Gospel Story Finder

One group of friends found an unusual way to reach out to each other. They came from different family situations and backgrounds, but they all cared about each other and wanted to strengthen their friendship.

One of their friends was having a particularly hard time at home. She told them she sometimes wished she could disappear but kept her feelings hidden behind a smile because she was worried that others would judge her.

Her friends wanted her to know that she was safe with them and that the world was a better place because she was in it. So they came up with a plan: they would wear safety pins. Each of them wore a safety pin on their clothes each day to remind her, and each other, that they were committed to creating a safe, secure, trustworthy friendship—and that they wanted each other to stick around.

Years later, this young woman still remembers her safety-pin friends and is grateful for the security she felt knowing that they cared about her.

Sam pedaled his bike as fast as he could up the hill. He leaned forward. The air whipped through his hair. His friend Liam pedaled next to him.
“Getting tired?” Liam said.
“No way!” Sam said.
Their friend Eric was already at the park at the top of the hill.
“Komm schon! Come on!” he yelled.
Sam and Liam reached the top of the hill. The boys parked their bikes and sat under a tree.
Liam picked up a rock and threw it. “I’m bored.” There weren’t many places to go in their small village in Switzerland.
“Me too,” Eric said. He scratched the dirt with a stick.
“We could keep biking,” Sam said.
Liam scrunched up his face. “That’s all we ever do.”
“Let’s do something funny!” Eric said. He hopped up and walked over to the bike rack, where lots of bikes were parked. Sam and Liam followed him.
Sam’s stomach felt tight. Sometimes what Eric and Liam thought was funny wasn’t funny to him. Eric and Liam liked to tease other kids and say rude things in class. But maybe this time would be different.
Besides, there weren’t many boys in Sam’s class. If he wasn’t friends with Eric and Liam, who would he be friends with?
“Let’s take the valve caps off all the tires,” Eric whispered. “We can hide them by the tree.” He knelt down by a shiny red bike and twisted a little plastic cap off one of the tires.
Liam laughed. “Yes! That will be so funny.”
Sam sighed. Nope. This time wasn’t different. “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe we should just go.”
Eric shoved Sam’s arm. “Aw, come on!” he said. “No one is even looking.”
“They’re just little parts,” Liam said. “No one will even notice they’re gone.”
Sam tried to ignore the sick feeling in his stomach. Taking the valve caps wouldn’t ruin the bikes. He shrugged and nodded.
The three boys quickly took all the valve caps off the bike tires and ran back to the tree. They hid all the caps under a rock and sat down to watch the bikes. Liam and Eric were giggling.
Soon a man walked up, unlocked his bike, and rode off.
“See? He didn’t even notice,” Liam said.
But I did, Sam thought.
The rest of the day, Sam couldn’t stop thinking about the valve caps. He wished he could give them back, but he had no way to find the bikes’ owners. He knelt down and told Heavenly Father about it.
“I feel awful,” Sam said. “I wish I had never done it. Please forgive me, Heavenly Father.”
The next day, Sam and his friends rode their bikes to the park again.
Once again, Eric said, “Let’s take the valve caps!”
Once again, Liam agreed.
Sam remembered his prayer. And this time, he felt a little braver.
“I don’t think we should,” he said.
“Why not?” Liam said, frowning. “No one even noticed yesterday.”
“I wouldn’t want someone messing with my bike,” Sam said. Before either boy could answer, he hopped on his bike. “Race you to the bakery!” he yelled. Then he started pedaling as fast as he could.
Eric and Liam grabbed their bikes too.
“No fair! You got a head start,” Liam called.
Sam grinned as his friends raced after him. He whispered a thank you to Heavenly Father. He felt much better.
This story took place in Switzerland.

I have heard the account many times of the arrival of the pioneers in the Salt Lake Valley under the direction of Brigham Young. Although I live in Mexico, my own story is similar. I had been praying to find the true Church and the purpose of my life. A friend of mine, Sandro, introduced me to the missionaries, and soon I was listening to their message. One day while they were teaching me about the Restoration of the Church of Jesus Christ in the latter days, I was suddenly filled with a great joy. I knew I had arrived, or as President Young said: “This is the right place. Drive on.”

When I was younger, my dad was bishop for six years. Almost every Sunday I would sit with him just because I loved him. Three years ago my dad died. I am still sad, but it isn’t as hard as it used to be. I believe that my family can live together in heaven. Thank you, everybody who has helped me. I love you. I love the Friend magazine too. It is my favorite thing to read.Rebecca Rose H., age 11Arizona

Joe Lee sat quietly in conference listening to the people who spoke. He couldn’t understand all they said, but he loved singing the songs with them. He thought how wonderful it would be if he could go up on the stand and tell everyone how exciting it was to be a member of the Church.
Joe was an eight-year-old Korean-Hawaiian boy who had just been baptized. He lived on the island of Molokai in Hoolehua, Hawaii. Joe and his mother were members of the Church, but his father had no interest in it at all. Joe had such a good feeling that he wanted his father to become a member of the Church too.
That night after conference Joe told his mother the thoughts that had come to him during the meeting and later she told Brother Murphy, who was conducting the conference, what her young son had said.
During the next session of conference Joe suddenly heard his name called. Brother Murphy was inviting him to go up to the pulpit and speak!
Joe quickly stood up, and while he was walking up to the pulpit, someone on the stand hurried to get a little chair. Many in the meeting wondered what an eight-year-old boy who was called out of the audience might say.
Joe stood on the chair and spoke into the microphone. A breathless hush came over everyone as Joe began, “Aloha everybody!” He paused only a moment. Then in a clear calm voice he went on, “I know that Jesus is God’s own Son. I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet.”
Tears filled many eyes when Joe said, “My father is not a member of the Church. Please pray that he will become one so he can take Mother and our family to the temple. Then we will all be together in the next world.”
Joe’s prayer and the prayers of others were answered a short time later when Joe’s father was baptized. One of the happiest days of Joe’s life was about a year later when his father took his family to the temple at Laie, where they were sealed as a family.

