Gospel Story Finder

I was standing in line with my mom to pay for our groceries. The line was crowded, so my mom had to bend over this little boy in front of us to buy our things. The little boy started to kick her. The second time he kicked her, she backed away and said, “Will you please stop kicking?”
The boy’s mom turned around and told my mom it was her fault she got kicked. She said all sorts of insulting things to us. I started to glare at her as she turned back around and was rude to the cashier too! I acted calm, but inside I was angry. It bugged me. I knew that what happened wasn’t my mom’s fault or mine, but I still felt hurt.
When we got home, I went to my room and pulled out my scriptures. After reading for a minute, I felt a need to pray. I hardly felt in the mood, but I knelt down and started to pray. Eventually, I found myself praying for this woman who had treated us so awfully. The calmest feeling I’ve ever felt settled all over me. I couldn’t find room in my heart to be angry at her anymore. I felt love.
Teresa G., Idaho, USA

Christ has helped me through many trials in my life, even those times when heaven seemed so far away and I felt I was suffering alone. Ryan and I suffered through several miscarriages and two failed adoptions at the beginning of our marriage. Given what I’d gone through growing up, I protested to Heavenly Father that I deserved an exemption from any more trials. But that isn’t how it works, is it? We grieved and suffered over infertility, and the sadness and agony consumed us for over five long years. Any hope for children of our own seemed impossible during those times, but we lived our lives the best we knew how. And when my faith lacked, I had to rely on church leaders, family, and strong friends during those years. Then, what do you think came next? Surprise! Heavenly Father blessed us with four wonderful children—two sets of twins, back to back!

After all, all things are done in His timeline, not ours. I know sometimes the way forward seems grim when you’re in the thick of it, but if you are out there feeling alone, overwhelmed, or confused, or whatever challenge you are facing, don’t ever give up. Keep doing what you know is right and turn to our Savior for help. I know that the day will finally come when we will look back to find that the hardships we experience today are temporary.

4 Joseph F. always remembered the anguish he felt the last time he saw his father. He wrote, “Without getting off his horse, Father leaned over in his saddle and picked me up off the ground. He kissed me good-bye and put me down again, and I saw him ride away.” Several days passed before five-year-old Joseph F. and his mother, Mary Fielding Smith, had any news of Hyrum.
5 Then the tragic night came. Joseph F. later wrote, “I remember the night of the murder … when one of the brethren came from Carthage and knocked on Mother’s window after dark and, with a trembling voice, called to my mother, ‘Sister Smith, your husband has been killed.’”
6 Joseph F. always remembered the fear he felt that night as he lay in his bed listening to his mother crying.

We had a wonderful life. We had jobs to earn a little bit of money here and there. During World War II, we collected and sold scrap metal to help with the war effort. I would get my little pile, and we would sell it to a scrap metal dealer for a few dimes. My father would make out a tithing slip for my two or three pennies. He did that with all of the children in Bunkerville Ward, and we really learned about paying tithing. Since we didn’t have a chapel, we held church in the school; the bishop’s work was done in our home. I can remember seeing other children and adults coming to pay their tithing. It was a good lesson, and I’ve never forgotten it.

Several years later, after I was married, I gazed into the eyes of my firstborn child and knew I had to take the next step toward participating fully in the gospel that had taught me parents can be with their children forever. My husband, not yet an active member, understood and supported my decision to return to the Church. I finally committed myself to full activity, and with that has come a deepened relationship with our Heavenly Father and an appreciation for the Book of Mormon.

