Gospel Story Finder

Paige shrugged off her backpack, kicked off her shoes, and slumped onto a kitchen stool. “What? No hug? No kiss? No demand for an after-school snack?” Paige’s mother teased. When Paige didn’t respond with a smile, her mother became serious. “Did something happen at school today?”
Paige lifted one shoulder.
“Is it about the play?”
Paige nodded slowly.
“You didn’t get the part, did you?”
Paige shook her head. Her mother wrapped her arms around her. “Honey, I’m sorry. I know how much you wanted to be Dorothy and how hard you practiced. What part did you get?”
“A munchkin.”
“Well, that’s not so bad. You’ll be a wonderful munchkin. You can ham it up and make it fun.”
“I guess,” Paige said, leaning on the counter. “Something’s bothering me more than not being Dorothy, though.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, you know how you and Dad have always taught me that if I want something, I need to work hard and do all I can do to make it happen, right?”
“Right.”
“Then I need to pray to Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus Christ and ask Him to help me.”
“Yes,” Mom said slowly.
“If I have enough faith, Heavenly Father will bless me. Well, I worked hard. I practiced as much as I could, and I did my best at the audition. I had faith that Heavenly Father and Jesus could help me get the part. They can do anything—I know They can. At least I thought I did. I didn’t get the part, so does that mean I don’t have enough faith?”
“Oh, Paige, that’s not what it means at all.” The timer above the stove started beeping. “Just a minute, honey. I need to punch down the bread dough.” Mom lifted the towel covering the bowl of dough. “Oh, no!”
“What happened, Mom?”
“The dough didn’t rise. I can’t make bread out of it now.” Mom drummed her fingers on the countertop, then smiled. “The dough should work for scones.” Paige’s mother placed a pan on the stove, filled it with oil, and began heating it.
Paige smiled for the first time since coming home. “I’m glad the dough didn’t rise. Scones taste better than bread.”
“You know, I worked hard on that bread dough,” Mom said as she flattened small balls of dough into circles and gently placed them in the hot oil. “I followed the recipe, and I tried to make the best bread dough I could. I had faith that it would rise. But it didn’t. Does that mean that I just didn’t have enough faith?”
“I don’t think so,” Paige said. “And something better came from it.”
“Sometimes Heavenly Father has plans for us that are different from what we think we want. Even if we work hard and have faith, He doesn’t always bless us in the way we think that we want Him to.”
“But being a munchkin isn’t better than being Dorothy.”
“You need to try faith again, Paige.”
“What do you mean?”
“You need to have faith that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ know things that you don’t, that They know what will be best for you in the long run. Do you think that you can have that kind of faith?”
“I’ll try.”
“Good.” Mom set a piping hot scone onto a plate, dropped a glob of butter and dribbled honey onto it, and set it before Paige. “Would you like the first scone?”
“Yes!”
The next week during play rehearsal, while the children playing Dorothy and the other lead characters were practicing their lines, Paige painted scenery with the rest of the munchkins and the flying monkeys. She turned to the girl next to her. “Could you pass the green, please, Trisha?”
“Sure.” Trisha set the paint can between them, and the girls dipped their brushes into it together. Trisha sighed as she gazed toward the stage where the other children were practicing.
“Did you want to be Dorothy, too?” Paige asked.
Trisha shook her head. “I wanted to be the Wicked Witch of the West. I would have scared everyone with my cackle.” She cackled wickedly, and Paige laughed.
“That was super! I can’t believe Mrs. Mullen didn’t choose you for the witch after hearing your cackle.”
“I didn’t do it at the audition. I didn’t even try out for the witch. I overheard Sylvie talking about how much she wanted to be the witch, so I decided not to compete against her.”
“Wow, that was nice!”
Trisha shrugged. “It’s what I think Jesus would have wanted me to do. In my church we learn to ask ourselves, ‘What might Jesus want us to do?’ and try to do it.”
“We learn the same thing at our church.” Paige smiled a bit ruefully.
“Really?” Trisha’s eyes grew wide. “I thought you were a Mormon.”
“I am. Mormons believe in Jesus Christ. You see, the real name of our church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
“It is? I’m glad I know that now.” Trisha paused. “I like talking to you about church and stuff. We never would have had this chance if we had been given the parts in the play we wanted.”
Paige froze for a moment, paint dripping from her brush back into the can. “I have another scone,” she whispered.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Sorry—I was just thinking about something my mom and I talked about.” Paige began painting again. “This year, at church, we’re learning how to have more faith in Jesus Christ.”
“Is it working?” Trisha asked. “Do you think you have more faith now than you did before?”
“Yes,” Paige said, smiling confidently. “I know I do.”

Sister Nichole Franklyn, Relief Society president in the Kingstown Branch, recalls, “We started a kitchen garden. We were happy, but it took a lot of work. We prayed each night over the crops, and Heavenly Father heard our prayers and blessed them.” Their simple garden has grown and is producing.
Not all the produce in their garden is ready to harvest, but they are reaping cucumbers and sweet peppers. They were worried that the ash fall would ruin their garden as it has much of the agriculture on the island. “Many crops have been completely wiped out, but God has spared ours. We were able to reap cucumbers. Right now, we can sell our cucumbers for five dollars per pound, but we opted to share with three shelters,” Sister Franklyn said.
Sister Franklyn is grateful for the blessings that her garden has brought to her family and to those in the shelters. “The Lord watches out for His children and provides when we are able to follow His teachings through our leaders,” she said. “It really feels good to give rather than to receive at this time.”

