Gospel Story Finder

Last year marked the Oregon Trail’s 150th anniversary, and to celebrate, young women from the Unity First Ward, Burley Idaho Stake, decided to try a four-day, authentic pioneer trek along the trail that runs close to their homes.
They donned pioneer skirts and bonnets and ditched modern conveniences like makeup for the 32-mile trek. They camped out, pressed their own fresh cider, made “johnny cakes,” and listened to numerous stories about pioneer experiences along the way. Every night two girls kept watch over the horses, camp, and fire.
On the last day, as they tromped into Oakley, Idaho, they noticed a man standing on the balcony of one of the original pioneer homes. As they got closer, they realized it was Elder David B. Haight. He greeted the tired group and invited them into his ancestral home, recounting the history of the area, and bearing his testimony that “the gospel is the hope of the world.” By the time the trek was through, the young women had learned more about hope than they’d ever dreamed.

Although Mary managed to get some additional cattle to help pull the wagons to the Salt Lake Valley, the trek still tested and refined her faith. One day one of her best oxen became very sick, lay down, and was apparently near death. Had this happened, she could not have continued on the journey to the Valley. Mary got a bottle of consecrated oil and asked two brethren to administer to the sick ox. Although administration to the sick had only been used for humans, Mary believed that the Lord would heal the animal that she needed so desperately.

After the blessing, the ox got up and was soon ready to pull the wagon again. Two more times other oxen became ill, and twice more Mary asked the brethren to bless them. Each time, they were healed instantly. Despite all difficulties, Mary and her family arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on September 23, 1848, a full day before the rest of the company.

It isn’t always easy to reach a Book of Mormon reading goal, so the young women of the Hemet Third Ward, Hemet California Stake, set up a study buddy program where each person drew the name of partner to help encourage each other to read their two pages a day.
At the end of the nine-month program, more than half of the girls and leaders finished the entire book, and it was time for a celebration. They held a “Book of Mormon Fest,” with games like “Get the Gadiantons,” where the girls threw darts at balloons labeled with the names of Book of Mormon bad guys, and “The Mock Walk,” where the girls had to walk a beam representing the straight and narrow path while being mocked with laughter.

Boy, am I glad I didn’t know what was coming! I might have decided to pull the covers up over my head and hide out for a while.
But there I was, Mike Tucker, standing unknowing in front of my bedroom mirror, adjusting my collar and giving my hair another quick once-over.
Suddenly there was a loud pounding on the door, and in barged my sister, Jill.
“Come on, curly locks,” she teased. “Your ride is here. Stop messing with your precious hair and get a move on.”
“You’re just jealous,” I said with admirable restraint.
Grabbing my jacket and the bag of munchies, I checked out with my parents, then hustled down to Brother Moore’s car.
Brother Moore is this real neat guy who moved into our ward a few months ago. He has a great grin, a wacky sense of humor, and a ton of patience, so naturally they made him our Primary teacher. It was his idea to drag the whole class over to the Conlins’ house for a little party that late-August night.
Matt Conlin is this gutsy classmate who’s been struggling with cancer and chemotherapy. Over the past year, he’d gotten thinner, weaker, and balder; but he always has a smile or a funny story whenever you see him.
We were there that night to celebrate the fact that he was in remission and could finally go back to school. He was a bit self-conscious about it, so we laughed it up and teased him about all the girls he was going to impress with his newfangled hairstyle.
“Yeah, it’s different all right,” he answered with a lopsided grin. “But if it’s so wonderful, how come you guys haven’t joined me?”
We were still laughing about it when we got back into the car to leave.
“You know, boys,” Brother Moore said, settling onto the front seat, “Matt’s putting on a brave front, but he’s really going to need our support, especially the first day he goes back to school.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel a few seconds. “Let’s do something really special for Matt,” he said with enthusiasm. “Come on—anybody have any great ideas?”
We all looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders. You had to be careful when Brother Moore got excited about something!
“No ideas now, huh? Well, you know what I always say—when in doubt, pray about it.”
So right then and there we said a prayer to help us all think of something special we could do for Matt to make his first day back at school easier.
“Now, boys,” Brother Moore added as he eased out into traffic, “when you pray for something, you have to be willing to listen for an answer. I want each of you to go home and listen for your own answer, OK?”
He made it sound so easy that I actually expected to wake up the next morning and find that the answer had been deposited in my brain overnight.
Unfortunately the next morning nothing was there that hadn’t been there before. By the next night I was pacing nervously back and forth in front of my bed, going over all the conversations I’d ever had with Matt, looking for a clue. The trouble was that I couldn’t remember him ever asking anybody for anything. I thought back to our party and his joking about the things that were really worrying him.
Immediately a totally outrageous and not very welcome idea popped into my head. No, no, I argued with myself, Matt was only joking. He’d never expect anyone to … I’ll sleep on it, I reasoned. By morning the “real” answer will come to me.
But three more days went by, and I decided that enough was enough! I didn’t like the answer I’d gotten, but it was the only one I’d gotten and it kept sneaking back into my head. So on the afternoon before school started, I mustered up as much courage as I could and went around the corner to visit a barbershop.
What happened when our Primary class went to pick up Matt for school the next day was extra special. Eddy Kowalski, the kid who got a C- in English last year, wrote one of the best poems I’ve ever read in my life. And Todd Stott and Larry King got permission from the principal to carry Matt’s books and lunch tray because he was still kind of weak. Every one of us had something special to share with Matt that day, and it was really super!
Yep, life is full of surprises. I wouldn’t have wanted to know that I’d end up bald on the first day of school. But it’s sure nice to know that the answers are there, right where you need them, just around the corner.

