Gospel Story Finder

On one hand there were good people who were active in the Church and who did a lot of good for the Church who played professional sports on Sunday. On the other hand, Eli had seen some very powerful examples of people who had refused to break the Sabbath.

One was Erroll Bennett, one of the top soccer players in Tahiti, whom Eli read about one day on his mission. When Brother Bennett joined the Church, he decided to withdraw from his team because he chose not to play on the Sabbath. When Eli read the story and saw how dedicated Brother Bennett was to the gospel, he was impressed. He says, “I knew I wanted to be a man like that, with that kind of commitment and dedication to what I knew was right.”

Many years ago, my friend and her husband were doing leadership training in rural Ghana, and a woman came up to her afterward and said very emotionally, “This is a woman’s church.” My friend asked the woman what she meant. She said, in essence, “We have the glorious Relief Society, which teaches us about spiritual things and everyday things that bless our families and us. And at the same time your husband is in the next room teaching our husbands that they must treat their wives and children with kindness and gentleness. We have the temple, so my children who are dead will be mine forever. Everything I want I find in this church. This is a woman’s church.”

Although she came from a family with few resources, Sister Patience Ngalula, from Kananga, DRC, had a passion to be a journalist. She finished her secondary studies and then volunteered to work without pay at a radio/television station. She learned many things, and after one year she was hired at a radio station. She then had funds to help her family and to complete her professional studies. “I now have a very good job at a radio station in Kinshasa whose content is especially dedicated to children. I remain positive, ready to serve and have great concern for the well-being of others.”

Since I know something of the anxiety the pressure of time creates in your life, I would like to share what I have learned about how to handle that feeling of hurry. It’s important to be sure we agree on the nature of the problem. Time passes at a fixed rate and we can’t store it. You can just decide what to do with it—or not to do with it. Even a moment’s reflection will help you see that the problem of using your time well is not a problem of the mind but of the heart. It will only yield to a change in the very way we feel about time. The value of time must change for us. And then the way we think about it will change, naturally and wisely.
That change in feeling and in thinking is combined in the words of a prophet of God in this dispensation. It was Brigham Young, and the year was 1877. “The property which we inherit from our Heavenly Father is our time, and the power to choose in the disposition of the same. This is the real capital that is bequeathed unto us by our Heavenly Father; all the rest is what he may be pleased to add unto us” (Journal of Discourses, 18:354).
Time is the property which we inherit from God, along with the power to choose what we will do with it. President Young calls the gift of life, which is time and the power to dispose of it, so great an inheritance that we should feel that it is our capital. The early Yankee families in America taught their children and grandchildren some rules about an inheritance. They were always to invest the capital they inherited and to live only on part of the earnings. One rule was “Never spend your capital.” The hope was that inherited wealth would be felt a trust so important that no descendant would put pleasure ahead of obligation to those who would follow.
There is more than one way to spend time foolishly, as you know. You may sleep it away or play it away. But the bankruptcy that will cheat all those who come after you, comes after the idleness and the thoughtless seeking for thrills.
When you choose to see or hear filth portrayed, for instance, you may at first feel you have just spent some time. But if you persist, you will find that beyond time wasted you have allowed Satan to draw you toward sin and then into it. And then you will have incurred debts that will burden and diminish every minute of existence that follows, unless and until you find the healing balm of the atonement of Jesus Christ through repentance, which takes pain, and time. Oh, what Brigham Young would want for you, and what I pray you may have, is a heart that wants to invest your inheritance, time.
It’s worth doing, not only because you have life ahead but because you have eternity ahead, as well. Here is one report that suggests your reward for investing your inheritance well here will be to get to do it forever. President Wilford Woodruff gave this report in general conference in 1896.
“Joseph Smith continued visiting myself and others up to a certain time, and then it stopped. The last time I saw him was in heaven. In the night vision I saw him at the door of the temple in heaven. He came to me and spoke to me. He said he could not stop to talk with me because he was in a hurry. The next man I met was Father Smith; he could not talk with me because he was in a hurry. I met half a dozen brethren who had held high positions on earth, and none of them could stop to talk with me because they were in a hurry. I was much astonished. By and by I saw the Prophet again and I got the privilege of asking him a question.
“‘Now,’ said I, ‘I want to know why you are in a hurry? I have been in a hurry all my life; but I expected my hurry would be over when I got into the kingdom of heaven, if I ever did.’
“Joseph said: ‘I will tell you, Brother Woodruff. Every dispensation that has had the priesthood on the earth and has gone into the celestial kingdom has had a certain amount of work to do to prepare to go to the earth with the Savior when he goes to reign on the earth. Each dispensation has had ample time to do this work. We have not. We are the last dispensation, and so much work has to be done, and we need to be in a hurry in order to accomplish it.’
“Of course, that was satisfactory, but it was new doctrine to me” (Discourses of Wilford Woodruff, sel. G. Homer Durham, Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1946, pp. 288–89).
Can you see and feel the truth in these familiar words of President Benson? “You have been born at this time for a sacred and glorious purpose. It is not by chance that you have been reserved to come to earth in this last dispensation of the fulness of times. Your birth at this particular time was foreordained in the eternities. You are to be the royal army of the Lord in the last days. You are ‘youth of the noble birthright’” (Ensign, May 1986, p. 43).
When I heard those words I thought of a boy with a noble birthright, but lacking what many of you have. He was born on November 22. Thirteen days later his father was buried. He was named and blessed by the bishop of his ward, Edwin Woolley. The name he was given by the bishop was Heber Jeddy Ivins Grant. “I was only an instrument in the hands of his dead father … in blessing him,” Bishop Woolley later remarked. Heber Grant “is entitled to be one of the Apostles, and I know it” (The Presidents of the Church, ed. Leonard J. Arrington, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1986, p. 212).
People then and since have called Heber J. Grant a “child of promise.” He was. But his departed father didn’t make the promises to the child. His Heavenly Father did. Your Heavenly Father did—the same Father who chose you to come into this time and place to hold, honor, and to nurture those who hold his power. You have a right to become like your Heavenly Father. You are a royal child of God, a child of promise, chosen from among many to be here and to have your royal inheritance, time in the fulness of times.
One young man changed forever my feelings about the value of that gift, and what it means to be a child of promise. Bob Allen was an undergraduate at Stanford University when I was his bishop. He left his schooling to serve a mission in Japan. He came back to school, took up his studies, and lived in a world of too many demands and too little time.
One day I was sitting at my desk in the graduate school of business at Stanford. I looked up and saw two people. I remember that their faces seemed to shine. Suddenly, Bob Allen stepped between them and, smiling as broadly as they were, said, “These are two new bishops from Japan.” They could speak little English, but I could tell they loved Bob Allen and, because of something he must have told them, they loved me. I thought then, as I have many times since, how remarkable it was that he had found time to spend days with those young men from Japan.
I spoke in a sacrament meeting in Tokyo ten years later. The person who had introduced me mentioned that I had been at Stanford. Two young people, a couple, rushed to me after the meeting and said, “Did you know Bob Allen? We love him.”
Later I was in Tokyo again. Of all the excellent presentations made to me, one seemed most remarkable. I asked to see the man who had made it. He was introduced and then said, “We have met before, at Stanford University.” He was the young man, now older, who had stood with his fellow bishop in my office door. He told me about his life, and the life of the other man, now a great leader in Japan. In that moment, I learned again, in my heart as well as my head, what it means to have a royal inheritance of time, and how a child of promise, who believes the promises, can invest it to produce returns for eternity.
Because of that moment I’ve come to understand something that happened to me in my early teens. I was in a hurry when I felt, not heard, a voice, an impression, which I knew then was from God. It was close to these words: “Someday, when you know who you really are, you will be sorry that you didn’t use your time better.” I thought then that the impression was odd, since I thought I was using my time pretty well and I thought I knew who I was. Now, years later, I am beginning to know who I am—and who you are—and why we will be so sorry if we do not invest our time well.
You will develop your ability to invest your precious time well by gaining three confidences. First, you must gain confidence that God keeps his promises. Second, you must gain God’s confidence that you will always keep the promises, not that you choose to make, but that he asks you to make. And third, you must help others gain confidence that God keeps his promises.

