Gospel Story Finder

When I was about five years old, I was playing football with my friends behind the church in my small village in Côte d’Ivoire. I vividly remember the preacher’s call to his congregation to cleanse their clothes in preparation for the Savior’s arrival. Being young, I took this call literally. I ran home as fast as my little legs could carry me and begged my mother to clean my few clothes so that I could be spotless and ready for the Savior’s coming the next day. Although my mother was skeptical about the Savior’s imminent return, she still washed my best outfit.
The next morning, I put on the still slightly damp clothing and eagerly waited for the announcement of the Savior’s arrival. As the day wore on and nothing happened, I decided to go to the meetinghouse. I was deeply disappointed to find that the church was empty and the Savior had not arrived. You can imagine my feelings as I slowly walked home.
Years later, as I was receiving the missionary lessons in preparation to join The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I read the following: “And no unclean thing can enter into his kingdom; therefore nothing entereth into his rest save it be those who have washed their garments in my blood, because of their faith, and the repentance of all their sins, and their faithfulness unto the end.”
The clarification I received at that time helped me to understand the important truth that had eluded my young mind many years prior. The preacher’s message was centered on the importance of spiritual purity. He urged the congregation to seek repentance, make changes in their lives, and turn to the Savior for redemption.

Evan Stephens was born in Wales in 1854. By the time he was 12 years old, his family had moved to Willard, Utah, where he sang in the town choir. But when Evan learned that President Brigham Young was coming to hear the choir, he had a problem.
Evan looked down at the dusty road and dragged his feet as he walked home from choir practice. Everyone else in the Willard town choir had cheered at the invitation to sing for President Brigham Young. The men clapped each other on the back, while the women whispered excitedly from behind their books and fans. No one noticed the glum look on 12-year-old Evan’s face as he slumped down in his chair. The “Boy Alto,” as he was known, quietly slipped through the church doors and left practice by himself.
The problem wasn’t that Evan didn’t want to sing. He loved music. When his family settled in Willard, a town about 50 miles (80 km) north of Salt Lake City, he had been delighted to learn about the unusually good town choir. As the 10th child in the Stephens family, Evan had found little time between farm chores to learn much about music. In the Willard choir, he could finally learn more about it. He found himself moving in rhythm as he worked and dancing as he herded the cows. He felt music everywhere now.
No, the idea of singing for the prophet didn’t upset Evan. But choir members would need to dress in their best Sunday clothes for the performance, and Evan didn’t have any good clothes. His family didn’t have much money. He had never owned a nice coat or a pair of black Sunday shoes. He was ashamed to sing in front of the prophet while looking so shabby.
Evan looked down at his dusty feet. They were covered with dirt from the trail. He would have to scrub them hard before going to church Sunday morning. Otherwise, his feet would look black. Evan’s heart jumped at this thought. He could get black feet—really black feet—by using polish. Everyone would be looking at the faces of the singers, so no one would notice that Evan had black feet instead of black shoes.
On the day the choir was to sing to the prophet, Evan felt sweat on his forehead and the palms of his hands as he looked down at his black feet. He knew he must go—the choir needed him—but he wanted to hide so the prophet would not see him. With tears racing down his cheeks, he ran toward the bowery where the choir was going to sing.
At the bowery, Evan stopped. What if the prophet did see him? What would he think of a poor farm boy with painted black feet and no coat? Evan couldn’t let the prophet see him. Turning around, he bolted like a frightened colt. He ran right into the very man he had hoped not to see.
President Brigham Young grabbed the frightened boy by the shoulders. “Now, now, what’s this?” he asked. “What’s the matter? Why are you running away?”
Tears filled Evan’s eyes as he bowed his head and whispered, “I have no coat for the program and no shoes.” Swallowing the lump in his throat, he continued, “I painted my feet black with polish.”
The grip on Evan’s shoulders relaxed, and he felt the prophet pat him on the head. Looking up, he was surprised to see a kind look on President Young’s face and tears in his eyes too. “Never mind that,” he told Evan. “Don’t you hesitate a moment. Go right on in.”
Relief wrapped around Evan like a soft, warm blanket. He blinked away the tears and returned the prophet’s smile with one of his own. He hurried to take his place with the choir. Happy to be accepted by the prophet, Evan sang his part perfectly.
President Young gave Evan an encouraging word and courage to do his part. This kindness influenced Evan long after the choir performance. He continued to study music and taught himself new skills.
When Evan grew up, he became director of the Tabernacle Choir. He served in that position from 1889 to 1916. Evan also wrote many sacred hymns and patriotic songs. He remained humble and always remembered the lesson he had learned from the prophet. Evan treated people like he did his music—with love. And like President Young, he listened with his heart.
Evan Stephens later wrote a hymn about courage, including the words, “Courage, for the Lord is on our side” (“Let Us All Press On,” Hymns, no. 243).

