Reminiscing During FHE

Today was a snowy, windy day--a good day to stay inside. Since it's Monday, Richard had the day off, so we didn't even need to go outside for anything. Steven went to work, but Rich and I just stayed here. I didn't even take the car out of the garage.

Tonight for FHE, I gave the lesson and we reminisced about Pres. Hinckley. I read from Vol. 2 of Pres. Hinckley's discourses about his first trip to Thailand in 1966 when he and Elder Marion D. Hanks met with the minister of education who had responsibility for religious work in Thailand. Pres. Hinckley said the minister was unfriendly to them and told them they didn't need our church there. It was during that trip that Pres. Hinckley offered a dedicatory prayer on the work in the nation of Thailand. They made applications for visas and the missionaries were granted visas for three months. The understanding was that the missionaries would have to leave the country every three months and have their visas renewed. It was an "expensive and costly and difficult and discouraging practice that interfered greatly with the work." This continued over the years. And then there was the unfortunate incident where a missionary climbed on a buddha, which caused big problems for the Church and brought about further restrictions on the work. Then Pres. Hinckley told how the current governor of Bangkok (in 2000 when he gave this talk), had become a friend of the Church. When he was a young man, the governor was causing his father great concern with his long hair and dabbling in drugs. His father asked one of his Rotary International friends, Elder Richard L. Evans, if there was a school in America where he could send his son that would be a good environment for him. Elder Evans told him to "try BYU." So that's where his son went and got his masters and doctorate in microbiology. He ended up marrying a friend of his from Thailand who had also come to attend BYU. They stayed for seven years and their first daughter was born while they were at BYU. When he went back to Thailand he got into politics and was elected governor of Bangkok. His father was the prime minister. They were both very influential men. "Between the two they were able to secure, through their government, authorization under which we are allowed 150 missionaries who don't have to renew their visas every three months. They can go forward with their work." Pres. Hinckley went on to say, "Now, to me, that is an absolute miracle. That is the unseen consequenc of that which was begun in 1966 and has come to pass in a miraculous way."

As a family we like that story because we had the opportunity to become acquainted with the governor and his wife and two daughters when he was awarded the College of Biology and Agriculture's Distinguished Alumni Award a few years ago. At the time Steven first started contacting him, Lindy was on her mission in Thailand. The governor was very interested to know that she was there and tried to set up a lunch appointment with her, but she had been transferred out of Bangkok, so she was unable to have lunch with him. Since that time, however, we have had the privilege of hosting his wife and daughters at BYU (he was unable to come); and then later, Steven and I had lunch with him and his wife in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building along with Pres. Packer. He and his wife also invited us to have dinner with them at the Thai Restaurant in Provo. It was a fun and interesting time for us and for Lindy after she had returned home from her mission. We're grateful she had the opportunity to serve in Thailand and for Pres. Hinckley's involvement in getting missionary work started there. Our becoming acquainted with the governor and his family was an added bonus for us. It was fun during FHE to remember the experiences we had with the governor of Bangkok and to read about him in Pres. Hinckley's book.