Gospel Story Finder

What would you do if you were really good at karate and other kids made fun of you? Would you use your skills to get back at them? Maybe teach them not to pick on you anymore?
Eleven-year-old Eduardo Dourado knows what he would do—nothing. Although some of his schoolmates make fun of him for keeping the standards of the Church, he chooses the right and refuses to fight. “I could beat them,” he says, “but I don’t want to hurt anyone. Sometimes I’ve had to protect myself, but I try other things first to keep from fighting.”
As Jesus taught, Eduardo ignores insults. But it isn’t always easy. Because he won’t swear and do other bad things, kids make fun of him. Sometimes he feels lonely. But he knows what Jesus wants him to do, and that is what he chooses to do.

I mentioned that my Dad had a 5th grade education. I also mentioned that my siblings and I were teased a lot in school because we were Mormons. So my Dad and Mom would encourage us kids to do well in school. To my parents, this would be another way for us Mormons to preach the gospel and to show that Mormons are really smart and hopefully it will lessen the teasing or completely stop it. So no pressure there for me and my brother, but we did just that. In those days in elementary school in Fitiuta, they have what we called “Lau Togi” or calling of final grades, where all of our parents would come to school at the end of the school year and the principal would call out loud the top 3 students of each class. It was a big deal.

Parents would anxiously wait for their kids names to be called. I’m happy to say that I was always first place in the top 3 kids of my class and I even skipped grade and moved up to my brother’s class and we graduated together in 1973 from Kahuku High School. Not bad yeah. I’m not sharing this with you to boast about me, well maybe I am, but it’s okay. It was a long time ago. I’m old now. My parents were right about us doing well in school. We earned the respect from the principal and the teachers and even the kids of the village. They became our friends and the teasing stopped. We were known to be the smart Mormon kids. I have wonderful memories of my parents growing up and how much love they have for us and they would do anything to make sure we succeed even in hard times.

Elliot Grow had it made. The summer before his senior year of high school, he was an aspiring lacrosse player with a promising future, and it looked like he just might land a starting spot on his school’s basketball team as well. But calamity struck for Elliot one day in June when he tore the meniscus cartilage in his knee during a recreational league basketball game.

Surgery came shortly thereafter, followed by three months of intense physical therapy. It was a lot of hard work, but Elliot persisted. Eventually he made it off the crutches and back onto the basketball court. Some people would probably complain about the months of lost training and the pain, but Elliot feels a sense of gratitude.

“I feel blessed that I am still able to do what I love. I love playing lacrosse. I love playing basketball. I don’t take that for granted anymore. When I am out there, I play as hard as I can and I don’t only play for me. My little brother had a brain tumor when he was three, so he can’t do some of the things that I’ve been able to do. Now I play for him.

“Before my injury, I would have thought, ‘My body is mine. I can do whatever I want with it,’” he says. “But after this surgery, I have realized that my body is a gift and I should take care of it the right way.”

I close with a WWI story from a book by Lucy Gertsch Thomson:
"After fighting in a bitter battle, a soldier pleaded with his commanding officer to let him go out on the battlefield to search for his missing companion. The commander said it was of no use, for no one could have lived through the hours of constant fire. The soldier insisted and was finally granted permission. Sometime later he returned with the limp body of his dead comrade. "I told you it was useless," commented the commander. "But you're wrong sir" the soldier said. "I got there just in time to hear him whisper, 'I knew you'd come.'"[6]

Francisco and Estela Magdaleno of Las Aguilas Ward, Guadalajara México Moctezuma Stake, were baptized in the mid-1960s. The area where they live is strongly traditional with regard to religion. At first, neighbors wanted little to do with them or their faith. The Magdalenos continued to live their religion and tried their best to maintain good relationships with those around them. They and their three children have all served missions in Mexico. The Magdalenos have lived to see the day when neighbors turn to them for advice on questions of faith.

