Gospel Story Finder

I was shopping with my mom when I found a $10 bill lying on the floor. I picked it up and thought I would go to the toy aisle and pick out a new toy. But then I remembered that I should choose the right and be honest. I knew that $10 was a lot of money to lose, especially for someone my age. I also thought about how sad I would feel if I was the one who lost the money. So I told my mom I was going to take it to the lost and found. The man at the service desk told me that someone had been looking for the money and that he would return it to him. I had a good feeling inside—better than if I had bought a new toy.

My mother fought cancer for nearly 10 years. Treatments and surgeries and finally confinement to her bed were some of her trials.
I remember my father saying as he watched her take her last breath, “A little girl has gone home to rest.”
One of the speakers at her funeral was President Spencer W. Kimball. Among the tributes he paid, I remember one that went something like this: “Some of you may have thought that Mildred suffered so long and so much because of something she had done wrong that required the trials.” He then said, “No, it was that God just wanted her to be polished a little more.” I remember at the time thinking, “If a woman that good needed that much polishing, what is ahead for me?”

Name: Jackson
Location: South Carolina, USA
Goal: Long-term: Own a food truck some day; short-term: Learn about making food
“I told one of my Young Men leaders about a goal I had to have a food truck. He said, ‘Every year I do a back-to-school party. Why don’t you come cook for us?’ So I did. I made about 50 hot dogs and burgers in 45 minutes. I loved being with the guys in my quorum, and I got awesome feedback from the experience and some compliments. And I learned a lot.”

