Gospel Story Finder

1 “Stop it!”
“Stop it!”
Andrew stomped his foot and stuck his tongue out at his little sister. She did the same to him.
2 “Mom, I can’t take it anymore. Please make Sarah stop copying me.”
3 “I don’t know if we can stop Sarah from doing everything you do. Right now she is learning from your example and doing the things you teach her to do.”
“I didn’t teach her that.”
“Yes, you did. Sarah loves you and thinks you are a great big brother. She watches what you do and tries to do the same.”
4 “I still don’t like it when she copies what I do. It gives me a headache.”
5 “Remember, Jesus set a good example for us by showing love and being kind to others. You can show Sarah a good example by doing what Jesus did.”
6 Andrew thought about what Mom said. He decided he would try to be a good example. Andrew looked at Sarah and smiled.
“I love you.”
Sarah smiled back at him.
“I love you too.”

My family lived in São Paulo, Brazil. On the other side of our street, there was a forest of mangrove trees. Mangrove forests have rivers crossing through the trees. The ground is very muddy.
Many people built houses on that muddy ground. They put huge logs in the mud. Then they built their house on top of them. But when it rained, the river overflowed. The water got into their houses. Then the people had nowhere to sleep at night.
When that happened, my father would invite all of them into our home. Sometimes there were as many as 15 people! He brought them into our living room and gave them blankets. Mom made them something to eat. Then they slept in our house until the next day.
This happened at least three or four times. I remember thinking, “Not very many people would take strangers in.” My father was letting people we barely knew sleep in our house! But then I thought, “They have nowhere else to go.”
My parents always did things to help people. But their service was more than just helping and giving. It was showing love to our neighbor, even when our neighbor was somebody we didn’t know well.

Many of the most important lessons Robert learned as a child came from the example of his parents and from his experiences in the Queens Ward. As deacons quorum president, Robert learned to respect his priesthood leaders after an experience with the bishop. At that time, the ward met in the Citizen’s League Hall. The sacrament table was on the main floor in front of the stage. The deacons used to take the sacrament trays, climb up onto the stage, put the trays away, and then run and jump off the stage, grab another tray, and repeat the process until all the trays were put away. “I came sailing off of that stage,” says Elder Hales, “and our new bishop was standing there. He caught me in flight. I said, ‘Well, everyone else is doing it,’ and he said, ‘Yes, but you are the president of the deacons quorum.’ The bishop said he wanted the sacrament taken care of properly, with reverence. That was when I began to learn an important lesson. I’ve appreciated priesthood leaders who have taken the time to teach me.”

Amanda Rawlins, a 13-year-old Beehive from the Burton Second Ward in Rexburg, Idaho, just finished holding a weeklong Locks of Love event. She decided to organize the event for her Good Works project after seeing a TV interview about girls going through chemotherapy. Amanda learned that it takes 6 to 10 ponytails to make a wig for one patient who has lost her hair. She realized that simply donating her own hair would not be enough. She wanted to do more.
She made arrangements for a beauty college to give free haircuts to those willing to donate their hair for the event. With her mother’s help, Amanda put up posters and handed out flyers at local schools. At the end of the project, they had collected 30 ponytails. That’s enough hair for three or four full wigs. “I am so happy with how many ponytails we received,” Amanda says. “I am so thankful to all those willing to cut off the 10 inches needed for the donation.”

“In our council, we talked about how music can invite the Spirit,” says Jocelyn Herrington, a Primary teacher in the same Minnesota ward. “Later, I was teaching the Sunbeams. I thought, ‘I’ll sing while they’re coloring, and it will be nice.’ I started to sing, and they all stopped and listened. So I kept singing. It did bring the Spirit, and when I was done, they were reverent, waiting for me to speak. We had talked about that [in council] too, to bear your testimony when the opportunity comes. So I bore testimony in words they could understand.”

Among those who remained in France were Louis and Marie Gaston of Nice. In 1950, Louis, searching for Christ’s church, systematically attended each local church. However, it was his wife who told him of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints after she had learned of it from a friend at the market. Marie was touched when she heard the words “the church of Jesus Christ.” They rang true to her because she had often heard Louis say that the church of Jesus Christ must be on the earth.

The Gastons attended church the next Sunday. The meeting place was only a small room. Besides the Gastons and the missionaries, two other members were present. Louis’s heart was touched when he heard each member bear testimony of the Savior. After the meeting he stood on the sidewalk in front of the building and, with great emotion, said to his family, “This is the true church of Jesus Christ.”