Wangu, of the Kibuyu tribe, liked the hot dust of the road squeezing up between his brown toes. The African plain around him was spotted with many colored flowers, showing against the yellow grasses waving in the gentle breeze. Nandi flame trees flashed in the glaring sunshine. Wangu felt happy. He was sure something good was going to happen to him. Already he had found his bwana’s (white-man boss’s) lost cow and now he could see the tops of the huts in his shamba (village).
Wangu turned to pull on the lead rope to make the cow walk faster, and then he saw the bicycle. It was in the ditch beside the road and almost covered with thorn bushes. Wangu jumped into the ditch and with his panga (machete-like knife) he chopped the thorn bushes away. Then he dragged the bicycle up to the road.
It was a very old bicycle. Both its wheels were dented and it had many broken spokes. Its chain was stiff with rust. Some bwana threw it away a long time ago, he thought, but it was a bicycle and to own a bicycle was something Wangu had dreamed about.
Wangu had trouble leading the cow and carrying the bicycle, but he struggled on. A little farther along the road he stepped off into the grass, walking toward his shamba. He heard the neighing of an unseen zebra and the roar of simba (lion) a long distance away. The sounds did not disturb Wangu because he was thinking deeply about his four sons. They were a year or two apart in age, starting at age nine. He thought how much each boy would like a bicycle.
When Wangu entered the village his oldest son was the first to greet him. “What will you do with the broken bicycle, Father?” he asked.
His other three sons quickly gathered around him as he answered. “I will make it whole again so that it will be useful.”
“It is a beautiful bicycle,” his nine-year-old son said wistfully.
“I will make it even more beautiful,” Wangu promised, putting the broken bicycle in his thingira, a special hut where his wife could not enter. Then he took the cow to its place among his employer’s cattle.
Wangu began work on the bicycle by taking it apart. For help in understanding how to do it and to borrow tools, he went to the nearby mission.
Each month Wangu took part of the shillingi (English money) his bwana paid him for the work he did, and walked the seven miles to the ducca (general store) and bought new parts for the bicycle.
Repairing the bicycle was slow work, but for Wangu it was a work of joy. As he worked, his thoughts kept wandering to the worth of his four sons. He thought of how proud he was of them and of how fine and helpful they were to him.
Just before he finished working on the bicycle, he decided that his sons deserved to have it. But he couldn’t give it to all of them. Wangu knew that if he did that, the bicycle would cause many quarrels. He must give it to just one boy. He wondered how he could do that without hurting the feelings of the others.
Wangu painted the bicycle red and yellow; and while he waited for the paint to dry, he tried hard to think of a way to give it to just one of his sons. The answer came to him the night before he would take the bicycle out of his thingira and show it to all the people in the village.
The next morning Wangu wheeled the sparkling, newly painted bicycle out onto the hard-packed dirt in the center of the circle of beehive-shaped huts made out of wattle and mud. The people came running from all directions, shouting words of praise for the bicycle. Wangu waited for quiet and until his sons stood in front of him. As he looked at them he thought of how well they cared for his sheep and goats.
“It is my wish to give this bicycle to one of my sons, and I have found a way to do it fairly,” Wangu announced. “The people at the mission have taught us to write our names and some of the white man’s words.” Then he spoke directly to his sons. “Go and get a calabash (clay bowl shaped like a gourd), four pieces of paper, and a pencil.”
The boys left in an excited rush. Wangu waited, beaming under the admiration of the people. He waited until he became impatient. It seemed that his sons were taking much too long. When they finally arrived on the run he frowned at them.
“You will each write your name on a piece of paper, fold it so the name cannot be seen, and drop it into the calabash,” he told them. “Then I will lift out a name and whoever owns the name owns the bicycle.”
When this was done Wangu took the calabash and shook it. He pulled a paper from it. Wangu was the name written on the paper.
“This is the wrong name,” he said gruffly.
With his fingers in the calabash he stirred the papers around. Then he quickly took another one and unfolded it slowly. Wangu was also written on that paper. In a fast movement he grabbed the remaining two papers in the calabash and on each one was written the name Wangu.
All his sons had wanted him to have the bicycle. Tears filled Wangu’s eyes and his heart seemed almost to burst with the great love he felt for his sons.

As the Light of Christ shines through us, we could compare it to sunrises and sunsets. What we do with the Light of Christ in our lives will be as different as the colors of sunrises and sunsets. This light does not grow brighter with cosmetics, expensive clothes, or fancy cars. Instead, it increases with Christlike acts. In last week’s devotional address, Brother Byron Gilbert talked about the goal of a CPR class and how practicing the techniques over and over and over again prepares the participant for a real-life situation if needed. I believe that is why the Light of Christ is given to every person on earth. As we act on a feeling or impression to help others in small ways, doing it over and over again becomes a part of our daily lives. Examples include taking an extra few minutes to help a friend, being kind to someone less fortunate, speaking a soft word to someone who is stressed or angry, or giving up something that we want in order to make someone else's day more joyful, comfortable, or happy.

I would like to tell you about two men that fit these criteria. The first man was one of my co-workers in the carpenter shop when I started working at Ricks College. I was warned by several people that he had the reputation of being a prankster and made life interesting. One time, he grabbed some stale bread, wilted lettuce, and whatever else he could find from the MC kitchen garbage room and put together a sandwich. Then, he wrapped it and swapped it out for one in a co-worker’s lunchbox. A 26-pound lead brick in your empty lunchbox or the lunchbox screwed to the bench was not uncommon.

