Gospel Story Finder

Fifty-two years ago, in July 1964, I had an assignment in New York City during the time the World’s Fair was hosted there. Early one morning I visited the Mormon Pavilion at the fair. I arrived just prior to a showing of the Church’s film Man’s Search for Happiness, a portrayal of the plan of salvation which has since become a Church classic. I sat next to a young man who was perhaps 35 years of age. We spoke briefly. He was not a member of our Church. Then the lights dimmed, and the show commenced.
We listened to the voice of the narrator as he posed the poignant and universal questions: Where did I come from? Why am I here? Where do I go when I leave this life? All ears strained to hear the answers, and all eyes were fixed on the images portrayed. A description of our premortal life was given, along with an explanation of our purpose on earth. We witnessed a touching depiction of the passing from this life of an elderly grandfather and of his glorious reunion with loved ones who had preceded him to the spirit world.
At the conclusion of this beautiful portrayal of our Heavenly Father’s plan for us, the crowd silently filed out, many visibly touched by the message of the film. The young visitor next to me did not arise. I asked if he had enjoyed the presentation. His emphatic response: “This is the truth!”
Our Father’s plan for our happiness and our salvation is shared by our missionaries throughout the world. Not all who hear this divine message accept and embrace it. However, men and women everywhere, just like my young friend at the New York World’s Fair, recognize its truths, and they plant their feet on the path that will lead them safely home. Their lives are forever changed.

Pornography can jump out at you when you least expect it. Some years ago, after checking into a hotel late at night, I started unpacking my suitcase. I opened the hotel room drawers, only to find three or four pornographic magazines, the kind by just looking at the cover you knew that they were tools of the devil.

I had already changed into my pajamas and was ready for bed. Now I had a dilemma. What if I left the magazines in the drawer and were to die in the middle of the night of a heart attack? Of course, my room would be searched and there in the drawer would be these filthy magazines. But, I was not in my street clothes and didn’t want to change again. Yet, fearing the worst could possibly happen, I begrudgingly dressed again, took the magazines into the hallway, and cast them where they belonged, into the garbage. The Lord has told us to “let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly.”[6]

