Gospel Story Finder

The state of New Mexico has a dot-to-dot line called Highway 66. This line comes across the state boundary near the northeastern corner and connects dots Gallup, Bluewater, Grants, and Albuquerque. Although Bluewater is the smallest of these dots, to me it is the most important. Here I was born and raised. It was my world. Here I learned many lessons, not the least of which was one taught by the episode of the “gentile cow.”
In Bluewater, nature is not a soft, sweet, green Mother who gives of her bounty. Here she is a rugged individual who demands the utmost of man’s endeavor for the yield she lets him have. She does have a strong beauty here, however. Mt. Taylor stands to the east and the range of Rocky Mountains to the west. North, toward Gallup, are red sandstone bluffs and black jagged malpais (volcanic ridges). Much of the level valley floor is covered with red soil. When it is dry, which is nearly always, this sandy loam is sifted around fence posts in miniature mountains by the ever-present wind. It used to be a delightful experience to walk barefooted through the sand, but the Russian thistles that thrive here made walking pleasant only for the wary. It was a status symbol to have feet tough enough to walk barefoot over thistles.
An arroya (deep gully) begins from the northwest hills and zig-zags diagonally across the valley. This arroya is usually dry, but in rainy seasons it holds a red, raging torrent. Near the head of the arroya where there is a runoff from the hills, some cottonwood trees have managed to send their roots down deep enough to be sustained by underground water. They are so firmly situated that they are not affected by wind or drought. As a child I had hoped my testimony of the gospel would become as deep-rooted and as unbendable as those cottonwood trees.
Bluewater was really a community divided between the Mormons and the gentiles. Northward lived the rich (we thought) gentiles. They owned the General Merchandise Store and the garage with a gas pump. There also was a small Union Pacific Depot and the United States Post Office. Southward, the Mormons had a little concrete church house and a red brick, four-room schoolhouse. There was not much socializing between the groups. The Mormons went up to the store to get produce and to fill their gas tanks at the garage and get their mail at the Post Office. Few trains ever stopped at the depot, so few people went there. The gentile children came down to school, and the gentile adults came occasionally to Church socials or dances.
During the depression of the 1930s, we lived mostly on potatoes and pinto beans. The ultimatum was, “If you don’t raise it, you don’t eat it.” Momma could make potatoes and beans taste like gourmet food, but she couldn’t make them into milk for the children. In this little town there were no telephones, sidewalks, electric lights, or paved streets—and no dairies. There wasn’t even any money to buy canned milk. A milking cow was a necessity for a family. Our cows were all dry. My parents worried about their eight children. As the oldest child, I worried too.
One day as I helped Momma with the dishes, I asked, “Are we going to starve?” She countered, “We haven’t starved yet, have we?” I knew we hadn’t starved, but we had hungered for variety, and now we needed milk. She continued as much for herself as for me: “So long as we pay our tithing, I can’t think the Lord will let us starve. He has always looked after us.” I knew this was true, and I knew that my parents always paid an honest and cheerful tithe on every cent they received. Every tenth calf went for tithing. I saw Momma write on the calendar each night the number of eggs she had gathered that day, and each month a tenth went to the Lord. I was reassured. Besides, it was spring and new crops were being planted.
One day not long after this, I hurried home from the school bus. As I came up the path to the house, I saw my two little brothers and my sister looking at something by the gate. It was a smoldering cigar butt. I could not think how a fat cigar butt could have gotten inside our gate. The only smoking Mormon I knew smoked thin cigarettes.
“Where did it come from?” I asked.
The answer could only make more questions. “Mr. Thigpen threw it there.” Mr. Thigpen was the arch-gentile. He owned the General Merchandise Store.
“Why was he here?”
Their next answer did nothing to solve the mystery: “He’s going to give Daddy a cow.”
My sister reached out her foot and kicked the cigar butt. We stood aghast. But lightning didn’t strike, and the earth didn’t swallow her up, so my brother took the shovel and covered the remains with sand.
Daddy came out of the house and put a bridle on the horse that was in the corral. Momma came out and said, “Are you going now?”
“Yes. Mr. Thigpen said to come get a cow. He’ll change his mind when he sobers up, but we’ll milk her tonight anyway.”
He threw the saddle on the horse’s back and fastened the cinch. “I’ll be back in a little while.” He got on the horse and trotted off to the north. I was too mystified to ask if I could go too.
While Momma got supper, I worked on my lessons. I had to get them done before dark because we were out of coal oil for the lamp. Momma put wood in the stove. She stirred the food in the kettles, then pushed the kettles to the back of the stove where they would keep warm but not burn. She took the bread from the oven and turned it out of the pans onto the sideboard by the stove. Then she set the table.
By this time the children who had been watching at the gate came running through the house. “Daddy’s home! The cow’s here!” They ran out of the kitchen door. I ran out too. Momma followed with a milk pail. My brother quickly opened the corral gate. We all watched as the beautiful little Jersey cow with the big milk bag stepped daintily inside. She stood waiting to be milked. No prima donna ever had a more appreciative audience.
Daddy milked the cow. We stood there listening to the sharp zing of the stream of milk as it hit the pail, beating itself into a standing foam that soon muffled the zing to a mellow swish. We all filed into the house behind Daddy who carried the milk pail. He opened the stove door to light the darkened room. He strained the milk and set the pitcher on the table. Momma broke a warm loaf of bread and set the beans, potatoes, and bread on the table. We all sat down, and Daddy said the blessing on the food and thanked the Lord for his kindness to us that day.
Mr. Thigpen did come back a few days later. He was a bit chagrined by his generous offer. However, he saved face by offering Daddy a job to pay for the cow and also to draw “store pay.”
“Well,” said Momma, “we don’t know in what way the Lord will help us. I never thought a drunk gentile could answer a prayer.” The roots of my testimony anchored about ten feet deep.
It has been many years since we sat around that table eating our supper by firelight, but the scene is as bright to me as an unshaded light bulb. I have traveled many fine lines on the map and eaten many remarkable meals. I have sampled milk that has been pasteurized, homogenized, pulverized, refined, and vitalized, but no milk has ever surpassed, or even equaled, the soul-satisfying milk that the Lord sent to us by that gentle “gentile cow.”

