Gospel Story Finder

Some years ago, President Thomas S. Monson came to a regional conference in Hamburg, Germany, and it was my honor to accompany him.
President Monson asked about Brother Michael Panitsch, a former stake president who had been one of the stalwart pioneers of the Church in Germany. I told him that Brother Panitsch was seriously ill, that he was bedridden and unable to attend our meetings.
President Monson asked if we could pay him a visit.
I knew that shortly before his trip to Hamburg, President Monson had undergone foot surgery and that he could not walk without pain. I explained that Brother Panitsch lived on the fifth floor of a building with no elevators. We would have to climb the stairs to see him.
But President Monson insisted. And so we went.
I remember how difficult it was for President Monson to climb those stairs. He could take only a few at a time before needing to stop and rest. He never uttered a word of complaint, and he would not turn back. Because the building had high ceilings, the stairs seemed to go on forever, but President Monson cheerfully persevered until we arrived at the apartment of Brother Panitsch on the fifth floor.
Once there, we had a wonderful visit. President Monson thanked him for his life of dedicated service and cheered him with a smile. Before we left, he gave him a wonderful priesthood blessing.
President Monson could have chosen to rest between our long meetings. He could have asked to see some of the beautiful sights of Hamburg. I have often thought of how remarkable it was that of all the sights in that city, the one he wanted to see more than any other was a feeble and ailing member of the Church.
President Monson came to Hamburg to teach and bless the people of a country. But at the same time, he focused on the one.

Coach Ken Jenks has some good news and some bad news for the boys on his soccer team. As members of a recreation-league soccer team, they’ve had incredible success. The LDS boys, who have teamed up with nonmember friends, are some of the best soccer players in the area.
The coach starts with the good news. “Well, boys, we’ve got a great team, and the Southern California Soccer League championship is in the bag,” he says. Then his face clouds a bit, and he delivers the bad news. “But we’ll be playing three games, and one of them is on a Sunday. How do you feel about that?”
Five hands reluctantly but firmly go up. Eric Miller, 14, Jeff Jenks, 14, Justin Bonsey, 14, and twins Trent and Travis Weaver, 15, stand up and tell the group, “We can’t play on Sunday.” The boys, who are members of the Cypress First Ward, Cypress California Stake, aren’t happy about the idea of missing out on the biggest game of the season, but they are sure about their decision.
Although the controversy of the games on Sunday still continues in Orange County sports leagues, the boys’ stand is beginning to make a difference. Many local sports organizations are holding Sunday games less often.
So, as expected, the soccer team plays well on Saturday and wins easily. Then the Mormon boys wish their team the best and go to church on Sunday. The non-LDS members of the team play the championship game and lose. The team takes third place.
Eric shrugs his shoulders, “This game is a temporary thing. I really would have liked to play that championship game if it hadn’t been on Sunday, but I know that keeping the Sabbath will help me return to my Father in Heaven.”
Justin echoes Eric, “It was an individual decision for me, too. I know that it is right and so it didn’t bother me either. The next day some of the kids at school were a little upset, but I think they respected me for staying with my standards.”
And respect from peers, parents, coaches, and other players is a valuable by-product of the sacrifice these boys have made. But perhaps even more important than that is the fact that their example does not go unnoticed by the younger boys waiting for their turn to play the game—but not on Sunday.
Editor’s note: Because of the stand these and other LDS boys have made, regular-season soccer games are no longer held on Sunday in Orange County, California.

Christmas that year was a memorable one. I took the bus to Saigon, where the members met together for the first time in ten years in Viet Nam. The meeting was in a park. There were nearly one hundred people there. We had ice cream and cake. Later, at our table, brethren holding the priesthood broke bread and poured water into small glasses for the sacrament. We bowed our heads and prayed silently. Our joy was full.

As a witness of the Lord Jesus Christ, I bear witness of the Book of Mormon that led me to Him. I found the Lord Jesus Christ within the covers of the Book of Mormon as a 19-year-old missionary, walking through the rain and the mud of England, riding a bike with mud clear up the back of my coat and over the top of my head, tracting in cities that had never been opened, with baptisms that did not come for a long time. Those nights I went back to No. 3 Gilmore Road and read and read and wept. I knew that Jesus was the Christ, that the Book of Mormon was true, that the gospel had been restored. If the folks in England didn’t understand that, then I would just keep knocking on their doors until they did.

