Gospel Story Finder

I grew up in a non-member family less than 50 miles from the Hill Cumorah in Palmyra, New York. In those days there were very few Mormons in and around the birthplace of the Church. So few members that the Hill Cumorah stake to which I belonged encompassed the entire state of New York. I didn’t know any Mormons. I knew nothing at all of the church. To the extent that I had even heard of the word “Mormon”, I assumed it was an “old timey” Christian sect, kind of like the Amish. I guess I wasn’t the only one, because when I told my friends that I had joined the Mormon church, they said “well what are you doing here? Where are your clothes?” They apparently thought I should be plowing fields in a straw hat behind a team of horses.

I was at the time a young married adult working as an apprentice butcher when Utah Elders Sullivan and Lemon knocked on my door in the winter of 1968. It seems amazing to me in retrospect that I let them in. I wasn’t a religious person. Hadn’t grown up in a religious family. Wasn’t deep enough to be searching for the meaning of life. I don’t think that anyone thought I was a particularly promising young man. I was kinda like Rocky, just another bum in the neighborhood - an unlikely conversion prospect for sure.

But Elder Sullivan and Elder Lemon were both about my age. And they obviously WERE promising and impressive young men. They befriended me and taught me. I didn’t know anything about the scriptures or doctrine or apostasy or restoration. But I loved and trusted the elders and I believed what they told me. The spirit testified to me in a very subtle way. I gained the tiny seed of a testimony, gave up my sins, (at least the ones I recognized as sins at the time) and was baptized. Again in retrospect I marvel that I opened the door.

I became part of a very small branch on the Cattaraugus Indian reservation – which coincidentally was the location of the very first missionary effort of the restored church. In 1968 the branch consisted of 4 active priesthood holders and about a dozen Indian women and their children. As the only male convert in their living memory, I was kind of a celebrity in the branch, and the branch family eventually convinced me that I had potential that could only be realized by going to college at BYU. So about 8 months after joining the church I became a freshman at BYU in Provo.

My father especially encouraged me to pay my tithing, so one day I asked him about his testimony of this principle. “When did you really know the importance of paying your tithes?” I asked. In response to my question, my father told me a story about his parents paying their tithing.
When my father was growing up in Utah, his family was poor. His shoes were so worn out that the soles had holes in them and were barely attached to his shoes.
One day his father gave him an envelope full of money and said, “Take this to the bishop. This represents our tithing to the Lord.”
So my father started walking through the fields to the bishop’s house. It was winter, and there was snow on the ground. As my father walked, his feet were very cold. He felt the money in his hand and thought how much he could use a new pair of shoes.
But my father kept walking, and he thought to himself, “I guess this has to be a very important thing, so important that my father would take this money and give it to the bishop even when we need it so badly.”
Walking through the snow that day, my father realized the importance of tithing. He came to understand that tithing is more a matter of faith than of money.

One of those members was Jorge Leaño, who had been invited by a fellow employee to listen to the message of two North American missionaries. Jorge was so impressed with the account of Joseph Smith’s First Vision that he wanted his wife, Zorka, to hear it. Zorka’s sister had listened to the missionaries a year earlier in the central Bolivian city of Cochabamba, so Jorge and Zorka welcomed them into their home.

When the missionaries finished the discussions and challenged the family to be baptized, the Leaños told them that they could not be ready so soon. The missionaries again challenged the family to read the Book of Mormon and pray about the things they had heard. Until then, Jorge and Zorka had prayed only at the end of each discussion with the missionaries.

That night, for the first time in their marriage, Jorge and Zorka knelt together and prayed to Heavenly Father. They did so with sincere hearts, intending to do their Heavenly Father’s will as he revealed it to them. Both felt an overpowering witness that the message of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ was true and that the Book of Mormon was the word of God. The following day they told the missionaries they were ready to be baptized, and on 19 September 1965 they became members of the Church.

As he grew in the gospel, Jorge became convinced that God had indeed spoken to man again. “All my questions were answered as to where we came from, why we are here on earth, and what our eternal future will be,” he said.

