Gospel Story Finder

Twenty people crowded into the small home of Erich Konietz in Selbongen, Poland. Some had traveled more than nine hours to get to Selbongen, and among them were seven young children. These boys and girls weren’t old enough to understand just what the meeting meant, but they could feel the wonder and excitement of friends being together again.
The date was October 17, 1970. Percy Fetzer of Salt Lake City, Utah, had been specially ordained by the First Presidency of the Church to give patriarchal blessings to members behind the Iron Curtain. M. Elmer Christensen, president of the Switzerland Mission, had arranged for him to go to Selbongen and had sent word to the members of the branch to meet with him on that wonderful Saturday afternoon.
President Christensen first told the group about the death of David O. McKay, the ninth president of the Church. He had been able to bring a picture of Joseph Fielding Smith, who was now the tenth president. He told the group the names of all of the General Authorities and had them say the names again and again until even the young children could repeat them.
Sister Fetzer and Sister Christensen told the Saints about Sunday School and Primary programs for children. Young and old learned some songs, including “I Am a Child of God,” which they especially liked. No one there had heard this song before, and they learned the words quickly and sang it with great feeling. Although they couldn’t write the words down on paper, they recorded the melody in their hearts and minds.
The members of the Selbongen Branch who crowded the Konietz home had once been free to enjoy each other and their membership in the Church. They had even built a small chapel in 1928—the first chapel of the Church ever built in Germany. But in 1945 war came to their country and many of them left their homes to escape the invading Russian army.
Some of the Church members who fled walked for days, taking with them only what they could carry. Others loaded their belongings into handcarts. A few were able to scramble aboard trains. Many died trying to escape.
Those who stayed in their own homes and survived the horrors of war found afterward that they were no longer citizens of Germany. Their land had been given to Poland. Because of this the people had to endure many hardships, and they were greatly limited in where they could go and what they could do. In spite of these difficulties, however, the small group of Church members managed to meet together. They were more than six hundred miles from any other Latter-day Saints, but by a miracle their lives and their chapel had been spared. Their hearts were full of gratitude.
Now they were meeting together, hearing news of their brothers and sisters, and receiving Patriarchal blessings from Brother Fetzer. It was a wonderful day!
While giving the blessings, Brother Fetzer was inspired to promise some that if they lived the gospel, they would go to a temple. He promised others that they would go on missions. These things seemed impossible on that day in October 1970, but since that time, all German people living in Poland have been given permission to move to West Germany.
It is very possible that the promises of those blessings for the Saints of Selbongen might soon be fulfilled!

Jim came home one Friday night and asked his father if he could borrow the family car to drive some friends to a high school ball game. His father asked him, “Jim, can I trust you with the car?”
“Sure, dad, you know me.”
“Yes,” chided his father, “that’s why I asked. I want it back in one piece, and I don’t want you to hot rod around. If you will give me your word that you will drive carefully, keep within the speed limits, and not leave the gas tank empty when you come back, you may take the car. Do I have your promise, Jim?”
“Yes, dad. Do I have to sign in blood?”
“No,” his father said. “Your word is good enough.”
Taking the keys, Jim left the house, climbed into the car, and drove off to pick up a couple of friends on the way to the game. For the first few blocks he was a model driver, remembering everything he had learned in driver’s education. Shortly after picking up his friends, however, he found himself speeding down the road. One of his friends asked, “How fast will this machine go, anyway?” The other friend responded, “This hunk of junk probably won’t even go over 90.” But it did!
Jim and his friends soon pulled into the neighboring town for the ball game. It was a great game. Jim’s team won. He and his friends were excited as they got into the car to head for home. Driving up to a stoplight, Jim and his friends noticed some girls pulling up alongside them in a brand-new car.
“Ya wanna drag?” said one of Jim’s friends to the girls.
“You bet!” came the reply.
Amidst the roaring of engines and the screeching of tires, two men standing on the street corner waiting for the light to change went unnoticed. They, also, had attended the ball game and were on their way back home when they saw the great drag race.
Later that evening Jim dropped off his friends at their houses and returned the car to the family garage. It was late, but his father was snacking in the kitchen. When Jim came in, his father asked, “Well, Jim, how did you treat the car?”
“Fine, dad,” was the reply.
“Okay. Goodnight, son.”
“Goodnight, dad.”
The following Sunday, however, both the men who had witnessed the drag race the Friday before approached Jim’s father.
“That son of yours is some race driver!” one of them said.
“I’ll say!” exclaimed the other. “He passed me on the freeway, and he must have been going at least 100.”
“You must be mistaken,” retorted Jim’s father. “Jim wouldn’t do that. He gave me his word.”
“I’m sorry,” one of the men replied, “but we both saw Jim hot rodding the car and racing from a stoplight. We were only a few feet away from him.”
That night Jim approached his father and said, “Dad, can I have the keys to the car? I want to go to a fireside.” What do you think Jim’s father said to him on that occasion? What would you have done if you’d been Jim’s father? In this case Jim’s father said, “I’ll take you to the fireside, son, but don’t ever ask me to loan you the keys to the family car again. I can’t trust you.”

