Gospel Story Finder

Carl B. Cook(51) A “Band of Brothers” who strengthen and help convert each other in Botswana bless countless lives through missionary service. Priesthood quorums rally around and bless young Carl B. Cook.

Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles once asked Elder Neal A. Maxwell (1926–2004) what lessons he had learned while suffering from leukemia. Elder Maxwell responded, “I have learned that not shrinking is more important than surviving.”4 Choosing not to shrink requires action even in the face of fear. But it invokes power beyond mortal capacity.

He also met his wife-to-be, Jill Featherstone, at BYU. She was teaching the Gospel Doctrine class in her student ward. Invited by his brother, Elder Taylor visited her class and met her. A romance blossomed, and they were married on April 30, 1987, in the Salt Lake Temple. They are the parents of seven children.
Sister Taylor is the only daughter out of seven children of Elder Vaughn J. Featherstone, emeritus General Authority, and Sister Merlene Featherstone. “They were just really accepting and kind,” Elder Taylor said of his in-laws. “I felt immediately loved.”

When I was baptized into the Church, I wasn’t baptized by my father; I was baptized by a priest. When I was a priest, I had the blessing to baptize my sister. And one of the great experiences I had as a father was when my son, who was a priest, ordained his brother to be a teacher.

Illustration by Laura Proietti
On Christmas Eve when I was 14, my extended family gathered at my grandma’s house to have a Christmas program and do a small gift exchange, just like we did every year. It was fun to be with my cousins and the rest of the family, but I couldn’t help but think about all the gifts that were waiting for me back at home. During all the festivities, I was anxious for Christmas Day to come—Christmas, after all, was about opening presents.
But before we could leave, we had one more tradition to take care of: “adopting” a family for Christmas. In the weeks leading up to Christmas, the adults found a family in the area that was in need of help, got gifts for the kids, and then someone in our family would go out and deliver everything to the family on Christmas Eve. I never participated much in this activity—sure, it seemed like a nice idea, but I never even knew the people we were delivering to.
After the festivities ended, we gathered the gifts and put them in my dad’s pickup. My dad even put on a Santa suit before leaving. There were a lot of gifts to take, so I got nominated to go with him. I was given an elf hat and became Santa’s not-so-eager helper.
But my attitude started to change on the drive over as my dad told me about the family. Their situation was heart-wrenching. Just a few weeks before, the dad had left them, so now the mom had to take care of the four kids on her own. As we drove up to the house, it was all dark. It was almost like I could feel the family’s hopelessness coming from the house.
We knocked on the door. That sad feeling went away as soon as the door opened and the kids saw who had come to visit. They shouted, “Santa’s here!”
I stepped into the house with the gifts and felt the Spirit so strongly that I almost started to cry. When I looked over at Dad, I could see he was holding back tears too. The kids were all running around saying things like, “This one has my name on it!” or “This one is for you, Mom!” As we passed out the gifts, I saw that the mom was crying tears of relieved joy. I got the sense she had told her kids that Santa wouldn’t be coming that year.
The kids and mom all hugged us and thanked us as we left. My dad and I rode back to my grandma’s house in complete silence, neither of us able to express with words what we had just felt and seen. It had been such a rare and beautiful experience, and we were both trying to savor the feeling.
On the drive home, I wasn’t worried about my own gifts anymore. I realized that what I had felt was just a small portion of the love Jesus Christ feels for us and that as we serve others, we can help them feel this love too.

One of the great East German leaders was Henry Burkhardt, who worked closely and was with President Monson for two decades at the scene of all the pivotal events in that country. Brother Burkhardt was a man who served so faithfully and at such great risk all those years behind the Iron Curtain as the Church’s representative to the government. He served, among other positions, as a Church leader and as president of the Freiberg Temple.
I asked him what stood out in his mind as the singular moment in President Monson’s ministry. I expected him to mention the meeting in Görlitz, the dedication of the country in 1975, the organization of the first stake, the dedication of the Freiberg Temple, or the meeting with Herr Honecker, East Germany’s highest Communist official, when President Monson asked permission for missionaries to enter the country and other missionaries to leave the country to serve in other lands. Given the death squads that patrolled the wall, the query sounded almost ludicrous, but Herr Honecker responded, “We have watched you all these years, and we trust you. Permission granted.” Which one of these events would Brother Burkhardt choose?
Tears began to flow down his cheeks as he responded: “It was December 2, 1979.” I couldn’t register in my mind a major event attached to that date. “Tell me about it,” I said.
“It was the day President Monson came to East Germany to give my wife, Inge, a blessing.” President Monson had a weekend without an assignment, and he flew from the United States to Germany for just that purpose. Sister Burkhardt had been in the hospital for nine weeks with complications from surgery, and her condition was deteriorating. President Monson had recorded in his journal, “We joined our faith and our prayers in providing her a blessing.”8 He had gone thousands of miles with his only free time in months—to the rescue.

