Gospel Story Finder

In 1993, after I had served as president of the Mexico Tuxtla Gutiérrez Mission, we traveled as a family to see my parents, who lived in northern Mexico. During the trip we talked about the joy of serving the Lord and seeing the change in people who had accepted the gospel during the three years we were in the mission. We were commenting about those people who were baptized, confirmed, and had received the priesthood and the ones we knew had entered the temple and were sealed as families for eternity.
My youngest son asked a question that made me reflect: “Dad, are you sealed to your parents?” I told him that because my father had been less active for many years, he and my mother were not sealed in the temple. To help him become active, I thought up a plan. It involved my children, and I explained to them how we would do it: Every Sunday my father would get up early to take my mother and sister to church, only to return home, wait for the services to end, then go back to pick them up. So I assigned my children to go with him and say, “Grandpa, would you do us a favor?” I knew his answer would be, “Whatever you want, my children.” Then they would ask him if he would go with them to church and stay with them so he could listen to their testimonies. It was the first Sunday of the month. I also knew my father would give any excuse not to go, so I planned to enter the room to help my children convince him.
The time soon came for executing the plan. My daughter, Susana, approached my father and asked him about the favor. Sure enough, my father told her he would do anything he could for them. Then came the invitation to go to church, and just as we had predicted, he used this excuse: “I can’t because I haven’t even showered.” That’s when my wife and I, who were hiding behind the door, shouted, “We’ll wait for you!”
When we realized he was not making a decision, my wife and I entered the room and, together with our children, began to insist: “Shower! Shower!” Then what we expected happened. My father came with us, he stayed for the services, listened to the testimonies of my children, his heart was softened, and from that Sunday on he never missed church. Months later, at the age of 78, he and my mother were sealed, and we, his children, were sealed to them.
I know that thanks to the power of godliness manifest in the ordinances of the temple, I can now be reunited with my parents for all eternity, even after death.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints found fertile ground in Nana Esi Ninsin VIII’s community through her own spiritual journey. After years of observing and studying the Church online, she formally joined in 2017 alongside her brother Charles and cousin Joannes. But the Church did not meet in a chapel; it met in her palace.

With no formal meetinghouse nearby, Nana Esi Ninsin VIII opened her palace for Sunday services, missionary lessons, and gospel study. Her home became a sanctuary for faith and fellowship, especially for those curious but hesitant to attend a formal church.

“I invited the missionaries to come during our skills training,” she explains. “We’d have an hour of gospel teaching before the training began.” This grassroots approach helped the Church gain traction in a predominantly Muslim community, where religious diversity required sensitivity and trust building.

This fact was brought forcibly to mind in August of 1958 when I was in Hamburg, Germany, attending a district missionary conference. Presiding at the conference was Elder Henry D. Moyle, then of the Council of the Twelve. We had a question-and-answer session, and one of the missionaries asked a question in which he referred to President David O. McKay as the head of the Church. Elder Moyle interrupted him and in a very forceful manner stated that Jesus Christ was the head of the Church, not David O. McKay. The significant point here is that Elder Moyle knew that Jesus is the Son of God, that he lives, even today, and that he stands at the head of this church.

