Gospel Story Finder

Some years ago in the early spring, I took my little niece Shelly’s hand in mine, and for hours we carefully picked our way from one rock to the next along a creek bed shaded by some tall trees. The gurgling water was like a musical accompaniment to the dance we were creating, as we would take a step, hesitate, reach, step forward, and then wait a moment to secure our balance.

Before long, we were drawn to an open meadow where some large cottonwood trees had been recently cut. Making my way through the tall grass, I held Shelly’s hand as she cautiously placed one foot ahead of the other, walking the full length of the tree and back again. We noticed in that springtime tender green shoots forcing their way through the earthly floor, and we saw the winter snow receding toward the mountain peaks. It seemed as though all of nature bore evidence of God’s creations and his great love for us.

Our afternoon activities continued until the evening breeze reminded us that our special day was coming to a close.

Approaching the narrow, steep garden path leading to my home, I let go of Shelly’s hand, allowing her to go first. Our hands stuck together for a moment. A bond had formed from the warmth of the day through our shared adventures.

Just before reaching the clearing near the house, we stopped. Bending down, I lifted Shelly up to see into a little nest built by a robin in the branch of a tree.

At the close of this memorable day, before tucking my little niece (whom my sister shares with me) into bed, we knelt together while she expressed her own thanks which included gratitude for the creek, the slippery rocks, the big tree, and the robin’s nest. Feeling a renewed appreciation for the same wonderful blessings, I tucked the covers around her and bent down for a goodnight kiss. Reaching up, placing both arms around my neck, and pulling me close to her, Shelly whispered, “I wish we were in the same family.”

“Shelly, my dear,” I quickly explained, “we are in the same family.”

“No, I mean the very same family. My last name is Larsen and your last name is Kapp, and that isn’t the same. I mean, if you were my sister and we had the very same last name.”

Even though she was very young, I felt that she might sense security in our eternal relationship if I could somehow awaken within her a great eternal truth.

“Shelly, we really are in the very same family. You see, we are all our Heavenly Father’s children, every one of us, and that makes us members of one great family. We are brothers and sisters, and Jesus is our brother, too, our elder brother.”

“Then what is Jesus’ last name?” she asked.

“Shelly, we know our Savior as Jesus the Christ.” With the pure innocence of youth, she began to make us all one family by linking my first name with the surname “The Christ.”

“Oh, no, my dear! We don’t put our names together like that.”

“But why not?” she asked. Wanting her to be aware of the sacredness of our relationship with the Savior, I tried to explain: “I guess maybe it’s because sometimes we are not good enough. I don’t feel worthy yet.”

With that, she raised up on her elbow. “What do you do that’s wrong? Why don’t you stop doing it, and then we can all be in the same family? We can all use His name.”

I pondered the answer to her simple questions. I heard in my mind words as though I was hearing them for the first time. And yet, it had been only two days since I had attended sacrament meeting where I had listened to the same words. I had heard them with my ears so often before, but now it seemed different. It was as though I was hearing them with my whole heart and soul: “… that they are willing to take upon them the name of thy Son, and always remember him and keep his commandments which he has given them …” (D&C 20:77).

Wasn’t this the very thing that we were talking about—the responsibility of taking upon ourselves that sacred name and committing to try always to remember Him and keep His commandments?

While Shelly seemed secure and satisfied with the explanation given her at that time, over the years I have searched for deeper understanding of this sacred ordinance in which we renew our covenant each week to take upon ourselves His name. And while that usually occurs on Sunday, what does it mean on weekdays, and what difference does it make to a child, a youth, or an adult? Does it affect how we live our lives in the summer, winter, or fall? Should it? Can we afford to consider this sacred ordinance passively and allow it to become routine in nature?

I would now say to Shelly, “Yes, my dear, put my name with the Savior’s.” He said we could. He wants us to. He wants us to feel comfortable carrying his name.

