Gospel Story Finder

Another time, my uncle, who was only three years older than I was, put me in a baby carriage and took me for a walk around the house. In front of the house was a road, and on the other side of the road was an irrigation canal. When he took me across the road, the carriage slid into the canal. It was empty at that time, but my uncle couldn’t get us out. My mother felt concern for me and began to call me. Then she looked for me in the house but couldn’t find me. She felt prompted to look on the road and in the canal. She found us and got us out of the canal just before the water started to come through the canal. Had she not listened to the Spirit, my uncle and I would have drowned.

I am acquainted with a family that came to America from Germany. The English language was difficult for them. They had but little by way of means, but each was blessed with the will to work and with a love of God.

Their third child was born, lived but two months, and then died. The father was a cabinetmaker and fashioned a beautiful casket for the body of his precious child. The day of the funeral was gloomy, thus reflecting the sadness they felt in their loss. As the family walked to the chapel, with Father carrying the tiny casket, a small number of friends had gathered. However, the chapel door was locked. The busy bishop had forgotten the funeral. Attempts to reach him were futile. Not knowing what to do, the father placed the casket under his arm and, with his family beside him, carried it home, walking in a drenching rain.

If the family were of a lesser character, they could have blamed the bishop and harbored ill feelings. When the bishop discovered the tragedy, he visited the family and apologized. With the hurt still evident in his expression, but with tears in his eyes, the father accepted the apology, and the two embraced in a spirit of understanding. No hidden wedge was left to cause further feelings of anger. Love and acceptance prevailed.

Ten years later I came back to my father’s home for a time. My father, who was the ward mission leader, invited me to listen as the missionaries taught two young ladies in his home. The missionaries challenged us to ask Heavenly Father if Joseph Smith was a prophet. I accepted the challenge and spent 14 hours reading, meditating, and praying about Joseph Smith. It was a spiritual experience that is sacred to me. I read Joseph Smith’s history in the Pearl of Great Price twice that night. I prayed many times and stayed up all night. At nine o’clock the next morning I knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that the gospel was true.
I went to the sister missionaries’ house and asked for baptism. They explained that they needed to teach me seven discussions. I told them, “Give me all seven right now. I need to be baptized.” Two days later, I was. I began at once to work in the Church and to study everything the Church published in Portuguese. I enjoyed it all immensely, and my testimony has been strong ever since. The Church and the gospel have given me everything I have, including my family.

We had the privilege of working with Ingar Skaug, recently retired Chief Executive Officer of Wilhelmsen, one of the largest shipping and logistics companies in the world. A number of years ago, a ship loaded with refugees, was sinking. The Captain of a Wilhelmsen ship detoured his route and rescued over 400 people. He loaded them on his ship which was designed to hold a crew of less than 50 plus cargo. They headed for Australia, but as they approached, the government of Australia would not let them unload the refugees. Instead they told the Captain to take the refugees back to where they came from, which would have been suicide. Instead, the Captain said, no, we will stay here and feed and take care of these people until they are allowed to come ashore. After an 8-day stand-off, including a boarding of the ship by the military, arrangements were finally made and the refugees were allowed to go ashore and begin new lives. Of course, the cargo the Wilhelmsen ship was carrying was delayed, customers had to wait and Wilhelmsen lost money. But the captain did not have to be told what to do, he knew and he acted. Ingar taught correct principles, expected people to act and held them accountable for their actions.