Just the same, I was a father trying to raise daughters on my own. I sought to create one-on-one time with both of them to strengthen our relationships. Yet how could I help them prepare to be women? I soon found there were more resources than I imagined:
Family members. I thank the Lord for a sister-in-law and a daughter-in-law who lived nearby and came to my rescue. They attended maturation meetings with my daughters. They helped my daughters get ready for dances. Most of all, they listened. They shared my daughters’ hopes, fears, longings, and desires. They helped them transition from child to adolescent to adult with a different understanding of that process than I could provide, never having experienced it in the same way.
Neighbors. Good neighbors watched my daughter with their daughter after school until I got home from the office. Other neighbors took my children to school when I had early meetings. One neighbor with a lawn-care business had his crew mow my lawn regularly for free so I could spend more time with my family.
Ministering brothers and Church leaders. My ministering brothers coordinated with the ward council, and it seemed that everyone in the ward, especially Primary and Young Women leaders, went out of their way to help my girls. I learned that one of the great things about the Relief Society is that they offer, well, relief. Once, a group of them cleaned my whole house, top to bottom. And at Young Women activities, someone always made sure my daughters felt included.
Not everyone will experience this same level of support. But I’ve learned that until we let others know the gaps we see our children experience without a mother, those individuals may not understand how they can help.
Honoring Fathers
“Some men are single fathers, foster fathers, or stepfathers. Many of them strive mightily and do their very best in an often difficult role. We honor those who do all that can be done in love, patience, and self-sacrifice to meet individual and family needs.”
Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, “Fathers,” Liahona, May 2016, 95.
Elder Baxter said: “Single parents, I testify that as you do your very best in the most difficult of human challenges, heaven will smile upon you. Truly you are not alone. Let the redemptive, loving power of Jesus Christ brighten your life now and fill you with the hope of eternal promise. Take courage. Have faith and hope. Consider the present with fortitude and look to the future with confidence.”4
Like anyone going through challenges, single fathers may feel overwhelmed. I know I did at times. But I also know there’s a lot of hope and a lot of help for single fathers in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Would you ever believe that the quiet, grandmotherly lady in your ward first kissed a boy on a dare? Or that the smiling, old grandpa who’s been in your ward forever once drove his car into the side of a barn because he forgot that he had to hit the brakes instead of yell “Whoa”?
It’s probably difficult to imagine that the seniors in your ward ever did such crazy things—especially when the only thing you know about them is what bench they usually sit on during sacrament meeting. But that’s not the case for the youth in the Dalton Gardens Ward, Coeur d‘Alene Idaho Stake. They know all about the lives of the ward’s elderly members. Of course, it hasn’t always been that way. It wasn’t until their ward’s “Family History Can Be Fun” night that they began to learn about the older people’s lives.
But ever since then, their hearts have been turning—not only toward their ward’s seniors, but also toward their ancestors and toward each other.
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.”
Desiree Wallace, 15, interviewed Virginia Gjevres about her life. Desiree found out about Virginia’s first teddy bear and her longing for a dog. And she learned that while Virginia was growing up she was so accident prone that everyone called her Calamity Jane.
“I didn’t really know Sister Gjevres before I interviewed her. I had only seen her at church. But now I just have this love for her, and I want to adopt her as my grandma,” says Desiree, who doesn’t have any grandparents living nearby.
As connections were made between the youth and the elderly in the ward family, it caused some to reflect on the importance of forming eternal connections with their own ancestors.
“The grandparents just really seemed enthusiastic about us getting to know them better. They looked so happy,” says Cassie Gatten, 15. “So it made me realize that when we do genealogy work for our ancestors who have died that they’re probably really happy about that too.”
Interviewing the grandparents about their lives, writing the scripts, finding costumes, and then having rehearsals to make sure everything was just right took a lot of time. But the youth said the time spent was worth it when they saw everything and everyone come together on the night of the activity.
“Sometimes I didn’t really feel like it was worth all the time it took to put this activity together. But then when I saw the final night and the looks on the faces of the elderly as they watched incidents from their lives acted out before them and as they realized that the youth in the ward care about who they are, it all seemed worth it,” Cassie says. “It also made me want to live my life in a way so that if someone were to write a play about me when I am old I wouldn’t be embarrassed by it.”
After acting out scenes from Reny Sampert’s life, Kim Pearson, a 17-year-old Laurel, and her group sang Reny’s favorite song, “O My Father.”
“When we were singing ‘O My Father,’ Reny got tears in her eyes, and you could tell she was really touched,” Kim says.
“This activity brought us so much closer to the older people,” says Amber Isaacson, 15. “A lot of people in the ward are related, but there are families like mine who are not, so it’s just really neat to get to know them like the relatives do.”
Even though Amber and her brother Russell don’t have any relatives in the ward, in doing this activity Russell has realized how much some of the ward’s grandparents have contributed to his life.
“Talking with the elderly in our ward helped me to understand that they are actually a part of me because they helped form the Church here in Coeur d‘Alene. And just to look at it today and see how I’m involved and see the key part they have played in my life makes me grateful that I was able to get to know them better,” Russell explains.
Learning about the grandparents in the ward has also given Russell some understanding about the effects that trials can have in a person’s life.
“Talking with Frances Young and learning about the different trials she went through in her life helps me to see how things like that have made her the great person she is today,” Russell says. “It’s just interesting how different experiences can mold a person.”
Cassie says she learned a lot of new things about the people she interviewed too, even though they were her own grandparents.
“A lot of what I learned about them was a surprise to me,” she says. “But in learning about their youth, I realized where some of their characteristics came from.”
Cassie has also learned that it is only by understanding her heritage that she is able to understand herself.
“It made me really want to figure out where I came from,” she says. “We’re made up of all these people and we don’t even know what they are, so how can we know what we are?”
Whether they learned more about themselves, about their ancestors, or about the seniors in their ward, one thing is certain for the youth in the Dalton Gardens Ward—their hearts have been turned.
“Doing this brought us so much closer to the elderly,” Amber says. “The older people were excited to share their lives with the youth, and we were excited to know about their lives. Everyone wanted to do a really good job with the skits because they had become such good friends with the elderly that they wanted their skit to be the best.”
Everyone in the ward took part in the activity. The Primary children sang, the Relief Society prepared food, the youth performed, and the older members brought their heirlooms to put on display.
A few hours before the activity started, all of the heirlooms were dropped off at the church, making several large piles of mismatched items. By the time everyone arrived, just a few hours later, the piles of items from various families had been organized into an old-fashioned bedroom, kitchen, and living room. All the mismatched items had come together to form a perfect display. And this is the way the activity affected the Dalton Gardens Ward. There was a group of people—some old, some young, some related, some not—that have now come together so well that no one would know they weren’t all from the same family.

