Gospel Story Finder

When President Russell M. Nelson was introduced to the media as prophet and President of the Church in January 2018, a colleague of mine at the time, who was not a member of the Church, spoke to me about the age of our new president. “Don’t worry,” I told her. After all, she couldn’t have known that he was still attending to his ecclesiastical duties every day, travelled all over the world as part of his calling, was learning Chinese at an advanced age and, at a youthful 93, was still eagerly whipping down Utah’s ski slopes.
However, her words also contained subtle criticism, which we tend to hear from a variety of worldly voices: How can you, in a modern society, blindly follow one person? Such a statement demonstrates that the world does not yet understand the role of a prophet. Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles declared: “The most important role of the Lord’s prophet is to teach us of the Savior and lead us to Him. …
“A prophet does not stand between [us] and the Savior. Rather, he stands beside [us] and points the way to the Savior.”1

One time in Minnesota, where I served as mission president, we had a missionary fireside where at the end I used the words “I know” as I bore my testimony. An investigator came up to speak with me after the meeting was over. He said, “Unless I can touch, smell, hear, see, or taste, I do not believe.” He, of course, had listed the five physical senses, which are an integral part of our mortal and temporal beings. I asked him if he believed in radio signals or gravity or even Hong Kong.

That is what happened to me one April. The end of another school year was fast approaching—and with it came the cares, worries, and work I had experienced during the past nine months. I was exhausted, emotional, and lonely. I felt like I was being tossed by the storms of life. General conference was coming up, and I looked forward to hearing the prophets of God speak to me, hoping to feel a calmness enter my “sinking soul.”
A closing hymn brought great peace. As the choir sang the third verse, I felt the Spirit calm the seas inside me:
Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid.
I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand, …
Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.
(“How Firm a Foundation,” Hymns, no. 85)
My storm may not have been as tempestuous as the storms others face, but it is not the velocity of the storm that makes our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ willing to help us. It is our faith in Christ’s calming power and our hastening to call for His help that allows Him to calm our hearts during life’s storms.

In reality, that kind of precision often requires mastery of some pretty complex technology on a modern bow. You start coming across terms like stabilizer, sight, clicker, and more. “My friends are sometimes shocked at all the gear,” says LaNola P., a 17-year-old from California with a true talent for archery. “It’s a lot harder than you would think.”
LaNola has been involved in archery since she was six years old, with her dad as her coach and shooting partner. Over the years she’s won competitions and set national archery records. Archery hasn’t been her only focus, however. She keeps the gospel at the heart of all she does, even when that means getting out of bed at 4:00 a.m. to attend 5:25 a.m. seminary. “The gospel allows me to keep things in perspective,” says LaNola. “I know my strength comes from Heavenly Father.”

Eleven years ago, when the doctors diagnosed me with multiple sclerosis, they gave me two years to live. Today, I am still alive, although I am totally paralyzed from the neck down. But now that I have the gospel, I am no longer bitter about my illness or my father’s death. I look forward to God’s promise of eternal life if I faithfully endure to the end.

Many years ago, while I was mending a fence, a small sliver of wood entered into my finger. I made a meager attempt to remove the sliver and thought I had done so, but apparently I had not. As time went on, skin grew over the sliver, creating a lump on my finger. It was annoying and sometimes painful.
Years later I decided to finally take action. All I did was simply apply ointment to the lump and cover it with a bandage. I repeated this process frequently. You cannot imagine my surprise when one day, as I removed the bandage, the sliver had emerged from my finger.
The ointment had softened the skin and created an escape for the very thing that had caused pain for so many years. Once the sliver was removed, the finger quickly healed, and to this day, there remains no evidence of any injury.

As you know, we have followed for a year a program under which all operating costs of stakes and wards in the United States and Canada, including construction and maintenance of buildings, as well as the expenses of activity programs, are now met from the tithing funds of the Church.
As you can realize, this has involved a very substantial outlay from the tithing resources. After a year’s experience, we have received numerous expressions of gratitude and appreciation. They have come from far and wide. Let me read to you part of a letter from a stake president which recently came to one of our Brethren:
“At the beginning of 1990,” he wrote, “when we were introduced to the new budgeting program, there were many members in our stake that were anxious and even a few that were critical. Throughout the year … we have emphasized the importance of conserving the financial resources of our people, along with their energies and time. Further to that, we have tried to focus on areas that could enhance the teaching and fellowshipping of members. …
“As we concluded the year 1990, as a presidency, as bishops, and as high councilors, we recognized the prophetic nature of the new budget program. A review of our statistics indicated that at year-end, we had only expended approximately 70 percent of the funds budgeted to us.
“Through normal channels, our stake will be sending the following funds:
“1. approximately $20,000 of excess funds from the 1990 annual budget, and
“2. $13,000 for the general missionary funds of the Church.”
He then speaks of yet other funds they will send in.
This is characteristic of letters from many stake presidents who have returned excess funds to the Church since the end of the year.
We look forward to the time when this budget program will be extended worldwide.