My Aunt Adena Nell Gourley told of an experience from many years ago with her father—my grandfather, Helge V. Swenson, now deceased—that illustrates what I mean. She related:
“My daughter and I were visiting in my parents’ home. Along about sundown my mother asked if we would like to step out on the back porch and watch Father call his [five] sheep to come into the shelter for the night. Father … is a stake patriarch, and … the personification of all that is good and gentle and true in a man of God.
“… Father walked to the edge of the field and called, ‘Come on.’ Immediately, without even stopping to bite off the mouthful of food they were reaching for, all five heads turned in his direction, and then [the sheep] broke into a run until they had reached his side and received his pat on each head.
“My little daughter said, ‘Oh, Grandmother, how did Grandfather get them to do that?’
“My mother answered, ‘The sheep know his voice, and they love him.’ Now I must confess that there were five sheep in the field, and five heads went up when he called, but only four ran to Father. Farthest away, clear over on the edge of the field, looking straight toward Father, stood [a] large [ewe]. Father called to her, ‘Come on.’ She made a motion as if to start but didn’t come. Then Father started across the field, calling to her, ‘Come on. You’re untied.’ The other four sheep trailed behind him at his heels.
“Then Mother explained to us that some few weeks before this, an acquaintance of theirs had brought the [ewe] and had given it to Father with the explanation that he no longer wanted it in his own herd. The man had said it was wild and wayward and was always leading his other sheep through the fences and causing so much trouble that he wanted to get rid of it. Father gladly accepted the sheep, and for the next few days he staked it in the field so it wouldn’t go away. Then he patiently taught it to love him and the other sheep. Then, as it felt more secure in its new home, Father left a short rope around its neck but didn’t stake it down.
“As Mother explained this to us, Father and his sheep had almost reached the [straggler] at the edge of the field, and through the stillness we heard him call again, ‘Come on. You aren’t tied down any more. You are free.’
“I felt the tears sting my eyes as I saw [the sheep] give a lurch and reach Father’s side. Then, with his loving hand on her head, he and all the members of his little flock turned and walked back toward us again.
“I thought how some of us, who are all God’s sheep, are bound and unfree because of our sins in the world. Standing there on the back porch, I silently thanked my Heavenly Father that there are true under-shepherds and teachers who are patient and kind and willingly teach us of love and obedience and offer us security and freedom within the flock so that, though we may be far from the shelter, we’ll recognize the Master’s voice when He calls, ‘Come on. Now you’re free.’”2

