Gospel Story Finder

A few years passed, and dad came home one night with another idea. “Why don’t you boys sell Christmas wreaths?” he said. And thus we were off on another venture. We would go from door to door taking orders, and then we purchased the wreaths from a wholesaler for our customers. For the next several years mom and dad spent many hours helping us in this project.

In Medford, New Jersey, Kristin Feuz, 17, a member of the Medford Ward, noticed that Medford was celebrating its 150th anniversary in 1997, which coincided with the Church’s sesquicentennial celebration. So she went to work. Along with other members of her ward, she helped plant flowers and clean up several different areas in Medford.

By the time I returned home from my mission, I believed I knew everything there was to know about the Book of Mormon. I never admitted that out loud, of course—but looking back, this attitude influenced how I approached the scriptures after my mission.
And not in a good way.
When I studied the scriptures, I often found myself returning to familiar passages over and over again—mostly to recall and reaffirm the things I’d learned before. I definitely tried to keep pondering the scriptures to learn something new, but I never felt like I was making any discoveries. The enthusiasm I once had for the Book of Mormon started to dwindle.
Soon after returning home, I also started a new job, and my scripture study time shrank from the full hour I had studied on my mission to 30 minutes. Then I received a calling, and those 30 minutes became 15. Then over the summer I served as an FSY counselor. And I used most of my study time to review a handful of verses that I repeatedly shared with youth week after week.
I knew that Heavenly Father loved any time I set aside to study His word. But, frankly, I didn’t feel like I was following Nephi’s invitation to “feast upon the words of Christ” (2 Nephi 32:3). I convinced myself that there couldn’t be anything new to learn. Instead of feasting on the Book of Mormon, I was barely nibbling.
This attitude of complacency continued into my first semester at Brigham Young University, during which I attended a Book of Mormon class. On the first day, my professor stood up at the head of our classroom. Fixing us with a friendly but piercing gaze, he said, “My goal in this class is to convince you that you don’t know the Book of Mormon—at all.”
I was intrigued by this, but it seemed more like the sort of sharp one-liner professors say to get your attention rather than an actual promise.
Thankfully, I turned out to be totally wrong.
As part of the class, my professor assigned us to read the Book of Mormon. Not just open it and scan the words or gloss over a chapter to recall the same story we may have consumed a million times.
He wanted us to actually read.
For example, he taught us about how the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon didn’t include punctuation at all—and he had us add in punctuation to a long, confusing passage from Alma 13 to teach us about the difference that commas and periods can make. He had us read a single verse alongside an 1828 Webster’s dictionary, looking up keywords that held radically different meanings than I’d first assumed.
The class challenged a lot of my basic assumptions about what the Book of Mormon even was. I’d never realized, for example, that Nephi wrote 1 Nephi years after he and his family had journeyed to the promised land (see 1 Nephi 9:1–5; 2 Nephi 5:28–31).
I also discovered how many of the deep flaws of the Nephite culture have startling parallels to the challenges our own cultures face today.
I came to understand the careful, deliberate messages that Mormon, Moroni, and others had implanted specifically for us—and how deeply anxious they were that we didn’t get caught up in the radical skepticism and doubt of the world.
My whole perception and testimony of this book started to change as I pondered these truths.
Through truly feasting on its words, I discovered that the Book of Mormon reveals who Jesus Christ is—not just doctrinally, but personally and intimately. The book bears His signature on every page. It’s an enduring record that testifies how He hasn’t forgotten His covenant people and He never will.
I don’t have all the answers to life. But I’ve come to understand that I didn’t learn everything there was to know about the Book of Mormon from my mission—there is always more to learn and to add to our faith.

During the latter part of World War II, we lived in the San Francisco Bay Area of northern California. Because of the war, my father worked seven days a week. He would get home at midnight and leave at six in the morning. Although he had been a real anchor of the Church in Arizona, he rarely could go to church during the war. Mother served as the Martinez Ward Relief Society president. She took us to stake conference in Oakland, which then was held on Saturday and Sunday. I remember seeing and hearing George Albert Smith, the President of the Church then, preside and speak at the meeting. Between the meetings on Saturday, she let us enjoy the Bay Area, Golden Gate Park, and baseball games at Seal Stadium. She kept the family and Church bond strong when my father, because of circumstances, couldn’t. A mother can accomplish many things.