When I was a college freshman, I would go with my roommate to visit her 98-year-old great-great-uncle, whom we affectionately called Uncle Joe. He lived alone and was lonely, so we tried to visit him as often as possible. During our visits he would tell us stories about when he lived in Mexico and in several border towns in Arizona, including Nogales.
When my roommate temporarily moved back home, I felt prompted to continue visiting Uncle Joe. He became a close friend, and I visited him until he passed away a year and a half later. I was sad to lose my friend but grateful for the valuable time we had spent together.
As I read this entry, I realized that the Joseph Kleinman who had helped my great-grandmother was Uncle Joe! I felt the Spirit whisper that I had been inspired to continue visiting Uncle Joe as a small thank-you for the kindness he had shown to my great-grandmother and her family.

For many years our family has enjoyed the annual tradition of camping high in the Uintah Mountains of northeastern Utah. We travel 20 miles (32 km) over a rocky dirt road to arrive at a beautiful green valley with towering canyon walls and through which runs a river filled with cold, clear water. Each year, hoping to reaffirm the value of gospel doctrine and practices within the hearts of our children and our grandchildren, Susan and I ask each of our six sons and their families to prepare a short message on a topic they feel is an important element in the foundation of a Christ-centered home. We then gather for a family devotional in a secluded place, and each presents their message.
This year our grandchildren wrote the topic of their message on stones and then, one by one, buried them next to one another, representing a sure foundation upon which a happy life is established. Woven among all six of their messages was the immutable, eternal truth that Jesus Christ is the cornerstone of that foundation.

When Raimundo Carvalho was 18, his father died. His father had earned a living washing clothes for other families. Now that meager income was gone.
“I was the oldest child, the only son, with four younger sisters. So, I needed to help my mother provide for the family,” he remembers. “We faced a lot of challenges and we were really poor.”
Raimundo learned to make shoes. Soon, however, it became apparent that he couldn’t keep up on his studies and work enough to provide the help his mother needed. “Taking care of the family came first,” he says. “I was able to finish my classes that year and that was it.”
In his heart, he knew he would come back to school again. But when and how?
He continued to work, and the family survived.
“Then I met and married this beautiful woman,” he says, smiling at his wife, Eréroythe. “And we built a family of our own. Today we have three children and three grandchildren.”
Eró, as his wife is known, encouraged Raimundo to go back to school. “But because of my responsibilities as a husband and a father,” Raimundo says, “I knew I couldn’t pursue the education I wanted at that time. I didn’t abandon my dream—I just put it on pause. It became something I would do in the future.”
What he could do, he found, was to encourage his wife and children in their education.
“The scriptures teach us that the glory of God is intelligence,1” he says. “They also say we should bring up our children in light and truth2 and that we should seek learning by study and faith.3 These principles became standards for our family.”
Today, Raimundo is 62. And that dream he put on pause? It’s finally coming true. He recently graduated from high school. What’s more, he’s preparing to enter college. “I have to take a challenging test to get in,” he says. “But I want people, old and young, to see that they can set a goal and achieve it.”

Elder Renlund and his family lived in Sweden when he was 12. One Sunday another deacon brought a firecracker and matches to the Church building. Before others arrived, Elder Renlund lit the firecracker! He tried to put it out, but it exploded and filled the chapel with fumes. Nothing was damaged, but the smell distracted everyone in sacrament meeting. Elder Renlund felt so bad that he decided not to take the sacrament. After church, he confessed to his branch president what he had done. Elder Renlund felt joy and happiness when he repented and knew he was forgiven.