I met William on the first day of my third year of teaching English in the adult high school program at our local community college. He was small, dark-eyed, with tight blond curls, rather unattractive, unwashed, and, as I soon came to discover, almost totally illiterate. It was the early ’70s, when long hair was popular among the young and drugs were beginning to be a major problem. I thought, Here’s another victim of the drug culture, and my heart sank.
After making my introductory remarks, I asked the class, as I always do on the first day of school, to write about themselves. Looking from student to student, I noticed that William worked very hard on his paragraph, grasping the pencil in a stranglehold, licking the point every few minutes. William’s face was close to the paper, his brows knit close together.
The rest of the class completed the assignment rather quickly and grew restless. I let them leave. It took William 40 minutes to print a few lines, and when he at last handed it to me, I could not read it. He stood at my desk staring at me while I looked at the paper.
“You want I should read it for you?” he said.
“Yes.”
“My name is William, and I live off a government pension in my car in an empty garage. I’m 19 years old, and since I was 11 I been a drinker. Now I’ve decided to be a learner.”
I had never before taught a student who could hardly read and write. I had no idea how to handle the problem.
“You’ve misspelled every word,” I said.
William looked dismayed. “I can learn,” he said.
“All right. I’ll print them correctly, and when you come to class tomorrow, plan to write them for me.”
“A spell test,” he said, as though it were some magical word.
I looked away from him. “Look, William …” I meant to tell him that the class would be impossible, that his skills were so poor he would fall behind immediately, and that there was no hope for him to catch up. I meant to tell him he could not possibly succeed. But instead I said, “Your basic skills are somewhat limited. How hard are you willing to work?”
He stared at me.
“We’ll be studying difficult writers—like Shakespeare and Twain.”
“Who?”
“William Shakespeare. Mark Twain.”
“Oh,” he said. And after a pause he added, “I can learn.”
“It won’t be easy for you,” I said, “but if you work hard …”
I didn’t expect to see him ever again, but the following day William was the first one in the room. He took a front-row seat, and as I taught, his eyes followed me intently, his brows knit into the same shaggy line, his mouth slightly open as he listened. After class ended, he stood by my desk staring at me for a long time.
“What is it?” I asked, irritated.
“I’m ready to spell,” he said.
And he was. He had memorized all the words, and as I called them out to him he wrote them quickly.
He stood watching as I marked his paper, putting a check by each correct word and then an A+ and a large I AM SO PROUD OF YOU at the top of the page. For the first time, I saw William smile. He took the test, folded it carefully, and put it into his shirt pocket.
“Now,” he said, “I’d like to pick up some on my reading. You got anything I can borrow?”
“I don’t think I have anything appropriate,” I said. Opening the desk drawer I began to look through the papers and books.
“What about that?” he said, pointing to a copy of Huckleberry Finn.
My hand hesitated, and then I shook my head. “It would be too hard for you.”
“I’ve done hard things all my life,” he said.
I pulled Ellie the Elephant Learns to Fly, one of my daughter’s books, from my desk drawer.
“That’s for little kids,” he said.
“It’s for new readers,” I said, handing it to him.
