Gospel Story Finder

I would like to tell you about a baby sparrow that was found lying on the pavement of a parking lot. During the night it had been blown from its nest by a storm.
As it lay there awaiting whatever fate would come, a young woman saw it and picked it up. Feeling sympathy for the helpless bird, she took it home to care for it. She prepared a nest in a basket with soft tissues.
She fed the little bird often, watching it gain strength. Within a few days, it opened its eyes and saw for the first time the girl who fed it and the family who lived in the home. It became accustomed to the sounds around it and was not afraid.
As the days passed, it was able to hop about, and it was taken from the basket and put into a clean birdcage. It trusted the girl and the family, and when it wanted food, it would chirp and flutter its growing wings. When the cage door was opened, it would hop out onto the girl’s hand and sit there patiently while she fed it.
It would sit on her hand even when she went outside to help it become accustomed to the world where it soon would have to live.
When the girl and her sister went to girl’s camp on Cedar Mountain, the bird went with them. It was there that it tried to fly for the first time, flapping from the girl’s hand to the low branches of a nearby tree. But it was always glad to come back to the familiar hand and security of the girl’s love. When the camp was over, the bird came home with the girls and continued its flying lessons.
Realizing that the bird must soon join its own kind, the girl took it out on the front lawn and encouraged it to fly away. It flew across the lawn to a small pine tree, where it perched and looked around. Assuming it would now join the other birds, the girl left it and went back inside.
Soon a chirping could be heard outside. When the girl went out, the bird flew out of the tree and landed back on her hand, and she fed it.
For the next few nights the bird came back to the house and wanted to come in with the family for the night. Soon, however, it began to stay out with newly found friends living in the trees close by the home. But when my daughter, Trinilee, went outside and whistled, it would return and land on her hand.
That little bird and my daughter taught me a great lesson in faith and trust. Although it was just a fraction of the size of its human friend, it trusted her and responded to her beckoning call.
Do we have that kind of trust and faith in the Lord? Do we respond to His beckoning call to serve and be fed at His hand?
I pray that we will show faith and trust equal to that of the little sparrow and respond to the call of the Lord.

Tom was also a good student in high school. He won prizes in state and regional science fairs. He attended Utah State University and included some challenging courses along with his basic classes. After serving a mission, Tom transferred to the University of Utah as a pre-med major. Then came the national medical aptitude exam.
He did well, but was not accepted by any of the schools to which he had applied. He was devastated. The future, once so bright, now seemed bleak. But rather than giving up, he planned a course of action. Even though he didn’t speak Spanish, he decided to attend a Mexican school of medicine, hoping he could later transfer back to the United States. After two years of distinguished study at the University of Guadalajara, he was offered his choice of several fine universities in the United States. Today, he is a practicing physician.

When they joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my friend and her husband joyfully learned family relationships need not be “until death do you part.” In the house of the Lord, families can be united eternally (sealed).

But my friend did not want to be sealed to her father. “He was not a nice husband to my mother. He was not a nice dad to his children,” she said. “My dad will have to wait. I do not have any desire to do his temple work and be sealed with him in eternity.”

For a year, she fasted, prayed, spoke a lot with the Lord about her father. Finally, she was ready. Her father’s temple work was completed. Later, she said, “In my sleep my dad appeared to me in a dream, all dressed in white. He had changed. He said, ‘Look at me. I am all clean. Thank you for doing the work for me in the temple.’” Her father added, “Get up and go back to the temple; your brother is waiting to be baptized.”

My friend says, “My ancestors and those that have passed on are eagerly waiting for their work to be done.”

“As for me,” she says, “the temple is a place of healing, learning, and acknowledging the Atonement of Jesus Christ.”

