True to the Faith That Our Parents Have Cherished
Please learn and receive strength from the faith and testimonies of those who came before you.
While I was visiting the Nashville Tennessee Temple for a temple review, I was privileged to do a walk-through as part of this assignment, reviewing this beautiful house of the Lord. I was especially impressed with the painting of Mary Wanlass called Carry On hanging on the wall in the office of the matron.
This is the story behind the painting:
“In Missouri in 1862, the 14-year-old Mary Wanlass promised her dying stepmother that she would see to it that her disabled father [and her four much younger siblings would all make] it to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake. … Mary drove the oxen and milk cows that pulled the wagon, in which her father [was bedridden, and] she cared for her … siblings. After each day’s journey, she fed the family by foraging edible plants, flowers, and berries. Her only compass was the instruction she had received to keep traveling west ‘until the clouds become mountains.’
“They reached [the] Utah Valley in September, having traveled all spring and summer. Her father died not long after the family settled in Utah County, where Mary later married and raised her [own] family.”
This is an amazing story of the faith and strength of a 14-year-old young woman that can help each one of us today to “just carry on.”
“Just carry on”—or freely translated in my native Dutch language, Gewoon doorgaan—is also my mom and dad’s lifelong slogan.
My parents and in-laws are the pioneers in our family. They have crossed their own “plains,” just like all those who are coming into the Church, the Lord’s fold, every day. Their stories have little to do with oxen and wagons but have the same effect on future generations.
They embraced the gospel and were baptized in their young adult years. Both my parents had a difficult childhood. My father grew up on the island of Java in Indonesia. During World War II, he was forcefully separated from his family and interned in a concentration camp, where he suffered unspeakable hardships at a young age.
My mother was raised in a broken home and also suffered from hunger and the hardships of World War II. At times she even had to resort to eating tulip bulbs. Due to her father’s actions and his subsequent divorce from her mother, it was sometimes difficult for her to see Heavenly Father as a loving Father.
My parents met at a Church activity and shortly after decided to get married and sealed in the Bern Switzerland Temple. Waiting at the railway station, having spent the last of their little savings for the trip to the temple, they wondered how they would make ends meet but were confident that it would all work out. And it did!
They started to raise their family from a very humble single attic-room apartment in the heart of Amsterdam. After several years of washing their clothes by hand, they had finally saved up enough money to purchase a washing machine. Just before they would make the purchase, the bishop visited them, asking for a contribution to build the meetinghouse in Amsterdam. They decided to give all they had saved for the washing machine and continued to do the laundry by hand.
As a family we went through some hardships, just like any other family. These have only made us stronger and have deepened our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, just like when Alma was sharing his story with his son Helaman, where he told him that he had been “supported under trials and troubles of every kind” because he had put his trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
How did two people who experienced so many trials in their younger years become the very best parents I could ever wish for? The answer is simple: they fully embraced the gospel and live by their covenants to this very day!
After more than 65 years of marriage, my mother, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, passed away in February. My father, at the age of 92 and still living at home, visited her as often as he could until she passed away. Some time ago he mentioned to my younger siblings that the dreadful experiences in the camp in Indonesia during World War II had prepared him to patiently care for his wife for so many years as she fell ill and deteriorated from this horrible disease and also for the fateful day he had to entrust her primary care to others and could not be by her side anymore. Their motto has been and still is to “Just carry on,” having a perfect hope in Christ to be raised up at the last day and to dwell with Him in glory forever.
Their faith and testimonies are a driving strength for the generations that have come after them.
In the village where my wife grew up, her parents, who were good churchgoing people, embraced the gospel as a young married couple with my wife as their two-year-old daughter and only child at that time. Their decision to become members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints had a great impact on their lives as they were shunned by the villagers and by their family. It took many years, loving notes to family members, and service to the community before they were finally accepted.
On one occasion when my wife’s father was serving as a bishop, he was falsely accused of something and was immediately released. My mother-in-law was so hurt that she asked her husband if they should continue to go to church. He answered that they of course would continue to go to church since this is not the church of men, but this is the Church of Jesus Christ.
It took some time before the truth came to light and apologies were made. What could have been their breaking point just added to their strength and conviction.
Why is it that some of us take for granted the faith and testimonies of our parents who through all their hardships have remained faithful? Do we think that they do not have a clear understanding of things? They were not and are not deceived! They just have had too many experiences with the Spirit and can say with the Prophet Joseph, “I knew it, … and I could not deny it.”
Don’t you love the song about the army of Helaman, found in the Children’s Songbook?
Even when this might not be the case, as my mother experienced as a child, you can become one of those “goodly parents who love the Lord” and provide a righteous example to others.
Do we feel that this is absolutely true when we sing it? Do you feel that you are “as the army of Helaman” and that you “will be the Lord’s missionaries to bring the world his truth”? I have felt it on so many occasions while singing this song in several FSY settings and other youth gatherings.
Or what do we feel when we sing the hymn “True to the Faith”?
To those of the rising generation wherever you are and in whatever situation you may find yourself, please learn and receive strength from the faith and testimonies of those who came before you. It will help you understand that in order to gain or grow a testimony, sacrifices will have to be made and that “sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven.”
Thinking about a sacrifice that will truly bless your life, please consider and pray about the invitation of our beloved prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, when he asked “every worthy, able young man to prepare for and serve a mission. For Latter-day Saint young men, missionary service is a priesthood responsibility. …
“For … young and able sisters, a mission is also a powerful, but optional, opportunity.”
You could be called as a service or a teaching missionary. Both types of missionaries contribute to the same goal of bringing souls to Christ, each in their own unique and powerful way.
In both types of service, you will show the Lord you love Him and that you want to get to know Him better. Remember, “for how knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?”
All of us, whether we are the first generation in the gospel or the fifth, should ask ourselves, What stories of faith, strength, and celestial commitment will I pass on to the next generation?
Let us all continue in our efforts to get to know our Savior, Jesus Christ, better and to make Him the center of our lives. He is the rock upon which we must build so that when times become difficult, we will be able to stand firm.
Let us be “true to the faith that our parents have cherished, true to truth for which martyrs have perished, to God’s command, soul, heart, and hand, faithful and true we will ever stand.” In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.