Gospel Story Finder

Tom put the final block on his tower. “That does it!” he said. He sat back and smiled as he looked over his creation. Suddenly his bedroom door swung open. His little sister Addison ran into the room.
“Can I play?” she asked.
“No,” Tom said quickly. “Go away.” He just felt like being alone. He had been with friends all day at school. Besides, sometimes Addison broke his buildings.
Addison frowned and started to cry. She turned around and walked away.
Tom sighed. He reached over to grab his mini army figure, who began a heroic ascent up the tower. Tom felt a little bad for talking to his sister like that. But it was his room, after all. She could find something else to do. The figure jumped off the building ledge and somersaulted down to the ground.
Someone knocked on Tom’s door. “Come in,” he said.
Mom stepped into the room. “Did something happen with Addison?” she asked.
“She wanted to play in here,” Tom said. “But I don’t want her to break my tower.”
“You worked hard on that, huh?” Mom asked.
Tom nodded.
“I think your sister is feeling a little sad, though,” Mom said. “She looks up to you a lot, and she doesn’t get to see you much while you’re at school. Is there anything you could do together for a little while?”
Tom thought for a moment. Part of him still wanted to be alone. But he also wanted to be a good older brother. “I guess,” he said.
“Thanks, Tom,” Mom said as she walked out.
A few minutes later, Addison hesitantly stepped back into the room. “Hi,” she said.
“Hey, come here,” said Tom. “I want to show you something.”
Addison sat down on the bed next to her big brother and looked up at him. Tom pulled out his collection of animal cards.
“All right,” said Tom. He held up two pictures. “Would you rather be this snow leopard or this tarantula?”
Addison giggled and pointed to the leopard, her favorite animal. Tom smiled and handed her the card. They took turns picking their favorite animals until Dad called them to dinner. Tom looked at the clock. He couldn’t believe how fast the time had gone!
When they got downstairs, Tom told Mom and Dad about the game. “It was fun!” he said as he sat by Addison at dinner. “Want me to read to you tonight?”
“Yes!” Addison said. “Can you read the snow leopard book?”
“Sure.” He knew she’d pick that one. He might not have time to read what he wanted before bed, but he realized it was worth it to see his sister smile.
“Anytime,” he said.

Henry and Mom were driving home. Gray clouds filled the sky. They even touched the ground. “This is a heavy fog,” Mom said.
Mom drove slowly. The lines on the road were getting harder to see.
“Are we going to get home OK?” Henry asked.
“I hope so,” Mom said. “It might take longer than usual. But I’m being careful.”
Henry could barely see the trees. He could barely see the buildings. He trusted Mom. But he felt lost.
Then Henry thought of something. “Can I say a prayer?” he asked.
“That’s a great idea,” Mom said.
Henry prayed. He asked Heavenly Father to make the fog go away so they would be safe. Then Henry opened his eyes. But the fog was still there. And now snow was falling!
Just then, lights along the highway came on. As they passed one light, they could see the next light up ahead. Mom followed the lights.
Henry and Mom finally found their way home. They pulled into the driveway. Mom looked at Henry. She smiled.
“Heavenly Father answered your prayer,” Mom said. “The fog didn’t go away. But the lights came on. And the lights helped us find our way.”
Henry smiled. He knew Mom was right. Henry bowed his head and said another prayer. This time the prayer was to tell Heavenly Father thank you.

Part of the Andean flood lore includes references to the rainbow as the symbol between god and man that there will never again be a universal deluge on the earth. At least two references to this tradition can be found among the Spanish writings. The following from Cabello Balboa, written in 1586, describes the Brothers Ayar as they went forth to found the city of Cuzco.
“They came to a hill that today is called Guanacauria and one day at dawn they saw the bow, or rainbow of the heavens that came to the foot of the same hill, and Mango Capac told the rest that it was a good sign that the world would not be destroyed any more by water, and that they should follow him and climb the hill, and from there they would see the place where they were to settle.”11
A similar version dating from 1572 is found in the work of Molina:
“The brothers Ayar climbed to the summit, and there they saw the rainbow of the heavens, which the natives call Guanacauri, and Manco Capaca said to them, ‘Hold this as a sign, that the world will never be destroyed again by water.’”12

When Elder Wirthlin was young, he loved to go fishing with his father, Joseph L. Wirthlin, who would later become the Presiding Bishop of the Church.
“When I was a boy, I spent a lot of time with my father and loved to be with him. One time we went on a fishing trip on the upper part of the Provo River, southeast of Heber City, Utah. We were walking through a meadow, and I was some distance behind him. Father disappeared over a rise in the meadow, and he fell into a deep pond of water!
“When I came over the rise, there was his hat floating on the surface of the water. He finally came up gasping for air, and I reached down and helped him get out of the pond so that he didn’t drown.
“Even though I was young and very small, I learned in a dramatic way that there are many things that we can do to help our parents on a daily basis, or even in a lifesaving situation. We should always be willing to reach out to help our loved ones, regardless of the situation.”