There was to be one great final lesson before his mortal life ended. He was incarcerated in Carthage Jail with his brother Hyrum, with John Taylor, and with Willard Richards. The angry mob stormed the jail; they came up the stairway, blasphemous in their cursing, heavily armed, and began to fire at will. Hyrum was hit and died. John Taylor took several balls of fire within his bosom. The Prophet Joseph, with his pistol in hand, was attempting to defend his life and that of his brethren, and yet he could tell from the pounding on the door that this mob would storm that door and would kill John Taylor and Willard Richards in an attempt to kill him.
And so his last great act here upon the earth was to leave the door and lead Willard Richards to safety, throw the gun on the floor, and go to the window, that they might see him, that the attention of this ruthless mob might be focused upon him rather than the others. Joseph Smith gave his life. Willard Richards was spared, and John Taylor recovered from his wounds. “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). The Prophet Joseph Smith taught us love—by example.

My beloved brothers and sisters, each time I enjoy a fresh, vine-ripened tomato or eat a juicy peach right off the tree, my thoughts go back 60 years to when my father owned a small peach orchard in Holladay, Utah. He kept beehives there to pollinate the peach blossoms that would eventually grow into very large, delicious peaches.
Father loved his gentle honeybees and marveled at the way thousands of them working together transformed the nectar gathered from his peach blossoms into sweet, golden honey—one of nature’s most beneficial foods. In fact, nutritionists tell us it is one of the foods that includes all the substances—enzymes, vitamins, minerals, and water—necessary to sustain life.
My father always tried to involve me in his work with his hives, but I was very happy to let him tend to his bees. However, since those days, I have learned more about the highly organized beehive—a colony of about 60,000 bees.
Honeybees are driven to pollinate, gather nectar, and condense the nectar into honey. It is their magnificent obsession imprinted into their genetic makeup by our Creator. It is estimated that to produce just one pound (0.45 kg) of honey, the average hive of 20,000 to 60,000 bees must collectively visit millions of flowers and travel the equivalent of two times around the world. Over its short lifetime of just a few weeks to four months, a single honeybee’s contribution of honey to its hive is a mere one-twelfth of one teaspoon.
Though seemingly insignificant when compared to the total, each bee’s one-twelfth of a teaspoon of honey is vital to the life of the hive. The bees depend on each other. Work that would be overwhelming for a few bees to do becomes lighter because all of the bees faithfully do their part.
The beehive has always been an important symbol in our Church history. We learn in the Book of Mormon that the Jaredites carried honeybees with them (see Ether 2:3) when they journeyed to the Americas thousands of years ago. Brigham Young chose the beehive as a symbol to encourage and inspire the cooperative energy necessary among the pioneers to transform the barren desert wasteland surrounding the Great Salt Lake into the fertile valleys we have today. We are the beneficiaries of their collective vision and industry.
The beehive symbol is found in both the interiors and exteriors of many of our temples. This podium where I stand is made from the wood of a walnut tree grown in President Gordon B. Hinckley’s backyard and is adorned with carved beehive images.
All of this symbolism attests to one fact: great things are brought about and burdens are lightened through the efforts of many hands “anxiously engaged in a good cause” (D&C 58:27). Imagine what the millions of Latter-day Saints could accomplish in the world if we functioned like a beehive in our focused, concentrated commitment to the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Savior taught that the first and great commandment is:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. …
“And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
“On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37, 39–40).
The Savior’s words are simple, yet their meaning is profound and deeply significant. We are to love God and to love and care for our neighbors as ourselves. Imagine what good we can do in the world if we all join together, united as followers of Christ, anxiously and busily responding to the needs of others and serving those around us—our families, our friends, our neighbors, our fellow citizens.
As the Epistle of James notes, service is the very definition of pure religion (see James 1:27).
We read of the service Church members provide around the world and especially the humanitarian service given in times of crisis—fires and floods and hurricanes and tornadoes. These much-needed and much-appreciated emergency responses should certainly continue as a way of bearing one another’s burdens. But what about our everyday lives? What would be the cumulative effect of millions of small, compassionate acts performed daily by us because of our heartfelt Christian love for others? Over time this would have a transformative effect upon all of our Heavenly Father’s children through the extension of His love to them through us. Our troubled world needs this love of Christ today more than ever, and it will need it even more in the years ahead.
These simple, daily acts of service may not seem like much in and of themselves, but when considered collectively they become just like the one-twelfth teaspoon of honey contributed by a single bee to the hive. There is power in our love for God and for His children, and when that love is tangibly manifest in millions of acts of Christian kindness, it will sweeten and nourish the world with the life-sustaining nectar of faith, hope, and charity.
