I Choose the Eternal

BY: Ashley Kloos

As of October 11, 2013 I have been a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints for 3 ½ years. I was baptized April 11, 2010 right after I turned 18. 

The story behind my conversion is an interesting one and I’ll try to keep it short.

Like a lot of converts, I knew people who were members of the church. In middle school I had a few close friends who were Mormon. One friend in particular was very open about being a member. I remember he did his 8th grade history day paper on Joseph Smith. I didn’t know who he was at the time but I thought it was very cool of him to write on someone from his church and I’ll admit I was a little curious although I never did anything about it then.

The first church event that I was invited to and actually went was a chili cook off. I don’t remember much about it but I remember it wasn’t for another two years before I actually read it. I just saw it as a special gift from a good friend.

But when I was a junior in High School my grandma Thomas passed away on Christmas from cancer. Five months later my uncle Mike passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. From that point on I began doubting what I knew about God and myself. It didn’t hit me until months later that my grandma was really gone but when it did it hurt. A lot. The same friend who gave me my first book of Mormon also continuously invited me to church with him and to meet with the missionaries. For a while things didn’t work out. I avoided meeting with the missionaries and going to church and when I made an appointment I got really sick.

Finally, another close friend convinced me to go to church with her.

Now, I have to admit that my first day in church was the epitome of AWKWARD but I was lucky enough to have some good friends with me and the people in the ward (what we call our local congregation) were friendly. The style of hymns we sing took some getting used to and so did the quietness in which the meetings are held. When I went to Sunday school things changed. I didn’t feel awkward there. I knew some people from school and the teacher was hilarious.

Needless to say I kept going back to church and started taking the missionary discussions. When the missionaries asked me if I wanted to be baptized I was hesitant at first for a few reasons. First of all I would be the only member in my family. I also wasn’t sure if it would really make me happier than I already was. Finally, the biggest thing was I couldn’t get passed the fact that all my life I had been taught that the Bible was the only word of God.

I told my friend this and he spent an entire lunch period with me outside on his car comparing book of Mormon passages with cross references to the Bible. I then went home and really prayed and studied about it and a couple weeks later I got my answer.

Yes there could be more than one true book. I also knew it would make me happier than I had been because I was already happier just learning about it. Lastly, whether or not I was the only member in my family was not important. My love for Christ was. The church also answered questions for me that I had always had but that no one else could give me an answer that made sense. For example, I never understood why churches didn’t have the same literal organization that Christ did in his day. With Christ as the head and then prophets and apostles (the idea that God didn’t need to speak to us the same way in our day didn’t work for me). It also made more sense to me that there isn’t just a heaven and a hell. There are varying degrees of good and evil in the world so why shouldn’t there be in the next life too?

There are so many things I love about this church but the biggest thing by far is that families CAN be eternal. I say can because there are things we have to do to in order to get there and we have to make good choices. This eternal nature of things is what gives me the chance to have children that can grow up with a mother AND a father who love each other (something I didn’t have) and know that they are loved. My mother did the best she could for me and my sisters but I know it would have been easier for her if she had be a man who loved her and helped her.

I have now been blessed with the opportunity to start my own eternal family. I met my husband at a single adults New Year’s dance in January 2012 and he asked me to marry him 6 months later on the Cliffside of a waterfall on Hamilton Mountain.

We got married September 14, 2013 in the Portland, OR temple. We are both converts AND the only members in our families. But now we have a family where EVERYONE is a member and someday our children will be blessed because they know their mom and dad love each other and Heavenly Father.

I’d like to close with the chorus from a simple yet very powerful hymn called Families Can Be together Forever:

Fam'lies can be together forever

Through Heav'nly Father's plan.

I always want to be with my own family,

And the Lord has shown me how I can.

The Lord has shown me how I can.