Gospel Story Finder

While I was stationed at an air base in Wyoming during World War II, it was announced in our branch sacrament meeting that the following week a branch conference would be held and that there was a good possibility that the mission president would bring a visiting authority from Salt Lake City with him. As we came to branch conference the following Sunday morning, we were introduced to that visiting authority, a man whom none of us had ever seen before. It was Elder Spencer W. Kimball, the newest member of the Twelve out on one of his very first assignments. His manner was kindly, his testimony so sure, but he expressed concern that such a high calling should come to one such as he. Then with renewed confidence, he said in effect: “Brothers and Sisters: I don’t know exactly why the Lord has called me, but I do have one talent to offer. My father taught me how to work; and if the Lord can use a worker, I’m available.” Yes, the Lord could use a worker! In fact he needed a hard worker who might possibly be ready to assume prime responsibility at a most significant time.

Muriel’s life started out normal enough. She was a young child in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. She had a happy family, a safe and comfy home, a warm bed, and plenty to eat.
Then war broke out.
After that, things got bad in a hurry. Her low point came when angry men dragged her loving father—“The strongest Christian I know”—away from the family at gunpoint.
Thankfully, her father was reunited with them later on. But life was no longer safe for Muriel or her family. They fled to a refugee camp in Uganda.
Muriel was five years old when her family fled to a refugee camp in Uganda.
Photograph courtesy of Muriel B.
Refugee camps are temporary settlements for people who are forced to leave their home because of war or other reasons. They’re meant to offer safety, and this one did so, but life for Muriel and her family was still a long way from easy.
“We were grateful to be away from the war,” Muriel says. “And the people who ran the camp did the best they could to help us, but there wasn’t enough.”
Not enough food, not enough shelter, not enough medicine—not enough of anything.
“Insects would bite us at night,” she remembers. “And we would be without food for days at a time. There was also a lot of disease in the camp.”
The refugee settlement camp today.
Photograph from Getty Images
Muriel and her family were not members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints at the time, but they were devoted and practicing Christians. They had rock-solid faith in God and in His Son, Jesus Christ. “My parents kept telling me that I can always pray and fast.”
So that’s what she did. As a child in a refugee camp, at an age when many kids are learning to read and write, Muriel was praying every day for survival. She prayed for food. She prayed for safety. She prayed for the strength and courage to keep going.
And she saw God work miracles in their lives.
“God got us away from the war,” she says, “so I knew I could trust Him. Whenever we needed Him the most, like when we had nothing to eat for so long, He always blessed us. He worked small miracles that built up my faith in Him.”
By helping to raise her younger siblings, Muriel has many skills to call on now as she raises her own child.
After nearly two years in the refugee camp, her life took another turn. Muriel and the rest of her family moved to the United States to start a new chapter in a new land. For all she had seen and lived through, Muriel was still only eight years old.
That’s when her parents decided to find a new church to attend.
“I learned to care for young children when I was still a child myself. I had to! My parents needed my help.”
“My Mom and Dad always wanted to worship God and give thanks to Him,” Muriel says. “One Sunday, not long after we arrived in the United States, they said, ‘Let’s go look for a church.’”
They didn’t have to look far. While walking around town they came across two missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the street.
Before long, Muriel was baptized along with her parents. Muriel’s younger siblings were baptized once they were old enough.
Muriel with her mother and youngest sibling.
A lot of what she learned at church was familiar to Muriel, who’d been taught about God and Jesus Christ her whole life. Other topics were new. “I’d never heard of Joseph Smith or Brigham Young or the Book of Mormon,” she said.
Those weren’t the only new things. There was a whole new culture to learn. Here, Church members made a big difference. They taught the family how to use some of the electronic devices and appliances that were different from back home. They helped with the language. And they helped most of all by simply being friends.
Muriel encourages youth today to do the same thing. “Refugees need friends too. Our family didn’t have any friends when we came to this country, but once we joined the Church, we had so many people visit us! Now we have many friends.”
Over the years, Muriel has been able to help serve those same friends who blessed her life early on.
After she entered Young Women, Muriel served in class presidencies and assisted with all kinds of youth activities. She served and taught and shared her testimony.
Through faith in the gospel, Muriel and her family continue to find hope even during life’s struggles.
But one of the best ways she continues to help her friends is by lending her strength in the gospel and her faith in God.
“Some of my friends are struggling to find hope right now,” she says. “But I always tell them, nothing bad lasts forever. For me, I feel like there’s nothing God can’t get you through.
“Sometimes all I can pray for is courage to hold on longer. To keep pushing on. God has always helped me find that courage. For the most part, the blessing of courage to keep pushing ahead is all you really need.”

