Gospel Story Finder

One day, a shy student came crying into Julie’s history class. After listening to the young woman’s feelings, Julie gave her some Church pamphlets to read. The girl trashed them. A short while later, the friend suffered severe family problems and ran away. Julie and her family invited the girl to stay at their home for a few days. “I tried to share the gospel with Maura, but she didn’t seem interested,” comments Julie. “Then I volunteered to help her at her job in a stable. In familiar surroundings she could sense how much I thought of her.”
Julie continues, “Maura felt discouraged about life and down on herself. She would ask, ‘Why would God let these things happen?’ Heavenly Father inspired me with answers to her questions. It was amazing how she changed when she started the discussions. She came to know she was a child of God and to believe in herself. I could not believe my joy the day of her baptism,” exclaims Julie.

Elder Palmer stepped out of his hotel room and into the dimly lit hallway.
“Out of the way, young man.”
Elder Palmer turned toward the voice. “Pardon me.”
The man barely glanced at him from under the brim of his top hat as he bristled by.
Elder Palmer wanted to say, “I’m a missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and I have an important message for you.” But he didn’t. Instead, he shoved his hands in his overcoat pockets and trudged on toward the stairway. That man wouldn’t have believed his words anyway. Why should he? Why would anyone believe a teacher who had never even read the scriptures?
At the top of the stairs, Elder Palmer pulled a small reading primer from one pocket and his Bible from the other. “Just as soon as I learn how to read,” he whispered, “nothing is going to stop me from preaching the gospel.”
“It’s a disgrace for the Mormon Church to send an ignorant man to try to convert the good people of Michigan!”
Elder Palmer froze. He recognized the voice that boomed from the parlor below. It was the preacher he’d visited with last night.
“I know he’s rough-looking,” said a female voice, “but that doesn’t mean he’s ignorant.”
“I’ll prove to you I’m right. When he comes down this morning, I’ll ask him some questions about the Bible.”
Elder Palmer backed away from the stairs. The preacher was right. He was ignorant. Somehow, he had to get away! He raced down the opposite hall, looking for another stairway, but there wasn’t one. He was trapped.
With nowhere else to turn, he rushed back to his room and closed the door. If only he’d been able to go to school when he was a boy! He had spent most of his childhood blind. And even though he had eventually—miraculously—received his sight, he had only received enough to get around, not enough to read. It wasn’t until he was a grown man that he had been blessed with enough sight to read, but by then it was too late to go to school.
“I need help, Heavenly Father,” he whispered.
Suddenly he remembered a cold winter evening not long after he’d received his sight. He and his father had been trapped in a mountain snowstorm. They could not see the road. Their oxen were frightened and did not know the way home.
“Son,” his father had said, “we have done all we can to find our way. Now we must ask the Lord for help.”
They then knelt in the snow and prayed. Afterward, they steered the oxen in the direction they thought was right, and the animals, without hesitation, led them home.
This memory reminded him of the power of prayer. He dropped to his knees. “Heavenly Father, Thou hast called me to do Thy work. I have done all that I can, but I need Thy help.” When he finished, he went directly to the parlor.
The preacher waved to Elder Palmer. “Ah, Mr. Palmer, come in. These people—” the preacher motioned to several men and women—“have been discussing the Bible with me. Would you, as a minister, be so kind as to explain this passage?” He then read from his Bible.
Elder Palmer listened closely to the verses. When he was a boy, his mother had helped him memorize many scriptures, but he didn’t recognize these.
“Well?”
Elder Palmer looked hard at the preacher, and as he did so, the familiar voice of the Holy Ghost filled his mind. “It is interesting that you should ask me this,” he said, “as I have a scripture I would like you to explain to me.”
The preacher laughed. “Go ahead.”
“‘And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.’”
“Oh, Mr. Palmer, that is not in our Bible. It must be in your Mormon Bible.”
“You will find it in Revelation 14:6.”
The preacher flipped to the book of Revelation. His face turned bright red. “Well, well. I have never seen that before. I will have to look it up in my Bible commentary.”
“That is the position I am in with your passage. Perhaps when we meet again we can explain to each other.”
The preacher nodded curtly, then turned back to the women who were seated on the circular sofa. One of them stood. “Mr. Palmer?”
“Yes?”
“You seem to have a good understanding of the scriptures. Can you please explain this verse to me?”
“I have a question, too.” It was the man he had bumped into earlier.
Elder Palmer smiled. He still felt a bit nervous, but he now realized that in many ways he was prepared to serve the Lord, and much of that preparation had come when he was a boy.
“I’d be happy to help each of you,” he said, “but I have one request. As you read from your Bible, please read slowly, and I will follow along in mine. That way, the Lord will help us both to understand.”

