Gospel Story Finder

In preparation for our most recent temple dedication, in Twin Falls, Idaho, local Church members constructed a huge stage at the Filer, Idaho, fairgrounds and filled the dirt arena with sod and other decorations, including a large waterfall to represent Shoshone Falls, a popular landmark located two miles (3 km) from the new temple. The evening of the performance, 3,200 young men and young women entered the arena waving blue and white ribbons, turning the arena into a representation of a great river of flowing water. Titled “Living Water,” from John 4:10, 14, the celebration brought together youth from 14 stakes in the new temple district. They depicted, through song and dance, both their dependence for their spiritual lives on the living water from the Savior and their dependence for their physical lives on the mountain streams and rivers in their area. Those of us privileged to witness this event were uplifted and edified.

One day at school, a classmate and I somehow entered into the topic of religion. My classmate became a little antagonistic and started to criticize what I believed.
She looked me in the face and said, “You believe in your Church only because your parents raised you in it. Otherwise, you wouldn’t believe.”
I don’t remember what I said to her, but I kept thinking about her comment and wondering why she would say that. I had been raised in the Church, and, really, I had never questioned the Church’s teachings or doctrines. Ever since I was little, I felt the Church was true. Before I was even baptized, our family read the Book of Mormon together, and I knew it was true. I didn’t just believe; I knew it and had no doubts. But I couldn’t define a particular moment when I had received that witness. For some time that bothered me. I wanted to have a particular experience when I would pray and immediately the answer would come rushing to me. It never happened.
But what I could define was a moment when my testimony was confirmed. After my first year of high school, I went with some other youth on a tour to Church history sites. When we arrived at the Sacred Grove, our tour guide invited us to seek a personal confirmation that what had happened there was true: that God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith and initiated the Restoration. I found a quiet place in the grove and read the account of the First Vision. Then I knelt down and prayed. I already knew the First Vision had happened and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. But I asked anyway. I finished my prayer, and nothing happened. No grand feeling, no vision, no angels. Nothing.
I found a rock and sat down and opened my patriarchal blessing and started to read. My blessing mentioned the Restoration of the gospel, and in my head the words repeated: “You already know. You already know.”
If I could go back to that moment when my friend challenged what I believed, I don’t know how I would describe how I know the Church is true. But I wish I had told her that while my parents had taught me what they knew to be true, I had to find that answer for myself. And I did.
I didn’t need to go to the Sacred Grove to know the Church was true. I didn’t need any great experience to know the Church was true. I just needed to be reminded, “You already know.”

In 2019, the program was approved, and I was among the first generation of students in Kinshasa to be enrolled. The beginning was difficult for me, because I had a full-time job and lived in a different area from the meeting location. But I had the support of my family and my friend Patrick Kalambayi. We both walked a long distance to attend the meetings and returned home late. Sometimes we didn’t have electricity. We were looking for places with electricity to charge our computer.

At one point, the government authorities shut down internet due to some political issues. My friend and I went to the local UN agency for help, telling them we had to send our school assignments and we needed connection to the internet to do our homework. I have a testimony that Heavenly Father puts people in our path to support and help us in times of adversity, such as electricity and internet access shortages.

After completing PathwayConnect, I decided to enroll in the public health program at Brigham Young University-Idaho. I completed a certification in public health planning and implementation, health method evaluation and epidemiology. I have learned to support the world in disease prevention and developed a pandemic health program. I was very happy to support my country during the COVID-19 breakout in Kinshasa. People were amazing. I learned more skills about how to control this disease in my community.

The BYU-Pathway Worldwide program helped me to understand that we must be faithful and improve our skills to establish the kingdom of our Savior on the earth. This program increased my knowledge of the Savior and motivated me to gain more skills and to become more faithful.

Instead of dwelling on difficulties and struggle, I have learned to trust the Lord and to pursue my education at famous universities across the world. Today I am proud to say that I earned three university degrees: one from my country, one from India, and one from the United States. As a result, I have increased my income, my faith in Jesus Christ, and my skills in the field of public health.

