Gospel Story Finder

Bro. Tew: Years ago we moved to Oklahoma so that I could attend graduate school. While there, a wonderful Relief Society sister showed care for us. Like most student families, money was tight, but twice a year we would get into our car to drive 1000 miles to see our family in Utah. As we got our car loaded up to go on our trips, she would bring over an ice chest full of food to last the journey. She was a second mother to us as we lived far from our own parents. We still feel close to her because of the small and simple acts she did for our family.

“Mom, guess what?” Nathan said as he climbed into the car after church. “The Primary president asked me to give a talk in Primary next Sunday.”
“Great!” Mom exclaimed. “What are you supposed to talk about?”
“I’m supposed to talk about all the blessings that I have from being a member of the Church.”
“Well, I think that you can give a talk about that. First, you should think about all the things that you are thankful for; then we can write them down on a blessings list,” Mom said.
“Mom,” said Nathan, “I want to be able to give my talk all by myself, with no one helping me this time, just like the big kids do.”
“OK, we’ll work on it,” Mom said encouragingly. “You keep thinking about the things that you’re grateful for.”
During the week, Nathan told his mom the things that he thought should be on his blessings list and Mom wrote them down. Every night before he went to bed, he and Mom sat down with the list and he tried to memorize it. But try as he might, he just couldn’t remember it all.
When Saturday morning came, Nathan was worried. “Mom, I still can’t remember my talk. What am I going to do?”
“Maybe if we say a prayer together, Heavenly Father will give us an idea.”
They knelt in the living room, and Nathan thanked Heavenly Father for all the things on his blessings list. Then he asked Him for help to find a way to give his talk all by himself.
After the prayer, Nathan and Mom sat quietly to listen for Heavenly Father’s answer.
Nathan’s mom jumped up. “I think that Heavenly Father gave me an answer. You sit right here, and I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Nathan sat very still, anxiously awaiting her return. When she came back, she had a big smile on her face and she was holding a big piece of paper. “Here are your talk ‘notes.’ Do you think you can read it all by yourself now?”
Nathan looked down at the paper. This is what he saw:
I am happy to be a member of the Church. I get blessings from Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father. The blessings are: my family, food, sunshine, my home, flowers, and my teachers. I am happy I can give my talk all by myself. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
“When you see the pictures, say their names,” Mom explained. “You know the word my. The cloud with the sunlight coming through it stands for blessings, and you’ve already memorized the first part and the last two sentences. Do you think that you can give your talk now?”
On Sunday Mom and Dad came to listen to Nathan give his talk. He gave it perfectly. But before he said the last sentence, he looked up from his notes and said, “And I’m glad that Heavenly Father answers our prayers.”

Like Nephi, I truly was “born of goodly ­parents.”21 My mom and dad were very intentional in their parenting, including creating a Darger family mission statement; insisting on early-­morning family scripture study, family prayer, and weekly family home evenings; and providing endless private moments of mentoring. One family home evening lesson I’ll never forget was taught by my mother about the importance of creating a “home-court advantage” in our home for every member of our family. We discussed things like the importance of celebrating each other’s success; how to be patient with a sibling when they were struggling; why we decorated our home with pictures of our family, the temple, and the Savior; and how to protect our home from influences that drive away the Spirit.22

The Darger family has grown over the years. While it has grown, endearing nicknames, family songs, matching outfits, and coordinated chants and cheers have all remained an important part of the Darger home-court advantage.

The strength that comes through this home-court advantage has been particularly needed and noticed during this past year. The COVID-19 pandemic caused many families, including mine, to adjust and virtually create a family-gathering atmosphere. During these weekly Zoom calls, the cheers and encouragement continued. One memorable Zoom call ended in a cheering session for my brother and his MBA graduation.

