Scott's Spiritual Experience in Junín

I'm not sure why this special, sacred experience happened to me in Junín, a remote, wind-blown town in the high altiplano of the central Andes. This shows the LDS chapel fence on the right on a typical Junín street:

Maybe because of the inspiration I felt when such wonderful children showed up to Beverly's music lessons, four of whom are shown here:

Or maybe because of the six people who attended my Book of Mormon class, among whom were the branch president and his family; a recently returned sister missionary; and a young man who is just submitting his papers for his mission. This picture shows Beverly and me with the returned sister missionary:

Or maybe because I needed this experience as a further personal witness of the Book of Mormon, as promised in my patriarchal blessing.

Regardless of why it happened in Junín, it was a special experience:

As I was reviewing the notes I had prepared for the Book of Mormon class and meditating on the scriptures in a freezing cold classroom in the Junín chapel, I felt a warm sensation in my chest—a true burning of the bosom—which I recognized as a witness of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon.

And then, when the class began, the eyes of my understanding were opened, and I was able to perceive the meaning of the scriptures with more clarity than perhaps at any time in my life. I mentioned to the students that the Book of Mormon was a book of covenants—nothing new there—and then I drew a diagram of one of the major themes of the Book of Mormon—the deliverance pattern, which includes captivity, deliverance, exodus, and the Promised Land—and I drew an arrow between the word exodus and the phrase Promised Land. I asked the students, "How do we have a successful exodus through the wilderness (our life on earth) to the Promised Land (our celestial reward)?" And the answer (which seems obvious in retrospect) is: we make and keep covenants. And why? Because through covenant keeping, we gain the guidance of the Holy Ghost.

The Liahona was a covenant by which the Lehites were guided through the fertile lands (blessed states of righteousness) during their exodus through the wilderness, just as we are guided through our mortal sojourn by keeping covenants and thereby receiving the Spirit. This process of exodus to the Promised Land was repeated three times—among the Lehites, the Jaredites, and the Mulekites—to fulfill the law of witnesses—so that we would understand that these three stories are our stories; they are stories of our exodus on earth.

We then re-read 1 Nephi 1:1 from the perspective of the deliverance pattern and saw for the first time that this verse is a mini-summary of the entire Book of Mormon. When Nephi says he was born of goodly parents, he refers not only to Lehi and Sariah but also to his lineage in the House of Israel. When he says that he learned the knowledge of his father, he was referring to his knowledge of the covenant between Jehovah and Abraham, which was passed down to his day, and which is renewed in our day through the Book of Mormon to the remnant of the House of Israel. When he said he endured much affliction, he was referring to his exodus in the wilderness (our sojourn on earth). When he says he was highly favored of the Lord, he is saying that he kept the covenant and received the Spirit. That’s how we become favored of the Lord.

We then read 1 Nephi 2:2-4, about Lehi’s call into the wilderness and likened his leaving all his riches to our leaving the riches of being in the presence of God to come to earth. The veil of forgetfulness causes us to come to earth with nothing, even as Lehi went into the wilderness with nothing.

In these early verses in the Book of Mormon, we are given an overview of the theme of the entire book: We succeed in our travel to the Promised Land (celestial glory) through making and keeping covenants.

I'm sure most of you reading this post knew all these things, but for me it was a personal revelation, given while teaching a Book of Mormon class to the descendants of Lehi, the remnants of the House of Israel, in a remote town in the high Andes.

Carnival in Tarma

One night, just as we arrived home, a parade of people came down our street. Here at the right are some men dressed up as women:


Scott pulled out his camera and began taking pictures. The costumed people were thrilled to have someone take their pictures:


Even the adults wanted their pictures taken:


Proud parents also encouraged their kids to have their pictures taken:


Two days later, we ran into some more merrymakers along the main street of downtown Tarma. The band was playing loudly and the costumed people were dancing enthusiastically:


Crowds gathered to watch the revelers and to join in the fun:


All of this is part of the month-long celebration of carnival ("carnavales," as it is called here). Carnival occurs each year just before Lent, the 40 days of fasting prior to Easter. The most famous carnival celebrations are in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and Mardi Gras in New Orleans.

In Tarma, neighborhoods join together, dress up, hire a band, and walk from their neighborhood to downtown Tarma, where the music, dancing, fireworks, and (of course, drinking), goes on until late at night.

Another Tarma tradition during carnival is the process of choosing a "mayordomo" (steward). The steward organizes a group, hires a band, holds a parade through the streets of Tarma, and serves a big feast. The following are pictures of a stewardship group walking up our street.


