Dear Gramps,

I have been married now for almost 36 years to a non-member. My children were all raised in the Gospel, but when my two sons reached the ages of 12 & 13 they decided that they weren’t going to go to church anymore. I found out years later that they would go over to a friend’s house and have beer. When they told their dad, he suggested they not be hypocrites. If they were going to stay active in church, then they shouldn’t drink beer. And I was never told this until just recently and it was one of my sons who told me. My husband has never smoked in the house, nor drank, but takes to his work shop to do such, but would never admit to doing it in front of the boys, but they knew and saw and were to keep it from me.

He gave his permission for me to receive my own endowment in 1996, which I did in the Toronto, Ontario Temple. We socialize with members and family in the Gospel, but have outside social contacts as well. He attended Church with us each week we were married until our first son turned 8 and was to be baptized and the Bishop, at the time did not go about it in the correct manner, as he did not include my husband in on things as was done with another Bishop at the time our daughter was baptized 3 1/2 years previous. That left bad feelings with him, even though this Bishop wasn’t Bishop for very long. The following year our youngest son was baptized and it was better organized and his approval was met and he went to both sons baptisms, but doesn’t attend Sacrament meetings or any other since. He is very hung-up on hypocrites, and feels that he is a much better person than some of the people who attend our church.

How do I go about getting him interested in coming out to church with me again, as we are getting older and my daughter and son-in-law have been married and sealed in the Washington Temple almost 13 years ago and have 3 wonderful children. Our hope is, to be sealed to one another, as I am to my parents and brothers, etc. (At the time I got married, there just wasn’t any young men around that weren’t related to me and we didn’t have the means to travel far to many functions elsewhere. And marrying a missionary was more than I could handle, as I did not want to leave my family.) My husband has been a good man and a good provider for the most part, but what I would like most from him is companionship now and for the eternities. What advice can you give me, that perhaps I haven’t tried yet? I look forward to your reply, and thank you for taking the time to read this.

Lorraine, from Hannon, Ontario, Canada

Dear Lorriane,

Your story is not atypical of many marriages. You are fortunate to have a good husband with whom you seem to be quite compatible. Partly because of and partly in spite of our instructions to our children, they all ultimately make their own decisions. It has been my observation and experience that the greatest influence that parents have over their own children is the power of their own example. If you remain faithful to your covenants and demonstrate love and acceptance of your children and your husband, and provide an appropriate example of Christian living, I am of the impression that you will have the most powerful influence on your family.

People come to the Lord and join the church when they are touched by the Spirit and respond to that influence. Your earnest prayers for the spiritual welfare of your family will be heard by a kind and loving Father in Heaven. He will exert his gentle, benign influence to bring to Him all His children, and He will be especially attentive to those for whom we pray, but He will never force the human mind.

Let me tell you whereof I speak. My mother’s grandparents were among the early pioneers of the church. Her grandmother, who became a plural wife, walked across the plains in the Willey Handcart Company. My father was a Presbyterian. His father was a U.S. Deputy Marshall, one of who’s functions was to hunt down the Mormon polygamists in Idaho. My father permitted us chidren to be baptized in the Lord’s church, but would never attend. When I was a boy he tended bar in the local pool hall. However, he was a good, honorable person, and we had a close relationship. When I was a young missionary in Argentina I wrote my Dad continually trying to get him interested in the church–to no avail. Finally, I decided that rather than arguing with my Dad, I would argue with the Lord. Never a night went by that I did not pray that my father wold join the church, and I’m sure that the same was true for my dear mother. One day, when my parents were visiting us where we lived at the time in Ohio, on the day before they were to return home, out of the blue, my father asked me that if he were to be baptized would they let me baptize him! My father was 64 years old at the time, and I had the privilege of baptizing him the next day. That night he and mother left for home, and that was the last time I saw him alive. He passed away rather suddenly seven months later.

Gramps