Gospel Story Finder

My Grandma Jeri and I have been making fudge since I was a little girl. Because my grandparents live in Utah and we reside in Colorado, we didn’t visit them as often as we liked. When we did, my grandma always made time for us to cook up some delicious fudge.
When my grandparents got their mission call to Cambodia, I was so excited for them to be able to share the gospel, but I was also sad, because it meant that I wouldn’t see them for two years. Their farewell was a bittersweet moment, not only because they were leaving but also because I was munching on bittersweet chocolate fudge.
My grandparents had been gone about a year when my uncle, their youngest son, got engaged. My grandma got special permission to attend the wedding. Excitement ran through my body as I gave her a hug. It was so good to see her and the rest of my family.
After the wedding my grandma and I were talking. My eyes lit up with excitement, and I asked if she wanted to make fudge. The batch was small, but it tasted just as good as I remembered.
It was hard to say goodbye before we left for the airport, but I knew that soon she’d be back. In grandma-fashion, she wanted to make sure we had something to eat on the plane, so I took the rest of our fudge. Needless to say, with a hungry dad and daughter, the fudge was gone before we got off the plane.
I will never forget how lucky I was to have that special time to talk with my grandma. I can’t wait until she gets home from her mission so that we can continue our tradition.

Having virtually no quantitative skills, I was seldom if ever able to help our children with math and scientific subjects. One day our high school daughter Nancy asked me for “a little help” regarding a Supreme Court case, Fletcher v. Peck. I was so eager to help after so many times of not being able to help. At last a chance to unload! Out came what I knew about Fletcher v. Peck. Finally my frustrated daughter said, “Dad, I need only a little help!” I was meeting my own needs rather than giving her “a little help.”

“Not long ago I interviewed a young man who desired to fill a mission, but he had been guilty of some very serious transgressions during his teen years. He was a member of an active Latter-day Saint family, and he himself had been an actively participating member of the Church, even during the time of his transgressions. Ultimately he had gone to his bishop and confessed his wrongdoings. Now, for more than a year, his life had been free of the earlier difficulties, and he was anxious to serve a mission.
“As we talked about his situation and the decisions he had made earlier in his life that led to his questionable standing in the Church, he said, ‘Oh, I knew that what I was doing was wrong, and I was sure that one day I would put things back in order and go on a mission.’
“While I was pleased with this young man’s desire to reorder his life and serve the Lord as a missionary, I was troubled by the apparent premeditated, calculated way in which he had allowed himself to move off the proper course to engage in some destructive, immoral behavior, and then, almost as if he were following a timetable set by himself, he had begun to reconstruct his resolve to be obedient.”

Teach them to love others by serving others. That brings the Spirit. The Prophet Joseph taught that, and he lived it. Of the many examples recorded of his loving nature, the one which most touches me occurred in Carthage Jail the night before his death. One of the men who went there with him was Dan Jones. The Prophet sensed the danger from the mob. He had reason to turn inward, to think of himself and his own peril. Instead his heart turned outward to comfort someone else.

“When all were apparently fast asleep, Joseph whispered to Dan Jones, ‘are you afraid to die?’ Dan [answered], ‘Has that time come, think you? Engaged in such a cause I do not think that death would have many terrors.’ Joseph replied, ‘You will yet see Wales, and fulfill the mission appointed you before you die.’”

Dan Jones survived to serve missions in Wales. Thousands of Welsh converts came to Zion. Some were gifted singers. They were among the first members of what became the Tabernacle Choir. When we hear the choir sing, I hope we remember Dan Jones, the faithful friend of the Prophet Joseph. Teach those you love to remember Joseph’s comfort, given when he needed comfort. When we comfort others, out of our faith in the Lord, He sends the Comforter to us. And the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, gave Joseph the power to give prophetic and loving encouragement.

The night was freezing, with snow coming thick and fast. I was warm and safe in our home, and our three children were sleeping soundly. My husband was attending a bishopric meeting at the chapel some five miles (8 km) away. At about 8:30 there was an unexpected knock at the door. Immediately I felt strongly impressed that I was not to open the door. This certainty—this warning of danger—had never before come to me so strongly.
I was therefore quite stunned to hear my husband’s brother answer my query as to who was there. My husband’s only brother, Michael, a member of the Church, lived 70 miles (110 km) away. We had a very good relationship with him, and it was not surprising that he would visit, possibly expecting to stay a few days, as he had done many times before. It wasn’t even surprising that he hadn’t called, since the phone lines were down because of the weather. I should have felt safe and relieved, and it would have been normal for me to welcome him into our home on this cold winter night.
I could not understand the strong feelings I had or why I heard myself asking him to travel to the chapel to meet my husband. After a stunned silence my brother-in-law explained in a rather strange manner that he had traveled by train, then had caught the bus to our home, and now the snow was getting quite deep.
A powerful prompting continued to impress upon me that I must not, for any reason, open the door. I calmly explained that I was sorry and repeated my request for him to travel to the chapel to meet my husband.
For the remainder of the evening I reflected on my actions. Poor Michael had traveled several hours by train and bus, and on a cold winter evening I had turned him away. How could anyone be so uncaring? Yet at the same time I was unable to deny the strong witness that I was in danger and must not open my door.
It was late and I was almost asleep when my husband returned home. We discussed the situation very briefly, my husband confirming that his brother had met him and was now sleeping downstairs. I no longer felt any fear and slept very soundly.
The next morning I puzzled over how I could explain my actions to Michael. Would he be angry with me? I took a deep breath and walked into the kitchen to prepare breakfast. “Michael, about last night … ,” I began but stopped when I saw that, far from being angry, he was actually smiling.
“I’m so glad you did not let us in last night,” he said. I had no idea until then that he had not been alone. He proceeded to tell me how he had met Steve, an old school friend, on the train, and it had taken him some time to realize that Steve was high on drugs. By then Michael had already told him where he was going. Steve became more and more aggressive during the journey. He explained he urgently needed money and a place to sleep. He forcibly accompanied Michael to our home with what my brother-in-law could describe only as “the most evil of intentions.”
“So, you see,” said Michael, “I stood outside the door, praying that you would not let us in. By the time we set off on the long trip to the chapel, Steve lost interest and said he would go and find some ‘action’ somewhere else.”
I will never know what might have befallen our family or me that winter night. I will just be eternally grateful to have learned one of the most valuable lessons here on earth—to obey the promptings of the Holy Spirit. Even when there appears to be no logical reason, we will be kept safe by relying on that still, small voice.