On 22 December 1950, the entire family was baptized in the Turkish baths in Nice. Eight months later, Louis was ordained an elder, and in the fall of 1951 he was called to serve as branch president. He talked about the gospel to everyone who came into his scales repair shop. Marie cared for those who were old or alone or ill. Her service and loving spirit also helped spread the gospel. Within two years, more than 100 people were attending the branch in Nice.

Illustration by Allen Garns
For a long time, I felt the desire to bake bread or make some extra food and just drop it off to someone in our ward to share my love and the Lord’s love with them, but I had never done it.
I love to cook, but only my husband and I are at home now. So I make smaller meals because huge meals usually take us several days to finish.
One night I decided to make some lasagna. Instead of making one large pan, I made two smaller pans. That way we would eat one for dinner, and I could give the other pan to someone who needed it.
I called the Relief Society president to see if anyone needed a meal brought to them. She mentioned a single mother who worked and had two children. That afternoon, I texted the mom and told her that I had made an extra lasagna and wanted to bring it over to her and her family.
She texted me back and said, “That is so weird! Sure, that would be great!” She was still at work, but her children would be home, so I could bring it over anytime.
A little while later, she texted me again and asked, “Did you know it was my birthday today?” I assured her that I had no idea. She replied, “Well, happy birthday to me!”
When I took the meal over, she had just gotten off work. She was thrilled, as were her children.
On Sunday, she found me at church, and with tears in her eyes, she told me that every year on her birthday, her grandmother would make her dinner—and it was always lasagna. Her grandmother had passed away the year before, and that was the first birthday her grandmother wouldn’t be there to make lasagna for her.
When I dropped off lasagna on her birthday, it strengthened her testimony that the Lord is aware of her and loves her. And it strengthened my testimony that if we make ourselves available to be an instrument in the Lord’s hands, He will show us where we can serve.

On one occasion a girl was trying to decide whether or not to marry a certain young man and was confused because at times she felt doubt and uncertainty and at other times was certain she wanted to marry him. When they were together it seemed right, but when she was alone or away from him, there was much doubt and uncertainty. We talked about many things: the kind of person she wanted to marry, the element of trust in marriage, possible reasons for her doubt, and why at times it seemed all right. Toward the end of the conversation she was asked to consider what she really felt was the right thing to do. After a few moments she said that she had really known all along it wasn’t right but had just put aside those feelings. One must follow the counsel of Mormon and “search diligently in the light of Christ that ye may know good from evil …” He then promised, “… if ye will lay hold upon every good thing, and condemn it not, ye certainly will be a child of Christ.” (Moro. 7:19.)

When I first went to senior high school, there was one thing I struggled with: when a new subject was introduced, I would find it difficult to understand. One evening I prayed to Heavenly Father to help me understand and overcome that challenge. I had faith, and I was able to understand better. Since then, prayer and faith have been on my to-do list in school and everywhere I go. Being in a boys school is challenging because of some of the immoral things students do. When that happens, the words of my parents come to my mind: “Don’t do something that will drive the Holy Ghost away.” I am grateful to my mum, who always reminds me to listen to the Holy Ghost. When we do what is right, God blesses us.
Nyame S., age 16, Ghana

