Gospel Story Finder

Once, I fell off my bunk bed and hit my head very hard. I was scared because I couldn’t see. My daddy gave me a blessing. He said that I would be able to see very soon. When the ambulance men came, they shined a flashlight in my eyes. I looked around and I could see again! I didn’t feel afraid anymore. I am grateful for the priesthood in my home. I am glad that whenever I am scared or need help, my daddy is there to give me a blessing.

The Prophet Joseph Smith was our neighbor. We lived next to him on the corner of Main and Parley streets. He came to our house quite often for short visits.

One day my older brother, Wallace, and I were on our way to school. It had been raining the previous day and the ground was very muddy, especially along the street on which the building known as Joseph’s brick store was. Wallace and I both got stuck fast in the mud and could not get out. And, childlike, we began to cry. Looking up, I beheld the loving friend of children, the Prophet Joseph, coming toward us. He soon had us on higher and drier ground. Then he stooped down and cleaned the mud from our little heavy-laden shoes, took his handkerchief from his pocket, and wiped our tearstained faces. He spoke kind and cheering words to us and sent us on our way to school rejoicing. You can see why Wallace and I loved him.

Elyssa Portillo (9) of Tucson, Arizona, has many talents. She dances, sings, draws, crochets, cooks, and acts out plays she makes up herself. But her greatest talent may be the talent of gratitude. She is grateful for good friends, good food, and the beautiful desert scenery that surrounds her home. “And I’m thankful for the Prophet Joseph Smith, President Gordon B. Hinckley, the Church, and the Book of Mormon,” she declares.
“Most of all, I’m thankful for my family. I’m thankful for my mom. Whenever I need her, she’s there. I’m thankful for Nana (her grandmother). She’s a teacher, and whenever I need help with my homework, she helps me. I’m very thankful for my dad. I like to take walks with him. I’m thankful for my tío (uncle). I like to sing with him while he plays the piano. I’m thankful for my dog, Pixie. I love them all.”
Elyssa lives in her grandmother’s home with all these loved ones, who love her right back. “When Elyssa’s around, we’re always laughing,” Uncle Eric says. “She makes us laugh when we least expect it. She’s very creative, and you never know what she’s going to do next.”
Nana recalls, “When Elyssa was young, instead of watching TV we just sat around watching Elyssa and her puppy. She liked the attention and started creating games and plays. She would dress up as Cinderella or Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz and act out the part. She filled the whole house with her personality. When she went out, the house was empty and too quiet.
“She’s sensitive to others and sees people’s needs. If I’m walking, she makes sure that I don’t trip: ‘Nana, wait. There’s something in your way.’ She often reminds her mom to put on her seat belt and to not lock her keys in her car. She likes to open doors for the elderly, and at church, she’s always helping mothers with their young children. I feel very safe with Elyssa around.”
“I love her dearly,” her mom says. “She’s my little companion, my little shadow. Everywhere I go, she’s right behind me. She’s a happy child.”
Elyssa also loves her tata (grandpa). When Elyssa was a baby, Tata would play the guitar for her. Later they sang together. Tata was with her a lot because he developed a serious disease and couldn’t go to work. Each day, he picked her up after school and took her to eat at a place of her choice. When Pixie was missing one stormy night, Tata comforted Elyssa, prayed with her, and kept searching until her beloved pet was found safe several days later.
Since Tata couldn’t go to work, he did much of the cooking at home and became a really good cook. Elyssa helped him and became a good cook herself. Their specialty was empanadas, a sort of meat pie that is held in one’s hands. Nana remembers her working beside Tata, flour all over her little face.
“They grew very close,” Nana recalls. “She was his life.”
When Elyssa was eight years old, Tata died suddenly of a heart attack. Elyssa took it very hard. “I felt lonely inside and was crying in my heart. I had a hard time at school. But the teachings of Jesus Christ have helped me to know that someday I will see my tata again. I know that if I keep the commandments, I can be with my family forever.”
In spite of having felt grief—or perhaps because of it—Elyssa has developed a talent for feeling joy. She remembers her baptism as an especially joyful experience. “I’m thankful that I get to have the Holy Ghost with me all the time. Every child in the world deserves to be blessed with the Spirit.” She was grateful that her dad and his parents came to the service to show their love and support, though they are not members of the Church.
Elyssa likes to use her talents to help others feel happy. She studies the violin and guitar and sings in the Little Mariachis at school. (Mariachi bands play traditional Mexican music with brass and string instruments.) Like her dad, she draws well, and she uses this gift to create greeting cards for her friends and family. She uses another talent to crochet purses for people.
She also helps her friends by setting a good example and sometimes by reminding them to choose the right. One day, she came home and reported, “My friend said a bad word. I told her that she shouldn’t say those things.”
A good student, Elyssa isn’t sure yet what she will do when she grows up. Three possibilities are “a police officer to protect the community, a firefighter so I can help others, or a teacher like Nana because I like to help people learn things.” She plans to follow the example of Uncle Eric by serving a mission. “And I plan to get married in the temple and raise a righteous family.”
In the meantime, in the words of a proud Nana, “Elyssa brings us all a lot of joy. We love her, and she knows it.”

