Gospel Story Finder

When I was a junior in high school, I was on the varsity cheerleading squad. Every summer we attended the NCA Cheerleading Camp at the University of Georgia. That year, as my roommate and I were unpacking, I took out my scriptures and my picture of a temple and put them on the desk in the room, something my Laurel adviser had challenged us to do. When my roommate saw that I had taken those things out, she moaned and said that she couldn’t take being around someone so religious and picked up her mattress and walked out of the room. She went into the next room and sat down with the rest of the cheerleading squad. I could hear them saying horrible things about my beliefs and me. I was shocked. I just sat there on my bed and wondered what to do. I looked at my scriptures and the temple picture and thought, “Who do I want to please? Do I want to please Heavenly Father or these girls?” I remembered that Heavenly Father would never forsake me, and I knew that I wanted to please Him.
I endured a week of being excluded and shunned. I sat alone in my room every night and listened to the other cheerleaders laughing. At mealtime, they would crowd me to the end of the table and turn their backs to me. The only time anyone would talk to me was if they needed to communicate about a cheer we were doing. I wanted so badly to go home, but I could not. I spent a lot of time that week praying for Heavenly Father to help me. I prayed for strength to make it through the week. I prayed that I would treat the other girls nicely in spite of how they were treating me. I prayed that their hearts would be softened towards me.
This situation continued until it was the last day of camp. In the morning, we practiced and prepared for the final competition that afternoon. Our squad was good, and we came in first or second place every year. That year, however, our routines were not going well. Nothing seemed to be working for us that morning. The girls felt hopeless. We sat in a circle and talked about what we could do to improve our cheer and make it come together.
One girl said, “We need help. We need to pray.” A few of the girls said they didn’t know how to pray. Then, in the same instant, I saw 11 heads turn in unison and look at me. “Kathy, you know how to pray. Will you pray for us?” asked one of the girls. I couldn’t believe it. The Spirit touched me, and I felt so much love for them. I was excited for the opportunity to pray and so happy that I had remained faithful to Heavenly Father, even in the face of ridicule. I felt such responsibility offering that prayer. The cheer came together, but the bigger miracle was the change that took place in the hearts of the girls. From that day forward, we were friends, and they respected my beliefs and values. On top of that, before every football game, our cheerleading squad would gather together in a circle joining hands, and they would ask me to offer a prayer.

During the television documentaries shown throughout the fiftieth anniversary of the D-Day invasion of Normandy, the terrible toll in human life was graphically illustrated, and gripping firsthand experiences of soldiers who were there were shared. I particularly remember the comments of an American infantryman who told that, after a day of ferocious fighting, he glanced up from his shallow foxhole to see an enemy soldier with his gun barrel leveled at the American’s heart. Said the infantryman: “I felt I was soon to cross over that bridge of death which leads to eternity. Incredibly my enemy, in broken English, said to me, ‘Soldier, for you this war is over!’ He took me prisoner and thus saved my life. Such mercy I shall remember forever.”

Tim jogged up the sidewalk after school. He saw Mom sitting on the porch steps holding a camera. “What’s the camera for?” he asked.
Mom patted the step beside her. “I’d like to take your picture, but I need to talk with you about something first. Sit down for a second, please.”
Tim plopped his backpack on the porch and sat down. He got a funny feeling all of a sudden. Was something wrong?
“I got a call this afternoon,” Mom explained. “Your friend Shem is in the hospital.”
Tim took a quick breath. “What happened?” he asked. “Is Shem OK?”
Mom slipped an arm around Tim. “No, he’s not. He had to have an operation.”
“But Mom,” Tim protested, “Shem was here just two days ago. He was fine!”
“I know, honey,” Mom said. “But sometimes something goes wrong inside the body very suddenly. An important blood vessel in Shem’s brain stopped working. Doctors aren’t sure if he’ll be able to see or recognize anybody once he wakes up from the operation.”
Tim couldn’t think of anything to say. His eyes stung with tears, and his throat hurt. He hugged Mom and thought about Shem. They had so much fun last summer playing knights and dragons in Shem’s backyard. He was scared for his friend.
“Why do you want to take a picture of me?” he finally asked.
Mom smiled. “The doctors think it might help Shem if some of his favorite things are nearby when he wakes up. You can’t be in Shem’s hospital room, but we can send a picture. Would you like to do that?”
“Yes!” Tim jumped up. Anything to help Shem. Mom stepped back and took the photograph.
Tim folded his arms and thought. “Can we do anything else to help?”
“You can pray for him.”
Tim felt relieved. Of course! Prayer was the perfect idea. “I’ll go do that right now,” he said, running inside.
The next morning Mom offered Tim some eggs and cereal for breakfast. Everything looked so tasty, but Tim shook his head. “I don’t want any, thanks.”
“What’s wrong? Do you have a stomach ache?”
“No,” Tim answered. “I just think maybe I should fast today. For Shem.”
“Oh,” Mom said. She knelt down beside Tim. “I think that would be a very good idea,” she said quietly.
When Tim got to school, he gave his teacher a note Mom had written, explaining that he wouldn’t be eating lunch. Miss Thompson looked closely at him after she read the note. “Shem must be a very special friend,” she said. Tim nodded.
All day at school, whenever Tim’s stomach rumbled, he said a silent prayer that Heavenly Father would bless Shem. It wasn’t easy, but he felt good inside doing this for his friend. On Sunday he learned that other Primary kids had fasted and prayed for Shem too.
Several days later Tim walked in the house just as Mom was hanging up the phone.
“Great news!” Mom said. “Shem opened his eyes today. And the first thing he said was, ‘Where am I, and why is there a picture of Tim?’”
“He saw my picture?” Tim asked, excited. Shem could still see!
“Yes, he did, and he knew it was you,” Mom said. “That means his brain still works the way it should. The doctors are calling it a miracle.”
Tim let out a whoop of excitement. He leaped up and started running down the hall toward his bedroom.
“Hey! Where are you going?” Mom asked.
Tim paused for only a moment. “I’ve got to thank Heavenly Father!”