In late fall 1838, Hyrum and Mary Fielding Smith awaited the birth of their first child in the midst of escalating conflict between old Missouri settlers and large numbers of newly arrived Latter-day Saints. When violence erupted, the governor ordered the Latter-day Saints to leave the state or face “extermination.” Hundreds of Church members lost their property, and a number lost their lives. Several Church leaders—Hyrum, his brother the Prophet Joseph Smith, and others—were unjustly jailed. Years later President Smith would begin a sketch of his life with these words: “I was born in Far West, Caldwell Co. Missouri, 13 days after my Father was taken a prisoner by the mob.”4

During four long months, Hyrum and Joseph and others suffered in Liberty Jail. Mary Fielding Smith, who had just given birth to her “dear little Joseph F.,” struggled to care for her newborn and the five surviving children from Hyrum’s first marriage to Jerusha Barden Smith, who had died in 1837.

While Mary lay bedridden, ruffians attacked the Smith home, ransacking the family’s belongings and nearly smothering the infant Joseph F. with bedding they tossed aside. Mary and the children, aided by Mary’s sister Mercy Fielding Thompson, joined the Saints’ forced exodus from Missouri. Hyrum was finally reunited with his family on 22 April 1839 at Quincy, Illinois, and in June, the family moved up the Mississippi River to settle with other Saints in Nauvoo, Illinois.

We have time to develop a variety of talents and interests. During my medical training, I didn’t have a very generous income. One year, I decided to make all of my Christmas presents myself. Searching for ideas, I bought a paperback book on batik (the art of dyeing designs on fabric). To my delight and surprise, I discovered an undeveloped artistic talent. The art gallery owner who framed the batiks I had made for presents liked them so much he invited me to produce a one-man show! With brisk sales from the show and subsequent commissions, I not only supported myself during my residency but saved enough for a partial down payment on a house.

Buddy Conatser and his wife, Marteena Lanae, had been inactive for almost sixteen years, ever since their baptisms when they were eighteen. No one in the Church had been able to talk to them—certainly no missionaries at least until Vern and Wilma Richins of Draper, Utah, came. When Elder and Sister Richins knocked on their door in Jamestown, Tennessee, Buddy started his usual excuses as soon as he realized who they were. But Elder Richins gestured at the deer head on the living room wall and asked, “Brother Conatser, isn’t that a white-tail deer?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Let me look at it. Who mounted that?”
“I did.”
Buddy invited them in, and for the next two hours they never mentioned the Church. But before they left, Brother Conatser agreed to let them offer a prayer.
Sister Richins also asked, “Wouldn’t you like us to teach your three young daughters about the church you belong to?”
“They go to the church down the road here,” he replied. “They don’t need another one.”
But after a little more conversation, Buddy consented. That was Thursday. Friday was the first discussion. Sunday, the whole family was at church. A week later, the family had attended church the second time and had received four of the missionary discussions. The oldest girl asked, “Brother Richins, when are you going to baptize us?”
“When your mother and father want us to.”
“I want you to,” said Buddy. “Since the first discussion, we’ve quit our smoking and we’ve quit our drinking. And we know the Church is true. We’d been hunting for something without knowing we had it all the time.”
Elder Richins baptized the girls that weekend and ordained Buddy Conatser a priest the next Sunday. During the following months, Elder Richins ordained him an elder, and under the direction of the stake president, set him apart as the second counselor in the branch presidency, then as its president. The Richinses also witnessed the Conatsers sealing ceremony in the Washington Temple.

