Gospel Story Finder

I certainly don’t want to compare myself to the great prophet Jonah. But I had an experience in my life where I was greatly rewarded for doing something that, although very difficult, was what the Lord wanted.
As a young man, I prepared to go on a mission. Every returned missionary I had heard said it was the best two years of his life. I interpreted this to mean that a mission was easy and glamorous. In a vain and arrogant manner, I figured the Lord would want someone of my ability and talent to open up China or Russia or India. At the very least, he would want me to serve in Japan or Europe.
I sent in my papers and eagerly awaited the moment when my call arrived in the mail. When it finally did, my mother and I opened the letter. In big words at the top of the page, it said, “You are hereby called to the Colorado Denver Mission.”
My heart sank. I thought, “How could this be? How could the Lord do this to me?” And to add insult to injury, they included a map of the mission. It included small towns in eastern Utah and parts of Wyoming.
I thought, “This is not exotic. This is embarrassing.”
I looked at my mom and said, “Mom, I’m not going to Colorado on my mission.”
She looked at me and said, “Let’s talk to your father when he gets home.”
When my father got home, I said to him, “Dad, I don’t want to go to Colorado.”
I thought he would say something like, “I never took you for a quitter. I thought when you started something, you would finish it.”
Instead, he said, “Son, I’ll support you in whatever you want to do. If you want to go to Colorado, I’m behind you. If you don’t want to go, I’m also behind you. But before you make that decision, I think you should fast and pray to see what the Lord wants you to do.”
We fasted and prayed until the next evening. When we finished the fast, we knelt and prayed. In the end the Lord gave me a witness that Colorado was where I was called and where I should serve. As we ended the fast, I said to my dad, “I guess Laramie won’t be so bad after all.”
He looked at me and said, “Yes, it will.”
I found that a mission was not easy. In fact, it was the most difficult thing I had ever done. Working and living 16 hours a day for the Lord wasn’t easy. I found a mission was not glamorous. People laughed and scoffed at us, dogs bit us, and doors slammed in our face. But as everyone who applies himself on a mission knows, it is the most rewarding experience of one’s life. The Lord blessed me beyond my ability to receive it, and I felt an inner peace and satisfaction I had never felt before.

I know some of you worry about being misjudged, ridiculed, and even harassed if you stand up for Heavenly Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Church. I understand your concerns.

I served in the British Mission after the end of World War II as a young missionary. At that time Mormons were “a hiss and a byword” (3 Nephi 16:9), and missionaries were laughed at and ridiculed. People even threw things at us, and some would spit at us. However, we did not retreat, but we continued to bear our testimonies and share the gospel. Like Abinadi, we did not shrink; like Paul, we did not shrink; and like the Savior, we did not shrink. At the time we could not have imagined the impact of our labors. We had 14 districts and no stakes. Today, 46 stakes of Zion are found in the British Isles.

The day after I learned that Brent had been killed, one of my former bishops gave me a blessing that changed my perspective. In his blessing, he said that my purpose as a wife, mother, and daughter of God had not changed. Then he promised that Brent’s purpose as my husband and our children’s father had not changed either.
After the blessing, I remember chanting in my mind: “My purpose has not changed. My purpose has not changed.”
The next morning, as I repeated those words to myself, a phrase came into my mind: “Only the details have changed.” And as I tried to accept the fact that the details of my life had changed from what I thought they would be, another impression came: “God is in the details.”
The Lord was giving me line-upon-line revelation. When He does this, it’s not because He is keeping secrets from us. It’s because He is going at our pace.
In the months after Brent died, I was anxious about what would come next. But I knew that I could take one step forward at a time and that I could trust that the Lord would give me one line of revelation at a time. It might not be the line I thought He was going to give me, so I had to keep making a conscious choice to trust Him with the details of my life.

For 67 years, Marjorie Pay Hinckley kept pace with her husband, President Gordon B. Hinckley, as he traveled the world. On 6 April 2004, her mortal journey ended. Surrounded by family and loved ones, Sister Hinckley quietly passed from this world to the next due to causes incident to age. Born on 23 November 1911, she was 92.
Often expressing surprise at the course her life had taken, Sister Hinckley often joked, “How did a nice girl like me end up in a mess like this?” In an interview with Church magazines several months before her death, Sister Hinckley said, “Well, it turned out better than I expected. It has been a good life.” Known for her caring heart and quick wit, she told Church magazines, “If we can’t laugh at life, we are in big trouble” (see “At Home with the Hinckleys,” Liahona, Oct. 2003, 32–37; Ensign, Oct. 2003, 22–27), and at her funeral services she was eulogized as “charity personified.”
As evidence of the countless lives she touched, thousands attended a public viewing, some of them standing in line outside on a blustery spring day for more than three hours. Thousands attended the funeral held in the Tabernacle on 10 April, and tens of thousands more watched on television and by satellite broadcast.
“She conversed with kings and queens. She loved little children,” President Thomas S. Monson, First Counselor in the First Presidency, said of Sister Hinckley’s ability to relate to people from all walks of life. “There was no flaw in her character. … Like the Master, Marjorie went about doing good.”
“She had such a good life,” said President James E. Faust, Second Counselor in the First Presidency. “All of us would benefit from following her faith, commitment, and devotion.”
During the funeral services, the Hinckleys’ five children—Kathleen, Richard, Virginia, Clark, and Jane—shared quotes from Sister Hinckley and gave expressions of gratitude to their mother. Clark Hinckley read a letter written by President Hinckley to his wife after nearly 60 years of marriage. “My darling, … I have known you for a long time … and it has turned out as I had hoped it would. … Now we have grown old together. … And when in some future day the hand of death gently touches one or the other of us, there will be tears, yes, but there will also be a quiet and certain assurance of reunion and eternal companionship.”
Sheri L. Dew, former member of the Relief Society general presidency and biographer of President Hinckley, said that while 12 million members together cannot take Sister Hinckley’s place, each would be praying that President Hinckley would have the strength to carry on. She said that each member would try a little harder in order to ease the prophet’s burden.