The first, Brent, grew up attending church and hearing daily sermonettes in his home on gospel subjects. In spite of this, he was deeply unhappy. He felt that he was fenced in by commandments and restrictions, supposedly imposed by God to dictate what he should not do, what he was forbidden to enjoy, and even what he must not think. Only a motivation to succeed, to have status in others’ eyes, kept him going in the Church. But “doing the right thing for the wrong reasons” brought him no happiness. He didn’t feel free.
He therefore began to seek happiness outside the Church. He discovered the “new morality” and became convinced that any suppression of or restriction upon his physical urges was wrong, that every commandment was a curse on life, that subscribing to religious and moral prescriptions was a way of hating one’s own body and the desires that affect it.
Tragically, supposing that all Church members obeyed the commandments for the same reasons he once did—out of selfishness or fear—he called them hypocritical and unloving. He told me that abandoning himself in total response to every physical desire was bringing him the first happiness he had ever known. Yet, even as he told me this, it was clear that his first exciting taste of what appeared to him to be freedom would turn bitter on his tongue. And I have learned since that, though it provided a momentary titillation of his senses, it is bringing him no peace. On the contrary, though he has tried to escape the guilt of disobeying the commandments by pretending that they are foolishness, that guilt is returning now to haunt him as never before.
What happened to Brent? Why did he leave the Church in order to find love, honesty, freedom, and happiness, the very blessings that others find in the Church? I think the answer is this: Even though Brent heard constant sermonizing in church and at home, he apparently never experienced much of the Spirit of God or tasted the joys of the gospel. Though bludgeoned all his life with words, he hadn’t felt the love and warmth that are fruits of the gospel. The words were merely meant to describe it. The words without the experiences were meaningless. Hence, when finally he encountered a way of life that promised to remove the restrictions that had condemned him and that he hoped would sweep away his guilt, his life in the Church seemed like a dingy black-and-white movie—the lamp of the projector being nearly burnt out—when compared with the technicolor of this alluring new way of life. The only version of the gospel he could compare to the luridly colorful worldliness that enticed him was pale and meaningless. Given these alternatives, how else could he have chosen?
Brent had never really tasted of the gospel; he had only heard descriptions of it. A man can learn all there is to know about water, that it is composed of molecules made up of two atoms of hydrogen and one of oxygen bonded together by a certain kind of chemical bond, and so on; but no matter how much he knows about it, unless he drinks of it he will die. So with Brent: he has never tasted the waters of life. And now he is headed on a collision course toward certain disaster, tragically, not knowing that he is.

A year after I was baptized, I received my mission call and entered the Missionary Training Center in Manila, Philippines. It was there that I made some treasured friends. The first was my companion, Sister Loh, a convert from Singapore. Since I couldn’t speak her language and she didn’t know any Filipino dialects, our only option was to communicate in English.
The 16 days I spent in the MTC were the most spiritual of my life. Although we were far from our families, we still felt loved thanks to a special person—Sister Luda Lee Cottrell, the wife of the MTC president. She was always smiling and happy. She gave us comfort and love and taught me about charity in words and in deed.
On our last night in the MTC, Sister Loh and I wanted to give something to Sister Cottrell as a remembrance and to thank her for all the love she gave us. We didn’t have anything nice to give, so my companion suggested that we sing a song for Sister Cottrell. I immediately agreed. Because we were new in the Church, neither of us was familiar with most of the hymns. We chose to sing “I Am a Child of God” (Hymns, no. 301).
We found Sister Cottrell in her office. We told her of our simple present, and she gladly and patiently listened to us. While Sister Loh and I were singing, a memorable spiritual experience happened. I realized that we were three people of three different races, cultures, and languages. My companion and I were singing in English so that our beloved Sister Cottrell could understand what we were singing.
At that moment I forgot all our differences. The Spirit was telling me that what we are on earth doesn’t really matter, because the three of us are literally daughters of Heavenly Father. The Spirit taught me why and what brought the three of us there. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the gospel that brought Sister Loh and me to the MTC. It is the gospel that made Sister Cottrell such a wonderful, loving person. It is the gospel that gave the three of us the knowledge that we are all children of God.

