Ray's Stake Conference Talk

 Ray spoke in Stake Conference last week (its a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints semi annual meeting). I have had several people ask if we have a copy of his talk, so it is in this post. Enjoy.

Good evening.  When President Wells asked me to speak he asked me to study the recent talk given by Relief Society General President Camille N. Johnson at BYU Women’s Conference, and I have to admit her message really hit home. Janel and I wrote this talk together because it has been so hard and it brings up so many raw emotions, so please bear with me as I try to share with you how I turned to Jesus Christ and Priesthood power to get through terribly difficult circumstances. Sister Johnson didn't sugarcoat the realities of our mortal experience. She said: “Life is hard. You can do hard things with Jesus, or you can go at it alone... But when you do hard things with Jesus Christ, the hard times become holy.”

I come before you today as a witness that this principle is true. If you know our family you know the last 4 years have been really hard. It started in 2022 with me having a faith crisis and learning the true meaning of repentance and forgiveness. In 2023 my father-in-law passed away from cancer and his death had a profound impact on me and my family. In 2024 our oldest daughter Jerika suffered a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, the doctor told us she most likely would not live and was on a ventilator in the ICU for 3 days and a total of 6 days in the hospital, but she recovered and is pregnant now, which is a miracle.

In November of last year our family entered a storm we never saw coming or even imagined in our worst nightmares. Our 25 year old daughter, Kinlee, suffered a sudden cardiac arrest and went without oxygen to her brain for 22 minutes. She was in Mexico at the time and we had to navigate getting her back to the United States and then getting her closer to home. She had to relearn everything after she woke up from her coma. She was basically just like a baby that could talk. She had to learn to walk, talk and everything else you teach babies and small children. She didn’t even know who any of us were.

For three agonizing months, the hospital became our home as she fought for her life. There were moments when she was so close to the veil that we could feel the breath of eternity in the room. Even now, the acute crisis has passed, but the trial has not ended. Our daily life is now defined by the intense, consuming reality of taking care of her and navigating her recovery.

In the quiet, heavy hours by her hospital bed, and now in the exhausting routine of caregiving at home, I have had to look at President Johnson’s question squarely in the face: How do we invite Jesus Christ into our struggles?

President Johnson suggested that we don't need to add more to our spiritual to-do lists. Instead, she said to do more with what we are already doing. Two areas she focused on have become the literal lifeline holding my family together: prayer and worship.

She recalled counsel given by President Jeffrey R. Holland after his own near-death experience. His message to the Church was simple: “Pray more than you pray... However much you’ve prayed, pray more.”

Before Kinlee’s cardiac arrest, I had what I considered good prayer habits. But crisis strips away the luxury of casual, routine prayers. My prayers could no longer be a polite monologue of daily activities. They became what President Nelson called a “living discussion” with my Heavenly Father.

When you are watching your child fight for every breath, your prayers become passionate, purposeful, and honest. I have poured out my deepest fears, my raw exhaustion, and my heartbreak on my knees. And in return, the Savior did not instantly remove the hardship—but He entered the struggle with us.

The second shift has been in how we view our worship, particularly the sacrament. While Kinlee was at the University of Utah we had the opportunity to have service missionaries bring us the sacrament every Sunday. Kinlee loved when they came into her room and she cried happy tears every time. She had no idea what the sacrament was or really what was happening at all, but she FELT the sacrament and asked several times “what is this feeling in my chest”?  We got to explain to her that feeling is the spirit and what that means. Elder Patrick Kearon, said “To attend means to be present at. But to worship is to intentionally praise and adore our God in a way that transforms us!”  We weren’t attending actual Sacrament meetings while Kinlee was at the hospital but she, in her fragile state was able to worship and praise and so were we.

Now as we partake of the sacrament, it is most definitely with a broken heart and a contrite spirit and we understand our absolute dependence on the Savior.

We have seen His hand in so many things, the medical staff, the unexpected strength to get through another sleepless night, the therapists, the missionaries, the stranger who asked us outside of a California hospital if he could pray with us, the nurses who begged to be on Kinlee’s team because of the “feeling” in her room, the flight team that flew her from California to Utah and the people that made that flight possible, the doctor that helped save our Jerika’s life in 2024 who did everything in his power to make sure Kinlee was transported to a facility closer to home, the family, friends and others that gave up precious time out of their own lives to make our life more bearable, also the endless prayers and priesthood blessings that bring ultimate peace.

Like Nephi, my deepest desires through this storm has been to do everything possible to make life as comfortable for my daughter and family and to develop a deep, personal relationship with my Savior and be able to say with absolute conviction, “I glory in my Jesus, for he hath redeemed my soul.”

