Lynn Nelson

1979-1981

To my fellow missionaries,                                                                                    8 June 2018

I joined the Church in July 1978.  I was 18 years old and the only member of my family to join.  Given my upbringing, it did not seem logical for me to join the Church, but I was compelled by the story of Joseph Smith.  I could relate with him.  Not that I have ever seen deity or ever had a vision, but I had sought after truth all of my life, and his experience with other people and denominations was similar to mine.  There was a hard-to-define quality about his story and I felt it was true the moment I heard it.  I investigated the Church and became convinced that Joseph Smith was a prophet, that the Book of Mormon is true, and that the Church is the only true church on Earth.  I had to go on a mission.

My parents were not members of the Church and would not pay for me to go on a mission, but because I felt it important to serve, I saved every penny I could, and a year later in July 1979, I left for Bolivia.  At the end of my mission in July 1981, I owed my bank fifty bucks.  I literally spent every penny I had on my mission.  After my mission, the only jobs I could find did not pay more than minimum wage.  Worse, my parents told me that I could only stay at home for six months.  Penniless and potentially homeless, I had to develop a plan of what to do.  Somehow, going to BYU seemed like a solution, so I saved as much as I could and borrowed a lot of money to make it happen. I arrived at BYU in January 1982 with the intent of attending school.  Honestly.  But not two weeks into the winter semester of 1982, I met Melody, and we have been together ever since.  We married in August of 1982.  We have four kids and currently ten grandkids.  This family is the greatest blessing in my life.

To help pay for school, in February 1983, I enlisted in the US Army Reserve.  After basic training I started working as a teacher’s aide in the Provo City Schools.  I found that a reserve military career and a teaching career work well together.  Teachers only work five days a week, and reservists work only one weekend a month.  A Reservist could get on orders for short periods of time as a summer job.  Once I graduated from BYU, I started a career as a teacher in January 1987 in the San Bernardino City Unified School District.  I was blessed to get the job; at first the interviewer told me he had no job for me, but when I told him I spoke Spanish, suddenly he had a job.  It was the only district to offer me a real job.  I taught there for 16 years.  But my plan included a military career, so in April 1987 I enlisted in the California Army National Guard with the intent of going to Officer Candidate School, and in August 1988 I was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant.  I was deployed in 1992 for the LA Riots and in 1994 for the Northridge Earthquake.  I have been blessed to travel to Korea, Thailand, Europe, Turkey, Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan as part of my military career.  I have deployed three times in support of combat operations.  In August of 2002, I went to work in the Pentagon on active duty orders.  I have not returned home since.  I should retire in 2019.

So why am I not at the reunion, only sending my wife in my stead?  I am in Kabul, Afghanistan, as part of the Combined Security Transition Command – Afghanistan (also known as CSTC-A, pronounced “See-Stick-A”).  I am a US Army advisor to the Ministry of Defense (MoD) of the Afghan National Army.  I train the staff at the MoD to manage the authorizing documents that establishes their Army.  This was not the first time for me as an advisor; I was blessed to advise the Iraqi Army from May 2007 through June 2008, which was probably the best job I’ve had in the Army.  The work of an advisor is not much different than the work of a missionary.  An advisor lives and works among the people they advise, he does a lot of humanitarian work, and he teaches people, very much like a missionary.  Sitting in someone’s home in Bolivia is no different than sitting in someone’s home in Iraq.  The public buildings here in Kabul are no different than those in La Paz.  However the main difference is that an advisor is armed and equipped for combat missions.  Missionaries don’t face danger do they?  They don’t have to deal with vicious dogs, rock throwing crowds, or golpes de estado do they?  None of us carried weapons in Bolivia, but you don’t leave home without them here.  After all the things I have done in my 35 years in uniform, I have been blessed to never needing to pull a trigger in anger, and I feel I have helped make the world a better place.

While in Iraq, I advised a Colonel on an infantry brigade staff.  He had an enormous office, and I would sit with my interpreter off to one side while the Colonel talked with the officers of his staff.  Every day his “chai guy” would serve everyone tea.  The Colonel rarely talked to me, I was a mere Major, until one day he motioned for me to come over by his desk.  He wanted to know why I would not drink the tea his staff offered.  Although we were under orders not to proselytize, I told him that I was a Mormon and did not drink tea.  He pulled out a note pad to take notes and began to ask me questions about Mormons.  I told him we didn’t drink alcohol, coffee, or tea, or use tobacco.  I told him we believed in prophets and in revelation.  While he praised me for not drinking alcohol, he was concerned that I ate pork.  After I answered all of his questions, he thought about my answers and then declared, “You’re almost a Muslim!”

So why have I recapped my life?  I remember something that was said during a zone conference that I have never forgotten.  To paraphrase, we would be blessed for our service as missionaries proportionate to our effort.  I have found this to be absolutely true.  I credit all of the blessings in my life directly to my missionary service. While I have never been a rich man, Heavenly Father has enriched me with exactly what I need, and for that I am grateful.  Like dominoes falling in sequence, my life unfolded.  I may not have recognized it at the time, but in retrospect I can see how one event led to the next very clearly.  Had I not been a missionary I would not have developed my language, leadership, and teaching skills that enabled me to become a teacher.  Becoming a teacher led me to become a commissioned officer, which led me to the many adventures only part of which I can relate here.  While in Iraq, my tour manager at the National Guard Bureau told me I would become a force manager, something that I thought would end my career.  Had I not become a force manager in 2008, I would not be here in Kabul today.  Because the Army needed force managers, I was retained for my expertise, and the position I am in today required that force management experience.  I would not have been successful as a military advisor without my missionary experiences.  My missionary experience was key to my success in life.  I cherish the time I spent as a missionary, serving with some of the best people I have ever known, doing the most important work of our lives.  I know the Church is true.

Very Respectfully,

LTC Lynn A. Nelson

CSTC-A, CDD MoD Team Lead

Kabul, Afghanistan

Richard Tullis Steven Garrard