Gospel Story Finder

This event was confirmed by John Murdock, missionary companion of Zebedee Coltrin at the time and also present at the meeting: “In one of these meetings the prophet told us if we could humble ourselves before God, and exercise strong faith, we should see the face of the Lord. And about midday the visions of my mind were opened, and the eyes of my understanding were enlightened, and I saw the form of a man, most lovely, the visage of his face was sound and fair as the sun. His hair a bright silver grey, curled in most majestic form, His eyes a keen penetrating blue, and the skin of his neck a most beautiful white and he was covered from the neck to the feet with a loose garment, pure white, whiter than any garment I have ever before seen. His countenance was most penetrating, and yet most lovely. And while I was endeavoring to comprehend the whole personage from head to feet it slipped from me, and the vision was closed up. But it left on my mind the impression of love, for months, that I never felt before to that degree” (John Murdock Journal, typescript, Brigham Young University archives, page 13).

The Wolfgramms took their Polynesian show on the road and traveled all over the United States and Canada. When they got a full-time offer from a Hawaiian hotel chain in Minneapolis, they packed their bags and moved. Minneapolis was about as far removed from Tonga as it could possibly be, but the Wolfgramms liked it there and contributed to the local ward as well as to the local entertainment industry. The missionaries in the area could always find a willing member of the family to go on splits with them, and their refreshing performances stimulated a lot of questions from the audiences about “what makes them so different?”
They were devastated, then, when the hotel chain they were working with folded. For several months the family of 15 lived in the hotel owners’ basement. They decided that it would be more profitable to switch from Polynesian to pop music, and they began traveling in an old, uninsulated van, to whatever engagements they could scrape up. “The van didn’t have any seats,” Leroy recalls, “and we sat in chairs against the sides. Sometimes we traveled in 40 below temperatures, and there would be ice on the roof—on the inside. We had no money, but Dad knows how to survive. When we didn’t have any place to stay, Dad would say ‘Let’s try camping in the snow—it’s different!’”
“Those were crazy days,” Eugene adds. “We’d live on balogna sandwiches, stop at a gas station to wash our faces, then go in and perform.”
Finally, however, their efforts and dedication payed off. Don Powell, an entertainment industry expert who had managed some top groups in the 60s and 70s, heard them play. He had retired from entertainment because the industry had become “so bizarre,” but when he heard the Wolfgramms, his interest was rekindled.
“The reason I reentered this business was literally because of this family,” says Don, who had had very little contact with the LDS church before he met the Wolfgramms. “They’re just too good to be true. Not only are they tremendously talented, but they have an unusually strong work ethic for their age. The whole family is so loving and bright, I couldn’t help getting involved. And we’ll never have problems with drugs or alcohol or anything like that, as you do with so many entertainers. It’s absolute heaven to manage them.”

A four-year-old Brazilian girl, Mayara Fernanda Dos Santos, suffering from leukemia with oxygen going into her nose from a tube, was blessed in 1996 by Elder Claudio Costa and myself in Curitiba, Brazil. After the blessing, little Mayara smilingly wiped a tear from her anxious mother’s cheek. Instinctively wise beyond her years, Mayara knows how to “comfort those that stand in need of comfort” (Mosiah 18:9), including her precious parents.

Thanks to Scout training and quick thinking, a tragedy was averted in Charlotte, North Carolina. Todd Smith of the Charlotte Second Ward saved the life of a five-year-old after the youngster was hit by a car.
The child was riding a tricycle when a slow-moving car hit him and knocked him unconscious. Todd saw the accident and after telling his mother to call for help, he ran to the little boy. Todd found that the child’s tongue was blocking his throat. Todd cleared the child’s air passage and helped stop the bleeding from a head wound. Todd also prevented anyone from moving the child until the rescue squad arrived, in case there were any back or neck injuries.
Todd received a Medal of Merit and was honored for his quick action.

