Gospel Story Finder

At the end of that summer, I walked onto this campus with two pieces of luggage and $45 in hand. I met with Brother Charlie Goo who encouraged me to find a job and to not be picky about it. And so I did. I worked in the cafeteria as a dish room worker in the early mornings and a line server during lunch and dinner. When I left home that summer, my family was very upset that I had converted to the LDS Church and so I did not get any support from them. There was a point in my dorm life that I had only enough money to do my laundry but I did not have any laundry soap. I remember the spirit whispering to me, "Go ask Evie!" and so I did. She gave me a cup of soap and I was able to do my laundry. Once I had to leave my laundry and return to my room for something. When I came back, my new pair of jeans were no where to be found. The Lord told me, go tell Char about this. And so I did. A couple days later, I found my new jeans nicely folded on my bed. I suppose if I had had lots of money and extra pairs of jeans this would not have mattered, but my meager paycheck and no support from home made this difficult. The whole year was such a humbling experience. I relied on the Lord for everything. He helped me. Elijah's reliance on the Lord to be fed by the ravens and the widow helps me to appreciate how I relied and continue to rely on the Lord on a daily basis. I live so that I can have the still small voice guide me.

“If I weren’t Mormon” seemed to be my favorite phrase this month. If I weren’t a Mormon I wouldn’t be getting up at 5:30 in the morning enduring 6° C. and less temperatures just to go to seminary. If I weren ’t a Mormon I’d be more accepted at school, and I’d have fun going to “all weekend” parties with friends, and I wouldn’t have to endure all those jokes about my religious beliefs. If I weren’t a Mormon life would be so much easier.
When I finally reached school that morning I was irritable, depressed, and tired. I wouldn’t be like this if I weren’t a Mormon, I thought. I missed the bus because Dad likes long family prayers. And Mom couldn’t drive me to school because she had to go to some Relief Society meeting.
I was late for class so I took a shortcut through the back of the library where I saw my old boyfriend with his beautiful new girlfriend. We had stopped seeing each other because I wasn’t willing to compromise my standards. Seeing those two together was more than I could handle. I ran into a nearby empty room and cried.
I finally arrived at my class just before I was marked absent. The daily notice sheet was read out loud reminding us of the upcoming long weekend and the camp planned at The Entrance, a coastal holiday town about five hours north of Sydney, Australia. That’s just what I needed. I wondered if Dad and Mom would let me go? No, they wouldn’t because I have to go to church Sunday and I have to go to family home evening Monday.
I was so bored in my mathematics class that I calculated how much more pocket money I’d have and all the things I could buy if I didn’t have to pay tithing.
The next morning the alarm went off at 5:30 as usual. Time to go to seminary again. Why should I have to go? Why get up at 5:30 every morning? Then I heard Mom’s happy voice telling me that if I didn’t get up I’d be late.
The topic that morning was, “What has Joseph Smith done for you?” I could answer that easily. If it weren’t for Joseph Smith I wouldn’t be a Mormon.
“Will you read Doctrine and Covenants, section 122, verses seven and eight, please?” my teacher asked.
Wearily, I took out my scriptures and started reading. At first I was not really listening, but then something made me start to pay attention to the words.
“And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very gates of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.” [D&C 122:7–8]
I choked out the last verse as my eyes filled with tears. “The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?”
A few days later I was standing on the balcony of the Opera House, overlooking Sydney harbor. I couldn’t remember why I had felt so restricted because of my religion. My problems seemed pretty small and insignificant compared to those of Jesus Christ and Joseph Smith. I felt selfish as I asked myself, “Art thou greater than he?”
The lights of the city seemed to be almost as bright as the stars above. “I’m so proud of my country,” I said to myself. “It’s so full of unique beauty, people, and culture. I thank God for our beautiful plants, animals, and freedom. And I’in proud to be a part of the ever-growing and only true church in the world.”
My favorite phrase still is, “If I weren’t a Mormon,” but in a different way. If I weren’t a Mormon I wouldn’t have such a wonderful family, such great friends, and such a clear understanding of the purpose of life.
By the way, I calculated how much tithing I have paid, and when I look at how much God has given me, there’s no comparison.

Naheed drank her breakfast of lassi (a mixture of buttermilk and sugar cane juice), but she did not really want it. She was too excited either to eat or to drink, because today she would go to school for the first time in her life.
Naheed would be eleven years old soon, and as long as she could remember, she had wanted to go to school. But in her small village in Pakistan it was unusual for girls to go to school. Naheed loved to go into the post office to watch Ali Mujuber, the calligrapher, writing letters for the villagers who could not write for themselves. She also listened as he read the replies that came back to those who sent letters.
Ali Mujuber would first ask the person who wanted to send a letter, “To whom is it to go?” and “To what village or town?” Then he would take his bamboo pen, check its point carefully, dip it into the big ink bottle while listening carefully to what the person wanted to say in the letter, and start scratching words onto the paper.
Naheed would watch closely as Ali Mujuber formed the beautiful characters. She liked to hear the scratching sound of the pen. And she enjoyed sniffing the ink smell and hearing the drone of the villager’s voice. More than anything in the world, Naheed wanted to know the mystery of the writing and the reading of the squiggly shapes … and today she would begin.
“Very soon I can do what Ali Mujuber does,” she mused.
Her brother, Bashir, heard her. He smiled, for he had gone to school for a short time himself before Father needed him in the fields. “It is not so easy,” he warned. But he cheerfully helped his sister prepare her clay slate and bamboo writing stick.
Soon Naheed left her home carrying the slate and sharpened writing stick.
“Kuda Hafiz (may the Almighty save you),” Mother called as Naheed started down the path to the great spreading banyan tree in whose shade the pupils would learn from their teacher. The small village had no school building. School would only be held on dry days, for if it rained, the students would have to run home for shelter.
Naheed dawdled on the way home, wondering just how many days it would take sitting under the banyan tree for her to know all that Ali Mujuber knew. Her head was in a spin thinking of the many, many days to come. “Maybe I was foolish to think I could ever do such an important and difficult thing as reading and writing,” she murmured half aloud. Perhaps Mother needs me at home, she pondered. Perhaps school is a waste of the hours.
Mother sat beside the fire in the courtyard making chapati, the bread for the family’s evening meal. She greeted Naheed with a smile. “And how was school?” she asked.
Naheed shrugged and went into the family’s room to put up the slate and bamboo stick.
Mother looked anxious as Naheed came back to the courtyard. “How was school?” she asked again.
“Mother, I cannot do that which Ali Mujuber can do. I can never make even one of the figures that mean so much in the letters Ali Mujuber writes.”
Mother stopped her work and looked into her daughter’s eyes for many beats of the heart. At last she spoke quietly. “Naheed, my daughter,” she began, “many of the duties of a woman’s life are learned easily in a moment or in an hour or a day. When I was a girl like you, I was given only these kinds of tasks. The school was closed to girls. But you … you, my daughter, have the chance of learning words and their sweet secrets. But such precious secrets are not given easily … surely not in one day’s time.”
Naheed’s eyes fell. Mother was right. Naheed had made a big mistake in thinking she would learn everything on the first day of school. She left her mother and skipped to the center of the village. Her heart was light. “I can do it. I know I can do it,” she hummed to herself.
She watched the village boys line up for a game of pir kaudi (tag or tackle game, having a finish line). From where she stood she saw her mother moving gracefully with the big water jug on her head along with the other women of the village toward the well.
Suddenly she was filled with a feeling of hope and gratitude. She was going to school again tomorrow and for many tomorrows to come, but she was not going to go alone. She would take with her every day the young girl her mother once was. And Naheed would learn so much so well that she could teach her mother everything she (Naheed) learned. Everyone in the family would then have a person nearby to read and to write the precious words of the world.