Hilda Larson was setting the table for dinner when her father came in and said to her, “Put the old dishes away, Hilda. We’re having company.”
“Who is coming, John?” asked Hilda’s mother.
“Two of the men I have been working with today on the temple,” he replied. “Heber Kimball and Brigham Young.”
Hilda smiled, glad to know Brother Young was coming to dinner. She liked most of the men her father had worked with since they moved to Kirtland, Ohio. But she especially liked Brigham Young who told such interesting stories.
Hilda and her mother went into a small room where the china dishes were kept in a tall cupboard behind heavy glass doors. Although they were used only for company or special holidays, Hilda was familiar with every piece.
There was the set of eight beautiful plates with matching cups and saucers, a gravy boat, and a large soup tureen made of delicate Dresden china. Around the edge of each piece was a willow branch pattern in dainty blue.
As her mother handed the dishes to her, Hilda held each one carefully.
“This set of china,” her mother explained, “belonged to your great-grandmother. She wrapped every piece in quilts when she sailed from England in 1770. She worried every time there was a storm on the ocean for fear her dishes would break.”
Hilda thought how happy her great-grandmother must have been when the dishes were unwrapped. Not one was broken then but Hilda’s grandmother had dropped a saucer when she was a little girl. And Hilda’s mother often told about how she, herself, broke the sugar bowl after the dishes were given to her for a wedding present.
“I really cried,” she said. “That bowl was my favorite.”
Hilda walked very slowly carrying the fragile china into the kitchen. After the table was set, Mother brought in a lovely blue pitcher that Hilda could remember the family using only a few times. She placed the pitcher in the center of the table. “There,” she said. “Doesn’t everything look nice?”
Putting his arm around his wife, Hilda’s father said, “It is beautiful, Sara.” But his voice was sad. “I’m glad you have a chance to show off the porcelain pitcher. It may be the last time.”
Hilda didn’t understand. Why would my mother stop using the pitcher? she wondered.
She remembered once when she had been allowed to hold it up carefully to the window to see how the light shone through. Her father had explained to her that fine porcelain china was translucent and that his mother brought the pitcher with her from Holland many years ago.
In answer to a knock, Father opened the door and welcomed the two distinguished men who stood outside. “Our guests are here,” he called, and Hilda and her mother hurried to welcome them.
During the meal Hilda enjoyed listening to her father talk with the two men. They spoke of how the Kirtland Temple they were building was nearly completed.
“All the Saints in Kirtland have helped,” Brother Kimball said.
“We may be few in number,” Brother Young agreed, “and poor, but we are rich in faith. While the men labor on the building, the women spin and weave cloth for our clothes.”
Brother Kimball picked up the china cup that was beside his plate. “And now the women give their precious dishes,” he said, looking at her mother. Then he pointed to the beautiful porcelain pitcher.
“That, too, Sister Larson?” he asked.
“Yes, Brother Young,” her mother nodded. “If it is needed.”
After the men had left, Hilda helped wash the dishes and put them back in their cupboard. As her mother closed the glass doors tears ran down her cheeks. Hilda wished she knew why everyone seemed so sad about the dishes.
The next afternoon Hilda was surprised to see her father come home early. He usually worked on the temple all day unless he had a cabinet-making job in Kirtland. He spoke quietly to Hilda’s mother, “We are ready for them, Sara.”
“Come, Hilda, I’ll need your help,” Mother said, and guided her into the room where the dish cupboard stood. A large box was on the floor beside it.
“We must pack the china into the box, Hilda,” her mother told her. “The dishes are needed to help build the temple.” Hilda could not imagine how china dishes and the priceless porcelain pitcher could help build a temple. She watched her father lift the box of dishes into the back of a pony cart. Then they rode to the bluff where the temple was being built.
Hilda climbed off the cart and followed her father toward a large vat where a workman was stirring something inside.
Bending down, Hilda’s father said over the noise, “We’re making stuccoed plaster for the outer temple walls. We have discovered that broken china helps hold the plaster together. Also,” he added, “the walls look very beautiful with the sparkling bits of china and glass shining through.”
A man nearby said, “Nearly all the Latter-day Saint women have given their best china for the temple.”
Hilda could hardly believe it when she saw her mother take the lovely Dresden china from the box and hand each piece to a man who stood beside the vat. He put them on a flat board, broke them into bits, and scraped the shattered pieces into the vat.
When the blue porcelain pitcher was broken and stirred into the stucco mixture, Hilda began to cry.
“Don’t feel badly, Hilda,” Mother said, putting an arm around the sobbing girl. But all the way down the hill in the cart, with the empty box rattling in back, Hilda was quietly crying.
One evening after the temple was finished, Hilda walked with her father and mother up the road toward the beautiful building. The sun was setting and Hilda saw the temple walls. They sparkled and shimmered in the sunlight.
“Oh, Mother!” she exclaimed, her heart suddenly full and happy. “Do you see that sort of blue brightness beside the front door? Only Grandmother Larson’s porcelain pitcher could sparkle like that!”

