Gospel Story Finder

The reason this story, together with President Hinckley’s counsel, comes to mind is that they closely mirror my own experience with tithing. I learnt that rendering “to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s”4 in diligence and love of Heavenly Father can really change our so-called fortunes. Once I decided to bring tithes into the storehouse and prove the Lord of hosts,5 the debts that I had struggled to pay for some years were settled in a few months. My self-reliance improved as a result, and it has been getting better and better ever since. All of this was the result of listening to a well-prepared talk given in a normal church meeting I attended and decided to act on the teachings received.

Seven or eight A.M. seemed an early hour for yard work; it would have been much more pleasant just to lounge in bed until 11:00. But by 8:00 A.M. Saturday morning, 25 Scouts, priests, Mia Maids, and Laurels from the San Jose Third Ward were on their way to help two elderly people in the ward.
A caravan of automobiles, with rakes and hoes sprawling out the windows, churned up a cloud of highway dust as the group rushed to the home of J. Winter Smith. Brother Smith is a great-grandson of Samuel Smith, brother of the Prophet Joseph. He was for a time in a rest home but was unhappy there. The ward brought him home and promised to take care of him.
Today, his yard would be spruced up. On other occasions, the young people of the area have prepared meals, cleaned and painted his house, and kept Uncle J, as they call him, company.
Stepping momentarily to the door with the help of Bishop John Minick, white-haired Uncle J gave directions to Keith Peddicord, 19, the project supervisor.
“You may as well make my yard pretty. You can’t do anything to make me pretty,” the grateful 96-year-old said.
When the work was done at Brother Smith’s, kids, hoes, and rakes piled into the cars again, racing to the home of the bishop’s elderly nonmember neighbor, a lady with a broken hip. Soon her yard was clean and her lawn well-manicured.

Let me tell you about a little girl who is well on her way. Eight-year-old Lindsay had studied well for her math test at school. She said: “When the test began, my friend leaned over and asked if I would help her with the answers. I thought of the family home evenings we have at the first of every school year. Dad reminds us that we should always do our own work. He says it’s better to be honest than to cheat for a higher grade. I knew if I helped my friend cheat, I would be cheating too. So I shook my head, no. The next day, the teacher called my friend and me out into the hall and said our answers were the same. It was easy for me to look at the teacher and tell her I didn’t cheat. When I looked at my friend, she was crying. She told the teacher she had looked on my paper. I was really sorry for my friend, but I was very glad I had been honest.”

