do I hope my soul here it is again wait for the Lord More than they that watch for the morning I say more than they that watch for the morning let Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord There is mercy and with him is plentiest redemption
I love that plentiest redemption and he shall redeem Israel from all his in equities You can feel that those are the words deep in someone's heart I'm David draw the number of those can I show you one I'm weak A refuge and harbor I seek thy weary head with wings shall cover
When will this endless night be over one of the songs he wrote after Bethsheba pity me Lord for I am weak we all have those moments
“So his songs about forgiveness are so important we need to memorize that we should know that one”
Because there are many times when we need the pity of the Lord to help us on thinking of the 84th song which is so powerful This humble 84
How lovely I do I am the Lord of hosts my soul on FDA fainted to the core of ...
My heart and my flesh clear for the living God and I love this part
“He had a spell as found over a house under the swallow and nest where she may lay her young”
Even I notice even I notice a lord of hosts my King and my God Yeah, either sparrow has found her house and the swallow and nest If he notices the difference between his sparrow and a swallow He knows the difference between all of us because he created us when Brahms wrote his requiem He didn't want to put in the D. F. E. Ray portion which was
I'm sorry God I've been a terrible person for giving me a few can and he said I don't like that and he was writing this Requiem for his mother who had just passed away. They said we don't use it then use one of the songs How lovely are the dwellings are Lord of hosts my soul longeth the a fainted for the courts of the Lord my heart and my flesh reach out to the living God Yeah, the sparrow has found her a house and the swallow and nest where she may lay her young
“That's in his requiem which makes it very special to me because that's how he viewed his mother”
not as a please be merciful to us God because we're nothing but sinners 84th song so powerful You need to memorize it She said it to music you'll remember it for the rest of your life
I'm certain that every him has a backstory One of my favorite was it John Henry Newman he's on a ship The Mediterranean the fog closes in he's sick They have no wind they can't move he writes these words Lead kindly light amid the encircling gloom lead down beyond the night is dark and I am far from home
When you hear the back story now I see what he was feeling at that time It's inspired
When the first him will came out I was speaking to board packer about it and he said what do you think of the new him though?
I said it's great, but it's missing one Which one he said? Amazing grace He said it'll be in the next one, but he passed away before the new one that is coming out I wrote the committee again, they didn't put me on the committee that was wise
“I said you need to put amazing grace in there”
I told him the story a boy k-packer saying it needs to be there it will bring people together It has it's there Think what it's doing because it speaks to every Christian on the face of the earth and if they happen to come to us
They'll hear something familiar, amazing grace, and you remember other Holland
Nevertheless, I see Amazing grace, how sweet the sound That saved a wretch like me I once was lost But now I am found
Was blind but now I see In the name of Jesus Christ Amen It was his final testimony
But the grace of God is amazing
I'm so glad it's part of our repository now Michael, I want your opinion on this because it sounds to me like there's a bit of a sense of humor here in Psalm 135 Starting at verse 15, the idols of the Heathen are silver gold the work of men's hands
They have mouths, but they speak not
Eyes have they, but they see not They have ears, but they hear not Neither is there any breath in their mouth and in this they that make them are like unto them So is everyone that trust it in them There is there's a sense of humor in there the first time I met Amelia McConkey
Bruce Ommerconkey's widow She bought the first two tickets to the Utah Festival opera which I founded in 1993 I said to her What was it like to be around your dad and your husband when they got together What was it like and she said
They laughed themselves silly
I said what do you mean because I never saw that from either one of them
At the pulpit she said every Sunday we'd have dinner together and the boys would play baseball From the back lawn That tells us just something They tell each other jokes until one of them would fall off their chair Imagine she said when they were speaking to the general public in the church
They needed to give them a profound message But they had tremendous senses of humor That makes them all are more lovable to me Yeah me too I just thought of one other
Then I just think is a is a wonderful lesson we use this quite a bit The stone which the builders refused Has become the head stone of the corner the ideas that There's things that the builders looked at went now we don't want to use that
“Now it's become the most important stone of all”
Very much at Jesus
That rejected but became the most important stone of all even we could say the restoration
Rejected by money but will be One day the most important stone of them all it's a line from a song But there's a lot to it Yeah, not everyone sees the majesty When Michelangelo did his crowning achievement the David
He used a discarded piece of marble that had been slightly used And nobody wanted it it was junk to everybody so he got it free and he said I looked at it And I thought I just have to chip away everything that's not David And God does that for us He chips away those parts of us that are not really who we are
And he's chipping it away so that we can become in his image as best we can And there it is in the Psalms David Is talking about Michael this is something you are so passionate about
“I think John and I and our listeners would love to just what are your favorite songs?”