Encouraging education.“We’re seeing a great miracle,” says Elder Costa. “Many people are poor when they join the Church. But the prophet tells them to see that their children get an education, and they make great sacrifices to do so. Their children are the first in their families to attend the university. Many get good employment—and they aren’t poor anymore.” One example is Luis Prieto, who grew up in a humble home in Bogotá. He was baptized in 1972, along with his parents and siblings. His parents made many sacrifices for their children to get an education. Now Luis is a successful attorney.

One hot summer day the circus pulled into a lot where there was no dust for the elephants to throw onto their backs to rid themselves of the flies that tormented them. Old Mom spied a gunnysack. Picking it up, she waved it around, and the flies flew away. Squealing with delight, Old Mom shimmied and swatted. Suddenly a young bull snatched the gunnysack from her. When Old Mom smacked him on the nose and he dropped it, a punk grabbed the treasure. Soon the sack was flying back and forth like a football. Fred heard the commotion and came running. He yelled for a boy to get each elephant a gunnysack. Within minutes the entire herd was squealing and swatting contentedly. Not one would give up his prize. Imagine the surprise of the circus crowd that night when Old Mom led the elephants into the ring, waving their limp brown flyswatters!

Although most of the Saints had left Nauvoo by summertime, some still remained because of poverty or sickness. This made anti-Mormons very angry. On September 10, 1846, about eight hundred men with six cannons began to fire on the Saints still in Nauvoo. The attack continued for several days until an agreement was reached that every Mormon would leave except five men and their families, who would stay to sell the remaining property.

Another typical example of President Hinckley’s caring for an individual occurred during the 2002 Winter Olympics, which were held in Salt Lake City, Utah. Nearly every day he met with presidents, ambassadors, and other dignitaries. One day, shortly before meeting with the president of Germany, he met with a 13-year-old young woman on her birthday. “[She] suffers from aplastic anemia, a very serious illness,” he recorded. “We had a delightful visit. … I told her that we would remember her in our prayers.”13

On Easter Sunday we had a unique lesson in our Young Women class. We were each given a paper to write down what happened during the days of the Savior’s last week in mortality. For the day of the Resurrection, we came together with all of the young women and listened to a narration of the final hours of the Savior’s life. As it neared the end, I stood up with several other young women to hold up portraits of the Savior.
When I stood up, I noticed that Meghan, an autistic girl in our Laurel class, was crying. I asked a friend to take my place, and I went over to Meghan. After the presentation was over, Meghan began filling out the space on her paper to describe the Savior’s last day. As she finished, my heart was filled with love and humility as I read what she had written from her heart—simple, innocent, and pure: “He will be with us forever.”

KAYLENE: When I was younger, I went through some experiences that will affect me the rest of my life. There was a moment in the temple last semester when I was really caught up in my thoughts. I was prompted to turn to a scripture in Matthew 9:22 that states, “Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole.” All those feelings of guilt, shame, and heartache faded away and I knew that I had received His mercy and He would remember them no more. That moment helped me to realize how important temples are and it renewed my faith in the future. His mercy is full of love and hope.

The temple is a place that I can truly talk one-on-one with my Savior. A few years ago, my uncle passed away and my dad was diagnosed with cancer. I was angry with God even though I didn't know it. After a few months, I went to the temple and talked with God about my struggles. The Lord whispered sweet words of comfort to me and that he has a plan for me and for all of His children.

In these experiences, I felt God’s mercy and love when I needed Him the most.

