Nathan Gowen, 18-year-old son of Michael and Doralee Solomon Gowen, will report to the Missionary Training Center (MTC) of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Provo, Utah, on Wednesday, July 12, 2017. After two weeks of intensive training, Elder Gowen will travel to the Idaho Pocatello Mission, where he will serve for two years.
Nathan, a 2017 honor graduate of Coffee High School, is a Zell Miller Scholar and an Eagle Scout. Following in the footsteps of his father, Michael Gowen, who served in the California Oakland (Laotian speaking) Mission, Elder Gowen has joined the ranks of more than 71,000 full-time LDS missionaries serving throughout the world. Nathan has voluntarily put aside many personal interests including college, work, and dating for 24 months to share the gospel of Jesus Christ in the Pocatello area. Elder Gowen will serve at his own expense. Communication with his family will be limited to weekly e-mails and letters so that he can better focus on being an effective missionary.
Elder Gowen has a rich heritage of missionary service in his family. Great-grandparents, Wilford and Ruby Fussell served in the North Carolina Raleigh Mission; uncle Glynn Solomon – Arizona Tucson Mission, uncle Clifton Solomon – Argentina Rosario Mission, uncle Andrew Solomon – Venezuela Caracas Mission; and a host of other family members who have served all over the world.
Christ’s church has always been a missionary-minded church. After the resurrection of the Savior, He gathered His apostles on a mountain in Galilee and instructed them: “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” Matthew 28:19