Parents are often taken aback by the replies their children make to questions from grown-ups. One evening, when my wife and I were away, our children’s babysitter, intrigued by the prayer she heard them saying, asked them this question: “But what is the difference between your religion and mine?” The reply from our eight-year-old daughter was immediate: “It’s almost the same, except that we study a lot more than you do!” Far from wanting to offend her babysitter, my little daughter just wanted to underline in her own way the importance that Latter-day Saints attach to the search for knowledge.

My mom always calls me a Last-days Kid. She says it as a compliment whenever I’m especially good. Or she’ll say it to prompt me when she knows that I can do better. Sometimes she calls me that to reassure me that I can do a difficult task: “Sure you can give that talk in front of the whole ward at the Scout banquet, Ryan. You’re a Last-days Kid.”
What it means is that I’m probably one of the really good spirits chosen to be born during the last days. And it’s not just me. Mom says lots of children born now are special kids. She volunteered to help out in my fourth grade class once a week, and she continually marveled at how bright we all were. “Of course, you might all be Last-days Kids,” she’d say.
I asked her if everybody in my class could be Last-days Kids. “I thought it was only kids in our church,” I said.
“No,” Mom answered. “Any child born now, whether to LDS parents or not, might have been saved to come forth at this time. You could all be Last-days Kids.”
Suddenly I didn’t seem so special anymore. Then I thought of Kevin, my best friend. If he was a Last-days Kid, too, maybe he’d like to come to Primary with me. I’d love it if he’d join the Church. I’m the only boy in my Primary class. Lisa and Tina-Marie are OK, but I’d sure like to have a buddy in there. So I told Kevin a little about maybe being a Last-days Kid and asked him if he’d like to go to Primary with me. But he said he had other things to do on Sunday. I said, “Some other time, maybe.”
“Well, maybe,” he said, “but probably not.”
I could tell that he hoped I’d drop the subject. I felt really stupid, because I figured that he’d start to tease me about being a Last-days Kid.
Sure enough, he did. At our next soccer game we were down three to one at the half, and our coach, Gracie Gosney’s dad, was trying to inspire us to be a come-back team. “You can do it,” he said as we all sucked on the oranges the trainer had passed out. But from the looks on all of our faces, it was obvious that nobody believed that we had a chance.
Then Kevin poked me in the side and said, “Maybe we could come back and win this game if some of us are Last-days Kids!” Then he started giggling.
“What are you talking about?” Coach asked.
“Ask Ryan. It’s something they teach in his church,” Kevin said.
I stared at the ground and said, “Some of the children on the earth today were saved to be born now, because they were valiant spirits in heaven. So, Last-days Kids are special.” I said it as quickly as I could, hoping the referee would blow her whistle before anyone could laugh.
Coach didn’t understand what I was talking about, but he said, “You mean that you believe that you’re special, Ryan?”
“Probably.”
“And do you believe some of the players on our team are Last-days Kids?”
I looked him right in the eye, and I could tell by his voice and face that he wasn’t teasing me, that he really wanted to know. “Yes,” I said louder. “At least, we could be.”
“I think you’re right.” He smiled. “Let’s go out there and play like Last-days Kids!” He gave us a cheer, and we all cheered back. “Last-days Kids! Last-days Kids! Last-days Kids!” we chanted as we ran out onto the field. The other team and all the parents stared at us, trying to figure out what we were saying.
We won the game, four to three, and I kicked in one of the goals myself! After the game Gracie walked over to me. “Tell me some more about your church, Ryan,” she said.
I told her about the Articles of Faith, which is what Sister Adams says that we should do if someone wants to know what the Church teaches. But Gracie didn’t seem to understand them at all, so I started telling her about Primary.
“Can any kid go to Primary, or just kids in your church?” she asked.
“Anybody who wants to,” I answered. She just stood there, waiting, so I took a deep breath and asked, “Would you like to go to Primary with me tomorrow?”
She smiled a big smile. “I’ll ask my dad.”
Oh, brother! Another girl! I thought. I was glad that Gracie wanted to go to church, but why hadn’t Kevin reacted like this? Gracie’s father said that it was OK for her to go with me, so I told him what time Primary started and when I’d pick her up. She drove off, waving at me from the window of her dad’s van.
That night Mom and Dad came into my room for my prayers. When I was done, Mom kissed my cheek and said, “We’re really proud of our missionary.”
“Don’t be,” I said.
“Why?” Dad asked.
“Because I wasn’t really a missionary to Gracie. She practically had to beg me to invite her to Primary. I didn’t want another girl in my class—I wanted Kevin to come. Why didn’t he want to go to Primary and learn more about the gospel?”
“Even Last-days Kids have their free agency,” Mom said. “Don’t give up on Kevin yet. And don’t stop being his friend just because he isn’t interested in going to church with you.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” I said.
“Good.” Dad smiled. “I’m proud of you.” And he kissed me good night.
Our lesson in Primary the next day was about the Word of Wisdom. Gracie sat and listened hard to everything Sister Adams said. Lisa and Tina-Marie were quiet too. It was a good lesson. After Primary Mom asked Gracie if she wanted to go home.
“Are you going home?” she asked.
“No. We’re going to stay for sacrament meeting,” Mom answered. “But if you’d like to go home now, I’ll take you.”
“Am I allowed to go to sacrament meeting?” Gracie asked.
“Of course,” Mom answered.
“Then I’d like to stay, please,” Gracie said.
Dad squeezed my arm, his smile almost too big for his face.
After church we dropped Gracie off at her house. “See you at soccer practice,” she said as she hopped out of the car.
“Will you need a ride to church next Sunday?” Dad asked.
“No. I don’t think so.” The whole mood in the car went down like a flat tire on a bicycle. Then Gracie leaned in through my open window. “Last night Mom and Dad and I had a big talk. Mom’s been wanting to find a church to go to ever since we moved here. And Dad said that he’s always been impressed with Ryan. So they said that if I liked your church, next Sunday they’d go with me.”

