Gospel Story Finder

Just like Rexburg, Bountiful was never on the list of recommended or even possible temple sites during the time I was doing the work for the Prophet of God. In the late 1980s, in fact, a brilliant man working for the Presiding Bishopric and for me prepared a list, using careful statistical analysis, of one hundred places deserving temples. I delivered it to the President. Based on the criteria we used to make that list, Bountiful, which is where my family and I then lived, would not have appeared in the second or third-hundred possibilities.

Not many weeks after I sent the list of one hundred sites to the President, our son John, the one born in the old Madison Memorial Hospital, came home from the Bountiful Seminary. He announced with some enthusiasm, "A Dad in seminary today told me that the Church has purchased a site for a temple on Bountiful Boulevard." I said to him with great emphasis, and some annoyance, "John, I am in charge of evaluating and buying sites for temples. If you look as if you even think that unfounded story might be true, people will believe it."

Within a day or two, my wife said that she had heard in Relief Society that the Church had purchased a future temple site in Bountiful. I told her, "Kathy, I am in charge. That is an unfounded rumor, and you mustn't even appear to believe it."

The next day in the media, the Church announced the purchase of a temple site in Bountiful. I called Clair Bankhead, who worked with me buying temple properties and sites. I asked, "Clair, why didn't you tell me?" He said, "President Benson told me to buy it and not to tell anyone. So I did what the Prophet asked."

When John came home that day after hearing the news, he said with a smile, "Now I know what it means for you to be in charge." So did I. And now so do you. The Prophet, who holds all the keys of the Kingdom, including the keys of the sealing power, is directly accountable to the Lord for temples. Others may help, but the Lord decides and tells His Prophet. It was a miracle that Bountiful, twenty minutes from Salt Lake and twenty-five from Ogden, received a temple.

Another of you wrote, “I love being a mother. I love teaching my children the gospel. I substituted in Relief Society one week and got to give the lesson on family scripture study. This is something close to my heart, something I can’t imagine family life without. After the lesson, a sister came up to me and said, ‘I can’t believe all you do. I don’t have the patience.’ But she sings and takes music lessons. At times I’ve envied people who could sing well or play an instrument, because I love music.
“After my conversation with her I felt that although I had not been blessed with great musical ability, Heavenly Father had blessed me with a love of motherhood and that this indeed was a gift and a talent for which I am grateful.”

Then there was the time they went underground. They heard one day that someone had discovered a cave up a nearby canyon, and from that moment on nothing would do but that they should find a cave of their own. So everyday after school, and all day on Saturdays, they could be seen up in the canyons with their cameras, pretending to be sightseeing and picture taking.

They were really cave hunting and doing it with the same all-out dedication they do everything. They checked out about every crack in every rock in the canyons, looking for the telltale air currents that reveal a cavern behind the crack. They learned to look for the slightest movement in spiderwebs and grasses; they lit matches and held them to cracks to see if the flame flickered under some imperceptible breeze.

For two months they searched, and they were prepared to go on searching until heavy snow made it impossible, and then to start again the following spring. But one day the search suddenly stopped for a moment as they squatted in front of a tiny crack looking at an extinguished match. They fumbled another into flame and held it in front of the crack. It was immediately blown out. Grabbing a nearby stick, they started to dig. The next day they returned with picks and shovels. Their callouses grew during the following days, but the crack remained a crack. They told no one about their search, knowing that many fine caves have been vandalized by thoughtless sightseers.

After 20 feet of hard digging, they came to a little room almost big enough for both of them to sit up in. A couple of anemic stalactites straggled down from the ceiling, but the room ended in a blank wall. They got the matches out, found another breezy crack, and started digging again. Fifteen feet farther in they broke through into a large cavern shimmering with the jeweled spires and daggers that cave hunters dream about. It had taken two months of search and 35 feet of back-breaking, dirty digging, but it was all worth it.

The cave turned out to be about 300 feet deep, fanning out on either side into many smaller rooms. They left a register of their discovery in the largest chamber and covered the entrance back up so that no one could come in and destroy the formations. For several years it was their own private, secret cave, a little magic kingdom that no other human beings had ever seen. Recently, members of a local spelunking club found the signs of digging at the entrance and broke through into the cave, but they too wish to preserve the cave’s beauty and have agreed to keep its location a secret.