“Sister Sylvia Gaitan was in a four-car freeway accident last week,” explained my Young Men president. “She’s in the Westlake Medical Center, and we need someone to take her the sacrament.”
“Westlake?!” I thought to myself. That was at least a 20-minute drive.
I pleaded for volunteers. One hand went up. “I don’t have a car,” said Russell, “but I’ll go with someone.”
On the way to Westlake, I said to Russell, “Next week we’ll make someone else take this time-consuming drive.”
We arrived at the hospital and wasted a few minutes getting lost. When we finally found Sister Gaitan’s room, my heart fell right into my stomach. Not even five feet tall, she seemed even smaller lying in a giant hospital bed surrounded by medical equipment. Looking at her I immediately felt guilty for having complained.
“How are you feeling, Sister Gaitan?” I asked.
“Oh, I’m all right,” she said, “but I’ll be much better after they perform those two surgeries they keep telling me I need.” I was amazed by how upbeat she was.
Russell and I blessed the small piece of bread we had brought and then blessed the water in her hospital drinking cup. She was so grateful to us for coming. I smiled and said, “We’re just doing our priesthood duty.”
I decided that I would bring the sacrament to her the next week, too. I took Sister Gaitan the sacrament every week until she recovered. Seeing her always made my day brighter.
The brightest day was when I saw her back at church for the first time. I was happy, not because I no longer had to drive to the hospital each week but because she was finally able to take the sacrament with her ward family.
I’m grateful I was able to take Sister Gaitan the sacrament, but I’m even more grateful that she taught me to fulfill my priesthood duties with a smile and a happy attitude.

Dad says it’s OK to use the barn for our riding club meetings. How about another one of those apples, McGraw? Well, guys, what do you say?” asked Jason Farwell, flipping the hair out of his eyes with a jerk of his head.
“Boy, Jason, that’s great!” said Eddie Fowler. “Say, McGraw, where’d you get these good apples?”
“Mom gave me a whole sackful. Do you suppose we could have trail rides and rodeos and cookouts and stuff, Jase?”
“Sure. You in?” Jason asked Dexter McGraw, who liked anything that involved food or horses. “How about you, Eddie, you in?
“You bet,” mumbled Eddie with a mouthful of apple.
“Hey, Jase,” he said, swallowing, “let’s ask Barney Lightner to join too. He rides.”
Eddie always wanted to include Barney in their plans. Jason said it was because Barney was the only one in school who had redder hair and more freckles than Eddie.
“Now. Who wants him? He’s weird.”
“Not really, Jase. He’s pretty neat when you get to know him. OK? Here he comes now. Hey, Lightner!”
“Hi, Eddie, guys. Hey, can I have your apple cores when you’ve finished eating your apples?”
“See what I mean? A real winner,” grumbled Jason sarcastically under his breath. “Nuts, there’s the bell. Boy, they never make recesses long enough. Come on, we’ll finish talking after school. Oh, Lightner, here’s your apple core.”
After school Jason and Dexter met to finish making plans.
“Oh, no,” muttered Jason. “Here comes Eddie and Lightner. Hey, Lightner, eaten any apple cores lately?”
“Aw, knock it off, Jase,” said Eddie. “You know he takes them home to Thunder.”
“Lightner, what do you think of the idea of us starting a riding club?” asked Dexter. “We want to have trail rides and rodeos and stuff like that.”
“Yeah,” grumbled Jason. “You might as well join, too, Lightner.”
“Thanks, guys, but I wouldn’t have time for it. Oh, here comes the bus. I have to get home and ride old Thunder. See ya.”
“Well, how do you like that?” said Jason. “For a poor kid, he’s pretty snooty if you ask me.”
Saturday turned out to be one of those beautiful spring days when the sun feels extra warm and the breezes feel extra cool. The riding club had planned a trail ride and camp-out in a canyon called Webster’s Gulch. Since it was on their way, the boys decided to stop at the Lightners’ house to give Barney a chance to change his mind. Mrs. Lightner said they’d find him in the barnyard riding old Thunder.
As the boys rounded the corner of the house, they saw Barney astride—a mule! He took turns pleading and hollering at the animal, but it wouldn’t budge an inch. When Barney saw the boys, his face became even redder than his hair, and he stammered, “He’s not usually this stubborn. Honest.”
Not being able to afford the horse Barney had always dreamed of owning, his mother allowed him to ride their old work mule, which Barney had named Thunder.
After what seemed to Barney like an eternity of laughter and cowboy jokes, the boys finally left. One thing was sure—he was going to have a miserable day at school on Monday. They’d see to that!
Later the boys camped half-way up the canyon, and set up a tether line to tie their horses to. A wide ledge about four feet up the canyon wall made a perfect place to pitch their tent.
Late that night it started to thunder violently, and the lightning flashed almost without interruption. Eventually the thunder subsided to a distant rumble, but the rain remained a steady torrent. After a few ghost stories the boys dropped off to sleep.
Just before dawn, the boys were suddenly awakened by Jason’s shout of alarm. The horses had broken loose from their tether line, and the canyon was now a raging river, with water inching up toward their tent.
The boys made a desperate scramble up the sheer wall of the canyon only to fall down again to their ledge, which was rapidly disappearing under the water. And Jason, in his try for safety, twisted his ankle.
The boys saw their tent being swept away, and they knew that they would be next.
“Listen!” yelled Jason above the sound of the rushing water. “I hear something!”
Above the rumble of the distant thunder, the roar of the water, and the steady drumming of the rain, they heard someone hollering!
There, on the rim of the canyon above them, was Barney, and he was lowering a rope to them. His friends quickly tied the rope under Jason’s arms while Barney tied the other end to Thunder. Then Barney and Thunder pulled Jason and then the other two boys to safety.
“Boy! I never thought I’d be so glad to see your old mule!” exclaimed Eddie. “How’d you know we were in trouble, Barney?”
“I woke up when your horses went galloping through Mom’s garden. I figured you might have been flooded out after that heavy rain. So I rounded up old Thunder, grabbed a rope, and got here as fast as I could.”
Everyone at school on Monday was buzzing about how Barney Lightner and old Thunder had saved the boys from a flash flood.
“Well, Barney,” said Miss Wilkins, their teacher, “I hear that you’re some kind of a hero. And that Thunder of yours must really be some kind of horse!”
Barney sank down in his seat, fearing what would surely come next, when a shuffling sound in the doorway diverted everyone’s attention. There, on crutches, stood Jason.
“That’s right, Miss Wilkins,” Jason said with a wink toward Barney. “Old Thunder is some kind of horse!”

