Gospel Story Finder

Tangible evidence of Maurice’s example to other Aaronic Priesthood holders in his ward came in the way of service for his Eagle Scout project he completed last year. Maurice organized a child identification day where he invited people in his community to bring their children to the ward on a Saturday so the children could be fingerprinted and videotaped. After police gave a presentation on ways to protect children, the parents in attendance took the fingerprint cards and the videotapes home. Now, if ID information is ever needed, it will be at the parents’ fingertips.
Maurice spent numerous hours coordinating this project that attracted close to 100 children. As a bonus, he also asked people who came to bring one or two cans of food that he could then donate to a food bank. He eventually filled three big boxes with canned goods.
“What I enjoyed about that project is that it was different,” Maurice says. “I really wanted to make a difference. I hope people never have to use their video or the fingerprint cards. I don’t want it ever to come to that point. But they are a good safety net.”

I had often heard that home teachers may receive inspiration for the families to which they are assigned. But how real that blessing is became evident to me through an experience we had a few years ago.
The semester at the university had ended, and I was spending my summer hours at a part-time job painting homes. I was also teaching an evening class at the Institute of Religion. Our family had recently purchased a new car big enough to comfortably seat our family of seven—just the kind of automobile we had always wanted.
One evening as I was preparing to go to class, our two little daughters, then about three and five years old, came running into the house with white all over their arms. Not suspecting what they had been up to, I thought they had been playing with the flour. But suddenly I noticed that the white on their arms was dripping! In an instant I knew what had happened. I had left an unopened gallon of white oil-base paint out in the car—and a wide paintbrush conveniently next to it. Our little girls had pried open the can and painted the inside of the car. And they had been thorough! The ceiling, the floor, the seats. …
As I stood there looking at the horrible sight before me, one of my little daughters said with a smile on her face, “See Daddy, pretty car.” I picked up the two girls, trying with all my heart to control my emotions, carried them into the bathroom, and put them into the bathtub. I then called for my wife to come and help clean them up while I tried to take care of the car.
At that very moment our telephone rang. I picked up the phone and with some impatience said, “Hello.” A voice at the other end said, “Brother McIntosh, this is Brother Wilde, your home teacher. I was just sitting here wondering how you and your family were getting along.”
“Brother Wilde, you will not believe what our two little daughters have just done,” I moaned. “They have painted the inside of our new car—and I don’t even have an ounce of turpentine to clean it up with!”
My home teacher then gave a response which, to this day, is an inspiration to me: “Brother McIntosh, you may not believe this, but about a half an hour ago, I was walking through a department store. Something said to me, ‘Buy a gallon of turpentine.’ I bought it, not knowing why. It’s still sitting out in the car. I’ll be right over to help you clean up the mess.”
Within minutes, he arrived. About twenty minutes later, we had the entire mess in hand, and I was able to make it to my class on time.
As I walked in the door of the building, I looked up into the sky and said a short prayer: “Thank thee, Father, for a home teacher who cares, who thinks about my family, and who seeks inspiration about us.”

You may have had the experience of being made stronger by the people you were called to serve. I was once called as a bishop of young single adults. I am not sure whether the Lord’s purposes were more for what changes I could help Him make in them or the changes He knew they would make in me.

To a degree I do not understand, most of those young people in that ward acted as if I was called of God especially for them. They saw my weaknesses but looked past them.

I remember one young man who asked for counsel about his educational choices. He was a freshman at a very good university. A week after I had given the advice, he scheduled an appointment with me.

When he came into the office, he surprised me by asking, “Bishop, could we pray before we talk? And could we kneel? And may I pray?”

His requests surprised me. But his prayer surprised me even more. It went something like this: “Heavenly Father, You know that Bishop Eyring gave me advice last week, and it didn’t work. Please inspire him to know what I am to do now.”

Now you might smile at that, but I didn’t. He already knew what the Lord wanted him to do. But he honored the office of a bishop in the Lord’s Church and perhaps wanted me to have the chance to gain greater confidence to receive revelation in that calling.