One summer afternoon when I was 12 years old, my brother Jason and I began snooping around the garage looking for something to do. Jason got the brilliant idea of tying our old red wagon behind his bike so he could pull me up the street. I, being foolish, thought it was a good idea.
As we tied the two ends of a rope to the bike seat and the wagon handle, Dad saw us from the kitchen window and came out to stop us. “I don’t want you kids doing that. Somebody will fall and get hurt.” We made a show of slowly untying the knots, but as soon as he was back inside, we cinched them tight again.
As I thought of my dad’s warning, I said to Jason, “I’ll get in the wagon, but you have to swear that you won’t go fast.”
“I won’t go fast,” he said.
“Promise you won’t go fast.” He did, and I, being foolish, believed him.
As soon as I lay down on my stomach in the wagon, Jason took off like a rocket. I called out for him to slow down, but apparently he didn’t hear me. He rounded a corner to go down the alley, and my wagon went up on two wheels, dumping me onto the pavement amidst a mixture of gravel, dirt, crushed glass, and who-knows-what-else. I slid to a stop and lay for a moment to get my breath back. I winced as I picked myself up. The pavement had left a big scrape the size of a bacon strip on my left forearm.
My brother hadn’t noticed what happened, so I was left alone. I sniffled to myself as I walked carefully home, trying not to jostle my burning arm while I picked bits of gravel out of my wound. I knew I was going to have to clean it because it was so big and dirty. But my greatest fear was what my dad would say when he saw me because he had specifically told us not to do what we had just done.
When I got home, I quietly slipped past the kitchen where Dad was reading the paper. He called out to me and asked if everything was okay. He must have sensed my hesitancy. I said I was fine as I headed down the hall to the bathroom. There I ran some warm water over my arm, which felt good. I hoped a bandage would keep infection out so it could heal. However, there was no gauze or tape in the bathroom. I would have to go upstairs.
To do so, I quickly walked past the kitchen again, keeping my arm hidden from view. Upstairs in the fully equipped mom-and-dad bathroom, I tried to cut some gauze and tape it on my arm, but I couldn’t do it one-handed. I began to get frustrated because I was so helpless. I was on the verge of crying as I placed two very inadequate Band-Aids over my scrape.
About that time my dad came in. I’m sure he decided to investigate because he had that instinct and usually knew when something was up. I braced myself for a scolding, but instead he saw my arm and said, “Oh my gosh, that’s not going to do it. We need to put something on that.” I told him what happened. I remember feeling ashamed that I was in the very predicament he’d warned me of, and vaguely wondering why he didn’t bring up that fact.
Dad opened the cabinet to get out his arsenal. Out came the hydrogen peroxide. He squirted it all over my cut and I could see it foam up, fizzling like soda. Next he lathered on the ointment, which now felt nice and cool. Then he cut a strip of gauze the right size and taped it over my cut, leaving no loose edge to catch on things. I was silent the whole time because I was trying not to cry—but not because of my pain. When he was done, I gave him a hug that lingered longer than usual.

Mary (names have been changed) expected her marriage to be happy and successful. She left her old life behind to immerse herself in her life with her husband. But after time, he made life choices that destroyed their union. She felt panicky, unprepared, and completely lost as she struggled to create another life for herself and her four children. She knew she needed to let God prevail in her life and allow Him to heal her, but it wasn’t easy.
Mary’s ministering brother and sister, the Watsons, lovingly reached out to her to offer assistance and support. At first, Mary stubbornly insisted she didn’t need help. But the Watsons and other members of her ward continued to offer their love and friendship in simple, natural ways: sitting with Mary’s family at gatherings, helping with yard work, and finding simple but personal ways to let Mary know they were thinking about her and serious about helping. She particularly appreciated the many priesthood blessings Brother Watson provided for Mary and her children, bringing peace to their hearts.
Mary knew the Watsons had been assigned to her, but she never felt like the service and friendship were out of obligation. She felt their sincerity and love because they treated her like a beloved sister. They became her family.

I wanted to let you know that “And the Winner Is …” (September 1991) was the answer to my prayers. For several months I’ve been training for the cross-country team to get in shape. As the season began, I realized I was much slower than my teammates. I wanted to quit, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I did, so I asked Heavenly Father for encouragement.
When I read Brother DeHaan’s article, I knew I had received my answer. Now I read it whenever I have doubts about my performance on the team.
Meredith QuinnPasadena, California