When I was 16, I moved into a Taiwanese ward. Ken, a 13-year-old, had recently been baptized. But shortly after his baptism, Ken almost never attended church. I had a great desire to help Ken come back to church. I invited him to come to several Church activities. Ken played basketball at Mutual and joined the youth choir. He and his sister, Linda, also began to attend the free English classes taught by my family and the missionaries. Soon Linda began to attend youth activities as well. I could see God’s hand helping us.
Ken’s family wondered why my family tried to help Ken and Linda. We told them that the gospel had brought us great joy, and we really wanted others to find the same joy and peace from the Savior. Later, Linda and Ken accepted our invitation to go to church. Linda came and had an awesome experience. However, Ken was ill, and when I prayed about what I could do to help him, I felt impressed that we should bring him the sacrament. With the bishop’s permission, our family went over to his house, and my brother and I helped administer the sacrament to him. We also visited with his family. I felt peaceful.
Our family has prayed for Ken, and all of us feel love for Ken and his family. The youth and adults in the ward and stake continue to fellowship Ken and Linda. The members’ combined efforts to minister are helping Ken and Linda feel the love of the Savior. This experience of trying to minister like the Savior has brought great joy to my life. Ministering is the Lord’s work, and because it is His work, His hand will guide our ministering efforts.

The ward Primary sacrament meeting program was next week. Mandy didn’t have a speaking part in the program this year. She was playing a piano solo instead. She had played prelude music for Primary before, but she had never played in front of the whole ward.
Mandy had been taking piano lessons since she’d turned eight last year. She loved her lessons. She especially liked learning to play the Primary songs. Right now, she played from a book of simplified arrangements. Someday, her teacher said, she’d play from the Children’s Songbook.
“I don’t know if I can play in the program,” Mandy said to her mother one night as they finished doing the dinner dishes. “I get all nervous just thinking about it.”
After Mother dried her hands on a dish towel, she said, “Did you know that Sister Hatch gets nervous, too?”
Sister Hatch was Mandy’s piano teacher, and she was also the Primary pianist. “Why would Sister Hatch be nervous? She plays great.”
“She still gets nervous. Just like you.”
At her next piano lesson, Mandy asked Sister Hatch, “Do you get nervous when you have to play in front of a whole bunch of people?”
Sister Hatch made a face. “All the time.”
“What do you do?” Mandy asked.
“First, I practice a lot. I try to do everything that I can to make sure I do a good job. Then I say a prayer.”
Mandy frowned. “What if you want to say a prayer right before you start to play?”
“I say the prayer in my head,” Sister Hatch said, “and in my heart. Heavenly Father knows what’s there even if I don’t say the words out loud.”
Mandy thought about that. “What if I make a mistake anyway?”
Sister Hatch grinned. “I make at least a couple of mistakes every Sunday when I’m playing for Primary.”
Mandy stared at her teacher in surprise. “You do? I’ve never noticed.”
“And no one will notice if you make a mistake. The important thing is to keep going. You know the song. Let your fingers do what they’ve been practicing.” Sister Hatch put her arm around Mandy’s shoulder. “I’ll be sitting right next to you during the program. If you start feeling afraid, reach over and squeeze my hand. And I’ll do the same if I feel scared.”
The morning of the program, Mandy felt sick to her stomach. She walked into her sister’s room. Sara was putting on her makeup.
“My stomach feels funny,” Mandy said.
“It’s just butterflies,” Sara said.
“It doesn’t feel like butterflies,” Mandy said. “It feels more like big, scary bats!”
“Don’t worry,” Sara said. “You’ll do fine.”
Mandy went to the piano and practiced her song. She had played it so much that she had memorized it. Still, she planned to take her book with her.
At church, Mandy sat with the other Primary children in the first three rows of the chapel. When the children went up to the stand following the sacrament, Mandy took her place beside Sister Hatch. Julie, who was also playing a solo, sat on the other side. As the Primary president introduced the Primary theme for the year, Mandy started to reach for Sister Hatch’s hand. Then she noticed that her teacher was reaching for hers at the same time. They looked at each other and smiled.
They squeezed hands, then Sister Hatch stood to go to the piano. The Primary children sang the first verse of “Follow the Prophet.”
As the time grew nearer for her to play her song, Mandy’s stomach started to feel funny again. Then she remembered what Sister Hatch had said about saying a prayer in her head and heart.
When it was Mandy’s turn to play, she placed her book on the piano, even though she didn’t need it. Her fingers did what they were supposed to do. When she played the last note, she let out a long breath and returned to her seat.
Sister Hatch gave Mandy a quick hug. “You did great,” she whispered.
Mandy felt great. The butterflies in her stomach had been replaced with a prayer in her heart.