As I held Shelly’s little hand in mine for one last squeeze before tiptoeing from her room that evening some years ago, a feeling of gratitude and reverence came flooding forth as I realized that while her hand had been in mine for most of the afternoon as I helped her through the creek, across the rocks, and over the tree and lifted her up to see the miracle of life unfolding in a robin’s nest, this child led me to begin a search that would lead me to a better understanding of a great eternal truth. King Benjamin explained it for us: “And now, because of the covenant which ye have made ye shall be called the children of Christ, his sons, and his daughters; for behold, this day he hath spiritually begotten you; for ye say that your hearts are changed through faith on his name; therefore, ye are born of him and have become his sons and his daughters” (Mosiah 5:7).

We can all be members of the same family. If you’re doing something you shouldn’t, consider Shelly’s question to me: Why don’t you stop? It may not always be easy, but with his help we can overcome.

It all started when my friend Brett said, “Last night when I talked to my friend, I found out that her parents have been telling her stuff about our religion, making us sound really bad. She told me that I was wrong for being Mormon, and she seemed to have plenty of evidence. Lots of stuff that I didn’t know about. I figured I can’t defend this if I don’t know what we believe.”
Then he asked me, “Do you want to come over and study scriptures tonight? You know, we could do a little reading, look some stuff up.”
“Seriously?” I hesitated. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to. It was just that I was taken off guard. I mean, how many teenagers hang out on weeknights to study the scriptures for fun?
“Sure, I guess,” I accepted slowly. “If you really want to.”
Brett was the only other Church member in my grade, and he’d never seemed very religious. I still remember being surprised my sophomore year when I first met him. He asked me why I chose not to date until I was 16. I was astounded by his question because Brett had been an active member his entire life but he somehow still didn’t know some of the basic teachings of the Church. To him, church was a Sunday thing. I remembered answering Brett’s question about my decision not to date until 16 and then enlightening him on many other standards we had as Church members.
Now, as seniors, we’d grown to be close friends. And once again I found myself surprised by Brett.
I arrived at his house not sure what to expect. As I walked into his family’s study, I noticed the Bible was open and several LDS reference materials were stacked on the desk. He’d already begun. “Look at this,” he said excitedly, pointing to James 2:21–26.
“I thought we could find some answers.” Then he asked, “Do you have any questions?”
“I don’t know. I guess so.”
“After listening to my friend, I know I need to study more,” Brett continued.
“So, are you looking up things about the points she made?” I asked.
“Yeah. I can see where she’s coming from, but you know, the more I find out about what we believe,” he continued, “the more I see and feel just how right our beliefs are. It’s exciting. I want you to help me.”
I’d never considered the scriptures exciting before. I felt humbled by his enthusiasm. He wanted my help because I’d read the Book of Mormon, prayed, felt the Spirit, and from then on hadn’t had doubts.
But at that moment, I realized I too needed to search the scriptures more.
Brett and I really studied the scriptures that night and found the answers to his questions. Time and time again, Brett searched the scriptures in response to criticisms of the Church. As he learned to trust the scriptures, his testimony grew. Not only did that study help him talk with his friend, but his example of asking questions and finding the answers in the scriptures made a difference for me too.

The fourth story is told by Gemma Penafiel:
I was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on May 25, 1991. I was visiting my aunt in Laguna, and she encouraged me to let the missionaries teach me about the Church. . . . It is a very funny story how my two aunties joined the Church. They were sitting under a mango tree when two missionaries passed by. My auntie Cita, who is a very funny woman, told the two missionaries, . . . “Hey Jo, give us chocolate Jo.” When the two missionaries heard what she said, they stopped by and arranged the first visit with them. . . .

My daughter Pinky was two and one-half years old. . . .

Our home in Banago was very little, about 6**8* . . . with no furniture, but I was happy with that house because Pinky, my auntie, and I have a place to sleep. . . .

I looked for employment and found a job working in a bag factory, where I worked for two and one-half years earning 35 pesos a day [or the equivalent of $1.10]. The company I was working for moved to . . . Manila, and I did not want to move there. Pinky was too small for me to make the move. To support my family I began washing clothes for some of my neighbors. I could provide for our food, but if one of us should get sick I did not have enough money to buy the medicine.