What about giving a talk in sacrament meeting or presenting at an academic conference in your area of study? The first time I gave a talk at a major Alzheimer’s disease conference, I was in the first year of graduate school. It was the American Society of Human Genetics meetings, attended by over 10,000 scientists. My talk didn't have that many attendees. But I was terrified. I managed my fear with preparation. I prayed for guidance on how to prepare, and for the ability to do my very best work. I carefully made slides, wrote a word-for-word script for each slide, shared it with my Ph.D. advisor, and made edits. Then, I practiced it over and over. In the mirror. To the people in my research lab. And to Monica. Poor, kind Monica. I vividly remember plugging the computer into the TV in our little apartment in Saint Louis and giving my talk…over and over. Monica must have listen to it at least 10 times, and maybe even 20 times. When the moment to speak came, I was still nervous but not scared. I knew I had prepared and trusted the preparation. It went soooo well!

As he grew older, however, Hal discovered a major difference between himself and his father.
Henry Eyring encouraged his sons to study physics and to prepare for a career in the sciences. Hal dutifully majored in physics at the University of Utah, but one day when he asked his father for help with a complex mathematical problem, it became apparent to Henry that Hal did not share his passion.
“My father was at a blackboard we kept in the basement,” President Eyring recalls. “Suddenly he stopped. ‘Hal,’ he said, ‘we were working at this same kind of problem a week ago. You don’t seem to understand it any better now than you did then. Haven’t you been working on it?’ ”
Hal said he had not. He then admitted to his father that physics was not something he constantly thought about. His father paused a moment and then, in tender words that released his son to pursue his own professional passion, he said, “You ought to find something that you love so much that when you don’t have to think about anything, that’s what you think about.”

Years ago I sold my computer service business and returned to the place of our childhood roots, a cattle ranch in a small town. My family and I moved to Robertson, Wyoming, where we began a new and very wonderful lifestyle. Our fourteen-year-old son, Joseph, owned a couple of black-and-tan hunting dogs. He loved his dogs and they loved him. After school each day he would do his chores, finish his homework, and then spend the rest of the evening with his faithful dogs.

One wintry day we received a life-changing telephone call from President Spencer W. Kimball. During that call, he extended the invitation for me to serve as mission president and for my wife to serve as my companion.

I will never forget Joseph’s reaction upon learning that we would be leaving the outdoor utopia we had created. “Dad, if we are going on a mission, what are we going to do with my dogs?” I replied that we would not be able to take them with us. A few weeks later, Joseph informed me that he had made arrangements to give his dogs away. I will never forget that day when a man came in a pickup truck to take Joseph’s dogs. I watched a young fourteen-year-old boy’s sacrifice and great faith as he loaded his dogs into that truck knowing he would never see them again.

I have always agreed that it is a great sacrifice for nineteen-year-old young men to leave their girlfriends. Likewise, it is a great sacrifice for sixty-five-year-old grandparents to leave their grandchildren. However, it can be an even greater sacrifice for a fourteen-year-old boy to leave his pet dogs.

I recently read the account of some deacons who got a little careless in their attitude towards passing the sacrament. They began to think of it as a chore, something that no one else wanted to do. They often came in late, and sometimes they didn’t dress appropriately. One Sunday their priesthood adviser told them: “You don’t have to worry about the sacrament today. It’s been taken care of.”
They were, of course, surprised to hear this, but as usual, they were late for sacrament meeting. They slipped in casually during the opening hymn and sat in the congregation. That’s when they noticed who was sitting on the deacons’ bench—their adviser and the high priests of the ward, who included men who had served as bishops and stake president. They were all dressed in dark suits with white shirts and ties. But more than that, their bearing was one of total reverence as they took the sacrament trays from row to row. Something was deeper and more significant about the sacrament that day. Those deacons who had become so perfunctory in their duties learned by example that passing the sacrament was a sacred trust and one of the greatest of honors. They began to realize that the priesthood is, as the Apostle Peter called it, “a royal priesthood.”