Coralie “Coco” Gamiette, 12, has a lot of favorite places to visit, and one of them is a waterfall. It’s called la Cascade aux Écrevisses. It’s the place where many of the early members of the Church on the West Indies island of Guadeloupe were baptized.
Coco says the waterfall reminds her of a place in the Book of Mormon, the Waters of Mormon, described as “a fountain of pure water” with “a thicket of small trees” nearby. That’s where 450 of those who believed Alma’s teachings were baptized. (See Mosiah 18:39.)
Of course, in Guadeloupe today, as in most places in the Church, baptisms are performed in a font at the chapel. But for Coco, la Cascade is still a pleasant place for picnicking, wading in the creek, and sitting in the cool shade to think about the heritage of the Church in her own family.
That heritage lies in a somewhat complex story that stretches back about 20 years, to the city of Angoulême, France. There, full-time missionaries were guided to a man named Michel Menardin, who had come from Guadeloupe, an overseas department of France, to perform his military service. Michel accepted the gospel and was baptized and confirmed.
That same year in the same town, missionaries left a pamphlet in a mailbox. It triggered interest from a single mother, Claudine, who was raising a 19-year-old daughter, Delphine. They both gained testimonies and were also baptized and confirmed.
Michel and Claudine met at church, decided they were meant for each other, and married. (They are Coco’s grandparents.) When Michel’s mother, Marthé, came for the wedding, she stayed in Angoulême, became acquainted with the Church, and joined.
Later, Delphine was called on a mission to Seattle, Washington. While she was serving, her parents and grandmother moved back to Guadeloupe. After her mission, Delphine came to visit them, and while in Guadeloupe she met Claude Gamiette, who had recently returned from the Florida Jacksonville Mission. He was serving as a counselor to Delphine’s stepfather in the branch presidency. The two returned missionaries dated and were married a short time later. Claude and Delphine are Coco’s parents. Now, 14 years and five children later, Claude, whose own family goes back years in the Church, is president of the Basse-Terre Guadeloupe District.
So with all of that, Coco is a fourth-generation Latter-day Saint. “I’ve grown up in the Church,” she says. “I’ve heard about it my whole life, gone to Primary and now to Young Women, and heard my parents and their parents and their parents bear their testimonies. I’ve always known the gospel is true. When I read in Mosiah about the promises the believers made when Alma baptized them, that’s what I’ve seen and felt my whole life.”
Coco remembers her great-grandmother saying that a family extends beyond a mother and father and their children. “She says family stretches across generations, from eternity to eternity,” Coco says. “That’s what I see in my family.”