One day I was invited to a birthday party in our ward, and the bishop introduced me to two missionary couples, the Broadbents and the Blackhams [former professors of chemistry here at Brigham Young University]. They knew that I knew how to make scripture cases, bags, wallets, and belts. They asked me to make some covers for the mission office in Bacolod. [They] gave me good advice, and I am grateful that I listened to them. . . .

The couples in the mission office helped me a lot, especially . . . Sister Broadbent. . . . You could see all the coin purses that I was making at the top of her table.[They] tried to help me find someone who would buy my products. . . .

. . .When I first joined the Church I started paying tithing at five pesos. I was jobless at the time, but now I am paying much more. When I pay my tithing and fast offerings I always pay a little extra because the Lord has been so good to me.

When the typhoon came in November 1995, we had much difficulty. Half of the roof blew off our house. In front of our house is my mother’s store. It is about 6**8* in size. The only roof that was left was over her store. We stayed inside the store the whole night. Ten persons, seven adults, and three kids and three dogs. . . . Our house was fixed with the help from friends and the Church. I was grateful for that. The Lord blessed me with many friends both American and Filipino. They have been an instrument of the Lord to help me. . . .

The scriptures tell us that if we live the commandments as we should, the Lord will bless us. He will provide the way. He is the only one who knows our needs in life and will help us to each reach our goals if we pay our tithes and fast offerings in the Church. . . . I know that the talents he has given to us we must exercise so that he will not take them from us. In all our dealings with others we must deal with honesty so that we can maintain our integrity. It is important that we do these things so that everywhere we go people will trust [us]. . . .

Each one of us is blessed with different skills, and it is up to us to improve it and share it with others if it is a good quality. . . .

My dream for my family is that we can be sealed in the temple for time and all eternity. . . . I would like to [find] a steady buyer for my products. I would like to send Pinky on a mission some day—that would be a fulfillment of my dreams, that and to let her finish her studies and to have enough food every day of our lives. . . . This is just a dream that I am relying on the Lord to bring to pass, because I believe that “with God all things are possible” (Matt. 19:26). . . .

I am very thankful to the Lord for the talent and all the things that he has given to me and to my family.

My self-esteem had been shattered by our experience with the disfellowshipment. I was busy many hours each week, serving as president of one of the ward auxiliaries. How could the Lord, or for that matter, the bishop, possibly expect me to continue in this calling? Emotionally and physically, I was drained. But nothing was mentioned concerning my release, and I stayed in that position. I later understood this to be the Lord’s way of demonstrating a need for my abilities. At the same time, our children continued to do well in and out of school. Here the Lord was assuring me that we weren’t failing as parents. These experiences lifted me and convinced me of my worth.

In our day-to-day actions, it is often the small and simple things that will have a long-lasting impact (see Alma 37:6–7). What we say, how we act, and how we choose to react will influence not only ourselves but also those around us. We can build up, or we can tear down. A simple and positive example is a story told about my grandmother. She sent one of her young children to buy some eggs. The trusted child was probably joyfully walking home along the road, but most of the eggs were broken when the child arrived home. A friend of the family was there and admonished my grandmother to scold the child for behaving so badly. Instead, Grandmother calmly and wisely said, “No, that will not make the eggs whole again. We will simply use what we can and make some pancakes that we can enjoy together.”

One morning my telephone rang very early and, as I picked it up, I recognized the soft voice of President Kimball on the other end of the line. After saying hello, I heard him in his faint voice say, “Marvin, I have something I want to talk to you about. Do you mind if I come up to your office and we visit?” I said, “President Kimball, if you’d like to talk to me, I “ll be right down to your office. Would you like me to come?” And he gently said, “Would you be good enough to do that?”

Courteous, friendly, and willing to be the servant of all, it was his leadership style to never demand or use the influence of his mighty calling to take the lead in what people would do or how they would respond to him. I would have you know that on this occasion he could have said, “Marvin, this is President Kimball. Come down to my office right away.” Certainly he had the power, authority, and right to ask me to meet with him under any and all circumstances, but I still have ringing in my ears what he said when I volunteered to come to his office: “Would you be good enough to do that?” He had the kind of approach, humility, mildness, and love that would inspire all of us to sustain and support him and love him under all conditions.

