Gospel Story Finder

The youth of the Harbor Ward, Palos Verdes Stake, California, have been traveling across the border to help members of the Mexico Tijuana Stake for about ten years. They’ve built and repaired homes, renovated chapels, and done roofing and landscaping. This year, the youth from Tijuana returned the favor.
As part of a neighborhood anti-graffiti campaign, the Tijuana Saints came north to work with the Palos Verdes Stake to paint and clean a high school.
The Mexican youth were granted weekend visitors’ passes. They spent hours cleaning debris from the school courtyard and repainting graffiti-marred walls. After the work was finished, the youth got together for a night of multicultural food and entertainment. The Tijuana Saints performed several ethnic dances and musical numbers. They stayed in members’ homes, and on Sunday morning had a joint sacrament meeting.
“They are really a model group of Latter-day Saints,” said Bishop David Bond of the Harbor Ward. “They did a lot of good for our ward.”

The ability to receive a patriarchal blessing was a profound opportunity for the British Saints, to strengthen their testimonies and better understand what it was the Lord would have them do. At a London district conference in 1932, Samuel Bantock, a seventy-three-year-old member, was filled with excitement. With tears in his eyes and a glowing face, he rushed up to President John Widstoe and whispered, “The Patriarch told me that my life’s offering was acceptable to the Lord. Think of it. The Lord is pleased with my humble efforts! I would rather know that than… possess all the riches or honour of earth.”10
With hands clasped together, the two men stood facing each other with tears in their eyes. Samuel had truly learned how to measure the values of life. Recalling the event, President Widstoe stated, “How many of the hundreds who in this land have received their patriarchal blessings during the last six months, place the true value upon them, as did this veteran soldier in the army of the Lord?”

The Prophet Joseph Smith knew his life was in danger. Angry mobs had followed him everywhere, threatening his life and the lives of his family. Then in the fall of 1838, he had been arrested again in Far West, Missouri.
As he was tied and pushed into a canvas-covered wagon, he asked for the privilege of saying good-bye to his mother, Lucy Mack Smith, who tearfully watched him being taken away. The officers refused to let the Prophet out of the wagon, so he called out to his mother to come closer. Searching frantically, Joseph found a rip in the canvas and reached out to touch his mother’s hand for one last good-bye. Just touching her hand seemed to be important to him as the wagon quickly pulled away and Joseph Smith was taken to the Liberty Jail. There he was confined to a dark, crowded dungeon for six months.

Then she put the old flatiron on the stove, drew a chair close to mine, and told me about temple work—how important it is to be able to go to the temple and participate in the sacred ordinances performed there. She also expressed her fervent hope that someday her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren would have the opportunity to enjoy these priceless blessings.
These sweet memories about the spirit of temple work were a blessing in our farm home, our little rural ward of three hundred, and the old Oneida Stake. These memories have returned as I have performed the marriage of each of our children and grandchildren—my mother’s grandchildren and great-grandchildren—under the influence of the Spirit in the house of the Lord.

My cousin Carrie was a sterling example of a single sister who was a happy, generous, loving woman, blessing all with whom she associated. She was killed in an automobile accident when she was in her late 30s, but her final act of goodness prior to her untimely death was finishing scrapbooks for each of her nieces and nephews. She was fulfilling her mission to the degree that she could within her opportunities.

I sat in my motel room on a snowy January night, deeply discouraged. I had recently finished serving more than 34 years in prison for some serious crimes and injuries, and I was contemplating doing something that would have sent me straight back to where I had just been. My plans since my release had fallen apart—and as I had few resources and my prayers seemed to be going unanswered, my options felt limited.
A sound outside caught my attention. Looking out my window, I spotted the motel owner shoveling snow in the parking lot by himself. “Oh, that’s not right,” I thought, so I joined him. I didn’t think much of my act of service that night. But to my surprise, the next day the owner reduced the cost of my room. And while I stayed there over the following five weeks, he never asked me to pay full price.
His generosity was more than a financial blessing that I deeply needed. His kindness was also an answer to my prayer when I was losing hope. Through him, I understood that God was aware of me—and that I needed to take some steps to return to Him.

