Gospel Story Finder

Unfortunately, as the season progressed, I found myself slowly letting my guard down. One day when I was working the Jupiter Peak rotation, I responded to an accident. My co-worker and I sped down the steep terrain with a toboggan, fighting to keep it steady. Upon arriving at the scene to help the victim, we laughed at the blunders we had made trying to get there. During our storytelling, I slipped in a colorful adjective.
I thought nothing of it until, in a conversation with the victim, he told us he was a BYU student and was preparing for a mission. I realized that to him I was probably just another coarse mountain patrol woman. I had given him no reason to believe otherwise. At that moment I reaffirmed my desire that no matter where I am, I want people to know I am a disciple of Christ. And isn’t that what we do when we take the sacrament each week—take His name upon us and stand as witnesses?
When I slipped in my conduct that day, I was embarrassed that the injured skier wouldn’t associate me with the Church. But I was far more embarrassed that I hadn’t first been ashamed that Heavenly Father had also heard me.

But a new love was waiting in the wings, and at 12 years of age, Kent was to have his eyes snatched from the delightful snake-harboring ground to the wide, blue, eagle-bearing sky.
One day on a camping trip Kent’s Scoutmaster pointed at a dead cottonwood tree and said, “Hey, guys, there are two eagles!” The two golden eagles perched on skeletal limbs burned their image into an unexposed surface of Kent’s brain and filled his life’s appointment book all in an instant. He came. He saw. He was conquered.
But finding eagles isn’t all that easy until you learn where to look, and it was two years before Kent was able to make a house call. One rainy afternoon in early May he stepped onto a tiny protruding ledge that overhung more than 150 feet of sheer emptiness. As he peered over the edge, the sun burst through the rain clouds, spotlighting the golden hackles of a female eagle on her nest about ten yards down. Seeing Kent, she soared silently away but left behind two eaglets who sat cheeping at him in a blaze of downy sunshine.
Kent says of that instant: “At that moment I was so inspired by the beauty and majesty of the eagles that I felt more alive myself. The air smelled fresher, and the stream far below sparkled more brightly than before. I had simply opened my eyes and had really seen and felt what was around me.”
From eagles Kent’s love spread to all raptors (birds of prey). The fierce independence and aristocratic bearing of these aerial hunters caught his imagination and sent him out during every spare moment to follow their flight and study their habits.
He went to the library too, hunting these feathered sky-riders among the quiet stacks of books. He learned, both from books and experience (he doesn’t believe a book until he has proved it in nature) about the different raptors—where they nested, where they hunted, how they hunted, what their prey was, how they mated, and even how they flew. Before long he could see a bird silhouetted gnat-small on the horizon and name it by its flight pattern. Every time he saw a bird or visited a nest, he took careful scientific notes of everything he observed. He has several PhD dissertations lying unwritten in his notebooks.
During his junior year in high school, Kent dropped out of football and basketball to allow more time for raptor study. He traveled miles and miles searching out nests and roosting areas. He developed the climbing ability of a mountain goat and the stamina of a mustang. Leaving home Friday night after school or well before dawn Saturday morning, getting home well after dark Saturday night, and spending much of the time in between climbing steep mountains at a brisk trot, he found many raptor nests and gradually became a legitimate expert in the field. Weekdays after school also found him in the hills as often as possible.
One of his most rewarding experiences came one winter after a month-long search when he found the winter roosting grounds of bald eagles from Canada and Alaska. “I stood alone in two feet of snow near the bottom of an isolated canyon in west-central Utah, my eyes searching the sky for signs of life. Suddenly, as if by magic, they came, one by one, in pairs, and in small groups. Bald eagles dropped from the tall pine trees to the south and were gradually caught up in thermal drafts of air. Slowly circling higher and higher, traveling on wings of up to eight feet in length, they drifted west in a steady stream of traffic across the sky.”