I would like now to relate one last very personal experience in faith that demonstrates, to a degree perhaps, these six suggestions I have tried to describe. Consider the six suggestions as you listen to this example. This is the first time, in a totally public sense, that I have ever shared this account.

On 29 July 1977, Sister Cook and I had just finished visiting in the Bolivia Santa Cruz Mission and were stalled in the Cochabamba, Bolivia, airport for some five hours. I recall that we were very tired, having had few hours of sleep the night before. We were both delighted in reality to have a few hours in which we might be able to rest in the airplane. As I was drifting off to sleep, I had a very strong feeling that I should awaken and write down some ideas. The desire to sleep was strong, but the promptings of the Spirit were more powerful. I did write; in fact, I wrote for nearly three hours, solving some organizational problems I had struggled with for a number of years previously concerning priesthood leaders and their roles. I felt a great outpouring of the Spirit on that day and excitedly wrote down each inspired thought. The experience took most of the time of the delay.

We were then off to La Paz, Bolivia. We were graciously met by President and Sister Chase Allred at the airport and driven in their van to the mission office. The mission president informed us that he needed to take care of a small item of business in the office and then we would be on our way to his home. We determined that we ought to go in with him to see the mission office. We locked the car and left our luggage and briefcase in the van, and Sister Allred asked an elder to keep his eye on the car.

Upon entering the office, the president was confronted with a difficult case of a woman whose husband was dying, and it necessitated an interview by both of us in order to properly calm her and assist with her needs. In the meanwhile, Sisters Cook and Allred left for the mission home.

When the president and I returned to the van, I realized immediately that all our goods were gone but assumed that Sister Cook had taken them with her to the mission home. While we were driving toward the home, I discovered that the right front small window-wing had been damaged and began to fear the perhaps our goods had been stolen.

Upon arrival at the mission home, it was quickly determined that all our luggage, our briefcase, and all our goods had been stolen. The loss of a substantial amount of money and of all our clothing created an immediate but only temporary problem. What was more disheartening than all that was my scriptures were in the briefcase together with the inspired ideas I had just received in Cochabamba. The overwhelming sensations of discouragement, anger, and inability to do anything about the situation were overpowering.

My wife and I prayed alone. We prayed with those present. We tried to enjoy our dinner but could not. Who could know of the great loss I personally felt? The scriptures had been given to me as a young man by my parents, a sacred inscription placed in one of them by my mother and in the other by my father before he died. I had spent literally thousands of hours marking, cross-referencing, and loving every moment of it in the only tangible earthly possessions I had ever considered of much value. I had on many occasions instructed my wife, if there were ever a fire in our home, to be sure to remove the children and, if there were time, to take my scriptures and not to worry about anything else.

The president and I had much to discuss as we were to be together only that evening. However, I felt a strong impression that we must do all in our power in order to attempt to recover the scriptures. After supper, all present knelt in a circle in prayer once again. We determined to search the immediate area near the mission office and a nearby field, hoping that the thief or thieves might have taken the salable items and discarded the English books.

In the prayer the pleadings were that the scriptures would be returned, that the persons who had taken them would be led to know of their unrighteous act and repent, and that the return of the books would be the means of bringing someone into the true church.

Eight or ten of us then loaded into the van with flashlights and warm clothing and drove up to the mission office in the central city. We scoured vacant lots across the street and adjacent streets and alleys; we talked with guards and anyone else we could find, exhausting all possibilities. No one had seen or heard anything. Finally we returned home, dejected, to be able only to pray individually and wait. President Allred and I were able to finish our business late that night, and the next day Sister Cook and I flew back to Quito, Ecuador, where we lived.

The mission, in the meantime, during the next few weeks searched the lots again. They looked in the hedges and garbage cans, searched a nearby park, placed a sign on a wall where the books were stolen requesting their return, and kept a watchful eye to see if the books might show up in an unexpected place nearby. In sheer desperation, trying to do all in their power, the missionaries decided to place an ad in two daily newspapers, offering a reward and giving explicit information concerning the books.

In Quito, Ecuador, I began a personal spiritual struggle that was a very difficult one for me. After nearly three weeks, I had not studied the scriptures at all. I had tried on numerous occasions, but every time I read a verse I recalled only a few of the many cross-references that had been made over twenty years. I was disheartened and depressed and had no desire whatsoever to read. I prayed many times telling the Lord that I had never tried to use my scriptures for any purpose other than glorifying his name and trying to teach others the truths that he had taught me. I pleaded with the Lord that he would do anything that had to be done in order to have them returned. My wife and little children prayed incessantly as well for the same blessing. After two or three weeks they continued praying every day, “Heavenly Father, please bring back Daddy’s scriptures.”