It was a routine she knew well. She would get up a little before 6:00 A.M. to catch the 6:30 bus, which would take her to school. School would last nine hours. But when the bell rang, dismissing classes, it would seem like her day was just beginning. She would leave class and head to the library for three more hours studying the day’s lessons. At 8:00 P.M., she would hop on the bus and ride 40 minutes to her home, where she would shower, eat, catch up on the world’s latest happenings from the newspaper, read from the scriptures, and then go to sleep. The next day Liu Kwan Ling, who also uses the English name Angel, would do it all over again.
Free time wasn’t one of the luxuries in Angel’s life then, and it certainly isn’t now.
Even Angel admits it was a grueling schedule. She will also admit it was worth it. Last year Angel graduated from the Taipei First Girls’ High School and is now in her first year at National Taiwan University, rated the top college in this island country near mainland China.
Having survived the rigors of high school, Angel is probably busier now that she has graduated. Her college schedule, compared to her daily high school routine, really isn’t that much different. In fact, it’s about identical. It’s just that the college courses she is taking are a little more demanding. Yet Angel knows how she has been able to juggle all the things in her busy schedule.
“I can increase my spirituality by reading the scriptures and praying,” she says. “I think without doing that and by not going to my Sunday meetings I would become easily discouraged and depressed about school and life. But if I go to sacrament meeting and listen to the talks, it seems that my life is always more positive and happy. I think the most important thing in my life is my spirituality.”
It was a tough two years on Angel as she both prepared for college and tried to remain active in the Peitou Ward of the Taipei East Stake, where she is her ward’s sacrament meeting pianist.
The bulk of her time was spent studying English, math, Chinese, physics, chemistry, biology, physical education, music, and housekeeping (cooking and sewing).
Scripture study was a welcome break for Angel, even if her friends didn’t understand why she would take time away from her school classes to bother with religion. “A lot of them think it’s strange that I spend time with my church. Most of my classmates don’t have any religious beliefs,” says Angel, who was the only Church member in the Taipei First Girls’ School student body of 4,000-plus. “Some students will discuss religion with me, but most of the time they just think being LDS is strange because it takes me away from my schoolwork.”
One of those classmates is a friend Angel invited to church one Sunday. Angel says her friend had a generally positive experience at church. She even told Angel afterward that she felt religion was good and that she might think about becoming religious herself—after she graduates from the university. “She just didn’t think she had the time for church,” Angel adds.
Even Angel’s father, Liu Chuen Hsin, isn’t completely convinced the time his daughter spends learning the gospel is all that productive. He often questions if Angel’s time wouldn’t be better spent studying or going to the library. When Angel’s mother, Catherine, joined the Church in 1984, Angel was only seven. Although Liu Chuen Hsin didn’t object to his wife’s baptism, he had no interest in joining the Church with her. However, he did allow Angel to be baptized when she turned eight.
“My father is interesting,” Angel adds. “Sometimes he will say, ‘Since you have an exam coming up, maybe you shouldn’t go to church.’ But there are other times when he’ll tell me to hurry up because he doesn’t want me to be late for church.
“My parents have high expectations of me. My father thinks I can have a great impact on our family by continuing my education and doing well,” Angel adds. Angel is quick to point out she can also have a great impact on her family by staying active in the Church.
“In Taiwan, parents who are members of the Church set examples for their children,” says Kent Liang, a former regional representative and stake president. “They go to church and perform their callings, and the children are able to see this. But some kids whose parents aren’t members are often tempted to rest and not go to church on Sundays. And the school competition is so high that school is sometimes all they see. They think, Should I go to church or go to the library? Sometimes they don’t worry that much about church things because they don’t see that far into the future. Right now, many of the kids in Taiwan are worried only about school.”
And that is what is so amazing about Angel. She graduated near the top of her high school class, yet she doubts she could have done it had she not had the gospel’s guiding influence in her life. “The Church was especially helpful to me during my senior year of high school. I noticed a lot of my schoolmates were easily depressed because of school,” she says. “But I knew if I did my best, Heavenly Father would help me. Usually, my grades were better than I expected.”
Today, college life keeps Angel busy as she studies to become a doctor. As Angel returns home from a full day, she still takes time to read from the scriptures. When she closes her scriptures, it’s 10:30 P.M. Angel’s day is over—finally. She can close her eyes knowing she is doing well in school, and, more importantly, she is finding time to include the gospel in her busy life. In less than eight hours, her day will begin all over again. Angel will undoubtedly enjoy a very sound sleep.