I would like now to relate one last very personal experience in faith that demonstrates these six suggestions.
On July 29, 1977, Sister Cook and I had just finished visiting the Bolivia Santa Cruz Mission and were stalled in the Cochabamba, Bolivia, airport for some five hours. I recall that we were very tired, having had few hours of sleep the night before. We were both delighted to have a few hours rest in the airport. As I was drifting off to sleep, I had a very strong feeling that I should awaken and write down some ideas. The desire to sleep was strong, but the promptings of the Spirit were more powerful. I did write; in fact, I wrote for nearly three hours, solving some organizational problems I had struggled with for a number of years previously. I felt a great outpouring of the Spirit on that day and excitedly wrote down each inspired thought. The experience took most of the time of the delay.
We were then off to La Paz, Bolivia. We were graciously met by President and Sister Chase Allred at the airport and driven in their van to the mission office. We locked the car and left our luggage and briefcase in the van.
Upon entering the office, the president was confronted with the difficult case of a woman whose husband was dying. While President Allred and I assisted with her needs, Sisters Cook and Allred left for the mission home.
When the president and I returned to the van, I realized immediately that all of our goods were gone but assumed that Sister Cook had taken them with her to the mission home. While we were driving toward the home, I discovered that the right front window-wing had been damaged and began to fear that our goods had been stolen.
Arriving at the mission home, we found that our luggage had indeed been stolen. The loss of a substantial amount of money and all our clothing created an immediate but only temporary problem. More disheartening than all was the fact that my scriptures were in my briefcase along with the inspired ideas I had just received in Cochabamba. The overwhelming sensation of discouragement, anger, and inability to do anything about the situation was overpowering.
My wife and I prayed alone. We prayed with those present. We tried to enjoy our dinner but could not. Who could know of the great loss I personally felt? The scriptures had been given to me as a young man by my parents, a sacred inscription placed in one of them by my mother and in the other by my since-deceased father. I had spent literally thousands of hours marking and cross-referencing (and loving every moment of it) in the only tangible earthly possessions I had ever considered of much value. I had on many occasions instructed my wife that if there were ever a fire in the home, she should first remove the children and then, if there were time, save my scriptures and not worry about anything else.
The president and I had much to discuss as we were to be together only that evening. However, I felt a strong impression that we must do all in our power to recover the scriptures. After supper, all present knelt in prayer once again. We determined to search the immediate area near the mission office and in a nearby field, hoping that the thief or thieves had taken the salable items and discarded the English books.
In the prayer we pleaded that the scriptures would be returned, that the persons who had taken them would be led to know of their unrighteous act and repent, and that the return of the books would be the means of bringing someone into the true church.
Eight to ten of us then loaded into the van with flashlights and warm clothing and drove up to the mission office in the central city. We scoured vacant lots across the street and adjacent streets and alleys; we talked with guards and anyone else we could find and exhausted all possibilities. No one had seen or heard anything. Finally we returned home, dejected, able only to pray individually and wait. President Allred and I worked late into the night to finish our business, and the next day Sister Cook and I flew back to Quito, Ecuador, where we lived.
During the next few weeks, the missionaries searched the lots again. They looked in hedges and garbage cans, searched a nearby park, placed a sign on a wall where the books were stolen, requesting their return, and kept a watchful eye to see if the books might show up in an unexpected place nearby. In sheer desperation, trying to do all in their power, the missionaries decided to place an advertisement in two daily newspapers, offering a reward and giving explicit information concerning the books.
In Quito, Ecuador, I began a personal spiritual struggle that was a very difficult one for me. After nearly three weeks, I had not studied in the scriptures at all. I had tried on numerous occasions, but every time I read a verse I recalled only a few of the many cross-references I had made over twenty years. I was disheartened, depressed, and had no desire whatsoever to read. I prayed many times expressing to the Father that I had never tried to use my scriptures for any purpose other than glorifying his name and trying to teach others the truths that he had taught me. I pleaded with him to do whatever had to be done in order to have them returned. My wife and little children prayed incessantly for the same blessing. Even after two or three weeks they continued praying every day, “Heavenly Father, please bring back daddy’s scriptures.”
After about three weeks, I felt a strong spiritual impression: “Elder Cook, how long will you go on without reading and studying?” It seemed to me to be a test or a trial and to have something to do with the “cost” of the blessing I desired. The words burned, and I determined that I must be humble and submissive enough to start all over again. With my wife’s permission to use her scriptures, I began reading in Genesis in the Old Testament, marking and cross-referencing once again.
On August 18, a friend, Brother Ebbie Davis, arrived in Ecuador from Bolivia and laid my scriptures on my desk along with a manila folder which contained the papers that I had written in Cochabamba and some recently prepared mission budgets that were also stolen. He indicated that they were the only things recovered, that he had been given those items by the mission president in La Paz as he boarded the plane, and that he did not know how the books were found, but that I would be told when I arrived there in the next few days to tour the mission.
The joy I experienced in that moment and later that day is indescribable. To realize that my Heavenly Father could, in some miraculous way, lift those books out of the hands of thieves in a city like La Paz and return them intact, not one page removed, torn, or soiled, is still beyond me. How the faith of our family and many Bolivian missionaries was rewarded! That day I promised my Father that I would make better use of my scriptures and my time as instruments in his hands for teaching the gospel.
On Sunday, August 21, I flew to Guayaquil, Ecuador, and on to La Paz, Bolivia, arriving on August 22. Upon arrival I was given the following account:
A lady had been in one of La Paz’s hundreds of marketplaces. She saw a drunk man waving a black book around. She had the strongest spiritual impression that something holy was being desecrated. She approached the man and asked him what it was. He did not know but showed her the book. She asked if he had anything else. He pulled out another black book. She asked if there were more. He removed a folder full of papers that he said he was going to burn. She then expressed the desire to purchase those things from him, to which he agreed, for the price of 50 pesos or about $2.50, U.S. currency.
After the purchase had been made, she felt totally taken back by what she had done. She realized the books and papers were in English—she didn’t speak, read, or understand English—and she had no desire to have any English books. It would have been like one of us paying nearly 10 percent of our monthly income to buy some books in a language we could not read. She immediately began a search for the church that was named in the front of the books. After approaching a number of other churches, she finally arrived at the mission office in La Paz, directed by the hand of the Lord. She had never heard of the reward nor of the advertisement in the newspaper, which was to appear that very day. She did not ask for any money, not even to reclaim the 50 pesos that she had paid. The elders received the books with rejoicing and paid her the reward anyway.
She told the missionaries that she was associated with a Pentecostal sect, but listened very intently as they unfolded the gospel to her. She recalled reading something about Joseph Smith from a pamphlet she had picked up in the street two or three years earlier. After their first discussion with her, they reported, “She is a golden contact.” After the second discussion, she committed to baptism. Two weeks later, September 11, 1977, on a Sunday afternoon in La Paz, Bolivia, Sister Maria Cloefe Cardenas Terrazas and her son, Marco Fernando Miranda Cardenas, age 12, were baptized into the true church of Jesus Christ by Elder Douglas Reeder.
Who could describe my deep, discouraging, depressing, disheartening, overpowering feelings of helplessness when the scriptures were lost? Who could describe my great feeling of joy and rejoicing when we saw the power of heaven revealed in this miraculous way? Our Heavenly Father does hear and answer the prayers of his sons and daughters if they exercise faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord said: “For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.
“Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” (Mark 11:23–24.)