I was raised in the Church and baptized and confirmed at eight years old. The gospel was a way of life for me and for most of the people around me. The Holy Ghost was a very familiar presence in my life.
When I was excommunicated, I felt an almost tangible feeling leave me. I felt like my thinking process had been disrupted and slowed, and making decisions was confusing and difficult. I was anxious and had a hard time feeling peace.
I never realized how losing my membership would change my life completely. I could no longer wear the temple garment or attend the temple. I could not pay my tithing, serve in any calling, take the sacrament, or bear my testimony or pray in church. I no longer had the gift of the Holy Ghost. Most importantly I was not in a covenant relationship with my Savior through the ordinances of baptism and the temple.
I was devastated and frightened. My three children were then 16, 14, and 12. They were my heritage, and I so badly wanted to leave them with an inheritance of hope. I sat them down and told them that if I should die before I could get rebaptized, I needed them to perform the ordinance again in my behalf as soon as it was allowed. I was frightened that I no longer had the blessings of keeping my baptismal covenants, and I worried that I might not be washed clean again.
I never had any question that the Church was true and that the gospel was how I wanted to live my life, so I continued going to church. I wanted Heavenly Father to know that I loved Him and that I was so sorry for my actions. I went to church every week even though it was very hard. The ward was uncomfortable with my being there, and only a few people talked to me. However, one special young woman with Down’s syndrome named Holly was particularly loving. Every Sunday as I would walk into the chapel, she would run up to me, throw her arms around me, give me a big hug, and say, “It’s so good to see you! I love you!” I felt as if she were acting for the Savior, letting me know that He was happy I was there.
It was particularly difficult to have to let the sacrament pass by without being able to take it because I knew I was not receiving the blessings. Taking the sacrament is such a blessing. It is incredible to have the blessing of being made clean through the power of the Savior and His atoning sacrifice, to be forgiven of our sins and shortcomings week after week, and to recommit with love and faithfulness to the covenant we have made to always remember our Savior and keep His commandments.
Because paying my tithing was so important to me, I set up a bank account and put my tithing in it each month. I needed the Lord to know that even though He couldn’t take my tithing now, I still wanted to pay it. I was single at the time and raising my three teenage daughters, and I felt that I needed those blessings of showing the Lord my willingness to pay tithing, even though I couldn’t. I have no doubt we were extremely blessed because of it.
I was rebaptized a little over a year after my excommunication. What a relief it was to come up out of the water knowing that Jesus was now my advocate, my partner. He had paid for my sins, and I was again in a covenant relationship with Him. I was filled with gratitude!
I received the gift of the Holy Ghost again. I felt once again a tangible presence: my dear friend was back to stay! I wanted to try so hard not to offend Him again so that He wouldn’t have to leave me.
I closed out the account with my tithing in it, wrote the check, and excitedly gave it to my bishop.
Five years later I was able to have my temple blessings restored. I felt so relieved and grateful. Once again I was covered in love and protected with the power of the covenants I had made in the temple.
I am now sealed to a man who adores me, and I him, and together we are actively working to establish our sealing as a covenant relationship that will last through the eternities.
In the 20 years since, I have sometimes felt a sense of deep guilt wash over me and cause me great unhappiness and worry. I wondered if I had done enough to repent and whether I was truly forgiven. As recently as just a few years ago, my feelings matched those of Alma the Younger, described in Alma 36:12–13:
“I was racked with eternal torment, for my soul was harrowed up to the greatest degree and racked with all my sins.
“Yea, I did remember all my sins and iniquities, for which I was tormented with the pains of hell; yea, I saw that I had rebelled against my God, and that I had not kept his holy commandments.”
One day I knelt down in prayer and asked, “Father, have I done enough? I will do whatever I need to, to have this taken from me.” Then I waited and listened with my heart.
The answer came very clearly: “You have done enough.” I was overcome with pure joy. I couldn’t stop smiling, and happy tears flowed. All that day I found myself giddy with joy. All the shame and guilt was gone for good.
Again I reflected on the experience of Alma the Younger:
“I could remember my pains no more; yea, I was harrowed up by the memory of my sins no more.
“And oh, what joy, and what marvelous light I did behold; yea, my soul was filled with joy as exceeding as was my pain!” (Alma 36:19–20).
My journey to regain my membership in the Church and my covenant relationship with the Savior was heart-wrenching and tender. I came out of this trial knowing that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is most precious. It has taken me almost all of these 20 years to get past the shame and guilt of my excommunication and to find the strength to share my experiences with others. I hope my experience inspires others to find courage to change and to reach out to those who want to change. I can stand and testify without a doubt that the Atonement of Christ is real. His power can change your life not only for the better but for the very best.
I love my membership in the Church dearly. It is a priceless gift and an incredible blessing in my life. I never want to be without it again.