“When is your uncle Tanolo going to take you into the kiva?” Little Brown Bear asked. “I am four moons younger than you, yet I was taken into our kiva this day.”
Acuma pulled his rabbit robe closer around his shoulders and sat huddled by the fire, watching the smoke curl upward to add more blackness to the sooty ceiling of the big cave.
“I don’t know,” he said sadly. “I have done everything I am supposed to do.”
“A boy must prove he is now a man before he can enter a kiva,” Little Brown Bear continued. “Have you gone on a hunt?”
“Oh, yes. We stalked the deer through snow and drove him to the edge of our flat mountain. It was my arrow that brought meat to our fire.”
Little Brown Bear shook his head. “I cannot understand. Surely Tanolo is not so cruel that he would tease you.”
Acuma shrugged but did not answer. He had done everything that was required. He knew the legends, his arrow points were well made, he could make fiber from the yucca plant and weave it into heavy sandals, and he could shoot a straight arrow. All these things his cousin from the big cave village had done too, and this day he had been taken into the kiva.
This was an honor for which every Indian boy lived. Yet Acuma could not go. His father said he was well prepared, but Tanolo would not take him. An Indian boy could not be taken to the kiva by his father. At birth an uncle is chosen to be his teacher, and it is this uncle who must take him to the kiva, where he will go through the rituals to become a man.
Acuma glanced at his cousin, wishing Little Brown Bear could tell him what had happened down in the kiva in his own village. But of course, it was a secret.
When Little Brown Bear left for his own cave village, Acuma jumped up and called his brown dog. He threw off the rabbit blanket. He would be running and his body would warm on this winter day.
“I will not shed tears like that foolish Popeta,” he exclaimed, and he dashed off to chase rabbits. Maybe he would kill one with his throwing stick and show his uncle how skilled he was. Acuma’s dog romped along beside him as they scrambled down the side of the canyon to the creek below.
Then he stopped in surprise. Popeta was filling a water jug to carry back up the steep canyon wall to the cave. She seemed small although she was his own age. Her father could not till his cornfield properly because of a lame leg, so the family did not have enough to eat. And because the father could not run fast, he could not kill enough rabbits to make new blankets. The one over Popeta’s shivering shoulders was badly worn.
“You wear no blanket,” Popeta said in surprise, her teeth chattering. “It is cold.”
Acuma squared his brown shoulders. “I am a man, and I do not feel the cold,” he boasted. “I shall run and catch a rabbit for our dinner.” He started off.
Popeta lifted the heavy water jug. As she did so, the blanket fell from her shoulders. Immediately the brown dog grabbed it in his teeth and raced off, dragging it through the thorny bushes.
“Come back, come back!” Popeta cried out. “It is my only blanket.” She spun angrily on Acuma. “Your horrible dog has stolen my blanket. Go get it.”
Then her shivering grew worse and she began to cry as she climbed the canyon wall with the water jug on her head.
Acuma tried to find the dog, but it had raced down the canyon, dragging the blanket. He could see torn scraps hanging on bushes.
“It is no good now anyhow,” he said as he raced along, feeling warm. Soon he threw his curved stick at a rabbit and proudly carried the dead animal home.
“We already have meat for stew, my son,” his mother said while she stirred something in a clay pot over the fire. “You are a great hunter, and my heart is proud. But why not give it to one who has none?”
Acuma strolled over to Popeta’s fire. “Here you will have meat.”
She thanked him, then asked, “Did you find my blanket? Without it I will have nothing to warm me tonight.”
Acuma shrugged. “No I could not find it.”
He forgot about Popeta as he ate his hearty stew that night and sat huddled by the fire, his own warm blanket over his shoulders.
During the night he awoke feeling cold and pulled the rabbit fur blanket up closer. Somewhere he could hear crying.
It is probably that foolish Popeta, he thought. She always cries.
The next day he could not see her by her fire.
“She is not well,” his mother said. “She needs food and warm blankets. But I have none to spare.”
Too bad, Acuma though carelessly and ran off. But every now and then he remembered her crying.
“It is the fault of my dog,” he grumbled to himself. And the more he thought about it, the less he enjoyed the games he played with his friends.
That night he could not sleep. Finally he got up and went to the small dark room behind the cave where Popeta slept.
“Here is my blanket,” he said. “Use it.”
“But it is not yours to give,” she said in surprise.
“I will lend it,” Acuma said, and he hurried back to his room. He was shivering. How cold it was! He found an old feather blanket that was so worn it could not cover him well. But if he curled up in a tight ball in the very corner of his room the blanket kept out a little of the cold. Popeta had been right—he could not give away his blanket, since all things in the family belonged to the mother. Though he used it, the blanket was his mother’s property.
Then I must make Popeta one, he decided.
For many days his friends called him to play games, but he could not because he was hunting rabbits. He had no idea it took so many to make a blanket. He gave the meat either to his mother or to Popeta, and he sat late into the night cleaning and tanning the skins. He sighed wearily. There was so much work and no fun. At times he was tempted to stop, but remembering Popeta’s tears during that cold night kept him going.
And the few hours he slept, he was always cold. He longed for his own rabbit fur blanket again.
After he had collected enough skins, he had to make many, many arrow points—the very best he could. Then he hurried to his cousin’s village, to the Blanket Maker.
“I will give you these fine arrow points if you will make me a blanket,” he said. “But I must have it quickly. The nights get colder and snow is now on the ground.”
Soon the blanket was finished and Acuma took it to Popeta. “This is yours. It should keep you warm.”
Popeta handed him back his own. “You are kind and it is a beautiful blanket. You have brought us so much meat that I am well. My mother and father do not feel hunger either.”
“I shall see that you have meat in your pot,” Acuma said in embarrassment, then hurried to his own campfire.
That night his uncle came to him.
“When the morning sun rises, you will come with me. It is time for you to enter the kiva to learn the things that will make you a man.”
Acuma’s heart leaped with joy. “I am pleased, my uncle. But tell me, why have you chosen the time as now? For these many moons I have been ready—knowing the making of arrow points, yucca fiber, and the hunt.”
“But the one thing you did not know, my son, you have learned,” Tanolo replied. “A boy plays and gives no thought to others. A man gives up his playing when there is work to be done. Because your dog caused misery to another, you did what was you duty to do, and you did it without complaint. I have watched you and my heart is proud. You shall be known as Acuma, the one who has the heart of a man, though his body is still that of a boy.”

He has to laugh a little when he recalls one of his camping experiences as Scoutmaster of the Spring Lake (Utah) Troop. “We enjoyed a very nice overnight camp by the shores of Utah Lake. Our transportation on that occasion was a wagon and two horses provided by a local farmer. Not being a farmer myself, I left the details to the assistant Scoutmaster. The result was fine for the Scouts, but not so good for the horses—we forgot to provide any hay for them!”

On a June day in 1976, young Chris Sanders and his family watched anxiously from high ground as swirling waters carried away their home and all their wordly possessions. The relentless torrent, unleashed when the Teton Dam collapsed near Rexburg, Idaho, left Chris, his brother Greg, and his parents with only the clothes they were wearing and the family station wagon.
The Sanders would not get back what they had lost, but they would rebuild their lives. In the years to come, Chris’s father, Lynn, accepted advancements in his employment which required several family moves. At each new location a rental house became their home.