She knew that she had a testimony. Just last fast Sunday she had followed Sister Hawkins to the stand. As she waited her turn, she looked over the congregation. I hope Marianne or Jill comes up and sits with me, she thought.
Sister Hawkins’s voice broke as she spoke of the Atonement. Why does she always cry when she bears her testimony? Susan wondered.
“I know Jesus Christ is the Savior of us all,” Sister Hawkins testified. “When I miss my husband and others who have passed on, I pray to Heavenly Father for comfort, and through the Holy Ghost my heart is filled with the Savior’s love. Then I don’t feel lonely anymore.”
Susan felt peace filling her heart as she listened. Tears moistened her eyes. The words to a Primary song came into her mind. “I feel my Savior’s love In all the world around me.”*
She closed her eyes and thought of the mountains. Red and yellow patches covered their sides. She loved autumn. She especially liked the smell of the air. She often saddled Lightning and galloped up the mountain road, breathing deeply.
She imagined the Savior creating the mountains, filling the streams with crystal water, and planting the trees for her. The feeling inside her kept growing until a tear trickled down her right cheek. She wiped it away with her index finger as the chorus came to her: “He knows I will follow him, Give all my life to him. I feel my Savior’s love, The love he freely gives me.”
When she walked to the pulpit, for the first time she didn’t think about her friends or about how proud her parents would be. She offered a silent prayer before she spoke. Please, Heavenly Father, help me to feel my Savior’s love like Sister Hawkins does. She felt a sweet peace flow over her. Her prayer had been answered. Tears streamed down her face. All she could say was “I feel my Savior’s love too. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”