Joel Bader was baptized by his older brother, who was a priest at the time. And when Joel was ordained a priest, the bishop let Joel ask a good friend, who was already a priest, to help in the ordination.
Joel feels that blessing the sacrament is a great service to the members:
“The sacrament gives me a chance every week to think about what I have to do here. Renewing my baptismal covenant helps me to always remember that I should be worthy of the covenant I entered into.
“When you’re together in a quorum, you can learn a lot about getting along with others and how to plan and run meetings. The most important part about the priesthood is serving others—and receiving blessings through the priesthood.”Joel Bader, Pratteln Ward, Bern Switzerland Stake

My grandpa was not a member of the Church, but he taught me to be fair and honest with everyone. I remember being in the field with him when storm clouds quickly came up. Grandpa unhooked the horses from the wagon so that they could run back to the barn. Then he and I got under the wagon. As we lay there, waiting for the storm to pass, my grandpa told me all about his parents and brothers and sisters.

Tyler cut a rectangle out of paper and carefully printed his name on it. Below his name, he wrote, “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” He taped a folded paper to the back of it to insert in his pocket to hold the name tag on. He went to the mirror to see how it looked.
First thing in the morning he thought about his name tag. Hurriedly he got dressed and put it on.
When Mom went grocery shopping, Tyler went too. He walked around, hoping that everyone saw his name tag. While they were going back to the car, it started to rain. He pushed the cart quickly and helped Mom load the car before they both got very wet. “Such a good helper!” she said, giving him a kiss on the cheek.
At home he helped carry in the groceries. When he leaned over, he noticed that his name tag was torn and sagging. And rain had smeared the words. I need a better name tag, he told himself.

After retiring, Brother and Sister Patterson went back to school to learn new skills: gunsmithing and woodworking.
Photograph courtesy of the Pattersons
After 40 years as a medical doctor and military officer, Kerry Patterson was injured while on a routine mission in Afghanistan. Forced to take a military disability retirement, he searched for things to do. Not content simply to spend his days fishing, he and his wife, Linda, went back to school at a local community college.
“I took a shop class in high school but had no other vocational training since then,” he explains. “Nonetheless, I decided to learn gunsmithing. I liked fixing people as a doctor and thought that learning how to fix things that required precision machining would keep me mentally active. It was a lot harder than I thought to go into something so new and different.” But now at age 71, after completing all required courses and getting necessary licenses, he has more business than he can handle. He has even hired an apprentice to share the workload and learn the trade.

Jamie, age 8 “When my brothers were fighting over who would be first at doing something, I helped them by saying they both could be first. Because I knew I was the peacemaker, I told them in a soft voice instead of yelling at them. It felt good.”

Neither of my parents or any of my siblings are members of the Church, so a year after my dad, Gerald Prior, passed away, the time came to do his temple work.
It was decided to do the work at the Preston England Temple. Upon our arrival on a Friday afternoon, I booked an appointment with the temple registrar and explained that I wanted to try to complete all the ordinances for my dad the next day. He informed me that the only way that it would be possible was if the baptism work was done that evening. There was a youth temple trip scheduled, and if I came back to the temple at 7:00 pm, I could join them and get the work done for my dad.
I returned to the temple at 7:00 pm and waited. Around 7:30 pm, the registrar informed me that the stake youth had cancelled their appointment, assuring me, “Don’t worry; we will get something sorted.” True to his word, 15 minutes later, he returned and invited my wife, Tracey, and me to the baptistry.
There, we met with about 10 temple workers who had already finished for the day. Upon hearing of my predicament, they generously sacrificed their time to assist. They asked whether I would be happy to be involved in doing the work for other people as well as my dad. I was more than happy to oblige, and it also gave me the opportunity to baptise Tracey, which I had never done before.
A great couple of hours were had in the Preston temple that evening. The following day I carried on doing the necessary ordinances for my dad, and several times met with the temple workers that I had met the evening before. They enquired how the work was progressing, and it was touching to see their support and encouragement for the work for my dad.
At the end of the day, I was able to participate in the sealing of my mum and dad. My daughter, Lauren, and her husband, Gabe, joined us and with their help, I was able to be sealed to my parents. Officiating were the very workers from the previous evening.
It was truly a wonderful experience, and one that will never be forgotten by Tracey and myself. I will always be grateful to those temple workers who selflessly sacrificed their own time to help me and my father.

The first was his baptism in Alice Springs on 1 July 2017, at age 74. Elder Joel Barfuss, of the Australia Adelaide Mission recalls, “We were walking to an appointment and saw Ray walking down another road, so we decided to turn down the road just to talk to him. . . . He came to Church that Sunday and the rest was history.”

