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Eternal Influence

Last week I sat in the chapel of our ward and relived childhood memories during the funeral of Dian Ferrin.  Dian and her husband, Cal, were my childhood Primary teachers.  They taught our class on Sunday and their oldest daughter, Gayle, did weekday “Merrie Miss” activities for us at their home.  Their home was just an orchard away from the church building tucked back in the trees with a large garden but to a small girl it seemed like it was a world away.  I learned to make pizza dough in their kitchen, gardening in their yard and we practiced sewing skills around their kitchen table.  

Hanging on the wall above the table where we sat was a framed map of the world.  When I was a girl, the map contained a few pictures of missionaries from their family with a string running from a picture to the place they had served.  One of the pictures was of Gayle.  As we sat around the table, she would tell us stories about her service in Sri Lanka.  She described a world unknown to us where it was sometimes difficult to obtain clean water and often the only safe beverage available was orange soda.  She showed us pictures of homes built unlike any we had seen and of the country and people she had come to love.  

More than forty years have passed since I first sat at their table.  The large map that hung on the wall was on display at her funeral and the few pictures have grown to more than fifty “Ferrin Family Missionaries”.  As I ponder the map, I admire the vision of Cal and Dian.  The map was enormous when they bought it with so few pictures to place but they could envision the grand scale of what they were building.  Through the family they raised in their home almost completely hidden by an orchard and grape vine fences, their influence has reached around the globe, sharing the hope and good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ by those who lived it and experienced it at home.  
 
If we tried to track and measure the good that has come from Cal and Dian Ferrin and the good that comes from those who learned from them, we would find that their influence has become “eternal”. The influence of our lives doesn’t die with us, it lives on and on and on…eternally.
 

Dream Home

Following the call of a prophet, William Lyman Rich was eleven years old when he arrived with his parents, in 1864, with the first group of settlers to the Bear Lake Valley.  The first winter came early, the frost killed their vegetable gardens before they could be harvested, the wheat did not ripen and snow soon blocked the pass to Cache Valley.  It was a dismal start for the new settlement.  

Eventually, the community of Paris, Idaho began to grow as did William.  In 1877, he married Ella Pomeroy and they worked and saved for the opportunity to build their “dream home”.  That dream became a reality in 1886 when they moved with their four young children into a new two story home, nicely furnished with the help of an interior decorator from Salt Lake City.    
 
After two weeks in their lovely home, William received a call to be the bishop of Montpelier, Idaho which would necessitate an immediate move to the town where two competing factions would make his calling even more difficult.  In the middle of the winter, William and Ella “prayed for strength as they moved their family into the only house available, the 

worst one I ever saw–a ricky, leaky, dirt-roofed tiny one, where Mother and baby Mabel were sick most of the time.” (daughter, Zula Rich Cole)

The winter ended, William’s farm implement business thrived and they obtained better housing while William served as bishop of Montpelier.  While the gospel of Jesus Christ is a gospel of joy it is also a gospel of sacrifice.  It is the sacrifice He made for us and the joy our redemption brings and it is the real, though token, sacrifices we make to follow HIm, receive His redemption and become like Him. 
 
William and Ella did return to Paris but never did live in their “dream home” again.  Yet when there is a family reunion or the family goes to Paris to visit old sites and grave yards, a stop is invariable made to take a picture of their “dream home”.  The home and the choice they made to leave it stand as a monument and testament of their faith for generations of their posterity.  It is a legacy they could have never forseen in their moment of decision.  Whether now or later and often both, sacrifice “brings forth the blessings of heaven.”
 

The Ball Doesn’t Lie

For the past eleven years, my brother, Boyd, has hosted a fundraiser golf tournament for the Boys and Girls Club of Northern Utah which begins with a clinic.  In past years, I have watched Boyd teach the clinic with his skilled children as examples of what he is teaching.  This year, my brother, Danny, taught the clinic with two PGA tour players from northern Utah, Patrick Fishburn and Zac Blair, as examples.  
 
Patrick at 6’4″ and 220 lbs is powerful off the tee.  Zac is 5’6″, 155 lbs and scores with his wedges and putter.  With such differences, Danny pointed out that in golf there are only two fundamentals, the angle of the club face and the club path at impact with the ball.   Everything else a player does: grip, alignment, or swing is about using their particular body and abilities to consistently generate the best angle and path to create the shot they desire.  “The golf ball flight tells you the story of impact.  Pay attention to the story the golf ball is telling you.  The ball doesn’t lie,” he taught.