Moleni hurried to finish weaving his palm-leaf basket. He tucked the last end in and raced toward the water. When the tide was low, he and other boys collected fingota (shellfish) for supper. Their moms would steam them with vegetables from their gardens.
Hurrying home with his fingota, Moleni ran into the yard and picked breadfruit to eat with the shellfish. On the way to his house he had found several coconuts to add to his bounty.
His mother was preparing supper in the kitchen, a small room separate from the house.
“Here, Mother,” he said, giving her the food that he’d brought. “May I go now?”
“Yes, dear, but don’t be gone long. Supper’s almost ready.”
Moleni knew that his mother thought that he was going swimming, but today he had something more important to do!
Moleni needed money to buy a new white shirt. He was to be ordained a deacon on Sunday, and he wanted to honor his priesthood by dressing properly. His father, Tevita Finau, had been a missionary and had been known in the Tongan islands as a very faithful member of the Church. Moleni wanted to be just like him; he wanted to look like the missionary picture his mother had of his father.
Since his father’s death, his mother supported the family by selling crops from their garden. She also sold copra (dried coconut meat). For all her hard work, she earned only fourteen dollars for every ton of copra that she dried. There was never enough money.
Moleni had to earn the money for the shirt himself. He didn’t want his mother to even guess how important it was to him—she had enough to worry about. Only his Primary teacher and his best friend, Sione, knew about his plans.
Weeks ago he had planted talo (taro, a starchy root) in a place in their garden where his mother wouldn’t find it. Now it was ready to take to the market. Sister Fonua, his Primary teacher, had said that she would sell it there for him, and tomorrow was market day.
Swiftly Moleni dug up the roots. He washed off the dirt, wrapped the roots in wet leaves, and placed them in a basket. Gathering up the basketful of talo together with mats and baskets that he had woven to sell, he walked as fast as he could to Sister Fonua’s home.
She pulled back the leaves and looked at the roots. “That’s the best talo I’ve seen,” she said. “I’m sure that it will sell well.” She looked at the empty baskets. “These baskets are tight and well woven too. But, Moleni,” she added unhappily, “this still won’t bring enough money.”
The boy’s heart sank. He had worked so hard. “If I catch some fish to sell, too, will it be enough?” he asked anxiously.
“It wouldn’t be enough for a ready-made shirt,” she said after thinking for a minute, “but I could buy enough material to make you one myself.”
“Thank you, Sister Fonua,” Moleni told her gratefully as he hurried away. “I’ll bring the fish early in the morning.”
On his way home he stopped at Sione’s and asked if he wanted to go fishing too.
“What are you up to?” his mother asked as he gulped his supper. “You’ve been acting funny lately.”
“Sione is going fishing with me,” he answered. “I don’t want to be late.”
“We could use some fish for breakfast,” his mother said, smiling at him as he finished his supper. She was proud of Moleni. She knew that he worked hard to help feed the family.
“There will be fish for breakfast,” he promised her.
Sione was already at the beach when Moleni got there. Neither of the boys owned a fishing pole or a boat, so they speared fish in the shallow water of the tide pools.
Sione was sending fish to market too. He and his brothers helped provide for their family also. They laughed together as they worked, and they worked hard. But by sundown, they had just three kiokio (a kind of fish) each.
“You can have my fish,” Sione offered. “I can catch some more tomorrow.”
“No,” Moleni answered. “Your family needs money too.”
They sat on the sand to think. Suddenly Moleni jumped up. “There is enough fish,” he said.
“Huh? How do you figure that?” Sione asked.
“There’s enough kiokio to send to market if we have something else, too,” Moleni told his friend. “There’s one thing that my family would rather have than kiokio: ‘uo (lobster).”
“Why didn’t I think of that?” Sione exclaimed. “Let’s go get my maama kasa (lantern). We’ll need it to find the ‘uo in the dark.”
The boys ran back to Sione’s home. They put their kiokio in water to stay fresh, then returned to the beach. It was very dark. The light from the maama kasa showed many scurrying ‘uo. Careful to not get pinched by the big claws, they grabbed the lobsters and put them into woven baskets.
“We’ll have a feast tomorrow!” Sione whooped. “These are the biggest ‘uo that I’ve ever seen.”
“There’s enough to give Sister Fonua a basketful, too,” Moleni said happily. “It can be a thank-you gift from me.”
“Sunday is just three days away,” Sione said with concern. “Will she have time to make your shirt?”
“I don’t know. But I know that she’ll do it if she can. And won’t mother be surprised if I show up for church in a white shirt?”
Early the next morning Sione and Moleni took their fish and lobsters to Sister Fonua. She was pleased with the fish and the ‘uo.
“This is enough,” she told Moleni. “And the shirt will be ready for Sunday.”
The next two days seemed to last forever. Moleni could hardly eat or sleep. His mother watched him anxiously, afraid that he was sick.
Finally Sunday came. Moleni slipped out early with his clean clothes and hurried to the meeting-house. There was a trough there where children could bathe—he wanted to be clean for the Sabbath!
Moleni bathed slowly and carefully. When he put on his new shirt, he felt truly special. He knew that his father would be proud of him.
He walked back home and went to the kitchen. His mother turned as he came in the door.
“Moleni! Where did you get that shirt?” Tears rolled down her cheeks as she looked at him. “You look just like your father.”
Moleni grinned. “I earned the money for the material, and Sister Fonua made it for me.”
It was a proud family that walked to church that day. Sister Fonua and Moleni’s mother both beamed when Moleni passed the sacrament. The Finau family had the priesthood in their home again!