I would like to pay tribute to my angel mother, who for many years prayed that a husband would become active, that he would recognize his sonship to God, and that he would accept the priesthood. As a little boy, I walked through those many years with my mother’s sustaining hand at church, finally seeing my father receive a testimony by the power of the Holy Ghost. I honor him tonight, and I love him and respect him. He has been my friend, for he has taken me into his confidence. He has taught me how to work, and how to love, and how not to be judgmental. I am grateful for my father and my mother.

Bing! As Kiconco B. sat in her home in Georgia, USA, another picture came into her mom’s inbox. It was from Kiconco’s uncle who was working in Uganda, the country where Kiconco had been born 12 years earlier. Kiconco expected to see the pictures and texts that her uncle sent every Sunday, but what she didn’t expect was the impact this picture would have on her and her summer.
In the picture, a group of children were huddled together. Normally, Kiconco and her mom looked at the pictures and then deleted them, but this time, the Spirit inspired them not to. Kiconco looked at the children more closely. “They were wearing clothing that was ripped and didn’t fit them properly,” Kiconco, now 13, says. “They were wearing rags,” Kiconco’s mom adds.
Kiconco was especially drawn to the two girls in the picture. She asked her uncle about them and found out that they were sisters being raised by their widowed grandmother, Nuliati. Her uncle then sent another picture of the two girls with their grandmother in front of their home, which had dirt floors and grass for a roof. Kiconco’s mom says, “They were standing right in front of their little house that was so beat up.” When the rainy season hit Uganda, their home would turn into a mud puddle. This made it hard for the family to cook because they couldn’t light a fire. It also made it difficult to sleep because there wasn’t a dry place to lie down.
This picture touched Kiconco. She told her mom, “I’m going to help this family.” At first Kiconco decided she was going to send her clothes to the two girls in the picture. But then she says, “I decided to think bigger and brainstormed with my mom. Sending clothes wasn’t enough. It would help them more just to have a house. They had clothes. They just needed a house more.” And so Kiconco decided to raise money to give them a home.
When Nuliati heard that Kiconco was going to help them get a house, she fell to her knees and cried. She had been praying that God would help her. Kiconco’s mom says, “She got to the point that she suffered so much that she thought God didn’t know she existed.” But God had been listening to Nuliati’s prayers, and they were answered in a unique way.
Kiconco knew she would have to raise money to help give the family a home. She decided to complete small projects and to send the money to her uncle in Uganda, who had found a contractor to build the house. It would take a lot of time and energy, but Kiconco went to work. She says, “When you help people and serve them, it makes you feel good. And it makes them happy—and everyone around you.”
She babysat, made and sold bread, watched people’s dogs, and painted fingernails. Every day, Kiconco tried to find projects so she could continue to raise enough money to build the house. She packed and moved boxes, cleared poison ivy, harvested corn, and washed decks. Little by little Kiconco made progress toward her goal. As she earned money, she sent it to her uncle so that the contractor could start building Nuliati’s home.
Raising money was hard work, and every now and then, Kiconco was worn out. “Sometimes I didn’t want to work anymore. I just wanted to stay home,” she says. Kiconco’s mom adds, “She really was sacrificing her whole summer.” But on those days, Kiconco felt God helping her move forward.
