Gospel Story Finder

Another Saint who sacrificed much during this period was John Rowe Moyle, an excellent stonemason from England. It was Brother Moyle’s custom to work on his farm in Alpine, Utah, only on Friday night and all day Saturday. Then each Monday morning he walked from home back to Salt Lake City to work until Friday on the temple. Following an accident, Brother Moyle’s leg was removed in an excruciating operation. While recovering, he made himself a wooden peg leg and walked around his farm on the stump until he was able to stand the pain. Eventually, he walked to Salt Lake City—a distance of more than thirty-two kilometers—to begin his labors at the temple again.

According to a story told by his family, John Moyle “climbed up the scaffolding on the east side of the Temple and carved ‘Holiness to the Lord,’ as his contribution to the Temple building.”

By Justin Christy
When I met Shuho at the gym, he said he wanted to learn English and go to a golf exchange program. I told him about the English classes at the church, but it took several weeks before we were able to attend. In the meantime, as we worked out together, we talked a lot about gospel topics, about the Book of Mormon, and about life in general.
The friendship and examples of the Church members he met caught his attention and helped him learn about the gospel. It is the Spirit that leads to conversion; all we do is deliver the message and support people as they choose for themselves.
It used to be stressful for me to think about sharing the gospel. But I have found that if we just open our mouth at the right time, we will have missionary opportunities. All we need to do is invite people to a church activity or meeting. If we are open-minded, there will always be opportunities to share the gospel.

The youth of the Westminster Third Ward (Huntington Beach California North Stake) know the importance of education. Using half the funds they had raised for their youth conference, they donated to the Perpetual Education Fund. Their check was presented to Elder John K. Carmack, emeritus member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, who is the managing director of the PEF.
The Westminster youth responded, along with thousands of other Church members, to President Hinckley’s call to help other Church members become self-reliant and successful (see Ensign, May 2001, 51–53).

On 20 April 1935, after five years as stake president, Brother Lee was called to the office of the First Presidency and was asked to take charge of a new Church welfare plan. He felt very humble and inadequate in this huge assignment. So, as was his pattern, he went to the Lord in prayer.

“As I kneeled down, my petition was, ‘What kind of organization should be set up in order to accomplish what the Presidency has assigned?’ And there came to me that glorious morning one of the most heavenly realizations of the power of the priesthood of God. It was as though something were saying to me, ‘There is no new organization necessary to take care of the needs of this people. All that is necessary is to put the priesthood of God to work. There is nothing else that you need as a substitute.’”

He resigned from the city commission and began a life of full-time service to the kingdom of God, never wavering in his assurance that God would guide him and that within the priesthood organization were the answers to all the challenges that lay ahead of the growing church.

But piano wasn’t Sheena’s only interest. She developed a love for sports, particularly basketball. Just before ninth-grade tryouts, however, Sheena experienced what she would term the greatest challenge of her life so far. She developed immune thrombocytopenic purpura, or ITP, a blood disorder which causes bleeding under the skin. Her disease prevented her from playing basketball since even an accidental bump on her head could cause a major brain hemorrhage.
After a year of transfusions, cortisone, and other medications, Sheena faced the decision of whether or not to have her spleen removed. As she had done since she was a small girl, Sheena turned to the Lord in prayer for a confirmation of her decision. After her surgery, she continued to worry. What if the ITP returned and kept her from her normal activities?
“I kept asking Heavenly Father if I was done with it,” she says, “but I never felt like I was getting an answer. Then my friend Liesel Bennion and I went to EFY [Especially for Youth] at BYU—Idaho. I had a wonderful counselor there who gave a devotional about the woman who had suffered with an issue of blood for 12 years and touched the hem of the Savior’s garment. When she read the words, ‘Daughter, be of good comfort: thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace’ (Luke 8:48) and sang a song called ‘Close Enough to Touch,’ my heart started pounding and tears sprang to my eyes. I knew at that moment I was done with the ITP. In a way I felt I also had touched the Savior’s hem by exercising faith in having the surgery.”

For a first-grade class project we were asked to dress up a paper bear to look like someone we want to be when we get older. I decided to dress my bear as a missionary. My mom helped me cut out a white shirt, vest, and pants. I glued them onto the bear. My dad made me a missionary nametag. I wrote a few sentences about how education would help me become what I had dressed my bear as. I wrote that education would help me learn to read, write, and even learn a new language. We had a teddy bear parade for all the first-grade children and their parents. I do plan to be a missionary.

