Gospel Story Finder

Toby opened the apartment door and stepped inside quietly. Carefully he folded his collapsible snow shovel and propped it against the wall so that it could drip on the throw rug. Then he knelt to remove his boots. As he unzipped them, his grandpa lifted his head from the pillow on the sofa bed and smiled sleepily.
“Done with your papers already, Son? It’s not even light out yet.”
Toby hung his things on the coatrack. “It’s almost seven o’clock, Gramps. Mom left for the restaurant an hour ago.”
“It must be going to snow some, then,” Grandpa mumbled. “It still seems dark.”
“You’re right, the snow is already flurrying again,” Toby replied as he went into the kitchen. “I’ll make us some oatmeal.”
It wasn’t long until Toby set a steaming bowl of oatmeal on the bedside table; then he propped another pillow behind Grandpa’s head.
“I thought that your mother was supposed to be off today.”
“She was,” Toby replied, “but she’s filling in for Martha.” He moved a footstool closer to the sofa. “Mom’ll be home by eleven, Gramps. Will you be OK till then?”
“Just leave me a book and the remote control for the TV,” Grandpa replied, “and I’ll be fine.”
Toby scooped up a spoonful of warm oatmeal, then aimed it at Grandpa’s mouth.
“Going down to the Center this morning?”
Toby nodded. “Miss Wiggins said that they’re sending someone out from the Village Observer to take pictures and do a story on our gymnastics group.”
Grandpa’s eyes sparkled. “So you’ll have your picture in the paper! Well, that’s something—a celebrity!”
Toby grinned. “I’m no celebrity, Gramps. Just part of the gang.”
Grandpa was dozing when Toby left. As he reached the second floor landing of their apartment building, Mrs. Brindle opened her door. “Would you mind, Toby?” she asked hopefully.
Toby shrugged and took the bag of garbage that she held out to him. “Nope. Do you need anything from the store while I’m out?” he asked.
“Not today, Toby,” she said. “But thanks for asking … and for taking down my garbage.”
“No trouble,” Toby said as he hurried down the stairs.
When Toby reached the Center, he knew that he was the first one there, because the snow hadn’t been broken by anyone’s footprints. He unfolded his snow shovel and began clearing a path. Shovelful by shovelful he worked alone, until a little gray station wagon chugged up and parked in the empty parking lot behind the old building.
Miss Wiggins jumped out and came toward Toby with a cheerful grin, a bright red scarf wrapped around her neck. “You’re always doing something, aren’t you, Toby?” she said as she put an arm around his shoulders and swept him along with her to the door. “You must be getting wet and tired! How long have you been here?”
“Not long,” Toby replied.
Miss Wiggins jangled her keys, searching for the right one. “Well, I can see that you’ve been here long enough to shovel a lot of snow. Where did you get that handy little folding shovel?”
Toby grinned proudly. “Gramps gave it to me for Christmas.”
She unlocked the door and swung it open. “That’s a really neat gift. Brrr,” she added as they stepped inside the huge empty room. “It’s colder in here than outside!”
“I’ll turn up the thermostat,” Toby offered.
She grinned and pointed at a blob of oatmeal on his sweatshirt. “I see you fed your grandfather oatmeal this morning.”
Toby looked down, then tried to wipe it off. “Sorry,” he mumbled self-consciously.
“Don’t be,” she said happily. “Helping others is always visible in one way or another, and helping others seems to be a habit with you.” She blew into her cupped hands and shivered.
“Wait a minute, and I’ll help you get the mats down,” Toby called as he hurried to the thermostat on the wall.
The other gymnasts began to arrive, and soon everyone was busy working out on the balance beams, the mats, the horses, or the overhead rings. When Miss Wiggins called for a break, they all sat around a long wooden table, eating cookies and drinking juice. They talked excitedly about what they’d do for the newspaper reporter.
“I thought that we could make a pyramid,” Miss Wiggins suggested. “That would be an impressive shot, don’t you think? And that way everyone could be in the same picture.”
“I should be on top,” Nancy Matthews said. “That’s an important position, don’t you think so, Miss Wiggins?”
“Well, you are one of the lightest,” she agreed.
“Well!” Brian Cramer snapped. “That’s not the most important position! If Calvin, Marty, Toby, and I didn’t hold everyone up, there wouldn’t be a top. We’re the most important because we’re the strongest and we hold everyone else up!”
“Hey, wait a minute!” Carol and Jan chorused. “If it weren’t for us—”
Miss Wiggins laughed and waved her arms. “Wait a minute, all of you! What’s the sudden interest in who’s the most important? In a pyramid, everyone’s important! It takes a team effort to make a pyramid. You can’t have a top without a base and a middle, so quit arguing.” Miss Wiggins shook her head and added, “The city started this program as a learning experience in cooperation. But now I’m not sure that you know what the word means!”
Carol frowned, then screwed her mouth up at one end. “It means working together,” she said.
“That’s right,” Miss Wiggins replied. “It doesn’t mean fighting over who comes first. In Heavenly Father’s eyes, the one who puts everyone else ahead of himself is first! So if you’re done with your snacks, let’s get back to work!”
The kids tossed their empty cartons toward the trash can. A lot of them missed the target, and the cartons landed on the floor. Toby dropped his juice container into the can, then deposited those that had missed the can as well. The others were already busy at the mats, so they didn’t even notice, but Miss Wiggins did. As Toby hurried to join the others, Miss Wiggins watched him coming and met him with a smile.
As he neared her, she reached out and rumpled his hair gently. “You’re a good kid, Toby,” she said quietly.
“Thanks, Miss Wiggins,” Toby said.