I was reared as a Quaker, in the Society of Friends. Some branches of my family had been in the Society from its very beginnings in the mid-seventeenth century. Some suffered years of imprisonment for their faith. (Incidentally, I had to join the Mormon Church and do genealogy to find that out.)
As a Quaker, my father had a testimony against war, and so during the first world war he became a farmhand and we lived for a while in a little village that felt resentment against us because their men of military age were at the war. The boys used to torment my younger sister and me, and because of this I could not go to the village school—my mother and father taught me at home.
We were taught to be against dancing, the cinema, alcohol, and betting and gambling (including speculating on the stock exchange). As a result I learned that we were not of the world, and that we had enjoyments other than the world’s enjoyments. I interpreted that, as a child might well do, as looking down on people (I must have been a prig).
But Quaker meetings also taught me something of the Holy Spirit. Quakers believe in the inner light, and in my early teens I learned how it felt to be compelled from within to get up and speak, no matter how much one struggled against it.
However, I became dissatisfied with Quakerism. My family was poor, and I felt the condescension of members who were prosperous tradespeople and professionals. There were few working-class members of the Society of Friends. I was especially sensitive because the Society supported my widowed mother. I felt that there were class distinctions among the Friends.
Quakers shared a spirit, but to me it seemed too vague a spirit. It led to humane action, but the action seemed to me not vigorous enough. Their God had no body, parts, and passions. They lacked dogma, something firm I could depend on to help answer my own and others’ questionings. When I went to Cambridge in 1928, I found a generation trying to make the experience of literature and the other arts a substitute for religion. The text was Arnold’s statement that “religion has attached itself to the fact, and now the fact is failing it; but for poetry the idea is everything.” The little book that most characteristically enshrines this view is I. A. Richards’s Science and Poetry. The view was, however, an essentially individualistic one; it lacked the force to make a group cohere. There was a group—around Leavis’s periodical Scrutiny—that had a good deal of influence and effectively enforced the relationship of art and morality; but we were at sea, and though we could learn about winds and tides, there was no anchor aboard, and we had no destination.
At this point, I should like to say a few words about three important writers and their attitudes toward religion: William Butler Yeats, D. H. Lawrence, and T. S. Eliot.
Yeats used myths and images as a box of magical toys, and we cannot take his use seriously. However, he did show us a way of seeing the whole world and the whole of history in terms of images; and though he was not serious about it, we can be for our own serious purposes.
Lawrence had a disturbed life. He was restless because he could never find what he wanted, and he would not face his illness until the last. But he taught something of the sanctity and tenderness of the right relationship between man and woman in marriage, idealized from his own not very satisfactory experience. And he had a profound instinct about the need for a patriarchal community (his own family was very matriarchal) and for the priesthood. There are strong but dark shadowings of this in Aaron’s Rod, Kangaroo, and The Plumed Serpent.
Eliot was a sensitive and truthful seeker. He taught the value of exactitude in religious experience: “The spirit killeth, but the letter giveth life,” meaning that dogma is better than vague, liberal goodwill. And he well understood the step to conversion: “The awful daring of a moment’s surrender … costing not less than everything.” But his Christianity, with its royalism and Anglo-Catholicism, was a kind of seventeenth-century pastiche. His social outlook was limited and led him into snobbery (see Notes Towards a Definition of Culture). And his conversion liberated him in some ways and desiccated him in others.
At one time I investigated the Anglican Church. I attended a village church for some years. While I appreciated the hymns and the ritual, I could not join; there was nothing to join—no community of the church, no true social group, no force. The upper class tended to go to morning service and the lower class to evening service.
Like Eliot, they were pretending in a mock world, with—like him—some seventeenth-century pastiche as well as some Victorian pastiche dear to their own hearts.
After I had left Cambridge, there came to that university, as to others, the wave of Marxist thought characteristic of the thirties. Marxists deny God, but devout Communists—among whom were some of my friends—taught me something of faith: that faith must issue in energy, force, determination, organization. Faith is not content to leave things as they are, but wishes to change them for the better, both inside and outside oneself.
The quality of my friends’ faith may have been very good, but its object was deception. The Stalin trials, the Russo-German Pact of 1939, and the suppression of Hungary in 1956 were fatal blows to faith. Nothing was left but disillusion—or else self-deception—for idealistic Marxists. They found themselves in a wasteland; they knew the kind of bitter disappointment that Wordsworth experienced in the French Revolution. “Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive”; but it was just being alive and young, the excitement of animal spirits, no more. History has only savage answers to those who do not believe it to be a process of incarnation.
In the fifties, I lived for seven years in Islamic countries in Persia and Pakistan. Islam resembles Mormonism and Judaism in legislating for the organization of the whole community. The original social function of polygamy in Islam—that of providing status for spinsters and widows—helps an outsider to understand, sympathize with, and ultimately, as a member, accept the historical and eternal function of polygamy in the Latter-day Saint Church.
But Allah is remote, arbitrary, and all spirit to the Muslims. His ways are not to be understood by man, but are accepted with resignation. That he could have a body is blasphemy. History is not a process of incarnation to the Mohammedan, good historians though some of them once were. And the drive has irretrievably gone out of Islam.
I have had some experience with other religions: Hinduism, with its admirable regard for the family but its vague superstitions and continued social prejudice; and Buddhism, which in its proper form is a matter of intense spiritual discipline, has no place for a personal God, and advocates the absorption of human personality into the infinite, not its intensification through eternity. Each world religion has fatal flaws; each has in it something that points us toward and prepares us for acceptance of our Church.
So I was ready for the truth when, in 1966, my second cousin—now my wife—stopped at my door in the course of a genealogical hunt, introduced herself, and within a day or so had borne her testimony. She and the ever-ready missionaries told me what I was prepared to hear, though I had heard none of it before.
I had my difficulties as I began to relate the gospel to the world around us. But the more I learned of the gospel, the more I realized that it was wholly true, whereas much learned explanation was partial and uncertain. Facts we must accept, and know that our faith is never ultimately incompatible with them; interpretations remain a matter of continued discussion—a good scientist will always agree, too, that science does not promulgate immutable laws, but presents temporary explanations. The immutable laws remain those revealed for governing conduct, not the transient explanations of physical fact.
But all difficulties of this kind are resolved by the determination to enter the Church and accept it as a whole—all of it. It belongs together, and conversion is a matter not of choosing what you like and ignoring the rest, but of wholehearted, whole-minded acceptance.
Once we have been converted and have laid down at Christ’s feet whatever talents and tools we may possess, we find ourselves able to take them up again and use them for the Church in his name and in the light of his countenance.
I know that God lives. I have always known it. But I now know that he has a body, parts, and passions, for we are made in his image, and we may become like him. He lives in and through history. His Son was incarnate man and has now the flesh and bone that we too shall inherit after the resurrection. This is profoundly satisfying dogma.
I know that the Church is true. Its social organization and utter indifference to class distinctions vouch for this at the superficial level. But this organization could not be maintained were it not for the urge behind, the religious drive. I do not believe with Jonathan Swift that religion is just a good means of keeping society in order.
I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. He speaks to me, a stylistician, in his own prose as a transparently sincere and matter-of-fact writer.
I know, therefore, that the Book of Mormon is an inspired translation and that the Doctrine and Covenants is revelation. They are quite different from Joseph Smith’s prose and significantly different from the Bible and from each other. They are unique. They could not have been invented by a man of Joseph Smith’s knowledge and training.
I know that there is a prophet upon the earth today, for there has to be succession and continuity. If Joseph Smith was a true prophet, then he had to be succeeded to maintain the revelation. As our prophet is sustained by our Father, so is he sustained by ourselves. Our Father blesses him, and through him the whole of the Church; and therefore we continue to accept and sustain him.
I believe in the work for the dead. The hearts of the fathers and the children may and must be turned to one another. The family goes back through history. It is not simply our nearest and dearest that are our concern, but our furthest and dearest. We want to learn as much as we can about them. I therefore believe in temple work. And only through regular temple work can a marriage be sanctified and become an eternal partnership on this earth.
I have come from the outside wilderness home. I carry with me throughout the day the sense of prayer. The whole world is sanctified unto the Most High, and “everything that lives is holy.”

