Gospel Story Finder

I finished law school around the time of my daughter’s first birthday. My wife and I looked forward to celebrating my graduation, our daughter’s birthday, and the new opportunities that would come to us, but nothing went as planned.
I found myself unemployed shortly after completing my degree and had difficulty finding work. Soon, financial difficulties came. Just having a simple birthday celebration would be difficult.
After many conversations with my wife, we accepted our situation. It was not easy for me as a father not to have the ability to buy even a simple present for my daughter and to see my beloved wife feeling frustrated.
I didn’t understand what was happening. I prayed and asked Heavenly Father to help me understand what He expected of me. Suddenly, as if a voice spoke to my mind, I heard the following words: “You possess something more valuable than any material possession on this earth. You hold the priesthood. What better gift could you give your daughter than a priesthood blessing?”
Tears filled my eyes as I thought about what the priesthood means to me. My heart filled with gratitude when I considered that the priesthood is the power that can unite my family for all eternity.
I shared my feelings with my wife. I told her that offering a blessing to our daughter was all I could give. We both decided that this would bring happiness and peace to her, and that would be enough.
On the day of our daughter’s birthday, friends, relatives, and neighbors brought a cake and simple decorations. We were grateful to celebrate this special day with those we love. That night, I placed my hands on my daughter’s head and gave her a blessing. I blessed her with all that the Spirit of the Lord prompted me to say.
We are still going through a period of changes and challenges regarding unemployment and finances. But even in the midst of sadness and frustration, peace and comfort comes to us through our Savior, Jesus Christ. I have no doubt that being a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with access to priesthood power is a blessing. It was all I could give on my daughter’s birthday, and it was more than enough.

Later Hernando hurried along Twentieth Street. He pushed the door of an office building open and took the steps two at a time. In Dr. Daily’s office his mother was singing at her work. When she saw Hernando, she smiled and shut off the vacuum cleaner. “All done?” she asked.
Nodding, he handed her his tip money. “I’ll go home for my books and lunch, then be off to school.”
She counted the change that he had given her. “Please stop at Myerling’s and get milk,” she said as she pressed the money into his hand. “Make sure it’s fresh, and don’t forget to close the refrigerator tightly. Be good, and have a nice day.”
He kissed her, then went back outside and down the street.
At the store, Hernando checked the date on the milk before taking it to the counter. As he waited to pay for it, his hand brushed a basket of pears. His mouth suddenly watered. He thought of how long it had been since he’d had one. He looked at Mr. Myerling, who was busy bagging groceries and talking to an early customer. Behind the meat counter, Mrs. Myerling was grinding meat with her back turned. How easy it would be to slip a pear into my pocket! he thought. How good it would taste … Then his mother’s words came to his mind: “Be good.” Swallowing hard, he turned his back on the basket of pears.
When the other customer finally left, Mr. Myerling turned to Hernando.
“Morning, Hernie,” he said. “I didn’t know if you’d stop by this morning, but I’ve been hoping you would.”
“You have?”
“I have some things for your mother,” Mr. Myerling explained. He put the milk into a sack behind the counter. “This bag of sugar split, but I taped it shut. And the labels on these cans are coming off from being on the shelf for a while, but I’m sure the food inside is still good. As for the fruit, it has some bruises, but it’s still good for fruit salad or for baking. Just be sure to put it into the refrigerator for your mother.”
Hernando’s face brightened as he took the sack of groceries. “Thanks, Mr. Myerling!”
“I’m glad you can use it.”
As Hernando entered the apartment building and climbed the stairs, his heart was singing. We might not have much, Hernando prayed silently, but what You give is always enough. Thank you, Father, for always providing.

It was my best friend’s birthday, and she was turning 13. I rushed to find a present for her before school, but I couldn’t find anything. Then I saw the Book of Mormon. I decided to challenge myself by giving it to her as a gift. I felt good inside but sort of scared because I had never given anyone the Book of Mormon before. I was afraid she might not accept it.
When I arrived at school, I looked for her and told her that I had a special book for her. She took the book and saw a picture of my family in the front. I told her that it was the Book of Mormon, a book that tells the truth of why we are here on earth. I also told her that I was sorry for not giving her a better gift.
She looked me in the eye and said it was the greatest thing I could have given her. Her words touched my heart, and I nearly cried. I felt like a missionary already! I can’t wait until I’m old enough to go on a mission so I can share the gospel with other people like my friend.