“Did anyone work problem number 12?” Mr. Bentley asked the class.
The students all shook their heads.
Except Jeff. He raised his hand. “I did.”
“Oh?” Mr. Bentley said with raised eyebrows. “What did you get for your answer?”
“(X-Y)/(X + Y).”
Mr. Bentley looked at him strangely. “That’s what I got too. Did anyone else work it?”
Silence.
Mr. Bentley looked at Jeff with newfound respect. “It’s a hard problem. Did it take you very long?”
He modestly shrugged his shoulders. “Not really.”
“Would you like to show the class how you got your answer?”
“No, that’s all right. You go ahead.”
He was a senior in high school. His family had just moved to town because his father was the new superintendent of schools. The reason he appeared so bright in math was because he’d used his dad’s stationery and written the publisher for the teacher’s supplement that had all the problems worked out.
After putting the problem on the board, Mr. Bentley turned to Jeff and asked, “Is that how you did it?”
Jeff casually nodded his head. “More or less.”
The class bell rang, and it was time for lunch.
He ate alone. He didn’t care. There was nobody in this town he wanted to know anyway.
When school was over he went downtown and continued to look for a job.
A week later he found a job at an expensive men’s clothing store. He worked after school and on Saturdays. They didn’t actually let him sell anything; he unpacked clothing, cleaned the rest rooms, dusted, and ran errands.
Upstairs the store was mahogany and marble, but in the store’s basement there was no need for a good impression because no customers ever ventured that far. Alterations were made in the basement, and there was a large steam press which hissed clouds of steam. The two women who worked there were grumpy and were always complaining about everyone else.
Beyond the alterations room was an entire area full of mannequin parts—a bin for heads, and another for arms. And scattered along the dimly lit hall stood headless, armless bronzed torsos on the roughened cement floor.
Another section was filled with remnants of past window displays—signs which define for us what the “Man of Action” is wearing. But the “Man of Action” changes every season, and the signs were for last year, so the signs lay in stacks gathering dust, waiting for the window man to finally decide what to keep and what to throw away.
Jeff spent much of his workday in the basement. Starting from cardboard slabs he made up suit and tie and sock boxes. He also mailed altered suits to out-of-town customers. Also it was in the basement where they kept the supplies for polishing and dusting the mahogany upstairs.
One day he walked to the end of the dreary hallway. The lighting was bad and the clutter more evident as he proceeded.
What a mess, he thought. He moved aside a sign and saw a stack of men’s magazines. He was embarrassed by the cover on top. Making sure nobody was around, he opened it up and quickly thumbed through its pages. There was a centerfold picture.
I’ve got no business looking at this, he thought, closing it and walking away.
Four days passed, and he never returned to the magazines. He congratulated himself on his self-control.
But one day he returned. It was a day when it seemed as if the world was against him. At breakfast his parents scolded him for driving the car but never putting any gas in it. His dad warned him that he’d better spend more time studying if he ever expected to get a college scholarship. At school he said hello to a girl, but she looked coolly at him as if he weren’t even there.
He forgot the combination to his locker and had to go to the principal’s office to ask for it. The girl working there smirked and suggested he write it on his hand so he wouldn’t forget it. He flunked a world history exam. After school his boss yelled at him as soon as he walked in because two days ago he’d switched two suits and sent an old suit to a state senator who’d bought one especially for a press conference.
On that day, when the world seemed to be tumbling down on him, he found himself in the basement lifting up the old signs to again gaze at the stack of magazines.
Life was the same dull routine day after day. Besides that, nobody really cared about him anyway. What good did it do to try to live right when things just turn out rotten anyway?
He picked one of the magazines from the bottom of the stack and quickly stuffed it in his school notebook and walked away.
Later that night, at home, after family prayer, when his mom had embarrassed him by insisting on a good night kiss, he went to his room and closed the door and read the magazine from cover to cover.
The next day at work he returned it to the bottom of the stack, and nobody was any the wiser. It was his little secret.
Over the course of the next two weeks, in the same way he read every magazine in the stack.
It doesn’t matter, he thought. I’m still the same. It hasn’t affected me at all.
Shortly after, he met Holly. She was from a small branch in a town 50 miles away. She was a sophomore and he was a senior, and they met at a seminary Super Saturday. She had blonde hair and blue-green eyes. Her high cheekbones made everything about her face seem more dramatic. Her laughter reminded him of wind chimes.
After the first scripture chase, he sat behind her so he could watch her every move.
After the lesson, they all went to the gym to play volleyball. He stood next to her. Before the game started, she turned to him, smiled, and said, “You’re new here, aren’t you?”
They talked. He couldn’t remember what he said, because he was so anxious to have her like him. The game started and they lost, but he didn’t care because she said she enjoyed getting to know him and that she hoped to see him again sometime.
When it was all over, he walked her outside to her parents’ car, he asked her if he could come up and visit her sometime, and she said she’d like that.
“Do you think we’ll be good friends?” she asked.
“I hope so.”
“I do too.”
He asked her for a picture, and she said she’d mail one to him.
On Monday of the next week, his math teacher asked him to sign up for the special college preparatory exam because if he did really well he could get a scholarship next year and anyone as bright as he was should be able to get a full-ride scholarship anywhere in the country.
“I’m not that smart,” Jeff said.
“I think you’re too modest. I’ve noticed the way you do all the homework. You’re the best student I’ve ever had. I insist you take the exam.”
Monday afternoon Holly’s picture came in the mail. He sat at his desk and looked at it and dreamed that they’d fall in love and that someday she’d let him kiss her.
He phoned and thanked her for the picture.
“I hope we can be good friends,” she said.
“Me too.”
“Can I tell you something? Last summer I met this guy and we really got along well and it was the first guy I’d every really dated. But after the second date he just quit. He didn’t ever call me or say what was wrong. I figured it was probably something that I’d said. Of course my parents said not to worry, but that’s what they say about everything.”
“He was a fool to quit dating you,” Jeff said. She smiled. “Thanks. I needed that.”
He took the standardized math exam, but he didn’t do as well as people expected. “I think I had the flu that day,” he explained to Mr. Bentley when the results came in.
He checked the magazine pile every week. Another new issue appeared on top of the pile. He told himself he wouldn’t read it, but after a few days he broke down and did.
He always promised himself it was the last. Somehow promising himself made him feel better.
Another Super Saturday rolled around again. He sat next to Holly in class. Afterwards everyone went roller skating. He skated with her the whole time.
He asked her if she’d go with him to the junior-senior prom, and she said yes.
The next week Mr. Bentley asked to speak with him privately. “I don’t understand how you can do so well on homework and so poorly on the hour exams.”
“I get nervous taking exams,” Jeff said.
“Is that the real reason?” he asked.
The junior-senior prom came. Holly had made arrangements to stay with Church members in town.
After the dance he drove out to a country lane and parked. He kissed her for the first time.
He kissed her again. Suddenly, uninvited, came a flood of images from the magazines. He didn’t like the thoughts racing through his mind. He tried to make them go away, but they wouldn’t.
Suddenly he was afraid of himself around Holly. He started the car and drove to where she was staying that night.
“Is anything wrong?” she asked.
He felt terrible. He realized that if she knew what he’d been thinking, she would hate him. “I’d better go now. Good night.”
“What did I do wrong?” she asked him.
“Nothing,” he said.
“You won’t ever call me again, will you? What’s wrong with me? At least tell me that.”
“It’s me. There’s something wrong with me.”
As he drove home, he hated himself. He decided not to date her anymore because of what he might do if he listened to the thoughts put there from the magazines.
He promised himself not to read the magazines anymore, but he did. They didn’t demand much from him except that he turn the pages.