The third decision that I made for which I am very grateful was a decision that also happened to me at that time. The bishop of the Oxford ward then called me to be the young men’s president. We had 48 young men in the Oxford ward, only one of whom was active. I had no idea how I was going to carry on my course of study and do anything near a capable job as a young men’s president. But what I decided to do is that I would get up every morning at 7:00 a.m. and focus on applied econometrics until 6:00 p.m., and then thereafter I would focus on being a Young Men’s President. In the midst of this, I learned that my father was dieing of cancer, and I dropped out of school for a time to come back home and take care of him until he passed away. When I got back, that meant that I even had less time to try to finish a very ambitious degree, and I thought to myself, ‘Maybe I’d better ask the bishop to release me because it would just take too much time away from my study.’ But then I thought, ‘No, if I know the Book of Mormon is true, then I better do what it says,’ and it had told me in 3 Nephi 13:33 that I should seek first the kingdom of God in His righteousness and all these things would be added unto me. And so that’s what I did. I bought a bicycle, and every night from six to nine, I rode around the streets of Oxford looking up these 47 inactive young men, inviting them to join us at church, and ultimately six of them did.
We met (the Oxford ward did) in a meeting room in the top of a pub. If Lucifer had picked our meeting spot, he couldn’t have done better. The only place for the Aaronic priesthood to meet was at the top landing of the back staircase where they stored the kegs of Guinness ale. And so we arranged the kegs in a semi-circle every Sunday and sat on the kegs. I fasted every Sunday that somehow the Lord would bring into that awful environment a wonderful spirit that would touch these young men’s hearts, and it did. All six of those young men served missions. But it was a big bite out of my studies, and as the time for my final exams arrived, I was really worried that I might not be able to pass, because in the Oxford system there aren’t any courses that you take. You just continuously study your subject and at the very end of the course you have to take a big, long, four day, 32 hour examination where you have to put it out all on paper. My tutor told me that I wasn’t prepared, that I better wait and graduate the next year, but I knew that if I had gone and done the things that the Lord commanded that he would open a way for me to pass the test. So I fasted and prayed and told the Lord I had two months left. I needed to know what questions the examiners were going to ask so that I could study the questions and pass the exam. I then prayerfully went to the library and put myself in the examiners shoes, and thought about, ‘If I wanted to really skewer Clayton Christensen, what questions and curve balls would I throw at him on this exam?’ Then for two months I studied to know the answers to those questions.
The night before the exam, I went off to one of the meadows at Oxford and knelt in prayer, and I poured my heart out to the Lord, and I recounted how hard I had worked to study economics, and how hard I had worked to magnify my calling as the Young Men’s President. And I plead with Him that He would bless me. And the next day, as I opened the exams, every one of the questions that the examiners threw at me was a question that I had come to know that they would ask. And the lesson that I learned from this is that when Heavenly Father invited us to seek first the kingdom of God, and promises us that all these other things will be added to us that He was dead serious. That is a promise that we can bank on.

There was the group of Relief Society women in Central Java who would each save a spoonful of rice in the morning before they began cooking for the day. They’d put that spoonful, each day, in a plastic bag; then on Saturday they would bring their bags with them to Relief Society. If anyone was ill or had not been attending church for some time, all the sisters would walk together following the meeting to visit her. And they would take some of the rice to share. I’ve learned much about service and consecration from such examples.

During the time my parents were serving in the Arizona Holbrook Mission, I joined them for a few days at Christmastime. Christmas morning we delivered treats and greetings to some of the families with whom they worked. As I stood in the center of one of the hogans surveying the surroundings and the people, I was overwhelmed with a sense of my richness in terms of material possessions and awed by the sense of peace, happiness, and contentment that radiated from the faces of the extended-family members who were present. “Could I be this content in these circumstances?” I asked myself. “What did I do to deserve what I have? What are my responsibilities? What are my values? What really matters?”

Am I rich? The answer depends on the comparative basis I choose to use—but in my heart I know that I have enough of this world’s material blessings and that I will be accountable for my use of them. Are you rich? Do you have enough and to spare? How can that determination be made? When we use more than our share of the earth’s resources, are we rich or are we greedy, or are we both rich and greedy? Are we greedy in our demands? Are we accountable?

That was not the end of the Lord’s blessings to me. At the end of their senior year, all dental students have to take practical tests—performing procedures on patients while professors watch and grade their performance. If you don’t do well on these practical tests, you don’t graduate. In the early winter of my senior year, I slipped on a patch of ice and broke my right arm. Immediately I felt grateful that it was only January, assuming the cast would come off in six weeks. But I was informed I had broken the scaphoid in my wrist, one of the most difficult bones to heal. I would be in a cast for six months. In despair, I realized I couldn’t work on patients with a cast on my right arm.
I asked for a priesthood blessing. In that blessing I was told not to fear, all would be well. After some weeks I discovered that my fingers were perfectly agile, even with the cast on. When I arrived at the testing area, the professors shook their heads, insisting there was no possibility I could perform the necessary procedures. I asked them to let me try, and if they were not satisfied I would withdraw. Each patient looked surprised upon seeing my cast, but I was able to perform the procedures to the complete approval of the examining professors. I graduated in the top of my class.