Danny Price sat on a stump in the woods behind his house, chewing his fingernails. In two days school would start, and he still didn’t know anyone in Sutton. Who was he kidding? He didn’t know anyone in the whole state of Illinois except his parents, and they didn’t count.
“Eeeeeya!”
“Wha—?” Danny sprang off the stump and faced his attacker. Before him stood the skinniest girl he’d ever seen. Her thick black hair was braided down her back, and Ping-Pong balls taped to wires stuck out of a headband in front. Her face was painted with red and green polka dots, and she held a flashlight in her hand like a laser rod. Beside her stood a huge dog.
“Did I scare you?” She looked hopeful.
“Well, maybe a little.”
She looked so pleased that Danny almost wished he’d said he’d been terrified.
“What’s your name?” asked the girl.
“Danny Price. We just moved here. What’s your name?”
“Today it’s Stella Andromeda. This is my trusty dog-droid, Sir Sirius. Tomorrow I’ll probably be somebody else, though. Maybe Florence Nightingale.”
“Who’s that?”
“Oh, she was this wonderful nurse, and she—Hey, maybe you can be a wounded soldier, and I’ll cut off your leg!”
“I don’t know …”
“We can switch if you get bored.”
“Well … maybe.”
“OK. We’ll wait and see who you feel like being before we decide.” She frowned and said, “But if you just want to be yourself, I’ll probably just be me, and you don’t know my real name.” Stella Andromeda considered the problem for a moment. “Well,” she said at last, “I’ll just have to tell you. I’m Albergetta Simonetta Veronica Lynn Blankenberry.”
Danny counted. “You’re the only person I know who has five names.” He thought it was great, but Stella Andromeda didn’t seem to agree.
“Isn’t it awful?” she moaned. “If you have to, call me Al. But only when I’m being me, OK?”
“OK.”
“Good. But what’ll we do now? Do you want to explore the Dark Galaxy with Sir Sirius and me?”
“Sure!”
“You’ll need an outer-space name.” Stella Andromeda looked the new space cadet over while Sir Sirius sniffed his toes.
“How about Star Avenger?”
Stella Andromeda frowned. “What do you think, Sir Sirius?” Sir Sirius licked the space cadet’s tennis shoes and barked.
Stella Andromeda grinned. “Welcome to the space rangers, Star Avenger.” She shook his hand, then put a finger to her lips.
“Do you hear that?”
“What?”
“Come on.”
The two space rangers and their trusty dog-droid trotted steadily through the astral forest. Actually Star Avenger kept getting caught in briars and tripping over tree roots. But his space friend assured him that all he needed was a little practice.
“I hear it now!” whispered Star Avenger. “It sounds like an alien war party.”
“Let’s sneak up and spy on them.”
The space rangers crept through the forest until they reached a ridge that sloped gently down to a thin creek and back up on the other side. Two younger kids—“They’re third graders,” whispered Stella Andromeda—stood with their backs to the rangers, while another crouched over something small and still. She poked it with a stick, and they all screamed with laughter.
“What do they have?” asked Star Avenger.
Stella Andromeda’s face had become very red. Her eyes were dark and stormy. “They’re teasing a ’possum. It looks dead, but that may be just an act.”
“What do you mean?”
“ ’Possums sometimes play dead so that their enemies will leave them alone. It doesn’t look like the act’s going to work, though.”
The kids seemed to be enjoying the game. The girl with the stick poked the ’possum again, while one of her friends tried to feed it some moss. They all laughed hysterically.
Now Star Avenger’s face was every bit as red as Stella Andromeda’s. His hands curled into fists.
“I can’t stand this,” he muttered. “We have to rescue it.”
Stella Andromeda nodded and pulled her laser rod from her pocket.
“Let’s go.” She began to run down the slope, whooping at the top of her lungs and slashing the flashlight around her. Star Avenger added his own war cry and leapt down the ridge after her, with Sir Sirius growling at his side.
Startled, the third graders looked up at them. One lost his balance and fell into the creek. He scrambled out and crawled up the ridge without even looking back. The girl with the stick threw it down and ran along the creek bank, screaming all the way. The remaining tormentor hesitated, then decided two space rangers were more than he could handle. He turned and raced after the girl.
Star Avenger chased the enemy until he heard Stella Andromeda call him back. When he returned, she was hunching over the ’possum. “Is it OK?” he asked, kneeling beside her.
“I think so. At least it’s breathing, and I can’t see any cuts on it. Let’s leave it alone and see what happens.”
They sat down on a fallen tree a few feet away. Sir Sirius lay at their feet.
“Cross your fingers,” whispered Stella Andromeda.
They waited a long time. Star Avenger got a cramp and had to stand up, and still the ’possum didn’t move. “What if it dies?” he whispered.
“We’ll give it a proper space burial.”
Finally the ’possum stirred. Sir Sirius’s ears pricked up, but Stella Andromeda grabbed his collar before he could move. For a long minute the small, beleaguered creature looked warily at the space rangers. Then it turned and sidled quickly up the ridge and into the woods.
“It’s gone home,” said Star Avenger.
Stella Andromeda nodded. “Which is where I should be going.”
“Stella Andromeda,” said Star Avenger as they turned for home, “I think that tomorrow I’ll be an Indian.”
“Great! Sir Sirius will be our trusty sidekick, Bear, and I’ll be Running Buffalo, and we can have a rain dance and a peace council. That is … if you want some company.”
“I’m counting on it!”

I was reared in a home with a faithful mother and a wonderful father. My mom was a descendant of pioneers who sacrificed everything for the Church and kingdom of God. My dad was not a member of our Church and, as a young man, had desired to become a Catholic priest. Ultimately, he elected not to attend theological seminary and instead pursued a career as a tool and die maker.

For much of his married life, my father attended meetings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with our family. In fact, many of the people in our ward had no idea that my dad was not a member of the Church. He played on and coached our ward softball team, helped with Scout activities, and supported my mother in her various callings and responsibilities. I want to tell you about one of the great lessons I learned from my father about priesthood authority and power.

