Gospel Story Finder

I remember visiting a friend in southern India. We had first come to know him twelve years previously when we went there in response to his request that someone come to baptize him. Ten years prior to that request he had found a missionary tract of the Church, but how or by whom it had come into that part of the world he did not know. He wrote to the Church offices in Salt Lake City. Other Church literature was sent to him which he read.

We did not baptize him when first we met him; he was not ready. But we arranged for him to be taught the gospel and he was baptized some months later.

This man worked as an accountant in a cement plant. His salary was meager. His house was small, but his heart was large and overflowing. Out of a great love for others that came from his understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ, he built a school with his own hands on a piece of ground he bought from his savings. It was a simple rough building; but studying there were some four hundred poor children, each being brought out of the darkness of illiteracy into the light of learning. What this act of love has meant and will mean in their lives is beyond calculation.

Through this one man’s efforts, there were established five small branches of the Church in the rural villages of southern India. The members constructed three or four little buildings, neat and clean. Over the door of each was a sign, in both English and Tamil, that read, “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” The floors were of concrete and without benches where the people sat together as we met, shared our testimonies, and partook of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

There are now a little over two hundred members of the Church among the vast millions of India. Some day, someone will write the story of the Church in India. That story will be incomplete unless there is a chapter on my friend who lost himself in the service of others.

It’s a little different growing up in the Middle East. In Saudi Arabia there’s not a big Young Women program, because the foreign families who make up the branch often send their high-school-age girls off to boarding schools in Europe or the U.S.
But thanks to a special project, the girls will never forget that they are to “stand for truth and righteousness.” Before each girl leaves, she receives a quilt. Each square has been made by one of her classmates and has something to do with the Young Women values. Mothers and daughters worked together for hours to piece and sew the quilts together.
“Our prayers and encouragement have gone off with these quilts and girls,” says Debby Gibson, a YW adviser. They’ve got the girls covered.

My next step was to try my goal at school. Being the only Mormon in my school was more than a little challenging. I started by listening to my friends, not just hearing. Others began to listen back. I found there was so much to learn about each person—their beliefs, their interests, and their goals. Also, I found that each person, whether he is Jewish, Greek Orthodox, or Catholic, wants to be important; he wants others to care about him.

The red, yellow, and orange leaves crunched under my feet on the bumpy brick sidewalk. Ivy climbed up the old buildings I passed on my way, forming intricate designs. I was headed for the subway. I was happy; inside I was singing. The blue sky outlined the tall majestic buildings. When I arrived at the subway station, I dug into my pocket and pulled out a button that read, “I Care.” I smiled. I pulled out a quarter and rode up to Park Street Station. A hundred faces, each individual, each reflecting a different personality, rode with me.
I smiled at every gaze that fell my way; some smiled back and sent a part of themselves with their smile. I knew where I was going; I knew what I wanted. I wanted others to know too. I had found the true joy of living; the button was pinned on the outside of my coat and on the inside of my heart.

There are abundant examples of successful youth leadership occurring minute by minute all over the world. Let me give you just one example.
I met Matt Andersen, a teachers quorum president whose father was serving as a mission president in Mexico. When Matt was set apart as the quorum president, he was the only member of the teachers quorum attending church in his ward. Young president Matt Andersen was learning a new language so he could be an effective missionary. Going forward with faith, courage, and confidence gained at home and in the deacons quorum, he determined to use his keys of presidency to bless the members of his quorum and their families. He immediately asked for a list of quorum members from the ward clerk, practiced his Spanish, and with a prayer in his heart called the one boy who was listed with a telephone number. He said, “¡Omar: Tú, Iglesia, Hoy!” Or in English, “Omar! You, Church, Today!” Just the basic message!
The miracle is that Omar came to church that day, and soon thereafter so did his mother and sister. Our young quorum president, Matt Andersen, then invited the bishop to drive him, translate, and together visit two other boys whose names were on the list but without telephone numbers. His keys of presidency, the ministering of angels, and the powers of heaven combined. The result was that these two boys also came to church and formed the new teachers quorum presidency. Other boys and their families also returned to the blessings of the gospel and the priesthood.

