Gospel Story Finder

Another time when prayer was significant in my life was when I had just graduated from high school and was working on a ranch in Idaho. I worked with two other fellows who were involved in athletics with me but who were at that time not very active in the Church. They went off in the evenings and did things that I didn’t want to do.
That left me with a lot of time alone. For six to eight weeks, I was mostly by myself after dinner so I began to study the scriptures. There were no computer games and no television to distract me, and soon I began to love the scriptures. I could hardly wait to finish work and get back to my reading. Scripture study, coupled with prayer, really made my testimony grow. I recommend that everyone be alone with his scriptures for a while.

But there are others in our everyday lives. My most memorable one had to do with modesty.
Some years ago, my daughter was invited by her boyfriend (now husband) to attend a very important work event that needed a reasonably formal dress. They went shopping and came back with this very cute but totally immodest dress. This was on a Tuesday, and the function was on the Friday. They had a minor request of me. “Please, adapt this for it to be modest enough for me to wear comfortably,” my daughter asked. Their trusting eyes and faith in me was touching but misplaced. I was effectively a non-sewer.
After succumbing to a panic attack, I figured that I was in the same boat as Nephi had been. Maybe not. I did at least own a good sewing machine. I beseeched the Lord for help, and quickly. I was a working mom, so I only had a few evenings to perform a miracle.
We found some fabric that could help. This was a strapless dress with a laced-up bodice showing lots of back. Straps were made, a bolero jacket covered bare shoulders, but the back was still a problem. I managed to fashion an insert to go behind the lacing, and at the end of it, it looked pretty good. We dubbed it the “Minnie Mouse” dress, as the black on red spots reminded us of her. That dress represented a very spiritual experience for me. I prayed at almost every stitch! The Lord gave me inspiration where I had no knowledge and guided my hands every inch of the way. Now I wonder why I didn’t call on more knowledgeable sewing friends. The idea didn’t occur to me. As a result, I had the most tangible experience of relying on the Lord to date.

As you know, the Brethren used to announce in general conference the names of those who had been called on missions. Not only was this the way friends and neighbors learned of the call, more often than not it was the way the missionary learned of it as well. One such prospect was Eli H. Peirce. A railroad man by trade, he had not been very faithful in Church meetings, “even had my inclinations led in that direction, which I frankly confess they did not,” he admitted. His mind had been given totally to what he demurely calls “temporalities.” He said he had never read more than a few pages of scripture in his life, that he had spoken to only one public gathering (an effort which he says “was no credit to himself” or those who heard him), and he used the vernacular of the railroad and bar room with a finesse born of long practice. He bought cigars wholesale—a thousand at a time—and he regularly lost his paycheck playing pool. Then this classic understatement:
“Nature never endowed me with a superabundance of religious sentiment or veneration; my region of spirituality [was] not high, but below the average.”

Well, the Lord knew what Eli Peirce was, and he knew something else. He knew what I’m pleading for today. He knew what Eli Peirce could become. When the call came that October 5, 1875, Eli wasn’t even in the Tabernacle. He was out working on one of the railroad lines. A fellow employee, once he recovered from the shock of it all, ran out to telegraph the startling news. Brother Peirce writes, “At the very moment this intelligence was being flashed over the wires, I was sitting lazily thrown back in an office rocking chair, my feet on the desk, reading a novel and simultaneously sucking an old Dutch pipe, … just to vary the monotony of cigar smoking.” (To my friends in the English department, I would just hasten to add that the novel reading was probably a more serious transgression than the pipe smoking.)
He goes on: “As soon as I had been informed of what had taken place, I threw the novel in the waste basket, the pipe in a corner and started up town to buy [scripture]. Have never read a novel nor smoked a pipe from that hour. Sent in my resignation … to take effect at once, in order that I might have time for study and preparation.”
Then these stirring words: “Remarkable as it may seem, and has since appeared to me, a thought of disregarding the call, or of refusing to comply with the requirement, never once entered my mind. The only question I asked myself a thousand times … was: ‘How can I accomplish this mission? How can I, who am so shamefully ignorant and untaught in doctrine, do honor to God and justice to the souls of men, and merit the trust reposed in me by the Priesthood?’”

With such genuine humility fostering resolution rather than defeating it, Eli Peirce fulfilled a remarkable mission. His journal could appropriately close on a completely renovated life with this one line: “Throughout our entire mission we were greatly blessed.” But I add one experience to make the point.
During the course of his missionary service, Brother Peirce was called in to administer to the infant child of a branch president whom he knew and loved. Unfortunately the wife of the branch president had become embittered and now seriously objected to any religious activity within the home, including a blessing for this dying child. With the mother refusing to leave the bedside and the child too ill to move, this humble branch president with his missionary friend retired to a small upper room in the house to pray for the baby’s life. The mother, suspecting just such an act, sent one of the older children to observe and report back.
There in that secluded chamber, the two men knelt and prayed fervently until, in Brother Peirce’s own words, “we felt that the child would live and knew that our prayers had been heard.” Arising from their knees, they turned slowly only to see the young girl standing in the partially open doorway gazing intently into the room. She seemed, however, quite oblivious to the movements of the two men. She stood entranced for some seconds, her eyes immovable.
Then she said, “Papa, who was that … man in there?”
Her father said, “Brother Peirce.”
“No,” she said matter-of-factly, “I mean that other man.”
“There was no other, darling, except Brother Peirce and myself; we were praying for baby.”
“Oh, yes, there was;” the child insisted, “I saw him standing [above] you and Brother Pierce and he was all dressed in white.”

