Gospel Story Finder

I received a similar letter from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, from a woman who said: “At the age of 19, I sat next to a sweet grandmother in Relief Society and learned to knit. She also was learning to knit. Over the years, I learned of bread making, of strength and perseverance. I learned that my toddler was just being a normal two-year-old, and I learned of a Heavenly Father who loves me. I learned to teach, to hug, to lead, and to follow.”

“L?ook!” Sasha whispered. “Another squirrel.” He was having fun exploring the Sochi Arboretum. The giant park had all kinds of beautiful flowers and trees. Back home, in central Russia, it was still snowy and freezing cold. But here in Sochi, the sun was shining, and the air smelled like spring.
Sasha watched the squirrel nibble on a nut. It still had its thick winter coat, but Sasha guessed it was as excited for spring as he was. He grinned as the squirrel scurried up a tree.
Just then Mama’s phone rang. “Hello?” Mama said. She paused. “But I thought our tickets were for tomorrow! It’s today?” Soon she hung up the phone.
“Sasha! We have to go now. Our tour of the Skypark is this morning, and the bus is leaving in 15 minutes!”
“Can we get to the bus stop that soon?” Sasha asked.
“I hope so. Let’s pray in our hearts and do our best.” Mama took his hand, and they started to run.
The Sochi Arboretum was big. Sasha wasn’t sure they could find the way out! But he said a prayer in his heart. Please help us get to the bus stop in time. We’d really like to go to the Skypark.
The Skypark was an adventure park high up in the mountains. It had giant swings, climbing walls, ziplines, and a ropes course. It also had the Skybridge—a super-long bridge hanging high up in the sky. Sasha hoped they would get there in time.
Finally they found the main road and looked for a taxi. They saw one right away! They hopped in and Mama told the driver the name of the bus stop.
“You’re lucky!” the driver said. “I know a shortcut.”
Sasha stared out the window as they sped past the trees.
“Do you think we’ll make it?” Sasha asked Mama.
Mama looked at her watch. “I don’t know. But we prayed. And even if we don’t make it, that’s OK. We’re on an adventure!”
Soon they were at the bus stop. The bus wasn’t even there yet! It was late.
Mama and Sasha were still breathing hard, but Sasha smiled. “That driver was right! We are lucky.”
“I don’t think it was just luck, dear,” Mama said. “Sometimes we have little miracles that remind us how much Heavenly Father loves us.”
Just then, the bus pulled up. Mama and Sasha climbed on and headed off to the Skypark. Sasha was grateful tor this little miracle!
This story took place in Russia.

Another example of the power of selfless love is the experience of my friends Thales and Charone Smith, recently returned from a humanitarian mission in Albania. He a pediatrician and she a nurse, they were the Church’s first missionaries there. They went about this work as they had through forty-six years as partners in marriage. Each found ample opportunity to use their individual attributes. Thales worked as a clinical instructor in a pediatric hospital that served a wide range of services for children. Charone was assigned to a dystrophy hospital, where eighty children from infancy to two or three years of age were treated for nutritional deficiencies and other severe problems. Because the hospital served a wide radius, mothers and fathers could seldom visit. Some children were abandoned there because of the poverty and desperate circumstances of their parents. When Charone arrived, the tiny patients were apathetic and unresponsive. Most were swaddled so that they lay in their beds listlessly. She observed that the doctors and nurses were professional and did well to keep the children fed and clean, but that was all done on a strict schedule. Demonstrativeness and individual caring were completely lacking. Charone was assigned to the care of ten children. She began singing and talking to them as she worked. At first they didn’t even look at her. She held them during their feedings instead of propping their bottles, and she commented to them about each other. Within two weeks, they were looking at her and following her gestures with their eyes. After six weeks, the changes could be seen by anyone. The children had begun to smile, they gained weight, and their personalities began to emerge. Charone exercised their limbs and gave them practice sitting up. Her charges progressed so well that the doctors modified her schedule so that she and others could nurture all eighty children. Although the little patients still faced difficulties, by the time Charone left, all were thriving as individuals. Love is not just good, it is essential to life.