This is a story about the importance of following the prophet. It took place on the Spear Ranch in the Gila Valley of Arizona. My good friend, Jim Bryce, was foreman of the ranch. Along with his father, Ross Bryce, who was a counselor in the Pima, Arizona, stake presidency, and four Mexican vaqueros (cowboys)—Pula, José, Chino, and Javier—we began the fall roundup.
Early in the morning before sunup, at the ranch headquarters we loaded the horses into trailers and hauled them out to Nuttall Canyon. After unloading and saddling the horses, we began riding up the canyon. We spotted the first cattle as the sun lit up the east side of Stowe Knoll.
Carefully, we made our way up the rugged slope above the cattle and moved them down toward the canyon floor, letting them make their way by themselves. We went higher up the canyon until we reached a fence at the edge of a forest. Spreading out, we searched the gullies, draws, and bottom brush and began to herd the cattle down and out of the canyon. Our goal was to drive them to a corral on the other side of Left Hand Canyon, where we would earmark, brand, and vaccinate the new calves.
My friend Jim took the lead and was riding on higher ground than the rest of us so he could watch the herd of about 120 cows and calves we had gathered. Two vaqueros rode on each side, keeping the herd together, and President Bryce and I were bringing up the rear, keeping any stragglers from drifting away from the herd.
As we approached Left Hand Canyon, Jim rode up onto a knoll where he could look over the area and see what lay ahead. Since this was the first time these vaqueros had been in this part of the ranch, they did not know where the trail crossed the canyon. Jim kept motioning to move the herd of cattle towards him. The vaqueros didn’t notice his motioning, so Jim began to wave his hat and yell to move the herd towards the knoll where he was. These gestures also went unnoticed or ignored by those of us with the herd.
We soon found ourselves in a thicket of mesquite and catclaw trees amid the boulders along the edge of the canyon. The cattle were spreading out in all directions; it was impossible to keep them together. We had to get off our horses, tie them up, and crawl on our hands and knees through the brush, trees, and rocks in order to get the cattle out. At the edge of the canyon was a cliff that dropped off 15 to 20 feet to boulders below.
After losing some of the cattle in the thick brush and getting the rest of the herd out of the thicket and back together, we again heard Jim calling from on top of the knoll. He motioned to us to drive the herd towards him where we would find the trail that went down the canyon and up the other side to the corral.
Once the herd got to the trail, they followed it easily as it wound down the side of the canyon, across the creek, and up the other side, right into the corral. How easy it was to follow the trail and cross the treacherous canyon to the safety of the corral. Had we paid attention to Jim, we would not have lost any cattle and would have saved a lot of time and avoided having to crawl through the mesquite thickets and around rocks and catclaw trees to get the cattle out. It would have been easier to follow his directions and stay on the trail.

Soon after we left the Indian reservation, Sister Owens in the next wagon became ill, and we camped for several days.
Some of the braves rode over from the reservation to get help with their baskets. Papa didn’t have much straw left to give them, but they had already decided that bear grass would do just as well. Papa showed them how to do a braided edge around the top of their baskets. He took out a pocketknife to trim the ends, and a little Indian boy who had come with his father looked so pleased with the knife that Papa let him keep it. Later that day the boy’s father returned with a strange-looking three-pronged stick that he gave to Papa, explaining how he could use it to find water for digging a well.
“I can probably use this later,” Papa said as he fastened it securely to the wagon.

I enjoyed the article “We Are His Hands” in the July 2010 New Era. In October 2005 I arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as a humanitarian missionary. One of my assignments was to take the Cambodian LDS Young Adults into the provinces to poor or remote government schools and put on a puppet show to teach the children how to stay well through good hygiene—clean water, clean hands, and clean food. I realized on our first outing that I would have the privilege of seeing what so many thousands of people Churchwide have never seen—the recipients of the hygiene kits, which were distributed at the end of the puppet show.
At one location I noticed that almost all of the children had something in their hands, around their necks, or even on their heads. I asked what they were, and was told, “Those are the hand towels in your church’s hygiene kits.” The kits had been distributed two months earlier. Almost every child there had their towel and used it much like you would a “blankie” or a comforter. It was also used to shield them from the hot sun. I wanted to cry with joy when I understood their appreciation and love for that which was given to them by His helping hands around the world.

I remember a case in my life a few years ago. I was in my office on the second floor. A young man came in. He was bedraggled, he looked pretty bad. His clothes were hanging loose, and I was afraid he was going to jump out my window. He was desperate. He told me he had just lost his wife. She had left him and taken his two sons with her. She did not leave anything to pay the numerous bills that they had. And life looked pretty desperate. He had even gone to drinking a little bit.
I finally said to him, “Well, now, I am going to help you if you would like me to. I will get you a job. It won’t be a very good job. It won’t be maybe the thing you have been used to doing. It won’t bring in the amount of money you have been used to spending, but if you need a job I will get you one and I will help you with the problems that come to you.” I got him a job at the hospital for eighty dollars a month.
“Oh,” he said, “I can’t live on that.”
And I said, “eighty dollars will be better than what you are getting now.” He agreed and finally he went to work. It was temporary, but it took care of the situation.
And I said to him, “Now, why don’t you, Bill, take your car and put it on blocks and walk to work because that will be good for your health as well as you will finally get caught up on your indebtedness. Why don’t you go to the music store and tell them you will pay out the cornet for your boy at two dollars a month and go to this other store and pay this much on your gas, you will pay this much on something else.”
He said, “Oh, they would laugh at me. They wouldn’t take that.”
And I said, “You try them.”
And when he came back after the first week, he said, “Well, they surprised me. Those people said, ‘That’s wonderful, I appreciate what you are paying. We will assist you.’”
And so when he came back the first week, he gave me a list of the things that he had been spending for, and I said, “What is this newspaper here? Costs ten cents a day, doesn’t it? That is seventy cents a week. You pay that on your obligations instead of buying the paper. There are several of them at the hospital. You can read them. And what is this shoe shine every day.”
“Oh,” he said, “I have to have my shoes shined.”
And I said, “Yes, you do, but you can shine your own shoes. Why don’t you use a few cents and get a can of polish and shine your own shoes?”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that,” he said. “I never have done it. My father didn’t do it.”
But here and there we finally got him to be willing to do this. And it was only a matter of a few months until he had a better job, paying twice as much with prospects of even doubling, and doubling again. And he was getting along fine. He had a little cheap room, he had a little hot plate. He cooked his own egg every morning, and he ate bread and milk at night, and he ate at the hospital at noon for free. And it was amazing how quickly he was out of debt, though it had run into thousands of dollars.