As a boy I asked my dad many times each week when he was going to be baptized. He responded lovingly but firmly each time I pestered him: “David, I am not going to join the Church for your mother, for you, or for anyone else. I will join the Church when I know it is the right thing to do.”

I believe I was in my early teenage years when the following conversation occurred with my father. We had just returned home from attending our Sunday meetings together, and I asked my dad when he was going to be baptized. He smiled and said, “You are the one always asking me about being baptized. Today I have a question for you.” I quickly and excitedly concluded that now we were making progress!

My dad continued, “David, your church teaches that the priesthood was taken from the earth anciently and has been restored by heavenly messengers to the Prophet Joseph Smith, right?” I replied that his statement was correct. Then he said, “Here is my question. Each week in priesthood meeting I listen to the bishop and the other priesthood leaders remind, beg, and plead with the men to do their home teaching and to perform their priesthood duties. If your church truly has the restored priesthood of God, why are so many of the men in your church no different about doing their religious duty than the men in my church?” My young mind immediately went completely blank. I had no adequate answer for my dad.

I believe my father was wrong to judge the validity of our Church’s claim to divine authority by the shortcomings of the men with whom he associated in our ward. But embedded in his question to me was a correct assumption that men who bear God’s holy priesthood should be different from other men. Men who hold the priesthood are not inherently better than other men, but they should act differently. Men who hold the priesthood should not only receive priesthood authority but also become worthy and faithful conduits of God’s power. “Be ye clean that bear the vessels of the Lord” (D&C 38:42).

I have never forgotten the lessons about priesthood authority and power I learned from my father, a good man not of our faith, who expected more from men who claimed to bear God’s priesthood. That Sunday afternoon conversation with my dad many years ago produced in me a desire to be a “good boy.” I did not want to be a poor example and a stumbling block to my father’s progress in learning about the restored gospel. I simply wanted to be a good boy. The Lord needs all of us as bearers of His authority to be honorable, virtuous, and good boys at all times and in all places.

You may be interested to know that a number of years later, my father was baptized. And at the appropriate times, I had the opportunity to confer upon him the Aaronic and the Melchizedek Priesthoods. One of the great experiences of my life was observing my dad receive the authority and, ultimately, the power of the priesthood.

I share with you this pointed lesson I learned from my father to emphasize a simple truth. Receiving the authority of the priesthood by the laying on of hands is an important beginning, but it is not enough. Ordination confers authority, but righteousness is required to act with power as we strive to lift souls, to teach and testify, to bless and counsel, and to advance the work of salvation.

It had just started to rain when seven-year-old Angela stepped into the tent. Her two older brothers, Michael and Mark, were already inside. Mom and Dad had their own tent set up not far away.
“Let’s say our prayers before we get into our sleeping bags,” Michael said.
The three children knelt in prayer. Angela thanked Heavenly Father for her many blessings, and she asked Him to keep them safe from the storm and to help them sleep well.
After her prayer, she slid into her sleeping bag. For a long time all was quiet except for the plomp, plomp, plomp of the rain against the roof of their tent. Then she heard Michael’s voice. “Hey, Angela, wasn’t Mount Rushmore cool?”
“Yes,” she answered with a yawn.
“So were the animals in the park,” said Mark.
“I liked them, too,” Angela agreed. She pictured the buffalo calves grazing so close to the road that she could see their eyes watching the slow-moving cars.
Flash! Boooooom!
Angela squeezed her eyes tight. “Go to sleep,” she told herself. “It’s just thunder.” It had rained almost every day that her family had been on vacation. Every time it rained, lightning shot across the sky like hot arrows, and thunder echoed on and on like beating drums.
Flash! Boooooom!
Angela pulled the sleeping bag over her head. “Go to sleep,” she told herself again.
“Mark, are you awake?” Michael whispered into the darkness.
“Hmmm?” Mark’s voice was heavy with sleep.
“Are you awake?”
Flash!
Mark opened his eyes. “I am now,” he said.
Boooom!
“Angela, are you awake?” Michael asked.
“Yes,” Angela whimpered. “I’m scared. I want to go to Mom and Dad’s tent.”
“It’s raining too hard,” Michael said. “You’ll get soaking wet. Besides, it’s not safe to go out in the lightning.”
Angela frowned. “But I’m really scared.”
Flash! Flash!
“You don’t need to be scared,” Mark said. “The lightning is really cool! It’s just a bunch of static electricity in the clouds.”
Boooom!
“And the thunder sounds like a big whip!” he added.
Angela shuddered. “I don’t like it!”
Flash! Boooom!
“Well, then think of things that make you happy,” Mark suggested. “That might help.”
Angela closed her eyes and thought about a field of yellow flowers. She imagined herself running down a hill into the field, laughing.
Flash! Boom! Flash! Flash! Booooom!
“It’s not working,” Angela said, shaking. “I’m still scared.”
Suddenly, rain began pelting their tent. Angela scrunched deep within her sleeping bag. What could she do to stop feeling scared? Then a quiet thought entered her mind. “Why don’t we sing?” she shouted, hoping her brothers could hear her above the noise. “My Primary teacher said that singing Primary songs can help us feel better.”
“OK,” Mark said loudly. “What should we sing?”
“How about ‘I Am a Child of God’?” Michael suggested.
Slowly, quietly, Angela started to sing.
“I am a child of God,
And he has sent me here …”
Angela stopped. Her brothers weren’t singing with her. “They must not be able to hear me,” she thought. So she sang louder.
“Has given me an earthly home
With parents kind and dear.”
Her brothers were singing now.
“Lead me, guide me, walk beside me,
Help me find the way.
Teach me all that I must do
To live with him someday.”
(Children’s Songbook, 2–3.)
Flash! Boom!
“Now what should we sing?” Angela asked.
“Let’s sing that one again,” Michael said.
Over and over, Angela, Michael, and Mark sang “I Am a Child of God” until the storm passed and peace returned to their tent.
“It worked!” Angela told herself as she snuggled into the warmth of her sleeping bag. “Finally I can go to sleep.” As she closed her eyes, another thought gently filled her mind. “I am a child of God, and I know He will help me find the way.”