I remember some time back we had a beautiful Irish setter. Joe owned the dog, and we lived in Boise at the time. The dog was running around up on one of the hills behind the house. Two teenagers had brought .22 rifles to do some practice shooting. They saw our dog, Stroker, and one of the boys decided to shoot at it as it ran back and forth. He shot Stroker, and the dog immediately dropped. Lawrence, watching the whole affair, ran and got his older brother, and they both ran to the dog. Joe picked the large dog up in his arms and carried it home. Then he and his mother drove it out to a veterinarian who administered care to the dog. Joe, his younger brother Lawrence, and his mother fasted through the next 24 hours. Then during the school lunch hour Joe went over to the vet’s to see how his dog was doing. The vet said the dog would live, that everything would be all right. Joe climbed in his car, drove over to the grade school, and went to Lawrence’s room to tell him Stroker would be okay, that the vet said he would live and no serious damage had been done.

Again, this kind of training is invaluable in a home. In addition to all these many great qualities Merlene has, there is one that I suppose is built in every woman. She is absolutely tenacious in the defense of her sons and daughter. When they need to be punished, appropriate discipline is administered and they are punished, but when someone accuses them unjustly or with only part of the facts, she becomes a tenacious defender and will not tolerate unjust criticism of her family members. She is the kind of person you would want to take tiger hunting in the night—you could always turn around and know that she was there.

Merlene has a compassionate heart and a gentle spirit. She loves people and things—she enjoys life to the fullest. She feels a great mission in her home and has eased the burdens and responsibilities of the family by being there so that her husband could be elsewhere in the Lord’s service. She loves family activity and loves the family being together. Her greatest moments are when we, as a family, all of the family, including those married with their companions and children, are with us. Then she feels secure and life reaches its fullest degree for her.

The greatest tribute I could pay to her would be to quote, as I have many times, from Camelot. King Arthur went to a lonely room, locked the door, and said, “Proposition: If I could choose, from every woman who breathes on this earth, the face I would most love, the smile, the touch, the voice, the heart, the laugh, the soul itself, every detail and feature to the smallest strand of hair—they would all be Jenny’s.” Such is my wife. I would choose no one else. Merlene is the miracle maker in our home.

Working with Spanish-speaking investigators is an experience shared by Elder Santiago Tinon from Chicago, Illinois, and Elder Alejandro Flores of E1 Paso, Texas. Originally called as English-speaking missionaries in the Utah Salt Lake City South Mission, the two elders are now working exclusively with Spanish-speaking people from Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela, and El Salvador. In one month alone, this missionary pair had six baptisms. One of them was a young Mexican woman who had come to Provo, Utah, to study. She smoked cigarettes heavily but accepted the challenge to read the Book of Mormon. By the third discussion, she was converted and readily gave up her smoking. She was an example, Elder Flores says, of how well the gospel is accepted among Hispanics.

It was the year 1975, and I was serving in the Uruguay-Paraguay Mission as a young missionary. During my first month in the mission, the zone leaders held an activity to demonstrate a gospel principle. Each missionary in the zone was blindfolded, and we were told that we were to follow a path leading to the cultural hall. We were to follow the voice of one particular leader, a voice we heard before starting to walk. However, we were warned that during the journey, we would hear several voices that would try to confuse us and get us to stray from the path.
After some minutes of hearing noises, talking, and—in the midst of it all—a voice that said, “Follow me,” I felt confident I was following the right voice. When we arrived at the cultural hall of the chapel, we were asked to take off our blindfolds. When I did so, I realized that there were two groups and that I was in the group that had followed the wrong voice. “It sounded so much like the right one,” I said to myself.
That experience of 39 years ago had a lasting effect on me. I told myself, “Never, ever again follow the wrong voice.” Then I told myself, “Yes, Lord, I will follow Thee.”