Each child of God comes to earth with different circumstances, different capacities and opportunities, different strengths and weaknesses and we all come with one invitation to follow the Savior, Jesus Christ, and become like Him.  As mere mortals we seek to imitate the Master and so often our efforts result in figurative golf balls all over the course, nowhere near the hole.  Yet He stands near teaching us to use our given circumstances to strengthen us and our capacities to create the club face angle along the path that will move us closer and closer to being like Him.  This life is a game we can all win.  “He inviteth [us] all to come unto Him and partake of His goodness; and He denieth none that come unto Him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and He remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God,..” (2 Nephi 26:33)

As we practice and tune our hearts and our minds to the whisperings of His Holy Spirit, He will show us all things that we should do to create the impact that propels our lives along His covenant path.  Our story will then tell of His mercy, His compassion, His attention to the details and His wisdom in shaping our lives with increasing access to His power that will give us all that He has.
 

Impossible Reality

After celebrated success as a half-back football player at the University of Utah, newly graduated Preston Summerhays accepted a position teaching and coaching in the small rural community of St. Anthony, Idaho.  It was 1931 and Preston’s contract for nine months held the indefinite phrase, “providing that economic conditions will permit…”  As the Great Depression gripped the country, School District No. 2 of Fremont County was not certain they would have the means to keep school open for the entire year.

It was a tenuous time, yet with audacious optimism, during the first year of his tenure, Preston taught, coached and gathered support for St. Anthony’s first golf course.  In the spring of 1932 a ground lease was signed, “Fairways…[were] grubbed out and cleared of rocks and sand greens put in together with tee boxes…being located along the Snake river with an abundance of grass and fine trees.” (The Post Register, Idaho Falls, Idaho June 28, 1932)   

Over the summer Preston managed the course, organized and played in matches with teams from other towns, and offered golf lessons.  In spite of the economic outlook, “the Hollow Tree Forest golf course has been very popular this summer and fall.  Plans for extensive improvements to the course for next season are being made at this time.” (Ibid October 20, 1932). What would seem impossible during such difficult times became a reality.

Though the future may feel doubtful, we can express our own hope that through the plan of the Savior the

challenges of life will not defeat us but allow us to thrive by overcoming.  “Be of good cheer, for I will lead you along.  The kingdom is yours and the blessings thereof are yours, and the riches of eternity are yours.” (D&C 78:18)   Have hope, we can each triumph through Him.

Harvest of Influence

Ten years ago, I was called to be the primary president in our ward.  I pondered and prayed over counselors and one day, while turning the corner at the bottom of the hill, I drove past Shirley’s house and received the impression that she should be one of my counselors.  I paused at the impression.  I love Shirley and had watched her serve faithfully for many decades but Shirley had just celebrated her eightieth birthday.  What would she say? I wondered.  When she received the calling, she reminded the bishop of her age, indicated she hadn’t served in Primary since it had been called Jr. Sunday School and then recounted that she had been surprised earlier by a prompting that a calling was coming and she should accept.  
 

While Shirley worried that some of the issues she faced would affect her service, the children and adults in Primary listened intently to the stories of her life and the testimony those experiences had shaped.  We felt the love she had for the Lord and all of us and we were blessed to simply be in her presence.  She accepted the opportunity to serve in faith that the Lord would make her efforts enough and while being blessed by her wisdom, her steadiness, and love, I came to understand that through her lifetime of faith, it wasn’t as much what she did, it was who she had become.

This week Shirley’s backyard was filled with friends and family who spanned her nine decades celebrating her birthday, a small glimpse of the fruits of her life. A life filled with ongoing moments of faith, forgiveness, repentance, laughter, kindness, prayer, work, hope, and love that have created a harvest of influence that will last eternally.