I was at the home of a friend. We played video games, and at first everything was OK. Then my friend’s parents started arguing with each other, saying bad words and things that weren’t kind. My friend told me he didn’t like them saying those things. It made him feel sad and scared. He asked his parents to stop arguing and saying bad words, but they didn’t stop. We decided to go downstairs to be away from the arguing. To help my friend feel better, I told him about Jesus Christ, and how we can all get to heaven and be together as happy families. My friend doesn’t go to church, so I wanted to share the gospel with him. My friend said that the things I told him made him feel much better.
When I got home, my parents gave me big hugs. I was so happy to be home that I never wanted to leave again. I told my mom that as soon as I got home I felt safe again. It was like a shield surrounded me and protected me.

Ruth has a love for children that she gained in part from her own youth. Many of Ruth’s childhood summers were spent in Springville, Utah, with her Aunt Millie Reynolds Martain. Aunt Millie was the midwife for that area, and like the old horse-and-buggy country doctor, many nights—good weather or bad—she would go out to help some new child into the world.

When Ruth was visiting her, Millie would take her along. Ruth would wait outside until the baby had come and then be called in to help give the newborn his first bath.

It was a beautiful tradition that helped teach her reverence for life; she has carried it on with each of her grandchildren. Wherever it happens, when they come into the world, Grandmother Funk is there to welcome them. Her careful attention and investment of time and love has developed into a close relationship with each of her grandchildren.