Shortly after my baptism, the branch president called me and said, “Sister Gamanga, the Spirit has directed me to call you to be the Relief Society president.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said. “I don’t know how to read, I don’t know how to write, and you want to call me? What is the meaning of that?”

He explained that I would invite the women to church, talk to them, and help them. “With God, I can do it,” I said.

Since that day, so many things have happened in my life. I started reading only two-letter words, then three-letter words. I then moved from three-letter words to four-letter words, then five to six-letter words. This has helped me teach in Relief Society.

If there is something I don’t understand, I ask for help. My problem is spelling. I don’t know how to pronounce some spellings, but I get help so I can understand. When I’m teaching, I ask one of the Relief Society sisters to help with any words I don’t know. That is the way I teach in class. Each time I ask for help, I learn more.

“Dad was a hard worker in his business and in the Church. He tried to make his time at home with the children quality time, and he was a very good teacher. His method of teaching was to thoroughly explain something to us and then to have us do it, sink or swim. He used to say that he didn’t want to put an old head on young shoulders but that he wanted us to learn as quickly as we could.
“I remember once when Dad had my brother and me help him build a corral. After we had measured where the postholes would be, Dad suggested that we have a posthole-digging contest the next morning and that he would challenge us both. He would start digging in one direction, and we would start digging in the opposite direction. Whoever dug the most postholes would win.
“Unbeknownst to us, Dad slipped out that night, and at each place where he was going to dig the next day, he soaked the ground with water. The next morning Dad easily shoveled the dirt and rocks out of his holes while we struggled with digging bar, pick, and shovels. The lesson we learned was that there is often a better way to accomplish a task if you think about it carefully.

Some years ago Elder Marion D. Hanks told about a group of Boy Scouts who went cave exploring. The narrow trail was marked with white stones and lighted in sections as they went. After about an hour they came to a huge, high dome. Below it lay an area called the Bottomless Pit, so called because the floor of the cave had collapsed into a deep, gaping hole. It was hard not to jostle each other on that narrow path. Pretty soon, one of the bigger boys accidentally pushed a smaller boy into a muddy area away from the light. Terrified as he lost his footing, he screamed in the darkness. The ranger heard his cry of terror and came quickly. The boy let out another cry as the beam of the ranger’s light showed that he was right on the very edge of the pit.
In this story, the boy was rescued. But this does not always happen. So many times young people are enticed to go to the very edge or even beyond it. With only a precarious toehold, it is easy to be seriously injured or even die. Life is too precious to throw away in the name of excitement or, as Jacob said in the Book of Mormon, “looking beyond the mark.”

1 When I was ten years old, I bought my horse Blaze. I never worked harder for anything than I did for the money to buy him.
2 One day when I went to the barn to feed him, he was lying on the ground, his mouth foaming, his stomach distended, and his legs covered with blood from thrashing against the troughs.
3 The veterinarian said that Blaze had swallowed some grass that had caused his intestines to twist. He said that Blaze would die if the grass in his stomach couldn’t pass through his system.
4 We had to try to keep Blaze on his feet. My father and mother and I walked my horse all through the night. I cried and pleaded with him each time he dropped to his knees in agony.
5 About 4:00 A.M. Blaze lay down and refused to get up. When I called the veterinarian, he told me that he would probably have to put Blaze to sleep later that morning.
6 My father, who works with the Quorum of the Twelve, had to go to his office. He told me to call and let him know how Blaze was. I called and said that Blaze still hadn’t gotten up.
7 Elder Thomas S. Monson overheard the conversation and asked to speak to me. Elder Monson told me to kneel and pray and said that he would pray too. “Then,” he said, “go out and walk that horse.”
8 When I went outside, I found that my mother had gotten Blaze back on his feet. I had walked him less than an hour when his problem was cured! I called my father with the good news, and my mother and I and my brothers and sisters knelt to thank Heavenly Father for His blessing.