That summer he carried back-breaking loads of wood and canvas up a towering mountain in order to build a blind from which to observe these eagles during the coming winter. When the snows were deep on the mountain a few months later, he spent hours watching them up close. “I have often crawled out of a warm bed at 3:00 A.M. and hiked up tall mountains through three feet of snow in the dark. Then I have sat cramped and numbed in a dark blind until mid-afternoon. By that time I have begun to wonder what is wrong with me. Suddenly, only 30 feet away and halfway up a scraggly old pine tree, a beautiful bald eagle has landed, and I wonder no longer.”
Kent interrupted his eagle watching to accept a mission call to the Kentucky Louisville Mission, but on his return he was on the road again checking nests.
Kent, like other students of raptors, is especially interested in the predators’ nesting behavior because this is the cycle that stands between the species and extinction.
There is also the mystery of the eternal interplay between the flight and the nest, freedom and responsibility. “An eagle’s freedom is exciting. They can leave the ground any time they want and ride the wind, and yet, like people, they’re tied down with responsibilities. When an eagle has eggs, she’s on the nest for 45 days, and she may leave it for only an hour a day. Eagles must follow their food supply too. They have certain laws they have to live within, but when they get up there and ride that wind, there’s not much that can touch them.”
In Utah, golden eagles begin their courtship flights in January or February, lay eggs from late February through March, and then incubate them from 42 to 45 days, after which the eaglets stay in the nest for from eight to ten weeks before taking to their wings. Kent warns that anyone interested in eagles should simply stay away from the nests during egg laying and incubation because during that period adult eagles are most prone to abandon the nest. Whenever a human being approaches her nest, the female eagle will invariably leave it until he is gone, and even if she returns, exposure to heat or cold can easily destroy the eggs. After the eaglets have hatched, the nest can be safely visited for very short periods of time, but after the eaglets are about seven weeks old, there is serious danger of frightening them off the nest before they are able to fly.
First flight is as breathtaking an experience for eagles as it is for people, and the proud lords of the skyways start out as bumbling, incompetent aviators. They too often crash and break a wing on the first flight and become easy prey to starvation or some four-legged predator. Kent once saw a ten-week-old eagle make its first flight and remembers: “He hopped off the nest as if he knew what he was doing, but all of a sudden he was speeding down toward the opposite cliff and losing altitude fast. You could see the shock in his eyes. His wings were spread out, his primary and secondary feathers flapping back and forth in the breeze. His head was moving back and forth watching the ground and looking back up at the nest—looking everywhere at once. He looked as if he was wondering what he had gotten himself into, whether he had really blown it, but you could also feel his exhilaration and the thrill of his first flight. He dropped down to the mouth of the canyon and hit an updraft that just pushed him right up out of sight. I found him the next day sitting on a tree unhurt.”
Kent realized from day one that it would be unthinkable to put an eagle in a cage like his childhood pet lizards, so he found another way of capturing the wild, free beauty of these magnificent creatures—photography. He seldom goes anywhere without his camera and his 400, 150, and 50 mm lenses. Over the years he has accumulated a fine collection of raptor slides and has organized them into several slide shows guaranteed to make you sad you were not born an eagle. He presents these shows to many groups and enjoys sharing them with people in rest homes and with handicapped children. It is his way of giving wings to people who are the most earthbound.
“I love eagles,” he says, “but people are the most important part of that love. It wouldn’t mean a thing to me if I went out there and filmed all those great things and didn’t have anybody to share it with.”
In photographing raptors, Kent has developed a skill that few people share. If you don’t believe it, go out sometime and photograph a bird moving in and out of focus at eye-blurring speed across blue sky, white clouds, black mountainsides, and blazing patches of snow, all in a few seconds. You’ll be very lucky even to find the thing in your telephoto lens, much less focus it and get the right exposure.
Kent’s delight in all living things has never faded. He still can’t pass up a lizard without stopping and watching. A porcupine is still a miracle. A turtle is still a masterpiece. A raven or a meadowlark is still breathtaking, and snakes still make him shiver as good as they make most of us shiver bad. There are no commonplace animals for Kent; they all bring him joy just by being. It is significant that on the gun rack in his pickup he has hung only a pair of binoculars.