One day Mr. Bentley called him in after class. “I think you’ve been cheating on the homework, but I can’t prove it. For your own sake, if you have, then admit it. No class is worth damaging your integrity over. Just confess what you’ve been doing, and I won’t flunk you. I’ll give you a C—a good, clean, honestly earned C.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Mr. Bentley had to give him a B because there was no proof.
Graduation day finally came. Jeff came down with the flu and asked to be excused from commencement. It was better that way.
Throughout the summer his father kept asking him to apply for college, but he didn’t feel like it.
One Sunday his Sunday School teacher told him he’d been chosen in the premortal existence to be alive at this time to help prepare for the second coming of the Savior.
She doesn’t know me, he thought. She doesn’t know the way I really am. Nobody does.
His bishop asked him to get ready for a mission, but Jeff knew he wasn’t that kind of guy.
He had no plans.
One Sunday in July, his bishop asked to speak to him in his office.
The bishop talked about being made an elder. Rather than having to explain why he didn’t want to be an elder, Jeff went along with the idea.
The bishop gave Jeff an interview. It started out easy enough, but before Jeff knew it the bishop was in deep waters.
Jeff wasn’t ready to confess. So he lied.
Perhaps because he had no reason to suspect any misconduct, the bishop wasn’t as penetrating with his questions as he should have been. When it was over, he told Jeff he’d passed the interview. “Stake conference is next Sunday. We’ll see you then. Your parents will be proud of you. Now the only thing you have to do is go see the stake president.”
“What for?” he asked.
“He needs to interview you too.”
The executive secretary had set up all the interviews on Sunday after church, but he’d set them too close together, so there was a line of people waiting to get in. Two of the guys from his ward, also graduating seniors, were also in line.
Holly and her father showed up in the hallway too because her father had a meeting to go to.
“Is it all right if I stand next to you in line?” she asked.
“I guess so.”
He looked at her. She was more beautiful than he’d remembered.
“What are your plans now that you’ve graduated?” she asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“I hope you go on a mission,” she said.
“Why?”
“I know you’d be a great missionary.”
He shook his head. “I doubt it.”
She touched him on the sleeve. “You’ve got to have faith in yourself. I think you’re … special.”
He shook his head. “No I’m not.”
“There you go again.”
He couldn’t look her in the face because she reminded him of what could have been.
“You quit coming to Super Saturday.”
“Yeah,” he said.
“Why?”
“I got busy.”
“I wished you hadn’t been so busy,” she said quietly. “But I learned from it.”
“What did you learn?”
“That you can’t depend on other people to make you feel good about yourself. It’s got to be inside you.”
For a moment he allowed himself the luxury of looking into her eyes. She was not afraid anymore. He looked away.
The next person in line went into the stake president’s office.
“Did you pass?” someone asked the one coming out.
“What do you think?”
“I doubt it, but hey, if you can pass, anybody can.”
They all laughed.
His face turned crimson red because he was next in line.
“Is something wrong?” she asked.
“No, why?”
“Your face is so red. Do you have a fever?”
“Yeah, I guess I do. You’d better stay away from me.”
She smiled. “I’ll take the chance it’s not contagious.”
“I hope it isn’t.”
Several minutes passed. He turned to her and said quietly, “I have a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“You need to tell someone. You can’t keep a problem to yourself.”
The door opened again. President Rossiter came out and shook Jeff’s hand and asked him in.
They went through the same questions again, and again he lied just as he had to the bishop.
When they were finished, President Rossiter looked uneasy.
“Is something wrong?” Jeff asked.
“I’m not sure. Maybe you’d better tell me.”
“What?”
“I just don’t feel good about what you’ve said.” Jeff wiped his forehead.
“Let me explain something, Jeff. You could probably lie to me or your bishop and get away with it. We’re only human, and we might never know the difference. But when I ask these questions, I represent the Lord as if he were asking them, and if you don’t tell the truth, then it’s as if you were lying to the Lord. Now let’s go over some of the questions one more time.”
They went over the questions one by one. Again Jeff lied, but by the time the questions were over his face was dripping with sweat.
President Rossiter shook his head. “I’m sorry, but there’s something wrong. Would you like to talk about it?”
Jeff shook his head. “There’s all those people waiting in the hall. If you take too much time with me, they’ll know there’s something wrong.”
“Telling the truth doesn’t take any longer than lying does.”
Jeff sat there stone faced.
“God knows what the problem is. Let me know too, so I can help you with whatever it is. You are important in his eyes. He reserved you to come to earth at this time to help bring about the Second Coming.”
Jeff shook his head. “I wish people would quit saying that. It’s not true about me. You don’t know me. Nobody knows what I’m really like.”
“Then why don’t you tell me,” President Rossiter said quietly.
“All right, I will. I lied to my bishop, and I lied to you. I’ve cheated in school, and I’ve read magazines. Bad magazines. Don’t tell me to stop. I’ve tried that, but no matter how hard I try, I’m just not strong enough anymore. It’s like it’s got control over me, and no matter how hard I say to myself I won’t ever do it again, I can’t stop. How can you possibly know what it’s like? I’m not like any of the people waiting in the hall out there. I’ve got a dirty mind.”
He tried to make the shame come out quietly, but it didn’t. It was the first time he’d cried since he was six years old. So now, he thought bitterly, on top of everything else, I’m not even a man, and everyone in the hall knows it because they can hear me crying.
President Rossiter put his arm around his shoulder. Jeff wondered if he’d talk about this in stake conference, and if after that people would stand in the halls of church and secretly smirk as he walked by.
He asked President Rossiter about it. “I don’t tell anyone, Jeff, not anyone.”
Jeff finally opened up and told it all—about the magazines and the thoughts that wouldn’t go away, and about cheating on homework, and about all the lying he’d done to cover it all up. He told every secret thing he’d done until it was all out in the open, and there was nothing left to hide. When he was finished, he asked, “Will you excommunicate me now?”
“Jeff, your bishop and I are going to work with you to help you repent, so you can wipe the slate clean again.”
Jeff looked up. “I can start over?”
“If you repent, you can. Your bishop will outline some steps to follow.”
“But I’ve disappointed the Lord.”
“Yes, you have.”
“But how can he forgive me for what I’ve done?”
“Because he loves you.”
“And if I do, someday will I be able to be an elder and go on a mission?”
“Yes, but it’s up to you. You can be forgiven if you turn from your sins and repent.”
“But what about the bad thoughts?”
“Replace them with good ones.”
Half an hour later he walked out into the hall again.
“It’s about time,” one of his high school friends complained. “What were you two talking about in there?”
President Rossiter smiled. “Bob, come on in and find out for yourself.”
Jeff started down the hall. He walked past Holly. He turned away. He didn’t want her to see his eyes because they were bloodshot from crying.
“Are you all right?” she called out after him.
He stopped walking and turned around to face her. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Can I walk with you?” she asked.
He smiled at her. “I’d really like that.”
The next day at work he put all the magazines into a box and lugged it up to the floor with the mahogany and marble.
The store was momentarily without customers.
“Hey, do these magazines belong to anyone?” he announced loudly.
All the salesmen came up to the counter where he’d set the box. They looked at the box full of tattered, dusty magazines. One by one they all denied that the magazines belonged to them.
“If they don’t belong to anyone, I guess nobody will mind if I just toss ’em out, right?”
Nobody objected.
He went outside and dumped them in a trash can just in time to see the garbage truck coming down the alley.
The hydraulic ram on the garbage truck crushed the box and mixed it with other garbage collected on that block wilted brown lettuce and old potato and carrot peelings and a large pail of darkened, deep-fat grease from the restaurant next door.
On his way inside again, he started whistling a hymn to himself. He decided he’d call Holly after work and ask if she’d go with their family on a picnic next week out at the lake. Maybe he could teach her how to water-ski.
Inside again, he passed a mirror customers used to look at themselves when they tried out clothes for the “Man of Action.”
He smiled at his reflection in the mirror. He liked what he saw.