After a short time, I was assigned to work with John. My "zoomed-in” perspective changed as I worked with him. He always talked about his mission to Sweden, the home of his ancestors, and how he loved the people there. After he passed away, I learned he bought a piano for a small branch in Sweden at the end of his mission. He would drive to Idaho Falls once a week to serve in the Idaho Falls Temple. At his home one evening, a young, married, expecting mother came to talk to his wife, who was in the Relief Society leadership and also a nurse. As they talked in the kitchen, he overheard the woman say something about needing money paid upfront before they could have the baby. He got his checkbook, signed a blank check, took it in the kitchen, and told her to take it and go have the baby. But the one thing for me that really sticks in my mind was how he prayed. The first time I heard him pray, I thought that if I had opened my eyes, I would have seen Christ listening intently. His prayers were like that every time.

The second man was a farmer and rancher, as well as working full-time for the U and I Sugar Co. in Idaho Falls. After taking a temple prep class, he and his wife, his parents, and another couple, went to the temple, received their endowment, and were then sealed to their families. While going through the endowment session, there was a jackhammer doing construction work on the temple. As a result of him not hearing well and not being totally prepared and committed, his experience was not good and he slowly went back to inactivity.

As his sons were growing up, he taught them by example, long hours, and hard work how to care for the animals and crops. He also taught them to serve others. Many times, a neighbor’s equipment would break down, cows would get out, fires would burn pens and outbuildings. Whenever there was someone in need, he would rush to help, usually bringing his sons along with him. Between farm and ranch work and his full-time job, as well as helping others, days were always busy. But when an opportunity arose and there was a short break, he would take his boys fishing on the nearby creeks and canals or hunting.

He loved his family and even though he didn't attend church much, he went to baby blessings, baptisms, ordinations, etc. He supported them in scouting and school activities, as well as their Church responsibilities and callings. He served on several fundraising committees for his ward (one was a ward cookbook—the funds went to the elders quorum). Another, he raised funds for and helped prepare supper for communities after the Teton Dam collapsed. Their ward community did not get flooded, so they would invite wards who had been impacted to come to their church throughout the summer for a pig roast with all the trimmings and fun activities.

One November day while packing bales of straw to tuck around his beehives for protection from the winter weather, he had a coughing spell due to a cold. As he was coughing, he bent over the bale of straw and felt a sharp pain in his lower rib area, but it went away shortly after. But day by day, the pain increased. So, he went to the doctor who prescribed an antibiotic and told him to come back next week if it did not improve. The pain was not improving, so he was sent to the hospital for x-rays. The following day when he went back in for the results, he had indeed broken a rib, but the x-rays revealed more. Several dark spots were scattered through his chest cavity. After multiple failed attempts to retrieve a tissue sample, the decision was made to do major surgery to get a sample. The results came back: a form of kidney cancer with a dim prognosis. After two unsuccessful chemo treatments, his health went downhill fast.

With his illness came the desire to return to the temple. He told his wife he wanted to go back to the temple but didn't know if it would be possible. His bishop and a member of the stake presidency came to his home and interviewed him. Arrangements were then made by the elders quorum presidency and his bishop to get a van (because he was very weak and in a wheelchair) and physically help him go through a session. This time, despite the pain, he had a very special feeling as he attended the temple.

Though the lives of these two men were totally different, their Christlike actions radiated a light unto me, my family, and all they served. The first man truly was like a second father to me over the years. The second man was my father, who passed away at the age of 42, a month before I started working at the college.