Kiconco’s mom started a GoFundMe page and posted about Kiconco’s project on social media. A stranger from Chicago saw the post and told her grandson about it. He donated the money he earned from mowing grass. One of Kiconco’s school teachers told her Sunday School class about Kiconco’s goal. The members were so touched that they donated money. One of Kiconco’s friends also told her grandmother about it. Her grandmother told the members of her church, who were so happy to hear about it that they also donated money. A woman from Kiconco’s ward also sewed a quilt and sold it to raise money for the family. Kiconco’s friends and family donated to the cause too. Overall, 35 people donated money to Kiconco’s project.
When Kiconco started receiving help from others, she said, “Wow! This could actually work!” From the support of others, Kiconco gained an extra boost of energy and found more work. Finally, after many hours of hard work, Kiconco had raised enough money to finish building Nuliati’s home.
The week before Nuliati and her granddaughters moved into their new home, it rained every single day and night, and the little grass roof the family slept under didn’t keep out the water. Their new home had a tin roof and cement floors. Here, they could sleep and cook during the rainy season.
Even though the home was finished, Kiconco knew the family didn’t have any furniture. In fact, they had never owned beds or even blankets. Kiconco wanted to help but didn’t know what else to do, because they had sent all of the money they had raised, and there weren’t any more jobs for them to do to raise money. Then Kiconco told her mom, “I think you might need to take the money from my savings account and go and buy them three beds so they don’t have to sleep on the cold cement floor.”
The next morning, Kiconco’s mom prepared to go to the bank but felt she should wait for the mail to come before she went. When the mail finally came, to Kiconco’s surprise, she found two envelopes that each had a check donating to the project. Kiconco’s mom says, “We opened the mail, looked at each other, and laughed. We almost did a dance!” Now, Kiconco had just enough money to buy furniture for the family. She says, “I knew God was helping me.”
Kiconco immediately sent the money to her uncle, who bought the family three beds, blankets, a table, and chairs.
When the truck pulled up with the furniture, the family was so happy and grateful. Kiconco’s mom says, “Even after they moved in, they felt like it was a dream. They were just amazed at the whole thing.”
Kiconco says, “It made me happy to finally look at the family’s home and to look back at what I had done. It was awesome!” To other youth who want to help others, she says, “Just have faith. You can do anything if you believe you can.”
Kiconco’s mom adds, “It really strengthened our faith because we never got stuck in any stage of building the house. Every time we ran out of funds, something big would happen.”
Nuliati and her two granddaughters still walk barefoot and don’t have electricity. But when they walk home in the drenching Uganda rains, they can dry off, cook a meal, and rest. Kiconco says the most important thing she learned was that “when we serve others, we are serving God.” Kiconco’s small and simple projects came together to bless a family.

Dave and Rosemary Smart were live-at-home missionaries assigned to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Maine. They learned of a young seaman in the coast guard who would soon leave for three months’ sea duty. The seaman and his wife, members of the Church, had three children.
Until the Smarts contacted them, the young couple were unaware of military relations missionaries. They were relieved to know that Elder and Sister Smart would be nearby to offer support to the family in the absence of their husband and father.
The Smarts introduced the couple to the manual Becoming a Self-Reliant and Resilient Family. They explained how to find it in the Gospel Library and on the Gospel Library app. The app version would be of benefit to the seaman when he was at sea and there was no wi-fi aboard ship. He realized that the manual would benefit him and his family and that it would assist him in his job. As a health services technician, he often counsels others.