What was the highlight of Kaonu Ly’s trip to Washington, D.C.? Kaonu and several other outstanding students from around the U.S. got to tour government agencies, visit historic sites, and participate in discussions of how government works. She also got to meet Senator Jesse Helms (shown here with Kaonu), the senator from Kaonu’s home state of North Carolina. And although Kaonu loved all of those things, she loved something else even more.
“A sight I will never forget was the Washington D.C. Temple. It was so sacredly beautiful. I felt so proud to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” she says.
Kaonu, who is a Laurel in the Albermarle Branch, Charlotte North Carolina South Stake, also used the trip as a missionary opportunity, sharing pamphlets about the Church and the Articles of Faith with the other youth she met.

I could run a long way in a minute.
Yesterday …
I ran two miles yesterday, like every other day. Fifteen laps, mouth shut all the way, to strengthen the heart and lungs.
Two miles a day, whether I felt like it or not.
I never could work out a labor-saving system for running two miles. Sometimes I tried running with short, quick strides, not lifting my feet very high off the track, and sometimes I tried bounding along with great, high strides. But no matter what method I used, two miles were still two miles, and every inch of them had to be run in the very old-fashioned way of throwing one foot in front of the other for as many times as it took to carry me all the way across the finish line.
There’s no way to sleight-of-hand a two-mile run …
The first two laps were always the hardest, because that was as far as most of the other fellows ever ran. I’d seen them come onto the track, run their two laps, and quit.
Some of them quit sooner.
Sometimes one of them would pass me, running just as hard as he could go, and I’d be tempted to race him. It bothered me to have anyone pass me on the track.
But I’d let him go, and in a lap or two I’d pass him back.
Sometimes he’d be walking, sometimes he’d be standing still, and sometimes he’d be doubled over at the edge of the track, gasping for breath like a chronic smoker.
I had fifteen laps to go, and I didn’t dare forget it. I had my choice of racing with the sprinters or running my fifteen laps.
One or the other.
But not both.
I did race with the sprinters a few times …
The competition was a thrill!
I’d be running along at a good two-mile speed, and I’d hear one of these sprinters coming up behind me, moving fast. He’d swing out around me and start to pass, and I’d let him get two or three strides ahead of me; then I’d hit it with all the speed I had and pass him like a blur!
Or else I’d pass him slowly, staying just a chest ahead of him, until he was at his absolute limit.
Then I’d move like a race horse and show him what a distance runner could do in an all-out sprint!
One day I walked onto the track and sprinted for two laps, keeping to the outer edge of the track and passing every man in sight.
I couldn’t stand to have the sprinters think that I was a distance runner only because I didn’t have the power and speed to sprint. I fed my ego, but I used up the wind I needed for my two miles.
I decided I had to choose between my wind and my ego. I chose my wind.
In a marathon, ego is no substitute for endurance.
I had to coexist with the sprinters. I had no more to gain by racing them in their sprints than they did by racing me in my distance runs.
I never raced them again.
If I raced with them, I didn’t make my fifteen laps.
You can’t win your own game by playing someone else at his, even if you beat him. There’s no way in the world you can win your own game without playing your own game …
And somewhere along the line, I made a decision in cold blood—my game was the two-mile game; I was running to win.
After that I ran my two miles every day, at a two-mile pace, and left the sprinting to the sprinters.
But the first two laps were still the hardest. That was probably because I could always think of so many good reasons why I should quit at the end of the first two laps.
There was only one way I could get past that point—I just had to grit my teeth and keep on running.
And I did …
The rest of the first mile was easier, but at the end of it was another mental barrier. After running one mile all the way to the finish line, I found myself at the starting line of another mile to run, and knew that I had to begin at the beginning and do it all over again.
I tried to ignore the quitter hidden in my mind, the traitor who liked to relax in a mental easy chair and taunt me: “A mile’s enough for anyone …”
I had to keep complete control crossing that dual line, the quitter-killer line, where quitters quit and winners keep on running.
That line killed a lot of quitters …
But once I crossed the line, I crossed the border into a new world, where the air came easier, and my body was lighter, and my brain was quicker and clearer.
The ultimate reward for running the first mile was the opportunity to run the second.
The second mile …
A mile of meditation, and even … relaxation. My brain was rich with oxygen, and I did some of my best thinking bounding along that second mile.
I thought of the physical world and its laws, and I thought of the fine arts and their expression, and I thought of people and their feelings. Especially the people I loved.
And sometimes I pretended she would be there waiting for me, just beyond the finish line …
Why didn’t I tell her how I loved her?
* * *
The last minute must be running out.
The game is finished.
And it wasn’t a two-mile game …
The heart is dead. All used up. Like a candle sputtering out when the last drop of wax is burned away.
Still …
This heart carried me over a lot of miles …
It was a two-mile heart. The heart of the two-mile game …
Can it really be dead?
How can it be dead?
I don’t believe …
I don’t believe it can be dead!
Come on, you two-mile heart! You CAN‘T be dead!
I have things I haven’t finished yet. I have things I haven’t even begun …
Beat! You can!
Beat! You will!
BEAT! I feel it coming …
BEAT! Almost …
THERE!
It beat!
I FELT it beat!
Exhausted …
Relax …
The first two are the hardest …
Now …
Beat! Almost …
Again, with more will …
BEAT!
Nothing …
Was the first time only my imagination?
For her sake …
BEAT!
AGAIN!
I felt it beat again!
AGAIN! …
Again! …
Again …
Again …
The second mile …
The mile of meditation …
Relaxation …
And very soon I’ll tell her how I love her …
“Nurse …”
“Yes; how are you feeling now?” “Much better, thanks, Would you let me have a pen and paper, please? I’d like to write a Christmas letter.”
* * *
The first mile is finished. The second is yet to run.
The second mile …
A soft, golden path, winding through green grass and tall trees, and leading—
Somewhere …
To her?
We’ll see where it leads. It’s a two-mile game, and it isn’t finished yet.
And now …
Now I’ll tell her how I love her …

