December 11, 2011

I have been jumping with excitement all year long because I could not wait to share my vision of Christmas. You see many will not have a merry Christmas.  This past week I had the wonderful opportunity to see and visit with one of my “sons”, Charles (CC) Chuck Lewis. He is going through some of the same kinds of torture most of us put ourselves through and so I dedicate this story to him, his wife Stacia, and his incredible son, Jessie. May the spirit of God rest with each of us as we build our own knowledge and wisdom, our family, and our eternal peace.

• Many will not have their temporal needs and wants met.
• Many will be without friends and family.
• But most importantly, many will be without the spiritual strength of testimony and a sure knowledge of God.

The important thing about this story is that the Genesis of all three elements for our family was in the tiny towns of Concho and St. Johns. This time must have been a true trial of fire for mother and dad, but one which really launched our family. My family moved to St. Johns, from Concho, Arizona for a few weeks. Dad had worked all year long in getting us ready to move to the big city. We were dirt poor and had traded our white house on the mighty main street of Concho for a house on Sixth Avenue in Mesa and were waiting for the opportunity to move there. The apartment we move to was right on main street, across from the big white, LDS Church. I get confused as to dates and times, but I believe I was ten years old at the time.

St. Johns was the first town I had lived in that was bigger than a button. It had stores, an LDS Church building, and multiple schools. We had little to no money and I honestly have no idea how we survived. Dad went to classes sponsored by the Veteran’s administration, to as mother put it, receive VA benefits. An interesting sidelight was that down the road in life, I met Dallas Butler, dad’s teacher. He was the Dean of Students at Eastern Arizona College when I met him, a good friend, and one who dearly loved life and those around him.

First, it was there that I began to see my dad making progress in his vocations. He was first and foremost a rancher, but mother had strong feelings that we needed to move to the big city where “the children” would have more opportunities for growth. He learned to use his Navy training in the CC’s as a carpenter and get work, and to use his excellent mind and mathematical skills to go into sales in insurance and real estate, apartments in Scottsdale, and ultimately ranches in Cordes Junction, La Junta, Colorado, and Mangas, New Mexico, all while raising his family in the big city.

Second, we had to remain strong as a family unit. This included doing things together and sacrificing many things that we “wanted.”  Auntie Marian lived about 30 miles from St. Johns in Springerville, and we found them to be very well rooted in serious material sacrifice. Uncle Chris had an unknown illness that rendered him almost entirely unable to work, so Auntie Marian was the primary bread winner. Though their home was small, it was absolutely immaculate and filled with love. I can still remember the piano in the living room, the wood stove with its hot water (what is the word, Glenn) thingie, the refrig that I believe was an ammonium  model with the funny circular cooling unit on top. Okay, so no money, no source of creating big mansions, no fancy cars, but hearts as big as all outdoors, a love for family that transcended all, and a reverence and knowledge of God, so big that, when Auntie Marian died, my brother said, she didn’t need to get to know God, she already knew him. Best tribute I have ever heard.

Besides our primary, and extended family, a trillion, or so, of the three or four hundred residents came out of the word work to help us, to love us, and to help us progress to the next stage temporally and spiritually.

Third, we began to understand what it meant to participate in Church activities, to learn of God, to understand the atonement, the sacrament, and the very sacrifice of our Savior. Jesus Christ. Mother had an absolute knowledge of God and dad had some notion that there was more to life than what his first 33 years had shown. The blessing of testimony has taken my entire life to mature, but it all started there. I had very difficult time understanding, or recognizing the Savior in my life, but over the years, I have seen his mighty hand through the Spirit of the Holy Ghost and understand how the tiny seeds planted in my soul all those years ago by caring, loving individuals move me along the path of life and help me share solemn testimony of the goodness and reality of God the Father, his Son Jesus Christ and of the Holy Ghost.

God bless each of you as you work through your personal trials

Duane Jacobs, Grandpa, popsa, uncle, dad, brother, cousin, friend and child of our Heavenly Father