Once our family spent a night at the home of some out-of-town friends. The next day, our friends’ sons went to school, and we were packing up to leave. My sister and I thought it would be funny to sneak into the boys’ room and put silly notes on their bed. We also got a bottle of glue and squirted glue on their beds. Afterward, I didn’t feel good inside. It didn’t seem funny anymore. I decided to tell my mom what we had done. I knew that we also needed to clean up the glue and confess to our friends. I know that the Holy Ghost helped me to understand that what we did was wrong and that I should tell my mom about it. I learned that I should respect other people’s property.

A young man said that while playing on his soccer and basketball teams, he had to tell his coaches that he would not be able to play on Sundays. This was hard to do as he felt a commitment to the team, but his coaches were very impressed with his commitment to his religion. Later, he invited his soccer team to visit the church meetinghouse. All the players and the parents were impressed with the beauty of the church and had lots of questions about the pictures inside.

Brother Paul related that he was one of three men from Kinkondja who had begun writing to then-Church President Spencer W. Kimball in 1975, asking for missionaries to be sent to the DRC—known as Zaire at the time—and especially to their own village. Brother Delphin added that his deceased father was one of those same three men. (This was well before the Church had been formally organized in the country and before the first missionaries arrived in 1986.) These brothers said that years before, both had been baptized and ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood. But in earlier instructions from Church leaders, they were told that they could not be ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood because at that time they lived too far away from an organized Church unit.
For the next two days, President Monga and Elder Wright taught and trained Brother Paul and Brother Delphin in the duties and obligations of the Melchizedek Priesthood. During his interview with Brother Paul, Elder Wright stressed the obligations associated with priesthood ordination, and reminded Brother Paul that “the priesthood is an irreversible event with heavy consequences based on the oath and covenant of the priesthood.” Speaking through President Monga as translator from Kiluba, his native language, Brother Paul replied, “I have waited for this event for 38 years, anticipating this happening for me. Do you think I will fall away? I will never turn away.”
Both brothers were sustained to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood in the district conference, and afterward ordained by Elder Wright with President Monga translating his words into Kiluba. After their ordinations, they were further authorized by President Monga to baptize their wives and children and to administer the sacrament to the Saints upon their return to Kinkondja. Brother Delphin, the younger of the two brothers, was given an additional instruction to dedicate the grave of his father to “honor him as one of the original converts and pioneers of the great work in the Congo.”

Many years ago, I had the desire to learn how to plant taro, which is our Polynesian potato. To help me in this endeavor, I went to see a very good friend—an elder in the ward—who knew a lot about agriculture, and who, over the years, had accumulated all the necessary expertise to produce beautiful taro in his fa’a’apu (field). I asked him if he could come to my house to teach me the basic techniques for planting beautiful taro. He accepted my invitation. He was excited to share his knowledge.
We talked for 30 minutes, and I took as many notes as possible of all the necessary steps to plant taro. I followed my notes to reproduce the advice my friend had given me. Every day, I would enjoy watering my taro after work. I could see the foliage of the taro plants growing day after day; it was radiant. I could envision myself eating my taro.
The long-awaited moment came to harvest the taro; seven months had gone by. I couldn’t wait to see the size of my taro tubers in the ground. I took my shovel to remove the soil around the plant to extract the taro. To my surprise, I found no taro under the plant. The taro had not grown. It was a total failure! I could see that the foliage of the plant had reached maturity—at least one meter, and it was green, which is a sign that the plant is doing well.
What happened to my taro which did not grow like my friend’s taro? I had followed every advice he had given me.
I would like to share with you some of the lessons I learned from this experience and especially how these lessons have helped my wife and I raise our children to stay on the covenant path, and to produce fruits worthy of the Lord.
The first lesson I learned was that taro needed much more water to grow. I don’t think I watered my taro plants enough. The “corme” (bulb) which is the base of the plant’s stem should not be completely submerged; or if so, only temporarily. However, the soil must constantly remain moist for the roots to grow and bear fruit.
The second lesson was that in addition to living in a humid environment, taro needed to be fertilized regularly because the taro plant needs plenty of nitrogen; and that’s something I hadn’t done, unfortunately. I must have overlooked this important information when I talked to my friend.