From the moment I first learned about the temple, I wanted to go there to learn and feel the Spirit, to be sealed for eternity to my family, and to make covenants with the Lord. But there are no temples in India, and I haven’t had the opportunity to travel to one yet. So many Latter-day Saints in India and I have said countless prayers, we’ve fasted, and we’ve held onto patience and faith that one day there would be a temple built in India.
During the April 2018 general conference, God answered our prayers as President Russell M. Nelson announced that a temple will be built in Bengaluru, India. I will never forget that day. The Spirit filled my heart with joy and my eyes with tears at the prophet’s words. I immediately thanked Heavenly Father for answering our prayers. And I am so excited to finally see and enter the temple in just a few years.
I am so happy and proud to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ. I know that the Lord restored the true gospel on this earth through the Prophet Joseph Smith. I know that the temple is where we can grow closer to God, be sealed to our families, and learn more about our purpose. And while I wait for the temple to be built here in India, I am working hard to prepare myself to enter.
I’m praying and learning as much as I can about the temple, the covenants I will make, and the ordinances I will receive there.
I’m asking other members who have already been through the temple for advice on how to prepare spiritually.
I’m learning how to do family history work so I can bring my ancestors’ names to the temple.
I’m attending a temple preparation class.
I want to be ready for the day I can finally enter the temple and make it a priority in my life. I will strive to always be worthy to enter so I can receive promised blessings, direction, and answers to my prayers I have waited so long for. I can’t wait for that day.

One of our missionaries, Sister Benson, who is attending with us this session, shared with me her desire to help her young brother. At that time, he was preparing to attend college and wasn’t sure about serving a mission. I felt impressed to invite Sister Benson to read the Book of Mormon during the first four months of her mission, marking her favorite verses, and then to send that copy to her brother.
Sister Benson sent the marked copy of the Book of Mormon and invited her brother to read from it each night. She later shared with me: “Before my mission, my brother wasn’t sure if he wanted to serve a full-time mission. Slowly, over time, as he read the Book of Mormon, he found increasing joy in his life and began to consider serving a mission.”
Two weeks before Sister Benson completed her mission, her brother received his mission call. He is now serving in the Mexico Tuxtla Gutiérrez Mission. Through the Book of Mormon, Elder Benson came to see his life with spiritual clarity, which led him to serve the Lord and trust that things would work out. That decision was a miracle—influenced by the power of the words of Christ.

“The Family: A Proclamation to the World” teaches my family the importance of work. Have the children hold up fingers to count each of the nine principles while you read paragraph 7 from “The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” beginning with “Successful marriages and families” and ending with “wholesome recreational activities.” See if they can remember the eighth principle (work). To teach the importance and value of work, tell the following story about President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Second Counselor in the First Presidency. As a young boy, he worked at his parents’ laundry business, delivering laundry before and after school. For many years he had to ride a big, heavy bicycle, pulling a laundry cart up and down the streets of their town. He said: “Sometimes the cart seemed so heavy and the work so tiring that I thought my lungs would burst, and I often had to stop to catch my breath. Nevertheless, I did my part because I knew we desperately needed the income as a family, and it was my way to contribute.” Dieter knew his hard work as a delivery boy was helping his family. But it wasn’t until many years later that he learned how his hard work helped cure him of a lung disease he never knew he had. He said, “My regular exercise in fresh air as a laundry boy had been a key factor in my healing from this illness” (“See the End from the Beginning,” Liahona and Ensign, May 2006, 43).

I received permission from my dear friend and emeritus General Authority Seventy, Elder Robert E. Wells, now 97 years old, to share his experience of more than 60 years ago:
While living in Paraguay in 1960 and employed as an international banker, Robert Wells, then 32 years old, and his wife, Meryl, were each a pilot in two different planes, flying home from Uruguay to Paraguay. Encountering thick clouds, Robert and Meryl lost visual and radio contact with each other. Robert quickly landed, where he learned his wife’s plane had crashed. Neither his wife nor the two friends flying with her had survived. His children, at home in Asunción, were ages seven, five, and two.
Elder Wells spoke of his grief:
“Words will forever be inadequate in expressing the pain that swelled within me, consuming my emotions and numbing my senses. Profound tears of sorrow simply wouldn’t stop flowing. To make matters worse, as my mind was attempting to deal with the devastating realization of my wife’s passing, I found myself experiencing tremendous guilt for feeling I was responsible for the crash.”
Robert blamed himself for not having had the plane inspected more thoroughly and for not giving his wife better instrument flying instructions. He felt he was guilty of neglect.
Robert said:
“My mind went into a dark daze. … I simply existed—[for the sake of the children,] nothing more.”
“I … lost my desire to continue on.”
In time, Robert was blessed with a deeply spiritual experience. He recounted:
“One evening, about one year later, while on my knees in prayer, a miracle occurred. While praying and pleading to my Heavenly Father, I felt as though the Savior came to my side and I heard an audible voice speaking these words to my soul and to my ears: ‘Robert, my atoning sacrifice paid for your sins and your mistakes. Your wife forgives you. Your friends forgive you. I will lift your burden. …’
“From that moment, the burden of guilt [and despair] was amazingly lifted from me. I had been rescued! I immediately understood the encompassing power of the Savior’s Atonement and … that it applied directly to me. … I … experienced light and joy like I had never before known. … I had been given an unearned gift—the Lord’s gift of grace. … I didn’t deserve it—I had done nothing to merit it, but He gave it to me nonetheless.”