One hot summer day, Reesey and Cheyenne invited Zara over to play. Mum made a snack. The girls sat at the table to eat.
Mum sliced mangoes from their mango tree. She put apple slices and grapes on a plate. Reesey looked at the delicious food. She remembered to say a prayer before eating her snack. She asked Zara, “Do you pray at your house?”
“What’s that?” Zara asked.
“Like this,” said Cheyenne. She folded her arms and bowed her head. She asked a blessing on the food. When she was done, she said, “See? Like that. Easy!”
“We don’t do that at our house. We just eat,” said Zara.
Reesey had never thought about not praying. “Mum,” she said, “do we have to say prayers?”
Mum smiled as she carried cups of ice water to the table. “We like thanking Heavenly Father for what He has given us. We’re going to keep saying prayers. But it’s OK if other people don’t.”
Reesey knew Mum was right. She was happy when her family prayed. Maybe praying would make Zara happy too. “You could try it,” she said to Zara.
Zara smiled. “Maybe I will,” she said and ate a slice of mango.
“I like it when we pray,” said Cheyenne.“It makes me feel happy inside.”
Reesey and Cheyenne were happy they could tell their friend about praying. They all finished their snacks and ran back outside to play.

I also prayed to know the truth when I finished reading the Book of Mormon. However, I didn’t receive an answer the first time I asked. After nearly a week of frustrated, tearful prayer, I watched The Testaments of One Fold and One Shepherd. As I watched the movie, I felt a burning in my heart, and I knew that now was the time to ask. I got down on my knees and asked in full faith and with an open heart if the Book of Mormon was true. I knew that if I received an answer, I would act upon it, regardless of the consequences. The answer I got was so powerful that I continue to feel it every day.

I remember a critical time in my life when a still small voice gave me direction to make an important decision. My family lived in Boston, Massachusetts, at the time. I had been with a retail firm for a number of years. To expand the business, we merged with a larger firm. Within a matter of months, I found myself in a very difficult situation. The new owners wanted me to violate a trust. I felt that I just could not do it. They continued to insist, and I continued to refuse. Finally, in order to solve the disagreement, I agreed to leave the company. The timing for me was devastating. I had a wife who was seriously ill and required a lot of medical attention, a daughter away at college, and a son on a mission. I spent the next year getting just enough consulting work to pay our expenses.
After struggling for about one year, a company called me from California and invited me to come out and talk to them about working for them. I went and was delighted with the opportunity. I told them that I had to return home and discuss it with my family before I could give them an answer. I returned home and convinced my family that it was the right thing to do. As I was calling the firm to accept the offer, a voice just as strong and powerful as I have ever heard came to me and said, “Say no to the offer.” I could not ignore the voice, so I turned the offer down, but I couldn’t understand why I had been told to do such a thing. I went upstairs to my bedroom, sat on the bed, and opened the scriptures. They fell open to the Doctrine and Covenants, section 111. These words in verses 5 and 7 jumped out from the page and met my eye: “Concern not yourselves about your debts, for I will give you power to pay them. …
“Tarry in this place, and in the regions round about.”
A great peace came to my soul. Within just a few days, I was offered a fine position there in Boston. A few months later, I had the great privilege of hosting a conference in which President Harold B. Lee, then First Counselor in the First Presidency, was the featured speaker. The following July, President Joseph Fielding Smith passed away and President Lee became the prophet. Three months later I was asked to come to Salt Lake, where I received a call to become a General Authority.