It worked. As soon as we stood up and then sat down, the revelation came to me. I told him what I felt the Lord would have him do. He was only 18 years old then, but he was mature in spiritual years.

He already knew he didn’t need to go to a bishop on such a problem. But he had learned to sustain the Lord’s servant even in his mortal weaknesses. He eventually became a stake president. He carried with him the lesson we learned together: if you have faith that the Lord leads His Church through revelation to those imperfect servants He calls, the Lord will open the windows of heaven to them, as He will to you.

From that experience, I carried away the lesson that the faith of the people we serve, sometimes more than our own faith, brings us revelation in the Lord’s service.

There was another lesson for me. If that boy had judged me for my failure to give him good advice the first time, he never would have come back to ask again. And so, by choosing not to judge me, he received the confirmation he desired.

Yet another lesson from that experience has served me well. As far as I know, he never told anyone in the ward that I had not given good counsel at first. Had he done that, it might have reduced the faith of others in the ward to trust the bishop’s inspiration.

My tourist visa ended and I had to return to Taiwan. During the following months alone, I missed what I had felt. For a time, I was filled with despair and darkness. Those feelings were so overwhelming that I wanted to give up. I didn’t really know how to pray, but I called out to God and told Him everything I was feeling and thinking. A feeling of peace came—the same feeling I had experienced when I had attended our home church. I know it was the Holy Ghost. He calmed me down.

I urge you to do what a missionary companion of mine did. He had run away from home as a teenager, and someone had placed a Book of Mormon in a box he carried with him in his search for more happiness.
Years passed. He moved from place to place across the world. He was alone and unhappy one day, when he saw the box. The box was filled with things he had carried with him. At the bottom of the box, he found the Book of Mormon. He read the promise in it and tested it. He knew it was true. That witness changed his life. He found happiness beyond his fondest dreams.

It had been 12 years since I had left my beloved California home and ward to remarry. With the Lord’s help, I had slowly rebuilt and achieved new goals. But I longed to visit dear friends who had shared the joys and the challenge of living in an area where Church members were a minority.
“Sometimes it isn’t good to relive the past,” my family members said. Nevertheless, I made the trip. At my old house, I marveled that the seedlings I had planted years before were now large trees shading the property. Overwhelmed with emotion, I left the spot and drove down the street. Old landmarks were hazily familiar. What was I doing here?
Then I sighted the spire of the local Church meeting-house, and I drove to my favorite parking spot. Though still not sure exactly what I was looking for, I began to feel more peaceful as I strolled through the church grounds. Rounding a hedge, I nearly bumped into a young man who was pulling weeds. He jumped to his feet, and I noticed that he had a fresh missionary haircut.
As I apologized, he looked at me strangely and said, “Aren’t you the mustard-seed teacher?”
I looked at him in puzzlement.
“Yes, I think you are,” he said. “You were my first Primary teacher. I could never resist coming to your class because of the clues about the lesson you always taped to the door. The picture of the jar of mustard was my favorite. I remember obediently carrying home my bag of tiny mustard seeds after your lesson about the parable. After that, I always thought of you as the mustard-seed teacher.”
The memory flooded back to me of a recently baptized woman bringing her seven-year-old son, Chandler, to my CTR classroom. Here was the same boy, now a young man.
“Your lessons made me want to be a good Latter-day Saint,” he said.
I was thrilled to hear that Chandler had recently submitted his application for a mission. As we spoke, I realized that his testimony was another tree that I’d help plant and nourish. When he was a young boy, his testimony had been embryonic, perhaps even “less than all the seeds that be in the earth” (Mark 4:31). Now the strength of his testimony made him a mighty tree in the Lord’s vineyard.
Silently thanking the Lord, I vowed to keep sowing grains of faith and to trust in their promise and strength.

