Over forty years ago, while living in Paris with my parents and brother for just one brief year, my entire world changed forever. One day we answered a knock on the door to welcome in two missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – Elder Guynn and Elder Snook. I was fourteen years old and searching for greater meaning in my spiritual journey. Through their instrumentality, and by personal prayer and scripture study, I gained for myself a witness of the truthfulness of the message of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. My father was not keen on this, though, and eventually asked for the missionaries to not return to our home. I was not able to be baptized and join the church, nor to keep in touch with the missionaries, but I was able to became pen pals to their girlfriends back home, and received great spiritual uplift from them.
Wayne and Linda Snook and Sister Coffey,
standing in front of a Chinese New Year kumquat tree
A year later, after we had moved to Boise, Idaho, and through the tender mercies of the Lord, my father changed his mind and allowed for me to be baptized into the Church. The day I received his letter saying ,”…bless you honey, and go..” my heart was filled with extreme joy and I quickly reached out to Elder Snook, who by this time had completed his mission and was living back in his home in Canada. I wondered if there was any possibility he could make the long trip to Boise to baptize me. It turned out that he was headed to Provo, Utah to go to school, and made plans to make the trip from Provo to Boise to baptize me.
So on August 31, 1975, I was baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by Wayne Snook, my “missionary” from France.
It has been nearly 40 years since that day. This week he and his wife Linda, the girlfriend who strengthened me so much through her letters, arrived here in Hong Kong to visit us and another missionary couple with whom they are friends, the Salmons.
Who would have known that over forty years later, the young woman that Elder Snook briefly taught in Paris, France, would now be serving on a mission in Hong Kong and would welcome him and his wife to our home? How grateful I am for a young man who left his family for 2 years so that I could enjoy mine for eternity. Who can know the extent of the blessings of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that will continue to grow in our lives, because of the sacrifice of Elder Snook and his companion to serve a mission so many years ago?
One of my favorite sayings – “You can count the number of seeds in an apple, but you can’t count the number of apples in a seed.”
Thank you, Wayne and Linda Snook, for the great blessings you have brought to our family!
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Over forty years ago, while living in Paris with my parents and brother for just one brief year, my entire world changed forever. One day we answered a knock on the door to welcome in two missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – Elder Guynn and Elder Snook. I was fourteen years old and searching for greater meaning in my spiritual journey. Through their instrumentality, and by personal prayer and scripture study, I gained for myself a witness of the truthfulness of the message of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. My father was not keen on this, though, and eventually asked for the missionaries to not return to our home. I was not able to be baptized and join the church, nor to keep in touch with the missionaries, but I was able to became pen pals to their girlfriends back home, and received great spiritual uplift from them. standing in front of a Chinese New Year kumquat tree
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