A tiny sunbeam shining bravely through a crack between the logs in her bedroom played across Louisa’s face. She stretched lazily and listened to the shrieking of the sea gulls outside her small window. They seemed to be calling to her to come and play. Louisa knew they had come for their usual breakfast of worms and insects and perhaps an occasional mouse from the fields surrounding the growing settlement. She had come to think of the gulls as her own, because each morning as the sun rose over the mountains they settled first in the field next to her window and then moved to other fields.
Quietly she slipped from her bed onto the rough floor and down the stairs to the door of the cabin. She smiled as she slipped outside. Father had built one of the few two-story log houses. He planned to cover it with stucco later when he wasn’t so busy.
Louisa chose her favorite spot on the porch by the corner post to sit quietly without moving to watch the sea gulls. She arranged her flannel nightgown around her bare toes to keep out the morning chill. Her soft, brown hair fell gently over her shoulders and her clear, blue eyes seemed to shine as brightly as the sunbeams.
With a soft sound the door opened again and her little brother Thomas crept quietly to her side. The sharp sound of her father’s ax in the woods across the field and her mother’s gentle singing in the garden broke the stillness of the beautiful morning. Thomas yawned sleepily and gazed at the birds in the field.
“Father’s chopping wood for winter and Mother’s weeding the garden so the vegetables will grow,” Louisa almost whispered so she wouldn’t frighten the sea gulls. The birds continued to eat as though Louisa and Thomas were not even there.
“Tell me again about the sea gulls, Louisa,” Thomas said sleepily. “Please.”
He was too young to remember when they had crossed the plains in the covered wagon to Utah. Louisa remembered, though.
“What about the sea gulls, Louisa?” Thomas didn’t like to hear about the times they had traveling to their new home in the mountains.
“Where was I?” asked Thomas.
“What are crickets?”
“Thomas, you know what crickets are. They are those shiny black bugs. They scrape their wings together to make a squeaky sound at night,” Louisa answered.
“Oh. Tell me about the sea gulls.”
Tears came to Louisa’s eyes remembering how hard she had cried. She had only been four. Now Louisa was eight and too big to cry. But sometimes she did when she was hurt or afraid.
“When did the sea gulls come?” Thomas asked.
Louisa waited for Thomas to encourage her to go on with the story. But he just lay quietly beside her. The sky was dark blue with streaks of white clouds high in the sky. Most of the sea gulls were quiet, but once in a while one would call.
But Thomas didn’t answer. He had fallen asleep in the warm sunshine.

At the end of a long overseas assignment, my wife, Lesa, and I stepped into an airport terminal in preparation for just one more flight—a red-eye—to get home. As we stood with many others moving a step at a time in long lines, we could feel the growing anxiety of fellow travelers worried about making flights, getting through passport and visa review, and successfully navigating security checks.
We finally reached a station occupied by a customs officer who seemed unaffected by the high levels of stress and anxiety in the room. She almost mechanically, with no eye contact, reached for my documents, confirmed my picture, thumbed through one page after another, and finally stamped my passport with a heavy thud.
She then reached for Lesa’s papers. Devoid of emotion, head down and focused on her work, she methodically thumbed through the pages with an expert eye, focusing on the details of the documents in front of her. We were somewhat surprised when she suddenly stopped, lifted her head, and made eye contact with Lesa in a deliberate and warm upward gaze. With a tender smile, she gently stamped Lesa’s passport and handed the documents back to her. My wife smiled in return, accepted the documents, and exchanged warm parting words.
“What just happened?” I asked incredulously.
Lesa then showed me what the agent had seen—a small card with the image of the Savior. It had accidentally slipped from Lesa’s purse into the folds of her passport. This is what the customs officer had found. This is what had changed her whole demeanor.
Grace and Truth, by Simon Dewey, courtesy of altusfineart.com, © 2025, used with permission
This small picture of the Savior connected the hearts of two otherwise disconnected strangers. It transformed the impersonal to personal, capturing the beauty, the miracle, and the reality of the Light of Jesus Christ. For the remainder of that day and often since, I have contemplated that sweet, simple moment with awe and have rejoiced in the glorious effect of the Light of Christ upon God’s children.

Elder Poelman said that one of the things he remembers and cherishes are the scripture stories that his mother taught him during his childhood. “Often my mother would be working at the ironing board. I can remember sitting close-by while she ironed. She would tell me Bible stories, and that was a great legacy my mother left to me.

