Gospel Story Finder

Since joining the Church, Liriel, now 22, has learned a lot about the Young Women values—especially faith.
“Even when I was very small, I always read the scriptures,” she says. “I always wanted to know about God. I wanted to feel close to Him.”
As Liriel grew, her dream of becoming a singer took shape—but not as quickly as she would have liked, partly because of her family’s financial struggles. “I cried and I cried and I cried about this,” she says. “I was impatient. But a voice would come to my mind saying, ‘Be calm. It isn’t your time yet.’”
She continued to work toward her dream while working to help her family financially. It was a hard time. “God will try us, but all these things are for our growth,” she explains.
Through it all, Liriel has learned a lot—about herself and about her Heavenly Father. “I know Heavenly Father loves me,” she says. “As long as I am humble He will hear my prayers and will help me overcome my problems. I know that He hears our prayers, listens, and answers—not always as we would like, but I don’t have the least doubt that He does answer.”

When I was 11 years old, I was baptized as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a decision that stands out as the most significant in my life. I am thankful for the gospel’s influence on me as a young girl. My dreams were always centered around having an eternal family. Because of the covenants I would one day make in the temple, I knew that I could be with my loved ones forever.
I met my husband when I was a young woman, and after he served his mission, we got married in 1999. We had our first child a year later, the same year that the Santo Domingo Dominican Republic Temple was dedicated. We were sealed in the temple when our baby was just three months old. I remember when they brought him dressed in white into the sealing room. It was one of the happiest moments of my life, achieving the goal I had set as a young woman—to be sealed for eternity with my family.
Our second child was born four years later, and I was happy because everything I had planned and prayed for was coming true. We had faced difficulties, but I felt like I was a beloved daughter of God, blessed with an eternal family.

When I was camping with my dad, we shared a moment I’ll never forget. We hiked up the side of a mountain late one night and found a spot to sit together. As we looked across the night sky, we were surrounded by the most brilliant stars I’d ever seen. We sat together for a long time, naming planets and constellations one by one.
Looking out at the universe in front of me, I felt pretty small and unimportant. I couldn’t even imagine how many other planets are out there—“worlds without end,” right? What was I compared to all that?
I asked my dad if there was other life out there in the universe, already feeling overwhelmed at the thought. He must have read my thoughts, because he simply said: “Here’s what I know. Heavenly Father has a lot of creations, as you can see. But of all His creations, He loves you individually.
“He sees everything you go through and wants more than anything to be a part of your life. He wants to bring you joy and help you get back to live with Him forever.”
I still felt small under the huge night sky, but I believed my dad’s testimony. I mattered to Heavenly Father. And He wanted to be in my life.

When I was a baby, I was baptized into the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Growing up, the fact that I never made the choice to be baptized unsettled me. I started to think that religion didn’t allow me the freedom to choose for myself.
So I eventually stopped believing in God or anything spiritual.
One day, I was talking to my friend who was in Czechia doing a study program affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She invited me to do the program too. I wasn’t interested originally, but after a while, I decided to check it out.
I liked the school’s overall message of positivity, so I gave in and applied.
But I had no interest in the program’s focus on Jesus Christ.
Or so I thought.
This academy made me live differently than I was used to. First, I learned that I wasn’t allowed to drink coffee on campus!
My freedom was already slipping through my fingers.
Along with that, every morning started with a mandatory devotional. I would mostly sleep through them because I wasn’t interested. I was just there to learn and then live my life the way I wanted to.
But after a while, I noticed the people around me who were taking Jesus Christ’s teachings seriously. In Ukraine, many people only went to church a few times a year, but here, everyone was always talking about Christ. They were kind, good, and positive about life.
I started to wonder what my life would be like if I believed in Him too. Sometimes I even caught myself thinking, “What would Jesus’s perspective be?”
I felt confused. I told one of my friends at the academy about how I was feeling torn. He invited me to try praying about my feelings.
On one foggy morning, I decided to find a quiet place to meditate outside. I don’t know what came over me, but instead of meditating, I gave God the benefit of the doubt. I said, “OK, let’s talk.”
And I said the longest prayer of my life.
I just wanted to know if God and Jesus Christ were real.
As I was praying, the sun pierced through the fog. I felt its warmth on my skin and warmth in my heart. I felt like someone’s hand was on my shoulder, telling me They were right there with me.
The message was clear: They were real. They were aware of me.
I also realized something else.
Looking at those who were living the gospel of Jesus Christ, I didn’t see anybody being forced to do things they didn’t want to do or feeling restricted by their faith. I saw them choosing to live like Jesus Christ because they wanted to.
In the Book of Mormon, the prophet Moroni extends his promise through an invitation, not a command: “If ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost” (Moroni 10:4).
I realized I wanted to choose Him too.
From then on, I took learning about Jesus Christ seriously. I accepted missionary lessons. I studied the Book of Mormon. I prayed every day. I even got baptized! (My choice this time!) This was all so new to me, but I felt my heart changing.
I still have a lot to learn, and I am so imperfect, but I always say to myself, “Let’s just try to be like Christ today. Just keep trying.”
Elder Joaquin E. Costa of the Seventy beautifully taught: “At times, having faith in Jesus Christ may seem like something impossible, almost unattainable. We may think that coming unto Christ requires a strength, power, and perfection we don’t have, and we just can’t find the energy to do it all. But … faith in Jesus Christ is what gives us the energy to begin the journey.”
Jesus Christ can change us if we give Him the chance and keep trying. He doesn’t limit our freedom. Instead, He offers us even more through His Atonement: joy, healing, and hope.
We have the freedom to choose Him every day, and I’m grateful for the miracles my choice to follow Him brings into my life.
The author is from Kyiv, Ukraine.

