Gospel Story Finder

One stormy winter night, Harold was traveling home. By the time he and his horse reached the stream, it was getting late.
As they crossed the stream, his horse tripped. Harold flew over its head and landed in a freezing, muddy pond.
He lay in the cold slush.
Harold: Please, Heavenly Father, send help. I’m hurt and can’t move. It’s so dark and cold.
Soon he heard his father.
Father: Harold? Is that you?
Harold: I’m over here!
His father helped him out of the water and wrapped a warm blanket around him.
Harold: I’m so glad you came. How did you know that I needed help?
Father: The Spirit whispered to your mother that something was wrong, and I knew that she was right.
Harold: Thank you for coming.
Harold and his father remembered to thank Heavenly Father that night, too.
Harold: I thank thee, Heavenly Father, for telling my mother that I needed help, and for sending my father to rescue me.
Harold B. Lee’s testimony that Heavenly Father answers prayers helped him throughout his life. He prayed for divine help many times as he served in stake callings, as an Apostle, and as President of the Church.

We are all aware of Hurricane Mitch, which devastated Nicaragua and Honduras last October and November. With terrific force it flooded homes and caused mud slides. More than 10,000 people died and another two million were left homeless. This very strong hurricane destroyed homes and covered streets with mud that seemed as hard as cement.
Almost immediately, the Church began sending life-sustaining food, clothing, medicine, and blankets to help both members of the Church and those of other faiths. Once the shipments arrived at their destination, Church members came by the hundreds to unload the trucks and assemble the supplies into boxes. The items in each box would sustain a family for a week.
Our dear President Gordon B. Hinckley, who is the chairman of the General Welfare Committee, felt troubled by the suffering in Central America. One sleepless night he felt a prompting to go and offer his love and support to those who had endured this great loss. The prophet’s visit lifted the spirits and gave hope to thousands. “As long as [the Church] has any resources,” he told them, “we will stand by you in times of trouble.” And I testify to you, brothers and sisters, that he truly is a prophet of God. And I sustain him with all my heart.

In my early teens, life seemed to fly by. I was testing the wings of young manhood and feeling a lot of turbulence along the way. Every turn brought new discoveries.
In the midst of this period I discovered something that I grew to cherish. It was something I never expected.
In those days our family would often spend our weekends in a small community nestled in the peaks of the Oregon mountains. As soon as my dad came home from work we would grab the fishing poles and mosquito repellent, throw them into the back of the camper, and drive off.
Full of anticipation, my sisters and I, and on occasion, our friends, would all lie on the top level of the bunk bed in the camper, leaning our faces up against the window screen to get relief from the summer heat. There we would plot out our upcoming adventures. During our planning sessions, I would never forget to tell the newcomers of the great summer attraction.
The great summer attraction was a large wooden pipe which carried water, under pressure, from a dam several miles to its powerhouse. The pipe was made of planks bound by steel bands. Over the years, time and moss had taken their toll, eating little holes in the pipe. This made the pipe resemble a gigantic lawn sprinkler, the kind that you stretch across the lawn but can never get both ends to lie right side up at the same time, resulting in water shooting for yards in every direction. This constant spraying was not only a refreshing retreat from the summer heat, but it kept the forest deep green. In winter it transformed the forest into a heavenly white, with every stream of water making its own unique ice sculpture.
On one of those summer outings, I sat in the cab of the truck and listened with the intense fascination of a boyish heart to Dad tell of his boyhood. He had grown up in this community. He told of spending the summers as a sheepherder in the alpine meadows, when the mountains would awaken and put on their summer green. In the winter, when the layers of white would again start to cover the high country, he would return to the small town below.
I had been to this community many times before and had visited his grandmother’s grave and the old house where he used to live. I had even wandered around his old high school. But never had my dad’s life seemed so real to me as it did that day. I spent the day as he had, at his old hangouts. He pointed to one of the meadows where he had herded sheep. We went to one of his favorite fishing holes, where a dam had stood. We continued to the lower dam. This was the place of the wooden pipe.
As I walked along the pipe that day, I felt different than I ever had before. I realized that there were just as many fish elsewhere. It wasn’t the fishing, or even the pipe, that was so special. It was my dad’s life. This place is my father’s link with the past, I thought. He had made a niche, a sanctuary, a home here. And his stories had become a part of me. Retracing the footsteps of my father’s childhood that day, I felt as if I was my dad. I knew that he had traveled this pipe often in his younger days, and I marveled at our newfound similarities. We were different; yet we were much the same. He wasn’t perfect, as I was not, but he, like the ice sculptures, was unique, a masterpiece of God’s creation.

A man came to Temple Square one day and stood outside the office door, wanting to come in. I knew as I saw him that he had a desperate need, and I’ll confess, to my sorrow, that my first thought was that the need probably was economic. We have many occasions there to be blessed with such opportunities. Well, I looked at him just a little bit suspiciously, and then, going to the door, I invited him in and saw immediately in his face that the need he had had little to do with economics. He had a kind of glaze over his eyes that comes with a deep, shattering shock.

He was a nonmember of the Church married to a fine Primary president. This lady and he were the parents of a beautiful daughter aged 11. This man’s parents lived in the eastern part of the country, and the family had decided in a little council a sweet and fine thing, as he discussed it, that the best Christmas present they could give his parents was to send Daddy to see them, because it had been so long, and, it being Christmastime, the best gift they could receive was a visit from their only son. So he had, although reluctantly, accepted this commission and had gone to see his parents. While there he had received word from people at home that his wife had been in an automobile accident. The little girl had been killed. Through fire that followed, her body had been destroyed.

This was, of course, a terrible shock to him. He was on his way home and had several hours layover in Salt Lake and had come to Temple Square trying to find peace. He sat across the desk from me, and I tried to teach him. I have seldom been more frustrated, because I didn’t get by that shock at all. I talked of eternity; I talked of resurrection; I talked of the faith we need, of the strength and sustaining influence of the Lord; and nothing registered—nothing at all. I began to get desperate. He sat ill at ease and getting ready to move, and I began to pray. My prayer (and I have repeated it so many times under similar circumstances) was, “Lord, help me now. Lord, help me now.” For a reason I am sure of, and you will accept, I suppose, I opened this book—perhaps I should have done it much sooner without the stimulus of the inspiration, but I hadn’t—to these words out of the 11th chapter of the book of Alma:

The spirit and the body shall be reunited again in its perfect form; both limb and joint shall be restored to its proper frame. [Alma 11:43]

I turned to Alma 40 and read a little more of the Resurrection, that “even a hair of the head shall not be lost” (Alma 40:23). For the first time I saw the break come. I found as we talked that the thing that disturbed him most was about this beautiful little girl. I have little girls; I know about how a father would feel—at least I think I can imagine. The thing that bothered him most was that he could not even see her again, that the beauty and perfection of her little life was gone, and he had no real hope for anything more. But he sat and listened, and the simple therapy was repeated. We read it as the word of the Lord. He accepted it as such. He sat in one of those little alcoves near the door and read it over and over for a long time. When I took him to the airport, the glaze in his eyes was gone. He had wept, perhaps for the first time. He had talked and seemed reachable, and we had discussed the principles I had tried to talk of before.

A few months later I heard his voice at the counter. I hadn’t heard a thing from him since our first meeting. He was standing there with two rather rough-looking men. They turned out to be his wife’s brothers, born in the Church. He had a copy of the Book of Mormon opened to Alma 11 and was reading to them those wonderful words, testifying of their truth, telling them that in his search through the record he had found it to be the word of God. He bought a book for them and sent them home to read—these men who had been born into the faith.

Other kinds of blessings can come, too. Teresa Gai, a widow living in Lima, Peru, supported herself by operating a small store, and Sunday was one of her biggest business days. When missionaries taught her the gospel, she worried about closing her store on Sunday. One weekend she finally agreed to do so, not realizing she was closing her store the day before New Year’s—her most profitable day of the year! With no business for two days in a row, she faced serious financial consequences. But she had promised. She closed her store and went to church. On Tuesday, she discovered that by the end of the day she had done more business than any day since opening her store. She never again did business on Sunday, and her sales increased steadily (see “Pioneering in the Andes,” Liahona, May 1997, 44–46).

The story is told of a group of men who were talking about people who had influenced their lives and to whom they were grateful. One man thought of a high-school teacher who had introduced him to the poet Tennyson. He decided to write and thank her.
In time, written in a feeble scrawl, came this letter:
“My dear Willie:
“I can’t tell you how much your note meant to me. I am in my 80s, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely and like the last leaf lingering behind. You will be interested to know that I taught school for 50 years, and yours is the first note of appreciation I have ever received. It came on a blue, cold morning, and it cheered me as nothing has for years.”

Few newlyweds honeymoon by camping out in the cold for two winter months. But the 18-year-old bride, Emily Abbott, and her new husband, Edward Bunker, had little choice. Right after John Taylor, then an Apostle, sealed them together as man and wife in Nauvoo, they fled west with hundreds of other Saints over frozen Mississippi River ice late in February 1846. As refugees, they camped in mud and snow day after day on their slow journey across Iowa.
At Garden Grove, Iowa, Edward managed to build a crude one-room log cabin. But its lack of windows or doors and its dirt floor certainly provided his new bride with much less than she was accustomed to. Emily, he well knew, had grown up with nice things. Her childhood home in Dansville, New York, was a prosperous home thanks to her father’s good income from a woolen mill he owned. Her parents sent her to a fine grammar school in the area.
When Emily was about ten, the family moved west to develop a 40-acre stretch of Illinois land. There they converted to Mormonism and soon moved to Nauvoo. Then in 1843 Emily’s father died, and to help provide for her mother and the five other children, teenage Emily found work in nearby homes. Hour after painstaking hour her tailoring work turned her into a fine seamstress. It was while tailoring that she met and then married Edward.
Life was not easy in their Garden Grove cabin community, so Edward ranged many miles distant to find odd jobs. He managed to bring home a little corn one time, some bacon another time. When he heard that the United States army wanted volunteers for the Mormon Battalion, he enlisted, hoping his army salary would pay for Emily’s trip west.
Off her new husband went, leaving Emily and her mother’s family to care for themselves until he returned. Within the year, by January 1847, poverty would teach the young wife a lasting lesson about pride.
Emily, an expert with needle and cloth, sometimes felt superior to those not dressed as well as she. One day she saw a young baby dressed in some glazed curtain material—bright shawl-type flower figures on a deep blue background. Curtain materials for a baby dress! She severely criticized the mother for not being able to provide better and vowed out loud: “I would not clothe my child in a dress like that, even if I could have it for nothing.”
But that January, when Emily gave birth to her own first baby, she had nothing to clothe him in. No one in the camp had anything she could buy to sew into baby clothes. No one, that is, except the poor mother she had criticized. The mother kindly said to her: “I have yet a few yards of the same material from which I made my baby’s dress. You are welcome to it.” Emily, swallowing her pride, accepted the curtain material and offered to pay for it. “No, I don’t want you to pay me for it,” the giver said. “I hope you need it so much that you’ll not shed tears over it and blame the Lord because you have no better.”
Emily did not complain about the curtain-cloth dress she made for her son. For a long time it was the only clothing the baby boy had.
When husband Edward returned from battalion duty after an 18-month absence, he got acquainted for the first time with his 11-month-old son. (But records do not tell us what the baby boy wore to meet his soldier-father.)
Years later, as the mother of 11 children, Emily often told the story of the curtain dress to her children to help them accept situations when money and earthly goods were lacking.

I have found that procrastination is real habit forming and gets easier the more we do it. I decided I hated the feeling of not getting things done. I went to my school teachers and asked them for upcoming assignments that I could start on, enabling me to complete them on time. I found that I could accomplish anything I put my mind to as long as I allowed enough time.
Elder Nathan Hicks, 20Texas Dallas Mission

Aaron burst through the front door after school and ran straight upstairs to his bedroom. He began searching for something while his little brother Jared curiously watched.
“Where are you? Where are you?” Aaron mumbled to himself.
“What are you looking for?” Jared asked.
“I’m looking for …” Then Aaron spied the very thing he needed up on the corner shelf in his closet, next to his scriptures. “Here it is!” Aaron exclaimed as he reached up and plucked his journal from its hiding place.
Aaron’s mind was buzzing with thoughts from his day. He wanted to begin writing as soon as possible so he wouldn’t forget about all the things he had heard and seen. He sat at the desk and carefully opened his journal to a blank page. He began to write.
Jared watched his big brother, wondering why he was so determined to write in that book. “What are you doing?” he asked. Aaron continued to concentrate on his journal. He wrote down the date, time, where he was, and how he was feeling. Jared became impatient and asked again, “What are you writing in that book?”
Aaron stopped writing and turned to Jared. “I’m almost finished,” he said. “Then I promise I’ll tell you what I’m doing, OK?” Jared nodded and sat patiently on his bed.
After writing some more, Aaron finally closed the book. Then he grabbed his scriptures and carried them with his journal to where Jared was sitting.
Aaron held up the Book of Mormon. “This book is kind of like a journal,” Aaron explained to his little brother. “It’s written by prophets and tells what they did and taught.”
Aaron told Jared about some of the stories he remembered reading and learning about in Primary: the Lord teaching Nephi to build a ship, the brave Lamanite Samuel standing on the wall to preach, Jesus Christ coming to the Americas and teaching the little children.
“Mormon and his son Moroni finally finished writing their people’s history on gold plates. Then Moroni hid the plates as God had commanded,” Aaron said. “The Book of Mormon was left for us to read today. Someday, someone in our family will read my journal too.” He smiled. “My journal is not scripture, but it will tell about all the important things that happened in my life and about the people I love, like you, Jared. It will be my testimony of the love Heavenly Father has for me.”
Jared thought about what Aaron had told him, then sprang off the bed and ran out of the room. He soon returned with a piece of paper and some crayons. He began coloring. Now Aaron was curious. “What are you doing?”
“I’m almost done,” Jared said. This time Aaron waited patiently. Jared put down his crayons and lifted up the paper for Aaron to see. He had drawn a picture of himself and his big brother. And he had drawn a journal and a Book of Mormon in Aaron’s hands. “I’m writing my journal now!” Jared said. “This is where I put down the time, the date, and where I was.” Then Jared pointed to the cartoonlike picture he had drawn of his big brother. “And this is where I put the person I love.”
At that moment Jared remembered he had forgotten something. He reached for a bright yellow crayon and drew a big smiley face on the top of his paper. “And this is how I am feeling inside!”

1. The first Sunday after Miguel moved to a new city, his mother took him to church. They went to meet his new Primary class.
2. When they got to the classroom door, Miguel grabbed Mom’s hand. “She isn’t my teacher, Mom. Where is Sister Dominguez?”
3. Mom knelt to talk with Miguel. “We live in a different city now, and we are going to meet new friends—like your new Primary teacher.”
4. “I don’t want a new teacher,” Miguel said. “I want to go home to my old house and be with my old teacher.”
5. “I know it isn’t easy to move to a new place,” Mom said. “But some things will be the same. You will sing Primary songs, pray, and listen to talks.”
6. “I will?” Miguel asked. “What else will be the same?”
“Your new Primary teacher will teach you about Jesus—just as Sister Dominguez did.”
7. Miguel let go of Mom’s hand and sat down in a chair in his new Primary class.
8. Later …
“Mom, you were right! We sang, prayed, and listened to talks. My new Primary teacher said Jesus loves me. It is the same!”

I was pondering this powerful message this past Saturday morning on the eve of Easter as I drove to the Northshore to watch the surfing action at pipeline. I pulled off the road at Kahuku and decided I would try to introduce myself to the Catholic priest at the St. Roch Church whose name is Father Jun Pastrano. He came out dressed in shorts and a casual shirt as I was and we had a wonderful visit on his porch. I told him why I was in town and a few highlights of this Kalaupapa devotional. After leaving him with books I had written on the subject, I then went a little ways down the road and knocked on the door of the United Methodist minister’s house and introduced myself to Pastor Tevita Maile and his wife. Pastor Maile was preparing his Easter sermon, but still made time for me. I found out we shared a past common friend in Viliami Afiaki and that he also knew Viliami Tolutau. We had a nice visit together.

The following morning as Easter dawned, I went to the St. Roch Church and arrived about the same time that Father Pastrano did. He soon told a prisoner that I was a bishop and also informed me that he had talked about the journey to Kalaupapa in his Saturday evening mass the night before. I was soon asked to introduce myself to the congregation along with other visitors and was edified by the hymns we sang together, which included “All Creatures of our God and King,” written by St. Francis of Assii eight hundred years ago.

I also visited the United Methodist Church and was asked to introduce myself by Pastor Tevita Maile. After I finished, he told the congregation: “Fred is giving a inter-faith lecture at BYU-Hawaii and all are invited to attend. He believes we all worship the same God.” We then sang the hymn written by the Methodist Christian missionary, Charles Wesley which was the same hymn I sang that day with the Saints of the Laie Second Ward, “Christ the Lord is Risen Today,” written before the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized in 1830.

As I have pondered over these hymns written by inspired men before the dawn of the Restoration with my Catholic and Methodist brothers and sisters, I was again reminded of the Latin maxim which I again invite you to reflect upon: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty, and in all things charity.”

Some time ago, a friend and I applied for an educational program. I was confident I would be selected. When the results came out, I was disappointed that my friend was selected but I was not. I felt wronged because I thought I deserved to be selected more than my friend.
At that moment, I saw my friend as an opponent or someone who had taken something that belonged to me. A few days later, while studying Jacob 2 in the Book of Mormon, I read how Jacob had rebuked his people for their sins. One of those sins was pride.
Jacob’s teachings made me realize that I was committing the sin of pride toward my friend by thinking I deserved something given to him. Jacob’s words were a revelation to me:
“Let not this pride of your hearts destroy your souls!
“Think of your brethren like unto yourselves” (Jacob 2:16–17).
I prayed to Heavenly Father to forgive me and to help me avoid the sin of pride in the future. Then I spoke to my friend about how I had felt and asked him to forgive me. I felt peace and joy in doing so and in receiving forgiveness from him and from Heavenly Father.

I love running, and in the fall of 2019, I signed up to run the Boston Marathon. I started training the following January, but in March 2020, COVID-19 put a halt to almost everything—including this storied race. When it became clear there would be no marathon that year, the organizers offered us the chance to participate virtually. To be eligible for the T-shirt—and I really wanted the T-shirt—each participant needed to run a 26.2-mile course during the month of September. So I resumed my training and mapped a course that started in the middle of Zion National Park and finished 26.2 miles away, near my parents’ house.

Southern Utah is still warm in September, and I knew I needed to start early. So, at 4:30 a.m. on my self-appointed race day, my good parents drove me to my starting line. Only when we arrived did I realize the depth of darkness in that canyon. As the weakness of my headlamp became apparent, my mind called up stories about a recent cougar sighting in the area and then scenes from every true crime show I had ever seen. My facial expressions must have revealed my growing concern because right then my parents offered to drive behind me so I could run in the stream of the truck’s headlights until the sun rose. Grateful, I agreed. Then I started my watch and began to run.

I have never felt slower than I did that morning, running in front of that diesel truck. I also didn’t get very far before I recognized parallels between that moment and our mortal journey. The darkness is real, and we don’t know what’s around us on any side. But, knowing better than us, our loving Heavenly Father devised a way to illuminate our paths and provide enough light for us to move forward one step at a time. Whether we realize it or not, He’s watching over us amidst our wobbles and providing what we need to make it to the end—at whatever pace we need to travel. We just need to focus on His light and do our best to keep moving forward.

When I started first grade, Mom said that she and Dad could not always be with me. And that if I ever needed help when they weren’t around, I should call on Heavenly Father and He would help me. I know that in the Book of Mormon and the Bible, whenever Jesus Christ needed help, He talked to Heavenly Father.
Dad travels a lot and was away one evening when Mom was making us a nice meal by roasting a turkey breast. She cooked it the time the package said to cook it. When she put the meat thermometer in, it said the meat was done. She told me later that she thought the meat was still a little pink but that sometimes when they add basting ingredients to turkeys, the meat is sometimes pink but still done.
We sat down to eat, and I did not want any turkey breast. I ate the other food on my plate. When we were finished, we sat down on the couch so Mom could read to me.
Suddenly Mom got a sharp pain in her stomach, and she bent over and stopped reading. “Wait just a minute, Malcolm,” she said. She started to read again, but the pain came back. This time she was doubled over on the floor, and she couldn’t talk. The dog was outside and scratching to get in. When the pain eased, Mom asked me to let the dog in, then doubled over again in pain.
I quickly dropped to my knees and asked Heavenly Father to help my mother. After my prayer, I asked her if I needed to call 911 and she said no. Within a few minutes the pain was completely gone, and she had no symptoms other than a few turkey-flavored burps.
Mom told me later that she just about cried when she heard my prayer. She felt so good to know that I would turn to Heavenly Father for help. And the minute I said, “amen,” she felt something change in her stomach. She said, “It was like someone turned off a light switch, and the pain, which had been getting worse and worse, started to get better.”

First let me share with you what I experienced overseas as I listened to a modest, gentle, manly father wearing the uniform of his country, leading and doing a job of importance while he gave great service to the Kingdom and his fellowmen. He told me of his work among many other officers in the prosecution arm of the United States Army—men who were not like him, who were not living the kind of life he was living. They had not been very much interested in the fact that he was a Mormon leader, or that he had a strong sense of loyalty to his wife and children and to God, or that he had control of his tongue and a way of speaking different from their own. None of that impressed them very much. He and his wife found themselves leaving required social events early quite frequently because the activities of the evening were not wholesome. As such an evening would progress, other guests occasionally became ugly as they imbibed additional spirits, lost their normal restraints, and sometimes acted less like men and women than like animals. He was not one to judge lightly or readily, and he was not expressing harsh judgments against them; he was simply presenting a setting for an incident that I shall not forget.

He said that they went to a Christmas party, more happily this time because the host family was a fine family who had little children of the same general age as their own. The children came in their pajamas by invitation and, joining the host family children, played together in another room while the adults ate their dinner. Periodically the children came out and interrupted proceedings with childish playing or questioning until finally the Mormon father, his sense of humor tried a little bit, said, “Now, look—you kids go on in the other room and stay there and don’t come out again or else.”

They sat at dinner in peace for a time; then the bedroom door opened and a little line of children filed out, the two-year-old in the vanguard. (They were sure daddy would not do too much violence to him.) The older brother had him by the shoulders and was egging him on. As the father, disturbed and feeling that he had to do something because he had said he would, began to push back his chair, the two-year-old said, “Daddy, you and mama forgot family prayer.”

Instead of expressing embarrassment, the mother said, “Honey, we did forget.” She pushed her chair back, he rose from his, and they excused themselves and quietly took their children and the other children into the bedroom where they performed this simple act of family unity and faith. Then they quietly came back to the table, seated themselves, and went on with the dinner.

“It was a different night,” he said to me, “and it’s been a different office. That party didn’t end like all the rest. And at the office things are different now.”

To be and not to seem brings great blessings.

When I was 11 years old, my bishop called me in for an interview in his office. He said, “Ulisses, it’s time to start your preparation to go on a mission.” I was astonished because I was only 11 years old! But he said, “We have to start that process now.”
My bishop said, “I’ll interview you once in a while to see how your progress is.” Then he gave me some direction. He taught me about the commandments, the priesthood, worthiness, and honesty. I was so impressed because he looked in my eyes and said, “You will serve a mission if you follow the directions I am giving you.”
I always remembered his words, especially when I faced a challenge. For example, one time my mother gave me money to go to a store to buy some fruit. For some reason the cashier gave me back more money than I gave her to pay for the fruit. I started walking home, and when I opened my hand, I saw that I had more money than I had started with.
Satan tried to convince me that I could keep the money for myself. I thought, “I have some money to do whatever I want, and then I will give back the correct change to my mother.” But then I thought, “No, that’s not what the bishop told me. To be a missionary, I have to be honest.” I felt the Spirit at that time and went back to the store to give back the money. I felt good in my heart. I thought, “I was honest, I obeyed the commandments, and I am preparing for my mission. I will be a missionary, and I need to be honest.”
When I was going to high school, I worked to save money for my mission. My parents were poor and couldn’t afford to pay for everything. I didn’t earn a lot of money, but after paying tithing, I decided to buy one piece of clothing per month for my mission. One month I bought a shirt, another month a tie, another month another shirt. During those three years, I saved enough to buy everything I needed. I saved enough to pay for my mission. I learned the principle of saving. I learned the principle of being obedient to the law of tithing and how many blessings we receive when we pay tithing.
My mission was a great experience because it helped me understand the principles of life and how to apply the gospel in my daily activities.
Boys and girls, prepare for a good mission and a good life. The Lord is waiting to give us all the blessings we need.

Temperance Wick held a damp cloth to her mother’s feverish forehead. “I’ll fetch the doctor before it gets dark,” she murmured comfortingly. “‘Tisn’t far to ride.”
Ever since Father had died just ten days before, Mother had been ill. It was only a mile to Temperance’s sister Phoebe’s home on the road to Mendham. Phoebe’s husband, Dr. Will Leddell, would come quickly to attend to her mother on that New Year’s Day of 1781 if he possibly could.
Mrs. Wick shook her head sadly. “The roads are too icy. It isn’t safe to ride horseback alone. And there was talk of some shooting over at Jockey Hollow.”
Tempe, an excellent horsewoman, frequently cantered her horse, Captain, through the beautiful, wooded New Jersey countryside near Morristown. “I’m not afraid,” she boasted. “Besides, Washington’s soldiers are in camp at Jockey Hollow to protect us from the Redcoats.”
“Still, trouble is brewing,” insisted her mother. “The war for our independence has gone on too long. Be very careful,” she muttered weakly before drifting off to sleep.
Tempe wrapped her red homespun cloak about her and dashed to the barn. She flung her arms around the horse’s neck. “Oh, Captain,” she whispered. “We must get help for Mother.” Then Tempe quickly saddled the animal and galloped down the road.
As they sped on, Tempe became more and more apprehensive. Mother and she were all alone at the Wick farm now. Snow-covered trees hung ominously over the narrow rutted road, and a stiff wind lashed her face, stinging her tear-filled eyes.
She gave a sigh of relief when she reached her sister’s house. A welcoming door swung open. “Tempe!” Dr. Leddell, cried, surprised. “Come in by the fire. What are you doing out in such wintry weather?”
“It’s Mother,” the worried girl replied. “Can you come quickly? Her fever is worse!”
The kindly doctor assured her that he would come right away.
Tempe turned Captain around, and as she headed homeward, she began to feel more at ease. “Everything will be all right,” she murmured, “and I’ll soon be safely home.” But as she rounded a bend in the road, several soldiers stepped out of the woods. They waved for her to stop. “Halt!” shouted a tall, ragged man. Grabbing Captain’s bridle, he added, “We won’t hurt you. We’re not the British.”
“Then let go of my horse!” cried Tempe. “I must get home!”
The soldier continued to hold on to Captain. “Excellent horse,” he declared. “We can use it.”
“But he’s my horse, and I want to keep him. I need him!” objected Tempe.
The soldier laughed. “We need him more. We need all the horses that we can find.”
“But aren’t you from Washington’s army? Captain is the only horse we have left. All the others have already been taken by the troops. Why do you need him, too?” persisted Tempe.
One of the other men pointed to a soldier with bandaged feet. “Frostbitten, that’s why. He can’t walk, and we can’t leave him here.”
“Aren’t you encamped at Jockey Hollow to defend us against attack by the Redcoats?” asked the puzzled girl.
Another soldier shouted angrily. “We were at camp. Indeed we were! Nearly froze to death! And we haven’t been paid for twelve months in the bargain.”
“Get down from your horse, Miss, before you get hurt,” urged the tall soldier. “We’re men of the Pennsylvania Line on our way to Philadelphia to see the Congress and to demand our back pay.”
Tempe nodded sympathetically. She really felt sorry for the men. Just the year before, more than a hundred soldiers had died at Jockey Hollow because of sickness and a lack of food and warm shelter. But then she thought of her sick mother at home. They would be stranded at the lonely farmhouse without a horse. Surely the soldiers could carry this man to the nearby army hospital and stay to defend New Jersey.
All at once she made up her mind. She reached out her hand as if for help in dismounting. But when the soldier let go of the bridle to help her, she kicked Captain with her heels and spurred him on. Down the frozen road she galloped, musket shots ringing in her ears.
“It’s all right, Captain. They can’t catch us now,” she cried, slowing him down at last. “But they will follow us,” she told her steed. “I can’t keep you in the barn. And if I hide you in the woods, you’ll surely die from the cold.”
Past the fields and apple orchards she rode and straight through the herb garden to the farmhouse door. She sprang from the horse’s back and glanced down the road. The men were nowhere in sight. Holding tightly to Captain’s bridle, she led him quickly inside and closed the door behind him.
Gently Tempe took him through the kitchen and into her mother’s bedroom, where she explained to the amazed woman all that had happened. Then she carefully walked Captain into the spare room. The horse’s shoes clattered over the wooden floors.
“You must keep quiet,” she told him. Hurriedly she fetched some towels from the wardrobe and wrapped them around Captain’s feet. “Just in case you paw the floor,” she muttered.
Tempe stood with her horse, holding his head so that he wouldn’t whinny or snort. A few minutes passed before she heard the angry soldiers shouting in the yard: “She’s not in the barn!” “No sign of them in the woods!” Other men’s voices sounded closer to the front door: “The snow is so trampled down that we can’t see any fresh tracks.” “Must have gone past and down the road!”
Worried and thoughtful, Tempe quietly soothed Captain while the soldiers searched the grounds and outbuildings. Are they setting a trap for me and waiting until I come out of hiding? She wondered. Of course, they wouldn’t have expected me to bring a horse into a house! Nevertheless, she waited a long time, listening for their footsteps and voices, before she went to help her mother.
Just when Tempe decided that the men had given up the hunt and left, Captain whinnied when there was a soft knock on the door. Tempe went and cautiously opened it a crack. She was relieved to see that it was Dr. Leddell.
After the doctor treated her mother, Mrs. Wick began to feel better, and in a few days she was able to leave her bed.
Tempe continued to keep Captain in the darkened spare room, however. At first she was afraid to leave the house, so she fed him biscuits and lumps of sugar from the kitchen. Later she dared to sneak out to the barn for feed.
Six days later news came that the soldiers’ mutiny was over. “Now Captain can go back to the barn!” cried Mother thankfully. Tempe slowly led her horse out of the house, leaving behind hoofmarks on the wooden floor.
Word spread like wildfire about the young woman who had outfoxed the soldiers in New Jersey. Even General Washington and his men expressed their admiration for her. To this day, Tempe Wick is remembered for the daring, clever way in which she saved her horse.

I think of a friend whom I knew when I was a missionary in London many years ago. He came to our door through the rain one night. I answered his knock and invited him in.
He said, as I remember, “I have to talk to someone. I’m all alone.”
I asked what the problem was.
He said, “When I joined the Church, my father told me to get out of his house and never come back. A few months later my athletic club dropped me from membership. Last month my boss fired me because I am a member of this Church. And last night the girl I love said she would never marry me because I’m a Mormon.”
I said, “If this has cost you so much, why don’t you leave the Church and go back to your father’s home, to your club, to the job that meant so much to you, and marry the girl you think you love?”
He said nothing for what seemed a long time. Then, putting his head in his hands, he sobbed as if his heart would break. Finally he looked up through his tears and said, “I couldn’t do that. I know this is true, and if it were to cost me my life, I could not give it up.”
He picked up his wet hat and walked to the door and went out into the rain. As I watched him, I thought of the power of conscience, the loneliness of faith, and the strength and power of personal testimony.

As you struggle in studying, researching, writing, and test taking, be aware that the Holy Ghost will help you and teach you along the way. I wish to testify that this principle is true and to give you a personal example to this effect. When I was completing my doctoral work at the University of Utah, I also struggled with time and responsibilities. I had four small children and was the ward Relief Society president. I was finishing my degree part-time, but even then some days were incredibly hard. One particular term was coming to an end when I suddenly got a bad case of the flu. I had studied very hard, but on the day of the final I was so sick with a high fever that I was dizzy and nauseated when I tried to get out of bed. I pleaded with the Lord for his help, then got dressed and headed for Salt Lake. As I walked to my classroom, I was so sick that I had to hold onto the wall so I wouldn’t fall. I sat at the back of the room to take the exam. I remember how difficult it was to read the test questions. My mind was fuzzy and I couldn’t think, but I nonetheless did my best. The next term I happened to meet that professor in the hall as I was going to another class. He stopped me and commented about my final. The Holy Ghost had blessed me more than I had ever supposed.

The author being baptized by Thomas Salisbury in Sông Bé Lake, Vietnam.
Photograph courtesy of the author
I enlisted in the United States Army for a three-year term and arrived in South Vietnam on my 20th birthday. After eight months, I was assigned to a unit northwest of Saigon. While there, I quickly observed that one of my tentmates, Thomas Salisbury, was different from everyone else.
The difference was so striking that I eventually asked him, “Tom, why are you so different from everyone else?”
“Because I’m a Latter-day Saint,” he replied.
“What is a Latter-day Saint?” I asked.
He arranged for me to meet with him and Harold Lewis, a returned missionary who was serving as an assistant to the unit chaplain. During our first meeting in a tent that served as a small chapel, I agreed that if I really believed what they were telling me, I would be baptized. I also received a copy of the Book of Mormon, which I kept in the lower pocket of my cargo pants and read whenever I had downtime.
Several discussions followed, and I found that each lesson answered questions I had had in my search for truth. But when Tom and Harold asked me if I wanted to be baptized, I said no. I didn’t know how I could keep all the commandments they had taught me.
After attending a district conference in Saigon, I went to Australia for a week of rest and relaxation. While there, I started to realize how important the teachings of the gospel had become to me. Upon my return to Vietnam, I immediately announced to Tom that I wished to be baptized.
Soon after, Tom baptized me in Sông Bé Lake, Harold confirmed me a member of the Church, and Timothy Hill, our Church group leader, ordained me a deacon.
When I returned home to the United States six weeks later, I introduced the gospel to my girlfriend, who became my wife. She also embraced the gospel’s hopeful message.
I will be forever grateful that Tom asked me if I wanted to know more. His example and invitation answered my longing to find the truth and enjoy the blessings of the gospel.