Liisa Roto of Tampere, Finland, has some friends she’d like you to meet. But to visit them, you need an appointment. You have to wear paper shoes so you won’t track bacteria into their living area. And Liisa must talk to them, calm them down, and convince them to trust you.

Then Liisa will stand beside a pool, raise both hands over her head, and blow on a whistle. Her friends will come slicing through the water at you like sleek, gray torpedoes. Then they’ll turn upward like missiles and launch themselves into the air, splashing you in the process.

Liisa’s friends, you see, are dolphins.

Enter the apartment of Venkat and Lynda Dunna of the Hyderabad Fourth Branch, and there are plenty of clues that these newlyweds are crazy about each other. A handmade birthday banner from him to her is taped to the wall. An album with their wedding photos sits on the table near the sofa. As they talk, he puts his arm around her, and she smiles so often it’s contagious.
They describe how they met through Church-sponsored activities and how happy Lynda’s mother was when they got engaged because she knew Venkat from church. But there was a problem. Venkat had an older brother who was single, and in India some still hold to the tradition that older siblings should be married before younger siblings. His parents, who are friendly to the Church but are not members, were also building a house and didn’t want a wedding until the house was finished. “My parents didn’t want to say no, but they did want us to wait many months, maybe a year,” recalls Venkat.
“What helped us was the Spirit,” he continues. “I felt prompted to tell everyone that Lynda and I were both working, so we would help take care of everything but that it was important to get married as soon as possible and that it was important to start by going to the temple. We just kept thinking, ‘The Lord’s going to help us,’ and He did.”
A new Latter-day Saint chapel was opened just in time for them to have their wedding and reception there, and then they left immediately to be sealed in the Hong Kong China Temple. “Seven of us traveled to the temple together,” Lynda says. “On the same day Venkat and I were sealed, my mother, my sister, and I were able to be sealed to my deceased father. It was a wonderful day in every way.”
Venkat, who is now serving as branch president, says one of his greatest desires is to see a temple in India some day. “That will be a great blessing,” he says. “It will help us to build Zion where we are.”

As a young man, I served in the U.S. Air Force as a jet-fighter pilot. We spent hours in a training device that simulated real flight. There, an instructor taught us about emergencies that could occur when flying at the speed of sound and about what we must do to avoid disaster.
One young man in my flight-training unit refused to listen to those with more knowledge and experience. When it was time for him to go to the trainer and learn emergency procedures, he went to the swimming pool, pistol range, or golf course, instead.
A few months later, fire erupted in the quiet sky over Texas, and my friend’s plane went down in flames. The young pilot who was with him bailed out and survived. My friend did not. He had not learned the lessons that could have saved his life.

A long line of cars and large trucks sped along the freeway through the steady rain, tires hissing on the wet pavement. Water squirting from under the wheels of the trucks formed a curtain behind each speeding colossus. Every time we passed one of those road giants, a streaming shower blocked our view.
Often, when a long line of cars was in front of us, we had to drive for minutes beside one of those enormous vehicles. Shivering with fear, my wife would look up at the monster that thundered along only a couple of meters away from us.
I grumbled to myself because we had left so late that I had to hurry in these dangerous weather conditions to arrive on time for our appointment.
Suddenly we heard a mysterious sound against the side of the car. It went “klack-klack-klack-klack,” sounding like the first four beats of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, of which the composer said, “That’s the way fate knocks at the door.” The sound repeated itself every so often.
I stopped the car in the emergency lane and inspected the tires and the body of the car. I could find nothing that could have caused this knocking sound, so we continued our trip. After several kilometers, we heard the same knocking sound. I stopped and inspected the car again. Nothing was to be found. But when I stopped a third time, I did discover something—a bump on one of the tires that slowly grew to the size of a coconut!
When the mechanic who came to change the tire inspected the inside of the tire, he whistled fearfully. Even though the tire had been new, it had a big tear in the canvas—a factory defect. “You couldn’t have driven another kilometer with this,” the man said. “The tire would have had a blowout.”
I shivered with the thought of what could have happened if we had had a blowout when we were driving next to one of those huge trucks. That day, I clearly felt the protecting power that we so often plead for in our daily prayers.
We are not wise people, just a simple couple striving to keep the covenants we made with Heavenly Father when we were married in the temple. We feel protected. Perhaps we are protected many more times than we even realize. Certainly, we believe that it was the hand of our Heavenly Father who saved us twice from misfortune.