Not long ago I attended a dance at a stake that was not my own. The friend who invited me began introducing me to a group of girls standing near the door as we entered. Since I didn’t know anyone, I was anxious to make some points with the ladies, so I said, “Wow. There sure are a lot of beautiful girls in your stake.” My friend looked around the group and, trying to be funny, said loudly, “Where? Where? I don’t see any.” Needless to say, we were not the most popular guys at the dance that night.
If the above experience had been a scene on a TV show, my friend’s “clever” comment would have been followed by laughter. In real life, the girls were offended and avoided us the rest of the evening. What many don’t realize is that those producing TV shows use a laugh track—prerecorded laughter that can be turned on and off at the touch of a button. That’s why laughter always follows sarcastic put-downs or mean jokes. It sounds like everyone enjoys the negative humor. In real life, there is no laugh track. People might put up with put-downs and manage a chuckle for the sake of saving face, but deep down, negative humor hurts. No matter how perfect the timing or how smoothly executed the joke, usually the only ones laughing are those who are afraid they may be your next targets.

One Sunday, my granddaughter Diana, who is four years old, was sitting next to her father at church. Diana sat reverently, enjoying the comfort of her father’s arm holding her close to him. However, when the bishop stood up and announced the sacrament hymn, Diana gently lifted her father’s arm from off her shoulder and placed it in his lap. Then she sat up straight and folded her arms. She looked over at her father and encouraged him to do the same.
Diana’s message to her father was perfectly clear. She was telling him to turn his complete and total attention to the Savior. This is the message a reverent attitude always conveys, and when reverent attitudes abound, reverent behavior will always flourish. I pray that, like Diana, we may all strive to develop reverent attitudes so that we may serve God reverently and with godly fear (see Heb. 12:28).

One never knows what a little kindness can generate. One January, while serving in Akure in the Nigeria Lagos Mission, I had a small gift that I wanted to give to someone. I wondered, “Whom can I give it to that will benefit from it?” I took the gift to church two Sundays, yet I was undecided.
On the third Sunday, I went to church thinking I would give it to a good friend. He did not come to church that day, but I had a feeling that someone else needed it. Looking around the chapel, I saw a boy whose parents were not members of the Church. He seemed so lonely. I felt impressed to give him the gift. I presented it to him, feeling very happy within.
Something wonderful happened. His mother came to church the following Sunday. She thanked me for the gift. She said, “I have been promising my son that I would one day come to church. Today I came to express my gratitude for the gift.” That was how my companion and I met her; since then she has joined the Church. How happy the boy was to see his mom finally baptized.
I know that by small means great things are brought to pass.