Early in 1957, two missionaries knocked on his mother’s door and she invited them in. This was the start of John Douglas Jeffrey’s learning about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As he and his mother spent time with the missionaries, the Holy Ghost bore witness to him that the Church was true because the missionaries were able to answer all of his questions.
Later, John moved to Townsville, Queensland, where he met more missionaries who continued to teach him, and also his new wife, Lois. In September 1957 they became the first people to join the Church in Townsville. He was baptised in Bluewater Creek just north of Townsville. (Baptisms in creeks or swimming pools were common in the early days of the Church.)
“Learning about the true Church changed my life,” John reflects. “I have wondered what I would have done if my mother said ‘no’ when those missionaries knocked on her door!” With a new gospel perspective, John and Lois saved up to visit the Hamilton New Zealand Temple, where their family was sealed for time and all eternity. “It took us a good while because we had four children and of course we had to take them to be sealed to us!”
John taught at the Townsville Grammar School and witnessed the struggles of a growing small branch. In those days there were few chapels in Australia and members met in homes or in rented halls. After 15 years in Townsville, he received an invitation to teach at the relatively new police academy in Oxley, Brisbane. He had only been at the police academy two years when he was invited to join the Church Educational System as a coordinator in Brisbane.
The first stake in Queensland was organized in 1960 with William E Waters called as the stake president. He was followed by a man from Scotland called William E Proctor. It was during this time that John was called to be the bishop of the Inala Ward. His time as bishop was short because after two years he was called to serve on the high council.
In those days, the geographic area of the stake was huge, covering much of the southeast of Queensland around Brisbane — north to Nambour, south to the Gold Coast, and west to Toowoomba. In 1975, John was called as president of the Brisbane Australia Stake.
President Jeffrey noticed how far some members had to travel to get to church each week, so he took a map and drew an 8 km radius around each congregation. He then worked with Church physical facility authorities in Sydney to create branches in the areas lying within those circles. Those branches met in school halls until they were strong enough to qualify for a chapel. This meant that members didn’t have to drive as far to attend Church meetings. This direction paved the way for the future growth of membership in Queensland.
In 1978, just three years after his call as the Brisbane Stake president, John recommended the stake be divided. He then became the president of the new Brisbane Australia South Stake. Only three years after that, in 1981, another stake was created and called the Brisbane Australia West Stake.
Today there are 12 stakes in the greater Brisbane area.
On top of his Church leadership service, John has also had vast experience with Church employment, he has been a coordinator for Seminaries and Institutes, and he was the Australia and Pacific Area director for the Church Educational System.
He went from new convert to branch president (Townsville Branch), to district president (Townsville District), to bishop (Inala Ward), stake president (multiple stakes), and then mission president (Winnipeg Canada). John also served as a regional representative (now known as Area Seventy), as the first president of the Brisbane Australia Temple, and as executive secretary to the Pacific Area Presidency.
“The Lord was very kind to me, putting me in positions where I was given great gospel experiences and training by the General Authorities,” John says. “Also, I was hired by Seminaries and Institutes because I loved to read and study the scriptures. Now in retirement I am more focused on efforts to . . . live like the Saviour taught.”
John’s wife, Lois Gay Tucker, passed away on 19 June 2014. They had six daughters and one son: Jennifer, Elizabeth, Karen, Anita, Lynis, Larissa and David. “I can bear testimony of the value of having a great helpmeet, having 57 years together we helped each other through many challenging experiences, including times with very little money to feed our family, but we always paid our tithing, and we survived those times with the Lord’s help . . . and we knew He would [help] because of our faith in Him.”
John, now 87, lives in Redland Bay in Brisbane Australia Cleveland Stake. He continues to be a faithful servant of the Lord and testifies of the gospel that continues to sustain him: “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true, and we have a living prophet as His mouthpiece here on Earth, even President Russell M. Nelson!”

“My grandparents … taught me about tithing with examples of one egg or one bushel of peaches out of ten. Years later I used those same kinds of examples to try to teach the principles of tithing to our own children.
“Parents are always looking for better ways to teach, and the results of their efforts are sometimes unexpected. Attempting to teach tithing to our young son, I explained the principle of a tenth. … When I finished what I was sure was a clear explanation, I wanted to test whether our seven-year-old had understood. I asked him to imagine that he was a farmer with a harvest of eggs and young animals. I supplied the figures and then asked our little boy what he would give to the bishop as tithing. He thought deeply for a moment and then said, ‘I would give him a very old horse.’
“We obviously had some further conversations on the principle of tithing, and I am proud of the way he and his brother and sisters learned and practiced that principle. But I have often thought of that little boy’s words as I have observed how some adult Church members relate to the law of tithing. I think we still have some whose attitude and performance consist of giving the bishop something like ‘a very old horse.’