Just as in graphic design, sometimes in life a visual, tangible pattern replaces a mental one. We often learn from the service of others. I still remember the first time as ward executive secretary that I couldn’t completely fill the bishop’s interview schedule. The bishop, however, reminded me that the Lord was in charge and He knew who needed to see the bishop that day—even if we didn’t. And sure enough, every time we had this “problem,” the phone would ring or someone would stop in to ask if the bishop had any time. And because of his inspired leadership, he did have time.

“Remember the year Dad wanted our photo taken in the mountains? He thought a background of snow and pine trees would be perfect.”
I remembered. The day we headed to the mountains, a full-scale blizzard was blowing in. The temperature was about 12 degrees, and our car slid off the road on the way home. If you look closely at the photo from that year, you can see the blue tinge to our lips, as we shivered in front of the camera.
“The year we almost died for the Christmas photo,” Lucy recalled glumly.

Shortly after I joined the Church, a Relief Society leader was joking about funny situations. Suddenly she started joking about me in front of everybody. I felt uncomfortable and let myself be offended.
My first thought was not to return to the ward. I opened my scriptures, trying to find comfort. As I read, I came across a verse where Jesus asked those offended by His teachings, “Will ye also go away?” (John 6:67).
Immediately, I answered in mind, “No, I will not go away!”
I called the Relief Society president, who recommended that I call the sister who had joked about me. I called her and expressed my feelings. We concluded that a sense of humor is great but that we shouldn’t joke about someone we don’t know in front of a group of people. We also talked about being sensitive to new ward members.
I continued attending that ward while I lived in that city. I had many wonderful experiences following my conversion to the gospel.

Following his RAF service, Elder Kearon’s father went to work as a defense contractor in Saudi Arabia. Patrick, as a seven-year-old boy, learned an important lesson there in obedience, memorably recounted in his first general conference talk as a General Authority. Ignoring his parents’ instructions to wear shoes during a desert camping trip, he went exploring in “flip-flops” and suffered a scorpion sting in the arch of his foot.

Annie Clark Tanner wrote this about her mother’s needlework: “Mother was an accomplished artist at needle work. Her industry in this line, as she plied her needle when crossing the ocean in a sailboat, attracted the attention of the captain and his wife for whom my mother sewed, and thus she enjoyed the best accomodations on board. When she was traveling across the plains to the Salt Lake Valley, she made yards of fine muslin embroidery with which she trimmed her first baby clothes. I noticed a small mark of yellow on the embroidery and asked her what it was.
“‘That mark,’ she said, ‘is a little iron rust from a wire on the bow of the wagon where I tied my work when crossing the plains.’”

Juliana was a little bit scared to give a talk in Primary.
Grandma gave Juliana a hug. “Heavenly Father will help you,” she whispered.
When it was her turn, Juliana saw her friends, her teacher, and Grandma and Grandpa all smiling at her. Then she gave her talk.
“I am a child of God. I show that I love Heavenly Father by learning about Jesus, saying my prayers, and helping my family. I know that Heavenly Father and Jesus love me too. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”
After Primary, Juliana gave Grandma a big hug. “I wasn’t scared,” she said. “I knew that Heavenly Father was helping me.”

As most of you are aware, I am a convert to the Church, having been baptized in Tokyo, Japan, back in 1952 while serving in the U.S. Navy during the Korean conflict. I was born and reared in Missouri, where much of the early history of this church took place. But I had never heard anything about the Mormon church. I was looking for the truth, and although I had read the Bible and believed that Jesus Christ had lived on the earth and had been resurrected, yet I had so many unanswered questions—questions such as: Why doesn’t God speak to man today as he did anciently when the Bible was being written? How can Jesus be his own father and the Holy Ghost too? Why did Jesus have to be baptized when he had no sin? Where was I before I was born, and where do I go when I die? How can just believing in Christ save me when I haven’t kept God’s Ten Commandments?