There are many opportunities all around us to be missionaries—we just need to recognize them. I was recently on an airplane flying home from England. I started talking to the man sitting next to me. We talked for a while about business and other things, but finally I said that I wanted to tell him about a very special book, the Book of Mormon. We spent the next four hours talking about it, and when we were through, he said, “This has truly changed my life.” All it took was the courage to open my mouth. The Lord will often tell us what to say.

As I sat restlessly in sacrament meeting one Sunday afternoon listening to a returned missionary speak, I entertained myself by watching two children play peek-a-boo across the back of the bench. Sunday meetings seemed a meaningless ritual. None of my friends went to church or observed the Sabbath, and I sat there grumpy, determined to be miserable.
Then I casually looked over my right shoulder and saw my parents with tears in their eyes. I looked around the room and noticed that many others had tear-stained cheeks. As I turned my attention back to the recently returned elder, I heard him say, “… and I know that my Father lives.”
That was a statement I had heard many times, especially in sacrament meetings. I had always asked myself, How could they possibly know that there is a God? The thought occurred again, and as the closing prayer was said, I felt a little guilty for my thoughts.
Later that evening my family sat down together for family scripture study. We were in the 30th chapter of Alma, and my older brother Jim was reading about the anti-Christ Korihor telling Alma there was no God. In verses 43–44, he read, “And now Korihor said unto Alma: If thou wilt show me a sign, that I may be convinced that there is a God, yea, show unto me that he hath power, and then will I be convinced of the truth of thy words.
“But Alma said unto him: … The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it.” [Alma 30:43–44]
That night I lay very still and pondered the words of Alma. I thought about all the creations on the earth, about the flowers and the trees and the animals—and about me. How magnificent the creation of the human body is! I lay there thinking a very long time until the words of a song I had learned in Primary entered my head: “Whenever I touch a velvet rose or walk by our lilac tree, I’m glad that I live in this beautiful world Heavenly Father created for me.”
Tears fell down my face, and I said a prayer to Father in Heaven asking his forgiveness and thanking him for the beautiful world he created for me. I know now that my Father lives.

“Why not just a little?” That was the question David asked after his early-morning seminary teacher had finished an entire lesson about protecting yourself from sin. “I’m not talking about doing anything big,” David continued. “I just want to know why I can’t have a sip of beer—just to taste it and know what it is like. Why not just one cigarette or one night with a girl so my friends will stop bugging me?”
Before the teacher could even start giving him the usual answers, David outguessed him and blurted, “And don’t tell me that alcohol kills your brain cells and that cigarettes cause cancer. Don’t tell me about AIDS.” He didn’t want to hear the typical “scare” stories. David continued, “I know men who used to drink and smoke, and they’re bishops now.”
It was true. David knew many people who had repented and been forgiven of their sins. “So,” he looked directly at his teacher and repeated his original question, “why not just a little?”
By now nearly every young person in the room was nodding and saying, “Yeah, why not?” The seminary teacher knew he had to say something—quickly. He swallowed hard, said a silent prayer, and offered, “Try looking at it like this: Isn’t the Holy Ghost a member of the Godhead?”
“Yes,” answered David, “but what does that have to do with anything?”
The teacher explained, “Well, ‘no unclean thing can dwell with God’ (1 Ne. 10:21; Mosiah 2:36–38). Maybe that’s why we must be baptized—completely cleaned—before we receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (see D&C 68:25; D&C 84:64).
The room was quiet. Despite the fact they had already sat through one lesson that day, David and his friends were listening to their teacher. “In scriptures we are told that the Spirit won’t always strive with men (see Gen. 6:3; Ether 15:19; D&C 1:33).
“The immediate consequence of any sin is withdrawal of the Spirit of the Holy Ghost. So one cigarette may not be enough to give you cancer, but it is enough to alienate you from the Spirit. One can of beer may not make you an alcoholic and leave you homeless, but it is enough to leave you without the Spirit. The same thing for a premarital sexual experience.”
Most of the class was agreeing with their teacher now, but David still wasn’t completely convinced. He said, “So the Spirit leaves. So what?”
Class time was over. The students needed to go to school. “Let’s pick this discussion up tomorrow,” said the teacher, and they did. Over the next few days the class studied the fruits of the Spirit. What David had not considered was that when we lose the Spirit we automatically lose some other things as well.
The seminary class was glad David had asked, “Why not just a little?” In the course of their discussions and study, David and his friends had come to some important conclusions. One student summed it up like this: “Why not just a little sin? Well, why not just a little touch on the burner of a hot stove? Sure, you may heal in the long run, but not without going through a lot of unnecessary pain and suffering.”