My teeth hurt. I got my braces tightened yesterday, and they still hurt. I hope they feel better by next Tuesday when we have our party with the Scouts. We’re all going over to Sister Marshall’s house to make pizza and play games. I hope Doug Richards goes. He hardly ever comes to church anymore. No one knows why either. He lives around the corner from me. I see him a lot because he walks past our house to go home from school. We never talk though. Jenny, my best friend, thinks he’s cute. She always comes home from school with me and makes me sit on the front step in the cold to talk with her until he goes by. The whole time he walks by our house she sits and giggles. That’s so dumb. She never says anything—just giggles. He always looks mad, and yesterday he walked on the other side of the street. I feel dumb on the front step. I hope he doesn’t think I’m like Jenny. I wish I knew what to do when he walks by so I could make a good impression on him. He is kind of cute.
Jenny was sick yesterday so she didn’t come over and sit on the front porch, but I was coming home from the store with my mom the same time Doug walked by. My mom used to teach him in Primary, so she waved and yelled practically loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear, “Hi, Doug! How are you?” I was so embarrassed. Sometimes I think my mother embarrasses me on purpose. He said he was fine, and then before I had a chance to run in the house he said, “Hi, Marcy.” My temperature shot up, and I probably turned red, but I said, “Hi.” I hope he heard me. I didn’t say it very loud. I don’t know why I was so embarrassed and warm all of a sudden. It was even cold outside. My body is so stupid sometimes.
Church was really good today. In Sunday School Brother Ferguson tried to give a lesson on missionary work. Our class is so noisy all the time. We’ve had three teachers now, but no one wants us. Robin and I are the only ones who ever listen except Leslie Powell, who is the teacher’s pet, and Kyle, because his dad is the teacher. The lesson was really good though. He said that a good place to start missionary work is trying to get the people in the ward who are inactive to come. That gave me an idea. I’m going to be a missionary to Doug. I can’t be shy forever. Next time I see him I’ll tell him about the ward dinner we’re having in a couple of weeks. His whole family is inactive. They used to come to church a long time ago, but then they just kind of quit. I’ll get Doug first; then I’ll help him get the rest of his family. This is a great plan! Sometimes I’m smarter than I think.
I blew it! I saw Doug at school today, and I blew it. I was just getting out of my French class and he was getting out of art, which is across the hall from my classroom. He was walking toward me to go to his locker, and I was walking toward him to go pick up Robin from her orchestra class. We looked at each other and put on our half-and-half smiles. I just kept walking toward him, staring at him with that stupid grin on my face, and before I could get enough courage to say anything, he had gone past me. Boy, am I stupid. I feel like a complete failure. I don’t even want to think about it anymore.
I tried again today, and this time it worked. It was really a nice day outside, so I decided to go out in front and play with Maynard, our dog. I had just barely thrown a stick for him and he had gone to get it when I looked up just in time to see Doug coming down the street. My first reaction was to run, but I caught myself and decided I’d better do it now or never. By this time, Maynard was bringing the stick back to me so I took it and very cleverly happened to throw it almost right next to where Doug was walking. Then Doug did something I didn’t expect. He picked up the stick before Maynard got to it and threw it back to me. Before I knew it we had a fun game of Keep Away going with poor Maynard in the middle. Maynard didn’t think it was so fun, so I dropped the stick on purpose, and he took it and fell asleep under the tree. Doug asked me why I did that, so I had to explain that Maynard was getting old and he can’t exercise much. He said, “Oh,” picked up his books, and started walking away. This time I called after him. I asked him if he wanted to do me a favor and buy a ticket to the ward dinner this Friday night. I made it sound like I really had to sell them fast, but no one was buying them. Actually my dad was really the one selling them, but I felt like I should help out. I told him how much they cost. I told him to bring his whole family if he wanted to because they could get a good deal on family tickets. He said he’d ask his mom, and then he left. I finally asked him! I couldn’t believe it was actually me talking, but it was and I’m not so dumb after all.
Doug’s mom called my mom today asking about the ward dinner. She wants to go. She always wanted her family to come back to church, but her husband didn’t seem interested. He’s out of town this week, so she wants to do it. My mom was surprised because she didn’t think Doug would even remember about the dinner. Doug’s mom bought a ticket for the whole family. I’m so excited!
Tonight was the dinner. It was pretty good. The best part was when Sister Richards and all six kids came in. The whole ward was so nice to them. They sat across the table from us, and Sister Richards and my mom got to be good friends. I talked to Doug a little bit, like when I asked him if he liked his dinner. After he got through eating he went off with Kyle Ferguson and Scott Sullivan. Doug seemed like he was really having a good time. I was glad Kyle and Scott were nice to him because I didn’t know what to say to him. His mother and little brothers and sisters seemed to be having fun too. All in all, I would say that tonight was a very good night.
Today in church everyone had the shock of their lives when they turned around and saw the whole Richards family walking in, led by Brother Richards! He seemed happy to be there. I was embarrassed at how noisy our Sunday School class was for Doug, but it was quieter than usual, and he was making some of the noise.
Doug’s family has been coming to church just about every week now. The whole family just fits right in. I think they’re going to come back in for good now. I’m glad I got up enough courage to ask Doug to that dinner. I must admit that it wasn’t all me though. I just know that Heavenly Father had something to do with the Richards family too. I’ll bet he’s even happier than I am that they’re back in the Church. Anyway, being a missionary is so much fun. It makes you feel so good inside. I think I’ll do it again. Watch out world! Marcy Elizabeth Burnham, the girl with the hair that does something and straight teeth, is on the move.

