Welcome to follow him favorites. This is where John and I share a single story to go with each

week's lesson. John, Doctor in Covenants 137 and 138. 80 years apart between these two sections.

They really do belong side by side. I want to talk about section 138, John. The year that that was given

is 1918. And you know the history of 1918. World War I. There's a Spanish flu epidemic.

There is death everywhere. Joseph F. Smith goes to the Lord, and the response becomes Section 138.

Well, my story has to do with that year, 1918. Everybody is experiencing death, including

brother George Goats. He's a farmer who is growing sugar beets in Lehigh, Utah that year, 1918.

Winter comes early, it froze much of his beet crop in the ground.

This story is shared by the way, John, by President Christofferson way back in the 1900s,

1998.

For George and his young son Francis, the harvest was slow and difficult. Meanwhile, an influenza

epidemic was raging. The dreaded disease claimed the lives of George's son Charles and three

of Charles' small children. Two little girls and a boy. In the course of only six days, a grieving George

goats made three separate trips from Lehigh to Ogden, Utah, to bring home bodies for burial.

Oh, man. These are his grandchildren and his child, Charles. At the end of this terrible interlude,

George and Francis hitched up their wagon and headed back to the beet field. On the way, they passed

wagon after wagon, loads of beets being hauled to the factory and driven by neighborhood

farmers. As they patched by, each driver would wave a greeting.

Hi, Uncle George. Sure, sorry, George. You've sure got a lot of friends, George. On the last wagon,

freckled face Jasper Rolf. He waved a cheery greeting and called out, That's all of him, Uncle George.

Brother Goats turned to Francis and said,

Oh, I wish it was all of ours.

...