A wise first step is to guide each deacon to a spiritual awareness of the sacredness of his ordained calling. In my life this was accomplished when the bishopric asked that I take the sacrament to a shut-in who lived about a mile from the chapel. That special Sunday morning, as I knocked on the door of Brother Wright and heard his feeble reply, “Come in,” I entered not only his humble cottage but also a room filled with the Spirit of the Lord. I approached his bedside and carefully placed a piece of the bread to his lips. I then held the cup of water, that he might drink. As I departed, I saw him smile as he said, “God bless you, my boy.” And God did bless me with an appreciation for the sacred emblems which continues even today.

Illustration by John Kachik
School was out for Thanksgiving break, but I was not looking forward to it. I was struggling at school, and I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of being surrounded by family members who were in the mood for holiday cheer. It seemed to me that I didn’t have a whole lot to be thankful for.
“Who is it?” my dad called from the kitchen as I came in the front door after school.
“It’s me,” I called back.
He came to give me a hug and invited me to help him make pies. I’d been hoping he would just tell me to relax, but all he said was, “I really could use your help.”
At first the task was tedious—one cup of this, two teaspoons of that. I’d never talked a lot with my father. I could ask him to help me with my homework, or he could tell me to do the dishes. But it seemed that deeper conversations just didn’t happen between us. So we went on working side by side until he asked a simple question: “How’s school going?”
I started talking about how school was really going—my frustrations, my worries, the things I liked, and the things I didn’t like. I talked and he listened. After I was done, it was his turn. He told me stories of his high school days and how he had experienced some of the same frustrations and delights. He gave me advice that I actually needed to hear.
We discovered that we didn’t have any bananas for the banana cream pie. “I guess I’ll have to run to the store,” my dad said.
“Can I come with you?” I asked. He agreed. Off we went, singing to the radio at the top of our lungs the whole way. I don’t remember ever having such a fun time on a trip to the grocery store.
The pies were all gone after a few days, but I will never forget talking with my dad while making them. It was the first time that I realized that my dad was just a person like me, the first time I saw that in addition to being my father, he could also be a friend. I learned to appreciate my whole family more and the small memories we create each day. I went back to school with a newfound motivation. For some reason, I felt like I had so much to be thankful for.

Some time later, I was dealing with a socially clumsy guy who excelled at making a nuisance of himself. Steve had been wearing on my patience already, and when he made some comment that was obviously out of bounds, I turned and snapped at him. My snide remark brought laughter from the group around us, and I felt satisfied that I had made my point.
That night, I was reading in the Book of Mormon when I came across two scriptures that had profound meaning.
“And again I say unto you, is there one among you that doth make a mock of his brother, or that heapeth upon him persecutions?
“Wo unto such an one, for he is not prepared, and the time is at hand that he must repent or he cannot be saved!” (Alma 5:30–31).
I pondered Alma’s question. I remembered my comment to Steve, and I thought back to Sarah and the mountainside. Even though Steve was hard to deal with, he didn’t know any better. His awkwardness deserved love, not a confirmation of his insecurities. I realized that no matter how annoyed I was—or even how thoughtless—I will be held directly responsible for how I treat each of Heavenly Father’s children. Christ has promised that our interactions with each other are important. He said, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me” (Matt. 25:40).
I know now I would rather have Heavenly Father refer to the service I rendered than to the injuries I compounded.