Unfortunately, my activity in the Church didn’t last. My marriage was difficult, and I turned to old vices to escape my pain. Hobbies began to replace church attendance.

Three years passed, and I reached rock bottom. I had to make a choice. Could I live the gospel for myself regardless of what was happening in my life? Or would I just give in to the darkness? I knew that committing to the strait and narrow path meant getting rid of negative influences in my life. Also, my desires to go back to church highlighted that my spouse and I were on different paths. With the state of our marriage at that point, we were headed toward divorce already.

I was scared. There was no guarantee that my efforts would grant me the good things I wanted in this life. But my decision came back to what I had learned years before—that I was happiest living the gospel. I decided to commit fully and put myself in God’s hands, come what may. From here on out, it was me and Him.

Once again, I started going back to church and getting my life on track. One of the happiest days of my life was when I received a temple recommend again. I found solace in the temple as my marriage continued to fracture and ultimately came to an end.

As scary as that decision felt, through that experience I learned to appreciate God’s hand in my path. Even though I had stumbled, the race wasn’t lost. I wasn’t competing with anyone else. When I relied on the Savior for my self-worth, I could stop spending all my efforts trying to change others’ perspective of me.

I found myself at church being OK sitting alone or amidst members who were in different stages of life. I made an effort not to hide and made myself available to talk with people in my ward. I was able to enjoy attending my meetings for their intended purpose.

Having that peace also helped as I got back into dating. I still didn’t get a lot of second dates, but I now knew I didn’t have to compromise my standards just because I had slipped up in the past. I was living the gospel to the best of my ability, and I was good enough to date those who were living the gospel to the best of theirs too.

I ultimately found a worthy daughter of God who I married in the temple. Her path was very different than mine, but when it came to a love of the Savior and an understanding of His Atonement, we were on the same page.

Media—whether good or bad—can be habit-forming. But it is a habit that can be broken. One woman who was “addicted” to watching daytime soap operas decided to rearrange her priorities and to stop what she felt was a time- and mind-wasting practice. She succeeded and later wrote: “Sometimes our whole family watches shows together, and it’s fun. But now I’m the master. When I want to invite newsmen, actors, or entertainers into my home, I do so. But it’s because they have informative and/or morally, spiritually, and emotionally uplifting programs to offer—not just because they’re there” (LeRee Farrar, “How I Kicked the TV Habit,” Ensign, March 1977, 19).

At the Berlin Olympics in 1936, Hitler declared that Caucasians were a superior race. North America had 10 black athletes, who, much to Hitler’s chagrin, scored more points than any national team. Chief among them was Jesse Owens. At the opening ceremonies, Hitler refused to greet Owens and deliberately snubbed the black athletes. Owens simply shrugged and said, “I didn’t come over to shake hands with Hitler, anyway.” Owens then battled to win four gold medals. As he broke the world’s record for the running broad jump, the first to greet him was not a fellow team member but an exuberant German competing in the same event, Luz Long.
“I have never seen anything like this. You are the greatest of all!” Long exclaimed.
As Owens took Long’s hand in both of his and squeezed it, the crowd thundered approval. Then the two competitors wrapped their arms about one another and began to walk toward the track. The crowd—in spite of Hitler’s presence—went wild with joy and shouted for many minutes.

Abraham Lincoln demonstrated his great integrity in his famous house-divided speech. John Wesley Hill, in his book Abraham Lincoln—Man of God, says: “Lincoln showed his independence and tenacity of purpose when he wrote his address accepting the nomination for United States Senator. … This is known as ‘The House Divided Against Itself’ speech. It embodied the historic declaration that the Union could not exist ‘half slave and half free.’ To his friend, Jesse K. Dubois, Lincoln said:
“‘I refused to read the passage about the house divided against itself to you, because I knew you would ask me to change or modify it, and that I was determined not to do. I had willed it so and was willing, if necessary, to perish with it. I would rather be defeated with this expression in the speech … than to be victorious without it.’” (Abraham Lincoln—Man of God, New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1927, p. 151.)
Now it took real courage for Lincoln to leave that “half slave and half free” sentence in his speech. He was ambitious, and it seemed that through the Senate was the way to the presidency, but the political climate at the time was not ready for the stand he took on that issue. The probability was that the statement would mean defeat in his race for the Senate, and that’s what it turned out to be. All this Lincoln well knew; nevertheless, he had the integrity to act in harmony with his convictions. Although his course did shut the door to the Senate, fortunately for the country, it later opened the door to the presidency.

