Gospel Story Finder

Sometimes the Savior’s touch can reach others through little bodies with big hearts. A lovely woman had received the missionary discussions but had not made the final commitment to be baptized. One Sunday she decided to attend sacrament meeting in a ward where she was not acquainted. She wanted a place where she could be alone with her thoughts. She sat beside a little boy. As the sacrament was passed, this little boy noticed that she did not take the sacrament bread. When it came to him, he carefully broke a piece in two and gave half to her. The woman was very impressed that a child would perform such a meaningful act of kindness. That day she contacted the missionaries and said, “If this is what you teach the children in your church, I want to become a member.”

As a leader he has tried to encourage that desire in others. He remembers a time in 1987 when he was the bishop in Fayetteville, Arkansas. “I went into Primary one Sunday,” he says. “They had invited me. I decided to wear red suspenders. I thought that I would somehow use them as an object lesson. So I got in the Primary room, took off my coat, and said, ‘Now, boys and girls, the bishop has these red suspenders. How are the scriptures like my red suspenders?’ And one little boy raised his hand and said, ‘The scriptures hold up our faith in Jesus the same way your suspenders hold up your pants.’ I said, ‘That is exactly right.’ The little boys in the ward started wearing red suspenders, and the little girls had red bows in their hair.

“My dad was a tool-and-die maker, and he would never be caught without his tools. It seemed to me that for members of the Church of Jesus Christ our tools are the scriptures and we would always have them in our meetings. When I became the stake president, we began to hold them up to remind us how they can, if we use them, hold up our faith.”

This story happened in Taiwan.
“Ready, Louie?” Miss Li asked.
Louie nodded. He put his fingers to the black and white piano keys and began to play. Plink, plink, plink. He loved playing all the notes together to make music. He played through the whole first page and moved to the next.
PLUNK. Oops. He always had trouble playing that part. It had lots of quick notes. Louie started again from the beginning.
PLUNK. Louie frowned. Not again!
“That’s OK,” Miss Li said. “Let’s try again slowly.”
Louie practiced with Miss Li’s help a few more times. But he still couldn’t get through that part very well.
“This part is tricky, but I know you can do it,” Miss Li said. “Do you think you can practice more at home before the performance?”
“I think so,” Louie said.
The next day, Louie practiced piano again. But he kept messing up the same part! Plink, plink, PLUNK.
Dad came into the room. “How’s it going?” he asked.
Louie pointed at the notes on the music sheet. “This part is really hard. I keep having to do it over and over!”
“That does look hard,” Dad said. “But this reminds me of a story in the Book of Mormon. The story about Nephi going back to get the plates.”
Louie’s eyes got big. “I love that story! Nephi kept going back to try again. And Heavenly Father helped him.”
Dad smiled. “That’s right. I think if you keep trying, Heavenly Father will help you like he helped Nephi.”
Louie nodded and started over. Dad sat in a chair close to Louie and listened. Louie focused on the part that was hard. He played each note slowly.
Then Louie played through the whole song again. Each time he played, he got faster. At last he played all the notes right! He felt so good. He didn’t even notice how long it took.
“You did it! Great job,” Dad said.
Mom stood in the doorway. “It sounded great, Louie!”
“Thanks,” Louie said. “I finally learned the hard part.”
Mom gave Louie a hug. “I’m proud of you for working so hard.”
On the night of the performance, Louie was nervous. His heart was pounding. His hands were sweaty.
Finally, his name was called. He walked onto the stage and looked at the parents and kids listening. He said the name of his song, then sat down on the hard bench.
Louie took a deep breath and placed his hands on the shiny keys. He knew he had done all he could. Heavenly Father would help him.
Louie started to play. The notes came just as he had practiced. Then it was time for the hard part.
He played each note right. It didn’t feel quite so hard this time!
Finally he played the last note of the song. Everyone clapped as he lifted his fingers from the keys. Louie smiled and bowed. He saw Mom, Dad, and his sisters clapping and smiling. He did it! He had tried again even when it was hard, just like Nephi. And Heavenly Father had helped him.
Illustrations by Toby Newsome