One day I remember I met in the grocery store some old friends of mine, and this woman had just paid eighty dollars for a small supply of food that she was carrying out of the grocery store. And I came in and bought one or two small things, and she said to me, “How can you do it? How can you do it?” And I said, “Well, I have a wife who is careful and she doesn’t waste anything. She doesn’t throw anything away. She just makes it over, uses it again. And we buy only what we need. And instead of buying the prepared things we can buy as many potatoes probably for a dollar that it would take many, many dollars to put into chips and in other preparations.” I have heard my mother-in-law, who was a very careful cook in her home, say many times, “That woman throws more waste from the kitchen than I would use in a month.” And I have seen that in many homes. And so I think that we need to be very, very careful.

As a member of the teachers quorum, which has the responsibility to prepare the sacrament, Scott was faced with an unfortunate situation one Sunday: there weren’t enough sacrament cups for his large ward.
“I felt bad—feeling that we hadn’t fulfilled our duty,” Scott says. “We decided that the teachers had to be more organized, and now our quorum presidency meets the hour before sacrament meeting for our presidency meeting to make sure everything is in order for the sacrament and to prepare for the next few weeks. I like the order in the Church. When there is order, you don’t have to worry.”

Without the ability to continue his education at that time, Enoch pursued other interests. From the time he had mastered the piano, he had wanted to teach it, so he began doing so. In addition, he resumed his service to the Lord by working for FamilySearch out of the offices of the Africa West Area in Accra, Ghana. While working there, he met a senior sister missionary who was teaching a ukulele class. He had become acquainted and enamoured with the ukulele on his mission where his general love of music had drawn him towards it, so he joined with the class. Through his association with members of the class, they became aware of his desire to continue his education, so they helped him find new sponsors for attending university. Again, his love of music and his service to, and trust in, the Lord had brought him to the next step in his personal progress. With his sponsorship now secure, Enoch applied to, and was accepted at, BYU-Idaho where he is now studying data science.

Brethren and sisters, after what I’ve heard here today—certainly a full coverage of the subject—I am reminded of an experience I had some years ago. I believe it was one of the few times, if not the only time, that we General Authorities were asked by the Brethren to treat a certain subject at a stake conference. That week I went to Richfield, and Brother Clifford Young went over to Monroe. They had a chorus of young folks from the school sing at Richfield while I was there in the morning, and then they went over to Monroe in the afternoon and sang where Brother Young was. It happened that I talked about the assigned subject in the morning, and Clifford talked about it in the afternoon. When we made our report to the Council of the Twelve, Brother Young said it had been a fine occasion; the only bad thing about it was that those students had had to listen to the same subject twice. President George F. Richards, then president of the Twelve, said, “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that. I don’t suppose they knew you were talking about the same subject.”