Four years ago Jimmie discovered a new heritage. Through entertaining, he met a member of the Church. They became friends, and she invited him to go to church with her. He enjoyed the meetings and soon he began talking with the missionaries.
“I found out all about the Church. I was more active than some members,” he says. Finally after two years Jimmie decided he was going to get baptized.
“I had the object one week to pray about it. I did pray, and sincerely. I think that was the big difference. I prayed sincerely because I did want to know if the Church was true. An answer came. I mean it was really strong—very, very strong.
“Before, I was expecting an answer straight away when I was praying. This time I waited. I didn’t have to wait very long. Once I had the feeling, I knew there was no way I could deny it. Just no way at all.
“My parents weren’t too keen on my decision at first. I had been brought up in the Church of Scotland. My mother was slightly hurt, but my father was just concerned I was doing the right thing. I asked them to come to my baptism, and they were there on the front row seats.
“My brother disowned me. He just didn’t want to know me at all. But now he’s great about it. If he hears anyone saying anything bad about the Church or my being a Mormon, he’ll jump to my defense. It’s heartwarming. It’s good to see him stand by me as my parents do.”
Jimmie shares with his family the things that happen at church each weekend. “If I have a calling they seem quite pleased. They know the Church is quite a big part of my life.”
He was attracted to the Church because he had many of the same values it teaches. “I’m a firm believer in doing unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
When he started studying with the missionaries, he was already living the Word of Wisdom. “As a teenager I drank, but only because all my friends were drinking. I realized that to be one of the boys you didn’t have to drink. They respected me eventually because of it.”
Jimmie is proud of his new-found heritage as a Latter-day Saint and strives to share it with others by his example. He blends his new beliefs with the Highland traditions of his homeland to show others what it means to be a Scottish Latter-day Saint.

A few months into his mission, our youngest son and his missionary companion were completing their study when our son felt a dull pain in his head. He felt very strange; at first he lost control of his left arm; then his tongue went numb. The left side of his face began to droop. He had difficulty speaking. He knew something was wrong. What he didn’t know was that he was in the middle of a massive stroke in three areas of his brain. Fear began to set in as he became partially paralyzed. How quickly a stroke victim receives care can have a dramatic effect on the extent of his healing. His faithful missionary companion acted decisively. After calling 911, he gave him a blessing. Miraculously, the ambulance was only five minutes away.
After our son was rushed to the hospital, the medical personnel quickly assessed the situation and determined they should administer a medicine to our son that could potentially reverse the stroke’s paralyzing effects over time.1 However, if our son was not having a stroke, the medicine could have severe consequences, such as bleeding in the brain. Our son had to choose. He chose to accept the medication. While full recovery required more operations and many months, our son eventually returned and completed his mission after the effects of the stroke were substantially reversed.
The missionary companion and the medical professionals who helped our stroke-afflicted son in the mission field acted quickly. Our son chose to receive the stroke-reversing medicine. The paralyzing effects of his stroke that could have followed him for the remainder of his mortal life were reversed. Likewise, the faster we repent and bring the Atonement of Jesus Christ into our lives, the sooner we can be healed from the effects of sin.

Thomas Edison devoted ten years and all of his money to developing the nickel-alkaline storage battery at a time when he was almost penniless. Through that period of time, his record and film production were supporting the storage battery effort. Then one night the terrifying cry of fire echoed through the film plant. Spontaneous combustion had ignited some chemicals. Within moments all of the packing compounds, celluloids for records, film, and other flammable goods had gone up with a whoosh. Fire companies from eight towns arrived, but the heat was so intense and the water pressure so low that the fire hoses had no effect. Edison was 67 years old—no age to begin anew. His daughter was frantic, wondering if he were safe, if his spirits were broken, how he would handle a crisis such as this at his age. She saw him running toward her. He spoke first. He said, “Where’s your mother? Go get her. Tell her to get her friends. They’ll never see another fire like this as long as they live.” At 5:30 the next morning, with the fire barely under control, he called his employees together and announced, “We’re rebuilding.” One man was told to lease all the machine shops in the area, another to obtain a wrecking crane from the Erie Railroad Company. Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, “Oh, by the way, anybody know where we can get some money?”

Virtually everything you now recognize as a Thomas Edison contribution to your life came after that disaster. Remember, “Trouble has no necessary connection with discouragement—discouragement has a germ of its own.”

It always seemed to take a long time for my senior companion and me to do our home teaching. After we had made our visits, he would park his car on one of the shady, peaceful streets that are common in Carrasco, Uruguay. Then he would talk to me about his childhood and about the challenges of growing up as the son of a widow. And—just by coincidence—he would always talk about the mission he had served when he was young. He spoke of that experience with great emotion.
The year was 1968, and my companion was William N. Jones, then president of the Uruguay-Paraguay Mission.
Did President Jones realize that I, like thousands of other young people in Uruguay, was struggling to find direction in a sea of doubt? Political tensions were strong in the country, and I was confused about the role I should play in the political changes going on around me.
Nevertheless, there, in the shade of eucalyptus trees, my companion would speak to me so calmly and so convincingly that, for the moment at least, my mind would clear. In a most natural way, he invited me to plan my life. And whenever he saw me at church, he would give me a big hug and ask, “How is my future missionary?”
Often I would respond, mentally, Me? A missionary? I couldn’t project my life that far into the future. And as for the Book of Mormon, I accepted that the book was true—but only for historical reasons. I did not have a real testimony of it. President Jones had encouraged me to read the book. He had even written an inscription in my copy—“May the light within you shine even brighter.” But as the months passed, the shiny leather covers stayed closed.
Somehow, in spite of conflicting feelings, I decided to go on a mission. Once I had made the decision, I was elated, almost euphoric. But when I told my nonmember mother, she found the idea disagreeable. “I have lost you as a son,” she said, with great pain on her face.
In spite of my mother’s reaction, I had many peaceful Sundays and many quiet, confidential talks with Bishop Calvar. “Look,” he said one day. “Here are the keys to the church. Find a little room somewhere and get close to the Lord.”
Day after day after that, I would stop at his house and pick up the keys. I would stay at church for four or five hours, reading the Book of Mormon and other scriptures. I also fasted for the purpose of gaining a testimony of the book.
The bishop knew about the fasting, and he did not miss an opportunity to instruct me about the close relationship between the body and the spirit. He explained the importance of the Word of Wisdom and taught me how to seek personal revelation. I will never forget his teachings.
The hours I spent in that classroom at the church will always be part of my life. I cannot specify any particular hour or day when my testimony came; it was a gradual process. But slowly, each story in the Book of Mormon became my own personal spiritual feast.
Often, I felt as though transported from the cold metal chair on which I sat, or from the floor on which I knelt, to the ancient days of the Nephites and the Lamanites. I did not read King Benjamin’s sermon—I lived it. I imagined that I lay on the grass, surrounded by Nephite tents, watching people who had come to hear their aging leader. His speech answered many of my longstanding questions about the role of government, good leadership, personal worthiness, and the nature of true service.
From the beginning I had believed that the promise of Moroni would be fulfilled. But I had expected it to happen suddenly, as it had for others I knew. But though it came gradually, it came powerfully. I knew! I knew!
I left for the mission field surrounded by the love of Church members, as well as that of some of my family. My family didn’t quite understand what I was doing, but most believed it was something good.
How grateful I am to the Lord for that time of challenge! How grateful I am for the opportunity I had to represent the Lord Jesus Christ! During my mission, I bore my testimony of him and of the Book of Mormon often—a testimony which I had gained slowly, but undeniably, one conversation, one prayer, one page at a time.