The skills that I learned during my journey have helped me to build a health nongovernmental organization and work in mental health awareness in the DRC. My recent experience, when I was applying for a new job as a public health specialist at the Center for Disease Control in DRC, the human resources team was surprised that I have an American degree and I live in Congo, and it was easy for them to verify this from my diploma.

The hiring process was interesting and each step I went through, I learned to be ready due to the PathwayConnect program, preparing my CV and cover letter, enjoying the interview, and showing people my unique qualifications. I am grateful to my Heavenly Father for the opportunity He gave me to join the team of the Center for Disease Control in DRC to prevent, detect and control disease in my country.

As an African, we are blessed to have an American degree, serve our community, and strengthen the Church in our local area. BYU-Pathway Worldwide blesses my life, my family, and my country in this specific time. The program helped me to understand the principle of working hard quietly and to let your success be your noise.

Whatever level you are in life and whether you have a degree or not, please join the program and work hard, the Lord knows your effort and will assist you to gain a new degree and develop more skills and the world will pay you based on your education and skills.

In 1980 we moved as a family across the street from the hospital where I trained and worked. I worked every day, including Sundays. If I finished my Sunday work by 2:00 p.m., I could join my wife and daughter and drive to church for meetings that began at 2:30.
One Sunday late in my first year of training, I knew that I would likely finish by 2:00. I realized, however, that if I stayed in the hospital just a little longer, my wife and daughter would depart without me. I could then walk home and take a needed nap. I regret to say that I did just that. I waited until 2:15, walked home slowly, and lay down on the couch, hoping to nap. But I could not fall asleep. I was disturbed and concerned. I had always loved going to church. I wondered why on this day the fire of testimony and the zeal that I had previously felt were missing.
I did not have to think long. Because of my schedule, I had become casual with my prayers and scripture study. I would get up one morning, say my prayers, and go to work. Often day blended into night and into day again before I would return home late the following evening. I would then be so tired that I would fall asleep before saying a prayer or reading the scriptures. The next morning the process began again. The problem was that I was not doing the basic things I needed to do to keep my mightily changed heart from turning to stone.
I got off the couch, got on my knees, and pleaded with God for forgiveness. I promised my Heavenly Father that I would change. The next day I brought a Book of Mormon to the hospital. On my to-do list that day, and every day since, were two items: praying at least morning and evening and reading in the scriptures. Sometimes midnight would come, and I would have to quickly find a private place to pray. Some days my scripture study was brief. I also promised Heavenly Father that I would always try to get to church, even if I missed part of the meeting. Over the course of a few weeks, the zeal returned and the fire of testimony burned fiercely again. I promised to never again fall into the spiritual death trap of being casual about these seemingly small actions and thereby jeopardizing things of an eternal nature, regardless of circumstances.

“Do you believe in God?”
“Yes,” I stammered. I couldn’t believe it. Here I was sitting in front of four of my best friends and my high school biology teacher, and not one of them believed in God.
“But what about evolution?” my friends asked.
My biology teacher, who had a reputation for being stubborn and persistent, turned his head momentarily from his papers and said: “Now, let’s be logical here. Look at the facts. Where does the evidence point?”
I was tongue-tied. I have known the Church is true since I was very young. I felt it was true. However, at the same time, logic and reason were driving forces in my life.
As I sat there, trying to come up with an answer to their questions, the awkward silence gave them satisfaction. They thought I had hit a dead end in my reasoning, as they expected I would. Thinking of no arguments to counter their position, I silently said a quick prayer, pleading with God to direct my words toward these five people. Within seconds a thought crossed my mind: “It is not you who converts, but the Spirit.”
Upon hearing those simple words, I began to share my testimony with my friends. I said, “I know there is a God, and He has a Son who created the world and saved us all. Whether or not we have all the answers now doesn’t discredit the fact that there is a God. God works line upon line and precept upon precept. Until we prove our faith, God will not reveal more to us.” I finished by confirming my testimony of the Church and its leaders, forgetting to even address the original questions posed.
After I finished, they all sat in silence, staring at me. I could feel my face getting hot. Just then, the bell rang. I grabbed my bag, thankful for this escape route, and headed for the door. As I opened the door, my biology teacher swung his chair around and called my name.
I turned, anticipating a rebuttal and, to my shock, found a sincere face staring back at me. “Thank you,” he said.
My simple testimony had conveyed more convincing truth than any logical debate could have. I know that I did not dissolve their accusations and criticisms that day, but the Holy Spirit did.