But while Pedro’s academic curiosity and craftsmanship would have made him stand out in any community, one other quality made him unique. There have been few characters in the course of written history with whom faith and fact were synonymous. Pedro was one of these.
Even for those of us who use the term daily, faith is a paradox. Conspicuously absent in many who bear its robes, it sometimes finds a more congenial soil under homespun wool and leather thongs.
At any rate Pedro’s faith was both simple and factual. We had bought a diesel engine that generated electricity for our school and church building. A film arrived from Church headquarters depicting the struggles of early pioneers in southern Utah. President Lorenzo Snow, president of the Church at that time, promised the pioneers that a devastating drought would end if they would pay their tithing.
That year Pedro’s village was experiencing a drought. Potatoes and corn were drooping in despair at the rainy season’s slow arrival.
Pedro arrived the morning after the film was shown to pay ten soles (less than 50 cents) in tithing. He then went home and sat on his porch to wait for the rain.
It rained.

One of these intrepid souls was Emma Batchelor, a young English girl traveling without family. She started out with the Willie handcart company, but by the time they reached Fort Laramie, they were ordered to lighten their loads. Emma was directed to leave the copper kettle in which she carried all of her belongings.
She refused to do this and set it by the side of the road and sat down on it. She knew that the Martin company was only a few days behind. She had been privileged to start with the Willie company, and when the Martin company caught up, she joined the Paul Gourley family.
A young son wrote many years later: “Here we were joined by Sister Emma Batchelor. We were glad to have her because she was young and strong and meant more flour for our mess.” It was here that Sister Gourley gave birth to a child, and Emma acted as the midwife and loaded the mother and the child in the cart for two days, which Emma helped pull.
Those who died in the Martin company were mercifully relieved of the suffering of others with frozen feet, ears, noses, or fingers—which maimed them for the rest of their lives. Emma, age twenty-one, however, was a fortunate one. She came through the ordeal whole.
A year later, she met Brigham Young, who was surprised that she was not maimed, and she told him, “Brother Brigham, I had no one to care for me or to look out for me, so I decided I must look out for myself. I was the one who called out when Brother Savage warned us [not to go]. I was at fault in that, but I tried to make up for it. I pulled my share at the cart every day. When we came to a stream, I stopped and took off my shoes and stockings and outer skirt and put them on top of the cart. Then, after I got the cart across, I came back and carried little Paul over on my back. Then I sat down and scrubbed my feet hard with my woolen neckerchief and put on dry shoes and stockings.”

Back when Barbara Hong of Singapore got her patriarchal blessing, she was surprised to be promised that her family would be sealed together in the temple. After all, she and her brother Phillip were the only members of the Church in her family. Their parents were active in another religion.
Last Mother’s Day, however, a step was taken in fulfilling that promise. Their mother accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon. She studied it, and after long discussions with the missionaries, was baptized.
That was an exciting day for the Hongs, and for their entire branch. Both Barbara and Phillip were serving as full-time missionaries in the Singapore mission.
They’re confident that the rest of their family will soon follow their mother’s example.