What are Michael ballons favorite songs? That one and all the children in my ward know that and they'll sing it in primary if I come for a visit That is an important him let me explain to you. I made a motion picture for the church It was played many many many times in some glorious buildings around the church it required admission You had to pay 10% of your income to get in but when I was called to play that part
I knew in advance Because 10 years before that I was sitting in the Logan Temple next to my grandfather and I heard him say Prepare you're gonna play that role I thought grandpa and I realized he hadn't said it and then I heard it again from the next 10 years I'd look at it and think how would I play that?
The day that I was called it wasn't a job it was a calling I was in Provo at the Tabernacle down there just before the Messiah began
“a guy came up to me didn't know who he was said you got to call this number and you have to call it right now”
It's really really important. I said I've come down because my student David Warner Is going to be the Tanner Solarist?
It's the first time he'll make a public appearance as a Tanner. I'm not gonna miss that
I listened to the whole Messiah got in my car and I headed north and I got after about 40 minutes It dawned on me. I was supposed to make that call We pulled off. This was before cell phones. I pulled off to a Wendy's where they had A payphone. I knew where every payphone in a state of Utah
Guy on the other end answered
This is Peter Johnson. I said Brother Johnson. This is Michael Ballon He said Brother Ballon. On behalf of the first presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ the modern He says we'd like to call you to play the role of Lucifer in a new temple field. Sometimes people go in to see the bishop and just a moment before they're told he's going to call you to be this
Releas society president. It's a tender mercy from God who's going to say I'm in charge
“This call is coming from me so you better be good at it. That's what it said to me”
So powerful when that project began they brought all of us together in the space it was going to be
Produced President Hinkley determined that he needed to consecrate the area because he said they're going to be some modifications made And it's going to make somebody in the universe angry and he's going to try to stop it We needed a deadocatory prayer. We offered a deadocatory prayer. It sounded like anyone that you can read from the Logan temple the man-tie temple just like that once the John Taylor
Dedicated but at the end He cast him out Before it started before he gave that deadocatory prayer he was walking up and he said to a secretary Old Hardy we need to sing two hymns a spirit of God and high on a mountain top
Old Hardy who is very much like
Barny five like our friend John here He said the president we have no hymns President Hinkley said in a very loud voice that we could all hear They shouldn't need hymns for those hymns Which said to me I met her memorize the spirit of God and how a high on a mountain top
Their scripture
“They're that important. They are our songs and they are holy”
We need to know the songs and when you know the hymns especially those two the president Hinkley Thought we should all know by heart I had a roommate when I was at BYU His name is Tom Ignite Tom went to officer candidate school after He graduated was a marine pilot. He flew F-18s
He was his handsome probably more so than any of those guys in the movies, but Tom Was flying an A4 skyhawk learning how to land on an aircraft carrier He had an unsafe landing gear indicator They told him you're gonna have to do a belly landing In QS Florida he tried inside loops out. He did everything to try to get the gear to come down and it wouldn't
He told me I was remembering my patriarchal blessing and singing hymns on the way to my landing That's for his power was coming from Tom's credit. He did a perfect belly landing pop the canopy
“They were running get out of there. He got out of there. We'll never forget that he was singing hymns”
That caught him through that got him through Amanda Barnes Smith Was taking care of her son Who was shot in Hansmel after her husband had been killed another son had been killed She's taking care of another son
Who had been shot in the hip and she hears that soul who on Jesus has leaned for repose I will not I cannot desert to his foes You see they need to live in your heart
You never know when you're gonna need them
How interesting you're going to do a temple video What better than the song that was sung in the heartland temple dedication then high on a mountain top that's what Isaiah 2 go up to the mountain of the Lord a banner is unfurled It's kind of fun hang up at the BYU Salt Lake Center. I used to be able to when we looked at
Isaiah 2 or second he fight 12 the banners unfurled. I used to be able to point out the window and say there it is and sign people But now there's some high density housing in the way That's it that's where they unfurled and said all right everybody gather We remember I say I say that because it's poetic He wrote in poetry as the Psalms or in poetry
Then I before Neil Maxwell was going to announce to the world that he was diagnosed with non-Hotchkins Nymphoma he called my wife and me to warn us. He said I don't want you to open the desert news and see it
I wondered that you hear it from me
Colleen and I have determined we're not gonna do anything we're gonna let the tickets course
I'm taking me home He told President Hinkley that
“President Hinkley said you're gonna do everything you can to maintain your life as long as you can because Neil”