An old fable, and one of my favorites over the years, tells this story:
A Japanese scholar each evening talked with workmen from a factory. One night he told the men that he would bring them something of beauty on the morrow. One man asked the scholar to bring him a rose, another asked for a branch, and the third requested a lily. The next evening he handed out the rose, the branch, and the lily.
“There is a thorn on my rose,” said the first man. The second complained, “There is a dead leaf on my branch.” “There is a clump of dirt on my lily,” cried the third.
The scholar took all his gifts back and said, “You had a beautiful rose and saw only the thorn; you had a lovely green branch and saw only the dead leaf; and on the glorious lily you saw only the clump of dirt.”

Thirteen-year-old Lynnette Thompson wondered why the dogs kept barking and running around in circles in the yard. Then the fence she was standing by started to rattle, and her dad, who had just climbed down from the roof of the house, yelled at her to stop shaking the fence. She started to protest that she wasn’t doing anything to the fence, when the rock wall by the house started to crumble. “Then everything started jumping around. I saw the flagpole fall over, and the roof of the house jumped up several inches and came back down.”

It had been a great day at school. Jeff had spent all recess playing tetherball with his friend, Ben. After two years at his new school, Jeff was glad to finally have a best friend. Ben liked the same things as Jeff did, and they always had lots to talk about.
When Jeff got home, he saw Mom waiting for him. She didn’t look happy at all. His smile faded away. “Jeff,” Mom said, “I got a call from the principal today. She said you’ve been bullying a boy in your class.”
“I have not!” said Jeff. He knew that bullying was wrong. A bully made people sad and afraid. Jeff had never done anything like that.
“Are you sure?” Mom asked. She made room on the couch for Jeff. “The principal said you and Ben tell Sam to go away, that he’s not in your club, and that he can’t join unless he jumps off the top of the slide.”
Jeff looked down. Sam asked to play with them almost every day. But Ben was his best friend, and they liked playing by themselves. That didn’t mean he had been a bully, did it?
“Is it wrong for Ben and me to play alone?” Jeff asked. It didn’t seem fair that someone called him a bully just for playing with his best friend.
“You two can still spend lots of time together. But when Sam is around, it’s wrong to make him feel left out and alone. The principal said you called Sam names for not jumping off the slide.”
“I did not!” Jeff said. But Ben had. And he had laughed.
“Remember how you felt when we first moved?” Mom asked.
Jeff nodded. School had been really lonely at first. He had prayed a lot to find a good friend.
“What do you wish people had done?” Mom asked.
“I wished they’d invited me to play games at recess. Or sit with them at lunch.”
“Isn’t it amazing that you have such a good friend now?” Mom said. “You can be someone who helps people who are lonely, like you used to be. I’m going to give you a challenge. Tomorrow I want you to find out three cool things about Sam. Then tell me after school.”
“I can probably do that,” Jeff said, staring at his shoes. He hadn’t meant to bully Sam. He wanted to be kind like Jesus. Tomorrow he could tell Sam he was sorry. And he could tell Ben that he wanted Sam to play too.
“Hey,” said Mom. She tipped Jeff’s chin up. “You are a good, kind boy. Sam would be lucky to have you as a friend. And guess what? I bet you’ll find out you’re lucky to have Sam as a friend too.”
Jeff smiled a little. Ben could still be his best friend. It wouldn’t hurt to have another friend too.