Nick Martindell shut off the engine of his pickup truck and grimly tromped down the dirty concrete steps leading to the basement apartment he shared with his best friend, Gordon. He pulled the screen door open. It whined and clattered shut behind him. He wrinkled his nose as he reluctantly took a breath of air. Even for late July the air was hot and humid and the heat in the kitchen was especially stifling, compounding the stale smell of pizza, chips, and unwashed dishes. The apartment was quiet except for the buzz of a dozen fat, lazy flies and the annoying drip of the water faucet.
Bread crumbs littered the table. The trash can in the corner was full and spilling over. A pair of his tennis shoes lay in the middle of the floor, which had not been mopped, and rarely swept, during the last two months that he and Gordon had been there.
He strolled to the refrigerator, pulled it open, and glared inside. A carton of milk, several slices of bread, a half bar of butter spotted with bread and jam, a half bottle of mustard, and several wilted vegetables were all he found. He grabbed the carton of milk, smelled it, grimaced and poured the contents down the sink.
“Gordon,” he called out after slamming the fridge door and kicking his tennis shoes under the table, “you home?”
There was no answer. Nick walked down the narrow hall leading from the kitchen to the bedroom. He pushed the door open. Two boxes and a suitcase partially blocked his way. Gordon sat on the edge of the bed, which was stripped bare to the mattress. He stared up at Nick without moving or speaking.
“What’s all this?” Nick blurted out, pointing down at the boxes and suitcase but making no attempt to enter the room.
“I’m leaving,” Gordon answered, getting up from the bed. He pulled a bulging canvas bag from the closet and set it on the floor next to the rest of his things. “I wanted to tell you before I left.”
Nick straightened up. “I thought we were in this together. This was your idea too.”
Gordon sighed. “It’s no good, Nick. Not for me.”
“It was good enough for you all last year when we planned it,” Nick flared, kicking the boxes aside and coming into the room. “Graduation night that’s all you talked about. You were going to break away from mommy and daddy and get completely away from all that family stuff. You were going to make it on your own as soon as you turned 18. Well, you’re 18.”
“It’s just not my kind of life.”
“It’s freedom. Here we live the way we want to. We come in when we want. We drink and eat when and what we want. Nobody’s telling us what to do. We live the way we want.”
“I guess I didn’t realize life away from home could be so glorious.”
“It’s freedom. That’s what we wanted.”
Gordon smiled wanly. “If this is freedom, slavery can’t be half bad.”
Nick sneered and began pacing the room shaking his head in disgust. “Wanted to be a big man on your own. I guess you found out that someone still had to tuck you in at night and help you say your prayers. All right, what really made you change your mind? I got a right to know. You’re copping out on me, leaving me holding the bag.”
Gordon stared at Nick for a moment, meeting his angry glare. “I was just trying to prove a point. That’s all we’ve ever been doing here—trying to prove a point. I decided the point wasn’t worth proving. We were wrong from the beginning.”
“And what made you decide that?”
Suddenly a crimson anger darkened Gordon’s cheeks and he grabbed at a pile of Nick’s soiled clothes lying in the corner. “I’m sick of this,” he growled, pushing the clothes under Nick’s nose. “I’m sick of yellow sheets that haven’t seen water for two months. I’m sick of dirty dishes in the sink. I’m tired of crumbs and pop spilled all over the kitchen floor. I’m sick of a greasy, grimy, dirty, putrified shower. I’m sick of this whole lousy place. What does living like a couple of pigs prove?”
“Clean it if you don’t like it.”
“It’s not that simple. It’s not like I thought it would be. I just want to …” He paused and added in a quiet voice, “I just want to get out of here. I’m going home.” He stooped and picked up a box and his pillow.
“What really made you change your mind?” Nick challenged. “So the place is a mess. You knew it would be. You told me so yourself when we moved in here. You said we’d probably let things get dirty. Well, we did. Now why are you complaining?”
Placing his box and pillow on the bed, Gordon faced his roommate. “All right. I’ll tell you.” He kicked the closet door closed and leaned against the dresser, looking down at the floor, avoiding Nick’s prying eyes. “You know when we used to plan all this, living away from home and all, I tried to figure out why we were going. You see, I needed a reason. I couldn’t just leave. At the time, finding a reason wasn’t hard. Mom and Dad were too strict. They didn’t understand things. They were always forcing me to do something. There were too many rules. There were lots of bad things about home, and I thought of all of them.”
Gordon glanced up at Nick, who wore a skeptical scowl. “When we came here,” Gordon continued, “I told myself how good it was. I think I believed it then. This was living. We had it made. But there was always something missing. I was kidding myself. Finally I tried to figure out what was missing. I thought about home.” He smiled and shook his head slowly. “I began to remember, not the bad things, not the things that convinced me to come here. No, I remembered the other things, and there were lots of them. Home isn’t so bad, Nick, not half as bad as we’ve tried to prove.”
“You’re quite the preacher. They’ll have you back in church before long,” Nick muttered, falling back on his bed and stuffing his pillow under his head.
“I’ve already gone, two weeks in a row, priesthood, sacrament meeting, the whole bit.”
Nick sat up slowly and swung his feet over the edge of the bed and stared. “I don’t believe it.”
“You know what, Nick? I liked it.” Nick groaned, turned over, and faced the wall. Gordon continued with added enthusiasm. “You know I found out something. I’ve never liked church. You know why? Because I never gave it a chance. I’ve never given a lot of things a chance. I’m not saying home and church and all that is for me, because I don’t know for sure. I just don’t know, not right now. But I tried this way, and this way sure isn’t what we cracked it up to be.” He waited for Nick to respond, but he remained silent. In an act of complete exasperation he slapped the wall with the flat of his hand. “Nick, we’re trying to prove the wrong point! What have we got to show for it?” He snatched the dirty laundry and flung it across the room. “All we got are some dirty jeans, some stale socks and a crumby, sticky, gummed up kitchen. Big deal! I want out. This is …”