A trip to Ireland sounded like an exciting vacation to me. I didn’t mind leaving home for a year while my dad taught at a university before returning to his job at Snow College.
When we arrived in Ireland and began preparations to attend school, I realized that not only would my siblings and I be the only Latter-day Saints in the school, but we would also be among the small group of non-Catholic students. This would be a big change from the predominantly LDS school I attended in Ephraim, Utah.
Although I was excited for school to start, there was one problem: we didn’t know what time new students were to arrive on registration day. The registration schedule wasn’t listed in the local paper, and it wasn’t posted at the school. On a whim, we showed up late in the morning.
Although we had guessed and been successful, we wondered how everyone else knew when to arrive, so my dad asked the woman in line in front of us. Her answer taught us a lesson. “Well, they’ve announced it in church the past four weeks.”
The church she referred to was Mass, the Catholic worship service.
Growing up in a predominantly Latter-day Saint community, I hadn’t been exposed much to other religions. And since I had grown up as a member of the majority religion, I now wondered how many times I had unconsciously made the same type of assumption—that everyone was a member of the Church.
I thought of the people I knew at my school in Utah who weren’t members of the Church and wondered how many times they had been left out of activities just because they didn’t go to the same church I went to. I had never intentionally discriminated, but I wondered if they felt excluded.
During that year of school I wore a school uniform every day. I learned Catholic prayers and attended Mass as part of the school curriculum. I took a class about Catholicism and listened each week when the priest came to tell our class stories from the Bible.
All of my friends at school in Ireland accepted me despite our religious differences. And as I learned more about their religion, they learned more about mine. There were times I felt left out because everyone but me knew of a certain activity or had heard a story in church that, when referred to, left me in the dark. But all those times reinforced my decision to be more aware of my classmates at home who were not LDS.
My dad thought it was important for us to understand the beliefs of the two major religions in Ireland so we would understand the people in our community. The topic of family home evenings and family discussions that year was often centered on the beliefs of the Catholic and Protestant churches. My parents taught us to respect the beliefs of others and, at the same time, to live the principles we believed.
At the end of the year none of my friends had been converted to the Church, but my testimony had grown as I tried to live my religion. I did learn that I could be tolerant of people who had different beliefs than mine without endorsing their beliefs. I learned that if I respected the religious differences of my friends and lived my religion in a way that merited respect, my religious beliefs would earn the same respect that I gave.