When I was 10 years old, my mother died, leaving five children. I grieved over her death, but it was even more painful to watch as my brothers and sisters and I were split up. No one wanted to take all five of us, so each set of grandparents took two children, and my father’s sister took my youngest brother, Orlando. Because of my rebelliousness, I was eventually sent to a school for orphans, where I grew up sad, alone, and bitter.

When I turned 16 I began looking for my brothers and sisters. I found only three of them because Orlando had moved with my aunt to the United States. Then, not long after I had located him, Raúl was electrocuted while learning to work as an electrician.
Shaken by the loss, I confided to my grandmother my memory of Raúl’s sickness. My grandmother asked, “What are you talking about? Raúl was not ill. That was you. One night you became so sick the doctor gave you up for dead. We were in despair and wept over your bed. We never knew why your heart started beating again.”
I was so shocked I didn’t ask my grandmother for more information, but questions about the meaning of life began to torment me: Why had my life been preserved? What was I to do? What did it all mean?
Ten years later, I moved to the United States. There I found my brother Orlando. But I had yet to find the answers to my questions. I began seeking answers in various churches. But though each contributed bits and pieces, none of them had all the answers I needed. I prayed that God would help me come to know the truth.
Then one day in the spring of 1986, Latter-day Saint missionaries came to my house. They answered every question I had. And when I studied the Book of Mormon, I was moved to tears by the testimony I gained of its truthfulness. I was baptized in July. A little more than a year later, I arranged for Raúl’s vicarious baptism in the temple. Then he and I were sealed to our parents forever.
Finding the gospel has changed my life. Surrounded by my brothers and sisters in the gospel, I have never felt lonely since. I understand that my life has a purpose and that, as long as we rely on the Lord, pain can teach and strengthen us.

I find joy in the expectation that members of my family are waiting for me beyond the veil of mortality. I know that someday my spirit will leave my body again. But I know that because of Jesus Christ my spirit and my body will one day be forever reunited, and I can live with Him and with my family eternally.

Today, as we travel throughout the world, we see that many seeds have fallen into good ground. We meet wonderful, stalwart members of the Church who are faithful and dedicated. Some of us who have sown seeds as missionaries may have felt that those seeds fell on hard ground. It is not always possible to know the consequences of one single contact. For years William R. Wagstaff, who served in the North Central States Mission from 1928 to 1930, felt disappointed he had not baptized more people. In the summer of 1929 he and his companion visited a farm family about 180 miles west of Winnipeg.
“Brother Wagstaff remembered giving a copy of the Book of Mormon to the mother and discussing the gospel with her during numerous visits through that and the following summer.
“He recalled that during each visit ‘she’d take off her apron and we’d sit down and discuss the gospel. She’d read and have lots of questions.’
“But at the close of his mission, she still had not been baptized, and he lost touch with her.”
Brother Wagstaff went home, married, and raised a family. Then in October 1969 he and his wife attended his missionary reunion. “A lady approached him and asked, ‘Aren’t you Elder Wagstaff?’
“… She introduced herself as the woman he had taught on the farm outside Winnipeg. In her hand was a worn copy of the Book of Mormon—the one he had given her 40 years earlier.
“‘She showed me the book,’ he related. ‘I turned over the front and there was my name and address.’
“She then told Brother Wagstaff about 60 members of her family were members of the Church, including a branch president.”