Roswell Georgia Stake
The youth leaders in the Roswell Georgia Stake run a tight ship. Youth activities for the stake are planned well in advance and put on the stake calendar. Once an activity appears on the calendar, it doesn’t move or change. In fact, it’s sort of a joke that the only things that might change the schedule of activities in the Roswell area are “death and tornado.”
A natural disaster of any kind, however, was the furthest thing from anybody’s mind when the youth council planned a fun “mini-youth-conference” for a weekend in the spring. There would be speakers on a variety of interesting subjects, some fun activities, and a dance.
Then, three weeks before the mini-conference, the unthinkable happened. A tornado touched down in the Roswell area. Andrew Opp, a priest and a leader on the stake youth council in Roswell, and his sister, Emily, helped in the massive cleanup effort. After several days of helping his dad and other men in his ward and stake move trees and other debris from driveways, yards, and roofs, Andrew had an idea.
“I looked around and realized that even after a day’s work, we were hardly putting a dent in things,” said Andrew. Why not postpone the youth conference and have a day-long cleanup project instead? After all, it was on the list of reasons to change the stake schedule. After getting the leaders’ approval, they formulated a plan and announced the change.
“The youth in our stake are really great,” said Andrew. “Everyone always pitches in and gets the job done right.”
And they did. Guys and girls worked hard all day in neighborhoods that looked like war zones, lifting and clearing debris.
The tornado hit hard at Dagmara Walczak’s house. Dagmara is a Laurel in the stake, and her home is in a neighborhood that felt the full force of the tornado.
“I thought it was great that in a time of need people from our church came and helped out. It really makes you feel loved,” she said.
And what of the originally planned activity? Were the youth that excited to give up a day of fun for a day of hard work, sweat, and tree sap? You bet.
“This is fun because you can chat with your friends while you work,” said 17-year-old Ben Jarvis. “And besides, these people are our friends and neighbors; it gave us all a good feeling to help them out.”

Some years ago I returned home to find our little children had discovered some newly hatched chicks under the manger in the barn. As our little girl held one of them, I said in a teasing way, “That will make a nice watchdog when it grows up, won’t it?” She looked at me quizzically, as if I didn’t know much.
So I changed my approach: “It won’t be a watchdog, will it?” She shook her head, “No, Daddy.” Then I added, “It will be a nice riding horse.”
She wrinkled up her nose and gave me that “Oh, Dad!” look. Even though she was only four years old, she knew that the little chick would grow up to be either a hen or a rooster—much like its mother or father.
All animal life produces after its own kind, and little ones grow up to look and to be like their parents. That is true of people too. Small boys and girls grow up to be big boys and girls, then men and women.
I testify that God is indeed our Father. When we reach our full growth and destiny, we have the promise that we may be like Him. Just as all life follows the pattern of its parents, so can we grow toward the image of our Heavenly Father if we will live righteously and be obedient to His commandments.

I would like to share an incident which took place during the Vietnam War. There were some who were convinced that the United States was engaged in a noble and justifiable war. However, public opinion was changing, and there was opposition which argued that the United States should pull out of Vietnam.
President Harold B. Lee was the President of the Church at the time. While at an area conference in another country, he was interviewed by reporters from the international news services. One reporter asked President Lee, “What is your church’s position on the Vietnam War?” Some recognized the question as a trap—one which could not be answered without a very real risk of being misunderstood or misinterpreted. If the prophet answered, “We are against the war,” the international media could state, “How strange—a religious leader who is against the position of the country he is obliged to sustain in his own church’s Articles of Faith.”
On the other hand, if President Lee answered, “We are in favor of the war,” the media could say, “How strange—a religious leader in favor of war.” Either way, the answer could result in serious misunderstandings both inside and outside the Church.
President Lee, with great inspiration and wisdom, answered as would a man who knows the Savior: “We, together with the whole Christian world, abhor war. But the Savior said, ‘In me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation’” (John 16:33). President Lee then explained, “The Savior was not talking about the peace that can be achieved between nations, by military force or by negotiation in the halls of parliaments. Rather, he was speaking of the peace we can each have in our own lives when we live the commandments and come unto Christ with broken hearts and contrite spirits” (see Ensign, November 1982, page 70).