But in spite of his reverence for all things, those binoculars are filled mostly with raptors right now, and Kent has been repaid for his thousands of hours of work with some heart-thumping experiences—a squadron of bald eagles on a winter day, the soaring rise of a Swainson’s hawk, the screaming dive of a prairie falcon, the puppet-like unreality of baby owls. And speaking of owls, he had the privilege of being knocked backwards off a 30-foot cliff by a frightened great horned owl and of having his face bloodied by the fierce attack of another not-at-all frightened member of the species.
He especially remembers one top-of-the-world moment on a peak high in a remote canyon. The granite walls were so buffeted by a tree-toppling wind that day that he had to lie flat to avoid being blown away like a leaf. A golden eagle came floating down onto the highest point on the peak, sorting out the changing, punishing wind with his wings, and somehow keeping an even keel. He stood there a moment looking regally around at the whole world lying beneath his talons as if inspecting his kingdom. “He only touched down for a few seconds, and then he simply opened his wings and turned them back into the wind. He shot up and out of sight like a rocket without ever flapping a wing.”
No one but Kent can say how many hours of sleep or basketball games or TV shows that experience was worth to him, but he isn’t complaining.
There is another aspect to Kent’s studies beyond the intellectual and aesthetic. Living with these magnificent birds has strengthened his testimony of his Creator. One winter day he took an atheist friend to a canyon where he knew there would be eagles. As they stood in the snow watching some 50 bald eagles soar above them, Kent looked at his open-mouthed friend and said quietly, “That didn’t just happen by accident.”
“Boy, I know it!” his friend said, his voice small with awe.
If anybody wants to know why eagles are worth saving, maybe that’s why.

“Why do I have to be here?” Lindsay whined.
“You need to support your brother,” Mom said.
“But it’s so boring,” Lindsay said. “Most of the time I don’t even watch him.”
Lindsay’s little brother, Michael, had joined a Little League baseball team, and Mom took Lindsay to every practice and every game. Lindsay was bored the whole time. While Michael struggled to hit the baseball, Lindsay listened to music, read books, and drew pictures for her little sister.
Lindsay sighed and watched her brother stand in the outfield with his teammates. She watched him as he ran to catch a ball, missed it, and then threw it to the wrong person.
“Keep going, Michael!” Mom called. “You’re doing great!”
“But, Mom,” Lindsay said, “he’s not doing great.”
“That’s why we’re here, Lindsay,” Mom said. “To cheer Michael on, especially when he does badly. If we weren’t here and Michael felt like he was failing, he might stop trying. I want him to always try. Just like how I want you to always try with your art.”
“No one has to cheer me on in art class,” Lindsay said. “Michael doesn’t come with me and shout, ‘Great job!’ when I mix the colors right.”
“No, but he always compliments your art when you show it to us,” Mom said.
Lindsay thought about that. She remembered how Mom had driven her to art classes and how sometimes Michael had to ride in the car, even when he wanted to play with his friends. She watched Michael in the outfield. The other team’s batter had just hit the ball. It was going straight toward him!
“Come on, Michael!” Lindsay cheered. “You can catch it!”
Michael ran toward the ball and stretched out his mitt. He caught the ball!
Lindsay and Mom both stood up and cheered. “Great job, Michael! You’re my favorite brother!” Lindsay shouted.
“I’m your only brother!” Michael shouted back with a huge grin on his face.
Lindsay sat back down, smiling from ear to ear.
“Maybe I should pay attention and cheer Michael on,” she thought. “Watching him catch that ball was the most interesting thing that has happened all day. And he looked like he really cared that I was watching. I’m so proud of him.”
“Mom, I think you’re right,” Lindsay said. “We should support Michael.”
Mom smiled. “I’m glad you changed your mind.”
“Let’s cheer some more!” Lindsay said.