Illustrations by Elise Black
Krista was holding a piece of paper when her mom picked her up from Primary class.
What’s the paper for?
My teacher wants me to give a talk in Primary next week.
Good! We will help you prepare a talk.
Later, the family was eating dinner.
I want to give a talk about Heavenly Father.
That’s a great idea. I’ll help you plan your talk after dinner.
The next night in family home evening, Mom and Dad helped Krista practice her talk. Her little brother Joshua couldn’t say any words yet, but he waved his hands happily. He made her smile.
On Sunday morning, Krista put on her pink dress.
Will you and Dad and Joshua come to Primary to listen to my talk?
Of course we will.
As the family walked together to the Primary room, Krista held tightly to Dad’s hand.
When it was Krista‘s turn to give her talk, she stepped onto the small wooden box and talked into the microphone.
I look like my mommy and my daddy. I have eyes like my mommy. I have a nose like my daddy.
Krista saw her parents smiling at her, so she smiled too.
I am like my mommy and my daddy. I am also like my Heavenly Father because I am a child of God. I know that He loves me just like my parents love me.
Heavenly Father has given me a plan. I know if I obey His commandments I will return to live with Him someday. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Krista returned to her seat. A warm glow of happiness settled over her as she thought of Heavenly Father’s love for her.

When I was visiting a friend once, I realized the journal’s potential for encouraging spiritual and emotional growth. After hours of bantering with a philosophy student who wanted to argue about the gospel, I wrote a long entry about my beliefs. Putting it on paper was like testifying. That night, as I wrote with a purple felt-tipped pen, I realized how open and honest I was with my journal—probably more candid than I was with any friend. Because of my frustration with my ability to think and express myself I wrote: “My brain has been like a vacuum cleaner, sucking in all sorts of garbage and dirt. And gold dust. So I must empty the bag and sort out the particles one by one until only the gold dust is left.”

When I was a teenager, our Young Women president gave each young woman a gift: a picture of the temple. She talked to us about covenants and living clean lives. Then she encouraged us to set a goal to go to the temple one day.
I took this sister’s counsel to heart and decided to make preparation a priority. There was no temple in Costa Rica at that time, but I did know from my recent baptism what a covenant was, and I looked forward to the opportunity to make additional covenants with the Lord.
No one else in my family was a member of the Church then, so the gospel was not taught in our home. Still, I decided that I could learn about gospel standards on my own and follow them. My preparation included attending seminary, even though it was held very early in the morning. It included not dating until I reached age 16. And it meant living the law of chastity—certainly not something popular or even common among most of my peers, but something I knew I could do because I had covenanted with the Lord that I would.
Studying the scriptures, both in seminary and on my own, strengthened my resolve to live a chaste, clean life. I remember being particularly inspired by the 2,000 stripling warriors. As it says in Alma 53:20–21, these young men “were exceedingly valiant for courage, and also for strength and activity; but behold, this was not all—they were men who were true at all times in whatsoever thing they were entrusted. … They were men of truth and soberness, for they had been taught to keep the commandments of God and to walk uprightly before him.” I too wanted to be faithful in the things I’d been entrusted with, including my baptismal covenants.
Additional understanding of covenants came when I was called to serve in the El Salvador San Salvador East Mission. When I received my endowment in the temple, Doctrine and Covenants 82:10 came to my mind: “I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say; but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise.” Throughout my mission, that idea of covenants—of us doing our part and the Lord doing His—motivated me to do my best. As I did so, my companions and I were blessed in our work.
My mission was many years ago, but I continue to find strength from keeping my covenants. I have since been blessed to serve for seven years in the San José Costa Rica Temple. Serving as a temple worker gave me regular opportunities to remember the covenants I had made. I have found similar reminders in serving in the Young Women organization, where I have tried to teach the importance of covenants just as my leaders taught me.
Keeping our covenants is not always easy. For instance, many people see the law of chastity (or, in some cases, religious behavior in general) as outdated. Fortunately, I don’t feel added pressure from those who don’t share my beliefs or from the passage of time. I look back on what I felt as a young woman when our leader encouraged us to prepare and live for temple covenants. The decision I made then is one I’ve followed to this day.
I can stand firm in my decisions because they weren’t decisions I made just by myself, for myself. Rather, they are decisions I have made as part of a covenant with a loving Heavenly Father. It doesn’t matter what the world says. I promised the Lord that I would obey His commandments. It is a matter of honor. The covenants I made at baptism and the covenants I made in the temple are as valid today as the day I made them. A covenant with God is forever.
Living the way God has asked us to live isn’t always easy, but I testify that it is possible. We can gain confidence and power from living our covenants, and we can be sure that Heavenly Father will never leave us alone. With Him on our side, we can do all things (see Moroni 7:33).