“Gordon,” Nick interrupted, “you know what? You depress me. In fact, the last couple of weeks I’ve become depressed every time I’ve seen you.”
Gordon countered with a knowing smile. He shook his head and said, “Nick, you’re always depressed. I don’t have anything to do with it. You’re just mad at the whole world. One of these days you’re going to wake up and find that the world was never mad back and that all this other never proved anything.”
“You know where the door is, or do you want me to take you by the hand?” Nick asked, his face pinched with anger.
Gordon shrugged, bent over, and picked up two of his boxes and walked out of the bedroom. Several minutes later he was back for the rest of his things. As he picked them up, Nick rolled over and asked dryly, “And you’re leaving me holding the bag? What about the rent? Remember this was your idea too.”
Gordon nodded toward the dresser. “There’s an envelope on the dresser. It’s next month’s rent money, all of it, not just half.”
The two stared at each other. Neither spoke. Finally Gordon gathered up his remaining things and turned to go. “Soon they’ll be calling you on a mission,” Nick laughed sardonically. “Elder Patrick Gordon Crandell, all decked out in his white shirt and tie and his hair shaved to the skin.”
Without turning around, Gordon replied calmly, “You know, that doesn’t sound so bad.”
As soon as Nick heard the kitchen door close and Gordon’s departing footsteps, he reared up and hurled his pillow across the room where it slammed into the door, closing it with a reverberating bang.
For half an hour Nick lay on his bed. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep, attempting to block the entire day from his mind, but it was too early in the afternoon. Sleep eluded him.
He felt hungry. He sat up and stepped to his dresser where he kept a supply of candy bars, but he slammed the dresser drawer as soon as he had opened it. He didn’t want candy. He was tired of eating candy bars, chips, and cookies. He wanted some real food, something like … But he refused to think of that. That was over, in the past. He wouldn’t follow Gordon back. He opened the drawer again, snatched a candy bar, ripped off the wrapper and angrily crammed the candy into his mouth. No, he wouldn’t go back. He was free here.
He returned to his bed, but an enigmatic hunger persisted, not a mere pang but an annoying desire for something satisfying, something that didn’t really have anything to do with food. He had felt this pang before, but he had tried to hide it from himself.
Eventually he crawled from the bed and went to the kitchen, hoping to find relief. Instead, a flood of nauseating disgust swept over him.
He left the apartment, got into the pickup, and drove, nowhere in particular, just someplace, any place away from … Well, he just wanted to drive, he told himself. He was not running, just leaving for a time.
Soon he found himself out of town, driving into the country along the narrow country road that looped around the foot of the mountain and passed through the small farms. The road was familiar. He’d traveled it often. It frustrated him that he was even driving there now, but he continued. After all, it was just a drive, like any other drive. It didn’t mean anything.
Five miles out of town he stopped in front of a frame house set back a hundred feet from the road in a grove of elm and poplar trees. The station wagon that usually occupied a place under the giant elm tree was missing. No one was home. He could tell.
He sat in the truck for several minutes before finally opening the door and stepping out. He looked up and down the highway furtively and then walked across the road and up to the front door. The door opened. Of course, he knew it would. They never locked it. He swallowed hard and walked in.
A rich, tantalizing aroma of baked bread lingered in the air and soon enveloped him. Unconsciously he breathed deeply, feeding hungrily upon the aroma—and the memories it inspired.
The kitchen sink was clean, no piled dishes there. The floor was swept and mopped to a pleasant glow. The plastic garbage container was empty and free of foul odors. He breathed deeply of the clean air and moved about the house, touching the sink, opening the fridge, glancing into the bathroom, sitting momentarily on the sofa to thumb through magazines. He was unable to explain his behavior. It baffled him, and yet he felt compelled to linger.
In his reverie he almost forgot the time. Half an hour passed. They would be home soon. Suddenly he realized that he didn’t want them to find him here, coming back, even though it was just to see. They would misunderstand, see it as a surrender, a weakening.
As he got up from the living room sofa, he noticed his picture hanging on the wall with those of his parents and brothers and sisters. It startled him. He stared, confused. The picture’s presence seemed so incongruous. He had assumed that when he had walked away, coldly abandoning them, that they would naturally reject him. His picture loudly proclaimed otherwise.
He started for the front door. As he was about to leave, he saw the loaf of homemade bread lying on the table next to a jar of strawberry preserves, his favorite, some she had made. There was a note under the bottle. He pulled it out and read: “Nick, we went to the park for a picnic. Come and join us if you can. We would love to have you with us, but we will understand if you can’t. Take the bread and jam. We love you, Mom.”
The note fluttered to the floor. “How did she know?” he whispered angrily, feeling as though he had been observed during his surreptitious visit. He picked up the note and read it again. There was no rebuke, no mention of his weeks of silence, no mention of his absence, his rebellion, his complaining. There was merely a quiet, subtle invitation to … He was not coming back! He crumpled the note. He didn’t need them. He would not give them the satisfaction.