“I was just remembering something that happened to me when I was a little girl. My father took me to a carnival and bought me some cotton candy. It was pink and looked like the clouds at sunset. I just thought it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. When we got home, it was time for bed. I decided to save it so that every day I could have it and look at its beauty. I put it in a little box and put the cover on. The next morning when I woke up, I rushed to look at my beautiful treasure. There was just a lump of sugar and a sticky cardboard funnel. I cried because I thought someone had destroyed it. When I told my mother that I had wanted it to last forever, she said, ‘You can’t save cotton candy. If you want cotton candy forever, you have to make a little every day.’”

All my life I strived to be who I thought Heavenly Father expected me to be. But there was a problem: I never knew if I was good enough.
I fixated on my imperfections, especially after studying scriptures or listening to general conference talks. When reading these things that were supposed to encourage me, I would only focus on what I was doing wrong.
I lived this way for a long time—miserable and feeling weary in my discipleship.
But I didn’t realize that what I was actually failing to do was truly believe in the Savior and the pure, simple truths of His gospel.
My perspective changed while I was listening to a recent devotional with Sister Patricia T. Holland. She said, “What I regret most in my youth is that I didn’t see the simple beauty of the gospel; I made even the gospel too complex.”1
Her message struck me.
I realized that I complicate the gospel frequently! Many of us do. We expect ourselves to be perfect, believing there is no room for flaws and progress. And if things aren’t going the way we expect them to, we become anxious about the future, compare ourselves to others, lose connection with Heavenly Father, and even start wondering if living the gospel is worth it.
I realized my anxiety wasn’t caused by living the gospel. I was anxious because I had stopped focusing on the reason I live the gospel: Jesus Christ.
I forgot that He and Heavenly Father love me with perfect love (see John 15:9; 2 Nephi 1:15).
I forgot that I am meant to have joy in the journey (see 2 Nephi 2:25).
I forgot that mortality includes having imperfections and relying on the Savior to overcome them (see Ether 12:27).
I forgot that the Savior is here to help me learn and grow and progress and that He consecrates my efforts along the way (see 2 Nephi 2:1–2; 32:9).
We run into trouble when we turn the gospel into a checklist of rules and forget the pure truths of Jesus Christ. When we strive to keep our covenants and the commandments with the intention of becoming more like Him, then we are truly living the gospel.
Heavenly Father wants us to always remember that the Savior can help us reach our divine potential. But how do we not forget this important truth?
Here are a few practices that have helped me:
I pray for Heavenly Father to help me feel that He loves me and accepts my best efforts.
I take the sacrament, focusing on Jesus Christ’s Atonement. I remind myself that His grace can help me in the future and is already at work in my life as I strive to follow Him.
I turn to the scriptures for comfort. I read about those who also felt inadequate and were strengthened by the Lord.
I go to the temple often. Everything in the Lord’s house reminds me of His mercy and that I am capable of progress. There, I can feel peace amid so many anxieties.
These practices have made me appreciate what matters most in the gospel. They remind me to not complicate its simplicity.
By focusing on the pure truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ, I have seen my life and faith miraculously simplify. I know yours will too.

Ten dollars
When leaving Tonga for Hawaii in March 1960, my parents were still on their mission in Tongatapu. During this time in Tonga, members of the Church would sell everything they owned in order to earn the fare to go to New Zealand to attend the temple and receive temple ordinances. I knew my parents wouldn’t be able to go because they did not have enough money. So I made myself a promise - if I find some money in Hawaii, I will save it to send my parents to the temple. When we got to Hawaii we found that the Church took good care of us. They provided everything we needed, plus we were given ten dollars in cash every month so we could buy soda, ice cream, and go to the movie.
When I received my first $10, I remembered the promise I made. So I took it to Lola, my supervisor’s wife, and asked her to please make me a savings account and put this ten dollars in it, and told her what it was for. She helped me do that and also offered to donate an additional $10 a month to my account if I would come and clean their yard. Her neighbor found out what I was doing and offered to donate $10 to my account for cleaning her yard. There were others who also donated. By the summer of 1962, I collected enough money to send my parents to New Zealand to the temple. One of my brother’s wrote me a letter and said, it may seem that you love our parents more than we do, but that is just because you were in the position to help them to go to the temple, but we love them just the same.
These two stories, the $10 and the watermelon, show that with God, a penniless young man from Tonga can gather enough money to help do His will in sending his parents to the temple and finding eternal marriage.

