This is a family story
from my uncle Ronald Frye (my mother Linda's brother) that has some
great lessons. This took place around 1997 when uncle Ron worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, a
nuclear weapons research facility. Below are my uncle's own words
from his autobiography about an inspiring event that took place while he was on the job:
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| Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory |
"During my last years
at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, in a job with the Procurement Department, any opportunity that came along which was in
any way remotely associated with something technical, I snatched up.
Such was the case with a problem that had been plaguing the
Procurement Department for years... that of creating some sort of
computer-based system for evaluating companies with whom the lab was
doing business. Now for one reason or another, Procurement just
couldn't seem to get its act together to solve this problem. Attempts
were made over the years, but a satisfactory solution was never
realized.
"So, to make a long
story short, I created a database, which was based on File Maker Pro,
to evaluate those companies. I programmed this application so that
quality assurance data would automatically be gathered from some of
the lab's other computers, and based on that data a letter grade
would be assigned to each company, much like the grading system used
in our school system.
"Being in the Quality
Assurance group of Procurement, and in a position I thought ideal for
solving this problem – after all, I was evaluating the quality
assurance programs of companies with whom we were doing business –
I started to think about it, and act on it, in my spare time, usually
during lunch hour.
"Now the version of
File Maker Pro I was using was not designed to plot graphs of data,
but I wanted that feature to be a part of the program. Something in
the back of my mind told me it could be done, albeit through a
"back-door" approach. During one of those working
lunchtimes, I closed the door to my office, got down on my knees, and
asked the Lord for help to solve this problem. Very clearly, the
answer came to my mind: "You will find the answer on page 'xx'
of the technical manual." Sure enough, turning to that page
revealed what could be done to solve this problem.
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| My Uncle Ronald Frye May 1998 |
"Shortly thereafter,
the project was completed, and I showed it to my boss, who contacted
his boss and urged him to come see what I had done. Not only did he
come, but many other Procurement managers as well. The word spread
like wildfire! They about "dropped their teeth" when they
saw what I had done in my spare time, something their high-paid
software engineers had been unable to do for years. I guess they were
really impressed, because I received an award and a raise at our next
big division meeting.
"Now how would the
Holy Spirit [of God] know about the contents of a software technical
manual? I don't know. But it just goes to show that the scriptures
are correct when they said the Spirit [of God] can help us know the truth of
ALL things."
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