He started for the door, leaving the bread on the table, but he stopped before going out. The old hunger returned and coaxed him. He glanced back. Taking the bread didn’t mean anything, he thought. A loaf of bread was a loaf of bread. He could buy one at the store if he wanted to. A loaf of bread didn’t mean he had given up. So he did come back. It was just a visit. He didn’t have anything to do. What was wrong with taking a ride and stopping someplace? He was independent.
Amid his own personal debate, he returned to the table and roughly grabbed the bread and preserves. He held them in his hand, pondering. Finally he turned and left.
Almost an hour after he left, a station wagon pulled under the elm tree. Doors burst open and seven children tumbled out. The five younger ones raced for the house. The two older ones walked, loaded with blankets, a jug, and a picnic basket.
An older man and woman stepped from the car. Exhausted but satisfied smiles touched their lips as they watched the young ones storm into the house.
The woman was the first to enter the kitchen. As she did, her gaze went to the kitchen table, as it had done so many times during the last two months. At first she disbelieved, wondering whether she had forgotten in her rush to get away to the park. Then she saw the crumpled note. The bread and the preserves were gone!
Trembling, she sat down at the table and looked up at her husband who now stood behind her. “I knew it,” she whispered. “I knew he couldn’t forget forever.”
“It doesn’t mean he’s coming back,” he cautioned. He remembered too well the hurts she had suffered. He didn’t want her snatching at elusive hopes.
She smiled and nodded with maternal intuition. “I know,” she replied, “but he was here. For now that’s enough.”
When Nick arrived at his apartment, he tossed the bread and preserves on the table and looked in the fridge. It was as bare as when he had left. Ignoring the bread, he went into his bedroom, turned on the radio and tried to wash away the memory with music and disc jockey jabber, but his escape was a feeble attempt.
Angrily he jumped from the bed and began snatching sweaty, soiled shirts, pants and socks from the floor and stuffing them into a canvas bag in the closet. He folded his blanket and pulled the sheet on his bed tight. Grabbing a T-shirt from his drawer, he attacked the accumulation of dirt and dead flies on his dresser and on the windowsill.
He returned to the kitchen, determined to push the job to its completion. The dishes went first, and while they dried in the sink, he filled a bucket with water, found a brush and rag and fell to his knees on the kitchen floor.
With his jaw clamped tight, he attacked the loathsome floor, digging and gouging at the sticky pop stains, the ground-in catsup and honey spots, and the two months’ buildup of outside dirt and grease. He became oblivious to time. His thoughts and energy were riveted to one thing—the eradication of the suffocating filth.
It was late when he finally stopped. His knees were tender, his arm and shoulder ached, and his fingers were wrinkled. But the apartment was clean. A grim satisfaction was carved upon his brow as he wandered throughout the apartment, surveying his work. However, his satisfaction was short-lived. Though he had succeeded at imitation, there was a blatant absence of something impalpable but much more substantial. The old craving persisted.
He became desperate. He cut himself a slice of his mother’s bread and smothered it with strawberry preserves, but when he was finished he was still unsatisfied. There was no escape from the pervasive, lonely depression.
Once more he fled from the apartment. This time he didn’t encounter a single car as he drove along the old familiar country road. The whole while he ridiculed himself for returning, but he didn’t turn back. He lacked the will to rationalize, and his mind was bombarded with memories.
He remembered, not the seeming strict discipline, not the rules he had tried to escape or circumvent, not the arguments, not the usual memories he had conditioned himself to conjure when he was tormented by sentimental reminiscence. Instead he remembered the quiet visits with his father, before the contention had developed. He remembered how safe and secure he had felt as his father wrapped a strong arm around his shoulders and drew him close. He remembered his mother sitting by his hospital bed for days after his knee operation. There was little she could do, but she was there, wiping his brow, holding his hand and lending him stability in the midst of strange surroundings. He recalled the vocal cheering section that had followed him to all his football and baseball games. He had been embarrassed at the time, but now he yearned to hear those enthusiastic cheers again.
The pickup slowed to a crawl as he neared the house. The station wagon was parked under the giant elm. The house was completely dark. Except for the lone porch light!
“I wonder who’s still out?” Nick thought instinctively. He remembered that the porch light never dimmed as long as one of the family was out. Even when he worked past midnight at Ernie’s Cafe, he had come home to that beckoning porch light.
“And when you come home,” his mother had insisted gently, “stop by our room and tell us you’re in. I don’t sleep well while someone’s still out.”
Nick looked at his watch. “Almost 3:00 A.M.,” he muttered, bewildered. “Teresa can’t still be out on a date. Not this late. Midnight is as late as she can stay out. And Paul doesn’t work nights. And none of the little ones would be away.”
Suddenly the buried hunger exploded within him and he knew for whom the light burned and he knew that during the last two months the light had never been switched off.
Only then did he begin to comprehend the strange hunger that had plagued him. He knew it had nothing to do with tangibles—clean sheets, waxed floors, and fresh baked bread. With a little effort he could duplicate those. There was something else, something far more significant and fulfilling.
His fierce pride prevented him from making any bold concessions this night, but deep within him there was a quiet serenity. There was still a gap between him and them. Having grown and festered over a period of months, it was deep and wide, but as Nick stared at the porch’s enduring beacon, he sensed that the gap would be bridged and he could return.