We had a wonderful experience with our son that taught us the importance of exercising faith in our Heavenly Father’s plan. He was about six or seven years old at the time. We were visiting with family for a few weeks and went for a drive with them to Park City, Utah. It was a beautiful winter day; we were seeing the sites and had stopped at one of the ski resorts. As we were walking, we noticed our son had climbed high on a nearby steep hill. His grandfather looked up the hill and asked, “JD, how did you get so far up that hill?” JD’s response (and he had to shout so we could hear him): “Grandpa, you just gotta believe!” That experience has been a good reminder to our family of the importance of exercising faith as you are lengthening your stride.

For some time, the large number of convert baptisms in the Campinas Brazil Castelo Stake had been challenging our ability as leaders to help our new members nourish the seed of truth and grow strong in the gospel. As a stake presidency, we felt an urgency to make sure new converts were being taught “the good word of God,” as President Gordon B. Hinckley has asked (see “Find the Lambs, Feed the Sheep,” Liahona, July 1999, 123).
About three years ago, as we discussed President Hinckley’s counsel as a stake presidency, we noticed an interesting thing: most of the members in our stake who were subscribing to the Liahona were longtime members; they knew the value of receiving the prophets’ words in their homes. However, most new members were not subscribing. We became convinced that an important part of our efforts to help new converts receive the spiritual sustenance they need was getting the Liahona into their homes.
This was no small task. Some 200 converts join our stake each year. How could we encourage these new members to subscribe without making them feel a subscription was obligatory? We didn’t want them to resent our encouragement, particularly if they were facing financial difficulties. And we didn’t want them to feel they had to subscribe to the Liahona to be good members of the Church.
Still, we recognized the power that flows into homes where people regularly read the words of the living prophets and other inspired Church members. We wanted each member of our stake to have access to that source of strength.
In considering the situation, we figured that the number of baptisms we had in a year corresponded to about 80 families. We asked ourselves, Why couldn’t we give a year’s subscription to the Liahona, free of charge, to these 80 families? We felt that after a year’s exposure to the magazine, they would want to continue their subscription on their own. But what of the cost to our meager stake resources? We decided that getting the First Presidency Message and the rest of the magazine into our new converts’ homes on a regular basis justified the cost.
As a stake presidency, we found a way to help new members receive a subscription for their first year in the Church. These new members received the Liahona gladly. Thelma de Paula Silva, a new member of the Rosolem Branch, reflects the feelings of many. “The Liahona has helped me set and achieve goals,” she says. “It has helped me strengthen my own testimony, and it helps my family members who still don’t belong to the Church. It brings joy and love to my home and helps me in my calling as Young Women president. The Liahona is a light for me in moments of darkness.”
As a stake presidency, we also pondered what we could do to help less-active members feel motivated to return to full activity in the Church. The year after our Liahona project began, we asked ourselves the questions, Now that the new members are being exposed to the Liahona, what about the less-active members of our stake? Why couldn’t we extend our Liahona program to them? We figured the number of subscriptions required for these members, and we felt we should order one-year subscriptions for them. Again we found a way to do so.
As our new and less-active members received their magazines, we began to notice an increase in attendance at our sacrament meetings. We felt better as a stake presidency, knowing that our brothers and sisters were being “nourished by the good word of God” (Moro. 6:4).
We began to wonder about active members of our stake who were not subscribing. During all this time, we had asked the bishops and branch presidents to make sure that every member household was given the opportunity to have the magazine. Active members were encouraged to obtain or renew their own subscriptions to the Liahona. We learned that some active members wanted to subscribe but didn’t have the financial means to do so. We decided to include these members in our stake subscription program as well.
As subscription levels among our active members increased, we received many favorable comments. Carla Virginia Soares de Oliveira of the Amarais Branch said: “I’ve been a member of the Church for five years. But I started receiving the Liahona only last year. The things I had not yet learned in Sunday School or Relief Society, I am now learning through the Church magazine.”
Leandro Domingos, a young member of the Amarais Branch, is the only Latter-day Saint in his family. “When I have doubts or questions,” he says, “I always get strength from the Liahona. I love the stories it contains. I usually can relate them to my own situation. Although my mother is not a member, she always compliments the articles.”
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.”
While it is difficult to measure all the benefits of this effort, we are gratified to see joy on the faces of members as they give talks, lessons, or testimonies about the influence of the Liahona in their lives. We have also seen an increased desire among our members to receive the counsel of the Lord through the magazine. Many people wait eagerly for it to arrive, anticipating that its messages will bless their lives.
Karen Pereira da Silva, a magazine representative in the Anhanguera Ward, expresses our sentiments exactly: “It is almost as if the magazine is made especially for me. Many times while reading its articles, especially the message from the First Presidency, I have felt through the Spirit that the counsel being given was what I needed to hear at that particular moment of my life.”
We are convinced our efforts to have a Liahona in every home in our stake have helped bring the joy and peace of the gospel of Jesus Christ into the lives of our brothers and sisters in greater abundance.