What do we need to do to become like the dedicated honeybees and have that dedication become part of our nature? Many of us are dutiful in attending our Church meetings. We work hard in our callings and especially on Sundays. That is surely to be commended. But are our minds and our hearts just as anxiously engaged in good things during the rest of the week? Do we just go through the motions, or are we truly converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ? How do we take the seed of faith that has been nurtured in our minds and plant it deep in the fertile soil of our souls? How do we make the mighty change of heart that Alma says is essential for our eternal happiness and peace? (see Alma 5:12–21).
Remember, honey contains all of the substances necessary to sustain mortal life. And the doctrine and gospel of Christ is the only way to obtain eternal life. Only when our testimony transcends what is in our mind and burrows deep into our heart will our motivation to love and to serve become like unto the Savior’s. It is then, and only then, that we become deeply converted disciples of Christ empowered by the Spirit to reach the hearts of our fellowmen.
When our hearts are no longer set upon the things of this world, we will no longer aspire to the honors of men or seek only to gratify our pride (see D&C 121:35–37). Rather, we take on the Christlike qualities that Jesus taught:
We are gentle and meek and long-suffering (see D&C 121:41).
We are kind, without hypocrisy or guile (see D&C 121:42).
We feel charity toward all men (see D&C 121:45).
Our thoughts are always virtuous (see D&C 121:45).
We no longer desire to do evil (see Mosiah 5:2).
The Holy Ghost is our constant companion, and the doctrines of the priesthood distill upon our souls as the dews from heaven (see D&C 121:45–46).
Now, brothers and sisters, I’m not encouraging religious zealotry or fanaticism. Quite the contrary! I’m simply suggesting that we take the next logical step in our complete conversion to the gospel of Christ by assimilating its doctrines deep within our hearts and our souls so we will act and live consistently—and with integrity—what we profess to believe.
This integrity simplifies our lives and amplifies our sensitivities to the Spirit and to the needs of others. It brings joy into our lives and peace to our souls—the kind of joy and peace that comes to us as we repent of our sins and follow the Savior by keeping His commandments.
How do we make this change? How do we ingrain this love of Christ into our hearts? There is one simple daily practice that can make a difference for every member of the Church, including you boys and girls, you young men and you young women, you single adults, and you fathers and mothers.
That simple practice is: In your morning prayer each new day, ask Heavenly Father to guide you to recognize an opportunity to serve one of His precious children. Then go throughout the day with your heart full of faith and love, looking for someone to help. Stay focused, just like the honeybees focus on the flowers from which to gather nectar and pollen. If you do this, your spiritual sensitivities will be enlarged and you will discover opportunities to serve that you never before realized were possible.
President Thomas S. Monson has taught that in many instances Heavenly Father answers another person’s prayers through us—through you and me—through our kind words and deeds, through our simple acts of service and love.
And President Spencer W. Kimball said: “God does notice us, and he watches over us. But it is usually through another person that he meets our needs. Therefore, it is vital that we serve each other” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball [2006], 82).
I know that if you do this—at home, at school, at work, and at church—the Spirit will guide you, and you will be able to discern those in need of a particular service that only you may be able to give. You will be prompted by the Spirit and magnificently motivated to help pollinate the world with the pure love of Christ and His gospel.
And remember, like the little honeybee’s one-twelfth teaspoon of honey provided to the hive, if we multiply our efforts by tens of thousands, even millions of prayerful efforts to share God’s love for His children through Christian service, there will be a compounding effect of good that will bring the Light of Christ to this ever-darkening world. Bound together, we will bring love and compassion to our own family and to the lonely, the poor, the broken, and to those of our Heavenly Father’s children who are searching for truth and peace.
It is my humble prayer, brothers and sisters, that we will ask in our daily prayers for the inspiration to find someone for whom we can provide some meaningful service, including the service of sharing the gospel truths and our testimonies. At the end of each day, may we be able to say yes to the questions: “Have I done any good in the world today? Have I helped anyone in need?” (Hymns, no. 223).
This is God’s work. May we be about it as faithfully as the dedicated little honeybees go about theirs, I humbly pray in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Soon after Sabrina and Camila returned to church, they began reaching out themselves. When Ana Carolina Batista, 14, began investigating the Church with her mother, the twins were there to help. The first time she attended church, Ana Carolina’s anxiety melted when the twins sat by her side and showed her how to look up scriptures from the lesson. “This made me feel good, because I didn’t know what to do. I felt relieved to see there were people to help me.”
Ana Carolina says the friendship of the twins made her decision to join the Church much easier. Sabrina and Camila were also happy; their little class was growing.