A true story from the USA.
Alex stomped down the stairs and let out a loud sigh.
Mom looked up from her book. “What’s wrong?”
“Nobody will share with me!” Alex said. “I hate being a middle kid.” Alex’s brothers always got what they wanted. It just wasn’t fair.
“I’m sure if you asked nicely, your brothers would share with you,” Mom said.
Alex frowned. “I did ask nicely!”
“How about you try setting a timer? That way each of you gets the same amount of time to play.”
“I did set a timer!” Alex said. “But maybe I’ll set two timers to be extra sure.” He grabbed the extra timer from the kitchen counter and marched up the stairs. His younger brother, David, was playing a game on the TV.
“Mom says you have to share,” Alex said. He set the timer for five minutes. “When this goes off, it’s my turn.”
The next day, when Alex and his older brother, Jake, both wanted to play a game, they set a timer for exactly 30 minutes each. When David and Jake were both playing with blocks, they counted out exactly the same number for each person. And when David and Alex both wanted the last chocolate chip cookie, they carefully split it exactly in half. Things were finally starting to feel fair.
But then came dinner …
That night, they were having spaghetti and meatballs! Jake started piling pasta on his plate before Alex could even grab the spoon.
“Hey, no fair,” Alex said. “I’m hungry too!”
Dad put a hand on his shoulder. “Alex, there’s plenty of food for everyone. Look, I’ll get you the same amount that Jake has.” Dad put some pasta on Alex’s plate.
After they blessed the food, everyone started eating. When Alex had finished his food, he was still hungry. He peeked into the pot in the middle of the table. There was one last meatball on top of the pile of pasta. He spooned it onto his plate.
“No fair!” David said. “That’s the last one.”
Jake pointed at the meatball with his fork. “I want some too. Let’s split it.”
“Split it?” Alex said. “For three of us? But it’s so small.”
Jake and David nodded. “It would be fair.”
Jake took Alex’s plate and began carefully dividing the meatball into three parts. Alex watched as the meatball got smaller and smaller.
Mom laughed. “Those are pretty small pieces!”
Dad laughed too. “It doesn’t always have to be exactly fair,” he said. “Maybe we could try to be better at sharing our things instead of splitting everything up.”
Alex looked down at the small pieces of meatball. It was a little silly. Did he actually care that much about a meatball? Maybe he did need to learn to share more.
The next day, when Jake and Alex both wanted to play with blocks, they decided to build something together. When David and Jake were outside, Alex let them take turns riding his bike. And when everyone wanted to play a game on the TV, Alex didn’t set any timers. Sharing and being kind actually felt better than being perfectly fair.
That night, when Jake and Alex both wanted the last roll at dinner, Alex told Jake he could have the whole thing.
“Thanks!” Jake winked. “Are you sure you don’t want to split it in three?”
David and Alex laughed. “Definitely not!”

“Amy,” Steve said breaking the awkward silence, “today when I was climbing, I couldn’t think about anything except those four sets of missionaries I went through during my conversion. Elder Snow gave up a baseball scholarship. Elder Decker postponed his education. Another missionary’s father had to work two jobs to support him. And then all I thought about was a postage stamp.”
Amy shook her head, pulling a weed from the soil and picking it apart. “You climbed Storm Mountain, fasting and everything, and all you could think about was a postage stamp?”
Steve’s voice was barely audible. Amy knew right away he was going to talk about his mother. “Once when I was six or seven years old and my dad was out of town, my mom needed a postage stamp to mail Uncle Robert’s birthday card. We lived in the country. The mailman would pick up the mail but couldn’t sell us stamps. Mom couldn’t wait until Dad got back home with the car or the card wouldn’t arrive at the right time.
“Mom sent me to Mrs. Harold’s down the lane. She was an old lady who kind of looked after Mom and me when Dad was on the road. Of course Mrs. Harold loaned me the stamp, and we mailed the card on time. But the next day Mom told me we were going to pack a picnic lunch and walk the two miles to the post office to buy a stamp to replace the one we borrowed from Mrs. Harold.”
Steve picked up a little rock and tossed it down the hillside. “I remember saying to her, ‘Why don’t we just bake her some cookies or just give her ten cents to cover the cost of the postage stamp?’
“And then I said, ‘We could wait until Dad gets home in a few days and drive to the post office. Why today? What’s a couple more days?’
“Mom put her arms around me. Then she said, ‘Because today is the day we owe for the postage stamp, not tomorrow or the next day.’”
Steve tightened his arm around Amy. “Uncle Robert got his card when he needed it, and the debt was paid when it was owed.”