To begin to make some sense of it, let us explore various types of unfairness. Consider a family in which each child received a weekly monetary allowance for doing common household chores. One son, John, purchased candy; one daughter, Anna, saved her money. Eventually, Anna bought herself a bicycle. John thought it was totally unfair that Anna got a bike when he did not. But John’s choices created the inequality, not parental actions. Anna’s decision to forgo the immediate gratification of eating candy did not impose any unfairness on John, because he had the same opportunity as his sister.

When he was five and Matt was eight, Marilyn and I took these two aspiring athletes to see BYU play football. Shortly after the game began, a wet snowstorm blew in from the north. I took Devin in my lap and sat on the north. Matt was next and then Marilyn. The one blanket we had brought along didn’t quite cover us. The sleetlike snow continued on and on until we became cold, wet, and uncomfortable. But at the same time BYU was winning, and I could not bear the thoughts of going home. I knew that we would have to if young preschooler Devin ever started to complain.
To keep him happy, I would say things such as, “Watch that man. He will throw the ball to that man.” Or, “Watch that man kick the ball.” Amidst all this I would take out my handkerchief and wipe the water from his head. Then I’d wring the water out of the totally soaked handkerchief and wipe his head again. My tactics succeeded. Devin didn’t get discouraged, and we were able to remain.
Finally the game was nearly over. It was now obvious that BYU would defeat their arch-rivals to the north. Fittingly, at that point the storm ended, and the sun came out.
I could feel Devin stirring in my arms, and I sensed that he wanted to stand on his own legs. I undid my hold on him, and he moved away and stood on the empty seat just below our row. After he had stretched and looked around, he turned and faced me. Our eyes met, and his expression became very thoughtful. He then spoke: “Dad, you do so much for me. Isn’t there something that I can do for you?”
Emotion swelled within me as these sincere words entered my heart. Somehow it was hard for me to respond, but I was able to softly say, “Yes, there is something that you can do for me.”
His five-year-old eyes seemed much older as he asked, “What can I do?”
I put my hands on his shoulders and, looking deep into his eyes, replied, “Just be my son. Just be my son.” Somehow he seemed to understand. I pulled him close to me, and joy filled my soul. I knew then as I’ve known so many times that Devin was a winner in the ways that really matter.

While in the depths of despair, surviving on filthy food and lying on the cold floors in Liberty Jail, the Prophet Joseph Smith chose to look upward and pleaded for heavenly help.

He received assurance from the Lord: “My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment” (Doctrine and Covenants 121:7). Then the Lord promised him, “If thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes” (Doctrine and Covenants 121:8).

Returning from a mission at age 19, Joseph F. Smith and his companions were threatened by drunken men. “Are you a ‘Mormon’?” one man demanded. Joseph F. answered yes. Surprised, the man said, “I am glad to see a man stand up for his convictions.”

Early in life, President Spencer W. Kimball learned the necessity of work. He had many painful experiences in his early years preparatory to his great ministry. As a young boy he nearly drowned. He suffered from Bell’s palsy. His mother died when he was a youth, and while he was still a young man he lost his beloved sister Ruth. Shortly after marriage he contracted smallpox, and Sister Kimball counted over 100 pustules on his face.

He learned early about financial reverses and lost some investments. Like Job, he suffered from boils, which continued for many years and on one occasion came on his nose and lips. On one occasion he suffered from 24 boils at one time; not long thereafter he began to suffer the excruciating pain of heart attacks, which continued for many years and finally resulted in open-heart surgery. He became bothered by a hoarseness of his voice, which was relieved through a blessing from the Brethren, only to return later, along with the boils. A serious cancer in the vocal cords required surgery and thereafter voice training and cobalt treatments. The Bell’s palsy returned, and skin cancers were removed.