“Even though I forgot to read a few times, overall it was a success. I realized that before I started Elder Stevenson’s invitation, I was really only reading about 3 minutes each night, and by increasing my reading to 10 minutes each night, I saw a difference in my life. When I read, I feel more in tune with the Spirit and I can feel the blessings of spiritual protection every day. The same way that it can be hard to start reading after not reading the scriptures for a while, once I started the habit of reading, I couldn’t stop.
“I noticed that for me, when I read the scriptures right before bed, I normally fell asleep or didn’t get as much out of my reading. It worked best to read either in the morning or after school.
“I had a blast doing this and would challenge everyone to try it.”
Rachel A., age 15, Colorado, USA

Several years ago, my brother and I entered a cave with the help of a guide. We followed him down the path of a natural tunnel deep into the earth. The air grew cool, then cold, as we descended. We could hear no sound but our breathing and the echo of our footsteps on the cold stone floor of the cave. The tunnel led us down to a large cavern with a ceiling that arched high above us. After we marveled for a few minutes at this huge cavern deep in the earth, the guide warned us to stand still because he was going to turn out the lights. And then he turned out the lights.
The darkness was thick and complete. It was unlike anything I had experienced before. There was absolutely no light. As we stood in compete darkness, I heard the voice of the guide echo off the stone: “Can you even see your hands?” I held my hand up to my face, and even touched my nose, and I could see nothing. I told him so. He commented that complete darkness is the absence of any light—and that is not pleasant. He explained as we stood in that thick darkness that if we were to remain in the cavern without light, we would become disoriented and lose all sense of direction. He added that as a result of such complete darkness, we would lose our sense of balance and find it hard to stand upright or even walk without stumbling and falling down. After waiting another moment, he turned on the light. I was more grateful for light in that moment than I had ever been before!

In the past I’ve always had very negative feelings about myself. I would always complain to my friends about how ugly I looked that day, how fat I was, how messy my hair was, and so on. One day this began to change.
I had a wonderful friend named Holly. She was a great listener and just fun to be around. She gave me a note after school one day, and on the envelope it said, “Don’t open until you get home!” Of course, my curiosity grew, and I wanted to open it very badly. But I decided to wait until I got home so that I could really read it.
I wondered what this letter contained. I thought of the worst things she could have written. I got home and opened the letter. It said that I was a good person and that I should always remember I am someone special. She had written out a list of all the good things she saw in me. I read this letter and wondered how I had let these qualities go unnoticed. By giving me that list in her letter, Holly helped me develop a better opinion of myself. She helped me remember that I am a child of God and that he loves me.
I think Satan would like us to believe that we are not worthwhile. When we don’t value ourselves, we end up doing things we will later regret.
The Lord loves us and always will. I now know that he doesn’t just look at our weaknesses. He also sees our strengths. I know, thanks to a letter from Holly, that I am someone special and that Heavenly Father loves me.

On August 15, 1991, another important experience happened. Crystal; her sister, Dawn; her mother, Melodie; and her father were sealed together as an eternal family in the temple. They had traveled eleven hours by bus with twenty-nine other members of their South Royalton Ward to the Toronto Ontario Temple. Mother said, “The ward gave us so much support that it seems like a big family now.” Both girls remember seeing only individual reflections of themselves in the mirrors when they first entered the sealing room, but after they were sealed to their parents, they saw a reflection of their entire family going on forever. Later that night, Crystal had a dream that assured her that Heavenly Father loved her and would never leave her.

It was a hot summer night in August, and my husband, Lynn, and our six children were asleep in the car. I had taken over driving just outside of Rocks Springs, Wyoming, so that my husband might rest. We could be at his parents’ home by midnight, he said, so it was best we go on. We were en route to Idaho from St. Louis, Missouri, where Lynn studied dentistry.

Soon after turning off Highway 30 and taking 30 North toward Bear Lake (on the Utah-Idaho border), I came to a detour sign that sent me to the right on a dirt road. I drove for quite some time, thinking I would soon see a sign to put me back on the main road. But the road got rougher and rougher. Suddenly out of the stillness came a very clear voice which said “Stop!”