I graduated from flight training and received my silver wings two days before my 20th birthday. Later I was stationed at Langley Field, Virginia, as copilot on a selected B-24 bomber crew trained to use a new secret weapon—radar.
My brother, Colonel Leon C. Packer, was stationed at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. A much decorated B-24 pilot, he became a brigadier general in the Air Force.
While I was at Langley Field, the war in Europe ended, and so we were ordered to the Pacific. I spent a few days with Leon in Washington before shipping out for combat.
He told me of things he had learned under fire. He flew from North Africa on raids over southern Europe; very few of those planes returned.
On April 16, 1943, he was captain of a B-24 bomber returning to England after a raid in Europe. His plane, the Yard Bird, was heavily damaged by flak and dropped out of formation.
Then they were alone and came under heavy attack from fighters.
His one-page account of that experience says: “Number three engine was smoking and the prop ran away. Number four fuel line was shot out. Right aileron cables and stabilizer cables were shot out. Rudders partially locked. Radio shot out. Extremely large holes in the right wing. Flaps shot out. Entire rear part of the fuselage filled with holes. Hydraulic system shot out. Tail turret out.”
A history of the Eighth Air Force, published just two years ago, gives a detailed account of that flight written by one of the crew.
With one engine on fire, the other three lost power. They were going down. The alarm bell ordered that they bail out. The bombardier, the only one able to get out, parachuted into the English Channel.
The pilots left their seats and made their way toward the bomb bay to bail out. Suddenly Leon heard an engine cough and sputter. He quickly climbed back to his seat and coaxed enough power from the engines to reach the coast of England. Then the engines failed, and they crashed.
The landing gear was shorn off on the brow of a hill; the plane plowed through trees and crumbled. Dirt filled the fuselage.
Amazingly, though some were terribly wounded, all aboard survived. The bombardier was lost, but he probably saved the lives of the other nine. When smoke poured from the engines and a parachute appeared, the fighters stopped their attack.
That was not the only time Leon had crash-landed.
As we visited, he told me how he was able to hold himself together under fire. He said, “I have a favorite hymn”—and he named it—“and when things got rough I would sing it silently to myself, and there would come a faith and an assurance that kept me on course.”
He sent me off to combat with that lesson.
In the spring of 1945 I was able to test that lesson Leon had taught me those months before.
The war in the Pacific ended before we reached the Philippines, and we were ordered to Japan.
One day we flew out of Atsugi airfield near Yokohama in a B-17 bomber bound for Guam to pick up a beacon light.
After nine hours in the air, we let down through the clouds to find ourselves hopelessly lost. Our radio was out. We were, as it turned out, in a typhoon.
Flying just above the ocean, we began a search pattern. In that desperate situation, I remembered the words of my brother. I learned that you can pray and even sing without making a sound.
After some time we pulled up over a line of rocks jutting out of the water. Could they be part of the chain of the Mariana Islands? We followed them. Soon Tinian Island loomed ahead, and we landed with literally seconds of fuel in the tank. As we headed down the runway, the engines one by one stopped.
I learned that both prayer and music can be very silent and very personal.

When his mother invited him to visit a Christian church in 1995, O. Odgerel did not know she was already a member. Working at a public library, she was in charge of renting out its assembly room. Drawn by singing she heard from that room one day, she was invited to join the meeting. Later, she listened to the missionary discussions and was baptized and confirmed.

Odgerel had been born in Russia while his parents were students there and had been educated in Soviet socialism; it was almost his religion. But when the Soviet Union fell apart, what he had believed in was gone. He turned to drinking and partying, thinking the only purpose in life was to enjoy oneself before dying. He soon realized, however, that this lifestyle was a dead end and he ought to abstain from things that he could see were harming him.

Like many other Mongolians, he found it easy to accept the Book of Mormon when he read it. “Mongolian people may receive the gospel really quickly because they can see the good things in it easily,” Odgerel says. They “open their hearts to it very sincerely.” So it was with him. He had felt there was a Supreme Being. Through the gospel, he found a God and a way of life he could believe in. “That was my happiest moment,” he says.

Mongolian society could benefit from the reshaping that the gospel brings to people’s lives, he says. Drinking is a problem; so too is immorality. In Mongolia, there is only the worldly model, now strongly reinforced via television, to shape behavior. There is no strong religious tradition in the country to work against it. But through the gospel of Jesus Christ, Odgerel says, people find a righteous way to direct their lives.

Odgerel is president of the Ulaanbaatar Mongolia District, which has 11 branches and some 3,700 members. About 70 percent of the members are single.

A funny clown and a floppy bird danced around the room, shaking hands with laughing four-year-olds. Five other girls dressed in funny costumes were passing out crayons and uncolored pictures of witches and ghosts. It was Halloween night, and suddenly things looked a lot brighter to the children (who ranged in age from three to seven) than they had earlier that evening. They were all patients at the Houston Southwest Memorial Hospital in Texas and because of sickness or injury were unable to join their friends in trick-or-treating. Not wanting the children to feel left out, the Braeburn Ward Laurels in the Houston Texas Stake had decided to take Halloween to the hospital.