“I want that other one.”
Ignoring his comment, I opened the child’s book and began to read aloud, resting a finger under each word while he stood beside me watching and listening.
“Let me do it now.” He read hesitantly and with great difficulty. “See, if somebody shows me, I can learn. If I had that other book, I could work at it. I’m not stupid.”
I gave him Huckleberry Finn.
Each day I sent William home to the garage with a list of words clutched in one hand and one of my daughter’s books tucked under his arm. Every morning he came back with the material mastered. A few weeks later he returned the Twain text. “I read it,” he said, and the look of pride on his face brought tears to my eyes.
That week I gave him a bag containing a bar of soap, a washcloth, a towel, and deodorant. “This is an important part of education, too,” I said.
He looked in the bag and then at me, stunned. But the next day William was clean. And he was reading and writing with greater confidence. He had progressed so much that he insisted on taking his turn at reading poems from our literature text aloud. And every day he stayed after class for an hour to talk with me. Actually, he asked question after question, and I tried to answer them.
His enthusiasm for learning was contagious, and soon three other students began to stay, too. There was Suzy, who later trained as a registered nurse; Jody, who went on to earn a doctorate in biology; and George, who planned to become a physician but died in a motorcycle accident that spring.
George’s death upset the class deeply, and we spent that day talking about the transient quality of life, trying to answer the eternal questions—where did we come from, what are we doing here, and what happens to us when we die? I taught the class that knowledge is power, that the glory of God is intelligence, and that all we take with us from this world to the next is our relationships with others and the knowledge we gain in this life.
“There are two ways most people learn,” I told them. “One way is by experience—and life doesn’t last long enough for us to get all our knowledge that way. The other is to read.” I encouraged them to spread their wings and learn while they were young and filled with energy and enthusiasm.
One day William came into class with a list of quotations he’d copied from the library, and he shared them with us. He particularly loved “Knowledge is the wings wherewith we fly.”
“Watch me fly, teacher.” He spread his arms and flapped them, bringing laughter from the students and me.
William (this genius—the only true genius I ever taught) was my student for two years of English. When he graduated, I sat in the audience and watched with pride, tears brimming my eyes. He enrolled in the community college program and continued his education. On occasion he stopped by my office during the week, sharing with me the excitement of his new world. Each Friday afternoon he borrowed one of my books, which he quickly read and returned. On one occasion, he asked to read my Book of Mormon. I gave him a copy and a week later learned that he had called the missionary number left with my testimony on a front page. At his baptism, I gave him the Pearl of Great Price.
Last spring I received a card from William. He was teaching Spanish and American literature at a large university. “We’re reading Huckleberry Finn,” he wrote, “and I’ve never been happier. I seem to have a gift for languages.” He continued, “Remember years back when you had to teach me English? For all you did for me, I thank you, teacher. Thank you for lending me your wings while I was growing my own.”