That biblical account of so long ago reminds me of being on a Church assignment in Takoradi, Ghana. Remarkably, I was there on Palm Sunday.

I was to divide the Takoradi Ghana Stake to create the Mpintsin Ghana Stake. Today, there are over 100,000 members of the Church in Ghana. (We welcome the Ga Mantse, His Majesty King Nii Tackie Teiko Tsuru II of Accra, Ghana, who is with us today.) Meeting with these Saints, I felt their profound love and devotion to the Lord. I expressed my great love for them and that the President of the Church loved them. I referred to the Savior’s words recorded by John: “That ye love one another, as I have loved you.” They deemed it the “I love you conference.”

As I looked up and down the rows of those dear brothers and sisters and their families in the chapel, I could see in their faces the glow of testimony and faith in Jesus Christ. I felt their desire to be counted as part of His far-reaching Church. And when the choir sang, they sang like angels.

Like on Palm Sunday of old, these were disciples of Jesus Christ gathered to pay tribute to Him as did those at the gates of Jerusalem who, with palms in their hands, exclaimed, “Hosanna … : Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.”

Even the parishioners in a church nearby were honoring Palm Sunday. As I was speaking from the pulpit, I noticed out the window they were joyfully walking down the street waving palms in their hands, much like those in this photo. It was a sight I will never forget—all of us that day worshipping the King of kings.

Are we continually grateful for the incomparable Atonement of Jesus Christ? Do we feel its purifying power, right now? That is why Jesus Christ, the Author and Finisher of our salvation, went to Jerusalem, to save us all. Do these words in Alma strike a chord: “If ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?” I can truly say, the choir in Takoradi that Palm Sunday sang “the song of redeeming love.”

That Palm Sunday in Takoradi was a very special experience for me because I shared it with a faithful congregation of brothers and sisters. So it has been on continents and islands all around the world. My heart and soul, like yours, longs to shout, “Hosanna to the Most High God.”