The morning of 18 May 1980 stands out vividly in Elder Shirley Dean Christensen’s memory. It began as a beautiful, sunny spring day. But by noon the skies over Royal City, Washington, were black, and the once-green fields and orchards were covered in ash. Mount Saint Helens, about 150 miles (240 km) west of Royal City, had erupted.
During the next few days, Elder Christensen watched in horror as the ash-laden trees in his orchards dropped much of their precious fruit. He thought the impact of the catastrophe on his apple-growing business would be devastating.
But the remaining apples were of excellent quality, and the thinning of the fruit had actually benefited his crop. “The Lord really did protect our crop,” he says. “That turned out to be one of the most productive years we’ve ever had.” He links that blessing to his family’s faithful payment of tithing and to their desire to obey the Lord’s commandments. The experience also taught him that adversity sometimes brings blessings in unexpected ways.

There was to be one great final lesson before his mortal life ended. He was incarcerated in Carthage Jail with his brother Hyrum, with John Taylor, and with Willard Richards. The angry mob stormed the jail; they came up the stairway, blasphemous in their cursing, heavily armed, and began to fire at will. Hyrum was hit and died. John Taylor took several balls of fire within his bosom. The Prophet Joseph, with his pistol in hand, was attempting to defend his life and that of his brethren, and yet he could tell from the pounding on the door that this mob would storm that door and would kill John Taylor and Willard Richards in an attempt to kill him. And so his last great act here upon the earth was to leave the door and lead Willard Richards to safety, throw the gun on the floor, and go to the window, that they might see him, that the attention of this ruthless mob might be focused upon him rather than the others. Joseph Smith gave his life. Willard Richards was spared, and John Taylor recovered from his wounds. “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”12 The Prophet Joseph Smith taught us love—by example.

When Jason woke up on Saturday morning, he jumped out of bed, looked out his window, saw the sun shining, and heard birds singing. He smiled his biggest smile. “What a happy day!” Jason said as he got dressed.
He began to clean his bedroom. He was expecting company, and he wanted his bedroom to look just right. He put all his cars and trucks and other toys in the toy box. He put all his books on their shelves. He put his dirty clothes in a basket.
Finally Jason looked around and smiled. “My bedroom looks good,” he said. “Now I am ready for my company.” He jumped back into bed, pulled his blankets up around his chin, and waited.
Pretty soon he heard a noise in the hall. He shut his eyes and tried to act like he was asleep. Squeak, squeak went the door to his bedroom as it slowly opened. Dad, Mom, and Jason’s two sisters tip-toed to his bed and began to sing. “Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. …”
Jason opened his eyes and smiled his biggest smile. “Thank you,” he said. “I knew you would come for my birthday!”

In September 1830, Newel Knight and his sister Anna’s husband, Freeborn DeMille, attended the Church’s second conference, held at Fayette, New York.11 Newel was ordained a priest, and Freeborn was baptized.

