Gospel Story Finder

He once shared this precious counsel concerning both discipline and work with a group of missionaries. One missionary had said, “I don’t like to work. I don’t like to tract.” This great leader responded:
Oh, is that so? I thought every missionary just loved to tract. . . . Didn’t you know that the worthwhile things of life are not the things . . . you . . . want to do, they are the things you ought to do because they are right. Did you just love to study everything that was assigned at the University? . . . Isn’t there anything in the world you do because you ought to do it? . . . My goodness, my boy, you’re headed for a total loss if you are only doing things you want to do.
Then Elder Kimball shared an experience from his early life. He said,
I wanted to go on a mission. I was scared to death, a little fellow coming from a country district.
I wondered if I could do it. I was quite sure I would have difficulty and yet I began to . . . remember specific friends that had done it. I thought, I can play basketball better than they can, . . . maybe I can do it. At any rate, I decided I wanted to go on a mission as I had been taught all my life.
I pause here to emphasize this great secret in his life so you may use it to bless your own. He made up his mind only once to resolve a particular challenge. From then on he used his energy to keep the resolve, not to reanalyze it repeatedly under every new circumstance. Elder Kimball continued:
So when I got near the end of my high school, I went to Globe, Arizona, to get a job so I could begin to save money, because . . . my father was having a little problem with a large family to support. I had earned money for my school for my last . . . three years, and then I earned it for my mission.
He then described how he raised a black colt to become a handsome stallion. He sold it, putting every penny into his mission account. He then described his work at the dairy.
I found that the work at the dairy wasn’t easy. I didn’t like it. I would milk the cows and then go in and do the washing of the cans and bottles. We would use scalding water when our fingers would get somewhat used to it. Then when I would go out to milk the cows the next time, my fingers would crack and bleed.
I went . . . to the Globe Ward every Sunday night. I would walk about two miles down the railroad to get there. I would hold up my hands above my head as we walked so that the weight of the blood in my fingers wouldn’t crucify me. It hurt terribly . . . I guess people thought I was giving up, but . . . I wasn’t surrendering, I was just on my way.
So my fingers bled every day, but every night I went back and milked . . . somewhere between twenty and twenty-eight cows . . . every night and every morning with my hands, not with machines. In between, we would turn the cows into the field, and we took a square-pointed shovel, and you know what we did with that shovel, we cleaned up after the cows. . . . It was about the filthiest job I ever had, but I had to do it . . . it was part of my job.
So then Elder Kimball said to this boy:
So you don’t like to tract. Well, for heaven’s sake, what do you like to do that will pay dividends? Think about that . . . If tracting is hard and other visits are hard and teaching the gospel is hard, and study is hard, so what? It pays big dividends.

I remember vividly, even today, a scene I witnessed nearly 20 years ago in the foyer of the church where I was the bishop. In those days we had a large group of young adults in the ward. This was before our resident stakes had single-adult wards. It was a Sunday before sacrament meeting. A dozen or so of our young adults were gathered in the foyer visiting about an outing they had scheduled for the following week. Their enthusiasm for the event was evident from the animated way they were talking about their plans. Everyone was deeply involved in the discussion. Then a young woman, about the age of those in the group, came rather timidly into the foyer. Although a member of the ward, she was not a regular attender—in fact, she rarely came. She was not blessed with gifts and graces that made her fit easily anywhere. Most of the time she seemed hostile and unpleasant. Although she was known to the group, she had no friends. She lived a lifestyle that was different and, in many respects, contrary to the commandments. And everyone knew it—or thought they knew it. Then it happened. One of the young men, who was a natural and charismatic leader, saw her come in. He excused himself from the group, walked over to the young lady, put an arm around her, and exclaimed how glad he was to see her. Would she sit with him in the meeting, and would she go with the group on their exciting excursion that week? She replied yes, and yes. A new friendship was begun. It would have been easy—even natural—for him to ignore her or to offer only a polite nod or hello. But he did what all of us should do. He extended himself to her in an offering of friendship.