Last summer the youth in our ward were challenged to read the entire Book of Mormon. Eventually the summer came to an end, and I finished the Book of Mormon. As I kneeled to pray and asked if the book was true, I remember thinking that this was it—I would finally have the experience that everyone seems to talk about where they are overcome by the Spirit.
The truth is, when I prayed, I didn’t feel that way. At first I was a little upset. Why hadn’t I received such a witness? Was I not worthy? But I soon realized that though many people might feel the Spirit confirming truth to them very strongly when they pray about the Book of Mormon, there are many others who don’t have that same experience. Just because you may not receive an extremely strong confirmation does not mean the Book of Mormon isn’t true or that your testimony is not as strong as someone else’s. It simply means that the Spirit can speak to people in different ways and at different times.
For me, this experience taught me that we don’t always receive answers in the way we expect. I thought I would feel an overpowering spiritual impression after I prayed about the Book of Mormon—but I didn’t. Honestly, I believe I already knew it was true.
Though I may not have felt the Spirit very strongly at that time, I knew I had felt it while reading about Alma’s conversion and about Ammon and his brothers bringing thousands of Lamanites to the gospel, and about Christ teaching the Nephites after His Resurrection. I realized that feeling the Spirit while reading different parts of the Book of Mormon also confirmed to me that the entire book was true.

As I walked through the door of the Relief Society room, I avoided meeting the gaze of any of the sisters by pretending to look intently at a fly resting on the piano. Glancing up to see how far back I could sit, I spied a seat on the last row, deep in the corner. I sat down and began to thumb through my scriptures, hoping my studious appearance would help me avoid making eye contact. My mother had been my Young Women leader for four years and was still in Young Women as I, now 18, moved on to Relief Society. Suddenly my peers changed from Beehives, Mia Maids, and Laurels to ladies my mother’s age.
As women filed through the door, I recognized all their faces, yet they seemed unfamiliar in this setting. Sister Pratt had taught me in seminary; Sister Caton used to teach my Sunday School class; I often babysat Sister Bent’s children. How could I ever relate to these women who had so much more life experience than I did?
The chatter began to die down as the clock ticked closer to the start of the meeting. Nobody sat by me. The empty seats surrounding me began to feel like a force field that was keeping me from joining the fellowship and camaraderie the others seemed to share.
I began shifting in my chair, wishing I could go back to the Young Women room to girls with whom I shared interests, friends, experiences, and the same decade of birth. Suddenly my “force field” was penetrated by a whisper in front of me.
“Heidi,” Sister Pratt said.
I looked up to see her beckoning me to sit by her.
“Come sit with us.”
I smiled as a rush of relief swept over me. Although I had chosen to sit alone, I was now grateful for the invitation to be included.
“Don’t ever try to sit on the back row again,” she said with a wink, as I sat down beside her.
Each week this wonderful warmth was repeated over and over again as other caring sisters invited me to sit with them until I felt truly loved by these sisters. It wasn’t long before I didn’t need to wait for an invitation.
I began to reach out to these sisters, just as they had reached out to me. I let their love engulf me and penetrate the wall I had built. I no longer felt a sense of dread as I entered the Relief Society room. These women with whom I had felt nothing in common soon became more than just sisters; they became my friends. I felt a part of the fold.