I bought the first one several years ago in a drugstore in Alexandria, Virginia. At 77¢, it was the least pretentious bound notebook I could find. At the time, I didn’t know I was starting a journal. I only knew I needed a place to organize my thoughts.
Before then, I had written ideas on any convenient scrap of paper—on the backs of tithing slips, on church programs, in small spaces on calendars. As I lost those bits of paper, I lost my only record of my best insights. The time had come to make them more lasting.
From grade school through high school I had kept diaries, but the small, hand-size pages didn’t allow for long entries. And the word diary on the front seemed too lofty, like the record an explorer would keep of an Antarctic exploration. I wrote only the activities of my life in them, never my thoughts. (A typical entry: “Today I did horrible on my history test, but tonight Mike in my French class called me.”)
There was little emotional substance to those entries, but at least they were entries. Regrettably, as l attended college, I became “too busy” to keep a diary.
Therefore, when I bought the 77¢ notebook, I wasn’t thinking “diary” or “journal.” I was just tired of losing those insights that would make good Sunday School talks. As I wrote in that first notebook, I was fascinated by how easily words came. I began looking forward to writing in my notebook at night. Sometimes during the day I would write myself a note about ideas to record that night. Some mornings I awoke before dawn and wrote fervently for five minutes or even an hour, undisturbed by the need to get up and get dressed. Some nights I wrote several entries; some nights I wrote none.
I liked the inexpensive notebooks because I wasn’t afraid to make mistakes in them, or to write about the mistakes I made in living. I began setting aside time to write. I wrote in the same place—curled up on the sofa, by the lamp. I recorded in the margins events that were significant, such as a new car or the date of my cat’s vaccinations. The actual writing space was used to record my reactions to the day, my observations and conclusions.
It was only when I went back to the drugstore several months later to buy another notebook that I realized I was keeping a journal. I decided to give the series of notebooks a name: Janet. The first volume, Janet 1, hadn’t exactly assumed journal form, since I had dated few entries, and none mentioned daily activities and impressions. As I realized I was keeping a journal, I modified the format so that I would at least know what day each entry was written.
It became interesting, too, to note where I was each day I wrote. No matter where I went—on trips or to stay with nearby friends—I found that I was the same person, with the same personality.
When I was visiting a friend once, I realized the journal’s potential for encouraging spiritual and emotional growth. After hours of bantering with a philosophy student who wanted to argue about the gospel, I wrote a long entry about my beliefs. Putting it on paper was like testifying. That night, as I wrote with a purple felt-tipped pen, I realized how open and honest I was with my journal—probably more candid than I was with any friend. Because of my frustration with my ability to think and express myself I wrote: “My brain has been like a vacuum cleaner, sucking in all sorts of garbage and dirt. And gold dust. So I must empty the bag and sort out the particles one by one until only the gold dust is left.”
Writing out my ideas gave me a chance to analyze them. Sometimes, in writing, I realized that my attitudes were based on selfishness or faulty judgment. Other times I was glad to realize that my ideas were sound.
Sometimes I found myself laughing out loud at my reactions to the traumas of each day. Once on a bad day I wrote “PHOOEY” in letters 15 spaces high. It helped.
I started titling each entry. One of my favorite titles—and favorite entries—came when I was trying to develop greater faith. That title was “Doubt Creeps in and Janet Strikes Back.” Some titles reflect a calmer attitude. One in Janet 3, “On Days and Nights and Things I Love,” leads into a paragraph I love to reread:
“I love nights that are chilly and clear, when I can see the stars and talk aloud under them. And I love early mornings, being up, being alive, and being outside on a day that is only starting. I love new beginnings that are just getting organized. And clean sheets, clean nightgown, clean body, clean hair, and a reason to be happy. I love the world when my soul brims with hope.”
My soul doesn’t always brim with hope. Sometimes it brims with frustration. When that’s the case, I can look back to the rejuvenating entry I wrote that September night. I can find encouragement from another entry, written soon after that one: “When I can understand what I’m going through, I find that endurance becomes easier.”
Not every entry is profound or even interesting. But each, in its own way, traces my daily conversion to the gospel, my struggles with myself, and my delight with each line-upon-line discovery of living. Each helps the others assume clearer perspective. Not only does each entry reflect my life, but it affects and becomes part of my life.
It was during Janet 4, when my best friend moved, that I wrote: “I hurt too much to write.” And it was during Janet 5, after I had written a thoughtless letter that hurt a friend, that I wrote in my journal: “Through the many confusing voices that ring through my mind, one calming voice pervades and tells me the whole matter will be of no consequence.” After writing about that “calming voice,” I listened to it more carefully. The “voice” was right; when I later asked the friend to forgive me, he said he already had.
One day, when I felt that life was picking on me, I started what has become a tradition. I wrote an entry titled “Things I Am Thankful For.” It amazed me that day, as it still does, how varied and plentiful are my blessings, and how obscure and sometimes even humorous are my trials.
Through moves from one side of the United States to the other, through vacations, through each peak and plateau, the volumes of my journal have been a constant, a friend, tucked on a bookshelf or into a suitcase along with my copies of the scriptures. They have become a vehicle for working out personal answers for the curious challenges of each day.
I thought, at the beginning of the journal keeping, that I would neatly record my most profound thoughts, making them more accessible when I had to give sacrament meeting talks. Once or twice I have used a journal for that, but it’s far from the full benefit. The journal isn’t a reference book about my life, nor does it map my life. It isn’t a status chart; it’s a dynamic, if rough, artwork.
The Janet series is steaming ahead in its 15th volume. Some volumes span a year, and others a few months. I am the only person who has read all of them, and I may keep it that way—for a few decades, at least. The volumes have graduated from inexpensive notebooks to actual hardback books with blank pages. I have to confess—I bought a leather-bound journal last time (but it was on sale). And I did make quite a concession on the journal before that; it actually says “Journal” on the cover!

Working with youth can be difficult. How is your relationship with the young people of the Church?
Our youth in Russia seem to lack initiative, self-esteem, and confidence in social situations. We must develop all of these things in our youth and be able to reach their hearts. Going on picnics together, I felt a mutual understanding grow, and we became friends. The same thing happened when I began to invite youth from all the six St. Petersburg branches. Now our youth gladly come out to activities.