Why do I feel so strongly that it is imperative that we know the Savior’s love for us and have reverence for our own lives? It is such a waste of a beautiful life when any person feels that he or she is no good. I know. I have lived on both sides of this issue. For more than half of my life, I did not like who I was. It was dark, lonely. On the surface everything seemed great, but inwardly I feared that if anyone really knew me, they wouldn’t like me. The confusing thing to me was, with all the accomplishments I was racking up, I still did not have a good sense of self.

Heavenly Father tells me in my patriarchal blessing that he loves me. I read those words for ten years, and they never sank in. By the time I was thirty-two, I was desperate to know if I was loved. This disparity between the “outside” me and the “inside” me came to be more than I could stand, and in a most earnest prayer I pleaded with Heavenly Father to know if he loved me. The answer was one I could not doubt or deny. Luckily, it was affirmative! Then I couldn’t reconcile this knowledge of being loved with how I felt about myself. If I don’t love myself I am telling Father he is wrong, or that he has bad taste! It took nearly six months of prayer, repenting, and pretending that I loved myself before I could come to genuinely be glad to be me. Then my whole life changed.

What an incredible difference to be able to honestly thank the Lord for who you are, to be grateful and happy to be you instead of disliking yourself or feeling pressure to be more than you are.

A little while ago my family and I moved to Kentucky. I was really upset because I was leaving all my friends and extended family behind. Kentucky was very different from what I was used to. The first time we went to church, I saw that there weren’t very many people there. When I realized how small my branch was, I decided that instead of thinking bad about it, I would do something about it.
The next day, my mom and I went to the store. Before we left the house, I grabbed a stack of pass-along cards. When we got to the store, I got a candy bar and went to check out. The cashier scanned the candy, then handed it to me. I handed it back. She looked confused and said, “You just paid for this, ma’am.”
I said, “I know, but I’m giving this to you as a gift.” Then I put a pass-along card with the candy. She smiled and thanked me. She looked at the back of the pass-along card, where I had written, “Everyone is a child of God.” I walked away with happiness, knowing that even if she didn’t join the Church, I still did something good.
Later that day, I remembered that I left the rest of the pass-along cards by the cash register! The next time we went to the store, I went to ask if they were still there. Then I saw something, and I stopped in my steps. About five of the cash registers had pass-along cards that said, “Everyone is a child of God.” The cashier had passed them out! I felt so happy because of what I did.