 

Known and Seen

I sat near a young man as a sister missionary shared the story of Joseph Smith who, troubled by the many different religions of his day, wondered which of all the churches were true.  Joseph followed the admonition of James, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God…”  Kneeling in a grove in the early spring of 1820, he prayed, was surrounded by intense darkness, and then using all his power to call upon God he “saw a pillar of light exactly over [his] head, above the brightness of the sun…”  In the light Joseph saw two glorious Beings.  One called him by name, pointed to the other and said, “This is my beloved Son, Hear Him!” (Joseph Smith History). God, the Father, and His Son, Jesus Christ, came to an obscure boy in a grove.  They knew his name, They knew his past, They knew his present struggle and They knew his future.
 
As I turned to the young man next to me, the love of God for him washed gently over 

me and I knew that just as the Lord knew Joseph, He knew the young man who sat next to me, an obscure boy in the living room of a house in Farmington. In a vast sea of people in our town, in our state, in our country, in our world, it is easy to feel insignificant, unknown and perhaps, alone, but we are not unknown or insignificant to the Father of heaven and earth.  He knows every one of His children, their name, their hopes, their present struggles, their past, and their future.

“No matter where you live, no matter how humble your circumstances, how meager your employment, how limited your abilities, how ordinary your appearance…you are not invisible to your Heavenly Father. He loves you. He knows your humble heart and your acts of love and kindness….We have the faithful promise of God that He will neither forget nor forsake those who incline their hearts to Him. Have hope and faith in that promise.” (President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, October 2011) 
 
He sees you, He knows you, and He loves you perfectly.
 

Small Gains

As we celebrate Labor Day and the gains attained by American workers, we also celebrate the achievements of those who worked long hours at back breaking work, in dangerous conditions, believing in something better for their children.

Born in 1810, James Nibley worked in the coal mines of Scotland which earned him a permanent stoop in his lower back. When he married in 1836, his wife, Jean, joined him in the mine carrying the mined coal in a basket on her back from the bottom of the mine up the incline to the top of the mine.  Her career in the mine was ended by the passage of the MInes and Collieries Bill in Parliament in 1842 prohibiting the underground work for women, girls and boys under the age of 10.  Jean found occasional work picking and packing fruit and began to supplement their income by purchasing pins, needles and other common household goods, selling them from the window of their small home.  Her work did not pay for extra activities for the children or for vacations but to maintain the steady diet of porridge and sour milk with meat once a week, usually on a Sunday.


In 1844, James and Jean joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and began to plan for a way to follow a prophets call to gather to Zion.  Though they had scrimped, after eleven years of saving they were far from their goal.  When Jean’s sister, who had emigrated to Rhode Island, sent enough money for Jean’s two oldest children to come and work with her in the textile mills, they decided half way was something.  Borrowing the additional money needed from a local merchant, James and Jean emigrated with their children and joined her sister in Rhode Island where James, their oldest son and two oldest daughters traded the coal mines for the textile mill where they were later joined by their nine year old son who worked as a bobbin boy.   Every spare dollar earned went to pay the debt they had incurred to make the journey and once it was paid every dollar was saved to make the trip west to the Salt Lake valley.  By 1860, they made the journey west by rail and then by wagon arriving with only what they carried to start an unaccustomed life of farming.


The Nibleys put their hope, vision and persistence to what seemed to be an impossible task of following the prophet.  For sixteen years they sacrificed with small gains to follow the counsel to gather to Zion.  It took them so long, yet the determined faith of James and Jean brought not just religious opportunity but economic and educational possibilities to generations of their posterity.  As we follow their example, giving our best efforts to follow the calls of the prophet of God, though the results may be slow, even imperceptible and seemingly impossible, God’s plan to bless our posterity will be worked for generations to come.  

Looking Forward

White Sulphur Springs in West Virginia is home to The Greenbrier, a storied resort that began in 1778 as a place of renewal where people came to take the “healing” and pungent waters from the sulphur springs.  My grandma was the third generation of her family to grow up less than 30 minutes from The Greenbrier in a home on a hill above the Greenbrier River.   They had their own sulphur water, which is an acquired taste, provided first by the spring and then by a well.  Charlie, my dad’s cousin, was the fourth generation to own the home and was raised on sulphur water. So, I was surprised to find on my last visit that Charlie, at great expense, had brought a water line from the city main at the bottom of the hill up through the craggy cliffs of limestone to provide culinary water to the home.  