After about three weeks, I felt a strong spiritual impression, “Elder Cook, how long will you go on without reading and studying?” It seemed to me to be a test or a trial and to have something to do with the “cost” of the blessing I desired. The words burned, and I determined that I must be humble enough and submissive enough to start all over again. I began to read Genesis in the Old Testament and, with the permission of my wife to use her scriptures, to mark and cross-reference once again.

On 18 August, a friend, Brother Ebbie Davis, arrived in Ecuador from Bolivia, and laid both sets of my scriptures on my desk along with a manila folder which contained the papers that I had written in Cochabamba and some recently prepared mission budgets that were also stolen. He indicated that they were the only things recovered, that the mission president had given them to him in La Paz as he boarded the plane, and that he did not know how the books were found, but that I would be told when I arrived there in the next few days to tour the mission.

The joy I experienced in that moment and later that day is indescribable. To realize that the Lord, in some miraculous way, could lift those books out of a city of 700,000–800,000 people like La Paz from the hands of thieves and return them intact, not one page removed, torn, or soiled, is still beyond me. How the faith of our family and many Bolivian missionaries was rewarded! That day I promised the Lord that I would make better use of them and my time, as instruments in His hands for teaching the gospel, than ever before.

On Sunday, 21 August, I flew to Guayaquil, Ecuador, and on to La Paz, Bolivia, arriving on 22 August, Monday. Upon arrival in Bolivia I was given the following account:

A lady had been in a marketplace, one of the hundreds that there are in La Paz. She was a member of the Protestant church. She indicated that she saw a drunk man waving around a black book. She had the strongest spiritual impression that something holy was being desecrated. She approached the man and asked him what it was. He did not know, but showed her the book. She asked if he had anything else. He pulled out another black book. She asked if there were more. He removed a folder full of papers that he said he was going to burn. She then expressed the desire to purchase those things from him, and he agreed, for the price of 50 pesos or about $2.50, U.S. currency.

After she made the purchase, she felt totally taken aback by the fact that she had purchased the books. She realized they were in English—she didn’t speak, read, or understand English—and she had no desire to have any English books. It would have been like one of us, my brothers and sisters, paying nearly 10 percent of our monthly income to buy some books in Chinese, which we could not read. For what purpose she knew not except that she knew she had the inspired feeling to buy that which was being desecrated. She immediately began a search for the church that was named in the front of the books. Fortunately, it translated from English into Spanish accurately, and after approaching a number of other churches, she finally arrived at the mission office in La Paz, directed by the hand of the Lord. She was only a block away from the mission office when she was told where the office was. She had never heard of the reward nor of the ad in the newspaper which was to appear that very day. She did not ask for any money, not even to reclaim the 50 pesos that she had paid. The elders received the books and greatly rejoiced and paid her the reward anyway.

She told the missionaries she was associated with a Pentecostal sect but listened very intently as they unfolded the gospel to her. She recalled reading something about Joseph Smith from a pamphlet she had picked up in the street two or three years earlier. After their first discussion with her, they reported, “She is a golden contact.” After the second discussion, she agreed to be baptized in two weeks. Two weeks later, 11 September 1977, on a Sunday afternoon at Branch 1 in La Paz, Bolivia, Sister Maria Cloefe Cardenas Terrazas and her son, Marco Fernando Miranda Cardenas, age twelve, were baptized into the true church of Jesus Christ by Elder Douglas Reeder.

Who could describe the deep, discouraging, depressing, disheartening, overpowering feelings of helplessness when the scriptures were lost? Who could describe the great feeling of joy and rejoicing to see the hand of the Lord revealed in as miraculous a way as many accounts recording in Holy Writ? Our Heavenly Father does hear and answer the prayers of his sons and daughters if they exercise faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

One evening I watched my daughters’ reactions as a beautiful friend visiting in our home told the story of meeting her husband. Her eyes sparkled as she explained that if she had disobeyed her father as she had been tempted to on that occasion, she would not have been present to meet the man she later married. Like thirsty sponges my daughters drank in her words. The story made a great impression on them. If I had tried to explain the same principle, they might have labeled it “preachy.” But my friend’s enthusiasm, spirit, and love made the experience memorable and helpful.