Recently I learned of a fearless young Laurel. She was invited to participate in a statewide competition for her high school on the same evening she had committed to participate in a stake Relief Society meeting. When she realized the conflict and explained to competition officials that she would need to leave the competition early to attend an important meeting, she was told she would be disqualified if she did so.

What did this latter-day Laurel do? She kept her commitment to participate in the Relief Society meeting. As promised, she was disqualified from the statewide competition. When asked about her decision, she replied simply, “Well, the Church is more important, isn’t it?”

In 1993, with the vigor of my newly made attorney’s oath and the energy that came from my recent graduation from law school and passing the bar exam, I received an unanticipated assignment one morning as a brand-new lawyer. That morning I was summoned into my supervising partner’s corner office and assigned my first jury trial—I was only a few months out of law school. Pleadings were complete, discovery had already been accomplished, even pre-trial documents had been submitted.

I should have foreseen what was to come when I picked up the file to prepare for my first meeting with my newly assigned clients and read their name: “The Church of Soldiers of the Cross of Christ.” They were a faith-filled zealous group, deeply committed to their beliefs. I prepared anxiously during every waking hour over the days that followed. Just a week later, I arrived early at the courthouse, filled with nervous tension for the first day of trial when we would argue last-minute motions, conduct jury selection, and give opening statements. It all filled my mind and consumed my thoughts. You know the feeling, kind of like when you show up for a semester-long comprehensive organic chemistry or calculus final exam. Filled with those kinds of feelings, I exited the elevator on the 6th floor of the courthouse. I was immediately met by an angry bailiff. I recall the top of my head came to about the level of the big shiny badge on his uniform. As I looked up at him, he said, with great tension and angst in his quivering voice “Mr. Bangerter, the judge wants you in his chambers now. I will escort you.” Then I saw it. Lining the long courthouse hallway, on both sides, was church member after church member, shoulder to shoulder, and all dressed head to toe in white. They broke out in song singing, “Onward, Christian Soldiers!” as we walked between them. By this point, any confidence I had upon arriving at the courthouse was entirely gone, leaving behind a big empty space that seemed to fill my mind.

As we entered the judge’s chambers, I was greeted by a red-faced, clearly very bothered judge. He yelled, “Mr. Bangerter, what is your church during in my hallways?” My response was immediate. I had feared he would ask a hard question. I felt such relief that the answer came so clearly and easily. I blurted out, “Oh, your honor, it’s not my church, that’s my client. My church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!” The Judge was disarmed by the candor and naivete of my reply; it seemed to melt his icy countenance. He then smiled and said softly, “Please, Mr. Bangerter, just tell them to leave the courthouse now and let me help you to know how you will do that.” He then got up from his chair, walked around his desk, and sat next to me. He said, “Go out to the hallway, thank them for their support. Ask them respectfully now to go on with their day and help them understand that their numbers would more likely intimidate the jury than endear the jury to them. Go down the stairway with them—lead them. Gather them again, and tell them you will update them every evening on the outcome of the day.”

That day, a judge who could have squashed me, instead took time to lift me. It worked; it worked just as he said it would. I got through that experience, but to this day, the clearest memory I have of that trial happened in the beginning with a judge kindly stepping down from his high position and sitting between me and the opposing attorney bringing peace to my heart and lifting me to accomplish something I did not think I could do.

I learned that day that whatever station or status we achieve in life, we can always take time to pause and lift another. This is God’s pattern. And so, He lifts us in the private times and in the public times of our lives to experience the reality of our own divine heritage.