From a hill, the ripe pumpkin field looks like orange and brown cake batter—swirled, not blended. It’s harvest time, and Alf Buckley is pulling pumpkins, building orange pyramids. It’s back-breaking work; 10–12-hours-a-day work.
“There are things I’d rather be doing,” says Alf, 17, a straight-talking young man with a true New England accent. “But you feel better about yourself after working. Maybe just to know you’re not sitting around the house, watching the tube all day.”
During the summer Alf works six days a week, saving for his mission and technical college. In the fall and winter he works evenings and Saturdays at local farms and for his father’s plumbing business.
Alf isn’t perfect, of course. He has challenges at school and with friends just like any other LDS teenager, but he knows how to work hard, and people recognize his effort.
“Sure, I get tempted to spend my tithing money, but Dad gave me a good way to stay in line,” said Alf. “I slip the money behind a poster on the wall. I can’t see it, and then I don’t spend it. When I pay my tithing the jobs keep coming in.”
Even Alf Buckley doesn’t know exactly when it happened, but he has learned the value of work. Perhaps it was one afternoon when his dad came home exhausted from a long day on the job, and he realized he was looking at an honest man. Whatever made the difference, it was Alf who decided to be the kind of young man he is today.
In a field near Pepperell, Alf is pulling pumpkins, working steady. The field was orange, now it’s brown—the pumpkins are stacked. “My dad taught me how to live, but now I have to take that and do something with it,” he says.
He pauses. “That’s kind of hard in a way. But I can do it.”