President Henry B. Eyring, in his talk "O Remember, Remember" in the 2007 October General Conference, states:
"When our children were very small, I started to write down a few things about what happened every day. Let me tell you how that got started. I came home late from a Church assignment. It was after dark. My father-in-law, who lived near us, surprised me as I walked toward the front door of my house. He was carrying a load of pipes over his shoulder, walking very fast and dressed in his work clothes. I knew that he had been building a system to pump water from a stream below us up to our property. He smiled, spoke softly, and then rushed past me into the darkness to go on with his work. I took a few steps toward the house, thinking of what he was doing for us, and just as I got to the door, I heard in my mind-not in my own voice-these words: I'm not giving you these experiences for yourself. Write them down."
"I went inside. I didn't go to bed. Although I was tired, I took out some paper and began to write. And as I did, I understood the message I had heard in my mind. I was supposed to record for my children to read, someday in the future, how I had seen the hand of God blessing our family. Grandpa didn't have to do what he was doing for us. He could have had someone else do it or not have done it at all. But he was serving us, his family, in the way covenant disciples of Jesus Christ always do. I knew that was true. And so I wrote it down, so that my children could have the memory someday when they would need it.
"I wrote down a few lines every day for years. I never missed a day no matter how tired I was or how early I would have to start the next day. Before I would write, I would ponder this question: Have I seen the hand of God reaching out to touch us or our children or our family today?' As I kept at it, something began to happen. As I would cast my mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done for one of us that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had allowed God to show me what He had done."

In the early 1930s the Brown family had left Cardston and come to Salt Lake City, where Victor Brown studied at the University of Utah. It was in 1936 in Salt Lake, downstairs in the board room in the old Granite Stake house, that he first saw Lois Kjar. Or perhaps it might be best to say that Lois saw Vic.
Sister Brown says about their first meeting, “I remember it as distinctly as can be. Our board meeting was just about to begin when a tall young man walked into the room. Since this was the first meeting of a new MIA stake board, none of us had been formally introduced, but as I watched this particular young man record the events of the evening in his capacity as secretary of the men’s board, I was much impressed by his quiet efficiency. With a feeling of guilt I turned around the engagement ring I was wearing just before I was introduced to him at the end of the meeting. Even so, it wasn’t a fairy-tale romance of ‘love at first sight,’ for it was several months before we had our first date—a prom at BYU. But his gentleness and courtesy were so genuine and natural that I found myself more deeply impressed each time we met, and happily for me, we began to meet more often than just at board meetings.”
Lois and Vic Brown enjoyed dancing and would often go to the Old Mill to dance. The Old Mill had once been a paper mill in the southeast part of Salt Lake Valley. It was a romantic spot near Big Cottonwood Creek and was surrounded by cottonwood trees. It was a great place for young people to meet and enjoy one another’s company. Lois remembers that Vic was a very good dancer, and on one occasion at the very same Old Mill, Victor L. Brown asked Lois Kjar to be Mrs. Brown—and she accepted, of course.

Solomon Massaquoi’s journey of gratitude began at the Gathering Place, where he discovered a world of opportunities! He took a few different classes, including Plumbing Basics at the Kakata Liberia District stake center. Learning about different materials, fittings, and pipe connections opened the door to his future. Armed with newfound skills, he secured a paid contract with a small company, helping him earn his mission commitment money and meet his goal to serve the Lord! Solomon received his mission call to the Nigeria Calabar Mission while on a YSA temple trip, marking the start of his next adventure!