Mother had been at the hospital late that night with Daddy. She told us that the doctors didn’t know for sure what was wrong with him. There was nothing to do but wait and see what tomorrow would bring.
Before we went to bed, Mother telephoned the hospital to check on Daddy one last time. A nurse told her that they would call her back in a few minutes since they had an emergency to take care of. We didn’t know it at the time, but the emergency was Daddy.
When the nurse called back, she asked Mother to come immediately. My brother, Lewis, and one of my sisters, Rebecca, said they would go with her. Tired and worried, I dressed for bed, but when I lay down, the Spirit said to me, “Get up—you’ve got to go.”
I ignored the voice, but it came again, stronger this time, and I didn’t argue. When we arrived at the hospital, Mother said, “I’ll go right into the intensive care unit and check on Daddy. I’ll be back in a minute.”
After a long time, she finally came out and said, “I can’t let you see your father in his condition. It would break his heart if he knew you saw him like that.”
We loudly protested, but she stood firm, saying, “No. Remember him the way he was.”
Surely Mother couldn’t mean that Daddy was dying! I was frantic with fear. Then my eyes fell on the Bible lying on the table. I took it and started reading. As I read, my attention was drawn to one verse in particular:
“For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better” (Philip. 1:23).
When I finished reading, I knew Daddy must go. Lewis was now sobbing in the waiting room. My younger sister, Rebecca, was telling me how it hurt her to see Lewis cry, and how hard it would be to not see Daddy here in the hospital. My older sister, MaryAnn, and my two brothers, Karl and Michael, were still at home, anxiously awaiting news from Mother. Oh, what awful news to hear!
After shedding many tears, we all sat on a couch and drifted in and out of fitful, uneasy sleep. I remember thinking: It can’t end this way. Something has to happen to let us know he’ll miss us and to give us comfort in the years ahead.
When I drifted off to sleep, I dreamed that Daddy was standing in the doorway, dressed all in white. He was crying, but I knew he was happy. He raised his hand and whispered, “Bye-bye, kiddies.”
I didn’t want him to go, but I awoke suddenly and he was gone. He died later that night.
I woke up the next morning in my own bed, barely remembering that friends had taken us home from the hospital the night before. I sat up in my bed and looked around the room. I knew something was wrong, and then I remembered: Daddy died last night. I sank back down on my pillow, already damp with tears, and cried some more.
The days after the funeral were the hardest: setting the table with only seven plates, hearing my mother softly crying in the night, and seeing his chair—empty. Where was the father I loved so much? Then I remembered my dream of his tearful good bye, and the scripture, “Having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better.”
Yes, he would be with us in spirit whenever we needed him, memories of him bringing us great comfort. Knowing that he was with Christ made it easier for me to bear my sorrow.

On June 6, 1944, Hyrum Shumway, a young second lieutenant in the United States Army, went ashore at Omaha Beach as part of the D-day invasion. He made it safely through the landing, but on July 27, as part of the Allied advance, he was severely injured by an exploding anti-tank mine. In an instant, his life and future medical career had been dramatically impacted. Following multiple surgeries, which helped him recover from most of his serious injuries, Brother Shumway never did regain his sight. How would he respond?
Following three years in a rehabilitation hospital, he returned home to Lovell, Wyoming. He knew that his dream of becoming a medical doctor was no longer possible, but he was determined to move ahead, get married, and support a family.
He eventually found work in Baltimore, Maryland, as a rehab counselor and employment specialist for the blind. In his own rehabilitation process, he had learned that the blind are capable of much more than he had realized, and during his eight years in this position, he placed more blind people into employment than any other counselor in the nation.
Now confident in his ability to provide for a family, Hyrum proposed to his sweetheart by telling her, “If you will read the mail, sort the socks, and drive the car, I can do the rest.” They were soon sealed in the Salt Lake Temple and ultimately blessed with eight children.
In 1954 the Shumways returned to Wyoming, where Brother Shumway worked for 32 years as the State Director of Education for the Deaf and Blind. During that time, he served for seven years as bishop of the Cheyenne First Ward and, later, 17 years as stake patriarch. Following his retirement, Brother and Sister Shumway also served as a senior couple in the London England South Mission.
Hyrum Shumway passed away in March 2011, leaving behind a legacy of faith and trust in the Lord, even under trying conditions, to his large posterity of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.
Hyrum Shumway’s life may have been changed by war, but he never doubted his divine nature and eternal potential. Like him, we are spirit sons and daughters of God, and we “accepted His plan by which [we] could obtain a physical body and gain earthly experience to progress toward perfection and ultimately realize [our] divine destiny as heirs of eternal life.” No amount of change, trial, or opposition can alter that eternal course—only our choices, as we exercise our agency.

One day Toshiro Yoshizawa, who served in the army during the war, encountered two young Americans holding a meeting in the street; they were among the first LDS missionaries called to serve in Japan after the war. One of them, Elder Ray Price, spoke with respect of the service Japanese soldiers had given their country and talked of how all men and women are brothers and sisters and ought to treat each other with love. This message drew Toshiro to gospel study and eventually to conversion. He and his wife, Midori, baptized in 1953, are among Japanese pioneers whose service helped sustain the Church after its postwar establishment. Brother Yoshizawa went on to become a branch president, district president, counselor to four mission presidents, stake president, and mission president. He was called as patriarch of the Fukuoka stake in 1986. Sister Yoshizawa has served as a teacher in the Sunday School and in numerous Relief Society teaching and leadership callings, often holding several callings at the same time in the early years.

I learned the importance of real intent when I was a young seminary student. Our teacher challenged us to read the Book of Mormon. To keep track of our progress, he created a chart with our names down one side and the books in the Book of Mormon across the top. Each time we read a book, he placed a star by our name.
At first I didn’t put much effort into reading, and it wasn’t long before I found myself getting further and further behind. Spurred by a sense of embarrassment and my innate competitive spirit, I started reading. Every time I got a star, I felt good. And the more stars I got, the more motivated I was to read—between classes, after school, during every spare minute.
This would be a great story if I could tell you that as a result of my efforts I finished first in the class—but I didn’t. And that would be OK if I could tell you that I got something better than first place—a testimony of the Book of Mormon. But that didn’t happen either. I didn’t get a testimony. What I got was stars. I got stars because that was why I was reading. To use Moroni’s words, that was my “real intent.”
Moroni was clear when he described how to find out if the Book of Mormon is true: “And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost” (Moroni 10:4; emphasis added).
Looking back, I can see that the Lord was totally fair with me. Why should I have expected to find anything other than what I was looking for? Real intent means doing the right thing for the right reasons; I was reading the right book for the wrong reasons.
It wasn’t until years later that I finally read the Book of Mormon with real intent. Now I know that the Book of Mormon fulfills its divine purpose of testifying of the life and mission of Jesus Christ because I have read it with real intent.