As they got closer, we saw the "mayordomo" (steward) holding the group's banner and dancing with his partner. The women were dressed in traditional costumes with native hats:


As the group paraded up the street, they occasionally twirled around as part of their traditional dance:


This couple strutted and danced to the music as they walked along. The woman wore the customary expression of being in a trance:


However, this woman couldn't resist a smile as she knew Scott was taking her picture:



Here you can see the dancers, followed by the band:

After the parade passed our house, some men on horses joined the group. Their horses pranced and bucked at the head of the procession.

The parade literally stopped traffic on our street, as you can see from the parked mototaxis (the three-wheeled vehicles that we ride in everywhere we go within the city.)

Life in Tarma is never dull.

Visiting a Man I Baptized 43 Years Ago

Words can't describe the joy I felt today as Beverly and I visited Blas Alvarez, a man I baptized 43 years ago. We took a taxi to San Martín de Porras (a suburb of Lima). I was one of the first missionaries in that area. This picture taken in 1965, shows me with Blas (on the left) and his family.


Through miracles that I won't describe here, this family accepted the gospel, and I had the great blessing of baptizing them. Sister Felícita Alvarez (in the middle of the picture), was one of the greatest missionaries in the history of the church (I do not exaggerate; please read Alma 26:1, 4, 11-12, 22). She was instrumental in directly bringing more than 1,000 people into the Church and indirectly in bringing in untold others.

Sister Alvarez died of cancer in 1981, but Blas, age 82, still lives in the very house where my companion and I taught him the gospel, and he is still active in the church today. Amazingly he remembered my name and that of my companion (Elder Vance Dunn). Here's how he and I look today, January 2, 2008.


To my astonishment, when Brother Alvarez showed us his photo album, we found this page---containing a picture of Beverly and me (ages 24) and our year-old son Stephen, and a picture of me when I was 8 years old that I had sent to Brother and Sister Alvarez! Also in the album there was a picture of me as a missionary, along with dozens of other missionaries with whom Brother and Sister Alvarez worked between 1965 and 1981.


After a long and wonderful afternoon of conversation, Brother Alvarez bid us farewell. We are going back on Sunday to meet his son Blas, Jr.

Our Trip to the Lima Peru Temple

Today we went to the Lima Temple because Scott had to interview and sign the recommend for a couple from Tarma who were being married. While we were there, we performed the sealing ordinance for some of Beverly's ancestors: 29 women, 46 men, and 11 couples.

It was an amazing experience to hear the ceremony in Spanish (the Peruvians actually did a good job of pronouncing these English names) and to be assisted by several wonderful Peruvian ordinance workers. When we finished the names for her family, Beverly was proxy for a daughter who was sealed to her Quechua parents, with the last name of Yapanqui. (The Quechua are the native Peruvian Indians. One of the most famous Inca leaders was named Tupac Yapanqui.)

Here are some pictures of the beautiful Lima Temple and grounds.

The Lima Peru Temple, dedicated January 10, 1986. Here is Scott's picture taken December 5, 2008:


The reoccurring architectural motif of arches, and arches within arches:


Scott by the temple.



The beautiful arches and flowers of the temple:


Here are a few of the 86 people for whom we did work today. Their ordinances have been done in Germany, Nauvoo, Arizona, Utah, and now Peru. They are from England, Ireland, Scotland, New Zealand, and the US and are from both Beverly's father's family (Byington) and her mother's family (Hood, Winmill).


After the session, the sealer said, "I'm going to write these numbers down so the Lord will know how much work we did today."

I Guess We're Going to Peru After All!

We haven't received official word, but we think we're going to Peru after all. [Note added September 18, 2008: We have received official word because I called the missionary department.]

One of the Biggest Disappointments of My Life
When our mission was postponed due to my heart problems, we were not given much hope of being able to serve our mission in a foreign country, especially not in Peru, where the medical facilities and expertise aren't the greatest in the world. My cardiologist told me "Yes, you'll be able to go on a mission after your operation, but not to Peru."

I was deeply disappointed. I realized that I must have lived a charmed life, because not being able to serve a mission in Peru was one of my top two or three disappointments in my entire life. At times my wife and I decided that we definitely weren't going to Peru on our mission and we started making arrangements for a U.S. mission.

Operation to Cure My Atrial Fibrillation
I had a four-hour catheter ablation on July 10, 2008. It turned out to be a mini-miracle. My heart has been beating almost flawlessly since then. I am up to running five miles, three days a week, and my heart is doing great. I even went on two runs with a heart-rate monitor attached to me, and the resulting ECG showed that my heart was working perfectly (well, nearly perfectly).