At Fayette, Newel Knight became the young prophet’s confidant during a crisis caused by Hiram Page’s claim of receiving revelations for the Church through a peepstone. Newel wrote that Hiram Page carried “quite a roll of papers full of these revelations,” which led many astray. Joseph Smith “was perplexed and scarcely knew how to meet this new exigency.” Sharing the same room, the two friends spent the greater part of the night in prayer. In response, Joseph received a revelation (see D&C 28) that spelled out the proper channels for revelation to reach the Church. Newel reported, “Brother Page and all … present renounced the stone, … much to our joy and satisfaction.”

When Clare Morris’s English literature teacher assigned the class to read a book that contained offensive language, she wasn’t sure what to do. Clare, who lives in Wolverhampton, West Midlands, England, was especially nervous about reading the book aloud in front of the class, which she knew she would be called on to do. Clare knew it was not right to read the book, but she also knew that her teacher was strict and might not be understanding about Clare’s convictions.
Finally, Clare approached her teacher and told him she would not read the book. When the teacher asked her why, Clare told him some of her beliefs. The next day the teacher announced that the class would not finish reading the book because it was offensive to some students.
“I know that this book isn’t used in the curriculum anymore, and it makes me happy that I have stopped other people from going through what I did,” says Clare.

After I finished high school I got a job that didn’t pay very much, and I was embarrassed to be paying so little tithing. One of my friends reminded me of Jesus praising the poor widow (see Luke 21:1–4). From that point on, those thoughts didn’t return to my mind. I continued to pay a full tithing. Later on I was blessed to get a better job and earn money for my mission.
Fabián Argote Montalvo,Las Granjas Ward, Neiva Colombia Stake

One evening I took three of my younger siblings to the temple to do baptisms. As the temple worker checked our recommends, he discovered that my sister’s was missing the bishop’s signature. I started filling out a form to take to the temple recorder, who would call the bishop. Then the temple worker checked my brother’s recommend and found that it had not been activated. I had the pen, so I took the form we were handed and began filling it out too.
I knew my brother and sister could not go in with errors on their recommends, but I felt responsible for them, and until I helped them take care of these errors, I could not go in either. I felt frustrated at being kept out of the temple. We left the baptistry and went upstairs to the temple entrance to explain our situation at the front desk. The temple recorder said he could fix the problem in just a few minutes, so the four of us sat down to wait in the lobby.
As I sat there, my frustration changed to discouragement. We were being kept out for such simple errors, but they were all the difference between waiting in the lobby and entering the Lord’s house. It had been a rough day, and I had counted on the temple to help me feel at peace. The mistakes weren’t my fault, but as the wait dragged on, I felt ready to cry. I was trying to be good by coming to the temple and setting an example of temple attendance for my younger siblings. So why were we being kept out when I wanted so badly to be inside?
And then I realized something: if I felt discouraged being kept out of the temple for a few clerical errors, how disappointed would I feel to be kept out for my own errors—to not be worthy to enter the temple? As I considered this, I was suddenly calm. I felt that I had learned the lesson God wanted me to learn. I promised Him that I would always try to be worthy to go inside the temple. I promised that I would never be kept out of the Lord’s house for my own errors; I never want my actions to confine me to just the lobby.
Later that night I had an appointment with my bishop to renew my temple recommend. Before I went, I checked for any errors in myself that might keep me out of the temple. When the bishop asked if I was worthy to enter the house of the Lord, I was so grateful that I could say yes.

Another example: In 1830, Frederick G. Williams, a prominent medical doctor, was baptized. He immediately gave of his talents and prosperity to the Church. He became a leader in the Church. He donated property for the Kirtland Temple. In 1837, caught up in difficulties of the times, Frederick G. Williams made serious mistakes. The Lord declared in a revelation that “in consequence of [his] transgressions [his] former standing [in the leadership of the Church had] been taken away from [him].”18

The beautiful lesson we learn from Frederick G. Williams is that “whatever his personal weaknesses, he had the strength of character to [renew] his loyalty to the [Lord,] the Prophet and … to the Church, when it would have been so easy to have disintegrated in bitterness.”19 In the spring of 1840, he presented himself at a general conference, humbly asking forgiveness for his past conduct and expressing his determination to do the will of God in the future. His case was presented by Hyrum Smith, and he was freely forgiven. He died a faithful member of the Church.

I recently met the president of the Recife Brazil Temple, whose name is Frederick G. Williams. He recounted how his great-great-grandfather’s decision of character had blessed the family and hundreds of his posterity.