A true story from Ghana.
Anane grinned as he walked through the street. The smell of frying fish and the busy chatter of people filled the market. He was on his way to Uncle’s house. Mum had given Anane some money to give to Uncle.
He looked around at all the stands selling produce, foods, and other items. Then something caught his eye.
There was a food stand that had two of his very favorite treats, toffee and biscuits. He looked at the money Mum gave him. One hundred cedis is a lot, he thought. His favorite treats were only 10 cedis. Uncle probably wouldn’t even notice if some was missing.
Anane bought the treats. He popped a toffee into his mouth and kept walking to Uncle’s house.
Uncle was standing outside his house as Anane walked up.
“If it isn’t little Anane! Come on over,” said Uncle. “What can I do for you?”
“I brought you some money from Mum.” Anane handed him the money, then put his hands back in his pockets. Would Uncle notice that some of the money was missing? He watched as Uncle counted it.
“Thank you for bringing this over,” Uncle said.
Anane was glad Uncle didn’t notice the missing money. He said goodbye and started the long walk home. On the way, he finished eating his toffee and biscuits.
“How was the walk to Uncle’s?” Mum asked when Anane got home.
He shrugged. “It was good.”
“Thank you for taking that money to him for me,” said Mum.
Anane looked down at the floor. He started to feel guilty. What if his parents found out he had spent some of the money? He didn’t want to lose their trust.
The next morning, Mum asked Anane to buy some things at a nearby shop. “Come straight home after you are done at the shop, OK?”
“OK.” Anane walked through the market, but he didn’t stop to buy anything. He scrunched his eyebrows and thought, This time I’m going to do exactly what Mum asked.
As soon as he was done, he went right home. He gave Mum all the leftover money.
That Sunday, Anane went to his Primary class. “Good morning!” his teacher said. “Today we are talking about obedience. It is important for us to listen to our parents and make good choices.”
Anane thought about the money he spent on the toffee and biscuits. He felt his stomach drop. He knew he had made a wrong choice.
After church, Anane wanted to talk to his parents. His heart was racing.
“Mum, Dad? You know the money you gave me to take to Uncle?” Anane asked. “Well, I bought some treats with some of it.” He looked down at the floor. “I’m sorry.”
“Thank you for being honest,” Dad said. “I’m proud of you.”
Anane smiled. He was so happy that he told the truth. And he felt good inside after telling his parents. He was already making a better choice.

The Prophet Joseph was allowed to see the Nauvoo Temple in vision. Concerning its appearance, he recorded this experience: “In the afternoon, Elder William Weeks (whom I had employed as architect of the Temple), came in for instruction. I instructed him in relation to the circular windows designed to light the offices in the dead work of the arch between stories. He said that round windows in the broad side of a building were a violation of all the known rules of architecture, and contended that they should be semicircular—that the building was too low for round windows. I told him I would have the circles, if I had to make the Temple ten feet higher than it was originally calculated; that one light at the centre of each circular window would be sufficient to light the whole room; that when the whole building was thus illuminated, the effect would be remarkably grand. ‘I wish you to carry out my designs. I have seen in vision the splendid appearance of that building illuminated, and will have it built according to the pattern shown me.’” (N. B. Lundwall, Temples of the Most High [Lundwall, 1941], pp. 51–52.)

While serving as president of the European area, Sister Wirthlin and I traveled throughout Finland, Sweden, Denmark, and Norway holding meetings and conferences with members and missionaries. As we neared the end of our travels, we arrived with President and Sister John Langeland in the small city of Alta, Norway. We were happy that we had made the extra effort to meet the members in such a remote place. But while chatting with the local Church leaders, we learned there was yet one more small branch even farther north in Hammerfest. Hammerfest is one of the world’s northernmost cities, making its tiny branch one of the most remote units of the Church.
To our surprise, we learned that several years earlier, Elder Howard W. Hunter had been the first General Authority to visit the Hammerfest Branch. The story of that visit says so much about the man whom the Lord would later choose as his prophet, seer, and revelator:
“Hammerfest is difficult to reach by normal transportation. It was originally planned that the visitors would fly … by seaplane. A change in the weather eliminated any possibility of using a plane, as is often the case. It was decided that they should travel by car from Alta, the closest city to Hammerfest with a commercial airport. Snow had started to cover the roads. Several times en route Elder Hunter and Pres. [Leo M.] Jacobsen had to push their car through the snow. When it seemed as if further progress was impossible, a truck towed the car over the summit to Hammerfest.
“They finally arrived at ten-thirty that night for a meeting that was to have started at seven o’clock, and found that most of the members had waited” (quoted in Eleanor Knowles, Howard W. Hunter, 1994, 175–76).
The members in Hammerfest, anxious to meet an Apostle and hear the voice of one called as a special witness, waited three and a half hours for Elder Hunter’s delayed arrival. Their faith, hope, and prayers were rewarded as he shared with them his powerful testimony of the Savior.

Some time back a small, bent, elderly woman came to my office. For the purpose of this talk I shall call her Mary Olsen, although that is not her name and she would not wish her identity disclosed. She said she had just come over from the temple. She took from her purse her checkbook. She said that she had been a widow for many years, that life had not been easy for her. She had a great love for the Lord and his Church. She had faithfully paid her tithing all her life. She felt she would not live much longer. Now, she said, she felt she ought to be doing more to help than she had done. In a hand shaky with age, she wrote a check for $5,000. She handed it to me. I noted the address where she lived. It was in a poor neighborhood. I confess that as I looked at that check tears came into my eyes. I have held many larger checks than that in my hands. But as I held the check of this widow woman, I was almost overcome by her faith and the seriousness of the trust that was mine in the expenditure of her consecrated contribution.

My dear young friends, we—you and I—are trustees of that which has been given to the Lord by Mary Olsen and thousands like her whose devotion is as great and whose sacrifice is as certain. This beautiful campus, with its many programs, is a consumer of a very substantial portion of the widow’s contribution. She gives her offering to the Lord, and she is then released from responsibility. The responsibility then becomes mine—and yours!