It had been a long, disappointing day, and now Elder Cooksey and I were walking through the rain of Puerto Montt, a city in the Chile Osorno Mission. We had lost three families from our investigator pool. Two were unable—perhaps unwilling—to commit to keeping some of the commandments, while the third family felt they couldn’t leave the pastor of their current church, a man who was this family’s close, personal friend.
We knew that all three families had testimonies of the gospel, yet they were no longer interested in listening to our message. I was in the depths of despair. As we walked through the cold rain that night, I thought, What’s the use? We were struggling to share something that no one wanted to hear. I wondered what I was doing. I was in this strange country, far from family and friends, and now to make matters worse I was soaking wet.
As I dried myself after arriving home late that night, I crawled into my bed, ready to do battle with fleas. I opened the Book of Mormon at random and glanced at a page. The words of Ammon helped me find the answer to my despair.
“And we have entered into their houses and taught them, and we have taught them in their streets; yea, and we have taught them upon their hills; and we have also entered into their temples and their synagogues and taught them; and we have been cast out, and mocked, and spit upon, and smote upon our cheeks; and we have been stoned, and taken and bound with strong cords, and cast into prison; and through the power and wisdom of God we have been delivered again.
“And we have suffered all manner of afflictions, and all this, that perhaps we might be the means of saving some soul; and we supposed that our joy would be full if perhaps we could be the means of saving some” (Alma 26:29–30).
This passage brought me back to reality, and I had the answer I was looking for. That was why I was in a foreign land, and that is why we serve missions—that perhaps we might be the means of saving some soul.

Brigham is an example of faith and courage. When he was three years old, he became very ill with leukemia, a cancer of the blood, and had to endure a painful treatment for two years. As he did, doctors discovered that he also had another disease, one that he cannot be cured of. It causes great pain, but he doesn’t complain. In fact, after doctors gave him a very painful treatment for his cancer, Brigham told them “thank you” through his tears.

When Patrick was 19, he lost his father and brother-in-law in a tragic car accident in Saudi Arabia. “My world turned upside down with their loss,” he says. His father’s guiding hand, loving encouragement, and joyful view of the world were gone. Lost in grief and emptiness for a time, Patrick went home to England with his mother but eventually returned to work in Saudi Arabia.
“I had all sorts of valuable opportunities to learn and grow and see how businesses worked,” he says. He was especially grateful for “a wonderful boss who coached and guided me and became a dear friend. He was one of several father-type figures I’ve been blessed with since my father’s death.”

After 18 months of preparation, including writing, choreography, and making costumes for 3,500 youth from 31 stakes around Ogden, Utah, the production Arise: Youth Spectacular was performed for over 45,000 people on three different evenings at a football stadium.
Aleisha Keller, 14, of the Ogden Utah Weber Heights Stake explains, “Three councils, each including 10 stakes, presented a 20-minute dance and musical program. Our stake represented youth from Scotland dancing to live bagpipe music, and the whole group also sang three songs, including ‘Called to Serve,’ when each of us held up our own copy of the Book of Mormon.
“But my favorite part of the youth spectacular,” she says, “was the last song, ‘Arise!’ Some of the words are: ‘Arise, shine forth! Be a light unto the world!’ It made me feel wonderful inside that we can all work together to be a standard to everyone we associate with.”
In addition to being an evening of uplifting music, the dance festival changed the lives of those involved. Matt Sakurada, 18, of the Roy Utah North Stake says: “There were lots of missionaries participating. That meant a lot to me because my brother is serving, and it felt as if he were there. This ‘Arise’ program helped me to realize that I should go on a mission, too.”
The pageant also touched the hearts of those who saw the production. Jolette Neeley, 20, of the Ogden Utah YSA First Stake says, “When I went to work on Monday following the performance, I ended up talking to one of my coworkers. She had been invited to the performance and pointed out that she had seen me singing and told me how much she had enjoyed it. We continued talking, and I learned that she had not been to church for some time. I was grateful for the opportunity I had to share my testimony with her and gave her the Book of Mormon that I had from the performance. I can testify that our program really did touch lives and planted seeds.”