When I was in seventh grade I decided to participate in a running competition against the other middle schools. What I didn’t know was that the area we were running in was hilly, and so running would be a lot harder than I was used to.
When I was a little over halfway through the race, I slowed to a walk and just decided that I couldn’t do it. Tears came, and I felt weak and embarrassed.
As I was about to stop and sit down, two eighth-grade girls from my school caught up to me and started encouraging me to keep going. I reluctantly started to slowly jog with them, with one on each side of me. My whole body was aching, but I kept on going. When we were finally in sight of the finish line, my youngest sister came to run with me too.
When we crossed the finish line, I was relieved. I received a ribbon for seventh place, and I felt embarrassed since there were only seven girls who ran. But now it reminds me of how I completed something that seemed so impossible.

I recognized the beauty of music and the total satisfaction that comes from sharing it with others. When I played in church, I felt an inner fulfillment come to me as a performer and to my friends as an audience. I experienced satisfaction each time people would thank me for touching their hearts with my music.
Just as I was realizing my musical potential, I was asked to teach the three-year-olds in church. I discovered how much happiness comes when a small hand takes mine and two big blue eyes look up to me and say, “Thanks, Michelle, for being my special friend.” Serving the Lord through working with his little children helped me understand the real meaning of the scripture, “Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God” (Luke 18:16).

Late that afternoon I got a phone call. It was Joel. We had been best friends when we were little kids but hadn’t spent much time together for quite a while.
“I got my driver’s license,” he said proudly. “Dad said I can take the car. Do you want a ride?”
“A ride?” I repeated, astonished. Was this really Joel? I tried to imagine him cruising on a Sunday afternoon with a load of giggling girls. It just didn’t work. In fact, the thought gave me brain flutters. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m offering you a ride to the fireside,” he said. “What did you think I meant?”
Now it all made sense. The stake youth fireside was in the next town. It did not sound very interesting. Going to a meeting like that was exactly Joel’s kind of thing to do.
“I’m sick of meetings,” I told him. “I may never go to another meeting as long as I live.”
“Have you got something better to do?” he asked.
“Let me put on a tie,” I groaned. “I’ll be ready in five minutes.”
There was nothing special about Joel’s family car. He drove it very carefully, making sure he didn’t speed or leave any patches of rubber at the intersections. We had a nice talk on the way to the stake center. I’d forgotten what a good friend he was and how much we had in common.
The fireside was one of those “come if you want to” affairs that hadn’t been advertised very well. There weren’t very many people there. Just the faithful, I thought as I looked around. I was surprised by the warm feeling that came over me. A girl my age led the singing, and other kids said the prayers and introduced the speaker. I suddenly felt very close to everyone I saw. Going to the meeting was Joel’s idea, but I was sure being blessed by being there!
“Friends are important,” the speaker told us. “When you pick your friends, you choose the direction of your life.” He told how friends had helped him stay close to the Church when he was a teenager. Then he read a scripture from the Doctrine and Covenants that really hit me. It was a verse where the Lord calls his people “friends.” “The Lord,” the speaker explained, “reserves the title friend for those who are valiant in obeying his commandments. He speaks to his friends and hears their prayers. They are the ones who stand beside him, and he stands by them. A true friend will help you stay close to the Church and to live a righteous life.” What he said made sense. I started thinking about friends in a different way.
A few years have gone by since I was offered those two rides on the Sabbath. I’m sad to say that Tom was on the wrong road. He got in a lot of trouble and broke his family’s heart. I’ve always been grateful that I didn’t jump to accept his sudden offer of “friendship” that day. Joel, on the other hand, was honorably released from a mission in New York about the same time I returned from mine in Japan. We had a joyous reunion. He’s still my very good friend.

More than a hundred years ago President Brigham Young sent a family to a small, remote place in Arizona to make peace with the Indians.
The father of the family was away on Church business when an impression came to him that something was wrong at home. He headed there at once, arriving about four o’clock in the morning. He found his wife gently cradling their little baby daughter in her arms. The baby had fallen into an open fireplace and was severely burned.
The father took their infant in his arms and gave her a blessing. He promised her that she would live, that she would not be disfigured, and that she would sing before the prominent people of the world. The baby girl did live. She was not disfigured, and she grew up, raised a family, and sang in the Tabernacle Choir. The powers of heaven gave life back to that tiny child. And that sweet baby girl, who owed her life to the power of prayer, grew up and gave me life. She was my mother.