Another way of building trust in Heavenly Father is to do His will. For Marta Fernández-Rebollos from Tarragona, Spain, learning to trust Heavenly Father came from choosing to maintain her standards.
The young man she was dating was not a member of the Church and was not interested in joining. “My spirit began to struggle between what I had been taught about eternal marriage and the hundreds of excuses that my heart gave me to give it all up and marry that young man for this life only,” she says. “Those were months of confusion, pain, and many tears.”
Torn by indecision, Marta went to her room and sought guidance from her patriarchal blessing. She read what was promised her if she chose the right. Bursting into tears, she knew what she had to do. “The consequences of the breakup didn’t matter to me anymore. I did not know what lay ahead, but I had conviction that as long as I was on the Lord’s side, it would undoubtedly be something good. I have discovered that when we raise our vision and follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost, we discover that the fruits of righteousness are ‘most sweet, above all that [we] ever before tasted’ (1 Nephi 8:11).”

Please consider a story told by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf at the October 2008 General Conference ("Lift Where You Stand"):
“Some years ago in our meetinghouse in Darmstadt, Germany, a group of brethren was asked to move a grand piano from the chapel to the adjoining cultural hall, where it was needed for a musical event. . . . Everybody knew that this task required not only physical strength but also careful coordination. There were plenty of ideas, but not one could keep the piano balanced correctly. . . .
“As they stood around the piano, uncertain of what to do next, a good friend of mine, Brother Hanno Luschin, spoke up. He said, “Brethren, stand close together and lift where you stand.”
“It seemed too simple. Nevertheless, each lifted where he stood, and the piano rose from the ground and moved into the cultural hall as if on its own power. That was the answer to the challenge. They merely needed to stand close together and lift where they stood.”
Here is a wonderful example of making a difference together. With a strong assist from Brother Luschin, this group of brethren was able to accomplish something an individual could not accomplish on his own.

One day I was working at my kitchen sink. The window above it was wide open to let in the springtime. And I could keep an eye and ear on our preschooler son playing in the garden below. Suddenly he and the little girl he was with changed their plans of play. Mischief was surfacing. So 1 called to him to come in. He didn’t come. I called again. No response. I called a third time before I put down my dish towel and went outside to get him.
“Why didn’t you answer me?” I confronted him sternly. “Didn’t you hear me?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of? Why didn’t you come when I called?”
And then came the punch line, “But, mom, she talked louder. Her mouth was in my ear!”
A teaching moment was at hand. I had to help him understand about voices—about loud voices and small voices, good voices and not so good ones, and about whose to listen to when. And why.
You see, our little boy ignored my voice and justified it on the basis of “her voice was louder—it was in my ear.” That was surely true. But that voice was leading him astray. He was still a child and hadn’t learned the voice-sorting process yet. He hadn’t learned to evaluate. But he wasn’t accountable yet, either. We all are. We are no longer children who see through the glass darkly. We have been baptized, confirmed by proper authority, and we have been given the gift of the Holy Ghost to help us know good from evil. The expectations for our performance are higher.

A neighbor once told me that as a missionary in earlier days he and his companion were walking along a ridge in the mountains of the South. They saw people gathering in a clearing near a cabin some distance down the hillside. They had come for a funeral. A little boy had drowned, and his parents had sent for the preacher to “say words.” The minister, who rode a circuit on horseback, would rarely visit these isolated families. But when there was trouble, they would send for him.
The little fellow was to be buried in a grave opened near the cabin. The elders stayed in the background as the minister stood before the grieving family and began his sermon.
If the parents had hoped for consolation from this man of the cloth, they were disappointed. He scolded them severely because the little boy had not been baptized. He told them bluntly that their little son was lost in endless torment, and it was their fault.
After the grave was covered and the neighbors had gone, the elders approached the grieving parents. “We are servants of the Lord,” they told the sobbing mother, “and we’ve come with a message for you.”
As the grief-stricken parents listened, the elders unfolded the plan of redemption. They quoted from the Book of Mormon, “Little children need no repentance, neither baptism” (Moro. 8:11) and then bore testimony of the restoration of the gospel.

Family organization. I heard a young mother in a testimony meeting a few weeks ago bear witness to a new understanding of what the Lord had entrusted to her. She said how disappointed she had been with the change in the Sunday meeting program, which had taken her—a Primary worker—from the opportunity of attending Relief Society and Sunday School. She had almost determined to fall into inactivity rather than accept the change. One day while brooding over this situation, the light of inspiration touched her heart and she could see the vision of what was occurring in the Church. It was not the loss of attendance at Relief Society she was to be concerned with, but the new, glorious opportunities to have prime time on the Lord’s day to be with her husband and children to fulfill the greatest responsibility the Lord has entrusted to her—the responsibility of teaching and training her own. Now after much prayer, study, and planning with her husband, Sunday has become the most special day in the week.