Then Christine thought of another day, just last October. It was overcast, gray, cool. The heavy air smelled of rain. Papa and Clément were up early, as usual on a Monday. The big diesel engine was already throbbing, mildly vibrating the entire house.
Clément stuffed the compartment behind the cab with blankets, canned pudding, instant soup, snack food. He ran inside to get some tapes, his earphones, and a tape player.
Then he thought again, and laid them aside. This was his last trip to Mechanicsburg for two years. He and father would be talking all the way there, talking about his mission.
The stairs were steep at the south end of the terrasse, but Christine took them easily. Hours of volleyball practice had conditioned her to run, and her lungs pulled in air that was crisp and pure. She reached a narrower boardwalk, the Promenade des Gouverneurs, which stretches along the cliffs to reach the Plains of Abraham.
The French love to tell of a great struggle here, when the Chevalier de Lévis, battling to reclaim Quebec, lured the British far from the city and beat them. But those assigned to cut off the retreat failed, and the rest of the army, too tired to pursue, let the enemy escape. British reinforcements arrived soon, and what should have been a French victory turned to defeat.
Christine breathed deeply and let the air out slowly. It surprised her when she thought of a scripture: “Look unto me, and endure to the end, and ye shall live” (3 Ne. 15:9).
“Endure,” she said aloud. “Sometimes you just have to endure.” And then she was remembering again.
It was a routine, the same routine Marie Claude had followed every morning for years. Get up early and care for the animals. Feed Daisy, Belle, and Lady, the horses. Feed Fido, the bull in the barn. Feed three pigs, three sheep, two dogs, four ducks, and any other animals calling the farm home at the moment.
From upstairs, Christine heard Marie Claude come in the house and bolt the back door against the wind. She could imagine her hanging her flannel coat on the peg in the kitchen. Then she heard her pull a chair across the floor and put breakfast dishes on the table.
For as long as Christine could remember, Marie Claude got up early to take care of the animals. But today the routine was different—the movements slower, the pauses longer, the sighs heavy and audible.
And Christine knew why. Last night, Marie Claude had finally told her boyfriend good-bye. He was a decent fellow, a nice man. But he didn’t understand. He’d had the missionary discussions, even been to church a time or two. But all this religion, meetings every Sunday, marriage in a temple—for him it just wouldn’t do.
And now Marie Claude, who loved him and had dated him for a couple of years, who had argued with him before, had sent him away. She sat at the breakfast table, numb, almost crying, wrenching solace from the everyday routine.
At the end of the promenade, there’s a gazebo. To get there, Christine had to mount steps again. Quickly she bounded up them, the end of her run in sight. And as she ran, her mind flashed ahead, like a video on fast forward.
Here was Marie Claude again, but this time she was smiling. Dressed in embroidered chiffon, she sat by a cheery window in a friend’s house, holding hands with an amiable young man in a blue sweater.
It was amazing. When they laughed, it was the same laugh. The smile was the same smile. They looked like each other, they talked like each other. They both had kind eyes. You’d think they were brother and sister, not fiances.
Yet there on the table was their wedding announcement, and it really did seem like a dream come true—“C’est avec joie que nous vous annonçons notre mariage qui aura lieu au Temple de Washington, D.C., mercredi le six mai.” (It is with joy that we announce our marriage in the Washington, D.C. Temple on May 6, 1987.)
André and Marie Claude. They met at church, and fell in love quickly. But after years of struggling to feel right about something that was wrong, it was easy for Marie Claude to do something that felt so true.
At the gazebo, Christine stopped.
She thought about the family. She pictured her mother, joking with the visiting teachers, happily discussing her hobby of decorating cakes. She saw Father, smiling broadly, the proudest sacrament meeting usher the Branche de Québec has as ever had. She imagined Clément, Elder Ferland, teaching missionary lessons in broken English. And she pictured Marie Claude, in her own home as a newlywed, so happy she was almost dancing.
Then she thought of spires of white, rising from a green woodland, and she cherished the promises of eternity.
Christine looked across the ancient battlefields. The rolling hills seemed to be resting, calm now as she was calm. In the distance, a calèche, a carriage, bobbed along the folds of green. From so far away, it seemed to be in slow motion. But in the evening air, she could hear the clip-clop, clip-clop of the horse’s hooves.
She turned and looked again at the river. It was shining still, but it was no longer silver. The setting sun had turned it to gold. And the sailboat, still a silhouette, pulled up to its moorings.
Dusk was past. The time for returning was here.