“Come on, Tito, it’s time to get to work!” Pedro stretched his arms toward the early dawn sky, then reached over and scratched the donkey’s ears.
Pedro and Tito were a team and had an important but difficult job. As they did every morning before daybreak, they went down to the sea where there were large mounds of salt that had been evaporated from the salty seawater. The donkey stood still and sleepily watched as his master shoveled salt into two large gunnysacks. When they were full, Pedro hoisted them onto Tito’s back and tied them down securely.
“You are loaded, old friend, so now we are off.” Pedro picked up the lead rope and guided the donkey toward the foothills.
The city where the salt was to be delivered was several miles away and was reached only by traveling along a dirt path that wound over stony, steep hills. Day after day the pair would make the long journey, sell the salt in the open-air market, and return, tired and hungry, to their little shack near the sea. To relieve his loneliness on these trips, Pedro often sang or talked to his shaggy brown friend as they walked along. Tito would twitch his long ears and keep on plodding.
About halfway to the city, they had to cross a small river. And as there was no bridge, Pedro would jump across from stone to stone. But Tito had to slosh through the knee-deep water. The donkey never seemed to like wading across the river, and he needed a lot of coaxing each time they came to it. “Now, come on,” Pedro would say, impatiently pulling the lead rope. “Every day it is the same. You know that you must get to the other side, so why don’t you just do it!”
But Tito would always dig in his heels and refuse to budge.
“The water won’t hurt you. Do you expect me to carry you across?”
Finally the donkey would put his ears back, bat his big brown eyes resentfully at his master, then slowly and carefully step into the water.
One day the current was a little stronger than usual. When Tito got to the middle of the stream, he stumbled and fell to his knees. The salt in the sacks started to wash away, so that by the time the donkey got back on his feet, they were nearly empty.
“What a foolish thing to do!” scolded Pedro. He was very unhappy to lose so much salt, but it was too late to turn back. They would have to go on and sell what was left. To Tito’s delight, his load was much lighter, and it was much easier to climb the hills!
The next day the little team got their load of salt and headed for the hills. When they got to the stream, Tito slipped and fell again. And again a lot of the salt washed away, leaving very little to sell in the city.
Day after day the canny donkey slipped and fell into the water. Realizing that Tito was doing it on purpose, Pedro scolded him and even used the switch on him. But it was no use.
Pedro was not only angry but worried. Hauling salt was the way that he made his living. Without money, he couldn’t eat or buy clothing. “What shall I do?” Pedro asked a friend one evening. “I must stop that dishonest little donkey from shirking his part of the work!”
“He is a smart one,” his friend said. “He does not like carrying that heavy load over all those hills.”
“But what can I do?”
“I have an idea,” said the friend. “Not too much farther down the shore is a man who has harvested a pile of sponges from the sea. He is looking for someone to take them to the city. Perhaps it would make a good load for your donkey to carry.”
“Thank you. I shall go see him right away,” said Pedro.
The next day Pedro loaded Tito down with sponges. The cargo wasn’t very heavy, and the donkey twitched his ears happily, thinking that his master had finally learned that he, Tito, didn’t like working hard.
When they got to the river, Pedro warned the animal, “If you fall in this time, you’ll learn a hard lesson!”
Tito stepped slowly into the river, and, as usual, “fell” into the water. But this time he was in for a big surprise! The sponges filled with water so that when he got to his feet, his load was many times heavier than before! Now it was even harder to climb the hills than when he had carried salt!
After two more days of hauling sponges, falling into the water, and increasing the weight of his load, Tito was careful to keep his footing while crossing the river. A few days later Pedro again loaded sacks filled with salt on Tito’s back and headed toward the city. When they came to the water, the little donkey didn’t hesitate a moment but crossed the river quickly and willingly did his share of hauling the salt to market.