I stepped on the brakes, and since I had been driving very slowly was able to stop almost instantly. Seven sleepy heads popped up to inquire: “Where are we? What’s the matter? Why did we stop here?”

All I could say was, “A voice told me to stop. Something must be wrong.” My husband took the flashlight and got out of the car—and found the front wheels on the edge of a canal.

By this time I was shaking, so Lynn took over driving and our older son guided him back. As we retraced our path, we noticed a very small sign that pointed back to the main highway—so small I had missed it in the darkness. Eight heads bowed in grateful thanks.

One day I sat with a handsome, young, prospective missionary as he poured out his sad story through sobs of sorrow, anguish, and remorse. I wanted to cry with him. Pressured by his so-called friends, he found himself at a mixed party where liquor was served. Against everything he knew to be right, he succumbed to the taunts and jeers of all those present, became drunk, and before the evening was over, lost his virtue.

Unable to resist the peer pressure he faced, his resolution to stay chaste being dissipated by the circumstances he found himself in, he had seen his lifelong dream of a mission and a temple marriage change to a nightmare—and now he felt ashamed, unclean, unworthy.

“Have I forfeited my opportunity for a mission, for marriage in the temple?” he asked. “How can my Father in Heaven forgive me for what I have done? I wish the earth would open up and swallow me!” My heart ached for him.

Almost overriding my sympathy for him was the anger I felt toward those who had led him down that “primrose path,” seemingly oblivious to the pain they had caused, listening to Satan’s siren song that chastity is outdated.

The full force of his actions was obvious to my tearful friend, who understood, at last, the reality of Alma’s words: “Wickedness never was happiness.” (Alma 41:10.)

One of the darkest chapters in the history of our people occurred in 1838 when they were being driven from Missouri. The incident to which I refer is known as the Haun’s Mill Massacre. In that tragic happening Amanda Smith lost her husband and her son Sardius. Her younger boy Alma was savagely wounded. In the darkness she carried him from the mill to a shelter in the brush. His hip joint had been shot away. Through the night she cried out in prayer, “Oh my Heavenly Father … what shall I do? Thou seest my poor wounded boy and knowest my inexperience. Oh Heavenly Father direct me what to do!” She later wrote in her journal concerning what happened: “I was directed as by a voice speaking to me.

“The ashes of our fire [were] still smouldering. We had been burning the bark of the shag-bark hickory. I was directed to take those ashes and make a lye and put a cloth saturated with it right into the wound. It hurt, but little Alma was too near dead to heed it much. Again and again I saturated the cloth and put it into the hole from which the hip-joint had been ploughed. …

“Having done as directed I again prayed to the Lord and was again instructed as distinctly as though a physician had been standing by speaking to me.

“Near by was a slippery-elm tree. From this I was told to make a slippery-elm poultice and fill the wound with it.” (In Edward W. Tullidge, The Women of Mormondom, New York, 1877; reprint, Salt Lake City, 1957, 1965, p. 124.)

She was able to get the injured boy to a house. With a mother’s love and a mother’s faith, she said to him, “The Lord can make something there in the place of your hip.” She had him lie on his face, and there he remained while a miracle occurred. Of that miracle she wrote, “So Alma laid on his face for five weeks, until he was entirely recovered—a flexible gristle having grown in place of the missing joint and socket, which remains to this day a marvel to physicians.

“On the day that he walked again I was out of the house fetching a bucket of water, when I heard screams from the children. Running back, in affright, I entered, and there was Alma on the floor, dancing around, and the children screaming in astonishment and joy.

“It is now nearly forty years ago,” she concluded, “but Alma has never been the least crippled during his life, and he has traveled quite a long period of the time as a missionary of the gospel and a living miracle of the power of God.” (Ibid., p. 128.)

Illustrations by Julissa Mora
Do we really have to go on a hike with the young women?
Yep. I’m going because of my calling. And I need you to come with me.
But it’s raining! And the rain here isn’t warm like where I used to live.
I bet something good will happen. After all, obeying our parents brings us blessings.
Why should I obey her? She’s not even my birth mom.
The trail will be too slippery.
What if we hike around the neighborhood instead?
Good idea.
Ugh!
Hey, Marcel!
Noah? You’re going on the hike?
Yeah! I’m here with my mom too. Are you going?
Yeah!
Watch me jump in this puddle!
That was awesome! What about this?
Pretty good. I give you an 8 out of 10.
OK! Your turn.
That splash was tiny! 2 out of 10.
It looked like you had fun on our walk. How was it?
You were right about obeying, Mom. Something good did happen!