The winter of 1922 spanked Bentley, North Dakota. A whack of freezing winds mean enough to make your eyes water followed swats of icy rain. Finally the cold set in deep, relaxing into magnificent pillows of snow twelve feet high. The drifts froze so solid that a brave man or loyal horse could climb them like hills—if he could get out the door!
For once, Albert was glad to have five brothers and sisters. It was easy to stay warm when the family gathered to read in front of the potbellied stove. If only Mama wasn’t so depressed about winter! She hadn’t smiled in a week. Even the breakfast prayer had been quieter than usual. “I miss getting mail,” she said a few minutes later, staring into the rag rug.
“Mmm,” Papa said. “Not worth getting frozen. And I’ve just warmed up after morning chores.”
Mama sighed. “We’re out of matches. And salt.”
“All right.” Papa rummaged in his pockets for coins. “Which of you boys will go get Mama’s mail?”
“Me!” Albert shouted, dropping his book to the floor.
“I’m older,” Ernest said. “And Kuchen needs exercise.”
“Kuchen’s my horse,” Otmar spoke up. “I’ll go.”
“Albert will go,” Papa said. “Here’s thirty cents. Get salt, matches, and the mail. Ride Kuchen.”
The path Papa had cleared to the barn was shrinking as the wind swept snow across it. Knowing that a saddle would be too cold, Albert mounted Kuchen bareback and plunged into the drifts. Five miles was not a bad ride, unless—like today—the temperature was forty degrees below zero. Kuchen knew the way, even though most landmarks were buried in snow. They met two other riders heading back from town, so when Albert arrived, his ruddy face and iced eyelashes were not an odd sight to the grocer.
“Hello, young fellow! What do the Kilzers need today?”
The boy tugged at the hat half-frozen to his head and answered, “Our mail, please. Oh—salt and matches too.”
Mr. Strubert tucked a packet of letters into the burlap bag, then turned and deftly climbed a ladder to a top shelf. Albert wandered up and down the aisles. Buttons, fabric, patterns, crackers, tinned fish—wait! A wonderful splash of natural green glowed inside the glass icebox. Six beautiful heads of lettuce, barely brown on the edges, were stacked in a pyramid. Albert hadn’t seen a leaf of lettuce in months. If only Mama could taste some! She loved crisp chunks of lettuce, even plain. In summer, when she made Papa’s sandwiches of thick bacon, she’d slip a lettuce leaf in, then munch a few leaves herself.
“That’ll be ten cents,” Mr. Strubert announced.
“How much is a head of lettuce?” Albert asked.
“Pretty expensive—twelve cents.”
Albert’s whole body warmed with the thought of Mama’s smile when she’d see the lettuce.
“I’ll take it!”
For the whole five miles riding back, Albert clutched the neck of the burlap bag with one hand, and Kuchen’s mane with the other. One mile from home his teeth ached with the cold. A half mile away his fingers seemed frozen together in their mittens. At the barn, Albert carefully rubbed Kuchen warm and dry, giving her an extra pitchfork of hay for her efforts. He trudged back across the path now covered in a foot of snow. Triumphantly he unhooked the iron door latch and entered the great room.
“Gone a while, boy,” Papa said, not looking up from his book. “Getting higher out there?”
“Yes, sir,” Albert answered, placing the eight cents change on his father’s reading stand, then heading to the kitchen.
Mama stood at the table, rolling out sourdough for bread. Albert was too impatient to wait until she noticed him.
“Here’s your mail, Mama. And a surprise too!”
She looked up as Albert dumped the burlap bag upside down on the table. The perfect ball of lettuce hit the table with a crash and broke into a thousand crystal green pieces. It had frozen solid on the ride home!
“What was that?” Otmar called from the loft.
“Who broke what?” Papa shouted.
The twins still napped, but little Opal cried at the uproar.
Albert could not stop his tears. “Oh, Mama, I’m sorry!” he sobbed. “I wanted to surprise you. I know how you love lettuce.”
Mama hugged Albert so hard that he finally felt warm again. “It’s a treasure! Don’t cry.”
“B-b-but it’s all broken. And it cost twelve cents. Papa will be—”
“Papa will be nothing. Don’t worry. I love it! It’s a reminder of summer on this dark, cold day. Your gift is perfect! You are a very special son.”
Albert knew that she meant it. After all, she kept the frozen fragments in the ice chest till spring. She called them her winter emeralds and smiled every time she saw them.

If you’re not wild about the thought of graduating as the only member of the Church in your class, you can always do what Tammy Shick of the Ridgeway Branch, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh Mission did. She helped convert two of her classmates.

But her missionary work didn’t stop there. She also gave a class presentation on the Book of Mormon and presented a copy to her non-LDS teacher. Then there was her senior paper, written on Church history.

Tammy is currently at Utah State on scholarship, majoring in Aerospace Engineering.