It was Thursday, and like hundreds of others in the Church, Jim and Alex anxiously waited for the mail to arrive. Their missionary recommendation papers had been turned in several weeks before, and today might be the day their calls would arrive.
Jim was working at the local supermarket, and Alex was working for a home builder. Both had made their mothers promise that if a large white envelope from Church headquarters arrived, they would not open it. Both had trouble concentrating on their work that day. Jim nearly bagged bath soap with the fresh vegetables, and Alex cut a couple of boards too short.
The large white envelopes did arrive. And both young men rushed home from work at the end of the day. With their families around them, they opened the long-awaited calls to serve. The anticipation was replaced by joy and tears of gratitude. Both young men felt the Lord had spoken, and they were ready to respond to His call.
As the initial excitement died down, the next phase of preparation began. Both families made detailed checklists: scheduling the last day of work, buying clothes and luggage, preparing for sacrament meeting, holding a family get-together, and—oh yes—going to the temple. Sadly, however, only one of the families revered the temple experience as the main event in the life of their son, giving it the emphasis it deserves.

For 20 years, Brother Huang Juncong struggled with alcohol, cigarettes, and compulsive gambling. When introduced to Jesus Christ and His restored gospel, Brother Huang desired to change for the sake of his young family. His greatest challenge was smoking. A heavy chain-smoker, he had tried to quit many times unsuccessfully. One day these words from the Book of Mormon lodged in his mind: “with a sincere heart, with real intent.” Though previous attempts had failed, he felt perhaps he could change with help from Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

The full-time missionaries united their faith with his and provided an action plan of practical interventions, along with heavy doses of prayer and studying the word of God. With sincerity and real intent, Brother Huang acted with faithful determination and found that as he focused more on the new habits he wished to develop, such as studying the Book of Mormon, he focused less on the habits he wanted to lose.

Recalling his experience from 15 years ago, he remarked, “I don’t remember when exactly I quit smoking, but as I tried hard every day to do the things I knew I needed to do to invite the Spirit of the Lord into my life and kept doing them, I was no longer attracted to cigarettes and have not been since.” Through applying the teachings of the Book of Mormon, Brother Huang’s life has been transformed, and he has become a better husband and father.

Please share this recent experience I had while visiting in South America. I was traveling with a mission president 200 miles from his office. Word reached him one of his elders was in the hospital with a ruptured appendix. His condition was grave because of the six- to seven-hour delay in getting medical attention. The mission president gave immediate instructions by telephone, getting the best physician possible, leading sixty missionaries assembled in zone conference in united prayer. He and his wife were at the elder’s bedside the following morning. Prayers continued, medical attention increased, companions took turns sitting at his bedside around the clock. Parents in Idaho were notified. “The best is being done for your son. We feel he will make it. Please have your family join us in our prayers.”

Here was friendship in action. Here was a friend at work. Here was an example of leaving the ninety and nine for the immediate attention of the one.

As a boy, I made a startling discovery in Sunday School one Mother’s Day which has remained with me all through the years. Melvin, a sightless brother in the ward, a talented vocalist, would stand and face the congregation as though he were seeing one and all. He would then sing “That Wonderful Mother of Mine.” The bright, glowing embers of memory penetrated human hearts. Men reached for their handkerchiefs; women’s eyes brimmed with tears.
We deacons would go among the congregation carrying a small geranium in a clay pot for presentation to each mother. Some of the mothers were young, some were middle-aged, some were barely hanging on to life in their old age. I became aware that the eyes of each mother were kind eyes. The words of each mother were “Thank you.” I felt the spirit of the statement “When someone gives another person a flower, the fragrance of the flower lingers on the hands of the giver.” I have not forgotten the lesson learned, nor shall I ever forget it.