By way of background, I joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when I was fifteen, in May 1978. My brother and I were raised by our father, who was a secular Jew, in Southern California. We gathered for the High Holy Days with our aunts and uncles and in many ways were deeply affected by our cultural background. Although indoctrination in the Christian religion was not a part of my upbringing, I had nevertheless read much of both the Old and New Testaments in my own personal search for truth as a teenager and was gradually drawn toward the persona and teachings of Jesus Christ.

The first experience happened just a week or so after my baptism. I was invited by a friend of my brother to attend a home worship service of an Evangelical fellowship. After the meeting, the preacher invited me to stay and discuss my new religion. Although we shared a common belief in the divine mission of Jesus Christ, his ensuing attack on the character of Joseph Smith was ruthless, and as a fifteen-year-old convert, I was unprepared to defend the Church. I discovered that night that we disagreed on two points: my very personal witness from the Spirit regarding the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and the foundational belief that we are not creatures but actually spirit children of God.

Around the world President McKay was regarded as an important spiritual leader. During a visit with the Queen of the Netherlands in 1952, President and Sister McKay were invited to have tea. When the McKays declined for religious reasons, the queen asked, “Do you mean to tell me you won’t have a little drink of tea, even with the Queen of the Netherlands?” President McKay responded, “Would [you] ask the leader of a million, three hundred thousand people to do something that he teaches his people not to do?” She replied, “You are a great man, President McKay. I wouldn’t ask you to do that.”19

Another story I would like to share happened winter semester 2011. The girls name in this story has been changed for confidentiality. It was the beginning of the semester and I just moved into a different house off campus. Friday evening I came home to find our neighbor Sarah sitting on the front porch all by herself playing with a cat that lived outside the house. She looked lonely and I felt bad for her but I simply said hi, and then walked to the back of the house to my apartment. I was planning to have a few friends over that evening to watch a movie. As I went into my house I felt strongly that I needed to go back outside and invite Sarah to come over to watch a movie with us, so I did. That evening was the beginning of a good friendship with Sarah. She started hanging out with my group of friends. After the semester ended Sarah and I both moved to different wards and didn’t see each other as often. Not for any particular reason, we no longer hung out anymore. We started hanging out with different groups of friends and went our own separate ways. Whenever I would see Sarah on campus or other places we always talked and said hi to each other. Just recently Sarah graduated from BYU–Hawaii. As my wife and I were saying goodbye to her she thanked me for being such a good friend to her. She said that I was so kind to her when she first got here. She said that I really helped her to meet people as well as get out and do stuff. Her roommates never invited her to do anything and she just thanked me for making her feel welcome. I could tell how sincere she was as she told me this.

This experience helped me to realize the difference I had made in her life. I never thought of it as anything great, I simply just invited her to come play games, but for her it made all the difference. She was a new transfer student who didn’t know anyone. She felt alone, which is especially hard when you go to a school thousands of miles away from home.

Carolyn not only serves her family but helps them serve their neighbors. Three years ago there was a drought in New Jersey. When rain finally came, it came in the form of Hurricane Floyd. Suddenly there was too much water. The Foxes could not leave their neighborhood because all the roads to it were flooded. Their whole neighborhood was without power for four days.
Their home didn’t get flooded, but nearly every other house in their area had seven to eight feet of water in its basement. “The stream in our backyard turned into a river. For a while the children sailed down it on their boogie boards,” Sister Fox said. “But they soon gave that up and went and helped people.”
The Foxes own a large pump and spent the next four days pumping out basements. It was a marvelous experience for them. They got to know their neighbors, and their neighbors got to know them. While Dad ran the pump, Carolyn, Katie, Adam, and David swam around the basements trying to save some of the families’ possessions.
“Our children came to realize that possessions aren’t very important,” Sister Fox said. “If the families were OK, everything else would be OK. It unified the whole neighborhood, and all our neighbors found out we are members of the Church.”

Today we have modern Ruths and Josephs all over the world. When Brother Jimmy Olvera from Guayaquil, Ecuador, received his mission call, his family was struggling greatly. The day he was leaving, he was told that if he walked out the door, he would lose his family. With a broken heart he walked out that door. While he was on his mission, his mother asked him to stay longer in the field because they were receiving so many blessings. Today Brother Olvera serves as a stake patriarch.