A story of the honesty of one of my ancestors has made a great impact in the lives of thousands of people who knew him—and still echoes in the minds and hearts of our family members after 128 years. My great-grandfather Georg Wolf was the leader of a group of Hungarians who immigrated to Brazil in 1891. Upon arriving at the designated Brazilian port, the mayor of that city gave him two thousand réis (the local currency at that time) and some machetes. With those resources this small group of people expected to open a 60km way through the dense Atlantic forest, where they would find the piece of land granted by the government for them to settle.
The money given by the government did not have to be accounted for, as it was a grant. However, since it was not all used to buy the necessary supplies for the group’s journey and settlement, my great-grandfather decided to go back to the mayor and return the unspent portion. Everyone in the community was quite surprised, as this group was starting a new life from ground zero in a different land and the unused money could bring them much more immediate comfort in their travels. But being honest and having peace of mind was more important to my great-grandfather.
Years later, that settlement became a prosperous region of the country with subsequent great spiritual and temporal blessings that continue in the lives of thousands today—including my own family.
I learned from my great-grandfather’s integrity that there are special temporal and spiritual blessings that can only be obtained as we are honest with men.

I would like to go back in thought to my native Holland where six generations of my father’s ancestors lived in the village of Scheveningen at the seashore.
On one occasion, during a severe storm, a fishing boat was in distress, and a rowboat went out to rescue its crew. The waves were enormous, and each of the men at the oars had to use all his strength and energy to reach the unfortunate sailors.
When the rowboat finally reached the fishing boat, one of the victims had to stay behind because the rescue boat was too small to carry everyone. The rescuers made it back to the beach, but the crew was too exhausted from their fight with the storm winds, the waves, and the sweeping rains to make the second trip.
The local captain of the coast guard asked for volunteers to make the second trip. Among those who stepped forward without hesitation was nineteen-year-old Hans.
When Hans stepped forward, his mother panicked and said, “Hans, please don’t go. Your father died at sea when you were four years old, and your older brother, Pete, has been reported missing at sea for more than three months now. You are the only son left to me!”
But Hans said, “Mom, I feel that I have to do it. It is my duty.”
Hans boarded the rowboat, took the oars, and disappeared into the night.
After more than an hour, the rowboat came into sight again. When the rescuers approached the beach, the captain of the coast guard called vigorously against the storm, “Did you save him?”
Hans rose from his rowing bench and shouted with all his might, “Yes! And tell Mother that it is my brother, Pete!”

When my son Joseph was twelve years old, he traveled with me to Kenya in east Africa. We flew into Nairobi, which is the capital city, then traveled by four-wheel drive vehicle into the area inhabited by the Masai—a friendly, happy, beautiful people.
When we arrived in the village, Joseph suddenly found himself surrounded by thirty or forty Masai children his own age. The children were laughing, a smiling, and talking to him, trying hard to overcome the enormous cultural and language barrier.
Our guide explained that we were in a remote area, and that although these children had seen white men before, Joseph was probably the first white boy they had ever seen.
I could tell Joseph wanted to be friendly, so I handed him a chocolate bar.
“Give them a piece of candy,” I said.
He opened the package and broke off a square. He tried to hand it to a boy who seemed about fourteen years old. I will never forget the reaction of that boy. He looked at the chocolate and drew back. He didn’t want to have anything to do with it.
So I said, “Show them that you eat it.”
Joseph put a square of chocolate in his mouth, then handed another square to this same fourteen-year-old boy. The boy looked at it and held it. He was suspicious as he friend to understand it. Then he took the first, tiniest little bite, then a larger bite; then he put the whole piece in his mouth. You could see the joy come over his face as he tasted chocolate candy for the very first time.
Then we handed out pieces of chocolate to all the other children, and they weren’t afraid to try it because they’d seen someone they knew eat it and he had enjoyed it. There was something wonderful about that chocolate.
Later in our trip, we came back to that same village. As soon as we arrived we were surrounded by the same group of children, and we didn’t need a translator to know what they wanted. They wanted more chocolate, more of something wonderful and sweet.
I would like to compare the taste of that chocolate bar to the taste of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Although the gospel tastes sweet and wonderful and good, sometimes other people don’t understand it, and it’s hard to get them to take just a tiny bite. But if they’ll take that bite, and then a larger bite, they will arrive at a marvelous moment when they place it in their mouths and taste the wonderful sweetness.
I think that we, as members of the Church, are much like my twelve-year-old boy was, surrounded by a world of people who want more of something they don’t even understand. I believe that many of the prayers of the people on this earth can only be answered by the members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Lord has given us the mandate to take the gospel to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. We can’t say, “They might not understand.” We must help them. There is nothing that will be sweeter to them than the gospel, nothing that will bless them more than the knowledge of the truth.
We have something wonderful and sweet, something much more vital than a chocolate bar, something that affects everyone for all eternity. We have tasted the gospel, and we know it is good. We cannot and we must not ignore the opportunity to help others taste it, too.