Whenever bad thoughts come into my head, I just sing “I Am a Child of God” quietly, and then the bad thought is gone.
Minae B., age 12, Guaynabo, Puerto Rico

Five years later, I was preparing to be endowed and married in the temple. The night before my temple sealing, my brother and his wife attended the temple to perform proxy work for my mother’s parents in preparation for their sealing the next day. My mother was a convert of almost 20 years at the time, and she was eager to begin her family’s history and temple work.
The next day, our grandparents were sealed to each other, my brother and his wife again standing as proxy. It was my wedding day, yes, but it held extra significance for me. My grandparents, whom I had never met, were sharing this special day with me.
A few days later, as my husband and I opened wedding gifts, we opened one very special gift from my grandmother’s first cousin. She was a religious woman who had been close to my grandmother. The gift was a picture of my grandmother on her own wedding day. An accompanying card said, “Your grandmother is so happy with you and is looking down upon you.”
This cousin had no idea how much her message meant to me. Nor did she know of the temple work that had recently been performed for my grandmother. I knew in my heart at that moment that my grandmother was pleased with me and happy that our family had started on the important journey of family history and temple work.
We were a forever family now, on the path of gathering our ancestors and led by my mother in blessing our family on the other side of the veil.

“I came out west every summer by car or train. In those days travel by air wasn’t very common. The families of my mother and father all lived in the Salt Lake area. My aunts and uncles were just like second mothers and fathers to me. My cousins are still like brothers and sisters. I worked on a ranch in Skull Valley, west of Salt Lake City, riding after wild horses, putting down salt licks, and sitting on a baler. I still have scars on one of my hands from working on the baler.”

One day when I was 14 years old, a loud sound from the street caught my attention. I hurried to investigate and found a truck with huge sacks of seeds lumbering up the road. One of the sacks had tumbled off the truck and burst open.
The recently paved street was covered with tar and fresh gravel. This caused an enormous mess as thousands of seeds mixed with the road material. After the driver stopped and examined the situation, he expressed his frustration and drove away angry. He didn’t think the seeds were worth the hassle of picking them up out of the tar and gravel.
For me, though, those discarded seeds were a treasure I couldn’t pass up. I lived on a farm. Even though I had no idea what type of seeds they were, I knew they could grow into something useful. So I grabbed a five-gallon bucket and scooped up as many as I could, gravel and all.
I ran home to show my family my newfound treasure. Though we’d never planted string beans before, my dad recognized the seeds for what they were. He walked me to a back corner of our farm. “This is your area now,” he said. “Plant those seeds and help them grow.”
I was excited! I’d never had my own area of the farm to work before. That year my little corner was better watered and better weeded than any other part of our entire farm. While the rest of my farm chores still felt like work, taking care of my own corner with the string beans each day felt like fun.
The plants grew and grew. We ended up with so many string beans that we had enough to freeze and eat all year long.
The best part was that I used only a tiny portion of the seeds from my bucket. I had enough seeds in there to keep me going for years. Every year I planted more string beans and every year our family enjoyed a good harvest.
When I was about to leave on my mission, I looked at my bucket of seeds. The seeds were still mixed in with tar and gravel, but they were still as valuable as ever.
Every seed still had potential. It didn’t matter if the seeds were surrounded by tar and gravel or if they were grimy on the outside. The harvest was the same with these seeds as with any other string bean seed. They only needed somebody to see their worth.
Looking down into my bucket, I realized that those seeds were like Heavenly Father’s children. Sometimes people “fall off the truck” into rough places and nobody seems to want them. But we all have the same divine potential, no matter our circumstances. We all need to recognize that potential in others and help nurture it along.
Many years later I was reading in Jacob 5 about the allegory of the tame and wild olive trees when I remembered this experience from my youth. In the allegory, the master had a place in “the nethermost part of the vineyard” (Jacob 5:19) that was poorer than the rest.
His servant wondered why they would even want to spend time in that part of the vineyard (see Jacob 5:21), yet the master of the vineyard saw its potential and chose to labor there. These efforts ultimately yielded a great harvest.
Back when I was 14, my corner of the farm also happened to be the poorest on our property. And yet this corner still yielded a great harvest as a result of the time and effort I spent there working with the abandoned seeds.

Aba Nigeria Temple
President Gordon B. Hinckley dedicated the Aba Nigeria Temple on August 7, 2005. The temple is located near the Ogbor River. As part of the temple construction, the Church built a bridge over the river and a road leading to the temple.
During the dedication ceremonies, President Hinckley said the temple would be a blessing to the people just as the Accra Ghana Temple has been to African Saints since being dedicated in 2004.

Nor did the early Saints forget it either. In 1913, with the aid of Elder Sellers from Vernal, Utah, and Elder Joseph E. Ward from Parowan, Utah, the Magnolia chapel was built. It stands now as the oldest LDS chapel in Alabama.
Before construction began, a mob gathered to drive the elders out. Mrs. Willie Autrey, a nonmember, stepped out with her gun and turned the mob away. So the Magnolia chapel was built and has stood through the years as a monument to the dedication of area Saints, early and modern.