By the time Nicky got to the street where he lived, he was almost jogging. When he reached his house, he dashed inside, slamming the door a little too hard, and called, “I’m home, Old Nonno!”
There was no answer.
Nicky rushed through the house, looking for Old Nonno. Finally he found Old Nonno sitting in a rocking chair on the back porch, enjoying the warm spring sunshine. “Hello, Old Nonno,” Nicky said as he went up to his great-grandfather and put his arms gently around the old man’s neck to give him a hug. “Are you ready?”
Old Nonno smiled at Nicky through his watery, cloudy, 102-year-old eyes. They were kind eyes, understanding eyes that had seen much during his lifetime. “Of course I’m ready!”
Both his grandfather and his great-grandfather had lived with Nicky and his parents. Grandfather was called Nonno, so great-grandfather was called Old Nonno. Then two years ago Nicky’s grandfather had died. But it had been his great-grandfather who had taken the time to talk and play with Nicky. He couldn’t imagine a better friend than Old Nonno.
By the time Nicky changed into his work clothes and went back outside, Old Nonno was already in the garden with the wooden boxes filled with the tomato plants that the two of them had started weeks earlier from seeds.
Nicky carried a bucket of water to the garden and Old Nonno started forcing his thick, pointed stick into the soft soil and pulling it to one side to form a hole. Nicky poured water into the hole, then held a six-inch tomato plant in it while Old Nonno pressed the soil around the plant’s roots.
When they finished the second row, Old Nonno paused. He picked up a handful of the black dirt and slowly straightened up, a faraway look in his eyes. Some of the dirt trickled between his fingers. Nicky looked at Old Nonno’s gnarled knuckles, swollen and misshapen by arthritis, and he wondered if being old hurt. Then Nicky looked up into Old Nonno’s face and saw that it wasn’t pain that had caused him to stop. It was his memories.
Old Nonno had been a teenager when he’d left his parents in Italy to live in the United States. It had taken many years of hard work before he’d been able to buy a small vegetable farm just outside a big city where, for almost fifty years, he had raised millions of tomatoes and other vegetables. Now that land was covered with streets and lawns and trees and homes.
Old Nonno bent over and patted his handful of black dirt around the last small tomato plant, then turned to Nicky. “Let’s hurry and clean up here, Nicky, so that we can go tend our magic garden.”
Fifteen minutes later they were upstairs in Old Nonno’s room. Except for the door, the closet, and the window, all the walls of Old Nonno’s room were covered with bookshelves filled with books that the old, cloudy eyes could no longer read.
“Your mind is a magic garden,” Old Nonno often said to Nicky. “It’s a magic garden because anything that you plant there grows into either seeds or weeds. Every day you choose which one you plant in your magic garden.”
Old Nonno sat down in a big chair and used his hands to lift his feet onto the footstool. From the table next to him he took a small framed picture of his wife and looked at it lovingly. Nicky had never known Old Nonnì. She had died more than twenty years before Nicky was born.
Nicky sat in his chair on the other side of the table and opened up Old Nonno’s Bible to the bookmark. Every day, the first thing was for Nicky to read to Old Nonno from the scriptures.
Nicky found the next marked verses, and read aloud: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
“A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted” (Eccl. 3:1–2).
As Nicky closed the Bible and put it back on the table, old Nonno said quietly, “Isn’t that beautiful, Nicky? That’s one of my favorite passages.”
Nicky nodded, although he wondered if he’d really understood what he’d just read. He decided to think about it later. For now, he’d just continue reading. “We finished Huckleberry Finn yesterday, Old Nonno. What do you want to read now?”
“That one,” Old Nonno said, pointing.
Nicky got the large book, opened it to Chapter One, and started to read. He looked at Old Nonno, who had his eyes closed and a happy smile on his face.
Throughout the spring, Nicky and Old Nonno pulled weeds in the outside garden and supported the growing tomato plants with wooden stakes. By summer the little yellow flowers on them became green tomatoes that grew larger every day. Nicky and Old Nonno tried to guess which of two tomatoes that they were especially watching would ripen first.
The day came when one of the tomatoes was fully ripe. As soon as Nicky’s baseball practice was over, he hopped on his bike and pedaled hard for home. He and Old Nonno were going to pick the tomato, eat it with their lunch, then walk to the ice-cream store and buy a treat. But when Nicky pulled into the driveway, his mother was outside waiting for him.
“Nicky,” she said softly, “something has happened to Old Nonno. Your father went with him in the ambulance to the hospital a few minutes ago, and I’ve been waiting here for you.”
Nicky dropped his bike on the lawn and got into the car. As his mother started to back the car out of the driveway, Nicky called out, “Wait!” He got out of the car, ran back to the garden, and tenderly picked the ripe tomato.
The hospital was only three miles away, but the drive seemed to take forever. Maybe it’s nothing serious, Nicky hoped.
At the admittance desk Nicky’s mom asked the emergency room nurse about Old Nonno. A few minutes later, a doctor in pale green hospital pants and shirt came through the metal swinging doors with Nicky’s dad.
“There was nothing more we could do,” the doctor said. “But if it’s any consolation to you, Mr. Mariani seemed to die peacefully.”
Nicky’s mom started to cry, and so did Nicky. Finally, when his tears subsided, Nicky realized that he was still holding Old Nonno’s tomato. He took it to the nurse’s desk. “Maybe somebody here would like to have this,” he said, handing her the tomato and trying to smile.
The nurse took the tomato and smiled back kindly.
The morning of the funeral the sun shone brilliantly in the blue sky. A good day for farming, Nicky thought as he walked between the rows of tomatoes—Old Nonno’s last crop. Just a few months ago Old Nonno had poured a bunch of tiny seeds into the palm of Nicky’s hand. Now those seeds had turned into rows of healthy plants with bushels of beautiful tomatoes on them.
Nicky went to Old Nonno’s room to wait while his parents finished getting dressed for the funeral. He walked past the bookshelves, stopping to read some of the familiar titles. Books. Hundreds of books that Old Nonno loved. Thousands of seeds for their magic garden. Nicky sat in Old Nonno’s big chair, picked up the picture of Old Nonnì, and looked at her smiling face. Wherever Old Nonno is, he decided, he’s with Old Nonnì, and they are happy together.
He glanced up at the books again as he suddenly understood the real magic of Old Nonno’s magic garden. The books were still here in this room, but Old Nonno had taken the “seeds” in them with him!
A similar thought came to Nicky in the cemetery as he watched the casket being lowered into the grave. It wasn’t really Old Nonno inside that casket; it was just the body that Old Nonno had left behind, an old, worn-out body.
As the casket settled into the grave, tears clouded Nicky’s eyes, and a dull ache persisted. He was really going to miss Old Nonno. But through the pain, some familiar words came into Nicky’s mind: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.” When he had read them before, they were only words. Now those words had meaning. “A time to be born, and a time to die …” Other seeds that had been planted in Old Nonno’s magic garden came to Nicky’s mind: “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Cor. 15:22).
Suddenly it was becoming clear to him. Everything has a purpose. Even death has a purpose, and it is not really that scary. When he had been helping Old Nonno plant seeds in his magic garden, he had also been planting his own magic garden of special memories that would last forever.

We all remember President Hunter’s experience at this podium as Cody Judy rushed him and threatened him with a bomb. President Hunter would not flinch or read the message demanded by his attacker. The students began to sing “We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.” A doctor came up and took President Hunter’s pulse following this frightening incident. His pulse read seventy, which is normal. This is another good example of a man with a purpose who was not distracted from his sacred calling regardless of danger. He resumed his speech by saying, “Life has a fair number of challenges in it.” He stopped, looked over the audience, and added, “As demonstrated.”