The evening’s activities included telling a story about a pumpkin, singing “pumpkin carols,” acting out a ghost story while the children helped with the sound effects, and coloring Halloween pictures. The hospital supplied the young women with a room so all the children (and their parents) could participate at once. After lots of laughter and smiles, the evening of sharing came to a close. As the Laurels bade their newfound friends good-bye, they agreed that this was one Halloween they would always remember.

One time when Joseph Smith was in grave danger and had bodyguards to protect him so that he could get his work done and could rest at night, he stayed in a friend’s log house. That evening he heard a little boy praying in the room next to his. He was pleading with the Lord to protect Joseph from the mob. When the boy’s prayer was over, Joseph turned to his bodyguards and told them all to go to bed and not worry about him, because the boy’s prayer had been heard and answered.

But one time, I found out that the scriptures really can be a lot like my life! It all happened when we went on a family reunion backpack trip.
I carried my own big backpack and sleeping bag, and I didn’t complain. After all, it was only supposed to be four miles (6.5 km) to the lake. I could make it, no problem.
The hike wasn’t too hard, but I was glad to stop for a rest after two miles (3 km). Then we saw the first trailhead sign. It said that the lake was still six miles (9.5 km) away. My dad didn’t have to tell me that the trail was really twice as long as we first thought. I already figured that out. He did need to remind us to make our water last longer.
My dad’s advice was important but hard to follow. The afternoon sun felt hot, and we hardly had any shade on the trail. It seemed like we were never going to reach the lake.
The grown-ups stayed in the back with the youngest kids, and the older cousins went on ahead. I stayed with three cousins my age, and we ended up somewhere in between.
When we couldn’t see anyone ahead or behind us anymore, we started to get nervous. Our backpacks felt heavy, and our water bottles were empty. How much farther did we have to go?
Finally, we got so worried and tired that we decided to stop and pray.
After the prayer, we picked up our backpacks and trudged on.
Just a little while later we heard hoofbeats coming up the trail. We waited and saw a man on a horse riding toward us.
He stopped and gave us some water. He explained that our older cousins had hurried to the lake with a water filter to start pumping water to bring back to us. The man heard about how we needed water and had agreed to help. “Do any of you need help with your backpacks?” he asked.
I looked at my cousins, and they smiled back at me. We actually felt pretty good!
“You better go on and help the others,” we said to the man. “We’re fine.”
And it was true! The rest of the way to the lake it felt like angels were lifting our packs and pushing us along. When I told my parents about it later, Dad beamed and Mom got tears in her eyes.

Let me give you one example from my own life.

Since I was very young I wanted to be a physician. My uncle Ted was a physician, and he was my role model during my formative years. He treated me when I was sick as a child, and, as I got older, he was both a mentor and a friend. Not only was he a successful doctor, he also served in the Church, serving twice as a bishop. I admired everything about him, and I felt that I would like to pattern my life after his.

As I got older, I kept this goal and enrolled in college courses that would lead to medical school. After my freshman year I left for my mission to Japan and returned in the fall of 1972. Three months later Mary and I were married in the Salt Lake Temple, and a year later our first child was born. As we prayed, both Mary and I felt the desire and prompting to have children, and our second child, little Rebecca, was born in October 1975. Over the years we were blessed with six other children.

During the months preceding the birth of Becky, I had a constant feeling that the Lord was leading us in a direction that did not include medical school. I was confused and a little stubborn in holding on to my childhood desire of becoming a doctor. The J. Reuben Clark Law School had recently opened at BYU, and I felt a continuing impression—and growing desire—that this was where I belonged and where the Lord would have me continue my education.

I had a wonderful stake president who had been a prominent lawyer in Salt Lake and had given it all up to accept the position of secretary to the First Presidency. I went to visit him and told him of both my confusion and the feelings that I was having.

