Religious educator balances humor, doctrine

PROVO, Utah — John Hilton III is grateful for the editors at Deseret Book who

help him affix clever wording to his published works. While he'd be

content with something simple, he knows that designations like "I Lost

My Phone Number, Can I Have Yours?" and "The Dog Ate My Scriptures" can

serve as "attention-getters."

But he also realizes that catchy titles — and humorous stories, for that matter — only go so far.

"What's important to me is not so much the attention-getter, but the doctrine behind it," said Hilton, a Seattle native.

Hilton, a 31-year-old religious instructor at Brigham Young

University, is a one-time business management major who's grateful that

his life took a detour into teaching. Since becoming involved with the

Church Educational System while a student at BYU, Hilton has gone on to

teach seminary, earn a master's degree at Harvard and become a presence

in programs such as Especially for Youth, Campus Education Week and

Time Out for Women and Girls.

A teaching career that began as a student instructor at a seminary

in Spanish Fork has taken Hilton from Nyssa, Ore., to Boston, Miami and

back to Provo, where he met his wife, Lani, while they were students at

BYU. The two were introduced when Hilton attended a volunteer student

leadership class that Lani was teaching, and she also taught seminary

part-time.

"It was something that we both really loved," he said.

A writer and speaker who has six published works to his credit,

Hilton has covered topics ranging from youth dating to evidences of the

authenticity of the Book of Mormon. Being a religious educator, he