When I was 18 I was the first in my family to find the restored gospel. After my baptism I began to really understand how the gospel could help my family.
As a result of these feelings, I started to do family history and my love for my ancestors grew as I worked and exercised my faith to find them. My desire to find them was so strong that on several occasions I traveled to my ancestors’ places of origin. Each trip brought new experiences, and my heart was turned to my ancestors (see Mal. 4:5–6).
Some time later I was called to serve as a family history consultant in my ward. My heart began to expand, and I began to love the ancestors of each person in my ward. As I searched parishes, archives, and libraries, I came to better understand the purpose of redeeming the dead.
Once I had my family history computer disk in my hands, I realized that the most important part of the work was still missing. I needed to go to the temple and provide my family beyond the veil with the ordinances that would enable them to be saved and join my family’s generations for eternity.
I was able to go to the temple when I went on my mission to Cochabamba, Bolivia. I began preaching the gospel in October 2000. A few months later my companion and I visited the temple with the youth from the ward where we were serving. I took my disk and was able to provide 599 names for ordinance work.
While I served as witness, my companion baptized the young people on behalf of my ancestors. What great joy I felt. The Spirit was with me, testifying of the truthfulness of what we were doing. I could feel my ancestors’ happiness and gratitude.
But there were other ordinances that still needed to be done. Because there were so many names, I turned them over to the temple. But I kept the names of my great-grandparents and their children, and later that month my companion and I, with the help of other missionaries, performed the work for them.
I am grateful to my Heavenly Father because, although I was far from my country and perhaps thought that I would baptize only the living, I was also able to participate in the work of redeeming the dead.
I am still trying to bring more souls to Christ and encouraging others to seek out their ancestors. I love this work, and I know that it is true and that Jesus Christ lives and loves us.

Carrying our brooms, buckets, rakes, and gloves, and sporting bright yellow “Helping Hands” T-shirts to identify us as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we walked through the neighborhoods of my hometown as part of youth conference. Two by two, we went to assigned homes, knocked on doors, introduced ourselves as members of the Church, and asked if there was any service we could perform.
It was scary at first to simply walk up to a house and knock on a door, not knowing whether we would be greeted with an invitation to rake the yard or a door slammed in our faces. With nervous anticipation, I approached the first house and knocked on the front door, only to find no one home. Persevering, my companion and I canvassed the neighborhood in search of a service opportunity. Knock, knock. No answer. Try again. Knock, knock. “No thanks.” Try again. I was beginning to feel discouraged as knock after knock, door after door, our offers to provide service were met with surprise, dismay, and ultimately, rejection.
As my companion and I made our way down the quiet street, we noticed a home in need of some attention. The grass had been mowed, but piles of trimmings and yard waste were everywhere. The flower beds were overgrown with weeds, moss had crept up the sidewalk and front steps, and the porch was thickly covered with dust. If there were ever a house in need of “helping hands,” this was it. With a silent prayer in my heart that we could be of service, I summoned courage and headed toward the house with my companion.
An older woman in a wheelchair was wheeling up the porch and into the home, but seeing us come closer, she turned and came toward us. As we approached her, I could sense her apprehension and reluctance to allow us to speak with her. My companion and I both smiled, introduced ourselves, and explained to her that we were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and were looking for opportunities to serve in the neighborhood. We asked her if there was anything we could do to help her. Instantly, the woman’s face lit up, and she began listing things we could do to help: weeding, raking grass, sweeping the porch, stacking wood, scraping moss, and washing the driveway. As her list of tasks grew longer and longer, I flagged the other members of our youth group to come join. Members from our group arrived, assignments were made, and we quickly set to work.
Performing this service put a smile on my face and made me want to do my very best. While we worked, we enjoyed getting to know this woman and listening to her stories. We learned that our offer to help came as a timely answer to prayer. She explained that she was not the homeowner but was caring for the house for her brother, who was scheduled to have open-heart surgery the next day. The woman knew how much her brother cared for his yard and enjoyed working in his garden, but because he was ill and she was unable to bend down and work, the yard was neglected and had become overgrown. Together, the brother and sister had prayed for someone to help with the upkeep of the yard. I felt the warmth of the Spirit fill my heart as I realized that through our service we were able to be the answer to another’s prayer.
Her brother called on the phone and, with tender emotion in his voice, thanked us for our labors. I was overcome with love for the man whom we had served and also for my Heavenly Father, who is ever mindful of the needs and prayers of His children.
When I set out that morning to perform service, I expected to use my rake, broom, and shovel to serve others, but I had no idea that the Lord would use me as His instrument to fill the needs of another. I am grateful for this experience that taught me the truth of the scripture, “When ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God” (Mosiah 2:17).