Last year, I had two amazing friends, James and Bartholomew.1 When I met a few of their friends, I started hanging out with them every day, and Bartholomew added me to a group chat they were all part of.
At first it was great! I could talk to my newfound friends all the time. But over time, my mum began to notice changes in my personality and emotions. I would be on my phone until late, I procrastinated doing my homework, and I stopped studying my scriptures and praying because I was preoccupied with texting. My friends and I would argue a lot too, so I was also upset a lot. I spoke to my mum, and she told me what she had been noticing and that I needed to spend less time with those friends. I began to spend less time texting them and got back on top of all my schoolwork and gospel study.
Now going into my next school year, I am still friends with James and Bartholomew and a few of our other friends. But I am much happier now, and I spend less time on my phone. I know that making the right friends is very important, as it says in For the Strength of Youth: “Everyone needs good and true friends. They will be a great strength and blessing to you” ([2011], 16). The next time a situation like this comes up, I’m going to be careful. I don’t ever again want to feel the way I did then.
Joshua C., United Kingdom

Reading aloud. I read aloud to a dear friend who is 91 and lives in the cottage next door. As we read we would stop and discuss how teachings apply to our lives. I will always consider this one of the richest experiences of my life. Sometimes the Spirit was so intense I was brought to tears. I am thankful for a wise and inspired prophet, who extended this challenge. Sylvia Willis, Hampstead, North Carolina, USA

I was nervous because I couldn’t help but think about my friend Danny (name has been changed). For months Danny had been talking about how much he looked forward to serving a mission. But that changed after he met with the bishop.
Because Danny had engaged in unworthy behavior with several young women, he later told me, he had disqualified himself from full-time missionary service. He was no longer free to choose a mission.
Danny, in the words of President Boyd K. Packer, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, had fallen to Satan’s temptation “to misuse [his] moral agency.”1
True freedom, as For the Strength of Youth teaches, comes when we use our agency to choose obedience. Loss of freedom, as Danny learned, comes from choosing disobedience.
“While you are free to choose your course of action, you are not free to choose the consequences. Whether for good or bad, consequences follow as a natural result of the choices you make.”2
Because the scriptures teach that we are “free to choose,” “free to act,” and free to do things “of [our] own free will” (2 Nephi 2:27; 10:23; D&C 58:27; Helaman 14:30), we often use the term “free agency.”
But did you know that the phrase “free agency” does not appear in the scriptures? Instead, the scriptures teach “that every man may act in doctrine and principle … according to the moral agency which I have given unto him, that every man may be accountable for his own sins” (D&C 101:78; emphasis added).
Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles has taught: “The word agency appears [in scriptures] either by itself or with the modifier moral. … When we use the term moral agency, we are appropriately emphasizing the accountability that is an essential part of the divine gift of agency. We are moral beings and agents unto ourselves, free to choose but also responsible for our choices.”3
President Packer adds, “Agency is defined in the scriptures as ‘moral agency,’ which means that we can choose between good and evil.”4 This God-given gift means we are “free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil” (2 Nephi 2:27).
Because moral agency plays an important role in the plan of salvation, Satan sought to destroy it in the premortal world. He was cast out for his rebellion and now seeks “to deceive and to blind men, and to lead them captive at his will” (Moses 4:3–4).
Satan wants us to make choices that limit our freedom, lead to bad habits and addictions, and leave us powerless to resist his temptations. The beauty of the gospel is that it makes us aware of our choices and the consequences of those choices. Wise use of agency keeps our choices open and improves our ability to choose correctly.
When the plan of salvation was presented in the Grand Council in Heaven, the Savior showed us how to use our moral agency correctly. He said, “Father, thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever” (Moses 4:2). Because He was willing to do the will of the Father then and later in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross (see Matthew 26:39; Luke 22:42), Jesus paid the price for our bad choices and provided a way for us to be forgiven through repentance.
If we follow the Savior’s example, instead of saying, “I do what I want,” we will declare, “I do what the Father wants.”5 Using our moral agency this way will bring us freedom and happiness.
As I went to see my bishop for my first mission interview, I was grateful I had made good choices. A few months later I was serving the Lord in Guatemala—teaching others the plan of salvation and the vital role moral agency plays in that plan.

Little green swords had pierced the earth in countless numbers. Johnny took off his shoes and carefully pressed one foot down on the jade green points. He shivered, not because of the dew, but because the new grass tickled his winter-soft feet. Johnny put his shoes back on and walked along the pony path.
Betsy was still wintering in the barn. Her last year’s trail from the brook to the top of the pasture was plain to see.
When Johnny neared the ridge, he leaned against an aspen tree and with his toes idly rustled last fall’s coin-shaped leaves that hadn’t stuck to the ground from the weight of snow and rain.
From down the slope Johnny could hear his name being called.
The boy’s eyes followed the direction of the call.
“Johnny, want to help drive the horses?”
“Oh, boy, do I!” he called back and fairly flew down to the field where Dad sat on the seat behind the plow. His father held the reins of a perfectly matched pair of roans with sorrel manes lifting and falling in the breeze, their heavy fetlocks fluttering like tiny wings above the broken sod.
Johnny listened carefully to his father’s instructions. “When you come to the knoll on your left, guide the plow well around it and don’t let the horses step on it either.”
“Why, Dad?” Johnny was puzzled because his father always took pride in plowing a straight furrow, and these instructions were contrary to all the principles of good farming. He remembered his father telling him once that nothing is a beautiful as a row of grain standing in flawless line, so straight that even a sunbeam piercing the mist at morning does not appear more perfect.
“On that little mound of earth a meadowlark is making a nest. The reeds rising above it act as a cover,” Dad explained. “So the meadowlark feels that its family is safe. Survival of all creatures is one of nature’s laws that man must learn to respect.”
Johnny took his turn with the horses, holding the free ends of the reins as he sat on his father’s knee. As they approached the lark’s knoll, Johnny said, “Careful, Dad, don’t let the plow touch the lark’s nest.” And the two plowmen, with great care, curved the furrow that lay so straight behind them. When Johnny became tired he jumped down, turned the reins over to his father, and climbed to the ridge. He wandered along the same pony path that led back to the barnyard.
Several weeks later Johnny again came up the path, this time holding a bridle in back of him and an apple in his outstretched hand. “Betsy! Betsy!” he called. Then he stopped at a fence post and listened. He could hear the chirping of very young birds. He quickly dropped the bridle and apple.
Bracing one foot on the barbed wire, the boy heaved himself up so he could see the hole from where the tiny sounds came. But the nest was in a deep hollow. He tested the wood at the opening and carefully tore it away until he came within sight of the nest and the gaping bills of three featherless baby woodpeckers.
“Wow!” Johnny exclaimed, picking up the bridle and apple, “am I in luck! I can come up every day and watch them grow.”
The next morning Johnny was up early to eat breakfast with his father.
“Are you going to help with the milking?” Dad asked, smiling at his son.
“Oh, Dad!” Johnny said excitedly. “I found some little birds in a nest.” Then he told how he had fixed the hole so he could watch them each day.
“Johnny, I hope you didn’t touch the nest,” Dad said. “Birds don’t like to be disturbed.”
After breakfast Johnny hurried up the hill to make sure the birds were all right. He propped his foot on the barbed wire, and looked in the ragged hole. “They’re gone!” he exclaimed. He reached down into the nest to make sure. It was cold and empty. Only the soft, downy bed remained. Tears came to his eyes and he ran into the barn where his father was milking the cows.
“You had to learn for yourself, son,” Dad said quietly when he had heard Johnny’s story. “Do you remember what I told you when we were plowing on the sidehill and plowed around the lark’s nest?”
“Something about respecting nature’s laws,” Johnny answered.
“That’s right,” Dad said. “Now you see that the woodpecker family chose that particular hollow post for a reason. The opening was just big enough for them, but not big enough for their enemies. When you changed that, any night owl could make a meal of the little ones. Maybe that’s what happened to your birds.”
“Dad, I didn’t want them to get hurt,” Johnny said.
“I know that, Johnny, I know.” He paused a minute before continuing. “It’s early in the year. Mr. and Mrs. Woodpecker will probably raise another family in some new nest before the summer is over.”
“Honest, will they?” Johnny asked eagerly.
“Honest,” Dad assured the boy. “And when they do, we’ll both remember how important nature’s law of survival is. Then we’ll have meadowlarks and woodpeckers and boys all growing and respecting each other. It’s all according to plan, son. Do you understand?”
And Johnny did.