I remember an experience when I was a young missionary. We met a gentleman during the blessing of a child in church. After the meeting, we exchanged contact information to go to his house and give him the missionary lessons. After teaching him the first lesson, the Spirit was very strong, and the gentleman was very moved by what he had learned. That’s when he asked for our address.

Surprised by that question, my companion and I asked him the reason for such a question. He told us that this message was so important that it would be better for him to come and take the lessons with us. Knowing that the gospel message is based on families, we kindly insisted that we keep going to his house to have the opportunity to teach the other members of his family as well.

Thanks to such an experience, this family is now baptized, sealed in the temple, and live the gospel in great joy. This story teaches and confirms to me that the field is white already to harvest. It also teaches me that if we are worthy, the Holy Ghost will guide us to people that are prepared and will also guide them to us to help them find the path to eternal life.

Even before the 1994 Tutsi genocide, many leaders of the Hutu tribe taught that a Hutu man married to a Tutsi woman should be required to kill her and all her family to show his allegiance to his tribe. Because of those teachings, and to better protect his family, my father moved his wife and children to a small village near Cyangugu, in the far southwestern corner of Rwanda. Even in that small village, the majority of Hutu villagers spurned and rejected my mother because she was a Tutsi. But my father continued to protect us. In 1993, when the tension and genocide ideology increased, she was pregnant with me and caring for my three older sisters. Because it was known that she was a Tutsi, our family didn’t have many friends and it was dangerous every time she had to fetch water or go to the market. It was a very difficult time for her, but always my father was on her side, protecting her and taking care of his family.
During this time, there were constant meetings in the community where the locals were given machetes and guns and trained on how to kill the Tutsis. Every week they had a community meeting. In March 1994, my father attended a town meeting where it was announced that Hutu men married to a Tutsi woman would be required to kill her and all their children. It was a hard time for them. Some of the men and some of the women who were Hutus did kill their children.
In a meeting in early April, my father was ordered to kill my mother and his four daughters. When he came home from the meeting around 6:00 p.m., it was very dark because there were no street lights at the time. He immediately took us to a small island located in the southern part of Lac Kivu, a large lake dividing Rwanda and Congo. He told my mom that the villagers had determined that we were supposed to die, so we should hide in that place; he was going back home to find a safe place for us. He told her that if she saw any boats, she should ask them if they would carry us over to Congo, where we would be safe from the Rwandan genocide. She was able to find someone willing to take us across to Congo, where we spent the next five months, until peace was restored in Rwanda and it was safe to return.
All the while in Congo, and after we came home, we didn’t know what had happened to my father. When we came back we didn’t see anything; they didn’t allow us to enter the house where we had lived, and we were told everything that belonged to my father had been sold. It was a very hard time for my mom. We didn’t have a house to stay in. We didn’t have anything to eat. We went to the Seventh-­Day Adventist chapel, where we slept for a whole week. After that my mother carried all of us to town where she learned we could get small help from the new government.
In 2003, nine years after the violence ended, the government created a reconciliation program called “Gacaca” to help resolve the hard feelings from the killings. As part of the process, people who had killed others during the genocide confessed and asked for forgiveness. Through gacaca, we came to know that my father’s family members, after they looked everywhere for us and could not find us, had killed him. My mother and my eldest sister attended the hearing where my father’s family asked for our forgiveness, and they forgave them. They told my mother that they had thrown his body into the river after killing him, so we were never able to locate his body. Because I was so young at the time he saved us, I have no recollections of my father; I don’t know his face.
When I met with the missionaries, it was hard for them to tell me how God loves me and that He is my Father in Heaven. I did come to understand that because of the plan of salvation, I will meet my father once more. Because of my faith in the plan of salvation and the Atonement of Jesus Christ, I was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-­day Saints in 2013.
My mother continued to struggle to raise the four of us herself. She had many health and stomach problems and for much of the time she suffered. She was not able to go to the hospital because she was a Tutsi. She finally passed away on June 16, 2016, from what was discovered to be cancer. She knew I was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ. She believed that I had become part of a big family. She blessed me and said I was doing the right thing. She always taught me and my sisters to love one another and to serve one another. She said our father suffered himself to allow us to live. She said we should always work hard; it would make our father happy.
I know this gospel is true. I know I will see my family again. I know my father sacrificed his life to allow me to have this life today and I am very anxious to meet him once more and thank him for his wonderful sacrifice.
I was thrilled to receive the privilege to serve as a missionary, starting in August 2017. My mission allows me to teach the joy of the gospel to families around me. One of the greatest blessings the Lord has given me since I have been on my mission is that two of my sisters have joined the Church. One of my greatest ambitions after I complete my mission is to do the temple work for my parents so that our family can be sealed for eternity.
The plan of salvation can bring happiness in this life and eternal joy in the life hereafter. I know this to be true, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Soon after my husband and I were married, we were blessed with a son. When I saw his smile and looked into his eyes, I felt indebted to Heavenly Father. Our son seemed perfect to me. My husband and I thanked the Lord daily for such a precious gift.
On February 19, 2009, I packed in preparation to return to school for my final year of classes. My husband and I didn’t know that the next day our beloved son would contract a fever and leave this mortal life.
It was a difficult experience for me to bear. The members of our ward came to our home to console us with scriptures and hymns and to pray with us. I cherished their compassionate condolences, but my grief for my son persisted. Whenever I thought of him, my eyes became heavy with tears.
Four days after his death, I was inspired to study Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith. As I held the book, it fell open in my hands to the chapter titled “Words of Hope and Consolation at the Time of Death.” I began to read and was deeply affected by the tragic losses Joseph and Emma had suffered as they started their family. When I reached an excerpt from a speech the Prophet gave at the funeral of a two-year-old girl, I felt as if cold water had been poured on my head, cooling my grief-ridden thoughts.
I called to my husband. Together we read: “I have … asked the question, why it is that infants, innocent children, are taken away from us. … The Lord takes many away, even in infancy, that they may escape … the sorrows and evils of this present world; they were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth; therefore, if rightly considered, instead of mourning we have reason to rejoice as they are delivered from evil, and we shall soon have them again.”
The Prophet added: “A question may be asked—‘Will mothers have their children in eternity?’ Yes! Yes! Mothers, you shall have your children; for they shall have eternal life, for their debt is paid.”1
Since we read those beautiful words, our family’s prayers have been full of thanksgiving for the promise that through the Atonement of Jesus Christ we will be with our son again.
Today we have three wonderful children, siblings to our departed son. We are teaching them the true and everlasting gospel, which will guide them back to their Heavenly Father and to their Savior, Jesus Christ.
I know that the Prophet Joseph Smith’s message of life after death is true. I will be grateful forever for the hope, peace, joy, and happiness it brings to our family—on both sides of the veil.