One time he had all the Boy Scouts helping him build a garage. It was a gray, bitter kind of day, and the wind howled around the corners of the building and practically knocked us flat. It didn’t seem to bother Brother Hanson much, though. He was bundled up in a huge goose-down jacket that made him look like a polar bear.
After a while we started to complain. Bryan even suggested that in this wind the garage might easily blow over and that perhaps we should leave the work for another day.
That’s when Brother Hanson gathered us all together on one side of the building, where we were partly protected from the gale. He patted the concrete foundation. “Feel this.”
We all felt it.
Then he patted the ground underneath. We felt that too. It was, being late autumn and the soil being rather clayish, about as bendable as a steel beam. “There’s a lesson to be learned here,” he announced.
We all groaned.
“In the scriptures—” he began.
“In the Book of Mormon?” asked Bryan, who was always eager to know what came from where.
Brother Hanson nodded. “In the Book of Mormon as well as in the Bible, it says that if you build your house upon a rock, which is the gospel, and the rain descends and the floods come and the winds blow, which are the trials and temptations of life, your house will not fall. That’s a good lesson, don’t you think?”
We all agreed that it was.
Then, just to emphasize his point, he sent us all back to work in the wind.

Socks. They seem such a trivial thing that most of us don’t think about them—unless we run out before wash day! For people who are homeless, however, a clean pair of socks can provide badly needed warmth and protection.
Youth and leaders from the Hewwood Ward in the Bennion Utah East Stake, needed a service project. Their local homeless shelter needed socks. So the youth got to work soliciting donations of new and gently used socks.
“I was surprised how many people helped us,” says Laurel president Christie Ballard. “It was really neat to see the face of the lady at the homeless shelter when we presented our donation.
All together, the group donated 1,122 pairs of socks. Whew!
Administrators at the shelter were shocked and overwhelmed at the work performed by the youth.
“We’ve never received a gift of this size or quality before,” said one administrator.

These hymns, with others added through the years, served the Church through many printings until 1886. In that year President John Taylor called together five prominent musicians of the Church: Thomas Griggs, Joseph J. Daynes, Ebenezer Beesley, Evan Stephens, and George Careless. Each had served or would yet serve as either Tabernacle Choir organist or conductor. He requested that they write original music for the hymn texts that then comprised the hymnbook. Each musician took one-fifth of the total hymns (several hundred by then) for which to compose melodies.
Meeting each Sunday after the Tabernacle services, these men played to one another their respective tunes for approval and criticism. Finally, three years later, their work was completed and published. Known as the Latter-day Saint Psalmody, the book included both words and music—the first of its kind in the Church. (From an address by Joseph J. Daynes, Jr., on the life of his father delivered on Nov. 20, 1952, as included in an unpublished master’s thesis, Joseph J. Daynes, First Tabernacle Organist, BYU, 1954, by M. Peter Overson.)

A former teacher of mine weighed well over 300 pounds the first time he went skiing. New to the sport and unfamiliar with the resort, he asked for directions, and a cruel stranger sent him to a black diamond run.

Exiting the lift for the first time, he experienced a short-lived slide of sheer terror, which ended when he crashed violently, embedding himself into the deep snow at the base of a mogul. From there it was uphill both ways, and he was tangled in his skis and stuck—by his own description—like a beached whale in the snow.

He found that by gyrating his entire body, he could plow forward a few inches at a time. As difficult and tiring as this painstaking process was, much more frustrating were the scores of experienced skiers speeding by him with no concern for his plight. Finally, a female skier swooshed to a perfect stop next to him—and the several-foot-long trail in the snow that represented his efforts over the last forty-five minutes.

“Do you need any help?” she asked brightly. To him it was so painfully obvious that he did that his temper got the best of him and he looked up at her and curtly replied, “No, lady, this is what I came here to do.” Insulted, or puzzled perhaps, she skied away, leaving him to another hour of belly flopping before he was finally free to hike down the mountain carrying his rented skis.

On days when I feel stuck—when progress is slow or nonexistent; when my life’s tasks seem difficult, repetitive, or fruitless; or when any help sought seems unforthcoming or insufficient for my needs—it has helped me to remember that wonderful line, “This is what I came here to do,” and to recognize that life’s work and life’s struggles, even the most difficult and mundane aspects for our existence, are truly, at least in part, what we came here to do.

Paula says, “The standards I always saw my friend live were now mine. My friend’s testimony was now mine.” Not long after, Paula began to feel an intense desire to share with others what she had been given. When she had been a member for one year, she filled out her mission papers, met with her priesthood leaders, and received a call to serve in the Chile Santiago East Mission.
Valeria says, “As I watched my friend prepare to serve her mission, the Spirit touched my heart. I wanted to commit myself to serve God the way she was.”
“May I speak to you?” This time it was Valeria who had pulled Paula aside. “I’ve felt something special as you have been preparing to leave on your mission.”
Paula told her friend the same thing her friend had once told her: “It’s the Spirit telling you what you need to do.”
Valeria’s plans hadn’t included a full-time mission. She wasn’t quite sure how to proceed. “I can’t do it alone,” she told Paula.
“Don’t worry. I’ll help you,” her friend assured.
Later, when Valeria opened her call, she was surprised to be going to the same mission as her friend. Paula began serving in October 2002; Valeria joined her in February 2003.

