Letter to David Porter (and Lutke)

September 4, 1990  [Bulletin:  The Duffer is still in the MTC.  Visa problems.  He has now been there 5 weeks over his two-month stay and has almost completed the Book of Mormon in Portuguese!  Last I heard he was working in the Mail Room.]

[The following is a letter I wrote to David Porter, but printed a copy and put Lutke’s name on it, too.]

Dear Elders Porter and Lutke:

   I finally figured out what I think the difference is between you guys who led the Program last year and those that are leading it this year.  I believe you treated each other like companions even before you went on your missions…as it teaches in the Leadership part of the Missionary Guide.  We have some wonderful kids leading us now, but they are not as close as you guys were.  It really makes a difference.

   I have been concerned about you since I talked with your mother last week.  She said that you were having a rough time in a little branch that is more inactive than active.  I am anxious for you to share your experiences with us…not the actual things that you do per se, but the type of mission it is.  She said there were inactive bishops and few active members.  I’d like to know, also, as you look at your circumstances, what your thoughts are and what plans you have for the work.  However, whatever you send will be worshipfully received with gratitude…since it has been so long since we have heard from you.

   Last Saturday was a high point that will only be succeeded by Trevor Barrett getting his endowments, soon.  (Talked to him after quitting writing last night and he is expecting his call this Saturday.  I hope you will be able to get to know him better some day because he is Awesome!  Lots of trials in his life.  He’s also pretty funny…he doesn’t want to go to South America, Africa, or anyplace where it is going to be too rough.  France, maybe.  He says it now costs $700.00 a month in the London, England Mission!  All kidding aside, Tennessee or Houston or Peoria would kill him for sure.)

Bryan Lane and I spent three hours in the temple together.  It was sweet.  The only other person to have his endowments is BARZ and he is being a flaky Convert, with a capital C at this time.  So, when Bryan got his endowments a week ago today (Tuesday) I was ready for a new face in the temple.  Troy was too busy before he left, Todd, Kyle…too busy.

   I didn’t know until just recently that Bryan had such terrific problems in his family.  I don’t have the full story, and don’t need to know, and don’t even know if what I’ve heard is true.  I just know that his Dad was not able to speak at his Farewell, help ordain him or come to the temple with him.  His grandfather was there and that helped.  Bryan is the eldest of ten children, so he has had a huge burden for quite awhile.  Derek Madsen told me he thought his Dad was in jail during the week and came home on weekends only, or something.

   If you want to know what humility it, all you have to do is look at Bryan.  Probably the most humble of the Guides I’ve worked with.  And he wanted to go to the temple with me.  Wanted to badly.  I can’t tell you how I have missed you and Lutke, McElhaney, Willis, Gibson, the Duffer, Murdock, and the others who put the temple high on their list of things to do.  Trevor is a breath of fresh air.  He wants to go so bad he can taste it.

   Anyway, we went to the session and then spent some time in the Celestial Room and then changed and went to the cafeteria for pie and milk.  It was almost 2 pm and everything was closing down.  Afterwards we went to the East Room and knelt in prayer and prayed for Bryan on his mission and for his family while he is gone.  It was even sweeter.  Boy, it is hard to let you guys go.  I haven’t been quite as close to the last few and it has helped some.  I just want to hug them and keep them close.

   Things are about as they always are.  Prayers are answered.  Out of the blue Flake called me yesterday (Sept. 5 – Just spent 30 minutes on the phone with him.  Read your letter.  He wants GUIDElines!) and wants me to be an Assistant Director for him doing Sacrament Meetings and Outreach stuff for the Young Adult Guides.  After 18+ months now I am getting quite experienced at all of this.  I told him I would let him know in a couple of days.  Later yesterday afternoon I went and had a long talk with Elder and Sister Kimball.  We’ve gone over this before, but the gist of it was that I think Bob should retire, take on an Emeritus status, which would allow him to lead the music and be around, but not have a direct hand in running the Program.  I know that counselors are not supposed to do those things, but I just had to counsel with the Kimballs.  It was interesting that they were very concerned that I stay with the Program.  I didn’t think they would be that concerned.  They are convinced that there are only three people in the world who can run this thing…Bob, Flake and I.  He said that Vegas are fairly common, but the rest of us are uncommon and he wanted to make sure that we worked out all our differences carefully so that we could continue while he studied it all.  (I don’t think Vegas are all that common, if you want to know what I think!)  I suggested that he have an interview with Bob and Jeri and talk about health and retirement and all of that.  I wouldn’t have been so brave if I hadn’t talked to Kaleen and had her reveal to me the consensus of several of the returned Guides that there is something wrong with how Bob does things.  We’ve all known it, but after they’ve been gone for two years they said it stuck out really significantly.

   One of the reasons I talked to Kimball is that Bob has cut me back to only working with the Records Specialists.  He doesn’t want me to work with the Ammonites, the Presidency, and in fact he has decided to call President Allen (our Sunday Night District Advisor) and North Stake Mission President) as an Asst. Director and have him work with the District Leaders.  Well, it kind of hurt my feelings that I had worked so hard and my recompense is a diminished role in the Program.  Just when I am getting much better at everything, I guess I have become more of a threat.