Another happy day she remembered was the day she met the missionaries.

“I have been a member about three and a half years. My mother—she’s not a member—says it happened by chance. Two elders knocked on our door and my father opened it. They taught us right then. My father, my elder sister, and I later joined the Church. My mother and my two brothers, 14 and 8, didn’t join. It’s a hard thing not having the whole family in the Church. Sometimes mom wants me to stay home and do chores instead of going to meetings. My sister and I try to do our best to keep up with the housework and to help each other out so we can still go. I need to have the Church and feel the Spirit. It’s worth all my life. When I don’t get to go to a meeting, I can tell I haven’t been. It’s easier to get depressed or upset. When I do go, my life feels more complete. I feel happy. My daily chores are a breeze.”

I want to share two more examples of integrity and honesty involving students at Brigham Young University–Idaho. I believe the simplicity and seemingly ordinary nature of these events make them extraordinary.
The second example comes from a letter I received from a student.
“I recently attended an outdoor dance. Just before the dance, my friends and I were sitting on the grounds eating pizza. I took my wallet out of my pocket to show my friends some pictures, and then I forgot to put my wallet back as we got up and left for the dance.
“Later that evening I realized what had happened. I proceeded toward what I thought should be the location of my wallet. I quickly realized that my wallet was no longer there. I knelt down right there in the grass and began to pray to my Father in Heaven to help me find my wallet.
“I then returned to my dorm room with a very optimistic attitude. I walked into my room fully expecting the wallet to be sitting right there, but it wasn’t. So I proceeded to check my telephone messages. And there was a message from the Lost and Found saying that someone had returned my wallet and I could pick it up any time.
“I am so grateful to be here at a university where I can trust my fellow students. I never found out who returned my wallet, but I have thanked him or her many times in my prayers. I have thanked them for helping me to have a spiritual experience, one that I will never forget.”
The unknown person at BYU–Idaho who returned this young man’s wallet is an example of integrity and honesty with God, of integrity and honesty with herself or himself, and of integrity and honesty with other people.

Illustration by Allen Garns
My father suffered all his life from low self-esteem and feelings of worthlessness. He was raised by an alcoholic father who often told him how worthless he thought he was. Thankfully, my father never became an alcoholic himself, but he never told me and my siblings that he was proud of us or praised us for things we had done well. Growing up, I tried to please him, but I always felt I couldn’t quite make the mark. This caused us to have a strained relationship.
One year, I mentioned this to my wise bishop. He counseled me to write my father a letter telling him all the reasons I was thankful for him. This would be no small feat for me. My wounds were deep, and I didn’t want my letter of gratitude to become one of resentment. So I prayed. With the Spirit guiding me, the reasons that I was grateful for my father began to flow. It took time, but when I finished, I had filled two full pages.
I delivered my letter, not knowing how my father would respond. But I knew that I didn’t get to choose his response. I just needed to look into my own heart and remember why I had written the letter.
The next morning, I received a phone call from my stepmother. She was crying. She told me my father had read the letter over and over and over. She said he couldn’t talk to me because he was crying too hard.
“Thank you!” she said. “Your father needed this.”
Later that day, my father called to thank me. He called me every day for several days to express how much the letter meant to him.
I wish I could say that our relationship was miraculously healed, but we still had much work to do. Over time, my heart began to heal, and our relationship improved. Eventually, I was able to forgive him.
A few years later, after a tremendous battle with cancer, my father died. I am sure he is now experiencing great joy as the Savior helps him heal from years of abuse. I know that I have experienced healing through the power of Jesus Christ’s Atonement. The Savior understands our needs and can help us remove the poison of hurt and resentment from our souls. I know that gratitude, forgiveness, and love are powerful cures.