I have been blessed to have a mother who has spent her life preparing to meet God. She understands the principles of creating, learning, and serving in this life. Her motto has been “Welcome the task that makes you go beyond yourself, and you will grow.” Let me tell you a few highlights from her adventure-filled life. In her youth she lived in the wild Uinta Mountains, where her father worked. She learned to cut tall trees, fish, and camp in the outdoors. During the winter she attended school in the city, played on a basketball team, and learned to play the trumpet. She went to the university and became a nurse. After she was married, she went on a mission with her husband to Brazil, where she learned to speak Portuguese. She has traveled to many countries and has taught the gospel to thousands. She studies the scriptures daily, has written several family history books, works in the temple, keeps track of 62 grandchildren, and can cook 600 doughnuts in one morning!
My mother has stayed in the Savior’s path with unshaken faith in Him (see 2 Nephi 31:19) all the days of her life. She wakes up every day looking forward to new adventures. For her, life is so interesting, and she still has so much to learn.

One hot summer day, some workers were doing repairs to the street outside President Smith’s home. As the work intensified and the sun grew hotter, the workers started using obscene and profane words. Soon one of the neighbors approached and scolded the workers for their offensive language, pointing out that George Albert Smith lived nearby. Unimpressed, the workers began to swear even more.
Meanwhile, President Smith was in his kitchen preparing a pitcher of lemonade. He brought it out on a tray with some glasses and said to the workers, “My friends, you look so hot and tired. Why don’t you come and sit under my trees here and have a cool drink?”
Humbled and grateful, the workers accepted his offer, and after their welcome break they finished their work respectfully and quietly.3

For thirteen years I was a devoted, “born again” Christian and an equally devoted anti-Mormon. As part of an organized evangelical program, I talked to people in stores, in parks, and in their homes, seeking to share the “good news of the gospel.”
Many of those people I encountered in my evangelical work were Latter-day Saints. I took every opportunity to tell them that their church was not of God, but was a cult inspired by Satan. I was well-read in anti-Mormon literature, and my heart ached for those “misguided Mormons.” They went about trying to “work” their way to heaven, believing in the words of a self-appointed prophet named Joseph Smith.
I told them again and again that those works didn’t count. Only those people who ask Jesus into their hearts will go to heaven, I said. All others, good and evil, share a fate of agony and eternal separation from God.
“What about those who have never heard of Jesus?” I was always asked. Having no answer, I quietly ignored the question.
After a divorce that was hard for me, I stopped going to church, and although my faith in God and love for him remained, I decided to lay aside the spiritual part of my life for a time. I married an inactive Latter-day Saint who nonetheless possessed an unshakable testimony. We rarely discussed religion, but whenever the subject came up, I made fruitless attempts to show him the error of his beliefs. He quietly listened, but his testimony remained intact. Then, through a family crisis, my heart began to change.
My father-in-law became very ill with cancer, and as death approached, he felt the need to express the importance of the Church to his children. Something about his simple testimony touched my heart, and I decided to find out for myself the truth regarding this church. I began by cross-referencing the scriptures, and found to my surprise that there were no inconsistencies between the Bible and the Book of Mormon. To me, the Bible was the precious word of God. I believed it without question. Could Mormon doctrine possibly be proven within the Bible? I set out to find the answer.
In going through my husband’s Church books, I came across A Marvelous Work and a Wonder by Elder LeGrand Richards. As I read it, I felt as if it had been written for me. I discovered New Testament scriptures regarding baptism for the dead and Christ’s mission during the time prior to his resurrection. I discovered Jesus’ words to Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb: “Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father.” (John 20:17.) Had he not returned to his Father immediately after his death? But I had used his words to the thief on the cross, “To day shalt thou be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43) to prove deathbed repentance! I had read these same scriptures countless times before but had never really understood them. Now I realized I had been deceived about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
As I studied and prayed, I began to find answers to the questions I had quietly pushed aside. Finally, I knew that this church was the Savior’s church, and its doctrine was his doctrine. In 1984 I was baptized.
I am grateful the Lord waited so patiently for the moment when my heart would open so that his Spirit would lead me to the truth.

My second point is, the Holy Spirit has the power to guide. A 15-year-old girl felt that she needed to find new friends. Have you ever felt that way? She writes, “Now, I don’t know if you have ever had to change friends, but it honestly was the hardest thing I have ever had to do.” She decided to put her problem in the hands of the Lord, and she also counseled with her parents. She says that after several months “she wanted to just give up.” One afternoon she was casually talking to her seminary teacher, and she confided her problem to him. Then he said, “I really don’t know why I am asking you this, but do you happen to know these girls?” This girl answered with a yes. And then he said, “Have you ever thought about being friends with them?”

“I told him that there was no way that I could fit in with them. He then asked me if he could talk to one of the girls. I decided I would let him, if he promised not to embarrass me.