A group of young women came to the Jordan River Utah Temple to do baptisms for the dead. As they were waiting, their leader started thinking. That day they were doing baptisms by proxy for people who could not do them for themselves. She starting thinking about a Laurel in her ward who, because of a terrible traffic accident, was not able to earn her Young Womanhood medallion for herself.
Could they all help? Could they do something like Personal Progress by proxy?
The leader, Suzanne Rentmeister, and the Young Women of the Prairie 13th Ward in the West Jordan Utah Prairie Stake, made a plan. First they went to their bishop and stake president. After receiving an enthusiastic OK, they felt they needed to talk to Laura White, the Laurel who would be the one to receive their gift of service. Even though Laura cannot speak, her bouyant smile answered louder than words that she loved the idea. The other girls in Young Women were asked if they wanted to participate but were told they didn’t need to if they were too busy or did not feel the desire. Every girl and every leader wanted to be involved.
The Young Women leaders created a chart with all the value experiences and projects on it. Then they held something like an auction. Girls could pick which value experiences and projects they wanted to do.
“Who wants Good Works #7? Who will take Divine Nature #1?” The chart filled up as fast as they could write. Taylor Ligman, 13, remembers that Sunday. “Our leaders pulled out this chart. It was like names were everywhere. I signed up for four of the experiences.”
Before things got going in high gear, they all agreed on three rules: (1) The girls could not do double duty; (2) working on the experiences they chose could not count towards fulfilling their own Personal Progress—they had to sacrifice their time; and (3) they had to keep it a secret from Laura’s parents. Laura’s younger sister, Amy, a Beehive, agreed that doing the project as a surprise for her parents was a fun idea.
“We were really excited,” said Bailee Bloomquist, 14. “I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to do much service. This was a cool experience. I had to spend 10 hours on a talent. I practiced a piece on the piano to play for the program when Laura would receive her medallion.”
Alexa Pengue, 14, said, “I chose to focus on living righteously following For the Strength of Youth for three weeks. I just wanted to keep going.” Alexa will get the chance because she did this experience for Laura and has yet to do it for her own Personal Progress.
“It feels good to do this for Laura,” said Arienna White, 13. “It makes you feel good that you’re helping someone who couldn’t do it for herself.”
“It doesn’t seem fair that we can just pass things off and get it done and Laura can’t,” said Braygan Berrett, 15. “I thought our Young Women president was totally looking out for her. The only way she could earn it was through us.”
Actually Laura was able to do one Personal Progress experience for herself. She was able to participate in family home evening and family scripture reading. Her leaders were thrilled to sign that off for her.
When the girls all volunteered to help and as they were dividing up the experiences, Sister Rentmeister said, “Laura was with us in that meeting, and she was just beaming. She lit up.”
This experience has brought all sorts of blessings to these Young Women. For example, all the other Laurels in the class wanted to receive their medallions at the same time as Laura, so they went to work and finished the requirements for their medallions.
The Mia Maids reported having some of their most spiritual experiences working on the experiences they volunteered to complete for Laura.
And the Beehive leader reports that the Beehives have been “just crazy” about service ever since. They want to do something every week—pull weeds, help with the food drive, anything anyone needs done.
On the ward’s Night of Excellence, Laura and Amy’s parents wondered why their six sons with daughters-in-law and grandchildren had traveled into town for the program. When Laura was wheeled to the front and lined up with those who were to receive their medallions, everyone in the room understood. It was a visible lesson of what it means to do something by proxy, doing something for someone who cannot do it for themselves.