We lived on a hill, but it wasn’t so steep that it couldn’t be used for pick-up games of baseball in the spring and summer. The street was the ribbon that tied together the lives of each boy on our block.
After supper was over, the boys would gather on the same corner, and when enough were there, we’d pick sides. We used a rubber ball that we bought at Mr. Pinelli’s variety store for a quarter. We’d play baseball until it became dark.
One breezy June evening, Ricky Cray, the best hitter on the block, was up to bat. My best friend, Chuck Grable, was next to me in the “outfield,” which was the stretch of road between Mr. LaSalle’s and Mr. Kominski’s.
Ricky sized up a belt-high pitch and plastered the ball a good 20 feet beyond my grasp. I put my head down and furiously chased the ball. Suddenly, I came upon two sets of the shiniest black shoes I’d ever seen. I looked up and there were two young men in suits, smiling. One of them was holding the rubber ball.
“Lose something?” he said cheerfully. He flipped the ball to me and I heaved it toward my friends, just as Ricky crossed home plate.
Chuck came over to me. “Who are those guys? That one made a nice catch.” We didn’t see men in suits in our neighborhood often.
“I don’t know. Maybe they’re selling something. Like books.”
“I think they’re police,” confided Chuck.
“No, they’re too young. And they’d be more secret. Look, they’re stopping at every house on the street.”
The next hitter popped a lazy fly ball toward Chuck who easily snagged it. We went to take our turn at bat. Home plate was near our house, and the two men in suits were just stepping to the door.
Father answered. I heard one of the young men say they were from a church and they had a message about families. Father sized them up.
“Are you selling something?” he asked.
“No, sir,” replied the one who had fielded the ball.
“Are you honest?” Father asked. It would have been an odd question from anyone but my father. That’s the way he was, a man who took himself and others at face value.
“Yes, sir, we try to be,” the same man answered without hesitation.
“Are you boys from around here?”
“No. Elder Cone is from Bountiful, Utah. And I’m from Boston.”
Father smiled. “Then come into my house. I’m Joseph Rosa, and this is my wife, Leslee.” As soon as the one said he was from Boston, I knew my father would invite them in. A little thing like that, being from Massachusetts. Yet it changed our lives forever.
We saw the young men in the suits and white shirts many times over the following weeks. Father and Mother listened to them, prayed with them, studied with them, and fed them pasta until they almost could no longer get into their suits. When the elders came, Father pulled me out of the baseball games. “If what they say is true, then you need to hear it also,” he told me. I could see how important this was to my parents. Father’s eyes blazed as the missionaries taught us. “Yes, that seems right. I’ve always believed that,” he often said.
“We have reached a decision as a family,” Father told the missionaries one night. They both looked nervously at each other. “We would like to be baptized.” The two young men almost leaped into the air. The following night, Father and I went to a department store and bought our church clothes. A week later, the four of us were baptized. Never again did my parents talk about the missing piece. We had found it.

Soon I’ll be celebrating the first anniversary of my baptism, thanks to the efforts of my neighbor Diane Novak who is ten.
Diane invited me to Primary at the Caribou Branch of the Church in the Houlton-Maine District of the Canada-Halifax Mission. Later I met with the missionaries and was baptized by Diane’s father in the swimming pool at Loring Air Force Base. Now I go to Mutual and take my nonmember brother and one of his friends with me.

In Farmington, Utah, there lived a good man named Bob Hasenyager, who was not yet a member of the Church. His wife, Marlene, was devoted to the gospel. She honored her covenants quietly and patiently, never pressuring—only loving. Bob was serving and helping in the local ward. One day the stake president asked Bob, “Are you aware that your wife longs to attend the temple but still waits, not wanting to hurt you?”
Bob wept when he was told this. Then he gave his full support. Marlene received her endowment and began attending the temple regularly. Bob noticed something different: not pressure, not argument, but peace. Then one day a young missionary simply suggested Bob be baptized on a specific date. In Bob’s words: “I felt the Holy Ghost. I felt warmth and joy and peace. I finally had my answer.” Bob was baptized. He was later diagnosed with terminal cancer. He and Marlene were sealed four months before he passed away.