One young woman remembers how her visiting teacher shared a spirit of caring, concern, and friendship with her. She had moved into a new ward at the end of her last year of law school and found herself to be the youngest member there by about 30 years. “Feeling uncomfortable and not knowing anyone,” she recalls, “I drifted into semiactivity. I would appear and disappear in Church like a shadow without exchanging words with anyone.
“In the next few weeks there appeared at my door a vibrant, good-humored, white-haired lady who announced she was my visiting teacher. I received visits from her on an almost weekly basis, many times with other sisters of the ward in tow so that I might become acquainted. [Before long] I was no longer a shadow in Church. [My visiting teacher introduced] me into a vast army of friends. After having been away from [this ward] for several years, I still count its members [as] some of my most cherished friends.”8

When you meet Chris Jones, the first thing you’ll notice is how quick he is to smile.
And the second thing—which follows almost immediately—is how quickly he begins to treat you like a good friend.
As Chris’s new friend, you’ll be talking football—because Chris has been a football player since the age of seven—but you can’t help noticing that his conversation is full of references to the gospel. It soon becomes clear that he loves the Lord and the Church with all his heart.
Even though Chris has been home from serving in the Oregon Portland Mission for a couple of years, he still has the sure handshake of a missionary. A mission is something he had been planning for his whole life. And his missionary spirit certainly did not get left in the mission field when he returned.
Chris is from St. Mary’s, Georgia. His parents, Artie and Carolyn Jones, met the missionaries in 1978, when Chris was only two. Chris said, “The first time my dad went to church, he saw a lot of people that he recognized in the community that respected him. That was one thing he really noticed.”
The Jones family was baptized and, as Chris has been told, they received a lot of ridicule for joining the Church. When Chris looks back, he is so appreciative of the fact that his parents were able to raise him and his two brothers and one sister in a way consistent with the principles of the gospel. And Chris grew up knowing that someday he would serve a mission. “If it is part of the Church and the Church is true, then I’ll do it.”
In fact, Chris says his mother helped him keep that in mind. “My mom was the one that pulled us out of bed at 5:15 in the morning to go to seminary for four years. It was a struggle. I hated getting up at 5:15. But it was through a combination of my mother and going to seminary that I gained a testimony of the gospel. Up until then, I always knew the gospel was right. I just didn’t know why it was right.”
As Chris gained a testimony, he found that living the gospel principles helped him learn about prayer. “I can’t recall a prayer that I’ve never received an answer to. Receiving an answer is a matter of allowing the Lord to answer you and give you His answer. A lot of times if you pray with your own answer in mind, you look for that answer. If another answer comes, then you’re not ready to receive it.”
Chris loved playing football in grade school and junior high. He started at linebacker all during high school. And, as Chris points out, football in Georgia is serious business. His high school would have 10,000 fans attend its Friday night games. During his junior year, he began getting attention from college scouts. It was exciting, but his mom would remind him not to get too interested because he was going on a mission.
When the scouts showed up, that was the time Chris had to face the possibilities of playing football at the college level. His high school coach told the scouts that he was a hard-working player and was an honor student. Finally concrete offers started to come—full-ride scholarships through four years of college, worth thousands of dollars.
“I asked,” said Chris, “if they would hold a scholarship for two years. One coach was shocked. I told him I was going to go on a mission for my church. He just stared at me and said, ‘You’re going to give up 80 thousand dollars to serve a mission for two years?’ He got mad at me. But I didn’t get offended.” After that, his coach started turning away college recruiters interested in Chris.
Eventually, State University of West Georgia called. The school offered him a scholarship. It turned out that Chris would be able to play a year and a quarter, essentially two seasons, before turning 19 and receiving a mission call. “I knew that all things were possible with the Lord. There were people saying that I couldn’t serve a mission and play ball, yet the Lord provided a way to do both.”
Chris struggled at West Georgia, not on the field where he started as a true freshman but in the permissive atmosphere in the dorms. He didn’t like what was going on around him. He was more determined than ever to go on a mission. And it was on his mission that Chris put football behind him completely. He told his coaches that if they needed to talk to him, to go through his parents. He didn’t keep up on what the team was doing. He says that the only way to serve on a mission is completely and with total focus.
At the conclusion of his mission, Chris decided that he could not return to the atmosphere at his former college. He thought that was also a decision to give up football, and he was willing to do it.
Just as Chris was completing his mission, his mission president contacted BYU about Chris. At first, becoming a BYU football team member didn’t seem like a possibility, but he was invited to try out. He received a full-ride scholarship but was redshirted a year. Once Chris thought sitting out a year would be horrible, but now it was a blessing. He was able to concentrate on his major, a difficult one, in manufacturing engineering and technology. He feels that the Lord has guided his life because at BYU he has had the opportunity to continue missionary work as a ward mission leader. Football will fall by the wayside. That’s fine with Chris. It no longer has his heart.
There is, however, one thing Chris has always wanted—a championship ring. He just missed taking state in high school. And his college team won the conference the year he left on his mission. Knowing this, some friends on his mission got together and bought Chris a ring—a CTR ring that he wears continually. It’s become his championship ring.
Whenever Chris looks at it he is reminded of what he believes deep inside. “Right makes you happy. If you do what is right, everything will fall into place.”