   Elder Kimball decided he would allow me to “temporarily” work with Flake, as long as it was only a few months and the work with him didn’t adversely influence what I am doing in the Program.

   I hate to burden you with all of this, but David, there probably isn’t anyone else in the world who understands the depths of the Program like you, and sometimes I just have to tell someone.  I confess (first time in print) that I really would like to direct the affairs of the Program, even though I now that I don’t have everything it would take.  But, I have learned that we do the best we can with what we have and the Lord will help take care of the rest.  When some men are made bishops you wonder how they will do it, but it all works out and the Church moves forward.  I don’t have the scriptural facility of Flake, the wisdom of Vega, or the magnetism of Bob, but I am a good administrator, and maybe a good administrator is needed as much as charisma and wisdom, at times.

   I have been very successful at establishing, again, the most effective meeting process.  We have a Sunday morning Presidency Meeting, a District Leadership (DLs and TSs run by the Presidency) at 6:15 p.m. and the SNTM is pretty well scheduled.  We meet to start with in the Cultural Hall with two large circles of chairs.  We had almost 80 kids there two weeks ago (last Sunday was Fast Sunday, which we have taken off regularly twice now!!).  There were some really good-looking guys of the right age and demeanor there.  Randy Morris is now in charge of Ammonites.  That gives us good experience there.  Keith Bacon is gone in about ten days.  He leaves October 4^th for the MTC and then to Toronto with Brent Bowden and Mike Jensen.

   Trevor Barrett will probably be our next President.  Either him or Curtis Nielson (believe it or not!).  The only other choices are Randy,

September 5, 1990

I trailed off last night to TV land and bed.  Anyway, I received your latest letter today and for some reason the world seems righter now than it did yesterday.  Thanks for writing.  It’s kind of like I enjoy getting letters from all of the guys around the world, but there is still this empty feeling until I get yours.  Silly, I guess, since we didn’t grow up together, or marry girlfriends, or serve in the Armed Forces, or go to school together…all we did was GUIDEWORK, GUIDEWORK, GUIDEWORK!

  Just talking to Don brings up so many emotions….

   You said before you left that if Lance didn’t write you it was understood that you were still grrrr8! buddies and eternal friends.  Well, if you had time to write and didn’t, then I accept your apology.  If you didn’t and didn’t, no big deal.

   I will redouble my efforts never to let the GUIDElines be a month late, ever again.  Word processing gets to me sometimes, but I am getting rested up and feel better now so I am going to try some new things for the September issue.  I’m over my root canal and cap, we got our 50 referrals and made it through August.  Mary Robertson has sent me the article she wrote and I think I will quote from it a little in the GLs this month!  I read it to the Saturday Night District, the first two pages at least, and they loved it.  Remember about Emily Good’s Set A Date?  And the Monsoon?  Well, Mary entitled her article, “FAITH TO MOVE MONSOONS!”  the kids are going to love it!

   Your sentence about Satan’s making you think you are less a missionary than you could be or hoped to be gave me a shiver.  I sensed recently that I needed to ask you what your plan was so that you might, in having to think it all the way through for me, be aware of your direction and the path you are on.  I, too, wish we had some time together…and I guess it is now.  I think I could be of more help to you now than I was.  In fact, you were the teacher then, and probably will always be, but I hope that I can be of some assistance.  For instance, I have been concerned for months that the Guides need to have some relief from constantly not getting their five cards.  They haven’t had a hundred percent ever, I don’t think.  After a session at the temple last Saturday, I not only discovered that the leaders need to be more companions to each other, as I said at the first of this letter, but that we needed to change the whole focus of the cards back to what it used to be.  We used to use the Commitment Pattern and follow up with a Mall Card.  For the past months we have used the cards alone to start the Commitment Pattern, and it has not worked.  The Guides would walk up to someone and ask if they had seen this place and hand them a card.  Well, they weren’t getting too far with the first sentence being, “Hi, I’m a Guide….”

   So, I am going to make a big deal about it, telling them that after prayer and discussion and having received inspiration from the Lord we are going to change the Standard of Performance in the Program.  This, in my estimation, is a major change and will have dramatic effects on the Guides and their success at learning to be missionaries.

   When you said you are learning things about companionships that will serve you for a lifetime I hope you have a way of remembering all you learn.  I suggested to some that they mark a square somewhere on each day of their Day Planner where they could jot down a word that would remind them of something they had learned that day.  Then when they were about to leave the MTC, if they could spend some time putting together a letter for me I could use it in teaching the Guides.  You see, I am feeling guilty that in the most active and exciting time of my life, the past 5 years, I have not kept a journal.  How sad.

   Your comment on being surrounded in the Program with those whose only desire was to please the Lord is a reflection of when you were in the Program.  We have plenty of examples of those who are struggling with this very thing in the Program now.  Of course, their level is much higher than the regular member, but there are still big struggles and opportunities right in the Program to learn some of the things you are learning on your mission.  You were fortunate to have been surrounded with many, many good friends and companions.  It is just not the same, now.