Several years ago I had lunch with a young man who was a student in my department here on campus—one whom I had taught in a graduate-level class. With his permission I would like to share with you his remarkable story.
John was born healthy but developed bone cancer in his leg when he was only 11 years old. He underwent some of the early chemotherapy and radiation treatments. The cancer in his leg was successfully treated, but the medication used in the chemotherapy attacked his heart and resulted in a disease called cardiomyopathy. Such chemotherapy procedures today avoid the onset of this disease with frequent heart biopsies during the treatment. Unfortunately, these were not performed routinely when John was treated.
In this condition the muscles in his heart slowly deteriorated. Despite his weakened heart, John lived an active life, even becoming an Eagle Scout. By age 19 his heart had weakened seriously; nonetheless, against the recommendation of his doctors, John submitted his application to serve a full-time mission. His cardiologist advised against a mission, but, on seeing John’s determination to serve, suggested that he request a mission close to home. The doctor candidly warned him and his parents that his last years of life might be spent there. John accepted a call to the California Oakland Mission. At the time, being among those who were called to serve for 18 months, he prayerfully extended his mission service to 24 months when given the opportunity.
After his honorable mission teaching Cambodian refugees, John returned to BYU to study mechanical engineering. When he was 25 the muscle decay in his heart became so severe that his doctor indicated a heart transplant was the only option. After careful screening, John was placed on the eligible organ transplant recipient list at the University of Utah, and he waited for word of organ availability with an electronic pager at his side 24 hours a day. His family moved temporarily from California to Bountiful to be near the hospital. After nearly two months John was notified that a donor heart had become available, and he went immediately to the hospital for the transplant. In a surgical procedure that lasted only 87 minutes, John’s diseased heart was taken from his body and replaced by the healthy heart of a young automobile accident victim whose family’s unselfishness made critical transplants of several body organs possible all across the country. Incidentally, the heart transplant donor was female, and John used to joke that his transplant might be the only way he could “capture the heart of a woman.” After two weeks of hospital recuperation and nearly six months of required recuperation near the hospital, he returned to BYU to complete his studies.
I was then and still am amazed at the miracle of John’s story. Sitting beside him in the cafeteria, I was astonished to realize that I was talking to a young man whose heart had been taken from his body, and the heart of another was beating in its place. After his transplant John resumed a full, active life with participation in Men’s Chorus, an election as president of the student section of the national professional society to which he belonged, and Church service. He completed a master’s degree and was married in the temple in August 1992.
I’m quite sure John appreciates mortality more than perhaps most do. And he recognizes that his routine will never be the same. For the rest of his life he will face frequent visits to the doctor, careful oversight of his physical activity, and a daily regimen of medication to prevent his body from rejecting his borrowed heart. His heart transplant, however, has made it possible for him to escape what the doctors promised would be certain early death.

When I first met with the missionaries, I did not understand much of what they said, and to tell you the truth, I may not have paid much attention to them. My heart was closed to a new religion. I wanted only to prove they were wrong and to gain time to convince Renee to marry me anyway.

Today my children have served and are serving missions, and I understand the sacrifices that these young men and young women make to teach the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now I wish I had paid more attention to Elder Richardson, Elder Farrell, and Elder Hyland, the wonderful missionaries who taught me.