Sunshine highlighted the autumn leaves as Lottie and her collie, King, picked their way down the rocky path to the springhouse to fetch a crock of butter. She held up her long skirt that she wore to school so as not to dirty it. Despite Mama’s lecture, however, she had discarded the stiff high-button shoes in the weeds. The cool grass chilled the bottoms of her calloused feet. She hadn’t worn shoes all summer (except to church because Mama insisted), and she hated to start now. Mama said that a ten-year-old girl should act like a lady, but Lottie didn’t feel like a lady as she ducked under a low limb of an apple tree.
As she opened the wide, heavy door of the springhouse, she felt a chill sweep past her, and she was grateful for King’s companionship. Although Lottie had three older sisters, they stayed at the house to help Mama with the three younger girls and her little brother.
It was damp and dark in the springhouse. The icy springwater flowed briskly through the long troughs where they kept their perishable foods. Maybe I’d better get one more crock, thought Lottie. It takes a lot of butter for hot cakes for all of us. Just then Lottie lost her footing on the slippery floor. As she grabbed a shelf to break her fall, the fancy butter crock that she had just chosen slipped from her grasp and hit the floor with a sickening crash! Pieces of blue pottery scattered in all directions!
Tears welled up in Lottie’s eyes as she remembered Papa’s words of caution: “These are hard times and we cannot afford any waste.”
Fearful of being late for school and of getting a tongue-lashing from Mama, while King licked up the splattered butter, she stuffed as many pieces as she could find into her apron pocket, grabbed another crock of butter, and hurried toward the house.
Lottie quickly pushed the pieces of broken crockery into a crevice in the old stone fence at the edge of the field and ran back to the house. As she neared it, the smell of bacon floated out with the chimney smoke to meet her.
“What kept you, Charlotte?” asked Papa as Lottie appeared in the doorway.
“I guess I’m a little slow this morning, Papa,” Lottie answered, trying hard to smile. She felt Papa’s sideway glance every so often during breakfast. It was a questioning expression that Papa always wore when he knew that there was something that he should know but didn’t.
“Anything special going on at school today?” he asked.
“No, not much,” Lottie answered, trying to be cheerful.
“I have a busy day ahead of me,” he said. “I need to mend some fences to get ready for the new herd.”
Lottie nearly choked on a bite of bacon. What if Papa checks that particular fence? she wondered. It wouldn’t have been such a big thing to Mama had it not been her favorite crock, nor to Papa had it been empty, nor to herself if careful inventory would not be taken, but she knew that an accounting must come.
It came sooner than Lottie had anticipated, for Papa was waiting outside the barn as the girls came home from school. “Come into the barn, girls. We need to talk.”
The four girls looked at each other, recognizing the concern in Papa’s voice.
“I happened onto these pieces of Mama’s best crock today while I was mending the stone fence,” he said, displaying the broken pieces. “Who can tell me how they got there?”
A big lump jumped into Lottie’s throat. She hung her head. The older girls looked at each other and then back at Papa.
“How about you, Charlotte?” Papa’s voice, although even and mild-tempered, thundered in Lottie’s ears.
“I don’t know, Papa.” It was a lie, and she knew it—and she knew that Papa knew it. But somehow, down deep, she secretly hoped that he didn’t.
“I suppose that the wind broke it and scattered the pieces into the fence,” Papa said, looking hard into each girl’s eyes. Finally he sighed and said, “All right, get to your chores.”
Lottie’s mind wasn’t on her work. It was on her last Primary lesson. “The best remedy for a guilty conscience,” Sister Thompson had said, “is to repent and admit what you’ve done wrong.” Gathering her courage, Lottie walked slowly back to the barn.
Papa looked up, pitchfork in hand. “You want to tell me something, Charlotte?” After a long, awkward silence, he prodded gently, “It was you, wasn’t it, Lottie?”
“Yes, Papa. I suppose that I have to tell Mama too.”
“It’s up to you. You’ve always been taught to do what’s right. Listen to your conscience; then decide.”
As Lottie dragged into the house, Mama was fixing supper. The tears Lottie hated were back again.
“Oh, Mama,” Lottie sobbed, “I broke it.”
“Broke what?” asked Mama, giving her a hug.
“Your best crock—and King ate it!” Lottie clung to Mama and cried even harder.
“He ate the crock?” Mama smiled and wiped Lottie’s tears.
“No, the butter,” Lottie explained, still sniffing. “Mama, I’m so sorry.”
“Well, I’m glad that you were honest and told me.”
“I just had to tell you and Papa, Mama. I felt so bad.”
“That’s a thing called conscience,” said Mama.
“I guess I just found out that I have one,” Lottie said, finally able to smile.

Jerry was another guy who helped me shape up properly. He managed the health spa where my brothers and I used to do our weight lifting, and he often joined our workouts.
Jerry was no scrawny high school kid. He was a mountain of muscle. Any weight I could lift barely once, Jerry could easily lift ten times. I hated it and loved it when Jerry worked out with us. I hated it because he wouldn’t let us rest or loaf.
“One more! C’mon, you can do one more rep,” he’d yell when I was ready to rack the weights. “Don’t give up now. You can do it.” Then he’d stand over me as I grunted and strained to produce one more repetition. “Atta boy. I knew you could do it.”
I hated the hard work, but I loved the encouragement and motivation he added to our workouts. Jerry squeezed out the best in me, and I always made my best lifts when he was around.

Many years ago, there lived an unusual man who chose to live underground. Some people even called him “the human mole,” because moles are small burrowing animals that spend most of their lives beneath the earth’s surface.

Although no one is small enough to crawl through the dark earthen tunnels inhabited by moles, thousands of people have visited the Fresno Underground Gardens, an estate created by Baldasare Forestiere. This unusual “house” is a short distance north of Fresno, California, and has been open to the public since 1954.

Mr. Forestiere was born in Messina, Sicily, in 1879. When he was 21, he came to America and worked in the underground subways of New York City.

Later, Mr. Forestiere used his savings to move to California. He bought 800 hectares of land near Fresno, which was like a desert in those days before an irrigation dam could be built. Temperatures there reached as high as 120 degrees, and Mr. Forestiere found such heat very uncomfortable. He also found that he was unable to plant fruit trees because the earth was parched and hard.

Remembering how cool it had been working down in the subways in New York, he decided to make tunnels to escape the heat. At first, he was going to dig only a few rooms to live in. But his digging lasted for 40 years and his underground rooms and passageways extended for three hectares. Most of the rooms were built three meters below the surface of the ground. In some places, he also dug a “second story” about seven meters down.

Although he was only 1.6 m, Mr. Forestiere hauled hundreds of tons of earth with his wheelbarrow. He had a natural talent for designing rooms and passageways with the strongest forms of construction known—the arch, the column, and the dome. He created an interesting variety of rooms, grottoes, and sunlit patios beneath the ground.

