Gospel Story Finder

One of our favorite things to do as a family is to sit around after church and watch Church history movies. We learn a lot and come together as a family.Michael Lahusky, 18Navarre Ward, Pensacola Florida Stake

While coloring in a coloring book, AnnaLaura came across a picture that showed some girls wearing immodest bathing suits. She pointed out this problem to her mother, who drew new lines on the picture. Anna colored them in, delighted that all the girls were modest. Now whenever Anna finds a coloring page that she doesn’t think is modest, she calls Mom to fix it.

Do everything in the spirit of love. Elder LeGrand Richards shared with us the tender relationship he had with his father. Said he, “I walked into my father’s apartment when he was just about ninety, … and as I opened the door, he stood up and walked toward me and took me in his arms and hugged me and kissed me. He always did that. … Taking me in his arms and calling me by my kid name, he said, ‘Grandy, my boy, I love you.’” (In Conference Report, October 1967, pp. 111–12.)

I know I had a hard time understanding why it was so important until I went there for myself. I went there with my ward. When I entered into the temple I was just overpowered by the Spirit. Then I understood. Pray and then find out for yourself.
Marci Hales, 12Tremonton, Utah

I hated going without showers, eating half-cooked food, and sharing my living quarters with creepy creatures like spiders, yet there I was at girls’ camp. But the truth was I was having the time of my life.
My group was known as the Pink Ladies, and our leader gave each of us bright pink neon shoelaces as our trademark. After enduring five days of rain and cold in the great outdoors, we renamed our group the Pink Penguins.
The rain subsided just long enough to end the week with an evening testimony meeting. My testimony of Christ had been strengthened that week during evening scripture study and gospel discussions with my new friends. During the meeting I thought of my lifestyle at home. I had become friends with girls who were not living up to Church standards. My best friend, Amy, had been telling me how great smoking is and how fun I would be if only I loosened up a bit.
The Spirit had really touched me at camp, and I committed to myself to live a better life when I returned to civilization. I had never borne my testimony before, but I really wanted to this time. As I struggled to muster the courage to stand, I caught a glimpse of the feet of the girls in my group, all of them wearing their pink laces. One by one the girls’ feet carried them to the front where they bore their testimonies.
I looked down at my laces and thought of the love and unity we felt that week and realized I had a terrific support group all around me. With that I stood and headed toward the front. While bearing my testimony, the Spirit was so strong I remember thinking I never wanted to live without it again.

Children can provide wonderful and often humorous insights into life. We have in our family identical ten-year-old twin sons. In some circumstances they are practically impossible to tell apart.

Recently we moved and found ourselves in new surroundings. Several days later I was talking to Aaron, one of the twins, and inquired about the big bump he had on his forehead. He described it this way. “Well, Dad, Lincoln [who is his older brother] was chasing me down the hall. I ran around the corner, and I saw my twin brother, Adam. Now, I knew I could outrun Adam, so I just kept running.” It turns out he ran into a full-length mirror!

One Relief Society president challenged her ward sisters to learn the names of each young woman entering Relief Society. She distributed photos and a short biography of all the incoming young adults to each of the Relief Society sisters. It helped the sisters to call each young woman by name and befriend her.

I was raised in an atheist family that didn’t respect certain values. But my best friend, Maud Dominault, and her family, who are members of the Church, never turned away from me, even when I made mistakes. Her family accepted me, even though I was different. Today, we feel bound together as if part of the same family.

Brother Walters’ supervisor, CES area director Chris Gollan, believes the challenge of distance is being met by both teachers and students.
He recalls that for eight years when he was coordinating the CES program in Adelaide some years ago, the Stirling Branch had the highest percentage of enrollment and the best completion rate for any unit in the Adelaide region. “The teacher traveled from Adelaide, fifty-five kilometers away, each day. Both the teacher and the branch president were thoroughly committed to seminary. If a student didn’t show up at class, the teacher would drive over to his or her home.
“This is a perfect example of right attitude affecting students. The teacher would walk into that class any day of the week and there would never be a discipline problem. Despite the challenge of distance, they made it work.”

When we organized a genealogy class, particularly for a group of nonmembers in town who were doing genealogy as a hobby, we asked Heavenly Father for help in finding a teacher. He sent us another family; the wife was a genealogy expert. She agreed to teach the class every Tuesday night. She was also an excellent pianist and an expert in arts and crafts, which was a big asset to the branch. Her husband became the Sunday School president, and we had another child for Primary.

I am an avid reader of the New Era. I have learned many things from it that have helped me on my mission. One of the articles that I have treasured the most is “Assorted Assyrians” by Betty Curry in the January 1988 issue. The story really touched me, and I even shed tears. As a missionary in the Philippines Davao Mission, I have experienced lots of difficulties, and that article made me realize that I am here for a purpose. I realized I had to trust in God and obey his will. Thank you for an awesome magazine!
Sister CabigundaPhilippines Davao Mission

After John reached Toronto, Canada, he located the Methodist Church, where he became a member and a preacher. In May of 1836, Parley P. Pratt taught him about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, and John was baptized into the Church.
John Taylor continued to trust in the Lord, and he became the third President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Remember that laughter goes a long way. I was fond of telling my children about a championship football game where one team was down seven points with less than a minute and a half to go. A serious error left the team with very little hope of being able to score. As the quarterback huddled with his teammates, he said, “Well, guys, we’ve got them right where we want them.” The team laughed, and feeling relaxed, they went to work. Play after play found the quarterback with a grin on his face. With 10 seconds left in the game, the team scored and won the trophy.