I remember the first time I encountered the Americans. We came through a dense pine forest, and we had to go across the street. We opened the branches and all of a sudden a huge tank was right in front, and the gun was aimed at us.
I was scared. I had never seen an American tank or an American. The top of the tank opened, and an American came out. Russian prisoners who had been freed by the Americans were sitting on top. They saw that we were shaking. The American asked me where we came from and where we wanted to go. I told him we wanted to go home. “No way,” he said. “You just jump on here, and we’ll take you along. At the next stop we’ll put you on a truck that will take you to a camp.”

The Russian soldiers seated on the tank made me think of a possible solution to our dilemma. During the war the feeling of love I had learned all my life in church was in my heart. I didn’t hate anyone. I thought about being my brother’s keeper.

The Russian soldiers imprisoned in our camp weren’t treated well. They went without much to eat and we had plenty, so we asked them to clean our mess kits, and they consented. We left food in them all the time just to feed them.

My commanding officer noticed, and he called me in. “What do you do with your mess kits?”
“The Russians clean them for us,” I replied.
“I checked and there was food in them.”
“We cannot eat it all. That’s why we leave it in there.”
“You know that’s strictly forbidden. I could report you and you would be in trouble. Don’t do it again,” he said, and patted me on the shoulder.

One of the Russians to whom we had given the food wrote me a note. He told me that whenever we lost the war or I needed help from the Russians to show them this note.

I had put it in my pocket, and at the moment that we were confronted with that tank I remembered it. I pulled it out and gave it to the Russians. They read it and then all of a sudden said, “Friend! Friend!” in German and talked to the American, telling him that I had given food to the Russians. He said, “I hear you have been good to the Russians. Instead of us taking you along, just go ahead.”

This is a picture of my great-great-great-great-grandpa Hans Henry Hoffman. He was born in Maur, Zurich, Switzerland, on Christmas Day in 1815. In 1876, he and his wife joined the Church and made the trip to Utah. They were asked to help settle Randolph Valley in northern Utah. He went to Sage Creek, about eight miles north of the present town of Randolph, Utah. When he got there, he sat down on his bags and cried, remembering the beautiful Swiss land he had left to come to a place full of sagebrush. The land where he settled and built a house is still in the family. It is now known as Sage Creek Ranch, and I help my dad and grandpa work there. I love going there, and I’m so glad that a long time ago my fourth-great-grandpa chose to come here and live the gospel. He was a man of great faith and determination.
Illustrated by Cameron K. Hoffman

In the summer of 1979, I was surprised to learn that some of my mother’s books and papers were stored in a backyard shed of ward members in my hometown of London, Ontario. In salvaging what I could from several moldering cardboard boxes, I discovered partially completed pedigree charts on my family, some family group records, and a few research notes. The real treasure was a four-page personal history written by my mother, who died when I was 11. This wonderful handwritten history describes her childhood in England during the 1930s and her life through World War II. Finding these records stimulated my initial interest in family history and turned my heart to my ancestors.

Clayne Robison, a professor of music at BYU, took a roundabout way to discover his genius. In college he had a difficult time deciding what career to pursue. He went to law school at Harvard and worked for a year in a major law firm. But he found out he did not enjoy the work. He left the firm to work at BYU for a year. He next worked for a large consulting firm for a year. He said, “I could feel what I wanted to be like at age 60, and those jobs weren’t moving me toward that goal.” He then returned to BYU to study social psychology, also accepting an assistantship in music because he was singing in some productions at the university. By midsemester he had decided to pursue a career in music. The minute he started studying music, he found it was great fun. He enjoyed everything about his doctoral work. When you hear Clayne sing or watch him teach music, you know that he has discovered his genius.