Near the end of my junior year of high school, it was time to decide which classes to take my senior year. After signing up for all of the required classes, I still had one open space. Deciding how to fill it was an important decision to me, so I knelt and prayed for guidance. As I pondered what to do, the Spirit suggested that I study another foreign language. I’d already studied several years of Spanish, so I began to browse our school’s language courses. German, French, Italian, and others seemed interesting, but none seemed right. I finally reached the bottom of the list and read “Mandarin Chinese.” I didn’t know any Chinese people or even anyone who spoke Chinese, yet I felt the Spirit confirm that this was the right choice.
Despite my misgivings, I signed up for the course. I’ve felt and expressed gratitude to God for that decision almost every day of my life since. Choosing to learn an unfamiliar and difficult language—even when it wasn’t required—helped me when I was called to serve a Chinese-speaking mission in Taiwan. And that experience has led me to every internship, job, and opportunity I’ve had until now as a young adult. This experience taught me that Father in Heaven cares deeply about our education and that He expects us to pursue the best education possible, even when it’s inconvenient, uncomfortable, or challenging. When we follow Him by making that sacrifice, He always blesses us.
Brandon C., Utah, USA

One memorable night a relative and I disagreed about a political issue. She briskly and thoroughly took my comments apart, proving me wrong within earshot of family members. I felt foolish and uninformed—and I probably was. That night as I knelt to pray, I hurried to explain to Heavenly Father how difficult this relative was! I talked on and on. Perhaps I paused in my complaining and the Holy Ghost had a chance to get my attention, because, to my surprise, I next heard myself say, “You probably want me to love her.” Love her? I prayed on, saying something like, “How can I love her? I don’t think I even like her. My heart is hard; my feelings are hurt. I can’t do it.”

Then, surely with help from the Spirit, I had a new thought as I said, “But You love her, Heavenly Father. Would You give me a portion of Your love for her—so I can love her too?” My hard feelings softened, my heart started to change, and I began to see this person differently. I began to sense her real value that Heavenly Father saw. Isaiah writes, “The Lord bindeth up the breach of his people, and healeth the stroke of their wound.”10

Over time the gap between us sweetly closed. But even if she had not accepted my changed heart, I had learned that Heavenly Father will help us love even those we may think are unlovable, if we plead for His aid. The Savior’s Atonement is a conduit for the constant flow of charity from our Father in Heaven. We must choose to abide in this love in order to have charity for all.

A tour of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and other battlefields of the American Civil War marks that conflict, where brother fought against brother. Some families lost farms, others possessions. One family lost all. Let me share with you that memorable letter which President Abraham Lincoln wrote to Mrs. Lydia Bixby:
“Dear Madam:
“I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
“Yours very sincerely and respectfully, Abraham Lincoln.” (21 Nov. 1864; quoted in Selections from the Letters, Speeches, and State Papers of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Ida M. Tarbell, Boston: Ginn and Company, 1911, p. 109.)

I was born on a farm in Iowa, USA. When I was three, my parents traded some old windows and doors for two goats. The goats were so small. A woman brought them to my house in a dog crate. They were beautiful. I named the white, black, and red one Alice. My mom named the tan and black one Tawny.
Mom and Dad helped the woman load the doors and windows into her truck. She was going to turn them into artwork. I watched the goats nervously look around our yard. All of a sudden Alice took a running leap and jumped right over our pasture fence. Tawny looked from us to Alice and decided to leave too. She sprang over the fence like she could fly!
We tried to round them up by bribing them with sweet feed. But the two goats just trotted down the road. They disappeared into a cornfield. We were all scared that they wouldn’t be able to find their way back to their new home. I thought they would be lost in the hundreds of acres of corn that surrounded our house.
I told my mom that we should pray. We had read in the scriptures where Amulek said to “cry over the flocks of your fields” (Alma 34:25). I knew Heavenly Father was watching over our goats.
After I took a nap, I woke up and looked in our yard. Alice and Tawny were there. They had found their way back! I know Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers. Sometimes it’s even quickly and in the way we hope!

Stephen Oak of the Corvallis Second Ward, Corvallis Oregon Stake, finished a landmark year as student-body president of his high school. Steve led an ambitious campaign to raise money to build a life-sized bronze statue of the school’s mascot, a Spartan. Through Steve’s efforts, the school was able to feel a new unity of purpose and spirit.
Steve participated in the school jazz band. He is active in his quorum and earned his Eagle Award. He is also involved in many community service projects.

Despite such success, as a 19-year-old, Jason heeded the prophet’s counsel and applied to serve a mission. But, because of his visual impairment, his application was denied. Jason graciously accepted the decision and also accepted a new challenge: to find other ways to serve.
Jason’s success as a sprinter has opened less conventional forms of missionary work.
“I now have an opportunity to be a missionary in a different way—through sprinting,” says Jason.
He has found that rather than knocking on doors, he can bring the Church out of obscurity by sprinting past finish lines and setting new records, all the while setting a good example.
Already, Jason’s success has created a buzz as others find out about the Mormon sprinter who doesn’t train on Sundays and also abstains from tea, coffee, alcohol, and drugs.
His success has made him the subject of several media-related publications—including Ireland’s biggest newspaper. Many mention his Mormon lifestyle.
“When they get to know me, they know the way I live my life is different,” Jason says.