Now if God in his heavens will do that for a repentant, old, cigar-smoking, inactive, stern, swearing pool player, don’t you think he’ll do it for you? He will if your resolve is as deep and permanent as Eli Peirce’s. In this Church we ask for faith, not infallibility. (Eliza R. Snow, Biography and Family Record of Lorenzo Snow, 1884, pp. 407–13.)

On several occasions President Boyd K. Packer, Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, has described an experience he had during a leadership training meeting in which a bishop indicated he couldn’t get anyone to serve as the ward Primary president. The frustrated bishop said he had talked to nine different sisters in the ward, and not one of them had agreed to accept the call.

President Packer told the bishop he knew why none of the sisters had agreed to serve: “You asked them—you didn’t call them.” President Packer said that if the call had been extended properly, it would not have taken nine attempts to get someone to accept the call.

Through service to others, we develop a Christlike love and we experience joy. Service teaches patience and long-suffering as well as gentleness, goodness, and faith. The Bruce and Joyce Erickson family of Centerville, Utah, illustrates this process. The Ericksons were blessed with six children, three who are strong and healthy and three who suffered from a rare genetic disease called glutaric acidemia, which causes a spastic, permanent type of paralysis (see Bruce and Joyce Erickson, When Life Doesn’t Seem Fair [1995], 280–81).

The two oldest children, Michelle and Lara, were blessed with healthy bodies. Cindy, the third child, was normal for the first seven months of her life, but then the disease overtook her. For 18 years doctors were unable to diagnose the problem. Terror struck the family as they tried to understand and deal with Cindy’s suffering. Sister Erickson sometimes spent seven hours a day trying to feed her, and Cindy cried day and night and seldom slept more than 45 minutes in a 24-hour period. At the time of her death in 1995, Cindy was one of the oldest persons with the disease. She never was able to walk or talk. Her body was constantly racked by the twisting and contracting of her muscles, and she weighed less than 25 kilograms as a young adult.

When Cindy reached a point in her development that was a little less demanding, the Ericksons had a fourth child, Heidi, and then a fifth, Heather. Heather developed normally for the first six or seven months, but then she, too, started showing subtle yet troubling symptoms. Sister Erickson decided to take Heather to a doctor, but he could see nothing wrong. Unconvinced, Sister Erickson made an appointment for Heather to see a physical therapist.

A few days before the appointment, the visiting teachers came by. When they asked how the family was doing, Sister Erickson mentioned her concern about Heather’s development and indicated she was taking the baby to see a physical therapist on Friday.

“Little did I realize,” Sister Erickson writes, “but at that moment the ‘still small voice’ whispered to those wonderful sisters that I would need help on Friday. So, acting on that prompting by the Spirit, one visiting teacher volunteered to watch Heidi, and the other one later secretly called Bruce and arranged to get a key to our house so she could clean our kitchen while I was gone.
“Friday finally came. As I drove Heather to the clinic, I had a sick feeling in my stomach, a lump in my throat, and a prayer in my heart. I was trying to muster the courage to accept that which I had already suspected” (When Life Doesn’t Seem Fair, 17–18).

The therapist confirmed Joyce’s fears, and she felt devastated. After an hour with her husband at his workplace, where they shared a heartfelt prayer, Sister Erickson headed home. As she opened the front door, she was immediately hit by the aroma of freshly baked bread. She saw that the dishes were done, the kitchen counters were spotless, the floor was mopped and waxed, there was a new tablecloth on the table, and the stove and refrigerator were clean. The kitchen was immaculate! When she walked into the living room, she saw that the floor had been vacuumed, the furniture dusted, and freshly cut flowers in a new vase had been placed on the television. With a heart less heavy, she went upstairs. The beds were made, the bedrooms and bathrooms were spotless, and the laundry was done.

As she entered her bedroom to pray, her previously heavy heart was filled with gratitude and love—gratitude for the gospel and an immense love for her visiting teachers, who had followed the promptings of the Spirit and asked five other sisters to help.

“Although their cleaning my house didn’t change anything about Heather’s handicap,” Sister Erickson writes, “it helped me focus on something outside my immediate feelings of hurt and pain, and it helped me see that I really did have blessings to be thankful for. In a very real sense, it lightened my load and, in the process, taught me once again that the way we help each other is by serving and ‘bearing one another’s burdens, that they may be light.’ How grateful I am to have learned that lesson, for I believe it is central to the entire gospel plan” (When Life Doesn’t Seem Fair, 19).

I wonder what feelings the seven sisters had after baking the bread, cleaning the house, and doing the laundry. I have not heard their side of the story, but I suspect that peace and joy filled their hearts. Special feelings of love and gentleness must have pervaded their spirits. Increased faith must have swelled within them. The greatest miracle of the Atonement is the power Jesus Christ has to change our character if we come to Him with a broken heart and a contrite spirit.

While riding the bus on a school field trip, I was sitting in front of a girl who kept making rude comments and jokes that made me feel uncomfortable. My teachers and other students told her to stop, but she kept going. I didn’t know what to do, so I decided to pull out my iPod and listen to some of my favorite music.
I turned it on shuffle and one of the first songs that came on was a song from lds.org/youth/music. I was about to skip over it when something inside told me that I should just listen to the music. I kept listening to inspirational music for the next 20 minutes. The lyrics encouraged me to hold on, and they reminded me that I was a beloved daughter of Heavenly Father.
I know that music can have a profound influence in our lives. I know that listening to the inspirational music on my iPod a couple of days before had helped give me the courage I needed to leave the dance. These experiences helped me get much closer to my Heavenly Father.