I was very grateful to see the photograph on the cover of the September 1998 issue. With the Liahona (Spanish) in my hand, I went to where my husband was and showed it to him. “What do you see?” I asked.
He looked at it and replied, “A dad fixing a sink.” “Look closer,” I said. And then he realized it was the home teachers making a visit and they had arrived at just the right moment to help a sister in need.
I wanted to let you know that this issue helped my husband a lot. He’s the elders quorum president in our ward. He took a sheet of paper and started writing down what he needed to do to set up new assignments for his home teaching companionships. I also saw him meet with his counselors to plan visits. But most important of all, he made time to fulfill his own calling as a home teacher.

While traveling on the path to the tree of life, there is no shortcut to reach it; there is just danger off the designated path chosen by Jesus Christ. I often am looking for a shorter or better way to reach a goal or accomplish something that I need to do in my life, but I try to make sure that this way does not affect my eternal salvation or put me in danger of losing something very precious. However, I am reminded of a time I decided to create my own shortcut to reach a destination.

Near my daughter’s home in Denver is a delightful cement and asphalt bike path and walkway. The path leads one through undeveloped as well as developed areas. When I visit there, I take my granddaughter in her stroller as I do my daily walks. The beginning of the path that leaves my daughter’s area is downhill for about eight to ten minutes of the walk. You know what that means: the last of the walk is uphill. After walking for 45 minutes or so, I always dread that last uphill climb—especially pushing a stroller.

When I first started walking this path, I noticed that just before the sidewalk begins its ascent back to my daughter’s street, there is a dirt path that is much shorter but steeper than the cement pathway. It would lead me to the street and thus cut out some of the uphill climb near the end. I figured a short uphill climb would be better than a long one, even with its steepness.

Therefore, on one of my walks I decided to attempt it and began to push the stroller up the path. However, I failed to notice that on the dirt path there was also gravel. Halfway up, my feet began to slip on the rocks, and I found myself and the stroller going backward. I concluded that this was not a good thing, and I became concerned for the safety of my granddaughter as well as for myself. Luckily, grasping the stroller tightly, I was able to turn the stroller off the dirt path and head it back down to the safety of the sidewalk, even though I was running because of the decline. I never attempted that shortcut again.

This member learned to trust the Lord to help her build the kingdom: “I remember my parents teaching me from a young age that we always accept our callings because they are given by the Lord. While in college I was extended the call of Relief Society president. I was overwhelmed, but it never crossed my mind to say no. So I began the year with over 100 women to care for, little experience, and faith that the Lord would make up the difference. A year later I was released. As I thought back on the moments of revelation when I knew exactly what lesson to give or comment to share, or the many times when someone would make me a meal because I was too busy to cook, or the pile of encouraging notes I’d received, I knew with a surety that the Lord had magnified my efforts in building the kingdom.”

“I was with President Harold B. Lee in the hospital at the time of his sudden death. President Marion G. Romney, a counselor in the First Presidency, and President Spencer W. Kimball, of the Quorum of the Twelve, arrived and waited while the doctors did what they could. When it was announced that President Lee had died, President Romney turned to President Kimball and said, ‘President Kimball, what would you like me to do?’ In that moment—simply and without any doubts or questions—the leadership of the Church quietly changed hands in that hospital waiting room. It was a moment I shall never forget.”