When I was 11 years old, I had a wonderful Primary teacher. One day in class, she walked in on a discussion among us 11-year-old boys about our mothers and how tough they were on us. Our mothers would insist that we make our beds, help with the dishes, take out the garbage, and even help with other housework.
Our teacher said nothing but went ahead with our lesson. At the end of the class, she said that on the coming Saturday morning we were going to have a special activity at her house.
That Saturday, we peddled our bicycles to her home. She gathered us around her dining room table where she had some liquids in bottles. She also had small, empty bottles for each of us. We poured so much of this and so much of that through a funnel into our bottles. We learned that we were making hand lotion for our mothers.
When we finished, our teacher gave us a small piece of paper on which she had written a verse. We each copied it down and taped the verse onto our bottles. We proudly took the lotion home to our mothers as a gift.
My mother was wise so, instead of using the lotion, she put it on the middle shelf of our bathroom’s medicine cabinet. It remained there through all my teenage years. Every day, as I opened that cabinet to get my toothbrush or comb, there on the shelf was the bottle with that handwritten verse. It was still there the day I combed my hair before leaving for my mission.
That verse impacted my life permanently. It said, “Bless the hands that never tire in their loving care for me.” That message, which I read every day, drove deep into my heart love, respect, and appreciation for my mom.

Our camp near the ice caves at Banff, Alberta, was the scene of my first effort at getting along with guys who couldn’t cook, who argued over who got to light the fire, and who complained more than I did after a long hike. It wasn’t quite like home, but we set up camp and decided on rules to make things run smoothly.
The first night my feet were freezing, and I wanted to climb into my sleeping bag to warm up and go to sleep. I learned a lesson when the patrol leader suggested that a better way would be to do what the group wanted and warm my feet by sitting near the fire for a while instead of going to bed. Another time a fellow hurt his ankle. This meant he had to be carried down to camp. Some of the boys had to stay with him until everyone else finished exploring the caves. We solved the problem of who was to stay, and other similar problems that came up, by the discussion/vote method. “Choose a number from one to one hundred,” the patrol leader would say, and then if you chose the wrong number, you smiled, stayed, and cleaned camp or buried garbage.
Scout camps help fellows become real friends. We learned to help each other, to serve, to give in sometimes, and to abide by the rules of the camp for the benefit of all. If casual friends can get along and have a great time living together by the common consent method, I guess real families ought to be able to, too.

“You be good and mind your aunt and uncle,” Dad said.
Sammy gave his dad a big hug and then gave his mom an even bigger one. “I will,” he promised, waving good-bye as his parents left for a weekend out of town. Sammy was happy to be spending Saturday and Sunday at his cousin Joey’s house. There were so many fun things to do. There were board games and video games. There was a swing set, a trampoline, and a barn with a loft. Playing in the loft was Sammy’s favorite thing.
Sammy had a great time. He and Joey played catch in the morning. After lunch they bounced high on the trampoline and soared even higher on the swing set. Later in the afternoon they played hide-and-seek in the barn. For dinner they had sloppy joes, Sammy’s favorite. After dinner, Joey and Sammy watched one of their favorite movies and then fell asleep in the family room.
The next morning, Sammy enjoyed going to Primary with Joey. Brother Clark, the CTR 5 teacher, was kind. Sammy liked hearing the stories in the lesson.
After church the boys changed their clothes. “What should we do now?” Sammy asked.
Joey thought for a minute. “What if we play at the park? Or we could watch a movie or take turns riding my bike. Or we could play video games. What would you like to do?”
Sammy wondered what to say. None of those activities seemed like the best ones for Sunday. Sammy’s parents had taught him that the Sabbath was a special day that should be different from other days. But his parents weren’t here, and he didn’t want to offend Joey. Maybe it would be OK. Joey’s mom and dad must think so.
Sammy decided to tell Joey that all the ideas sounded fun. He started to form the words, but he just couldn’t say them. He knew it wasn’t right. “What if we color the pictures we got in Primary today?” he asked instead. “Then maybe we could draw pictures and send them to Uncle Nick on his mission in Chile.”
“Yeah, I guess that sounds pretty fun,” Joey agreed. “Let’s go get my crayons, and we can color at the kitchen table.”
Sammy gave a silent sigh of relief. He knew that Mom and Dad would be pleased, and he was glad that Joey wasn’t upset. But most important, he knew that Heavenly Father was happy with his choice. That was what really counted.

The Primary girls of the Vernal Fifth Ward, Vernal Utah Ashley Stake, created a beautiful and original design for tissue box holders to be placed in the temple where needed. They stitched plastic canvas with white yarn, making sure that the boxes were perfect. They donated many hours to this gift for the house of the Lord.
The girls also tied a beautiful white baby quilt to be used for the baby crib in the temple nursery, where children wait to be sealed to their parents. Amy Lefevre said, “I’m happy and excited because I know I’m making something important and special for the temple.”
The ward Primary leaders also decided to use a penny bank to collect money for the temple. A counselor in the bishopric designed and built a bank that looked like the proposed temple, with a window in the bank so that the children could see their money grow. They donated $350, mostly in pennies, for their gift of love.