I was in New York some time ago. I told the Saints I met with there that the president asked them all to be missionaries. I said, “Now, won’t you all stop and think for a minute of someone you know who isn’t a member of the Church—someone you work with, your neighbor, your friend, or a relative—someone you can bring to a knowledge of the truth? They will love you for it throughout the eternities. It would be worth more to them than if you would give them a million dollars.”
Not long after that I received a letter from a young man in Houston, Texas. He had been in New York attending a convention in his particular field and had attended our meeting. The letter went like this. He said, “Brother Richards, I heard you invite each one of us to be an instrument in the hands of the Lord in bringing someone to the knowledge of the truth. I wrote a letter to my wife and told her that I had a proposition to make to her when I came home.” When he got home he told her what I had said. He said, “There is a young man who works in the office with me. He knows I’m a Mormon, but I have never told him why. I would like to invite him over, with his wife, for supper some night. After supper we will have something to talk about.”
To make this story short, he wrote me a two-page letter telling me the joy he had had in leading this man and his wife into the waters of baptism. I have since met them down in Houston. I believe he is now the stake president of the Sunday School.

Darrell Bevell had a decision to make. It wasn’t an easy one.
Growing up as the son of a football coach, Darrell had always enjoyed sports, whether it was basketball, baseball, or football. If his parents wanted to keep him happy, they put a ball in his hand. Consequently, whatever sport was in season Darrell was playing it. Big ball in the winter, small ball in the spring, oval ball in the fall. He was a good basketball and baseball player, but it was football where he really excelled. And as a quarterback it had always been Darrell’s goal to earn a football scholarship to a major college.
“I had been recruited by Arizona State, Washington, New Mexico, BYU, Utah, and Wyoming. Most of the big schools in the West were interested in me,” says Darrell. “I had a really good junior year and played well in the first two games of my senior season when I broke a finger on my throwing hand. I missed the rest of the season, and most of the teams that were recruiting me backed off because of the injury.”
Darrell eventually signed to play football at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. It wasn’t exactly a big-time college football program as had been his plan, but school would be paid for and he was going to play college football.
“When I signed for that scholarship to play football, that was my dream. That’s what I always wanted to do. Right then I said, ‘Nope. I’m not going on a mission.’ I didn’t stop and really think about it because I got caught up in the excitement and everything.” That was the spring of 1988.
After signing with Northern Arizona, Darrell headed north from his home in Scottsdale, a suburb of Phoenix, to Flagstaff for two-a-day football practices in August. All he had on his mind was football. The mission thing had been decided, he thought.
“During those summer practices, I had been playing pretty well,” Darrell recalls. “But for some odd reason, right before the season started, it popped into my head, ‘Go on a mission.’ I knew I was about ready to turn 19, and I was still going to church every Sunday. But I again said, ‘Nope. I’m not going on a mission.’”
And that’s when an amazing turn of events took place. Almost immediately after deciding for the second time he wouldn’t go on a mission, Darrell began struggling on the field. “It was really amazing. A guy would go out for a short pattern and I’d throw the ball at his feet,” Darrell says. “So I called my dad and told him how this dang mission kept popping into my head and that I was starting to play terrible.”
Darrell’s father, Jim, told him to think about a mission and then pray about what he should do. “I did that, but I told the Lord in my prayer that I couldn’t quit the team because the season had already begun. I did promise the Lord that as soon as the season was over I’d begin thinking about a mission,” he recalls.
There was only one problem with that plan. When the season ended, Darrell didn’t think about a mission again. He had redshirted during his freshman season, so even though he was a sophomore in school, he was still only a freshman in football eligibility. And when the Lumberjacks’s starting quarterback the previous two years went down with an injury in spring practice, Darrell emerged as the number one quarterback. His dream had finally come true. He was going to be the starting quarterback for Northern Arizona University.
“After everything had been decided and I had talked to the coaches about being the starter, boom, going on a mission popped right back into my head,” says Darrell. “It had been a long time since I’d even thought about going on a mission, so I started praying about it. I kept praying and praying until I finally knew a mission is what I needed to do. I already knew the Church was true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. I just decided I should go on a mission too.”