Blessings come from holding true to our principles. When I was the president of the Cottonwood stake, one of our stake patriarchs was Dr. Creed Haymond. He would occasionally bear strong testimony of the Word of Wisdom. As a young man he was the captain of the University of Pennsylvania track team. In 1919 Brother Haymond and his team were invited to participate in the annual Inter-Collegiate Association track meet. The night before the track meet his coach, Lawson Robertson, who coached several Olympic teams, instructed his team members to drink some sherry wine. In those days, coaches wrongly felt that wine was a tonic for muscles hardened through rigorous training. All the other team members took the sherry, but Brother Haymond refused because his parents had taught him the Word of Wisdom. Brother Haymond became very anxious because he did not like to be disobedient to his coach. He was to compete against the fastest men in the world. What if he made a poor showing the next day? How could he face his coach?

The next day at the track meet the rest of the team members were very ill and performed poorly or were even too sick to run. Brother Haymond, however, felt well and won the 100- and 220-yard dashes. His coach told him, “You just ran the two hundred and twenty yards in the fastest time it has ever been run by any human being.” That night and for the rest of his life, Creed Haymond was grateful for his simple faith in keeping the Word of Wisdom.

At the end of 2020, I was finding it difficult to feel the spirit of Christmas, so I listened to John Bytheway’s book, Born This Happy Morning1, for ideas. In one chapter, he shares an experience where he purchased tyres for a woman he had just met.
Brother Bytheway says he knows he may have forfeited blessings by telling us about his service, but he risks it to share the overflowing joy and satisfaction he still feels when he remembers that incident. It’s a reminder that it is more blessed to give than to receive.
That joy and satisfaction was exactly what was missing in my life. That Christmas, I believed this feeling would help me focus more on my Saviour, so in December, I fasted to become an instrument in Heavenly Father’s hands. I wanted to help someone—spontaneously or unexpectedly—so they would know He cares for them, and also that I might feel the peace and joy of the season. As I tried to explain to Heavenly Father what I was fasting for, I ultimately said the words: “You know, like John Bytheway and the tyres”.
I spent the following days actively looking for opportunities to serve, then, while I was enjoying a night out with a dear friend, she briefly mentioned she needed new tyres!
My jaw dropped and my heart swelled as I heard the Spirit clearly speak to me: “Sarah, here are your tyres and the answer to your fast.”
I maneuvered the conversation back to the tyres and discovered that while my friend and her husband knew their tyres had to be replaced soon, in recent days, they both felt an even more urgent need for new tyres.
I told her about my fast and that I felt that this was Heavenly Father’s answer to my prayers. I then asked if I could pay for their tyres.
My friend went silent for some time, and then she nodded. After several more emotional moments, she explained that she and her husband could not currently afford the tyres they needed, but they still followed the promptings they both had received and organised the new set. It turned out, the exact day that I was fasting for an experience, ‘you know, like John Bytheway and the tyres’, they were fasting for a way to be able to pay for theirs.
I can assure you I was not expecting the answer to my fast to be so literal! But how perfectly timed and miraculously specific was the Lord’s response to each of our prayers.
If this miracle ended here, it would still be a favourite hear-Him moment in my life. However, just two days after this beautiful family got new tyres, my friend called. I was unable to take her call, which I love, because it means I still have her voicemail on my phone explaining that earlier that day, as she was driving with her young children, in torrential rain, a car with no brake lights pulled dangerously into the traffic ahead and she had to slam on the brakes. They safely came to a halt, and she knew immediately that if they still had their old tyres, they would have run right into the car in front. She said it was a miracle and ended the call with, “So, thank you”.