It was an early morning in 2008 when my mother woke me up to go to school. I was really happy that morning, but I didn’t know that it would turn into the worst day of my life or the last time I would be with her. I didn’t finish all my classes that day because a friend of our family had to pick me up and tell me that my mom had killed herself. I was only 12 years old.

I thought, “How can I live without my mother?” She was my best friend.

I cried for months. I didn’t like going to school because the other children treated me differently and felt sorry for me. I had no clue what I was supposed to do; I only knew I had to be strong for everyone else.

One day, five or six months after my mom’s death, I was alone in my room by the window, crying, trying to understand what I was here for. Suddenly I heard a voice in my head: “You are my daughter; I won’t let you suffer.” I knew it was God. But it surprised me because I didn’t believe in Him anymore, especially since I felt that it was God who had taken my mother from me. Even though I didn’t know what He meant, I felt safe.

Three years later I went to Rome, Italy, to visit my uncle. He kept telling me about this church he went to. One Sunday, he took me with him. I will always remember walking toward the church’s doors for the first time and feeling the love of Heavenly Father when I went in. It felt like home.

I started going to church every single Sunday and to every activity during the week. I loved being with the youth of the Church. They made me happier. They thought and believed in the same things that I did. Then, after three months, my summer holiday finished and I had to go back to Albania.

When I returned home, I told my dad about the feelings I had had and how happy I had felt during all that time. He didn’t like it. He told me he wouldn’t allow me to continue to go to church or learn more about it. So I would have to be patient for the next three years until I turned 18 years old. Then I could decide for myself and get baptized.

During this time I was blessed with so many people who would tell me about what they learned each Sunday at church. One of those people was Stephanie. She had been living in Italy when my uncle joined the Church, but she had returned to her home in the United States. My uncle thought it would be good for us to write to each other, so I added her as a friend on Facebook.

Even though we had never met in person, I will always be grateful to her for helping me build my faith and learn more about the gospel of Jesus Christ. She wrote to me almost every Sunday and told me everything she learned in church and then would answer my questions. She was a great friend to me.

Finally, after years of being patient, I was baptized just two days after my 18th birthday. And soon I will share with my mother the happiness I felt that day, because I will be baptized for her. I know she will be proud of the life I have chosen.

I feel blessed by Heavenly Father because He was with me during my entire journey in so many ways. I just had to wait and be patient because He had a plan for me. He’s the one who gave me strength to go through all the challenges I faced. He was always there, helping me be happier.

M?l? e lelei! I’m Lui, and I shine my light by sharing what I have with others.
I live on a big island in Tonga. I have six sisters and four brothers. We live close to the Nuku’alofa Tonga Temple.
Our beautiful island has many plants and animals. I’m in class four at the Ocean of Light Primary School, and science is my favorite subject.
My father grows crops, so we have plenty to eat. But many widows (women whose husbands have died) and other families don’t have their own crops. So my parents take them some of our food. I like going along to help!
The widows we visit use coconut husks to make fires to cook their food. When we take food to them, I remind my parents to take coconut husks too. I like to help get the fire going!
Heavenly Father blesses me when I help others—not with money but with wisdom and knowledge. I love to help and share what I have with others.