“My two younger brothers and I all had chores to do on the farm. My family raised cattle, milk cows, horses, chickens, and pigs, plus the grain and alfalfa to feed them. We children gathered eggs and helped with the feeding of the calves and the cows in the dairy herd. Each spring Dad would give us a calf to train and groom for the Franklin County Fair in the fall.
“I learned a lot about the willfulness of those animals. It seemed that every time I got my calf cleaned up, it would lie down and get dirty again, and I had to start over. Teaching an animal to lead on a rope halter took patience and consistency.
“One year I had a calf all ready for the fair to be held the next day. We put it in a stanchion in the barn and laid down fresh straw to keep the calf clean. In the morning we found that the calf had hanged itself in the stanchion. I learned a significant lesson: In spite of some failures and heartbreaks, I could rise above them. I have a happier memory of another year when I won second place overall for show and form for an animal that I had groomed.”

In addition to the summer farm work, Franklin’s father kept him busy at home. To make sure he didn’t run out of jobs around the house and to develop his sense of responsibility, his father had fifty chickens in the backyard. Franklin had to feed and water the chickens, keep the chicken huts clean, and gather the eggs. Since there were more eggs laid than the family needed, he was allowed to sell the extra eggs and keep the money. Brother Richards said, “I’m grateful that I had a father and mother who taught me the joy of working, the value of spending less than I made, and the importance of paying my tithing.”

A few years ago, Sister Monson and I were in the city of Toronto, where we once lived when I was the mission president. Olive Davies, the wife of the first stake president in Toronto, was gravely ill and preparing to pass from this life. Her illness required her to leave her cherished home and enter a hospital which could provide the care she needed. Her only child lived with her own family far away in the West.

I attempted to comfort Sister Davies, but she had present with her the comfort she longed to have. A stalwart grandson sat silently next to his grandmother. I learned he had spent most of the summer away from his university studies, that he might serve his grandmother’s needs. I said to him, “Shawn, you will never regret your decision. Your grandmother feels you are heaven-sent, an answer to her prayers.”

He replied, “I chose to come because I love her and know this is what my Heavenly Father would have me do.”

Tears were near the surface. Grandmother told us how she enjoyed being helped by her grandson and introducing him to each employee and every patient in the hospital. Hand in hand, they walked the halls, and during the night he was close by.

Olive Davies has passed on to her reward, there to meet her faithful husband and together continue an eternal journey. In a grandson’s heart there will ever remain those words, “Choose the right when a choice is placed before you. In the right the Holy Spirit guides” (Hymns, no. 239).

A number of years ago, a one-inch article in my local newspaper caught my attention, and I have remembered it ever since: “Four people were killed and seven workers were rescued after clinging for more than an hour to the underside of a 125-foot-high [38-m] bridge in St. Catharines, Ontario, [Canada,] after the scaffolding they were working on collapsed” (“News Capsules,” Deseret News, June 9, 1993, A2).
I was, and I continue to be, fascinated by this brief story. Shortly after reading this account, I called a family friend who lived in St. Catharines. She explained that the workers had been painting the Garden City Skyway bridge for about a year and were two weeks short of completing the project when the accident happened. After the accident, officials were asked why these men did not have any safety equipment. The answer was simple: they had the equipment; they just chose not to wear it. After the scaffolding gave way, the survivors held on to a one-inch (2.5-cm) lip of steel girder and stood on an eight-inch (20-cm) ledge of steel for over an hour until rescue teams could reach them. One survivor related that as he clung to the bridge, he thought a lot about his family. He said, “I just thank the Lord for me being here today. … It was pretty scary, I tell you” (in Rick Bogacz, “Skyway Horror,” Standard, June 9, 1993).

A full-time mission is an event Brian’s in full training for. He often brings friends from high school to church and seminary with him, hoping to interest them in the gospel.
Victor Venegas, 18, who joined the Church three years ago, says Brian’s friendship helped him feel welcome in the branch. “Brian and I have been friends since I joined the Church,” says Victor, who is also on Hempstead’s baseball team.
“When I first went to church everybody was nice, so I kept coming back,” he says.

Hey, what’s the big idea? Boy, you sure know how to mess things up! Here we poor, hardworking missionaries are trying to keep to a strict schedule of time and yet you continue sending this fantastic magazine. How do you expect a missionary to go back out and tract after lunch when a fresh New Era has just arrived in the mail? Talk about temptation! Last Sunday my companion and I stumbled across a box full of old New Eras. Needless to say, we spent the next two hours reading them. After that we were ready to go out and convert the world. The New Era is most inspirational and a great help to the missionary work. But please—have it delivered on preparation day!