I knew there must be answers that I had not heard. The answers came when Elders Ted Raban and Ronald Flygare knocked on my door in San Diego, California, in July 1951. My wife, Connie, let them in and accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon from them. I was in Hawaii at the time, attending a fourteen-week training course preparatory to deployment to Korea.

When I returned home, Connie gave me a copy of the Book of Mormon, and I began to read. I knew the book was true before I had finished 2 Nephi—Nephi had converted one more—and began to attend church in the old Valencia Park Ward in San Diego. Because of my preparation for deployment, I was not able to study and attend church as I wanted to and longed for the time when I could. The time came aboard the aircraft carrier Philippine Seas, where I read fourteen of the best books that have ever been written. They included the standard works of the Church, plus the writings of each of the Presidents of the Church from Joseph Smith, Jr., to David O. McKay, plus Parley P. and Orson Pratt and a few others. I was like a starving man who had found food and drink for the first time. I loved it. When we arrived in Japan, the LDS group aboard ship decided I should be baptized. So we traveled to the Tokyo mission home, where I requested baptism. I was informed that I had not been an investigator for the required one-year time period; therefore, I could not be baptized. However, I persisted. I asked to be interviewed. The interview took an hour and a half, but in the end I received a recommend for baptism and confirmation. McDonald B. Johnson, the LDS group leader on the Philippine Seas, baptized me, and Fred Gaylord Peterson confirmed me, and I became a member of the Church on February 26, 1952. I was ordained a deacon that day and subsequently to another office in the priesthood each time the ship returned to Japan, until on July 26, 1952, I was ordained an elder and returned to San Diego in August, where my wife had been baptized on March 1 of that same year. We were a united family in the gospel of Jesus Christ and were looking forward with much anticipation to being sealed together with our three children in the Mesa Arizona Temple, which happened in May 1953.