Travis Arrington awoke to the screams of his mother and three younger sisters in one of the adjoining rooms of their small cabin. It was still dark when he piled out of bed in his rumpled nightshirt and stumbled toward the bedroom door. But before he had taken two steps, the room was lit by a torch that burst through his window, shattering the glass and setting his bed afire.
The frightened lad backed against the wall, numb with dread as a face with a crooked nose, contorted by drink and blind hate, filled the broken window. Travis recognized the face as that of a farmer from a neighboring valley. He had seen him two days before, waving his fist at Pa and telling him that Mormons weren’t welcome in Missouri. As a final warning he told his father that he had better pack up and get out if he knew what was good for him.
Pa had just smiled kindly with a stalwart, quiet courage and told the man that he was homesteading on God’s land and that He didn’t seem to mind. He added that the Almighty was the only one he answered to.
Then the farmer with the crooked nose gave Travis’s father the same kind of nightmare look that he was giving Travis right now!
The boy fumbled for the doorknob, bolted into the next room, then stopped dead on the other side of the door. Fire was lapping up the walls of the main room like a deadly tapestry. His sisters were huddled together under a table, screaming and sobbing. And he could see his mother through the rising smoke, struggling with a man who was holding a half-empty bottle in one hand and a club in the other. Where, Travis wondered frantically, is Pa? At the same time he instinctively threw his twelve-year-old frame at the drunken man who was lifting his club to strike his mother.
The force of the boy’s lunge unbalanced the man and knocked him against the wall. Striking his head on the rough fireplace stones, he fell to the floor. Quickly Mama gathered up two of the little girls in her arms, while the third clutched her leg. She shouted for Travis to follow her down into the root cellar before the man on the floor regained his senses.
“But where’s Pa?” Travis wildly petitioned.
Mama, already halfway through the hole in the floor, glanced at Travis with tears streaming down her cheeks. “With God,” she choked, her voice breaking. Then, forcing herself to switch her attention from her agony to the terrible urgency of the moment, she tearfully commanded Travis to hurry, and then disappeared beneath the floor.
But Travis couldn’t move. He saw something through the smoke and the open front door that held him fast. In the yard outside he spied his father, facedown in the light of a dropped torch with a little pool of blood under his head and a third man standing near him waving a gun in shameful triumph. A ravaging anguish, hate, and fear riveted through the devastated boy like a molten iron rod and buried itself deep into his heart.
Suddenly something else was holding him fast. A hand locked about his leg with a viselike grip. The man on the floor shook the dizziness from his head and glowered up at Travis with a spiteful grin, then he pulled a knife from his coat pocket.
Travis blanched. Suddenly a roof timber wrapped with fire crashed to the floor. The man glanced about the small room, now an inferno, then looked back at Travis and widened his grin. The next moment he was up and gone. The sound of a closing door told Travis that the man had decided to let the fire seal the boy’s fate.
Sooty, strangling clouds of smoke were now so thick that Travis couldn’t see the door to the root cellar, and the fire was so intense it stung his eyes. He stumbled over a chair and fell to the floor. Unbidden tears ran down his face as he extended his hand and blindly felt his way through the ashen mist. His fingers were instantly blistered on the fiery wood as they desperately searched for the opening to the root cellar.
Suddenly, someone was grabbing at him! He cried out and pulled back his hand.
“Travis! It’s me!” came Mama’s anxious voice from out of the fiery tempest. He gave himself over to her saving tugs and let himself be dragged beneath the floor.
A little wind trembled the aspens surrounding the clearing and fanned the embers of still-hot coals where Travis’s family cabin had stood a few hours before. Travis peered out of the root cellar, scanning the black rubble. His reddened eyes stopped on the sight of his lifeless father in the smoke-hazed yard. Morning’s first frosted rays of light were splintering down through the dark trees and resting on Pa’s body. But the advancing light only resurrected the terrible memory the boy had tried to pretend was no more than a bad dream.
Travis wanted to stay in the hole—forever. But Mama told him, “Get a shovel and dig a place for your pa.” Then more gently she said, “Do it where the sun shows prettily by the willows.”
The boy wondered how the sun could feel so warm, as though nothing tragic had happened. And why does that bright red bird in the aspen tree a little way off sing so joyously, just like it did when Pa was alive?
Travis’s mother had concluded that these things “were for the best,” to help them to keep on going. It was as though his father were saying “All is well,” and telling them to look forward to the good in life that could still be theirs. That eased a portion of the agony some, but it didn’t change the hate that festered inside him for the three men who had taken away his greatest joy—his father.
Travis and his father had been very close, closer than a prayer to an amen. He tried to be strong like Mama wanted him to, but once again tears blurred and burned his eyes and fed the roots of his growing bitterness.
Travis watched his sisters pick little yellow wild flowers and place them atop the grave. Then he listened as his mother read a scripture from the Book of Mormon … something about the blessings due the righteous dead. She stopped once and shook with grief, then quickly lifted her head and turned her face toward the sun.
A twig snapped somewhere in the windy shadows of the nearby thickets and Mama said it was time they hurried on. There was nothing much to pack. Most everything had been lost in the fire, except a parcel of dried food in the root cellar that Travis lugged to the wagon along with his secret hate.
An hour later the hot blackened wood hissed as rain drifted down from a leaden sky, and wagon wheels slushed along a remote, rarely traveled road. Travis sat in the back of the wagon with his sisters, his eye set on the rainy landscape where a happier memory unfolded when he and Pa were in these lovely woods only a week ago. “Your ma loves blackberries, doesn’t she, boy!” Pa had said. “Well, we’ll just fill our hats with enough to make the biggest berry cobbler this side of anywhere a body can rightly think of!” And they did.
Suddenly the wagon stopped. Travis turned to see his mother climbing down and hurrying to the side of the trail, where a man lay facedown in a little gulley filled with rainwater. There was blood on the side of his head, and he looked to be unconscious.
Mama bent beside him and turned him over. Travis paled. It was the farmer with the crooked nose! “He’s one of the men who burned down our place!” Travis shouted.
His mother studied the man, who groaned with pain and fever. “Yes,” she quietly said, “but he needs help badly. He may die without it.”
Travis interrupted with fiery disbelief. “Then let him die! If it wasn’t for him and those other men, Pa would still be alive!”
“Fetch me a hand,” Mama firmly commanded. “We’ve got to get him out of the rain and into the wagon. He’s toting a killing fever.” She glanced about quickly, squinting through the falling rain. “He must’ve ridden past here last night and hit his head on one of these low-hanging limbs.” Her stare returned to Travis who stood back protestingly. This time Mama’s voice was stern. “Don’t just stand there, Travis Arrington, I said—!”
“But, Mama.” Travis countered. Then he paused, the man’s eyes were starting to open slowly. After a moment he stared wide-eyed at Travis, then at his mother. His lips tried to speak, but couldn’t. However, the expression on his blood-spattered face was one of stunned disbelief. Why are these people helping me? it seemed to ask.
Mama tried to lift the man by herself, and as she struggled in the dripping rain, Travis felt moved to help her.
A few minutes later the farmer was laid out in the back of the wagon. Mama removed her shawl and placed it over him. When she looked up she found Travis looking at her in a way he had never done before. Touched by his expression, her eyes filled with tears. Then she looked back at the man. “Can you point?” she asked.
The man looked puzzled, but nodded. Mama continued, “We’re going to take you home. There’s not much I can do for you here. We’ll sit you up so that when we get close to wherever it is you live, you can point in the direction we must go. Do you understand?”
The man nodded again. Is it just rain in the man’s eyes, Travis wondered, or is it tears? Surely not tears! he determined. But that look on his face … Must be out of his head with fever, he concluded.
The man slowly raised his hand. Travis stiffened, then picked up a shovel from the wagon bed. But the man’s hand only tapped Mama’s arm and motioned for her to draw near. The man mustered enough strength to whisper, “Why?”
“It is our way,” she replied simply.
Travis lowered the shovel slowly as he watched the man close his eyes and begin to sob. Then he looked at Mama. She took his hand in hers. Nothing was said, but suddenly Travis could almost hear the words that Pa had used one day … last Easter it was. Something he said Jesus had said of those who had mocked and scorned and whipped Him, and hung Him on the cross to die: “Father, forgive them. …”
Travis’s bitterness would not pass from him as easily as tired leaves dropped from autumn’s windy branches. But from that time on he would hear more and more each day the joyous singing of the birds in the aspens—all the way to Nauvoo and beyond.