As the Swiss movers were packing our household belongings preparatory to our return to America, the doorbell rang. A special-delivery mailman had a package for us. When opened, it revealed a green pillow with an embroidered message of love on it, the handiwork of Sister Alice Rusterholz. Our hearts and feelings swelled as we thought of this wonderful older sister. For four years she had graced our Sunday dinner table with her sweet spirit and lively sense of humor. For many years as a single, unmarried sister and the only member of the Church from her family, she struggled to come to church. Early Sunday morning she would leave her humble second-floor apartment. With great effort due to a crippled leg, she would walk down the outside stairway and on to the Küsnacht train station, beginning her journey of one hour and 15 minutes by train, tram, bus, and a final walk to our meetinghouse. What a blessing it had been for us in that beautiful land to pick up Sister Rusterholz every Sunday morning, accompany her to church, and conclude with dinner in our home before returning her to her apartment.

Another time, I was sent to speak to leaders of churches in the United States and ministers of those churches who had met in Minneapolis to deal with the problem of competition among churches.
When I arrived, I found that I was assigned to be a speaker. My subject was to be: Why there was a need for a restoration of the true Church through Joseph Smith. I was a last-minute substitute for Elder Neal A. Maxwell.
When I arrived in the city the night before the meetings and looked at the program, I called President Hinckley. I told him that the meetings were to last three days, that many talks were to be given at the same time, that the crowd could choose which one to attend. I told him that I thought if I told the truth, I feared that no one would come to my second session and that I might be coming home very quickly. I asked him what he thought I should do. He said, “Use your best judgment.”
I prayed through the night. Somewhere near dawn, I was sure I was to say about the Restoration not, “This is what we believe happened to Joseph Smith and why we believe it happened,” but, “This is what happened to Joseph Smith, and this is why the Lord did it.” In the nighttime I was given no assurance of the outcome, just a clear direction—go forward.
To my amazement, after my talk the ministers lined up to speak to me. Every one of them, one after another coming to me, told essentially the same story. Each of them had met a member of the Church somewhere in their lives that they admired. Many of them said that they lived in a community where the stake president had come to the aid of not just his members but of the community in a disaster. They asked if I could take back their greeting and their thanks to people I not only didn’t know but had no hope of ever meeting.
By the end of the three days of meetings, larger and larger crowds were coming to hear the message of the Restoration of the gospel and the true Church of Jesus Christ not because they believed the message but because they had seen goodness in people’s lives—the fruits of that restoration.

On a recent sunny summer day, the noise and excitement that 75 young people can generate brought life back to the area. The youth and leaders of the Highland Utah Ninth Ward came to help clean, fix, paint, weed, clear wood, scrub, and repair what they could of the old town. They wanted to participate in a service project that really meant something. Their bishop, LaMar Hatch was born in Gem Valley. He knew that the history foundation working to preserve the Mormon ghost town of Chesterfield needed a lot of donated muscle power, so he suggested the project to the Young Men and Young Women class presidents. They loved the idea.
As the caravan of cars and vans pulled into the valley, loaded with youth and leaders ready to work, the group was a little surprised by what they saw. Somehow they imagined a ghost town like they saw in the movies with swirling dust blowing tumbleweeds down the streets. On this day, the valley was lush and green with alfalfa to feed the cattle that are still grazed in the area. More than one person described it as looking like a big, green golf course.
The group scattered among the old buildings doing things some of them had never tried before. Several girls were enthusiastically sloshing white paint on themselves and on the outhouse behind the old chapel. After lunch the same group, with the paint thoroughly dried on their clothes, was dusting all the old framed photographs lining the back wall of the chapel.
Heather Nelson was fascinated by the faces she saw in the black-and-white photos of the people who once attended church here. “This is more fun than painting, and I had a blast painting.”
Some of the young men helped pour new concrete steps in front of the school. It was the first time they had ever tried their hand at pouring concrete. Of course, they had plenty of expert supervision, and they weren’t shy about getting into it up to their elbows when holes needed to be filled or excess moved from one place to another.
Many of the jobs that needed to be done were just plain hard work, like clearing dead wood away from old houses. But you didn’t hear many complaints. Everyone was busy.
While resting for a minute after lunch, Scott Sheffield said, “I thought we’d come up here and no one would be working. I thought we might end up destroying the ghost town instead of fixing it up.” But as they started clearing away the weeds, it almost immediately started looking better.
When the group was gathered on the benches inside the little one-room chapel, they couldn’t help noticing how some things about the Church were very much the same as they were one hundred years ago.
A hundred years ago, the young people would push back the benches and hold a dance after working hard all day. Today, this group was looking forward to the dance that evening hosted by the Chesterfield Ward. A hundred years ago, the youth might get together for ice cream after sending a wagon covered with canvas into the mountains to bring back snow to use in the ice cream freezers. Today, the youth would cool off with ice cream from the drive-in and a swim in the big outdoor pool at nearby Lava Hot Springs.
And one hundred years ago, young people gathered in their chapel to be taught about a Heavenly Father who loves them and the way to return to him. Today, the Highland Ninth Ward enjoyed being together to learn about those same gospel truths.
Although the youth in this group don’t really consider themselves pioneers, they are in much the same way that the residents of old Chesterfield were. By living the gospel and in turn teaching their children to stay close to the Lord, they can influence dozens and maybe hundreds of people. By looking back at the example set by teenagers a hundred years ago, maybe the youth of Highland Ninth Ward can know that they live their lives not just for themselves but for all those who come after.