A few years ago, Sister Monson and I were in the city of Toronto, where we once lived when I was the mission president. Olive Davies, the wife of the first stake president in Toronto, was gravely ill and preparing to pass from this life. Her illness required her to leave her cherished home and enter a hospital which could provide the care she needed. Her only child lived with her own family far away in the West.

I attempted to comfort Sister Davies, but she had present with her the comfort she longed to have. A stalwart grandson sat silently next to his grandmother. I learned he had spent most of the summer away from his university studies, that he might serve his grandmother’s needs. I said to him, “Shawn, you will never regret your decision. Your grandmother feels you are heaven-sent, an answer to her prayers.”

He replied, “I chose to come because I love her and know this is what my Heavenly Father would have me do.”

Tears were near the surface. Grandmother told us how she enjoyed being helped by her grandson and introducing him to each employee and every patient in the hospital. Hand in hand, they walked the halls, and during the night he was close by.

Olive Davies has passed on to her reward, there to meet her faithful husband and together continue an eternal journey. In a grandson’s heart there will ever remain those words, “Choose the right when a choice is placed before you. In the right the Holy Spirit guides” (Hymns, no. 239).

Young women laughed, joked, and sang songs while the sausages they were roasting on an open campfire sputtered and sizzled to keep them company. The group had hiked all day, and the rest and food were welcome.
It could have been a girls’ camp anywhere in the world. But this was on the border of the Wildschutzgebiet (a game preserve), and the four days of nature treks planned during the camp would lead 22 Latter-day Saints from the Frankfurt Germany Stake and their three leaders through the scenery surrounding the towns of Laubach, Ilbeshausen, Lauterbach, and Schotten.
Each morning there was a devotional. One night Brother Baumgart from the stake high council came to visit and conducted a fireside and testimony meeting. And everywhere they went the girls sang folk songs like “Hejo, spann den Wagen an” (“Hey, Hook the Wagon Up”), or hymns like “Der Morgen erwachet” (“The Day Dawn Is Breaking”).
There were pillow fights, trips to town for food, a night spent in a quaint hostel with yellow shutters and squeaky beds, meals like goulash and rice, a daily quiz with questions such as “Does a cow use its front or rear legs first when standing up?”, and many entries in journals.
Two particular experiences remain impressed on the girls’ memory: (1) At Lauterbach, the group chanced to meet a couple being married at city hall, so they serenaded them. (2) Hiking in the woods during the only day with bad weather, the group got lost in the fog. After stumbling around for several minutes, they decided to say a prayer. Following the prayer, they all agreed on one direction and walked straight to their destination.
But perhaps the ideals shared on the trip show more than anything else that it was an activity planned by young Latter-day Saint women. The goals were: (1) to be together as girls and have enjoyable, beautiful experiences; (2) to get better acquainted with nature; (3) to increase physical endurance; and (4) to draw closer through spiritual moments and to learn to understand one another. As they rode the train back to Frankfurt, the girls’ comments suggested that those goals had been realized in many ways.

We are also told that while science deals with experiment, religion deals with faith—and faith is supposed to be an intellectual process unknown to the scientist. This is obviously not true. Galileo (1564–1642), the great Italian astronomer and physicist who is often called the founder of experimental science, is a good example of a scientist who had faith. He invented telescopes that could see farther than had been seen before. His first important observations in astronomy concerned the moon. He discovered that the moon was not a smooth sphere shining by its own light; rather, its surface was marked with mountains and valleys, and its light was only reflected light. Galileo agreed with the theory of Copernicus that the earth moves around the sun, rather than the earth being the center of the universe with everything turning around it.
These observations did not agree with the teachings of Aristotle and of the Catholic Church, so Galileo was dragged before the Inquisition, forced to endure a long trial, and punished. But he never lost faith in his finding. I believe that his confident belief in the things he had discovered was the same mental process in religion we would call faith. He stood by his beliefs even when he was treated cruelly.

I was invited to a friend’s house. I was excited because he had moved to the other side of town, and I didn’t get to see him very often. On the way there, Mom and I reviewed what is expected of me at a friend’s house.
I was having a good time with my friend when he started playing a movie that was rated PG-13. I told him that I’m not allowed to watch PG-13 movies, and that I would not watch it. Then he put in an R-rated movie. I told him I would not watch that either. My friend would not listen to me. This made me sad.
I called my parents, and my mom came and got me. When she found out what had happened, she was very proud of me and took me out to eat. I am sad that my friend chose what was wrong. But I felt the Holy Ghost when I left my friend’s house, because I chose what was right.