Elder Sipos and Elder Damiano were among the missionaries who loaded their cars with books and took them to the other cities. One of the last stops on their trip was Debrecen, a city in eastern Hungary, where they stayed for Church meetings on Sunday, 22 December. “I’ll never forget the reaction in the Debrecen Branch,” says Elder Sipos.
Elder István Berente—a Hungarian who had escaped from the country during the Communist regime, had been baptized, and had returned to his homeland as a missionary—made the announcement. Sister Carina Ragozzine, a missionary in Debrecen at the time, remembers that he started giving a talk about the importance of prophets, especially President Ezra Taft Benson. He emphasized President Benson’s message to read the Book of Mormon and said, “To help you do this, we have a little something for you.” Then the missionaries started handing out copies of the Hungarian Book of Mormon.
“The reaction was amazing,” says Elder Sipos. “Some people were crying, some people started laughing, others started clapping.”
Sister Ragozzine remembers everyone being quiet and making comments about how beautiful the book was. “So many people had joined the Church without seeing it. Finally seeing it made it an even more beautiful book to look at,” she says.
For the next couple of hours the members of the Debrecen Branch wouldn’t leave the room. They were pouring over stories they had heard about from missionaries but had never been able to read for themselves. And they were signing their names and testimonies in other people’s copies of the new Hungarian Book of Mormon.
“It is inexpressible the happiness that fills this day,” wrote Sister Králik Ida2 in Sister Ragozzine’s copy. “I’ve waited a long time for this moment.”
In Elder Sipos’ copy, Sister Fegyverneki Ágnes wrote, “I am so happy. … This was the greatest Christmas present I’ve received. Please don’t ever forget what this Christmas means for us.”
“It was definitely the best Christmas present of the season,” says Sister Ragozzine.