When his grandpa had a mild heart attack, Chris gave up his bedroom to his grandpa and grandma so that they could stay at his house. He did this and many other things without complaint. He helped Grandpa with his IV (medicine that Grandpa had to carry around with him), got him something to drink when he was thirsty, brought him his supper, and did anything else he needed when he couldn’t get around very well. Chris even helped Grandma in the kitchen. A happy, loving child, Chris always has a smile on his face and a song in his heart. He is active in the ward Primary and has borne his strong testimony in fast and testimony meeting at church.

Several years ago I interviewed a young woman for a temple recommend to receive her own endowment and to be married and sealed for time and all eternity. As I completed the interview and signed the recommend, tears were streaming down her cheeks. I said, “Please share with me your feelings.” Then she told me the following story.
Since her youth she had sought to find truth and direction in her life. She had yearned to find peace and happiness, but no matter where she looked, she could not find it. It had come to a point where she was very distraught, assuming there was really nothing in life that had true meaning or was fulfilling. In this frame of mind, one evening while visiting a dear friend and recounting her concerns and despair she said: “I looked behind the sofa where I was sitting to the bookshelf. My eyes fell upon a particular volume, and a compelling feeling came over me. I knew I needed to find out what was written on its pages.”
She took the book from the shelf and read the title, the Book of Mormon. She asked her friend where she had received it. Her friend indicated that two young missionaries stopped her on the street and gave her the book but only after a commitment to read it. Due to a lack of time, she had just put it on the shelf.
“I started to read,” she said. “I could not put it down.” A feeling came over her that she had never felt before. Her friend told her that she could take the book with her. She went home and continued to read through the night. The next morning she went into the streets looking for the two young missionaries. It didn’t take long to find them. They agreed to teach her the gospel, and in a few weeks she was baptized a member of the Church.
Through her tears, she explained that since that day she had found a joy and inner peace that she never dreamed possible.
Living in a small town with few members and even fewer opportunities to marry in the Church, she didn’t dare hope that she might one day marry in the temple. But she felt it was through the guidance of the Holy Spirit that she met a young man while vacationing in another country. He was a member of the Church and honored his priesthood. They had fallen in love, and he had asked her to marry him in the temple. The realization that she could now go to the house of the Lord and be sealed for time and all eternity brought joy to her soul and feelings of thankfulness and gratitude that were overwhelming and impossible to describe.
“I continue to ask myself,” she said, “‘Why me? Why me?’ I am so blessed.”
Her humble, sweet spirit and testimony touched me deeply. As she left, we both shed tears of joy and appreciation.

Then something unfortunate happened to John Borrowman—because of exhaustion, he fell asleep on guard duty. He drifted off for just a few moments, but a watchful sergeant reported him. In time of war this was an offense punishable by death. The Mormon soldiers were subject to their army commanders and military law, and John was immediately imprisoned. During the next few weeks, he read a friend’s copy of the Book of Mormon, which brought him a great deal of comfort.
After he was set free, it was determined that his release had been an error, and John reluctantly returned to jail. He wrote in his journal that he was lonely and uncomfortable, for “I have no bedding … but my blanket and a cold damp brick floor to lie on” (Journal of John Borrowman, 1846–1860, Church Historical Department, microfilm, 22). When his case was heard, he was sentenced to three additional days in guard quarters and three hours each day in the cells; three dollars of his pay were also withheld. Though grateful that his life was spared, he felt this was a great burden and prayed to the Lord to be relieved of it. His deliverance came in an unusual fashion. When the regular army colonel was informed of the sentence of the court, he was disgusted at its leniency. Yet he didn’t have the power to overturn it. So he set it aside, saying it was better to have no punishment than one that was so light. John accepted this as an answer to his earnest prayers.

“My mission did not help my football,” Bart says. “Some guys go out and expect that since they’re making a sacrifice for the Lord, the Lord is going to bless them by improving their football skills. That’s not the case.” Toward the end of his mission Bart did rise at 4:30 A.M. for conditioning workouts. (“All my companions wanted to be transferred. I know that,” he laughs.) But he wasn’t a superman when he returned. He had to scramble to regain his skills and reflexes.
“I wasn’t better than I was before my mission,” he confides. “I wasn’t even as good. But it didn’t take me long to get back into shape.” Bart also notes that by the time he returned to BYU, the starting center ahead of him had graduated, and the position was open to Bart for the next three years, whereas he would have been second string two of those three years had he chosen to stay and play.