In March 1881 a convention was held at a Maori village near Masterton in the Waiarapa District, north of Wellington. Among the subjects that were discussed between the Maori chiefs, who belonged to the Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian and Anglican churches is if all Christianity was of Christ, why were not all Christians affiliated with but one church? The same question the boy Prophet Joseph Smith asked, "Which is the Church? Which one should the Maori join?" After much discussion and debate the question was directed to one chief, Paora Potangaroa. His answer was "Taihoa" which means "wait" or "wait a while." The chief left the assembly, and retired to his own residence. There for three days he was occupied in prayer, fasting and meditation. After the three days Potangaroa returned to the convention. Freely translated these were his words, "My friends, the church for the Maori people has not yet come among us. You will recognize it when it comes. Its missionaries will travel in pairs. They will come from the land of the rising sun. They will learn the language and teach us the gospel in our own tongue. When they pray they will raise their right hands."

Years later, I spoke with my son, Jorge Daniel, while he was a missionary in Portugal. He said: “I am so glad I was encouraged to prepare to be endowed in the temple quite a while before my mission. As a temple ordinance worker, I had many sacred experiences, and then my mission leaders helped me have constant unforgettable experiences in the temple as a missionary. Although it’s special to see friends we’ve taught choose to be baptized, what’s been truly life-changing is going to the temple with them and seeing them progress in the covenant path.”

Today, Jorge adds, “Being home for over a year, I have felt more and more protection, guidance, and angels assisting me as I’ve served in the temple during the busiest time of my life and ran to the Savior in His holy house for direction, comfort, and healing.”

Even before the 1994 Tutsi genocide, many leaders of the Hutu tribe taught that a Hutu man married to a Tutsi woman should be required to kill her and all her family to show his allegiance to his tribe. Because of those teachings, and to better protect his family, my father moved his wife and children to a small village near Cyangugu, in the far southwestern corner of Rwanda. Even in that small village, the majority of Hutu villagers spurned and rejected my mother because she was a Tutsi. But my father continued to protect us. In 1993, when the tension and genocide ideology increased, she was pregnant with me and caring for my three older sisters. Because it was known that she was a Tutsi, our family didn’t have many friends and it was dangerous every time she had to fetch water or go to the market. It was a very difficult time for her, but always my father was on her side, protecting her and taking care of his family.
During this time, there were constant meetings in the community where the locals were given machetes and guns and trained on how to kill the Tutsis. Every week they had a community meeting. In March 1994, my father attended a town meeting where it was announced that Hutu men married to a Tutsi woman would be required to kill her and all their children. It was a hard time for them. Some of the men and some of the women who were Hutus did kill their children.
In a meeting in early April, my father was ordered to kill my mother and his four daughters. When he came home from the meeting around 6:00 p.m., it was very dark because there were no street lights at the time. He immediately took us to a small island located in the southern part of Lac Kivu, a large lake dividing Rwanda and Congo. He told my mom that the villagers had determined that we were supposed to die, so we should hide in that place; he was going back home to find a safe place for us. He told her that if she saw any boats, she should ask them if they would carry us over to Congo, where we would be safe from the Rwandan genocide. She was able to find someone willing to take us across to Congo, where we spent the next five months, until peace was restored in Rwanda and it was safe to return.
All the while in Congo, and after we came home, we didn’t know what had happened to my father. When we came back we didn’t see anything; they didn’t allow us to enter the house where we had lived, and we were told everything that belonged to my father had been sold. It was a very hard time for my mom. We didn’t have a house to stay in. We didn’t have anything to eat. We went to the Seventh-­Day Adventist chapel, where we slept for a whole week. After that my mother carried all of us to town where she learned we could get small help from the new government.
In 2003, nine years after the violence ended, the government created a reconciliation program called “Gacaca” to help resolve the hard feelings from the killings. As part of the process, people who had killed others during the genocide confessed and asked for forgiveness. Through gacaca, we came to know that my father’s family members, after they looked everywhere for us and could not find us, had killed him. My mother and my eldest sister attended the hearing where my father’s family asked for our forgiveness, and they forgave them. They told my mother that they had thrown his body into the river after killing him, so we were never able to locate his body. Because I was so young at the time he saved us, I have no recollections of my father; I don’t know his face.
When I met with the missionaries, it was hard for them to tell me how God loves me and that He is my Father in Heaven. I did come to understand that because of the plan of salvation, I will meet my father once more. Because of my faith in the plan of salvation and the Atonement of Jesus Christ, I was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-­day Saints in 2013.
My mother continued to struggle to raise the four of us herself. She had many health and stomach problems and for much of the time she suffered. She was not able to go to the hospital because she was a Tutsi. She finally passed away on June 16, 2016, from what was discovered to be cancer. She knew I was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ. She believed that I had become part of a big family. She blessed me and said I was doing the right thing. She always taught me and my sisters to love one another and to serve one another. She said our father suffered himself to allow us to live. She said we should always work hard; it would make our father happy.
I know this gospel is true. I know I will see my family again. I know my father sacrificed his life to allow me to have this life today and I am very anxious to meet him once more and thank him for his wonderful sacrifice.
I was thrilled to receive the privilege to serve as a missionary, starting in August 2017. My mission allows me to teach the joy of the gospel to families around me. One of the greatest blessings the Lord has given me since I have been on my mission is that two of my sisters have joined the Church. One of my greatest ambitions after I complete my mission is to do the temple work for my parents so that our family can be sealed for eternity.
The plan of salvation can bring happiness in this life and eternal joy in the life hereafter. I know this to be true, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