The underground architect’s first living quarters consisted of two rooms with some interesting features. He carved seats into the sides of the walls and made notches to hold shelves. Skylight openings above each room let in the natural light and air. In wintertime, they were covered with glass to keep out the rain.

Eventually, he constructed a more elaborate apartment that included two bedrooms and a living room, kitchen, chapel, library, and bathroom. He had a snugly recessed bed, a slide-away table to provide additional space, and two fireplaces. He built sliding windows in the kitchen and a half-wall picture window in one bedroom. He also made a “see through” or peephole so that if he heard someone coming, he could see in advance who it was.

After Mr. Forestiere had lived in his home for some time, he planted flowers, vegetables, shrubs, vines, and trees in certain sections of his underground maze where they could receive the proper sunlight and air. He experimented with various sizes and styles of skylights for this purpose. Many of the trees were grown in planters placed in the center of the rooms and gardens.

Some of the trees bear strange combinations of fruit, the result of Mr. Forestiere’s experimental grafting. His “Second Story Tree,” grown seven meters underground, produces seven different kinds of citrus fruit—navel and Valencia oranges, sweet and sour lemons, tangerines, grapefruits, and cheedro (a fruit native to Sicily). Other plants grown in the underground gardens include grape, wild mulberry, Chinese date, hibiscus, rose, date palm, avocado, almond, quince, strawberry bush, Bartlett pear, coronation pear, fig, Rose of Sharon, and loquat. There is also a carob tree, the beans from which flour and chocolate can be made.

To obtain nourishment for his plants, Mr. Forestiere made many trips in his Model T Ford pickup to bring back the rich loam of ancient lakebeds 20 km. away. Water at the necessary levels was provided by a well and pump. Mr. Forestiere even constructed an aquarium for keeping goldfish and tropical fish, with places for watching them above and under the ground.

In recent years, man has left the earth and walked on the moon. He has built submarines that became temporary homes beneath the surface of the seas. A number of science-fiction books have been written about people who have lived underground. However, it is truly remarkable that this talented man, more than 50 years ago, built a home so livable, so interesting, and so rare that thousands of visitors come each year to marvel at his accomplishment.

My mother is a very special woman. I am the oldest of eight sons, and I also have seven sisters. With such a large family, my mother had great responsibilities. The best thing my mother did for us was to be baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She gave us the opportunity to learn about the gospel. This opportunity changed our lives.
I remember the day we received the missionaries. I was about 10 or 11 years old. The missionaries shared a message about the First Vision. As soon as my mother listened, she was converted. She believed Joseph Smith saw the Father and the Son.
We began to attend church. I didn’t want to accept the gospel at first, but the missionaries persuaded me to see what it was all about. As soon as I did, I loved it. I am so grateful for my mother. She received a testimony during that first visit of the missionaries. From her baptism until today, she never missed a Church meeting.

Four years ago I spoke in this setting about couples serving full-time missions. My prayer was that “the Holy Ghost [would] touch hearts, and somewhere a spouse … [would] quietly nudge his or her companion, and a moment of truth [—a moment of decision—would] occur.” One sister later wrote me about that experience. She said, “We were sitting in the comfort of our family room enjoying conference on television. … As you spoke, my heart was touched so deeply. I looked over at my husband, and he looked at me. That moment changed my life forever.”

Hermann Mössner was nervous as he walked into the chapel. He and his friends from camp were still in their uniforms, marked with the letters “P.O.W.” Everyone knew those letters stood for “prisoner of war.” What would the members of the branch think? Would they see him as their enemy?
The chapel was near Leeds, England. But Hermann wasn’t from England. He was from Germany. After being forced to fight in World War II, Hermann had been captured by British soldiers and sent to an English prison camp. This was his first time at church in a long time.
Hermann took a deep breath as he sat down on one of the benches. He could see the branch president, George Camm, sitting at the front. President Camm was Hermann’s friend. Seeing him smile made Hermann feel better.
After that, President Camm visited Hermann every Saturday. During the rest of the week, Hermann did his best to live the gospel. He shared his testimony with the other prisoners while they worked in the fields. He answered their questions while they carved wood after a long day’s work. Sometimes he prayed with them.
“Hey, Hermann,” one of the prisoners had said one night. “Could I join in with you and Mr. Camm on Saturday?”
Hermann looked up from the block of wood he was carving. He smiled. “Of course!”
“May I too?” another prisoner asked.
Hermann and President Camm were very excited to teach more of the prisoners. Soon some of them even wanted to be baptized!
And now, as Hermann looked around the chapel at the families waiting for church to start, he felt peace. Some members were nervous around Hermann at first. But soon everyone came to trust him. The other prisoners who wanted to learn about the gospel got permission to leave camp to go to church with Hermann on Sundays. Later, Hermann was even called to be the branch Sunday School president.