Todd parted the barbed wire carefully and climbed through the fence. Then he held it up for his dog King. The collie leaped through carefully and bounded into the field. The April sun glinted on the dog’s golden coat, thick and deep from the cold winter.
“Come here, King!” Todd called. He put his hand on King’s sun-warmed head. King was Todd’s best friend—his only nearby friend, except for Mr. Phillips. There were no boys Todd’s age in the small mountain town where he lived, and he had to ride the school bus 16 kilometers to attend school.
Todd climbed through another fence into Mr. Phillips’ sheep enclosure. He could hear the old man moving around in the lambing shed. “Hi!” he called as he walked into the dimness of the shed. Then he saw Mr. Phillips watching an ewe lick her newborn lamb. Todd watched the lamb, smiling. He wanted to pick it up, to feel its woolly little body.
“You can hold it later,” the rancher said, picking up two shovels. “We have a less pleasant job to do now. Come with me.”
Todd followed his friend into the bright sunlight where King waited patiently by the door. He spent most of his Saturdays with Mr. Phillips, helping him with the sheep. Todd liked being there, for Mr. Phillips was like a grandfather to him.
“What are we going to do?” Todd asked, running a little to catch up.
“Well, Todd, I’d just as soon you didn’t see this, but I guess it’s part of our job.”
As they approached the corner of the fields, several black and white magpies flapped noisily into the air. Todd saw two dead sheep on the ground. “What happened?” His stomach tightened as he looked at the sheep’s torn bodies.
Mr. Phillips started to dig in the moist ground, piling the muddy shovelfuls onto the grass. “Dogs killed them,” he said, not looking up.
Todd couldn’t understand how this could happen. “When do the dogs come? Have you seen them?”
“I’ve seen four or five dogs running together ever since work started on the new dam and the men moved their trailers in up there. Everybody has a fierce watchdog because they keep so much equipment outside their trailers.
“I’ve lost ten or twelve sheep this way,” said Mr. Phillips.
The boy felt a terrible anger and frustration inside him. “Can’t you go to the owners and tell them?”
“I’ve tried that. But each one claims his dog is tied at night or for some other reason could not be the killer. And since I do not actually see who does the killing, I do not really know who is responsible.”
“Why don’t you get your gun and sit out here all night and watch. If you see a dog coming in here, just shoot it.”
“I’ve thought of something like that, and I’m within my legal right to shoot if a strange dog is on my property.”
Todd helped Mr. Phillips drag the sheep into the hole and cover them. Then they walked silently across the field to the sheds, King following sedately behind them.
Sunday morning Todd dressed quickly and quietly, wanting to see Mr. Phillips before Sunday School started and find out if anything had happened during the night.
Todd closed the back screen door quietly behind him and gave a low whistle for King. He was surprised when the animal didn’t bound out of his doghouse, but without waiting he walked quickly through the fields to Mr. Phillips’ sheds. As he crawled through the last fence, he saw Mr. Phillips leaning over something on the ground. He’s shot a dog, Todd thought. He ran forward quickly, but before he reached Mr. Phillips he stopped, fear and grief gripping his body. He walked forward slowly, his eyes fixed on the golden coat of the dog, now soggy with rain. Mr. Phillips looked up. He came toward Todd and put his hands on his shoulders.
“Todd,” he said, “it’s King. I’m so sorry.” Todd looked into Mr. Phillips’ face and saw tears mixed with raindrops, running into the deep wrinkles of his face. His dark eyes were full of suffering.
Todd felt numb. “How did it happen?” he asked.
“The night was so dark with the clouds and all—I’d fallen asleep waiting. When I woke up, I saw the dark form of a dog moving across the pastures, so I shot. I didn’t even look at the body until this morning. When I saw it was King I couldn’t believe it. He was probably going to the house to see if we’d put out any food scraps for him.” Mr. Phillips moved to put his arms around the boy.
Todd stiffened and pulled away. “How could you shoot King? You know him. You see him every day.” His voice rose with anger.
Mr. Phillips went for a cart as Todd struggled to lift the large wet dog. It was impossible. Together they lifted the dog into the cart and the old man pulled it down the road toward Todd’s house. The boy walked a short distance behind, grieving in silence.
Mr. Phillips wanted to dig the hole, but Todd dug it himself in the soft earth and lowered the dog into the hole, as Mr. Phillips stood silently watching him.
On Monday night Mr. Phillips came to the door with a little lamb for Todd. Todd wouldn’t see him. He told his mother to tell Mr. Phillips he didn’t want the lamb. All week Todd stayed in his room after school, mostly just lying on his bed. After dinner and when he had finished his chores he went back to his room. On Friday night, Todd’s father followed him into his room. He sat down on the side of the bed, not saying anything.
Finally Todd spoke. “Dad, do you honestly believe in dog heaven, or is it just a story to make little kids feel better?”
“I don’t know about dog heaven, but I do believe firmly that all life is eternal, because everything was created spiritually before it was created physically.”
“What does that mean?”
“It’s hard to understand, but to you it means that King still lives.”
“Will I see him again after I die?”
“I do not know that for sure, but it may be possible.” Todd’s father looked at him closely and said, “One thing bothers me, you had two great friends in this rather lonely place. You lost one by accident, something that could not be helped. I do not know why you chose to lose the second one. Have you thought any about how Mr. Phillips has been feeling this week?”
Todd had tried not to think of it. But he kept seeing Mr. Phillips’ face with tears and rain running down it. His conscience had also reminded him that shooting the prowling dogs was his idea. “Well, I do not want that little lamb. How could he think a lamb would ever replace King?”
“I am sure he does not think that, but he needs to do something to show how sorry he is. You are hurting him far more than he hurt you, because you are doing it intentionally.”
Todd had not thought of it quite like that. He still did not look at his father, who suddenly leaned over and kissed his cheek.
Saturday morning, Todd woke up early, the same knot of pain forming in his stomach as it did every morning since King died. Sunshine streamed in the window. Todd dressed, went out quietly, and walked through the fields, the morning dew drenching his sneakers. As the sun warmed his face, Todd slowly began to feel a little more alive again. His heart still ached for King, but he felt some comfort, a feeling of his heart softening just as he had prayed it would.
He saw Mr. Phillips in the shed gathering his shearing tools. “I guess I need that lamb if I’m ever going to have my own flock,” Todd called from the doorway. Mr. Phillips turned and came through the door into the sunlight, his eyes warm and shining.
“I’m sure glad to see you, Todd,” he said. “I’m going to need help with this shearing.”
And together they went into the shed.