After the service our Russian guide, a sister, and I walked to the elevator. During the meeting Tanya had sat quietly and perfectly attentive; she was still pensive. I hoped she had not been offended. She asked us if Mormons would dare speak from the heart in larger groups. (She wrongly assumed that our tour group consisted of longtime acquaintances and intimate friends.) Briefly I explained to her the purpose of monthly testimony meetings; I told her of men and women and boys and girls who would stand in front of two and three hundred people and bear their testimonies of the gospel with fervor and love. She marveled and stated with sobriety that her Soviet people were afraid to open their hearts with each other. Most masked their true feelings almost completely when in groups. She warmly thanked us for our sincerity. I believed she wished it for her people.

The sister standing with us asked Tanya if she would like a copy of the Book of Mormon. She quickly replied she would, but noted that a mailed copy would never reach her. Oh how I wished I had brought one with me! The sister’s eyes gleamed as she revealed that she had one packed in her suitcase for just such an occasion. We were all three delighted. Tanya only requested that we not give it to her where anyone might see her accept it. A couple of days later the sister deftly slipped the book, wrapped in a newspaper and signed by the members of the tour, into Tanya’s purse. Our guide acknowledged the gift with a quick smile and a knowing nod of the head.

Soon afterwards we left the USSR for Afghanistan, but we also left someone touched because we shared something dear to us with her. At best we planted a seed that will someday burgeon to bring one, or even many, into the Lord’s kingdom; at least we did not hide our light under a bushel simply because we were confronted on many sides by spiritual darkness.

A few weeks before leaving on my mission to Ecuador, I was ordained an elder and received all the responsibilities that come with the Melchizedek Priesthood.
Soon afterward, my mom and I were visiting some family members, and my uncle gave me a white missionary handbook, saying that I would soon be needing it. I thought he was referring to my mission—only weeks away. But that night my uncle asked me to assist in giving a blessing to my aunt, who was sick. I was surprised at the invitation but knew I now had the authority to administer to the sick—and even more, to help my aunt who was in need.
I immediately read how to give a blessing in my newly acquired handbook and was able to carry out my first priesthood blessing, feeling truly grateful in this new capacity to serve others.

One Saturday evening after returning from an FSY conference, I decided to go check out a job opportunity in the outskirts of town—a long distance from where I live. As I was trying to get back home afterwards, I stood by the roadside waiting for a bus, but none going in my direction came.
As I waited, I noticed a man nearby who also seemed to be looking for transportation. Just then, a cab driver slowed down in front of me. At first, I was hesitant. From the way he approached, it seemed he was offering a “drop,” which is what we call a private ride—and I wasn’t prepared to pay that much. So I told him I wasn’t looking for a drop, just a ride to the next bus stop. To my surprise, he agreed as though that was fine. Feeling it was OK, I got into the car. At that moment, I thought I was the only passenger in the car.
The man I had seen earlier then walked quickly toward the cab. He got into the back seat in a way that made it seem like we were friends traveling together, even though we were complete strangers. Still, I thought it was just him at the back seat and me in the front with the driver.
As we started driving, I began to feel pressure on my back—someone’s knee was pushing against my seat. At first, I ignored it. But when it happened again and again, I grew uncomfortable, so I turned around to see who it was. To my shock, there was another man sitting directly behind me—someone I had not realized was in the car at all. This startled me deeply, because when I got into the car earlier on, it looked completely empty.
This realization quickly gave way to deeper concern. Why had the driver stopped for me and acted as though the car was empty if someone was already inside? And why was the unknown man sitting directly behind me—hidden from my view as I entered—instead of behind the driver where I would have easily seen that someone was already in the cab? To keep me unsuspecting, the second man who joined after did not enter through the back door behind me—which would have revealed the hidden passenger—but quickly went around to the other side and entered behind the driver, making it appear as though he was the only passenger in the back seat. This meant there were two people in the back, not one, and the situation immediately felt wrong.
At that point, an overwhelming sense of fear came over me. The driver’s expression and the suspicious seating arrangement made me feel strongly that the three men were working together and possibly planning something bad. I could almost see it on the driver’s face that there was something sinister about their intentions.
Despite my fear, I remained calm and firmly told the driver to stop the car, and then he pulled over. I quickly got out, paid the fare, and walked away. He drove off without saying anything.
Reflecting on the situation, it became clearer to me that I had narrowly escaped danger. Whether it was kidnapping or robbery, I believe their plan was to lure me into a false sense of security. I realized that the hidden passenger, who kept pressing his knee against my seat, was in a way testing me—checking to see whether I was alert and attentive enough to notice. If I had not reacted, they might have assumed I was distracted and moved forward with their plan to attack me.
That day, I learned an important lesson: always be alert and attentive to your surroundings, no matter how ordinary the situation seems. I also learned that God, who loves us more than we can comprehend, often gives us clues or signs when danger is ahead. If we remain alert and sensitive to the Spirit, we can discern these warnings that will help us escape the dangers ahead and be safe.