Janet was new in my class. I knew right away that she wasn’t someone I wanted for a friend because whenever Mrs. Shell said anything to her, she put her finger in her mouth and said, “Duuuuuh,” then laughed as if it were really funny. A lot of other kids laughed too. Mrs. Shell didn’t.
On the playground, Janet was a bully. One day she was pushing a little kid around until a teacher stopped her. When she called the teacher a name, she was sent to see the principal. From then on, it seemed that Janet spent almost as much time in the principal’s office as she did in our classroom.
I stayed away from her because she was always getting into trouble. She didn’t like me, anyway. She couldn’t call me by my name, Esther—she called me Redhead-Wet-the-Bed. I thought she enjoyed being mean.
In January I went into the Merrie Miss class in Primary. There were seven girls in my class, but only six of us came. Janet was the seventh. When Sister Card asked us about Janet, we told her what kind of a girl Janet was. She hadn’t been to church since her family had moved into the neighborhood, so we hadn’t even known that she was a member.
Sister Card went to Janet’s house several times to invite her to Primary, but she didn’t come. Nobody in her family came to church. Sister Card suggested that we try something as a class to see if we could get Janet to come to Primary. We weren’t very eager to do it, because we were all a little bit afraid of her. She was different from us, and we didn’t understand her. But Sister Card said she would help us, so we finally agreed.
We had a hard time deciding what to do. “Maybe we need to try to understand why Janet acts and talks the way she does,” said Sister Card. “That might help us come up with a good idea.”
I knew why she acted and talked like she did. I said, “Her whole family acts and talks like that, even her mother and father. I’ve heard them when I walk past their house.”
“Yes, I suppose they do,” said Sister Card sadly. “Do you think there are any other reasons for her behavior?”
“Maybe she’s lonely,” said Christina.
“Maybe she is,” said Sister Card. “What do you think we could do to help her realize that we like her?”
“Let’s be pixies to her for a week!” said Mandi excitedly.
“That’s a good idea,” Sister Card said, smiling.
Well, we planned to deliver something to Janet every day for a week, beginning on Sunday. It was kind of scary going up to her porch after dark to ring the doorbell and hope we could run and hide fast enough to not get caught. Each night it got to be more and more of a challenge because everyone in her family began watching for us. We decided to reveal ourselves on Saturday and take her a necklace with a little gold heart and a note telling her that we loved her and wanted her to come and be part of our Primary class.
Ringing the doorbell and hiding had been fun, but meeting Janet face-to-face was going to be different. We were all nervous, even Sister Card, because we didn’t know what Janet would do or say. As we stood on the porch, getting ready to ring the doorbell, the door flew open and Joel, Janet’s eight-year-old brother, yelled, “I caught you!”
We must have all jumped a foot in the air. Then we started laughing. Finally Sister Card asked if Janet was home. Joel left us standing on the porch while he went to look for her.
Just when we began to think they had forgotten us, Janet appeared at the door. She looked a little uncertain when she saw all of us standing there.
“Hello, Janet,” Sister Card said, breaking the uncomfortable silence. “I’m Sister Card, your Primary teacher. You remember me, don’t you? And I think you already know all of these girls from school.”
Janet barely nodded her head.
Sister Card then looked at us expectantly. We had decided earlier that we couldn’t let Sister Card do all the talking, or Janet might think it was only the teacher who wanted her to come to Primary. We looked at each other, and then Kelly said, “We wanted to do something special for you so that you would know that we like you.”
“Yeah,” I said, feeling a bit more courageous. “We hope you got all the things we’ve been bringing you.”
Before I could go on, Janet said, “Oh, so it was you guys who were bringing that stuff. I guess you’re trying to bribe me into going to Primary. That’s kind of what they tried to do where we lived before, too, but it didn’t work. I just don’t like to go to church.”
We were all stunned. No one said anything. Janet looked triumphant, like she had just scored a crucial point.
Then Sister Card spoke. “No, Janet, we’re not here to bribe you. We brought you those gifts to let you know that we like you, just as Kelly said. We brought one more today.” She handed Janet the necklace, beautifully wrapped in a small box, accompanied by a card with the note we had all signed.
“Thanks,” Janet said, as she took the gift, “but don’t expect to see me at church.”
And she went inside and closed the door.

Extended family and the Church community can augment the support of the father. Kathleen H. Hughes, former counselor in the Relief Society general presidency, spoke about her experience with postpartum depression and the help she received from others:
“After the birth of our son … , I sank into a horrible depression. Many of the women in my family suffer from postpartum depression and, as you may know, in those days medical professionals did very little to help women with this condition. I was left to fight my way out of the darkness.
“But those hard times for me were often tempered and lightened by wonderful sisters in the ward who cared for my children and who cared for me physically, emotionally, and spiritually—helping me through that emotional battle.”4

My mother’s parents lived next door to us while I was young. They came from England and Scotland and had also joined the Church and crossed the plains. My mother also set a tone of love and spirituality in our home. I remember one occasion when we had used all our credit at the grocery store. In those days you bought groceries on credit. We had also used up all of the food that Mother had bottled the previous fall. I noticed an expression of great concern on her face as she looked at the empty shelves and the empty flour bin. I followed her upstairs and saw her go into her bedroom and kneel in prayer. Later that afternoon one of my cousins came to our house with several boxes of bread. He had been driving up Fifth East Street when the back door of a bread truck flew open and some boxes of bread fell out in front of his car. By the time he got his car stopped and had surveyed the situation, the bread truck had disappeared. He put the boxes of bread into his car and then drove to our home, which was a short distance away. He knew nothing about our need, but there is no doubt in my mind that the bread was a direct answer to my mother’s prayer.