On a cold winter’s night in 1951, there was a knock at my door. A German brother from Ogden, Utah, announced himself and said, “Are you Bishop Monson?” I answered in the affirmative. He began to weep and said, “My brother, his wife, and family are coming here from Germany. They are going to live in your ward. Will you come with us to see the apartment we have rented for them?”
On the way to the apartment, he told me he had not seen his brother for many years. Through the holocaust of World War II, his brother had been faithful to the Church, once serving as a branch president before the war took him to the Russian front.
I observed the apartment. It was cold and dreary. The paint was peeling, the wallpaper soiled, the cupboards empty. A forty-watt bulb, suspended from the living room ceiling, revealed a linoleum floor covering with a large hole in the center. I was heartsick. I thought, “What a dismal welcome for a family which has endured so much.”
My thoughts were interrupted by the brother’s statement, “It isn’t much, but it’s better than they have in Germany.” With that, the key to the apartment was left with me, along with the information that the family would arrive in Salt Lake City in three weeks—just two days before Christmas.
Sleep was slow in coming to me that night. The next morning was Sunday. In our ward welfare committee meeting, one of my counselors said, “Bishop, you look worried. Is something wrong?”
I recounted to those present my experience of the night before, revealing the details of the uninviting apartment. There were a few moments of silence. Then Brother Eardley, the group leader of the high priests, said, “Bishop, did you say that apartment was inadequately lighted and that the kitchen appliances were in need of replacement?” I answered in the affirmative. He continued, “I am an electrical contractor. Would you permit the high priests of this ward to rewire that apartment? I would also like to invite my suppliers to contribute a new stove and a new refrigerator. Do I have your permission?”
I answered with a glad “Certainly.”
Then Brother Balmforth, the seventies president, responded, “Bishop, as you know, I’m in the carpet business. I would like to invite my suppliers to contribute some carpet, and the seventies can easily lay it and eliminate that worn linoleum.”
Then Brother Bowden, the president of the elders quorum, spoke up. He was a painting contractor. He said, “I’ll furnish the paint. May the elders paint and wallpaper that apartment?”
Sister Miller, the Relief Society president, was next to speak. “We in the Relief Society cannot stand the thought of empty cupboards. May we fill them?”
The three weeks which followed are ever to be remembered. It seemed that the entire ward joined in the project. The days passed, and at the appointed time, the family arrived from Germany. Again at my door stood the brother from Ogden. With an emotion-filled voice, he introduced to me his brother, his brother’s wife, and their family. Then he asked, “Could we go visit the apartment?” As we walked up the staircase leading to the apartment, he repeated, “It isn’t much, but it’s more than they have had in Germany.” Little did he know what a transformation had taken place and that many who had participated were inside waiting for our arrival.
The door opened to reveal a newness of life. We were greeted by the aroma of freshly painted woodwork and newly papered walls. Gone was the forty-watt bulb, along with the worn linoleum it had illuminated. We stepped on carpet deep and beautiful. A walk to the kitchen presented to our view a new stove and new refrigerator. The cupboard doors were still open; however, they now revealed every shelf filled with food. As usual, the Relief Society had done its work.
In the living room, we began to sing Christmas hymns. We sang “Silent night! Holy night! All is calm, all is bright.” (Hymns, 1985, no. 204.) We sang in English; they sang in German. At the conclusion, the father, realizing that all of this was his, took me by the hand to express his thanks. His emotion was too great. He buried his head in my shoulder and repeated the words, “Mein Bruder, mein Bruder, mein Bruder.”
It was time to leave. As we walked down the stairs and out into the night air, snow was falling. Not a word was spoken. Finally, a young girl asked, “Bishop, I feel better than I have ever felt before. Can you tell me why?”
I responded with the words of the Master: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” (Matt. 25:40.) Suddenly there came to mind the words from “O Little Town of Bethlehem”:
How silently, how silently,
The wondrous gift is giv’n!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of his heav’n.
No ear may hear his coming;
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him, still
The dear Christ enters in.
(Hymns, 1985, no. 208.)
Silently, wondrously, His gift had been given. Lives were blessed, needs were met, hearts were touched, and souls were saved. A provident plan had been followed. A precious promise had been fulfilled.

Everyone can find ways to offer Christlike service. My counselor Sister Carol F. McConkie recently told me about her 10-year-old granddaughter Sarah who, when she realized that her mother was ill, decided on her own to be of help. She got her little sister up, helped her dress, brush her teeth, fix her hair, and eat breakfast so her mother could rest. She quietly performed this simple act of service without being asked because she saw a need and desired to help. Not only did Sarah bless her mother, but I am sure that she also felt joy in knowing she had lightened the burden of someone she loved and, along the way, strengthened her relationship with her sister. President James E. Faust said: “Serving others can begin at almost any age. … It need not be on a grand scale, and it is noblest within the family.”4

In 1850, Elder Lorenzo Snow of the Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ascended a very high mountain near LaTour to visit the Vaudois of the Piedmont. He and his two companions stood on a bold projecting rock, where he proclaimed that Joseph Smith had seen the Father and the Son and had restored the gospel in its fulness and completeness. He testified that the keys of the holy apostleship had been restored. He further testified that there were indeed living Apostles and prophets upon the earth. Many believed his startling message and joined the Church. Moved by his experience with the Vaudois living in the Alpine mountain valleys, President Snow cited the stirring words:
For the strength of the hills we bless thee,
Our God, our fathers’ God;
Thou hast made thy children mighty
By the touch of the mountain sod.
John Daniel Malan was the first of the Vaudois to be baptized on October 27, 1850, followed by the families of the Cardons, Stalles, Beuses, Pons, Malans, Gaudins, Chatelains, and many others. Some were in the first handcart companies to come to the Salt Lake Valley in the early 1850s. These families intermarried into other well-known families in the western United States, including the Larsons, Maughans, Crocketts, Miners, Budges, Thatchers, Steeds, and Parkinsons. Drawing from their roots in the Vaudois mountain sod, many of their descendants tended the vineyards of the newly restored Church and today are making singular contributions to the worldwide Church, believing, as did their forebears, that Apostles hold the keys that never rust.