A few years ago, I decided to attend the temple weekly. At the time, we lived near a temple. This practice became a reliable source of light and power that I came to count on.
A year later, when our family moved across the country, we no longer lived close to a temple. Temple attendance was not impossible, but faced with the longer travel time and the needs of my young family, I attended only twice a month.
Once the COVID-19 pandemic started, I couldn’t attend the temple at all, which seemed like a punishment after reorganizing my life to attend frequently. I wondered how I could continue to grow spiritually, and I felt heavy with how unfair things seemed.
During a routine dental cleaning, I struggled to calm my mind. When the hygienist asked me what I wanted to listen to during my cleaning, I replied, “I would really love some relaxing meditation sounds.”
She said nobody had ever requested that, but she obliged. Fifteen minutes into our appointment, she expressed how much she was enjoying our “meditative cleaning.” Then she told me about the anxiety in her own life, which included her 13-year-old son’s recent injury. Surrounded by the hum of a busy office, she shared her burden with me, and we found peace together.
In my relaxed mental state, my thoughts went to the temple. I found myself progressing through an initiatory session, the words of my temple covenants passing seamlessly through my mind. Three distinct promptings from the Spirit then followed:
Ask the hygienist the name of her son.
Tell her you will pray for him.
Pray for both of them by name.
Through this seemingly simple exchange, I felt my burden transform into a blessing. I caught a glimpse of how my covenants helped me to love Heavenly Father and my neighbor. The Spirit taught me that attending the temple is just as much about helping others on this side of the veil as it is about spiritually empowering myself and my ancestors.
Temple closures hadn’t stunted my spiritual growth. Rather, they had allowed me to create new ways to engage in God’s work and receive heavenly love, light, and knowledge.

I was in a certain part of the Church not so long ago, and I heard this story: A couple of boys went to the patriarch to receive their blessings. The patriarch knew one of the boys very well, and to the one he knew he said: “I have a wonderful blessing for you.” He blessed the other boy first. Then he laid his hands on the head of the boy for whom he had said he had a wonderful blessing, and he found he could not give him a blessing at all. The words just would not come. Finally he had to say, “You will have to come back some other time.”
The Lord let that patriarch know that no patriarch has a blessing for anybody. The blessings are from the Lord, and when men want to do honor to themselves, speak by their own power, by their own inspiration, they have nothing to give. It is the Lord who has the blessings to give and the patriarch is only the means through whom the Lord works to give His blessings.

Photograph from iStockphoto/Thinkstock
A week after graduating high school, I moved to the other side of the country to live with my older sister’s family for the summer before I started college in the fall.
I made a few friends, most of them older and in college. One Saturday night two of my new friends picked me up to go hear a good band that was playing at a local club.
As we parked, I started feeling a little nervous, but I didn’t want to object and ruin the evening. We entered the club, and the man behind the counter looked at my driver’s license. Without warning he swiped a black permanent marker across the knuckles on both of my hands.
I looked down in surprise. I realized he had marked my hands to show that I was too young to buy alcohol at the bar.
I was immediately uncomfortable. People were drinking and smoking.
I’m sorry to say that I didn’t have the courage to leave right then. After about 30 minutes, one of my friends asked if I was feeling OK. I told him I had a headache from the music and smoke. He offered to take me home, and I gratefully accepted.
I rushed into the bathroom at my sister’s house and scrubbed at those black marks until it hurt. I would be taking the sacrament with these hands the next day, and I desperately wanted them to be clean. However, two faint black lines remained visible on my raw, pink skin.
Before I went to bed, in prayer I asked forgiveness for not having the courage to leave—and more appropriately, for not having the courage to never go inside in the first place. I promised Heavenly Father I would never allow myself to get in that kind of situation again.
The next morning I was able to remove most of the rest of the marker, and my hands were almost completely clean when I took the sacrament. I thought of how sin is like those black marks. It takes effort and can even be painful, but we can repent and have our sins removed through the power of the Atonement and be clean from the black marks in our lives.