Throughout my mission in Europe, a phrase in my patriarchal blessing about preaching the gospel in power reminded me I was on the Lord’s errand, and therefore I should speak with authority. When I returned home and began searching for a wife, I knew I must find someone who would help me be worthy. After all, my patriarchal blessing made reference to the joys of a righteous posterity. Today, I am thrilled to go to the temple with my six children and their companions, and I do find joy and rejoicing in my posterity.

On the Saturday before Valentine’s Day, Samuel’s ward Primary visited a nursing home. “We’ll each adopt a grandma or grandpa,” Sister Myers, the Primary president, said as the children gathered inside the building.
Five-year-old Samuel stayed close by his mother who was a Primary teacher. He looked around and was a little afraid. Some of the people were in wheelchairs. Others used walkers or crutches. One lady had tubes coming out of her nose.
“I’m scared,” he whispered to his mother.
“I know this can be a little scary,” his mother said. “Try to remember that all of these people are children of Heavenly Father, just like you. The only difference is that the people who live here are older.”
“A lot older,” Samuel said.
He felt better when the children started singing “I Am a Child of God.” That was his favorite song. The Primary chorister then led them in singing “When Grandpa Comes,” “A Happy Family,” and “Mother Dear.”
The grandmas and grandpas all clapped.
“We’re going to make valentines now,” Sister Myers said. She assigned each child a “grandma” or a “grandpa.”
Samuel discovered that his adopted grandfather was in a wheelchair. Samuel stuck out his hand and said, “I’m Samuel.”
“My name is Jackson Gaither,” the man said as he shook Samuel’s hand.
Mr. Gaither tried to cut the valentine from the red paper, but he couldn’t make the scissors open and close. “My hands don’t work so good any more,” he said.
“That’s all right,” Samuel whispered. Then he helped Mr. Gaither finish cutting out the heart. They wrote their names by each other and glued glitter all around their names.
Samuel held up his hands and looked at them. They were covered with glitter.
Mr. Gaither’s hands were also covered with glitter. He looked at Samuel and smiled. “Looks like we’re wearing as much glitter as that valentine.”
“I like glitter,” Samuel said.
“Me too,” Mr. Gaither said. He looked at the wrinkles in the heart from where he’d tried to cut it out. “It has a few wrinkles,” he said and winked at Samuel. “I guess that’s all right since I have some wrinkles too.”
Samuel winked back. Then he gave his adopted grandpa a big hug before he left.
“I wasn’t afraid of Mr. Gaither,” Samuel told his mother. “I remembered what you told me. He’s just a child of God with wrinkles.”

My wife, Rhonda, and I have parents who are just regular people—probably a lot like your parents. But one thing I love about our parents is that they dedicated their lives to serving God, and they taught us to do the same.

When Rhonda’s parents had been married for just a couple of years, her 23-year-old dad was called to serve a full-time mission. He left behind his young wife and their 2-year-old daughter. Then his wife was called to serve with him during the last seven months of his mission—leaving their daughter in the care of relatives.

A few years later, now with four children, they moved to Missoula, Montana, so her dad could attend the university. However, they had been there only a few months when President Spencer W. Kimball and Elder Mark E. Petersen extended a call to my father-in-law to be the first president of the newly created Missoula stake. He was only 34. Thoughts of the university were left behind as he sought to do the Lord’s will—not his own.

My parents have served in the temple for more than 30 years—Dad as a sealer, Mom as an ordinance worker. They also served five full-time missions together—in Riverside, California; Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia; Nairobi, Kenya; the Nauvoo Illinois Temple; and the Monterrey Mexico Temple. In Mexico they worked hard to learn a new language, which wasn’t easy at 80 years of age. But they sought to do the will of the Lord rather than to pursue their own desires in life.

To them, and to all such dedicated Latter-day Saints throughout the world, I echo the words spoken by the Lord to the prophet Nephi, the son of Helaman: “Blessed art thou, … for those things which thou hast done … with unwearyingness … , [for thou] hast not sought thine own life, but hast sought my will, and to keep my commandments.”

As we seek to do God’s will by faithfully serving Him and our fellowmen, we feel His approval and truly come to know Him.

One new father wrote: “Often as I watch my son watch me, I am taken back to moments with my own dad, remembering how vividly I wanted to be just like him. I remember having a plastic razor and my own can of foaming cream, and each morning I would shave when he shaved. I remember following his footsteps back and forth across the grass as he mowed the lawn in summer.

“Now I want my son to follow my lead, and yet it terrifies me to know he probably will. Holding this little boy in my arms, I feel a ‘heavenly homesickness,’ a longing to love the way God loves, to comfort the way He comforts, to protect the way He protects. The answer to all the fears of my youth was always ‘What would Dad do?’ Now that I have a child to raise I am counting on a Heavenly Father to tell me exactly that.”