When I was growing up, every year or so my stake would put on a road show. For weeks before the event, leaders in the wards would concoct unlikely plots, create ridiculous songs and dances, and coerce reluctant youth into wearing outlandish costumes. Our road shows could hardly be termed theater, but they were a lot of fun.
Of all the stake road shows I took part in, one in particular stands out in my memory. The year I was 16, the stake presidency, of which my father was a member, decided the wards would not be allowed to use glitter in their costumes or makeup. Although the shimmering flecks looked wonderful on stage under the spotlight, they invariably found their way into the carpets and furniture. Because the road show was to be held on Saturday night, the stake presidency hoped this measure would help keep the building clean for the Sabbath.
But in the enthusiasm and good-natured competition of that year’s road show, the stake presidency’s counsel unfortunately went largely unheeded. When the performances concluded, I looked for my dad among the members slowly trickling from the building. They all seemed to have had a night of friendship and amusement. When I finally found my father in one of the rooms used for preparation, I could see that he was not amused. He was walking slowly around the room, surveying the damage.
“Most of the wards used glitter,” I said, stating the obvious.
“It’s like this in almost all the rooms,” he said and sighed, pointing to the glitter scattered across the carpet. “Weren’t we clear about not using glitter?”
“I think you were,” I said, hoping to ease some of the tension.
When we found the rest of the family and went home, it was already late. After seeing the younger kids to bed, my father took his coat and the car keys and went to the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“Back to the stake center,” he said quietly, “to see what I can do to get it ready for Sunday. Do you want to come?”
I didn’t have any special desire to spend what remained of my Saturday evening cleaning, but then I thought about him doing all that work alone.
By the time we reached the stake center, my dad’s attitude had changed. As we cleaned, he seemed less and less discouraged and even somewhat enthusiastic about the challenge before us. He spent the time asking me about school and my friends.
Although the cleaning took several hours, we both felt a certain pleasure in our work and tried to be as thorough as possible. It wasn’t until after midnight that we felt the building was ready for church in the morning.
The next day, I felt special satisfaction as I looked through the clean rooms and remembered how they had appeared the night before. I considered telling my friends about my one-night stint at janitorial work, but that didn’t seem appropriate. Apparently, my father felt the same—to this day I can’t remember his mentioning that night to anyone.
Today when I think back to that road show, I’ve forgotten the humor, costumes, and music. What comes to my mind are images of my father vacuuming and sweeping and picking up glitter from the floor of the church—doing behind-the-scenes work in preparation for the Sabbath.

When she visited Temple Square in Salt Lake City, Utah, with her 10-year-old son, Vincent, in December 2016, Katie Funk considered herself “comfortably agnostic.” She left the Church at age 16, became a single mother at 17, started getting tattoos, and developed a taste for coffee. But during that Temple Square visit, Vincent felt the Holy Ghost and asked his mother if he could take the missionary lessons.
Despite her two-job, 80-hour workweeks, Katie studied the gospel with Vincent, researching answers to his questions between missionary visits. By the summer of 2017, she began attending Church meetings, where she learned about the Church’s self-reliance courses.
“I realized they were something that could help me,” she said. “Maybe I wouldn’t need to work two jobs or lean on my parents for the rest of my life.”
Katie called her course “incredibly strengthening temporally and spiritually,” not just because of what she learned but also because of how her self-reliance group accepted and ministered to her.
How You Can Help
Here are some ideas from Katie for how we can make the Church’s self-reliance initiative an opportunity to minister both spiritually and temporally:
“I know it’s cliché, but don’t judge a book by its cover. The fact that I was able to go to that course and not feel judged by others was huge.”
“Give support and encouragement. My group supported me in such a way that I left each class feeling loved.”
“Share your experience. The honesty and openness we had for each other made our hearts feel better. You never know who’s going to benefit from what you share.”
“Be vocal. I’m vocal about how my life is much better because I pay my tithing and go to church. I take my Personal Finances for Self-Reliance book with me to my job as a behavioral therapist. When appropriate, I share some of its principles with others.”
“Go to a self-reliance course for yourself, but watch for those who might need your help. I had to miss almost half the classes because of a change in my work schedule, but members of my group stayed in contact and cheered me on. It was amazing to feel that I still belonged even when I couldn’t be there.”

