In my scripture study I’ve come up with a law.  I call it the law of the boomerang.  Simply stated, it is that whatever you send out will come back again.

The preacher, in Ecclesiastes 11:1 says it this way:  “Cast thy bread upon the waters:  for thou shalt find it after many days.”

Someone altered that verse, and, I think improved upon it, when he said, “Cast thy bread upon the waters:  and it will return to you—buttered.”

Alma’s version of the law says, “For that which ye do send out shall return unto you again, and be restored...”  (Alma 41:15).  He called this “the plan of restoration.”  (Alma 41:2).

Samuel the Lamanite also weighed in on this law when he said, “(The Lord) hath given you that ye might know good from evil, and he hath given unto you that ye might choose life or death; and ye can do good and be restored unto that which is good, or have that which is good restored unto you; or ye can do evil, and have that which is evil restored unto you.”  (Helaman 14:31).

I’d like to illustrate this law with some stories.

As a young man I was in the U.S. Navy on an army base.  I was a brand-new member of the Church, having been baptized just 13 days before having to report for active duty.  Military men have never been noted for being particularly virtuous, and many of my companions were especially not so.  Nevertheless, I knew that I must be, and determined that since I had to live with and get along with them, I would not say anything bad about anyone.  That meant trying not to even think bad thoughts about them.

This was my own private, self-improvement program.  I didn’t tell anyone about it.  I just worked at getting along, and being friendly with everyone.

I lived in a barracks with 20 other men.  Late one night I was sleeping peacefully when I was awakened by someone shaking my shoulder.  It was Terry Weller, my friend from Iowa.  He was dead drunk.  He had pulled a chair up to my bed, and he wanted to talk.  I let him.  He went on for about 15 minutes, and then gave me one of the greatest compliments I’ve ever received.  It’s because of this cherished compliment from a drunk man that I even remember the incident.

He said, “Kerns, you’re the most amazing person I’ve ever known.  I expected you to be mad if I woke you up, but you’re not.  You never say anything bad about anybody!”

He’d noticed!  My silent efforts had come back in the form of a great compliment.

Terry wondered what made me the way I was, so I took him to church with me a couple of times.  I have no idea what happened to him, but I hope that in later years when the missionaries knocked on his door, he let them in because of the Latter-day Saint that he once knew.

That story reminds me of another.  From that army base in California this sailor went to an Air Force base in Texas.  Every day I attended a class taught by a profane man who felt it his duty to entertain these military men by telling a daily dirty joke.

I was powerless to do a thing about the situation, so each day as the joke began I found something to look at on my desk, and concentrated on trying not to hear what was being said.

One day the jokes stopped.  Two weeks went by.  It was a blessed relief.  And then a classmate said to me, “Do you know why Garrison doesn’t tell jokes any more?”

“No.”

“It’s because you won’t laugh.”

Oh, the power of a silent example!  It came back to bless not only my life, but the lives of others.

When I arrived in Texas, I had been a member of the Church for exactly one year.  I was still just a shy boy, afraid to open my mouth in front of a group of people.  But I was asked to give my first talk in church.  I was scared to death, but above all I wanted to be obedient.  I prepared a talk, memorized scriptures, and, wonder of wonders, felt confidence as I stood to speak.  The fact that an old lady in the congregation was shaking her head in disagreement at something that I’d said didn’t even unnerve me, because I knew I was right.  My confidence in myself and in the Lord got a great boost as I gave that talk.  I decided that with the Lord’s help, I could do anything.

I went from Texas to Japan.  I held the Melchizedek Priesthood then.  My ship was in drydock, so I was a permanent member of the servicemen’s branch on shore.  Because I was available, the branch president came to depend upon me for some things.

There was a large military hospital there in Yokosuka.  It was during the Vietnam conflict.  Whenever our men were injured in Vietnam, they were flown to the hospital in Yokosuka.  Some of these injured men were LDS.  Upon arriving in Yokosuka they’d tell the hospital chaplain that they wanted to see someone from the LDS Church.  The chaplain would call the branch president, and the branch president would contact me to ask me to go make the visit.  I’d find a companion, and off we’d go.  Because of those visits I had many choice experiences.

On one occasion I was unable to find an available companion, and went alone.  I found the soldier’s bed empty.  Upon inquiry I learned that he’d been sent to surgery just a few minutes before.  These men usually wanted to see someone from the Church because they wanted a Priesthood blessing.  I didn’t want this man to go through surgery without a Priesthood blessing, so I had the temerity to knock on the surgery room door.  I explained what I wanted, and was admitted into the surgery room where I gave a Priesthood blessing as the doctors and nurses stood around observing.

Mind you, this was being done by a painfully-shy 21-year-old boy who had recently learned that the Lord was aware of him and was willing to bless him beyond his own abilities.

Following the blessing I took the man’s hand and sat down beside him.  I was permitted to be there through his surgery.

