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Most people thought President Gordon B. Hinckley was saying goodbye during the LDS Church's General Conference in April.
"I am in the sunset of my life," Hinckley told thousands of church members gathered at the giant Conference Center in downtown Salt Lake City and millions more around the globe watching via satellite. "I am totally in the hands of the Lord."
As the LDS Church's 176th Semiannual General Conference gets under way Saturday, some Mormons may be amazed to see the man they consider a "prophet, seer and revelator" in such good health. Many worried he would be gone by now.
Possibly to allay such fears, Hinckley this week told LDS general authorities he is finished with chemotherapy and is "cancer-free." He is thinner and weaker, but goes to his office in downtown Salt Lake City most days. Colleagues report he seems energized by his continuing work.
It's been an unusual year for the leader of the 12 million member Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
In January, Hinckley had unexpected surgery to remove a cancerous growth from his colon. He was undergoing chemotherapy treatments to deal with what he called in the speech, "residual problems," and was suffering enormous loneliness since losing his wife, Marjorie, two years earlier.
Hinckley went on to say he was going through all the books and artifacts he had accumulated over the years. He then reminisced about his lifelong career working for the church.
Even though Hinckley warned listeners at the time not to "regard what I have said as an obituary," many did. They looked for signs of his imminent demise and spread rumors that he was at death's door.
He wasn't - except for the fact that he was 95.
In early June, Hinckley traveled to Iowa City, Iowa, to speak at a fireside commemorating the 150th anniversary of the start of the handcart companies.
On June 23, he celebrated his 96th birthday by participating in a groundbreaking for a new building at Brigham Young University to be named in his honor. In August, he spoke at another groundbreaking, this time for a new temple in Draper.
On Sept. 1, he met in a closed-door meeting with President Bush; on Sept. 3, he dedicated a new temple in Sacramento, Calif.; and 10 days later, he was on hand to dedicate the new LDS Business College building at the old Triad Center in downtown Salt Lake City.
On Saturday, he addressed millions of Mormon women at the annual General Relief Society meeting, broadcast from the Conference Center.
This weekend, Hinckley will conduct the church's two-day conference, during which he may speak several times. Many Mormons will tune in to hear what he chooses to talk about in what could be among his last sermons. They will be looking to judge for themselves just how well he seems.
That's OK with Hinckley.
"The life of a president of the church is not his own," he said in April. "He has very little privacy and no secrets."