Marty glanced at his shoes self-consciously. No one looking at the brightly polished leather could tell that the insides were caked with mud. But Marty knew. He couldn’t wait for Primary to end, so that he could go home and take them off. I won’t go near the canal this time! he vowed to himself.
Last Sunday it had sounded like fun when his brother challenged him to jump over the canal on the way home from church. He’d almost made it, too, but not quite. Conrad had had to pull him out, wet and muddy from head to toe. When they reached home, Mother looked them over. “I think it’s time you boys learned how to do your own laundry,” she said. “And don’t forget to clean your shoes.”
But Marty had forgotten until just a few minutes before church started. He’d gotten the outsides cleaned and polished, but not the insides. Now his feet hurt after sitting three hours with mud in his shoes.
“Can anyone tell me the steps of repentance?” Sister Wilson’s voice brought him back to the present. “Yes, Shelly.”
“Recognize that what you’ve done was wrong. Ask the Lord for forgiveness. Ask for forgiveness from the people you’ve hurt. Repay what you can. Never do it again.”
“That’s right. What happens if you leave out one of these steps? Have you truly repented?”
“No,” the class answered in unison.
“I want you to think about repentance this week. Choose some mistake you’ve made, and honestly try to apply all the steps of repentance. Then pay close attention to how it makes you feel.”
The ringing bell told Marty that there were just a few minutes left before he would be free of his shoes. He didn’t hear most of the closing prayer. At the sound of “Amen,” he was off to the car. Once inside, he took off his shoes and wiggled his toes. Who’d have thought that a little mud could make you so uncomfortable?
“Marty, will you take this pile of clothes up to Emily’s room,” Mom called out Tuesday afternoon. As he was setting the clothes on Emily’s bed, the collection of perfume bottles on her dresser caught his attention. He picked them up one by one, read the names out loud, and sniffed them. How do they come up with the names for these things?
“Marty!” Conrad called from the hallway. “Come play ball.”
Conrad’s voice startled Marty, and he dropped the bottle he was holding. It fell over, and most of the contents spilled out before he could right it. An overpowering scent filled the room. Marty grabbed a handful of tissues from the box on Emily’s dresser and started to mop up the mess.
“What are you doing in here,” Conrad asked as he stuck his head in the doorway. “Give me a gas mask, I’m suffocating!”
“I spilled one of Emily’s perfumes. I didn’t mean to; I was just looking at them.”
“Boy, that’s the expensive one Richard just gave her for her birthday,” Conrad said, coming over to help wipe up the spill. “She’s going to hit the roof when she finds out about this.”
“What can I do?”
“Well, first, don’t throw the tissues in her garbage can. That would tip her off the minute she walked in. We’ll wrap them in a plastic bag and throw them in the garbage can outside. Next, open the windows to air the room out. She won’t be back until late, and the smell should be gone by then.”
Marty nodded in agreement and scooped up the tissues. He was careful to hold them away from his shirt so that it wouldn’t absorb the smell. After he stuffed them into a plastic bag and pushed the bag to the bottom of the trash, he went back to Emily’s room. “Whew—it still smells pretty bad, doesn’t it? Maybe I’ll bring the fan from the family room in here to help blow the smell outside.”
“That was a great idea,” Conrad said when Marty plugged the fan in. “We can leave it on until we go to bed tonight. I bet Emily will never even notice that there was a problem.”
“Except for one thing.” Marty pointed to the almost-empty bottle.
“Maybe if you rearrange them and put that one in the back, she won’t notice it. She has so many that by the time she thinks of wearing that one again, she probably won’t remember how much she used of it.”
“She’ll remember,” Marty moaned. “Hey, I have an idea! I’ll be right back.”
A few minutes later he returned with a glass of water and the box of food coloring from the kitchen. “I bet I can color this water to look just like that perfume. Then I’ll just fill the bottle. It was so strong, she’ll never notice if it’s diluted a little.”
By the time Emily returned home, her room was aired, the fan returned to the family room, her windows closed, and the perfume bottle filled. Conrad and Marty lay wide awake in their bedroom across the hall, listening for Emily’s cry of alarm. When her bedroom light clicked off, they knew they were in the clear, at least for a while. I should feel relieved, Marty thought as he lay awake in the dark, but I feel miserable.
Every time Marty looked at Emily for the next few days, he felt awful, even though she never seemed to notice that her perfume was diluted. Marty resolved he would never again touch Emily’s belongings without her permission. He even stopped his usual teasing. He opened doors for her, carried things for her, did anything he could to be helpful to her. Still, he didn’t stop feeling guilty inside.
“What am I doing wrong?” he asked in his prayers. “I’ve talked to Thee about my problem with Emily’s perfume. I’ve done everything I can to be nice to her. But I still feel horrible. I feel like my Sunday shoes, clean on the outside but muddy inside. How can I feel all the way clean?” Marty knew the answer. He rose from his knees, crossed the hall to Emily’s room, and knocked on the door.
“Come in.” Emily was sitting on her bed, studying history.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Have a seat.” She nodded toward the end of the bed.
Marty sat down, but he had a hard time looking at Emily. Help me, Heavenly Father, he prayed silently. Finally looking up, he blurted out, “I spilled your bottle of perfume from Richard.”
Emily got up and walked over to her collection of perfumes. She picked up the bottle and looked at it. “This one?”
Marty nodded.
She removed the lid, sniffed, and replaced it. She sat back down on the bed next to Marty. “Is that why you’ve been so nice to me lately?”
“Yes,” Marty admitted. “At first, I just wanted to keep you from getting mad at me, so I filled the bottle with colored water. Then I felt really awful and wanted to be a better brother to you. But no matter how much I tried to help you and no matter how much I prayed about it, I never stopped feeling guilty. I knew I had to tell you what I’d done before these awful feelings would go away.”
Emily put her arm around Marty’s shoulders. They sat in silence for a few moments. “You know, Marty, when you spilled the bottle, you wasted only what had spilled. But when you added water to what was left, you ruined all of it.”
“I’ll buy you another bottle, Emily, honest. Just tell me how much it costs, and I’ll save all my allowance until I can buy another one.”
Emily smiled, “Marty, if you want to get me something to replace it, I’d rather have a tube of my favorite hand cream. It would take several months of your allowance to replace that perfume, and I wouldn’t really feel good about letting you do it. Do you know why?”
Marty shook his head.
“Because as much as I appreciate it as a gift because Richard gave it to me, I don’t really like it. It’s much too strong for me. Of all the perfumes I have, if you were going to spill one, I’m glad you spilled that one.”
They both laughed hard for a few minutes. It feels so good to be able to laugh with Emily, Marty thought.
“I probably never would have used it again, little brother,” Emily confided affectionately. “Why didn’t you just wait until I said something? You would have gotten away with it completely.”
“I couldn’t live with the way I felt any longer,” Marty explained.
“The Holy Ghost may whisper softly,” she said, “but it’s a pretty piercing whisper at times, isn’t it?”
Marty nodded. “Do you forgive me?”
“Yes, I forgive you, Marty. And I’m happy to know that you’re listening to the Holy Ghost so carefully. It must have been very hard to come to me. I have just one more question—does this mean you’re going to stop being nice to me?”
Marty grinned. “How could I stop being nice to you, when you’ve been so nice to me? Anyone who thinks having a big sister is a big pain doesn’t have a big sister like you.”
Marty didn’t watch his feet during Sister Wilson’s lesson that Sunday. His shoes were clean on the outside and the inside. And so was he.