The doctrine of repentance allows us to correct or fix defects, but it is better to focus on meeting God’s standards than to plan on invoking the principle of repentance before the Judgment. I learned this lesson when I was young.

As a teenager I spent my summers working on my grandfather’s ranch in Wyoming, USA. It was a sheep and cattle ranch of more than 2,000 acres (810 ha), plus additional rangeland. The ranch operation required a lot of equipment. Because the closest repair center was far away, my grandfather taught us to carefully maintain the equipment and to inspect everything before we left the ranch house. If we had a breakdown, it was usually miles from the ranch house, and that meant a long walk.

It didn’t take long for me to learn the law of consequences. It was always better to avoid problems than to take a long walk. The same is true with the commandments of our Heavenly Father. He can tell the difference between someone who truly is striving to become like Him and an individual who is pushing the edges but trying to stay just inside the acceptable limits.

Sometimes you start catching and then think folks don’t want you to catch them anymore. I was ordained a Seventy in St. George when dirt was new and Enoch was the president of the Church. In those days the office of a Seventy was a local office in the priesthood. Another Seventy and I were stake missionaries, and we helped our neighbor Matt and his wife come into the Church and to full Church activity. Then we were allowed to go to another stake and teach Matt’s parents, Ward and Louise. It was clear that Louise was quite interested, and it was also abundantly clear that Ward only listened—if you could call it listening—to be courteous to Louise. After several months, despite Louise’s progress, we had to stop teaching them.

A couple of years later, a colleague who was the ward mission leader in the ward Louise and Ward lived in came to my room and told me Louise wanted me to call her. Because I began my teaching career when dinosaurs roamed the earth, I didn’t have a cell phone available to use, because they weren’t invented yet. I had to wait until recess to call her on the office telephone. When I reached her, we exchanged greetings, and then she said, “I have decided to be baptized. I woke up this morning with this feeling that I wanted to be baptized.”

I was elated. Then I asked, “Louise, how does Ward feel about this?”

She said, “I don’t know. He hasn’t said much.”

I called her back that evening to follow up on the arrangements for her baptism, and, to my surprise, she told me Ward had decided to be baptized too. They were baptized a few days later and then were sealed in the holy temple a year after that. A few months later I received word that Louise had passed away.

But it saddened Margarette that the Prophet and his wife, Emma, had lost so many children of their own. Their young child had died shortly after Margarette’s mother had given birth to twin baby girls not long ago. The Prophet and his wife were so kind to children, Margarette was sure they missed their own sweet baby.
One day, Margarette heard the Prophet talking to her mother in the kitchen. He asked if she would let him borrow one of the twin girls to help comfort Emma.
“You may take one home with you, as long as you bring her back each night,” Margarette’s mother said. She handed him little Mary. Margarette watched as he gently wrapped a quilt around the baby and, cooing to her, opened the door and left.
True to his word, the Prophet returned little Mary every night, except for one. Margarette’s mother was nervous when he didn’t come at his usual time. She decided to go check on the babe, and hurried away to the Prophet’s home, the Mansion House. Soon afterward, Mother and the Prophet returned with little Mary. Margarette heard him explaining again that Mary had been cranky. He had been trying to calm her down before he returned her.
The next morning, the Prophet arrived as usual. Margarette’s mother handed him Sarah instead of Mary, thinking he would not know which baby he was holding. Sarah and Mary were identical—even some family members couldn’t tell them apart. After gently cuddling the child, the Prophet looked down at her face and then slowly shook his head. “This is not my little Mary,” he said.
Margarette’s mother nodded and took Sarah back to the cradle.
After the Prophet left with Mary, Margarette said, “He must really study Mary’s face in order to tell the difference between her and little Sarah.” As Margarette left the kitchen, she noticed her mother blotting her eyes with the hem of her apron.
Soon afterwards, the Prophet stopped taking Mary to his home, but he often came to visit her. Sadly, a short time later, Mary was called to return home to her Heavenly Father. Just after Mary died, Margarette was sitting at the kitchen table when the Prophet arrived. Little Mary’s body lay quiet and still in her cradle. The Prophet rushed to pick her cold form up in his arms. He cried as if he had lost one of his own little children. Again and again he whispered, “Mary, oh my dear little Mary!”
Margarette went to where her mother stood sobbing and softly said, “See how much he loved her, Mother—just as he loves all children. It is right that he is often called ‘the loving friend of children.’”