Now he had a problem of a different sort. For two years, Darrell had been concentrating on football and telling everybody he wasn’t going on a mission. Now that he had decided to serve the Lord, he had to tell his coach he wouldn’t be his quarterback. Driving to Flagstaff with his father to break the news to the coaching staff, Darrell had a good case of butterflies in his stomach. “When I got to his office, I was really nervous,” he says.
After the quarterback and the coach shook hands, Darrell said, “Coach, I’m going to go on a mission for my church. I’m not going to come back next season.”
Obviously, finding out your starting quarterback is leaving the team for two years isn’t the kind of news that helps a coach sleep well at night. After hearing Darrell’s decision, he began trying to dissuade him. Darrell listened as his coach told him how football players who go on missions lose their drive to play after they return home, and how he was throwing away a chance at stardom. “I was believing a lot of what he was saying. But I’ve always been the kind of person who makes a decision then sticks to it. That’s something I’ve always tried to do. Since I’d already made my decision to go, it wasn’t that hard, regardless of what the coach was saying.”
So long, Flagstaff, Arizona. Hello, Cleveland Ohio Mission.
“I had a great experience, and I loved my mission. The work was really going well there, and we had a lot of good missionaries,” Darrell says. “Of course, I wanted to play football after my mission, but I figured the Lord would take care of that. I had always wanted to play football, and somehow I knew it was going to work out.”
When Darrell’s mission was almost complete, he began thinking more and more about football. He knew the coaching staff at Northern Arizona had been fired, so he was an unknown commodity to the new coaching staff there. The great mystery in Darrell Bevell’s life was where he was going to go to college. Would he ever get to stand on the field and throw balls to open receivers? Would anybody offer him a scholarship?
One of his assistant coaches at Northern Arizona had taken a job as an assistant at the University of Wisconsin, and he remembered Darrell. In need of another quarterback in the program, the assistant got in contact with Darrell’s dad and asked if he thought his son would be interested in playing football in Wisconsin. Considering Wisconsin competes in one of the country’s top football conferences, and that it plays its home games in a 75,000-seat stadium, Darrell’s dad figured he might be able to persuade his son to check out the school.
After he finished his mission in October of 1991, Darrell made his recruiting trip to the University of Wisconsin and became convinced that was the place for him. “I basically decided then that I wanted to go there,” he says. He sat out the entire 1991 season and got ready for 1992.
During his freshman season of 1992, Darrell broke into the starting lineup in Wisconsin’s second game against Bowling Green State, and helped engineer a win over then number-12 ranked Ohio State in the Badgers’s fourth game. What made that victory all the better is that it was televised nationally by ESPN. Needless to say, a lot of people in Scottsdale, as well as those who knew him as Elder Bevell in Ohio, were crowded around their television sets. A shoulder injury hampered his play the remainder of the season, but he still completed 51 percent of his passes and threw for eight touchdowns. The future is extremely bright for Darrell as he prepares for his sophomore season. And the missionary work continues.
“It seems like every time an article is written about me, the first thing it says is my name and that I’m a member of the Church or that I’m a returned missionary,” he adds. “If I were at BYU, nobody would have cared. It would have been the same old story. But here at Wisconsin, not that many people know about the Church so it’s a bigger deal.”
A big deal just like Wisconsin’s victory over Ohio State. However, Darrell still knows that was just one game, and winning football games isn’t the most important thing in his life. “Beating Ohio State on national television was nice, but how long does that last?” he asks. “Seeing someone going into the waters of baptism is so great. I remember I was able to baptize a woman the day before I went home from my mission. I know that ordinance is something that is going to last forever. It’s something I’ll always remember. I don’t think that when we get into the afterlife someone’s going to say, ‘How about that one drive against Ohio State when you were five for five and you were able to pull it out on national television?’ But I might see that woman I baptized and have her come up to me and give me a big hug and say thank you very much.”
Maybe it’s a little strange to Wisconsin football fans that while most 23-year-olds have already graduated from college, Darrell Bevell is only a sophomore. Maybe Darrell’s teammates can’t understand why he would take two years off from football, not make a cent on his mission, and not be able to go to movies, watch TV, or date while he was a missionary. Maybe they never will understand. But Darrell does. In his life, he’s glad his job on the football field didn’t interfere with his call to the mission field.