While I was serving as a missionary in a small town in Wales, my companion and I were tracting a street leading up one of the many hills there. It was a warm summer day. As we reached the top of the hill, the view was beautiful, so my companion and I decided to take a short break to enjoy the view and regain our energy.
As I got an orange out of my backpack, I saw a Chinese lady walking up the hill. I don’t know why, but I waved to her. She happily waved back and walked over to sit by us. We started talking, and she explained that she came up the hill to enjoy the view because it reminded her of God and His love for her. She also told us that she had been ready to go back to China when a job in Wales came up. She took it, believing that God provided this job for a reason she didn’t know.
Soon after this first meeting, we started teaching her in a recent convert’s home and shared many spiritual moments together. One of them I cherish the most. We presented her with a Chinese copy of the Book of Mormon with our testimonies written in the front. The Spirit was so strong that she started crying.
Not long after, I was transferred to another area. Unfortunately, I couldn’t go back to that area for her baptism, but it will always strengthen me to think back to our first meeting high on a hilltop.
Jurek Bäder, Germany

The Secuya family live in a mountainous part of Cebu, with the parents working as farm caretakers to support their brood of five. On weekends, the entire household puts on formal clothes and shoes and start trekking . . . up to twelve kilometers to reach the Busay 2nd Ward meetinghouse of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“It’s important we go to church every Sunday, because we learn a lot listening to the words of Jesus Christ,” shares Richelle Secuya. Together with her other siblings and parents, Richelle walks through upland paths and then takes off her footwear to ford through streams, after which she and her family wait for a public utility vehicle that brings them to church.
As they attend sacrament meeting, the Secuyas feel a different kind of fulfillment. “We know that Heavenly Father is happy when we are at church, which is His House,” Richelle’s brother Ryle smiles.
Still, the family knows the challenges of keeping the Lord’s command to renew their baptismal covenants as they keep the Sabbath day holy. “I remember our worst experience,” recalls Mitzi Secuya, the siblings’ mother, “we had to walk three to four hours, which we did for a month.”
At one point, the long trek became almost unbearable for her children. “There were times when they would say they were tired from walking and walking,” she admits, “but we still continued because our Sunday would not be complete if we went to church without them.”
The winding ways Sister Secuya and her family traverse reflect her journey in bringing her family to walk the covenant path together. At first, Sister Secuya was the only Church member in the family, but she had become less active.
Then, one day, she saw the full- time missionaries. “I’m a member of the Church, come please,” Mitzi excitedly called them out. The missionaries set an appointment with the family, and invited them to hear about the gospel of Jesus Christ.
At first, Richard Secuya wasn’t that receptive to the missionaries, but as he thought of his wife and children, he became more responsive to the promptings of the Spirit. The entire family became members of the Church, and were sealed for time and all eternity in the temple.
“I know the Lord will not forsake us if we come to Him,” Brother Secuya testifies, “and it is truly wonderful that we are now members of the Church. He really is mindful of us.”