Rather than telling me the answer I was looking for, he said something that I have never forgotten. He said, “David, you know section 9 of the Doctrine and Covenants as well as I do. Go home to your wife, Mary. Study it out in your minds together and come to a decision that you can take to the Lord. Then pray and ask God if what you have decided is right. He will answer you.”

He then said, “This revelation does not need to take months and months of agonizing. Rather, it takes the desire to find out what the Lord would have you do and the determination to do it.”

Two weeks later I was back with my stake president. I told him that both Mary and I were settled and that we would be applying to law school instead of medical school. Once we knew what the Lord would have us do, we were absolutely determined to follow that course. After I told him of our experience, he told me that he had received that same witness when we had met two weeks earlier, but it was important for me to receive the witness rather than for him to just tell me what I should do.

For me it was the right answer. That same path may not be right for others. The way to know is through personal revelation. If you care enough to go through the process of seeking God’s will, God will care enough to answer.

While I was in graduate school, I had a professor who claimed that there were no "local communities" left in our modern world, that we couldn't really "belong" anywhere any more. I wrote a paper in response, claiming that the Church was a local community. She disagreed and made me defend my point in class. But I won the day, for you see, two weeks after arriving in Pennsylvania to go to school, I was called as the Relief Society president for the ward. So within the first few months, I came to know many people well and to participate in their lives. I used several examples to support the fact that I "belonged" to this community even though I had only been there a short time. For example, within one week I had helped dress the body of a beloved ninety-year-old sister for her burial and held the new daughter of my counselor and her husband just two hours after she arrived on earth.
For you to see, here is a current picture of that beautiful baby, Lici Kanan, seated with her mother, Shannon. How could I not feel that I belonged when I had the privilege to share these most important moments of life with those in my church community? How can you not belong when o share your life and love with children?

Playing with dolls might seem like a silly thing for a Laurel to be involved with, but Kancie Schaefer, a member of the Pleasant View Ninth Ward, Provo Utah Sharon East Stake, knew that dolls would be a great way to send her love and friendship to places where she couldn’t go. For a Laurel project, Kancie organized several “doll days” where she and several other girls in her ward made rag dolls to be sent to Africa and the Philippines.
“If I could meet one of the little girls that receives a doll, I’d tell her how much I love her and that the doll is straight from my heart to hers,” says Kancie.

At school I made an awesome football field out of clay. My friend accidentally knocked it over and broke it. I was very sad. My friend also made a football field, so my teacher asked him to give me his. He had been so excited to show his parents that I said, “No, you can keep it.” He said he was sorry, and I forgave him. It made me feel good to forgive because that’s what Jesus would want me to do.
William S., age 8, Texas, USA

Then when I was 12, Latter-day Saint missionaries started visiting us. Whenever they were in our home, we felt a sense of peace and sheer goodness. Those were unusual feelings for us at that time. I wanted those feelings in my life all of the time, not just when the elders were with us.
I started to believe that salvation could come to our home. The missionaries helped me understand that Heavenly Father knows each of us individually. They explained that He is so anxious to bless us that He sent His Son to save us. I felt that the Savior had found us. I embraced the gospel with gratitude and was baptized a month before my 13th birthday. I received the Aaronic Priesthood and started to pass the sacrament, which seemed like a great honor, knowing that the first sacrament was blessed and passed by Jesus Himself.
I felt as though our family expanded to include the entire ward. We were immediately given opportunities to serve, and it was a wonderful feeling. Through my early Church life I gained hope. There were better days ahead. It was possible to feel a sense of belonging. We were important to Heavenly Father.