I don’t think I had ever even seen a homeless person until I moved to Puerto Rico with my family before my junior year of high school. Then the day after Christmas, the youth and leaders of my ward gathered at the church building to put together boxes of food to distribute to the homeless people who live on the streets of Old San Juan.
I had been to Old San Juan several times, but there weren’t any homeless people out during the day, or else I just hadn’t noticed them. When we arrived in the city, each of us set out with one box and the hope we would find someone who needed what we had to offer.
To my surprise, it wasn’t difficult. The first man we saw was selling little bags of tostones that his wife had made. When we asked him if he could use the food we had, he smiled and took it, thanking us until we were too far away to hear him. Before we left, he handed us a bag of his snacks to show his appreciation.
After giving away four of our boxes, we had only one box left. We got in the car and decided we would keep our eyes out for someone. It was getting late, and we needed to get back to the wardhouse.
As we were driving, one of the girls in the car told the driver to stop. “Do you see that guy over there?” she asked.
“Yeah, but he doesn’t look homeless.”
“I know, but I have seen him three times tonight, and he’s just been walking around.”
With that, she jumped out of the car and yelled, “Necesita comida?” or “Do you need food?”
The sweetest, most sincere smile I have ever seen came to his face as she handed him the box, covered with Christmas wrapping and filled with food.
A tear fell down his cheek as he said, “Feliz Navidad!” We could tell by his “Merry Christmas” greeting that one box filled with crackers, apples, and juice made a difference in his life.

I wanted to read the Bible from the time I was about 11 years old. But in the home where I was raised, the Bible was considered so sacred it was kept in a closet under lock and key. When I was 13 and my brother was 12, we went to live in the beautiful country of Canada. Between the ages of 16 and 20, I attended two Christian churches. They used the Bible to teach correct principles, but as I was investigating, I learned something about the members—that they didn’t get along with each other very well. I stopped going to these churches for three years.
When I was 23, I met a young man at a discotheque. A few months later I married him, and shortly afterwards we had our first baby. Everything was going well in our home. He worked hard, always came home from work early, and helped me with the housework. I was very happy and peaceful in my home, and I completely forgot about God.
But without any warning, one day my husband started going out to discotheques with his friends. These friends also wanted to go to bars. So in just a few months my husband had become a drunk and a carouser. Eventually I resigned from my job and left him. Soon after our separation I learned that I was expecting my second child. I felt so sad and distressed I couldn’t find peace. I would go to sleep crying and wake up crying. But thanks to a woman who was a great friend to me, I started attending a Christian church again.
This time I took the things of God more seriously. I even set a goal to investigate more churches. Before I would go to church, I would kneel down and ask Heavenly Father to give me more wisdom so that I would be able to choose good and reject evil.
I began to visit other churches in addition to the Christian church I attended, but I often felt confused by their different doctrines. The more confused I got, the more I prayed. It seemed that every time I visited a church, I felt something was missing, but I didn’t realize what it was. That’s why I set a goal to keep investigating other churches and not rest until I found the truth.
One day I was visiting my brother and sister-in-law, and it got dark before I left. I had quite a distance to walk to reach the bus stop. This was March 1992, and it was very cold with a strong wind. My baby was squirming as I carried him. I walked backwards many times so the wind would hit me and not my baby.
I became sad as I thought about how I was freezing, walking with my baby, while my ex-husband had our car. I started thinking about how cruel life had been to me and felt a great weight in my heart. I started to cry like a child. I looked around and saw I was alone, so I cried to God out loud, “Heavenly Father, help me find the light.”
Finally I arrived at the bus stop, and when the bus came I sat in the front seat as I always did. When I looked to my left, I saw two young men in white shirts and ties. One of them came up to me and said to me in Spanish that was quite limited, “You too speak Spanish?”
“Yes, of course,” I replied.
“You desire to receive the gospel of Jesus Christ?” he asked.
These words were wonderful to me. The gospel of Jesus Christ. I had investigated several churches, and in none of them had I heard this beautiful turn of phrase. I had always heard the word, the gospel, or the good news. So I very happily gave them my address and phone number.
I started taking the discussions from the missionaries, and in June 1992 I was baptized and confirmed. I will never forget that very special day. Before entering the waters of baptism I could feel a great weight, as if I were walking with feet of lead. But when I came out of the water, I felt like I was flying in the air. And when the missionaries placed their hands on my head and gave me the gift of the Holy Ghost, a warm feeling entered my body, and I was filled with a peace I had never felt before. The tears began to roll down my cheeks. To my surprise I realized I was crying not from pain or sadness but for the great joy and peace in my heart.
Some months after my baptism I was called to serve in the nursery and then as a Primary teacher. A year later I received my endowment. I also met a great man at church. In September 1994 we were sealed in the Toronto Canada Temple. Three years later we were blessed with a beautiful son.
I continue to serve in Church callings, and I share my testimony of the gospel with all my loved ones. I know that the gospel of Jesus Christ comes from the heavens in all its glory and that through this gospel we can be transformed if we are obedient to the Lord’s commandments.

Contrast these events with an incident which happened to me when I was a young man in my early twenties. While serving in the Air Force, one of the pilots in my squadron crashed on a training mission and was killed. I was assigned to accompany my fallen comrade on his final journey home to be buried in Brooklyn. I had the honor of standing by his family during the viewing and funeral services and of representing our government in presenting the flag to his grieving widow at the graveside. The funeral service was dark and dismal. No mention was made of his goodness or his accomplishments. His name was never mentioned. At the conclusion of the services, his widow turned to me and asked, “Bob, what is really going to happen to Don?” I was then able to give her the sweet doctrine of the Resurrection and the reality that, if baptized and sealed in the temple for time and all eternity, they could be together eternally. The clergyman standing next to her said, “That is the most beautiful doctrine I have ever heard.”