During the Great Depression, Sister Louise Kelly, who lived on a farm in the United States, grew strawberry plants. Her family’s income depended on the sale of their crops. During one season, the $40 earned from strawberry sales was the only cash they had seen for a long time. Their $4 in tithing seemed a small sum to offer, and with a family of four children the money was desperately needed. But Louise was determined to pay her tithing. She was not aware of any immediate blessings other than the satisfaction of having obeyed. However, the following year when a strawberry-leaf blight struck the area, only her family’s plants remained healthy. Asked what special care they had given their plants, they simply explained they had tithed their income the previous year. Louise reflected that “at a time when the economy was at low ebb, our blessing of a good crop was to us an irrefutable example of the blessings that come from paying tithing” (“Divine Law of the Tithe,” Ensign, June 1981, 69).

Many years ago I stood by the bedside of a young man, the father of two children, as he hovered between life and the great beyond. He took my hand in his, looked into my eyes and pleadingly asked, “Bishop, I know I am about to die. Tell me what happens to my spirit when I die.”
I prayed for heavenly guidance before attempting to respond. My attention was directed to the Book of Mormon, which rested on the table beside his bed. I held the book in my hand, and, as I stand before you here today, that book opened to the fortieth chapter of Alma. I began to read aloud:
“Now my son, here is somewhat more I would say unto thee; for I perceive that thy mind is worried concerning the resurrection of the dead. …
“Now, concerning the state of the soul between death and the resurrection—Behold, it has been made known unto me by an angel, that the spirits of all men, as soon as they are departed from this mortal body … are taken home to that God who gave them life.
“And then shall it come to pass, that the spirits of those who are righteous are received into a state of happiness, which is called paradise, a state of rest, a state of peace, where they shall rest from all their troubles and from all care, and sorrow.” (Alma 40:1, 11–12.)
My young friend closed his eyes, expressed a sincere thank-you, and silently slipped away to that paradise about which we had spoken.

Sister Clark: Pain and suffering come to all of us. Illness, accidents, death, natural disasters, depression, disappointments of all kinds, and the actions of others cause physical and emotional pain and suffering. They disrupt our happiness. Our family has faced many such challenges over the years. They seem to come in bunches. Here are some examples:

President Clark: In February of 1998 my mother died unexpectedly of a blood clot in her lung. On the day of her funeral in St. George, Utah, we received word that our son Jonathan had been run over by a truck on a remote highway in Minnesota. The message was that he was alive, but badly injured.

Sister Clark: In May of 2004 our daughter Julia was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease, a cancer of the lymph system. She came home from college to undergo several months of chemotherapy. While Julia was home, I was diagnosed with colon cancer and underwent major surgery that September.

President Clark: From these experiences, and from many others, we have learned that the pattern of holiness the Lord has given us helps us overcome the effects of pain and suffering. Here are the lessons:
Trust in the Lord Jesus Christ-trust in His love, mercy, and power, and in His timing. Resist thoughts of anger, bitterness, or despair. Act with faith in Christ to do His will, no matter what comes. Remember, the Savior sees the end from the beginning. His will is the very best thing that could ever happen.

Sister Clark: Nurture your personal spiritual and physical strength. When hard times come, we need strength of body and spirit. But hard times often cause us to stop doing the very things that bring personal strength. Don't stop exercising and eating right. When challenges come, continue to seek holiness in your life. Pray, search, and ponder the scriptures. Worship in the temple. Serve the Lord, and stay close to the Spirit.

President Clark: Serve someone else. It is true that when we suffer we need support and love. Those around us can bless us immensely with their care and concern. However, when we face affliction, we have a tendency to turn inward and become self-absorbed. That is a sure path to misery. Serving someone else gets us outside of ourselves. It opens channels of love, inspiration, and heavenly blessings. It is a sure path to overcoming suffering and finding happiness once again.

Sister Clark: Embrace the plan of happiness. Remember, pain and suffering are part of the plan. Instead of asking questions like, "Why do we have to suffer?" ask, "What does the Lord want us to learn from this experience?" Out of that kind of question comes gratitude for the Lord's love and tutoring, even when the experience is very hard.