Clayne’s experience illustrates the sixth myth about careers: The career decision is so important that it would be disastrous to make a mistake.

When I first entered the field as a mission president, I met several times with a missionary who was struggling with obedience.

One day in frustration he blurted out: “What then do you want me to do?”

I replied: “You have missed the point. It is not what do I want you to do but what do you want to do?”

There was a moment of silence, and then he made this insightful observation: “You are not just asking me to change my behavior; you are asking me to change my nature.”

He was so right. If someone only changes his behavior while a missionary, then, when he goes home, he will be the very same person he was when he left, subject to the same problems that plagued him before. But if someone changes his nature, he will go home a new man, with the power and discipline to conquer his old Goliaths.

A number of firsts occurred in 2008 for young women in the New Delhi India District. At the first ever Young Women camp in the district, young women built wood fires, cooked over open flames, slept in tents, and learned survival and camping skills while filling the air with friendly laughter.
“My favorite part of camp was talking to and getting to know the girls,” said Hanna Smith of the New Delhi First Branch. “I got to make friends with girls I had never met before.”
For many of the young women it was their first experience camping, and they learned the basics of outdoor survival and living. The girls also learned how to interpret maps and how to read and conduct music. Youth camp leaders taught a variety of other skills, including dancing, sewing, water safety, and glass painting. Cumorah Taylor, one of the young women in the district, said she felt more confident in her abilities after the camp ended.

Amherst Ward, Springfield Massachusetts Stake
My name is Nichole Jewkes, and I am eleven years old. I live in Belchertown, Massachusetts. I am one of only three Latter-day Saints in my middle school. This has been a big change for me because I just recently moved here from Utah. Since not many people in my school know about the Church, I have a great opportunity to do missionary work.
I wear my CTR ring to school every day. People look at my ring and ask what CTR stands for. I always reply, “Choose the right.” And they say, “Cool!” and move on.
One day, my friend Christine noticed my CTR ring and asked what it stands for. I answered, “Choose the right.” Christine said, “Wow! This is so cool!” Then she asked me where I had gotten it. I said that I got it from my church. She asked me how much one costs and if she could buy one. I said that I’d get one for her for free. She acted surprised and said, “Thank you so much.”
I got a CTR ring from my Primary president on Sunday and took it to school on Monday. Christine was very excited and said thank you so many times! She continued to wear it every day and was always telling me how neat it was and how much she loved it.
A few days later, another friend named Julie also noticed my CTR ring. She noticed that Christine had one, too. Julie thought they were neat and asked where we had gotten them. I asked her if she would like one, and she said, “Oh yes, please!”
Now when Julie sometimes says the Lord’s name in vain, she’ll remember and say, “Sorry.” And when older kids swear around me, she’ll say, “Don’t swear around Nichole; she doesn’t like it.” It is nice to know that even though my friends do not belong to our church, they are still trying to choose the right and stand up for me.
I have learned from living here and having many friends who are not LDS that most people are still really good people, trying to do good things with their lives. I hope the CTR rings continue to strengthen Julie and Christine and that I can continue to invite them to church and Church activities. I hope we can all continue to be good missionaries, no matter how old we are.

SUSAN: I had friends whose parents drank. I was 12 years old. I didn’t really want to get into it. I was just curious. We’d go downstairs to their bar and we’d smell the different kinds of liquor, and we’d do a little bit of tasting.

SUSAN: After that I started drinking occasionally. I didn’t feel guilty. (Actually, I did deep down, but I blocked it out.) I don’t ever remember right after doing it saying, Oh no, what did I do? I was surrounded by friends and was not thinking about religion right then. I felt some guilt when I was sitting in church the next Sunday, but Sunday only came once a week. Sunday was for religion, and the rest of the week was for “real” life.

SUSAN: Sometime after ninth grade I started smoking marijuana, just every now and then, and into my sophomore year it was the same. This summer there were more parties, so I was doing it a lot more often, and drinking the whole time too. You get to the point where your values are totally shot. You’ll lie to anybody; you’ll say anything. I would get into arguments with my family and just pack up and move out. My grades started to go down, and I would sluff a lot.