I have seen that faith and courage many times when believing Latter-day Saints have faced fearsome trials. For one example, I was in Idaho when the Teton Dam broke on June 5, 1976. A wall of water came down. Thousands fled from their homes. Thousands of homes and businesses were destroyed. Miraculously, fewer than 15 people were killed.
What I saw there, I have seen whenever Latter-day Saints stand firmly on the rock of a testimony of Jesus Christ. Because they have no doubt He watches over them, they become fearless. They ignore their own trials to go to the relief of others. And they do so out of love for the Lord, asking no recompense.
For example, when the Teton Dam broke, a Latter-day Saint couple was traveling, miles away from their home. As soon as they heard the news on the radio, they hurried back to Rexburg. Rather than going to their own home to see if it was destroyed, they went looking for their bishop. He was in a building that was being used as the recovery center. He was helping to direct the thousands of volunteers who were arriving in yellow school buses.
The couple walked up to the bishop and said, “We just got back. Bishop, where can we go to help?” He gave them the names of a family. That couple stayed mucking out mud and water in one home after another. They worked from dawn to dark for days. They finally took a break to go see about their own home. It was gone in the flood, leaving nothing to clean up. So they turned around quickly to go back to their bishop. They asked, “Bishop, do you have someone for us to help?”
That miracle of quiet courage and charity—the pure love of Christ—has been repeated over the years and across the world. It happened in the terrible days of the persecutions and trials at the time of the Prophet Joseph Smith in Missouri. It happened as Brigham Young led the exodus from Nauvoo and then called Saints to desert places all over the western United States, to help each other create Zion for the Lord.
If you read the journal entries of those pioneers, you see the miracle of faith driving out doubt and fear. And you read of Saints leaving their own interests to help someone else for the Lord, before getting back to their own sheep or to their own unplowed fields.
I saw that same miracle a few short days ago in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Rico, Saint Thomas, and Florida, where Latter-day Saints partnered with other churches, local community groups, and national organizations to begin cleanup efforts.
Like my friends in Rexburg, one nonmember couple in Florida focused on helping the community rather than laboring on their own property. When some Latter-day Saint neighbors offered help with the two large trees blocking their driveway, the couple explained that they had been overwhelmed and so had turned to helping others, having faith that the Lord would provide the aid they needed at their own home. The husband then shared that before our Church members arrived with offers of assistance, the couple had been praying. They had received an answer that help would come. It came within hours of that assurance.
I have heard a report that some have started calling the Latter-day Saints who are wearing yellow Helping Hands T-shirts “The Yellow Angels.” One Latter-day Saint took her car in for service, and the man helping her described the “spiritual experience” he had when people in yellow shirts removed trees from his yard and then, he said, they “sang some song to me about being a child of God.”
Another Florida resident—also not of our faith—related that Latter-day Saints came to her home when she was working in her devastated yard and feeling overwhelmed, overheated, and close to tears. The volunteers created, in her words, “a pure miracle.” They served not only with diligence but also with laughter and smiles, accepting nothing in return.
I saw that diligence and heard that laughter when, late on a Saturday, I visited with a group of Latter-day Saints in Florida. The volunteers stopped their cleanup labor long enough to let me shake some hands. They said that 90 members of their stake in Georgia had created a plan to join in the rescue in Florida just the night before.
They left Georgia at 4:00 in the morning, drove for hours, worked through the day and into the night, and planned to labor again the next day.
They described it to me all with smiles and good humor. The only stress I sensed was that they wanted to stop being thanked so they could get back to work. The stake president had restarted his chain saw and was working on a downed tree and a bishop was moving tree limbs as we got into our vehicle to go to the next rescue team.
Earlier that day, as we pulled away from another site, a man had walked up to the car, taken off his hat, and thanked us for the volunteers. He said, “I’m not a member of your church. I can’t believe what you have done for us. God bless you.” The LDS volunteer standing next to him in his yellow shirt smiled and shrugged his shoulders as if he deserved no praise.
While the volunteers from Georgia had come to help this man who couldn’t believe it, hundreds of Latter-day Saints from that very devastated part of Florida had gone hundreds of miles south to another place in Florida where they had heard the people were harder hit.
That day I remembered and understood better the prophetic words of the Prophet Joseph Smith: “A man filled with the love of God, is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith [2007], 426).
We see such love in the lives of Latter-day Saints everywhere. Each time there is a tragic event anywhere in the world, Latter-day Saints donate and volunteer to the Church’s humanitarian efforts. An appeal is seldom needed. In fact, on some occasions, we have had to ask would-be volunteers to wait to travel to the recovery site until those directing the work are prepared to receive them.
That desire to bless is the fruit of people gaining a testimony of Jesus Christ, His gospel, His restored Church, and His prophet. That is why the Lord’s people doubt not and fear not. That is why missionaries volunteer for service in every corner of the world. That is why parents pray with their children for others. That is why leaders challenge their youth to take President Monson’s request to immerse themselves in the Book of Mormon to heart. The fruit comes not by being urged by leaders but by the youth and members acting on faith. That faith, put into action, which requires selfless sacrifice, brings the change of heart that allows them to feel the love of God.
Our hearts, however, remain changed only as long as we continue to follow the prophet’s counsel. If we stop trying after one burst of effort, the change will fade.
Faithful Latter-day Saints have increased their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, in the Book of Mormon as the word of God, and in the restoration of priesthood keys in His true Church. That increased testimony has given us greater courage and concern for others of God’s children. But the challenges and the opportunities ahead will require even more.
We cannot foresee the details, but we know the larger picture. We know that in the last days, the world will be in commotion. We know that in the midst of whatever trouble comes, the Lord will lead faithful Latter-day Saints to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. And we know that the Lord’s true disciples will be worthy and prepared to receive Him when He comes again. We need not fear.
So, as much as we have already built faith and courage in our hearts, the Lord expects more from us—and from the generations after us. They will need to be stronger and braver because they will do even greater and harder things than we have done. And they will face increasing opposition from the enemy of our souls.
The way to optimism as we go forward was given by the Lord: “Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not” (D&C 6:36). President Monson told us how to do that. We are to ponder and apply the Book of Mormon and the words of prophets. Pray always. Be believing. Serve the Lord with all our heart, might, mind, and strength. We are to pray with all the energy of our hearts for the gift of charity, the pure love of Christ (see Moroni 7:47–48). And above all, we are to be consistent and persistent in following prophetic counsel.
When the way is difficult, we can rely on the Lord’s promise—the promise President Monson has reminded us of when he has often quoted these words of the Savior: “Whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up” (D&C 84:88).
I testify that the Lord goes before your face whenever you are on His errand. Sometimes you will be the angel the Lord sends to bear others up. Sometimes you will be the one surrounded by angels who bear you up. But always you will have His Spirit to be in your heart, as you have been promised in every sacrament service. You have only to keep His commandments.
The best days are ahead for the kingdom of God on the earth. Opposition will strengthen our faith in Jesus Christ, as it has since the days of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Faith always defeats fear. Standing together produces unity. And your prayers for those in need are heard and answered by a loving God. He neither slumbers nor does He sleep.
I bear my witness that God the Father lives and wants you to come home to Him. This is the true Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. He knows you; He loves you; He watches over you. He atoned for your sins and mine and the sins of all of Heavenly Father’s children. Following Him in your life and in your service to others is the only way to eternal life.
I so testify and leave you my blessing and my love. In the sacred name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Elder Zivic was born on December 19, 1948, to Latter-day Saint parents Sergio Jorge Zivic and Eleonora Zalewski Zivic in Buenos Aires, Argentina. As a 15-year-old runner, he ranked second nationally in his age group in the 800 meters. His greatest desire was to compete in the Olympics, and his coach, a former Olympic decathlete, believed he could do it—if he would only give up his reluctance to compete on Sundays.
“I had to choose,” says Elder Zivic. “In the end I felt competing wasn’t what the Lord wanted for me.”