My grandpa has a big white truck that is really old. He says that it was new when my dad was still a boy. Whenever our family goes to visit Grandpa and Grandma, my brother, Justin, and I like to play in it. Grandma laughs and says we only come to visit Grandpa and his truck.
Some days we have to wait for Grandpa to come home from work before we can play in it. As soon as he opens the kitchen door, out we race to the big white truck.
The first one to reach the truck wins—that’s the rule.
I push my brother up into the truck, and then I climb in behind the wheel. Once inside the truck, we put on hats that Grandpa leaves in the truck—baseball caps or big straw hats or cowboy hats with turned-up brims. Grandpa always leaves hats there for us.
Justin and I take turns making roaring engine noises as we pretend to race with screeching tires and squealing brakes to catch the robbers just around the corner or to finish the big race in first place.
When we are tired of racing, we climb out through the open windows into the bed of the truck. There we hide from the ugly wild things we imagine are lurking behind the trees, or we build big forts with some old blankets Grandpa leaves in his truck.
Sometimes we take turns jumping off the truck’s tailgate. I always jump the farthest.
When Grandpa sits in the truck with us, we put the hats on him in funny ways, and he laughs with us a lot. Whenever he brings us cookies from Grandma, we sit and eat them in the truck. He doesn’t even care if we drop crumbs.
Sometimes Grandpa takes us to the park in his big white truck. We ride high above the cars and look down on them moving along beside us. Justin sits next to Grandpa and reminds him where to turn. I sit close to the door and wave and shout hello to people who pass by.
Once in a while Grandpa takes us to the ice-cream store in his big white truck. Grandma, who says the truck is too old, comes out to see us off. She asks Grandpa if he would rather take the car, but Grandpa says no and tells her not to worry. Then off we go in the big white truck.
We are always sad when it’s time to leave. Grandpa hugs us and tells us to come back soon. Grandma kisses us and tells us to be good.
I think the big white truck might be a little sad to see us go. I think it likes to race and chase and go with us. I’m glad Grandpa has his big white truck.

Some years ago, I met a remarkable family. Each member of the family had an unshakable testimony of the reality of the Resurrection. Each of the children had been born with a rare form of muscular dystrophy. The only daughter, Shanna, was then five years old. All of the children were intelligent and faith-filled.
We visited for a while, and the special spirit of that family filled my office and my heart. Then the parents asked if little Shanna could sing for me. She sang of a brighter future:
On a beautiful day that I dream about
In a world I would love to see,
Is a beautiful place where the sun comes out
And it shines in the sky for me.
On this beautiful winter’s morning,
If my wish could come true somehow,
Then the beautiful day that I dream about
Would be here and now.1
Eventually, Shanna passed away at age 14. At the funeral services, I spoke of the lovely song Shanna sang. I concluded with the thought: “Because our Savior died on Calvary, death has no hold upon any one of us. Shanna lives, whole and well, and for her that beautiful day she sang about is here and now.”

D. J. Holland doesn’t have a zigzag haircut anymore. Nor does he have any scars from the lightning that struck him a few summers ago in Daniel, Wyoming. But he still has a testimony of the power of prayer and of the priesthood.
He remembers the dark sky and the distant lightning flashes as he worked on his grandfather’s ranch that August afternoon when he was 17. He had just brought in his last truckload of baled hay from the wide, open fields.
“I knew it was going to rain,” recalls D. J., “but it never crossed my mind that the storm would threaten my life. I just wanted to get as much work done as I could before the rain came.”
D. J. parked his semi behind another hay-filled truck, driven there by his younger cousin Ross Varner. Then he hurried into the barn. There he helped Ross and their grandfather Ron Wagstaff hoist the bales into place with a huge hay fork on a backhoe tractor.
“After a few minutes Grandpa asked me to go out to the cattle feeder, which was about 100 feet away, and clean out the strings,” says D. J. “These are plastic ties which are taken off the bales and left in the feeder. They need to be cleaned out before spring so the animals can use the feeder before the grass grows high enough to graze.
“The bars on the feeder were metal, a perfect target for lightning,” says D. J. “But I didn’t think about that until it was too late.”
While D. J. cleaned up the strings, Ross and his grandfather worked fast to get the hay unloaded before the rain came and the lightning grew worse.
“Storms come up quick there,” recalls Ross. “And after what had happened in the past, we usually headed for cover any time we saw lightning. Lightning killed a white horse that Grandpa had given to me about two years before,” he continues. “It also hit a big barn that was full of hay and expensive tools. It burned to the ground.
“That day as we unloaded the hay, we heard a few faraway rumbles of thunder. Then suddenly we heard a big one that was really close,” remembers Ross. “It kind of spooked us, and we said we’d better go in. We looked around for D. J. and couldn’t see him. We decided he’d probably gone back to the house.”
Ross and his grandpa jumped into the small Honda and started for the ranch house about a city block away. As they pulled out, they saw something startling—two boots sticking up from a pile of dirt. D. J.! Quickly they drove there, fearing the worst. There lay D. J., unconscious. Most of his shirt was gone. A zigzag mark on his bare chest looked as though it had been drawn with a black marker. His baseball cap lay several feet away.
Ross and Grandpa lifted his limp six-foot-four frame into the little Honda as quickly as they could.
“It was pretty scary,” recalls Ross. “Grandpa dropped me off at the house, and I called the doctor in Pinedale to tell him Grandpa was bringing D. J. in. Then I called Salt Lake City to tell his mom and dad and also my mom and grandma. I was really nervous.”
On the way to the clinic, D. J. gained consciousness.
“When I woke up in the back of the car,” says D. J., “I was confused and didn’t know what was happening. I was numb. I couldn’t move. I asked, ‘What happened? Where are we going?’ My grandpa kept patting me and saying that I was going to be all right.”
At the clinic, medical personnel put D. J. on a gurney, they cut his shredded shirt from his body, and they stuffed cotton into his bleeding ear.
“They put me in a restraint that clamped around my forehead and down my body in case I had neck and back injuries,” says D. J. “Apparently the lightning had knocked me a few feet.”
The Pinedale doctor suggested that an ambulance transport D. J. to a larger clinic in Rock Springs for further treatment. By the time he arrived in the nearby Wyoming city, D.J’s parents, Douglas and Jennifer Holland, were there to meet him.
When the emergency room physician examined D. J., he found a severely burned right ear, much of his sandy-colored hair above the ear melted off, and a face scarred with burns. Finger-like projections all down his body resembled burst capillaries. The physician, amazed that D. J. had survived, arranged to have him taken to the University of Utah Medical Center burn unit in Salt Lake City.
During the 90-minute ride to the Salt Lake hospital, D. J. was awake and aware of the trip. In his room a few hours later—in the middle of the night—a crowd of worried family members gathered around his hospital bed.
“The room was full,” D. J. fondly remembers. “My parents and four sisters and my grandparents were there. Ross and other cousins and aunts and uncles were there. My grandpa gave me a priesthood blessing. Grandpa blessed me that I would completely recover from the accident, and that I would have no scars or ill effects. After the blessing I had no doubt that I would be okay.”
During his 24-hour hospital stay, D. J. learned that besides the extensive burns on his body, he had a seriously damaged eardrum. He later learned that sometimes the eardrum will rupture because of the loud percussion of thunder.
But that didn’t worry D. J. He did know he needed to do something about his burned-off hair. The barber had an appropriate idea. He shaved D. J.’s head, except for a zigzag, lightning-bolt strip down the center.
During the next few weeks D. J. returned to the hospital several times to have his burns checked. They were healing. Then he went to an ear specialist. This doctor told the family that the burned-out eardrum probably wouldn’t mend and that he might have to graft in a new one. Only time would tell.
Just two weeks after the first visit with the specialist, D. J. went back.
“This time the doctor was really surprised,” D. J. says. “He found that my eardrum was actually growing back. It wasn’t completely healed yet, but it was growing back. It was a miracle.”
Today, D. J.’s burns have completely healed. He has no scars on his face or body, and he has no hearing loss. He even has to stop to think which is his damaged ear. His hair also has grown out. But most of all, he has a very strong testimony of the power of prayer and of the priesthood.
“I said a lot of prayers back then, and so did my family,” says D. J. “But mostly I knew that Grandpa had given me an inspired priesthood blessing.”
Editor’s Note: D. J. is now married and living in Salt Lake City. Ross recently finished his freshman year at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California. He is preparing for a mission.