As a missionary, I set daily and weekly goals with my companion that focused on our missionary purposes. These goals started as numbers, but as I grew and understood more about why we set these goals, the numbers were replaced by names we prayed for individually.

When 10-year-old John joined the swimming team, he told his coach he could compete in the meets held on Saturday but not those held on Sunday. At the last meet of the season, John’s relay race was scheduled for Sunday. He remembered a family home evening lesson about making decisions in advance so it would be easier to do the right thing when the time came. John said: “I had made the decision not to swim on Sunday before I joined my team. That made it easier for me to tell the coach that I couldn’t swim the relay. I thought the coach would be mad at me. But at the end-of-the-year banquet, … he told the team how proud he was of me for having standards and then sticking to them.”3 John shows he knows by keeping the Sabbath day holy and setting an example of someone who follows the teachings of Jesus. Every time you keep the Sabbath day holy, you show you know.

For example, President Henry B. Eyring, First Counselor in the First Presidency, remembers when, as a young man, he’d convinced himself he couldn’t understand math. His dad thought otherwise and helped him through his homework. “I can’t remember the gifts my dad wrapped and gave to me” for holidays, he said. “But I remember the chalkboard and his quiet voice. … Because he had spent time [studying as a boy], he and I could have that time at the chalkboard and he could help me.”1

Once I got home, I took up weight lifting again, but with a considerably different attitude. I’d never looked on my weight lifting talent as a gift before. I hadn’t thought that training was a way of magnifying that talent. I began training with a new intensity. Also, I figured that as I continued to work hard, I would have more opportunities to meet people who didn’t have the gospel in their lives, and I could share it with them. And maybe my example could help someone.
It wasn’t easy to jump right back into lifting, but within seven months I won the National Collegiate Power Lifting Championship in the 198-pound weight class. The following year I won it again, and even managed to set two national records. It dawned on me that I hadn’t lost anything, but I’d gained a great deal. I’d learned about true happiness, determination, self-worth, and the belief in a divine purpose—and oh, yes—I’d learned what true power lifting really is.

In the last area of my mission, Molo, Iloilo, in the Philippines, I prayed hard that before I was released we could baptize and confirm a family. My companion and I prayed one day that we would be directed to the honest in heart, someone who was ready to accept the gospel. We were impressed to knock at a certain house with a bamboo fence. A man came down the stairs, opened the door for us, and invited us to come in.
We befriended him and learned that he was a lawyer. He asked many questions that we sometimes could not answer, and when he spoke, it was with such eloquence as to discourage any missionary. He became a difficult investigator. We introduced the Book of Mormon, but he said, “The Bible alone is enough.” He would never read or even touch the Book of Mormon, as if his hand would be burned.
One day an assistant to the mission president came to work with Elder Alcos, my junior companion. They met with this man, and afterward the assistant frankly told us, “I don’t think that man is prepared to accept the gospel.” I pondered his words, but a sweet, peaceful, reassuring feeling came to me as I recalled our prayer petitioning Heavenly Father to direct us to those who were ready to accept the gospel. I knew our prayer had been answered. I felt that there was something we needed to share with this man. We just did not know what it was or how to do it. But we did not give up on him.
Slowly his heart began to change, and he learned to love the family home evening program that we introduced to him. As the days passed, I felt discouraged that we could not baptize and confirm this family before I left. I had only a few more days before my release. One day I sadly told him, “Brother Garcia, I think I failed my mission.”
He said, “No, Elder Cruz, you did not fail. We have developed a friendship.” We were delighted at his next words: “Don’t worry. We will go to your church on Sunday.”
He and his family did come to church, and the members received them warmly. I saw him shed tears as he listened to the inspiring words spoken during sacrament meeting. He went home happy and uplifted that day. I knew his heart had been touched.
When the time was right and we felt he was ready, we challenged him to be baptized and confirmed. He accepted the challenge. We also challenged him to fast and pray and read the Book of Mormon. My companion and I fasted for him and his family.
May 4, 1986, was my last Sunday in the mission field. It was fast and testimony meeting, and I bore my sincere final testimony to the people I had learned to love. After I testified, I saw this lawyer, who had at first been unreceptive to our message, stand up and walk to the pulpit, holding the Book of Mormon. His whole frame was shaking, and there were tears in his eyes as he raised the Book of Mormon and cried, “Brothers and sisters, I know the Book of Mormon is true.” We rejoiced to hear this testimony.
That afternoon many members of the ward attended the baptism of the Garcia family.
After I was released from my mission, I corresponded regularly with Brother Garcia. He gladly told me when he became a Sunday School president. Later he was called as bishop. He traveled many hours by boat to attend my wedding in the Manila Philippines Temple. Eventually he was called to serve as a stake president and as a counselor in the Philippines Bacolod Mission presidency.
He has been an instrument in the conversion of many people to the restored gospel. The man who acted as if his hand would be burned if he touched the Book of Mormon became a great witness to the divinity and truth of that book.

