The last days are upon us

In light of recent events which have led to some people leaving the church, I wish to warn my grandchildren of things that will surely come to pass. 

A number of years ago a member of a stake presidency embezzled millions of dollars from some good friends and members of his ward. He was convicted and served 7 years in prison and has yet to repay the money that he stole.

The news is replete with episodes of a similar nature. In addition, the church will be mis-characterized as allowing and condoning inappropriate behavior as a recent article from the Associated Press which made headlines across the nation. I wrote this letter to my friends. It contains some points that you might consider in evaluating situations that may occur.

"My Dear Friends,

I have heard of your trials from afar.  If it were possible, I would remove them from you.  After some thought and contemplation I offer the following in hopes that it will in some way be a soothing balm and let you know that I still regard you as my friends and fellow travelers on the road to Christ.

There is adequate historical evidence that leaders in the church can go astray and cause pain to the flock of Christ.  I have been recently rereading the New Testament and Jesus the Christ. Although Jesus personally chose his apostles, one closely associated with him, betrayed him, and it was over money.

In the time of Joseph Smith, Warren Parrish, Joseph's secretary misappropriated money entrusted to him and caused the failure of the Kirtland Safety Society and a great apostasy from the church in Kirtland and it was over money.

There are a few church members who do now and will in the future take advantage of their membership in the church and their positions of leadership to deceive and steal money, property, and possessions from unsuspecting fellow saints.  Even the very elect may be led astray. 

I recently heard of a family that came to America from a Scandinavian country to Utah in the early days. They sold all that they had and came to Ellis Island with some missionaries. When they disembarked the missionaries offered to exchange their money for them.  The missionaries never returned and absconded with the family's money, their entire savings. Because of this many descendants left the church.

There are many trials to come to individual members of the church.  Each and every member of the church will be tried and tested to see if they will stand firm in spite of all things that they will have thrown their way.

Christ said that the servant was no greater than the master.  Thus we can expect to be betrayed and misunderstood from both within and without the church.  Hopefully that will not happen often in our lives.  We will be given individualized and customized challenges to bring us to Christ.  For those like me we have to learn to rely solely upon the Lord and not on our own strength.

We must be like Job and say, “The Lord giveth and taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord.”

The promise to the faithful is that what we lose will be restored to us many fold if we maintain our integrity.

If we believe in the promise, we can go on with our life.

What do we do with those people who have wronged us?  We forgive them. This is probably the most difficult thing to do.  We would like to see justice done in this life.  When we feel betrayed and taken advantage of, we want to see our sense of justice exercised.  The hardest thing to do is leave things in the hand of the eternal lawgiver.

There are two scriptures that we need to remember.  “I the Lord will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men.”  The other is, “Let the Lord judge between thee and me and reward thee according to thy works.”  We thus leave everything to the Lord and it takes the burden from our shoulders.  He will judge righteous judgment.  We want Him to be fair with us not only in our case, but he also will avenge us of our wrongs.  You can be assured of that.  I find that this is the most difficult test of our integrity.  We cannot let the actions of others determine our eternal salvation.   

I hope that you will not let the actions of one individual jeopardize your eternal salvation.

Sincerely,

Your friend in the gospel of Christ."

 

With my love,

Grandpa 

 

Introduction to Dr. Laurence Gee

 

Introduction to Dr. Laurence Gee

I received my medical school training at the University of Utah.  During my senior year of medical school, the obstetrical department of the LDS hospital employed me.  That year the hospital did not have enough interns to staff the labor and delivery department so they hired senior medical students to cover from 7:00 pm to 7:00am.  I worked every third night and delivered over 500 babies and assisted on numerous other deliveries during that time. 

I completed a rotating internship at the Dee Memorial Hospital in Ogden and completed two years of pediatric residency at the University of Utah Affiliated Hospitals.  During my first year of pediatric residency the hospital in Ogden did not have enough interns to staff the emergency room, so I worked one night a week in the emergency room in Ogden.

Once I completed my training in pediatrics, I opened a private practice for the diseases of Infants, Children and Adolescents in the town of Lander, Wyoming.  The population at that time was approximately 7,000.  There were about 30,000 people in the surrounding county area.  When I went into practice in 1965, I was the fifth pediatrician in the State of Wyoming and the only one in the western half of the state.

Wyoming is a state in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States.  The area is 97,814 sq mi
(253,348 km2)  - 

Width 280 miles (450 km)  - 

Length 360 miles (581 km)

Inasmuch as there were a number of people that did not want to go to the other doctors in the town, I took care of all ages of patients and also delivered babies.  Not long after I arrived, the veterinarians had a convention in Jackson, Wyoming and there were none in town.  A patient of mine had a horse that ran into a barbed wire fence and cut her shoulder.  She was a prize racehorse and so I was asked to sew up the horse’s shoulder.  I joked that it was ok, because the horse was only 3 years old.

I had been trained to take out tonsils and adenoids and put tubes in ears.  None of the doctors in Lander were trained to put tubes in ears, so that was something new to them.  No one had ever done an exchange transfusion for hypebilirubinemia of the newborn due to erythroblastosis fetalis,  so I did the first one in that hospital.  I had a patient with Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura and wanted to do a bone marrow aspiration, but there was no bone marrow needle in the hospital, so I had to improvise.

We had a small 40 bed hospital when I first came to Lander.  They later built a 100-bed hospital.

I was drafted into the Navy as served as the base pediatrician at Naval Air Station Lemoore, California and took call in the obstetrical department at night and delivered babies and assisted at c-sections. 

I was a founding member of the Wyoming Pediatric Society. 

I trained residents, interns and child health associates and physicians assistants in my office in Lander, Wyoming.

Appointments

Pediatric Consultant to Wyoming Children’s Health Services, 1965 to 1996

Alternate Chapter Chairman Wyoming Chapter, American Academy of   Pediatrics 1976-1977

Chapter Chairman Wyoming Chapter, American Academy of Pediatrics 1977-1983

President and Founding Member of Wyoming Pediatric Society, 1977-1983

Chief of Staff Bishop Randall Hospital, Lander Wyoming 1970-1972 

Chief of Pediatrics Bishop Randall Hospital, Lander Wyoming      1968-1986, 1990 to 1996.

Clinical Instructor in Pediatrics, University of Wyoming 1980-7

Wyoming Representative to and Council Member of American Academy of Pediatrics District VIII Perinatal Committee, 1990 to 1996

Pediatric Consultant to Wyoming Deaf and Blind Services 1985 to 1996

Medical Director Morning Star Manor Nursing Home, Ft. Washakie 1990-1997

Missionary Medical Advisory Committee, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints 2003-Present

 

PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS:

Diplomat of the American Board of Pediatrics since 1972         

Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics since 1973          

Fremont County Medical Society 1965-1997

Wyoming State Medical Society 1965-1997

Irish and American Pediatric Society 1996-2000