As I entered the rest home, my thoughts were not really on grandma, even though she was dying. I loved her, and it made me sad to realize she would soon be leaving, but she had been waiting so long to be with grandpa again that it seemed like her dying would be a blessing, a long-awaited reward for her faithfulness. My own mind longed for such assurance of what the future would hold. I was wrestling with an important decision and was filled with confusion; I found myself pleading with the Lord for peace of mind. That’s why I was so surprised when such a feeling of calmness came over me when I walked into grandma’s room. She was weeping. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and told me softly that as she looked back at her life, she was overcome with the blessings the Lord had given her. Her quiet reflection and gratitude totally removed me from my earthly worries. I hardly realized I was standing there, listening to her in the darkness. She was radiant, thin and dying, but glowing.
Any unappreciative thought I’d ever had about her was erased from my mind, and I was so humbled that I can’t find words to explain it. Why don’t those times stay with us forever? I put my unwrinkled hand over her wrinkled one and held it. I asked her what she was thinking. She said something I’ve often felt but could never quite express. She shook her head and said, “Oh, dear, if you knew all I think about.” Then she told me I looked different. I told her it was because I had no eye makeup on and she probably couldn’t recognize me. But she hadn’t even looked at me. She’d been looking out the window and then she said, “No, you are different than when you came in. You’re seeing your future laid out in front of you, and you wonder what will happen to you.” Tears came to my eyes. She was right. “Don’t be impatient, my dear. The Lord has many good things in store for you, and he loves you very much. But you are impatient like me. You want to tell the Lord when you’re ready and when you’re not.”
Then she smiled. “I have been a trial to my Lord all my life because of my impatience, and now I see my life closing, and I realize he still loves me—he loves me.” When she had finished, tears fell down her cheeks. I wasn’t crying outwardly, but when I saw her tears, mine came, too. At that moment we were sharing something together as children of God, not as an old lady and her granddaughter. That is how I will remember Grandma Windsor, and when my time comes to join her, I hope she will be proud of me.
I walked down the rest home steps with one more testimony that there really is one greater than ourselves, and that he loves me far more than I can even imagine. He has blessed me so much! Knowing that, I can’t be anything less than my best. When I fail, I punish myself. He is a God of abounding love, not hate or resentment. I do so many things wrong, and yet he still loves me. Looking at grandma’s face that day, I could see that love. I could see wisdom, humility, and peace—an overwhelming peace. I wish I could have written on stone plates that would last forever the feeling I had then.

One evening at Christmastime, my wife and I visited a nursing home in Salt Lake City. We looked in vain for a 95-year-old widow whose memory had become clouded and who could not speak a word. An attendant led us in our search, and we found Nell in the dining room. She had eaten her meal; she was sitting silently, staring into space. She did not show us any sign of recognition. As I reached to take her hand, she withdrew it. I noticed that she held firmly to a Christmas greeting card. The attendant smiled and said, “I don’t know who sent that card, but she will not lay it aside. She doesn’t speak, but pats the card and holds it to her lips and kisses it.” I recognized the card. It was one my wife, Frances, had sent to Nell the week before. We left Maytime Manor more filled with the Christmas spirit than when we entered. We kept to ourselves the mystery of that special card and the life it had gladdened and the heart it had touched. Heaven was nearby.

Sacrifice has always been required of missionaries. Brigham Young recorded: “In company with several of the Twelve I was sent to England in 1839. We started from home without purse or scrip, and most of the Twelve were sick; and those who were not sick when they started were sick on the way to Ohio; Brother Taylor was left to die by the roadside, by old Father Coltrin, though he did not die. I was not able to walk to the river, not so far as across this block, no, not more than half as far; I had to be helped to the river in order to get into a boat to cross it. This was about our situation. I had not even an overcoat; I took a small quilt from the trundle bed, and that served for my overcoat, while I was traveling to the State of New York, where I had a coarse satinette overcoat given to me. Thus we went to England, to a strange land to sojourn among strangers.” (Preston Nibley, Missionary Experiences, Bookcraft, 1975, p. 90.)

Susan: “For a while, any contact my husband, Tim, had with the Church was very stressful for me. I was constantly praying that someone would say the thing that would open his eyes and that no one would do or say anything that would offend him.

“Five years passed before I finally realized that during my own investigation of the Church, no one had smoothed the way for me or prepared every personality for my benefit. There had been unsettling experiences for me now and again; but through it all, I had retained my agency. When I decided to be baptized, I did so because I knew through prayer and study that the Church was true.