“Miss Flores, what this world needs is a way of making people happier and healthier. Families just aren’t what they used to be.”
With that, Governor Eulogio Rodriguez of the Province of Rizal, the Philippines, turned to his desk and his thoughts. He was quite surprised when, a few minutes later, there was a knock at his door and in came two young LDS missionaries. He was even more surprised when they explained a program that would increase the efficiency of his staff by making their families happier and healthier than ever before.
The elders told him about Health Awareness ’76, a health fair presented by the Church’s International Health Team in the Philippines Manila Mission. The governor was so excited with the idea that he called a staff meeting to present a preview of the fair, and in fact, directed all of his employees and their families to attend.
Health Awareness ’76, just an idea in the minds of 11 young health services missionaries in its beginning, exploded into one of the most dynamic ways of introducing the gospel of Jesus Christ ever seen in the Philippines. A vast amount of practical health information on nutrition, disease prevention, and child care was assembled in unique, eye-catching ways that stimulated the curiosity of both the professional and the layman. It was presented in Manila and in several other cities throughout the Philippines.
The enthusiastic response of the various government organizations and community leaders was overwhelming. Over 20 agencies contributed information and personnel for the fair. National and private corporations became so interested in the project that many of them donated equipment and professional assistance in demonstrations. Displays, films, lectures, workshops, and booths were set up to educate the people of the Philippines about hygiene, nutrition, and other important items of health care awareness.
A display called Careless Charley taught the value of personal cleanliness and proper food preparation and sanitation as a preventative measure against parasites. Nearly 92 percent of the children in the Philippines suffer from some type of parasite; most are preventable with good hygiene.
The mobile X-ray van of the Philippines Tuberculosis Society provided free chest X-rays and medical consultation. The Heart Center for Asia demonstrated mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and even a heart monitor was displayed.
Doctors James O. Mason and Isaac Ferguson flew from Salt Lake City to attend the health fair. In his opening statement, Dr. Mason, director of Church Welfare Services, pointed out that “the Church not only helps people prepare for eternal life, but it also helps them to be strong, healthy, and happy on earth.”
Public awareness of the Church’s concern for the health of its members increased when GTV-4, a national television station, devoted an entire 30-minute show called “Health Talk” to the Health Fair. During the interview, Miss Yvonne Nite, the hostess ot the show, asked Dr. Mason: “We’ve heard about your church’s beliefs regarding the use of alcohol, tobacco, and coffee. What are the medical reasons behind these beliefs?”
Dr. Mason’s impressive response was: “The Church believes in divine revelation from a Heavenly Father who loves his children. All revelation is given to us through a living prophet. It is interesting to note that 150 years ago, the Lord revealed to a prophet that alcohol, tobacco, coffee, and tea are harmful to our bodies. The scientists and doctors of today are only now discovering that these substances are dangerous.”
Aided by stupendous advertising and hundreds of hours of work by determined, excited proselyting missionaries, the total number who attended the fair at the Araneta Coliseum in Manila exceeded 15,000 in the first three days.
After only one week, the Philippines Manila Mission was flooded with referrals. In fact, one of the mission assistants exclaimed, “I just can’t believe it, over 12,000 referral cards after only two areas. What will the tour of the provinces bring?”
The health fair has prompted enthusiastic action by Church members in an effort to improve their standards of health. Members who discovered that their children were undernourished received instruction and counseling on nutrition from local government agencies as well as their Relief Society teachers. With the cooperation of the local health departments, thousands were immunized against cholera, typhoid, small pox, tuberculosis, and polio. Several active cases of tuberculosis and other respiratory ailments were discovered, and proper rehabilitative measures are being taken.
Thousands of garden seeds were sold to encourage home gardeners, and local wards and branches were planning their own welfare projects. Tiny seedlings began springing up in tin cans and flower pots all over Manila. Garden plots were cultivated where space was available, and families will save hundreds of pesos in food costs as they harvest their own tomatoes, lettuce, squash, and beans.
Thousands of seeds have been planted, but not only those that yield tomatoes, squash, or other vegetables. The Philippines Manila Mission and the Church will yet reap a bountiful harvest in terms of public appreciation, cooperation, and support, in increased member activity and productivity, and in converts who first learned that the Church existed when they attended Health Awareness ’76, the health affair of the year.

One woman said, “I have my own religion, but I was interested in seeing the building.” She spent hours asking questions, and when she left she said, “I didn’t know you believed in Christ. I am so impressed.”