Years later, it was like my Pokaiaua was singing this song to me. After almost a year of being ill, my 3 o’clock, was finally rightfully diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. He was nearly seven years old. He needed so much care and attention, but I had other little children to tend to. But with the help of family and friends and ward members, my burden was lightened; I was comforted, I could feel their love and support And in spite of that trial, I truly felt the Lord’s loving arms around me. He gave me strength I had no idea I possessed.
After a year of treatment, everything seemed to be going very well, and I had another baby on the way. Then a few months before that baby was to arrive, we realized that it wasn’t going as well as we thought. I could see that he was tired of all the treatments but there was one more surgery that the doctors said would give us an extra six months with him. Only a mother would grasp at this very desperate straw. The thought that my child would precede me, the parent, in death was not the way life was supposed to be.
I remember how we got to take him home for the weekend. I was to convince him to have the surgery. With the World Series on TV in the background and us lying on my bed, I said:
“Pokaiaua, the doctors want to do one more surgery so you can stay with us longer. Will that be all right?”
By this time, he had been baptized only a month. I could see how tired he was. But he looked at me so grown-up like and said, “I want to go home.”
I said, “But you are home!”
He replied, “Not this home.”
I cried and asked him to please have the surgery, and he looked at me through his little man eyes and with a tolerant smile on his face said, “Okay.” And suddenly, he was my senior.
If I had known then what I knew later, I wouldn’t have done the surgery. We didn’t have six more months with him at all—we only had six weeks, but six weeks of him in a coma. I was expecting another baby at the time, 7 o’clock, and the doctors said as soon as I delivered her, I could take him home.
Because we loved him first, Pokaiaua loved us enough to wait for his little sister to come down for her turn on earth before he headed home. I thought for sure they would high five each other, her spirit on her way down and his spirit on his way up. We named her “Kealohakamakanaoklani” – beloved gift from heaven. She was a gift Heavenly Father was sending to ease the pain. She was ten days old when he gently woke us up as his spirit left his body. And because I had just recently seen the play MY TURN ON EARTH, his eulogy was written through the eyes of his baby sister.

When I was young, I was overly dependent on my older sister. For example, I was a fussy eater, and when we went to visit our grandparents, I was constantly faced with being offered food I didn’t like. When the plate was passed to me, I would turn to my sister and ask, “Collene, do I like this?”
If it was familiar and she knew that I didn’t like it, she would say, “No, you don’t like that.”
If it was something we hadn’t eaten before, she would say, “Just a minute,” and taste it, and then tell me if I liked it or not. If she said that I didn’t like it, no amount of coaxing could get me to eat it.
Just as I needed to rely on my own taste buds and stop denying myself good food just because my sister told me that I didn’t like it, we must all feast on the fruit of our own testimony and not the testimony of another person. We also need to increase our ability to receive personal revelation.

How can we do this in our homes? Some of you have heard me tell how overwhelmed my husband, Mel, and I felt as the parents of four young children. As we faced the challenges of parenting and keeping up with the demands of life, we were desperate for help. We prayed and pleaded to know what to do. The answer that came was clear: “It is OK if the house is a mess and the children are still in their pajamas and some responsibilities are left undone. The only things that really need to be accomplished in the home are daily scripture study and prayer and weekly family home evening.”

We were trying to do these things, but they were not always the priority and, amidst the chaos, were sometimes neglected. We changed our focus and tried not to worry about the less-important things. Our focus became to talk, rejoice, preach, and testify of Christ by striving to daily pray and study the scriptures and have weekly family home evening.