Even during my darkest times, I have always felt peace in my trials through the Holy Ghost. But that changed when I underwent treatment for chronic pain that left me bedridden for two months.
The pain lessened after my treatment ended, but I began to struggle with depression. At the same time, it seemed to me that I had lost my ability to feel the Spirit.
For six months, I felt abandoned and desperately longed to feel the Spirit again. My healing was long and painful, which seemed even more daunting without the Spirit.
I met with my bishop, who explained that depression sometimes masks the Spirit so that we cannot feel it. His counsel comforted me, and a priesthood blessing from my husband gave me added strength as I waited hopefully to feel the Holy Ghost again.
General conference had always been a source of spiritual strength for me, but during the opening session of the April 2019 general conference, I felt nothing. That changed during the next session when a combined choir from Brigham Young University sang “Jesus, Once of Humble Birth.”1
The lyrics and the imagery of Jesus Christ as a lamb softened my heart. I realized that a wall of anger, depression, and false feelings of abandonment had masked my ability to feel the Spirit. A fortress of darkness had surrounded me, making it impossible for the Spirit to enter my heart. When the choir sang the second verse, that fortress began to crumble.
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles followed the hymn with his talk “Behold the Lamb of God.”2 With the added power of his words, a love for the Savior and Heavenly Father washed over me.
Many impediments can hinder us from feeling the Spirit, but we can work through these barriers with help from Heavenly Father and His Son. Jesus Christ perfectly understands my struggles. Out of love for us and His Father, “He groaned in blood and tears.”3
Heavenly Father knows what will bring us comfort, and He knows when to bless us for our greatest spiritual growth.

In 1836, John Deere decided to move west to Grand Detour, Illinois. There he opened a blacksmith shop and sent for his family. The farmers recognized John’s skills and kept him busy. The iron plows that the farmers were using, which worked satisfactorily in the east, quickly caked with the clayey prairie soil and constantly had to be cleaned. In order to grow crops and feed their families, the farmers needed a plow that would clean itself as it made the furrows. Otherwise, they would be forced to leave their farms and return to the east.
John began experimenting on a design for a better plow. One day when he visited a local sawmill, he saw a shiny circular saw blade that had been thrown away because it was broken. John wondered if the prairie soil would cling to a moldboard and plowshare made of polished steel. He took the broken steel blade back to his blacksmith shop and put his idea to work.
The news spread throughout the village that he was making an improved plow. And when the tall, rugged blacksmith carried it on his broad shoulders to Lewis Crandall’s field, farmers from the surrounding area were there, waiting anxiously to see if it would work.
John hitched the light but sturdy steel plow to Crandall’s horse, grasped the polished hardwood handles, and slapped the reins. As the horse moved forward, the plowshare bit into the soil. The soil curled away from the moldboard! The crowd pressed closer with growing excitement.
“By cracky, it’s clean!”
The blacksmith plowed another furrow. “It moves right along and polishes itself as it goes!” an old-timer cried excitedly.
One by one each farmer took a turn behind the plow. At last everyone was satisfied. John Deere had invented the first successful steel plow.

