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Missionary moments: 'You were that man!'

I am a teacher at the Ogden LDS Institute of Religion and have been here since 1967 when I was transferred from Southern California. Recently, I received a telephone call during which the caller said: "My name is Steven Stone. Are you the Johansen who had a baby girl born on March 19, 1967, in the Westminster Hospital in California?"

I said, "No, we did not have a baby girl born on that date, but we did have a baby boy born that day in that hospital."Then he said, "Do you remember talking to me about the LDS Church in the father's waiting room while our wives were in the delivery room at the same time?"

I replied: "I do indeed remember that conversation. I was a seventy in the Garden Grove Ward in California, and it was the era of the golden question.' I tried it on you while we were both alone in the father's waiting room.What do you know about the Mormon Church? Would you like to know more?' You showed an interest, and I got your name and address for the missionaries and was so excited that when I was invited in to hold my wife's hand during the last stages of my wife's labor pains, that's all I could talk about!

"You were that man - and must have joined the Church!" I said excitedly.

"Yes, I did - and also my wife and our four children," he said. "We had the missionaries come shortly after my wife came home from the hospital, and we were baptized that same year in 1967. I have been looking for you all these years to thank you for sharing the gospel. I only knew your last name was Johansen and have been checking on all the Johansens I heard about. Your name was on a brochure sent out by the institute to our college-age daughter."

There was a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes as I said, "I remember that incident, but I never did remember your name."

He added, "That's because I didn't change your life - but you did mine!"

You often wonder what happened to the people with whom you try to share the gospel in your conversations. After 27 years, I found out!

Today, Brother Stone is a member of the Country Creek Ward, Layton Utah Holmes Creek Stake. - Jerald R. Johansen, Ogden, Utah

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