Commending Themselves Unto the Lord Their God

I have heard about my 4^th great-grandfather Dan Jones since I was young. He is on my paternal grandfather’s father’s side and I have loved learning about him and the incredible missionary work he did. He served two missions to Wales—his homeland—and baptized thousands of people. The last prophecy we know of which Joseph Smith gave was that Dan Jones would live (he was in Carthage with Joseph) and serve a mission to Wales. In the MTC I was excited to see a painting of him, the same one found in the Preach My Gospel manual. Yesterday I received an email from FamilySearch with information about my 3^rd great-grandmother and so I clicked on it and found it was someone with the last name of Jones who was from Wales named Mary Ann. I assumed, of course, that this was in the Dan Jones’ line, but as I looked closer I was excited to see that she is on my paternal grandfather’s mother’s side. Mary Ann Jones is my grandfather’s mother’s grandmother, and she was born near Merthyr Tydfil, Wales in 1847. My grandfather’s father’s grandmother, Claudia Jones (daughter of Dan Jones), was born in 1849 also in Merthyr Tydfil. I don’t know yet if they were actually related, but I found a fun connection as I looked looked further. Mary Ann’s father was Evan John Jones, and he was baptized in December 1846. One of the memories in FamilyTree says this about Evan Jones and his wife: “They were confirmed members of the Church on the following Sunday by Elder Dan Jones.” So Dan Jones confirmed Evan Jones a member of the church in Wales, and then 77 years later Dan’s great-grandson married Evan’s great-granddaughter in Utah.

                As I learned about this story, one of the things that touched me was the brief description I found of Evan Jones and his faithfulness. The story I found says that he “was always a righteous and spiritual man” and preached the gospel in Wales. Eventually they decided to come to Utah, and in 1866 he and his wife brought their 11 children to the United States, leaving behind seven others who died in infancy. I can’t imagine taking 11 children on a boat across the Atlantic Ocean, the youngest of whom was an infant born that same year. They had left seven other children who died either in infancy or very young buried in Wales. What’s incredible to me is that all 11 survived the journey—the earliest death among those children was almost 30 years after the voyage. It must have taken incredible faith for that couple to embark on such a trip with all their children, leaving behind their homeland forever and coming to join the saints in Utah with the last leg of the trip taken by handcart from Nebraska. Perhaps this verse describing the Jaredites’ voyage across the sea describes them as well: “When they had done all these things they got aboard of their vessels or barges, and set forth into the sea, commending themselves unto the Lord their God” (Ether 6:4). The Jaredites had no real idea of where they were going, but they trusted the Lord and commended themselves to Him to guide their journey and keep them safe. And my ancestors surely did the same as they embarked on a more modern vessel on a similarly long voyage. And the Lord clearly blessed and preserved them like He did the Jaredites. I am grateful for their examples of faith. One common theme through the record of the Jaredites in the book of Ether is that the righteous remembered what the Lord had done for their fathers, such as we see in this description of Shule: “And he remembered the great things that the Lord had done for his fathers in bringing them across the great deep into the promised land; wherefore he did execute judgment in righteousness all his days” (Ether 7:27). I hope that I can similarly remember the great things the Lord has done for my ancestors in bringing them across the ocean to help establish Zion among the saints in Utah. And I pray that I can likewise exhibit their same faith as I seek in my small way to continue building up Zion in our day.