This last year, Allyx has had a lot going on. She has a brain tumor. Most of the time, her hand and voice shake because of the tumor. Sometimes she has to go to the hospital for chemotherapy treatments. They make her feel weak and tired. When she feels better, we play again.
When Allyx has to be in the hospital, my mom and dad take me to see her. We have fun visiting her there, but I like it better when she gets to come home.
My mom and dad have been teaching me that when I am baptized, it doesn’t just mean that I’m a member of Jesus Christ’s church. It also means that I make special promises with Heavenly Father and Jesus. Some of them are that I am willing to bear another’s burdens that they may be light, to mourn with those who mourn, and to comfort those who stand in need of comfort. To me that means that when Allyx isn’t feeling well, I can still go sit with her and watch a video with her and keep her company. When she has to have her chemotherapy, I can pray for her and ask Heavenly Father to watch over her.

Many years ago, I got a phone call from a good friend who had been hired to play Santa Claus at a local mall. He wasn’t the real Santa Claus but was just one of his helpers. He explained that he needed someone to take his shift. He asked if I would substitute for him for just one night. I have to admit that this job was perfect for me. I always enjoy making children smile, so I gladly agreed.
The evening arrived, and I soon found myself in a small back room at the Eastview Mall. I changed into that familiar red suit, those polished black boots, and that white beard. I needed quite a bit of extra padding to make everything fit. But with a little effort, the Santa makeover was complete.
As I walked through the mall to get to my place, I was delighted to see how excited the young children were to see Santa. Even adults couldn’t help but smile and wave.
Once I sat down, the gate to the workshop opened. A long line of parents and children kept coming in. All but the very shyest children climbed up on my knee, and I listened patiently while they told me their Christmas wishes.
I was having a terrific time. It was great to interact with all the young children who looked at Santa with such wide-eyed wonder. I am proud to say that I really played up the role. I perfected my “Ho, ho, ho!” and even managed a laugh or two that made my belly shake like a bowl full of jelly.
A woman brought a small boy to me. “Excuse me,” she said. “He just wanted to come and say hello.”
I invited him to sit on my lap, but she declined, explaining that he didn’t speak English.
“He’s from Belgium,” she said. “He speaks French.”
My first reaction was, “Oh, this is going to be fun!” Nine years earlier, I had served a French-speaking mission in Quebec, Canada. Although I was no longer fluent in French, I could still have a conversation with a four-year-old. So I turned to the boy and, in French, invited him to come sit with me. The woman’s eyes grew wide and her jaw dropped, but the boy beamed and jumped onto my lap!
After several delightful minutes, it was time to say goodbye because the line had steadily grown while we were talking. Still, I congratulated myself on what felt like a real Christmas miracle—just like the one in Miracle on 34th Street.
But then I did something out of character for Santa. I felt impressed to tell the boy, “Always remember that Santa loves you.” I recall instantly thinking, “What a strange thing for Santa to say!” But the boy hugged me. And then he smiled and waved and ran back to the woman.
She led him a few steps away and then stopped. She asked him to wait there and turned back to me. “I don’t know what just happened,” she told me with tears in her eyes. “But I need to tell you something.”
She explained that she was the little boy’s aunt. She had returned with him from Belgium only a few days earlier. “His mother and father were killed in a car crash,” she said. “I’m his only living relative. I have just brought him to the United States to live with me.”
Her tears began to fall more freely. “But it’s Christmas, and I simply had no idea how we were going to make it through this season. It’s supposed to be joyful and magical, but all I could feel was sorrow. I kept praying, ‘God, help us both get through this.’”
She decided to bring him to the mall. “I know it seems silly,” she continued, “but I thought that if we walked around and just looked at the stores and the holiday decorations, it would at least give us a little distraction.”
“But my nephew saw you and said that he had to come see you. I told him, ‘No, honey, Santa won’t be able to understand you.’ But he said, ‘Yes, he will. I need to talk to him.’ And he literally pulled me to you.”
She looked at me again and said, “I don’t know how this happened, but thank you.”
I had been enjoying playing the coolest Santa ever. But in that instant, I knew that my being at the mall that evening was not about me at all. Instead, it was about one child who needed his own Christmas miracle.
I have no idea how many children climbed onto Santa’s lap for the rest of that night. But I’m sure their loved ones were wondering why Santa seemed to be crying!
Every Christmas, I still think about that boy. I wonder if he even remembers that night he met me and brought tears to my eyes. I’ll never forget how God led me to be just where He needed me to be one winter’s night to bless one of His precious children.
That experience continues to be a strong reminder to me that God knows and loves each of us. He knows our desires—even those expressed through the pure faith of a small child who simply wanted to talk with Santa.

Kim and Neil Davis were getting nervous.
You see, they come from a very goal-oriented family with six children, and they always help each other accomplish the things they set out to do. When they set a goal as a family, there’s almost no stopping them.
That’s why they were getting anxious now. Time was growing short. They’d set a goal to introduce a new family to the gospel every six months, and here it was, the last week of that time period, and not one interested family had materialized.
They’d fulfilled this goal many times in the past. When the Davises had lived in Boston and Washington, D.C., they could introduce lots of families to the gospel. “Not only would we have them over for the missionary discussions,” says Kim, 16, the oldest daughter, “but we’d invite them to family home evenings, pumpkin carvings, have Easter egg coloring parties, and special Christmas programs.”
But now the family was back in Utah, and it wasn’t as easy finding non-LDS families to share the gospel with. The end of their six-month time frame was looming near, and they hadn’t found anyone. The Davises knew theirs was a righteous desire, so they had family prayers and fasted. The six children each asked for help in their individual prayers.
And then, on the last day of the sixth month, their prayers were answered.
“My dad is used to receiving foreign mail from doctors asking for copies of articles,” explains Kim. Her father, Dr. Kim Davis, has done research and been published in a number of medical journals. “So when he picked up the letter from Hungary, he didn’t think much of it, until he opened it and read what was inside.”
“We were so excited!” says Neil, age 13. The letter was from a family in Hungary. They had seen a television documentary about Utah on Hungarian national television, and it had mentioned the Mormons and some of their beliefs. What had impressed this family most was the idea that families could be together forever. They wanted to know more about a church which taught that, so the father, being a doctor, and the son, being a medical resident, pored over back medical journals until they found an address in Utah. It happened to be Dr. Davis’s. The Hungarian family asked if their letter could be forwarded to some information center.
There was no need for that. The Davises went immediately down to the distribution center and collected all the Church information they could find in Hungarian. They put it in a box, and shipped it to their newfound investigator family.
Then they went home and wrote their testimonies of the gospel. They put those in an envelope, along with pictures of their family, and sent them to the Keresztis as well.
The Keresztis were amazed when they received a big box so soon from the United States and eagerly began reading the material. They were even more amazed when they received the letter and found that such a large family could be so close and have such strong testimonies of the gospel. Though the Keresztis had only one child, which is quite common in Hungary, they felt just as strong about family unity and were ecstatic to find something to help them.
Soon the Davises and the Keresztis were exchanging letters and pictures frequently. “We grew very close,” says Kim. “When we got a letter from them, our whole family would pass it around, and we’d read it at family home evening. We were so excited to see how they were accepting the gospel in Hungary, and we couldn’t believe it was happening to us.”
In the meantime, the Davises contacted the mission president in Vienna, Austria. Through him, the Keresztis were able to have missionary discussions about once a month.
“When we got the letter saying they were going to be baptized in Vienna, Austria, it was really neat,” says Neil. “And when we got pictures taken after their baptism, that was great!”