Not all marital unhappiness stems from obvious bad habits. Some problems develop silently, almost imperceptibly, as we are involved in taxing schedules and multiple demands. Consider the couple who had spent all their married years in devotion to Church and children. The children were now grown and had left home; church callings were less demanding; and unexpectedly, they who had spent years helping others resolve difficulties, faced problems of their own. Preoccupied with serving their children, they had forgotten to serve each other. Quick to lavish affection on those about them, they had neglected sharing simple expressions of love and concern with one another. Now, in the time when they might enjoy the richness of their experiences together, they found their relationship strained. Each felt a sense of falling short which easily led to criticism and complaint. Their years of church activity, however, had taught them a better way. They had experienced the light of the gospel and longed for it now.
They found that by taking a fresh view of gospel principles, this time as a means of solving their own problems, they could relearn how to serve one another. They realized that expressing their affection in those mellowing years together brought a sweetness and satisfaction that was especially rewarding. They selected some projects on which they worked together around their home; they found meaningful church activity, prepared family records and histories, and learned how to preserve other valuable documents. Already, in the gospel, they had the principles they needed, and found them more than adequate as they brought them to bear on their own problems.

I love my current calling as Primary pianist. A few weeks ago the kids were practicing a song. I felt the Spirit as they sang:
Search, ponder, and pray
Are the things that I must do.
The Spirit will guide, and, deep inside,
I’ll know the scriptures are true.1
But a question also popped into my head. What if you don’t—as the first verse of the song suggests—“love to read the holy scriptures”? I guess the topic of reading has been on my mind lately because more than one friend has shared that they struggle with a reading disability. And many people I know simply don’t enjoy reading! Is there a way they can still have a meaningful experience with scriptures and develop “a testimony that they’re true”?
People seem to learn best when information is presented in lots of different ways, like both visually and verbally, and lessons are repeated over time. With that in mind, I tried to think of as many different ways of studying the scriptures as I could. Now, granted, not everything on this list would count as the thoughtful and in-depth scripture study prophets have taught is vital to our testimonies—some of these are just quick, fun ideas—but I figured they might at least prompt some fresh ideas of your own. Let’s give gospel study our best effort so that we can, as the song says, “come to understand” together!

When it comes to geography, 15-year-old James Wingate really knows where it’s at.

By identifying Prince Edward Island as Canada’s smallest province in land area, James, a teacher in the Rosedale Ward, Salt Lake Riverside Stake, earned an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., to compete in the National Geography Bee.

There contestants were quizzed on their knowledge of locations, weather patterns, and the cultural characteristics of nations. They also visited historical sites and national landmarks, and James was particularly excited to see the Washington Temple.

Now graduated from Northwest Intermediate School, James is a freshman at West High School and hopes to someday be a school teacher. “I’d like to teach geography,” he says. “But I’d like to teach other subjects, too.”

A patriarch received a call one afternoon from a concerned mother of a young daughter who was physically challenged from birth. This dear mother asked if her daughter could possibly receive a patriarchal blessing. The patriarch informed her that if her daughter could obtain a recommend from the bishop, he was sure that the Lord had a blessing for her. A short time later the patriarch was informed that the bishop had given this sweet young girl a recommend to receive a patriarchal blessing.
An appointment was made. The blessing was given and gratefully received. Her lineage was given. She received a blessing suited to her needs and unique situation. Lives, focus, and attitudes were changed. She was told that through her cheerful acceptance of the efforts and sacrifices of those who loved and cared for her, she would be blessing their lives, and to accept their offerings graciously and willingly.