Our family has not been spared the adversities of life. Growing up, I admired large families. Such families felt appealing to me, especially when I found the Church in my teens through my maternal uncle, Sarfo, and his wife in Takoradi, Ghana.
When Hannah and I were married, we desired the fulfillment of our patriarchal blessings, which indicated that we would be blessed with many children. However, prior to the birth of our third boy, it became medically clear that Hannah would not be able to have another baby. Gratefully, though Kenneth was born in a life-threatening situation to both him and his mother, he arrived safely, and his mother recovered. He was able to begin to fully participate in our family life—including Church attendance, daily family prayers, scripture study, home evening, and wholesome recreational activities.
Though we had to adjust our expectations of a large family, it was a joy to put into practice the teachings from “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” with our three beloved children. Following those teachings added much meaning to my growing faith.
As the proclamation states: “Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan. Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity.” As we put these principles into practice, we were blessed.
However, one weekend during my service as a stake president, we experienced perhaps the worst trial parents can face. Our family returned from a Church activity and gathered for lunch. Then our three boys went out within our compound to play.
My wife felt repeated impressions that something might be wrong. She asked me to check on the children while we were washing the dishes. I felt they were safe since we could hear their voices of excitement from their play.
When we both finally went to check on our sons, to our dismay we found little 18-month-old Kenneth helpless in a bucket of water, unseen by his brothers. We rushed him to the hospital, but all attempts to revive him proved futile.
We were devastated that we would not have the opportunity to raise our precious child during this mortal life. Though we knew Kenneth would be part of our family eternally, I found myself questioning why God would let this tragedy happen to me when I was doing all I could to magnify my calling. I had just come home from fulfilling one of my duties in ministering to the Saints. Why couldn’t God look upon my service and save our son and our family from this tragedy? The more I thought about it, the more bitter I became.
My wife never blamed me for not responding to her promptings, but I learned a life-changing lesson and made two rules, never to be broken:
Rule 1: Listen to and heed the promptings of your wife.
Rule 2: If you are not sure for any reason, refer to rule number 1.
Though the experience was shattering and we continue to grieve, our overwhelming burden was eventually eased. My wife and I learned specific lessons from our loss. We came to feel united and bound by our temple covenants; we know we can claim Kenneth as ours in the next world because he was born in the covenant. We also gained experience necessary to minister to others and empathize with their pain. I testify that our bitterness has since dispersed as we exercised faith in the Lord. Our experience continues to be hard, but we have learned with the Apostle Paul that we “can do all things through Christ which [strengthens us]” if we focus on Him.