I felt so good after the operation that I started praying fervently that we would be able to serve our mission in Peru. I prayed that I would get approval from my cardiologist and from the church to go foreign.

Temple Experience
My wife and I went to the temple just before meeting with my cardiologist seven weeks after my operation. In the temple my wife received the impression that if I asked my doctor, he would write a letter supporting our desire to go to Peru. That's what I did. I met with my cardiologist on September 2, and he agreed to write a letter giving me permission to serve my mission in Peru!

Meeting with Stake President
We met with our stake president on September 9, 2008, gave him the letter from my cardiologist, gave him a letter from me explaining why I felt we could go to Peru, and then he wrote a letter and hand carried everything to the missionary department on September 10.

Approval from Salt Lake
Two days later, September 12, 2008, the stake president called and said that we enter the MTC on October 13, 2008. I asked, "And are we going to Peru?" He said, "I assume so." He said the missionary department will send out an official letter. [Well, he was mistaken. The Missionary Department told me that they do not send out new letters for a simple change in MTC date.]

Word from the Peru Lima East Mission
In the mean time, I got an email from Doug Earl, who is a missionary with the Perpetual Education Fund in Lima. His email said that he had received word from the secretary of the mission that we were coming and that we would be serving a leadership mission. That was all news to us. [Actually, the official description of our call is Member and Leadership Support.]

So we now eagerly await the official letter from the missionary department.

My South American Chemistry Students

In my 30 years of teaching chemistry, I have never had one student who wanted me to explain course material in Spanish--except this summer term. Three students in my current biochemistry class are from my former mission area, Peru and Ecuador. They feel more comfortable conversing in Spanish, and one of them frequently comes to my office for Spanish explanations of what we've covered in class.

In fact, I just barely finished a 1½-hour biochemistry lecture/help session in Spanish with two of these Spanish-speaking students, Bertha and Lorena, both from Ecuador. We covered protein structure, calculation of net charge on peptides, determination of isoelectric point, interactions between biomolecules, and other subjects that will appear on the next exam. I think I learned as much Spanish as they did biochemistry.

I know these sessions are absolutely wonderful opportunities for me to push myself in Spanish and to become more comfortable in speaking Spanish in a wide variety of different situations.

What a great blessing I've received this school term as I prepare for my mission in Peru!

Our Pre-Mission Spanish Training at the MTC

We met yesterday (April 10, 2008) with the woman (Maria Johnson from the Dominican Republic) in charge of language training for couple missionaries at the Provo Missionary Training Center. Wow! Was I impressed. Here's the story:

1. The MTC has wonderful materials to help train couples before they enter the MTC for their missions: books, handouts, CDs (for listening to native Spanish speakers), and computer tutorials.
2. The MTC also has a one-on-one tutor program. My wife's tutor is Katie and mine is Rodrigo, neither of whom we have met yet. For couples who can't go to the MTC for face-to-face tutoring, the MTC has a telephone tutoring program.
3. Before we met with Maria, I assumed that only my wife, who doesn't speak Spanish, would take the classes with a tutor but that I wouldn't, because I speak Spanish already. Not so. I too get a tutor, who will help me review vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation, but will also tutor me in Spanish conversation and gospel lessons.
4. We will meet with our tutors for one hour per week, stay another hour (usually) to do computer tutorials, and have homework of about two hours per day. I figure that by the time we are done, we will have had the equivalent of a 2-semester-hour college course in Spanish conversation.

I'm really excited about all this and am eager to improve my Spanish.

By the way, while we were at the MTC, we went to the travel office to get our visa pictures taken. At the MTC travel office, we had a great chat with a woman named Sharon, who was supervisor of our daughter Melissa when Melissa worked at the MTC while attending BYU. Sharon raved on and on about how competent and hard working Melissa was. In fact, after Melissa had worked there for a while, Sharon assigned Melissa to train all the new employees. It warmed our heart to hear someone else say wonderful things about our wonderful daughter.