President Clark: Last fall I learned this lesson in a powerful way. In August I had a kidney transplant. I had come to know that this was the Lord's plan for me. I decided to embrace the plan, including all of the pain and suffering it would entail-the surgery, the hospital, the recovery, the changes in my life-all of it. I was blessed with a deep conviction that this was the Lord's plan for new life for me, and I chose to embrace that plan.

At the end of the first day in the hospital (after surgery that morning), with a catheter in my neck and with lots of other tubes and catheters in me, I said to Sue, "I have loved every moment of this day." It hurt. I had a tough road ahead; but Sue was by my side, and the Lord blessed me to feel happiness and joy.

I recall an experience that shows the effect of her teachings. Just before Christmas one year, our bishop asked me, as a deacon, to help him deliver Christmas baskets to the widows of the ward. I carried a basket to each door with his greetings. When he drove me home, there was one basket remaining. He handed it to me and said it was for my mother. As he drove away, I stood in the falling snow wondering why there was a basket for my mother. She never referred to herself as a widow, and it had never occurred to me that she was. To a 12-year-old boy, she wasn’t a widow. She had a husband, and we had a father. He was just away for a while.

I anticipate that glorious future day when the separated will be reunited and all of us will be made complete as the Lord has promised.

When I was a young mother with a two-year-old son, I lived for a short time in Santa Catarina, Brazil, and knew very few members of the Church there. I lived in a growing but remote neighborhood, so there weren’t many neighbors close to my house.
One day I began to feel ill and quickly became dehydrated. Soon I couldn’t even get up to take care of my son or go to the nearest telephone on the street to call my husband. I began to pray, but with each attempt to get up, I felt weaker.
It wasn’t long before my visiting teachers knocked at my door. They recognized immediately that they had been guided by Heavenly Father to find me. They prepared a remedy for me, helped me with my son, and washed the dishes. Then they told me that they had walked for quite a while to find my house and had thought about giving up, but the Spirit had told them not to.
By the time they left, I was already feeling better. Before they left, we said a prayer together.
They probably don’t know how much they helped me and nurtured me spiritually with their example of kindness and promptness in listening to and heeding the voice of the Spirit.