The next day I went back to see him.  He was in his bed, and wanted to tell me a story.  He said that one night as he was on patrol and sleeping in the bush, he had a dream.  He dreamed that he was severely injured.  He was put aboard a plane, and sent to Japan.  He was wheeled into surgery, and a knock came at the door.  A man came in, gave him a Priesthood blessing, and then sat down and held his hand through the surgery.  He said, “You’re the man I saw in the dream.”

I can’t tell you what that story did to me.  To know that the Lord knew James Kerns, and had entrusted me with that errand was an overwhelming sensation.  I had cast my bread upon the waters, and it came back buttered.

My friend continued, “And I’ll tell you what’s going to happen next.  In my dream I was flown from Japan to a hospital in Bremerton, Washington, near my home.  When I get there I’ll try to call my parents, but no one will be home.  On my second try my sister will answer, and she won’t recognize my voice.”

I went to see my friend again the very next day, and found his bed empty again.  I inquired where he was, and learned that he’d been put on a plane bound for Washington state.

I’d like to talk with Vernon Denman and Terry Weller again, but they passed out of my life.

So did Bill Mills.  I always made it a point to go early to the base chapel for church in Japan so that I could be standing at the door to greet people as they arrived. One day a scruffy-looking sailor appeared.  As I shook his hand he asked, “How do you go about joining this Church?”

“Well, you’ll need to take the missionary discussions, which my friend and I could give you, and then you could be baptized.”

Bill was interested in the Church because he had an LDS girlfriend back home who was dead-set that she would only marry a Mormon.  Bill was not a very shiny-looking person, and I questioned whether we’d ever be able to put enough of a shine on him to qualify him for baptism.  Nevertheless, we managed to give him three discussions before his ship pulled out.  I thought that was the last time I’d ever see him, and put him out of my mind.

Three months went by, and I don’t suppose I thought of Bill once.

One night I went down into the hold of my ship and crawled into my bunk.  My bunk was at the end of a blind passageway.  On the right side of my bunk was a bulkhead (or wall).  Twenty inches above my nose was another bunk, and there were two more above that.  The passageway was two feet wide, and on the other side were four more bunks stacked one above another.  I can still see this picture in my mind because of what happened that night.

I turned on my reading light, and opened my scriptures.  Suddenly thoughts of Bill Mills came flooding into my mind.  I couldn’t concentrate on what I was reading.  All I could think about was Bill Mills.  The thoughts were so compelling that, finally, there was nothing else for me to do but to get up, get dressed, and go see if his ship had come in.  I walked up and down the dark docks, and sure enough, there was his ship.

I marched up the gangplank, and requested permission to come aboard.  I then began looking for Bill.  He wasn’t in his bunk.  He wasn’t in the galley.  He wasn’t at his work station.  No one had seen him.  I determined that I wasn’t leaving the ship until I found him.  I literally searched that strange, unfamiliar ship from stem to stern.

I finally found him.  He was way down in the hold of the ship, up forward in the bow, in a little cubbyhole.  He was an engineman.  Enginemen were always greasy, but he was filthy even for an engineman.  I was so grateful to have finally found him.  He was shocked to see me.  He couldn’t have been more shocked if his own parents had just walked in.

I explained why I was there, and the circumstances that had compelled me to come looking for him.  I said, “The Lord sent me.  Now tell me why I’m here.”

“Well,” he said, “if you must know, I’m sitting here deciding the best way to kill myself.”

“Bill, the fact that I’m here is evidence that the Lord knows you, knows what you’re thinking, and doesn’t want you to do that.”

We had a long talk.  Bill cheered up, and assured me that he would never again entertain such thoughts.  His ship pulled out again the next day.  I’ve never heard from him since, but I’m satisfied that he’s probably still alive and well after all these years.  Hopefully he went home, became a member of the Church, and lived happily ever after.

But it’s hard to say who was more blessed by that event—him, or the emissary who was sent to save him from himself.

The law of the boomerang works both ways.  What you send out comes back again, but what you don’t send out can’t come back.

I once knew a couple that was a great puzzle to me.  They were the finest, friendliest people in the world.  They took their children to church every Sunday, and the husband served in every important calling.  But one of their boys ended up in prison, and all but one of their children left the Church.  Why? I wondered.  My heart ached for them.

One day years later it all came clear to me.  I realized I had never once heard the woman give a prayer, bear her testimony, or knew of her teaching a class at church.  She knew she wasn’t capable of doing such things, and routinely told the bishop “no” every time she was asked to do anything.

She was in church every Sunday; but her children had never heard her testimony, had never caught her on her knees in prayer, or seen her reading the scriptures.  If these things weren’t important to her, why should they be important to them?  She hadn’t cast any bread on the water, so there was nothing to come back.