It was an early morning in 2008 when my mother woke me up to go to school. I was really happy that morning, but I didn’t know that it would turn into the worst day of my life or the last time I would be with her. I didn’t finish all my classes that day because a friend of our family picked me up and told me that my mom had killed herself. I was only 12 years old.
I thought, “How can I live without my mother?” She was my best friend.
I cried for months. I didn’t like going to school because the other children treated me differently and felt sorry for me. I had no clue what I was supposed to do; I only knew I had to be strong for everyone else.
One day, five or six months after my mom’s death, I was alone in my room by the window, crying, trying to understand what I was here for. Suddenly I heard a voice in my head: “You are my daughter; I won’t let you suffer.” I knew it was God. But it surprised me because I didn’t believe in Him anymore, especially since I felt that it was God who had taken my mother from me. Even though I didn’t know what He meant, I felt safe.
Three years later I went to Rome, Italy, to visit my uncle. He kept telling me about this church he went to. One Sunday, he took me with him. I will always remember walking toward the church’s doors for the first time and feeling the love of Heavenly Father when I went in. It felt like home.
I started going to church every single Sunday and to every activity during the week. I loved being with the youth of the Church. They made me happier. They thought and believed in the same things that I did. Then, after three months, my summer holiday finished and I had to go back to Albania.
When I returned home, I told my dad about the feelings I’d had and how happy I’d felt during those three months going to Church activities. He didn’t like it. He told me he wouldn’t allow me to continue to go to church. So I would have to be patient for the next three years until I turned 18 years old. Then I could decide for myself and be baptized.
During this time I was blessed with so many people who would tell me about what they learned each Sunday at church. One of those people was Stephanie. She’d been living in Italy when my uncle joined the Church, but she had returned to her home in the United States. My uncle thought it would be good for us to write to each other, so I added her as a friend on Facebook.
Even though we’d never met in person, I will always be grateful to her for helping me build my faith and learn more about the gospel of Jesus Christ. She wrote to me almost every Sunday and told me everything she learned in church and then would answer my questions. She was a great friend to me.
Finally, after years of being patient, I was baptized just two days after my 18th birthday. And soon I will share with my mother the happiness I felt that day, because I will be baptized for her. I know she will be proud of the life I have chosen.
I feel blessed by Heavenly Father because He was with me during my entire journey in so many ways. I just had to wait and be patient because He had a plan for me. He’s the one who gave me strength to go through all the challenges I faced. He was always there, helping me be happier.

I want give an example of the importance of this knowledge in the life of one young man.

I am acquainted with a young man now no longer quite so young who was reared in an LDS home. He understood the doctrine of the Godhead, that the Father and the Son are separate beings and that they have bodies "of flesh and bones, as tangible as man's . . ."[4] However, the philosophies of men were also deeply entrenched in this young man's culture and he and his family were not immune. He listened to traditional teachings of God's power and omniscience influenced by ideas born in the apostate era. He learned that, due to his nature, God was very different from us. In his father's terms, God is as different from us in his intellect as we are different from earthworms. The metaphor of caring for and watching for a colony of earthworms as a model for God's watching over us played itself out vividly in this young boy's mind. He also learned that this very smart and distant God knew all the principles by which everything operated. The young man concluded that such a God was very busy far too busy to have much time, let alone much concern, for any particular earthworm such as he. And yet, he was taught that this same God is mindful of everything, such that even a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his knowing it.[5] The young man's again concluded that God must have some sort of cosmic mind that can detect disturbances in the force so to speak. But, he didn't feel much better as a disturbance than he did as a earthworm. While this understanding of God made intellectual sense to him, the more he contemplated on these things, the more the young man felt lost in a vast cosmic network of causes and effects, but very far from a great but impersonal God.

It became increasingly difficult for this young man to understand what it meant to love this God, although he tried. He felt an obligation to love God out of respect for his superior nature, but it was a love born of fear and intellect, almost untouched by emotion. It was hard to love an abstraction, even one with a body of flesh and bones. He did know that God loved him, he was told so many times. Perfect beings are required to love everyone. Being an earthworm, he was not sure what it was like for God to love him. More importantly, this young man was quite sure that however much God might love him, God's actions as a perfectly rational being were hopelessly determined by the inalterable network of laws and principles that bound this perfectly rational God to act in particular ways, so that love could never modify the inevitable natural consequences of the young man's acts, or anyone else's for that matter. It was a tough, loving God who presided over such a finely tuned web of unalterable principles. Finally, the young man began to wonder how or why an infinitely intelligent God, bound by abstract laws and principles, would need to really listen to prayers; and besides, God already knew both what the boy needed and whether it would be possible to grant it. Nothing really hung in the balance at prayer time. Prayers were dutifully said, but given his understanding of God, they could not be otherwise than hollow echoing off the ceiling. This young man, I'm happy to report stayed quite faithful, although quite melancholy, into adulthood. He tried very hard to believe what he was taught, but what he did believe brought little comfort. It is with a mixture of sorrow over lost time, and great relief that today, after more than forty years, he can say with genuine conviction and joy, that he loves God, and he knows what he means when he says it.

I have related this true story for two reasons. First, I have wondered how many of you might have thought or felt, at one time or another, anything like this young man thought and felt. Perhaps, choice spirits that you are, you never have, but maybe you know someone who has. I have related the story so that you might be able to help those who struggle to find the God of the restored gospel in the midst of a world where the nature of God is misunderstood, the heavens are created by the intellects of men, and the quality of mercy is strained through a network of abstractions. Second, I wanted to use this true story to introduce the real important subject of this talk, the God of Condescension, because it was in coming to know this God that the young man=s story had a happy ending.

Young Women in the Scotch Plains Ward, Morristown New Jersey Stake, went out on a limb for scripture study. What started out as a project for the “Experiment upon the Word” program has turned into a growing tradition.
Each girl set a goal for personal scripture study and wrote it on a piece of fruit made from construction paper. For each week that she reached her goal, every girl put a leaf on the tree, which is now loaded with them!
“Reading the scriptures has helped me in my life. It has made me feel more peaceful, and it has given me more faith in the gospel,” says one Beehive.
“Experiment upon the Word” has ended, but the girls in Scotch Plains are still adding leaves to their tree and building testimonies that are firmly rooted in the scriptures.