Before he became an apostle, George Albert Smith served two missions—one as an MIA missionary in the Southern settlements of Utah and one in the southern United States, where persecution against Mormons was still rampant. Elder Smith was once with a group of missionaries in a log cabin that was under seige by a mob. While the missionaries huddled against the floor, a barrage of bullets poured into the room. Yet, through all this experience, there was no bitterness on Elder Smith’s part, just a determination to work harder to “share the gospel with the rest of God’s children.”

What goals are you planning to set this year?
I want to build my own spaceship and fly to Mars! Want to come with me?
I think I’ll stay on this planet.
Actually, I wanted to plan some ways to serve people this year.
Me too! I bet we could help a lot of people if we work together.
I was thinking that too. But I’m not sure where to start.
Well, what about that new family in the ward?
Oh yeah! I really like Jada and Tyler, but I’ve only seen them at Primary a few times.
I think their parents work most weekends.
Hey, we could ask them to come with us to Primary, and to activities, and …
And Mars will just have to wait.

John Powell shares this touching experience: “It was the day my father died. … In the small hospital room, I was supporting him in my arms, when … my father slumped back, and I lowered his head gently onto the pillow. I … told my mother … :
“‘It’s all over, Mom. Dad is dead.’
“She startled me. I will never know why these were her first words to me after his death. My mother said: ‘Oh, he was so proud of you. He loved you so much.’
“Somehow I knew … that these words were saying something very important to me. They were like a sudden shaft of light, like a startling thought I had never before absorbed. Yet there was a definite edge of pain, as though I were going to know my father better in death than I had ever known him in life.
“Later, while a doctor was verifying death, I was leaning against the wall in the far corner of the room, crying softly. A nurse came over to me and put a comforting arm around me. I couldn’t talk through my tears. I wanted to tell her:
“‘I’m not crying because my father is dead. I’m crying because my father never told me that he was proud of me. He never told me that he loved me. Of course, I was expected to know these things. I was expected to know the great part I played in his life and the great part I occupied of his heart, but he never told me.’” (The Secret of Staying in Love, Niles, Ill.: Argus, 1974, p. 68.)

Some years ago I had a most unusual experience while flying in a four-seat, single-engine airplane.
We were flying toward Salt Lake City, and it was one of those days when the smog and fog had settled over the valley very quickly.
We were still flying above the fog at 3,000 feet when our pilot radioed to air traffic control at the Salt Lake tower for instructions for our approach and landing.
He was an expert flier, but the plane didn’t have radar or the other sophisticated equipment that larger planes have.
The controller told our pilot that although the runway was closing down because of poor ground visibility, he would talk us down through the fast-accumulating dense fog if we wanted him to.
Our pilot turned to us and said, “What do you want to do? We can either be talked down by the traffic controller, or we can go back to Nevada and land and wait for the weather to clear in a day or two.” We all agreed that we should land in Salt Lake if at all possible.
It was a very interesting experience to sit in our small plane and listen to the instructions from the control tower to the pilot. The controller, through radar, could see where we were. He told our pilot when to lower our altitude and when to turn either right or left. We were now in such dense fog that we could not see anything at all and were totally under directions from the tower.
I remember thinking how completely dependent the four of us were on the expertise and knowledge of the controller, who could see us on the radar scope.
It was a remarkable experience, for even though we kept lowering our altitude, we could not see the ground at all.
At about 500 feet our pilot said to my friend who was sitting in the right front seat, “Now you watch for the runway, and when you see it, tell me.” The pilot concentrated on watching the instruments and following exactly the instructions he received from the air traffic controller. I was watching the altimeter.
Soon we were down to 400 feet, 350 feet, 300 feet—still we could see nothing. Then all of a sudden my friend in the front seat shouted, “I see the runway!”
We were all relieved as we looked out the windshield of the airplane. There, directly in front of us, was the runway, and the nose of our airplane was right on the white line in the center of it as we approached for landing. How grateful I was that someone in the tower had the experience and knowledge to give us careful instructions so we could safely land the plane!

Elder Forsgren’s sister, Erika, had an interesting experience that prepared her and Peter to receive the gospel. A few months before her brother’s arrival, she was attending church, as was her custom. During the singing of a hymn, she saw a person stand before her and say, “On the fifth day of July a man will come to you with three books and all those that believe in the things written in those books shall be saved.” When her brother arrived with the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and the Doctrine and Covenants, she believed his testimony without question.1