One of my most joyous memories began during the summer of 1981. We had walked the city streets all morning talking to businessmen about the Church. By noon we were hot and tired and ready to take a break. We decided to walk through a nearby park, and as we did so, we could see off to the side a group of young people. We decided to see if they would listen to our message.
As we approached, they looked at us with some suspicion. We told them we were missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They laughed a little and made a few mocking comments. It seemed obvious that they didn’t want to listen to us. But there was one young man in the group who looked at us with a sincere interest. So we focused our attention on him. He had a guitar. We asked, “Would you play something for us?” He smiled, lifted his guitar, and began to play.
When he finished, we told him more about ourselves and our message. He told us his name was Jose Manuel. We talked for a few more minutes and then ended the conversation by asking if we could talk to him another day about our church. He replied he would be glad to listen to us and that we could find him in the park most every day taking his dog for a walk or playing his guitar.
As we left, we couldn’t imagine this young man ever being baptized. A few days later we were in that same area. To our pleasant surprise, there he was. We asked if he would listen to us. He consented, and we pulled two park benches together, and my companion and I sat on one and he sat on the other. We looked into Jose Manuel’s eyes and told him about Jesus Christ. Near the end of our message we told him about the Book of Mormon and that Jesus Christ had visited America after his resurrection. We challenged him to read about this great event. He said he would. We left the book, yet we had our doubts if Jose Manuel would ever even open it.
A few more days went by, and we decided to see how he had done on his reading assignment. To our surprise, he told us that he had read the part in the Book of Mormon that we had assigned him. He explained that he had told his friend about what he’d read. His friend also wanted to read the book, so Jose Manuel had given it to him. He asked us if he could possibly get another copy. We told him that we could probably work something out.
After that we continued to teach him the gospel. We saw him change his appearance and his heart. He wanted to be baptized.
Nearly three years have passed since we first met Jose Manuel in that park in Madrid, Spain. He is now a member of the Church. A few months ago he, like you and me, had a decision to make. He had to decide whether or not to serve a mission. Jose Manuel had every reason in the world not to go. He was just a recent convert. His knowledge of the gospel wasn’t that extensive. He had lost his father a few years before, and his mother didn’t want him to go. Other family members didn’t want him to go either. He didn’t have the finances to be able to serve for 18 months. He also had to complete his military service before he would be able to even think about serving a mission. Everything was against his going on a mission.
Every one of us, as we think about a mission, can find a number of reasons why we shouldn’t go. We must each look beyond those reasons. The key is to look for reasons to go. And Jose Manuel had some reasons to go. He knew that Jesus Christ was the son of God and the Savior of the world. He knew that Joseph Smith had seen a vision. He knew that the Church was true. He knew that it had changed his life, and he wanted to go out and share that knowledge with others.
Jose Manuel had a desire to serve. He was called to the work. With the help of the Lord, he was able to work things out. That always seems to happen. He overcame the obstacles, and he’s now serving in the Spain Barcelona Mission.
We’re all faced with different obstacles that sometimes make serving missions seem difficult. In my dad’s case, his father was ill. Jose Manuel’s family didn’t want him to go. I wondered about my basketball future. Many of the obstacles we face are those within our own minds. For just a minute I want to talk directly to you—just you. You who might say, “I have this girl friend”; or, “I’ve got a good job and a car”; or, “I’ve never been good at schoolwork, and I know I could never memorize scriptures and all those discussions”; or, “I can’t talk to people who I don’t even know”; or, “I couldn’t be obedient to all the rules missionaries follow”; or, “I don’t really know the Church is true, so how could I tell others about it?”
To those who have such thoughts and feelings: if you don’t now have a testimony, you can gain one on a mission. Your girl friend will be all right. You can learn the scriptures and discussions well enough to be effective. You’ll have the courage you need to talk to strangers. You can be obedient. You can do it.
Some of you may be fearful about your ability because to this point in your life you have struggled. Perhaps you’ve not been academically gifted or socially prominent. I agree that being socially graceful, well educated, experienced in leadership, and able to speak well are useful talents for doing missionary work. But there is something beyond these which can give a missionary his real power.
I was told recently of two missionary companions—one had many outward talents, the other didn’t. They had received a letter from a man and his family to whom they had taught several discussions. The letter told the elders to come by and pick up the Book of Mormon because the family had decided they were not interested in continuing the discussions.
The more outwardly talented elder felt confident that by using all his social skills and all his learning he would be able to change the man’s mind. During the meeting he used every persuasive skill he could think of. The other elder listened. Finally the man agreed to continue the discussions.
Later, at the family’s baptism, the talented elder remembered the night with some degree of pride. After the baptism the man told him, “The night I changed my mind and continued to have you teach me was the most important night of my life. As you talked to me, my mind was so determined to not listen that there was nothing you could have said that would have caused me to continue. But then I looked at your companion. His eyes were focused on me. I saw in his face more love than I’d ever known before. My heart felt a spirit that made it so I could not resist his silent message. I decided then that if this church could cause someone to love like that, then I wanted to be part of it.”
Outward social and educational talents help, but more needed than these are the inward talents of love and faith and testimony. In these talents we can all be equal.
If your health will allow, make yourself worthy to serve. Push aside the obstacles and go.