And in all they do, there is love—love both expressed and self-evident. “I love my family a lot,” Lou says, “and I know they love me too. They’ve shown me many times that they do. My daddy proved it four times in particular. Those were the four times when I fell into the water before I knew how to swim. Daddy came in after me every time—shoes and all.

“Being sealed in the temple makes me feel like I have an insurance policy on our love. If anything happens to one of us, I’ll still have my family.”

Ashley, a sister I minister to, and I both have cookbooks from our grandmothers. Hers is from her great-grandmother, and mine is a book I put together when I inherited my Grandma Greenwood’s recipe box after she passed away.
Ashley and I both chose a recipe from our cookbooks, and we got together after work one night to try them out. She chose a blondie dessert recipe, so we made it first and put it in the oven. I chose “pink chip dip”—a staple at every Greenwood family party. Ashley’s daughter Alice helped us taste test the food. Then, because Ashley didn’t want her kids to eat all the blondies, she cut them up and delivered them to the sisters to whom she ministers.
The thing I loved most about our recipe night is that as we cooked and baked, we talked about all the regular ministering topics—her struggles and mine. But we also talked about our grandmothers and moms, which was tender for both of us.
Jenifer Greenwood, Utah, USA

Across the plains one Christmas night,
Three drovers riding blythe and gay,
Looked up and saw a starry light,
More radiant than the Milky Way;
And on their hearts such wonder fell,
They sang with joy “Noel! Noel!”
The air was dry with summer heat,
and smoke was on the yellow moon;
But from the heavens, faint and sweet,
came floating down a wond’rous tune;
And as they heard, they sang full well,
those drovers three—“Noel! Noel!”
The black swans flew across the sky,
the wild dog called across the plain,
The starry lustre blazed on high,
still echoed on the heavenly strain;
And still they sang “Noel! Noel!”
those drovers three, “Noel! Noel!”

When Greg returned from his mission, he finished up at Ricks, then went on to BYU. He never had satisfied his dream of becoming a student body president, but the thought of presiding over BYU’s 27,000 students seemed overly ambitious to him. His sister Kristie was convinced he could do it though. She helped him find a running mate, served as his campaign manager, and after a lot of hard work, Greg was elected by one of the biggest margins in BYU history.

A ward in Hawaii, USA, put on a play about family history. The youth and their families all took part in the production, which included sharing testimonies about the importance of temple work. You could put on a play covering any gospel topic, from dating to missionary work to Book of Mormon stories.

It looked as though the Dublin football match would have to be stopped. The game just couldn’t continue with two referees blowing identical-sounding whistles. The official referee was blowing his whistle at the proper times, but the whistle of a mysterious, unseen “official” was sounding at all the wrong times.
Fortunately for the players and spectators, the unofficial whistle-blower was discovered to be a starling perched in a nearby tree! The bird was chased away, and the game continued.