When I reflect on the race of life, I remember another race, even from childhood days. Perhaps a shared experience from this period will assist in formulating answers to these significant and universally asked questions.
When I was about ten, my boyfriends and I would take pocketknives in hand and from the soft wood of a willow tree fashion small toy boats. With a triangular-shaped cotton sail in place, each would launch his crude craft in a race down the relatively turbulent waters of the Provo River. We would run along the river’s bank and watch the tiny vessels sometimes bobbing violently in the swift current and at other times sailing serenely as the water deepened.
During such a race, we noted that one boat led all the rest toward the appointed finish line. Suddenly, the current carried it too close to a large whirlpool, and the boat heaved to its side and capsized. Around and around it was carried, unable to make its way back into the main current. At last it came to rest at the end of the pool, amid the flotsam and jetsam which surrounded it, held fast by the fingerlike tentacles of the grasping green moss.
The toy boats of childhood had no keel for stability, no rudder to provide direction, and no source of power. Like the hitchhiker, their destination was “ANYWHERE,” but inevitably downstream.
We have been provided divine attributes to guide our destiny. We entered mortality not to float with the moving currents of life, but with the power to think, to reason, and to achieve.
Our Heavenly Father did not launch us on our eternal journey without providing the means whereby we could receive from Him God-given guidance to ensure our safe return at the end of life’s great race. Yes, I speak of prayer. I speak, too, of the whisperings from that still, small voice within each of us; and I do not overlook the holy scriptures, written by mariners who successfully sailed the seas we too must cross.
Individual effort will be required of us. What can we do to prepare? How can we assure a safe voyage?
First, we must visualize our objective. What is our purpose? The Prophet Joseph Smith counseled: “Happiness is the object and design of our existence; and will be the end thereof, if we pursue the path that leads to it; and this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping all the commandments of God.” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pp. 255–56.) In this one sentence we are provided not only a well-defined goal, but also the way we might achieve it.
Second, we must make continuous effort. Have you noticed that many of the most cherished of God’s dealings with His children have been when they were engaged in a proper activity? The visit of the Master to His disciples on the way to Emmaus, the good Samaritan on the road to Jericho, even Nephi on his return to Jerusalem, and Father Lehi en route to the precious land of promise. Let us not overlook Joseph Smith on the way to Carthage, and Brigham Young on the vast plains to the valley home of the Saints.
Third, we must not detour from our determined course. In our journey we will encounter forks and turnings in the road. There will be the inevitable trials of our faith and the temptations of our times. We simply cannot afford the luxury of a detour, for certain detours lead to destruction and spiritual death. Let us avoid the moral quicksands that threaten on every side, the whirlpools of sin, and the crosscurrents of uninspired philosophies. That clever pied piper called Lucifer still plays his lilting melody and attracts the unsuspecting away from the safety of their chosen pathway, away from the counsel of loving parents, away from the security of God’s teachings. His tune is ever so old, his words ever so sweet. His prize is everlasting. He seeks not the refuse of humanity but the very elect of God. King David listened, then followed, then fell. But then so did Cain in an earlier era, and Judas Iscariot in a later one.
Fourth, to gain the prize we must be willing to pay the price. The apprentice does not become the master craftsman until he has qualified. The lawyer does not practice until he has passed the bar. The doctor does not attend our needs until internship has been completed.
You are the fellow that has to decide
Whether you’ll do it or toss it aside. …
Whether you’ll try for the goal that’s afar
Or just be contented to stay where you are.
Edgar A. Guest, “You,” The Light of Faith, Chicago: Reilly and Lee, 1926, p. 133.
Let us remember how Saul the persecutor became Paul the proselyter, how Simon, the fisherman, became Peter, the apostle of spiritual power. And let us be mindful that before Easter there had to be a cross.
Our example in the race of life could well be our elder brother, even the Lord. As a small boy, he provided a watchword: “Wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?” (Luke 2:49.) As a grown man he taught by example compassion, love, obedience, sacrifice, and devotion. To you and to me his summons is still the same: “Come, follow me.”
One who listened and who followed was the Mormon missionary Randall Ellsworth, about whom you may have read in your daily newspaper or watched on the television set in your home.
Six months ago, while serving in Guatemala as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Randall Ellsworth survived the devastating earthquake which hurled a beam down on his back, paralyzed his legs, and severely damaged his kidneys.
After receiving emergency medical treatment, Randall was flown to a large hospital near his home in Rockville, Maryland. While confined there, a television newscaster conducted with Randall an interview which I witnessed through the miracle of television. The reporter asked, “Can you walk?” The answer, “Not yet, but I will.” “Do you think you will be able to complete your mission?” Came the reply, “Others think not, but I will.”
With microphone in hand, the reporter continued: “I understand you have received a special letter containing a get-well message from none other than the president of the United States.” “Yes,” replied Randall, “I am very grateful to President Ford for his thoughtfulness; but I received another letter, not from the president of my country, but from the president of my church—The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—even President Spencer W. Kimball. This I cherish. With him praying for me, and the prayers of my family, my friends, and my missionary companions, I will return to Guatemala. The Lord wanted me to preach the gospel there for two years, and that’s what I intend to do.”
I turned to my wife and commented, “He surely must not know the extent of his injuries. Our official medical reports would not permit us to expect such a return to Guatemala.”
How grateful am I that the day of faith and the age of miracles are not past history but continue with us even now.
The newspapers and the television cameras directed their attention to more immediate news as the days turned to weeks and the weeks to months. The words of Rudyard Kipling described Randall Ellsworth’s situation:
The tumult and the shouting dies;
The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
Rudyard Kipling’s Verse, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1946, p. 327.
And God did not forget him who possessed an humble and a contrite heart, even Elder Randall Ellsworth. Little by little the feeling in his legs began to return. In his own words, Randall described the recovery: “The thing I did was always to keep busy, always pushing myself. In the hospital I asked to do therapy twice a day instead of just once. I wanted to walk again on my own.”
When the Missionary Committee evaluated the amazing medical progress Randall Ellsworth had made, word was sent to him that his return to Guatemala was authorized. Said he, “At first I was so happy I didn’t know what to do. Then I went into my bedroom and I started to cry. Then I dropped to my knees and thanked my Heavenly Father.”
Two months ago Randall Ellsworth walked aboard the plane that carried him back to the mission to which he was called and back to the people whom he loved. Behind he left a trail of skeptics, a host of doubters, but also hundreds amazed at the power of God, the miracle of faith, and the reward of determination. Ahead lay honest, God-fearing, and earnestly seeking sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. They shall hear His word. They shall learn His truth. They shall accept His ordinances. A modern-day Paul, who too overcame his “thorn in the flesh,” has returned to teach them the truth, to lead them to life eternal.
Like Randall Ellsworth, may each of us know where he is going, be willing to make the continuous effort required to get there, avoid any detour, and be ready to pay the often very high price of faith and determination to win life’s race. Then, as mortality ends, we shall hear the plaudit from our Eternal Judge, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.” (Matt. 25:21.)
Each will then have completed his journey, not to a nebulous “ANYWHERE,” but to his heavenly home—even eternal life in the celestial kingdom of God.
May such be our goal and our reward is my prayer, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

