The bottom of a high school locker in Tempe, Arizona, is not where most conversion stories begin. But that is where a black paperback book sat for months, tossed there by a teenage football player who knew only that it was a "churchy thing" from the girl who had just broken up with him. She had ended the relationship because she wanted a temple marriage, and he could not give her one. The book was called A Marvelous Work and a Wonder. He forgot about it. Then, one afternoon, still thinking about her and still wondering why her church mattered so much to her friends, he dug it out and started flipping through, looking for something he could make sense of.

That teenager was Chris Crowe, who went on to play football for Coach LaVell Edwards at BYU, teach English for 49 years across Arizona, Japan, Hawaii, and Provo, and become one of the most honored young adult authors in the country. His novel Mississippi Trial, 1955 won the International Reading Association's top award, and in 2024, the Association for Mormon Letters gave him their Lifetime Achievement Award.

In this episode of Why We Believe, host Nathan Gwilliam sits down with Chris to trace the path that began with those few paragraphs in his bedroom. What follows is a story about quiet certainty, unwanted answers, and a family that learned to go wherever the Lord asked.

A Few Paragraphs That Rang True

When Chris finally opened the book, he landed on a narrative about a boy who prayed in a forest and saw God the Father and Jesus Christ. There was no vision of his own, no jolt, not even a burning in his bosom. There was simply a knowing. Sitting in his bedroom in Tempe, Chris understood that the boy was not making up a story or trying to convince anyone of anything. He was reporting something that had happened to him.

That recognition carried a simple logic Chris still leans on today. If the First Vision really happened, then everything that flowed out of that encounter probably came from God. Within days, he called Elizabeth, the girl who had given him the book, and asked who he should talk to.

The missionary discussions were not a straight shot. The scripted lessons frustrated him, and it took an elder from the BYU wrestling team to help him see that members of the Church were regular people. But the foundation had already been laid, and it never moved.

A 36-Hour Fast and an Answer He Did Not Want

Chris had already accepted a football scholarship to BYU, and his plan was convenient: get baptized in Provo, far from a father who had absorbed years of ugly rumors about Latter-day Saints from a coworker. The missionaries asked him to fast and pray about the timing instead. Elizabeth fasted with him.

He had never fasted in his life, and as a multi-sport athlete it felt like withdrawal. After roughly 36 hours, he prayed and received an answer he did not want. He needed to tell his father, and he needed to be baptized now.

The night before his baptism, Chris sat his parents down. His father did not blow up, but he was steaming, and his mother cried. Later that night, his dad came to his room and told him that he had made his own decisions at that age, so Chris had the right to make his, even though he was sure it was the wrong one. Chris was baptized the next day, July 2, 1972. Exactly 47 years later, on July 2, 2019, he stood at the pulpit to give his BYU devotional.

What LaVell Edwards Taught Him About Leading Like Christ

Chris arrived at BYU expecting football to work the way it had always worked. His high school coaches came out of the Vince Lombardi and Frank Kush school, where losing meant a brutal Monday. Coach Edwards was different. After a poor game, there was no torture and no chewing out, only a focus on learning what went wrong and getting better.

Chris later realized Edwards had served as a bishop and ran the team almost like a ward, with a player council where each position group had a representative who met with him weekly. The humanity of it stunned a young lineman who did not know football could work that way.

The relationship outlasted the playing years. When Chris joined the BYU faculty in 1993, a welcome note from Edwards was waiting in his campus mailbox, with a joke that Chris could escape to the football office if the English department ever wore him out. Decades later, Edwards still remembered his parents by name.

Learning to Pray for Confirmation, Not Just Answers

The Crowes' life kept refusing to follow their plans. An eviction notice arrived with Chris's diploma. A dream job at his alma mater in Tempe ended when a district newsletter pointed him toward a teaching post in Japan. Years later, a university in Japan offered him a position for life, and Chris begged his bishop to just tell him what to do. The bishop laughed and refused. Chris and Elizabeth fasted, prayed, and felt the Lord wanted them to go, so they packed 12 suitcases for a country where their son would learn to read Japanese before English.

The pattern sharpened when BYU in Provo called while they were settled in Hawaii, a place they loved so much they had bought their burial plots there. Their prayers about leaving kept returning nothing, a stupor of thought. Then Elizabeth suggested they stop praying for answers and instead make a decision and ask the Lord to confirm it. When they decided to stay, the answer came back clearly: that is not the answer; you are not staying.

So they said goodbye to paradise and moved to Provo, where Chris taught for 33 years. The lesson became the heart of his devotional, The Undiscovered Country: you might think you know where you are going, but the Lord knows, and happiness comes by finding out what He wants and going where He wants you to go.

Why He Still Believes

At the end of the conversation, Nathan asked Chris the show's defining question. His answer went straight back to that bedroom in Tempe. He calls himself a simpleton in church matters compared to his scholarly friends because his testimony still rests on the same few paragraphs he read at 17. He knows Joseph Smith saw God the Father and Jesus Christ, he knows the Church the Lord founded through him is true, and he knows President Oaks is the prophet the Lord has chosen today.

The twists of history and the failings of people roll off his back because people are human, and his anchor was never people. It is the peace that comes from doing what the Lord asks, a peace he says he cannot imagine living without.

Key Takeaways

Chris Crowe's story shows that a testimony built on Christ alone, rather than on comfort or plans, holds steady through every change life brings. The Lord prepares His people for callings through seasons that only make sense in hindsight, and real faith means saying yes to His plan even when the answer contradicts everything already built. A spouse who invites more humble prayer is a gift from God, and the uncertainty of leaving security behind can deepen a testimony more than staying comfortable ever could.

Thank you for reading this week's blog post inspired by the Why We Believe show. If you are interested in more stories like this, you can check out our other blog posts and episodes at WhyWeBelieve.com, or listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

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