“Go, Michael!” cheered Lindsay and Mom. “You can do it!”

It was a warm summer morning as Josh followed his dad into the hardware store. Outside, bees hummed and sprinklers hissed, but inside everything was cool and quiet. Josh stood at the window and watched a bee bump against the glass.
Then something on a shelf caught his eye—a pocketknife gleaming in the sunlight near the window. Josh was sure he could use a knife like that for all sorts of things. But he didn’t ask Dad if he could buy it. He already knew what Dad would say: “You should wait until you’re a Boy Scout to get a pocketknife.” Josh didn’t want to wait until then. He wanted a pocketknife right now.
Josh looked over his shoulder. Dad was busy paying the cashier for some work gloves. Josh snatched the knife and put it in his pocket.
“Ready to go?” Dad asked.
Josh followed Dad to the car, his heart thumping like the bee against the window. As they drove away, Josh smiled. No one had noticed! The knife was his.
So why did it feel like a heavy rock in his pocket?
By the time Josh got home, he felt like he had a rock in his stomach too. Josh went to his room and took out the knife. It didn’t seem to gleam anymore. Josh tried to imagine what kinds of things he’d use it for, but he couldn’t think of any. Besides, if he took the knife out of his room, Dad might see it.
Josh felt anxious all day. The knife’s weight in his pocket kept reminding him of the wrong choice he had made. He had to get rid of it.
“Can I ride my bike?” he asked Mom.
“Yes, just be home in time for dinner,” Mom said.
Josh hurried to get his bicycle from the garage and pedaled onto the sidewalk.
“Hey, Josh! Where are you going?” Josh’s brother Tanner called from his friend Chris’s yard.
Josh didn’t slow down. He raced to the end of the street, where a brick wall was built into a hillside. Josh found a crack between the bricks and stuffed the pocketknife into the dark hole. No one would know what he’d done. Now he could forget about it too.
A few hours later, Tanner and Chris burst into the house. “Look what we found!” Tanner held up the pocketknife.
Josh tried not to look guilty. “Where did you get that?” he asked.
“We followed a bee,” Tanner said.
“You followed a bee?” Mom repeated.
“We were bored,” Tanner said. “We chased the bee to the end of the street. It crawled into a hole in the brick wall, and that’s where the pocketknife was.”
Josh felt sick. Even though he’d hidden the knife, Heavenly Father knew where it was. He went to his room and counted the dollar bills in his wallet. Then he prayed for the courage to tell the truth. When he got up from his knees, the anxiousness in his mind quieted. He felt a little nervous about telling his parents and the cashier at the hardware store what he had done, but he felt lighter than he had all day—like a bee zipping over the rooftops toward home.

Elder Scott taught and lived by the motto “Do what is right; let the consequence follow.”4 That motto guided him in 1965 when, after receiving a call to serve, he told his boss he would be leaving his job to serve as a mission president in Argentina. His boss, a navy admiral, was angry. He said he would never to talk to him again and that Elder Scott would never again work as a nuclear engineer.
Two months later, Elder Scott gave his boss a Book of Mormon. His boss said he would read it and then surprised Elder Scott when he said, “When you come back … , I want you to call me. There will be a job for you.”5
In his navy uniform.
After his mission, Elder Scott worked as a nuclear engineering consultant until he was called to the First Quorum of the Seventy in 1977. In 1988 he was called as an Apostle. Fulfilling the call was one way he kept a covenant he had made years before: “When I was very young,” he said, “I made a covenant with the Lord that I would devote my best energies to his work. I have repeated that covenant throughout the years.”6
After joining the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1988.
Elder Scott taught how to cope with trials and receive guidance from Heavenly Father. He testified that when we face challenges like doubt, depression, sin, or abuse, we can find strength and relief through faith in Jesus Christ.
He also taught about the importance of making correct choices, that forgiving others heals painful wounds, that sincere prayer opens the door to heavenly guidance, that temple worship and scripture study bring peace and answers, and that marriage and family is central to God’s plan. His faith in Jesus Christ was firm, as was his hope in the blessings that would come in the future.