All this turning began when the Dalton Gardens Ward youth took Malachi’s prophecy to heart and became excited about family history work (see Mal. 4:5–6).
They did this by filling out pedigree charts, having classes on the importance of genealogy, visiting with their ward’s senior citizens, and organizing a ward activity in which they acted out episodes from the lives of the grandparents in their ward family.
And what’s been the outcome of all this excitement? For one thing, the ward’s generation gap has narrowed.
“Now when you go to church, you see a lot of the young people going up to the older people in the ward and saying hi and maybe walking them to class,” says Russell Isaacson, a 16-year-old priest. “Before we might have just walked by them because we didn’t really know them at all, but now we see them as our friends.”

The snows stayed late in the highlands that spring and gave Jamie great cause to worry. Fiona, his very own ewe, would probably need help with the birthing of her first lamb. What would happen if she stayed too long in the highlands and became trapped by the sudden fury of a late storm? She and her lamb might die.
“Grandfather,” Jamie began over breakfast, “I’ll carry feed to the sheep today. There’s time before school this morning.”
Grandfather poured milk onto his porridge. “We’ll not be carrying feed up the hill any more this spring,” he said. “There’s work to do below—the fields must be readied for sowing.”
“But, Grandfather, the sheep could go hungry, especially …”
“Especially those heavy with lambs,” Grandfather finished. He wiped his gray mustache with a thick cloth. “I know that’s what you’re thinkin’, lad. But they’ve only to scratch through the snow and find spring timothy grass for food now. It’s in their nature to know these things.”
“But Fiona …”
“Jamie, if she gets caught in the hills when her time comes, she’ll take shelter and give birth the way it’s always been done. When you’ve learned more about crofting (farming), you’ll find that it’s hard, hard work. There’s no room for soft feelings for just one sheep.”
Jamie opened his mouth to speak again but stopped at Grandfather’s look. His eyes were the shivery blue of a November sunrise, his face a craggy reminder of Aberdeen’s moors. Jamie could not speak again, not in the face of Grandfather’s wintry look.
Had Grandfather never felt the warmth of the work he was doing? Would he, Jamie, lose the tender feelings he now held for all the living, breathing things on the croft? Would he, one day, become like Grandfather? Once, he wanted to be just like him. Now he wasn’t so sure.
“Take up your books now, lad,” Grandfather said. “I’ll take up my plow.”
Jamie hurried through the soft fields that were waiting for the seeds of oats and barley. They were the staple of life for those on this land. Without them Grandfather could not keep his croft. So Jamie knew that the planting must be done on time and that the sheep must look after themselves.
But Fiona … Fiona was different. Jamie knew that too. He paused and looked to the low hills beyond the meadows. This summer they would be covered with the lavender glow of wild heather, but now they were dull with patches of spiny gorse (a shrub) and dirty snow. Fiona was up there somewhere, waiting.
At school, Jamie’s books lay open to the thoughts of Robbie Burns and the deeds of past Highlanders. But his mind stayed with Fiona and with remembrances of past lambing snows. It was during the lambing snows two years ago when he’d first seen her trembling legs take a step towards him and he’d touched her still-damp wool. Her mother had died with milk sickness, so Jamie had bottle-fed Fiona until she could join the other spring lambs dancing in the fields.
But she always remembered him and waited for his visit. Then she cavorted around and around on sturdy legs as they traveled the craggy paths together. And she still hurried over to him when he managed to find chores to take him her way.
The day was as gray as slabs of cold porridge when school ended. Jamie hurried along the pathways, eager to be home. Despite Grandfather’s words, surely he would give Jamie time to carry a basket of feed to Fiona. Surely there would be time for that much.
But the milking had to be done, the hens fed, and the fires tended in the cooking stove. And then it was dark and a cold wind blew. Before they’d finished supper, rain clawed at the windows with sharp, scraping sounds.
Sometime in the night Jamie awoke to a great silence. The storm had moved up to the highlands, and he knew that when he looked in the morning, he would see new scarves of snow tossed over the hills. Fiona was up there, waiting for him to come.
At first light Jamie dressed in his thickest woollies and set out for the feed shed. He filled a basket with grazing supplements and began the long walk to the hills. As he climbed, he burrowed deeper into his mackintosh and hood, glad for the Wellingtons that kept his feet warm and dry.
Soon he saw the sheep lying in the snow in soft, lumpy clutches. Fiona was not among them.
“Fiona,” Jamie called.
The wind carried his voice away from the hills toward Grandfather’s house below, where a light now shone in the kitchen window. Jamie hurried on, his heart cold with what he might find. He called again: “Fiona.”
He stopped where the snow drifted against the stone fence. Should he follow the fence line or climb over it? Every moment counted. Decide quickly, he told himself.
Fiona, in her heaviness, could not climb over the fence, he knew, so she would stay on this side. But which way had she gone? There were no prints in the snow, nothing to show that she’d ever been here. There were only the drifts, as smooth as the icing on the tea cakes in Mrs. MacCrae’s bakeshop window—except for that one small place where the snow mounded in a small, round hump.
“Fiona!” He ran, dropped on his knees, and pawed away the snow until he found her lying still and quiet. Was there breath left in her? There’d not be much air under the snow.
Then he saw and understood. Her small muzzle was tucked into a crack between the stones in the fence. There she’d found air to keep her alive.
She pulled her soft, woolly face away from the fence, and something stirred against her. Jamie saw then that her lamb had only just come, looking as trembly and damp as Fiona had when she’d been born in the lambing snows. Bent beneath the lamb were tender shoots of timothy grass. Air and food. Fiona had known just what to do after all.
Jamie looked up to see Grandfather standing next to him. “You were right, Grandfather. She doesn’t need me any more.”
“But I do,” Grandfather said, “to remind me about the way of crofting that I’d almost forgotten.” His eyes had lost their shivery blueness and were warm and caring.
Grandfather carried Fiona, and Jamie carried her lamb down to the warmth of the house below.