A young bride went to be with her husband at an army camp on the edge of a desert. Housing was scarce and costly. All they could afford was a small cabin near an Indian village. The 115-degree heat was unbearable in the daytime. The wind blew constantly, spreading dust and sand over everything. The days were long and lonely. When her husband was ordered into the desert for two weeks of maneuvers, she just couldn’t bear the living conditions any longer, and she wrote to her mother that she was coming home. An almost immediate reply included these lines:
Two men look out from prison bars;
One saw the mud, the other saw the stars.
She read the lines over and over. All right, she would look for the stars.
She determined to make friends with her neighbors, the Indians. She admired their artful weaving and pottery work and asked them to teach her. As soon as they sensed her interest was genuine, they were most willing. She became fascinated with their culture, their history—everything about them. The desert changed from a desolate, forbidding place to a world of wondrous beauty.
What had changed? Not the desert, not her environment; her own attitude transformed a miserable experience into a highly rewarding one. (From Bits and Pieces, Vol. C no. 5, pp. 21–23.)

Scritchy-scratchy, scritchy, scritchy-scratchy.
Jimmy awoke with a start. “What is that noise?” he asked out loud.
“It must be Kitty,” he cried, jumping out of bed. He ran through the hall and out the front door to find Kitty.
Jimmy ran around the house, and there he saw Kitty lapping milk from a saucer on the back porch.
Kitty licked the milk off her whiskers and stared at Jimmy a moment. Then she quietly returned to her milk. Lap, lap, lap.
Jimmy shook his head. If it’s not Kitty, it must be Spotty, he decided. And away Jimmy ran to find his dog.
Spotty was burying a bone near the shrubs. “Woof,” he barked. His paws made a soft poosh, poosh sound as he dug into the wet ground.
“It’s not Kitty and it’s not Spotty. Maybe it’s Baby Brother,” Jimmy said to himself as he ran into the house.
Mother and Baby Brother were in the kitchen. Baby Brother was sitting in his high chair. Bang! Bang! went the spoon as Baby Brother hit the tray. He waved his arms and wiggled.
Ker-sploosh! Down went his cereal bowl. Clatter! Bang! Plop!
“You make a lot of noise,” Jimmy said, “but it’s not a scritchy-scratchy sound.”
Mother picked up the cereal bowl. “Jimmy, why are you running around in your pajamas and bare feet?”
“I’m trying to find what woke me,” Jimmy answered.
“Maybe it was the sun shining in your window,” Mother suggested.
Jimmy shook his head. “The sun doesn’t make any noise.”
“What kind of noise did you hear?” Mother asked.
“It was sort of like Kitty scratching on something, but Kitty is lapping her milk,” Jimmy replied. “And it was a little like Spotty when he is scratching, but Spotty is burying a bone in the soft ground.”
Mother smiled. “Let’s go back in your room. Maybe I can help you find it.”
So Mother lifted Baby Brother out of the high chair, and they all went to Jimmy’s bedroom.
“Sh-h-h,” said Mother.
“Sh-h-h,” said Jimmy.
They listened quietly. Soon they heard the noise.
Scritchy-scratchy, scritchy, scritchy-scratchy.
“That’s it,” whispered Jimmy.
Mother smiled. “Come look out the window.”
Jimmy tiptoed to the window.
“Look up under the eaves of the roof,” Mother whispered.
Jimmy looked and he saw a little bird building a nest.
Jimmy and Mother and Baby Brother watched the bird fly away. Soon it returned, carrying dry grass and a twig in its beak. The scritchy-scratchy sounds began again as the bird worked at building the nest.
Jimmy smiled happily. “Will there be eggs in the nest?” he asked.
Mother nodded. “Tiny speckled eggs.”
“And will there be baby birds?” Jimmy questioned.
“With their mouths wide open, waiting to be fed,” Mother told him.
“I can hardly wait!” Jimmy exclaimed. “That will be great! I have Kitty and Spotty and Baby Brother, and now I’ll even have baby birds to watch. I have just about everything!”