Of course there are examples of these serviceable individuals in our dispensation as well. Oliver Granger is mentioned in the 117th section of the Doctrine and Covenants. Oliver’s name may be unfamiliar to many, so I will take the liberty to acquaint you with him.
Oliver Granger was 11 years older than Joseph Smith and, like the Prophet, was from upstate New York. Because of severe cold and exposure when he was 33 years old, Oliver lost much of his eyesight. Notwithstanding his limited vision, he served three full-time missions. He also worked on the Kirtland Temple and served on the Kirtland High Council.
When most of the Saints were driven from Kirtland, Ohio, the Church left some debts unsatisfied. Oliver was appointed to represent Joseph Smith and the First Presidency to return to Kirtland to settle the Church’s business. He performed this assignment so well that one of the creditors wrote: “Oliver Granger’s management in the arrangement of the unfinished business of people that have moved to the Far West, in redeeming their pledges and thereby sustaining their integrity, … has entitled him to my highest esteem” (Horace Kingsbury, Painesville, 26 Oct. 1838).
When he died in 1841, even though there were but few Saints remaining in the Kirtland area and even fewer friends of the Saints, Oliver Granger’s funeral was attended by a vast concourse of people.
Though Oliver Granger is not as well known today as other early leaders of the Church, he was, nevertheless, important in the service he rendered to the kingdom. And of course, if no one but the Lord had his name in remembrance, that would be a sufficient blessing for any of us.

The first principle is to give and receive encouragement and help. All cross country courses are brutal, but the hilly, 10,000-meter championship course in Stillwater, Oklahoma, is considered by many athletes to be one of the most difficult cross country courses they have ever experienced. In a performance that Coach Ed Eyestone called “otherworldly,”36 Conner Mantz won this year’s National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) individual men’s cross country national champion­ship. In a postrace interview, Conner described a powerful experience during the race:

During the race, Adriaan Wildschutt from Florida State came up next to me, and we ran together. When he came up next to me, he said, “Hey, man, we can catch these guys up ahead. Let’s work together.” At first I was like, “You know what, by all means you take the lead right now for me, because I am dying in this heavy headwind.” He took it for a couple hundred meters. Then I was able to bounce back and take it for about the next thousand meters.37

Conner’s experience stands out to me for two reasons. First, he was encouraged by his opponent in the middle of a championship race, which is a wonderful reminder that there are good people everywhere who are seeking to work together. Second, Conner had the eyes to see and the humility to receive the help he was offered.38 He could have brushed off his opponent and continued the race alone. But Conner accepted his opponent’s offer to work together. The two ran together to overtake the lead, ultimately taking first and second.

Working with horses also taught me to be patient and never to give up. Progress comes a little at a time. Once I had a colt named Planchet. Someone said, “That horse is weak. He will never be worth anything.” But someone else told me if I would be patient and exercise my colt’s muscles, he would someday be a good horse. I fed Planchet and took care of him and loved him. For one whole year, I walked him to strengthen his muscles. I worked and worked with him. And, sure enough, this weak colt won the Brazilian championship in a three-day competition.