One time during a particularly intense blizzard, our tractor tore a drive belt in the middle of our driveway. My mother and I soon discovered we had no more extra belts. The tractor had to be pushed back into the garage. With the wind chill, the temperature was about 20 degrees below zero (-29° C). My fingers were so cold they had become almost nonresponsive. Unfortunately, the tractor wasn’t going to go anywhere by itself, so Mom and I put it in neutral gear and tried to push it.
Our initial efforts were futile. Even with heavy-duty snow boots we couldn’t get enough friction to push the tractor forward. I remember falling and bruising my knees several times as my feet failed to get any traction on the slippery ice. I was cold, I was miserable, and I wanted hot chocolate. If we were going to get this done, we needed a different approach.
It became apparent that we needed to literally put our “shoulders to the wheel,” simultaneously pushing down with all of our strength on the front side of the tires. Because we were pushing down instead of forward, we were able to move the tractor! Slowly but surely, we pushed the tractor back into the garage.

“I was in a new culture full of new vocabulary and traditions. I felt like an outsider in most conversations and questioned my worth.”

Amy Faragher, shown with her husband, Nathan, and their children

Amy Faragher knew the Church was true the moment she stepped through the church door. “I could not deny the witness I had received from the Holy Ghost,” she says, “so I chose to be baptized.”

About a year after joining the Church as a 19-year-old, she received a calling to serve in Relief Society. A year later she was called to serve as Relief Society president of her young single adult ward. “Those experiences really enriched my life,” she says. “I was all in.”

Serving in this calling as a relatively new member of the Church had its challenges. “I was in a new culture full of new vocabulary and traditions,” she says. “I felt like an outsider in most conversations and questioned my worth as a member.”

Despite the difficulties, Church members received her with warmth and open arms, like one sister who asked to be her friend. “Such associations softened the challenge of learning a new life,” Sister Faragher says. “I felt part of a community. Ward members didn’t judge me for not understanding Church culture or doctrine.”

Five years after joining the Church, she got married. She and her husband lived in various wards over the years. One in particular was accepting of her convert experience, even inviting her to share her story as a member of a panel at a ward activity.

In other wards she attended, Amy was eager to participate but didn’t feel included. She began to doubt her place in the Church. “At times, the loneliness was unbearable,” she remembers. “I continued to attend sacrament meeting and fill my calling in the nursery but suffered from a high level of anxiety.”