The result of this refiner’s fire was to be manifest in a refined spirit, sensitivity, an understanding heart, kindness, and humility.

María Colof spoke briefly of a special experience. “When I was ill,” she said, “my brother went to call the missionaries, but they couldn’t come. But some brothers of the Church came and gave me a blessing of health. By the following day I felt completely well.”

One day, we all will be resurrected. The loved one who dies will be resurrected as the Savior was. The reunion we will have with them will not be ethereal but with bodies that need never die nor age nor become infirm. I have felt that comfort when I looked down at the gravestone of someone I knew—someone that I know I can at some future time hold in my arms. Knowing that, I was not only delivered from grief but was filled with happy anticipation.

We must come to think of our obligation rather than our convenience. The time, I think, is here when sacrifice must become an even more important element in the Church. Remember the story of how Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball went on their missions to England. They were both ill and poverty stricken, but they accepted the call to serve, The day they were to leave, Brigham Young was so ill that he fell down and could not get up. Heber C. Kimball went over and tried to lift him up but could not because he was so weak. So he called across the street to another brother and said, “Come on over here and help me get Brother Brigham up!” The next day both of them were on the way to their missions.

I conclude by reading from a letter I received from a convert to the Church who, after the required waiting period, took his family to the holy temple of God for a sealing ordinance. He wrote:
“We love this church and we love the Lord and our Heavenly Father. We were on the verge of a total family failure when some of our LDS friends here began to work with us.
“Even now as I sit here and think back to Saturday, I have to be amazed at the way the Church has changed our lives, from almost total family loss to an eternal family! …
“Nothing can compare to seeing my wife and child dressed in white, with a radiant glow around them, and feeling the very Spirit of God whisper in my ear, ‘John, they’re yours for all time and all eternity.’”

Many lives have been blessed by the success of the Philippines Area’s “I Will Go, I Will Serve: 4600” initiative. Aside from the inspired vision of the Area Presidency, the support of the local priesthood leaders and the efforts of youth leaders, the miraculous success of the campaign was also boosted by the catchy theme song performed by Loredel “Daday” Ducena-Baluyot.
Composing the popular anthem with her husband Justin was a labor of love. After the first Area Presidency fireside premiered on Facebook on May 16, 2021, Daday and Justin felt the spirit and were inspired to write the song. After a few weeks, they presented the song to the Church area production team and offered its use to help sustain the momentum of the campaign. The song was reviewed and approved, and by July they were recording it with some help from Brio Divinagracia on the arrangement and background vocals. The song was officially launched during the follow-up Area Presidency fireside on November 21, 2021.
Aside from the 2021 youth theme song “A Great Work,” Daday’s “I Will Go, I Will Serve,” became popular after being part of youth, YSA, and FSY conferences all over the country. It was also listened to and sung along with the 2022 youth theme song “Trust in the Lord.” Recently, the couple rewrote the song as part of the November 20, 2022 Area Presidency fireside launching a heightened and more comprehensive “Come Unto Christ: I Will Go, I Will Serve” initiative.

Elder Neil L. Andersen
(77) Couples in Mozambique follow the Savior instead of their traditions.

Illustration by Greg Stevenson
Shortly after I was hired as the assistant director of a large library, my team and I began an ambitious project to digitize 37,000 books. One day my supervisor called me into his office.
“Edouard,” he said, “I’ve been invited to present our book digitization project in the United States and to solicit some new acquisitions. I’ve been asked to bring a trusted co-worker with me. I have confidence in you but not in your church. If you renounce your faith, you can come with me.”
Before I could say anything, he told me to think about it and then dismissed me.
That evening, I shared with my wife what had happened. She encouraged me to have faith. The next day, I told my supervisor that I would keep my faith. He was angry and said he’d just travel alone.
A year later, I had an opportunity to travel to France to receive training in library funding, acquisitions, and management. I just needed my supervisor’s approval. He said he would approve only if I denounced my faith. I again declined. He then tore up the document and threw it in my face. Some time later my supervisor approached me again.
“I am about to leave on another trip,” he said. “You can come with me, but the condition remains the same. I will never travel with a member of your church.”
“I will not reject my faith,” I said. He left without saying a word. Soon he began to talk about me to my colleagues.
“I have offered him opportunities,” he’d say. “But he has exhausted them all because of his blind faith. He is a fool.”
From then on, I became the object of mockery and contempt at work. I felt beaten down. One evening, preoccupied with this problem, I opened the Bible and read, “If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell” (Matthew 5:29).
If the Lord says we should get rid of something in order to save ourselves, why was I hanging on to a job that had become a danger to my spiritual well-being? The next day, I handed in my resignation.
Today, I rejoice in this choice. With courage and faith in Jesus Christ, I faced humiliation at work and temporary unemployment. My new job now provides opportunities unavailable to me before. The Lord has blessed me, and I thank Him for His kindness and His love toward me.