When I was a young university student, one of my classmates urgently pleaded with a group of us—his Latter-day Saint friends—to donate blood for his mother, who was bleeding profusely. We went directly to the hospital to have our blood typed and tested. I’ll never forget our shock when told that one of the prospective donors was unfit because of a positive blood test for a venereal disease. That infected blood was my classmate’s own!
Fortunately, his mother survived, but I’ll never forget his lingering sorrow. He bore the burden of knowing that his personal immorality had disqualified him from giving needed aid to his mother, and he had added to her grief.
I learned a great lesson: if one dishonors the commandments of God, one dishonors mother, and if one dishonors mother, one dishonors the commandments of God.1

Anna Matilda Anderson huddled with her mother and sister, Ida, under the black umbrella. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the train approach. She shivered. This train would take her from Sweden and begin her journey to America.
“Be good and listen to Elder Carlson,” Anna’s mother whispered in Swedish. She held the girls close. Elder Carlson was a missionary who had been serving in Sweden for three years, since Anna was eight. Now it was time for him to return to his family in Idaho, in the United States.
When Mamma had decided to send Anna and Ida to America to escape the persecution in Sweden, Elder Carlson had offered to watch over them. Now he stood by the train. He motioned for the two girls to join him. Ida hugged her mother tightly and moved forward, but Anna stayed behind.
“I love you,” Anna said. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too. Now listen closely. If you come to a place where you can’t understand what the people are saying, don’t forget to pray to your Father in Heaven because He can understand you.”
Still thinking of her mother’s words, Anna got on the train and settled next to Ida and Elder Carlson. She had been excited about her first ride on a train, but now she only wanted one last glimpse of her mother. The train was too tall for her to see people’s faces, but she smiled when she saw her mother’s black umbrella held high above the crowd. It reminded her that Mamma was watching.
With a great bellow of smoke, the train lurched forward. At first it moved so slowly that Mamma ran beside the train. The black umbrella waved at Anna. But soon the black umbrella disappeared from view. Anna leaned against the windowpane and wondered what lay in store.
Several weeks later, Anna leaned against the windowpane of another train. This one was taking her to Salt Lake City, Utah. “America looks different than Sweden, ja?” she said to Ida.
“Ja,” Ida whispered back in Swedish. “But America is home now, and if we work hard enough, we can bring Mamma here too.”
There had not been enough money for Mamma to buy her own ticket. A family in Ogden, Utah, had paid for Ida’s passage to America. Ida would stay with them on their farm and work to repay them. But Anna would be staying with her aunt in Salt Lake City. Anna’s aunt had come to Utah several years earlier, and Mamma had written to tell her that Anna was coming.
After the train, they had taken a boat over the North Sea to Denmark. Then they sailed to England and Ireland before crossing the Atlantic Ocean and landing in New York City. Anna had been seasick for most of the 15-day journey. She had been relieved to board a train in New York headed to Utah.
“Ogden, Utah!” the conductor called. Anna still knew no English, but she recognized the name of the city. Her heart sank. It sank even further when Elder Carlson stood and picked up his and Ida’s bags.
“Do you have to go?” she asked her sister.
“Yes,” Ida said gently. “Don’t worry, Auntie will be there when you get to Salt Lake City.”
Anna watched as Ida and Elder Carlson met his family at the station. They would take Ida in a covered wagon to her new home on the farm and then travel on to Idaho. Now Anna felt truly alone.
The train rumbled through the night until it shuddered to a halt at the station in Salt Lake City. It was nearly midnight. Anna grabbed her bag and leapt down onto the platform. Her tired eyes searched for her aunt.
But there was no one waiting for her.
Fear slid over Anna. She scanned the platform again, hoping she had missed something. Her eyes lingered on the shadows. She tried to make out people’s features in the flickering gaslights. But her aunt was not there.
Strangers walked up to her and asked her questions. Anna thought they wanted to help, but she could not understand what they were saying.
She had never felt so scared in her life. Not when her classmates in Sweden had mocked her new faith. Not when she had been sick on the boat to New York. And not even when she had said good-bye to Mamma.
Anna closed her eyes and thought back to her mother’s words: “Don’t forget to pray to your Father in Heaven because He can understand you.”
Anna knelt on the platform next to her suitcase and prayed harder than she had ever prayed in her life. She prayed that Heavenly Father would send her someone who spoke Swedish and could understand her.
When she finished the prayer, she looked up. There was still no one waiting for her. But then she saw a German family she recognized from the train ride. The mother motioned for her to follow them. Still crying, Anna grabbed her bag and shuffled after them.
She followed them to the south gate of the Temple Square block. She looked at the spot where the beautiful new temple had been built. Then suddenly Anna heard rapid footsteps nearby. A woman was hurrying toward them, looking closely at all the arriving immigrants. The woman’s gaze passed over the German family. Then she paused on Anna. When Anna looked up, the woman stopped and stared. Anna stared back, hope rising in her.
Anna knew her! It was her Sunday School teacher who had gone to Utah only a year before! She knew her!
The teacher pulled Anna tightly into her arms. She wiped away Anna’s tears and whispered in Swedish, “I was awakened over and over again. Images of the arriving immigrants raced through my mind. I could not go back to sleep. I was prompted to come to the temple to see if there was anyone I knew here.” She took Anna’s hand and led her down the street. “Now come with me.”
Later Anna learned that her aunt and uncle had moved from Salt Lake and had not received her mother’s letter. Her teacher sent word to them, and they came to pick up Anna four days later. Eventually Ida and Anna were able to bring Mamma to America too.
But for now, none of that mattered. As Anna walked to her teacher’s home, she thought, “Heavenly Father more than answered my prayer. I only asked for someone who could understand me, and He sent someone I knew.”