Mark Johnson is a young man striving to fulfill his duties as a deacon. But at times, it’s a struggle. Seven years ago doctors discovered that Mark had muscular dystrophy; Mark was given just two years of mobility. But he set a high goal for himself—he wanted to pass the sacrament when he was ordained a deacon. It seemed impossible, especially after Mark was forced into a wheelchair. But because of his undying desire to render service, Mark has found a way to fulfill his duties. His father, Lee Johnson, carries Mark in his arms every Sunday as Mark passes the bread and water.
In addition to deacon’s duties, Mark is earnestly pursuing the Eagle Scout rank. As a member of Troop 101 of the Ventura First Ward in California, he is a Life Scout and is working on the two remaining merit badges left to fill the Eagle requirements. Some of the badges have not come easy; take, for example, hiking, camping, swimming. But he claims his hardest merit badge was music.
Mark’s troop helps him every chance they get. They alternate backpacking with car camping so Mark can participate. He has a special friend in Ricky Johnson who pushes the wheelchair up the trail and through the streambeds on the walk-in camps.
Mark lives close to the Lord, and his diligence is an inspiration to others. He has been helped by many, but when asked how he has achieved his goals, his answer is, “My dad and I do it together.”

Illustrations by Scott Peck
Andrew opens his last birthday present …
It’s a model rocket!
This is the coolest present ever!
Sweet! Let’s put it together.
Dad said I have to wait for him to help.
Whatever. We can do it by ourselves.
That doesn’t really feel right. … But I REALLY want to see it take off.
OK, it’s pretty easy. I mean, I’m 10 now. And 10-year-olds can do basically anything.
Three, two, one … BLAST OFF!
But then …
OH NO! That’s Mr. Warner’s car! We have to tell him!
No way! He’ll be so mad when he sees this!
I’m outta here!
I wish I could run away too. But I know that’s not right.
Andrew runs inside to tell Mom what happened. She calls the fire department.
Now to tell Mr. Warner …
Yes?
Mr. Warner! Your car’s on fire!
That warning feeling I had must have been the Holy Ghost. I should’ve listened!
The seats are burned pretty bad. But it looks like the rest of the car is OK.
I’m so sorry, I’ll pay to fix your car.
Thanks for being honest and for sticking around. I know it wasn’t easy to tell me.
A few days later …
What’s that?
The bill to fix Mr. Warner’s car. It’s going to cost a lot.
I probably don’t have enough.
We can pay right now, and you can work to pay us back.
OK. Thanks for helping me. I’ll work hard and pay it back.
I made a mistake, and I want to fix it. I mean, I’m 10 now. And I can do hard things. Especially when I listen to the Holy Ghost!

Tyler turned away from his friends, hoping the recess bell would ring soon. His friends continued to tease Adam, the new boy in their fourth-grade class. Ron and Mike didn’t like Adam because he had pierced ears. Tyler looked for the aide but couldn’t see her anywhere on the playground. He felt heartsick. He knew he should do something to help Adam, but if he did, his friends would turn on him.
After recess, Ron pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket. He whispered to Tyler, “I stole Adam’s math assignment. Come with me to the bathroom, and we’ll rip it up.” This wasn’t the first time.
Tyler shook his head. “I have some problems of my own to finish.”
Ron left for the bathroom and came back a few minutes later, smiling.
Tyler closed his eyes while the teacher, Miss Johnson, called for assignments. When she called Adam’s name, he answered, “Unprepared.”
Miss Johnson paused. “Adam, that’s the second missing assignment today. Please go to the principal’s office.”
Tyler slipped lower in his chair as Adam left the room. Tyler had to do something, but what? If he told on Ron and his other friends, they’d tease him and steal his assignments. Miss Johnson would never believe that his homework had been stolen. Neither would his parents.
What bothered Tyler even more was that his friends were members of the Church and were in his Webelos den. They were being terrible examples. Something had to be done.
After school, he didn’t wait for Ron or Mike. He ran straight home. His mother sat at the kitchen table, busy paying bills.
He dropped his backpack down by her chair. “Mom, my friends are bullying a new boy in our class. They’ve told everyone not to play with Adam or sit with him.”
His mother looked up. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
Tyler fidgeted with the straps of his backpack. “If I tell on them or try to do anything to help Adam, they won’t be my friends anymore.”
His mother hugged him. “It sounds like you have a serious problem. That’s why Heavenly Father gave you the gift of the Holy Ghost. Why don’t you ask Heavenly Father what you should do? I’ll support you in whatever you decide.”
Tyler nodded. He went to his room and knelt by his bed. Even though he knew that Heavenly Father knew the whole story, Tyler told Him everything. He explained how bad he felt about what was happening and how scared he was. Then he asked what he should do. He waited for an answer, and an idea came to his mind. Pulling a piece of paper from his desk, he folded it in half, then wrote:
Dear Adam,I’m glad you moved to our neighborhood. I’m sorry some of the kids in our class are mean to you, but I want you to know I like you and I’m glad you’re in my class. Signed, Your Secret Friend
Tyler looked at the note. What a strange idea. How could this be the answer to his problem? His stomach tingled with excitement. Tomorrow he’d find out. He would put the letter in Adam’s desk when no one was looking.
The next morning at school, Tyler lagged behind after the recess bell rang. When everyone else had left, he slipped the note into Adam’s desk.
Mike waited for Tyler in the hall. “Let’s hurry. Ron wants us to help him catch Adam.”
A warm feeling inside made Tyler tug on Mike’s arm. “Wait. Do you remember last week in our den meeting when we memorized the Scout Oath?”
“Sure I do.”
“Well, do you remember the part about doing our best to help other people at all times?” Tyler asked.
Mike’s shoulders drooped. “Maybe we should just play basketball instead.”
Tyler smiled as he raced Mike out to the basketball court. When Ron saw them playing basketball, he quit chasing Adam and joined the game.
After recess, Tyler watched as Adam found the note in his desk and read it. Adam sat up taller in his chair and looked around the room. Tyler looked away before Adam saw him watching. Now the letter idea made perfect sense—since Adam didn’t know who gave it to him, he would believe that every member of the class might be his secret friend.
At lunch, Tyler noticed Adam sitting at the end of the bench, alone. The warm feeling inside him made it easy to scoot next to Adam and ask, “Do you have anything you want to trade?”
Adam showed Tyler his lunch: a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, an orange drink, a roll of fruit leather, and a package of sunflower seeds. “Do you want anything?”
Ron walked up and stood across from Tyler with a scowl on his face. “Why are you sitting next to him?”
“We’re trading,” Tyler answered.
Mike came over and sat down. “I love sunflower seeds. I’ll trade you for my cookies.”
Adam smiled and handed Mike the package of seeds.
When Ron finally sat down by Adam, Tyler gave a silent prayer of thanks to Heavenly Father. He couldn’t wait to tell his mother how the Holy Ghost had helped him. With the Holy Ghost guiding him, he hadn’t been afraid to do what was right.