I have a good friend who is a rabbi as well as a psychologist. I brought him here about 10 years ago to teach summer term at BYU—a class in psychology and one on Jewish traditions. It was wonderful to have him here. He brought Susan and me a gift of the Torah, edited by Gunter Plaut, his favorite source. It was a big book with a dark blue cover, and inside the front cover was: “To Bruce and Susan from Aron and Sarah.” We went to the distribution center in Salt Lake City and found a large-print copy of the Book of Mormon, also with a dark blue cover and about the same size, and we gave it to them: “To Aron and Sarah from Bruce and Susan.” To my surprise, he immediately began reading it and showing me things I’d never seen. I remember him saying, “This is a book written by a Jew to a Jew in a very unself-conscious way.” After he showed me, I could see many ways that the book assumes knowledge of Jewish tradition. It was something of a mystery to him, for, as he said, “Knowledge of Judaism was in short supply on the American frontier in 1830.”

He showed me, for example, that the backdrop to the story in 1 Nephi includes the celebration of three of the fundamental feasts of the law: the Feast of the Passover, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tabernacles. You can read about these three feasts and their themes on pages 672–74 of the Bible dictionary, alphabetically listed under the heading “feasts.” Additional information is given on pages 765–67 under the heading “sacrifices.” In ancient Israel sacrifices were not just offered at random times but were an integral part of these three major feasts and involved instruction, celebration, and fellowship. They are much like our Thanksgiving but are combined with ritual and instruction. I picture them as a combination of the delight of learning and instruction that we have at general conference, but together with a wonderful Thanksgiving feast with one’s family and friends in a yearly cycle. The feasts are one of the central ways our ancestors rejoiced in and taught each other about the things of God. Each feast celebrates a different aspect of the great plan of the redemption of God’s people.

The instruction and ritual of these three major feasts centers upon three themes. The first feast is Passover. The theme is freedom, emancipation, the joy of deliverance from bondage, and going out from among the wicked to establish Zion in the wilderness. The second feast is the Feast of Weeks, and its theme is the joy of scripture, a celebration of receiving the Torah on Mount Sinai. The third great feast is the Feast of Tabernacles, in October at the end of the feast season. The theme is the joy of harvest, symbolic of the harvest of souls in the end of days.

My rabbi friend saw something in the Book of Mormon that I had never noticed. Lehi and his family offer sacrifices three times in the book of 1 Nephi, and each time it fits the appropriate theme of these three major feasts of ancient Israel where sacrifices were to be offered. First, in chapter 2, they go out from among the wicked of Jerusalem to find a promised land, and they then offer sacrifice, consistent with the first theme of deliverance from bondage. Second, in chapter 5, they offer sacrifice in conjunction with their rejoicing in having received the brass plates of Laban, their Torah. Third, they offer sacrifice at the end of chapter 7 after having brought the family of Ishmael out of Jerusalem as converts to their divine mission, consistent with the theme of the harvest of souls. In chapter 17 Nephi rehearses for his brothers the story of the Exodus and how the children of Israel rebelled against Moses in the wilderness. As a family they would have celebrated and discussed this every year in connection with Passover, but it is now as if Nephi is saying to them, “Guys, pay attention here. This time we are doing it for real! We are reenacting the Exodus, going out from among the wicked to find the promised land, and you are acting just like the rebels in ancient Israel.”

“She’s like my mom,” says Ricardo of his grandmother. “She has been raising me since I was young.” Ricardo lives with his grandmother and grandfather and four of his uncles. “My grandfather suffers from Parkinson’s disease, so I do things like help him get in his chair,” Ricardo says. Ricardo is constantly trying to teach his family by example. “I try to be an example when I go to church because when I’m on the right path, my family is watching me, and I want them to come to church too.”
Even though Ricardo and his grandmother are the only active members of the Church in their house, he says, “We all have family home evening together.”
Standing up front and teaching the lesson each Monday is young Ricardo. “I use the Book of Mormon and the Bible for family home evening lessons,” he says. “I read the story and then testify. Sometimes I use the lesson manual for deacons.”
Ricardo also testifies to his friends and neighbors. “In my neighborhood I tell my friends stories about Christ, about prophets, about Nephi,” he says. “I tell them stories I’ve heard in church about faith and about how prayer helps us in our lives. Some friends stay and listen, but others leave. That’s a way I can be an example.”
No longer does Ricardo walk to church alone. Now every Sunday he puts on his shirt and tie, takes his grandmother by the hand, and they walk together. Who knows? In time, Ricardo will probably be leading others to church with him.

Civil government. This was another discussion group that Chauncey belonged to and provided focus for much of his reading. In part it was something of a debating society, organized along lines similar to the model United Nations of today. He notes at one point that he “gained Montana for my state to defend hereafter.” It is not surprising, since 1895 was the year of the constitutional convention prior to statehood in Utah, that these young people organized themselves as a mock constitutional convention. One of the hot topics of discussion was female suffrage, which Chauncey defended. An indication of how opinion was divided on this subject is found in his diary entry for February 28: “I quit at 7:00 and went to Civil Government where I upheld woman suffrage. The house was in disorder. The vote stood 21 to 21. The president decided in favor of woman suffrage.”

Members and missionaries in Japan put their heads together to develop an exciting way to present the gospel. After three months of planning they presented the first annual Matsumoto-Salt Lake City Sister City Night.
The missionaries got the idea when they saw a film entitled Mormon and Girl Violinist, featuring a young female violinist and officials of Matsumoto, Japan, when they made a trip to Salt Lake City. Matsumoto and Salt Lake are “Sister Cities,” a concept developed by the International Friendship Association to promote international goodwill.
The elders asked the president of the association in Japan if he would promote a Sister City Night. The president then persuaded other members of the association to support the program. The name of the Church was on all advertising for the event, and a questionnaire about the Church was included in the program.
The International Friendship Association helped the missionaries by providing advertising, programs, money, the building, and talent for the night.
More than 200 residents of Matsumoto watched a slide presentation on Salt Lake City and the Church along with talent numbers and a skit by the missionaries.