Several boys were kneeling in a circle on the sidewalk in front of David’s house, laughing and shouting. He watched them through the window. New in the neighborhood, he thought that this would be a good time to go out and make some friends. When the screen banged shut behind him, the boys looked up.
“Hi.” David combed his brown hair to one side with his fingers. “My name’s David. I just moved in. What are you doing?”
“We’re playing Grasshopper Gladiators,” a boy with reddish hair and freckles told him.
“I’ve never heard of that before,” David said. “How do you play?”
“You have to catch a grasshopper first,” said another boy. David had seen most of them at school, but he hadn’t been there long enough to learn their names. And right now they were more interested in their game than they were in him.
There were a lot of weeds around his new house. It had stood empty for quite a while before his parents bought it. It shouldn’t be too hard to find a grasshopper in all these weeds. He walked slowly through them till he heard a low buzzing sound to his right. Perched on a tall blade of grass was a brown grasshopper at least an inch long. David stopped and moved his cupped hands slowly toward it. When they were about three inches from it, he snatched at it. He felt it hit against the inside of his hands and then stand motionless. Experience had taught him that if he wasn’t very careful, when he opened his hands to look at his catch, it would be gone in a flash.
He waited a few more seconds. When he didn’t feel it jump again, he moved his left thumb, making a small opening. Then he tipped his hands until the warm afternoon sun entered the opening and made it easier for him to see the small creature.
He had read that grasshoppers have two hard lips and sharp biting jaws to help them tear off bits of plants for food. It’s a good thing it’s so much smaller than I am, he thought. Otherwise I might be in for a good bite.
David remembered the night his family had been reading about John the Baptist in Mark 3 in the New Testament. John had grown up eating locusts and honey. Mom had explained that locusts were a type of grasshopper. She had been told by someone who had eaten them that they tasted something like shrimp.
I like shrimp a lot, David thought, but I don’t know if I could eat a grasshopper. The grasshopper hopped toward the opening. David moved his left thumb quickly to keep it from jumping out. Its feet tickled. “I caught one,” he yelled as he approached the boys on the sidewalk.
“Good,” said the redhead. “Mark needs a challenger.” He nodded his head toward the boy who had told David to catch one.
The boys opened up to let David into the ring. What he saw made his stomach knot. In the center of the boys’ circle were grasshopper legs, wings, heads, and bodies. Two grasshoppers were still alive but had been stripped of their back two sets of legs and wings. They struggled helplessly before the laughing boys.
“What are you doing?” David choked out.
“What does it look like we’re doing?” the redhead retorted. “We’re making Roman gladiators out of them. We take turns pulling something off the other guy’s grasshopper. The guy whose grasshopper lives the longest wins.”
David watched in horror as one of the struggling grasshoppers stopped moving.
“I’m the winner!” the redhead chortled.
“That gives Jerry a score of six,” Mark said, marking a line under the initial J. S. on the sidewalk with chalk. “Is the new kid going to challenge me next?”
“No!” David shouted. “That’s mean.”
“You mean, mean boys,” Mark mimicked in a whiny voice. “Now you’ve gone and upset the new boy. How could you be so mean?”
“Oh, go away and leave us alone,” said Jerry, rising to his feet. He was a good head taller than David and was scowling at him. “What are you, anyway—a grasshopper lover? Come on, Mark, Steve will challenge you. You have a hopper left, haven’t you, Steve?”
A slightly built boy with blond hair answered. “Yeah, I have one. Hey, David, they’re only grasshoppers. It isn’t like we’re really hurting anything.”
“No.” David freed his grasshopper. “It isn’t right.”
He turned his back on the other boys and walked toward his house. He wanted to run from the jeering that followed him but forced himself to walk slowly. He didn’t want them to think that he was afraid of them.
Mom came into the living room from the kitchen. “Did you meet some of the neighbor boys?” she called cheerfully.
“I wish we’d never moved here,” he muttered.
“Why? What happened?”
“See those boys on the sidewalk?” His mother nodded. “They’re making a game out of tearing grasshoppers apart.”
“Oh, no!” His mother hesitated. “Do you want me to ask them to stop?”
David shook his head. “I already did. They just laughed at me and called me a grasshopper lover.”
“It isn’t a good way to get introduced into the neighborhood, is it?” Mom asked understandingly.
“I don’t care if they don’t like me,” David told her. “Who wants to be friends with guys like that.”
He went down the hall to his room and threw himself across his bed. The truth was, he did care. He wanted to have friends. But he couldn’t stand by and watch those boys destroy small, helpless creatures.
Mom had never let him kill even a spider. She had insisted that spiders are good and had a place in God’s world. She helped him catch them in paper cups and set them free outside. The same was true with bees and wasps.
Together they had watched a butterfly emerge from its cocoon. Its wings looked damp and crumpled at first. Then, ever so slowly, they unfolded and the butterfly pumped them up with fluid and fanned them slowly. Finally it flew away.
Dad had read him the story in Moses 7 in the Pearl of Great Price about Enoch hearing the earth cry out because of the wickedness of the people. And when they worked in the flower garden together, his mother sometimes said, “I hope that this little corner of the earth is feeling joy because of our efforts.”
In a family home evening he had learned the story in Matthew 21 [Matt. 21], Luke 19, and John 12 in the New Testament of Jesus entering Jerusalem riding on the colt. The people greeted Him with branches of palm trees and called out “Hosanna.” The Pharisees told Him to make the people stop. But Jesus said that “the stones would immediately cry out” hosannas if the people were silenced.
Dad had said that in some ways the earth’s spirit was like ours. Its body needs proper care if its spirit is to be happy. And all the creatures of the earth have spirits and can experience joy. David had even been afraid to pick flowers at one time. But then he’d realized that the joy plants experience must be connected to their service to man.