Each new convert should be provided a calling in the Church. Such brings interest, stability, and growth. The task may be somewhat simple, such as that given to Jacob de Jager when he and his family became members in Toronto. He held lofty posts in business, but his first calling in the Church was to put the hymnbooks in place along the pews. He took his assignment seriously. In recollecting this first calling, he said, “I had to be present each week, or the hymnbooks would remain undistributed.” As you know, Elder de Jager later served many years as a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy. Though he had many demanding responsibilities as a General Authority, he never forgot his first calling in the Church.

“What does ‘Families Are Forever’ mean?” Mia asked. She moved her game piece across the board. She and her best friend, Zoey, were playing a game in Zoey’s living room. On the wall was a picture that said, “Families Are Forever.” Mia liked the sound of that.
“It means that even after you die, you’re still a family,” Zoey explained. She put down a card and moved her game piece.
Mia looked around the room. It looked normal. There were couches, tables, pillows, and a TV. But Zoey’s house felt a little different from her own. “Do you have a forever family?” Mia asked.
Zoey looked up from the game with a smile. “Yes! My mom and dad were married in the temple. So we can be together forever.”
“Is that why your house feels different?” Mia asked.
Zoey looked confused. “Different?”
Mia didn’t know how to explain the feeling in Zoey’s house. It was happy and warm. But that sounded silly to say. “Never mind,” she said. “Let’s keep playing.”
That night Mia couldn’t stop thinking about Zoey’s forever family. She loved the feeling in Zoey’s house. Mia’s family was going to move to Ontario, Canada, in a few days. She wondered how their new house would feel.
“Mom, Zoey’s house feels so happy,” Mia said as Mom tucked her into bed. “I want our new house to feel like that.” Mia thought about how much she loved Mom, Dad, and her little brothers. “I want our family to be forever.”
Mom listened quietly. “I do too,” she said.
The next day, Mom called Zoey’s mom. She found out that Zoey’s family went to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“I want to go to that church,” Mia told her parents while they packed. Their house was almost empty now.
“Zoey’s mom said she could help us find their church in Ontario,” Dad said as he taped up a box.
Mia smiled and felt a flutter in her stomach. Maybe their new house could feel as warm and happy as Zoey’s!
Once they were settled in their new house, Mia’s family started going to church. The people there were very nice. Everyone called each other “Brother” and “Sister.” Mia went to Primary with her little brothers. She liked singing songs and reading the scriptures.
Soon two young women came to Mia’s house. Their names were Sister Justin and Sister Ramos, and they were missionaries. They told Mia’s family about Heavenly Father, Jesus, and the Book of Mormon. Mia loved hearing about the gospel. Even her brothers sat quietly and listened!
Mia told Sister Ramos and Sister Justin about Zoey’s house. “I want a forever family like Zoey’s.”
“We’re all part of Heavenly Father’s family,” Sister Ramos said. “And we can be sealed to our families in the temple too.”
Soon Mia’s family decided to be baptized.
Zoey and her family drove all the way to Ontario for the baptisms. A year later, they came back again. This time it was because Mia and her family were being sealed in the temple!
The day of the sealing, Mia stood outside the temple with her family, dressed in white. They were all smiling from ear to ear. Mia felt warm and peaceful inside. It was a feeling she had first felt at Zoey’s house, and she wanted to keep it with her forever.