Then recently, half a world away, I sat with another good man. He had brought light and warmth and good humor into the room with him, and I was listening with deep interest as he told his “before and after” story. The “before” involved his life as a nominal but nonpracticing Christian employed in a stressful occupation with rough associates and with a tendency to follow the crowd in all their bad habits. He was not attentive to his wife and children, was worried about his family, suffered from an unhappy conscience, and had developed a serious physical ailment.
Then two young men came to his door. They represented the Lord, they said, with a message of eternal truth for him and his family: the gospel of Jesus Christ is restored to the earth, the church of Jesus Christ reestablished; every individual and every family are important to God and through his plan can find purpose and meaning; families are meant to be together forever; and there is a way to know for oneself the truth of these things, they said, for the Holy Spirit will confirm the knowledge for those who sincerely seek.
He listened and believed. Immediately he put aside bad habits. His wife and children responded also. Their lives changed. They studied and prayed and worshiped, joined the Church, and lived in the light of the Spirit. His work improved, and soon new opportunities and trust and renewed reputation for dependability resulted.
At the conclusion of his story came a ringing declaration of faith, without self-consciousness, without bluster, without guile. “I am like the Lord in one thing,” he said; “my specialty is mercy.”
My specialty is mercy!

One ward, for example, had a young man in a wheelchair who went to all the basketball games of his teachers quorum. He cheered them the whole season, at the end of which his father asked the teachers quorum advisor if he would consider a chess tournament so his son could take a more active part with his friends.

Not only did the young men of that ward have a chess tournament, they began what became a stake chess tournament that included the young women and all the Aaronic Priesthood and introduced many young people to each other who otherwise would not have met.

Kathy looked out her bedroom window at the deep snow piled high against the barn and the fences. Her father had shoveled a narrow path from the house to the barn, and she could see him now struggling to open the heavy barn door against the wind so he could get inside to feed the animals.
Kathy sighed as she thought, Why couldn’t this big snowstorm have waited a few days, or why didn’t I see the picture of the beautiful shawl a few weeks earlier?
She wanted the shawl for a Christmas present for Grandmother, who was a dear companion to Kathy. Grandmother was always so gentle and kind and full of laughter that she made life fun. But lately, Grandmother couldn’t seem to keep warm. She would say, “Is there a door open somewhere?” or “I feel cold across my shoulders.”
Early in the fall Kathy decided to knit Grandmother a lap robe for Christmas. With Mother’s help, she had already gotten a good start on it. Then, as she was looking through the mail-order catalog one day, she saw the shawl. It was white and lacy and edged with long fringe. It was the most beautiful one she had ever seen.
That’s what I’m going to give Grandmother for Christmas, thought Kathy. It’s much prettier than the lap robe I’m making, and she can wear the shawl to parties or to church or just around the house.
Quickly Kathy checked the price and then counted the money she had tucked away in her top dresser drawer. But she didn’t have quite enough!
What can I do? thought Kathy. Christmas is only a month away. Then Kathy remembered that Mrs. Taylor owed her some money for babysitting.
Happily, Kathy picked up the catalog and slipped into the kitchen to see what Mother thought about this gift for Grandmother.
“It’s a lovely idea,” said Mother. “However, I think Grandmother would be just as happy with a lap robe that you made yourself. But if you decide on the shawl, have your order ready tomorrow and I’ll stop at the post office when I’m in town.”
Before going to bed that night Kathy spread the unfinished lap robe on her bed and placed the picture of the shawl beside it. As she looked at them both, she thought. The lap robe is pretty and it wouldn’t take me too long to finish it, but the shawl is beautiful. Grandmother would love it. I must get her the shawl.
So Kathy folded the unfinished lap robe and tucked it into her knitting bag. The next day she filled out an order for the shawl, and her mother mailed it when she went to town.
Now, it was just four days before Christmas and, although the postmistress had called to say the shawl had arrived, Kathy couldn’t pick it up because the drifting snows had closed the only road into town.
Tears filled Kathy’s eyes as she watched her father push through the storm on his way toward the house. I won’t be able to pick up the shawl until after Christmas the way the snow is piling up now, she thought unhappily.
Just then, Mother opened the bedroom door. “Kathy, I know you’re terribly disappointed about the shawl, but how much do you have left to do on the lap robe?”
“I could never finish the lap robe by Christmas, Mother,” answered Kathy, trying hard to hold back the tears. “Oh why won’t it stop snowing!” she fumed.
“Darling, we can’t do anything about the snow,” said Mother patiently, “but we can do something about the lap robe. Let’s see how much you have left to do.”
Kathy got out her knitting bag and laid the unfinished lap robe and the loose knitted squares on the bed. “Mother,” she sighed, “I just can’t finish it. I don’t even have all the squares done. Christmas is just four days away and we have so many other things to do.”
“I think we have time,” said Mother.
“Time for what?” asked nine-year-old Becky, poking her head through the doorway.
“To finish Grandmother’s lap robe before Christmas,” answered Mother.
“I can help,” offered Becky. “I could knit a square for you. The coin purse I knitted last summer looked good, didn’t it, Mother? And I could do your share of the dishes so you’d have more time to knit.”
“Oh, Becky,” exclaimed Kathy, “you’re a dear! Thank you.”
“How many more squares do you need?” asked Mother.
“I’ll need ten more,” Kathy counted, “besides this half-finished one. Then the squares need to be sewn onto the others, and an edge crocheted. We might as well forget it!”
“Well, let’s see,” said Mother, ignoring Kathy’s last remark. “I could finish sewing the squares together. Becky could finish the square you’ve started and then help you with the new squares.”
So as soon as Grandmother went to bed that night, out came the yarn and needles.
Kathy knit.
Becky knit.
Mother sewed.
Clickety-clickety-clickety went the knitting needles.
Daddy said, “What’s going on? I never saw such busy fingers. I guess if I’m going to belong to this family I’ll have to get me some knitting needles too!”
Becky, Mother, and Kathy just smiled and kept on working and as each square was finished it disappeared into Mother’s bedroom to be added to the other squares.
The next evening all the squares were finished. While Kathy crocheted on the edge of the lap robe, Mother sewed the last square onto the other end, and Becky stood watch at the door so Grandmother wouldn’t suddenly pop in to see what was going on.
The next day Kathy crocheted every spare moment she had. She excused herself quickly from the table before anyone else was through with lunch. Grandmother commented, “My goodness, Kathy, you’ve been in such a hurry all day that you’ve barely taken time to eat.”
“Just finishing up a few odds and ends, Grandmother,” said Kathy with a smile. “There’s lots to do at the last minute.”
“Maybe I could help,” volunteered Grandmother.
“Thank you, Grandmother, but with Mother and Becky’s help I’m just about finished,” Kathy said, patting Grandmother’s cheek.
As Kathy left the room to go back to her crocheting, Becky winked at Mother and hurried to her room.
Just as the big hall clock struck five, Kathy’s bedroom door opened. “Almost through?” questioned Mother.
“Almost,” Kathy responded.
The next thing Kathy heard was, “Time for dinner. Are you going to make it?” said Daddy, popping his head into the room.
“Yes, I only have three inches to go.”
“Come and eat,” Dad said. “You’ll need some strength to finish those three inches.”
After dinner Kathy hurried back to her room. Soon the lacy edge was finished, the yarn cut and tied, and the lap robe spread smoothly on her bed.
Why it’s really pretty, thought Kathy in amazement. It looks like Grandmother’s flower garden. It’s almost as beautiful as the shawl!
Just then Mother and Becky came into Kathy’s room.
“It’s lovely!” exclaimed Mother.
“Gorgeous!” added Becky.
“And finished!” said Kathy.
“Hurry and get it wrapped,” said Becky. “It’s almost time for our Christmas Eve program and we need you to play for our carols.”
Once again Kathy looked out her bedroom window. During the day, fresh snow had fallen. It was a soft, sparkling snow that seemed to reflect the light of a thousand stars that twinkled in the faraway heavens.
Kathy thought for a moment of helpful little Becky who hated to do dishes, yet had done her own share and Kathy’s too for four days. She thought of Mother and Daddy—all so loving, so understanding, so helpful. Then, brimming with love and happiness, Kathy picked up Grandmother’s gift, wrapped it in bright Christmas paper, and hurried into the living room to join the family.