Vanwillam was a tailor with a shop by the river. He made cloaks and capes, skirts and shirts, while his friends laughed at him for the dull life he led. “Surely you can find a more interesting line of work,” they said. “Tailoring is so dull.”
“True,” Vanwillam replied. “But it’s a job that needs doing, and when there’s a job that needs doing, I’m willing to do it.”
One day, as Vanwillam was about to take his first snip of black velvet, he heard the town crier outside. Curious, Vanwillam opened his window.
The town crier unrolled an impressive-looking scroll. “King Blander issues the following proclamation,” he announced. “A box containing the deed to the kingdom was stolen by his beautiful but wicked stepsister, Zelda. Whoever retrieves the deed from Zelda’s home in Peligro Swamp will be royally rewarded.”
He rolled up the scroll and hurried to the next corner.
Vanwillam slowly withdrew his head from the window. So Zelda had stolen the deed to the kingdom. It was hardly a surprise. She believed the kingdom was rightfully hers. With the deed, she might claim the right to rule, and nobody wanted her as queen.
Vanwillam looked at the velvet on his table. He’d promised to make a cloak for the Earl of Thomble. Still, how could he work when the kingdom was at risk? He was only a humble tailor, but he wasn’t the sort to sit idly by when danger threatened. So he packed the tools of his trade—the black velvet, scissors, a tape measure, buttons, and a needle and thread. Then he strode down the road to Peligro Swamp.
On the way he met several who had already tried to retrieve the deed. They laughed at his shortness and lack of weapons, warned of quicksand and alligators, and doubted that a tailor could succeed where knights had failed.
Nevertheless, he pressed on, determined to do what he could.
Peligro Swamp appeared ahead. It was dark and dank. Spanish moss hung like thick gray spiderwebs.
Mindful of the warnings he had received, he tied the scissors to his tape measure, then swung them over his head and let them fly. They landed in the swamp and sank—quicksand!
He pulled them back and hurled them again and again until he found solid ground. He stepped there, dropped a button, and swung again. Thus he made his way through the swamp to dry earth bordering a slimy green pond where a dozen ominous green shapes bobbed in the water.
Quickly he pulled out his needle and threaded it with sturdy button thread. As each of the alligators pulled itself to shore, drawn by the thought of a tailor lunch, Vanwillam grabbed its jaws and, with a few quick stitches, sewed each mouth shut. Soon there were a dozen angry alligators on the shore, thrashing their heads around.
A path led away from the pond. Shouldering his bag, Vanwillam followed it. Night was settling in when he found Zelda’s home. His knees quivered, but he straightened his back and knocked.
“My name’s Vanwillam,” he said when Zelda opened the door. “Word of your beauty reached me from afar.”
Zelda was suspicious, but it had been years since anyone had entertained her with such honeyed words.
“Why are you here?” she asked, letting him enter.
Vanwillam smiled modestly. “I’m a tailor, but I have yet to prove my skill in these parts. I need a beautiful woman for whom to sew an elegant cloak. Then, as people see her beauty, they also see my cloak. My reputation would be assured.”
“I won’t pay for a new cloak,” Zelda said.
“Pay?” Vanwillam put his hand to his heart. “You wound me! This would be a gift, naturally.”
Zelda hesitated, but greed overcame distrust. “Very well, but tomorrow you must be on your way. Don’t try to escape, for my alligators know my scent and will attack anyone else. I wonder that you made it here alive.”
Vanwillam measured Zelda, then cut the black velvet and sewed late into the night. At last he yawned, and Zelda sent him to sleep in the attic.
In the middle of the night Vanwillam crept downstairs. He hoped to find the box with the deed and escape while Zelda slept. He searched and searched, but the box wasn’t to be found. The only place he couldn’t search was Zelda’s bedroom. He tiptoed back upstairs to formulate a new plan.
The next day Vanwillam stitched and sewed, hemmed and tucked. Beneath his fingers appeared a cloak fit for a queen. Finally he called Zelda over. “Try it on,” he urged. “Nothing could enhance your beauty, but I hope that my cloak will at least not detract from it.”
He draped it over her shoulders. It fit perfectly, sweeping the floor in flowing darkness.
Vanwillam stroked his chin. “It still needs something,” he said. “Perhaps a silver brooch to hold it together at the neck?”
Zelda twirled, watching the cloak flare around her ankles.
“Fetch one from my bedroom at once,” she commanded.
Vanwillam darted to her room. On the dresser lay a clutter of jewelry and a wooden box. Inside the box was the missing deed. Quickly he tucked it under his hat, then hurried back with a stunning silver brooch. Zelda fastened it to the cloak, with nary a word of thanks.
“I must be going,” Vanwillam said. “I would be honored if you would wear the cloak soon and let it be known that I made it for you.” With that, he hurriedly gathered his things and headed out the door.
Zelda was too busy admiring herself to stop him. Or perhaps she was depending on the alligators. Vanwillam was approaching the slimy green pond when Zelda’s scream announced that she had discovered her loss.
Twelve miserable alligators slumped nearby. Quickly he cut the stitches holding their mouths closed, then ran.
He reached the quicksand as Zelda came into view. Jumping to the first button—solid ground—he turned to see what would happen.
“Attack!” Zelda screamed.
The alligators followed her instructions, but not as she had expected. She was wearing her new cloak, which still smelled strongly of the tailor, whom the alligators had reason to despise. She came to her senses just in time to flee back up the path.
Once safely through the quicksand, Vanwillam headed to the palace. He wasn’t an impressive sight, this short tailor with the muddy shoes, as he walked up to the throne. Still, he was well-received when he took off his hat and handed the king the deed to the kingdom.
“You’ve saved us from disaster,” the king said. “What would you have as your reward?”
Vanwillam bowed. “I didn’t do it for the reward, Your Highness. I did it for the kingdom. It was a job that needed doing, and when there’s a job that needs doing, I’m willing to do it.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” the king said, shaking Vanwillam’s hand. “You may be hearing from me again.”
So Vanwillam returned to his tailor shop by the river and took out some velvet for the Earl of Thomble’s cloak. His friends still laughed at the dull life he led, but he just smiled.
“A tailor’s life isn’t often exciting,” he agreed. “But it’s a job that needs doing. And when there’s a job that needs doing, I’m willing to do it.”