Last year a dear family friend passed away. Lucile was 89 years old and had been a widow for more than 20 years. She was not a rich woman, she was not famous, and most of the world knew nothing of her passing. But her family knew. Her neighbors knew. The members of her ward knew. For all who had experienced her love, her death had left the world a diminished place. During her years as a widow, Lucile had endured difficult challenges, including the death of a beloved grandson and infirmities brought on by age. But Lucile continued to nourish everyone she knew with her spirit, with her baked goods, with her quilts and afghans, with her humor and goodwill. And she loved to work in the temple. One spring day in 1981, she wrote in her journal: “This morning at 3:30 a.m., as I was walking up the path to the temple, I watched the flag gently blowing in the breeze and looked at the beautiful sky and thought how happy I was to be there. I felt sad for all the people who [were] sleeping and missing the awakening of a beautiful day.”

Most of us don’t think the world is “awakening” at 3:30 in the morning, and we’re perfectly happy to roll over in bed about then and allow Lucile to feel sorry for us. But what an attitude! Only a flow of goodness from within could explain it. Did she possess this purity of spirit at 15, at 25, or even 55? I don’t know. In most cases, it probably takes a lifetime of listening to the Holy Ghost before we know God’s voice so well and before we trust in the living waters enough to taste them throughout the entire day—especially a day that begins at 3:30 a.m. But I believe the living waters sustained Lucile during those long years when she might have given way to self-pity, and her life, her spirit, became nourishment to everyone she knew.

During my first year in the management training program our banks' branch decided to celebrate Christmas by going to a dinner, which also included a show. After the dinner we were entertained with a floor show. As the show unraveled, it soon became obvious that the show was burlesque in nature. My wife turned to me and to this day I remember her words, "I want to go home to our children, I will wait in the car." To you young students, there are moments of truth that you will face and management training programs do not prepare you for these moments. Do I stand up and leave with my wife under the gaze of my fellow employees or do I shrink back and wait for a more convenient and less conspicuous time? The prophets Lehi and Nephi knew about this moment and I am so thankful that Debbie and I knew about Lehi and Nephi.