Pich Sareth, a member of the Phnom Penh 12th Branch in the Phnom Penh Cambodia North District, also saw trials at a very young age. He was only five years old when he was separated from his family and forced to work in the fields. He would sometimes find crabs or frogs he could eat to quell his hunger.
Brother Pich’s wife, Seng Tha, and her family were also forced from their home. Because she was only four years old and small, she was not required to work, as other children were. She was separated from her family much of the day and was watched by elderly women who could not work.
After meeting the missionaries in 1995, Brother Pich and his wife began to learn about the love Heavenly Father has for them. “When I had problems, I could see that praying helped me get through them,” Brother Pich says. “I knew Heavenly Father cared.”
After Brother Pich decided to be baptized, his wife also gained a testimony of the gospel and was baptized.
Since their baptisms, Brother Pich and his family have recognized the joy that stems from gaining a testimony of Jesus Christ. The Pich family takes time every day to read the scriptures. As they have done this, the joy of the gospel has permeated their souls.
“We feel we are on the right path now, and we want to stay on this narrow path and continue to progress,” Sister Seng says. “I am grateful every day that we can have our children on this path with us.”

One of the first people Rambo wanted to share the gospel with was her sister Agnes. She invited Agnes to church. “When I first went to church,” says Agnes, who is two years older than Rambo, “I was pretty bored. I liked to talk to the missionaries, but I didn’t like to talk about the Church. But Rambo would try to help me understand more about the gospel. Finally I decided to investigate the Church because Belle was so serious and made so many sacrifices for the Church, and I could see what the Church was beginning to mean to Rambo.”
And so the sharing went: Two missionaries talked to Belle. Belle joined the Church and began fellowshipping Rambo. Rambo was baptized and began talking about the gospel with Agnes and Simon. Agnes and Simon were baptized, and they were followed by Mandy, the Wongs’ oldest daughter, and May, Angela, and their parents.

I held the paint pen in my hand and started painting the blank canvas in front of me. I was giving art therapy a try, and my therapist and I were working together to help me overcome some of the deep shame I was experiencing. I had picked the color blue to represent those feelings on the canvas.
When my therapist then asked me what I wanted to do with this shame, I immediately thought of Jesus Christ and His healing power. I picked up a yellow pen to represent His light and began to mix the blue and yellow together.
The two colors started to form a bright green—a color we see in spring after a long, cold winter. To me, this green represented me giving my pain, fear, and shame to the Savior and Him providing healing in return. The painting became a representation of who I was becoming, a new man in Christ (see 2 Corinthians 5:17).
It also led me to a new way of living and to feeling greater love from Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
I’ve had to look deep into my soul and explore the shame and pain in many different ways, including the painting exercise I mentioned earlier. I realized that the more willing I was to face these things, the more I was able to draw upon the Savior’s healing power in my life. I’ve continued to seek His influence through consistent prayer, scripture study, meditation, heartfelt conversations with loved ones and trusted friends, and therapy.

Photographs courtesy of Melanie Garcia
On a cold but beautifully sunny day last March, youth from one Texas ward volunteered in their community’s benefit run to help raise awareness for colon cancer. The young men and women were put in charge of providing directions and handing out bottled water and bananas to the runners and walkers. The young men and women also released hundreds of balloons to start the race and to mark the run’s halfway point. “I loved seeing how happy the runners and walkers were when they saw us cheering them on and seeing 300 balloons fill the sky as we let them go,” says Thomas G., a deacon who helped out.
The Latter-day Saint youth were easy to spot since they all wore special volunteer shirts that read, “Arise & Shine Forth Volunteer 2012.” The event’s coordinator spoke highly of the youth and their willingness to serve, saying, “I couldn’t have done this event without the ‘Arise & Shine Forth’ volunteers.”
Rachael D., one of the Laurels at the event, summed up the experience saying, “It felt like we were standing out and making a difference in our own lives and other people’s lives. A lot of people had a blue event shirt, but ours had our Mutual theme on it. I felt like I was wearing a banner that said, ‘I stand up and help where I can and whenever I can.’”

When I was young, my brothers and I liked to sleep outside during the summer. We would spread our sleeping bags on the porch, then find constellations in the stars and listen to crickets as we fell asleep.
One night my older brother Larry and I were out on the porch. We stretched out and looked up at the stars. Larry wasn’t usually very talkative, but that night he said he wanted to tell me some stories. He told me stories from the Book of Mormon, starting with Lehi and his family leaving Jerusalem.
I had heard stories from the Book of Mormon in Primary before, but when Larry told them, it was different. It felt more real. As I looked up at the stars and listened to my brother, I felt very warm and happy inside. Though I didn’t know it then, I was feeling the Holy Ghost telling me the Book of Mormon was true.
A few months later, I found a book of illustrated stories from the Book of Mormon at our house. When I started reading, I got the same warm, comforting feeling that I’d had when Larry told me the same stories.
Years later, when I was trying to decide if I had a testimony, I was a little disappointed that I had never had a big or strong answer. Did this mean I didn’t have a testimony? Then I remembered how I felt when my brother told me stories from the Book of Mormon, and I knew that I did know the Church was true.