Part of Cody’s goal to become an astronaut included a goal to become an Air Force Academy cadet. As he progressed through high school, he counseled with his father and mother and prayed about each step along the way. He had three great goals in life.
The first was to keep all the commandments of his Father in Heaven. The second was to serve a full-time mission. “All my life we have talked about a mission and the things pertaining to a mission. It was never ‘if you go on a mission’ but always ‘when you go.’” The third great goal was temple marriage.
“Every night before we went to sleep, mom or dad would come around to our beds and ask each of us in turn, ‘What do you want out of life? What do you want to do? What do you want to be?’ Those goal-setting sessions really helped me keep my head on straight. Every night I said those three things and sometimes others—like the astronaut plans—but always those three. We would talk about what I needed to do to achieve those goals, and then we would talk about any problems or questions I had.”
But two of Cody’s goals conflicted with each other. In order to go on a mission, he would have to resign from the academy after his first year—there was no such thing as a leave of absence for a mission. If he left, he was probably out of the program. To get back in, he would have to be renominated, and the mere fact of his resignation might work against him. What were the odds?
The preparations continued. Cody ran four or five miles each night to condition himself. As a junior, he spent one whole day taking college entrance exams, including the ACT (American College Test), SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test), an Air Force engineering aptitude examination, and a physical fitness test. He was also interviewed and appraised for leadership potential.
The first year at the academy wasn’t spent just waiting for a mission call. “It was hard,” he remembers. “After the first four months I started asking, ‘Is this what I want to do in life?’ But then I would think back to the confirmations I had received through the Holy Ghost. I knew I was doing things, as President Kimball says, in their proper season and order, and I prayed, and the plan was reconfirmed. I knew I was right where I should be, and that really helped me.”
As the first year drew to a close, Cody had to reaffirm in his own mind his decision to go on a mission. To survive the toughest year in the academy and then give it all up took a lot of courage. And it might also mean abandoning his lifelong dream of becoming an astronaut. “But I had already made the decision to resign eight years earlier. I had no doubt what I was going to do even though I agonized over it.”
In March, during spring break, Cody had his mission interviews with his bishop and stake president. At the end of the summer, following SERE training (survival, evasion, resistance, and escape), he resigned. As with any cadet who asks to leave the academy, he was sent to interviews with several different counselors and officers.
“All of them would grill me at first,” Cody said, “but as soon as I told them my reasons for resigning, their attitude changed. They all expressed their respect for the LDS people they knew, and when I told them I was going to try to come back, which was something of a shock in itself, they said fine.” His written statement included a full explanation of what a mission is and why he wanted to serve.
The officer who had to sign the paper as a witness commented, “I’ve never read anything like that before in my life. Is that really what you believe?”
“I sure do,” Cody replied.
“A lot of them didn’t understand,” Cody explains, “but they accepted. They were feeling something they’d rarely felt before.”
In May Cody received his call to the Switzerland Zurich Mission. He entered the MTC in August. Concentrating on studies was second nature, and obedience was ingrained. “I wanted to use my time wisely because I knew I was paying a price for my mission,” he said.
At first the thought of not being readmitted hung over him, but the time finally came when he stopped worrying and left it in the hands of the Lord. Besides, missionary work presented its own challenges. “For the first six or seven months, I found myself going through the motions. I knew the Church was true and that the work was important, but I didn’t love it as I should. My academy experience came to my aid. I was used to doing difficult things. I worked hard and prayed every day that the work would become a joy instead of a burden. In the course of about a week, the whole thing turned around. Suddenly I was happier; I was working out of desire, not just duty. I knew my mission would be worth it even if I never got accepted back into the academy.”
Then a letter from home told Cody that Ted Parsons, another cadet who had resigned from the academy to serve a mission, had been readmitted! Maybe there was a chance after all!
Cody took the necessary exams at a U.S. military installation. “My mission president gave me a blessing. He told me I had served an honorable mission and that the Lord would help me accomplish what I needed to.”
Shortly after the blessing, Cody had a head-on bicycle collision, shattering his nose on the handlebar. “Qualifications at the academy are stringent. With an impact like that you would normally lose pilot qualification. If I had hit my eye or forehead or even my teeth, it would probably have disqualified me.” Cody is convinced he was protected.
When the test results arrived, they showed a score higher than the first time Cody applied for admission, which was advantageous because the competition was tougher.
“I had done everything I could. I made sure my end of things was in order. I wasn’t expecting the Lord to meet me more than halfway. Then I left it up to him,” Cody said.
Cody was renominated by his senator. His faith had paid off. Two weeks after returning from Switzerland and two years after leaving Colorado Springs, Cody Carr entered the academy once more. His dream of being an astronaut was fully intact, along with his other goals of keeping the commandments, marrying in the temple, and being a lifelong missionary.