While serving a full-time mission in the Philippines, my husband, Robert, and I traveled to Cagayan de Oro to set up a Family History Center in the Cagayan de Oro East Stake Center and to do some training. We also invited members from the Malaybalay district to join us. Non-Filipinos are not allowed to go into some parts of the region, and Malaybalay was an area where we could not go. For almost a year, the Malaybalay district had had the equipment for a Family History Center; all they needed was some training to be able to set it up.
We contacted the Malaybalay district president, Leandro Miole, and asked him if he and the Saints in Malaybalay could come to the Cagayan de Oro East Stake Center for our seminar. President Miole responded that they would be happy to come, even though it meant a drive of more than two hours on mountain roads. My husband wrote a letter to President Miole confirming the date, place, and time of our training session.
On the day of the seminar as I was doing my portion of the training, a man walked in and started talking with my husband. The man drew a letter from his pocket and opened it for my husband to read. I could see the conversation was quite serious.
At the end of our training session, my husband informed me that the man was President Miole from the Malaybalay district and that he and 10 members of his district had been waiting at the Cagayan de Oro Stake Center since 8:00 A.M. President Miole had shown my husband the letter stating the details of the training. To my husband’s chagrin, he realized he had forgotten to identify the place as the east stake center. We felt bad that these faithful Saints had waited hours for training that had never come, and we happily agreed to go to the Cagayan de Oro Stake Center to conduct the training session.
The Saints were happy to see us when we arrived. We opened with a prayer and a hymn, then launched into the training.
As I began demonstrating how to use the microfilm reader, I noticed that a film had been left in the reader. So instead of using the film I had brought for the demonstration, I used the film already in the reader. As my husband turned the crank and I showed where to look on the film for names, I heard someone crying softly. Looking up, I realized President Miole was in tears. I quickly asked if I had said something to distress him.
Through his tears he quietly said, “I found them!” Pointing to the names on the screen of the microfilm reader, he told us he had searched and prayed to find these names—the names of his ancestors—for more than three years. And now, there they were—on a microfilm reader he should not have been looking at, in a building he should not have been in.
That day we were reminded that “by small and simple things are great things brought to pass” (Alma 37:6).

I have always been ambitious about education and leap at every opportunity. One year in high school, I took courses at the local community college through a program funded by my school. I really like computer science, and I was excited to take a computer programming class so I could learn more.
When I got my schedule from the college, I realized that my programming class was at the same time as my Young Women activity every week. I tried to ignore it at first and tell myself that education was encouraged by the Church and that I was doing the right thing. As the time for classes to start drew nearer, I felt more and more uncomfortable about taking the class. When the time came that I had to tell my Young Women leader that I wouldn’t be making it to any of the activities, she sounded devastated. She told me that I would be sorely missed, and she would do anything to help me.
After talking to her, I felt bad that I thought the class was more important. When I got home, I went to my room and looked at the goal board I had made for Personal Progress. I had written on it, “If you want something, you’ve got to prove it.” I read my scriptures with that in mind and came across Mosiah 2:21. I realized I had to prove that I was going to serve God and not myself by letting my desires get in the way. I cancelled the class the next day. I had a wonderful year of Young Women activities, and I was able to set a higher priority for the Church in my life. I know it was the right thing to drop that class, and I am really glad that I did.

“I first heard about the Church from my best friend, Vera, who is 16. I was curious to know about her beliefs, especially why Latter-day Saints don’t drink tea and coffee and where my friend went for three hours every Sunday. I asked her to take me to church, and a month later I was baptized.
“At first I didn’t understand many things. Everything seemed to be strange and unusual, but I kept asking questions of friends and missionaries.
“Now, four months later, I reflect on the many ways I have changed since my baptism. The day of my baptism, I could feel the Holy Ghost, but I was very emotional, somewhat worried, and a little afraid. Now I can feel the peaceful, quiet influence of the Spirit, and I have what is most important—my faith in the Savior.”
Vera Terekhova,Vasiliostrovsky Branch,St. Petersburg Russia West District

From this pulpit years ago, President Marion G. Romney recounted reading the Book of Mormon aloud, alternating paragraphs with his young son, he on the bottom level of a double-decker bed and his son on the upper. He thought his son was catching a cold but then learned that the tears came from his son feeling testimony that the book was true. And because they read together, both were blessed. (See Conference Report, Apr. 1949, 41.)