Even without Isabela Quiroga to worry about, that day was every bit as discouraging as all the others I had struggled through in Bolivia. Like every other morning of my week-old mission, the heavy rain of a monsoon squall had quickly beat the dirt until it danced in muddy splashes, and just as quickly had rolled away over the flat horizon. By the time Elder Skye and I started our trudge through the muddy streets of Montero, the sun was milking the moisture out of the ground in a heavy vapor that rolled over our skin. As usual, Elder Skye led the way while I followed behind, wiping the sweat off my face and picking at the shirt plastered to my body.
“Why do we have to go back there?” I asked him. “After all, she said ‘Come by if you can.’ Let’s just go home for lunch and tell her we were busy.”
“You don’t understand,” Elder Skye told me. “We’ve gotta go back. You’ll see how it is after you’ve been here awhile.”
The only thing I understood right then was that I wouldn’t be able to eat anything at Isabela’s house. As I followed Elder Skye’s confidently squared shoulders through streets I didn’t ever expect to be able to tell apart, I longed for the assurance I had felt one short week before.
On the flight down from Miami, I had joked with the other missionaries about the stern warnings we received from our teachers in the Missionary Training Center. Our brash enthusiasm let us laugh at all their talk of strange foods, alien customs, and a way of life that was far less comfortable than the one we’d known. Nothing could intimidate brand-new missionaries with new suits, shiny shoes, and a spiritual high—at least that’s what I thought.
That confidence in my ability to cope began to fade almost as soon as I stepped off the jet into the thick, moist air of the Bolivian lowlands. The first day in mud-bound Montero, my cozy optimism was replaced by shock almost as fast as my shiny new shoes were replaced with knee-high rubber boots. Not one sight, sound, or sensation was familiar. The language everyone spoke bore little resemblance—in either speed or accent—to the Spanish I had been practicing. There was everything to learn from scratch. When I arrived in Montero from the mission home, I couldn’t even hail a taxi, and ended up dragging my suitcases across town to meet my companion.
Sights, sounds, smells. Learning to clap before entering a dooryard, making purchases in a bustling market without checkout stands. The hundreds of new images of that first week kept me awake at night, trying to sort them all out.
That particular morning, however, it was a stateside memory that preoccupied me. As we neared Isabela’s house, I was remembering with recently acquired fear that someone had told me, “Don’t eat in the homes of the poor people.”
For several days before Isabela’s lunch invitation, my maladjustment to Bolivia had reached the point where I couldn’t even eat in our own apartment. My appetite disappeared every time I found myself facing a plate of guiso or a strangely-spiced soup. Even the vaguely American dishes prepared by that kind sister couldn’t overcome the problems of a stomach—and a mind—that had never been south of the border before.
Just when I began to seriously worry that I might not be able to make it in Bolivia, Isabela invited us to come to lunch the next day and doubled my distress. The home where Isabela lived with her five children was the type I had been warned about. The adobe walls of the lot enclosed a mud courtyard, two rooms with only beds and chairs for furniture, and a ceilingless kitchen where the clay tiles showed above the rafters. The money Isabela made selling vegetables in the marketplace couldn’t pay for anything more.
On our previous visits, Elder Skye and I had sat on the only two chairs while Isabela and her children crowded the beds. In their rapt attention to the discussions, they didn’t notice how uncomfortable I was in those meager surroundings. That uneasiness, however, was nothing compared to the alarm I felt when Elder Skye accepted the invitation to actually eat in their home. Twenty-four anxious hours later, as we headed down her street, I was so afraid my stomach hurt.
As we approached the house, the little boy watching the street ran inside to let Isabela know we were coming. At the open gate, we paused and Elder Skye clapped his hands, bringing the boy flying out again to take us both by the hand and laugh, “Pasen, pasen no mas!” “Come in, just come in!” Elder Skye laughed with him as he tugged us across the flat stepping-stones dropped in the mud, and I looked around the courtyard and remembered that the elders in the mission home had said the water in Montero had amoebas.
At the door to the kitchen, we paused to kick the clods from our boots. In the middle of the room Isabela and her sons and daughters stood around a table set with only two places. With a guilty feeling, I realized she had never doubted we would come.
“Pasen, sientense.” “Come in, sit down.”
With simple grace, Isabela offered us her two chairs, her smile showing her pleasure that we had come to eat at her table. Isabela was a short, quiet woman with the harshness of Bolivian widowhood etched in her face, her sinewy arms, and her strong brown hands. Nevertheless, there was beauty in the dignity, strength, and kindness evident in the features inherited from her Inca ancestors.
Once we were seated, the children clustered around the table, their smiles flashing in their dark faces. They joked with Elder Skye and laughed when I didn’t understand the Quechua words they mingled with their Spanish. Coming back from the stove, Isabela shooed them away and set a steaming bowl of gray mush before each of us. With the poetic phrasing of her Kolla people, she told us, “He esperado su buenallegada con trigo.” “I have awaited your good arrival with wheat.” Then, while our sweat dripped onto her table, she asked us to forgive her for not having anything better to offer.
I almost trembled as I looked at that bowl of boiled wheat. But then a strange thing happened. As Elder Skye offered a blessing and I sat with my eyes closed, another voice replaced his in my mind. “I have awaited your good arrival with wheat.” Amidst all the jumbled images of the past seven days, those words were something I finally understood. I realized how much that gruel meant to the family, and that they would wait until we left to share what remained in the pot. When Elder Skye finished, I stared at my bowl for a long time, and then, with a look at Isabela’s smile, I ate the wheat.
In the months that followed that meal, I learned to love Bolivia and its food. I ate chicharrón and picante, and not only survived, but thrived. I also grew to love the people I met, and again and again during my stay there, I experienced through them the joy the gospel brings to those who embrace it. Isabela’s act of Christ-like love helped me to put aside my own cares and serve others, and I never forgot the words that were so sweet and delicious to a lonely and discouraged soul.