“President Lee once told of a woman in New York who approached him concerning her nonmember husband. Her spouse wanted her to attend parties that were far below Church standards. President Lee advised her that whereas a woman should follow her husband, she need not follow him to hell. The husband, upon hearing this from his wife, was, like your parents, extremely resentful.

“Let your parents know how much you love them and appreciate their offer but also that the Lord has said that sacrament meeting is the most important meeting we have to attend. Being the only member or active member of a family is sometimes a lonely ordeal. But if we seek to do the Lord’s will over the conflicting desires of loved ones who don’t or won’t understand, he will bless us. He certainly blessed the lady from New York. A few months after she had revealed the advice of the prophet, her ‘resentful’ husband was baptized.”

Let me illustrate: Several years ago, while teaching a course in American literature at Brigham Young University, I assigned a famous novel, a book familiar to many students, a book that I found to be, when I first read it after my mission, a thought-provoking, stimulating, uplifting, and essentially spiritual book, a book of “good report.” I had read and studied the book without feeling my delicate relationship with the Holy Spirit bruised in the least. I was surprised, then, when a lovely young female student approached me after class, with tears in her eyes, to confess that the first few pages of the book had so upset her that she could not continue reading what she felt to be indecent literature. Although it was not what I considered an “indecent” book, by any standard, I saw that her relationship with the Holy Spirit had apparently been harmed by exposure to this book, and I promptly asked her to read, instead, another book by the same author. Still concerned about the assignment, I queried other students. At their various levels of development they had found the book generally unobjectionable. Indeed, one of the students, a returned missionary, thanked me for the opportunity of reading the book, for he had met many people in his missionary experiences who resembled characters in the book, and the novel had opened to him, he insisted, new insights into those people and new vistas regarding life in general. The occasionally earthy (not obscene) language had not troubled him, for he had heard such language and dismissed it; instead, he had thrilled to the portrait that the author had penned of children of God on a troubled journey through a life full of wrong turns and dead ends that arose because the characters were having to learn, the hard way, of the need to be in harmony with eternal principles. The young man was ready for the book. In fact, when I told him of his classmate’s response to the novel, he asked, “Have we both been reading the same book?”

The book was as different as the experience that each student brought to it. The young lady was on a level of development that prevented her from seeing beyond some of the rawness described in the work; the alternate selection was more suited for her personal development, and she was delighted by her insights into that novel. Perhaps there would come a point when she would be ready for the other book. There had surely been a point in the returned missionary’s life, as in mine, when we, too, would have been unable to see beyond some of the rawness of life as depicted in the book to the genuine beauty and truth of the work. The young lady was right in rejecting the book. The returned missionary was right in reading it. Finding that self-understanding which enables us to make careful and proper selections which will not discourage the Holy Spirit from remaining with us is part of reaching for spiritual maturity. Enroute to such maturity, most of us make some mistakes, along with a lot of right decisions.

Not many children serve in a Church calling before they graduate from Primary. But George N. from Uganda was only five years old when he was called to be the chorister in his branch.
The chorister is the person who stands up in front of everybody during sacrament meeting to lead the singing. It’s an important job!
“I used to be very nervous when I was younger,” George says. But even then he always did his best. He improved every week. Before long he was leading the music confidently.
George enjoys serving in his calling. “I feel good,” he says. “I feel like the Spirit is inside the room.”

Achieving the Eagle award before the age of 13 is only one of the goals David Nielsen of the Orem 63rd Ward, Orem Utah South Stake, has set and fulfilled. In addition, he has earned all of the Boy Scout skill awards, 53 merit badges, his Trail to the Duty to God award, the Boy Scout Conservation award, the Presidential Physical Fitness award, and two citations in the American Red Cross Basic Life Support Course in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation. He earned the Boy Scout Lifeguard award (which included swimming a half mile) while his arm was in a cast. He also made two 25-mile bike rides toward his cycling merit badge during the same time.