Several Decembers ago I learned again the power that comes from trying harder to have the scriptures opened to our hearts. It began when I noticed the scriptures of a man sitting next to me in a meeting. I could see that he had marked them, as I had done, but with a difference. He had placed colored tags on the edges of pages, keyed to the colors with which he had marked the scriptures so that he could study all the scriptures that were helpful to him on a particular topic.

Within a day I had purchased an inexpensive set of scriptures. But it took more than a few days and more than a few prayers for me to know the topics that would open the scriptures anew for me. I chose the topics that would teach me of my call to be a witness of Jesus Christ. The first topic was the witness that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the next was that He is risen, and the third was that He is the head of His Church.

I would not urge you to buy a new set of scriptures nor to get colored tags and colored pencils nor to choose the topics I chose. But I plead with you to return to the scriptures in some way that opens your mind and heart to be taught.

Many of the scriptures have become familiar to us. Yet in just a few weeks what I remembered about the Savior and what I felt about Him were enriched.

I began to read with purpose. Perhaps it was because of the Christmas season, perhaps it was because I wanted always to remember Him, but I found myself drawn to the accounts of His birth. I read again His words, spoken to a prophet named Nephi, recorded in the Book of Mormon, familiar to us all. And yet it seemed new to me:
“Behold, I come unto my own, to fulfil all things which I have made known unto the children of men from the foundation of the world, and to do the will, both of the Father and of the Son—of the Father because of me, and of the Son because of my flesh. And behold, the time is at hand, and this night shall the sign be given.
“And it came to pass that the words which came unto Nephi were fulfilled, according as they had been spoken; for behold, at the going down of the sun there was no darkness; and the people began to be astonished because there was no darkness when the night came” (3 Ne. 1:14–15).

Later, as I had never done before, I saw in my mind and felt in my heart the fulfillment of Samuel the Lamanite’s prophecy that the sun would set without darkness (see Hel. 14:3–4). I saw it at His birth, as if I were somewhere among the people in those lands of promise. And I saw it as it will be when He comes to stand, in resurrected glory, on the Mount of Olives. The darkness will be dispelled when the promised Messiah comes with healing in His wings. Knowing how much I need that healing, I feel my heart nearly burst with joy and love for Him at the thought of that light. I believe I will never see the dawning of a new day, as the sun banishes the darkness, without the sight triggering love in my heart for Him.

I would also like to thank you for the June 1991 issue on families. After reading it, I now have a good relationship with my mom. Before, we would fight all the time. You really care about the youth in the world.

I have also visited the valley of Adam-ondi-Ahman in western Missouri. I get the same vision of glory there. We’re told in prophecies that someday there’s going to be a very special meeting there. It will be presided over by Adam. He will ask for reports from all the dispensations. Then the Savior will appear, and Adam will turn over to him a kingdom for the millennium. But that will be a private meeting. Probably only a few select priesthood holders will know about it. But you sense the great impact of that area.

Even though my dad is not a member of the Church, I still pray at his house. When the lights go out and the doors are closed, I kneel down and pray. I am glad I can feel the Holy Ghost at my dad’s house.
Riley D., age 9, Alaska, USA

We’ve been told not to procrastinate:
our senses will disintegrate;
our joints we will not lubricate
doing only what we like.
But as I sit and meditate,
my muscles won’t cooperate;
working conditions they clearly hate.
I think they’ve gone on strike!