I watched Jason dribble the ball down the court, weaving around two players from the other team while I tried to outrun the one guarding me. Jason leaped toward the side of the basket and shot. The ball teetered on the rim for a second before it dropped through the net.
“Go, Jason, go!” cheered a crowd of little kids. I should have felt happy because our team, the Jets, had finally tied the score. But I didn’t want to hear Jason’s name anymore. He always scored the most points and caught the most rebounds—and got the most cheers.
The big red numbers on the clock showed only one minute left in the game when Dave passed the ball to me. The court was clear. I dribbled the ball down the sideline, the sound of thundering footsteps close behind. I jumped as high as I could and shot, trying to bounce the ball off the backboard and into the net. It hit the rim and bounced off. So who caught the rebound? Jason. Who scored the winning basket? Jason.
It wasn’t easy being in the same fifth-grade class and on the same basketball team as a superstar. All the second and third graders knew Jason. They ran up to him on the playground and crowded around him like a fan club. I’d be famous, too, if I scored 15 points a game. Secretly I wished Jason would disappear. Then one day he did!
“Jason has to have his tonsils out,” Mrs. Litten told our class. “He’s going to be out of school for at least a week.”
Dave groaned. “Now we’re going to get trampled by the Kings,” he whispered to me loudly. “Our team will never win without Jason.”
“Maybe,” I whispered back. Mrs. Litten gave me a look that said, “Be quiet and do your work.” I tried to concentrate on my spelling words, but I kept thinking that maybe I’d finally have a chance to be the star. Maybe now the kids would shout, “Go, Taylor!”
Basketball practice was a disaster, however. I practiced shooting from the free-throw line, and only one ball swished through. And when I tried dribbling fast, I tripped over the ball. But I didn’t give up. I started practicing my free throws again. It wasn’t going to be easy to be famous.
On Wednesday, Mrs. Litten asked me to stay after class, and I wondered what I’d done wrong.
“Taylor, I have a favor to ask.”
“Yes?” I was curious now.
“Would you fill in for Jason tomorrow and Friday? He goes to the second-grade classes after lunch to help them with their schoolwork. They’re missing him.”
“Me?”
“Yes.” Mrs. Litten smiled. “You’re a good student.”
“Sure.” But I wondered what I was getting myself into.
The next day I walked into a second-grade class after gulping down my sandwich. When I saw all those faces staring at me, I was nervous. The teacher introduced me and told them that I played basketball with Jason. Suddenly everyone was asking me questions, and the time passed quickly.
Right before I left, little Angelica gave me a hug. “Tell me your name again,” she said.
“Taylor,” I repeated for the zillionth time—but I didn’t mind one bit. In fact, I felt fantastic!
“I need to know your name so I can cheer for you,” Angelica told me. “Just like for Jason.”
That’s when I figured it out. All the kids knew Jason because he helped them. It really had little to do with basketball! I thought that over.
That afternoon I had my own little cheering section at the game. I started grinning, but I wasn’t thinking about being famous. Instead, I was planning to bring some dinosaur stickers for Robby and a book about kittens to show Angelica. I planned to tell Mrs. Litten that I wanted to keep volunteering, even when Jason came back.
“Go, Taylor!” shouted Angelica, and I was glad I’d learned that some things are much better than being a basketball superstar!