As I sat at the kitchen table with the fifth generation of our family to live in the home, I realized he was thinking not of himself but of the future.  

In another project, Charlie planted three new peach trees near the house which he nurtured and tended.  They grew tall and beautiful but did not yield any fruit.  Charlie passed away last year at the age of 80 and the family gathered recently to place a memorial stone and scatter his ashes on the land he loved.  To their delight, the peach trees were loaded with delicious fruit.  While his years were waning, he was looking forward.  Though he would never enjoy their fruit, those trees will continue to be a gift from Charlie to his family for years to come.

No matter where we find ourselves on our journey we can look forward in hope and faith to the “Author and Finisher of our faith,”  Jesus Christ.  (Hebrews 12:2) Long after our mortality, He will still be working miracles and writing the beautiful ending of our story. If efforts seem unfruitful, the Holy Spirit whispers, “Don’t give up… Don’t you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead…Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come.” (Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, October 1999) He who sees the sparrow fall, knows you, knows your heart, knows the promises He has made and those promises will bless you, your family and generations to come in ways we can not yet forsee.

Joy of Sacrifice

Eight years younger than her next sibling, my husband’s grandma, Annette, was the only sibling still at home when her parents were called to serve as mission leaders in the Northwestern States Mission headquartered in Portland, Oregon.  Soon after the call, her father proceeded to the mission while her mother stored their belongings and put their affairs in order before she and eleven year old Annette joined him.  
 
In Portland, she was plunged into a new world.  The missionaries who staffed the office lived in the mission home.  They had a devotional each morning with a song and scripture before they knelt in prayer.  Meals were lively discussions of the gospel and missionary work and she spent countless hours at the mission office helping the sisters and elders put mission magazines and pamphlets together. 
 
She recalled, “[Dad] and Mother had to travel a lot to mission and district conferences.  I went with them many times as my father always said he thought children got more out of trips and experiences associated with them than they did at school….I will be forever grateful to my Heavenly Father for allowing me this blessing of accompanying my parents on this mission and partaking of the spirit that such a calling provides and to my parents for letting me be part of everything that took place so that I might gain from such an experience the testimony of missionary service and the effect of the gospel in the lives of the people who espouse it.” (Personal History of Annette Nibley Richards, 1983)
 
Grandma’s tween and early teen years were not “normal”.  Her life was so different from the one she had at home in Salt Lake City.  Many would call her experience a sacrifice but I never heard her speak of it that way.  She only spoke of the blessings and the joy.
 
We each have our own opportunities to sacrifice, whether it is a sacrifice of time to be in the temple, a sacrifice of pride to receive and extend forgiveness, a sacrifice of tithes or fast offerings, the sacrifice required by the daily diligence of prayer and scripture study, or the willingness to embrace the future with faith when our expectations don’t materialize.  
 
“Very few of us will ever be asked to sacrifice our lives for the Savior.  But we are all invited to consecrate our lives to Him…[then] everything else begins to align.  Life no longer feels like a long list of separate efforts held in tenuous balance.  Over time, it all becomes one work.  One joy.  One holy purpose….” (Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf, April 2022)
 
As we look to Him in all things, we will be filled with His joy.

Holding Generations

While searching through some photos, I came across a picture of my grandparents holding their new baby, Ann.  As they held my mother they could not see the generations that they held in their arms and the far reaching effects of the love they would give.  
 
Grandpa was just starting his education and it would be years of school and working in Washington D.C. before he became a professor of political science at the University of Utah.  
 
Grandma was beautiful, poised, quick to laugh and unafraid of hard work.  The years would yet reveal the mettle under her surface that allowed her to meet great challenges with grace and a smile.  
 
One afternoon when my children were young, we were visiting Grandpa and Grandma.  As we pulled out of their driveway my son called out, “Slow down, Mom, this is my favorite part!”  I looked up to see my grandparents standing in the picture window of their front room, blowing kisses as we 

drove away.  It was a scene I had witnessed for as long as I can remember, a simple gesture to convey their love repeated over and over again.

“Frequently it is the commonplace tasks…that have the greatest positive effect on the lives of others, as compared with the things that the world so often relates to greatness.”  (President Dallin H. Oaks, April 2018)  The smallest expression or a simple act repeated over and over can incrementally change hearts, minds, and lives through generations.