“Now I have accepted the fact that my husband is capable of making the same mature investigation of the Church whenever he is ready.”

by Elder Craig BarrOhio Columbus Mission
Every year there is a big celebration down in Elkins, West Virginia, called the Forest Festival. To take part in the festival missionaries in the past have set up a display about some aspect of the Church. This year we decided to really do a good job.
Our display consisted of a giant painting of the Washington D.C. Temple. In fact, it was 8-by-12 feet and was painted by an artist in the branch in Elkins. To go with the painting, we obtained a tent 20-by-40 feet from the Army Reserve Depot at Charleston, West Virginia. We set up the tent behind the painting and showed movies to festival visitors. We ran Man’s Search for Happiness, Meet the Mormons, and The New Landmark, a film on the Washington D.C. Temple. On each side of the entrance we placed a display board and pamphlets. These were centered on the family, the family home evening program, and temple work. Floodlights were also set up. There was a blue light in front of the painting to enhance the beauty of the temple and white lights on the side to offset the color and light the display boards. The title of our booth was Why Families and Why Temples?
For four days we had from two to four missionaries at the booth. The response that we received was tremendous. We were kept busy day and night. Many people stopped and commented on the painting, and many others asked for pamphlets and wanted to see the movies. Others requested to hear the missionary lessons or signed our guest register and asked us to come and see them after the festival was over.
The last day there was a parade, and the special guest was President Gerald R. Ford. He stopped and waved to us when he saw the painting of the temple.
We closed down the booth that same evening. When we reflected back over those hurried days, we could see what a great success the booth had been. We had received over 40 referrals and many other verbal referrals. We had come in contact with people who requested that the missionaries come to their homes. Now we are busy teaching and are very grateful for the response that we had. We are especially grateful to those who donated time and talents to help make the display a success.

“A long time before your grandma was born, one of her grandmother’s grandmothers lived in England. Her name was Elizabeth, and her husband died, leaving her with five children to care for. When the missionaries taught her the gospel, she knew that it was true and was baptized. In those days, new members of the Church left their homes to join the Saints in Utah. So Grandma Elizabeth gathered her children and a few possessions and boarded a boat for America. Just before the boat sailed, her brothers came alongside in a rowboat. They yelled up at her, ‘How can you take your children into that desolate wilderness? They may die! If you give up this foolish idea and stay with us, we will pay for your children’s education. They’ll have a good life here!’ But Grandma said no. She wanted to raise her children among the Saints, and she believed that they’d be safe. Do you know why?”
Katherine shook her head.
“Grandma had been given a special blessing before she left England. In it, Heavenly Father promised that if she lived righteously, all her children would reach Utah safely. Grandma faithfully kept her promise by keeping the commandments, and she believed that Heavenly Father would keep His promise.”
“Did He?” Katherine asked eagerly.
“You’ll soon find out,” Mom said with a wink. “Grandma Elizabeth was too poor to buy horses or oxen to carry her across the plains. She and her children walked and pulled a handcart, instead. There were no bridges across rivers in those days, so when the pioneers came to a river, they had to wade or swim across.
“One day Grandma was carrying her six-year-old son on her shoulders as she crossed a river. This river was deep, and its powerful current pulled at her so hard that she began to lose her footing and slip downstream. The people on the riverbank saw her being washed away. They yelled for her to let go of her son and swim for her life. ‘You’ll never make it with him on your shoulders!’ they shouted. ‘Let him go and save yourself!’”
“She didn’t let him go, did she, Mom?”
“No, sweetheart, she didn’t. She remembered Heavenly Father’s promise that her children would reach Utah safely. She fought to keep her head above water as the river surged around her. Her son’s legs hung down over her shoulders, and she gripped them tightly as she thrashed her legs to try to reach the shore.
“There were branches growing from the riverbank that Grandma Elizabeth could have grabbed to pull herself in, but she would not let go of her son’s legs for an instant. She prayed for strength to hold on, and at last she came to a shallow area near the river’s edge. She waded to the riverbank and leaned against it, trembling with exhaustion. After men from the handcart company lifted her son off her shoulders from above, she crawled up after him.”
“Oh!” Katherine exclaimed, giving a little jump. “I liked that story!”
“It’s not over yet,” Mom laughed. “Right on the banks of that river, Grandma Elizabeth knelt and said a prayer. She thanked Heavenly Father for giving her the strength to help fulfill her blessing to keep her children safe.”