Darrell Bevell had a decision to make. It wasn’t an easy one.
Growing up as the son of a football coach, Darrell had always enjoyed sports, whether it was basketball, baseball, or football. If his parents wanted to keep him happy, they put a ball in his hand. Consequently, whatever sport was in season Darrell was playing it. Big ball in the winter, small ball in the spring, oval ball in the fall. He was a good basketball and baseball player, but it was football where he really excelled. And as a quarterback it had always been Darrell’s goal to earn a football scholarship to a major college.
“I had been recruited by Arizona State, Washington, New Mexico, BYU, Utah, and Wyoming. Most of the big schools in the West were interested in me,” says Darrell. “I had a really good junior year and played well in the first two games of my senior season when I broke a finger on my throwing hand. I missed the rest of the season, and most of the teams that were recruiting me backed off because of the injury.”
Darrell eventually signed to play football at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. It wasn’t exactly a big-time college football program as had been his plan, but school would be paid for and he was going to play college football.
“When I signed for that scholarship to play football, that was my dream. That’s what I always wanted to do. Right then I said, ‘Nope. I’m not going on a mission.’ I didn’t stop and really think about it because I got caught up in the excitement and everything.” That was the spring of 1988.
After signing with Northern Arizona, Darrell headed north from his home in Scottsdale, a suburb of Phoenix, to Flagstaff for two-a-day football practices in August. All he had on his mind was football. The mission thing had been decided, he thought.
“During those summer practices, I had been playing pretty well,” Darrell recalls. “But for some odd reason, right before the season started, it popped into my head, ‘Go on a mission.’ I knew I was about ready to turn 19, and I was still going to church every Sunday. But I again said, ‘Nope. I’m not going on a mission.’”
And that’s when an amazing turn of events took place. Almost immediately after deciding for the second time he wouldn’t go on a mission, Darrell began struggling on the field. “It was really amazing. A guy would go out for a short pattern and I’d throw the ball at his feet,” Darrell says. “So I called my dad and told him how this dang mission kept popping into my head and that I was starting to play terrible.”
Darrell’s father, Jim, told him to think about a mission and then pray about what he should do. “I did that, but I told the Lord in my prayer that I couldn’t quit the team because the season had already begun. I did promise the Lord that as soon as the season was over I’d begin thinking about a mission,” he recalls.
There was only one problem with that plan. When the season ended, Darrell didn’t think about a mission again. He had redshirted during his freshman season, so even though he was a sophomore in school, he was still only a freshman in football eligibility. And when the Lumberjacks’s starting quarterback the previous two years went down with an injury in spring practice, Darrell emerged as the number one quarterback. His dream had finally come true. He was going to be the starting quarterback for Northern Arizona University.
“After everything had been decided and I had talked to the coaches about being the starter, boom, going on a mission popped right back into my head,” says Darrell. “It had been a long time since I’d even thought about going on a mission, so I started praying about it. I kept praying and praying until I finally knew a mission is what I needed to do. I already knew the Church was true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. I just decided I should go on a mission too.”
Now he had a problem of a different sort. For two years, Darrell had been concentrating on football and telling everybody he wasn’t going on a mission. Now that he had decided to serve the Lord, he had to tell his coach he wouldn’t be his quarterback. Driving to Flagstaff with his father to break the news to the coaching staff, Darrell had a good case of butterflies in his stomach. “When I got to his office, I was really nervous,” he says.
After the quarterback and the coach shook hands, Darrell said, “Coach, I’m going to go on a mission for my church. I’m not going to come back next season.”
Obviously, finding out your starting quarterback is leaving the team for two years isn’t the kind of news that helps a coach sleep well at night. After hearing Darrell’s decision, he began trying to dissuade him. Darrell listened as his coach told him how football players who go on missions lose their drive to play after they return home, and how he was throwing away a chance at stardom. “I was believing a lot of what he was saying. But I’ve always been the kind of person who makes a decision then sticks to it. That’s something I’ve always tried to do. Since I’d already made my decision to go, it wasn’t that hard, regardless of what the coach was saying.”
So long, Flagstaff, Arizona. Hello, Cleveland Ohio Mission.
“I had a great experience, and I loved my mission. The work was really going well there, and we had a lot of good missionaries,” Darrell says. “Of course, I wanted to play football after my mission, but I figured the Lord would take care of that. I had always wanted to play football, and somehow I knew it was going to work out.”
When Darrell’s mission was almost complete, he began thinking more and more about football. He knew the coaching staff at Northern Arizona had been fired, so he was an unknown commodity to the new coaching staff there. The great mystery in Darrell Bevell’s life was where he was going to go to college. Would he ever get to stand on the field and throw balls to open receivers? Would anybody offer him a scholarship?
One of his assistant coaches at Northern Arizona had taken a job as an assistant at the University of Wisconsin, and he remembered Darrell. In need of another quarterback in the program, the assistant got in contact with Darrell’s dad and asked if he thought his son would be interested in playing football in Wisconsin. Considering Wisconsin competes in one of the country’s top football conferences, and that it plays its home games in a 75,000-seat stadium, Darrell’s dad figured he might be able to persuade his son to check out the school.
After he finished his mission in October of 1991, Darrell made his recruiting trip to the University of Wisconsin and became convinced that was the place for him. “I basically decided then that I wanted to go there,” he says. He sat out the entire 1991 season and got ready for 1992.
During his freshman season of 1992, Darrell broke into the starting lineup in Wisconsin’s second game against Bowling Green State, and helped engineer a win over then number-12 ranked Ohio State in the Badgers’s fourth game. What made that victory all the better is that it was televised nationally by ESPN. Needless to say, a lot of people in Scottsdale, as well as those who knew him as Elder Bevell in Ohio, were crowded around their television sets. A shoulder injury hampered his play the remainder of the season, but he still completed 51 percent of his passes and threw for eight touchdowns. The future is extremely bright for Darrell as he prepares for his sophomore season. And the missionary work continues.
“It seems like every time an article is written about me, the first thing it says is my name and that I’m a member of the Church or that I’m a returned missionary,” he adds. “If I were at BYU, nobody would have cared. It would have been the same old story. But here at Wisconsin, not that many people know about the Church so it’s a bigger deal.”
A big deal just like Wisconsin’s victory over Ohio State. However, Darrell still knows that was just one game, and winning football games isn’t the most important thing in his life. “Beating Ohio State on national television was nice, but how long does that last?” he asks. “Seeing someone going into the waters of baptism is so great. I remember I was able to baptize a woman the day before I went home from my mission. I know that ordinance is something that is going to last forever. It’s something I’ll always remember. I don’t think that when we get into the afterlife someone’s going to say, ‘How about that one drive against Ohio State when you were five for five and you were able to pull it out on national television?’ But I might see that woman I baptized and have her come up to me and give me a big hug and say thank you very much.”
Maybe it’s a little strange to Wisconsin football fans that while most 23-year-olds have already graduated from college, Darrell Bevell is only a sophomore. Maybe Darrell’s teammates can’t understand why he would take two years off from football, not make a cent on his mission, and not be able to go to movies, watch TV, or date while he was a missionary. Maybe they never will understand. But Darrell does. In his life, he’s glad his job on the football field didn’t interfere with his call to the mission field.