I recall talking to the proprietress of a nursing home. From the hallway where we stood, she pointed to several elderly women assembled in a peaceful living room. She observed, “There’s Mrs. Hansen. Her daughter visits her every week, right at 3:00 P.M. on Sunday. To her right is Mrs. Peek. Each Wednesday there is a letter in her hands from her son in New York. It is read, then reread, then saved as a precious piece of treasure. But see Mrs. Carroll: her family never telephones, never writes, never visits. Patiently she justifies this neglect with words that are heard but do not convince or excuse: ‘They are all so busy.’”

When I was about 10, my mother had an infection around the lining of her heart. There were five of us children in the family. We knew that Mother was very sick. We lived a long distance from the hospital, and in those days children weren’t allowed to go into hospitals to visit patients. When we visited my mother, we stood outside so she could look out the window and see us.
When we returned home, Father gathered us together in my parents’ bedroom. We all knelt around the bed and prayed for Mother. After being in the hospital for a month, Mother got well. I have a testimony that our Father in Heaven hears and answers our prayers.

These youth and others from the Payson 20th Ward in the Payson Utah Mount Nebo Stake started indexing after their bishop challenged them to index 250 names each to qualify to go on a trip. He also extended the challenge to the leaders as well as the youth.
“We challenged them that we leaders could index more names than they could,” says Bishop Steven Pace. “The losers had to serve the winners dinner … and the leaders ended up serving the youth dinner.”
Four months after the challenge was issued, the youth had far surpassed the original goal of 250 names per person and had indexed more than 50,000 names altogether. The leaders realized the goal was too low and upped the challenge to 1,000 names, and they made the challenge not only between the leaders and youth, but also between the different quorums and classes.
“The priests quorum needs to pick it up,” says Kendall Little, 17, who has indexed more names than any of the other teens. “We don’t want to be one of the bottom two classes, because then we have to do dishes on the trip.”
The youth were originally motivated by the competition, but now they say they do indexing because it’s fun, and they know they are helping those who lived before.
“I like to think about the people we are doing this for and how much they must appreciate it,” says Miranda Hyer, 14. “When I first started indexing, I thought they were just old people who lived a long time ago, but they’re not that different from us.”
One of the big differences between the times of the people in the records and today is the writing style used. The youth said the only hard thing about indexing is trying to figure out how the names are spelled when the writing is hard to read.
“Some of the cursive writing is like hieroglyphics,” says Jason Trauntvein, 12. “My mom would have to come and help me.”
Being able to distinguish names that were difficult to read taught the youth that they were doing the work of the Lord and that He was helping them.
Amanda says there were times when she would think she knew what a name was while she was indexing and then just have a feeling that it was something else. “Then I’d look at it again and I’d see that it clearly said the name I was feeling,” she says. “Those were really good experiences.”
Having experiences helping those who lived in the past has also helped these youth strengthen their testimonies and live in the world today.
“Doing indexing helped show me the importance of temple work,” says Kendall. “I also know that God is willing to help us and give us the answers if we’ll just listen to Him.”
The willingness to provide this service is something that has changed them. And it’s also given them something worthwhile to do during their free time.
One time when Trevor had some extra time after taking a biology test in a class, he got on a computer and started indexing. Other students were on the computers playing games although the teacher told them not to. “The kids who were playing games got in trouble,” Trevor says, “but the teacher just told me to finish up my batch.”
The youth say being able to index names has been a satisfying endeavor, and counting the names they have indexed is way better than any score they could get on a computer or video game.
All of those names the youth indexed are real people who lived before, so there are thousands of Heavenly Father’s children being affected by their efforts with indexing, people Kendall says he hopes to meet one day.
“If you think about it, you’re kind of making lots of friends that you’re going to go meet eventually when you die,” he says. “Then they’ll all come and say, ‘Thanks for doing my name,’ because without you their work may have never been done.”
Receiving so many blessings has taught these youth and their leaders something many Church members have discovered: indexing is easy, fun, rewarding, and engrossing.

Curt’s record is impressive, too. He placed second in the wheelchair division in April 1977 and again in 1978 at the Boston Marathon in Massachusetts. He completed the 26-mile, 385-yard race in two hours, 34 minutes, and 15 seconds. That’s right! Over 26 miles!

The Boston Marathon is the biggest and oldest race in the U.S. This is it’s 83rd year, and only the top athletes are selected to participate. This year there were 20 wheelchair competitors racing in temperatures below 40° Fahrenheit. Five of the athletes had to be hospitalized for a brief period after the race for hypothermia. Curt says, “After the first mile of soaring downhill, each wheelchair contestant was covered with mud and water from the chairs in front.” He also explains that wheelchair marathoners have more problems than regular runners because their circulation is poorer.
The wheelchair winner of the Boston Marathon this year was Ken Archer, a Mormon from Akron, Ohio. Curt says: “Ken is one of the greatest fellows I’ll ever meet. When he won, he came across the finish line with his hands raised in triumph and his head bowed in humility.”
In 1977 Curt placed in every event in Denver, taking two first places in the 100-yard dash and the mile push. In San Diego he placed either second or third in five events. At San Jose, he took first in the 100 meters, breaking the world record. He also placed third in lawn bowling and discus and fourth in shotput.
The same year, Curt placed first in the wheelchair division at both the Deseret News Marathon in Salt Lake and the Pioneer Marathon in St. George, Utah. In 1978 he took first in the New York City Marathon and now holds the national record in the 1500-meter run.
Curt was voted Most Outstanding Athlete in 1978 and 1979 at the Denver Rocky Mountain Regional.

