Jon Bunker

1977-1979

Dear President Hill,

I am crushed that I will not be able to be in attendance to our 40-year mission reunion next month.  It is hard to believe that many years have past since our time together in Bolivia, but for me not a day goes by that I don’t reflect or remember a person, an experience, a companion, or my Mission President in one way or another.  In fact I, like many, have pictures, woodworkings, rugs, K’orawas and other recuerdos of the Bolivia La Paz Mission all over our home!

I remember like it was yesterday when I found out I was assigned to Bolivia.  I was actually at college (Utah State University) and my mother sent me a letter telling me that my mission call envelope had arrived at our home in Las Vegas.  As I didn’t have a phone and cell phones weren’t invented then, I called home collect and my mother opened the letter and read aloud to me the contents of the letter.  Admittedly at the time, I wasn’t sure if Bolivia was in South or Central America but I was excited to learn Spanish and go to a foreign country.  Imagine my surprise when four weeks in to our training at the Provo LTM, my assignment was changed to learn Aymara and we were to stay an additional two months.  I couldn’t have known or understood how my experiences with those humble and poor people would shape my life forever.

I remember many experiences with you while serving in the office but one in particular will always stand out.  Elder Gene R. Cook had come to visit, for what reason I don’t know but perhaps it was a mission tour.  We took him out to the Altiplano and perhaps their was a reason, but it was just myself, you, him, and my companion as I remember it and we came upon some native Indians by the ruins that we were visiting and showing him.  He asked me to speak to them and I felt in some way that he was testing me to see if we could really speak their language and if this Aymara program was worth maintaining.  I don’t know to this day if that truly was a question on his mind or his motive in asking me to speak with them, but I do remember having my tongue loosed to an even greater degree than usual and I could speak, translate, and understand everything the Natives were saying and I felt that Elder Cook was satisfied we were of benefit and use in continuing to teach them in Aymara.  We all understood the need for the people to learn Spanish and to assimilate into the world for sake of employment, education, and improving their temporal life.  But I knew in that moment that Heavenly Father knew all of His children and that at least for that time, He was pleased that we were trying to teach all children about the Savior and His reality in their own language.

Having been a Mission President and now serving as an MTC President here in England I can better understand the blessing and privilege of your service to me and to all the others.  I hope in some small way I have been and will continue to be for my missionaries what you have meant to me.  I have tried to pattern my service after yours and what I felt from you.  I always felt loved, appreciated, and that I was not simply a number.  I felt like you not only knew me, but that you also trusted me and I never wanted to let you down or be found to be less in your eyes than as you saw me and my potential.

I have been married now for 36 years (St. George Temple).  We have 5 children and 10 grandchildren and all of our children have been married and sealed in the temple.  As you may remember, I lost my mother to cancer shortly after I returned from my mission but my father lived until last March and I was able to return home from England for a few days to bury him and settle his affairs.  I graduated from Utah State in Accounting and worked for a few different firms and companies before landing at a new start up Managed Healthcare Company where I spent the next 20+ years helping to build and shape it into a thriving enterprise that now insures and cares for over 650,000 people in Medicare, Commercial, and Medicaid insurance products.  I have served in the Church all my life and I have tried to be a loving home teacher, friend, and neighbor wherever I go.  I have tried to live my life as an example of the Lord and while I have stumbled and fallen to the ways of the world at times, my heart is soft and my spirit is willing.  But with all of that, and not minimizing my love for my wife and family, quite simply my most favorite time of life and my most satisfying sense of purpose and accomplishment was serving under you as a full-time missionary in the Bolivia La Paz Mission.  I still have the notes I took from one of your Zone Conference presentations on the Law of Chastity and how that fits into the Plan of Salvation on mission letterhead that I refer to this day!

I loved the Aymaras; I loved all my companions and fellow zone members; I loved all the missionaries and cherished the months I served as one of your Assistants.  Of course, my greatest love was for you and for you helping me to find my own love, my own faith, my own witness, and my own conversion to the Lord Jesus Christ.

God bless you my dear President; I hope the Lord will preserve your life until I can return and express in person what my heart feels so deeply for your life and service to me.

My eternal love,

Jon Bunker

December 1977 – December 1979

Dee Gregoire Schonle Richard Tullis