When 17-year-old Patrick Robertson got a suspension letter from his school, it was big news. But not for the reason you might think. It wasn’t because Patrick had done something horrible. It was news because Patrick is so good nobody could believe he’d be suspended.
We’re talking about a young man who is such an example that his non-LDS friends jokingly refer to him as “Reverend.” We’re talking about a priests quorum assistant so skilled in applying the gospel to life that one of the other Aaronic Priesthood holders calls him “wise”—and means it.
So what was Patrick doing opening that letter with the telltale yellow mark? Teenagers at Mount Royal High School in Montreal, Canada, see that yellow mark and know it’s a suspension letter.
To get the answer, you’ll have to skip back about three years, back to a time when Patrick was rebellious. “I wasn’t too right and correct,” he recalls, speaking with formal phrasing that identifies his Jamaican roots. “As they call it in scriptural terms, I was a wayward person.”
That may be a rather harsh assessment. But Patrick knew he needed to change. And when he decided he could change, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints played a big part.
“At that time our family seemed to be falling apart. Then one night my mother was watching TV, and she saw a ‘Mormon’ commercial about putting the family first. She decided to order the video so it could maybe reinforce our family ties.”
And she and other family members continued to work on Patrick. “They weren’t happy with the way I was behaving, and, to be honest about it, neither was I. So I started trying to do the things I knew were right. Then, precisely at the time when I was changing, the sister missionaries arrived at our door with a Book of Mormon and a video. They came into our home and started to teach us. I was really glad for the message and for the change they brought into our lives, even though I’m the only one (so far) who has joined the Church.”
Once Patrick started learning about the restored gospel, the change was remarkable.
“It took a year before I got baptized. My mother wanted me to be sure about my decision. So during that time I studied, I went to church, and I was active with the other LDS youth. I tried my best to participate in meetings and social events. I even enrolled in seminary before I was baptized. I was learning and growing in the scriptures and in prayer. By the time my baptism came, I felt ready.”
And Patrick kept right on growing. First, he was called to be the teachers quorum president. Now he’s first assistant in the priests quorum of the English-speaking Montreal Ward. He continues to study the gospel and to share his knowledge with others.
“There are four members in our priests quorum, and we try our best to reinforce each other in the gospel, to prepare ourselves to serve the Lord with all our capacities. Receiving the Melchizedek Priesthood is my goal as a young man. I want to be able to serve a mission.”
Patrick is also on the student council, gets top grades, is a fantastic basketball player, has a paper route (the money will help pay for his mission), helps host events for the Special Olympics, and … well, you get the idea. So what was the deal with the letter?
“It was for skipping a class, which I didn’t do,” Patrick explains. “The teacher didn’t see me there, so she thought it was an unexcused absence. Actually, at the time I was on stage with the vice principal, giving a speech. I cleared it up with the office.”
It didn’t take much clearing up. After all, Patrick is the kind who doesn’t cut class, or cheat on tests, or go to wild parties. Patrick is more likely to be calming down someone who’s angry, helping someone in need, volunteering for community service, or telling someone about the gospel. He travels an hour and 15 minutes each way on Sundays just to come to church. He … well, again, you get the idea.
In many ways, Patrick Robertson is typical of a lot of the LDS youth in Montreal. He speaks both English and French (and several other languages), which is fairly common in this bilingual, multicultural city. He often has the opportunity to talk about the Church, which he is happy to do. And he’s no stranger to using spiritual principles as he climbs through life.
Montreal means “Royal Mountain.” Patrick and other LDS youth who live here can identify with that name. In fact, they could almost claim it as a motto. Children of a heavenly king, they are reaching for a summit. As they progress through life, they climb toward the heights, knowing that when the slope seems steep or the cliffs treacherous, there is ready help along the way.
Marie-Frédérique Carter, 15, is a member of the French-speaking Lemoyne Ward. She lives in a nice, suburban part of town, where she attends a large écolesecondaire (high school) named in honor of a Catholic monsignor. Her friends know her as an aspiring violinist. They also know her as a Latter-day Saint who keeps her standards.
“I got into quite a discussion with one of my friends concerning the law of chastity,” Marie-Frédérique explains. “She thought I was really old-fashioned. She didn’t agree with my standards at all. But she finally saw I was going to stick to my principles no matter what. I want to be a good member of the Church, and I know that obedience now will bring blessings later on.”
Just the same, it isn’t always easy. “It’s hard when you get to a certain age, and you see your friends who aren’t LDS start dating and having boyfriends, and your desire is to remain faithful to the Church and to the standards that have been given to us by a living prophet. At first, I found that difficult. But not anymore. I find that I am happy doing what’s right and knowing that I’m blessed by my Heavenly Father.”
Shawn and Melissa Poirier, 16, are twins, born three minutes apart. Like most twins, they tease each other good-naturedly about who’s the most intelligent, who’s the strongest, and who’s the best looking. But there’s one thing they don’t tease about. That’s their testimony of the gospel.
“About two years ago, our parents were wondering what religion they should be,” Melissa says. “But they didn’t really know which Church would be right,” Shawn adds. Their father in particular talked with priests and missionaries from lots of denominations.
“Then the missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints knocked on our door,” Shawn continues. “He felt inspired to let them in.” The parents began taking the discussions in earnest. “One night, after I had seen the missionaries come over and over and over, I decided to sit in. Then my sister eventually came in.” As the twins studied, they began to see a spiritual summit worth attaining. Baptism became an important step along the way.
“Our parents have not been baptized yet,” Melissa explains. “But they’re still working on it.” And they encourage Shawn and Melissa to keep climbing as members of the English-speaking Montreal Ward.
“I’m surprised at how easy it’s been,” Shawn says. “I thought it would be really tough to keep the commandments and laws of God and the standards of the Church. But I take it day by day, and I pray and then do what I feel in my heart is right. People seem to respect what I’m doing, and I love being a Latter-day Saint.”
Melissa tells of an experience at school. “In my home economics class we were learning how to make tea. I had to explain to the teacher that it’s part of our religion to keep our bodies healthy, and that I couldn’t drink that kind of tea because there are bad things in it. Everyone was surprised when she gave me special permission to make herbal tea separately from the rest of the class, and I got to tell a lot of people about the Word of Wisdom.”
That’s not the scaling of a towering peak, but it is a part of a steady, upward striving, the same sort of striving that takes place daily among the French- and English-speaking LDS youth of Montreal.
Mount Royal is a hill on an island at the heart of Montreal. By most standards, it isn’t much of a mountain. It’s more of a gradual rise. But if you look at belief as a summit, conversion and obedience as lofty peaks, and testimony as a towering achievement, then there are certainly mountains here. Patrick, Marie-Frédérique, Shawn, Melissa, and dozens of other Latter-day Saint teenagers in Montreal are not only climbing to the top, but also standing as monuments of faith to help and inspire other people.
Latter-day Saints from Montreal know one secret to climbing high is daily seminary activity. Some of them have home-study seminary. Others meet in early-morning or evening classes. But they all agree that seminary helps them rise to spiritual heights.
“It’s preparing me for a mission,” says James Stewart, 17, who attends early-morning classes at the Kirkland Ward.
“It makes a difference to have a daily contact with the scriptures,” says classmate Cynthia Tsien, 14. “It reminds you of what you should be.”
And of course there are Super Saturdays every few months, when all the seminary students in the stake get together for scripture study, talks from Church leaders, and activities.
“That’s the best,” says 14-year-old Cassie Hoather, also from Kirkland. “Everybody there wants you to have a testimony. They help you to find what’s really true.”