"My parents were both musical, though untrained. While we had no musical instruments at home except my father’s ukulele, the family enjoyed singing together. I was in my teens when my parents first acquired a record player. And I remember what a great experience that was and how much we all enjoyed it. When I was older, the family did acquire a piano, and some of the younger children took lessons. My wife was a music major, and that was one of the things I enjoyed about her when we were dating. I loved to sit and listen to her play the Bach Inventions.

“The name Poelman is a Dutch name,” Elder Poelman explained. “My paternal grandfather was born in Holland, and as a young man in his teens, he left Holland and went to South Africa. There he married my grandmother, a Scottish girl. She was working at the time as a governess for an English family living in South Africa. My grandparents had one child born in South Africa, then they went back to the British Isles. Another child was born in England, and then they moved to Glasgow, Scotland, where my father was born. It was to their home in Scotland that the missionaries came tracting, and my grandmother answered the door. They were on the third floor of a cold-water flat in the working-class section, and a man named A. Z. Richards was one of the missionaries. He stayed close to our family until he died, and I have always been very fond of him.

“Subsequently, I was called to serve as a missionary in Holland, as were all three of my younger brothers. My father also served a mission in Holland. That missionary experience was a valuable one for me, because I had an opportunity to meet some of my grandfather’s brothers and sisters, and I was able to learn the language.”

I asked Elder Poelman what message he wanted to share with the children of the world, and he replied, “Your Father in heaven knows who you are and loves you unconditionally. Even when you do things that are bad, He loves you. It makes Him sad, of course, but it doesn’t mean that He stops loving you. I would encourage you to pray to our Heavenly Father often, knowing that no matter what you’ve done or how you feel about yourself, Heavenly Father will listen to you.

“Sometimes we may think that the Lord loves us only if we keep His commandments and that if we disobey His commandments, He loves us less. That isn’t true! This is something Satan would like us to believe because then we feel estranged from our Father in heaven. Remember, He loves you all the time wherever you are and whatever you are doing.”

One couple said:

“Serving a senior couple mission was our righteous desire, but we [faced] many challenges. We exercised our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ to have the Holy Ghost guide us in every step. Despite our challenges, we were blessed with peace and confidence to move forward. We were able to save sufficient funds for our mission, paid off debts, and organised our family. We are blessed to have a better relationship as husband and wife, as well as [with] each of our children.”

Lance Reynolds can understand that feeling. Football had become an important part of his life at an early age, beginning with children’s football teams. He played for the team at Granite High School in Salt Lake City and was chosen to be on the team of top players of the region when he was 16 years old. He was selected to the top team in the state and again to the top team of the region.
The year Lance entered Brigham Young University was the first year that first year students were allowed to play on the first (top) team representing a university, and he played with the varsity football team enough to win a school letter. His second year he was on the starting team, and his third year promised to be a great one—he would have been the only player in his position on the team returning. But it was time for Lance to go on his mission, and although he had always planned to go, the final decision was a difficult one to make.
“At the time,” he remembers, “leaving on a mission seemed like the end of all hopes for a football career.” It seemed like a choice between football and a mission. He chose the mission.
Five years and a professional contract later, Lance no longer feels that you have to make a choice. “Why not do both?” he asks. “Young students and athletes don’t have to ‘give up’ things to go on a mission—only postpone them for two years.”
And he should know. Having kept himself in good physical condition during his mission by exercising during personal time (before 6:30 A.M.) and watching his weight, Lance was able on his return to slip back into his uniform and the game with ease. Within two weeks he felt at home on the field. The following season he was on the starting team at BYU. His fourth year he was honored by the Western Athletic Conference, received All-American honorable mention, and was chosen by the Pittsburgh Steelers, a top professional football team. He is now playing with the Philadelphia Eagles football team.
Lance feels he gained in intensity, concentration, and self-control. And all three felt an increased confidence upon returning to their sport.
Although some missionaries do return and do not continue in sports, it is usually due to a change in interests rather than inability. Ed, Mark, and Lance are convinced that any athlete who serves a mission will be able to regain his previous ability upon diligently applying himself.
And even if that were not the case, Lance wouldn’t have missed his mission for anything. “I would trade all of my athletic experiences for the opportunity of going on a mission,” he insists.

An invitation to face her fears came in 1868, when President Brigham Young asked Eliza to help organize Relief Societies throughout Utah. “I want you to instruct the sisters,” he said. The idea was so frightening that Eliza described her heart skipping a beat.3 But she found the courage to do her best, and over time she learned that accepting challenging callings filled her with strength beyond her own.