Soon after we moved to India, a boy began bullying us. We were around him a lot because we lived in the same neighborhood, rode the same bus to school, and played on the same soccer team. We know that Jesus taught us to love our enemies and pray for people who are not kind to us. For many weeks we tried to be nice to the bully, and we prayed that he would be our friend. We asked him to be our friend one time, and he finally said yes. After that we had fun playing together.
Spencer and Zachary W., ages 9 and 7, India

While we were at lunch, we sat with a man who is now a grandfather who said that his little four-year-old grandson came to him the other day and said, “Grandpa, why do the hummingbirds hum?” Grandpa said, “I don’t know. Why?” The little boy said, “Because they don’t know the words.”
It is unlikely that we will remember very many of the words that we’ve heard during the meetings of this conference. But I hope that we shall be able to “hum” the spirit of this conference and that we shall carry with us a great feeling of uplift because of our participation together. It has been a glorious time. The Spirit of the Lord has been with us. We have every reason to be grateful. We have been refreshed in our testimonies and strengthened in our faith.

Every year, fifth-graders at my school can go to a camp called Sky Ranch. They sleep in cabins, swim, and learn about the outdoors. My parents didn’t have enough money for me to go, but they said they’d help me earn it.
The Fourth of July was coming up, so we decided to make some cute Uncle Sam flag holders. We figured out how much money we needed to buy the materials and still have enough money for me to go to camp. We needed to buy flags, wood, and paint to make fifteen holders.
Dad bought and cut the wood. Mom and I painted the holders. When we were finished, Dad and I started to sell them. We sold seven that Saturday. At Sunday dinner, Grandpa asked, “What about paying your tithing?” I had forgotten about tithing!
We decided to raise the price of the flag holders, but we only sold one, so we knew we had to lower the price again to what it was and find another way to earn the money I still needed. Mom said that we had to pay the tithing first and that the Lord would bless us for it.
On the last Saturday before the Fourth of July, we sold all but two flag holders. Then a man came up and bought those two. Upon learning why we were selling them, he gave me an extra twenty dollars!
I am very excited about going to Sky Ranch, but I’m even more excited about learning that the Lord will bless you when you pay your tithing first.
Melissa McKenna, age 10Allen, Texas