In the Atwater Ward (Merced California Stake) the youth decided to go floating. It all began when they entered a float in the annual Atwater Fourth of July parade. Bonnie Regan, a Beehive girl, was chairman of the float committee. John Howe from the teachers quorum, and Sister Terry Latey, the Young Women secretary, worked with Bonnie. They decided to hold a contest for the design of the float, and a vote was held during activity night to determine which one the young people liked the best.
The theme for the parade was “America’s Bright Horizons,” so the young people inscribed on their float: “The family is the future of America. Loving families will produce good citizens. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that the family is the basic strength of society and that members of families can become strong and united through unselfishness, love, and service.” A backdrop across the float read, “America’s Future: the Family.” The back of the float was covered with an original painting of the Oakland Temple done by Sister Lois Moore, the Laurel adviser. Beneath the temple were the words “A Family Can Be Forever.”
The float committee organized bake sales to earn the money to build the float. Priests and teachers were assigned to build the frame using materials from a prop that had been used by the stake in the regional dance festival the previous week. The ingenious Beehive girls were in charge of covering the float with white paper napkins. Their problem was finding enough napkins and still staying within the budget. A couple of large bags full of wrinkled napkins had been left from the dance festival, and someone came up with the idea of ironing the used napkins. The Beehive girls set up a production line, with some young women spraying the paper napkins with water and other young women ironing them.
The Mia Maids were assigned to make the paper flowers. It took a lot of time and a lot of young women to make the 53 large paper flowers for the float and the 20 small flowers for the wedding bouquet. The girls thought it would be a fun activity for nonmembers, too, and invited their nonmember friends to help. The Laurels and deacons were in charge of making the letters. Everyone pitched in to draw, cut, and glitter the letters.
The Mutual held the week before the parade was called “Make a Float, Have a Float,” and of course, root beer floats were served to the hardworking float builders. Work began at 1:00 P.M. and lasted all afternoon and evening. Several adults and Primary children from the ward joined in the work also.
The float committee especially wanted the float to be useful in helping people learn more about the gospel, so permission was received for the full-time missionaries working in Atwater to hand out pamphlets about the family to the parade spectators. They circulated among an estimated 10,000 people who were viewing the parade.
From among 98 units entered in the parade, the Atwater Ward float won first prize in the youth division.

