Take the Holy
Spirit as Your Guide. By Elder Larry Y. Wilson. General Conference April 2018
During the
Korean War, Ensign Frank Blair served on a troop transport ship stationed in
Japan.6 The ship wasn’t large enough to have a formal chaplain, so the captain
asked Brother Blair to be the ship’s informal chaplain, having observed that
the young man was a person of faith and principle, highly respected by the
whole crew.
Ensign Blair
wrote: “Our ship was caught in a huge typhoon. The waves were about 45 feet [14
m] high. I was on watch … during which time one of our three engines stopped
working and a crack in the centerline of the ship was reported. We had two
remaining engines, one of which was only functioning at half power. We were in
serious trouble.”
Ensign Blair
finished his watch and was getting into bed when the captain knocked on his
door. He asked, “Would you please pray for this ship?” Of course, Ensign Blair
agreed to do so.
At that
point, Ensign Blair could have simply prayed, “Heavenly Father, please bless
our ship and keep us safe,” and then gone to bed. Instead, he prayed to know if
there was something he could do to help ensure the safety of the ship. In
response to Brother Blair’s prayer, the Holy Ghost prompted him to go to the
bridge, speak with the captain, and learn more. He found that the captain was
trying to determine how fast to run the ship’s remaining engines. Ensign Blair
returned to his cabin to pray again.
He prayed,
“What can I do to help address the problem with the engines?”
In response,
the Holy Ghost whispered that he needed to walk around the ship and observe to
gather more information. He again returned to the captain and asked for
permission to walk around the deck. Then, with a lifeline tied around his
waist, he went out into the storm.
Standing on
the stern, he observed the giant propellers as they came out of the water when
the ship crested a wave. Only one was working fully, and it was spinning very
fast. After these observations, Ensign Blair once again prayed. The clear
answer he received was that the remaining good engine was under too much strain
and needed to be slowed down. So he returned to the captain and made that
recommendation. The captain was surprised, telling him that the ship’s engineer
had just suggested the opposite—that they increase the speed of the good engine
in order to outrun the storm. Nevertheless, the captain chose to follow Ensign
Blair’s suggestion and slowed the engine down. By dawn the ship was safely in
calm waters.
Only two
hours later, the good engine stopped working altogether. With half power in the
remaining engine, the ship was able to limp into port.
The captain
said to Ensign Blair, “If we had not slowed that engine when we did, we would
have lost it in the middle of the storm.”
Without that
engine, there would have been no way to steer. The ship would have overturned
and been sunk. The captain thanked the young LDS officer and said he believed
that following Ensign Blair’s spiritual impressions had saved the ship and its
crew.