Jason C. Jones turned up the collar of his wet coat. He tried to creep farther under the bush, but the chilling rain still soaked through and found him.
Will I ever be warm again? Jason wondered.
On this cold night in November 1833, Jason thought back to that hot day in July when it seemed to him their troubles had all begun.
Jason’s father said to him that morning, “I have to ride into Independence for supplies, Jason. Fix the broken fence. And remember you’re eleven now, and you’ll have to look out for your mother and Jane.”
Shortly after noon that day Jason was straightening a fence rail near the road when he heard the sound of running horses.
Shading his eyes, Jason looked down the road. Many men were coming toward him on galloping horses. Then he noticed that all the men had weapons of some sort. Jason saw several rifles and some pistols, but most of the riders carried whips or clubs.
The boy trembled in fright. Are they members of a mob? he wondered. He’d heard stories about men who threatened the Saints, and sometimes when his father and mother had thought the children were both asleep, Jason had heard them whisper about killings.
All but one of the riders raced past the boy. The one who stopped pulled his horse up near Jason and shouted, “You one of those Mormon boys?”
Jason nodded.
“Tell your folks to get out,” the man cried. “You’re not wanted in Jackson County, Missouri.”
Jason stood silent and the man rode away.
When his father came home, Jason told him about the men and then asked, “Why don’t the people want us here, Father? We’re not hurting anyone, are we?”
His father looked sad. He was quiet for a moment, and then he explained, “I guess folks feel there are too many Mormons coming to live here.”
Jason remembered that the rest of the summer was peaceful at their farm, but many other families had not been as fortunate. One night his father rode into Independence again. A meeting was being held so that some of the Mormon leaders and other men chosen from the area could talk over their problems.
Before he left, Jason’s father had smiled and said again, “Take care of your mother and Jane, son. I’ll be home soon.”
But two weeks passed and Jason’s father had not returned. Near nightfall that day Jason walked to the road. He peered in the direction of town, hoping he might see his father coming home. What Jason saw instead made him stiffen with fear. He raced back into the house and shut the door.
Before he spoke, he took a deep breath. “Mother,” Jason quietly said, “some men are coming.”
His mother jumped up. A shirt she had been mending dropped unnoticed on the floor. “Maybe we can get away through the back door, Jason,” she suggested in a shaky voice. “Let’s hurry and—”
Before his mother finished speaking, a huge man pushed the door open.
“You Mormons get out!” he bellowed. “We’re going to burn your house down!”
Jason could not believe what he heard the man say. Then there were sounds in the yard outside, and Jason knew the loud noises meant fences were being ripped down and the barn and other outbuildings torn apart.
Jason helped his mother find Jane’s shawl as well as her own. He snatched a wicker basket and began to throw food into it, but the big man grabbed the basket and shouted, “Go on! Get out before this place burns down around you!”
Jason and his mother and Jane ran outside and up the road. They stopped a few times to look back at the flames that licked around their home as it burned.
During the night they were joined by other homeless women and children. They crossed a burned prairie crusted with sleet. Whenever they tried to stop and rest, men on horseback drove them on.
The driven people moved northward to the Missouri River. They reached the river late one evening.
Crowded on its banks were household goods, boxes, provisions, animals, and many people waiting their turn to cross the river. Only one small ferry was available.
Shortly after dark Jason became separated from his mother and Jane. Now the rain began to fall in torrents, and Jason huddled under the bush. He was desperately miserable and lonely as he thought about all that had happened since that July day when the man on horseback had screamed, “You’re not wanted!”
Then Jason remembered what he could do. Kneeling in the mud, Jason prayed for help.
Finally he dozed. But cries from the people on the river bank soon awakened him, and Jason crawled from beneath his bush.
The rain had stopped, and everyone was looking up. Jason looked up too. The sight he saw filled him with amazement!
The heavens were a deep blue background for a wondrous spectacle of falling stars that streaked downward in bright flames. It looked as if the stars exploded in place and then began to tumble toward the earth.
To Jason, it seemed that every star in the heavens was about to land in the river beside the people.
As the magnificent display gradually stopped, Jason again remembered his troubles. He sighed and shivered as he pulled his coat about him. Just then he felt a hand on his shoulder, and Jason looked up and saw his father.
“Oh, Father,” he sobbed, “I’m so glad to see you!”
His father hugged him close. “I found your mother and Jane too,” he said. “Come.”
The man and the boy walked down the river bank together. A fire burned warmly in front of a tent, and inside the opening Jason could see his mother and sister.
“With our family together again, even a tent is a home,” Father said as he gently pushed Jason inside toward his welcoming family.

