GOD’S SUBTLE WAYS

Several years ago I attended a sacrament meeting at which a young man was speaking prior to leaving as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  I knew some of his circumstances.  He was living with another family in our area though I didn’t know why.  As I was waiting for the meeting to begin, I turned to look over my right shoulder.  Seated a few rows behind and to the right of me was a man for whom I had previously done plaster work.  I had lost track of him and had not seen him for several years.  I acknowledged him and we smiled, seemingly it was just an innocent coincidence that we happened to be at the same meeting.  The young man gave a good talk and I had high hopes he would be successful and grow through his service.  The following week while plastering a foundation fifty miles from home, I encountered that same man I had not seen for years but had noticed at the sacrament meeting.  We greeted each other and our conversation naturally turned to the young man.  He told me that for several years he had been a home teacher to that young man’s family.  He indicated the boy was raised in a dysfunctional home with absolutely no discernable spiritual influence.  In his words, it was a “miracle” the young man had chosen to serve a mission.  We were both excited and pleased that he had.  At that moment I had no indication that we were a part of the Lord’s plan for that young man.  At the time I was serving as an assistant Stake executive secretary.  While on the phone with the Stake President a few days later, he mentioned that the young man had reported to the Missionary Training Center but had then confessed some previously undisclosed sins of a significant nature.  The matter was serious enough that the President of the Mission Training Center consulted a General Authority and was instructed to send the boy home.  My Stake President was dismayed at the news but the decision had been rendered and there was seemingly no hope of altering the outcome.  The President of the MTC seemed sympathetic to the young man’s circumstances but made it perfectly clear that the decision regarding the young man was no longer his.  He indicated that he had never seen such a decision reversed, regardless of the circumstances.  In my phone conversation with the Stake President, I shared his sorrow at the decision which had been rendered and told him of the conversation I’d had with his former home teacher and how difficult it had been for this young man to reach the point where a mission was even considered a possibility.  While I was sharing this with the Stake President, he suddenly said, I’ve got to go and hung up abruptly.  He called me later to tell me that during our conversation, he had the strongest impression to share the information I had given him to the General Authority who had made the decision to send him home.  Unfortunately, he was unable to speak directly with the General Authority so he relayed the information to his assistant and was assured it would be given to the General Authority as soon as possible.  We both prayed for the young man and left it in the Lord’s hands.  The decision to send the young man home was so far along in the process that attempts were made to contact the family he was living with in order for them to come pick him up from the MTC.  Interestingly, they could not be reached, delaying his return home.  The next day my Stake President received a call from the President of the MTC who incredulously informed him that the General Authority had reversed his decision and instructed him to work with the young man and let him continue his mission.  We were overjoyed.  His mission service was exemplary and he became an Assistant to the Mission President.  He returned home two years later with honor and soon met a young woman who accepted his proposal of marriage, which occurred in the temple.  The last I heard, they had two beautiful children.  How incredibly different this story would have been had not several things combined to change the outcome; what if I hadn’t looked over my right shoulder before that meeting began, what if the man I saw had not attended that meeting or sat where I could not have seen him, what if he hadn’t been a home teacher to that young man’s family, what if either I hadn’t been working where I was on that day afterward or he hadn’t come to that location at the same time, what if our conversation had never made it to the ears of the General Authority, and what if the Stake President and the General Authority hadn’t been attuned to God’s will?  I never cease to marvel at how involved the Lord is in our lives and how subtly He brings about His purposes, so much so that if we aren’t paying attention, we may never see His hand at all.