I have realized how much repentance affects everything. For example, for some months I was committing sins and not repenting of them, and I was finding it difficult to break this cycle. But after speaking with the bishop and other close friends, I was able to use the repentance process and feel so much closer to God and feel happier again. In praying hard and spending lots of time reading my scriptures, I realized that I had to change how I was living some parts of my life. I realize now how much I have grown because of this. Through this experience I was able to get much closer to my mum and dad especially.
Although I still have temptations and still commit sins, I am able to use the Savior’s Atonement to repent and review how I have done every day and try to always want to improve. I will be forever grateful for the Atonement in my life.
Billy P., age 17, Ipswich, England

In the spring of 1991 the First Presidency requested the Asia Area Presidency— consisting of Elders Merlin R. Lybbert, W. Eugene Hansen, and Monte J. Brough —to discreetly begin a search for a temple site in Hong Kong. They found several small and, in their view, inadequate sites with extremely high price tags. President Gordon B. Hinckley visited those sites in April of that year and encouraged the Area Presidency to keep looking.
Late in 1991 two more sites were identified. One was part of a government development project near an ocean bay known locally as Junk Bay (a “junk” is a Chinese boat). The other potential site was located in Fanling. Neither the Fanling nor the Junk Bay site was easily accessible or convenient to the people who would use the temple, so the search continued.
Unfortunately, time was running short. If Hong Kong was going to have a temple, it would best be built by July 1, 1997.
A little world history might be important here to understand the urgency of completing the temple in Hong Kong by July 1997. In 1898 Hong Kong became a British colony with the signing of a 99-year lease, expiring June 30, 1997. In December 1984, British and Chinese authorities signed a declaration confirming that the British government would hand over Hong Kong to the People’s Republic of China on July 1, 1997.
In June 1992 the Area Presidency was reorganized, with Elders Monte J. Brough, John K. Carmack, and Kwok Yuen Tai as members of the presidency.
In July President Hinckley called the Area Presidency twice to discuss the Fanling and Junk Bay sites. President Hinckley also indicated that he and Ted Simmons, managing director of the Church Physical Facilities Department, would come to Hong Kong on July 25 to choose the site for the temple.
When President Hinckley and Brother Simmons arrived, Elders Brough and Carmack took them to half a dozen potential sites, starting at Kom Tong Hall, where the area office was located. (Elder Tai was away from Hong Kong on a trip at the time.) After looking at all the sites, President Hinckley, Brother Simmons, and Elders Brough and Carmack met with four stake presidents in the Hong Kong region. President Hinckley discussed his feelings about the various sites and probed the stake presidents’ feelings. He found them supportive of any decision he would make.
The group was exhausted from the rigorous day of prayerfully reviewing the various properties. President Hinckley retired to his hotel room and requested that Elders Brough and Carmack come back the next morning to further discuss the matter. It was apparent that the Area Presidency had yet to find a solution President Hinckley could accept.
At about 6:45 a.m., President Hinckley called Elder Brough and requested that he and Elder Carmack come to his hotel room at 8:00 a.m. Brother Simmons joined them there at the appointed time, and President Hinckley then shared, on a sheet of white paper, a detailed drawing. During the night, he had envisioned a building of about eight floors above ground, with the temple on the top floors and other functions housed on the lower floors. It included replacement facilities for the Kowloon Tong chapel and the Hong Kong mission home and office, since the new building would require that these existing buildings on side-by-side lots be demolished. This concept of multiple use, President Hinckley explained, would depart from tradition in that all other temples in the Church at that time were stand-alone buildings.
President Hinckley asked Elders Brough and Carmack to express their feelings. They each responded that the concept of a multi-story, multi-use building had not even been considered previously, but they had a strong conviction that President Hinckley had received inspiration—even revelation—about what the Lord intended.