“Well, that next day I received a phone call from one of the girls. Now, you have to understand that this girl was on student council, and I hate to use the term, but she was ‘extremely popular.’ She asked if I would like to go to the basketball game with her that night. That night was one of the funnest, most peaceful nights of my life. The next day at school, she introduced me to two other girls. We all instantly became friends. This event has changed me.”

She concludes by saying, “I don’t know about you, but I would much rather have the Lord, who knows the outcome of everything, direct my life than me, who just sees things as they are at the time. He is right by our side, walking us through life, even when we feel so alone” (letter on file in the Young Women office).

“Nettie,” I hollered, picking up a pair of socks that were draped over my fishbowl like a lampshade.
“Oops,” giggled Nettie as she charged into our bedroom. She knocked over the stack of books on my nightstand as she tried to stop.
“That’ll be ten cents,” I ordered as I dropped the socks in her hand. Every time Nettie left her stuff on my side of our bedroom, I made her put ten cents in the big jar on my shelf. Mom told me I could do that if I thought it would help. Nettie was really sloppy, and I was the lucky one who had to share a room with her.
Nettie dropped a dime in the jar and jammed her socks into her jumbled-up drawer. She turned to run out, and I pointed to the books she’d scattered all over the floor.
“Good thing I don’t have to pay ten cents apiece for these,” she joked. “I’d owe you my allowance for two years.”
“Funny,” I said. “You wouldn’t have to pay anything if you kept your messes on your own side of the room.”
“I know,” Nettie sighed, trying to stack up my books. She knocked them over again with her elbow before she’d finished.
“Slow down a little,” I grumbled, grabbing my Birds of North America book before she ripped the pictures.
“Taylor is waiting for me to play baseball,” Nettie said. “I’m going to show her how to hit a home run.”
“Oh, just go,” I finally told her.
“Thanks,” she said. She dropped the books on my bed and raced off. Of course, the books bounced back onto the floor. Somehow everything Nettie touched seemed to end up on the floor.
That week, Nettie’s luck didn’t improve. She tossed her soccer uniform and shin pads on my bed, and that added up to sixty cents including the socks. Then she flooded Mom’s pot of violets when she watered them, and the water made puddles on the shelf and streaks down the wall. Next, she broke a plate when she tried to help dry the dishes, knocked her bike over and bent the pedal, and lost one orange tennis shoe.
“If you slowed down you wouldn’t be such a disaster,” I told Nettie. “And you would be able to find your stuff if you were neater.”
Nettie didn’t say anything. She knew I was right.
For one moment, Nettie’s luck changed—Taylor’s family invited her to go camping with them that Friday. But her luck didn’t last long. Friday morning, Nettie came down with the flu.
I went in our room to talk to her. She gave me the same look she’d made the day her pet worm Wiggles died.
“I’m sorry you can’t go camping,” I told her. I was sorry for me too. I had been looking forward to a break from sharing a room.
“That’s OK,” she said. “It’s probably good that I can’t go. I would have wrecked everything!”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She sniffled, and not from the flu. “What if I knocked down the tent or broke the lantern or fell in the lake? I do everything wrong. I’m a big disaster. You said so yourself.”
I didn’t know what to do or say as the tears slipped down Nettie’s cheeks. I felt horrible. My heart thumped in my chest. What had I done? I’d never thought about how everything I said made Nettie feel bad about herself. I always told her how she messed up, but I never told her what she did right.
“Nettie, you are a good friend,” I said. “I’m sure Taylor wishes you were there right now. You try to help her. In fact, you try to help everyone.”
“Really?” Nettie asked, wiping her nose.
I nodded. “Yep. You’re always helping Mom with the chores. She appreciates that.”
“She does?”
“Of course,” I told her. “You’re the nicest helper I know, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before.”
“Thanks,” Nettie said. She was smiling and looking a little better.
When Nettie dozed off to sleep, I quietly took the big jar off my shelf and took it to Mom. I had an idea.
Later that day, Dad took me to the store. I returned with a brightly wrapped box just for Nettie.
“A present?” she asked. “Because I’m sick?”
I shook my head. “No. Because I love you.” I showed her the empty jar. “I never should have made you pay me. The present rightly belongs to you.”
Nettie squealed and hugged me so hard I almost dropped the jar. “You’re the greatest sister,” she said.
“You’re pretty great yourself,” I said.
I looked at the empty jar in my hands and thought about it. Then I opened my closet and put the jar on the top shelf. I didn’t want it anymore. Instead of filling the jar with dimes, I planned on filling Nettie up with good feelings about herself. I knew I could do it because Nettie had shown me how much power my words had. From now on, I would be much more careful about how I used them. I wasn’t the greatest sister yet, but maybe I could be a good one if I tried.