".... .behold, he saw other multitudes pressing forward; and they came and caught hold of the end of the rod of Iron; and they did press their way forward, continually holding fast to the rod of iron, until they came forth and fell down and partook of the fruit of the tree.... .And great was the multitude that did enter into that strange building. And after they did enter into that building they did point the finger of scorn at me and those that were partaking of the fruit also; but we heeded them not" (1 Nephi 8:30, 33).
We left that floorshow together, and I knew that the person in whose embrace I had placed my faith for the upbringing of our children, though tenuous and full of challenges, was in safe hands.

Once we choose faith, we make a discovery: that miracles are real and happen all the time. We just need to look for them. Miracles can occur on a grand scale but are also happening daily in the most common of circumstances. We simply need "eyes to see" and "ears to hear," as proclaimed by both Moses and Ezekiel.[2]

Becky and I recently had a flat tire to teach us just this lesson. A flat tire after midnight over three hundred miles from home did not seem like a very good miracle, until we realized that only a few minutes before this happened, we had left the high-speed interstate highway and were now on a much safer road close to our destination.

Also, just a week earlier, after first having a vehicle safety inspection, we had taken the same car full of young people over a dangerous high-mountain pass, where a flat tire would have been disastrous.

Miracles occur every day, if we look for them. When we see the smallest miracle in our lives, it is proof that God is still there; we are not alone or forgotten.

“I can go all by myself, Mom. I’m four years old now!” Andy exclaimed, his freckled face all lit up with pride.
“Don’t you want me to come with you?”
“No. I know the way. I go down the road, around the turn, past the barn, by the chicken coop, and through the garden. That’s how.” He grinned. “Can I go by myself?”
“All right,” said Mother. “But be careful.”
Andy walked down the road. He stopped to watch a duck with five babies waddle across it. He liked the way the babies followed their mother one by one.
He walked around the turn. He saw a squirrel run up a tree and scamper into the old granary. The squirrel had a long bushy tail of pretty brown colors.
Then he walked past the barn. The lambs who didn’t have mothers bleated to him. They think I have some milk for them, he thought. He patted their heads and said, “You’ll get fed again at suppertime.”
Andy walked by the chicken coop. The chickens were busy clucking to each other. I wonder what they’re saying, he thought.
When he walked down the path through the garden, he picked a piece of rhubarb and bit into it. “Oooh!” He pulled a funny face. “This is too sour.”
He walked up the steps of the house beyond the garden and knocked on the door.
“Well, look who’s here!”
“Hi Grandma Great!” Andy opened the door and gave her a big hug.
“Didn’t your mother come with you?”
“No. I’m four years old now, and I walked here all by myself.”
“You did? You’re such a big boy! I’m very proud of you. Are you ready to spend the day with me making cookies and breadsticks?”
“Yes! Can I wear an apron too?”
“You sure can!” Grandma Great helped him put on an apron. It was blue with red and white polka dots.
“Grandma Great?”
“What is it, honey?” Grandma asked, putting her arm around Andy.
“Will you be my grandma forever?”
“Well, Andy,” Grandma Great answered as she lifted him onto her lap, “do you see that picture of the St. George Temple on the wall?”
Andy nodded.
“Grandpa Great and I were married there for time and all eternity. Your mom and dad were married there too. That means that we will all be together forever if we try everyday to be good people and keep Heavenly Father’s commandments.”
“I’ll try real hard, Grandma, because I love you and want you to always be my grandma.”
“And I’ll try hard, too, because I love you, Andy.”

I hope I can also speak with the simple conviction of a child, like the child I heard about just the other day.
A little girl was talking to her elementary school teacher about whales. She had just learned about Jonah and the whale in her Sunday School class. The teacher said it was physically impossible for a whale to swallow a human because even though it was a very large mammal, its throat was very small. The little girl stated that Jonah was swallowed by a whale. Irritated, the teacher reiterated that a whale could not swallow a human; it was physically impossible.
The little girl said, “When I get to heaven I will ask Jonah.”
The teacher asked, “What if Jonah went to hell?”
The little girl replied, “Then you ask him.”

Shannon Welty of Centerville, Utah, is saving the lives of African children—with puppets.
“When little children get sick with diarrhea and vomiting, the parents don’t know it’s dangerous to restrict water,” Shannon explains. “Because their children are discharging liquid they think they have had too much moisture, so they stop giving them food and water. The children end up dying from dehydration.”
Instead of waiting for some international committee to help, Shannon organized a service project to teach African villagers how to treat sick children. She persuaded people in her hometown to donate materials, enlisted elementary school students as volunteers, and spent many hours preparing 13 puppet kits.
The puppets will be used to tell a story about a little boy who is sick with dehydration and how to treat him. Contacts in Mali, Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Burkina Faso will receive and translate the kits.
“I couldn’t have imagined I’d be saving lives by making puppets,” Shannon says. “People were asking how I felt saving someone’s life and that’s when it hit me. Service is really Christlike because he saved everyone.”