I might mention here an experience of a young couple. This young lady and her husband (they had two children, a tiny girl and a baby two weeks old) graduated from college, and he had a business opportunity in Salt Lake City. So they moved to Salt Lake City.
They, of course, were active in the Church, and Bishop Bowles—it was in the Belvedere Ward—called them in the first week they were there. The bishop said, “We’re building a new building, and we need all the help we can get. Are you willing to serve?” They both said they were. And he said, “Would you like to suggest where you’d like to serve?”
That’s a little unusual in the Church, but she was happy for that. She was a teacher. She said she’d like to teach in the Sunday School or in the Young Women. So the following Sunday she was sustained as second counselor in the presidency of the Relief Society! Now, she protested and used the word shocked, and this is a quote: “That organization is for my mother, not for me.” She said she had no experience, and, I quote again, “I have no desire to learn.”
Well, the bishop prevailed, as bishops will, and she answered the call. They held Relief Society in a dismal room in the basement of the chapel because of remodeling and construction. It was in the furnace room. While the furnace was on, it was terrible, and when the furnace was off, it was intolerable. Her children caught cold. On at least two occasions she went to the bishop and asked to be released. On both occasions the bishop said he’d think about it.
Finally, she was in a very serious automobile accident. After some period of treatment, she was recovering at home. Part of the injury was a terrible laceration of her face. This became infected, and they called a doctor one Sunday night. He made preparation for some further attention, but he said, “I think we can’t touch this surgically; it’s too close to the nerve in your face.” He gave her what attention he could and explained how grave the situation was.
It was as the doctor was leaving that Sunday night when the bishop appeared at the door, after a long, busy day, as Sundays will be for a bishop. He said, “I was just on my way home from some interviews and saw the light on and wondered if there was trouble here.” This woman was in agony. When the bishop said, “Is there anything we can do for you?” she answered from her pain and with tears, “Yes, bishop. Now will you release me from the Relief Society?” He said he would pray about it. And when the answer came back, it was, “Sister Spafford, I still don’t get the feeling that you should be released from the Relief Society.”
This great and lovely woman, who for many years presided over our Relief Society in the Church, was tested in those early days of her life. I think that something like that may come to many of us, most of us, when we’re being tested, as it were.

It must be difficult living in a place where one of life’s greatest temptations is going to the beach on Sunday. “Sunday always has the perfect beach weather,” says Tami Ting Mei Lim of Honolulu, Hawaii, “but I want to be in church.”
Tami loves her home state and takes advantage of every opportunity to spread the gospel across it. She once spent two hours driving through the busy streets of Honolulu telling her captive driving instructor about the gospel. “I was surprised about the interest he took in hearing about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon,” she said.
Tami also takes advantage of opportunities to keep her state beautiful. She’s constantly involved in community cleanup projects. Her experience in church and school leadership positions helps her with this. All this, and an avid interest in violin and piano music? No wonder it’s tempting to think of relaxing at the beach.

I remember an experience that Elder K. Brett Nattress shared with us in a general conference address. His mother read the scriptures to him and his brother every day during breakfast, and he acted irreverently along with his brother. One day he questioned his mother asking her why she did that every morning and she told him something that just remembering it embarrassed him. Let me share his own words:
“I told her, ‘Mom, I am not listening!’
“Her loving response was a defining moment in my life. She said, ‘Son, I was at a meeting where President Marion G. Romney [1897–1988] taught about the blessings of scripture reading. During this meeting, I received a promise that if I would read the Book of Mormon to my children every day, I would not lose them.’ She then looked at me straight in the eyes and, with absolute determination, said, ‘And I will not lose you!’”2

When I was 11, at a regional conference in Johannesburg, South Africa, President Howard W. Hunter (1907–95) shook my hand and said, “You’re going to go on a mission and be a fine missionary someday.”
Most young men would have cherished those words forever. Not me. For the next 10 years I had no desire to serve a mission. I was more concerned with success in sports and my social life. I thought that giving up two years would throw all that away. During interviews with my branch and stake presidents, I would come up with excuses as to why I didn’t want to serve.
At 21, still with no desire to serve a mission, I visited my family in the United States, in Iowa. They had moved there the year before. While in Iowa I had the chance to go to the Winter Quarters Nebraska Temple with the local singles branch. I wasn’t endowed, so I figured I’d perform baptisms for the dead.
Upon arriving at the temple, I discovered there was no baptismal session scheduled for the afternoon. I thought, “Great, what am I going to do for the next two and a half hours?”
I decided to go to the Mormon Trail Visitors’ Center across the street. After watching a 15-minute movie about the pioneers, I was greeted by two sister missionaries who were going to take me on my own personal tour. After learning a little bit about me, Sister Cusick asked why I hadn’t served a mission. The usual excuses came flying out. Sister Cusick then testified to me not only of the pioneers but also of missionary work.
After the tour I sat in the temple waiting room, thinking. Suddenly, my excuses for not serving a mission became a stupor of thought. The Spirit testified strongly that I should serve a mission. From the time I started talking to the sister missionaries, everything had changed inside me. The Spirit testified to my heart what I needed to do.
Months later I found out that the still, small voice had told Sister Cusick that I needed to have my own tour. She didn’t know why, but the Lord had plans for me.
I served in the California Ventura Mission—the greatest mission in the world—and built some wonderful friendships that I hope will last through the eternities. I didn’t believe President Hunter for 10 years, but he knew exactly what he was talking about.
My life changed completely, all because a sister missionary acted on the promptings of the Holy Ghost.