Kim Cloward, too, has a special family story. Her great-great-grandmother was a seamstress to the Queen of England, and she married one of the king’s horsemen. After joining the Church, the couple immigrated to America. Her abilities with a needle were well known in northern Utah where she tailored men’s suits and made moccasins and gloves. She taught her daughter to sew. The daughter, in turn, taught her daughter. “And now,” Kim commented, “my mother has taught me to sew, and I’ll sew for my family and ‘sew’ on and ‘sew’ on.” Her eyes twinkled as she waited for her seminary friends to catch the pun. Kim has won several national sewing contests and now better understands where her abilities and pride in tailoring come from.

“I think this is the best we’ve ever done,” said Johnny Apel, 16. And that’s a pretty big compliment. After all, this is a stake that sponsors memorable activities at the end of each seminary year that correspond with the book of scriptures they’ve been studying. They’ve put on things like a “Nephite Festival” that was their version of a county fair in the land of Bountiful, complete with a realistically simulated earthquake and storm, followed by a beautiful talk on Third Nephi.
Then there was the big “Wander in the Wilderness,” where the seminary students were taken to a desolate area, divided by their birth months into twelve “tribes,” and required to complete 12 Old Testament-oriented tasks like rescuing Daniel from the lion’s den, building a tower of Babel, and building an ark. At the end, they were treated to a big feast, similar to that of the Passover.
With activities like that, rating the “Come unto Christ” youth conference number one really says something.
What made the event such a big success? The location wasn’t out of the ordinary—much of the program was held in the chapel, and the workshops were held in church classrooms. Meals were brought in and either eaten outside in the Texas sunshine or inside, picnic-style, on blankets on the gym floor.
So it was the theme itself and the attitudes of the kids involved that made this such a big event. “What could be more important than to come unto Christ?” said Tisha Perry, age 16. “I hoped that this activity would help me to get closer to him, and it did.”
You could actually see some changes taking place right before your eyes as the day wore on. “I really don’t know where it started, but lately I’ve had a real problem with listening to what my parents say and following the counsel they give me,” Greg Harkrider, 16, told the entire group. “I just want them to know that I’m glad that I listened to what they said and came today to learn more about Christ. That’s what I need to be here for. I’ll try to be better because of this.”
And responses from the 30 or so non-LDS kids who did come were positive as well. Rick Moore and Eric Bradshaw, two 16-year-olds who met on the set of a movie they were both involved in, came to the conference because the subject was of great interest to them both. Rick is LDS. Eric is Presbyterian. “Pretty much everything that’s been said here today I’m 100 percent with,” said Eric. “This is really encouraging for me.”
Darla Marburger, 16, who came with her LDS friend Milli Egger, 14, had a response similar to Eric’s. “This has really helped me to grow spiritually,” she said.
“I’m just glad someone has taken the time to teach us more about Christ,” added Milli. “It’s important to learn now, when we’re young and impressionable, so we have a better chance of turning out right.”
Richard Cromwell, a very popular high school teacher and an ordained Methodist minister, also paid big compliments to the event. “This is great!” he said. “I’m all for anything that helps bring the kids closer to Christ.”
The spirit of the day was not diminished when the lights in the gym went down low and the music was turned up for the dance that finished off the conference. A stake music committee, made up mostly of youth, had previously selected all the music that would be played, making sure it was fun to dance to, yet didn’t contain inappropriate lyrics.
While the music played inside, the youth on the organizing committee wandered outside for a breather. They inevitably began discussing the big subject of the day. “Being a part of all this really makes me want to work harder to be better—to be more like Jesus,” said Mark Davies, 17. “That would be so great.”
“We heard a lot about Christ today, and his spirit was here,” added Anna. “That’s exactly what we wanted.”
“Oh yes,” Thomasyn agreed. “Even though it didn’t turn out exactly like we’d planned at first, it was a big success.”
There it was. Still another big to add to the Texas list.

Actually, I was the one who questioned at first. I was a teenager when my mother and brother met with the missionaries. I listened only halfheartedly. But when they joined the Church, I saw that the things they had learned agreed with what I’d been taught my whole life. After I joined the military, I sought out the missionaries, went to meetings, studied and prayed, and then went home to be baptized. The gospel made me happy, and the Spirit told me it is true.Nicole V., 20, Georgia, USA

A few years ago, when Elder Merrill J. Bateman of the Presidency of the Seventy was in Japan, the missionaries introduced him to a young Japanese brother who had just joined the Church. He was from a non-Christian background. When he met the missionaries, he was interested in the message, but he could not understand or feel the need for a Savior, and he didn’t have a witness regarding the gospel. One day the missionaries decided to show him a film about the Atonement. The young man saw the film, but still he didn’t have a witness.