Finally, I learned that there are many kinds of pioneers. I am a first-generation member of the Church. My family was not happy with my decision to be baptized, which made it difficult for me to attend my meetings. Our small branch struggled because of a lack of members, especially priesthood holders. Eventually it became evident that the mission was going to close it.
As a result, I decided to move to Canada, which was one of the hardest decisions I have ever made. I was an only child and loved my parents very much, as they loved me, but my testimony would have been at risk had I stayed in an area where I couldn’t attend church. I can still remember the night I left—my father running alongside the train blowing kisses to me while my mother looked on. My heart was breaking, but I knew I had to leave.
I arrived in Calgary, Alberta, on Mother’s Day in May 1967. I attended church with the members I was staying with and cried through the whole meeting. I remember writing letters home to my parents with tears streaming down my face, telling them I loved Canada but missed England and my family so much.
I struggled to adjust to my new life, suffering homesickness, loneliness, and disappointments, but I stayed true to the gospel. I attended all of my meetings and accepted callings. These were my pioneer days.
Eventually I met my husband. We were sealed in the Cardston Alberta Temple and raised three children in the Church.

As a high school student, I determined that I would act on this advice and try to obtain my own testimony of the gospel. I wanted to know that it was true. So I carefully read the Book of Mormon, underlining as I went, making notes about memorable passages. When I finished I felt a great sense of anticipation about Moroni’s promise. I knelt down and prayed, trying to learn for myself whether this book was true or not. Although I prayed off and on for several weeks with what I thought was “real intent” and determination, I failed to recognize an answer. When my friends stood in fast meeting to express their testimonies, my parents were disappointed that I did not. I told them that I was trying, but that a testimony had just not come to me yet. I could not be dishonest. I worried and wondered what I was doing wrong. Perhaps my life was not good enough for the Lord to recognize my question—or maybe there was something wrong with the way I was praying—or perhaps I just didn’t know how to recognize an answer when it came.
The prayer and study went on for two more years, during which I read the Book of Mormon a second time, and then my bishop asked me to go on a mission. On one hand, I was elated, because I had always wanted to serve a mission; but on the other hand, I was very worried, because my testimony had not been granted. How would I convince others if I could not speak with conviction? My brother was going on a mission at the same time, and my parents, who were of very modest means, pledged themselves to our financial support.
When I went for my interview with the stake president, he surprised me by suggesting that I remain at home until my older brother returned—to lessen the financial burden on my parents. Greatly disappointed, I returned home to relay this sad advice to my father, normally a quiet, soft-spoken man. My father was distressed. He expressed strongly held feelings that I should go at the same time as my brother, and that the Lord would help us to meet the financial obligation. He put on his coat and announced that he was going to talk with the stake president. “You are going on a mission—and you are going now!” he said with conviction I had never seen in him before. Before he left, he wanted us all to kneel in family prayer. My father uttered a simple, short prayer, expressing thanks for blessings, and asking for help in his talk with the stake president and for help for his sons as they prepared to leave for the mission field.
As I listened with faith to that prayer and tried to look into the future, I was spiritually moved beyond anything I can describe. At that instant, I received a testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel. I was overcome with a feeling of happiness and excitement, as if to say that my father would be successful in his own little mission, which he was. But I also knew absolutely that I would be able to go on a mission (as I did to New Zealand) and testify with honesty and certainty to anyone who would listen to me. It was an enormously satisfying experience. My previous anxieties about being a missionary without the conviction of a testimony were gone. The Lord had answered my prayers—although in a way that I had not expected. As for my parents—they successfully supported their two sons as missionaries for two years and prospered financially as they had never done before.

Bertha came into my life when I was 13 and just beginning junior high school. How well I remember that first day of school. The building was large and sprawling with endless halls and rows and rows of lockers. It seemed like a huge transit mall compared to the security of grade school. Most of the students had come on school buses from small farms and neighborhoods. This was certainly not a big city group, but we were still anxious to be popular and accepted. There were so many of us that we were going to be using the old grade school across the street for additional classrooms. I alternated between excitement and panic at the thought of finding my way around.
I had worked hard all summer babysitting and getting up at 5:00 A.M. to pick strawberries and cherries so I could earn enough money to buy nice school clothes. But even in all my fine new clothes, I felt awkward and uneasy.
My friends and I huddled together, trying to act nonchalant to hide the fear we felt but didn’t dare admit. We stood in awe as the eighth and ninth graders moved confidently through the halls laughing and teasing each other. It was a relief when the bell finally rang and we all headed to the big gym where it was announced that each seventh grader was to be assigned to an eighth grade “big brother or sister” to show them around. Each seventh grader was called, along with the name of his buddy for the day.
When my name was called along with Bertha Brown, I heard several of my friends gasp. I had no idea who Bertha Brown was, but it was obvious that some of them did. As soon as we were excused to go meet our big sisters, I was surrounded by girls telling me to hide quickly before Bertha could find me. It was clear that to be assigned to Bertha was the worst possible fate. I was so confused. Part of me said not to hide—that would be mean. But another part of me wanted to be popular, and that’s the side that won.
So the game began—the hiding, the giggling, and the running from imagined danger. We managed to escape from Bertha for the moment, but not before I caught a glimpse of her. It was true that she was not pretty. She was even a little scary to look at with her wild, dry hair. Her clothes looked like something a grandmother would wear, and her shoes were brown and ugly.
All day the big story was how poor little Sheron had to hide from Bertha. The one time that I really saw Bertha’s face she looked so sad. How could we be so mean to her? I thought. She hadn’t done anything to deserve it. There we were, a whole group of girls, running away from one lonely person. I knew that what we were doing was wrong. I didn’t want to play that awful game. What I really wanted was to talk to Bertha and tell her I was sorry. I knew that she must be embarrassed. But I wasn’t brave enough, so I let everyone else lead me. But oh, I was miserable!
Later that day I forgot about Bertha when I was called to Mrs. Jensen’s office. She had been my very favorite teacher in grade school, and now she was a counselor at the junior high. I could hardly wait to see her. All the way to her office I imagined all kinds of wonderful things. Maybe she wanted me to be her special assistant. Maybe she had something important that she wanted me to do. I almost ran through the halls in my eagerness to see Mrs. Jensen. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for her.
When I walked into her office, I could see tears in her eyes, and my heart nearly broke when she looked straight at me and said, “Of all the girls coming into seventh grade, I assigned Bertha to you because I thought that you were the one girl who would be kind to her!”
All the misery of the day came crashing down on me, and I sobbed as I realized that Mrs. Jensen did have an important assignment for me and I had failed her. I had failed Bertha. But, most of all, I had betrayed myself. The next day everyone else forgot about the game—and Bertha. I never did. I rarely saw her after that day. When I did catch a glimpse of her all alone, I wanted desperately to tell her how sorry I was. But I was too ashamed and too young in my understanding of compassion to know how much it would mean to her.
I never saw Bertha again after junior high, and yet she has been a very important part of my life. Even today I wish that I had found the courage to be her friend. How do you say you are sorry to someone that you have never spoken to and yet hurt so deeply that more than 30 years later you cannot forget?