It is not just by enticing us to engage in clearly addictive behavior that Satan tries to limit our ability to act according to our desires. He is able to limit this core component of agency by confusing us in other ways. Let me illustrate with a simple example from my own life. For a time, I practiced law in Arizona. The morning commute from our home in Tempe to my office in downtown Phoenix was a daily adventure that took anywhere from 20 minutes, on a good day, to close to an hour, on a bad day. After a few months, I began to notice that my mood for the day was determined largely by how long the commute took and how aggravated I was with the drivers who I thought were causing the problems. The longer the commute, and the more annoying the drivers, the more irritable I was with everyone I met during the day. When I first noticed this trend (probably long after my co-workers had discovered it), I became even more annoyed at the other drivers. How dare they ruin my day by making me angry and frustrated? Then one day I read, not for the first time, but with new eyes, three verses from Lehi's teachings in Second Nephi chapter 2. The first is verse 14: "God ... hath created .. all things that [are in the heavens and earth], both things to act and things to be acted upon." "That's it," I thought, "my problem is that those other drivers are acting upon me. It's all their fault." Then I came to verses 26 and 27: "And the Messiah cometh in the fullness of time that he may redeem the children of men ... And because that they are redeemed from the fall, they have become free forever ... to act for themselves and not to be acted upon. ... Wherefore men are free ... to choose liberty and eternal life ... or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself." It hit me like a thunderbolt. The problem was not with the other drivers; the problem was with me. Because of the atonement, I was free to choose my attitude, to act for myself, but I was surrendering that freedom by succumbing to Satan's temptation to become angry. And - just as Satan desired - I was becoming miserable. He had me thinking I had no choice about what mood I was in, when in reality, because of the atonement, it was entirely my choice. I could choose to act, but I too often chose to be acted upon, to be led captive by the actions of others, thereby surrendering my agency to them.

The Fowkes family had been having emergency drills during family home evenings for several years. This training helped them instinctively do the right things when the quake hit. Nathan, 13, who was studying in the library, immediately dove under a table that protected him from being hit by a tall cabinet of books. His younger brother and sister ducked under the kitchen table at home and missed being hit by falling china. just three weeks before the quake, Sister Fowkes had shown her son Kendall, 9, how to turn off the gas, electricity, and water in the house, so he could earn a Cub Scout achievement. This knowledge saved the family from a flooded basement, since the quake caused a water pipe to break.
Ten years earlier the Fowkes had made some other preparations. Following two consecutive dreams about being in an earthquake, Sister Fowkes insisted that her husband string wire in front of the shelves in their fruit room before they left on vacation. Eventually their foresight paid off. While they had over 200 bottles stacked seven shelves high, none were broken.

Some weeks later I received a phone call. It was Cameron’s mother, Joyce. She was the Young Women president; my husband, Van, was the Young Men president. It was routine for her to leave messages with me.
As we spoke, she indicated that she was tying up all loose ends before Cameron’s surgery. Cameron’s surgery? I tried to think. Oh, yes, something to help his hips. The conversation ended, and I hung up the phone.
Suddenly the feeling came to me: Cameron was going to die.
I felt nauseated and weak. I went to my bedroom to pray. Was there something I should do? After praying, I felt a sense of reassurance.
Cameron had his surgery. Joyce called and reported that all had gone well. Still, I sensed something in her voice. Everything seems fine, she said.
The next day as I was trying to organize my day, the telephone rang. It was Jamie, a member of the Relief Society presidency.
“How are you?” I asked politely.
“Not very good,” she answered, as she started to cry. “Cameron passed away last night.”
I sat down.
“I just thought that you should know.”
“Thank you for calling me, Jamie,” I said. “You may never know how much this means.” I hung up the phone, then took down the picture of Jesus healing the man born blind. I wrapped it and thought of a gracious God who prepares answers to prayers before they are uttered. I wrote Cameron’s family a letter that I hoped would comfort them, then I attached it to the gift.

The handsome American youth had only been in Czechoslovakia for a few weeks. With absolutely no language training he had come to preach the gospel to the Czech people in their own tongue. Now the time had arrived to preach his first sermon to a group of Saints and interested investigators. His experienced companion had labored diligently to help him write his speech and had also provided a phonetic guide to aid in the pronunciation of this very difficult language. Now he must face the congregation alone.

When the young man began to speak the senior companion suffered in silence as his youthful counterpart proceeded to violate every grammatical rule in the entire Czech language. However, all was not lost, because his pronunciation was so atrocious that few in the audience could tell what he was saying anyway.

After the meeting, the young elder felt somewhat embarrassed and disappointed until a matronly investigator approached him. With tear-stained cheeks and trembling voice she told him (through an interpreter), "I felt that everything you said was true—I’d like to be baptized." The promise in the Book of Mormon is that "when a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the hearts of the children of men" (2 Ne. 33:1).