A couple of years ago, my grandson Christian was turning eight and planning his baptismal service with great anticipation. He asked his mother if I could be one of the speakers and share my conversion story. When I asked him why he wanted me to do that, he replied, “Grandma, that is so important. Do you realize that if you hadn’t accepted the gospel, I wouldn’t be getting baptized? I wouldn’t even be who I am.”

I don’t know if missionaries realize the far-reaching impact of their work. In my own family, the blessings of the gospel have now touched four generations. Didn’t President Gordon B. Hinckley say that “when we save a girl, we save generations”? I got married in the temple and have eight children. They are all faithful members of the Church, endowed in the temple. Six of them are now married and have their own children. At present there are 34 of us. And that is not all. Both my husband and I served missions, and our two sons and three of our six daughters have also served missions. Collectively we have helped hundreds embrace the gospel in many countries. Some of those converts and their children have also served missions.

Missionary work is the lifeblood of the Church. There is no greater work, no more important work. It blesses the lives of all those who participate in it. It will continue blessing future generations.

On the way home from school, Ben ran to catch up with his older brother, Rick. Rick didn’t seem to be in a good mood, but Ben had something important to ask him that just couldn’t wait.
“Hey, Rick,” Ben panted, “are you going to enter the school spirit contest this year?”
“I have no choice,” Rick said without slowing down. “Everyone has to enter.”
Ben was surprised. “But you probably can’t win it again.” Ben swallowed hard and then spoke quickly. “Maybe you’d like to help somebody else win.”
“Like who?” Rick asked.
“Like me.” Ben smiled weakly.
“You? Bashful Benny?”
“After I win, nobody will call me Bashful Benny anymore. They’ll know I’m somebody special, a real winner, like—well, like you.”
Rick’s expression softened. “Think so, huh? I’m sorry I can’t help you. It’s against the rules.”
“I didn’t mean for you to do anything. I just need to borrow your camera for a few days. Please?” Ben pleaded.
“You can use my camera for one week if I can cut up all your old magazines for my poster,” Rick said.
“Deal!” Ben sprinted home before Rick could change his mind.
Ben worked hard on his project. For the contest, students had to get involved in school activities and make posters to promote school spirit. Ben decided to take photographs of different school activities and mount them on poster board. He had just finished writing carefully under the last picture when Rick came into his room and looked over his shoulder.
“You spelled a word wrong,” Rick said.
“I did not! Mom checked all my spelling. You’re just jealous of my poster.”
“I’m not jealous,” Rick said. “I won last year. You’re the one who should be worried.”
“What do you mean?” Ben asked.
“What are you going to do when you have to get up in front of all those people and accept your award?” Rick asked.
Ben thought about that. “I won’t have to give a speech, will I?”
“You never know.” Rick shrugged and turned to leave.
“Rick,” Ben said, “were you ever scared to win?”
“Of course not,” Rick said quickly. “Well, maybe a little.” He sat down on Ben’s bed. “Do you know what helped me last year?”
“What?” Ben scrambled up next to him.
“My friend, Pete—remember him?”
Ben nodded. “The one who moved away?”
“Yeah. Pete started clapping and yelling so loud when they announced my name that it made me laugh. And I forgot my fear.” Rick smiled, remembering it. “Tell you what, Ben. When you win the contest I’ll clap really loud, and maybe even whistle.”
Finally the day came when the whole school assembled to find out who would win the school spirit contest. The room was so crowded that Ben had to look for a long time before he saw his brother. Rick grinned and gave him a thumbs-up sign. Ben tried to smile back, but he was too nervous.
The room fell silent as the principal stood up to speak. “I am so proud of each of you for the hard work you’ve put into your projects this year.” Her words echoed throughout the gymnasium. “Normally we would not award the prize to the same person two years in a row,” she explained, “but we have an exceptionally talented student at our school.” Ben’s mouth dropped open as the principal announced that Rick had won. Again. At first Ben wasn’t sure he’d heard right. Then he thought it must be a mistake. The principal had probably confused him with his brother.
Ben looked up hopefully at the principal, but she wasn’t looking at him. She was looking across the room to where a group of boys was shoving Rick forward. But Rick wouldn’t move. He shook his head, looking disappointed and a little frightened.
When Ben saw this, he realized his brother really loved him. Rick had wanted Ben to win. Ben could also see that Rick was scared. He couldn’t face the crowd alone. Ben wished that Rick’s friend, Pete, was still there to help him.
Then Ben had a rather frightening idea. He wasn’t sure he could do it, but he knew he had to try, for Rick’s sake. Ben closed his eyes. Then, finding his courage, he leaped to his feet and started to clap.
“Way to go, Rick!” he yelled as loud as he could.
Some of Ben’s classmates tugged on his shirt and whispered, “What are you doing? Sit down.”
“That’s my brother!” Ben whispered back. Many students stood up and clapped with him. Others patted Ben on the back and said, “You’re pretty brave, Ben!” Soon the whole room was filled with applause and cheering.
Slowly Rick walked to the podium to accept the award. He looked at Ben and smiled gratefully. Even though Ben had lost the contest, he felt happy. He knew he was a winner. Nobody could call him Bashful Benny anymore.