Elder Robert L. Backman, when he was general president of the Young Men of the Church, liked to tell the story of a deacons quorum presidency who took it upon themselves to visit every member of their quorum. They made appointments, got together at an appointed time, and went to the homes of their young brethren. One such visit was particularly memorable, when they visited a young man who was just about to become a deacon.
The presidency arrived at their prospective quorum member’s home at the appointed hour and knocked on the door. They were invited into the living room, and the prospective deacon joined them. He was a little nervous and didn’t know exactly what to expect. His parents left them alone to visit. The presidency took the time to explain to him what his duties would be, where and when they met as a quorum, how he would participate in meetings and activities, and then welcomed him into the group.
When the presidency left, the young man’s father asked how the visit had gone, to which he responded, “They were awesome, Dad.”

“I had never supposed there would be no icons in a church, or that there would be a kitchen, showers, a gymnasium, a huge room with an organ, and many classrooms,” recalls Andrei Semionov of his first Church meeting in Finland.
Andrei had met Latter-day Saints shortly after beginning work as a doctor in Vyborg, a Russian city close to Finland. In the summer of 1989 Andrei took a canoe trip with a Finnish Latter-day Saint couple—Aimo and Nellie Jäkkö. Campfire discussions about God and faith touched Andrei. He had been troubled by questions about life’s purpose, the meaning of evil, and the possibility of an afterlife. The Jäkkös invited Andrei to attend Church services in Lappeenranta in Finland. There he met full-time missionaries.
“I tried to hold to materialist positions as before, but my eternal questions continued to bother me,” Andrei writes of his discussion with the missionaries. “It was then that the seed, of which I later read in the book of Alma, fell into my soul [see Alma 32:28–43]. I took with me from Lappeenranta this ‘good seed’ in my soul and a Book of Mormon in my travel bag.”
During a second trip to Lappeenranta, the missionaries nourished Andrei’s faith. Of that visit, he writes, “The last prejudices and reservations I had in my heart in relation to a foreign church disappeared.”
When he returned to Vyborg, he studied the Book of Mormon. “I realized that a human mind did not have the power to create such a thing. I knew almost nothing about Joseph Smith himself, his education or intellectual qualities, but I didn’t need to know anything at all about them. I knew these words were not of man but of God.”
Andrei attended a conference with 15 Leningrad Saints in February 1990: “I kept thinking, Could I go on with my life without these people, without the excitement in my heart and the chills that run down my spine when I pray and read the scriptures? All my doubts vanished when Jussi Kemppainen [a counselor in the mission presidency] approached me after the conference and said, ‘I think you are ready to be baptized. What do you think?’ The words immediately escaped my lips—I didn’t even have time to think—and I heard my response: ‘Yes, of course I am ready.’” He was baptized that day.
A month later Andrei was ordained an elder and set apart as branch president. He soon baptized his wife, Marina.
Changes in the couple’s life brought many blessings and opportunities. “A special joy came into our lives after we were sealed for eternity in the Stockholm Sweden Temple,” President Semionov writes. “During the past two and a half years I’ve been to this temple with every group from Russia, and I try to help my brothers and sisters prepare to enter the eternal world.”2
President Semionov served with distinction as a branch president; he also served as the first district president in Vyborg. On 4 May 1996, under the direction of Elder Neuenschwander, then president of the Europe East Area, President Andrei Semionov dedicated the first Latter-day Saint chapel in Russia.