When her efforts to seek support from her ward during a challenging time didn’t bear fruit, she sought counsel from her stake president. As she spoke with him on one occasion, she divulged the ache of her heart. He responded quickly and asked to hear more. They talked at length and committed to meet regularly. “The stake president was genuinely interested and listened to all I had to say,” she recalls. “He was the first to ask the hard question about what was going on.”

Her counseling with the stake president and receiving other professional counseling helped her feel Heavenly Father’s love, an important step in her healing. “Everything changed for me. I’m finding my place,” she says. “I’ve learned I don’t need to be ashamed of being a convert.”

“It’s important for leaders to acknowledge and care for new members,” she suggests. “Ask the hard questions and learn how they are really doing. A calling or responsibility suited to the new member’s capacity is also important to the confidence of a new member. It’s not a burden to serve, as some leaders believe.”

Amy recently earned a master’s degree in clinical mental health counseling, and she conducts stake workshops on mental health and assists with the Church’s addiction recovery program.

When Elder Brook P. Hales was eight or nine, he was in a fast and testimony meeting where his father was presiding as bishop. His father invited the congregation to bear testimonies, and nearly everyone present bore testimony. “It was perhaps the first time I felt the Spirit bearing witness to me of the truthfulness of the gospel,” Elder Hales recalls.
He has felt that witness many times since, particularly while serving as secretary to the First Presidency since 2008. When President Thomas S. Monson was sustained as prophet and President of the Church, and again when President Russell M. Nelson was sustained, he witnessed “the mantle of prophet fall on each of these men, and I knew without a doubt that they had been chosen and called to be the President of the Church for their particular time.”
Elder Hales was called as a General Authority Seventy on May 17, 2018, and sustained on October 6, 2018. He will continue as secretary to the First Presidency.

I moved to another village to live with a friend. As I was telling my story to my friend and some of her neighbors, one neighbor said, “Mariama, we don’t have anything to offer you except an invitation to church tomorrow. That’s where we find safety. That’s where we find hope.” I loved God already and needed comfort in my life, so I decided to go.
My first Sunday in that Latter-day Saint branch is a day I will never forget. I learned of hope. You could just see that there was hope in those people, and I was drawn to them. I was given the Book of Mormon and started reading right away. I remember hearing in church about how families could be together again after death and then reading in Alma 11 where Alma teaches about how our bodies will be made perfect again in the Resurrection. I felt the Spirit so strongly as I thought of my family. I knew that the Church was true and that we could be together forever—each of us well and whole.
There were no missionaries in Sierra Leone at that time, so I took the lessons from my branch president and was baptized and confirmed soon after. We were blessed in our town because the Church sent food and humanitarian kits for the members of the Church and others. The food kept us all alive. Everyone was so grateful even to receive a small bag of rice or beans. I received a blanket and a hygiene kit that included a toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, soap, a comb, and a washcloth.

Emmanuel introduced his younger brother, Stephen Abu (their last names differ because of Ghanaian traditions in naming children), to the gospel while Stephen was visiting in Accra. After his baptism, Stephen returned to Abomosu, their isolated home village, and began to “organize” his own family, as he says, teaching them the gospel. His teaching extended to friends, and when missionaries were finally sent to the village, there was a group of people waiting to be baptized.
From that beginning came the Abomosu Ghana District, which now has more than 600 members. With two branches in the village, Latter-day Saints are a significant portion of the population. Two miles up the road, a new meetinghouse is under construction for the branch in Sankobenase.

I remember some time back we had a beautiful Irish setter. Joe owned the dog, and we lived in Boise at the time. The dog was running around up on one of the hills behind the house. Two teenagers had brought .22 rifles to do some practice shooting. They saw our dog, Stroker, and one of the boys decided to shoot at it as it ran back and forth. He shot Stroker, and the dog immediately dropped. Lawrence, watching the whole affair, ran and got his older brother, and they both ran to the dog. Joe picked the large dog up in his arms and carried it home. Then he and his mother drove it out to a veterinarian who administered care to the dog. Joe, his younger brother Lawrence, and his mother fasted through the next 24 hours. Then during the school lunch hour Joe went over to the vet’s to see how his dog was doing. The vet said the dog would live, that everything would be all right. Joe climbed in his car, drove over to the grade school, and went to Lawrence’s room to tell him Stroker would be okay, that the vet said he would live and no serious damage had been done.

