Elder Jerald L. Taylor

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Elder Jerald L. Taylor

“As farmers and ranchers, we had to depend on the Lord,” says Elder Jerald L. Taylor, who grew up in the Latter-day Saint colony of Colonia Dublan in Chihuahua, Mexico. “We had no deep wells for irrigation, so we relied on man-made lakes. If rain didn’t fill them, we had no water. I remember many family and ward fasts that resulted in some wonderful blessings.”

Elder Taylor’s great-grandfather drove a wagon into Salt Lake Valley after Brigham Young’s, and his grandfather helped settle Colonia Juarez in Mexico. Elder Taylor was born in Colonia Dublan on 22 March 1937 and has lived there all his life except during college and missions. His mother passed away when he was three, and later his father married a widow who had nine children, making a total of 15 children.

Jerald Taylor took time off from attending Brigham Young University to serve a mission to Argentina. Then he met his wife, Sharon Willis, a few months before he graduated from BYU with a degree in animal husbandry. Married in the Manti Temple on 5 July 1963, the Taylors have six children and four grandchildren. Elder Taylor has earned his living raising beef cattle and growing apples.

His Church experience has included serving as a branch president, stake mission president, stake executive secretary, and stake president. In 1986 he was called to preside over the Chile Santiago South Mission. Upon his return to Mexico, he was called as a bishop and later as a regional representative. He was serving as an Area Authority at the time of his call to the Second Quorum of the Seventy.

“I’m grateful for my heritage,” Elder Taylor says. “The people of the colonies have shown me what sacrifice and obedience mean. The Church has been everything in my life. I’m grateful for the gospel.”