God Told Him I Was "The One"

I’m always a little suspicious when God gives revelation to someone else on my behalf. Such was the case during the summer of 1995 when I was in college and going through what my BFF’s call my “seminary teacher phase.” That summer I was a dating magnet for future seminary teachers and it probably didn’t help that I was taking a heavy load of institute classes, was in the (LDS) Lambda Delta Sigma sorority, attending institute dances at every college, and was determined to catch me a strapping prophet in the making. I’d been dating several guys at the time, but started going out with one guy in particular several times, but it was nothing exclusive. He was a good seven years older than me, was about to graduate, had been student body president at the university, and was an awesome makeout. On the night in question we’d gone down to a “clean” comedy club near BYU, then afterwards I met his parents, and finally a little lovin’ on the family couch. As he was driving me home he kept asking deep questions about my testimony, which I answered with conviction. And then it all went bad. I remember sitting at a red light and him saying,

“What are your thoughts on marriage?” And of course my reply was positive.
“What are your thoughts on marrying ME?” He asked leaving me speechless. I can recall putting my hand on the car door handle and thinking we weren’t going that fast and that I could probably just roll off to the side if I jumped out.

When I didn’t respond his voice took on that shaky spiritual tone you often hear in testimony meetings and he said, “I’ve been praying about us and Heavenly Father has told me that you’re- “The One.” My mind raced between wanting to scream and wondering if Heavenly Father really had told him I should be his wife. “Pray about it and let me know," he said as we sat in the driveway of my parent’s house.
To which I responded,“Peter (fake name), we’ve had a lot of great dates, but I just don’t think I’m ready to marry you.” And he took it really well for a man who’d been talking to God only to find his “chosen” target was uncooperative.

A few days later I went to my sorority meeting. It was tradition that if a girl got engaged we’d have a “rose circle” and that night it was announced that there’d be one. Getting into a circle we started singing the sorority theme song (I know pathetic huh?) while we passed around a red rose, each girl lingering with it to fool everyone else into thinking it was them until it reached “Jessica,” one of my sorority sisters that I knew, but not that well. When it got to her and she refused to pass it on, all of us jumped up and down screaming. Someone asked who the groom was, and she responded with “Peter ______” and my heart sank. So, Heavenly Father does indeed work in mysterious ways and sometimes he gives those he talks to a Plan B.

Have We Come Far Enough?

Recently I went to lunch with two LDS friends who’ve lived in Utah their entire lives and our conversation turned to politics and race. “I don’t know why everyone keeps talking about people not voting for Obama because he’s black, I haven’t seen any racism,” said one of the women. That night I mulled over what she’d said and why she said it. I was raised in Utah, but I’d been away for a long time and I’d forgotten the racial isolation of the state’s suburbs. Recalling back to the Sunday school lessons I’d grown up with where blacks were marked for being “fence-sitters” or “less valiant” in the pre-existence, I realized that somewhere in my mind those teachings had given me an initial hesitation toward blacks. Right away, their dark skin color marked them as people who’d messed up even before they got to earth. In a way, my friend was right, she probably didn’t see much outward racism having never left Zion, where I’d been living in the South and had seen outrageous acts of prejudice. But I’ll ask you, which is worse—to experience blatant racism and know it for what it is, or to have it be something passive and unconscious that hides in people blind to racism because of their racial dominance in an area?

The Salt Lake Tribune had an article on the 30th Anniversary of the “all worthy men” revelation. www.sltrib.com/ci_9497769 I thought the last line from Tamu Smith was a great place to start an open discussion, “For racism to stop, we need to hear it condemned at Conference as often as pornography or abuse are.” What do you think?