I grew up in Mongolia and believed in Buddhism. But one day a friend came to my home. She was a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She talked to me about Jesus Christ and invited me to attend her church. I didn’t listen to her. She came again, but still I didn’t listen.
A few weeks after her visit I had a dream. In the dream a voice told me to go to church. I asked, “What? What church? I don’t understand.” The voice gave me directions on how to get to church. I was told, “Tomorrow morning go to this church. When you enter, two missionaries will be there to meet you.”
When I woke up the next morning, I was confused. “Who had come to me in a dream? Who had talked to me?” I wondered. But I decided to go to church.
I followed the directions and found the church. At the door were two missionaries to meet me. They shook my hand and invited me to attend the meeting. The members were nice, and everyone smiled. I felt very happy.
After sacrament meeting the missionaries invited me to hear the discussions. I said yes.
When Elder Johnson and Elder Sampson taught me the first discussion, I was confused, but they explained everything again. They had powerful testimonies. I asked many questions, and the elders always answered me. They read the scriptures with me and invited me to pray about what they had shared with me. Then they left my home.
I felt happy. I decided to ask God if what I was learning was true. I knelt down and prayed, “If God lives and loves me, if Jesus Christ lives, and if this Church is true, let me feel the Spirit.” After I prayed, my heart felt so good and so comfortable. I felt like I was flying. I felt the answer come to my heart: “God lives. He loves you! Jesus Christ lives. Do not be confused. This is the only true Church.” I knew this was the Holy Ghost testifying of the truth. I had received my answer from God.
Two days later the missionaries returned to my home. I told them about my feelings and that I wanted to be baptized. I was so happy I jumped up and down. During the next three weeks, the elders taught me the rest of the discussions, and I was baptized.
I know that God lives and that He loves us. Jesus Christ is our Redeemer and Savior. I know that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. I love the Book of Mormon and know it is the word of God. I am now serving as a full-time missionary in Raleigh, North Carolina, in the United States. I love my mission. This is the Lord’s work. I am so grateful I was guided to the true Church of Jesus Christ.