Again, this kind of training is invaluable in a home. In addition to all these many great qualities Merlene has, there is one that I suppose is built in every woman. She is absolutely tenacious in the defense of her sons and daughter. When they need to be punished, appropriate discipline is administered and they are punished, but when someone accuses them unjustly or with only part of the facts, she becomes a tenacious defender and will not tolerate unjust criticism of her family members. She is the kind of person you would want to take tiger hunting in the night—you could always turn around and know that she was there.

Merlene has a compassionate heart and a gentle spirit. She loves people and things—she enjoys life to the fullest. She feels a great mission in her home and has eased the burdens and responsibilities of the family by being there so that her husband could be elsewhere in the Lord’s service. She loves family activity and loves the family being together. Her greatest moments are when we, as a family, all of the family, including those married with their companions and children, are with us. Then she feels secure and life reaches its fullest degree for her.

The greatest tribute I could pay to her would be to quote, as I have many times, from Camelot. King Arthur went to a lonely room, locked the door, and said, “Proposition: If I could choose, from every woman who breathes on this earth, the face I would most love, the smile, the touch, the voice, the heart, the laugh, the soul itself, every detail and feature to the smallest strand of hair—they would all be Jenny’s.” Such is my wife. I would choose no one else. Merlene is the miracle maker in our home.

I remember vividly my first view of an iceberg. In 1937 Sister Kimball and I made our first crossing of the Atlantic by steamer from Montreal, out through the St. Lawrence River and into the North Atlantic.
One day when we were well out into the ocean, there was excitement on the ship. An iceberg had been sighted. Most of the passengers rushed to the deck to see this sight. We could see it in the distance—a great white object against the dark sea and the azure of the sky.
There it floated quietly in the water like a sharp peak of a high mountain range, a thing of beauty to behold. All my life I had heard about them, and now, for the first time, it was there before my eyes—a sharp mountain peak of ice.
This recalled to our minds the tragic sinking of the Titanic, steamship of the White Star Line, on its maiden trip across the ocean. The huge iceberg collided with this large, new ship late in the evening, April 14, 1912. Fifteen hundred and three persons, many of them eminent in Britain and in the United States, were drowned as the ship sank and only 703 were saved.
Then four years ago, flying from England to the United States, we passed over Greenland and saw them again. Much of our trip we had traveled above the blanket of clouds, but as we flew over Greenland, the sky was clear and free of clouds. The sun shone brightly. Seldom does the human eye ever see such beauty and grandeur. Stretching out in the distance was the mile-thick blanket of ice over the great, domed island. We saw the thick glaciers creeping slowly down the valleys to the sea, where they break off and become icebergs. The fjords were full of floating mountains of ice drifting on their way to the ocean. Here was the birthplace of countless such icebergs as we had seen 33 years earlier.

Nine years later Annie married Soren Hansen. They had eight children. When Soren died, Annie sold sawdust to the butcher shops to support her family. Every day she hitched her yellow pony to a little cart and carried a load of sawdust to nearby Oslo.
One day as Annie neared the open-air market, she heard a strange commotion. Two young men were speaking to a crowd gathered near the vegetable market. Annie was curious and stopped to listen. They spoke about a prophet and the Book of Mormon.
Their message stirred Annie’s heart. On 2 March 1857 she was baptized as one of the first converts in Norway.