When I first met Bert Braack in the early 1930s he was nearing the end of his search. He had taken the Bible admonition, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you” (Matt. 7:7), as his personal invitation to prayer, and it had brought him a challenging answer.
Bert’s mother died when he was nine, and his father, an atheist who wanted no part of religion, ran preachers off with a gun. The large family of children received no religious and little moral training. Drinking, smoking, and swearing were a way of life with them.
Yet as Bert grew to maturity and left home to make his way in the world, he says there was a deep craving within him. He wanted desperately to know if there was a God. And if so, what was that God like?
He began attending different churches and reading the Bible. The words in Matthew prompted him to ask for himself, and so, like the youthful Joseph Smith, with an intense desire to know the truth, he offered his first prayer: “If you are there, God, let me know and I will do what you want me to do.” And as he knelt, he says, “A great peace engulfed me, my heart burned within me, and a joy such as I had never known flowed over me. I felt as if I were completely immersed in a great spiritual essence.”
For three days this feeling remained with him, and during all that time, he says, “I hardly felt my feet touch the ground. The pure love of God seemed to completely encompass me, and it was wonderful. During this time I loved everything. I had never cared much for children, but now a great love flowed out from me toward them. I had cursed the rain; now, drenched in it, I loved every minute of it. If this is a small taste of the love of God that fills the celestial kingdom, no wonder the lamb and the lion can lie down together and there is nothing to hurt or make afraid.”
After three days this great joy left him, and he felt he had lost the most precious thing in the world. In great agony of soul he prayed to God to restore it, but he was left on his own. Only now there was a great difference—he knew there was a God. He knew God was real, for he had felt his love and power. He knew God would answer sincere prayer, for his prayer had been answered.
Then came a time of soul-searching. He had made God a promise. He would keep it. He would do what God wanted him to do—if only he could find out what it was. Determined to put his life in harmony with the truth, he first felt God would want him to change his life, so he quit smoking and drinking and tried to overcome other faults.
Then, surely God would want him to learn the truth. He began to study the Bible. Later he read the Koran, works on Buddha, Confucius, and other religious philosophers. The religion shelves at the public library became his schoolroom. He could not rest until he gained knowledge of the truth.
“The local protestant minister was a sincere man who wanted to baptize me,” Bert recalls, “but I gave him a strange answer. I told him that it would do no good for him to baptize me because he didn’t have the authority. I don’t know why I felt this way, but I knew it was true.”
At this point Bert arranged to move to Raymond, Washington, where he remembered seeing many churches. There he began questioning the ministers. “What is God like? Describe him to me. If I met him walking down the street would he be a man? Is he six feet tall, or more?”
The answers were not satisfying. He was told he could not meet God, that God couldn’t walk, that he was not any size but was something that filled the universe.
One day he noticed a small tract at his sister’s home called Rays of Living Light. He read it excitedly and asked his sister where it came from. “If you had been out on the desert for days, dying of thirst, and someone gave you a drink of clear, cold water, you would feel as I did when I read that tract,” he says. “I knew it was the truth. It was as if I were dying of thirst for the truth, and now I had received a small cup of it. I wanted more.”
Bert’s sister told him that her doctor, who was something called a “branch president” in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, had given it to her. She thought they were called “Mormons,” too.
Soon Bert had some well-marked tracts, a Book of Mormon, and an invitation to attend church. It was at the doctor’s office I first met my husband, Bert Braack. I next saw him in church. He attended all the meetings. His searching questions kept the members busy studying for the answers.
At last he had found someone who could explain God to him. Joseph Smith’s description of God and Jesus rang true. He could understand a God with a real, tangible body—a God who could walk and talk, one he could meet face to face and who could love with the great love he had felt once before. After a long search, he knew he had found the church with authority to baptize him, and since his immersion one autumn day in the cold Willapa River, his testimony has never faltered.

On a windy Sunday morning the doors of our chicken shed blew open while we were at church. All nine of our chickens escaped. When we got home, we found three chickens in the garden and five in our yard. But we couldn’t find Ginger though we looked and looked. That night there was a terrible storm with wind, rain, and lightning. We were all worried that Ginger would not survive. All of us prayed that she would be safe.
The next morning a delivery man came to the front door with a package. When Mom opened the door, Ginger walked right into the house. I learned that if you need help, you can pray. Heavenly Father will answer your prayer, even if it is a small prayer for a pet chicken.Dallin P., age 9, Utah

Some of those calls may seem unimportant, but my life, and my family, was changed for the better by my accepting a call to teach a deacons quorum. I felt the love of those deacons for the Savior and His love for them.