A few days later, I opened the door to see two fine-looking young men. They introduced themselves as missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In the conversation that followed, they asked, “Do you believe that the church of Jesus Christ is on the earth today?” My wife and I had already considered this question while studying the Bible. We concluded that if there were a true church, it would have to have all the doctrines Jesus taught. The churches we knew, including our own, were not complete. “If it exists,” I said, “it must have all the things Jesus taught. But it does not exist.”
The missionaries said that the church they represented was organized in the same way as the church at Christ’s time. They added that this church had continuing revelation from Jesus Christ.
I felt sorry for them; they had been so misled. I told them, “I’m sure that just as our church has errors in its doctrine, so does yours. Someone has added, changed, or taken something away.” Again they testified that their church was Christ’s own church, organized with his authority and directed by him.
Soon after, I told my mother about the missionaries. She smiled and went into her bedroom, then returned with a copy of the Book of Mormon. She told me I could have it.
I began reading the Book of Mormon with a curious, but negative attitude. As I read the first page, I thought angrily, this was written by a man with a vivid imagination who knew the Bible well. I read two more pages, slammed the book shut, threw it on the table, and exclaimed, “What a fake!” During the missionaries’ next visit, I told them that I thought the Book of Mormon was a hoax. It was like the Bible, I said, except it referred to the American continent. But, undeterred, the missionaries easily handled the questions my wife and I had then, and in subsequent visits. I could find nothing wrong with what they taught us, but I could not accept the Book of Mormon.
However, the missionaries testified that I could know that the Book of Mormon was true if I followed the admonition of Moroni and sincerely sought for divine guidance. (See Moro. 10:4.) Having prayed, and while reading the words of Moroni, I received a spiritual witness that I have never been able to describe. A realization that the Book of Mormon and the Church were true penetrated every fiber of my being. Happily I exclaimed to my wife, “Margrit, Margrit, I know that it is true!”
Margrit continued to seek her own witness, and within a few weeks she also knew the truth. We set our baptismal date.

We believe in you because we know you can be honest. A television channel ran the story of a 10-year-old boy named Josh Bowers from West Jordan, Utah. He found a wallet that had $530 in it. Josh didn’t hesitate. He picked it up and took it to his mother. The wallet belonged to a mother of four, and the $530 was rent money she couldn’t live without.

Josh really wanted a new bike. But he knew the money was not his. The relieved young mother gave Josh $40 for returning the wallet. Josh planned to use some of the money to get his old bike tire fixed. But a viewer, on hearing the story, had Josh pick out a brand-new bike “to reward him for being an honest guy.”1

Pooja Prabhakar, 18, says she has received many blessings because of the gospel. “I have been brought into the light of truth, and I am happy that I can prepare myself to go back and live with my Heavenly Father.” She says that becoming a member of the Church has changed her life in many ways: “I begin each day with scripture study. I dress modestly. I use good language. I used to have a habit of making fun of others, but because of the Church I learned that I shouldn’t be doing that, so I stopped.”

She says she was 14 years old when she first attended Young Women. “I loved it,” she says. “I was very much reserved, but as I went on, I became jolly happy. I learned how to be a good daughter to my parents, a loving sister to my siblings, and a peacemaker at home. It’s been jolly nice, especially when I received my Personal Progress medallion.”

Now as she transitions into Relief Society, she has many pleasant memories—of singing songs at a residence for the elderly “to show our love;” of gaining a testimony that the Book of Mormon is true, that Joseph Smith was a prophet, and that President Thomas S. Monson is a living prophet; and of “learning more about the gospel every time I come to church.”

She tells of an experience she and her friends had one day on their way to school. “We saw an older woman who was trying to find her way to the chemist [pharmacy] to get a prescription filled, so we stopped and helped her.” They not only walked with her to her destination, but they went inside and made sure she was able to get what she needed.

“I’m glad to know God would let us help her,” Pooja says.