Anne, Lisa, Paula, Vicki, and Joanne* weren’t members of the Church, but they seemed to have high standards. And since there were no Latter-day Saint girls in my neighborhood when my family moved in, I was grateful they befriended me and took me into their group.
A few years later, we left our little elementary school and entered junior high. Right away, things started to change. Soon our conversations began to include fashions and boys. I noticed that my friends were treating me a little differently, too. I brushed it off, but then it got worse. Whispering ended abruptly when I joined the group, and the other girls paired up more. Joanne and Vicki seemed to splinter off, and Anne, Lisa, and Paula spent a lot of time together, often leaving me alone.
It hurt when I learned, one Monday morning, of Friday night’s party at Anne’s house. “We thought you were too busy” was supposed to be an explanation for not inviting me. Another day we were all to meet at the park, but when I got there one of the girls told me that another girl was mad at me, so I’d better leave.
Christmastime came, and our usual Christmas gift exchange was planned. Usually we drew one another’s names, but since I hadn’t been around, someone drew a name for me. I was to buy a gift for Paula. No one had drawn my name, and they were sure I’d be too busy to come to the party, so they asked me to drop off my gift at the door.
I don’t remember whether I was more hurt than angry, but I do remember trying to think of all the mean ways I could get back at them. After some thinking, it occurred to me that being mean wouldn’t be right.
Maybe the best thing to do would be nothing at all, I thought. For a while I settled on ignoring them and their party until I realized that if I didn’t give Paula a present, they might think they were justified in treating me unkindly. I decided, finally, to give Paula something beautiful to show I could rise above pettiness and forgive.
The prettiest wrapping paper I could find made a lovely lining and covering for a small shoe box. I carefully chose items to fill the treasure box: a dainty cut-glass perfume bottle, a miniature vase with tiny dried flowers in it, and other dried flowers in doll-sized bouquets, all tied with ribbons.
The most important part of the gift was the inspirational poems I copied in my best handwriting on pretty stationery. I rolled each like a scroll, tied them with ribbon, and carefully laid them in the box. Finally, I laid the covered lid on the box and tied it closed with a matching ribbon. I walked to Anne’s house, where the party was being held, gave someone my gift, and left. I felt good knowing that I had done the right thing. From that time on, although I never rejoined that group of girls, they were never unkind to me.
We graduated from junior high and went on to high school. If we happened to meet in the halls, we always acknowledged one another with a friendly hello but rarely stopped to talk. After high school graduation, I went away to college.
I came home to visit during a holiday that year, and I heard that the LDS students attending the local junior college had planned a get-together at the institute of religion. Everyone who had gone away to college and returned for the holiday was invited. When I arrived, I saw Paula. She was waiting for me with tears in her eyes.
She threw her arms around me, and after a few minutes she explained: “After high school the missionaries came to my house and taught me the gospel. I was baptized just a few weeks ago, and I’ve been attending institute classes.
“We were so mean to you in junior high, and I felt so bad. I’m so sorry! I loved the box you made for me, and I kept it. I love the poems. They’re spiritual and beautiful, and I reread them all the time.”
I sure had some exciting news to tell my parents when I got home that night! Sometimes rewards for doing right come immediately, but sometimes not for years. We may never learn of the good we’ve done, though the effects of our good deeds may span many lifetimes. I am relieved that I didn’t give in to my angry feelings those many years ago and do something unkind. I am glad that, during that Christmas season long ago, I chose a gift of love—a treasure that Paula now more fully shares.

Last year, Lyndsey Payzant and her mom, of the Rancho Cucamonga California Stake, searched in vain for a modest dress at a department store near their home in Alta Loma. After being approached by a store manager to see if they were finding what they needed, Lindsey and her mom explained that they were having trouble finding modest clothing in the store.

The store manager was interested in what they had to say and helped set up a meeting with Lyndsey, her mom, and the store’s managers and buyers. Having read about some forward-thinking Kansas young women, Lyndsey went to her Young Women group for help on what to propose at the meeting (see New Era, Jan. 2001, 28).

The meeting was a success, and Lyndsey was invited to help put on a fashion show of appropriate and modest clothing. Lyndsey got to pick most of the clothes, and she already has plans to meet with the store’s designers to have a spring fashion show as well. Strike one up for modesty … again!