This time in your life is a time of decision-making. I know from experience and from my work as an academic advisor that sometimes it can feel overwhelming. When I was in my mid- to late twenties, I remember looking back over the previous decade and realizing that I had made a major, life-changing decision every single year of that decade. It felt exhausting. The pace of major ­decision-making has slowed down for me, but it has not stopped. It turns out that making potentially life-changing decisions is just a part of adulthood.

The role God plays in making these decisions, however, is not always constant. Sometimes you will just know on your own what you want to do, and God is there to play a supporting role. This is how I felt about my decision to come to BYU as an undergraduate. I had no grand revelation; it was just where I wanted to come. At other times you may feel that God leads you in a very specific direction, maybe even a direction that you wouldn’t have chosen for yourself. When I was deciding where to go for my doctoral program, I knew where I wanted to go, but I had several powerful spiritual experiences that sent me in another direction. To this day I have great certainty that, in spite of the challenges, it was exactly where I needed to be for those five years.

Mickey Mantle, the great baseball player, once told of a little five-year-old boy who had grown up with a great fear of the barber. His parents tried to cut his hair at home, but that never seemed to work out well. Even if the boy held still, which he seldom did, their haircuts always looked worse than if his hair were left long and shaggy.
One afternoon the boy’s father said that they were going to the barber to get a haircut. The boy replied, “No, I’m not going to get a haircut!”
“Yes, you are,” his father explained, “but don’t worry about it now.”
The father and the boy went to the shopping center and parked the car. They stopped for a few things that they had to buy, and several times the father reminded his son that they were going to stop for a haircut too. Each time the boy answered, “No, we’re not!”
Suddenly they were in front of the barbershop door, and the boy froze in his tracks. He held onto his father’s hand and stared straight ahead. The father looked down at the boy but didn’t say a word. The boy’s face was solemn and serious as he stared through the glass of the shop. Finally he softly said to himself, “I am going to get my hair cut.”
The father opened the door, and together they walked inside. They had to wait a few minutes, and so they sat down on the chairs along the wall. The boy sat on the edge of his chair without saying a word.
Finally one of the barbers called, “Next please.” Then the boy turned and looked at his father, and his father nodded. The boy got up, walked slowly to the barber chair, and climbed up onto the little seat that barbers put across the arms of their big chairs for children. The boy let the barber put the sheet around him as he sat still as a statute.
No one said a word until the haircut was finished. Then the young boy took a deep breath and climbed down from the chair. His father paid for the haircut and the two of them left the shop.
Outside the boy stopped and looked up at his father. “I got my hair cut!” he said proudly.
This father later told Mickey Mantle that the bravest act he had ever seen was when his little boy stood up to something that had terrified him.

A modern example of this is taken from the life of Elder John B. Dickson of the Seventy. He recalls:
“When it was time for me to go on a mission, I was very excited to serve the Lord. Just before I was to leave, however, I found out that I had bone cancer. The chance of living long enough to serve a mission wasn’t very high. I had faith that the Lord would provide a way if He wanted me to go. My father gave me a blessing in which I was told that I would serve my mission in Mexico, serve in the Church all my life, and have a family. My right arm had to be amputated above the elbow, but my life was spared, and the promises I was given have all been fulfilled.
“Some would think that losing an arm would be a terrible burden, but it has been one of the greatest blessings in my life. I learned that it is very important to have challenges and to face up to them.”
Elder Dickson had always been right-handed, and now he had to learn to do everything left-handed. One struggle was learning how to tie his ties. He said: “One Sunday morning when I was in my bedroom with my tie in my hand, I thought, How am I going to tie this? I thought about getting a clip-on tie. I thought about asking Mom to help me. But I couldn’t take her with me on my mission just to tie my ties. So I decided I had to learn how to do it myself. I finally figured it out by using my teeth. I still do it that way, even after having tied it thousands of times.”