I had just graduated from high school and had just gone to work as a disc jockey at a radio station. As I was making money and gaining valuable experience in broadcasting, the thought of serving a mission was pushed further and further from my mind. After much deliberation I accepted a mission call. I had a great mission and grew to know that some things in life are not as important as we sometimes feel. When I got home, the radio station that I had worked for before my mission called me and asked if I would like to return. I did and had a great opportunity to report on sports, which is what I have always wanted to do.
I tremble when I think of the time that I considered not going on a mission in order to pursue my own goals. I know the Lord will bless you in your life pursuits when you decide to put his work first.
Scott C. Miller, 23Bountiful, Utah

A while ago my bishop and priests quorum adviser challenged our quorum to give away two copies of the Book of Mormon within a year. I took the challenge to heart and always had a Book of Mormon on me (in the car, in my backpack, etc.). Several people accepted copies, but nobody really showed any further interest.
Then one day in June, I was filling up my car with gasoline after work and saw a coworker buying cigarettes. Because of his smoking and his rough personality, I never thought about sharing the gospel with him. He came over to talk to me, and we talked about music and movies. When I explained that I don’t watch movies with vulgarity, violence, or immorality, the topic changed to religion. I grabbed the Book of Mormon from the backseat of my car, wrote my testimony inside the cover, and gave it to him.
The next time I worked with him, I asked if he had read any of it. He said, “Jeff, I read the introduction, and I know it’s true. I want to know more and be baptized.”
That really shocked me. I gave the missionaries his address so that they could teach him, and I took him to church with me. He loved it. He set a date for his baptism.
Before his baptism, he told me that he had been offered a really good job, but he had to act immediately. It was in Alaska, and he was leaving in two days. So we found the address of the meetinghouse in town, and then he left.
Over the next few months we kept in touch, but he made no progress toward baptism. Then one day he called and told me he had contacted the missionaries and was going to be baptized that Saturday.
Now he holds the Aaronic Priesthood and has blessed the sacrament several times.
This goes to show that you never know who will accept the gospel, so share it with everyone, and God will provide a way.

When reverses come we need the Church and the gospel all the more. I’m satisfied that it’s possible for a man or woman who has a testimony of the divinity of this work to meet any possible reverses and still keep his spirit sweet and his faith strong. I saw members of this church in Europe right after World War II, the worst war so far as we know in the history of modern nations, when nations were fallen economically. I saw members of this church, some of them the only remaining members of once happy and prosperous families—with their homes destroyed and every member of the family killed in the war—and they stood alone as the one remaining person. I saw them and I heard them as they stood on their feet and bore testimony to the divinity of this work and thanked God for his blessings—the blessings of the eternity of the marriage covenant, the conviction that the family continues beyond the veil, that there is life after death, that there will be a happy reunion for those who live worthy.

I was baptized on April 26, 2009, by Zach’s dad, Brother Simons. I had the support of the entire ward, my family, and my friends. I have never felt so beautiful in my life as I did in my white dress and as I made that wonderful covenant with my Heavenly Father. Afterward, I was given the gift of the Holy Ghost by Brother Davis, whose entire family was especially supportive of me while I was investigating the Church. I was so touched, and I knew that the words he said were from Heavenly Father.

Photograph of London England Temple by Chris Wills
I was only 19 when my dad died on June 20, 2010. It was Father’s Day in the United States. My dad’s death shook me to the core, and I gradually stopped going to my church. How was I supposed to go to church and ask God for guidance when He didn’t listen to me when I needed Him most? I felt that He had abandoned me.
A few years later, I moved to London, England, for graduate school. On my walk to campus one cold, snowy day, I was listening to a musical on my earbuds when two missionaries approached me and introduced themselves.
Elders Hathaway and Porter asked what I was listening to. When I told them I was listening to The Book of Mormon musical, their eyes grew wide. The two missionaries then shared their testimonies of the book, giving me a copy. As I started to read the Book of Mormon, I realized that maybe God was giving me a sign, telling me that it was time to return to Him—but in a new way.
The next day the missionaries taught me the plan of salvation. During that lesson, Elder Porter said, “In the end, we will have the opportunity to be with our families again.” That was the most powerful doctrine I had ever heard. I would have a chance to be with my dad again. I knew right then that I wanted to learn more. My love for and trust in God started to slowly return.
On April 15, 2018, I was baptized. I will always remember how warm the water was. It was as if God was giving me a big hug and saying, “I missed you, Christine. Welcome back.” The reminder of God’s love was glorious. The Hyde Park First Ward also welcomed me and helped me on my journey.
If you had asked me a decade ago if I could ever love God again, I probably would have said, “No!” But being taught God’s plan of salvation changed that.
Soon, I went to the London England Temple, taking my father’s name with me. When someone was baptized and confirmed by proxy for my dad, I knew I was one step closer to being with him once more.
I know that I will be reunited with my father again. Now my love for God blossoms every day.