The next night after supper he went with Fitzie and some of his friends to play basketball in the school gym. They played for two hours.
Afterward they were all in the locker room. Kevin had already showered and was just putting on his shoes. The others were in various stages of getting dressed.
Suddenly the lights went out.
“Okay, who’s the clown?” Fitzie yelled. “Turn the lights back on!”
“I didn’t turn ’em off,” someone answered. “Where’s the light switch anyway? … Ow! My toe! … The switch doesn’t work.”
“There aren’t any lights anywhere in the building,” another voice added.
“Oh no,” Fitzie groaned, “another blackout. Do any of you guys have a lighter?”
“I do,” someone volunteered. “It’s in my shirt pocket if I can find it.” Kevin could make out a figure fumbling in a locker near him. “Here it is.”
A small glimmer of light shone in the otherwise dark room.
“Hurry up, you guys! I’m low on lighter fluid.” Kevin sat on the bench and watched unknown figures make use of the small light as they finished preparing to leave the room.
“Man, I never thought I’d be glad somebody had a cheap lighter,” a voice drawled.
“What do you mean, cheap lighter? It cost me two bucks.”
“Yeah, well it sure seems bright in here.”
Finally they were ready. “Kevin, what are you doing sitting there? Let’s get out of here.”
On Sunday Kevin went with Jenny to class, mainly to be with her. He had already discounted any possibility that their teacher could teach him anything, so he sat with his shoulders hunched over, his head down, wrestling with his problems.
It wasn’t until Sister Mattson called on him that he looked up. “Kevin,” she said, then read aloud from the manual, “this can best be seen by examining what the Savior said. Will you read Matthew, chapter 5, verses 14 through 16?” [Matt. 5:14–16]
Jenny loaned him her Bible and helped him find the reference. “‘Ye are the light of the world,’” Kevin began mechanically. “‘A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light …’” He stopped and stared at the words on the page.
“Yes, go on,” Sister Mattson urged.
“‘… and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.’”
“Kevin, there’s one more verse,” Jenny quietly prompted.
“‘Let your light so shine before men,’” he read slowly, “‘that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.’”
“Yes, and what can we learn from this scripture?” Sister Mattson asked.
He didn’t say anything. He pictured the small light in the darkened locker room and the dim figures of people moving around, each attracted by the light and using it as their reference point.
“Jenny, do you know what we can learn from this scripture?” Sister Mattson asked, thinking that Kevin did not have an answer.
“We can learn a lot,” Kevin said quietly, almost to himself. “The first thing is that in order to be a light, we have to live the commandments. You have to set your standards. You can’t re-decide what to do every time someone asks you to do something wrong. You’ve got to make a mental list: This is what I will do. This is what I won’t do. You have to decide what your life is going to mean, or it won’t mean a thing.”
“Thank you,” Sister Mattson said. “Now we should get on with the rest of the lesson.”
Kevin interrupted. “The problem is, I keep thinking that if I didn’t live here, it would be easier. It doesn’t really matter where you live. What matters is that you set your standards once and for all. If you do that, you can be a light.”
“Yes, thank you, and now we’d better get on to Ephesians,” Sister Mattson said.
“You’ve got to be a light to the people around you. Do you know how much light one small lighter can throw in a completely dark room?”
“No,” Jenny replied.
“Enough. That’s the point. Enough for everyone in the room to find his way out of the darkness. And the darker it is, the more the light is noticed. And people who enjoy the light will come nearer to it. That’s how I can find friends who will help me live my standards! We can gather friends around us who will help us, and the light will get even brighter.”
Sister Mattson by now was just looking at both of them.
“Do you know what I’m going to do?” Kevin burst out. “I’m going to memorize jokes from my brother’s Boy’s Life magazine. It has some of the corniest jokes in the world. Every time I hear someone starting a dirty joke, I’m going to bombard him with corny jokes. And I’m going to have a party of my own, at my house, with kids from school and the missionaries. In a nice friendly way, they’re going to know I’m a Mormon.”
“Thank you, Kevin,” Sister Mattson broke in. Turning to Jenny, she asked confidentially, “Jenny, what did he say?”
Jenny put her hand on his arm and answered proudly, “He said that he’s going to be okay.”
“How nice,” Sister Mattson said. “Well, we’d better get on with the rest of the lesson.” She looked at the page of the manual, paused, and then shut the book.
“No. I think Kevin’s story can teach us the same thing. What were you saying about the light in the dark room?”

How can we do this in our homes? Some of you have heard me tell how overwhelmed my husband, Mel, and I felt as the parents of four young children. As we faced the challenges of parenting and keeping up with the demands of life, we were desperate for help. We prayed and pleaded to know what to do. The answer that came was clear: “It is OK if the house is a mess and the children are still in their pajamas and some responsibilities are left undone. The only things that really need to be accomplished in the home are daily scripture study and prayer and weekly family home evening.”
We were trying to do these things, but they were not always the priority and, amidst the chaos, were sometimes neglected. We changed our focus and tried not to worry about the less-important things. Our focus became to talk, rejoice, preach, and testify of Christ by striving to daily pray and study the scriptures and have weekly family home evening.

“I remember a little six- or seven-year-old girl whom I met in Ethiopia. She was collecting water from an irrigation ditch. It was full of silt and mud, but it was the only water available. She went down a very steep bank with a basin and a cutoff plastic bottle, which she used as a dipper, and filled the basin with the black water. Then she carried it home on her head. God bless those dear little ones. How He must love them. And how heavy are the burdens that they have to carry. It tears at my heart.

When I first met with the missionaries, I did not understand much of what they said, and to tell you the truth, I may not have paid much attention to them. My heart was closed to a new religion. I wanted only to prove they were wrong and to gain time to convince Renee to marry me anyway.

Today my children have served and are serving missions, and I understand the sacrifices that these young men and young women make to teach the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now I wish I had paid more attention to Elder Richardson, Elder Farrell, and Elder Hyland, the wonderful missionaries who taught me.