Nathan ate his breakfast and smiled. Mother kept thanking Heavenly Father. She thanked Him for morning, for sunshine, for a blue sky.
“Mother, you thanked Heavenly Father three times!” he giggled.
“Three times? No wonder I’m happy. Thanking Heavenly Father for His gifts makes me very happy!”
Nathan stared at Mother. Her eyes sparkled; her lips curved up. She was happy! “I want to be happy, too!” he cried.
“Thank Heavenly Father, and you will be happy!” Mother told him.
“OK.” Nathan thanked Heavenly Father for the birds he heard chirping in the bush near the kitchen window. He smiled. Mother was right! Thanking Heavenly Father did make him happy!
The rest of the morning he thanked Heavenly Father for many things: the backyard with the swing in it; the apple tree that had pretty white blossoms now, and later would have good apples; Grandma’s dog, Lady; kittens and fish; the moon and stars; his playmates, Tom and Chris; and his new bike. Nathan was very, very happy!
At noon Mother said, “Lunchtime, happy Nathan!”
Nathan laughed. He was happy! He was hungry, too. And when he bowed his head to thank Heavenly Father for the good food, Nathan also said, “And I thank Thee for making me happy!”

In the hospital one day I was wheeled out of the operating room by an attendant who stumbled, and there issued from his angry lips vicious cursing with a combination of the names of the Savior. Even half-conscious, I recoiled and implored: “Please! Please! That is my Lord whose names you revile.”
There was a deathly silence; then a subdued voice whispered, “I am sorry.” He had forgotten for the moment that the Lord had forcefully commanded all his people, “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain” (Ex. 20:7).

We went over to Cordoba in Argentina. As the president of the mission and I were going down the street, we met a young woman in her early 30s, and the mission president said, “Sister, tell Brother Kimball how many people you have brought into the Church. She said, “Oh, I didn’t do very much.” He said, “Well, tell him.” She said, “I think it’s about 32.” Thirty-two of her friends had come into the Church because one woman was willing to accept her responsibility—not only a privilege, but a responsibility—to bring people into the Church.

One young man strayed from the Church for years before finally returning. At a testimony meeting he said: “I got involved in a lot of things I shouldn’t have in an effort to fit in with the popular group, but I always knew something was missing. When I finally repented and returned to full activity in the Church, I didn’t feel that void anymore. I came back, and through the forgiveness of Jesus Christ and His perfect love, I know this is where I belong.”