As a witness of the Lord Jesus Christ, I bear witness of the Book of Mormon that led me to Him. I found the Lord Jesus Christ within the covers of the Book of Mormon as a 19-year-old missionary, walking through the rain and the mud of England, riding a bike with mud clear up the back of my coat and over the top of my head, tracting in cities that had never been opened, with baptisms that did not come for a long time. Those nights I went back to No. 3 Gilmore Road and read and read and wept. I knew that Jesus was the Christ, that the Book of Mormon was true, that the gospel had been restored. If the folks in England didn’t understand that, then I would just keep knocking on their doors until they did.

A few weeks ago, a brother complained to me, “When I was away on business recently, in another part of the country, I went to church and no one spoke to me. I felt very lonely, especially as I was so far from home.”

I paused and then asked, “How many people did you speak to?” At first he was a little annoyed, feeling I had not empathized, but then he smiled and said, “You’re right, I did hold back instead of reaching out.”

Carie Nielson (11) and Kandace Eral (12) of La Verkin, Utah, love exploring the area where they live. “The desert has many interesting things to discover,” said Kandace. “You just have to be willing to get out and look for them.” The lava hillside behind their home is a perfect place to start. The girls have found ancient arrowheads and fossil vertebrae. Not far from their home on Hurricane Hill they found petroglyphs made by the Anasazi Indians.
The girls like to include their younger sisters on some of their exploring trips. Julie (9) and Nila (8) Nielson and Stacha (8) and Tausha (6) Eral are thrilled when they get to go. “Our favorite places have always been Pah Tempe Hot Springs and Bear Cave,” said Carie. “There aren’t really any bears in Bear Cave. We just call it that. There are a lot of bats, though. Stacha and Nila think that they’re cute!”

One Sunday I went to listen to the talk of a friend who had returned from a mission. When I arrived, I realized I didn’t know many people in the congregation, so I sat alone in the back of the chapel.
Soon the sacrament was being passed. There were only three of us on the long bench at the back of the chapel, with me on one side and an older couple on the other. I sat there silently, and when one of the deacons got to our row with the water, I moved toward the couple so the deacon wouldn’t have to walk all the way around the pews just to give the water to me.
But because I’d moved, the deacons were confused about whether I’d received the sacrament. After the deacons had handed their trays back to the priests, there was some discussion among them. I watched as one of the priests walked over to the bishop and asked him a question, with the bishop nodding in the affirmative. Next thing I knew, a deacon, with a bread tray in hand, was walking up to me, asking, “You got the bread, right?”
I nodded quickly, and the deacon returned to the front of the chapel. At first, I was embarrassed that I had caused an interruption. But then I thought of the spiritual implications of the situation: the priesthood holders, representatives of Jesus Christ, were concerned that I had not received the emblems of the body and the blood of Christ and went out of their way so I could participate fully in the ordinance.
The actions of the priesthood holders during that sacrament meeting reminded me of what Christ would do in a similar situation—He would go out of His way to minister to the one. Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin (1917–2008) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles taught that “true disciples of Jesus Christ have always been concerned for the one.”1
This experience with the sacrament also helped me better understand the sacredness of the ordinance and how it enables us to renew our covenants with Heavenly Father and become better disciples of Christ.