Taking care of Kinlee is the hardest thing our family has ever done. We cannot eliminate the struggles of mortality, and we cannot predict what tomorrow looks like. But because we have thrown the door wide open and invited the Savior into her hospital rooms and into our home, this difficult season has become sacred, sanctifying, and holy.

I agree with the testimony of President Johnson:

Jesus Christ is relief. He is our strength and our salvation.

I know with my whole heart that we can trust Him to be by our side during our deepest struggles, I have felt him by my side every day I know he is guiding us in everything we do, and is making our afflictions for our ultimate good.

I couldn’t do any of this without His help and the faith we as a family have in Him and His promises.

I say these things In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

November 9

Pictures and Videos from home kept me going. Love these 3. It was so hard for Jerika to be so far away from all of us. She was such a trooper.

Laina to the rescue once again. If you know me you know I NEED PEOPLE. I probably already said that in one of my other posts. Her family was my lifeline to people.

We made Jonah get in the picture. He will never know how much I appreciate him. What amazing kids Laina has.

Back then Blake knew everything about her care. What her blood pressure should be, her temperature, her heart rate. ALL THE THINGS. I really have a hard time writing anything nice about him after what he put her through during the divorce. I've said it already, it could have been so much easier and it just puts a bitter taste in my mouth for him and his family. But, God will take care of all of that one day. She's so much better off right now with us.

And look I researched this place way before we ever went there.

This is the explanation of the picture above. These loaded out of order sorry

This was morning time at the hotel while Blake's mom was still there. Does Ray look irritated??? HE WAS. After spending from 8 pm to 8 am away from the hospital the first thing we wanted to do every day WAS GET TO THE HOSPITAL. These 2 drug their feet every morning and we only had 1 rental car. It was hard. 

November 8

 

This was our reality for days just watching our girl and trying to figure out how to get her closer to home. This nurse was our favorite Chelsea and she did everything in her power to keep Kinlee's long beautiful hair. Seeing the name Sharp on everything helped me so much. Blake was so amazing in the beginning. This is hard for me to write since we know what the end result was with him. But, he had a lot of pressure to jump ship in the beginning too. His dad would call several times a day and we could hear his dad say "She's not your problem anymore, all you are doing is watching the machines breath for her. You need to come home and go back to work". But, he knew everything about the machines and if something didn't look right he made sure to tell whoever would listen. I still think the hardest part was leaving her every night. We did get rest, well as much as we could, sleeping was so hard too, but being gone from 8 pm to 8 am was so hard.

November 7

Messages like these literally pushed me through my day. I didn't save all of them but they were my lifeline through this entire process.

Laina was my LIFELINE to the outside world. Her and Sophia were amazing. Not only did they have Jonah pick me up at the airport, they came every weekend and brought us supplies, and food and just helped me feel a little more normal and sane. Emma helped pay for a lot of the supplies too. We do love our California cousins, I don't know how I could ever repay them. The EEG was GREAT news that is when we found out she did have brain activity. Thank goodness we didn't have to make the hard decision. We didn't know what was ahead of us but we knew she was going to live and we would take whatever life brought us. 

 

The View From the Outside

There is a specific kind of quiet that feels incredibly loud. It’s the silence that follows an unreturned message, the empty space where a conversation used to be, or the heavy stillness of wondering, “Did I say something wrong?”

​Lately, I’ve been living in that quiet.

​Every single day, a familiar paranoia creeps in. It whispers that I’ve offended people, that I’ve somehow misstepped, and that the silence from those around me—even my own people—is a quiet verdict. It is exhausting to constantly replay interactions in your mind, searching for the exact moment a bridge might have broken, wondering why the responses have stopped.

​The hardest part isn't just the silence; it’s everything unsaid. There is so much I could say about my own feelings, so much depth and nuance to what I am carrying, but the space to say it feels like it’s shrinking.

​Instead, I find myself on the outside looking in.

​It is a surreal feeling to watch a life you used to be so deeply embedded in simply continue. The world keeps spinning, people keep moving, plans are made, and days pass—all without you. You become a spectator to a world you used to inhabit. And the sting of that isolation doesn't just affect me. It cuts even deeper to watch the same pattern ripple outward, seeing Kinlee’s friends continue forward, leaving a quiet space where she should be.

​When you are on the outside, you realize how fragile connections can be. But you also realize the value of genuine presence.

​To anyone else who is currently standing in the cold, watching the warmth of their old life move on through a window: I see you. It is a lonely place to be, but you are not wrong for feeling the weight of it.

Present Day

 We got family pictures taken and look how cute our family is. Jerika wanted birth announcement photos and we wanted a quick family picture, so we just used our cell phones and took some pictures. They aren't professional, but I think they look pretty awesome. And look at the happy Kinlee. We just love her happy disposition. She's amazing. We missed Keegan and Tyler but we will take official family pictures in August.