I do not have all the answers, but hopefully the following experience, which happened several years ago, may be helpful to some who are still battling the question of why.
On a small Pacific island an infant girl was born to a faithful family. They called her Felila. There was happiness and joy as this grateful spirit made her debut into mortal life, but soon there were problems. Her head was abnormally large. The doctors diagnosed it as hydrocephalus. The questions of brain damage, of normalcy, of other problems all raised their haunting heads. After much fasting and prayer the elders quorum president approached the branch president, who in turn talked with the district president, who after adequate checking came to me as the mission president to see if there were some additional help available.
The medical authorities were consulted, and it was determined that there was little if anything they could do locally. Letters were written, information was sent back and forth, x-rays were taken and analyzed. There was so much to do—so many questions to be answered, so many pieces to fit together. Finally after exasperatingly long delays, things began to fall into place. A family in Salt Lake agreed to accept full responsibility for the infant, even if it meant years of outpatient care; the doctors agreed on the possibility of her eventual recovery; the hospital accepted the case on a service basis; funds were raised for her air fare; some local travelers arranged their schedules to bring her right to the hospital. But there were other problems—visas, health certificates, reservations, passports.
All during these trying days the family, and the elders quorum, and even the whole branch continued to fast and pray. The time of departure of the infrequent airplane grew near.
One morning, amidst myriads of other pressing matters, I had the strong impression that I must take the time now and put forth the extra effort required to get everything done so she could go. I got on the overseas telephone. The consulate finally agreed to issue a visa; the airlines made a special reservation; the passport people agreed to waive the normal regulations; others gave that extra effort and cooperation; and soon all was in order.
Normally I would have sent someone to bring the family in to sign the final papers, but again I felt strongly impressed that I should personally go and see the branch president. I located him in the early afternoon near the school where he was teaching. He was standing alone outside as though he were waiting for me.
Excitedly I ran up to him: “Guess what? It’s all set. Miraculously everything has worked out and Felila can leave tomorrow. Please get word to the family immediately.”
His calm, penetrating gaze quelled my exuberance. “It’s true,” I said. “I know it’s been long and there have been lots of disappointments, but she really is going now. What’s the matter?”
His steady gaze seemed to penetrate my very soul. Then softly in his liquid native tongue he informed me that when all the preparations had been made, when the hearts of so many had been stretched in service, when the goal of unity and selflessness had been achieved in those many hearts, when all had made the final commitment of others above self, at the height of all this activity that very morning, little Felila had quietly and unobtrusively slipped away—gone to that better care which so many had fasted and prayed and worked so long and hard for her to receive.
Gone? This morning? But all that work, all that time, all that fasting and praying and those strong feelings. Gone? No!
Without once shifting his gaze, he, having more faith than I, offered a few words of truth and encouragement, then quietly turned and rejoined his class.
And I was left alone, or so it seemed. I moved slowly and heavily down that dusty trail. Why? Why? After all that work and that strong faith of so many and those impressions, why?
I sensed the brightness of the sun and felt the warmth of the breeze as it lazily tossed the palm leaves and slowly shifted the silent clouds against the clear blue sky. A feeling came over me. I realized that the earth was beautiful, that life went on and was eternal. And while I cannot describe fully what happened next, part of the experience is proper to relate. The best explanation is contained in the phrase, “I was overcome by the Spirit.” It was as though one took me by the hand and led me to a high place and stood by me and said, “Look.” And I looked and beheld such beauty and magnificence as man cannot conceive. And I heard a voice, such a tender, compassionate voice—yet so unmistakably powerful—that all nature stood still and listened and obeyed.
“Come home, Felila, my daughter. Come home to the care your loved ones have sought for you. I have heard their prayers and have known their fasting and love for you, and I answer. Come home, my daughter. You have finished your mission in life. Hearts have been softened; souls have been stretched; faith has been increased. Come home now, Felila.”
He knew her! He knew her name. He knew all about her and about all those others. How perfect our Father’s love! He had heard the prayers. He had done what was best. He knew everything—which thing, though I believed, I never had supposed. In some marvelous way, which is beyond our mortal comprehension, he knows and understands all things.
My questions as to why—as to justice and reasons—were all at that moment completely swept away. They were so irrelevant, my questioning so totally out of place, like one trying to dig the Grand Canyon with a teaspoon.

I have seen such experiences happen over and over again. When a child or an adult prays in simple faith, his prayer is answered. Two years ago, my granddaughter Sarah started first grade. At first, she appeared to love it. But within only a couple of weeks, she started to cry every morning and beg her parents to let her stay home. They asked what was wrong, but she either couldn’t or wouldn’t tell them. They talked to her teacher, who had no idea what the problem might be. Sarah was well liked, she had friends, and she was doing well in her schoolwork.
One day after Sarah returned from school particularly upset, her father asked if she thought it would help if they knelt in prayer as a family the next morning and asked for Heavenly Father’s help. “Oh, yes, Dad,” Sarah replied. “I think that would help.”
The next morning, the family went through their regular routine, Sarah crying and protesting but eventually ending up in the car, ready to go to school. “Wait, Dad,” Sarah said just before they left. “We forgot to pray.”
Sarah and her father went back inside and knelt in prayer with her mother and little sister. They prayed specifically that Sarah would have a happy day and a good time at school. That afternoon, when her father picked her up, Sarah left the building with her arms raised in victory. “Prayer works, Dad!” she exclaimed. “Prayer works!”

Victor and Susana Mendoza of the Ramona (Spanish) Branch, Hemet California Stake, have found that rotating the opportunity to teach is an excellent way to come up with innovative lessons. “Our family home evenings are truly exciting,” writes Sister Mendoza. “Our children each take a turn and invent ways to make family home evening different and interesting. For example, Victor Daniel makes invitations and gives them to us in advance so we can be on time. When Jasmin finishes her lesson, she gives us a certificate of achievement for paying attention. Melissa tells us interesting stories she has learned in seminary.
“It wasn’t easy at first, but we put our faith in the Lord, and He has helped us. I testify that holding family home evenings has strengthened our marriage as well as our family. Our bonds of love grow stronger each week. We’re grateful to Jesus Christ for showing us the way and for giving us His Spirit in our home and in our hearts.”