The missionaries of the Brazil Campinas Mission were a great support to our stake Liahona program. The missionaries took copies of the Liahona with them whenever they visited the members.
“The missionaries loved this project,” says former mission president Rodney Cuthbert. “The Liahona project gave them an opportunity to visit members who hadn’t been to church for a long time. A number of these people have become active again. The missionaries also used the Liahona to introduce the Church to investigators, and we had some conversions as a result.”

As a young missionary in Germany, just a month or two in the field, I had two similar experiences that affected my testimony of the Book of Mormon in a profound way.
One morning as we were tracting, my companion and I knocked on the door of a minister of a prominent church. He invited us in, asked us to be seated at his table, and then immediately began to attack the Book of Mormon in a highly agitated and animated way. I understood most of what he was saying, and the contentious spirit in which he was saying it was unmistakable, but my lack of proficiency with the German language made it difficult for me to respond. My senior companion, a strong and outstanding missionary, simply bore a powerful testimony of the book, and we excused ourselves and left. My heart was pounding. I believe I was shaking a bit. I felt troubled.
A week or two later we met a man while street contacting who agreed to an appointment. We set a time, and he gave us his address in Bückeburg, a picturesque little town several miles from our assigned city of Minden but still in our area.
It was winter, and on the Sunday morning of our appointment, we mounted our bicycles and pedaled the entire distance, bucking a strong, cold headwind. Cold and panting, we pressed the doorbell on the man’s apartment building, and he buzzed the door open. We climbed the stairs to his apartment, and he let us in. Immediately we recognized a contentious spirit in the room—the same spirit we had felt a few weeks earlier in the home of the minister.
Our host did not invite us to sit down. Instead, he left the room for a moment. He returned carrying several editions of the Bible, dropped them on the table, and said in a very loud and defiant voice, “So you want to talk [religion], do you?” Then, pointing to the window, he bellowed, “Good, but first throw your Book of Mormon in the Weser [River]!”
A couple of weeks had passed since our experience with the minister, and I was now able to say a sentence or two in German. I attempted to do so. Once again, my senior companion simply bore a strong, quiet testimony of the Book of Mormon and politely thanked the man for his time. Then we excused ourselves and rode back to Minden, this time with the wind at our backs.
I had a testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, or so I thought at the time. But it became painfully clear after those two experiences, so close together in time, that my testimony was neither deep nor strong. I was unsure of myself and of my ability to truthfully bear witness of the Book of Mormon in a powerful and convincing way.
I made up my mind that if I were to have a successful mission, I had better make sure my testimony of the Book of Mormon was true and strong. I went to work on it. I read and prayed and thought and contemplated. Ultimately, the Lord blessed my efforts. A testimony came to me and has never left; rather, it has grown stronger through the years.
I have thought often of those two experiences. I am grateful to a wise and steady companion, and in a way I am thankful for an unwitting minister and a rather fanatical man, who figuratively took hold of my shoulders and shook me. To this day, well beyond 40 years later, I remember their names and the details of our meetings. When I think of them, the great passage from 3 Nephi comes to mind:
“And according as I have commanded you thus shall ye baptize. And there shall be no disputations among you, as there have hitherto been; neither shall there be disputations among you concerning the points of my doctrine, as there have hitherto been.
“For verily, verily I say unto you, he that hath the spirit of contention is not of me, but is of the devil, who is the father of contention, and he stirreth up the hearts of men to contend with anger, one with another.
“Behold, this is not my doctrine, to stir up the hearts of men with anger, one against another; but this is my doctrine, that such things should be done away” (3 Nephi 11:28–30).
I think too of the great words of Paul to the Galatians: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance” (Galatians 5:22–23).
These are the fruits I experience when I read the Book of Mormon. Reading its pages, contemplating the transcendent doctrines of Christ it contains, attempting to apply these in my life—all this settles in my mind and in my soul as a “mighty change” (Mosiah 5:2; Alma 5:14) in my heart, one that gives me resolve to do better; to be a little kinder, less critical, more generous; and to share with others the great blessings the Lord has given me.
These are the fruits of the Spirit of God. These are the fruits of the Book of Mormon.

Troy Jackson, Jaren Hope, and Andrew Allan are bearers of the Aaronic Priesthood who were called by an inspired bishop to team teach a family history class in their ward. These young men are representative of so many of you in their eagerness to learn and desire to serve.
Troy stated, “I used to come to church and just sit there, but now I realize that I need to go home and do something. We can all do family history.”
Jaren reported that as he learned more about family history, he realized “that these were not just names but real people. I became more and more excited about taking the names to the temple.”
And Andrew commented, “I have taken to family history with a love and vigor I did not know I could muster. As I prepared each week to teach, I was often nudged by the Holy Spirit to act and try some of the methods taught in the lesson. Before, family history was a scary thing. But aided by the Spirit I was able to step up to my calling and help many people in our ward.”

For the past 17 years, I have had the privilege of spending the majority of my time living and traveling throughout China. I see numerous members participate in monthly temple excursions to Hong Kong to do temple ordinances for those who have departed this world. Many are involved in genealogical projects where long lost ancestral records are found and temple ordinances can be done for them. In 2008, a deadly earthquake occurred in Sichuan Province where tens of thousands of inhabitants perished. Hundreds of church members responded instantly. Many travelled to the areas of destruction to offer lifesaving services. I am proud to say, some of them are among you in the audience. Some recipients were touched by those charitable acts and subsequently accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ. Another young sister was in college at the time of the earthquake. She did not hesitate to make the extreme personal sacrifice. She left school altogether to join the rescue effort to save lives that lasted several months. This remarkable sister from Sichuan, China will arrive here to further her education this coming September.