Realeboha Lesia, a young single adult from Bloemfontein, South Africa, has recently implemented this principle in her own life. While working a full-­time job to support herself, she also started her own business or “side hustle” as she refers to it, in which she hopes to one day replace her income by following her creative interests and passions.

“Coming back home after work, I would be so tired, having worked all day in my job and then working after hours to get my business going,” she says. It meant pushing through fatigue and fighting the desire just to take one night off. It also meant sacrificing some things she enjoyed: “It often meant not going out and doing fun things,” says Rea. “I was staying at home, doing research and meeting people to find out how they started their business and how they made things work.”

For Rea, part of perseverance has meant being flexible and realising that plans and reality often don’t coincide. It’s “seeing that with time, plans change,” she says. But contrary to what we might expect, this change is often for the better. And with every effort, she finds that the process itself helps her progress. “You learn things, you make contacts, you meet mentors, and learn better ways of doing things,” Rea explains.

Rea has found that positive self-talk is extremely important too. “How you speak to yourself is vital,” she says. “You must be careful what you say to yourself, because you are always listening. Tell yourself if you’re positive, it will happen.”

In order to stay motivated and keep going, Rea has identified unofficial mentors. “I chose people who are in the creative sector, I told them this is what I want to do and asked them for their insights.” On a tough day or when things don’t go as planned, she calls a friend and shares her frustrations. Afterwards she finds renewed energy and focus. She also relies on the example of others, such as someone who also started his own business and battled through a tough period before experiencing success.

“When things were going badly, I saw him keeping on going, he didn’t give up and say let me quit and start on a 9 to 5 job or start another project,” says Rea. “I have these people that can advise me and listen to me.”

But most importantly, she’s seeking direction and support from God. “Besides talking to these mentors, I’m also talking to my Heavenly Father,” she says. “Always remembering that I’m not alone, and it would be far better to let Heavenly Father be my partner in my goals.”