After briefly reviewing the other options, President Hinckley asked the brethren to join in prayer. He asked if it would be all right if he offered the prayer. He then discussed the whole matter with the Lord. He talked of the need for a temple in China to bless the people in that area of the world. The prayer was powerful and compelling, evidencing his love for all the people of Asia.
Those present then returned to the Kowloon Tong site, walking the area. They crossed the street to check the neighborhood and view the site from all aspects, checking particularly the access to it from the underground railway systems. Then Elders Brough and Carmack returned President Hinckley and Brother Simmons to the Kai Tak International Airport.
After returning to Salt Lake City, President Hinckley presented his sketch to the Temple Department, asking that the architects turn the concept into building plans as soon as possible. Seeing an opportunity to expand the functions of the building, the department’s architects created a plan for a larger building—nearly twice the size of President Hinckley’s initial concept. To build this building, they would need a variance to the height limitations and other restrictions imposed on buildings in the area.
When the plans were completed, permission was sought to build this expanded facility, but after many months of negotiations with Hong Kong officials, the proposed building was rejected.
At the April 1993 general conference, President Hinckley invited Brother Simmons and Elders Brough, Carmack, and Tai to his office. He asked why the approval process was going so slowly and what might be done to obtain a building permit. After referring to President Hinckley’s earlier experience in Hong Kong and testifying of the feelings the Area Presidency had on that occasion, the Area Presidency unanimously recommended that the Church return to the original concept described by President Hinckley in Hong Kong.
Once the plans were redone to reflect the original concept in President Hinckley’s sketch, the necessary approvals were quickly obtained. Within days, various British, Hong Kong, and Chinese officials issued permits for the temple’s construction.
On May 26 and 27, 1996, President Gordon B. Hinckley dedicated the Hong Kong China Temple. In the dedicatory prayer, he prayed:
“Thy Church in this area now comes to full maturity with the dedication of this sacred temple. We pray that this harvest of souls may continue, that in the future as in the present, Thy people may be free and secure in their worship and that none shall hinder the service of missionaries called to this area. We pray that Thy work may grow and prosper in the great Chinese realm, and may those who govern be ever receptive to those called and sent as messengers of revealed truth.”

Healed the captain’s steward on a journey back to North America.
When Elder Snow left England to return to Nauvoo, Illinois, he brought a large group of newly baptized members with him. They all booked passage on the ship Swanton and prepared for the long journey to North America.

Although the captain of the Swanton was not unkind to the Latter-day Saints on his ship, he wasn’t exactly friendly either. He usually distanced himself from them. But after about two weeks at sea, something happened. The captain’s steward was badly injured in an accident. No one expected the steward to live through the night.

But one of the faithful sisters who had been attending to the dying sailor had a suggestion. She told the steward that Elder Lorenzo Snow could give him a blessing and that it might save his life. The steward—who was working to support his wife and two children back in Germany—eagerly agreed.

In the middle of the night, Elder Snow was awakened and asked to come to the dying man’s room. When he arrived, he met the captain of the ship. The captain thanked him for coming but expressed the hopelessness of the situation. Elder Snow could see that the captain had been crying.

He went into the room, laid his hands upon the steward’s head, and gave him a priesthood blessing. Immediately after Elder Snow finished the blessing, the man sat up and got out of bed. The steward was completely healed, and he returned to his duties the next day.

The healing of the steward changed things on board the Swanton. The captain began to spend as much time with the Saints as he could spare, and he even studied the gospel and attended Church meetings. The other sailors were just as impressed. When the ship reached its destination, the crew lovingly bid the Saints farewell. Through the power of the priesthood, not only was a man’s life saved, but several others were also given a glimpse of God’s power and love. The steward and many members of the crew were eventually baptized.