“The next morning he went to work. He worked in an optician’s shop making eyeglasses. … An elderly woman came in. He remembered her coming in a few weeks before. She had broken her glasses. She needed a new pair. When she had come in earlier, she didn’t have enough money and had gone away to save more in order to purchase the new glasses. As she came in that day, she again showed him her spectacles and showed him the money that she now had. He realized that she didn’t have enough yet. Then a thought came to him: I have some money. I don’t need to tell her. I can make up the difference. So he told her the money she had was adequate, took her glasses, [and] made an appointment for her to return when he had finished making the spectacles. …

“She returned later. He had the glasses ready for her. He handed them to her, and she put them on [and exclaimed] ‘… I see. I see.’ Then she began to cry. At that point, a burning sensation began to grow within his bosom and swelled within him. He said, ‘… I understand. I understand.’ He began to cry. Out the door he ran, looking for the missionaries. When he found them, he said, ‘I see! My eyes have been opened! I know that Jesus is the Son of God. I know the stone was rolled away from the tomb and on that glorious Easter morning He arose from the dead. He can make up the difference in my life when I fall short.’”2

Carrying a friend on a ten-mile mountain hike under the hot summer sun may not sound like a great way to spend a day of youth conference, but Todd Beam and Zach Reed of the Seattle Washington Shoreline Stake did just that. The hike would have been nearly impossible for their friend, Travis Freeman, because of physical impairments that require him to walk with crutches. Impossible, that is, without the help of a few good friends.
“Zach and I were on the committee that planned the youth conference. We wanted Travis to be with us,” says Todd. “We just had to figure out a way.”
With the help of a friend, Todd’s dad built a sort of cart with a seat in the middle for Todd and Zach to carry Travis up the mountainside. Dubbed the “Travis Trolley” it became a symbol for the conference, which focused on overcoming trials and giving service.
“I actually think it was harder for Travis than it was for Zach or me,” says Todd. “He had to hold himself up the whole time, and that was hard work.”
Travis, Todd, and Zach were put in the first of eight hike groups, so that if they fell behind, there would be seven more groups of youth and leaders to assist them. Trailing just slightly behind them was another boy, Layne Mohlman, who carried Travis’s crutches to be used at the conclusion of the hike. Even when the handles came off the cart three quarters of the way to the final destination, the boys didn’t give up. Zach carried Travis the rest of the way on his back!
The hike concluded in a large meadow, which, Todd reports, “felt just like coming into the promised land.” Though all the boys were tired, they were happy and proud of their accomplishments. Best of all, Travis had been able to experience the first true hike of his life.
All participants in the conference were given bracelets to wear as a reminder of the theme of the conference. The inscription on the bracelets read: “All these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good. The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he? Therefore, hold on thy way” (D&C 122:7–9).
As Zach, Todd, Layne, and Travis learned, sometimes, “holding on thy way” means holding on to a friend.

Illustration by Bradley H. Clark
I was a girl when I first saw my mother’s wedding dress. It was carefully wrapped inside a box, and I remember my mother unwrapping it tenderly so I could see it. How beautiful it was! I so much wanted to wear that dress when the day of my marriage arrived.
My mother gently put it back and promised to lend it to me in the future. She said the dress had been a special gift from my father. She looked so in love and beautiful in her wedding photographs. My parents, not members of the Church, were wonderful people.
I learned about the Church when I met the man who would become my husband. That meeting was unusual because, though he was not active in the Church, our meeting led to the story of the First Vision. I found the story amazing, but I was not ready to accept it.
After we had dated for 16 months, my dreams came true when I put on my mother’s wedding dress with its long tail and walked down the aisle toward my fiancé. I also was so in love. Many people said I looked just like my mother when she married.
Years passed, and we had two sons. When my husband tried to return to church, I hindered his efforts. Though I wasn’t active in the church of my youth, I had a hard time accepting another church.
That finally changed after 19 years of marriage. My husband returned to church, and a few weeks later I began to attend with him. My testimony grew rapidly, and I was baptized and confirmed. Soon afterward my greatest desire was to prepare myself to be sealed to my husband in the temple.
When the happy day of our sealing arrived, I wore my mother’s white dress again. A friend from church had adjusted it so it would be proper to wear in the temple. I have worn it there ever since.
By the time my father had passed away and my mother had entered her last days, she still wasn’t ready to accept the restored Church. But I told her many wonderful things about the Restoration. I also told her that when she crossed the veil, she was going to hear the message of the true gospel. I promised her that after a year, I would wear our dress in her behalf so she could vicariously receive temple ordinances and be sealed to my father. And I did.
My dress is old now, and I know that one day I will have to retire it. Until that day comes, I will continue to wear it with love—for my husband, for my mother and father, for family members I have served vicariously in the temple, for the true gospel, for my sacred covenants, and for my Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.