I spent my career in the department store business. Because I was part of a management team, it was important for me to interact socially with local business organizations. The meetings with most of these organizations always started with a cocktail hour. It was a time to mix and get acquainted with the men who belonged to the organization. I have always felt uncomfortable in these social hours. At first I started asking for a lemon-lime soda. I soon discovered that lemon-lime soda looks like many of the other drinks. I could not build the impression I was a nondrinker with a clear soda in my hands. I tried root beer. It had the same problem.

Finally I decided I had to have a drink that would clearly mark me as a nondrinker. I went to the bartender and requested a glass of milk. The bartender had never had such a request. He went into the kitchen and found a glass of milk for me. Now I had a drink that looked very different from the alcoholic beverages the others were drinking. Suddenly I was the center of attention. There were a lot of jokes made of my drink. My milk was a conversation piece. I met more business leaders that evening than I ever had before at a cocktail hour.

Milk became my drink of choice at the cocktail hours. It soon became common knowledge I was a Mormon. The respect I received really surprised me, as did an interesting event that started to occur. Others soon joined me in a pure milk cocktail!

One of the most pleasant and productive experiences in my life happened in 1943 as the Japanese war was taking place. I heard Dr. Adam S. Bennion give a lecture on the value of great literature. You can sell the idea of the value of great ideas to anyone. That is, we all believe that we should be acquainted with great human thought. But almost everyone gets away from its benefit by saying that he doesn’t have time to read. To get away from this objection of not having time, Dr. Bennion said, “Suppose that you were going to be a prisoner in a Japanese concentration camp for the next four years and you could take with you the works of any ten authors. Which would you take, and what would you expect to get out of them?” That is, what are the values of great ideas, of great literature? His idea was to take the ten authors you would most like to resemble and then exhaust each one in turn. That is, you would read every thought and consider every idea that a particular author had ever recorded; you would rethink his every idea. The psychologists say that when you run an idea through your brain, it makes a little groove or engram. If you run through your mind the kind of ideas that went through the mind of Shakespeare or Emerson or the apostle Paul or Moses or Jesus of Nazareth, then your brain will tend to respond as their brains did.
From someplace I got the courage to make the start. I guess Shakespeare comes fairly close to the top of most people’s lists of great authors. So I got out Shakespeare’s 37 plays, his sonnets, and his poems and went to work. Reading them was pretty difficult at first. I read very slowly and perhaps not very comprehendingly. Shakespeare wrote a long time ago, and there were many things that I did not understand. I had to reread some things several times, look up their meanings, and ask people about them. But finally the clouds began to part, a little bit of the sunlight began to come through, and I had a tremendous experience with Shakespeare. Shakespeare looked with clearer insight into human life than do most men. He said his purpose in writing was to hold the mirror up to life, to show virtue her own image and scorn her own likeness. He said, “I your looking-glass will be and will modestly discover to yourself qualities which you yourself know not of.” I had a great uplift as I read his speeches and his arguments for success. And as he pictured life in miniature with his great characters acting and reacting upon each other, I was intellectually born again—a great many times. Each time we discover some inspiring thought, we can be changed, and changed for the better.
I always read with my pen, marking every idea, every phrase, every quote, and every other thing that I think will help me. And then I put these thoughts into my notebooks. One of my most valuable possessions in the world is my collection of 25 notebooks. They are just regular 8 1/2-by-11-inch page size, three-ring binders, with about 300 pages in each one; so I have 7,500 pages of notes. I think of my reading as a combine harvester sweeping across a field of wheat. It cuts everything before it, but throws out the weeds and the chaff and the straw and puts the wheat in the sack. If I were now going to read something that would be particularly exciting to me, it wouldn’t be Shakespeare, it wouldn’t be Emerson, it wouldn’t even be the scriptures. It would be my notes, because I have selected for my notes those things that particularly inspire me.