Work was also progressing on a model Samoan village to commemorate President McKay’s 1921 visit and his apostolic blessing on Sauniatu. A special chief’s house was built and named the McKay house. After it was built, it seemed bare, and so the young people went to the forests and cut teak logs. Getting each log was a big project. After finding a good tree in the forest, they had to cut it. Then each one had to be trimmed and winched onto a trailer and taken to a sawmill. After the log was sawn, a native craftsman began carving a Samoan folk legend on it. It took many months to get the log and make the carvings. The money to pay for the first few carvings had been donated by Sauniatu missionaries or others who were impressed with the vitality of the people at Sauniatu, but the young people earned the money to pay for most of the 20 carvings. They transplanted a special river grass to the swampy areas of land. By hand, they put starts of this pasture grass in acre after acre of the swampy land, and in return they were paid in cattle, which they sold to pay for the carvings.
When the carvings were completed, Brother Kamauoha asked the carver to do a bust of President McKay. The pictures that he gave the carver to work from were all of President McKay in his later years. When Brother Kamauoha went back to pick up the bust, the carver was frustrated and related the following story.
“Ed, I am going to tell you something. This is the first time in my life that I haven’t been able to carve what I wanted to carve. Normally, I can do anything, but somehow when I worked on this man, I couldn’t control my hands. As you can see, the carving is not like your finished pictures.”
Brother Kamauoha took the carving back to Sauniatu that evening. “The sun was just setting, and I hurried into the McKay house and put the carving on the pedestal we had prepared for it,” he said. “An old Samoan who had lived most of his life at Sauniatu was there, and I asked him how he liked the bust of President McKay. I stood back and looked at it, and this old man didn’t answer me. And so I turned around and asked him, ‘What is wrong? Don’t you like the carving?’ Then as I looked at him, I could see the tears running down his face. And he said to me, ‘You know, I was here when [President] McKay left his blessing. That is how he looked when he came here in 1921!’
“On another occasion, the carver told me, and remember he was not a Mormon, ‘Ed,’ he said, ‘with all sincerity I am telling you, this carving is not my work, it is not your work, but it is the Lord’s work’.”

In 1991 we moved into a small branch. Several months before our youngest son’s eighth birthday, my wife, the Primary president, asked him who he wanted to perform his baptism. Of course he wanted his father to perform the ordinance. My wife told him that probably was not going to happen. He did not accept that answer and set about the task of activating his father. He was quite relentless, and in short order I found myself serving as the Scoutmaster, and I later baptized and confirmed my son.

A few years ago while I was president of the Southern States Mission, I delivered a sermon one night in Quitman, Georgia, on the eternal duration of the marriage covenant and the family unit. I read from Brother Rulon S. Howells’ book Do Men Believe What Their Church Prescribes? (Deseret Book Co., 1932.) He has a chart there where he lists all the major churches and then their statement and attitude toward the major doctrinal principles, including this one about the eternal duration of the marriage covenant, and not one believes this.

At the close of that meeting, I stood at the door to shake hands with the people as they left, and a man came up and introduced himself to me as a Baptist minister. I said, “Did I misquote you here tonight?” “No, Mr. Richards,” he said; “it is just like you say. We don’t all believe all the things that our churches teach.” And I said, “And you don’t believe them either. Why don’t you go back and teach your people the truth? They will take it from you and they are not ready to take it from the Mormon elders yet.” He said, “I’ll see you again,” and that is all I could get from him that night.

The next time I went to that branch to hold a conference, about four months later, my coming was announced in the newspaper because I was the mission president. As I walked up to that little church, there stood that Baptist minister waiting for me. As we shook hands I said, “I would certainly be interested to know what you thought of my last sermon here.” He said, “Mr. Richards, I have been thinking about it ever since. I believe every word you said.” Then he said, “But I would like to hear the rest of it.” How could any man who has a true love for his wife and his children not want to believe that principle?

One day when I was in fifth grade, my best friend and I went downtown. Afterward, we stopped at a convenience store. A man came to a window of the van and asked my friend’s mom for money to catch the bus that was leaving soon. She handed him the money and smiled.
While this was happening, I spotted a poor, lonely man watching us. He came up after the first man had left and asked for money because he was hungry. My friend’s mom turned around, looked at both of us girls, and took some food from our snack boxes. She handed it to the man.
He looked at her, puzzled and amused. She said, “Have a nice day,” to him, and we started back home. We asked her why she hadn’t just given him money, too. She said, “I think he just would have gone and bought beer or cigarettes, and I know he’s better off eating carrots and juice.”
This experience made me realize how much love she had for these two men.
My friend’s mom has passed away and is with Heavenly Father now, but this story lives in my heart and mind forever. I want to be just like her and Jesus Christ and love other people and serve Heavenly Father.