Eliza R. Snow, who had heard of the Prophet and some very ugly things in that ­connection, happened to be at home one day when the Prophet called and visited with her family. “In the winter of 1830 and ’31, Joseph Smith called at my father’s,” she wrote of this visit, “and as he sat warming himself, I scrutinized his face as closely as I could without attracting his attention, and decided that his was an honest face.”43 Later, after joining the Church, she was often in his home as a kind of babysitter and help for a time in Kirtland. She first admired him in his public ministry, saw him as a prophet, but not until she saw him in his own home, on his knees in prayer, and in his relationship with his children did her whole heart go out to him in admiration.44 He was, she said, as humble as a little child.45

Bertha came into my life when I was 13 and just beginning junior high school. How well I remember that first day of school. The building was large and sprawling with endless halls and rows and rows of lockers. It seemed like a huge transit mall compared to the security of grade school. Most of the students had come on school buses from small farms and neighborhoods. This was certainly not a big city group, but we were still anxious to be popular and accepted. There were so many of us that we were going to be using the old grade school across the street for additional classrooms. I alternated between excitement and panic at the thought of finding my way around.
I had worked hard all summer babysitting and getting up at 5:00 A.M. to pick strawberries and cherries so I could earn enough money to buy nice school clothes. But even in all my fine new clothes, I felt awkward and uneasy.
My friends and I huddled together, trying to act nonchalant to hide the fear we felt but didn’t dare admit. We stood in awe as the eighth and ninth graders moved confidently through the halls laughing and teasing each other. It was a relief when the bell finally rang and we all headed to the big gym where it was announced that each seventh grader was to be assigned to an eighth grade “big brother or sister” to show them around. Each seventh grader was called, along with the name of his buddy for the day.
When my name was called along with Bertha Brown, I heard several of my friends gasp. I had no idea who Bertha Brown was, but it was obvious that some of them did. As soon as we were excused to go meet our big sisters, I was surrounded by girls telling me to hide quickly before Bertha could find me. It was clear that to be assigned to Bertha was the worst possible fate. I was so confused. Part of me said not to hide—that would be mean. But another part of me wanted to be popular, and that’s the side that won.
So the game began—the hiding, the giggling, and the running from imagined danger. We managed to escape from Bertha for the moment, but not before I caught a glimpse of her. It was true that she was not pretty. She was even a little scary to look at with her wild, dry hair. Her clothes looked like something a grandmother would wear, and her shoes were brown and ugly.
All day the big story was how poor little Sheron had to hide from Bertha. The one time that I really saw Bertha’s face she looked so sad. How could we be so mean to her? I thought. She hadn’t done anything to deserve it. There we were, a whole group of girls, running away from one lonely person. I knew that what we were doing was wrong. I didn’t want to play that awful game. What I really wanted was to talk to Bertha and tell her I was sorry. I knew that she must be embarrassed. But I wasn’t brave enough, so I let everyone else lead me. But oh, I was miserable!
Later that day I forgot about Bertha when I was called to Mrs. Jensen’s office. She had been my very favorite teacher in grade school, and now she was a counselor at the junior high. I could hardly wait to see her. All the way to her office I imagined all kinds of wonderful things. Maybe she wanted me to be her special assistant. Maybe she had something important that she wanted me to do. I almost ran through the halls in my eagerness to see Mrs. Jensen. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for her.
When I walked into her office, I could see tears in her eyes, and my heart nearly broke when she looked straight at me and said, “Of all the girls coming into seventh grade, I assigned Bertha to you because I thought that you were the one girl who would be kind to her!”
All the misery of the day came crashing down on me, and I sobbed as I realized that Mrs. Jensen did have an important assignment for me and I had failed her. I had failed Bertha. But, most of all, I had betrayed myself. The next day everyone else forgot about the game—and Bertha. I never did. I rarely saw her after that day. When I did catch a glimpse of her all alone, I wanted desperately to tell her how sorry I was. But I was too ashamed and too young in my understanding of compassion to know how much it would mean to her.
I never saw Bertha again after junior high, and yet she has been a very important part of my life. Even today I wish that I had found the courage to be her friend. How do you say you are sorry to someone that you have never spoken to and yet hurt so deeply that more than 30 years later you cannot forget?
I finally came to grips with what I had done to Bertha one Easter when I was studying about the atonement of Christ. How grateful I am to the Saviour for his sacrifice and for the realization that through his wonderful gift I can finally lay that burden down and find peace and forgiveness—not that I will forget, but that I can now use the lesson to improve my life and bless others.
Because of Bertha, I have never again knowingly been unkind to anyone, and I have tried to teach my children the same. I have a special place in my heart for those who don’t seem to fit in, for those who are lonely and forgotten. Because of Bertha it is easier for me to see beyond the surface and understand the heart of those I meet. I have tried to make it up to her by the way I treat others, but I will always wish that I could see her and say, “I’m sorry, Bertha.”