It was the day before my high school graduation. The seminary building was packed with students, most of them graduating seniors full of anticipation of the next day’s big event.
It had been a great year for me, and now my high school years were coming to an end. I was standing in a large group of noisy, excited seniors signing yearbooks when a girl I didn’t know asked me if she could sign my book. I thought it was a little unusual, but I shrugged and handed it over. She gave me a big smile and hurried off to a desk in one of the classrooms.
That night as I was looking through my yearbook and smiling at all the things my friends had written, I came to a small paragraph that began, "You don’t know me, but I have been watching you all year."
I was shocked. I read that sentence over and over. I hadn’t been living my life as if someone might be watching me. I had only been thinking of what a good time I was having. I read on. This girl who had asked to sign my yearbook also wrote that she had noticed how active I was in seminary and that she was determined to be just like me.
While I was proud she had chosen me to admire, what I mostly felt at that moment was a profound sense of relief that I had not unknowingly led her down the wrong path by my actions. Not once during that last year of high school had I considered myself a role model to younger students. But that night when I said my prayers, I thanked Heavenly Father for righteous parents, inspiring teachers, and good friends who had made it easy for me to choose the right.
I never saw that girl again. But I have always remembered the moment she changed my life by asking to sign my yearbook. I have tried since that day to live each minute as though someone is watching—because someone usually is.

During the Mexican Revolution, Catherine left her home on fifteen minutes notice. She buried her silver and dishes and left a cake baking in the oven and chickens frying on the stove. Taking only one roll of bedding and one trunk of necessities, Catherine quietly closed the door on the fourth home she had been driven from because of her religious beliefs. As they drove away, two daughters stood up in the back of the wagon and began singing “Count Your Many Blessings.” (Hymns, no. 202.) Lula saw her mother, tears rolling down her cheeks, take one last look towards her husband’s grave, then smile at the children.

My older sister, Aurelia, and I took a jazz dance class this past school year. It was fun, and we were really looking forward to our costumes and doing the recital. Then the schedule came out, and our class had been scheduled for the Sunday performance instead of the one on Saturday. We decided to choose the right and e-mailed the dance teacher that we wouldn’t be able to be in the show so we could keep the Sabbath day holy. It took courage! The next time we went to our dance class we got a surprise. The teacher said that she didn’t want us to not be able to participate, and that we could do a special duet of our dance on Saturday instead. We did, and everyone said it was great. We felt happy that we had chosen the right.

In the summer of 1980, I was nearing the end of my service in the Massachusetts Boston Mission. One evening we had an appointment to teach a promising young college student about the plan of salvation.
Several times during the course of the lesson, I was almost overwhelmed as the Holy Ghost repeatedly witnessed to me that the principles we were teaching were true. I remember praying almost out loud: “I already know this. I have taught this lesson numerous times these past two years. I am grateful to feel thy Spirit, but please witness to our investigator as well!”
A short time after this evening, I met with my mission president, and he informed me that my mother had been killed in a tragic automobile accident. Naturally, this sudden loss came as a tremendous shock to my family and our entire community. But once the emotions of the moment passed and I had occasion to reflect, I recalled with perfect clarity the powerful witness of the Spirit I’d received during that plan of salvation lesson. I knew that this was the work of a loving Heavenly Father preparing me for the loss that was to come.
A day never passes that I do not miss the teaching and companionship of my mother. But a day also never passes that I am not reminded of how a loving Heavenly Father carefully prepared me for that loss.

October is a month to play tricks, but the youth of the Surrey Second Ward, Surrey British Columbia Stake, decided to give treats to a local hospital instead.
Dressed in their Halloween costumes, the youth delivered uncut jack-o’-lanterns that they had decorated with paints, marking pens, and hats (cut jack-o’-lanterns don’t last as long) to the nurses’ stations at a nearby medical center.
Making Halloween sweet instead of scary for the patients wasn’t just a great way for the youth to give service; they say it was also a lot of fun.

When he was President of the Church, he visited Nauvoo in 1906 and reflected on a memory he had when he was just five years old. He said: “This is the exact spot where I stood when [Joseph, my uncle, and my father, Hyrum] came riding up on their way to Carthage. Without getting off his horse father leaned over in his saddle and picked me up off the ground. He kissed me good-bye and put me down again and I saw him ride away.”
The next time Joseph F. saw them, his mother, Mary Fielding Smith, lifted him up to see the martyrs lying side by side after being brutally murdered in Carthage Jail on June 27, 1844.