I am a member of the British Army based in West Germany. When I first arrived I found it hard being away from my family and home ward (the Catford Ward in London).
The nearest LDS chapel is 22 kilometers away, and it is only possible for me to attend when a member of the German-speaking ward in Celle can collect me and take me to the chapel. I don’t yet know how to speak German, but every Sunday a member translates for me.
I am grateful for the New Era, as I’ve only been a member for three years. When my brother Philip has finished with each month’s issue, he keeps it until I get home so I can take a stack when I return to Germany.
The New Era always strengthens me when I’m down and helps me keep the Spirit of the Lord close. Thanks for such a great magazine.
Allon William Shaftoe1st Armoured Field AmbulanceRoyal Army Medical Corps

Manasseh Byrd Kearl, born in 1870 and raised near the Bear Lake in northern Utah, tells a wonderful story that might be instructional to his descendants, of which I am one. The following is from his journal as he wrote it:
“That fall father bought some cattle for John Dikens, a very large herd. Dikens had a large ranch on Bear River. … I remember Jimmie was down north buying cattle and he sent father that he needed more money. So father toled me to take some money to him. Mother sewed six hundred dollars in my under clothes, and father put me on a horse and said, ‘Now Byrdie my boy, don’t you get off this horse till you find your brother Jimmie, and keep your mouth shut, and if any one asks you questions don’t reply or tell them where you are going, and do not give this money to any one but Jimmie, no matter what any one tells you.’ Well, when I got to DingleDell, I was toled Jimmie was in Montpelier. So to Montpelier I went to Joe Richs, a friend of father’s, he toled me that Jimmie had gone home. Brother Rich wanted me to go in the house and get something to eat. I toled him no, that father toled me not to get off this horse till I found Jim, and here I stayed. I turned around and headed for home. When I got to Bears Valley, … I could hardly walk. Mr. Potter tried to get me to stop and rest, but I could not stay. At last I got home. Jimmie took me off the horse and carried me into the house. Mother cried to think I had been in the saddle while the horse went over eighty miles” (Personal Journal of Manasseh Byrd Kearl).