God offers us counsel not just for our own safety, but for the safety of His other children, whom we should love. There are few comforts so sweet as to know that we have been an instrument in the hands of God in leading someone else to safety. That blessing generally requires the faith to follow counsel when it is hard to do. An example from Church history is that of Reddick Newton Allred. He was one of the rescue party sent out by Brigham Young to bring in the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies. When a terrible storm hit, Captain Grant, captain of the rescue party, decided to leave some of the wagons by the Sweetwater River as he pressed ahead to find the handcart companies. With the blizzards howling and the weather becoming life-threatening, two of the men left behind at the Sweetwater decided that it was foolish to stay. They thought that either the handcart companies had wintered over somewhere or had perished. They decided to return to the Salt Lake Valley and tried to persuade everyone else to do the same.
Reddick Allred refused to budge. Brigham had sent them out, and his priesthood leader had told him to wait there. The others took several wagons, all filled with needed supplies, and started back. Even more tragic, each wagon they met coming out from Salt Lake they turned back as well. They turned back 77 wagons, returning all the way to Little Mountain, where President Young learned what was happening and turned them around again. When the Willie Company was finally found, and had made that heartrending pull up and over Rocky Ridge, it was Reddick Allred and his wagons that waited for them. (See Rebecca Bartholomew and Leonard J. Arrington, Rescue of the 1856 Handcart Companies [1992], 29, 33–34.)

In this conference you will hear inspired counsel, for instance, to reach out to the new members of the Church. Those with the faith of Reddick Newton Allred will keep offering friendship even when it seems not to be needed or to have no effect. They will persist. When some new member reaches the point of spiritual exhaustion, they will be there offering kind words and fellowship. They will then feel the same divine approval Brother Allred felt when he saw those handcart pioneers struggling toward him, knowing he could offer them safety because he had followed counsel when it was hard to do.

While the record does not prove it, I am confident that Brother Allred prayed while he waited. I am confident that his prayers were answered. He then knew that the counsel to stand fast was from God. We must pray to know that. I promise you answers to such prayers of faith.

The father of a young family who was asked to serve as a mission president gathered his children around him. He explained to them that the prophet had emphasized that the call was a call to the entire family. He asked each of the children if they would be willing to leave their new home, their friends, their school and go three years to an unknown place in the mission field. In that tender moment, each child agreed to willingly support this call to serve.

Several days later, the father, sensing that his fourteen-year-old son was unusually solemn and quiet, sat down with him to ask what was on his mind. The boy confided that he was worried about having to quit school at such a young age to serve as a full-time missionary. He didn’t know if he was ready to wear a suit and tie every day. He said, “I kinda wanted to be a boy a little longer.” Of course, the son had misunderstood. These duties were not expected of a young man his age. Yet he had been willing to do them if that was what the Lord required.

One evening here at BYU-Hawaii, I came home from school and prayed about becoming a presenter in one of the organizations on campus, Students in Free Enterprise also known as SIFE. Earlier, they handed out a part to memorize, and after that prayer, I did so. That small and simple decision has played an enormous role in my life to opening the views and opportunities that came to pass. I was able to participate in service projects for an elementary school and environmental sustainability efforts. [slide 38] We also compiled a presentation to present first regionally, and upon winning, nationally. We placed top 10 the past 2 years amongst over 100 colleges!

If you had asked me in high school if I would be doing such a thing in college, my answer would have been a definite, "NO!" However, I am so grateful for the opportunities that this campus offers to students. They are all around us, we need to make the decision and "act, not be acted upon!" (2 Nephi 2:14). This situation has led me to run for Student Body President. This also led to an internship, and eventually a job offer.

I know that many times we may feel that there isn't an activity on campus that is the right fit. I once thought that my purpose was to go to class, learn, get my degree and leave on to the next chapter of life. I know that in my life, because of one simple prayer, and action upon that prayer, I was able to learn more about service, leadership, and the many opportunities that are offered on this campus that will bless anybody with work, church callings, and families. I encourage you to get involved as well. I learned that many times we do not know what the Lord has in store for us. The Lord knows our full potential, and if we let Him, He will lead us in achieving it.