Rotary Club Featuring Elder Luke

February 4

This is a report on my Rotary Club speech given last Thursday, Jan. 28^th, that I feel was effective.

After my intro I showed President Monson’s picture, explaining the call letter that Beverly and I received from him, then a picture of the Cebu Temple and how President Monson would visit Cebu in June 14-15 for the Cultural Celebration and to dedicate this sacred facility.

After this luncheon engagement it was reported that Mr. Edward Gaisano, part owner (family owned) of Metro Gaisano Malls, present at the Rotary meeting, mention that he wanted to hire me.  I told the group that I was not available to perform appraisals but that I would make myself available as an unpaid coach and advisor.  However, I did mention to our Stake Pres., John Balledos, that I would be willing to tutor LDS accountants in Cebu Province on how to complete business appraisals, and this could possibly happen.  My gut feel is that the appraisal science/art is not well understood in the Philippines, at least not in Cebu.   While our LDS accountants likely would not be paid near what U.S. business appraisers are paid, I believe this kind of consulting work could add significant additional income to their practices.

The “preamble quote” noted in the attachment is:

“It has always been a cardinal teaching with the Latter-day Saints that a religion which has not the power to save people temporally and make them prosperous and happy here, cannot be depended upon to save them spiritually, to exalt them in the life to come.”

President Joseph F. Smith

This quote and the following quote I shared in my PowerPoint presentation:

— “A man out of work is of special moment to the Church because, deprived of his inheritance, he is on trial as Job was on trial-for his integrity….

— Continued economic dependence breaks him…

— He soon becomes the seedbed of discontent…

— The Church cannot hope to save a man on Sunday if during the week it is a complacent witness to the crucifixion of his soul.”  -Gordon B. Hinckley

Had a pretty strong impact on the group and I found several coming up afterward and effectively telling me that they agreed with the principle, as confirmed in the attached.  Pretty cool.

The man in the picture in the attachment is Boni Belen, Pres. Of the Rotary Club.  I sat at the head table to the left of Boni, with Elder Peck to my left.  Boni told me that he is Covey (Steve) trained and uses Covey principles in his business, which is “Estate Property Management & Technopreneurship.”  I hadn’t expected to find the Covey tentacles reaching  into this location but was favorably impressed.  J  Boni has been to Utah and is acquainted with the church and the Covey Institute by direct contact, but not a member.

A second strong impact was made in my presentation (points shared as follows) regarding the out-reach of the church-wide Employment Resource Center:

— A global non-profit NGO with 312 offices in 53 countries

— Over 70 years experience

— 300,000 people served each year for free

— Serving Corporate partners free of charge (bolding and underline added)

— Professionally staffed

— Sponsored by the LDS Church

As you can see in the attached, they liked the “FREE OF CHARGE” point.    Some that came up after my talk, I perceived were looking for some underlying pretext for our doing this at no charge.  There was a little unbelief written on their faces.  I stated that there were no direct proselyting intentions behind this, which is true.  However, at the end of the Career Workshops, we do invite the attendees to fill out a  Missionary Referral car, if they are interested in receiving contact from the church.  We tell them they will receive a visit if they complete the card.  But we don’t go beyond that.  And I think extending this opportunity for church contact is only fair as they have received a very useful training booklet and free instruction, sponsored by the LDS Church.

After the discussion of our Employment Resource Center assignment, I talked about the appraisal business and had fun sharing the story of the law suit between Vickie Lynn Marshall vs. E. Pierce Marshall

I told the Rotary  group a fact not known by the U.S. media, that two LDS appraisers (Mike Hill, former employer, and  Paul Shields, CFA, CPA, CIRA, from Salt Lake) were on opposite sides of the litigation, representing Pierce and Anna Nicole.  Mike and Paul discovered this in the court room, on break, in small chit-chat. 

The punch line came with the following: Both don’t take it with them!  Pierce dies in 2006 and Anna dies in 2007.

I quite enjoyed this little adventure in speaking and hope some good can come out of this for the church and persons we hope to bless in Cebu.