My Feelings about Going Back to Peru on a Mission

Here are my feelings:

• The words I would use to describe my feelings include: thrilled, ecstatic, joyous, and thankful.
• My wife has some deep concerns, of course, including: our living conditions there, Peruvian food, our health, and her (current) inability to speak Spanish.
• I asked my wife to forgive me for being giddy about our call to Peru. I do empathize with her reservations about serving in Peru, but I can't contain my own enthusiasm.
• I feel that my emphasis on studying and using Spanish over the past 10 years will pay huge dividends. I feel totally fluent in preaching the gospel and in most common activities. (I'm not so fluent in everyday Spanish conversation, because of a limited vocabulary.) Visits to Peru, Argentina, and Mexico (6 times) over the past decade have really helped, along with my study of grammar and vocabulary.
• I feel that my service over the past five months as a temple ordinance worker (Timpanogos Utah Temple) has really helped me prepare, by increasing my testimony, improving my ability to memorize things, encouraging me to practice the piano (I am the accompanist in the men's prayer meeting), and putting me in the spirit of spiritual service.
• I have a deep desire within my soul to bear testimony, through the Spirit and with priesthood authority, of the divinity of our Savior.

Other Observations about the Peru Lima East Mission

Here are some more observations about the Peru Lima East Mission:

• The area of our mission covers approximately the same area over which I was a zone leader back in 1965 while a young missionary serving in the Andes Mission.
• When I arrived in Peru in May 1964, missionaries were in none of the cities (except for Lima) currently inside the boundaries of the Peru Lima East Mission.
• After I had been in Peru for a while, one of the first mountain town to be opened to missionary work was Huancayo (altitude 10,600 ft), in the Region called Junín. When I was zone leader over Huancayo, it had no branch of the church, but just 6 missionaries. In September of 1965, the first branch of the church was organized there. Now (2008) there are 15 wards and two stakes there.
• The Peru Lima East Mission includes the following stakes: Cerro de Pasco, Huánuco (2 stakes), Huancayo (2 stakes), Lima Bayóvar, Lima La Molina, Lima Las Flores, Lima Rimac, Lima Campoy, Lima Vitarte, Lima Chosica, Lima Canto Grande. That's 8 stakes in Lima and five stakes in the provinces--in regions outside of Lima. The mission also includes two member districts--Tarma and Huancavelica.
• Cerro de Pasco is the highest city in the world, at an altitude of 14,200 feet above sea level, and hence it is the highest stake of Zion in the church. I've been through Cerro de Pasco six times in my travels between Lima and Huancayo.

About the Peru Lima East Mission

The Peru Lima East Mission:

• Is about 50,000 square miles in size. That is about the same size as Alabama or Louisiana. Utah is 85,000 square miles in size. The map of the mission is shown below.
• Has 15 stakes: 10 in Lima, 2 in Huanuco (which had one little branch when I left Peru 42 years ago), 2 in Huancayo (over which I was zone leader before it even had a branch), and 1 in Cerro de Pasco.
  
• Includes the Cerro de Pasco Stake, which is the highest Stake of Zion in the world, at 14,200 feet above sea level! I didn't specifically read that it was the highest stake, but I did read that Cerro de Pasco is the highest city in the world. I couldn't confirm the latter. Some online sites say that Potosi, Bolivia, is the highest city, but Cerro de Pasco is 1000 feet higher than Potosi. (BTW, there is a Bolivia Potosi Stake, which a friend of mine says has its headquarters upon on a high plateau over 1000 feet above the city center, making Potosi the highest stake in the world. Whatever.)


• Covers an area of Peru in which the rate of poverty is about 60%. I'm not sure what constitutes poverty in Peru, but I'm guessing it's lower than the poverty level in the US. And I can't even guess what the rate of poverty is among members of the church there, but I'm guessing that among active members of the church, the poverty rate is low. (I'm not saying this as a positive thing. I'm guessing that poverty-striken members don't stay active.)


• Includes all eight natural regions of Peru. the major ones of which are the coast (including Lima), la sierra (the high Andes mountainous area), the high jungle, and the low junge or rain forrest of the Amazon basin.


• Includes (on its border) the mountain Yerupajá (locally called El Carnicero, which means butcher, and refers to the sharp-edged knife shape of the mountain), which is the second-highest point in Peru, at 21,758 feet above sea level. (The highest point in Peru is El Huascarán, at 22,204 feet, but it is not in our mission.)


• Got a new mission president in July 2008. Surf around this blog for information on Pres. and Sister Leyva.

Map of Peru, with the area of the Peru Lima East Mission marked in red. Each area on the map is a Region (analogous to a state) of Peru, of which there are 25 regions. Our mission includes the regions of Huánuco, Pasco, Junín, and Huancavelica, as well as a piece of the Lima region and the city of Lima.