Both Mike and Curt are also involved in their careers. Mike has counseled at the State Hospital in Provo, worked as a draftsman for the Bureau of Reclamation, and is now majoring in health sciences at BYU. His goal is to coach college basketball.
Curt has gained experiences in various jobs. He was a resident assistant at Ricks College, an insurance salesman, a desk clerk at a motel, a switchboard operator, and an insurance clerk for a hospital. Now he works at Handicapped Awareness, Inc. in Provo. He graduated with a B.S. degree in psychology from BYU in 1978 and is in the process of getting his masters in rehabilitation administration.
Church activities form another part of their lives. Mike works with the Explorers in the Alpine Fourth Ward, Alpine Utah Stake. He and a couple of other members in the stake took the Explorers to the National Explorer Olympics at Fort Collins, Colorado, for a week in August 1978. Mike coached basketball and helped coach volleyball during the Olympics. Mike says some of the Explorers in his ward like to double date with Jan and him.
Curt and Bonnie are members of the Provo West Stake, Sunset Third Ward. Curt was the elders quorum president in a previous ward and is now the first counselor in the quorum presidency. Bonnie has served as a Relief Society president. Now she is the first counselor in the Young Women organization.
Service is another important part of their lives. To earn money for a specially equipped bus for the handicapped in Utah County, Mike and Curt earned pledges and then wheeled 115 miles around Utah Lake in 16 hours. As a sidelight they shattered the world record which was 108 miles in eight days.
In May of 1978, Curt wheeled 284 miles from Cedar City, Utah, to Salt Lake City in five days, raising nearly twelve thousand dollars in pledges for Easter Seals.
Both athletes have spoken to large groups on a number of occasions. Mike addressed the Orem High School student body during their Freedom Week. He told the students they could go as far up as they want to in life, or they could stand still and not progress at all. Mike says, “The choice is theirs. We live in a country with that freedom. The degree of excellence we attain depends mainly on how willing we are to work.”
Last July, Curt was the keynote speaker during the National Olympic Academy at BYU. He has spoken across the United States at meets and says: “I’ve really seen a lot of the country. If I’ve impressed just a few people the way that I’ve been impressed by others, then it’s been a blessing to be in a wheelchair.”
Curt says traveling has also provided an opportunity for missionary work. He was invited to a party in Boston for 50 top athletes. When asked why he wouldn’t drink, he had the opportunity to share the gospel.
Curt finds it interesting that people are so concerned about what to do and say when they meet a handicapped person. He says that usually it’s what people don’t say that hurts. For example, when a child runs up and asks why he doesn’t have any legs, Curt wishes the parents would let him answer the question rather than hushing the child and rushing off. He explains, “The child grows up feeling he shouldn’t associate with the handicapped, and that’s not good for either one.”
Mike has some advice of his own, and he says it applies to everyone, whether they’re handicapped or not. First, he says, he doesn’t like quitters. Then he adds: “Don’t be afraid to try things you think you might not be able to do. Whatever you want, go after it one hundred and ten percent. Whether your goals concern work, church, school, jobs, marriage, or whatever, just don’t, don’t, don’t ever quit!”

Third, the Master Healer can comfort and sustain us as we experience painful “realities of mortality,” such as disaster, mental illness, disease, chronic pain, and death. I have recently become acquainted with a remarkable young woman named Josie who suffers from bipolar disorder. Here is just a little of her journey toward healing as she shared it with me:
“The worst of the darkness occurs on what my family and I have deemed ‘floor days.’ It begins with sensory overload and acute sensitivity and resistance to any type of sound, touch, or light. It is the apex of mental anguish. There is one day in particular that I will never forget.
“It was early in the journey, making the experience especially frightening. I can remember sobbing, tears racing down my face as I gasped for air. But even such intense suffering paled in comparison to the pain that followed as I observed panic overwhelm my mother, so desperate to help me.
“With my broken mind came her broken heart. But little did we know that despite the deepening darkness, we were just moments away from experiencing a mighty miracle.
“As a long hour continued, my mom whispered over and over and over again, ‘I would do anything to take this from you.’
“Meanwhile, the darkness intensified, and when I was convinced I could take no more, just then something marvelous occurred.
“A transcendent and wonderful power suddenly overtook my body. Then, with a ‘strength beyond my own,’ I declared to my mom with great conviction seven life-changing words in response to her repeated desire to bear my pain. I said, ‘You don’t have to; Someone already has.’”
From the dark abyss of debilitating mental illness, Josie summoned the strength to testify of Jesus Christ and of His Atonement.
She was not healed completely that day, but she received the light of hope in a time of intense darkness. And today, supported by a bedrock understanding of the doctrine of Christ and refreshed daily by the Savior’s living water, Josie continues on her journey toward healing and exercises unshakable faith in the Master Healer. She helps others along the way. And she says, “When the darkness feels unremitting, I rely on the memory of His tender mercies. They serve as a guiding light as I navigate through hard times.”