Illustrations by Christopher Thornock
When I was 14, I made a decision that changed everything. I was walking down the street with some friends on a Friday night, and we were having a good time, just as we usually did. But tonight there was a problem, and I knew I had to do something about it. I just wasn’t sure I could.
For the past couple of years, my friends had started experimenting with cigarettes and alcohol. It was slow at first, just a once or twice sort of thing, but by the time this Friday came, they regularly smoked and drank when we were out alone.
I thought that as long as I just kept myself clean, I could still have a good time with my friends. Of course, my parents could tell something wasn’t right with my friends. And my friends could tell that my parents didn’t approve of them. That left me in the uncomfortable middle: I found myself repeatedly defending my friends to my parents and defending my parents to my friends.
So there we were that Friday night, walking down the street. My friends started drinking and smoking, and I finally realized how uncomfortable I was with their behavior. So I made a choice.
I walked to the other side of the road.
My friends laughed at me. They called me a “goody-goody.” And they said that if I stayed over there, I wouldn’t be their friend anymore.
Well, we got to the end of the road. My friends turned left, and I turned right. I was two miles (3.2 km) from home, and they were the longest two miles I’d ever walked. You might think I would feel good about making such a courageous choice, but in that moment, I felt awful. I woke up the next morning with the terrifying realization that I had lost my friends and that I was now alone. For a 14-year-old, that was devastating.
Not too many days later, I got a phone call from a member of the Church I knew named Dave. He asked if I wanted to come to his house on Saturday night. He also invited me to join his family for dinner the next day. It sounded like a lot more fun than I was currently having with no friends, so I agreed.
Dave and I had a good time together—and, of course, there were no cigarettes or alcohol. As I listened to Dave’s dad say the prayer at dinner, I felt so good. I began to think that maybe—just maybe—things were getting better.
Dave and I became best friends. We played football together, went to school together, helped each other go on missions. When we got back, we were college roommates. We helped each other find the right women to marry and kept each other on the strait and narrow path all the way to the temple and after. All these years later, we’re still good friends. And it all started with a simple phone call, right when I needed it.
At least, that’s how I thought it had all started. Imagine my surprise when, years later, I found out that it was my mom, working behind the scenes, who had orchestrated our friendship! Soon after I lost my old friends, she noticed something was wrong with me, so she called Dave’s mom to see if they could figure out a way to help. Dave’s mom then coaxed Dave into contacting me and inviting me over. Sometimes promptings to help someone in need come from the Holy Ghost; sometimes they come from an angel—such as a mother—who “speak[s] by the power of the Holy Ghost” (2 Nephi 32:3).
I’ve often wondered how life might have been different—for me and for Dave—if my mom hadn’t perceived my struggle and taken action. Doesn’t that remind you of the way Heavenly Father blesses us? He knows about our every need, and He sends “blessings from above thru words and deeds of those who love” (“Each Life That Touches Ours for Good,” Hymns, no. 293).
Ultimately, we are all responsible for our own choices. As President Thomas S. Monson has said repeatedly, “The choices we make determine our destiny,”1 and many of those choices must be made personally, individually. Often our decisions make us feel isolated, even lonely. But our Heavenly Father did not send us here alone.
The decisions I made at key moments blessed and guided my entire life. But those decisions were inspired and empowered by my mother’s prayerful efforts and by Dave’s support and friendship.
The test that we call earth life is different from the tests we often take in school—where you have to keep your eyes on your own test and you aren’t allowed to help your neighbor. No, in this test, we can and must help each other; in fact, that’s part of the test. So while your choices may at times take you to the lonely side of the road, please know that all along that road are others who have made their own difficult decision to be on the Lord’s side. They will walk with you, and they need you to walk with them.

We visited Granddad’s farm most summers. The summer I was 14, however, Stu decided he was too old and too cool to come on a family vacation with us. Stu had stopped coming to church and had started going with a new crowd of friends. Most nights he came home late, and I could smell the cigarette smoke and beer on his clothes.

But after a few days camping at Granddad’s farm without Stu, I began to feel very alone and very bored. Early one morning I was kicking a football (soccer ball) against our caravan (trailer) when Granddad passed by carting a big paper bag.

“Fancy sum’ mushrooms?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I muttered, not very happy with the world.

“Aye. Good ‘enough. I’ll just have to try and find ‘em by myself,” he said, and shuffled off across his green pasture. I shrugged my shoulders and ran after him. Mushroom hunting was something to do. And, anyway, Granddad was old and might need my help.

“Thought we might find sum’ by town,” he said as he stepped onto a low stone fence and bounded over. I scrambled over the rocks and had to run to catch up with Granddad. In fact, I soon found myself running a lot to keep up with his breezy pace. Obviously he was not going to need my help.

“You must walk a lot,” I said to him, half out of breath.

He looked down at me and laughed. “I walk these hills every day. But a young ‘un like you should be able to out-walk me. Living in the city makes you soft.”

I dropped my gaze to the path.

“You have something on your mind, lad?” he asked.

“No, just bored.”

“Aye, probably.”

It seemed like we crossed most of the Yorkshire glens before we reached the top of a hill that overlooked town. Granddad led me down the hillside, past at least a dozen bent-over people searching for white mushrooms amid the waving grass. I noticed most of their bags were empty.

“I don’t think there are many mushrooms around here,” I confided to Granddad.

He looked back at the mushroom hunters and chuckled. “Oh, I think we might find one or two.”

He stepped off the trail, and I followed him as we rounded a small rock outcropping and were suddenly alone in a shady clearing with more mushrooms than I’d ever seen. They were everywhere! Big, white, fluffy mushrooms.

It only took us a few minutes to fill our bag. Then we started back up the hill, past the scattered mushroom hunters.

A man with wire-rimmed glasses stood up when we passed and wiped his forehead. “Find any?” he asked.

“Just enough,” Granddad answered. Then he winked at me and whispered, “You have to know where to look, lad.”

I laughed and put my hand on Granddad’s shoulder.

But as we walked away, Granddad looked back at the man and said, “You might want to try behind those rocks.”

“I just might,” came the reply.

We reached the top of the hill and rested on a big, flat rock, perched with a grand view of the gray and green town below.

“That was nice of you, telling that man where to look,” I said.

“Sumtimes people just need a little hint,” he answered.