I have always felt a little bit cheated in my life that no one has ever tried to talk me out of my faith. I have heard many people say that they got into the wrong crowd or listened to the wrong professor or were influenced by the wrong philosophy. But everywhere I have gone, people have encouraged me to live my religion. Once I thought that maybe I believed as I did just because I didn’t know any better, so I got the complete works of Robert G. Ingersoll. In my opinion Robert G. Ingersoll was the greatest atheist, if you could use that term, that ever lived in the world. I don’t know how convincing other people’s atheism is, but Robert G. Ingersoll was a great salesman. He was a great orator. He was a great architect of speech. He knew how to put ideas together. If anybody could persuade me about something, I think maybe it would have been Robert G. Ingersoll. His complete works are made up of 19,900 pages. There are 214 pages in my New Testament, so I read 90 new testaments of atheism. I didn’t read his works to try to out-argue him or to find fault with them. I read them actually to try to help him persuade me that there was something better than those things that I believed. I read him very carefully. I don’t skip read. I don’t jump over things or just read things that I think will be interesting. If something is important enough for him to write down, it is important enough for me to study and to try to find out the right answer to the subject discussed. And in all of my experiences in reading his work, he hasn’t shaken my faith in the smallest degree. Since that time I have read 987 of the great books, and I have had some tremendous experiences in a lot of different directions with what I have read. These great new philosophies have enabled me to have an “intellectual rebirth.”

Elizabeth wanted to be the best baby-sitter in the world. She knew how important it was to be reliable and responsible. A file box, just like her big sister’s, helped her keep track of important information. Each family she baby-sat for had a card. There weren’t many cards in the bright blue box yet, but there would be soon.
Early Saturday morning, Elizabeth took out the Burroughs’s card and scanned the information. “Two children—Billy and Kristi. Kristi likes picture books,” she read. Elizabeth remembered the little girl’s favorite book and put it and some other books in her box before leaving her house. She briskly walked the three blocks to the familiar yellow house and rang the doorbell.
“Good morning,” Mrs. Burroughs greeted her. “You’re right on time as usual. Billy’s spending the day at the zoo with John and some of his other friends. He’ll be home by five. You remember John’s mother, don’t you?”
“Sure. She brought Billy home when I baby-sat before.”
“She’s going to drive him home today too. If she invites him to spend the night with John, it’s fine. Just remind Billy to pack his toothbrush.”
“Did you leave me a note about Kristi’s lunch and dinner?” asked Elizabeth.
“It’s on the kitchen table. We should be back by seven if the traffic isn’t too bad. We’ll try to call you this afternoon to be sure everything’s OK.”
Elizabeth knew Mr. and Mrs. Burroughs were fixing up a mountain cabin. The cabin didn’t have a phone, so they usually called from a nearby store to check on things. She wasn’t worried.
After carefully locking the door when Mr. and Mrs. Burroughs left, Elizabeth slid the safety chain into position. She put the file card right by the phone. The card was an easy way to keep track of important details. It had the Burroughs’s address printed on it just in case Elizabeth couldn’t remember it if there was an emergency. Billy and Kristi’s pediatrician’s phone number was there too. Mrs. Burroughs had explained to Elizabeth that the doctor had a special permission form on file in case Billy or Kristi needed treatment and their parents couldn’t be reached.
Police and fire department numbers were printed in red so Elizabeth could find them in a hurry. She’d even made notes about what Mrs. Burroughs liked the children to have for snacks. “NO VISITORS” was printed at the bottom of the card.
There was one other thing Elizabeth wanted to do to prepare for an emergency. She and Kristi played the “creeping, crawling game.” Kristi loved it. She was much too young to realize that this was Elizabeth’s way of making sure she would be able to get the toddler safely out of the house if there was a fire.
“Hungry,” Kristi said later, when Elizabeth finished reading the last page of the picture book.
“How about some banana wheels?”
“Yes! Yes!”
Elizabeth peeled a banana and carefully sliced it into little wheels. