Gospel Story Finder

While I was serving as stake president, my counselors and I invited a certain brother for an interview where we presented to him his calling to be the president of the stake Young Men organization. This man had not been fully active. He liked to spend his weekends, including Sundays, camping and fishing, and it was reported that he and his wife did not always obey the Word of Wisdom. There was some question as to whether we should consider him for such a position, but because of the prayerful discussions we had held in the presidency and the high council we concluded that he should be called. As we advised this brother of his appointment, he responded that he was not interested and that he did not feel worthy or qualified. We then told him how we had come to choose him over all the members of the stake. We explained that we needed a strong and capable leader of youth in our stake and that both the presidency and the high council had offered earnest prayers, asking the Lord to indicate the person who should fill the position. We said: “The answer was clear. You are the man the Lord has chosen. It is for you to decide, of course, but you do have an obligation to go home and discuss the question with your wife. The only request we make of you is that thereafter you kneel down with her and ask the Lord what he wants you to do.”

Three days later I received an unhappy telephone call from this same man. He reluctantly informed me that he would accept the position with all its implications. He gave powerful service in his calling, and when that assignment was finished, he became a member of the high council, and he has been happy about the gospel ever since.

Shinnah B. from Nairobi, Kenya, knows that Heavenly Father loves her. But she didn’t really know it until a couple of years ago, when she first heard about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from her aunt.
“The missionaries taught me things I didn’t know. They taught me that Heavenly Father loves me, and how to pray,” Shinnah says. After she was baptized, a few experiences helped her better understand God’s love for her. Now she strives to show her love for Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

Thousands of Saints were soon huddled by the banks of the Missouri River at Winter Quarters. Even before winter had fully set in, fourteen in the camp died in a single week.44 “There were no vegetables,” Latter-day Saint convert Louisa Barnes Pratt wrote, explaining why so many were afflicted with scurvy, herself included. “I pined for vegetables till I could feel my flesh waste away from off my bones!”45 When an elder from the Church visited Louisa, the man saw her state and sat down and wept.46

Given these circumstances, and with Church leadership operating out of a crude hut called the Octagon, President Brigham Young might have been forgiven for tabling education. No one would have blamed him for focusing exclusively on the lower rungs of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. And yet, only four days before setting off for the Rocky Mountains, President Young composed a letter aimed to assist William W. Phelps in acquiring a printing press:
This people cannot live without intelligence, for it is through obedience to that principle they are to receive their exaltation. . . . This principle is sufficient to show you the importance of using all diligence . . . to bring us the materials, whereby we can furnish our children with books, and the Saints with new things to feast the soul.47

After my husband would leave for work, I used to finish my daily housework and then lie down and spend a few hours on Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram. I spent almost 15 hours a week on social media. I couldn’t seem to stop sharing funny videos and images, but I seldom shared messages about the Church. Often at bedtime, my husband had to help me get off social media so I could get to sleep.
At this time, I set a goal to read the Bible all the way through to help me better understand the gospel of Jesus Christ. Each day I dedicated myself to read approximately three chapters. On days that social media ate up some of my time, I would try to read a little extra.
One night I put my Bible beside me to read a few chapters. But before reading, I grabbed my phone and spent the next hour and a half on social media. When I realized what time it was, I put my phone aside and knelt to pray. My prayer didn’t last even 10 seconds. As soon as I stood up, a voice came to my mind, saying, “I would that you invest as much time to prayer as you do to social media.”
I was surprised to receive such a direct message from the Spirit. I knew what to do and didn’t hesitate for a second. Immediately, I deleted the social media apps from my phone and began a social media fast.
A week later, I was endowed in the holy temple. Along with the covenants I made with the Lord, I promised Him that in my free time I would read about the Church and about the Prophet Joseph Smith and continue reading the Bible.
Heavenly Father has greatly blessed me for deciding to make a better choice by getting away from social media and spending more time learning about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.

While at church one Sunday, my daughter Baylor studied the cover of the sacrament meeting program. She really liked the picture of Jesus Christ wearing a red robe. She said that He looked so kind. After church she cut out the picture and put it in a frame in her room so that she could always look at it and remember to try to be like Jesus. When her friends come over to play, she shows them the picture. In this photo she is holding a drawing of her room, including the picture of Jesus on top of her chest of drawers.

In 1970 my mother was diagnosed with a chronic illness that was shutting down the arteries that fed her brain. She was a particularly bright, elegant, and engaging woman with sparkling eyes. But over the next 13 years, her condition declined. It was like losing a good friend piece by piece.
Dad stepped in to become her primary caregiver. At first he made small sacrifices to make her comfortable and cheerful. He prepared her meals, sang her songs, and held her hand. As time went on, however, caring for my mother became more difficult and more physical. It must have been trying for Dad.
As Mother’s condition worsened, my dad’s own health became a concern. I was there when his doctor told him that Mother needed full-time care in a skilled nursing facility. He would likely die if he continued to give the level of care she required, and then she would have no one to take care of her.
For the last 13 months of my mother’s life, Dad visited her in the nursing facility every day that he was not away on a Church assignment. She didn’t recognize him, but that made no difference to him. He spoke with her as though everything was all right. I would see him return from visiting a stake conference in some far-off place. He would be exhausted. But the first thing he would do when he arrived was go see Mother, to bring what cheer he could.
My father could not have taken better care of my mother. I learned much about sacrifice from watching him take care of her.

For a group of young men in Nevada, a journey of 195 miles started with service. It ended with goals accomplished, lessons learned, and bonds formed.
The idea for running the 195-mile relay race came when the young men, as a Scout troop, volunteered to set up and man some stations at the race the previous year.
“We thought it was pretty cool that people were running just for fun,” says Carter M., 17. “Our group thought we wouldn’t mind doing something like that.”
A few months later, their Young Men president, Jon Wayne Nielsen, got serious about the idea and asked the boys if they really wanted to run the race. “He thought that would be something fun for us to do and something that would be a good experience,” Andrew B., 18, says. The young men agreed and decided to participate in the race.
Many of the young men had never run long distances before, so they began training a couple of months before the race. They would train most days of the week.
“Starting out we would do 25 minutes, 30 minutes, or an hour,” says Michael W., 13. “Then we started running 3 to 8 miles. Two weeks before the race, we did a qualifying run that was 10 miles, which we had to complete in order to run the race.”
Some of the Scouts did the training on their own, and others ran together. “Having other people helped a lot,” says Carson M., 15. “A lot of us thought that when we were running by ourselves, we were doing this all on our own, and it didn’t really matter. Having your team running with you is more of a motivation, because you know you’re going to be running with them in the race.”
Finally, the day of the race came, and Carter started off their two-day run at 7:30 a.m. on a Friday morning. Their team of 12 included 10 members of their Scout troop and 2 of their leaders. Each runner completed three legs of the race, ranging between 3 and 12 miles. They all ran in their Scout uniforms. They traveled in two vans when they weren’t running.
After 34 hours of running day and night, the Scouts finished the race on Saturday afternoon. The young men say the race was hard, but they enjoyed it. They were especially impressed by all the support they got from the other teams in the race.
“We were the youngest group to ever do one of these races,” Andrew says. “So it was cool to see all these people who are good runners and do this all the time come up to us and say, ‘It’s cool that you guys are doing this.’ It felt really good.”
The other thing that felt good was the sense of accomplishment the young men had from training for and completing this race.
“I think the race helped me learn that I can set a goal and actually do it,” Michael says. “It really helped me learn that I can do hard things instead of sitting around playing video games.”
The race also helped the young men get closer to the other members of their troop and their priesthood quorums.
“It’s just cool to have fun with people who are members of the Church,” Andrew says. “We all got a lot closer as a quorum, as a priesthood body. That was a bonding experience for us. We all hold the same priesthood, and we all felt our struggles together.”
Along with getting to know one another better, the young men also learned to help and support each other. “We were always there supporting each other,” Carson says. “Everything we did there, we worked as a team. We cheered on everybody as a team.”
“The most important thing I learned from that race would be to care for others around you,” Carter says. “If others need help, you help them out, because you’re going to run into people who want to hear the Lord’s gospel, and how you care for them and others will affect them.”
It may have seemed like just a long race, but these young men learned valuable lessons and skills that will help them in a more important race—the race of life.

In closing, may I share a recent experience. A short time ago I got a call from Elder Holland indicating that he had just received an assignment to accompany a friend of the First Presidency on a visit to BYU. The individual in question is a well-known leader in Asia and heads one of the largest Muslim groups in the world—a group totaling 40 million members. The leader had learned about BYU’s first translation of an Islamic work: The Incoherence of the Philosophers by Al-Ghazali. During the visit he indicated that the book had a profound influence on him as a young man. He was pleased with the translation, but even more important he appreciated the efforts of Professor Daniel Peterson and the scholars working with him to produce a series of Islamic classics in a Western language. He clearly understood the potential cultural bridge that is being built between two worlds—Islam and the West.

Accompanying the leader was a visiting professor at Harvard and a prominent Asian businessman. Following a luncheon and a campus tour, both expressed surprise at the beauty, size, and cleanliness of the campus. They were not aware that BYU is the largest private university in the United States, that students come from each state in the Union and from more than 100 foreign countries. They were amazed to learn that more than 60 languages are taught on campus and more than 80 are spoken. Discussions were held regarding the possibility of further visits, student exchanges, and the recruiting of BYU students for employment.

As the visitors left, I thought how important BYU is as a window on the Church. The glass is not dark but clear and allows viewers to see the values and truths of the restored gospel. Through this window nonmembers feel the importance of education to Church members. They see the youth of the Church, note their strength, and observe the peace within them. The veil that separates is thin when they meet with faculty, discern their cultural sensitivities, and sense the quality of their work and thought.

WESLEY: In 2012, I was skiing with a group of friends, and I went off a jump, and I came down 15 feet onto my neck. That completely changed my life. I broke my neck, rendering me a quadriplegic for the rest of my life. My father was there, and so I actually called out to him and told him I needed help, and he came and was able to give me a blessing right there on the mountain. And it comforted me. It comforted me for the rest of that day and even the rest of the time in this injury. I was told that I would be able to shrug my shoulders and only turn my head for the rest of my life, but I had a great surgeon, and he was able to fix my neck and then a few days later realize that I would be able to actually gain more back. And I was actually able to start moving my arms and get into a manual wheelchair. Another blessing I saw in this was that I was able to graduate a year early. About a year before, I had decided to graduate a year early and do all the work to do that. And from then on, I was able to focus more on my injury.

Each of us is headed down a ski slope called life. And at times, we’ll fall--either spiritually or physically--and we’ll have to turn to our Heavenly Father to get back up and turn to those people around us, and they’ll help us get back up. And just like I got back up on skis within a year, we can get back up and continue on with our life.

I’ve learned so much from this injury. I’ve learned how to see people better. I’ve learned how to come closer to our Heavenly Father and that He’s always there for us. No matter what happens in our life, He is there for us.

President N. Eldon Tanner told of the following experience:

A young man came to me not long ago and said, “I made an agreement with a man that requires me to make certain payments each year. I am in arrears, and I can’t make those payments, for if I do, it is going to cause me to lose my home. What shall I do?”

I looked at him and said, “Keep your agreement.”

“Even if it costs me my home?”

I said, “I am not talking about your home. I am talking about your agreement; and I think your wife would rather have a husband who would keep his word, meet his obligations, keep his pledges or his covenants, and have to rent a home than to have a home with a husband who will not keep his covenants and his pledges.”

He had a difficult choice—his home or his integrity. A man of integrity does not yield or succumb merely because it is hard or expensive or inconvenient.

As I sat across from a member of the stake presidency, my heart started pounding. I had felt jumpy since the stake clerk had called to set an appointment. Would he know I was not worthy to serve?

I had decided that some sins would be easier to take to the judgment bar of God than to reveal here on earth, thinking it would be selfish to disclose things that would bring pain or embarrassment to my wife. Better to overcome them by myself and live with the burden. The only problem was that I couldn’t overcome them on my own.

I sat there as the counselor in the stake presidency extended a call to serve. He asked, “Brother, would you accept this calling?” How I wanted to shout, “Yes!” Instead, almost involuntarily, I heard myself say, “I cannot; I need to clear up some sins.”

Anxiety and relief poured into me simultaneously as I confessed the general nature of the sin. He asked if I had spoken with my bishop. “No.” My wife? “No.” He shook my hand, smiled, told me he was proud of me for confessing, and directed me to talk with the bishop and my wife.

I obeyed, telling my wife first—thereby eliminating my biggest fear. She still loved me! Yes, she was upset, and we would have to work out some things, but she loved me and encouraged me to visit the bishop.

When I went to see the bishop, he immediately welcomed me into his office. With difficulty, I tried to articulate why I was there. After hiding my sins so long, I hardly knew where to start. He lovingly encouraged me to come clean. I explained the general nature of my sins and asked for time to provide the full inventory of my misdeeds. He readily agreed.

I still had yet to fully confess, but I felt the weight of the world lifting from my shoulders. I also felt a renewed hope of freedom, finally, from this burden.

I spent the next weeks praying, reading the scriptures, and creating my inventory to present to both my bishop and my Heavenly Father. First I took my list to Heavenly Father, with a broken heart and a contrite spirit, to let Him know I was sorry and sincerely desired to change. I set another appointment with the bishop and shared my list in its entirety. He didn’t frown, yell, or chastise me; instead, he gave me a big hug. He let me know of his love and the Lord’s love, informing me that I was now on the path of true repentance. I knew it was true.

Confessing my sins, formerly my biggest fear, became one of the most beautiful experiences of my life. It was the first step for me to truly understand the gift and the healing power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

A tiny sunbeam shining bravely through a crack between the logs in her bedroom played across Louisa’s face. She stretched lazily and listened to the shrieking of the sea gulls outside her small window. They seemed to be calling to her to come and play. Louisa knew they had come for their usual breakfast of worms and insects and perhaps an occasional mouse from the fields surrounding the growing settlement. She had come to think of the gulls as her own, because each morning as the sun rose over the mountains they settled first in the field next to her window and then moved to other fields.
Quietly she slipped from her bed onto the rough floor and down the stairs to the door of the cabin. She smiled as she slipped outside. Father had built one of the few two-story log houses. He planned to cover it with stucco later when he wasn’t so busy.
Louisa chose her favorite spot on the porch by the corner post to sit quietly without moving to watch the sea gulls. She arranged her flannel nightgown around her bare toes to keep out the morning chill. Her soft, brown hair fell gently over her shoulders and her clear, blue eyes seemed to shine as brightly as the sunbeams.
With a soft sound the door opened again and her little brother Thomas crept quietly to her side. The sharp sound of her father’s ax in the woods across the field and her mother’s gentle singing in the garden broke the stillness of the beautiful morning. Thomas yawned sleepily and gazed at the birds in the field.
“Father’s chopping wood for winter and Mother’s weeding the garden so the vegetables will grow,” Louisa almost whispered so she wouldn’t frighten the sea gulls. The birds continued to eat as though Louisa and Thomas were not even there.
“Tell me again about the sea gulls, Louisa,” Thomas said sleepily. “Please.”
He was too young to remember when they had crossed the plains in the covered wagon to Utah. Louisa remembered, though.
“Mother and Father packed our clothes, quilts, pots and pans, dishes, food, and everything else they could into the wagon. I put in my doll and helped with some of the smaller things. Father hitched the oxen to the wagon and we started on our long journey. I’d never seen oxen before. They looked like big brown cows to me.”
“What about the sea gulls, Louisa?” Thomas didn’t like to hear about the times they had traveling to their new home in the mountains.
“When we first came to Utah, I helped Father and Mother plant the seeds in the ground. It took Father two days to break the hard ground before we could plant the seeds. All day we worked and dropped a seed at a time on the ground.”
“Where was I?” asked Thomas.
“You wouldn’t remember because you were only a baby then and had just learned to walk,” Louisa answered quietly. “Anyway, when the new plants were just coming up, about this high,” Louisa measured with her fingers, “some crickets came and began eating them. More and more crickets came.”
“What are crickets?”
“Thomas, you know what crickets are. They are those shiny black bugs. They scrape their wings together to make a squeaky sound at night,” Louisa answered.
“Oh. Tell me about the sea gulls.”
Louisa continued her story. “Everyone got sticks and shovels and whatever they could find and began beating the crickets. But more crickets came. Finally, the people gave up. They couldn’t kill all the crickets. They were going to eat up all the food we planted.”
Tears came to Louisa’s eyes remembering how hard she had cried. She had only been four. Now Louisa was eight and too big to cry. But sometimes she did when she was hurt or afraid.
“When did the sea gulls come?” Thomas asked.
“Father and Mother and the rest of the people prayed to our Heavenly Father that the crops would be saved from the hungry crickets. And it wasn’t long until we were surprised to hear a noise in the sky. I looked up and saw sea gulls. At first they looked like more crickets. I hadn’t seen any sea gulls here before, although I used to watch them on the ocean before we came west in the wagon.”
Louisa waited for Thomas to encourage her to go on with the story. But he just lay quietly beside her. The sky was dark blue with streaks of white clouds high in the sky. Most of the sea gulls were quiet, but once in a while one would call.
“The sea gulls came to the ground and ate up the crickets,” Louisa continued. “No one had really noticed them in the valley before. Some people say they were here all the time. But I think Heavenly Father sent them to us when the people prayed. What do you think, Thomas?”
But Thomas didn’t answer. He had fallen asleep in the warm sunshine.

An interesting experiment in social psychology investigates how much the judgments of others influence the way we see things. A psychologist built a small machine containing a bright light which could be switched on in pinpoint bursts. When one views a small burst of light in a dark room, the light appears to move, even though the machine producing the light is stable and doesn’t move at all. This is called the autokinetic (self-movement) effect, and it plays an important role in this experiment.
During the first stage of the experiment one person, let’s call him Bill, is led into a dark room and instructed to judge how far the tiny pinpoints of light move each time he sees a burst of light. His judgment is one inch the first time, two inches the second time, and three inches the third time. After several trials he settles on three inches as his average judgment.
Bill is then excused from the room, and Susan is invited to be seated several feet from the light machine. She then voices her judgments each time she sees a burst of light. She begins with three inches, then two inches, and she finally begins to repeat estimates of about one inch.
After her judgments have been recorded, Bill is then invited back into the room with Susan, and both of them are instructed to voice their individual estimates of another series of light bursts. After the first burst Bill says, “three inches,” and Susan counters with “one inch.” On the next trial Susan says, “one and a half,” and Bill replies, “two and a half.” After several subsequent trials, they concur that the light moves two inches each time.
Few of us are ever invited into an experimental laboratory to share our opinions, but each day of our lives we are required to make important judgments in the laboratory of life. Sometimes we tend to forget some important eternal truths. For example, “the Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil.” The Lord assured us that if we are responsive to his spirit, he will “show [us] the way to judge” (Moro. 7:16). The Savior also referred to himself as “the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12). This light never moves, and if it appears to move from us, we are the ones who have moved.
Sometimes in everyday life, just as in the darkened laboratory, we lose our perspective as familiar landmarks vanish. We think the light has moved. One of the ways we move from the light of Christ is in engaging in the “Not As Bad As Game.” You know how it goes:
“I swear a lot, but I never take the Lord’s name in vain.”
“I don’t pay a full tithing, but at least I pay something.”
“I go to a few questionable movies, but never to an X-rated movie.”
“Necking isn’t as bad as petting.”
“Sure, I cheat on my income tax, but not as bad as other people.”
“I don’t consider it gossip when I’m only telling the truth.”
“If what I wear is a little extreme, it’s not as bad as what others at school wear.”
And so, in the words of our beloved friend Nephi, “thus the devil cheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell” (2 Ne. 28:21).
Although the light never moves, the more often we are in contact with that which is abnormal, degrading, and undesirable, the more normal and desirable it begins to appear. We become less sensitive to the promptings of the still, small voice. In that same great epistle which motivated the boy prophet Joseph to seek the Lord in prayer, the Apostle James shared some great insights into this process:
“Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.
“Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
“But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
“Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. …
“Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls” (James 1:12–15, 21).
Youth of the noble birthright, you have been lovingly commanded to “shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light” (1 Pet. 2:9).
Remember, the light never moves.

On the first day of history class, the teacher started telling some jokes. I laughed at first, but after a while, some of the jokes he told were kind of offensive and inappropriate. He also kept taking the Lord’s name in vain. I started to feel uncomfortable. I knew that I wanted to stand up for what was right, but I had never done anything like that before.
After class, my heart was pounding as I started toward the teacher’s desk. I had never been more anxious in my life. I finally mustered the courage to speak. “Hey, I was wondering if you would mind not taking the Lord’s name in vain. I would really appreciate it.” I anxiously awaited his response.
“OK. What does it mean to take the Lord’s name in vain?” he asked, crossing his arms and cocking his head.
My mind went blank. But suddenly words came out of my mouth that weren’t my own: “Taking the Lord’s name in vain is when you use His name causally in conversation. His name is sacred, so we should respect it.”
He looked at me for a while, then simply said, “OK.” I felt so happy and peaceful inside. I was so grateful Heavenly Father helped me to say what I needed to say. I’m glad that I stood up for what I believed.
Mosiah M., Utah, USA

One afternoon Percy K. Fetzer, a righteous patriarch, came to my office by appointment. He was weeping as we visited together. He explained that he had just returned from the land of Poland, where he had been privileged to give patriarchal blessings to our worthy members there. After a long pause, the patriarch revealed that he had been impressed to promise to members of a German-speaking family by the name of Konietz declarations which could not be fulfilled. He had promised missions. He had promised temple blessings. These were beyond the reach of those whom he had blessed. He whispered that he had tried to withhold the promises he knew were unattainable. It had been no use. The inspiration had come, the promises spoken, the blessings provided.

“What shall I do? What can I say?” he repeated to me.

I replied, “Brother Fetzer, these blessings have not come from you; they have been given of God. Let us kneel and pray to Him for their fulfillment.”

Within several years of that prayer, an unanticipated pact was signed between the Federal Republic of Germany and the Polish nation which provided that German nationals trapped in Poland at war’s end could now enter Germany. The Konietz family, whose members had received these special patriarchal blessings, came to live in West Germany. I had the privilege to ordain the father a bishop in the Dortmund stake of the Church. The family then made that long-awaited trek to the temple in Switzerland. They dressed in clothing of spotless white. They knelt at a sacred altar to await that ordinance which binds father, mother, brothers, and sisters not only for time, but for all eternity. He who pronounced that sacred sealing ceremony was the temple president. More than this, however, he was the same servant of the Lord, Percy K. Fetzer, who, as a patriarch years before, had provided those precious promises in the patriarchal blessings he had bestowed.

Photograph by Hemera/Thinkstock
Thomas Edison worked several years and tried more than 1,000 different materials before he found a suitable filament (the thin wire at the heart of a light bulb) that could provide long-lasting, affordable light. Ever the optimist, Edison viewed each material that didn’t work as a mere stepping-stone toward finding one that would. And once he did, the world was never the same.

Having heard the voice of the Shepherd, they fully committed their lives to living the gospel and following the direction of the Lord’s prophet. Responding to the call to gather to Zion, they left behind their home in England, crossed the Atlantic, and gathered with the Saints in Nauvoo, Illinois.
They embraced the gospel with all their hearts. While trying to get established in their new land, they assisted in the building of the Nauvoo Temple by tithing their labor—spending every 10th day working on the construction of the temple.
They were brokenhearted at the news of the death of their beloved prophet, Joseph Smith, and his brother Hyrum. But they carried on! They stayed true to the faith.
When the Saints were persecuted and driven from Nauvoo, Robert and Maria felt greatly blessed to receive their endowments in the temple shortly before they crossed the Mississippi River and headed west. Although they were uncertain of what their future held, they were certain of their faith and their testimonies.
With six children, they slogged through mud as they crossed Iowa on their way west. They built for themselves a lean-to on the side of the Missouri River at what came to be known as Winter Quarters.
These intrepid pioneers were waiting for apostolic direction on how and when they would be heading further west. Everyone’s plans were altered when Brigham Young, the President of the Quorum of the Twelve, issued a call for men to volunteer to serve in the United States Army in what came to be known as the Mormon Battalion.
Robert Harris Jr. was one of over 500 Mormon pioneer men who responded to that call from Brigham Young. He enlisted, even though it meant he would leave behind his pregnant wife and six little children.
Why would he and the other men do such a thing?
The answer can be given in my great-great-grandfather’s own words. In a letter that he wrote to his wife when the battalion was on its way to Santa Fe, he wrote, “My faith is so strong as ever [and when I think of the things that Brigham Young told us], I believe it about the same as if the Great God had told me.”
In short, he knew he was listening to a prophet of God, as did the other men. That is why they did it! They knew they were led by a prophet of God.
In that same letter, he expressed his tender feelings for his wife and children and told of his constant prayers that she and the children would be blessed.
Later in the letter, he made this powerful statement: “We must not forget the things which you and I heard and [experienced] in the Temple of the Lord.”
Combined with his earlier testimony that “we are led by a Prophet of God,” these two sacred admonitions have become like scripture to me.
Eighteen months after departing with the battalion, Robert Harris was safely reunited with his beloved Maria. They stayed true and faithful to the restored gospel throughout their lives. They had 15 children, 13 of whom lived to maturity. My grandmother Fannye Walker, of Raymond, Alberta, Canada, was one of their 136 grandchildren.
Grandma Walker was proud of the fact that her grandfather had served in the Mormon Battalion, and she wanted all of her grandchildren to know it. Now that I am a grandfather, I understand why it was so important to her. She wanted to turn the hearts of the children to the fathers. She wanted her grandchildren to know of their righteous heritage—because she knew it would bless their lives.

When I was young, I worked in my father’s factory during vacations. The first question my father always asked after I received my salary was “What are you going to do with your money?”

I knew the answer and responded, “Pay my tithing and save for my mission.”

After working with him for about eight years and constantly answering his same question, my father figured he had taught me about paying my tithing. What he didn’t realize was that I had learned this important principle in just one weekend. Let me tell you how I learned that principle.

After some events related to a civil war in Central America, my father’s business went bankrupt. He went from about 200 full-time employees to fewer than five sewing operators who worked as needed in the garage of our home. One day during those difficult times, I heard my parents discussing whether they should pay tithing or buy food for the children.

On Sunday, I followed my father to see what he was going to do. After our Church meetings, I saw him take an envelope and put his tithing in it. That was only part of the lesson. The question that remained for me was what we were going to eat.

Early Monday morning, some people knocked on our door. When I opened it, they asked for my father. I called for him, and when he arrived, the visitors told him about an urgent sewing order they needed as quickly as possible. They told him that the order was so urgent that they would pay for it in advance. That day I learned the principles of paying tithing and the blessings that follow.

President David O. McKay told about the grief suffered in a family due to the loss of a precious, priceless son. His death had occurred as the result of a tragic accident, and the parents were inconsolable. The mother was particularly troubled and went about her round of duties relentlessly trying to block out her intense sorrow.

One day the mother was at home, quietly going about her work, and her thoughts turned toward the son they mourned so much. And then something very unusual happened. This son came to her briefly. He explained that he had tried to visit his father, but his father’s life was too busy, and he hadn’t been able to get through to him. He wanted his parents to know that he was fine and that there was no need to worry about him (see Gospel Ideals [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Company, 1953], pp. 525–26).

This spiritual experience was a great source of comfort to the mother, and to the father when she recounted it to him. But the father learned a great lesson. Sometimes we need to be still for a moment. We need to slow down and be less frenetic. Psalm 46:10 teaches us, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

When Ryan Wilkinson moved from Horsefly, British Columbia, Canada, to Bountiful, Utah, during his junior year of high school, he left Horsefly with $255 in his savings account.
That’s $255, Canadian. Or somewhere in the vicinity of 190 U.S. dollars.
Ryan’s goal was to leave for a mission soon after he turned 19 in February 2000. Since Ryan knew he needed approximately $9,000 for the two years he planned to be in the mission field, he could do the math. “What I had in the bank wouldn’t even last me a month as a missionary,” he explains.
So Ryan did what anybody in need of eight or nine grand would do.
“I went looking for a job.”
In Canada, Ryan had worked wrapping potatoes in aluminum foil at a nearby restaurant. “I got $5 for each box,” he says. Lots of potatoes but not much money.
So with less than two years before he turned 19, Ryan put a plan in place once he got to Utah. “I figured if I could earn $2,000 before I graduated from high school, I could earn the rest by getting a full-time job once I was out of school,” he says. The plan was feasible since Ryan decided he wasn’t going to go to college until after his mission.
When Ryan put on the cap and gown for Bountiful High School’s class of ’99 commencement exercises, he had about $1,800 in his account, just short of his goal but in the neighborhood. All that money came from his work as a bagger and then as a cashier at a local grocery store. “I even got a 15-cent raise when I was promoted,” he says with a smile.
Not long after graduation, a neighbor who was building a house down the street from the Wilkinsons approached Ryan and his brother Mark about working construction for the summer. “We didn’t know what we were doing, but we learned as we went,” Ryan says. “That was a pretty good job. We put on the roof, and I put on all the shingles. I helped put in the windows and doors, and I helped pour the cement for the basement floor.”
Ka-ching. Ka-ching. The money began adding up.
But two jobs, apparently, weren’t enough.
“I heard about this other job—a graveyard shift—from midnight to six in the morning where I’d be unloading boxes from a truck,” he says. “And it paid a lot more than being a cashier. But since it would be a harder job, I decided to quit my [grocery store] job.”
But being a conscientious employee, Ryan gave two weeks’ notice at the grocery store. And this is where his schedule became a little tricky.
“I did the three jobs for two weeks. I’d start in the morning and go build the house from eight until about five. Then I’d go to the store from seven o’clock to eleven,” he says. “After I cashed out the money, I’d head to the loading dock. I worked from midnight to six.”
What about sleep?
“I didn’t get a lot,” he admits.
Fortunately, that torturous schedule ended, and he could settle back in to the relaxation of working only two jobs.
“Yeah, everybody says that going on a mission will be the hardest thing I’ll ever do in my life,” Ryan adds. “But it seems that going on a mission will be a break for me.”
Guess he’s finding out.
On March 1, Elder Wilkinson entered the Missionary Training Center. Two months later he left for the Italy Rome Mission. He earned a little extra for the purchase of suits, shirts, shoes, and all the other things he needed to be a missionary. But he had the $9,000 in his account for the 24 months he’d be gone.
“I always knew I was going to earn the money for my mission,” Ryan adds. “I just didn’t know how.”
He does now.