Twenty-three-year-old Totshauna Svenstrup, her husband, Christian, and their two small daughters were four of those who responded to the call. They came out of Denmark and, after sailing to the United States, joined one of two ill-fated handcart companies that headed westward to Zion. Totshauna’s daughter, Anna Karil, at that time only five, years later wrote briefly of the trek in her journal:
“Father died just outside of Florence [Nebraska] in a wagon accident. Mother pulled the cart, and she with child. We buried Gury in the snow by the Sweetwater [Wyoming]. She froze one night next to me and Mother in the tent. We reached the Salt Lake Valley in October. In December Mother delivered a son.”

It had been years since I had attended sacrament meeting at the care center. But now, representing the stake Relief Society presidency, I had come back to visit a ward conference session at the nursing home.
As the prelude music signaled the beginning of the meeting, I glanced around the room. Some of those who attended were suffering the infirmities of old age. Others had been stricken with abnormalities at birth, and their whole lives had been upward struggles. Just to sit or to be strapped to a wheelchair was an accomplishment.
To my left was a familiar wheelchair, a little apart from the semicircle. I had seen this little lady each time I had visited. Thick, straight hair, squared to the chin, framed her bony face. Her jaw was twisted and loose, and her long tongue often hung out. The rest of her body was twisted and contorted, as though her joints were trying to bend in the wrong direction. But, strapped to her wheelchair, she seemed to await the meeting as anxiously as anyone else.
We sang and prayed, and as the meeting progressed, I watched the sacrament table. One of the priests seemed confident and experienced, while the other looked nervous. Then the deacons caught my eye as they approached the table, received the trays, and began to pass the sacrament.
One of them stepped up to the woman in the wheelchair. Her arm was twisted through the bar of the arm rail; her palsied shoulder did not respond. As the deacon approached, her twisted, toothless mouth fell open. Without hesitation, he took a piece of bread and placed it on her tongue.
From across the room came a high-pitched voice: “Did you see that sweet boy give bread to Rosie?”
At the amen ending the prayer on the water, I thought, “Shall I get up and help her with that tiny cup? How will she manage?” While I sat in my chair, the same deacon gently poured the water into that helpless mouth, blessing Rosie again with his service.
I sat, ashamed at my failure to act. Then, as that deacon stood before me, I saw the trembling in his hands, the questioning in his eyes, a pleading to know if he had done right. All I had seen was his strength and compassion. I nodded and tried to reassure him with a smile.
Had he been primed or prepared for that moment, or was it spontaneous? Either way, it was a hard thing for a 12-year-old boy. And I was overcome with appreciation for a young priesthood servant quietly fulfilling just another quorum assignment.

As we remember our experiences and blessings from prayer, we will also come to more fully understand the power of prayer as a means to keep us growing up toward the Lord. I have invited my husband, Dean, to share with you today his experience with prayer as means to keep us growing toward the Lord.

Dean: When I returned from my mission back in the 1960's, I was going to Weber State, majoring in English and minoring in Philosophy. Two of my favorite professors were men who had grown up as Latter-day Saints but had now "outgrown" their beliefs. They loved to poke fun at the logic or what they considered the logic of the foolish "local culture", as they liked to refer to Latter-day Saints. I struggled with that, but they were brilliant, charming men, and I thought I was strong enough to handle anything they threw at me.

Skepticism seems to come naturally to me, my middle name is Thomas, and under their influence, doubt about my testimony began to grow. I started to wonder whether any of my reasons for believing were valid. I attended Institute classes, but those teachers seemed all "sweetness and light," not nearly so tough-minded and erudite as the two professors on campus.

I came to a time when I wondered whether I believed anything, even whether I believed in God, and I began to admit to myself and ask myself whether I shouldn't really disassociate myself from the Church if I had no more testimony than that. It was the most frightening experience of my life. But a number of experiences helped me at that very point: I met a brilliant professor who was a believer; I met Kathy, and I loved her goodness. And I reviewed my mission and asked myself whether some of those experiences I called "spiritual" were real, and I found that I did believe in them- without trying. I reestablished my trust in what I'd felt, first-hand. But the great realization for me was that if I disclaimed God, and turned toward disbelief, I wouldn't be able to pray. And that's when I knew that I did have a testimony. Prayer was absolutely real to me. I had established a relationship with God that lasted since my childhood. I believed in prayer, and I didn't have to talk myself into that belief. I knew I couldn't live without praying, and that meant I couldn't live without God.