Members of the Palo Alto First Ward, Menlo Park California Stake, watched in anticipation as a three-bedroom, two-bath, fully-carpeted home on Eighth Avenue was built last summer. Complete with a sun deck protected by overhanging oak boughs, the house is like many others in the region except for one thing—it was built, and then sold, by the priests quorum in the Palo Alto First Ward.
The project was undertaken with a fourfold goal in mind: (1) to strengthen quorum brotherhood, (2) to put the principle of work into action, (3) to raise money for a special summer activity, and (4) to prepare for missionary service. A year’s worth of work went into the planning, construction, and selling of “the House.” After paying off the loan and other expenses incurred in the project, the quorum made a profit of $10,000. Eighty percent of this went into a missionary trust fund for quorum members, ten percent was divided among the members, and ten percent went into a fund to finance quorum activities.
Each member of the quorum had specific tasks for which he was responsible. Some of these included lot acquisition, demolition, carpenter foreman, payroll and accounting, shingling, electrical work, heating, sheet metal work, plumbing, and interior design and color coordination. The quorum was assisted by members of the teachers quorum and four nonmembers who are now actively participating in and/or investigating the Church and its programs. Adviser for the entire project was Young Men president and priests quorum adviser Dick Jacobsen.

“A few years ago,” says one member, “I thought there was nothing more important than playing pool (a game similar to billiards), drinking and smoking with the boys, and staying away from home. Now I can’t understand how I ever did some of those things. When we moved to Texas things were about the same. I didn’t attend church and didn’t care much about religion. Then my wife went to our bishop and asked him to help. Of course, he passed on the plea to my elders quorum president, who prayed about it and decided that he should assign himself to be our home teacher. Then a strange thing happened. When he came to our house on his first visit, for some reason I let him in—and I had never let a home teacher in before. He talked to me as a friend and someone who cared about me. He asked me if I liked sports; well, that was great because I loved sports. He told me that they were playing basketball and asked me to join the fellows on the team. I was happy to cooperate. Meeting those good men on the team made me feel as though the friends I had in the bars weren’t really friends at all.”

But this brother still wasn’t attending church. Every month the home teachers would invite him to come, and “every month I would make up some excuse. I was afraid to make the change. But the president never made me feel bad or ashamed at my excuses; I was always happy and content when he was in our house. Then my father died. I realized that I had gone almost my entire life disappointing him, and vowed I would never disappoint him and my mother again. That next Sunday I went to church in Houston for the first time. The people accepted me like I had never been inactive at all.”

From there it was only a matter of continuing on his new path to reach the temple with his wife and children.

Forty-five years ago I worked with a man named Sharman Hummel in the printing business. I once asked him how he came to receive his testimony of the gospel.
He responded, “We lived in the East. I was journeying by bus to San Francisco. In Salt Lake City a young girl entered the bus—a Primary girl—who sat next to me. She was going to Reno, Nevada, for a visit with her aunt. As we journeyed westward, I noticed a billboard: ‘Visit the Mormon Sunday School this week.’
“I said to the little girl, ‘I guess there are a lot of Mormons in Utah, aren’t there?’
“She replied, ‘Yes, sir.’
“Then I said to her, ‘Are you a Mormon?’
“Again her reply: ‘Yes, sir.’”
Sharman Hummel then asked, “What do Mormons believe?” And that little girl recited the first article of faith; then she talked about it. Continuing, she gave him the second article of faith and talked about it. Then she gave him the third and the fourth and the fifth and the sixth and all of the Articles of Faith and talked about all of them.
Sharman Hummel said, “I was profoundly impressed. When I arrived in San Francisco, the very first thing I did was to look through the yellow pages for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I called the mission president, and he sent two missionaries to where I was staying. I became a member of the Church, my wife became a member, all of our children became members.”
The entire Hummel family remained active in the Church. Each of the daughters has been to the temple. Countless are those who have been brought to a knowledge of the gospel by the members of this family—all because a young child had been taught the Articles of Faith and had the ability and the courage to proclaim the truth.