Monday, October 6, 2014

Letter to Jonathan from Dad

I have attached a portion of the letter I'm sending to Jonathan where he asked for a story from his family where the Lord guided them. I know that you used heard this story before but I thought you might like to have it in writing.

Love,

Dad

Dear Son,

Once you asked for a story from each of us about where we felt the Lord had guided us. The story I would like to share deals with me getting out of the military and getting the job at UPS. As a pilot in the Air Force, we had a seven year commitment after pilot training to pay the Air Force back for the money that they spent on training us.  Six years into the commitment, my career and life was going very well. We were living in Germany, Stephanie had finally gotten pregnant, and I was an instructor in C-130s. Our commander, Col. Williams, came to me one day and asked if I would go back to the United States and take some tactical training about using night vision goggles flying low levels during the nighttime. I would then return back to the unit and train everyone else in what I had learned. It was an honor that he came and asked me because there were many other instructors he could've asked and the training sounded very fun.  At the time I was trying to make the decision whether I would stay in the military and make it a career or get out and fly for the commercial airlines. My dream was to fly for Delta out of Salt Lake City so I could finally live by my family. I had never lived by my brothers and sister my entire life that I could remember. My brother Ross and Dennis and my sister Karla lived in the Salt Lake area as well as my parents. What a great opportunity that would be to create some relationships that I always wanted to. So at that time I was strongly leaning towards getting out of the military to try to make that dream come true. Why this is important is that the tactical training my commander wanted me to do would add just six weeks to my seven year commitment. That seemed like nothing but, for some reason I felt very uncomfortable about adding those six weeks. I prayed and fasted about what I should do because it did not make any sense that staying in the military for an additional six weeks could make any difference in my life. This feeling just did not go away so finally I had to go to Col. Williams and explained that I was a religious man and for some reason I just did not feel good about doing the training. To say the least he was very disappointed and could not understand why I was refusing this. In fact, he threatened me that he would just ground me for my remaining year and not let me fly at all if I didn't do this training.  I stuck to my guns and refused to go. It turned out that his threat was not real because we were so short of instructors that I had to fly constantly to do the training the squadron needed. But my relationship with Col. Williams turn negative that last year which I still regret to this day. So, my focus then turn towards getting out of the military and finding a job in the civilian flying sector. I went to my Stake President, which was easy at the time because I was a High Councilman, and asked for a blessing about what I should do and where I should go after leaving the military. In that blessing he promised that I would fly for my career, which gave me great comfort. It turned out that the war to Iraq started the following summer. I was to get out the military on July 31, 1990 and my unit was activated to go to that war on August 6. If I had taken that six-week extension I would've had to go to war,which lasted a few years, because the military canceled all discharges until the end of the war. When I officially got out of the military on July 31, 1990, the airlines were still hiring and I got a job with UPS (That is another story about being guided by The Lord).  After the war was over there were not any airline jobs to be had and many of my friends had to find other type of work in a poor economy that did not pay very well. The Lord watched over me and guided me in my decision not to do that training because that six weeks made all the difference in the world to the future of my family and going where the Lord wanted me to go.


Elder Neal A. Maxwell (1926–2004) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles once said: “The same God that placed that star in a precise orbit millennia before it appeared over Bethlehem in celebration of the birth of the Babe has given at least equal attention to placement of each of us in precise human orbits so that we may, if we will, illuminate the landscape of our individual lives, so that our light may not only lead others but warm them as well".

I have a testimony that the Lord loves each of us and will guide us if we remain faithful and do what he has asked us to do. I have been extremely blessed in my life, more than I deserve. My children are wonderful and I am very proud of each one of them.  I'm grateful that they have chosen to all follow the Savior and pray that they will be open to his guiding hand so that the Lord will be able to place them in that orbit which He has chosen.

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