“Set a goal; then eliminate anything that stands in the way of achieving it.” I read the words on the poster and cringed. It was impossible to make it through class without looking at the clock—which meant looking at the poster right next to it, too. And I didn’t want to see that dumb poster.
I turned away from it to focus my thoughts on Dennis. We had been dating for a while, and I couldn’t imagine loving anyone else. The problem was that he wasn’t a member of the Church, and I had set a goal a long time ago to be married in the temple. According to the poster, I needed to eliminate Dennis! I pushed the thought of breaking up with him out of my head. Maybe I could convert him.
At lunch I decided to give it a try. I steered our conversation in a more serious direction, then gathered my courage and began sharing my beliefs, including temple marriage for eternity. Dennis liked the idea. I could feel the Spirit, so I bore my testimony.
Dennis was thoughtful. Finally he replied, “I know that if you know your church is true, then I will know it is true, too, someday.”
I was ecstatic! If Dennis joined the Church that would solve all my problems. I began by inviting him to church the next Sunday. He really wanted to come, but his family already had plans. He had equally good excuses for not coming the next two Sundays as well, and I understood.
As I lay in bed one night thinking about my situation, the words from that poster at school came into my head. “Set a goal; then eliminate anything that stands in the way of achieving it.” Converting Dennis was going to be a bigger challenge than I had thought. What if he never joined the Church? Or what if he joined but was not really converted? My only other choice was to break up with him. The thought turned my stomach cold. I didn’t have that kind of courage. It would be like breaking my leg.
My heart ached, knowing that keeping Dennis meant I would have to change my goal. I thought of my possible future—attending church alone; raising children with someone who didn’t live the Word of Wisdom; calling my home teachers, not my husband, when a priesthood blessing was needed. And what about eternity? Celestial marriage was a requirement to achieve exaltation with Heavenly Father; this was what I knew I had the potential to achieve. And I was going to give it all up for Dennis, because I didn’t have the courage to spend my earthly life without him?
I had to break up with Dennis.
I was shocked at myself for considering it. But then suddenly the sweetest, most reassuring peace filled me from head to toe. Heavenly Father was speaking to me through the Holy Ghost. Tears came to my eyes. I had to break up with Dennis, and I could do it. Heavenly Father would give me the courage.
The next day during lunch my heart began to pound. I’ll do it tomorrow, I told myself. I could feel my cheeks getting hot.
“What’s wrong?” Dennis asked.
I took a deep breath then blurted, “I have to break up with you!”
Dennis froze. He looked shocked.
“I can’t marry you. I have to break up—now.”
Tears came quickly to his eyes. “But I want you to teach me about your church,” he said.
I swallowed my own tears. “I want to teach you too, but I want to teach you when I know you will join because you know it is true and not because of me.”
I said a silent prayer that he would understand. After a moment of agonizing silence, he asked, “Will you date me again if I join your church someday?”
“Of course!” I nearly sprang out of my chair with joy.
“Promise you won’t forget to teach me,” he said.
I promised.
For weeks my heart throbbed in pain. Every time I saw Dennis I prayed for the strength not to change my mind. We both survived, and our lives took different directions. I never dated a nonmember again, for fear of having to repeat such a painful experience.
Several years later, on summer break from college, I saw Dennis and remembered my promise. Even though I didn’t feel the same way about him anymore and had no intention of ever marrying him, a promise was a promise. I called him up that night and invited him to church. I wasn’t really surprised to hear that he still wasn’t interested.
As I hung up the phone, how grateful I was to my Heavenly Father for giving me the help and the strength I needed to get myself back on the path where I belonged. And how thankful I was for that poster in my class that pointed me in the right direction. Maybe that poster wasn’t so dumb after all.

Seeing an excellent financial opportunity, Elder Ribeiro and his wife Zélia and their small children, planned to move to the USA. Ready to leave, after prayer, fasting and attending the temple the answer was “no”. Months later, Elder Ribeiro was called as a stake president. His wife comforted the family by saying, “We were born to serve the Lord.”
During the following years, they experienced very significant financial losses. The hardships seemed to have no end. The heavens were silent. Days followed months, and months followed years. Faith was tested to the limits. Elder Ribeiro‘s testimony was forged. He learned to know his Saviour in a deeper way. He said: “The Son of God trusted in His Father, endured all things, and endured well until the end. We‘ll never know when the end will come. We can only bear it and bear it well”.

Heavenly Father wants us to serve others. My Primary teacher was a great example of service. When we came to Primary, Sister Antonietti always brought a chocolate cake. I hated chocolate cake! Everyone else liked it. But I never ate it.
One day she asked me, “Why don’t you try a little piece? This cake is made with a special ingredient.”
I agreed to try it. And guess what? I liked it!
Many years later my mom told me what Sister Antonietti’s secret ingredient was. “Sister Antonietti didn’t have much money,” my mom said. “Each week she had to choose between paying for a bus ride to Primary or buying the ingredients to make the chocolate cake for your class. She always chose the chocolate cake. So instead of riding the bus, she walked more than two miles [3 km], each way, regardless of the weather.”
Sister Antonietti’s secret ingredient was the love she had for others!