SUSAN: I would say to myself, “I’ll just party through high school because it’s the thing to do, but when I get into college I’ll straighten up. I’m going to start working, I’ll get back into the Church and be married in the temple, and everything’s going to be hunky dory. But that simply does not happen when you’re an addict. You don’t understand that you need help and that it’s going to be a problem for the rest of your life.

SUSAN: Even when I was using, I always believed there was a god, but I’d try to push the thought out of my mind. When I wanted to pray and ask for something I’d think, I can’t ask. I don’t deserve any help.

Now I talk to God all the time. I know that he is my friend. I don’t even open it up with “Our dear Heavenly Father.” I just talk as if I were talking to someone in the room. And I get answers. Some times they come through somebody else, and sometimes they just come into my own mind. It’s I because I’m being open to it. I’m listening.

“I feel the Spirit and receive promptings through sudden ideas and thoughts. This happens when my mind is open to God. At Young Women camp, I felt really lonely. I walked to my cabin and prayed about it. Afterward I had the feeling to turn around. I did and met with my leaders. We had a great time ziplining and eating snow cones! This experience helped me learn how I can feel the Spirit.”
Harper J., 14, Oregon, USA

Julia Mavimbela’s life suddenly changed in 1955 when her husband, John, was killed in an automobile accident. Evidence at the scene suggested that the other person involved, a white man, had veered into John’s lane. Yet that man was not ruled at fault. Rather, white police officers said that blacks are poor drivers, so John was responsible for the crash.1

On her husband’s tombstone, Julia inscribed these words:
In loving memory of
John Phillip Corlie Mavimbela.
By his wife and relatives.
But the lump remains.
May his soul rest in peace.

Describing the fourth line, Julia said, “At the time of writing, the lump that remained was one of hatred and bitterness—for the man who caused the accident, for the policemen who lied, [and] for the court who deemed my husband responsible for the accident that took his life.”2 One of her greatest trials was to overcome this bitterness and anger.

1. The first Sunday after Miguel moved to a new city, his mother took him to church. They went to meet his new Primary class.
2. When they got to the classroom door, Miguel grabbed Mom’s hand. “She isn’t my teacher, Mom. Where is Sister Dominguez?”
3. Mom knelt to talk with Miguel. “We live in a different city now, and we are going to meet new friends—like your new Primary teacher.”
4. “I don’t want a new teacher,” Miguel said. “I want to go home to my old house and be with my old teacher.”
5. “I know it isn’t easy to move to a new place,” Mom said. “But some things will be the same. You will sing Primary songs, pray, and listen to talks.”
6. “I will?” Miguel asked. “What else will be the same?”
“Your new Primary teacher will teach you about Jesus—just as Sister Dominguez did.”
7. Miguel let go of Mom’s hand and sat down in a chair in his new Primary class.
8. Later …
“Mom, you were right! We sang, prayed, and listened to talks. My new Primary teacher said Jesus loves me. It is the same!”

Brigham Young wrote in his journal:
“I started from Montrose on my mission to England. My health was so poor I was unable to go thirty rods to the river without assistance. After I had crossed the river I got Israel Barlow to carry me on his horse behind him to Heber C. Kimball’s, where I remained sick till the 18th. I left my wife sick with a babe only ten days old, and all my children sick and unable to wait upon each other. …”1
An economist could hardly condone the decision of Brigham Young to leave his family in such dire conditions to go off to England as a missionary. An economist learns to make decisions on the basis of what might be called a prudential value system, that is, a value system in which one counts the costs, compares them with the benefits, and follows that course of action for which the rewards are greatest. He makes a cost-benefit analysis and justifies his actions not by appeal to past authority or to previously formulated principles but by their expected future effects. The ethic is sensible and rational. We have come to respect it as a good system by which to make decisions.
By this ethic, though, Brigham Young’s action seems ill-considered, if not totally unjustifiable. Had he relied on the evidence of a cost-benefit analysis, he would likely not have gone on a mission at all: the cost in certain pain and possible death seemed to far outweigh the benefit in uncertain conversions in a far-off land.