I had a similar experience in Idaho some years later. I was attending a stake conference. After the Sunday morning session one of the bishops brought his aged mother up to see me. I had been referring to the Book of Mormon during my sermon and was still holding it in my hand.
She took the book from me, opened it, read a paragraph at random, and then returned the book. I wondered why. Then she said that at the previous stake conference the visitor had been Elder Thomas E. McKay, one of the Assistants to the Council of the Twelve.
She asked me if I knew Elder McKay and of course, I responded that I did. Then she said, “Will you please tell him that I read a paragraph in your book? When he was here at our last conference, my son brought him to my home and had him administer to me. I was blind. Please tell him that I read from your book.”

After one of our lengthy temple meetings, when I had been a member of the Twelve for only a short time, President Kimball took hold of my arm and said, “Will you wait just a few minutes? I want to talk to you.” Of course I waited. When we were alone he said, “I don’t want the First Presidency or the other members of the Twelve to know, but I don’t feel very good today. Will you please give me a blessing?”
This thought came to my mind immediately: “Here am I, the least and last to be ordained, and he is asking me to give him a blessing.”
I was very nervous; I do not remember all that I said, but I shall never forget how pleased I was that he thought enough of me to ask for my assistance. He was asking the newest member to give him a blessing when he could have asked any of the First Presidency or other Apostles.
Why do I love this great man? In his hour of need he was exhibiting love for and confidence in me. He has learned the art of making people feel good about themselves. By his actions we know he loves us. “But whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant.” (Matt. 20:26–27.)

We thank Thee for the great faith of our people who were driven from Nauvoo and who, with great suffering, including the death of many, crossed Iowa to establish Winter Quarters and subsequently undertook the long march which carried them from Winter Quarters to this valley of the Great Salt Lake.

We thank Thee for the inspired leadership of President Brigham Young, who, having never previously seen this valley, except in vision, led our people here. He knew very little about the area. He was not familiar with the soil or the climate, the water or other features. In this desert place those pioneers plowed and planted, irrigated, cultivated, and harvested the fruits of their labors. They laid out a city, which has now become large with many hundreds of thousands of inhabitants.

As a young man, President Gordon B. Hinckley rode trains that hurtled through narrow mountain passes at night. It helped him understand how the light of faith can guide us through dark times of discouragement.
Long ago I worked for one of the railroads whose tracks threaded the passes through these western mountains. I frequently rode the trains. It was in the days when there were steam locomotives. Those great monsters of the rails were huge and fast and dangerous. I often wondered how the engineer dared the long journey through the night. Then I came to realize that it was not one long journey, but rather a constant continuation of a short journey. The engine had a powerful headlight that made bright the way for a distance of 400 or 500 yards (350 to 450 m). The engineer saw only that distance, and that was enough, because it was constantly before him all through the night into the dawn of the new day.

My dear penpal who lives in Ogden, Utah, gave me a year’s subscription to the New Era for my birthday. That was the most wonderful present I’ve ever had. The New Era is a very valuable magazine. When I read it, I realize that English-speaking members are doing the same things we’re doing, feeling the same spirit we’re feeling, and teaching the same principles of the gospel we’re teaching. This recognition strengthens my testimony that this is the true gospel of Jesus Christ. Whether in English or in Japanese, the testimony we bear is just the same. God certainly lives. Kami wa masani ikitamo.

Illustrations by Katie McDee
Ooh! This looks good. Can I check this one out, Mamãe?
Sure!
How’s your book?
I thought I would like it, but I didn’t feel good when I was reading it. There were some bad parts, so I decided to stop.
I think that was the Holy Ghost! He was helping you know that it wasn’t good to read.
I’m proud of you for acting on your feelings. We can get a new book next week, OK?
OK. Thanks, Mamãe.

Sister Leonora de Contreras, a Relief Society president, said she knew the gospel was true. She expressed thanks for her husband, who holds the priesthood and is a pillar of strength. The catastrophe destroyed the fruits of their lifetime of labor in less than thirty minutes. She recalled the words of their son who is serving in the Peru Trujillo Mission. As he left home, he said to her, “Mami, whatever happens, if you need help, ask the Lord, and stay close to the Brethren.” She expressed appreciation to stake leaders for their assistance.