Recently our 11-year-old grandson Clark was trying with all his energies and effort to get the lawn mower started so that he could complete the task of having the lawn mowed before his father returned from meeting me at the airport. Clark is a dutiful boy and wanted to please his father and his grandfather by having the lawn looking its best. Finally, after many frustrating moments of trying without success to get the mower started, he went to the telephone to call his mother, who was at a rehearsal at the church. She was there to preview a pageant that was being prepared for their stake youth conference and had been listening to words of scripture and testimony of prophets of the Book of Mormon from member-actors who were portraying Nephi, Alma, Helaman, and a mother of a stripling warrior.

Therefore, when Clark asked his mother what he should do, her first thought was to say: “Pray about it!”

Clark’s first thought was “Pray about starting a lawn mower!?” But, “stripling warrior” that he is, he didn’t doubt his mother, and he didn’t doubt the Lord. He thought, “Well, God created this whole world! Of course He can start a lawn mower!” He knew when he went back to try again the lawn mower would start. And it did, with very little effort from Clark. Then Clark prayed again, this time to say “Thank you.” This simple faith of a young boy brought an answer to his earnest prayer when he needed help.

Probably no one took a greater interest in the recent dedication of the Ogden (Utah) temple than did a group of fellows and girls from the Layton Stake who raised $16,000 to help build it! Dave Preece, chairman of the students, says the effort was called Mission Y-Bat (Youth Build A Temple), and the young people raised funds by delivering telephone books, taking inventories, selling wax remover, and doing yard and farm work. Some found jobs and made contributions from their salaries on a pledge basis.

When my mom was expecting my sister Chantel, the whole family tried to guess if the baby would be a boy or a girl. I was sure it would be a boy, since we already had seven girls. We had only three boys, and all of them were older than I was. I hoped I was right, because it would have been nice to have a brother who wasn’t big enough to tease me. But when Chantel came to our family, I was grateful for this special new girl who is my sister.
Chantel has Down’s syndrome, which makes it hard for her to learn quickly. We have discovered, however, that Chantel is a peacemaker. When everyone else is fighting or yelling at each other, Chantel always helps us remember that we should be helping, not hurting, each other.

There are individuals who declare that those who support the Residential Living Standards—expecting that young men and young women not go into each other’s private living spaces (bedrooms and bathrooms as opposed to public areas like living rooms and kitchens)—are residing in the Dark Ages and need to get up to the decade of the nineties. A letter from a former student reflects the folly of attempting to explain away Residential Living Standards. The letter read, “I thought that the rules regarding Residential Living Standards were the most ridiculous rules that ever existed. After all, I reasoned, you should have been able to discern that nothing inappropriate was either intended or going on. After all, we only went into the bedroom to study together, to read the scriptures, and to pray. I am sorry to have to report that I came to know that the rules were not ridiculous. They were to protect us, and they were founded on principles. The reasons are clear to me now, and I want to apologize for my disregard of them. Should my children ever have the privilege of becoming students at BYU, rest assured that they will be instructed by their parents before they leave home that Residential Living Standards matter.”

Last year, when I was five years old, I wanted to practice being a missionary. I decided to give the family home evening lesson. I prepared the lesson by myself. I cut out temple pictures from old magazines so I could talk about temples. When I showed a picture of a temple, I asked my family to guess which temple it was. Then I read the name that was written on the back of it. I wore my church clothes. On my white shirt, I had attached a little missionary tag that my grandparents had given me. It said “Future Missionary.”
This experience helped me to be more like Jesus Christ because He was a missionary too. He taught and served many people. I want to be a missionary like Jesus Christ.