All my life someone had been responsible for me, checking my spiritual readiness. But at that point, I had to grow up. There comes a time in our lives when it's no longer good enough to believe because our parents do, our bishop does, our mission president. We grow up when we accept responsibility not only for our careers, and our goals, our worldly choices, but for our faith. For me--for everyone, really--the first source of faith is the Holy Ghost, whose influence we find in humility and prayer.

I testify that I know victims of serious abuse who have successfully made the difficult journey to full healing through the power of the Atonement. After her own concerns were resolved by her faith in the healing power of the Atonement, one young woman who had been severely abused by her father requested another interview with me. She returned with an older couple. I could sense that she loved the two very deeply. Her face radiated happiness. She began, “Elder Scott, this is my father. I love him. He’s concerned about some things that happened in my early childhood. They are no longer a problem for me. Could you help him?” What a powerful confirmation of the Savior’s capacity to heal! She no longer suffered from the consequences of abuse, because she had adequate understanding of His Atonement, exercised sufficient faith, and was obedient to His law. As you conscientiously study the Atonement and exercise your faith that Jesus Christ has the power to heal, you can receive the same blessed relief. During your journey of recovery, accept His invitation to let Him share your burden until you have sufficient time and strength to be healed.

For much of my life, I believed if I was obedient to God’s commandments, I was entitled to any and all blessings that I asked for. Imagine my bewilderment when, after trying to live a life of obedience for my nearly 30 years, I watched addiction and a cancer diagnosis devastate my family; my father lose his job at the outbreak of a pandemic; my sister contract a debilitating terminal illness; and several other life-changing events I never dreamed I’d experience.
I spent a lot of time in fervent prayer, trying to figure out why these things were happening. I felt I had earned blessings. Why did it appear that people who made no efforts to be obedient had amazing lives without the kinds of trials I had faced? From my finite perspective, my circumstances felt confusing, frustrating, and unjust.
It can be hard to have a broad perspective amid trials, but looking back, I can see that the Lord’s ways truly are not our ways (see Isaiah 55:8). As finite beings in this mortal sphere, some of us like to be instantly gratified, effortlessly happy, and constantly comfortable.
But Heavenly Father wants better for us. In His infinite wisdom, He understands what each of His children needs to obtain eternal joy, lasting happiness, and divine comfort.
Consequently, we are not always given the blessings we ask for because they are not for our everlasting benefit. Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles taught: “Some misunderstand the promises of God to mean that obedience to Him yields specific outcomes on a fixed schedule. They might think, ‘If I diligently serve a full-time mission, God will bless me with a happy marriage and children,’ or ‘If I refrain from doing schoolwork on the Sabbath, God will bless me with good grades.’ … If life doesn’t fall out precisely this way or according to an expected timetable, they may feel betrayed by God. But things are not so mechanical in the divine economy. We ought not to think of God’s plan as a cosmic vending machine where we (1) select a desired blessing, (2) insert the required sum of good works, and (3) the order is promptly delivered.”1
The Lord said that “inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments ye shall prosper in the land” (2 Nephi 4:4). The ultimate prosperity Heavenly Father intends for his children is “immortality and eternal life” (Moses 1:39). And because of His deep love for us, He invites us to use our agency to make choices that will lead to that point. But nowhere in the scriptures does it say that He will give us exactly what we want. He knows far better than we do what is best for us. So whether we receive the blessings we are hoping for or not, we are asked to trust that it is for our good (see Doctrine and Covenants 122:7).
The personal revelation to serve a mission was one of the clearest answers to prayer I’ve ever received. Admittedly, I was not thrilled about the prospect of leaving my family for 18 months, but I could not deny the answer I received. So, I obediently heeded the call.