Father and I are ready to leave in the morning to join the Saints. Uncle Samuel came today all the way from Avery to persuade Father to give up Mormonism. My dearest cousin, Lydia, came with him. I haven’t seen Lydia since Mother’s funeral. Lydia told me that I needn’t go with Father. I could live with her family. She said Father had been deluded and led astray by the Mormons.
I told Lydia that I also believed the Mormon church is the only true church on earth.
She said, “But that Joseph Smith is dead now. Father said he was possessed by devils!”
My heart hurt when I heard those words. “No,” I told her, “Joseph Smith was a prophet just like the prophets in the Bible. I know this is true!”
Lydia stared at me. “I feel sorry for you. I guess we’ll never see each other again.”
Am I going to be without friends for the rest of my life?

“I recall that when I was eleven years old my father told me that I had to earn all the money for my own clothes and that I should also start saving for my mission. When my mission call came, I told my father that we needed to go down to the bank and make necessary arrangements for my mission money to be withdrawn monthly and sent to me. I will never forget my father saying, ‘You didn’t think I was really going to make you pay for your mission, did you? I just wanted you to learn to work. I wouldn’t want to miss the blessing of supporting you in the mission field. You save your money, son, you’ll need it when you return.’
“My older brother, Ron, has always been an inspiration to me. I recall one evening when he came home from a Church youth meeting and announced to the family that his teacher had told him that he had to gain his own testimony and receive his own witness and to not rely on that of others. He said—almost prophetically—‘I’m going to gain that personal witness and testimony, no matter how long it takes or what the cost.’
“Ron began reading and studying the scriptures and fasting and praying. One morning a short time later, he was suddenly stricken by a paralysis. He could not move his body and his right side was in terrible pain. He was barely able to whisper to Dad that he wanted a blessing. No sooner had Dad finished blessing his son than Ron was miraculously cured! My brother uncoiled his tense body, straightened up, and was free of pain.
“When he was later examined by a doctor, the diagnosis was that he had had what appeared to be a ruptured appendix but that no trace of damaged tissue was found in his body. Later, my brother told me that during this experience he received his special witness that the Book of Mormon and the gospel were true. He wanted me to know, however, that he had received this knowledge before Dad had blessed him before his healing. He truly had shown faith before the miracle.
“This experience really influenced my life and at age twelve I began a fervent study of the Book of Mormon. I, too, received a personal witness and confirmation of the truthfulness of the gospel. I knew then, and have never doubted since, that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and that the gospel is true.
“My message to the children of the world is this: study and pray while you are young so that you, too, might receive this same witness.”

My wife’s grandfather James B. Keysor has always impressed me with his own mighty change of heart. Born of faithful Latter-day Saint pioneer ancestors in the Salt Lake Valley in 1906, he lost his mother at a young age and struggled throughout his youth. His teenage and young adult years were spent away from the Church, during which time he acquired a number of bad habits. Nevertheless, he met and married a faithful woman, and together they raised five children.

In 1943, following the difficult years of the Great Depression and during World War II, Bud, as he was called by friends and family, left Utah and moved to Los Angeles, California, to look for employment. During this time away from home, he lived with his sister and her husband, who was serving as the bishop of their ward.

With the love and influence of his sister and brother-in-law, he started to revive his interest in the Church and began to read the Book of Mormon each night before going to sleep.

One night, while he was reading in Alma chapter 34, his heart was touched as he read the following words:
“Yea, I would that ye would come forth and harden not your hearts any longer. …
“For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors.”

While he was reading these verses, a powerful feeling came over him and he knew that he had to change, to repent, and he knew what he must do. He got up from his bed and knelt down and began to pray, pleading with the Lord to forgive him and to give him the strength he needed to make changes in his life. His prayer was answered, and from that time forward, he never looked back. Bud went on to serve in the Church and remained a faithful, committed Latter-day Saint to the end of his life. He was changed in every way. His mind, his heart, his actions, his very being were changed.