On the morning of Thursday, July 20, 1837, the merchant ship Garrick slipped quietly into the River Mersey and anchored opposite the bustling English seaport of Liverpool. To the uninformed bystander, the vessel, newly arrived from New York, was no different from any other. It was the dawn of the Victorian age, and Liverpool was already establishing an ascendancy as the greatest English port, which it retained for half a century.
But among the weary passengers were seven men whose presence made the Garrick far from insignificant—men whose simple but provocative message was soon to send thousands of English men, women, and children to the United States. The seven Americans were Mormons—the first missionaries to preach the restored gospel in this dispensation outside North America. Their unheralded arrival and the dramatic events of the next few months came to form a fascinating chapter in the history of northwest England and left an indelible stamp on The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Today their names stand boldly among the spiritual giants of the Church: Heber C. Kimball, grandfather of President Spencer W. Kimball; Joseph Fielding; Orson Hyde; Willard Richards; John Snyder; John Goodson; and Isaac Russell.
To British Saints and thousands of Americans whose ancestry springs from this part of England, Liverpool and Preston are as much a part of the rich Latter-day Saint heritage as Nauvoo and Kirtland. And it was the word heritage in a letter from the First Presidency to all units of the Church that triggered a chain of events leading to one of the most unusual and spectacular joint activities ever organized by the Liverpool and Preston districts.
That letter urged Church members to organize significant activities to commemorate their history as part of an international heritage year. Rod Fullwood, seminary supervisor in the Liverpool District, and his counterpart in the Preston District, Arthur Hardy, had already talked over the possibility of a joint seminary graduation. From that it was a short step for them to come up with the concept of a major commemorative program telling the story of the first missionaries to arrive in England and the events leading to the first baptisms in the River Ribble in July 1837.
Once the plan had been approved by the Preston and Liverpool district presidencies, the next few weeks were marked by frantic activity as seminary groups in each branch worked on their own projects. Branches in the Liverpool District were assigned to re-create the atmosphere and scenes of 1837 by staging an “English Fayre,” complete with stalls from the period. They also wrote a dramatic production telling the story of early Mormon emigrants. Period dress for the nearly 200 young people and adults who attended was mandatory, but forseeing the likelihood of a few arriving in 20th century dress, the organizers assigned the Southport Branch to construct a set of stocks to “discipline” offenders.
The play, “The Emigrant Ship,” was based on the Charles Dickens’ novel, The Uncommercial Traveller, not one of the great author’s best-known works but certainly the most significant from the point of view of Church history. The fact that Dickens commented on the Church is little known, and even among Latter-day Saints it is not widely appreciated. But his reference to 800 Mormon emigrants as “the pick and flower of England” was one of the first recorded compliments paid to the English Saints by anyone of standing.
The script, by David Irwin, closely followed Dickens’ original prose, but other characters were interjected into the story during the production. Well-performed, it gave members a valued insight into the atmosphere of those early days.
Dickens: (To audience) Now, I have seen emigrant ships before this day, and these people are so strikingly different from all other people in like circumstances whom I have ever seen, I ask the captain … what would a stranger suppose these emigrants to be?
Captain: What indeed!
Dickens: When did they arrive here?
Captain: Most of them came aboard yesterday evening.
Dickens: And from where did these people come?
Captain: They came from various parts of England in small parties and had never seen one another before.
Dickens: They had never seen one another before? How have they settled down on board?
Captain: They had not been a couple of hours on board when they established their own police, made their own regulations, and set their own watches at all the hatchways. Before 9:00 the ship was as orderly and quiet as a man-of-war. A stranger would be puzzled to guess the right name for these people.
Dickens: Indeed he would.
Captain: If you hadn’t known who they were, could you ever have supposed?
Dickens: How could I? I should have said they were the pick and flower of England.
Captain: So should I.
Dickens: How many are there?
Captain: Eight hundred.
Dickens: Eight hundred of the pick and flower of England! What has motivated these emigrants of all ages?
Later Dickens says, “Afterwards I learned that a dispatch was sent home by the captain before he struck out into the wide Atlantic, highly extolling the behavior of these emigrants, and the perfect order and propriety of all their social arrangements.
“What is in store for the poor people on the shores of the Great Salt Lake, what happy delusions they are laboring under now, on what miserable blindness their eyes may be opened then, I do not pretend to say. But I went on board their ship to bear testimony against them if they deserved it, as I fully believed they would; to my great astonishment they did not deserve it; and my predispositions and tendencies must not affect me as an honest witness.
“I went over the ship’s side feeling it impossible to deny that, so far, some remarkable influence had produced a remarkable result, which better known influences have often missed.”
The afternoon following the “Fayre” and the dramatic production the Liverpool Saints joined those at Preston for the second half of the program—a sermon on the banks of the Ribble and a commemoration of the baptisms that took place there in July 1837.
The weekend’s events provided a natural attraction for newspapers, radio, and television, and they were widely publicized. The events were relayed in a four-minute spot on BBC television, which also included an interview with Brother Fullwood. In addition to newspaper reports of the weekend, at least one Lancashire paper began plans for a full-scale feature on early Church history.
Appropriately winding up the commemoration, a 24-member Brigham Young University ballroom dance team, which had been performing in international competition in nearby Blackpool, gave a brief display for members immediately before the seminary graduation. As if to underline the point, it was then announced that Preston seminary students had beaten all other districts in Britain in enrollment and work completion for the year.
Said Brother Fullwood: “I think the weekend’s events and all the work that went in beforehand have given the members here a greater appreciation for those early missionaries as well as for our own heritage. The fact that an ambitious program like this was so successful will encourage us to shoot for high goals in the future.”