There were wonderful parts of my mission, but I also experienced a lot of challenges that tested my faith and caused me to wonder why I was even prompted to serve a mission! However, as I look back now, I can honestly say that the difficult experiences on my mission strengthened me in many ways, and they prepared me to receive blessings later on.
Sometimes our obedience leads us into a refiner’s fire (see Malachi 3:2), and that is never a comfortable experience. But if we allow that fire to change us, from the resultant ashes comes new growth and beauty (see Isaiah 61:3).
True conversion to Christ includes having complete trust that both He and Heavenly Father want us to have only what is best for us in the eternal scheme. When we wholeheartedly believe that, we can genuinely end all our prayers with “Thy will be done, O Lord, and not ours” (Doctrine and Covenants 109:44). With this commitment to do as President Russell M. Nelson instructed and “let God prevail in our lives,”2 we understand that we will not get all the things we want or think we deserve. We will be content and happy with the blessings that have come to us through obedience to God’s commandments without comparing ourselves with how we perceive other people are living and how God is blessing them.
Abraham’s perspective allowed him to have faith.
Abraham, by Robert T. Barrett
A beautiful example of this true conversion is the prophet Abraham. The Lord told him to “look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be” (Genesis 15:5). So it must have been shocking to Abraham when, in his old age, the Lord commanded him to kill Isaac, the son God had indicated He would use to establish His covenant (see Genesis 17:19). Abraham must have wondered why God would ask him to give up the son who was to follow him in the covenant line. But Abraham never questioned the Lord, recognizing that the Lord knows the end from the beginning and trusting that His promise would be fulfilled.
At the very moment Abraham was about to slay his son, an angel stopped him and commended his willingness to be obedient (See Genesis 22:11–12). Later the angel quoted the Lord, saying: “I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore” (Genesis 22:17). Abraham had faith that somehow the Lord would bless him, even if it wasn’t in the manner he had originally thought.
A powerful reminder from this account is that we can choose how we perceive the workings of the Lord; we can choose to have faith. Abraham could have looked at the Lord’s command to kill his son as profoundly unfair and merciless. Yet Abraham chose to see it differently—he chose to focus on the Lord’s power, reliability, and goodness.
Developing a perspective like Abraham’s isn’t easy—it takes time and practice. At times I have been resistant to developing the humility required for submitting my will and trusting in the Lord. I have thrown spiritual temper tantrums, upset that I’m not getting what I want and feeling bitter that I continue to experience hardships. In these instances, I have failed to see that “to get [us] from where [we] are to where [the Lord] wants [us] to be requires a lot of stretching, and that generally entails discomfort and pain.”3
This does not mean that the Lord wants us to be miserable—just the opposite. The Lord intends that we “might have joy” (see 2 Nephi 2:25). But the word “might” implies that our joy depends on our agency. If we want true, everlasting joy, we choose to see blessings in whatever form and time they come. We choose to remain obedient, even when it doesn’t yield immediate results, because we love and trust Heavenly Father. And we work to understand that the richest blessings are in the lessons we choose to learn from our trials, for those are what draw us closer to Christ.
And isn’t drawing closer to the Savior and becoming like Him the whole point of this life?
I have spent a lot of time focusing on the negative aspects of trials and the disappointment of not getting what I think I want. I still have moments of questioning why my life often seems harder than many other people’s. And I sometimes wonder why, despite my diligent obedience, desired blessings seem to be missing. But I am learning to see that the Lord is constantly blessing me when I am obedient to His commandments (see Doctrine and Covenants 82:10; 130:20–21), even if those blessings do not always come in the timing or manner I may hope for.
Whenever a blessing is not granted in the manner or timing we expect, we have the opportunity to carefully evaluate the ways we have seen Heavenly Father and our Savior show up in our lives, because They always do. When we truly understand this truth, we will have the perspective and courage to humbly proclaim, “Thy will be done.”

