Elder Paul B. Pieper

Of the Seventy

Elder Paul B. Pieper

Because Elder Paul Bowen Pieper of the First Quorum of the Seventy has spent much of his life working with developing units of the Church, he has a strong testimony of the Lord’s guidance in the growth of the kingdom.

“The Lord knows who and what is needed for the growth of His kingdom and prepares the way,” says Elder Pieper. “He gives us the privilege of participating if we have willing hearts and minds.”

When Elder Pieper served as a branch president, a prompting came to call a less-active man as a counselor. That man is now a stake president and has supported the reestablishment of the Church in Nicaragua. Elder Pieper has seen this pattern repeated in other countries where he has served.

For the past six years, Elder Pieper and his family have lived in the former Soviet Union. They have witnessed the emergence of the Church in Kazakhstan and other countries of central Asia. At the time of his call, Elder Pieper was serving as president of the Russia St. Petersburg Mission. “This is the Lord’s Church,” Elder Pieper says. “He loves it. He wants it to spread throughout the world.”

In addition to crediting his parents and grandparents, Elder Pieper credits his wife, Melissa Tuttle Pieper—to whom he was married on November 7, 1979, in the Salt Lake Temple—and their six children with having helped him develop as a worthy father and priesthood holder.

Elder Pieper was born on October 7, 1957, in Pocatello, Idaho, to Dee Meyers Pieper and Norma Bowen Pieper. He studied international relations at Brigham Young University, then completed his bachelor’s degree in political science at the University of Utah, where he also received a law degree. Elder Pieper worked as an attorney and an international development consultant.

He has served in a stake presidency, on high councils, in branch presidencies, and as a full-time missionary in the Mexico Monterrey Mission.