Peni and Jieni Naivaluvou doubled the size of their family when they took in four girls from Vanuatu who were attending the Fiji LDS Church College. But the Naivaluvous do not see this as a sacrifice. They feel they have been amply blessed for doing it. One of those blessings, they believe, is the addition to their family of baby Hagoth, born in January 2009.
In early 2008 Bishop and Sister Naivaluvou of the Tamavua Ward, Suva Fiji North Stake, heard that two young students from Vanuatu needed a place to board, so the Naivaluvous took stock of their own situation. Their sons, Soane, 18, and Ross, 16, were away from home attending a Church school in Tonga, the land of their father’s ancestry. The two girls from Vanuatu were boarding, at high cost to their parents, with a non-LDS family in Suva. The two girls would be good company for then 13-year-old Andrea Naivaluvou; Andrea also attends the Church College and was arriving home in the afternoon before her parents were off work. So Brother and Sister Naivaluvou decided they would invite the two girls from Vanuatu to live in their home at no charge.
The girls insisted on helping with costs, but still their expenses were less than half of what they had been paying earlier—a blessing for their families.
In April two other Vanuatuan girls came for a visit and enjoyed the atmosphere of the Naivaluvou home. A short time later these two girls asked if they too might come there to live. The Naivaluvous gladly took them in.
How did it work to have four extra young people in the home? “We’ve built up such a bond it’s more like they are our daughters,” Bishop Naivaluvou says. The Naivaluvous made it clear from the beginning that the girls were to be considered part of the family. The four girls from Vanuatu actually are related to each other, but in the Naivaluvou home they treated each other like sisters born of the same parents. Andrea Naivaluvou also came to accept them “like my sisters,” she says; the older girls watched out for her and even helped her with homework when there was a need. The four girls began to call Bishop and Sister Naivaluvou Ta and Na—“Dad” and “Mom” in Fijian.
This may be the first time, Sister Naivaluvou says, that girls from Vanuatu who are attending the Church College have been able to board with member families. The father of one of the girls, when he came to visit, expressed his deep gratitude to the Naivaluvous for the love they have shown his daughter.
Sister Naivaluvou points out that one of the girls, the daughter of a district president on Vanuatu, was a great example to their family through her faith; Bishop Naivaluvou says her example helped his family be more consistent about scripture study and family prayer.
Both of the Naivaluvous say they have been blessed temporally because they have shared with others. Their resources have gone farther. And Sister Naivaluvou believes the blessing of being able to become pregnant again after 13 years is connected with their willingness to share love with others.
When the Naivaluvous’ two sons returned home at the end of their school year in Tonga, they too accepted the young women as part of the family. But perhaps Soane can be excused for not seeing the girls exactly as sisters. He found himself drafted as a prom date for one of the young women. He played his role like a gentleman.
When the four girls finished their school year and returned home to Vanuatu late in 2008, the farewells were heart tugging, Bishop Naivaluvou recalls. It was as though he and his wife were saying good-bye to four daughters. And when a new school year began in 2009, the Naivaluvous were glad to welcome their four “daughters” back—plus two more.
With only four sleeping rooms in their home, some would wonder how they could make room for six young women in addition to their own daughter and new baby. But the Naivaluvou family quickly worked it out without difficulty.
After all, it was not a matter of personal space. It was simply a matter of expanding their circle of love.

Gustavo: Claudiana’s illness hasn’t been our only rough patch. While we were dating, there would occasionally be moments of friction between us. One day we decided to sit down and have a conversation about the things we did that hurt or made the other uncomfortable.
This conversation made a huge difference because we became aware of behaviors we had no idea were affecting our connection. It’s impossible to read someone else’s mind, so it was important to be honest about what was and what wasn’t working in our relationship. As Claudiana and I continue to make our needs known to each other and ask Heavenly Father for help in overcoming our weaknesses (see Ether 12:27), we are able to better navigate conflict and disagreements.