During my sophomore year in high school, we were studying the Book of Mormon in seminary. After we read Moroni 10:3–5 [Moro. 10:3–5], our seminary teacher challenged us to pray about the things we were studying. I really enjoyed learning about the Book of Mormon, so I took him up on his challenge.
That night I read Moroni’s promise again and got down on my knees to ask my Heavenly Father if this book was really true. I liked the stories, but I just wasn’t sure if the Book of Mormon was true or not.
First I got in tune with the Spirit and started my prayer. At one point in the prayer I asked Heavenly Father if the Book of Mormon was really true. All at once I experienced a strong, loving feeling in my bedroom, and I got warm all over. The next thing that happened really shocked me. It felt like someone wrapped his arms around me and gave me a big hug.
I later served a mission on the Navajo Indian Reservation in the New Mexico Albuquerque Mission. I wouldn’t have gone on a mission if it wasn’t for the answer I received that night. I know the things I prayed about are true, and I want to share that knowledge with others.

The organ music was solemn and low, and a reverent hush fell over the congregation as the pallbearers entered carrying the simple pine box. A few garden flowers had been lovingly placed on top, and nestled among them was an old mandolin, its worn but polished surface gleaming dully in the dim light. The flickering candles made the large room seem gloomier, although sunlight seeped in here and there between the rough-hewn logs.
The organ seemed out of place in this rugged wilderness. There were few luxuries in this early western settlement, and the small organ, brought all the way across the plains on a wagon, was highly treasured.
Amanda watched little puffs of dust rise from the floor as the pallbearers walked slowly down the isle.
“The coffin is so small,” she whispered to her mother.
“Your great-grandfather may not have been very tall in stature, but he was a giant in spirit,” Mother whispered back.
Amanda nodded, and bitter tears stung her dark brown eyes. Grandpa’s death was hard for her to understand. He had been lighthearted, always spreading laughter wherever he went. And music. How he loved music!
“Manda, the world would be a sad and sorry place without music,” he had said to her often. “It’s helped me more times than I can recollect, both before and after I left Denmark.”
“Tell me a story about Denmark, Grandpa. Please?” she used to plead.
“All right, but you know you’ve heard them all before.” His eyes would twinkle as the tale would unfold. “When I was a young lad in Alborg, my family tended sheep in the fields surrounding the town. The country was lush and green in the daytime, but at night everything was veiled in shadows. I had the evening watch alone. Sometimes the sheep were restless, so I always took along my old mandolin. I’d sing a quiet song, and it would settle them down. It would ease my mind a bit too. Tending sheep can be mighty lonely. My mandolin has always been a comfort to me, Manda. I’m glad you have learned to play it. Someday I want you to have it.”
A sharp nudge from her older brother brought Amanda back to the present. Bishop Madsen stepped up to the tall box that served as a pulpit and announced the opening song and prayer. Then Amanda’s mind wandered again as the service began. She could see herself bumping around in the back of the covered wagon, gazing wistfully behind them as the trial disappeared into dust. She’d missed her home and the friends she’d left behind. Grandpa hadn’t seemed to, though. He’d sat in front, constantly looking ahead.
“Let’s sing a song,” he’d suggest. Amanda would be the first to join in.
Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear;
But with joy wend your way.
Though hard to you this journey may appear,
Grace shall be as your day …
Their voices had been carried by the warm Nebraska wind, and soon all the settlers in their company had raised their voices to sing along.
The most precious moments had been at night around the campfire. The wagons had been pulled together into a circle, and the moon had loomed large in the prairie sky, softly shining on tired, sunbaked faces.
The trek to Utah was long and hard, Amanda thought. Grandpa had made it then. Why did he have to die now?
The bishop had finished speaking, and he turned toward Amanda.
“Amanda, we all know how much you and your great-grandfather loved to sing together. Do you think you could come up here and sing one of his favorite songs for us?”
Amanda froze in her seat. I could never sing without Grandpa, she thought. Then she looked at the mandolin lying among the flowers. It had helped Grandpa while he tended sheep. Maybe it would help her now.
She rose slowly and walked over to the casket. Her hands trembled as she lifted the mandolin from its bed of flowers. Several people in the crowd nodded encouragement. Amanda cleared her throat, placed her fingers on the strings, and began: “Come, come, ye Saints, …”
The song went beautifully until she came to the last verse. Tears welled up in her eyes, and her voice started to quaver.
Bishop Madsen stepped quickly to Amanda’s side, beckoning the congregation to join in. Instantly the little log church was filled with music.
And should we die before our journey’s through,
Happy day! all is well!
We then are free from toil and sorrow, too;
With the just we shall dwell! …
Amanda sat down, still holding the mandolin. Mother put her arm around Amanda’s shoulder and said, “Grandpa’s mandolin can become as much a part of you as it was a part of him. Take good care of it.”
Amanda smiled. It was already a great comfort to her.