Seven-year-old Mikela Hart of Flower Mound, Texas, is looking forward to her baptism. She reads the scriptures every night and plans to finish the Book of Mormon before being baptized.

Most people don’t start thinking about Christmas until jolly songs play on the radio and festive decor fills the malls. But Rachel H. was thinking about it back in May of 2010. She wasn’t waiting for any physical present; instead, she was preparing to audition for and perform in Savior of the World: His Birth, a musical production depicting the birth of Jesus. When she auditioned for the stake production, she didn’t realize how much of a gift the experience would be.
When the cast list was posted a few weeks later, Rachel was excited to see that she had been given the part of Mary in one of the two casts. “I was so happy to have been chosen to play the part of Mary. I was excited but very nervous,” she recalls. Rachel was just one of nearly 300 youth who participated in the production.

On his mission in England, he and his companions held meetings in market-places or town squares. They set up a stand, sang hymns, and shared their testimonies.

Within months, my sister Dina and I were called as local missionaries in San Salvador. This calling gave us the opportunity to go door to door to share the glad news of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and bring many people to the waters of baptism. In due time, we both served full-time missions in the Central America Mission.

As you were listening to this beautiful rendition by the choir, I was thinking of William Clayton. His father was a teacher, and William had received a good education. He was a good penman, he was good with figures, and he was good at writing and keeping records. He was taught and baptized by the Heber C. Kimball missionary group in the early days of the Church in England. They understood and accepted him readily because of his education and his penmanship. He was just a bright young fellow, 23 years old. Soon he was being used as a secretary, a scribe, or as a bookkeeper by the little organization of the Church over there.

By the time he was 24, he and his wife wanted to go to Nauvoo, so they sailed for America. In Nauvoo he met the Prophet and other leaders of the Church. They used him in interesting ways again because he wrote a beautiful hand and he was a good speller. They could use a young man of that kind. But after the martyrdom of the Prophet he sided with Brigham Young and the Twelve and became one of their scribes and the secretary.

After the martyrdom of the Prophet, he left with the Brigham Young company and had the experience in Iowa that inspired the writing of this wonderful song that we have today. They left in February; it was now April. Slogging through the fields with the wagons and the horses and the teams and the rain and the mud in Iowa, they were discouraged. The going was difficult; people were dying, and babies were born. They were moving slowly, only traveling a few miles a day. In their discouragement, William Clayton wrote in his journal that he sat on a wagon tongue and wrote a song, hoping it would encourage and give some renewed hope and faith to the Saints.

So he wrote “Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear.” It was difficult. They were discouraged. “But with joy wend your way. / Though hard to you this journey may appear, / Grace shall be as your day.” He was giving them encouragement to keep going, that the situation would get better.

Then he wrote those wonderful lines, “We’ll find the place which God for us prepared, / Far away in the West.” Even though we’re stuck here in the mud and discouraged, this will all change. If we have the courage and the faith, the Lord will answer our prayers; it will all come about. It gave them hope and encouragement. “We’ll find the place which God for us prepared, / Far away … / Where none shall come to hurt or make afraid”—stirring, inspirational words.

And then the last verse that the choir sang so beautifully this morning, “And should we die before our journey’s through, / Happy day! All is well!” So if we die, we’ve done our best. We’re going to die sometime, as we all know. So “Happy day! All is well!”

“But if our lives are spared again / To see the Saints their rest obtain.” We’ll see if the wagon wheels will stay on and if the rims will stay on the little handcarts and if we can keep up that courage and the strength through our prayers and we’ll get there. “If our lives are spared again / To see the Saints their rest obtain.” If we get there, then “All is well! All is well!”—if we get there and if we have the courage to make it work.

And in his journal he wrote, “I’ve composed a new song—‘All is well’” (William Clayton’s Journal [1921], 19). I like that original title, “All is Well! All is Well!” which explains our lives if we live as we should. We have the outline, we have the procedures, we have the information, and if we can get there and if our lives are spared again, then we will be able to sing “All is well! All is well!” That hymn has become the Church’s “national anthem.”

“You can always ask the Lord in prayer. The Lord empowers those whom He calls to be missionaries. When my father died, I was comforted by my testimony of the plan of salvation. But there are many people in this world who still don’t know about Heavenly Father’s plan. I know the Lord is preparing people for me to teach.”
Felipe F., 17, Brazil

Recently I read a blog post where the author talked about how the Savior plays a vital role in her daily life. I was happy she was willing to share her feelings, but I was saddened by one reader’s response: “He is of no importance whatever in my life—never has been and never will be.”