Jennetta Richards had traveled across the Atlantic Ocean and half the North American continent to join the Saints in Nauvoo, Illinois. She also suffered for years with “general debility”—an undiagnosed chronic illness. In the Winter of 1844, the Nauvoo Temple was far from being complete. But the Prophet Joseph Smith had gathered a group of men and women together to perform the sacred temple ceremonies in locations such as the Red Brick Store. Included as part of these temple ceremonies was a unified prayer in which participants combined their faith in behalf of themselves and others. The journals of the Saints who attended these temple meetings are guarded and reverent when it comes to the sacred temple ceremonies in which they participated but regularly note the people for whom they prayed—often children who were critically ill. On February 10, 1844, Jennetta was suffering a great deal. Joseph held a prayer meeting for endowed members in the evening, and those who attended “prayed for Sister Richards and others.”

A year and a half after being prayed for in the 1844 temple meeting, Jennetta Richards passed away. Notwithstanding her faith, and the united faith of her family and their temple community, just after 10:00 a.m. on July 9, 1845, Jennetta stopped breathing. The scriptures explain that even where there is faith to be healed, the healing comes only if the person “is not appointed unto death” (Doctrine and Covenants 42:48). Like Joseph Smith, who was murdered in the summer of 1844, Jennetta did not live to see the temple completed. She did, however, help lay the foundation of temple worship in the Restoration. And part of that foundation was her example of seeking healing from the Lord through a prayer offered by others—a prayer offered in the same manner we experience in temples today.

The Holy Spirit has the power to guide. A 15-year-old girl felt that she needed to find new friends. She wrote to the Young Women office, “Now, I don’t know if you have ever had to change friends, but it honestly was the hardest thing I have ever had to do.” She decided to put her problem in the hands of the Lord, and she also counseled with her parents. She says that after several months “she wanted to just give up.”
One afternoon she was casually talking to her seminary teacher, and she confided her problem to him. Then he said, “I really don’t know why I am asking you this, but do you happen to know these girls?”
This girl answered with a yes. And then he said, “Have you ever thought about being friends with them?”
“I told him that there was no way that I could fit in with them. He then asked me if he could talk to one of the girls. I decided I would let him, if he promised not to embarrass me.
“Well, that next day I received a phone call from one of the girls. Now, you have to understand that this girl was on student council, and I hate to use the term, but she was ‘extremely popular.’ She asked if I would like to go to the basketball game with her that night. It was one of the funnest, most peaceful nights of my life. The next day at school, she introduced me to two other girls. We all instantly became friends.”
She concludes by saying, “I don’t know about you, but I would much rather have the Lord, who knows the outcome of everything, direct my life than me, who just sees things as they are at the time. He is right by our side, walking us through life, even when we feel so alone.”

In 2007 the University of Washington invited me to a banquet honoring its female athletes. I had played tennis at the university 44 years earlier, and my tennis partner and I had won the Northwest championship in doubles. At the banquet I would be recognized for my achievement.
On our way to the dinner, my husband and I picked up Lynda, a friend from our days as students. She was also the one who introduced me to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when I was 33. Together we enjoyed seeing our former campus and old friends.
However, when I went to pick up a packet and name tag prior to the banquet, I was disappointed to discover that printed on them was the name “Sharon Krull,” not Sherry Krull. “Oh, well,” I thought, and I crossed out Sharon and wrote Sherry instead. But the mistake continued through the night. Later in the evening, when the host introduced me as an award recipient, he called me “Sharon.” The plaque he handed me also included the error.
It wasn’t a huge problem; I was grateful to have been invited to the banquet, and the people in charge of the event promised to replace the plaque with one bearing the correct name.
The next day was Easter Sunday. My husband and I had spent Good Friday at the temple and had spent much time during the week pondering the Savior’s last days on earth. But the most powerful part of Easter that year came during sacrament meeting, when our bishop made this statement: “How grateful I am that the Lord knows my name.”
I felt a great joy come over me. As much as I had enjoyed the previous evening, the happiness I felt at this truth far outweighed anything I felt from receiving “the honors of men.”
My life changed then, at my baptism and confirmation, and it changed again that powerful Easter morning when I received the witness that Heavenly Father and the Savior really do know our names. I cannot fully express the joy that it is to know Heavenly Father and the Savior—and to know that They know me.