One woman, Kelly, was so touched by the opportunity to buy items for teens and children that she told her member friend, “This idea is so unbelievably awesome! Everyone needs to know about these machines!” Kelly posted about the experience on her Facebook page. She became an incredible advocate for the Giving Machine initiative, prompting five families in her neighborhood to visit a Giving Machine kiosk, as well as family members in three different cities to visit their local Giving Machine kiosks.

The Rexburg Idaho North Stake Adventurers climbed to new heights as they spent three days backpacking in the Tetons of Wyoming. They hiked 20 miles up and across the ridge of mountains starting in Idaho and ending in Wyoming. The girls were challenged by the steep terrain, the altitude, and the effort of carrying everything with them. The nine Young Women who practiced in the hike formed close friendships as they joined together in helping each other along the way.

I am reminded of a story of a man who awakened in a hotel room one cold winter night. He had been very happy to reach his hotel to be sheltered from the cold weather. Sometime in the night he heard a woman in the next room calling, “Hans, Hans, get up!” He turned over in bed and went to sleep. Then he heard the woman again calling to her husband, “Hans, Hans, get up! The hotel is on fire! The hotel is on fire!” This time he sat up and he could smell smoke. He quickly slipped on a robe and ran to the stairway, down the stairs, and opened the door. Then a blast of cold air and snow hit him. He stopped for a moment and then said to himself, “My name isn’t Hans.” And he went back up to bed.
The next morning his body was found in the charred ruins of the hotel. Because his name wasn’t Hans. Now the voice of warning is to all people. And what I have to say, I would like to say to you.

Lorraine Booth of the Ottawa Second Ward, Ottawa Ontario Stake, was born with a birth defect leaving her partially paralyzed from the waist down. But that hasn’t stopped her from competing in athletics.
Lorraine won two firsts in the Regional Ontario Games for the Disabled in the 25-metre breaststroke and the 25-metre freestyle in swimming. She went on to the Provincial Games for the Physically Disabled in Toronto and entered two 50-metre races and received gold medals in both.
Lorraine also enjoys horseback riding and tennis.

My father-in-law, Blaine Twitchell, one of the best men I have ever known, taught me a great lesson. Sister Rasband and I went to visit him when he was nearing the end of his mortal journey. As we entered his room, his bishop was just leaving. As we greeted the bishop, I thought, “What a nice bishop. He’s here doing his ministering to a faithful member of his ward.”
I mentioned to Blaine, “Wasn’t that nice of the bishop to come visit.”
Blaine looked at me and responded, “It was far more than that. I asked for the bishop to come because I wanted my temple recommend interview. I want to go recommended to the Lord.” And he did!

As we pushed across the Arctic, the directing and protecting powers of the Spirit were always present. We had prayed regularly throughout the trip; I had set a pattern and hoped Bob would follow, and he did. For the first week, his prayers were choppy and short. But as we moved further into the wilderness, an emotion began to build. He began to talk to the Lord. He would say please, and when I heard him say it, I knew he was on the way back. As we got into some more difficult situations, he really opened up. Sometimes we would pray a dozen or more times a day. The feeling kept growing that we were not really two alone, but three together—myself, my son, and the Lord.