One night when we were having family home evening, my baby brother was running around and yelling. Some of my siblings were laughing at him. I tried to follow Jesus by being a good example and not laughing. Instead, I sat quietly and listened to the lesson. I felt good inside because I knew what I had done was right.
Landon Z., age 7, Utah, USA

Another highlight of the conference was hearing real-life conversion stories. This was particularly powerful for Anthony Diaz, who joined the Church in 2007.
“I loved Brother Jim Whitney’s class on the Book of Mormon because of the experience he shared and the testimony he gave,” Anthony says. “And I loved hearing from others who haven’t always been members of the Church. I didn’t know that some of them were converts. It helped me remember my own experience of joining the Church and reminded me how important missionary work really is.”
Anthony treasures his experience of receiving the gospel and was grateful to have a better idea of how to share it. Then at the end of his class, Brother Whitney encouraged each participant to share a copy of the Book of Mormon with someone they knew. “It’s not as easy as I thought it would be,” Anthony says. “I realized you have to anticipate the kinds of questions people might ask about the Church. You have to be able to answer them clearly and directly, and keep it short and simple. If you don’t know the answer, don’t be afraid to say so. Tell your friends that you’ll find out or offer to introduce them to the full-time missionaries.”

My first assignment was supervising the nine missions on the East Coast from Canada to Florida for five years. That was a great experience. My next assignment was with President Spencer W. Kimball, who was then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, supervising South America.
We organized the first stake in South America in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in May of 1966. As Elder Lynn A. Sorensen mentioned, the growth there has been tremendous. I remember that President Kimball said, “We’re not going to call any North Americans to the major leadership positions.” And there were many Latter-day Saints living in Sao Paulo at that time working in businesses associated with the United States. He said, “We’re going to call the local people.” And so our policy was to call local men and women to those positions and to be missionaries. At that time, in 1966, there were no stakes in South America, whereas now there are nearly two hundred stakes.

A family consisting of my grandmother, my mother, and two or three of the younger children were seated before an open door, watching the great display of nature’s fireworks as a severe thunderstorm raged near the mountain where our home was located. A flash of chain lightning followed by an immediate loud clap of thunder indicated that the lightning had struck very close.
I was standing in the doorway when suddenly and without warning my mother gave me a vigorous push that sent me sprawling on my back out of the doorway. At that instant, a bolt of lightning came down the chimney of the kitchen stove, out through the open doorway, and split a huge gash from top to bottom in a large tree immediately in front of the house. If I had remained in the door opening, I wouldn’t be writing this story today.
My mother could never explain her split-second decision. All I know is that my life was spared because of her impulsive, intuitive action.
Years later, when I saw the deep scar on that large tree at the old family home, I could only say from a grateful heart: Thank the Lord for that precious gift possessed in abundant measure by my own mother and by many other faithful mothers, through whom heaven can be very near in time of need.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson told of Gareth, a prince and a knight of King Arthur’s round table, and of his quest. The fair Lady Lyonors had been stolen away by the horrible black knight, who held her in his castle. Many young knights tried to rescue her but failed. They returned defeated and broken, with tales of the awesome power of the black knight; they begged Gareth not to go.
But Gareth went to the castle with the drawbridge, the tower, and the window where “Lady Lyonors wrung her hands and wept” (“Gareth and Lynette,” Idylls of the King, line 1360). Then, “high on a night-black horse, in night-black arms, with white breast-bone, and barren ribs of Death,” a laughing skull engraved upon his helmet, “in the half-light—thro’ the dim dawn—advanced the monster,” more awesome, more terrible even than Gareth had been told (lines 1346–47, 49–50).
The black knight lowered his lance and thundered forward. Gareth, who had been defeated in more than one tournament, sensed his terrible fate. Every logic and emotion shouted, “Flee for your life!” But he could not turn away. Not, that is, and keep his honor. Gareth lowered his lance and met the charge.
And then, to his surprise, Gareth unseated the black knight and tore his helmet away. There in that black armor with the bones engraven on it sat a little boy who began to cry and beg for mercy.