A short time ago I stood in a family circle while the husband of one of our granddaughters blessed their new little son, Mark. As he blessed little Mark, he prayed that Mark would someday go on a mission and, when he returned, find a sweet, young companion and be sealed in the temple. As he pronounced these blessings upon little Mark, I had the desire that he might know what I know and feel what I feel about some of the spiritual blessings that have entered into my life. I desired that his life would also be filled with spiritual experiences similar to one I had 26 years ago today when I was called to be an Assistant to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. On that same day, Elder Boyd K. Packer was called to the Quorum of the Twelve.
I remember the details well. I was called to the First Presidency’s office to meet with President Joseph Fielding Smith. His name would be presented the next day for sustaining as the new President and prophet of the Church, just as we have done today with President Hinckley. Harold B. Lee was to be sustained as the First Counselor and N. Eldon Tanner as the Second Counselor. They spent a few moments with me, extending the call, and then reminded me that the next morning my name would be read in the conference.
After that call was extended to me, I walked down the granite steps of the Administration Building. I felt amazement and wonder. How could this happen? How could this come to me? As I walked around the block, I thought and wondered about the changes that would come into my life now. How would I ever measure up to the responsibility that would now rest upon me? How could I go out and represent this great and glorious organization out in the world?
I was so overcome with my feelings as I walked around the block that I didn’t want to meet anyone I knew. I just wanted to find my wife, Ruby, and tell her what had happened. I went up to the ninth floor of the Hotel Utah, where Ruby was visiting with some family. I remember knocking on the door and opening it just a couple of inches so I could motion for her to come out. Of course, she wondered what was happening and came out into the hall.
I took her by the hand, and as we walked along the hallway, all I could do was squeeze her hand. I was so overcome with what had happened that I had trouble even getting the words out to tell her about it. Finally she stopped me and said, “Well, say something.” Then I looked at her, put my hands on her shoulders, and told her what had happened. She started to cry. The two of us stood there with our arms around one another and people walking by wondering who those silly boobs were crying in the hallway. But we didn’t pay any attention to the traffic because something momentous was happening to us. Our lives had been changed.
On the next day, a day like this, my name was read to be sustained and I was asked to come up and take one of these red chairs. I did so in all amazement. And then the Tabernacle Choir sang “O Divine Redeemer.” I thought my heart would break in the pleading of those words: “Remember not, remember not, O Lord, my sins.”
I would hope someday that our great-grandson Mark and others of our posterity would have similar spiritual experiences and that they would feel the spiritual power and influence of this gospel. I hope that Mark and others will have opportunities such as I had when I was in the temple when President Spencer W. Kimball received the revelation regarding the priesthood. I was the junior member of the Quorum of the Twelve. I was there. I was there with the outpouring of the Spirit in that room so strong that none of us could speak afterwards. We just left quietly to go back to the office. No one could say anything because of the powerful outpouring of the heavenly spiritual experience.
But just a few hours after the announcement was made to the press, I was assigned to attend a stake conference in Detroit, Michigan. When my plane landed in Chicago, I noticed an edition of the Chicago Tribune on the newsstand. The headline in the paper said, “Mormons Give Blacks Priesthood.” And the subheading said, “President Kimball Claims to Have Received a Revelation.” I bought a copy of the newspaper. I stared at one word in that subheading—claims. It stood out to me just like it was in red neon. As I walked along the hallway to make my plane connection, I thought, Here I am now in Chicago walking through this busy airport, yet I was a witness to this revelation. I was there. I witnessed it. I felt that heavenly influence. I was part of it. Little did the editor of that newspaper realize the truth of that revelation when he wrote, “… Claims to Have Received a Revelation.” Little did he know, or the printer, or the man who put the ink on the press, or the one who delivered the newspaper—little did any of them know that it was truly a revelation from God. Little did they know what I knew because I was a witness to it.
God lives. He is our Father. We are His children. He loves us. Jesus is the Christ, the Only Begotten of the Father in the flesh. He is our Savior, our Redeemer. He is our advocate with the Father. He is the one who died and suffered great agony, great humiliation, and great pain for us. The Restoration of the gospel is true. Someday we’ll know of the greatness of the Prophet Joseph Smith. All this work is true. I leave you my love and my witness, and I pray that you will live and raise your own families in such a way that you will be part of the great army needed to carry the message of hope and salvation to all the world. I leave my love and witness with you in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

One of the amazing legacies of this campus is the hundreds of employees and the thousands of students who are guided here by direct intervention of the Lord. Their stories read like something out of scripture, miraculous, compelling. For many years BYU-Hawaii was considered by some as a dead end to a university teacher's academic career. It was seen as a nice place, but hardly a serious institution that would advance one to the top of one's profession. The special mission of this school and the spirit of God have brought some of the finest people in the Church to serve and teach in this place.
Bruce Bowen, former Dean of Admissions wrote that the thought of taking a position at BYU-Hawaii turned his wife Debbie's world upside down. They had just moved into a brand new home they had built. Debbie had just delivered their eighth child. The thought of moving the entire family to a island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean was overwhelming, crazy. But once the idea was deposited, like the seed of faith, it grew and swelled and filled their minds and hearts. He says "It seemed that [once the seed was planted] everywhere we went we met someone who had lived in Hawaii or heard someone speaking about Hawaii or saw something that reminded us of Hawaii, we couldn't get away from it. Bit by bit our hearts were softened as the Lord's will was made known. When we came to the campus for interviews, we had another witness of the spirit while touring the Polynesian Cultural Center. . We moved to Hawaii in June of that year and embarked on the most wonderful experience of our lives . . . we are not the same people that we were before moving to Hawaii, and we will forever be grateful for the way our hearts and lives have been touched by the spirit of aloha." Bruce Bowen is now the Dean of Admissions at Weber State University.

My own childhood is a testament of the powerful influence a Christian adult can have on the life of a child. My mother died when I was four years old, and my grandmother helped care for me and my siblings. She belonged to the Salvation Army church, and she taught us to pray, love our enemies, and treat others kindly. Her guidance during those few critical years laid the foundation for my future choices.

Illustration by Greg Newbold
I’d never met Irv and Carmen Walker before, and I was nervous about being their new home teacher. But I liked them the instant I met them. Carmen, who was almost blind, had a straightforward and humorous personality that made me feel completely at ease. I was amazed at the things she could do despite her loss of sight. She attended a pottery class and sculpted beautiful bowls and figurines, was part of a women’s social organization, and volunteered on a service committee for the blind. Carmen also took care of her husband, Irv.
Irv had experienced numerous strokes and suffered from decreased brain function. He rarely spoke, and when he did it was slow and quiet. He was always smiling though. He loved to pull little pranks—especially on his wife—and he enjoyed making others laugh.
Irv and Carmen hadn’t been to church in over 20 years, and because of their physical limitations they had no way of getting there on their own.
As my companion and I began to meet with Carmen and Irv, two things became apparent. First, they’d forgotten most of the Church’s teachings. Second, they were fantastic people who loved helping others. As we continued to home teach them and discuss the gospel together, we eventually invited them back to church. They accepted, and we began to pick them up on Sunday mornings. They both befriended many ward members and were a great blessing to the ward.
Not long after they started to come to church again, Irv experienced a major illness and was hospitalized. He passed away shortly after. I’ll always be grateful that he was reminded of Heavenly Father’s love and teachings before he died.
After Irv’s death, Carmen remained a great friend and continued to amaze me with her talents. Over the years many ornaments on my family Christmas tree were crafted by her skilled hands. Eventually, however, her eyesight worsened to the point that she was completely blind and experiencing pain and discomfort. Carmen eventually moved away to be closer to her eye specialist and her children.
I’m grateful for home teaching because it has allowed me to meet wonderful people like Carmen and Irv. Home teaching has taught me that some of the most amazing people may be less active and living within my own ward boundaries. The key is to befriend them and remind them that they haven’t been forgotten and that they can receive great joy and blessings in the Church. Even though home teaching assignments may change and people may move away, I’ll always remember the friendships I’ve formed through home teaching.