It was a beautiful summer morning in the northern German countryside as my husband and I drove from our home in Frederiksberg, Denmark, toward the county where my mother’s mother was born. Like a child looking forward to the fulfillment of a great wish, I got a lump in my throat when I saw the first road sign that said “Ladelund.” Ever since joining the Church, I had had a burning desire to submit my grandmother’s name for temple work. Often I had had divine guidance in my genealogical research, and I was eagerly looking forward to helping give my grandmother the full blessings of the gospel.
In northern Germany, vital records are scattered about in various church parish houses, rather than being gathered together in a central archive. So I had written to Ladelund to find out just where my grandmother’s records were located. Then I had telephoned the priest to set up an appointment to borrow the books containing those records.
When we arrived at the cozy little house in Ladelund, the priest’s secretary greeted us warmly. She went to the safe to get the book I had received permission to borrow, then returned, looking confused. “The book you need is not here, but it was here yesterday,” she said. Together we searched among the shelves of books, but we could not find it.
I was bitterly disappointed. I had done so much work. Why wasn’t Heavenly Father helping me now? I went to our car to wait for our next appointment several hours later. As I sat there crying, I got the idea that we could drive to the little town where my grandmother’s family had lived. Even though it had been more than a hundred years since the family had lived there, I just wanted to see how it looked.
We arrived in the tiny town at about noon, and we could see no one about. As we drove past the nine or ten houses, I finally spotted an older woman washing windows in her home. We stopped and I ran in to see if she knew anything about my grandmother’s family. As I stood at her front door, I glanced at the name plate. My heart seemed to skip a beat when I saw the name Carstensen—my grandmother’s family name!
Just then the lady opened the door and with a beautiful Slesvig accent asked what I wanted. After I explained my work, she said, “Oh, so it’s mother’s pedigree you want to see. I’ll get it.” She left the room and returned to spread before me a pedigree showing my relatives back to the 1600s. Beside the name of each married couple, with their dates of birth, marriage, and death, it listed all the children, with their place of birth and marriage. This one document gave me more information about my grandmother’s family than I could have gotten from the church records. Now I knew exactly where I needed to look for the children in the family.
After I had returned home to Denmark, I received a letter from the Ladelund church. The secretary enclosed the information from the missing book, explaining that it had been placed in the wrong cabinet by mistake. Thanks to this “mistake,” however, I have found not just one, but more than a hundred names of my German family. Indeed, the Lord had been helping me all along, even though I had not realized it at first.

As we face some of the harsh realities of life and the real obstacles that are there for us to overcome, we often make matters much worse by imagining difficulties that never materialize. We are afraid of what might happen in the future, but it is unproductive to spend time fretting and worrying about what "might" go wrong. I love the story of Abraham Lincoln and the Fox River. Abraham Lincoln, as a young lawyer, was traveling through Southern Illinois on the circuit. In his own words, he tells the story "Many years ago when I was a young lawyer and Illinois was little settled, I and other lawyers used to ride the circuit; from county seat to county seat in quest of business. Once after a long spell of pouring rain which had flooded the whole country, transforming small creeks into rivers, we were often stopped by the swollen streams which we with difficulty crossed. Still ahead of us was the Fox River, larger than all the rest, and we could not help saying to each other, if these streams give us so much trouble how shall we get over Fox River? Darkness fell before we had reached that stream and we all stopped at a log tavern, had our horses put out, and resolved to pass the night. Here we were right glad to fall in with Methodists' presiding elder of the circuit who rode it in all weather, knew all its' ways and could tell us about Fox River. So we all gathered around him and asked him if he knew about the crossing of Fox River. Oh yes he replied, I know all about Fox River. I have crossed it often and I understand it well. But, I have one fixed rule with regard to Fox River. I never cross it until I reach it."
Good advice.

I really appreciate the New Era recognizing how some of the stakes try to help the youth find a greater understanding of the Book of Mormon. I attended youth conference in Medicine Hat, and it will be a lifetime of memories. We almost left our shoes in the mud, and we also had other challenges such as a six-kilometer trek the first day while pulling our luggage on travois. But I guarantee that I will never forget those four days we spent reenacting the Book of Mormon in the “wilderness.” And I’m sure that anyone else who has experienced something similar to it will never forget it as well.
Krista LivingstoneMedicine Hat, Alberta, Canada (via e-mail)

A letter came from a rural area addressed to me. It said, “Following your advice, we appraised our lot and became ashamed of it. It was a pioneer rural home with the usual barn, chicken house, and sheds. The outside fence was broken.
“We tore down the old barn; we straightened up and painted the fence; we whitewashed the other outside buildings; and we dug up the barn area and planted a garden, and what a delightful one it was! Thank you.”