The invitation to teach in Uppsala was a great academic honor, and it was a personal honor as well. During an earlier visit to Sweden, Paul’s commitment to his standards was tested.
“I had given a talk at a fancy dinner hosted by the king and queen,” Brother Cox recalls. He was sitting next to the queen, and someone stood up and offered a toast in her honor. “There were about 600 people in the room. I looked, and raised wineglasses were everywhere. I didn’t know what to do, so I picked up my water glass and raised it. There was a gasp—people were just amazed I would do that.
“After the toast, as I sat down, the queen leaned over to me and whispered in my ear, ‘You are very wise.’ That was eight years ago, and now they’ve invited me back again. I think you gain respect from people if you’re true to what you believe.”

Ten days ago, I had a beautiful and touching experience in the Salt Lake Temple, the building immediately to the east of this tabernacle. There in that holy sanctuary I had the privilege of sealing in marriage, in two separate but consecutive ceremonies, two beautiful young women who are twins, each to a handsome and able young man of her choice. That evening, a double wedding reception was held where hundreds of friends came to express their love and good wishes.
Mothers often shed tears at a wedding ceremony. Sisters also, and sometimes fathers. Seldom do grandparents show any emotion. But these beautiful girls were my own granddaughters, and I must confess that this old grandfather choked up and had a difficult time. I don’t understand why. Certainly it was a happy occasion, a fulfillment of dreams and prayers. Perhaps my tears were really an expression of joy and of gratitude to God for these lovely brides and their handsome young husbands. In sacred promises, they pledged their love and loyalty one to another for time and all eternity.

One short story: a preacher finally came to the point where he felt that he had enough faith to walk on water. And so he sent the word out to all the land, and people came from far and near. There were thousands there. But right in the front row was a deacon from the LDS church. He had great interest in this kind of faith. He’d heard about it in Sunday School and in family home evening, and he was on the front row, not fifteen feet away.
As the preacher walked up to the water, he paused momentarily and as he bent down to roll up his trousers the boy said, “Mister, you’ll never make it.” And he didn’t.

Adriana was bored. She wanted to play with her twin sister, Diana. But Diana had gone to buy food at the market with Mamá. Adriana sighed. The house felt very empty. She wished she’d gone with them.
Adriana decided to visit her neighbor Margarita. Margarita’s kids were all grown up, and she was like a grandma to Adriana. They always had lots of fun together.
Adriana went outside. The hot sun shone down on her as she walked to Margarita’s house. She poked her head inside the door. “Margarita, are you home?”
“Sí, I am in the kitchen,” Margarita called. Adriana found her sitting at the kitchen table with her head down. She looked up when Adriana came in.
“Hello, Adriana,” said Margarita. She gave a small smile. But it seemed sad.
“Is something wrong?” asked Adriana.
Margarita sighed. “Nothing you need to worry about.”
“How can I help her feel better?” Adriana thought. Margarita always seemed happy when they cooked together. “May I help you make tortillas?”
“I just finished making some,” said Margarita. She lifted a cloth napkin to show a stack of tortillas.
“Then may I help you eat tortillas?” Adriana asked with a grin.
Margarita laughed. “Of course. Let me just heat up some beans to go with them.”
Adriana stood by Margarita at the stove and stirred black refried beans in a pot. When the beans were done, she carried them to the table. Margarita brought the tortillas and the cheese.
Adriana took a warm tortilla and spread beans over it. Then she sprinkled the cheese on top. It looked delicious! Adriana couldn’t wait to take a bite. But there was something she wanted to do first.
“May I please say a prayer?” Adriana asked Margarita.
“Sure.”
Adriana closed her eyes and folded her arms. “Heavenly Father, we thank Thee for this food. Please bless it to make us healthy and strong. And please help Margarita with whatever she needs. I’m glad she’s my friend. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”
Adriana opened her eyes. Margarita had a big smile—a real one this time. While they ate, they talked about school and sports and books. Adriana loved talking with Margarita.
When they finished eating, Adriana gave Margarita a big hug. “Thank you for the snack. I had a great time!”
Margarita hugged Adriana back. “Thank you, Adriana. I needed a friend today.”
Adriana beamed. “I’m glad we’re amigas.”
“I’m glad we’re friends too,” Margarita said. “Why don’t you take the rest of these tortillas home? I’m so full.”
Adriana skipped all the way back to her house. She felt full too—and not just from the tortillas! She was full of friendship from head to toe.