Elder Stevenson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles told the true story of a loyal sheep dog. When some sheep got stuck in the mountains, the dog stayed with them, circling in the snowy weather, protecting them from coyotes. The dog finally led the sheep back to the shepherd and the flock. Heavenly Father loves us and, like the sheep dog, will never leave us, even when life gets stormy. We should also love and protect others.

A group of men were talking with the Prophet Joseph Smith one day when news arrived that the house of a poor brother who lived some distance from town was burned down. Everyone expressed sorrow for what had happened. The Prophet listened for a moment, then “put his hand in his pocket, took out five dollars and said, ‘I feel sorry for this brother to the amount of five dollars; how much do you all feel sorry?’” The immediacy of the Prophet’s response is significant. Last year millions of you responded to the sorrow of others with your means, tender hearts, and helping hands. Thank you for your wonderful measure of generosity.

I went off to school that fall. I was on the track team, and though I was not a star that year, I ran straight and hard. When I came home that summer, I had an interview with my bishop to begin the work of serving a mission. It didn’t take place in a bishop’s office, but in a blue, two-story home in south San Francisco. I sat on the edge of a bed, and the bishop pulled close his favorite old chair. He seemed a little hesitant. His eyes were wet.
“Tom, you are a Rosa,” he began. “And you are a Latter-day Saint.”
“Yes.”
“If you honor your family, you will honor your church. If you honor your church, you will honor your family.”
“I understand that.”
After asking me the normal missionary interview questions, he concluded, “You will do good. You will be a fine missionary.”
Then he told me to go help Mom in the kitchen. I looked back at him as I left. His hair was mostly gray now, and his arms were not as thickly muscled as before. He sat in his chair and stared out the window at ten thousand sparkling lights on the hillside across the bay from our home. I wondered if he knew how proud I was to be his son and how much it meant to me to share his good name. I walked downstairs realizing that all those years I had been running, my father had been growing, and I would never lack for someone to look up to.