Leaving behind relatives, a culture, and a land they loved must have been a daunting sacrifice, but the hardships were in many ways just beginning. Arriving in Calgary with only a suitcase, a baby buggy, and CAD $32, my parents were in great need.
The Canadian members immediately started serving my family, generously providing help with transportation, shopping, and finding a home to rent. Within a week my parents and my grandma had a home furnished with beds, a table and chairs, a couch, a crib, bedding, dishes, and even some food in the cupboards. My mother wrote in her journal how surprising and thrilling it was to see these unexpected furnishings and how grateful she was for the service given.
Along with deep feelings of gratitude, however, were other emotions. Culture shock was very real and difficult to deal with. The first year of living in Calgary was filled with English classes and frigid walks to work for Dad. They were doing everything possible to establish a sense of home, but still this was a trying time with so much change. The Saints of their new ward in Calgary worked through the language barrier to become a support system to the newly arrived members. Each Sunday my family gained strength as they attended sacrament meeting to renew their covenants, relying on the Spirit to teach them English.
Our family of five was sealed together in the Cardston Alberta Temple in October 1976. My mother had set her sights on this day over 20 years earlier and finally, in a country and language that she would have never imagined as a youth, her prayers were answered. I was then almost eight years old, and I have wonderful memories of my parents’ sparkling eyes and smiles as we children entered the sealing room.
My grandmother was also at the temple that day. I recall her excitement at seeing the temple lights as we had arrived in Cardston. Years later, after retiring from her job in Calgary, she moved to Cardston and gave many hours of service in the temple. She loved to play the organ and help inspire reverence there. Her testimony and love for the Savior was evidenced through her kindness to everyone around her. She is to me an example of a strong Latter-day Saint woman.
I feel overwhelming gratitude to my parents—the pioneers in my family—for their sacrifices of career, extended family, homeland, and possessions. It seems they gave up so much, but the Lord has so abundantly blessed them—and their posterity—for living the principles of the gospel.

When I was 17, Sabrina and I went to the same boarding school in Uruguay. I was going through a difficult time and didn’t want to have anything to do with anybody. But I did make a few friends.
Sabrina in particular stood out. She was nice to everyone. She invited me to play volleyball at her church, and she smiled even when I made excuses not to go. As I felt more comfortable with her, I thought maybe I should go.
Then one day I was rushed to the hospital with appendicitis. After surgery, I couldn’t go to school for 15 days. When I returned, Sabrina wasn’t there. She had moved back home. School wasn’t the same without her, so I wrote her a letter.
I asked her to forgive me for not playing volleyball. I told her that I’d always felt good around her and that I missed her.
Soon I received a letter and a package. In the letter, Sabrina told me she was happy that I’d written to her. She also told me about a tragic bus accident in which several people she knew had been killed. Then she wrote something that would change my life:
“We should always be at peace with God, because we never know when He will call us to His presence. Please read the book I sent with this letter. Ask God if it is true.”
In the package was the Book of Mormon. I started reading and I did ask if it was true. I felt so wonderful I thought my heart would burst. I’d never felt that way before. I went to church and started meeting with the missionaries. Soon I became a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
That was 15 years ago. Today I still have a firm testimony. Thank you, Sabrina, for inviting me to play volleyball. Even though I never did come to play, your example helped to bring me to Jesus Christ.

When my great-great grandparents joined the Church in Sweden over one hundred years ago they were faced with a long ocean voyage to America, a train trip from New York to Omaha, and then a trek by wagon to Salt Lake City. But when they boarded the train in New York, they discovered that they were to ride in stock cars that had been used to haul hogs to market—and the cars were filthy and filled with parasitic insects that live on hogs.
Grandmother accepted the inconvenience, but the humiliation was almost more than grandfather could bear. “To think we are no better than hogs,” he complained. Unwillingly he made the trip anyway.
Grandmother was expecting another child, and when they reached Omaha to begin their long trek west, grandfather was concerned about her health and the safety of the baby. The person in charge of the wagon train assured him that there were competent women trained to deliver babies available and that everything would be all right, so they began their journey.
Somewhere on the plains of Nebraska, a healthy baby was born. But a few days later, the three-year-old son got cholera. In the middle of the night, grandfather went to a neighboring wagon to borrow a candle, but was told they couldn’t spare one. This angered him, and he was angry as he sat in the dark with his son’s drooping, feverish body in his arms. The boy died that night.
The next morning the wagon master said they would hold a short funeral service and bury the boy in a shallow grave, apologetically explaining that they were in a dangerous Indian country and didn’t have time to do anything more. But grandfather couldn’t accept this, and insisted on staying behind and digging a grave deep enough so the animals couldn’t get the body.
Throughout the day and into the night he worked, building a strong wood coffin and digging a grave 1 1/2 meters deep in the hard soil. Finally, very tired and sobbing, he buried his son and then walked all night to catch up with the wagon train. He was heartbroken and he was angry—angry at the wagon master for not waiting to give his son a proper burial, and angry at God for “allowing” his son to die. When he arrived at his wagon and expressed his feelings to his wife, she spoke to him tenderly:
“Father, we have to make the best of it. The baby and I are all right and, thank the Lord, the rest of us are well. If we get to our journey’s end without any more trouble, we must be very thankful to our Heavenly Father. We have joined the Mormon Church because we believed it was the only true one and I have faith that it is. We are not the only ones that are having sorrow and trouble on this trip” (from the history of Hakan Hanson).
This wasn’t the end of their difficulties; they continued to suffer serious hardships and adversities throughout their lives. But although they both went through identical experiences, each was affected differently by them. Grandfather became withdrawn, ill-natured, and bitter. He stopped going to Church and found fault with Church leaders. He became trapped in his own miseries, and the light of Christ grew dimmer and dimmer in his life.
On the other hand, grandmother’s faith increased. Each new problem seemed to make her stronger. She became an angel of mercy—filled with empathy, compassion, and charity. She was a light to those around her. Her family moved toward her and looked to her as their leader.

