"You have become stranded on a cliff, a couple of hundred feet below and above safe ground. Rescuers have located a rope, but it is just long enough to reach down to you; there is no way to secure it, so you won't be able to rappel down; the only way to go is up. It will be tough - footholds and handholds are scarce. Whom would you choose as your belayer, your lifeline, the one you would trust most with your life?"

Predictably, most of the kids wrote tributes to a mother, a father, a brother, a favorite uncle or skilled mountaineers. My choice was neither a relative nor fearsomely strong.

Although I had known the man for most of my life, I didn't start paying attention to him until I was a pre-teenager. He was the soft-spoken first counselor in our LDS Stake presidency for what seemed like an eternity. When I first heard him speak from the podium at stake conference - and every time thereafter -- I assumed he was the visiting general authority. He sounded so calm, self-assured, kind.

My first lasting impression came during a routine family dinner in his home. I was a middle-teen then. His blessing on the food included a brief family prayer. It was like no other prayer I had heard before. I had the distinct impression that he was having a one-on-one, frank and open exchange with the Lord.

A few years later I found myself wrestling with God, like lots of young people do. I had read just enough history to be troublesome; absorbed just enough philosophy to have doubts, and knew just enough math to know that some things in life just don't add up.

So there we sat on the lawn behind his modest white-clapboard cottage in East Millcreek talking about the meaning of life, God, and, especially, the church. I couldn't get up the nerve to ask some blunt questions, so we waltzed around my "doubts" and so on for some time until finally he said something like, "Well, you've told me all about doubts, how about telling me about what you don't doubt. There must be a few things about the gospel, the church you believe to be true." I ticked off a few fairly safe ones and a couple of provocative ones for good measure. He looked me square in the eyes and said: "Hold on tight to what you know to be true and let it lead you to all the rest." I am still applying his advice.

When the time came to serve a mission, I assumed it would be to Japan or Hong Kong or Korea. By then, my life line was supervising all the missions in that part of the world. Many of my friends were serving there as well. When my lifeline called to offer his congratulations on my assignment to New England, I told him my surprise at not being called to the Far East.

There was thoughtful silence on the line. "What is the date on your call?"

I read it off.

"Ah," he said, audibly relieved. "I was out of town that week."

I laughed loudly, then teased. "I thought missionary callings were supposed to be inspired."

"Oh they are," he insisted. "They're like an inspired game of darts: if you know the young man, it helps you aim the dart a little better."

I served the mission, returned to college, wrote my essay about him, and went off to New York to write for Time. But I kept track of him; I read all his speeches; saved news clips about him. I learned that he had once wanted to be a journalist -- that he too had once dreamed of writing for Time Magazine.

He was a serious man, but did not want for a sense of humor. A friend, a particularly snappy, colorful dresser and now an LDS stake president in New York City was asked to give a closing prayer in a business meeting that included my "lifeline."

"That was a particularly fine prayer," he said. "And the Lord may have taken you more seriously if he wasn't distracted by your snazzy tie."

He always stood for truth, decency and kindness. Stood up for people, the lucky and unlucky, the rich and poor and insisted that they talk to each other. Like a good boy scout, he strove to leave the "camp site" in better shape than he found it.

I believe the record will show that no mortal man - except Joseph Smith and Brigham Young -- had a greater influence on The Church of Jesus Christ than the man I described in a college essay 40 years ago when he was a young apostle.

If I were stranded on a granite cliff today, I would want Gordon Bitner Hinckley manning the rope. He was my counselor, my lifeline and friend.

-- RONALD B. SCOTT is a Boston-based journalist. This essay was adapted from a speech he made in his LDS ward before Gordon B. Hinckley died Sunday.