When I was six years old, my family moved to the United States. We loaded everything we owned into a truck and drove to my grandmother’s house in Mesa, Arizona.
I remember standing on her porch with my father when a truck playing music came down the street.
“Dad, what’s that?” I asked. He explained that it was an ice-cream truck, and he gave me money to buy something. I ran over to the truck and said, “I want a paleta (frozen dessert on a stick). I had grown up in Mexico and spoke English and Spanish, but I didn’t know the English word for the thing I wanted. My father told me that I had to ask for a Popsicle.
I remember walking up the steps of my new school on the first day of first grade. When I saw some of the other children crying, I asked my mother, “Why are those kids crying?” My mother had taught us how important education was, so I couldn’t imagine what was so sad about going to school.
I soon learned that in the United States, most children my age had many things that I didn’t have. One of those things was a bike, and I wanted one badly. Somehow, my dad got me a bike for $5. Unfortunately, it had one major defect: it was a girl’s bike! It was humiliating for me to ride it. I found my shiny new dream machine in a mail-order catalogue, and it cost $65. I decided to earn the money to buy the bike myself, so I started working in the cotton fields every day after school. I would drag a long canvas bag up and down the rows of plants, filling it with cotton. Each afternoon, I could usually pick between twenty and forty pounds of cotton. I was paid two cents a pound, so I could usually make at least fifty cents a day.
As the end of the harvest drew near, I realized that I was not going to earn enough money for the bike. I told my dad, and he agreed that if I could raise half the money, he would pay the other half. Even after I had earned my part, the bike didn’t show up immediately. But then on Christmas morning, I got my beautiful new bike. From that experience, I learned that sometimes when we work very hard to reach a goal but fall short of reaching it, we can ask someone for help. Just as my father helped me, our Heavenly Father will help us, too.

Alice held the crumbled paper in her hand. She clenched her fist tightly and tried hard to erase the horrible words that now burned in her mind.
Alice is an idiot, the paper read. Alice didn’t know who had written the words—someone nearby, no doubt—but she had found the mean little message sitting on her desk when she had returned to her seat. Now, defeated and miserable, she wished she had never signed up for this section of Speech 1. She wished even harder that she had never had to stand up to give her presentation. And she wished even harder still that she could believe that the words written on the paper were lies. But she couldn’t. She was an idiot, she was sure.
Minutes before, Alice had walked to the front of the class to deliver her speech. She had prepared for her presentation carefully, had even read the book for her report twice. But something unexplained had snatched her confidence from her the moment she had opened her mouth to speak. Her voice had trembled as she spoke, unrecognizable, wobbling foolishly, and her hands had shaken so badly she was afraid she would knock the podium over. She had barely made it through her speech. By the end of it, she was visibly on the verge of crying. During the long walk back to her desk, she had been afraid to look at the students in the class.
Why? she had thought miserably to herself. Why did I have to go to junior high school? Why did we have to move? Couldn’t I have stayed in the sixth grade forever? Everything within her young, thin frame wanted to be back in Mrs. Martin’s class, to be back in her old neighborhood, where all was familiar and sweet.
And then she had sat down at her desk, and there she had found the nasty message she was certain was true.
I am a jerk, she thought bitterly to herself. I’m stupid and dumb and I have no confidence. I have no friends, either. And I hate this stupid school.
The angry bath of self-hatred washed over her, spilled out of the corners of her eyes, made her feel peculiarly numb in her misery.
But the horror was not over yet.
“Alice?” Mr. Goldstein’s voice called to her, as the bell sounded to switch classes. “Alice, can I see you up front for a minute?”
Alice heard some snickers from a group of boys as she gathered her books. She swallowed, then walked up the aisle to Mr. Goldstein’s desk.
“Alice,” he began. “I was so surprised by your performance today. I know you’re a bright and talented girl. I think you just need another chance.” He paused thoughtfully, then continued, “What if I schedule you to give it another try next time we meet?”
Alice opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Panic filled her. Wasn’t one humiliation enough? Couldn’t he see she was no good at speaking? But Mr. Goldstein’s soft voice rumbled on, something about fitting her in easily at the end of the next class, that he was certain her classmates wanted her to get another chance, too.
Alice walked home from school alone that day. Tami and Susan had offered to walk with her, but she had declined. They weren’t in her speech class, and she didn’t want to have to tell them the sad story of how foolish she had felt. If she didn’t walk with them, she wouldn’t have to speak to any one until she got home. By then, she hoped she could muster a calm hello to her mother, and then take refuge in the room she shared with her older sister until dinner. If she was lucky, Karen would stay late at school, practicing her part for the Autumn Festival play.
Alice walked the blocks home from school, acutely conscious of herself. In every storefront, in the windows of every parked car, she saw her face, her thin and sorrowing face.
Why can’t I wear eye makeup yet? she wondered angrily to herself. Everyone else does, even most of the girls in the ward.
She held her head down before the gusty wind, couldn’t bear to let her bangs blow upward, exposing her large forehead. Oh! it was miserable to be almost 13.
Alice managed to pass by her mother’s scrutiny. Something inside her wouldn’t let her tell her mother. She wanted to keep her horrible failure inside. She wanted to be by herself. Alice closed the door to her room, lay on her bed, face down on the pillow, alone in the safety of her home. Her father had been transferred again. They had lived in this new neighborhood just three months. Alice remembered her painful good-byes now. She rolled over, looked up to the ceiling, felt a flash of nervousness. She was terrorized at the thought of having to present her speech again. How could Mr. Goldstein be so mean?
Dinner passed.
“What’s the matter with the kid, here?” her older brother had asked, affectionately winking at Alice. “You’re quieter than usual.”
Karen gave the family home evening lesson that night on joy, of all things. Alice listened stonily.
Who could feel joy when everyone thought you were an idiot? she thought bitterly. Worse yet, who could feel joy when you had to go through another horrible day at school? Alice hardly heard her older sister’s comments about how prayer had sustained her during the first weeks of their move.
Tuesday passed. Alice saw only two of the students that were in her speech class, and both of them were girls. They smiled at her, and Alice felt no menace in them. Inevitably, though, Tuesday evening came, the good-nights, the walk up the stairs to bed, the certainty that tomorrow was coming.
Alice turned restlessly in bed. She was still awake when Karen came in. Alice watched the easy confidence with which Karen removed her makeup, fluffed her hair, then reached for the light. There were a few moments of silence as Karen said her prayers beside her bed, then the comforting sound of the bedsprings, the rustling sheets, of Karen settling into sleep. But Alice was still awake.
Hours passed, it seemed, but always the horror of the morning prevented Alice from surrendering to the black walls of her heavy eyelids. She had said her speech 300 times by now, had practiced taking deep breaths, had even imagined the entire occasion from start to finish, the perfect delivery and confident self-assurance. But reality always filled her. Alice was afraid. This wasn’t Primary, this wasn’t Young Women, this wasn’t even sacrament meeting. It was a class full of strangers, some of them older than she was, and all of them better at speaking than she would ever be.
Alice sat up in bed. She looked over at her sleeping sister, peaceful and at rest. Maybe being 17 did that to a person, Alice thought hopefully.
A thin column of white penetrated the dark room, the glow from the streetlight on the corner reaching in from behind the shade. A car passed by, its headlights shadowing wild patterns in the room. The pipes knocked in the basement, followed by the pleasant sound of steam hissing in the radiator.
Prayer is the best way to get through the tough times, Karen had said the other night. Alice had not wanted to think about it then, had thought it sounded corny and dumb. After all, Alice wasn’t a Merrie Miss anymore. She no longer had to sit uncomfortably in the back of Primary opening exercises.
But prayer?
Alice pushed the covers off. The floor felt cold on her feet. She bent down, then knelt awkwardly. Should she fold her arms, or was it enough just to kneel?
It was an awkward prayer, she knew, her first attempt since the faith of her family had begun to seem something weird and distant to her, something not to tell her new friends about, something that had to be done, she guessed, when her parents made her, a burden more than a blessing.
Alice opened her eyes after the amen, lingered for a moment on her knees, beside her bed, looking at the shadows in the light. And then a feeling warmed her, something real and sweet, a glow not from the hissing radiator, but a quiet warmth just the same. Quite simple, really. As Alice pulled the covers over herself, though, the moment lost its simplicity and became profound. The Holy Spirit had filled her, she knew, had warmed her and given her peace.
Alice walked slowly down the hall to her speech class. She avoided the boys who had laughed. She tried hard not to think of her failure or of the horrid little note, or of the minutes until she must surely try again.
“Alice? Are you ready to give it another try now?” It was Mr. Goldstein’s voice, of course, calling her to her second death, she was sure.
Alice stood slowly, picked up her paper, told her legs to move to the podium in the front of the classroom.
She knew her heart was beating too fast already. She was cold and trembling. She took a deep and trembling breath, smiled weakly to the class, then opened her mouth to speak.
And in a timeless moment, suspended somewhere between her trembling breath and her first uneven words, she remembered the warmth of the night before, the sense that her Father loved her, had heard her.
“Mr. Goldstein. Students. Good morning.”