He loved to read stories about Native Americans. They gave a prayer of thanksgiving to the spirit of an animal after they killed it for food. And they thanked it for its gift of life.
Who needs friends like Mark and Jerry and those other boys, David thought again. I’d rather be alone.
“Come on, David, it’s time to get up,” Mom called from his bedroom doorway Sunday morning.
Oh, great! David thought. Church! It had been bad enough the past few days at school with Mark and Jerry and their gang calling him “grasshopper lover” during recess. No one had dared to pay any attention to him, at least not in a friendly way. Jerry and Mark seemed to lead the whole sixth grade. He could find some remote corner during recess and lunch most of the time. Walking home from school was the hardest. With a bunch of other kids, they usually waited and teased him all the way home. And he’d learned that Mark, Jerry, and Steve were in his ward at church. He pulled the pillow over his head.
“David,” Mom called a few minutes later. “Come on, breakfast is ready.”
“I’m not hungry,” David called. “Eat without me.”
He knew better than to think that that would keep Mom away. Less than a minute later she was back in his doorway. “What’s the matter, David?” she asked. “Don’t you feel well?”
It would be easy to tell her I’m sick, he thought, but that wouldn’t be true. Besides, I like church. I’m not going to let a few tough guys keep me from going. Aloud, he said, “I’m coming, Mom. I’ll be all right once I get going.”
It wasn’t hard to figure out where the Valiants sat. Jerry and Mark sat together at one end of the row, glaring at him. He sat on the opposite end. Steve came in during the opening song. There were only two seats left. One was in the middle of the girls. One was by him. David watched Steve’s look of bewilderment with slight amusement. Which would he be hassled the most for—sitting by the girls or by a grasshopper lover?
Steve only hesitated for a moment before slipping in next to David. “Hi,” he whispered under his breath, then joined in the song while Mark and Jerry talked and pointed their way.
When they were dismissed to class, Jerry and Mark elbowed their way to the chairs on the back row. They tipped their chairs against the back wall and called to Steve to join them. He looked at them and then at David sitting on the front row. He surprised David by sitting by him. “I’m glad you like grasshoppers,” he whispered. “I wish I’d stood up to those guys like you did.”
David felt a glow inside. He turned and gave Steve a grin. “It’s easier to stand up to people you don’t know.”
After she introduced herself and the rest of the class members to David, Sister Newell said, “Today I want to talk about the story of Korihor from the Book of Mormon. Who can tell me something about Korihor.”
“He was an antichrist,” one of the girls behind David volunteered.
“That’s right, Mary,” Sister Newell replied. “He was an antichrist. What does that mean?”
“It means that he didn’t believe that Jesus Christ was real,” Mary answered.
“Thank you, Mary. Does anyone besides Mary remember something about Korihor?”
David loved that story. He knew it by heart. But he didn’t want to look like a know-it-all or a show-off his first day of Primary.
The rest of the class was silent, too. Then Jerry blurted out from the back row. “Hey, wasn’t he the guy that got stomped to death?”
“Yes,” Sister Newell answered. “He was trampled to death. Open your Book of Mormon to Alma 30. Skim through the chapter if you need to, and find why Korihor was struck dumb.”
David stopped worrying about looking like a know-it-all. He loved this story and wanted to share what he had learned from it with others. Maybe Jerry and Mark would listen to Alma’s words, even if they wouldn’t listen to his. He raised his hand.
“David,” Sister Newell called.
David jabbed his finger along the pages in his Book of Mormon as he answered. “Starting in verse 37, Alma asks Korihor if he believes in God. Korihor tells him, ‘No.’ Alma testifies that there is a God and a Christ and tells Korihor that evidence that God lives is all around him. Korihor tells Alma that if there is a God, He should give a sign that He has power. Verse 44 reads, ‘But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye tempt your God? Will ye say, Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy brethren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.’
“Then Alma told Korihor that because he would not accept the testimonies of other people and of all creation around him, he would be struck dumb.”
“That’s right, David. Thank you. What can we learn from this story?”
Steve raised his hand. “I think that it’s teaching us the importance of listening to the testimonies of other people. We should also treat everything around us on earth like it is a testimony of God and Christ. Even grasshoppers.”
The fidgeting on the back row stopped. There was a thud as the front legs of Jerry’s and Mark’s chairs hit the floor.
“You mean Korihor became dumb and was trampled to death because he didn’t respect bugs?” Jerry snorted.
“I’m not sure what bugs and grasshoppers have to do with the story of Korihor,” Sister Newell answered, “but I do know that he didn’t accept that these kinds of things bore testimony of the Savior and our Heavenly Father. You’ll notice in verse 59 that Korihor was trampled by the Zoramites. These were Nephites who lost the companionship of the Holy Ghost. Loss of the Holy Ghost takes away our respect for all forms of life. Otherwise they would not have trampled him.”
Then the bell rang for Sharing Time. Jerry and Mark didn’t push their way past everyone else this time. They even asked David and Steve if they could sit by them in the Primary room.
After church, Jerry, Mark, and Steve waited for David in the foyer. “Do you want to walk home with us?” Jerry asked him.
“Is it all right?” David asked his parents.
“Sure,” Dad said. “We’ll see you in a little while.”
No one said anything for the first block. Then Jerry broke the silence. “I guess Grasshopper Gladiators is a pretty mean game,” he said. “I’m not going to play it anymore.”
“Me either,” Mark agreed. “I just never thought of bugs and things as being a testimony of Jesus before.”
“I’d sure hate to end up like Korihor or those Zoramites,” Jerry added.
“Me, too,” Mark agreed. “Maybe grasshopper lover isn’t such a bad nickname, after all—but I think I’ll just call you David now.”