Since I consider family history a type of work, I decided to make my own family history book. So I made a compilation of all the pictures of the members of my family. I did that so that my kids and my great-grandchildren will be able to see how their ancestors looked. And while I was doing it, I felt so peaceful because I knew I wasn’t doing it for myself, but I was also doing it for generations to come.
Glory S., 18, Johannesburg, South Africa

The shadows grew longer and finally disappeared as the sun sank behind the hazy mountains far to the west.
The small western town, built on the edge of the desert near the delta of a small river, boasted one of the better rodeo grounds in the area. The grandstand, stock corrals, small concession building, and large greasewood brush on two sides made the grounds an ideal place for us four boys to play. On this sunny afternoon, my friends and I had come to the rodeo grounds and let our fantasies run wild. We had fought and won many battles with cattle rustlers and other outlaws. We had ridden the hardest-bucking horses and bulldogged the meanest steers.
Now the four of us were sitting quietly on the top steps of the grandstand, and Ray suggested, “It’ll soon be dark, so we’d better be getting home.”
“Yeah, my brothers will be looking for me,” I said, brushing wisps of hair out of my eyes.
“I’m still too tired to walk home. Let’s rest a few minutes more,” Bobby mumbled coaxingly.
“Do you guys like honey?” Jack asked. He was gazing across the rodeo grounds into Mr. Sampson’s alfalfa field, where there were a dozen white beehives, barely visible now in the near darkness.
“I do,” I said, “with peanut butter and bread.”
Ray and Bobby agreed.
“Honey is good fresh out of the comb,” Jack said then. “Have you guys ever eaten honey fresh out of the comb?” None of us had. “Well, let’s go see if Mr. Sampson left any honey in the hives and get us each a comb.”
“Wouldn’t that be stealing?” asked Ray.
“Mr. Sampson probably already has all the honey out of the hives that he needs, so I don’t think he’d care if we took some,” answered Jack.
We were hungry as well as tired, so it didn’t take much argument to convince us that honeycomb would probably taste really good. We crossed the rodeo grounds, climbed over the board fence, and took a honeycomb apiece from a different hive.
As we sat back on the top seats of the grandstand, my conscience began to tell me there was something not exactly right with what I was doing. I should have been home before dark, and I had taken something that belonged to someone else. That first bite of honey didn’t taste as good as I had expected it to.
Just then we heard the crunch of footsteps in the gravel below us.
“Quick, put your combs on the footboard,” Jack whispered.
The footsteps came slowly up the grandstand toward us. The large figure of a man loomed out of the darkness. “Evening, boys.” It was Mr. Sampson. Everybody in our community respected him and liked him, and we weren’t very happy at this point.
Jack shifted uneasily, trying to wipe the honey off his fingers onto the seat beside him.
“Good evening, Mr. Sampson.” Ray was the only one able to speak.
“Out kind of late, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Yes sir. We were just going home,” Ray answered.
After a slight pause, Mr. Sampson asked, “Do you boys know anything about bees?”
This question made us squirm. Finally Ray answered, “I don’t think we know very much.”
“I didn’t think that you did. Let me tell you a little bit about them. In each beehive there are three kinds of bees—the queen, the drones, and the workers. Each has a separate job to do, and each does its job well. The queen bee lays the eggs that hatch into young bees. The drones are male bees that fertilize the eggs laid by the queen.
Mr. Sampson hesitated a few seconds to let what he had told us sink in. “Now I’ll tell you about the workers. As soon as it warms up in the spring and the plants and trees start blossoming, worker bees leave the hive and begin gathering nectar from the flowers. They fly from blossom to blossom until their pouches are full, then fly back to the hive and deposit the nectar in the comb. I extract the honey from the combs as they are filled throughout the summer. But in early fall when it gets cold and the blossoms are gone, the bees can no longer work, so I leave the combs full of honey for them to live on during the cold months. If someone took the combs away from the hives, the bees would starve to death and there would be no more bees or honey.”
Mr. Sampson stood up. “Well, boys, I guess that’s enough about bees for now. I’d better be getting on home.” He started down the grandstand, then stopped and turned back toward us. “You boys had better go on home too. But first I think there’s a little chore that you might want to do. Good night, boys.”
“Good night, Mr. Sampson,” we chorused.
For a minute we just sat there, stunned. Mr. Sampson knew that we had taken the honeycombs, yet there had been no anger, no scolding, no threats.
We knew what “little chore” we had to do. We retrieved our combs from the footboard and returned them to the hives.