For David Wojnar, 22, from Springfield, Massachusetts, a good friendship played an important role in his conversion to the Church. Now a missionary serving in Utah Salt Lake Mission, Elder Wojnar talked about the role of friendship in missionary work.

“When I graduated from high school, I decided it was time to move away from home. I got a job in Virginia and moved in with an old friend. One of my roommates was LDS. We soon became good friends. We did things together, and we could talk about anything. He had a sincere interest in me. We were friends first, and being friends probably helped more than anything else,” Elder Wojnar explained.

“Eventually, he asked me to go to a Young Adult activity with him. They were putting on a play. The young people came up and made me feel welcome. They all were excited about meeting someone new,” Elder Wojnar explained. “They were different from anybody I had run around with before. There was a different spirit.”

“When I became involved in the activities and started attending church, the members made me feel special and important. They never put me down because I was a member of another church. I felt good being around them.”

At that time, Elder Wojnar still wasn’t ready to commit himself to baptism. “My other roommate, my friend from Massachusetts, was taking the discussions and was almost ready for baptism. When the missionaries came, I always found an excuse to leave. Most of the barriers I had were just fear and not knowing what would happen. I was determined to serve the Lord, and I just needed time. No one seemed excited or upset about the hesitancy that I was experiencing. My friend was patient and didn’t give up on me. He was still my friend, and eventually I did make the commitment,” Elder Wojnar said.

“Being sincere is one of the most important aspects of missionary work,” Elder Wojnar explained. “If you’re sincere and a true friend, people will respond to the gospel. It’s not as important for members to teach the doctrines as it is for them to plant the seed. Being a good example is also important. It means more than just living the principles. It means going out and showing the results of living the gospel. Don’t be afraid to let people know you’re a Mormon. I’m tickled pink whenever I can tell anybody I’m a Mormon,” Elder Wojnar concluded.

As newlyweds, my wife and I both were stubborn. We would disagree and argue about things that didn’t really matter, and it had worn down our relationship. Our marriage wouldn’t have lasted if we had kept going down the road we were on.
But making eternal covenants in the house of the Lord has made all the difference. Our temple covenants changed the focus from “me” to “we.” We learned to value our eternal relationship instead of focusing on our own needs as individuals. Eventually, we became “of one heart and one mind” (Moses 7:18), which vastly improved our course, connection, and communication.

Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf said the following: “In family relationships love is really spelled t-i-m-e, time.”10
I tried to teach that principle in the talk I gave at the last October conference. Recently I received an email from Hailey, a member of the Church in Salem, Oregon, and mother of six, who learned this lesson on her own. Here is what she said:

After coming home last night from a couple of long days of helping at our elementary school, a flat tire, doctor’s visit, radiology appointment, and emergency room visit for one of my sick children, I was greeted with a kitchen full of dishes and life mess all over my house. I was exhausted, . . . and honestly, I just wanted to shower and climb into bed. . . .

While I was trying to tidy the kitchen, my seven-year-old approached me and asked if I would walk down to our basement to help him find a particular toy. My first thought . . . was, “I just want to get the kitchen cleaned and kids to bed without interruption.” He again asked if I would help him. . . .

I then remembered the following from your talk in conference: “When prompted, we can leave dishes in the sink or an in-box full of challenges demanding attention in order to read to a child, visit with a friend, babysit a neighbor’s children, or serve in the temple [my insert: or help your child find a toy]. . . . [We can] see people not as interruptions but as the purpose of [our] life.”

I looked at my son, who was looking up at me, and I looked at my sink full of dishes and countertops littered with clutter, and I said out loud, “Dishes, you have to wait.”
As he and I proceeded to walk down our stairs to the basement, my son, Andrew, said, “Mom, you love me more than dishes, huh?”
To which I responded an unequivocal “Yes!” . . .

Then, this morning, while helping him finish his homework for school, I said, “Andrew, I love you.”
He responded with, “Yup, you love me more than dishes.”

That became our new parenting mantra: “I love you more than dishes” (or insert any of the other thousand to-dos on our list).11

Hailey is my example in this. She knows that each day is a gift from a loving Father in Heaven.