The example Belle set for her family has made a big impression on her youngest sister, Wong Cho Ho—who goes by the English name of Rambo—and her younger brother, Wong Wah Kan (Simon), both of whom are now teenagers.
“Before I was a member, I’d always notice Belle,” says Simon, who was baptized in 1992. “She wasn’t lazy. Every Sunday she’d get up and go to church. When Belle was a missionary, she was a good example to my family and she helped us.”
Rambo also talked about the gospel with Simon and helped him with his decision to be baptized.
And so the sharing went: Two missionaries talked to Belle. Belle joined the Church and began fellowshipping Rambo. Rambo was baptized and began talking about the gospel with Agnes and Simon. Agnes and Simon were baptized, and they were followed by Mandy, the Wongs’ oldest daughter, and May, Angela, and their parents.
Simon likes to think back to the time when he began seriously investigating the gospel. He remembers praying for the first time. “I didn’t know how to pray or what I should say,” he remembers. “But I always felt good when I prayed.”
Before Simon joined the Church, Sundays were reserved for rest and relaxation. He would generally sleep in, then get up and play soccer with his friends. These days, his friends don’t even bother asking him to play games on the Sabbath. “I’ve already told them I don’t do that, and they understand why I don’t and what I do instead,” he says. Sundays for Simon generally consist of attending church meetings and reading the scriptures. “I love studying in the Book of Mormon—especially about Lehi and the faith he had. My own faith isn’t great, so it’s good for me to read about someone who was so strong.”

When John Batty was eight years old, his family was taught the gospel by two missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was 1854, and the Battys lived in Pilley, Yorkshire, England.
A few years later, George and Encora Batty and their children joined the Church and applied for passage on a ship sailing from Liverpool to New York City. They were going to Utah to be with the Saints.
A few months before leaving England, eleven-year-old John was skipping up a dirt path toward his home. As he went along the hard-packed trail, he noticed a large apple orchard in a nearby field. He could see that the trees were covered with ripe, red apples. His mouth watered, and he decided to take an apple from the nearest tree.
There was only one problem. The trees did not belong to John, and his father and mother had taught him that being honest was the best way to live. “Never take anything that does not belong to you,” his father had told him many times.
Ignoring his parents’ teachings, John quickly climbed a tree next to the path and picked three large apples. Placing one in each of his pants pockets and one in his mouth, he quickly slid down the tree trunk and raced up the road toward home. Before he got there, he had eaten all three apples and his stomach had begun to ache.
“What gave you a stomachache?” his mother asked.
“I don’t know,” John replied, being dishonest again. He knew that if he told his mother about the apples, she would ask where he got them.
John was tucked into bed to sleep off his illness. As he lay on his straw tick mattress that night, he made a promise to himself: He would work and save enough money to pay for those three apples. And he would tell the owner of the orchard that he had climbed the tree and stolen them.
Before he could keep his promise, however, his family sailed for America. John thought about those stolen apples every day during the long weeks it took to sail across the Atlantic Ocean.
From New York, his family went by boat, stagecoach, covered wagon, and foot to Council Bluffs, Nebraska. There they bought a handcart and piled their belongings in it for the long walk to Utah. Young John Batty walked and helped push the cart all the way. He wore out the only pair of shoes that he owned.
When the Battys arrived in Salt Lake City in September of 1857, President Brigham Young asked them to move on to southern Utah to live among the Indians in a small settlement called Toquerville at “the head of the Ash Creek.”
Barefoot, young John Batty walked the three hundred miles to Toquerville. Every day he thought about the stolen fruit. His conscience was so hurt that he could not even eat an apple.
Thirty years later, long after he was grown up and married, John Batty was called on a mission. He was asked to return to England to preach the gospel to his former friends and family living in the Yorkshire and Nottingham areas of England.
Upon his arrival in Liverpool, John made his way by train back to Pilley. Walking along a path toward the edge of town, he passed the same orchard from which he had stolen the apples as a boy. Standing among the trees was a very old, stooped, white-haired man.
John called out to him, “Do you own this orchard?”
“Yes,” the man replied.
“Have you owned it for a long time?”
“Fifty years.”
Here was John’s chance to repent of stealing those apples. “Sir,” he said, “I used to live nearby when I was just a boy. One day before my family sailed for America, I climbed one of those trees and stole three apples from you. I have been sorry ever since. I would like to ask your forgiveness and also pay you for them.”
“Certainly,” the man said, “but they will cost you three times as much as they cost clear back then.”
“That is fair,” John replied with a smile.
With only a little change in his pocket, John paid for the three stolen apples and bought another one to eat. In his journal that night, he wrote, “That was the sweetest apple I ever tasted!”