I started meeting with missionaries and learning more. The spiritual hole inside of me started to be filled. Around the time I was deciding to get baptized, some Christian friends invited me to one of their church campouts.
During the final sermon on the last day of camp, I prayed for God to confirm to me that the Book of Mormon was true. At that exact moment, a student who was studying to be a pastor pulled out the Book of Mormon and said, “Why don’t we read from this book? This book is all about Jesus Christ and is in line with the Bible.” The crowd went silent. I am convinced that this was an answer to my prayer.
After hearing from that student, I felt the Spirit confirm to me that this book is another testament of Jesus Christ. I was baptized soon after.

When Elder Marcos Antony Aidukaitis’s oldest son was eight, he drew a picture of his family for a school assignment. At the time, Elder Aidukaitis was putting in long hours as general manager of a company in São Paulo, Brazil. “I was working a lot and was traveling to many places around the world,” he recalls.
Elder Aidukaitis was noticeably absent from his son’s illustration. “Where is your father?” the teacher asked the boy. “Oh, he’s working,” he replied.
For Elder Aidukaitis, the experience was a wake-up call. “I changed jobs and fixed what had to be fixed,” he says, renewing his efforts to put family first.

Our names are Ashley, Jessica, and Amanda Alessi. Sundays are very long because Ashley and Jessica usually go to church around 7:00 A.M. with our Dad, and church doesn’t end until 12:30 P.M. We’re always tired and hungry by that time, but for the last few years, no matter how tired and hungry we are, we visit a member of our branch, Sister Terry, each week after church.
When we visit, we like to sing songs like, “I Am a Child of God,” “Love One Another,” “I Am like a Star,” “Book of Mormon Stories,” and “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes.” Sometimes she tries to do the hand motions, and sometimes she even smiles. We like it when she smiles. The other residents in the hall seem to like the songs, so sometimes we sing to them too. We like to share the gospel by singing.
On nice days, we take Sister Terry outside for a walk. We wheel her around and hope she enjoys the flowers, trees, and fresh air. Most of the time, we have to visit with her inside her room. Mom and Grandmother read scriptures to her, and we all pray with her. Jesus Christ said we should visit the sick, and we’re glad that we can, because it makes us happy and because we love Sister Terry. We think it makes her happy too.

Mara loved making people smile. She made her schoolteacher smile when she raised her hand to ask questions. She made her sister, Marcella, smile when she said nice things to her.
Then Mara would smile too. It felt good to help other people be happy.
But there was one time each week when Mara hardly ever smiled. That time was early Sunday morning. That’s when Mara and Marcella were always the most tired. Rushing around to get ready for church made them extra grumpy. Then there was the long walk to church. It was more than a mile away! Mara and Marcella often got there late. They would miss the first part of Primary.
“We miss you when you’re not here on time,” Sister Lima said one day. She was the Primary president of their ward in Brazil.
Mara knew she should get to church on time. But how? Then Mara got an idea. The next Saturday night, Mara decided to try something new.
Instead of sneaking bedtime snacks after dinner, Mara brushed her teeth. Most days Mama had to remind the girls to turn off the TV and go to bed. Even then they would play and whisper under their covers until late at night. Sometimes they stayed up so long they could hardly keep their eyes open. They had to wiggle to keep from falling asleep.
Tonight Mara put on pajamas and hopped right into bed. Mama didn’t even have to remind her. She started looking at the pictures in the front of her Book of Mormon.
“What are you doing?” Marcella asked.
“A test,” Mara said. Her mind was full of happy thoughts. Plus she was already feeling sleepy.
The next thing Mara knew, the sun was peeking through her window. It was almost time to get ready for church. Instead of feeling yucky, Mara felt great. Her head didn’t feel fuzzy. Her body didn’t feel tired.
She got to Primary even before some of the leaders.
“Thank you for being such a good example to the other children,” Sister Lima said.
Now it was Mara’s turn to smile. She decided she would always go to bed early on Saturday. That way she would be able to spread smiles all Sunday long.