During the summer, I did odd jobs to earn money. That summer I was working as a service station attendant. A man who worked there was a member of the Church, and he invited me to attend MIA (Mutual). At first I hesitated, but he persisted, and I finally gave in. The warmth and friendliness of the members and missionaries impressed me, but again the music influenced me most. Their hymns sounded different from any I had ever heard.

When I first started reading the Book of Mormon, it seemed strange to me. The only name in the book that was familiar to me was the name of one of Nephi’s brothers—Sam! That was my name! But there was a force that drew me to the Book of Mormon. I felt that if I were to become a member of the Church, my life would become much more meaningful.

When I told my older brother that I would like to be baptized, he said, “That would be fine. But if you become a member, you must be a lifetime member. You must commit yourself and be loyal.” I was baptized when I was sixteen.

After high school, I was in the military, and I had the opportunity to have an interview with Elder Harold B. Lee, who was then an Apostle and who later became President of the Church. It was a very precious time for me. For an hour he counseled me to go on a mission, to go to the house of the Lord, and to sustain the leaders of the Church. This same advice applies to every member of the Church.

I never forgot Elder Lee’s advice. I came to Salt Lake City, Utah, on furlough and went to the Salt Lake Temple. After I left the military and went to college, I saved money for a mission. During my mission, I was able to open the Okinawa area, where my father was from, for missionary work. Later, serving as president of the Tokyo Temple, I had the wonderful blessing of seeing many of the Japanese Saints receive their temple endowments. Seeing the joy in the faces of those being sealed was a great blessing.

Take advantage of companionship inventory. You have time set aside once a week where you and your companion can talk openly and lovingly about your companionship. This is not a time to nitpick your companion’s personality or habits, but rather a time to lovingly identify things you can work on together to improve your companionship with the goal of becoming better missionaries. For example, one time my companion pointed out that I was complaining frequently. I hadn’t noticed, but once she helped me recognize that, I was able to make an effort to be more positive, and our work improved.

Their first stop in India was Edwin’s brother’s house. Edwin’s parents and siblings were there too. Right away, Edwin and Elsie started teaching them. Their family was happy to learn about the gospel.
A few weeks later, Edwin and his family gathered around the swimming pool in his brother’s yard. The pool had been cleaned, painted, and filled with fresh water. Everyone was wearing white. The women wore flowing saris that draped over their shoulders. The men wore loose Indian-style jackets and trousers.
Edwin stood in the pool with his father. “Samuel David,” Edwin said, “having been commissioned of Jesus Christ, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
Edwin felt happy as he baptized his father. He felt even happier when he baptized his mom next. By the end of the day, Edwin had baptized 18 people!
The next day, Edwin and Elsie rode a train for six hours. They visited more family members and taught them about the gospel. Edwin baptized four more of his relatives in a nearby river.
When Edwin and Elsie finished their mission, there were enough new members to start one of the first branches of the Church in India! Edwin and Elsie were happy when they returned to Samoa. They were grateful Heavenly Father had sent them on a mission!

One of the first lessons elders and sisters learn at the England MTC might surprise you. The mission president’s wife, Sister Carol Sperry, talks about peeling oranges.

“It’s a lesson I learned from my father-in-law,” she says. “When my husband and I were first engaged, he wanted to get better acquainted with me. ‘Let’s go peel an orange together,’ he said.” It wasn’t the orange that was important, it was the time spent listening to each other. It became a tradition in the Sperry household, and now it’s a tradition at the MTC.