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert O’Brien; illustrated by Zena Bernstein. Atheneum, 1971. Mrs. Frisby’s husband died suddenly last summer, and in the spring she and her four children have to move to a summer residence or be plowed under by the farmer’s tractor.
Mrs. Frisby starts out to find help. She befriends a crow named Jeremy, visits a wise owl, and then goes to the rats of NIMH for help.
These intelligent rats have a highly developed underground colony; however, they have found life too easy for them and have made plans to become self-sufficient. How the rats and Mrs. Frisby help each other is an exciting science fiction story. This book won the 1972 Newbery Award for the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children.

By the time I returned home from my mission, I believed I knew everything there was to know about the Book of Mormon. I never admitted that out loud, of course—but looking back, this attitude influenced how I approached the scriptures after my mission.
And not in a good way.
When I studied the scriptures, I often found myself returning to familiar passages over and over again—mostly to recall and reaffirm the things I’d learned before. I definitely tried to keep pondering the scriptures to learn something new, but I never felt like I was making any discoveries. The enthusiasm I once had for the Book of Mormon started to dwindle.
Soon after returning home, I also started a new job, and my scripture study time shrank from the full hour I had studied on my mission to 30 minutes. Then I received a calling, and those 30 minutes became 15. Then over the summer I served as an FSY counselor. And I used most of my study time to review a handful of verses that I repeatedly shared with youth week after week.
I knew that Heavenly Father loved any time I set aside to study His word. But, frankly, I didn’t feel like I was following Nephi’s invitation to “feast upon the words of Christ” (2 Nephi 32:3). I convinced myself that there couldn’t be anything new to learn. Instead of feasting on the Book of Mormon, I was barely nibbling.
This attitude of complacency continued into my first semester at Brigham Young University, during which I attended a Book of Mormon class. On the first day, my professor stood up at the head of our classroom. Fixing us with a friendly but piercing gaze, he said, “My goal in this class is to convince you that you don’t know the Book of Mormon—at all.”
I was intrigued by this, but it seemed more like the sort of sharp one-liner professors say to get your attention rather than an actual promise.
Thankfully, I turned out to be totally wrong.
As part of the class, my professor assigned us to read the Book of Mormon. Not just open it and scan the words or gloss over a chapter to recall the same story we may have consumed a million times.
He wanted us to actually read.
For example, he taught us about how the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon didn’t include punctuation at all—and he had us add in punctuation to a long, confusing passage from Alma 13 to teach us about the difference that commas and periods can make. He had us read a single verse alongside an 1828 Webster’s dictionary, looking up keywords that held radically different meanings than I’d first assumed.
The class challenged a lot of my basic assumptions about what the Book of Mormon even was. I’d never realized, for example, that Nephi wrote 1 Nephi years after he and his family had journeyed to the promised land (see 1 Nephi 9:1–5; 2 Nephi 5:28–31).
I also discovered how many of the deep flaws of the Nephite culture have startling parallels to the challenges our own cultures face today.
I came to understand the careful, deliberate messages that Mormon, Moroni, and others had implanted specifically for us—and how deeply anxious they were that we didn’t get caught up in the radical skepticism and doubt of the world.
My whole perception and testimony of this book started to change as I pondered these truths.
Through truly feasting on its words, I discovered that the Book of Mormon reveals who Jesus Christ is—not just doctrinally, but personally and intimately. The book bears His signature on every page. It’s an enduring record that testifies how He hasn’t forgotten His covenant people and He never will.
I don’t have all the answers to life. But I’ve come to understand that I didn’t learn everything there was to know about the Book of Mormon from my mission—there is always more to learn and to add to our faith.

Elder Rasband’s middle name is Anderson. It helps him remember his mother’s family. His great-great-grandparents were Jens and Ane Cathrine Anderson. They lived in Denmark almost 200 years ago. They learned about the gospel in Denmark and were baptized. In 1862 they traveled to the United States to be with other Latter-day Saints. Jens died on the trip across the ocean, but Ane Cathrine and her son kept going. It was hard, but their faith was strong. They made it all the way to Utah.