You are our Isaiah No, the rest of us are replaceable Neil you're not your our Isaiah and we need you for as long as we can have you here And he lived ten years longer that he battled Battled so much those bone marrow transfusions are so painful He endured them every week and it's a standin
He was able to complete that full volume of his works Before he passed away he was valiant the month before he died He came to Logan to see an opera Lobo Amba putchini he loved that he was very very sick very very sick He knew that my father was dying of cancer
He said I don't want to impose but I feel like I should give your father blessing It's not okay
“It's more than okay. I warn my parents Neil Maxwell is coming home with me and it must give dad a blessing”
Which he did after the blessing both of them were gonna die the next month My dad asked Neil Maxwell when is it time to just Give up and say to the Lord I can't go on anymore and Neil Maxwell said Never We need to endure to the end
Sometimes that's really really hard He knew My dad knew because he also had cancer in his bones when he passed away
There's been nobody like it. They're never will be anyone like Neil a Maxwell
Michael you're so wonderfully passionate about music. Why is it so healing? It is It can suit your soul when almost nothing else can. It can lift you from darkness For one reason or another. I've played the devil in many operas. He's in a lot of operas The first time I played him He was called metastofflies in that instead of the devil
I went before the conductor of the Metropolitan Opera. I had prepared like crazy He opened the score and started playing and I started singing After about 30 seconds. He closed the score Had it to me and said there's nothing I can do for you. You're gonna be terrible What do you mean? I had worked so hard
He said yeah, but you play him like a villain I said he is And he said but if you play him like that the audience won't understand Why he was able to compel fouls Just sell him his soul
You need to be compiling and endearing So that he will accept the invitation to hell
I always did that in the portrayals of Satan now all of a sudden the church calls me and I thought the same thing
I can't play him so evil that he would repel had him Because he's not he's very cunning He's very beautiful and till He turns on you That was really important for me. I wanted to convey that in the film
Hank one time I was in the Joseph Smith building at BYU And there were boxes outside the Dean's office with old cassette tapes that said take these if you want him I grabbed some CES symposium tapes that church educational system symposium and I'd listen to all of them and I kept some of them One of them that I kept was Michael Ballum talking about playing the apostle Paul It was so good
I'm gonna let him tell you one thing I want you to tell us because it touched me and I know this isn't part of the Psalms But it's the apostle Paul you talked about wearing chains
“I will never forget that part of the talk. Do you remember that? It's got to be”
34 to years ago, but do you remember what you said because I can remind you if he can't remember It is ingrained in my heart when the church asked me to play Paul who was one of my heroes He was an enemy to God and then all of a sudden he
Changes and becomes the greatest missionary
Possible, but he's imprisoned in a maritime prison in Rome which is enough to stand there in the darkness
He's in chains for years We filmed one of the scenes where I was in chains appearing before king or grippa where Paul tells him
“I have seen him. I know he lives. I called break. I said let's go to lunch and the prop master came up with a key instead”
I'll take your chains off. I said no. Don't take them off I need to wear them. I need to feel what that felt like Even if it's just for a day. I need to feel what being shackled in chains feels like I went up
To the commentary with chains on my feet and chains on my hands and consumed dinner
Very difficult to do that, but I got a glimpse of what he must have felt like When the day was over My wrists were raw and Bleeding that was just for one day and imagine Months at a time shackled in chains
That speech you refer to I never forget it either because I went to that Conference with of speech in mind And they showed the film about Paul
Right there. We'll show it. I'd never seen it. It was brand new and it was going to be released to all of their church educators
And I watched it and When I got up to give the speech I had prepared
“It wasn't there. I couldn't remember anything”
I couldn't remember anything I don't write speeches Maybe outline at five or six things and I looked at it. I thought I don't Know what this means And I said to the people there. I'm not supposed to give this speech
I'm not sure what I am, but Here it is With no warning at all. I gave a speech about the possible None of those words were mine Somebody wanted me to convey to those important brothers and sisters who were going to teach about him
The experience I had had I'm just living his life for a little bit of time
“The spirit can do that but you have to be willing to do what the spirit I should do”
And if you do it'll be stronger than next time Coming up in part two I said Ben if I could do anything for you in the world. What would you have me do? I want to meet Harry Potter I want to meet Daniel Radcliffe I said Ben he lives in London
We live in Logan and he saw I know dad, but you said anything Well, I started thinking about that It just so happened that Daniel Radcliffe was coming to New York City to be in a play I thought I wonder