While I was serving my mission in Argentina, I had an experience that tested my willingness to do what the Lord asked me to do. I was serving in Trelew, a very small town in a very remote area of southern Argentina. I had flown to Buenos Aires, the capital, for a mission conference. I had been having severe pains in my side, so while I was there, I went to see a doctor. He said that my appendix was very inflamed and that I should stay near a hospital in case I needed to have my appendix removed.

After I saw the doctor, I went to the mission conference. Elder Henry D. Moyle (1889–1963) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles was the visiting General Authority at the conference. He gave me a blessing. In the blessing, he told me that I would be fine. He said that I should not stay in Buenos Aires, as the doctor had recommended, but that I should return to Trelew as soon as the conference was over.

The next morning, I boarded the plane and returned to Trelew, and my appendix never bothered me again. In fact, I still have it. This experience taught me that when our prophets speak to us, we can trust them and follow what they say.

First, from my own family, I mention a touching experience that has always been an inspiration to me.
My maternal great-grandparents Gibson and Cecelia Sharp Condie lived in Clackmannan, Scotland. Their families were engaged in coal mining. They were at peace with the world, surrounded by relatives and friends, and were housed in fairly comfortable quarters in a land they loved. Then they listened to the message of the missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and, to the depths of their very souls, were converted. They heard the call to gather to Zion and knew they must answer that call.
Sometime around 1848, they sold their possessions and prepared for the hazardous voyage across the mighty Atlantic Ocean. With five small children, they boarded a sailing vessel, all their worldly possessions in one tiny trunk. They traveled 3,000 miles (4,800 km) across the waters—eight long, weary weeks on a treacherous sea, watching and waiting, with poor food, poor water, and no help beyond the length and breadth of that small ship.
In the midst of this soul-trying situation, one of their young sons became ill. There were no doctors, no stores at which they might purchase medicine to ease his suffering. They watched, they prayed, they waited, and they wept as day by day his condition deteriorated. When his eyes were at last closed in death, their hearts were torn asunder. To add to their grief, the laws of the sea must be obeyed. Wrapped in a canvas weighed down with iron, the little body was consigned to a watery grave. As they sailed away, only those parents knew the crushing blow dealt to wounded hearts.4 However, with a faith born of their deep conviction of the truth and their love of the Lord, Gibson and Cecelia held on. They were comforted by the words of the Lord: “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”5
How grateful I am for ancestors who had the faith to leave hearth and home and to journey to Zion, who made sacrifices I can scarcely imagine. I thank my Heavenly Father for the example of faith, of courage, and of determination Gibson and Cecelia Sharp Condie provide for me and for all their posterity.

Simply giving thanks for the good things in our lives makes a wonderful family home evening and can be used successfully several times a year. James and Kelly Peterson of the Burley 10th Ward, Burley Idaho Stake, enjoyed such a lesson. “One week we had some unexpected challenges and some extraordinary blessings,” writes Sister Peterson. “So we sat as a family and talked about the things we were grateful for. We started with simple things like a home and food. Then we began to notice many things we had taken for granted, and we realized how much the Lord had blessed us. As we expressed gratitude, warmth filled our home; it was a spirit of thankfulness, a feeling of comfort and peace. We felt so close to our Heavenly Father and to each other that night. It was one of our most memorable family home evenings.”

Stake Young Women president Paulette Griffiths first had the idea while talking to Church member Tony Iliffe, whose company turns tubes of knitting into finished socks.
“We always end up with sacks full of odd ones that don’t have matches,” commented Tony. “The partners are there somewhere, but no one knows where. A gentleman from London used to take them for the homeless, but he died.”
So began Sister Griffith’s brain wave.
She thought it would be a wonderful service project for the youth of the Lichfield England Stake—her stake—to sort socks, try to find matches, and then donate the pairs to charity.
So the youth got together, and like some gigantic jigsaw puzzle, the matchmaking began. The prevailing comment from the 60 young people who had gathered was, “I’ve never seen so many socks in my life!”
During the day, the excitement became infectious, with “I’ve got one!” shouts echoing through the hall. “It’s like finding treasure,” said Kristie McCall. “It’s a laugh.” Ellen Tong added, “Helping someone else and having a good time doing it is great.”
“It’s something different to do on a Saturday,” said Sharon Whiting from Sutton Coldfield, who spent her day sifting through hundreds of socks. Even Chelsea Birtcher, a visitor from Utah, said, “It’s the best service project I’ve been to.”
Everyone rotated to other sock activities when they were in danger of becoming tired of sorting. The sock activities ranged from puppet making, building a puppet theater, and decorating socks to be worn later at the evening Sock Hop—a slippery barn dance. Prizes were announced for the best decorated socks. And a puppet show was planned, to be performed for children’s hospitals, with the puppets donated to the ward nurseries.
With the youth from six wards pulling together, they finished with eight large sacks of paired socks for their day’s work.
Sam Barber, a 15-year-old from Stafford, said, “We had more people turn up to this service project than ever before. That’s what made it enjoyable.”
One of the project’s success stories belonged to the youth from the Lichfield and Tamworth wards. They achieved their goal and filled sacks of baby socks for two social service groups that work with children.
At the end of the day, a final count seemed a bit like the loaves and fishes. Despite eight bags of socks with partners, the remaining pile of singles still looked as high as ever. And only a few groaned when Sister Griffiths announced, “We’ll be back to enjoy this activity again soon.”