Late one afternoon we were approaching the mouth of a river at the end of Starvation Lake. As we pulled ashore, the canoe bumped a boulder. We noticed a huge mound of fur nearby. I thought it was a dead animal until it moved and Bob said, “It’s a grizzly. And it isn’t dead, it’s asleep.” We were less than 100 feet from it at that point. Suddenly, it stood up. I thought it would run away, as most bears do. But it was irritated. The hair on its neck raised up, it started swaying its head back and forth, its jaws started moving—you could hear the teeth clacking—and its ears were laid back. I grabbed the camera and Bob grabbed the gun, but we soon decided it wasn’t smart to stay close, and we backed into deeper water. Somehow we had to get by that grizzly.
We pulled into a small draw about 200 feet away and checked on the bear. It had lain back down. So we took the food packs up and came back for the canoe. When we checked on the bear again, it was gone. It couldn’t go the opposite direction from us because of cliffs. It couldn’t go to the right, because of the lake. So we knew it was either going parallel uphill or coming straight for us. It knew where we were, but we didn’t know where it was. Bears will sometimes move up your trail and intercept you, and we were both scared. We knew it might come boiling over the hill any minute. Bob said, “Dad, can we pray, please?” After a prayer and with great caution, we started up the draw, me with the canoe over my head and Bob with the gun.
We broke the ridge about 100 feet from our packs, and it was waiting there for us. If it tasted the food in the packs, we would have to kill it to keep it from destroying the entire supply, and we didn’t want to do that. As a last desperate effort, and with prayer in my heart, I raised the canoe and shouted at the top of my lungs.
The bear swung its huge head around and saw a pair of legs, a body, and a 17-foot aluminum head growling at it. It was startled so badly it took off at a dead run. It took us about four hours to shake the hollow feeling we had after that close encounter, but we both knew the prayer had helped us through.
When we arrived at Point Lake, it was covered with ice floes. Shifting ice floes in a bad wind would crush a small canoe like an egg shell. We made camp, and I asked Bob to pray that night. He exhibited a faith rarely seen. He said, simply, “Father, stop the wind.”
The next day when we got up, it was perfectly still. The lake was smooth as a mirror. But we had 20 miles to cross. Even the slightest breeze once we were on the lake and we would be destroyed. For 20 miles we pushed through the floes. Twice the canoe froze in the ice as we got hemmed in, and we had to jump and pry and push to work our way free. Finally, after 7 1/2 hours, we broke into open waters. No sooner had we cleared the ice floes than the wind began to blow again. It had been a daily companion except for those 7 1/2 hours. We prayed again, this time a prayer of thanks.
It was about that time Bob began talking again about going on his mission. We hadn’t mentioned it much, but then one day he said, “Well, I guess when we get home I’ll start getting ready for my mission.” From then on, he talked about a mission more and more. One night, about 1:00 A.M., after a long, hard day, he rolled over in his sleeping bag and said, “Dad, tell me about eternal life.” We talked for about two hours. Then, with his last effort, he said, “That’s for me,” and fell asleep. For me that made the whole trip worthwhile.
We also had several other experiences that taught us to appreciate the harmony and beauty of nature and the power of its forces and creatures.
One day, after we had reached the Coppermine, we were paddling on the river during a blizzard. It was the end of July and the snow was flying! The current was powerful, but the headwind was so strong we were struggling for progress. Bob said, “Dad, look at the shore.” I did. We were standing still. And when we stopped paddling, the wind blew us upstream! So we stopped and pulled over and gathered what wood we could for a fire to warm our hands.
We were resting there when we saw a herd of caribou coming directly toward us. They looked spooked, but I was sure they’d follow their established trail. They did and swam across the river. Right behind them was a pack of wolves. As the herd came out of the water, there were two old cows lagging behind. A second set of wolves, waiting on the far shore, renewed the pursuit, and soon dragged down a victim. Had we not stopped to warm our hands, we would have missed this spectacle of life and death.
That wasn’t our only experience with wind or with wolves. Headwinds plagued us through much of the early trip. Sometimes they were so strong you could lean into them without falling over; sometimes they literally lifted you off your feet. It’s quite a challenge carrying a canoe over your head in winds like that! Another time winds were so strong we couldn’t even pitch our tent. We just waited them out for two days and slept on the ground.
Another day, Bob had stopped to fish. When he looked up, a large wolf, about 30 feet away across the creek, was staring at him. It followed us for several days. I’m pretty sure he was a dominant wolf that had been driven out of his pack. He still carried his tail curled way up above the top of his back, a sign in the society of the pack that he’s a leader. We finally lost him when we crossed a large lake.
We also drifted up to a large bull moose in the river one time. He was upwind from us and didn’t notice us. I’m sure his antlers were 60 inches wide. We got several good pictures of him before we scared him and he ran away, but those photos were among the two rolls of film that were later destroyed in processing, along with photos of the grizzly bear and the caribou and wolves.
Another time we were hung up on a boulder in a bad set of rapids, and it seemed as though we might stay there forever. But after a prayer and a quick maneuvering of the boat, we broke free.
Once we reached the river, we were determined to make up our lost time. We didn’t mind moving, because when we’d stop we’d start to chill. Even at night we slept cold. The ground was ice, and the wind was cold. We had canned heat, but just enough to warm our food. And so we paddled and rushed on. Our worst day on the river we made three miles. Our best day we made 50, and we went over the falls and swamped at the last set of rapids out of eight we covered that day. The map showed eight sets of rapids, and we decided, because of our haste, to run them without studying them first, a foolish thing to do.
We slowly made up time, and by the end of the trip, arrived in the small eskimo village at the mouth of the river right on schedule. We had one half of a meal left. Our canoe was so badly damaged we had to abandon it (after notifying Canadian officials). We had run every set of rapids on the river but one (whether we were tired or afraid of the one we portaged around I’m not sure), so we didn’t claim any records. But Bob had been lost and now was found. The day after we returned home, he went to see the bishop and expressed his desire to serve the Lord. He is now serving in the Illinois Chicago Mission.
To any father who is trying to help his son decide to go on a mission, I would say that the most important thing is to know your son. Not everyone needs to go on a trip down the Coppermine. The same kind of building experiences can take place at home, working in the garage together, playing a game of tennis, maybe just going for a walk where the two of you can be alone. I wouldn’t have gone on the Coppermine if I hadn’t felt inspired to do so.
And to you young men who know you should be going on a mission, I would remind you that for every person there will be wilderness areas, Gethsemanes, Sacred Groves, if you will—places where we learn to rely on the Lord completely and call on him in fervent prayer. Don’t try to tempt the Lord by placing yourself in a dangerous situation, but be prepared to follow the promptings of his Spirit, wherever they may lead you.