On January 2, 1891, a 19-year-old Norwegian immigrant sat down in his home, in Logan City, Cache County, Utah Territory, and wrote the following lines on some lined paper:
“As I have come to fully realize; that, I am as weak as all other mortals—perhaps weaker than many; and realizing that happiness in life is only obtained by having a pure heart, a clear conscience; and fearing the Lord and keeping his commandments; also as I realize that happiness in old age consists of reviewing a life devoid from great sins; the gratification of noble desires manfully carried out; and finding that my life up to this time has not been as I should like it to have been: I lay down the following regulations by which I shall try to conduct my life hereafter; to which end may the Lord Almighty, my Creator, help me.”
He then wrote down 17 resolutions. Nearly eight months later, on Tuesday, August 25, 1891, he copied them in a hardcover journal. Here he was to record his years of struggle as a stranger-student from Utah Territory at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He began by entering the 17 resolves that were to guide his life.
“Resolved:
“1st. That religion, the science of sciences, be made my chief concernment throughout life.
“2nd. That I will daily pray to God in secret.
“3rd. That I will daily reflect upon God and his attributes and try to become like him.
“4th. That I will receive Light, Wisdom or Knowledge, wherever or however it may be offered.
“5th. That I will never be ashamed to acknowledge my principles, beliefs and religion when I once become fully convinced of their correctness …
“6th. That I will never lose one moment of time but use it wisely.
“7th. That I maintain strict temperance in eating and drinking.
“8th. That I will never do anything that I would not do were it the last hour of my life.
“9th. That I daily read the word of God, that I may learn his will and that I may be comforted, strengthened and encouraged by so doing.
“10th. That in any narrations I speak nothing but the pure and simple truth.
“11th. That I always do that which I think is my duty and for the best good for my fellow beings.
“12th. That I live with all my might while I do live, that I may not die a living death.
“13th. That I never by word or manner try to force my opinions on others but that I simply state them and offer my arguments against others.
“14th. That I seek to overcome the habit of quickly becoming angry, loud speaking, impatient motions, and whatever might offend my fellowmen and hurt me.
“15th. That I never for a moment forget my duty towards my mother, she who has made me who I am and who will make what I will become, she who has spent the better portion of her life in my behalf and to whom I owe all the honor, respect, and affection that I can give; also that I always remember my duties toward my brother and all my friends and relations.
“16th. That I complete every task which I begin: also that I carefully consider my purpose and its results before taking upon me any duty.
“17th. That I always remember that the men and women I meet are my brothers and sisters and that I look to the beam in my own eye before attempting to remove the mote in my fellow’s eye.” (See Matt. 7:5). It would be well if every young man and woman today would similarly evaluate his or her position in life.
The young man who wrote these lines was a student at the Brigham Young College in Logan when he first recorded them. The new year of 1891 was just beginning. A little over three months before, President Wilford Woodruff had issued, by revelation, the “Manifesto.” New opportunities awaited the driven, persecuted, misunderstood Latter-day Saints.
The young man’s name was John Andreas Widtsoe. He lived with his widowed mother and little brother in a small, poor cottage. They had come from Norway in 1884. On June 27, 1894, in Sanders Theater, in Harvard Yard, Cambridge, Massachusetts, President Charles W. Eliot of Harvard University conferred upon the young immigrant the degree, Bachelor of Science, summa cum laude (with highest honors). He completed the four-year curriculum in three years. He had undergone many hardships. His widowed mother and little brother had sent him small sums of money from their meager earnings. The rest of his education had been financed by unusual personal sacrifice and by loans from kind friends in Logan, with notes signed at 12 percent interest.
He returned home to Logan from Harvard to serve as chemist of the Agriculture Experiment Station, Logan, Utah. On June 1, 1898, he was married to a beautiful young woman, Miss Leah Dunford, eldest daughter of Susa Young Gates. The young couple went to Germany where he earned the PhD degree in biochemistry at the University of Gottingen. This was followed by postdoctoral studies at the Zurich Polytechnium in Switzerland and the University of London, in England.
While in Europe he was offered the presidency of the Brigham Young College by cablegram from the chairman of its board of trustees. A cablegram from President Joseph F. Smith of the First Presidency followed the next day, advising him not to accept the Brigham Young College presidency but to return to what is now Utah State University where he built up agricultural research, establishing scientific dry farming and irrigation practices to bless the arid lands of the world.
He became the father of scientific irrigation practices and dry farming. His books and articles were published in French, Italian, and Arabic and were widely used in arid regions throughout the world as well as in the United States and Canada. He was then called by the U.S. Secretary of the Interior to revise the reclamation laws and policies of the United States. He became the president of Utah State University in Logan, Utah (1907–1916) and the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah (1916–1921). In March 1921 he was called to be an apostle by President Heber J. Grant and continued in that position throughout a long and eventful life. At his funeral in the Salt Lake Tabernacle in 1952, a telegram of appreciation for his great services to Canada was read; it was from the prime minister.
The life of John A. Widtsoe can serve as an example to every young man and young woman of the Church and of the world in these times, especially to those about to enter college, the world of work, and family life.
Recall his words:
“Realizing that happiness in life is only obtained by having a pure heart, a clear conscience; and fearing the Lord and keeping his commandments … I lay down the following regulations by which I shall try to conduct my life.”
Again, it would be well if all young men and women wrote down the regulations by which they desire to conduct their lives. Elder Widtsoe often counseled young people to “make promises. Then keep those promises.”
His commitment to the search for truth, for knowledge, was a notable landmark in the history of young Latter-day Saints. President of two state universities, he was also a member of the executive committee of Brigham Young University for many years and one of its guiding lights. He also served twice as Church Commissioner of Education. Fundamental as his commitment was to research and extending the fields of knowledge, his commitment to the Author of Truth, our Heavenly Father, and his faith in him was even greater. He recognized faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as not only the first principle of the gospel but also referred to such faith as “the greater knowledge.”
One of his poems, written as a Harvard student, now appears in LDS Hymns with a musical setting by Alexander Schreiner (“Lead Me Into Life Eternal”). Here one finds the lines, “Give me faith, the greater knowledge; Father hear me as I pray.” (No. 141.)
Can we overcome handicaps in these times? Can a person without money, family ties, or influence with people in high positions make his way in today’s world? Can we reconcile faith and knowledge?
We certainly can.
How?
By utilizing the same principles that Elder Widtsoe established for his life at a very early age. His example can be commended to all young men and young women today.
In his book “In Search of Truth,” Elder Widtsoe offered a formula we can follow. It served him well. It will serve anyone well. It is: “Work, work, work. Study, study, study. Pray, pray, pray.”