I received a shock when I moved to the Salt Lake Valley a few years ago. At that time I really didn’t know much about the Mormons—I just had a vague notion that they lived “somewhere in the West” and that they had somehow contributed to its development. My interest and knowledge both stopped at that point. I was therefore surprised to find that I had come to live in a whole state full of Mormons!
I suppose my background had a lot to do with my lack of interest in any particular religion. I was born an Episcopalian, but my father died when I was nine, and I then entered a nondenominational orphanage. My experience there left me without preferences for one church over another. I later attended several different churches and found good in all of them.
As time passed in our new home and my wife and I began to realize who and what the Mormons were, I patiently waited for the onslaught of well-meaning Mormons trying to convert me. But the onslaught didn’t come. The Mormons I knew were friendly, but they didn’t press. So I asked questions. But the answers didn’t seem to be quite relevant.
Then one day I met Dick Reisner. He had a fine and beautiful family, and was to be coordinator during a year of training in a new career field. He was an enthusiastic Mormon, and I was impressed. His dedication to his faith was precise and honest. He’d ask me questions good-naturedly to see what I knew about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. By this time I knew quite a bit; I had read the early history of the Church and knew generally of its government and beliefs.
The chief obstacle for me concerned the principle of faith. I reasoned that if God could show himself to the sinner Saul on the road to Damascus and speak through a burning bush to Moses, then he could manifest himself to me in a similar way. Once convinced, I would surely be one of God’s strongest defenders and most able architects; but my conversion had to be at least as dramatic as a burning bush.
All too soon my training in Utah was completed and we moved to St. Augustine, Florida.
As time went by, however, we found that we missed Utah—especially the people. We checked the phone book to see if there were any Mormon churches in the area. The closest one listed was 64 kilometers north. We decided we would do without; we didn’t want the Church as much as we did the companionship of the people who made it up.
After one particularly tiring day, I returned from work early to find my wife busy in the kitchen.
“We had some visitors today,” she smiled.
“Really. Who? Salesmen?”
“Yes … a kind of salesmen.
“Who?”
“Two Mormon missionaries.”
“You’re teasing!”
“No. They left a pamphlet. See for yourself. It’s got a telephone number in it.”
“I’m going to call them. I bet that will shock them!”
She laughed. “I called them and invited them over. They told me the branch met in town over at the Odd Fellows Hall. I thought I had misunderstood, but thanked them and hung up.”
The two young men who came to see us offered us six easy lessons over a period of six weeks. Why not listen? We thought to ourselves. It was a small price to pay for the companionship of Mormons. Besides, I had had discussions with some very knowledgeable people.
That Sunday we arose early. In good spirits we turned our efforts to the task of getting four children ready. But we misjudged the time.
“We’re late,” said my wife, as we drove into the parking lot of the Odd Fellows Hall.
“Perhaps,” I said, “it would be better if we waited. We don’t even know which way the congregation is facing. It could be pretty embarrassing to go in and find that they’re all facing us.”
The dilemma was resolved, however, when a pleasant-looking gentleman got out of one of the parked cars and introduced himself as the branch president. Knowing that we might arrive late, he had decided to wait for us.
The children were taken to their particular classes, while we were introduced to the investigators’ class. Our instructor was obviously a learned man and knew his material well. Finding people of his intellect belonging to a church and staunchly professing a belief in God forced me to reassess my own reasoning.
We had a good time that day. Attending church made us feel much closer as a family. And we felt something magnificent, challenging, and rewarding in the simple humility of this branch.
Shortly thereafter I contacted another friend in Utah, Dennis Hill, with whom I had worked. I told him I was now attending his church. He said he was going to send me a book, even though I tried to convince him that I was attending only because I liked the people.
The book, A Marvelous Work and a Wonder by LeGrand Richards, came after our second visit to the little church. I set it aside to read “sometime later.”
The third Sunday we decided we were too tired to go to church. No one called to ask “Where were you?” and we were disappointed.
But Monday night the telephone rang. It was the missionaries!
“We missed you at church Sunday.”
“Yes, but you know how it is.”
“Yes, we do.” A pause. “We promised you six lessons; we would like to begin them soon.”
“Fine! How about tomorrow night and every Tuesday thereafter?”
That was the beginning of a very fine friendship. The children loved these two young men who exuded faith and happiness.
I cooperated with their attempts to use psychology on me because I felt they needed the practice; however, I had to set the limit when they invited me to offer prayer at the opening and close of these meetings. I was happy to have them or anyone else offer the prayer, but I would have felt hypocritical praying to a God whose existence I wasn’t sure of.