While on a Church assignment in Cusco, Peru, my wife and I attended a combined Relief Society and Melchizedek Priesthood class. The teacher that day was the adult Gospel Doctrine teacher. Because of scheduling issues during the first two meetings, only about 20 minutes remained for him to teach what he had prepared.
He began by asking all members to stand who had joined the Church during the past two years. Five members stood. He wrote the number 5 on the board and then said, “Brothers and sisters, it is wonderful that we have these 5 members with us who have recently joined the Church. The only problem is that during the past two years, we baptized 16 new converts in this ward.”
He then wrote the number 16 next to the number 5 and with great earnestness asked, “So, brothers and sisters, what are we going to do?”
A sister raised her hand and said, “We need to go find them and bring them back.”
The teacher agreed and then wrote the word rescue on the board. “We’ve got 11 new members to bring back,” he responded.
He then read a quote from President Thomas S. Monson about the importance of rescuing. He also read from the New Testament about how the Savior went after lost sheep (see Luke 15:6). Then he asked, “So how will we bring them back?”
Hands went up, and he called on one member after another. Class members had suggestions about how they as a ward family or as individuals could work together to help recent converts return to church. Then the teacher asked, “So if you were walking down the street and saw a man you recognized as one of these recent converts on the other side of the street, what would you do?” One member said, “I would cross over and greet him. I would tell him how much we need him to come back and how eager we are to have him join with us again.”
Others in the class agreed and offered additional specific suggestions about how to help these members. There was an enthusiasm in the room, a determination to do what needed to be done to help these recently baptized members find their way back to full activity.
My wife and I left this lesson with a renewed desire to do something ourselves to help someone return to activity in the Church. I believe that everyone in the class left with such a feeling. Following this experience, I asked myself: What made this short lesson so effective? Why did everyone leave the class feeling so motivated to live the gospel more fully?
While participating in the class in Peru, I could feel the love the teacher had for those present as well as for the recent converts he was inviting class members to activate. Love seemed to permeate the room—from teacher to learner, from learner to teacher, from one learner to another, and from learners to the recent converts.
When a teacher’s motive is to cover the lesson material, the teacher focuses on content rather than on the needs of each individual learner. The Peruvian teacher seemed to feel no need to cover anything. He simply wanted to inspire class members to reach out to their brothers and sisters in love. Love for the Lord and love for each other constituted the driving force. Love was the motive. When love is our motive, the Lord will strengthen us to accomplish His purposes to help His children. He will inspire us with what we as teachers need to say and how we should say it.
The teacher in Peru did not read from the lesson manual as he taught. I am convinced he used the manual or conference talks to prepare for the class, but when he taught, he taught from the scriptures. He recounted the story of the lost sheep and recited the following verse: “And when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren” (Luke 22:32). He shared President Monson’s invitation to all Church members to rescue those who have lost their way. The doctrines at the center of his lesson were faith and charity. Class members needed enough faith to act, and they needed to act out of love.
When the doctrines of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ are taught with clarity and conviction, the Lord strengthens both learner and teacher. The more class members offered their suggestions for reaching out to their brothers and sisters who were less active, the closer everyone felt to the Savior, who constantly reached out to others during His earthly ministry. Doctrine is the key to effective gospel learning and teaching. It unlocks hearts. It unlocks minds. It opens the way for the Spirit of God to inspire and edify everyone present.
Great gospel teachers recognize that they are not actually the teachers at all. The gospel is taught and learned through the Spirit. Without the Spirit, the teaching of gospel truths cannot lead to learning (see D&C 42:14). The more the teacher gives inspired invitations to act, the more the Spirit will be present during the lesson. The Peruvian teacher gave an inspired invitation. Then, as class members responded with suggestions, the feeling of the Spirit grew and strengthened everyone.
The teacher was not trying to cover the lesson. Rather, he was trying to uncover the lesson that was already inside the learner. By inviting class members through the power of the Spirit, the teacher helped members discover their own desire to act—to reach out to their brothers and sisters in love. As class members shared their ideas, they inspired each other because they were jointly drawing upon the Spirit.

After having been set apart to serve in the Second Quorum of the Seventy, I, with my wife and one of our children, visited my father. We asked him to give me a blessing, something which I have always striven to do when I have received a new priesthood assignment. He laid his hands upon my head and gave me a short but grand blessing. He said, “Son, I bless you that the Holy Spirit may accompany you, your wife, and your children in everything you do.” What more could I wish for?

But it is perhaps Phil who is busiest of all. Besides “splitting” with the full-time missionaries, serving as ward organist, assistant to the president of the priests quorum, and seminary class representative to the stake, he also organizes dances for Super Saturdays and studies seminary lessons. He organized his own dance band at school, with 15 singers and six musicians, and he plays in the school band. He helped organize a blood drive and is president of the school chorus. He has won the John Phillip Sousa Award, the National Choral Association and National Band Association awards, and the U.S. Marine Corps Award, all for musical excellence. But one of his biggest thrills was being elected student-body president.

“I ran because I wanted to help the school,” he said. “There was a problem with drugs, and I wanted to help people get out of that and give them something better.” As a result of his campaign, Gowanda Central High now has a class about drugs and alcoholism that not only educates students but refers those with problems to counselors and agencies who can help.

Twenty months earlier, I had found myself asking parallel questions in a parallel situation, only in a place with all the peace and serenity that my stoplight moment lacked.
In the Sacred Grove, in Palmyra, New York, the leaves were barely budding on the brown branches surrounding me. The newly green shrubbery sprinkling the ground seemed to breathe life into the air. Only the rustles of a gentle breeze, our stroller, and my footsteps reached my ears—no cars, no roads, no loud conversations. Yet despite the serenity, my mind swayed with questions and uncertainty. My husband, Lance, and I had been waiting 72 painstaking hours for my doctor to call with results of a last-minute ultrasound and blood test. I was desperate for answers and consolation.
I found myself staring at the winter-worn flower beds outside the Palmyra New York Temple. My mind fully articulated the questions weighing on it: “If I lose this pregnancy, why? What then?” As gentle as the spring breeze around me, the Lord spoke to my mind the comfort I had been yearning for. I no longer needed the doctor to let me know; I knew I would lose this pregnancy, but I suddenly understood that this tiny soul was in the perfect, loving hands of Heavenly Father. All at once, the desperation that had consumed me was replaced with a reassuring peace that sustained me through the following weeks and months.
Several days after visiting Palmyra, I experienced a traumatic miscarriage. Although a sense of peace continued to sustain me, I felt physically and emotionally weak from the loss and unprepared for the waiting that followed. I first waited for lab results, which indicated a rare, partial molar pregnancy. I then waited for blood tests weekly, biweekly, and finally monthly to ensure no signs of a possible resultant cancer. Even through the long months of waiting, Lance and I could easily see the Lord’s hand comforting and reassuring us through that time. The partial molar pregnancy had no lasting effects, and after only six months my doctor said we could try to have another baby. I was back on the path to progress in my life; the light had finally changed from red to green.