People rarely walked up the big hill to get to my house. The ice-cream man wouldn’t waste his gas going up such a steep hill, the paperboy refused to ride his bike to deliver papers there, and even my dog would never run away because he would have to run back up the hill to get home! But at least once a week, Linda huffed and puffed up the big hill on her way up, up, up to my house.
Linda was an older, heavyset woman with short black-and-white hair like salt and pepper. Some people in our neighborhood said she was disabled, but my mother told me that Linda was special. Inside, she was still a little girl. Whenever Linda came to visit, she would greet us with a great big hug and a kiss on the cheek. We could not help smiling when she was around.
One day Linda came jaunting up the hill and bolted into the house. She never knocked or rang the doorbell; she just came in and said, “Linda is here!” Today she was so excited that she grabbed my brother Roy and danced him around the room, yelling, “I’m invited to the Snowflake Ball! Linda is invited to the Snowflake Ball!”
The Snowflake Ball was a fancy dance party for the people who went to Linda’s school. She was so excited to get dressed up that she could not talk about anything else. “I want to wear a big, red, fluffy dress, sparkles in my hair, and red, sparkly shoes,” she said. “I want to wear roses in my hair too. Do you like red, Katie?”
“I like red, but I like pink best,” I answered truthfully.
“I like red the best. I have always wanted to wear a beautiful red dress and be a fancy lady.”
Mother offered to sew Linda’s dream dress. We bought some red shoes at the discount store and glued glitter on them so they sparkled. Every time Linda tried on her dress and shoes, she cried when she had to take them off again. She liked looking as beautiful on the outside as she was on the inside.
Finally the day of the Snowflake Ball arrived. It was a school day for me, but I felt excited for Linda’s big party. At lunch I sat down outside with my friends. From a distance I heard someone yelling my name. “Katie! Katie! My best friend, Katie! Look at me! Katie, I’m so pretty! Katie, look at my pretty, fluffy, puffy, sparkly, happy dress. Katie, look at your friend Linda! I am a fancy lady. Linda is right here. Look, Katie!”
I saw Linda waving from across the street, all dressed up. I would have waved back, but I noticed my friends’ faces. They looked surprised.
“You know that weird lady?” Natalie asked. “She walks all over our neighborhood. My mother says she’s crazy.”
I stammered for an answer.
Then Kelly added, “I see her all over our neighborhood too. Look at her ugly dress! She looks so funny!” They all started to laugh.
Natalie smirked and again asked, “So you know that crazy lady? Is she your best friend or something? How does she know your name?”
Across the street Linda was still waving to me, but she had stopped yelling. I could tell she was sad that I had not answered. I sat quietly for a moment. “Um, I think she knows my name because she walks by our house and hears my mom calling me,” I lied. “Of course I don’t know her.”
Kelly, Natalie, and the other girls seemed relieved and continued joking about her. I felt terrible. I could not bring myself to look across the street at Linda. I couldn’t eat the rest of my lunch; I couldn’t even talk. I knew I had done something wrong.
When I was baptized the year before, I had promised to try to be like Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost was now telling me that I had broken my promise. Jesus loved Linda and would never treat her this way, and He loved me and would never want me to act this way.
As the girls began to clear away their lunches, I jumped up. “Stop! I am friends with that lady,” I blurted out. “Her name is Linda, and she is a friend of my family. Please don’t be mean to her. She is special, and we love her.” Some of the girls suppressed smiles, but others said they had special friends like Linda too.
Linda sat on the street curb looking sadly down at her sparkly shoes. Now it was my turn to shout and wave my arms. “Linda, Linda, my best friend, Linda. Look at me! Linda, you look so pretty! You are a very fancy lady! Linda, look at your pretty, puffy, sparkly, happy dress! Linda, look at your friend Katie. Katie is right here, Linda!”
Linda lifted her head. She smiled and waved. The more I waved and shouted, the more she waved back and smiled. Soon she and I were jumping up and down, waving, blowing kisses to each other, and smiling. We had attracted the attention of all the students outside, and they heard me say that Linda was my friend.
Linda had a wonderful time at the Snowflake Ball. She really did look like a fancy lady. Mother and I volunteered to serve punch at the dance so we could watch Linda have a good time.
After the ball Mother, Linda, and I walked up that great big hill to my house. I apologized to Linda for being slow to wave to her. She didn’t even seem to remember, and I thought how lucky I was to have such a forgiving friend. We had a lovely walk home together, my best friends and I. Somehow, with them on each side of me, that great big hill up, up, up to my house didn’t seem so hard after all.