Christophe and Isabelle are both from France, the children of converts to the Church whose conversion stories are similar. In 1968, Isabelle’s family (the Mauclairs) was living in Bordeaux, France, when two missionaries from the Church knocked on the door. They were invited in and told their story. The visit resulted in membership in Heavenly Father’s kingdom on earth.
Christophe was born on January 21, 1966, the first of seven children born to Gerard and Annie Giraud-Carrier. When he was two, his parents met missionaries on the streets of Toulouse, France, and provided their phone number to the missionaries. Those missionaries misplaced the number and never called. Subsequent missionaries found the number, called, visited, taught and baptized the Giraud-Carriers.
Both couples were devoted to the gospel of Jesus Christ, teaching their children and serving wherever called. They served in significant ways, including in branch and ward leadership and in district and stake leadership callings.
Isabelle’s father was a physician in the French armed forces, which gave him opportunities to serve in foreign lands. Consequently, several of Isabelle’s childhood years were spent in Djibouti, New Caledonia and Algeria. The Church was not established in some of those countries. Worship and gospel living were thus family centered with no supporting Church organization. Family prayer and family scripture study were regular practices in the home, as were weekly sacrament meetings.
In the late 1970s the Mauclairs moved back to metropolitan France, first to Auch (pronounced Osh) near Toulouse. In 1978, they moved to the Versailles ward, where the Mauclair and Giraud-Carrier families became good friends, and a young Christophe met an even younger Isabelle. That childhood friendship grew into dating, courtship, engagement, and marriage. After some time in the same ward and stake, the families moved apart, but Christophe’s and Isabelle’s developing romance continued to grow as they courted by regular letters, occasional phone calls and quarterly in-person connections.
In July 1986 Christophe commenced full-time missionary service in the Canada Montreal Mission. While he was in Canada, Isabelle’s father was her district president in Cholet, France. Her father called her as a district missionary, fulfilling a promise in her patriarchal blessing. She arranged her work schedule to work three days a week and all evenings with the full-time missionaries. During her service, she became a key part of bringing about 20 new converts into the Church.
Just weeks after Christophe returned from the Canada Montreal Mission, the two, who had met as children 10 years before, became husband and wife on July 16, 1988 in Cholet, France. Three days later, at the Bern Switzerland Temple, they became a forever union. Christophe was 22 and Isabelle was 21.
Shortly after their marriage, Christophe was drafted into the French military. He served in the air force for one year. After his military service, Christophe transferred two years of college credit to Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. There he earned a bachelor’s degree, a master’s degree, and a PhD in computer science.
After earning his PhD, the family moved to Bristol, England, where Christophe worked as a computer science professor for six years. He left academia for a time to accept a manager position at ELCA Informatique in Lausanne, Switzerland. In Switzerland, they were just two hours from family for the first time in nearly 13 years. They loved living in Switzerland.
BYU had regularly asked Dr. Giraud-Carrier if he would consider accepting a professorship at the Provo campus. The answer was always no. When the Giraud-Carriers traveled to Utah in 2004, the Computer Science department chair asked them again, “What would make you stay in Utah?” Both Christophe and Isabelle had a strong impression that they should accept a professorship at BYU. They said yes and moved resolutely forward with the direction the Lord was revealing to them.
The Giraud-Carriers have eight children, four sons and four daughters. Four of the children were born after they left Provo. Today, six of their children are married. And they are grandparents to 18 beautiful grandchildren.
Throughout their lives, they have accepted and magnified each of their Church callings. Elder Giraud-Carrier has served as a bishop, ward and stake Young Men president, stake mission president, high councilor, stake president, and mission president. Sister Giraud-Carrier has been the president of her ward Primary, Young Women, and Relief Society, and served as Primary teacher, district missionary, mission leader, and an exceptional ministering sister. Of her, Elder Patrick Kearon has said: “If I had to cross the plains, I would want to be in her wagon.”