On another occasion, I was in New Zealand visiting the home of a single mother with three teenage children. The oldest son was 18 and had received the Melchizedek Priesthood just the previous Sunday. I asked if he had been able to exercise this priesthood yet. He said, “I’m not sure what that means.”
I told him he now had the authority to give a priesthood blessing of comfort or healing. I looked at his mother, who had not had a Melchizedek Priesthood holder by her side for many years. “I think it would be wonderful,” I said, “if you would give your mom a blessing.”
He replied, “I don’t know how.”
I explained that he could put his hands on his mother’s head, state her name, state that he is giving her a blessing by the authority of the Melchizedek Priesthood, say whatever the Spirit puts in his mind and heart, and close in the name of Jesus Christ.
The next day, I received an email from him. It read in part: “Tonight I blessed my mum. … I felt very, very nervous and inadequate, so I prayed continually to ensure I had the Spirit with me, because I could not give a blessing without it. As I started, I completely forgot myself and my weaknesses. … I [did not expect] the immense spiritual and emotional power I felt. … Afterwards the spirit of love hit me so hard I could not contain my emotions, so I hugged my mum and wept like a baby. … Even now as I write this, [I feel] the Spirit [so much that] I never want to sin again. … I love this gospel.”
Isn’t it inspiring to see how a seemingly ordinary young man can accomplish great things through priesthood service, even when he feels inadequate? I recently learned that this young elder has received a mission call and will enter the missionary training center next month. I believe he will lead many souls to Christ because he has learned how to follow Christ in his priesthood service—beginning in his own home, where his example is having a profound influence on his 14-year-old brother.