One morning at work the factory bosses told all employees that in addition to our hourly wage, we would begin receiving piecework incentive pay. The more we produced, the more we would earn. This happened four months before I left on my mission, so now I could make more money to help pay for it.
Production went up significantly, and so did our pay. I worked on a three-man rubber-curing press, and every time I saw a mold come out of the incubator and trip the automatic counter, I imagined my bank account balance increasing.
The new pay incentive, however, created an incentive to cheat. A co-worker would often sneak beside the automatic counter, give its trip lever a few extra yanks, and return to his workstation. I grinned when I saw this happen, shook my head, and continued my work. I felt that as long as I wasn’t messing with the counter myself, then my integrity was still intact.
But before long I realized that because I got paid the same amount as the other men on my team, then it didn’t really matter who pulled on the counter. I was just as guilty of stealing from the company as the others were. Was I going to fund my mission with stolen money?
I agonized over what to do. The extra money in our paychecks wasn’t much. A lot of people would say it wasn’t worth troubling over, but I was troubled. I knew I had to confront my co-workers.
“Are you kidding me?” asked Bob (names have been changed), the senior team member. “Everybody cheats. Even the management. They expect it.”
He saw no need to change. What else could I do? Even without inflating our production numbers, our press was the most productive on our shift. I often heard workers on other presses say they wished they worked on our team.
“I could trade places with Jack at the other press,” I suggested to Bob.
“I think you’re being stupid,” he told me, “but I can work with Jack.”
After Jack and I switched teams, Bob often reminded me how much more money he was making than I was. Lyrics from “How Firm a Foundation” came to mind: “Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed.” Those words helped me shrug off Bob’s taunts.
Not long afterward, Bob approached me. He said Jack was not working out, and my team wanted me back. I was surprised. I told Bob that I would return but there couldn’t be any cheating. He agreed. My old team welcomed me back warmly, and the cheating stopped.
I expected to be tested before going on my mission, but I had no idea that my honesty and courage would be tried. I am grateful that when I needed strength to do what was right, the Lord upheld me with His “righteous, omnipotent hand.”1

Almost thirty years ago I knew a boy, even a priest, who held the authority of the Aaronic Priesthood. As the bishop, I was his quorum president. This boy, Robert, stuttered and stammered, void of control. Self-conscious, shy, fearful of himself and all others, he had an impediment of speech which was devastating to him. Never did he fulfill an assignment; never would he look another in the eye; always would he gaze downward. Then one day, through a set of unusual circumstances, he accepted an assignment to perform the priestly responsibility to baptize another.

I sat next to him in the baptistry of this sacred tabernacle. He was dressed in immaculate white, prepared for the ordinance he was to perform. I asked Robert how he felt. He gazed at the floor and stuttered almost incoherently that he felt terrible.

We both prayed fervently that he would be made equal to his task. Then the clerk read the words: “Nancy Ann McArthur will now be baptized by Robert Williams, a priest.” Robert left my side, stepped into the font, took little Nancy by the hand, and helped her into that water which cleanses human lives and provides a spiritual rebirth. He then gazed as though toward heaven and, with his right arm to the square, repeated the words “Nancy Ann McArthur, having been commissioned of Jesus Christ, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (see D&C 20:73). Not once did he stammer. Not once did he stutter. Not once did he falter. A modern miracle had been witnessed.

In the dressing room, as I congratulated Robert, I expected to hear this same uninterrupted flow of speech. I was wrong. He gazed downward and stammered his reply of gratitude.

To each of you this day, I testify that when Robert acted in the authority of the Aaronic Priesthood, he spoke with power, with conviction, and with heavenly help.