A woman was converted up in Idaho. She comes down to see me often. She calls me after nearly every conference. She is a nurse. She gave me a check for $500 for the children’s hospital because, at the death of her husband, one of our Saints visited her to tell her what she might expect in the future if she just knew the truth. I got a letter from her recently. She said she had found more love in this Church than she had ever known in her life—even from her own mother.

Srilaksanaa “Sri” Suntarahut was born on 4 July 1924 in Bangkok, Thailand. Her father was doctor for the royal princes, and her mother was a friend of Her Majesty Queen Intharasaksaji. Sri’s family often visited the queen at the Royal Teak Palace. When Sri was six years old, the queen asked to raise her. This arrangement was made on the condition that Sri would be free to visit her family.
The queen loved Sri as if she were her own daughter. “I slept in the queen’s bedroom on a mattress in front of the queen’s bed,” says Sister Sri. “Since there were no screens on the windows, the beds were surrounded by a large silk net. Each morning I got up with the queen, dressed, ate breakfast, and read to her. After breakfast I went to a school taught by European nuns. I could speak only English while there. After school I returned to the palace, shared a meal with the queen, and again read to her. This was my routine for eight years. As a result, I developed a better education than many who have earned a degree.”
While at school, Sri would look at the English Bible. “In my heart I would say, One day I must read this book,” says Sister Sri. “But my family tradition was that we children should remain with our country’s religion.”
Sri lived with the queen until she was 17 years old. Then she went to Chulalongkorn University. Because of her excellent language skills, she became the financial secretary for a group of high-level government officials after World War II.
Sri was married and had a family when Elders Larry White and Carl Hansen met her in 1968. “I did not like the missionaries very much at first,” says Sister Sri, “but they kept coming back. I put the Book of Mormon on the shelf for three months. One night I decided to look at it, so I held it up and prayed, ‘If there is something good in here for me, let me know it.’ I opened it and read until I couldn’t read anymore. Tears came to my eyes. Then I held the book to my chest. Soon I went upstairs to my room and closed the door. It was the first time I knelt down and prayed. I cried and called out, ‘My Father, my Father.’ I knew He could hear me. I prayed and cried for a long time. When I got up, I began to read again without stopping.” Sri and two of her children were baptized on 4 July 1968, her 44th birthday.
The education Sri received while living with the queen enabled her not only to read the Book of Mormon in English, but also to play a key part in the translation of the book into Thai. The translation effort began in 1970, and Sri was asked to be the lead translator of the translating committee. The project was completed in 1974, and the Book of Mormon was published in Thai in 1976.
“Making this translation brought such spiritual strength to me,” says Sister Sri. “I love my Heavenly Father so much for pouring upon me this gift of tongues and language.”
In 1975, while waiting for approval of the Book of Mormon translation, she began translating the Doctrine and Covenants. The other members of the translating committee discontinued translating for various reasons, so Sri was the mainstay of the scripture translation effort. Though she went to her job during the day, she felt driven to translate when she returned home. Often she worked late into the night, completing a rough translation of as many verses as she could in order to have them ready for the daily meeting of the translation committee. Once she went with other Church members to help with a cleaning project. After several hours of hard work, others suggested she go home to rest. Sri said that she was already resting because if she went home she would feel compelled to translate and could not sleep. The translation of the Doctrine and Covenants was completed in 1979.
Before the queen’s death in 1974, Sri went to see her in the hospital. All of the ladies-in-waiting sat on the floor around the queen’s bed in order of their class. “The queen, who was in great pain, raised up to see me when I entered,” says Sister Sri. “She said, ‘Come to me.’ I stood near her. She said, ‘I still love you.’ I will always be grateful to the queen. Because of the many things I learned while living with her, I was able to read the Book of Mormon and accept the gospel. Because of her, I learned to write and speak in proper Thai language—the language into which the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants are translated.”