When Caitlin was six years old, she asked her dance teacher if she could wear a more modest costume for the dance recital. When her teacher said no, Caitlin knew what she had to do. She told her teacher she would have to drop out because she had to do what Jesus would want her to do. Caitlin said, “It was a very hard decision to make, but I felt good afterward.”4 We respect our bodies by dressing modestly. We show we know how to keep the commandments and follow the Savior.

While my devotional is not on gratitude, please permit me to briefly express my gratitude to the love of my life, my wife Karrie. She is my best friend, my partner, and my better half. This past summer marked 12 years since she and I deplaned with our children in Honolulu.
With only a handful of bags and an address, which we had received only just before departing, we set out for a house that we had never seen before. We had just sold a house, most of our belongings, rehomed my beloved geriatric dog Fetch with my parents, and were all feeling the trepidation and excitement of having flown almost 4,000 miles to start a new chapter in our lives.
Many of you probably relate to this story, as each of you has made a similar journey to BYU–Hawaii. Do you remember the first view when you exited the H3 tunnel? That expansive view of Kaneohe Bay, the turquoise blue water bespeckled with patch reefs before you, and the sheer green peaks of the Ko’olau behind? Do you remember your first view of BYU–Hawaii? What about the David O. McKay building framed by flags from all the countries represented by our international student body? In front of it all, the sign exclaiming, “Enter to Learn, Go Forth to Serve”. This common experience unites each of us here today.

At a stake conference before Caleb’s passing, I spoke with a General Authority about our experience with Caleb. After he acknowledged the exhausting effort needed to care for Caleb, I thought he would encourage me to faithfully persevere in the service and sacrifice I was providing. Instead, his next four words transformed my relationship with Caleb forever.
He simply said, “You are being exalted.”
The Lord taught a similar principle when Joseph Smith, while incarcerated in Liberty Jail, prayed for relief from the great suffering he and the Saints were experiencing. The Lord responded with a comforting promise:
“My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment;
“And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high” (Doctrine and Covenants 121:7–8).
Similarly, Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles testified: “Adversity is not evidence of the Lord’s disfavor, nor a withdrawal of His blessings. Opposition is part of God’s plan to refine us and prepare us for an eternal, celestial destiny (see 2 Nephi 2:11).”
All this time I thought we were taking care of Caleb. In reality, God, through Caleb, had been taking care of us. The Lord was performing a miracle on me, on my wife and children, and on all those who met Caleb.
Caleb could have quickly returned to heaven, but instead he brought heaven to us for seven remarkable years. In our toughest times, God never abandoned us. With faith, courage, and hope, we learned that His blessings often shine brightest during our trials. Caleb’s constant wink was a tender reminder of God’s profound love for us all.
The author lives in Utah.
Like the Moody family, how can you “purposely choose hope and trust in the Lord” in your own trials?

Three years ago my husband and I were called into the Stake Presidents office. I thought they wanted to talk to us about a position for my husband. To my surprise they asked me to be the Stake Young Women's President. Now, I have never been a president of any auxiliary before so I was pretty sure I looked behind me to see who else was in the room. There sat only me, my husband, and the Stake Presidency. I asked them first of all, are you sure? Then of course I cried out of fear and disbelief. Why would they be inspired by our Heavenly Father to call me? I felt I did not fit the mold or potential of someone to be called to this calling based on my perspective of others I had observed.

After I was set apart I was talking to one of my colleagues at work and I told her of the inadequacy I felt and how I had no idea how or why I would have been called to this calling. Still crying as I spoke to her about my concerns, my friend said to me, "I understand how you feel." She told me she had those same feelings when she was called to that same position. She said, "Euleza, let me tell you what helped me when I felt as you feel right now." It was something one of her stake presidents had said to her when she was called. He said, "Kris, you are not called because of who you are, but who you can become." I felt, as I heard those words, Kris was an angel that was trying to give me a message from my Heavenly Father. Those words may have been for Kris at the time she heard them, but they were for me right now. Her knowledge and understanding of what and how I was feeling was valid to me because I knew she had a similar experience and she had lived through some of my same concerns. She had walked in my shoes.