I used to have nightmares every night after hearing a scary story at Scout camp. I was very scared—it was hard to go to sleep. I prayed every night for Heavenly Father to help me, but I still had nightmares. Then one night I told my dad. I was shaking a little when I told him because it scared me to talk about it. We said a prayer together. Dad suggested I sing a Church hymn to myself, because I share a room with my brother. My favorite hymn is “There Is a Green Hill Far Away” (Hymns, no. 194). Every night after that I wasn’t scared, and I stopped having nightmares. In my personal prayers every night I ask Heavenly Father to continue helping me with my fears, and I still sing my favorite hymn to myself every night.

Her question knocked on the door of my past—a door that I had carefully hidden away deep in a crevice of my mind. Memory and a deep feeling I hadn’t realized was there answered …
The day was scorching; my sister, Susie, and I waited impatiently outside the church for Dad to pick us up following his weekly golf game. The sweat trickled down my back; Susie’s golden curls were wet and drooping. I remember watching with envy as my friends left the church with their parents. I wished with all my heart that Mom and Dad would come with us to church. I had even prayed about it. But they always thought they were too busy or too tired. By the time Dad picked us up, we were half baked. I was angry at both him and Mom.
Mom had stayed home, as usual, fixing dinner. We sat around the table now, but I was still very angry inside. I detest spinach, so rather than taking any, I passed the bowl to Susie. Instantly, both Dad and Mom were nagging at me, saying, “Take some spinach, Dan! It’s good for you!”
I had reached my limit. I retorted, “Why don’t you come to Church? It’s good for you, just like spinach is for me!” Dad struck me, and Mom left the table crying. I ran from the house angry and hurt.
“Am I a Christian, Rebecca?” I asked, as I came back to the present. “Let’s say I used to be.” She sensed my need for silence.
We walked along the dark, tree-lined street; only the crunching sound of autumn leaves under our feet interrupted the silence. I felt so alone in the cold, dark world. More than anything else, I wanted Rebecca’s friendship. She seemed so sure of herself, so at peace with herself. I wanted to draw from her strength, to learn from her wisdom. I looked down at my feet, afraid of her warm eyes.
“Rebecca,” I whispered softly. “What is it that makes you so special?”
I could have guessed that she would say it was her belief in Diety; she impressed me as a deeply religious girl. I wondered, though, which religion was to receive the credit for making her so sensitive, tender, and caring.
I pressed further, “What is your religion, Rebecca? Are you Catholic, Protestant, or something else?”
Her lips held just a hint of a smile. “I guess I fall into the ‘something else’ category, Dan. I’m searching for truth wherever I can find it. I discover it in some unusual places. But I can’t help but wonder one thing. Is there one religion that contains all of the truth?”
Her question pricked me deeply. Her eyes were searching mine, imploring. I looked away—my past blazed before me. Silently, I bowed my head and prayed. I hadn’t done that in years! After a long moment, I returned her gaze.
“Rebecca,” I slowly began, “what do you know about the Mormon church?”

Lyle says he is not the kind of person who accepts things on faith very easily. “It took me a while to realize that the Spirit of the Lord is a substantial, real thing, not just a belief.”

When Lyle’s younger brother Skyler was being ordained a deacon, Lyle was gathered with his father, uncles, and cousins in a circle to help with the ordination. “I thought, What could be better than to spend eternity with these people? I would do anything for anybody in this circle. The Spirit was very strong. That’s when I started thinking, It’s real, it’s substantial, it’s God’s power, and it’s been here all along. The thing I see happening in the family, the spirit that can be there, is the most important thing to me. I’d drop robots right now if the choice was between them and my family. I’m playing with little toys that pale in comparison to that.”