A few years ago while we were serving in the mission field, a minister who was investigating the Church said, “I hear you talk about the benefit of a living prophet. What sort of pronouncements has he made lately?” We replied, “The prophet has taught us that we need to live frugally. We need to stay out of debt, fix up our homes, and plant gardens that we may enjoy the fruit of our labor.” The minister thought for a moment and then said, “That is not what I would have imagined a prophet to say, but as I consider it, what better advice could be given?”

Emily smelled something good coming from the kitchen. I know that smell, she thought. Mom’s making chicken soup. She watched her mom ladle soup from a big, steaming pot into a glass jar. “What are you doing with the soup?” she asked.
“Mrs. Jenkins isn’t feeling well,” Mom replied, putting the jar into a sturdy paper bag with a handle. “I was hoping that you would take it to her.”
“Sure. Your chicken soup always makes me feel better when I’m sick.”
Mrs. Jenkins was their neighbor. She was old and lived alone.
That gave Emily an idea. She raced to her room and hunted for her favorite storybook, “The Three Little Pigs.”
“What’s the book for?” asked Mom.
Emily buckled her sandals. “I thought I’d read it to Mrs. Jenkins while she eats.”
Emily rang Mrs. Jenkins’ doorbell. There was no answer, so Emily rang the doorbell again.
Mrs. Jenkins’ door finally creaked open, and Mrs. Jenkins peeked around the door.
She’s as white as a marshmallow! Emily thought.
“Good afternoon, Emily.” Mrs. Jenkins’ voice was barely above a whisper.
“I brought you some chicken soup that my mother made.” Emily held up the bag. “We hope it makes you feel better.”
“Please come in.”
While Mrs. Jenkins got a bowl from the cupboard, Emily set the soup on the kitchen counter. “I brought a story to read to you while you eat.”
Mrs. Jenkins sipped some of the soup.
“Once upon a time, …” Emily began.
Mrs. Jenkins sipped another spoonful.
“Is the soup good?” Emily asked.
“It’s wonderful.” Mrs. Jenkins smiled. “Now, please read on.”
Emily read. She made huffing and puffing sounds every time the wolf tried to blow one of the pigs’ houses down.
Mrs. Jenkins laughed every time Emily huffed and puffed.
By the time Emily had finished the story, Mrs. Jenkins had finished her soup. Her cheeks were pink, and her eyes sparkled. The chicken soup had sure worked fast!
“Maybe you should have another bowl,” Emily said.
“Only if you read the story again.”
So Mrs. Jenkins had another bowl of soup, and Emily huffed and puffed some more.
“I feel much better,” Mrs. Jenkins said. “Thank you. And thank your mom for me, too.”
“Mom, your chicken soup is amazing!” Emily exclaimed when she went back home. “Mrs. Jenkins already feels better.”
Mom gave Emily a great big hug. “I don’t think it was just the soup.”
The hug felt warm and good. Emily thought about Mrs. Jenkins alone in her big house with no one to share hugs with. “May I read another story to Mrs. Jenkins tomorrow?”
Mom smiled. “I’m sure she’d like that.”
Maybe it isn’t just the chicken soup, Emily decided. Maybe visits and stories are good medicine, too.

Then their bishop was inspired with an idea that would help the Tuckers—as well as many others in the Three Forks Ward, Bozeman Montana Stake—achieve the dream of an eternal family. A few years ago Bishop Aaron Baczuk was in a meeting for bishops and new converts in the stake. The Area Seventy who was presiding asked a new member, “Have you been to the temple to perform baptisms for the dead?” He had.
Bishop Baczuk had never considered taking unendowed adults to the temple. The following week he made an appointment with the Billings Montana Temple for adults in his ward to perform baptisms for the dead. The visit to the temple was a success, and in the months that followed, elders and high priests in the ward accompanied more unendowed adults to the temple. “It proved to be a very spiritual experience for them, compounding their desire and commitment to receive their endowments,” says Bishop Baczuk.
To prepare, adult members work with the bishop to become worthy to attend the temple. Then they take the temple-preparation class. Their interest in the class really peaks after they perform baptisms for the dead. They find that talking about the temple in class is one thing, but actually feeling the Lord’s Spirit in the temple is another.
“Having the option to take someone to the temple who may not be prepared for additional covenants but can still have an experience participating in ordinances is huge,” says Bishop Baczuk. “I think it fits with the sentiment the Church is trying to convey in its temple-preparation booklet: ‘Come to the temple!’”1