Preparation—temporal as well as spiritual—has been a frequent theme of President Romney’s sermons. For decades he has been an important person in the Church’s welfare program. When, as a young bishop in the mid-1930s, he heard the Brethren urge the Saints to store food and other necessities, he immediately built shelves at home and in the basement of the meetinghouse and filled them with clothing and food. Later, as stake president, he developed a prototype of the new program on a stake and regional basis.

An item posted on a local Peterborough Facebook page caught the eye of BBC Radio host Dotty McLeod, who wondered why two young men would offer to provide gardening and household service for free.
At her request, Elder Nathan Kidd and Elder Jarom Beale, of the England Leeds Mission, answered questions live on her breakfast show of 5 October 2020.
Elder Kidd, from the USA, and Elder Beale, from England, serve as missionaries for the Church in Peterborough, their purpose being to share messages of hope that come through faith in Jesus Christ.
Inherent in that faith is serving others as Christ would. The elders shared stories of serving in the community as well as relating how people responded to their offer, which led to delivering food and clothing to those in need, gardening, painting, and lifting heavy items.

The first is illustrated by an experience when a stake president and I took the opportunity to visit a young woman in her home near Atlanta, Georgia. She was young; her husband had been killed in a car accident; she was living in an apartment with her two young children. I suppose we expected to find her upset and discouraged at having received a “bump” not of her own making. On the contrary, she was cheerful, calm, and very gracious. She thanked us for coming and said, as nearly as I can recall: “Brethren, I want you to know that I believe in the plan of redemption. I am grateful to my Savior for the promise of a glorious resurrection with my husband. I am grateful for his redeeming sacrifice.” Then, putting her arms around her two children, she said, “Our faith in Jesus Christ will see us through.”
We came expecting to comfort and strengthen, and we left humbled, buoyed, and blessed by her wonderful expression of faith.

Rooma didn’t really want to study the scriptures. Vaitiare didn’t really want to go to seminary. And they didn’t have to. But when they chose to, their lives changed.
Why would a teen choose to spend two hours every Thursday night studying the scriptures with his mom? A year ago Rooma Terooatea of Tahiti probably would have wondered the same thing.
Now he might ask why a teen would choose not to.
During three years of seminary, Rooma had never really paid attention when his teachers assigned scriptures to read for the next lesson. “I didn’t want to read them,” he says. “The scriptures really didn’t jump out at me.”
But he wondered why Church leaders in his ward and stake always used the scriptures in their talks and lessons. He watched his leaders. He noticed how easy it was for his stake president to quote from the scriptures.
So when the Faaa Tahiti Stake divided the seminary students into teams to hold scripture mastery competitions throughout his last year of seminary, Rooma decided to give the scriptures a chance.
That’s when his weekly study sessions with his mother began. Each Thursday night they studied together for the class competition the next day, learning where important verses are and even memorizing many of them.
And that’s when things began to change for Rooma. His scripture study strengthened his relationship with his mom. He started to see the parallels between what the scriptures teach and what is happening in the world today. As he prayed about what he was reading, he realized it was of God.
It also helped him lead his team to victory in the stake scripture mastery championship.
Rooma recognizes in the blessings he’s received a lesson he learned in his studying. “In Mosiah 2:24 King Benjamin taught that when we choose to do what the Lord asks, we are blessed immediately,” says Rooma. One of the greatest blessings he has received is that “after studying the scriptures this year, I know that the Book of Mormon is true.”

After learning of the deaths of the Prophet Joseph and the Patriarch Hyrum, Wilford Woodruff reports his meeting with Brigham Young, who was then the President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, as follows: “I met Brigham Young in the streets of Boston, he having just returned, opposite to Sister Voce’s house. We reached out our hands, but neither of us was able to speak a word. … After we had done weeping we began to converse. … In the course of the conversation, he [Brigham Young] smote his hand upon his thigh and said, ‘Thank God, the keys of the kingdom are here.’”