“The Family: A Proclamation to the World” teaches my family the importance of work. Have the children hold up fingers to count each of the nine principles while you read paragraph 7 from “The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” beginning with “Successful marriages and families” and ending with “wholesome recreational activities.” See if they can remember the eighth principle (work). To teach the importance and value of work, tell the following story about President Dieter F. Uchtdorf. As a young boy, he worked at his parents’ laundry business, delivering laundry before and after school. For many years he had to ride a big, heavy bicycle, pulling a laundry cart up and down the streets of their town. He said, “Sometimes the cart seemed so heavy and the work so tiring that I thought my lungs would burst, and I often had to stop to catch my breath. Nevertheless, I did my part because I knew we desperately needed the income as a family, and it was my way to contribute.” Dieter knew his hard work as a delivery boy was helping his family. But it wasn’t until many years later that he learned how his hard work helped cure him of a lung disease he never knew he had. He said, “My regular exercise in fresh air as a laundry boy had been a key factor in my healing from this illness” (“See the End from the Beginning,” Ensign, May 2006, 43).

The unique qualities possessed by these men and women whom I have mentioned can be of invaluable assistance to us as we face the problems and the trials which lie ahead. May I illustrate by mentioning the experience of the Jerome Kenneth Pollard family of Oakland, California.
This past May, as Elder Taavili Joseph Samuel Pollard was traveling to the mission office on the last day of his mission in Zimbabwe, the mission car he was driving somehow spun out of control and hit a tree. A passerby was able to rescue Elder Pollard’s companion, but Elder Pollard, who was unconscious, was trapped in the car, which burst into flames. Elder Pollard perished. His mother had passed away eight years earlier; hence, his father was rearing the family alone. A brother was serving in the West Indies Mission.
When the news of Elder Pollard’s death reached his father, this humble man—who had already lost his wife—called the son serving in the West Indies Mission to let him know of his brother’s death. Over that long-distance telephone line, Brother Pollard and his son, no doubt grief stricken and heartsick, sang together “I Am a Child of God.” Before concluding the call, the father offered a prayer to Heavenly Father, thanking Him for His blessings and seeking His divine comfort.
Brother Pollard later commented that he knew his family would be all right, for they have strong testimonies of the gospel and of the plan of salvation.

There are many examples in our lives that have shown Christlike attributes and love for others. When our children were young, our bishop requested that I bring sacrament to a sister named Irma who resided in a senior assisted living institution. Like the people who were in the dark, she did not have the capacity to regularly receive the light of the Savior through partaking of the sacrament. As a family, we would bring the sacrament bread and water to her each Sunday. Our children would hold up the light of Christ by sharing their testimony or lessons they have learned from their classes and the sacrament meeting. From this experience we learned about compassion and Christlike love.

The chapel I worship at in Nigeria is close to a school whose principal wants nothing to do with the Church. On one occasion the principal told a teacher never to return to the school after learning that the teacher was a Latter-day Saint. A Church member who volunteered to visit and explain the mission of the Church was rebuffed.
As a salesman for laboratory and medical equipment, I often visit schools and hospitals to make sales. After one unsuccessful month, I had no choice but to visit this school. My plan was to sell my product and leave, hoping the principal would not find out I was a member of the Church. The Spirit, however, told me that she would want to know about my religion.
My business with the head of the school’s science department went smoothly, and he took me to the principal for payment. After filling out the check, she started asking questions to get to know me better. When her questions became personal, I began to feel uncomfortable. Then she asked the question I had been praying she would not ask: “Which denomination are you a member of?”
I was tempted to lie, collect my check, and go because I badly needed the sale. But I felt I should tell her the truth. After all, the early Saints had experienced worse than this minor test of my faith.
With renewed courage, I looked her straight in the eye and said, “I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” Then I bore my testimony. To my surprise she smiled, said we all worship the same God, and handed me the check.
As I left, a scripture came to my mind: “Now this was a great trial to those that did stand fast in the faith; nevertheless, they were steadfast and immovable in keeping the commandments of God, and they bore with patience the persecution which was heaped upon them” (Alma 1:25).
I was happy not to have disappointed Heavenly Father or myself. Because of this experience, I made a commitment to always be a good sales representative. More important, I committed to always be a good representative of the gospel of Jesus Christ.