“I’d like to say that I grew up in the Church,” says Bert, “but I didn’t. I’m considered a convert by Church standards, because I wasn’t baptized until I was twelve, although I went to Primary. I came from a part-member family.”
Bert’s father, a tough, determined, highly-respected police officer, refused to give permission for his son’s baptism; then, “when I was twelve, I really got emphatic. He finally consented, and my brother and I were both baptized. I was ordained a deacon shortly after that.” Within a year, however, Bert was enrolled in a military boarding school, complete with its own non-denominational Protestant church. During the next five years, he recalls, the influence of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints “just started fading away.”
Amanda was not a member of the Church when she and Bert met, nor was she a Latter-day Saint when they married a few years later. Bert had become somewhat active during his air force training in California; but, he says, “things were moving slowly for me.” Shortly after their marriage, however, “my life started to change because of her.
“We were married after I was commissioned as an officer in the air force.” (Amanda, by this time, had earned a degree in secondary education from the University of Hawaii.) “For a while we lived in California; then we moved to Kansas after some air force training in Texas. Two weeks after we arrived in Kansas, I think the Lord felt it was time that Amanda found out about the Church. Although we had been attending meetings, we hadn’t gotten really serious about the Church.
Bert was sent to Greenland for 109 days, and since the couple had not yet found an apartment in Kansas, Amanda stayed with Bert’s cousin and his wife. The relatives were active Church members, and they and the stake missionaries began encouraging Amanda to schedule her baptism for the same day as the cousin’s eight-year-old daughter’s.
Amanda was unhappy about the situation. “I didn’t think they should know when I was going to be ready; but they said they knew, and they had set the date.”
“I felt a little bad about that,” says Bert, remembering the letter Amanda sent him at the time. “I was a little embarrassed, because that was my church. But then the next week I got another letter saying, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t wait any longer. I’m being baptized Saturday.’”
“They did know,” smiles Amanda. “I was ready.”
Following Amanda’s conversion, Bert began to progress in the Church as well. He was ordained a priest, then an elder, and the DuPonts were soon sealed in the temple.
Still, Bert had questions. “I’m not ashamed to admit it—I had some doubts about the Church, and one of them concerned the reality of a modern-day prophet.” In time, Bert would receive that testimony in a very personal way—from a prophet of God himself.
Along with continuing spiritual growth came additional Church responsibilities, the adoption of two sons, and rapid professional advancement. As a colonel in the air force, Bert was known and respected for his integrity, willingness to work, and his ability to get the job done. Such a reputation made him a top candidate for assignment in Montevideo, Uruguay, in the early 1970s as an adviser to that country’s military services. He was offered the position, but the decision to accept or refuse it was his. “I looked at a Church directory to see if the Church was there,” he says. “There were two stakes, so I thought, ‘Well, we’ll go.’” Then he and Amanda went to Washington, D.C., where he took an intensive six-month course in Spanish language and culture.
But then came a telephone call for Bert from his superiors. “They said, ‘We need you more in Bogota, Colombia, than we do in Montevideo, so we are changing your assignment.’ I could find no Church listings for Colombia, so I refused, and there was nothing they could say to change my mind.
“Then one day I had another telephone call from an officer. I tried to explain to him that I was a member of the Church and why I didn’t want to go to Colombia. It turned out that he was a member of the Church, the senior president of the seventies in his stake, and he said, ‘Brother DuPont, have you ever thought that maybe the Lord has a job for you to do in Colombia?’ It was the first time we had thought of it like that. We decided that we would go.”
Once in Colombia, the DuPonts found that the Lord did indeed have a job for them—several jobs, in fact. “I really feel,” says Bert, “though I didn’t feel that way at the time, that we were sent there to help with the Church. When the Church moves into a new area, the people who are converted are not the bank presidents or the university professors; they are the humblest and the poorest people. And all we had there were missionaries from the United States, who often weren’t accepted by the people. I was somewhat different because of my rank in the air force; being in the military helped. And I wasn’t white; that helped, too. Missionaries would tell the people something, and they wouldn’t believe it; but if we walked in the door and said the same thing, they would listen.”
Soon after the DuPonts arrived in Bogota, Bert was called to be a counselor in the district presidency; later he served as a branch president in Bogota. Amanda, warmly interested in her Colombian sisters, learned the language and was called to assume leadership responsibilities in the Relief Society and Young Women organizations. Both the DuPonts were loved and honored for their commitment to the gospel and their daily acts of Christian service.
A good part of their service embraced the missionary effort; still developing in Colombia some twelve years ago, the Church needed all the strong testimonies and good examples it could get. One returned missionary who served in Colombia recalls that the DuPonts were “great examples for the Saints. They demonstrated what home teaching and visiting teaching really were; what home evening is all about, and what it means to love and serve each other.”
The DuPonts’ home was a much-loved gathering place for the elders and sisters. Bert remembers, “We’d sometimes have as many as sixty missionaries over for dinner for the big U.S. holidays—Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas.”