There are other ways to lose children.  I have seen good members of the Church who have held onto a favorite vice or passion while otherwise being exemplary members of the Church.  My observation is that what such parents do in moderation, the children do to excess.

Conversely I see many good families where the children grow up to be better than their parents.  I’m convinced that it’s all about the quality of the bread that we cast upon the waters.  Sooner or later it’s going to return to us.  We must be very careful about our examples and the seeds that we purposely or inadvertently plant.

The Savior said, “...and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.”  (Matthew 7:2, 3 Nephi 14:2).

A sister missionary spoke in our ward last Sunday.  She used a phrase that I’ve never heard before, and which I’ve been playing with all week.  Her phrase is what has inspired the thoughts that I’ve had for this talk.  She mentioned “Paying it forward.”

Have you ever tried to get the Lord in debt to you?  It can’t be done.

King Benjamin taught, “And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you.

“And now, in the first place, he hath created you, and granted unto you your lives, for which ye are indebted unto him.

“And secondly, he doth require that ye should do as he hath commanded you; for which if ye do, he doth immediately bless you; and therefore he hath paid you.  And ye are still indebted unto him, and are, and will be, forever and ever...”  (Mosiah 2: 22-24).

Once upon a time my wife and I were facing a year where it was very important that we make an income that was double what we’d ever earned before.  At the beginning of the year we did something that we’d never done before, and haven’t done since.  We paid tithing on what we hoped to earn in the coming year.  It was double what we’d paid the year before.

I have no explanation for what happened except to testify that you can’t put the Lord in debt to you.  It was no little tithing that we paid, yet at the end of the year when we figured everything out, we still owed $7.00.

“Pay it forward,” the sister missionary said.  I’m not sure just what point she was trying to make, but I know that whatever we send out returns to us.  It’s critically important that we be sending out positive ripples.  It’s especially important for the young people and young parents to be “paying it forward” because whatever they are now is what their own children will be later.

Postscript:

I was invited to be the speaking companion of high councilor, Mike Webb, to speak to La Grande 1st Ward and La Grande 5th Branch on 16 October 2016.  Except for the last story (about tithing), I gave the above talk to La Grande 1st Ward.  However, I felt impressed to change everything before going to the 5th Branch.  The 5th Branch is composed of young single adults.  They needed to hear about their individual worth.  Therefore they didn’t hear anything about the law of the boomerang or about casting your bread upon the waters.

It was in the 5th Branch, however, that I had another experience of my bread returning to me.  Following the meeting a beautiful girl named Julia Bloom, the branch Relief Society president, came up and introduced herself to me.  She asked if I was the Kerns who had made the name assignments for the last handcart pioneer trek.  That would have been in 2013.

I replied that I was.  The stake Young Women and Young Men presidencies had asked me to prayerfully assign a name of someone from the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies to each of the youth who would be making the trek.  For the duration of the trek, they were to assume that pioneer’s name.

I prayed about the assignment, and asked for direction and inspiration.  I then studied the stories of each of the pioneers one-by-one, looked at the list of 200-plus young people, and put the name of the pioneer beside that of a stake young man or young woman.  It was a laborious process that took many days.  That much I remember.  Sister Bloom had to jog my memory about the rest.

She said, “Do you remember sending a letter to the stake Young Women’s president about a name that you’d initially assigned to another girl, but that you’d gone back and changed?  You assigned that name to me.  The name kept going over and over in your mind, and you knew that you’d assigned the name to the wrong person.  I wasn’t even going to go on the trek, but Karma Bedard sent me a copy of that letter.  I went on the trek, and it changed my life!  The woman you assigned to me, and Ephraim Hanks, were my great-great-great grandparents!

As Julia related the story, glimmers of memory came back to me.  I could dimly remember some pioneer’s name playing over and over again in my mind all one night.  I don’t remember doing anything with it, however, and I don’t remember writing a letter, but that’s exactly what I would have done.

That beautiful girl threw her arms around me and hugged me.  It took over three years, but the boomerang, or the bread, had made its circle, and came back to hit me right in the chest.  It brought tears to my eyes.

Postscript #2:

A week after speaking in La Grande, I received an anonymous, carefully-hand-printed letter in the mail:

Dear Brother Kerns,

I am not one who is very skilled with words, but I want to thank you the best I can.

Last Sunday, when you visited the Branch, you shared an experience that you had not planned to share.  I want you to know that I am, at least one reason, why you were prompted to tell your story.

You see, I have been all kinds of messed up in my mind for a few years now.  It has gotten extremely bad lately.  Even though I know God loves me and is mindful of me, He feels so out of reach to me.  I was very moved by your words of hope and encouragement.  To know that someone of your stature once struggled as I do gives me great hope that I too may be able to overcome and survive this mental anguish.

Thank you for living in a manner that allows the Holy Ghost to work through you.  And thank you for sharing your story and giving me hope.

With sincere gratitude.