As a young missionary I witnessed such an example in the conduct of President Harold B. Lee. I had the privilege of traveling through my mission with Elder Lee, who at the time was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve. During the trip he was suffering with stomach pain from what was thought to be an ulcer. Some individuals might be unpleasant traveling companions with such discomfort, perhaps feeling irritable or complaining, but Elder Lee was not the least bit unpleasant.

One evening, after driving several hours, we stopped for dinner, and a young waitress came to take our orders. Elder Lee, feeling the painful effects of his condition, asked only for a bowl of “milk toast.” The young lady replied that he could not have milk toast because it was not on the menu. Elder Lee, in a kindly manner, simply requested two slices of toast and a glass of milk. He then asked if it would be too much trouble to warm the milk. When his meal was served, he politely asked if he might please have an empty bowl. After he received the bowl, he thanked the waitress and proceeded to break the bread into the bowl and pour the warm milk over it. He did not get upset or impatient; he just kindly resolved the situation. I have always been grateful to have observed this mark as it was added to President Lee’s touchstone.

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I joined the Church when I was 14 years old. My parents granted me permission to be baptized, but neither of them were interested in joining or even learning about the Church.
For more than 10 years, I yearned for my family to know the happiness I felt in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I invited the missionaries and members to come over for dinner. My family was taught the missionary lessons multiple times, but nothing changed. During that decade, I attended church, received my endowment, and served a full-time mission without any family support.
When I returned home to Mexico following my mission at Temple Square in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, I lived with my mother. (My parents had divorced while I was in high school.) I started working at the Mexico Missionary Training Center, so I cleverly invited her to come meet the elders and sisters I was teaching. I subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) invited the missionaries serving in my ward to join my mother and me for dinner. I did everything I could to get her around missionaries, hoping that she might ask more about the gospel, but my efforts all seemed in vain.
I think she met every single set of missionaries I associated with during that three-year period, and still nothing happened.
In 2008, I moved to the United States to pursue a degree in nursing. Toward the end of the year, following extensive renovation, the Mexico City Mexico Temple held an open house. I urged my mother to go see what the temple was all about while she had this opportunity. After much prodding on my part, she agreed to make the 70-mile (113 km) drive to attend the open house.
When I spoke to her next, she gushed about what an amazing experience she had had. She talked about how, in the celestial room, she felt something beautiful but indescribable. She told me that she had plans to return again. In fact, she was able to go many more times during the remaining weeks of the open house. She even attended the cultural celebration prior to the temple’s rededication.*
The next time we talked on the phone, Mom told me she was going to invite the missionaries to teach her. Seemingly out of nowhere, she was asking questions and paying attention in ways that I had so long been hoping for. When I went home at Christmastime during my school break, I noticed that she was different. While she had always been kind and compassionate, there was a deep change in her—a conversion.
I returned to school amazed at what was taking place. A week later, Mom called and said, “Sonia, I just wanted to know when you’re coming back to Mexico, because I’m getting baptized.”
I was so excited, so happy! I flew home in February for her baptism. It was amazing to me to watch her attend church, to see her accept and serve in a calling, and to grow in the gospel. I knew that she knew it was true.
It was also powerful to hear her pray. I was especially touched to hear her pray for me and my safety just before I returned to the United States. There is nothing like a parent’s prayer for a child.
Why didn’t things happen sooner? I don’t know. Maybe my mother needed to have seeds planted in her life before she could accept the gospel. Maybe the temple touched her in a way and at a time that my earlier efforts couldn’t have. Seeing the Lord work in my mother’s life reminds me of times I have seen His hand in my own life, and it gives me great hope for what He can unfold in the lives of my other family members.
My mother is now endowed, and every time we go to the temple together, I can tell she feels inspired in the temple, just as she did when she attended the open house. I know that the Lord is aware of us and that He guides our lives. When I let Him lead my life, I end up in the right places. When I follow my own will, it takes longer and is generally harder. I prefer to let the Lord surprise me and show me what great things He has in store.