Here’s a fun puzzle game called Chinese Writing.
Trevor carefully eyed the odd collection of a dozen kitchen utensils on the floor.
“Who drew this picture?” he asked.
“I’m the artist,” volunteered Ken. Trevor looked carefully at Ken sitting cross-legged with head in hands. Trevor walked cautiously around the strange piece of artwork somewhat resembling a stick person.
“Well, judging from the cheese grater used for hair I suspect this is a drawing of a girl.” He carefully examined the large group of people surrounding him in the circle. “Because of the potato masher used for the mouth it must be someone with a pretty smile.” He glanced at Carol intently sitting cross-legged and head in hands. “I say it is none other than Carol Parkins.”
The group gasped in amazement. “How did you know?”
“I think I know how he did it,” boasted Cheri. “I’ll leave the room next and try.”
Do you know how Trevor did it? Did you catch the trick? That’s right. The artist gave away who the subject was by simply sitting in the same pose in which the subject was sitting. Trevor had only to see who in the room was sitting exactly like Ken. It was obviously Carol. Obvious? Well, only if you know the trick. You’ll be surprised how long it will take your friends to figure it out. Try it on them at the next birthday party you go to.

The happiness I feel in seminary is a lot like the happiness I feel when I’m in the temple. Before I turned 11, my siblings and friends had all been to the temple and I hadn’t. When they would go inside, I always waited outside. I kept hoping for the day I would be old enough to go inside myself.
When I was finally old enough to go inside and do baptisms for the dead, I felt a great peace. Even though my family and friends had described to me the feeling of being in the temple, I was so excited that I was able to feel that for myself.