Timeline for Getting our Mission Call

Here's a timeline of key events in our mission:

• 1967. In the year that we were married, my wife and I decided we wanted to serve a mission together. That desire has never wavered in the 41 intervening years.
• December 2000-January 2001. My wife and I, and two of our daughters, served a humanitarian expedition to Peru. I considered this part of the preparation for our upcoming mission to Peru.
• February 1, 2008. I'm not sure about this date, but some time around here, we started filling out the LDS church's online recommendation forms, with information about almost every aspect of our lives--past church service, education, special skills (music, computers, etc.), language abilities, and medical history.
• February 15, 2008. We started to get our physical and dental checkups. We needed some shots, and we both needed dental work.
• March 7, 2008. We finished all our medical and dental checkups.
• March 9, 2008. We held our final interview with our bishop in the morning and with our stake president in the afternoon. They both completed their part of the recommendation, and turned over the recommendation process to the assistant stake clerk. We received notice, however, that our physician had left off a couple of items that I needed to obtain from him.
• March 10, 2008. In the morning, I got the needed information from our physician, sent them to our ward clerk, and he submitted the final recommendation.
• Monday, March 10, 2008, 4:00. Our papers were officially submitted, and we received the official notice of "Recommendation Papers Received."
• Thursday, March 13, 2008. We got the official notice that our recommendation had been upgraded to "Ready for Assignment." I was surprised that things went that fast, because my medical profile wasn't the best, because of my history with atherosclerosis of the coronary arteries and atrial fibrillation. But because I recently had extensive tests that showed my heart was in good shape, and because I had recently run a half marathon, I guess the medical staff at church headquarters didn't have any issues with my medical condition.
• Friday, March 28, 2008. We got the official notice that our recommendation has been upgraded to "Call letter sent," which means we'd get on official call in the mail the next Wednesday.
• Wednesday, April 2, 2008. We received our mission call letter. We had been to our weekly service as ordinance workers at the Timpanogos Temple, and stopped by on our way to work at BYU to see if the mail had come. As we pulled into our cul-de-sac, our postwoman was pulling out. We stopped her and asked if our call had come. She said yes, that she had knocked on our door to hand deliver it, but we weren't at home. We didn't open the letter at that point, but waited until our kids who live in Utah could be there with us to open the letter. We got the kids who don't live in Utah on the phone, and opened our letter at 6:30 pm Utah time. I was thrilled by the call: Peru Lima East Mission. My wife wasn't quite so thrilled because she doesn't speak Spanish, but she knows that the call comes from God.

So from the time from when we started the online recommendation form and began our physical and dental checkups to the time that we got our call in the mail was only six weeks.

Why We Decided To Serve A Mission

Ever since returning from a mission in my youth (1964-1966 in Peru), I've dreamed of returning to Latin America to serve another mission there with my wife. At the same time, even before my wife married me, she had a goal to serve a mission. Her patriarchal blessing (a special recorded, personal priesthood blessing) spoke of her serving as a missionary abroad. She had planned to go on a mission in her youth, but I convinced her to marry me instead. (She has since forgiven me, I hope.) So the question of whether or not my wife and I would go on a mission was never considered. The only question was when. About a year ago, as I was having some heart problems, we decided that now was the time to retire and go on a mission. We notified our respective department chairs and the administration at Brigham Young University, where we were both professors, that we were going to retire early--I at age 63½ and she at age 63--on July 1, 2008. We talked a lot about the kind of mission that we wanted to serve, and we soon narrowed our choices to a temple mission (where we would be full-time temple workers) or a proselyting mission (where we would preach and teach the gospel). We finally decided to request to serve a Spanish-speaking proselyting mission. My wife was apprehensive of this type of mission, because she doesn't yet speak Spanish, but she supported me in this request. After making that decision, we just needed to get the ball rolling to start the missionary recommendation process. I'll talk about that process in the next post on this blog.

Why I Started This Blog

As a senior couple missionary (starting July 2008), I want to share my experiences and feelings about my mission. My audience includes family, friends, fellow members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), those thinking about serving an LDS mission in their youth or in their senior years, and all people interested in learning more about the Mormon Church and its missionary program. My wife and I will become missionaries on Monday, July 14, 2008, as we enter the Missionary Training Center (MTC) in Provo, Utah. After a time in Provo, learning more about missionary work, we will serve as full-time missionaries in the Peru Lima East Mission. The headquarters of the mission is in Lima, but most of the mission is in the high Andes of central Peru. This is an area where I served as a young missionary 42 years ago, 1964 to 1966, in what was then called the Andes Mission. Am I excited about returning to Peru? More than you can imagine. I hope over the course of developing this blog, you will feel that enthusiasm and understand why I am overjoyed to return to Peru to share the gospel.