“I talk about getting along with companions,” Sister Sperry says. “I tell them sometimes you need to work out your concerns. Peeling an orange together is a way of saying I care, I want to know what you’re feeling.”

It’s also a principle that works with investigators. “Of course you want to teach them, and the discussions present the gospel in an orderly way,” Sister Sperry advises. “But there are times when you need to just peel an orange together, too.”

The lesson is well remembered. “I receive lots of letters saying, ‘I’m still peeling oranges,’” Sister Sperry notes.

Let me tell you of some young people I know who have tried to provide for their missions, to whom you might provide additional help. A mother approached a mission president with this plea: “Could I get my son on a mission somehow? He’s my only hope! Unfortunately, his father is unable to provide well for the family. We have eight children. Our income is very meager. We eat only two meals a day. But this is a good boy. He wants to serve a mission. If we are very, very careful, we can provide a few pesos per month. Isn’t there some way he could serve a mission?”
Another young man lived on the outskirts of a large metropolitan area. There were no lights or water in the thin-walled, modest structure that served both as a home and a small shop. After his family’s conversion he attended seminary and developed an insatiable desire to learn. With great effort he entered the university, working part-time to buy books as well as to help support the family. When the desire to go on a mission became overwhelming, he had to double his efforts to save money for his mission. So he carried his books under one arm and his bag of wash rags, wax, and sponges in the other. Between classes he would go out and wash cars, then return for another class. The Lord blessed him with work. He multiplied his income until his leaders felt he had made the necessary sacrifice to help sustain himself.
There are scores of others, each one a lesson to all in the principle of obedience and sacrifice. A young lady with a great desire to fill a mission was counseled to buy ingredients, make cookies, and sell them at school during lunchtime. She did so. Then she bought more flour, baked more cookies, and continued this process for weeks, making a small amount of money each day to help toward her mission.
Are there not thousands of you listening today who are ready to match these two precious years of a young man’s life with sufficient additional funds from your abundance so that he can have the privilege of service? In this way, could you not become “nursing fathers and mothers” to these children of promise?
I call this matter to your attention for two reasons: First, time is of the essence! We need to get moving with the things of real import. The world must hear the gospel. Paul asks: “How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they be sent?” (Rom. 10:14–15.) And I ask, how shall they be sent today without sufficient means?
The second reason is the Lord counsels rather specifically about the wise use of property. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matt. 6:33.)
Jacob counsels:
“Think of your brethren like unto yourselves, and be familiar with all and free with your substance, that they may be rich like unto you.
“But before ye seek for riches, seek ye for the kingdom of God.
“And after ye have obtained a hope in Christ ye shall obtain riches … to clothe the naked, and to feed the hungry, and to liberate the captive, and administer relief to the sick and the afflicted.” (Jacob 2:17–19.)
How blessed we would be if we could pattern our conduct after the Nephites described by Alma:
“And thus, in their prosperous circumstances, they did not send away any who were naked, or that were hungry, or that were athirst, or that were sick, or that had not been nourished; and they did not set their hearts upon riches; therefore they were liberal to all, both old and young, both bond and free, both male and female, whether out of the church or in the church.” (Alma 1:30.)
In our day the Lord has warned us sternly, “And again, I command thee that thou shalt not covet thine own property, but impart it freely.” (D&C 19:26, italics added.)
My brethren, we have been too casual about these matters in the past. There is work to do. We need your help to do it. The word is urgency and the time is now. Many of you have the power to open doors of opportunity for the service of others. May you see this opportunity as a means to wisely use the property with which the Lord has blessed you to help His work and to save your souls. I know many of you already contribute. I know He will keep His promises to you if you will keep your promises to serve. I testify that God lives. Jesus is the Christ. This is His church. This is His earth—and all things in it. We are but stewards over His goods. May we delight to share them, and may we realize the promise that “he who doeth the works of righteousness shall receive his reward, even peace in this world, and eternal life in the world to come.” (D&C 59:23.) In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.