Holy Ground

August 5, 2012

Mission Letter

This week one of our young missionaries didn’t wake up in the morning.  Elder Jesse Kingston passed away sometime in the middle of the night.  His older brother, Charlie, was also serving here in our mission.  Charlie was devastated, as you can imagine.  Their family lives in Layton, not too far for them to come be with Charlie in a short time.  In the meantime, our young missionary coordinators, Elder and Sister Brandon, and our mission president and his wife, President and Sister Peterson, were with him and with Jesse’s companion, Elder Hurd.  Our young elders are shaken, as you can imagine.  It was particularly unexpected for everyone in the mission to lose one so young.

This all happened Friday, the 5^th of August, on my son-in-law’s birthday.  I was leaving after work to spend the weekend with the Hardins so I have not heard the final plans, but on Friday there was a discussion about a possible meeting Sunday night for all the young elders to comfort them and strengthen them and answer their questions.  They were also considering allowing the young missionaries to attend Jesse’s funeral.  The Salt Lake Temple has been closed for maintenance and the missionaries have been traveling in mission vans to various other temples while it is closed.  They will employ the same system to get all the young men that want to be there to the funeral.  I think it will be a large number (we have about 70).  It was very touching all day Friday to see the young elders embrace and sometimes shed tears when they met.  They are a close group, kind of like a small branch where everyone knows everyone.

I have not worried about Elder Jesse Kinston.  As his mother said when she arrived, what better place for him to be when he was called home to his Heavenly Father than here serving his mission?  He was happy here and enjoying success in serving. We know he is in a wonderful place, excited about all he is seeing and learning.  It is his brother and the rest of his family I feel so much empathy for.  There is no way to lose someone you love without pain.  However, I know they will draw strength and comfort from their belief that he lives on, that he is happy, and that they will be with him again someday, never to be parted from him again. And nothing comforts like the Comforter.  This I know.

Charlie was finishing his mission in August anyway and going to be released at the end of the month.  He and President Peterson talked it over and decided he would leave with his mother and help her with the funeral.  I spoke to a man from their ward (on the phone) who said they had another brother on a mission out of the country.  They were trying to work out how to reach him and let him know about Jesse. 

As sad as all of this has been, I have felt once again that I walk on holy ground here.  There is so much brotherly love and kindness between the young missionaries and between their leaders and them.  The gospel of Jesus Christ makes good men and women better.  It is evidence to me that the gospel is good and therefore true.