“As soon as I was old enough to milk a cow, that became one of my chores. I didn’t particularly enjoy that job, but it was a very good lesson in responsibility. We always had a cow, and I milked it every night and morning. I can remember milking it when the temperature was forty degrees below zero. When it was that cold, you could hear the crunch of the snow for a long distance when somebody walked on it. If you touched a piece of metal with your bare fingers, your skin would stick to the metal. You only did that once.”

Let me make one more point about your education. I have a friend who had a hard time choosing a career. In college he majored in accounting and worked part-time in an accounting firm. By the time he graduated he had decided he didn’t really want to be an accountant, so he applied to law school. He attended law school for just one week, found he didn’t like law, and withdrew. Then he enrolled in a master’s program in educational psychology. He lasted a full quarter in that program before dropping out. Next he entered a master’s program in marketing and completed that degree but could see no place for himself in the job arena of marketing.

By that time he had a military obligation and spent four years in the air force. As he completed that assignment he applied to the doctoral program at the Harvard Business School and was accepted. In his first year there he discovered organizational behavior and finally found a field that he enjoyed. Since then he has become an outstanding researcher and teacher in the field. When people hear that story they comment on all of the false starts. But the important thing is that no matter what programs he was involved in, he worked hard and received excellent grades. As a result, his academic record qualified him for admittance to Harvard. The moral: Even if you don’t know where you’re going, do your best work in order to keep your options open.

I met Mark when I came home from college for a visit. He was a young officer in the United States military, tall and handsome, just starting an exciting career. We liked each other immediately and spent as much time together as possible. It seemed we were made for each other. He visited me at college, and by the time I returned home for the summer vacation I knew I had to make a decision about my future.
After a few dates Mark had asked me to seriously consider not returning to college in the fall so that we could spend more time together. I had worked and saved through high school so that I could have a college education, and I just couldn’t give up my dreams of college so soon.
No matter how fervently I prayed about marriage and a future with Mark, I never felt peaceful with that decision. I thought it through many times and came up with many reasons why we could have a wonderful a life together. I had always wanted to travel and knew I would love living abroad in interesting foreign lands with him in the military.
One special evening, after a romantic dinner, we decided to drive around a lovely little lake. We drove slowly as if we might save the magic of the moment. We stopped not far from my home and spoke quietly and seriously about our future and how much we cared for each other.
At that moment it would have been easy to go too far with my affections, and he with his. Who would know? I had always been morally clean and thought I would never be vulnerable in that way. I was caught off guard by how easily physical desire became so strong.
Then pictures flooded my mind. I could clearly see my Beehive teacher, my grandmothers, and my parents. My thoughts were filled with their words and what they had taught me about being chaste. I could feel their love as strongly as if they were there with me. Time seemed to stop. I was facing temptation in its most deceiving disguise—temptation masquerading as young love. Clearly it was a choice between right and wrong, and I knew I wanted to be clean and pure. I was surprised at how easily that moment passed once the decision was made. I realized that real love respects purity. Temptation respects nothing.
The rest of the evening turned from romance to a clear-headed discussion of what our futures were to be. I was more certain than before that Heavenly Father had different plans for us. I don’t remember exactly what we said, only that we probably weren’t really meant for each other after all. I went home, told my parents it was over, but was at peace with the decision. We saw each other only a few times after that evening, and our paths soon went separate directions. I returned to college, and he went on with his life. We had no contact after that summer.
Returning to school, I moved back into regular college life, dating a few great guys, eventually meeting a fine man. He had a sense of humor and a strong testimony, and we had common goals. It was then that I received strong, positive confirmation he was the right person for me to marry. What had seemed so important the summer before faded. Mark just became just one of the guys I had known.
Years passed, and with a husband and several children, I was a busy mother trying to build an eternal family, working in the Church. One day I found some free time and slipped away to attend the temple. In that holy place, I noticed a temple worker who looked vaguely familiar. Only as I passed did I realize it was my old boyfriend Mark. There, in the Lord’s house, I felt no remorse or regrets. I didn’t have to turn away in shame because of things we had done. Instead I smiled and nodded.
In the celestial room I gave quiet thanks for guidance from Church leaders, parents, and Mutual teachers who had taught the principle of chastity. In the most sacred place on earth, the holy temple, I was filled with gratitude for sure and true commandments, which kept me safe and clean. Once I was young and inexperienced, but I had the best guides in all eternity, our Savior’s teachings and the Holy Ghost, to direct me to the right path. He knew what was right for me.
In the years since then, I have had a good, happy life, and I am sure Mark has had the same. I heard that he left the military, served a mission, and was later called to be a bishop. Ours are separate lives, free and clear, with only good memories. I am just one girl he dated; he is one guy I dated—and that is all.