Hank Smith:                      00:02                   Hey welcome to followHIM Favorites. This is where John and I share a single story to go with each week’s lesson. Now, John, this week’s favorite is going to be different than any we’ve done before. Instead of telling a story that fits the scriptures, I’m actually going to tell the story of the guest that we have on our show. His name is Dr. John White.

John Bytheway:               00:23                   Incredible.

Hank Smith:                      00:24                   I’m going to read a little bit of what he has written about his conversion story. He said when he was young, they moved nine times during his childhood. So that’s quite a bit. He said, “The house was not a happy one.” He said, “I would hear my mother crying. I knew my father drank too much, even as a kid. I didn’t always know which father I was going to get, the happy one or the angry one.” He said there’s a lot of shame in his childhood home.

                                           00:52                   He felt like a stranger, he said, in his own house, like a guest who had to measure up, right, to earn his place. Then John, get this. He gets into drinking pretty heavily as well. He says at Indiana University, he was kicked out of a fraternity. I shouldn’t laugh at this, but it is ironic. He was kicked out of a fraternity for partying too hard. Now, that’s got to be impressive. I’ve never been in a fraternity, but I’ve heard stories, and I think that’s part of the point. And they’re like, “Whoa, you’re going overboard.”

John Bytheway:               01:21                   Yeah, that’s a lot of partying.

Hank Smith:                      01:23                   Now, listen to what he says. He says, “I was alone and empty. And in that emptiness, God found me.” So he finds a Christian minister. They’re sitting at a lunch. They’re having a meal. And the minister says to him, he said, “I’d never heard this sentence ever. John, God loves you. He has a wonderful plan for your life.” He said, “Now, I’d heard of a distant God, a formal God, a God you say the prayer to before you eat, but I’d never heard of a God who loved me.” So he says, “In February 1989, in a library cafeteria with students eating and laughing around me, I bowed my head and gave my life to Jesus.” And he calls that his first conversion. He says what follows after that are like a campus ministry with his wonderful wife, Cindy. He got a doctorate degree in theology. John, you know, that’s a big deal.

John Bytheway:               02:16                   Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      02:17                   They moved to Scotland for that. Then he becomes a professor at Baylor University. Now, John, you know that Baylor is a very Christian university. Then John says some really dark, difficult things happen. He doesn’t go into the details. He just said, “It was a long season of professional exclusion.” So it sounds like it was pretty dark time. He said, “At the time, the breaking, the difficulty, the pain, the loneliness felt just like that. Difficult, painful, and lonely.” But he says, “Looking back now, I can see that God was emptying the cup before he filled it. He was not punishing me. He was interrupting me.” Isn’t that interesting? He was not punishing me. He was interrupting me. He said, “I needed to learn that my worth was not earned. It wasn’t proven. It wasn’t built. He could give it to me.” Okay. So then the big day comes. He actually gives the exact day. October 25th, 2023. He’s presenting a paper at an academic conference in Texas. In the room, sat a young Latter-Day Saint scholar. John, you know her. Dr. Janae Nelson. We’ve had her on our show.

                                           03:28                   She’s a BYU professor. He said, “I did not know her, but during my presentation…” Listen to this, John. Do miracles cease? “During this presentation, I was distracted because there was a bright light over her.” He says, it was real. It wasn’t just a, like, a metaphorical light. He said, “It was real. It was disorienting. I’m a trained theologian. Proof and reason. Those are the tools that I use.” He’s like this should not be happening. He later talked to Dr. Nelson, asking her about the light, and she, you know, she has no idea what he’s talking about. There was no light over me. He’s like, “No, there was a light over you.” Well, over the next little while, he has a couple of conversations with Janae, who we’ve talked to, and also Elder Kim Clark, who has been a general authority. He’s been a commissioner, I think, of church education, president of BYU Idaho, right?

                                           04:22                   He said, “In these conversations, these were not debates.” Now, listen to what he says. He says, “I had to give place as Alma says, for a seed to be planted.” It was emails and texts. He met BYU students and BYU faculty in this whole thing. “In June of 2024, I received my first copy of the Book of Mormon.” Now, John, you’re going to love this. I know you love the Book of Mormon. He says, “Reading the Book of Mormon did not overwhelm me. It enlarged me.” What do you think?

John Bytheway:               04:51                   Great word.

Hank Smith:                      04:52                   It didn’t overwhelm me. I wasn’t blown away. I was just, I was filled. He said, “It enlarged me. It swelled within me and began to be delicious ” Then he says, “In July,” so the month later, “I attended my first sacrament meeting. There was no bread. The microphone failed. It was disorganized. And I felt very embarrassed for the young men. By every rational metric, it was kind of a disaster. But then we sang, I will walk with Jesus.” He said, “The Holy Ghost entered the room and took my guard down.” Don’t you love that, the language he’s using? Now there’s voices competing inside of him. He said the voices were loud. Voices like, “If you get baptized, what happens to your job?” “All your training.” The voice said, “Listen, serious theologians don’t do this kind of thing. You’ll lose your people. You already know Jesus. Why make this change?” A persistent voice. “Don’t do it. Later. Not yet. Just wait.”

                                           05:49                   Then he visits Palmyra, New York. Probably not a good idea if you’re trying to resist the Spirit. He said, “The light that began that day when I was in that conference,” what we talked about earlier, he said “it completed or found an answer in the sacred grove.” On January 1st, 2025, he said, “I gave up alcohol. My father was an alcoholic and I knew where that road ended.” He said, “Now, giving up alcohol was not about me being superior. It was entering the conditions for spiritual perception.”

John Bytheway:               06:21                   Beautiful.

Hank Smith:                      06:22                   He’s like, “I had to become more spiritually sensitive, and alcohol was not helping that.” So then the light followed that act of faith. Then the day comes, John, October 26th, 2025. So not even a year ago, “I was baptized and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.” Now, John, listen to this. “I did not find a different Jesus.”

John Bytheway:               06:48                   Thank you.

Hank Smith:                      06:49                   That’s often what’s said about us, John. We believe in a different Jesus. He says “it is not a different Jesus. It is a deeper participation with the same Jesus. Not a replacement, a restoration.”

John Bytheway:               07:02                   This is a theologian.

Hank Smith:                      07:04                   A trained theologian. He finishes with this. “I testify that Heavenly Father lives. He has a face. He is a father. The father I was hungry for all my life. I testify that Jesus Christ is His beloved Son who suffered not only for my sins, but for my sadness. And that His love precedes our worth. I testify that the Holy Ghost is the comforter who dwells in us. I testify that the Book of Mormon is true, and that Joseph Smith saw what he said he saw. I testify that Christ does not stop healing ever.”

John Bytheway:               07:40                   So beautiful. I’m so excited for our listeners to hear his story and to hear his commentary on the Psalms. They’re just so good.

Hank Smith:                      07:48                   Yeah. So if you loved this story, you’re going to love hearing from the man himself. Dr. John White, he joins us for the book of Psalms. It was actually part of his master’s thesis was in the book of Psalms. And he also then tells us a little bit more about his experiences in joining the church and also the effects of it, John. Like his job is on the line. His friendships are tested. We hope you’ll join us on our full podcast. It’s called followHIM. You can get it wherever you get your podcast. We’d love for you to hear from Dr. White. Then come back here next week. We’ll do another followHIM Favorites.