From their earliest days in Colombia, the matter of heritage played a significant role in the DuPonts’ remarkable success story. Consider, for example, their participation in the Church’s first youth conference in that country. Invited to provide some Hawaiian entertainment, they drove ten hours over a tortuous mountain road to attend the conference.
Once there, Bert was asked to speak. “As I looked out into that group—the leaders and the youth—I was struck by the impression that it was like I was in Hawaii. They all looked like my relatives; their Indian background matched up with the Hawaiians and the Polynesians. So I decided I would tell them about Hagoth, the Nephite shipbuilder; I started out talking about that, and about how they looked like my uncles and aunts back in Hawaii. Our relationship with them grew from that. I told them, ‘When I say hermanos y hermanas to you, I don’t mean brothers and sisters only in the gospel; I really mean that we have a blood relationship—the blood of Israel is here.’”
The “blood of Israel” image became still more personal when Bert and Amanda invited his parents to visit them in Bogota. It was a new beginning.
“My dad was a good man,” reflects Bert, “but we couldn’t convince him to join the Church—even though whenever he visited us, he would comment about the happiness we had in our family, and how he wished the other children could have it.”
Late one night during his parents’ visit, Bert was awakened. “I was prompted,” he recalls, “to go and challenge my dad—again—to be baptized, even though he had refused many times before. I woke Amanda (I always have to confer with her, because she’s got the Spirit!), told her my feeling, and she said, ‘Well, I guess you’d better go do it.’ So I went into his room … it was like Daniel going into the lions’ den.”
Bert woke his father, bore testimony, issued the challenge. The response? “My dad put his arms around me and hugged me and cried. He had been shot, stabbed, and injured many times during his life as a police officer, and he had never before shed a tear as far as I knew.”
Within weeks, Brother DuPont had fully embraced the gospel. “The missionaries from the U.S. could not teach him in English,” Bert explains, “because they only knew their discussions in Spanish. So I interpreted for them. My parents came to church with us every Sunday even though they couldn’t understand what was going on because everything was spoken in Spanish. But evidently my father could feel something—and I believe it was the spirit of the people. There was standing room only the day he was baptized.”
It wasn’t until 1975, after Bert and Amanda had returned to Hawaii, that Bert’s testimony of the living prophet was solidly confirmed. Bert had been asked to assist with security measures for President Spencer W. Kimball who was making a short visit to Bogota. Bert’s description of the experience is a moving testimony of the prophet’s influence:
“President Kimball shook my hand, and it felt like electricity going up my arm. He looked into my eyes, and that was it; I knew. We were together a good deal of the time, and it was the most wonderful experience.
“We had family home evening at the mission home, and I was the only one without my family. I sat right next to President Kimball, and he put his arm around me. Then we knelt down, and the mission president asked the President to give the family prayer. My whole life changed in those moments; I just knew he was a prophet. It was the full conversion.”
Meanwhile, Amanda recalls with a knowing smile, while Bert was with the President, “things weren’t going too well back home. I was in a car accident; I wasn’t hurt, but the car was damaged.”
“You have to understand,” adds Bert, “that I was a person who had to have everything neat and clean. You didn’t touch my car, because you might leave a fingerprint on it.”
Amanda says their two sons, “Duane and Doug, kept saying, ‘Oh, boy, wait until Dad comes home and sees the car.’ The day Bert arrived home, they wouldn’t even go to the airport with me to meet him, so I went by myself; there hadn’t been time to get the car fixed.”
But something had changed. “Bert came off that airplane, and I think he was walking above the ground. When he saw me, all he could talk about was what a great experience it was to be with the prophet. He went right past the damaged fender on the car and didn’t even see it.
“When we got home, the boys were peeking out from behind the drapes. Bert said, ‘Okay, when my boys are hiding, something’s happened.’ So I had to show him the damaged fender. He looked at it, turned to me, and said, ‘Oh, Mom, I’m really glad you didn’t get hurt.’ Then he gave me a big hug.”
The stories go on and on. The DuPonts have opened their arms and home to a procession of foster children, less-fortunate Colombian friends and fellow Saints, missionaries whose finances and confidence needed help, and anyone else who can use a warm Hawaiian greeting, a generous sampling of Amanda’s expert cooking, or a gentle but persuasive nudge in the general direction of truth and righteousness.
“We love people,” says Amanda, “and the gospel gives us direction in serving and helping them wherever we can.”

Recently, Lesa and I attended the viewing of a dear friend, a woman of faith whose life was cut short by illness. We gathered with her family and close friends, exchanging fond memories of this beautiful soul who had enriched our lives.
While standing away some distance from the casket, conversing with others, I noticed two young Primary-age girls approach the casket and stretch up on their tiptoes—eyes just reaching its edge—to pay their final respects to their beloved aunt. With no one else nearby, Lesa slipped over and crouched down beside them to offer comfort and teaching. She asked how they were doing and if they knew where their aunt was now. They shared their sadness, but then these precious daughters of God, with confidence brimming in their eyes, said they knew their aunt was now happy and she could be with Jesus.
At this tender age, they found peace in the great plan of happiness and, in their own childlike way, testified of the profound reality and simple beauty of the Resurrection of the Savior. They knew this in their hearts because of thoughtful teachings of loving parents, family, and Primary leaders planting a seed of faith in Jesus Christ and eternal life. Wise beyond their years, these young girls understood truths that come to us through the Easter message and ministry of the resurrected Savior and the words of the prophets as told in the Book of Mormon.