Many years ago I was teaching released-time seminary. Life was good. I was married to a wonderful woman. We had been blessed with four small children. I was blessed to study and teach from the scriptures every day.

I came home from school one day to discover we were expecting child number five. There was good news and bad news. The good news was the blessing of another child. The bad news was that my wife got extremely ill during pregnancies. I knew it was going to be a rough road ahead. It seemed that everything that could go wrong did go wrong during the first three months of Debbie’s pregnancy. This included the following:

1. Debbie was sick with morning sickness. She was in bed for more than four weeks and couldn’t even sit up.
2. I had taken a leave of absence from teaching seminary to get my doctoral degree. I was back in graduate school carrying fifteen credit hours.
3. I was attempting to fill the role of mother while Debbie was ill. This included cleaning the house, doing laundry, fixing meals, tending kids, running errands, fulfilling nursemaid duties, and so on.
4. The dishwasher broke. I had no money to repair it. Dishes were done by hand.
5. Jana got an ear infection. She couldn’t hear me. I had to take her to the doctor.
6. I had to “farm out” the two youngest girls—ages two and four—during the day for different ward members to tend.
7. Because of all of the turmoil, I was up five to six times each night helping Debbie and consoling the children.
8. Jeremy, then age six, was throwing rocks at an icicle on the front of the house and broke the large picture window in the living room.
9. Jeremy also was chasing Jana and bumped a shelf of figurines. They crashed to the floor. My wife asked, “What was that?” I said, “Oh, nothing, dear.” The pile of pieces remained in a box for weeks awaiting the day when I would have time to glue them back together—which never happened.
10. Julie, age two, became ill. I took her to the doctor.
11. I had to take Debbie to the hospital several times for intravenous hydration. With all the vomiting, she got dehydrated regularly.
12. I was always at least 500 pages behind in my reading.
13. I was supposed to be doing a literature search for my dissertation.
14. I was serving as elders quorum president. Many hours of service were required.
15. Other things happened. A wind came up and blew the screen door right off the front of our house. It was lying out in the driveway.
16. I was in an education class in which I had to practice giving individualized intelligence tests. I tested most of the kids in the neighborhood. I began to doubt my own intelligence.
17. The straw that broke the camel’s back, I think, was that our scruffy little mongrel dog named Fluffy began her breeding cycle. We had no fence. It seemed as if we had male dog visitors from everywhere, all enamored with Fluffy.

I was at an all-time low. When you are at the bottom, there is no more bottom. I was drowning, being pulled down by an overwhelming whirlpool of duties that I couldn’t keep up with. And in the process I hadn’t opened a book of scripture in more than four weeks. Prior to all of this I had committed to teach an adult evening class on the Book of Mormon. It was too much. I felt I couldn’t do it, but I was committed.

So the night before the class was to begin, I found myself preparing during the only quiet time available: between midnight and 2 a.m. After about an hour of study I suddenly stopped. Something was different—very different. It took a few moments for me to realize what was happening. Then it came to me like a revelation from heaven. For the first time in four weeks I wasn’t depressed. It was also the first time in four weeks that I had immersed myself in scripture study. Because of the tailspin of life I had found myself in, I felt I had no time to study the scriptures. I was barely surviving day to day. I felt it was impossible to allot any time for scripture study.

I submit to you that the following words of President Spencer W. Kimball are true:

There are blessings that come from immersing ourselves in the scriptures. The distance narrows between ourselves and our Father in Heaven. Our spirituality shines brighter. We love more intensely those whom we should love. It is much easier to follow counsel. The lessons of life are learned more readily and surely. [“Men of Example,” address to religious educators, Temple Square Assembly Hall, 12 September 1975, 2; included in Charge to Religious Educators, 3d ed. (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1994), 23]

I witnessed the blessing of immersing myself in the scriptures. I testify that the light from the Book of Mormon helped chase darkness from me. I acknowledge that scripture study alone cannot resolve all despair and depression, but I do know that when I was finally compelled “to act” and “not to be acted upon” (see 2 Nephi 2:26), it was the keystone—the Book of Mormon—that led me back to the Cornerstone, Jesus Christ (see Ephesians 2:20).

We continued our march through the forest, day after day getting closer to home. From the mountain path, we could look down and see the American tanks passing by. Just a few days after our first encounter with the Americans, we were making our way along a hillside through the forest when suddenly I had a funny feeling. I told my friends I had to go down—right down there where the tanks were. “You’re crazy!” they said. “Can’t you see the tanks down there? They’ll shoot you down right away.” I told them that didn’t matter. I had to go down.
“Heinz, did you pray about that?” Günther asked me.
“Yes,” I said.
“Then I’ll go with you.”
Just like that. He didn’t think twice.
The other three stayed behind. “We’re not going with you because you’re crazy!” they said. “You’ll walk right into their arms.”
We marched down the hill as fast as we could. Günther, who was quite a bit larger than I, would put his arm under mine and nearly drag me along. After awhile, the other three came running behind us. They didn’t know why, they said, but they wanted to come with us. We continued down the mountain and came out of the forest.
Off to the left was a little farmhouse. As we came through the trees, the door of the house opened and a man came out and said, “Come in fast.” We ran inside, and he slammed the door shut behind us. Then he put us in the cow stable under the straw because it was forbidden, by severe punishment from the Americans, to hide German soldiers.
We had hardly crawled under the straw when the Americans came rolling through with tanks and trucks and went up into the mountains. It was the first time they had gone up there. Hours later they came back, their trucks filled with German soldiers who were taken to camps.
Once again the Lord guided me to be in the right place at the right time. When the Americans had cleared the mountain and were gone, we left the house and marched on again toward home. A few days later, we were stopped once more by the Americans. At first I didn’t speak. I wanted to act like I didn’t know English. I heard them say, “Well, we’ll just let them sit here, and we’ll put them on the next truck that comes to transport them to a camp.” Trucks had been going by every two to three minutes.
We sat there waiting for a truck to come by any second. We waited and waited, for an hour or longer, but no truck came. I finally went up to one of the military policemen.
I told him who we were, and he said, “Oh, all of a sudden you speak English.”
“Yes, I speak English. I learned it in school. I was just scared.”
“How old are you?” he asked me. I told him I was 17-and-a-half years old.
“Where have you been?”
I explained the whole thing—what we had done, why we had civilian clothes on, where we wanted to go—home. He called up on the phone and checked the outfits where we had been to see if the information I had given him was correct. Then he looked at me for a long time and said, “I have a boy about your age, and if he would say to someone, ‘I’d like to go home to Mother,’ I hope they’d give him the chance. If you take this road, there is an American headquarters; but if you take that road, they can’t see you. Good luck.”
Finally we were almost home. Everything was shut down. There was no train, no car, no bus, no telephone—nothing. So we continued crawling through the forest, following the creek. I knew that area well. We reached my neighborhood, and I just wanted to go through the gate of our neighbor’s backyard. I left the others and opened the gate. A little gun that had been put there to shoot the gophers went off. It scared the wits out of me and the neighbors, who quickly came running. But they were glad to see that I was home safely. I sent my sister back to the forest with some food for my friends before they continued on to their homes.
We all made it because the Lord guided us to the right places at the right times.
Prayer had been my strength. At times it was all I had. I prayed for guidance all the time and received a very peaceful feeling that everything would be all right, and it proved to be true. I don’t think a day passed by that I didn’t tell the Lord I loved him. During the war I had feelings of love in my heart. I didn’t have feelings of hate. I think for that reason the Lord spared my life. I stayed in tune with him. I knew that if I kept his commandments and was worthy to receive his guidance he would protect me. And he did.

So does an employer who is unfair to his employees. An idealistic young professional wrote Church headquarters about the plight of migrant farm workers. He had observed treatment that was probably illegal and certainly unchristian. When I read his letter, I thought of the positive example of Jesse Knight, the great benefactor of Brigham Young Academy. At a time when most mine owners exploited their workers, this Christian employer paid his miners something extra so they could earn their living in six days’ labor and rest on the Sabbath. He did not require them to patronize a company store. He built his workers a building for recreation, worship, and schooling. And Brother Knight would not permit the superintendent to question his workers about their religion or politics (see Jesse William Knight, The Jesse Knight Family, Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1940, pp. 43–44; and Gary Fuller Reese, “Uncle Jesse,” master’s thesis, Brigham Young University, 1961, pp. 26–28).

Lesson two is that we can endure challenges with patience. I worked hard during my undergraduate career to prepare for admission to graduate school. I kept my grades up, worked on research projects with professors, took a GRE prep class, and, like all of you, contributed in campus and community service projects. I carefully selected the graduate schools I would apply to and ensured my applications were complete and submitted early.

After months of waiting for each school to notify me of its admissions decision, I received a rejection letter, then another, and then another until every graduate school had respectfully denied me admission. With help and advice from professors in my department, I submitted a late application to one more graduate school. I was promptly admitted, and, from my present perspective, I am confident that I am going where I am supposed to go.

The gospel should break down all such divisions of language. And great men generally tend toward simplicity. I remember a lecture by Bertrand Russell to the Philosophical Society in Lund, Sweden, in 1934. It was beautifully lucid. It was a kind of dance of simple language, but something very subtle was conveyed by it. Afterwards the chairman of the society told me that he had been disappointed in the lecture; it was far too obvious, he said. I suggested to him that that simplicity had cost Bertrand Russell most of a lifetime. But the chairman didn’t understand.

Late in the afternoon of the second day at sea, the dreaded alarm “Man overboard” sounded. It became more ominous when the words “This is no drill” were added. The ship’s lookout believed he heard a splash and a cry for help. One adult leader recalls, “I was sitting in the officers’ wardroom, convincing myself I was going to become gloriously sick. But when the alarm sounded, I was no longer aware of anything except the fact that I had two sons out on deck somewhere.”
Fortunately, after a person-by-person muster was verified three times during search-at-sea procedures, there was a collective sigh of relief aboard when the ship’s captain announced all hands were present. The worried adult laughingly remembers, “That’s when it dawned on me that I was no longer seasick. I told the pediatrician who was with us that I thought I had discovered a sure cure for mal de mer—adrenalin!”

“During December 1987, I had some Church assignments in Bolivia, a beautiful South American country where the Church is growing rapidly but where the people have very little. The Regional Representative, Elder Philip Kradolfer, accompanied me, and he brought a large suitcase full of toys. Just before Christmas each year, his children give up some of their toys to help the children living in the Altiplano, or high plateau region, of Bolivia. It was wonderful to see the children’s faces as they received a doll, a game, a book, or a purse. Jesus taught that it is better to give than to receive, and I am sure that you have felt the same happiness when you have been a secret helper.
“While serving in South America last year,” Elder Cuthbert recalled, “I met many people who had little to eat and hardly a roof over their heads. Many are hearing the gospel and are being baptized. The children are attending Primary and are preparing for missions, just like you.
“In your prayers, would you remember these boys and girls who have a very hard life? As you prayerfully express thanks for the blessings that you enjoy, fill yourself up with gratitude and let it overflow into service. As you help other children, you will not want so much for yourselves.”

Down in the South, when I was president of the mission down there, I went to one of the beautiful new chapels there—not of our Church—and the minister showed us through. The ground had broken away so that the basement was above the ground level, and I said to the minister: “Do you know what we would do with this if we had it?”
And he said: “What?”
I said: “We’d improve it and use it to entertain our young people.”
“Well, Mr. Richards,” he said, “you can do it. You have trained leaders, you don’t have to pay them. But we haven’t got them, and we can’t afford to pay them.” Now I knew he could not because one of our members sang in his choir each week and was paid by the minister for singing in the choir.
What if we had to pay all of these folks here, and then all of our ward choirs, and all of the auxiliary organizations. And, just think!—on Friday we had a gathering of the Regional Representatives of the Twelve. I don’t remember just how many were there, but I think about 190. They are businessmen, executives, and professional men, and go all over the country without any compensation for their work in order to help build the kingdom. Thank God for the gift of the Holy Ghost! No wonder the Prophet said that included all things.

My father-in-law was a real inspiration to me. He was the 12th of 13 children of a very poor immigrant family from Switzerland. After he had finished elementary school, he, like many others in his time, was encouraged to drop out of school and learn a trade. Then one day he met Mr. Hicks, the new school teacher. Mr. Hicks asked, “Albert, are you coming to school this year?” Albert explained that he was not planning to. Mr. Hicks said, “Well, why don’t you come for three or four days and see how you like it?”
Albert came, and his future life was dramatically changed for the better. He said this new teacher didn’t just answer the questions. Instead he would write on the chalkboard the titles of the books where they could find the answers. A thirst for learning developed in Albert that was never quenched.
He was a hard-working farmer, providing for a large family. But when I came to know him, I hardly remember his being in the house without a book in his work-worn hands. He would circle words he didn’t know and write their definitions in the margins. He was a real student of history and the doctrine of the Church. Although he never had the opportunity to attend school beyond the eighth grade, he read much more than most college graduates. He not only learned to read; he read.

On that long, recent journey around the earth, we met another friend who once was on the faculty of Brigham Young University. Now his children are grown; and he and his wife concluded that rather than retire into idleness as they could well have done, and as millions of others in this land are doing, they would find someplace in the world where they could help some of our Father’s children by teaching them the truths that will save them. They found such a land. They sold their beautiful Utah home; they sold their Lincoln Continental; they left friends and relatives for a distant, less comfortable place. As they have cast their bread upon the waters, the Lord has opened opportunities for them to teach and lift and help. No one can foretell the consequences of their pioneering. As I have thought of this man and woman, who have left the comforts of their home and the society of their friends at an age when most people want to slow down and take it easy, I have thought of the words of the Lord, “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold and shall inherit everlasting life” (Matthew 19:29).

In these days, visiting teachers do much good. Twelve years ago, Suzy was called to be Dora’s visiting teacher. A widow with no children, Dora had a difficult personality and was almost a recluse. When Suzy first began visiting Dora, she was met at the doorstep but never invited in. Several months later, Suzy took a treat to Dora, but Dora said she could not accept it. When Suzy asked why not, she answered, “Because you’ll want something in return.” Suzy assured her, “All I want is your friendship.” After that, visiting became easier. Gradually, Suzy found ways to do things for Dora and to listen when listening was needed. She would also tell her about the wonderful people in the ward, the lessons, and the conferences, thus making her feel a part of the ward. As Dora’s health began to deteriorate, Suzy’s visits were daily, and they became close friends. When Dora died, Suzy was able to eulogize the woman others called “unapproachable” as a “remarkable woman” and “a cherished friend.” She knew her as few others could because of her service as a visiting teacher.

During the first year of my mission, my parents were not supportive about my missionary service. The Lord revealed to me while I was on my mission that my family was fine, and they would be taken care of. Then things changed all of a sudden. The last six to eight months of my mission my family was very supportive. They said they were receiving blessings, and they knew it was because of my serving a mission.