Amanda puzzled over her patriarchal blessing. It said she would be a great influence on her children and grandchildren, but she was past childbearing years and had never married. Then she met Patrick, a pilot. They enjoyed listening to music and playing golf together. After a while, they got married.
Patrick’s first wife had died, with whom he had three daughters. Although they grieved the loss of their mother, they eventually warmed to Amanda’s love. Years passed.
One day, Patrick went flying and never returned. After weeks of searching, the plane was found in a nearby lake. Amanda realized that she was the only living parent Patrick’s daughters had left. She made an extra effort to support and communicate with them, especially through their grief.
Now she and her stepdaughters have a strong bond. They call her for advice and turn to her after a stressful day. With humility and gratitude, Amanda realizes that her patriarchal blessing is being fulfilled after all.

Devastating earthquakes and tsunamis have recently occurred in diverse places, including Chile, Haiti, and the islands of the Pacific. A few weeks ago Presiding Bishop H. David Burton, Elder Tad R. Callister, and I were able to meet with the Saints who had lost family members as a result of the tsunami that hit the eastern side of Samoa last September. The chapel was full, and it was an emotional meeting. We were able to assure these choice members that because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, they can be reunited with the loved ones they have lost.

The stake president, Sonny Purcell, was driving his car when he saw the enormous wave coming far out at sea. He honked his horn and stopped children on the road walking to school and warned them to run for higher ground and safety as fast as they could. The children followed his instruction. He frantically drove, reached his four-year-old daughter, put her in the car, and then tried to get to his mother. Before he could reach his mother, the wall of water picked up his car and swept it over 100 yards (91 m), where it lodged in a tree. He scrambled to secure his daughter on top of the car and then swam to rescue his mother, who was clinging to a branch of another tree near their house. With great effort he swam with her to the car and safety. Many were not as fortunate. They did not have time to get to higher ground and safety. Many lost their lives, particularly the young and the elderly.

We told the Samoan families that members all over the world expressed love and concern and had prayed for them and contributed fast offerings and humanitarian aid for both the members and their neighbors. The same is true for the members and their neighbors in Chile and Haiti. We do this because we follow Jesus Christ.

As we met with the families in Samoa, the significance of spiritually going to the higher ground, living a better life, and clinging to saving ordinances was abundantly clear. The Savior’s example and life teach us to spiritually avoid the low pathway, where the things of this world dominate. As I shook hands with the members after our meeting, one sister told me her family had not been to the temple and they had lost a daughter. She tearfully said their goal now was to prepare themselves for the sacred ordinances of the temple so they can be together eternally.
As I have pondered what this sister said and the current condition of the world, I have felt an urgency to counsel each of us to seek the higher ground—the refuge and eternal protection of the temple.