The next Sunday was stake conference in Jacksonville, Florida, and the speaker was to be none other than Elder LeGrand Richards. I grabbed my book and started reading. (If I’m going to listen to a speaker, I want to know as much about him as possible.) When the day came, I managed to sit way up in the balcony where I could hear and see well. This man’s keen mind impressed me; but I was even more moved by his sincerity, conviction, and faith.
The missionary lessons continued, and we began to acquire a better comprehension of what the gospel was all about. About the fourth lesson we began to realize that these missionaries were planning to finish this by inviting us to be baptized.
I won’t do that! I told my wife. “I don’t even trust myself in a thing so simple as prayer. I’m not going to do all of that.” She agreed.
The missionaries finally mentioned it by telling us that a date had been selected for baptism. Would we like to go? “No,” I told them. “I don’t feel the urge.”
“Well,” they continued, “this Friday we are going to baptize two others. Would you like to come and observe?”
“Where?”
“A block from here—in the ocean.”
“The ocean!” gasped my wife. “That’s too cold this time of year.”
“Yes, we know.” Missionaries always seem to be undisturbed.
We went. After the baptismal service, the missionaries asked us, “Doesn’t that make you want to be baptized next time?”
“No!” I answered. And I meant it.
All of this time the elders had been teaching another family, a beautiful young couple by the name of John and Louise Hatch.
We had met the Hatches only briefly at Church, but were impressed by their vibrance and sincerity. At the time of our sixth and final lesson, the elders told us that John and Louise had elected to be baptized the following Friday, which happened to be Good Friday. The thought occurred to me that that would certainly be the ideal time to be baptized, that it would be a kind of “thank you” to Christ to commemorate that particular day with one’s own baptism. Nonetheless, I felt no urge to do so. I was still looking for that burning bush.
But as the elders prepared to leave following our sixth lesson, they asked, as was their custom, if I would like to offer the prayer. To my amazement, I heard myself agree; after my benediction, two somewhat astonished missionaries congratulated me. I was deep in thought when that beautiful evening ended.
The next day before I left for work, I gathered my courage, took a deep breath, and told my wife I had decided to be baptized on Friday and wanted her to join me. She would have been just as surprised if the roof had blown off or if Florida had begun to slip slowly into the sea.
“You can’t do this to me!” she said.
“Why not?”
“The ocean is too cold!”
“I know, but I’ve decided. With or without you, I’m going to do it. Think about it and let me know tonight because I’m going to call the missionaries tomorrow and tell them so they can get me some special clothing.”
I kissed her and left her standing in the doorway. But I couldn’t leave her in suspense all day, so I called her later.
“Have you decided?”
“I’m not going to let you do it without me!”
“Fine. I’ll call the missionaries tonight. Ask the kids if they want to join in, and let me know after work.”
The two older boys elected to join us. (The two younger children were still too young.) We were baptized on Friday; and I have not doubted since coming up from the water that I made the right decision.
Why did I suddenly decide to be baptized? Because I realized the night of the sixth lesson that a burning bush was not the right thing to look for. I realized that by looking for a burning bush I was missing something just as important. Perhaps the answer lay in the simple things that had been happening to me.
I thought back to the week before we had decided to be baptized. We had once again arrived late to Church. To dispel the awkwardness of the situation, a very young man, Eddie Markle, had welcomed us with a simple handshake. At that moment I sensed in him a faith so strong that I was deeply impressed. It was the kind of faith spoken of by Jesus to Thomas: “Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.” (John 20:29.) I decided I wanted that kind of faith.
I realized my previous experiences had impressed me in a similar way, but, because of my desire for a miraculous conversion, I had failed to recognize the promptings of the Spirit. My encounters with members of the Church had not been spectacular, but yet they had been very significant.
Each person had—in his own way—displayed a strong yet simple faith: Dick Reisner had planted the seed; Dennis Hill had sent the book; the missionaries had knocked on my door; President Pressler had waited for us that first Sunday; Elder Richards had delivered an inspiring message; Eddie Markle had eased an awkward moment with a handshake. Each person—through his example—had let the powerful light of his testimony shine forth. And to me, having been in darkness, each example was as “the bright shining of a candle” (Luke 11:36), bringing me to a testimony of the truth.
The Mormons love their families and I love them for that. As a religious group they are, in fact, a family themselves—with all the love and learning that implies. Yet through it all one fact never changes: they have the gospel of Jesus Christ. A burning bush is not the answer. We have free choice—we can choose a darkness devoid of faith or we can light it brilliantly and forever with our belief. The Mormons believe! And so do I.