“Lisa, you should take seminary,” Ashley mentioned casually. Before us were folders displaying lists of class choices for the next school year, when we were starting high school.
I looked vacantly at my friend, finally managing a smile. I hated to tell her, but seminary was the furthest thing from my mind. I was then a less-active member of the Church, as I had been for most of my life. Over the years, I had grown vaguely aware of the gospel but hadn’t received a strong testimony of its truthfulness.
As I went home after school that day, the prospect of seminary began to intrigue me. Ashley, as well as my other friends, all seemed very excited to become a part of it. I had a desire to do what my friends were doing, even if I didn’t understand what they were doing or why they were doing it. After discussing my plan with my parents and getting their permission, I decided to take seminary my first year of high school.
I didn’t know what a profound impact that simple act would have on my life. My first year of seminary changed my life as I began to see myself and others as children of God, loved and cherished. I began going to church on Sundays, despite my family’s inactivity.
I have now finished high school, but I will always be grateful for seminary. During that hour each day, I had my prayers answered and my testimony strengthened. Seminary helped me prepare for a temple marriage and encouraged me to strive to be a better person.
I know that God cares for each of us. I know that seminary is a blessing that helped me build on a firm foundation in Jesus Christ. I would encourage you to enroll in seminary. It will change your life too.

We usually judge others when they are at their best and ourselves when we are at our worst. Bill was quite surprised when he stopped by the Beckstead home and saw Tom dressed in mechanic’s coveralls and covered with grease. The Beckstead’s three-year-old was crying and the teenager had the television on loud. The house was slightly cluttered, and Sister Beckstead had curlers in her hair.

Without criticizing or judging, Bill learned an important lesson about comparing. “I had seen Tom only in church settings,” he reflected, “and because he always looked immaculately groomed and very well-dressed, somehow I pictured his life to be perfectly controlled and void of everyday human problems. Seeing him in a home setting was somehow comforting. I still admire him a great deal—he certainly hasn’t diminished any in my admiration. But it’s nice to know we are more alike than I had thought we were. Now I wonder how others at church perceive me?”

Years ago, our family purchased some land in beautiful Cache Valley, Utah. We called it the “farm.” We had always lived in large cities, so the thought of spending a part of each summer at the farm seemed very exciting. In a family home evening, we talked about things we wanted to do at the farm. We decided that every family member should have cowboy boots. We agreed, however, that all of the children would earn the money to pay for their own boots by doing chores.
One Saturday morning, our six-year-old son, Paul, happily announced at breakfast that he had completed all of his chores. He had enough money to buy the boots he had seen at the western store. He was the first child to earn enough money, and he was very proud. “Can we go to the store today, Dad?” he asked.
Paul had been taught about tithing as early as he could understand how to count money. I asked if he had paid his tithing on the money he had earned. His hands began to shake, and his face turned white. He had not returned to the Lord His share as tithing. Paul’s disappointment in thinking he might have to wait was very great.
He had often paid tithing. He understood tithing, but it never occurred to him that Heavenly Father would expect him to share his precious boot money. I think I even saw a tear in his eye.
I did not tell Paul what he must do. He already knew what Heavenly Father expected. I simply waited for him to choose the right. After a long pause, he asked for more chores so that he could be honest with the Lord before he bought his boots. It was another week before the new assignments were completed and the boots could be bought.
After deciding to share his boot money with Heavenly Father, Paul had learned forever to pay his tithing.
Some lessons we have to learn only once.