The doctor at the base near Taejon, Korea, looked up at me and smiled. I had been congratulating him and his colleagues on their brilliant management of a carbon monoxide poisoning incident. As Chief of Professional Services for the Surgeon of the U.S. Army and for the United Nations Forces, I had been so impressed by this young doctor’s actions that I came down personally to review the case with him.
In his tent we chatted about the incidence of such poisoning among soldiers. Korean homes are heated with a soft coal, called yantan, which is pressed into large bricks and burned in a stove beneath one corner of the house. Smoke and fumes are ducted through the clay and tile floor to a chimney on the opposite side of the structure, warming the building and its occupants. If a leak develops, carbon monoxide is released into the house.
Often U.S. soldiers would leave their base of assignment, go into a nearby village, get drunk, and fall asleep near a yantan stove. Occasionally they suffered carbon monoxide poisoning and were returned to the base unconscious. In the course of treatment, it was customary to check the alcohol level in their blood.
I asked the doctor what this soldier’s blood-alcohol level had been, and his answer was both startling and satisfying.
“Oh, I didn’t get a blood-alcohol reading on Private Christian,” he said. “He’s a Mormon.”
I played along.
“What’s that got to do with it?” I asked. “This fellow went into town and was found unconscious. How do you know his unconsciousness wasn’t caused by alcoholic intoxication?”
The doctor replied, “Because this is Christian. He never does anything that is not proper and exemplary.”
The doctor explained that nearly everyone on the base knew that Private Christian was a returned missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He had served his mission in Korea, spoke the language, and during his off-duty hours he often went to the village to visit with the people. He had taught some of them about his church, and they had joined. They lived in a small hamlet next to the base but had gone with Christian to religious services in Taejon.
The private had returned home with them Sunday evening and was invited to spend the night. Because he was the honored guest, he was given the place closest to the smoldering yantan. But it was a cold night, and all the openings in the building had been closed. A crack in the floor had not been noticed. As the American soldier slept, he had been overcome by the gases.
With utmost pride I informed my medical colleague that I, too, was Mormon. I marveled that he could have known this young private so well. He replied that he didn’t know many soldiers closely but that Christian’s life was so distinct that it set him apart from all the other men on the base.
I have never had the opportunity to meet Brother Christian and can only speculate about the total amount of good he did in an environment that normally draws out the base instincts of men. But I will never forget the impression he made on the doctor who treated him and the example he set for me. He had made proper decisions about many things in life years before being plunged into the challenges of military life, and he had not allowed environment to deter his power to do good. The other soldiers knew him for what he was—uncompromising. I am sure that many of them carry his example in their memories, even as I do, and I’m grateful to him for letting his light shine.

Elder Neil L. Andersen and his wife, Kathy, visited the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa. They had a Church meeting outside under tents. Around the tents was a big fence. Elder Andersen could see children watching them from the other side of the fence. Sister Andersen asked him, “Do you think you might want to invite the children to come in?” Elder Andersen walked up to the man at the microphone. He asked the man to invite the children to come in and join them.
The children came running! They were all smiling and excited to be a part of the meeting.

In early December President Young spent two weeks with the somewhat discouraged Elders Kimball and Woodruff, who had been assigned to London. Since their arrival in August, the work had gone slowly, and just before Brigham arrived Wilford had written, “There is so much agoing in the city to draw the attention of the people that it almost requires a trump to be blown from heaven in order to awaken [them] to the subject of the fulness of the gospel.”32
President Young’s visit must have served its purpose well because within a week he and the others were preaching to the largest gatherings the missionaries had yet been able to attract in London. Several indicated a desire to be baptized, and an independent minister talked of joining and bringing his congregation with him. Brigham visited the College of Surgeons with a Dr. Copeland, who had been attending seriously to the apostles’ message, and the doctor was baptized the next month. Then the president of the Quorum returned to Manchester and began a flurry of activities, completions, and arrangements for the future that brought the great apostolic mission to a close.