Col. Halvorsen said that children sometimes wrote to him with special requests. “I received one letter with a beautiful map in it. The little girl said hers was the white house with the chickens in the backyard and that she would be waiting there at 2:00 P.M. I never found her house so I mailed her a package.”
Twenty years later when Col. Halvorsen returned to Tempelhof as commander of the base, the same girl, now grown up with a family of her own, wrote to him again. She invited him to dinner in the same home he had failed to find during the airlift. The two families still keep in touch with each other.

This spreading evil has been aided by a failure to enforce laws designed to prohibit or regulate it. Although some additional legislation may be helpful, those who have been fighting the discouraging battle against pornography in recent years are in agreement that nearly 90 percent of all obscene materials could be eliminated from our communities if existing obscenity laws were strictly enforced. A few courageous cities have performed outstanding service by ridding themselves of X-rated theaters and so-called “adult” bookstores, and by limiting access to hard-core pornographic books and magazines. The citizens of Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania, formed a citizen action group and determined that they were not going to allow such degrading material in their community. They closed an adult bookshop and a large distribution warehouse, and, as a result of their determined citizens’ organization and involvement, they have had enacted a city public nuisance ordinance.

One day, I turned to my father for advice. Because of his training as a psychiatrist, I knew he wouldn’t be too critical of his son-in-law. His first words were like a bucket of cold water over me: “Martha, if you continue like this, you could drive your husband away.”

My jaw dropped. “What do you mean by that?” I asked. This wasn’t going at all as I had expected.

He held up his hand to ward off my indignation. “Just let me explain. Not long ago, I counseled a Latter-day Saint woman who had left a basically good marriage. She felt her husband wasn’t living all the Church standards. Years of nagging and pleading hadn’t changed him. She thought that if she left him, he would change his ways in order to win her back. She never suspected that he would find someone else who loved and respected him as he was. He remarried happily after their divorce, and she was devastated.”

I remember well the insecurities I felt as a teenager with a bad case of acne. I tried to care for my skin properly. My parents helped me get medical attention. For years I even went without eating chocolate and all the greasy fast foods around which teens often socialize, but with no obvious healing consequences. It was difficult for me at that time to fully appreciate this body which was giving me so much grief. But my good mother taught me a higher law. Over and over she said to me, “You must do everything you can to make your appearance pleasing, but the minute you walk out the door, forget yourself and start concentrating on others.”

There it was. She was teaching me the Christlike principle of selflessness. Charity, or the pure love of Christ, “envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own” (Moroni 7:45). When we become other-oriented, or selfless, we develop an inner beauty of spirit that glows in our outward appearance. This is how we make ourselves in the Lord’s image rather than the world’s and receive His image in our countenances. President Hinckley spoke of this very kind of beauty that comes as we learn to respect body, mind, and spirit. He said:
“Of all the creations of the Almighty, there is none more beautiful, none more inspiring than a lovely daughter of God who walks in virtue with an understanding of why she should do so, who honors and respects her body as a thing sacred and divine, who cultivates her mind and constantly enlarges the horizon of her understanding, who nurtures her spirit with everlasting truth” (“Understanding Our Divine Nature,” Liahona, Feb. 2002, 24; “Our Responsibility to Our Young Women,” Ensign, Sept. 1988, 11).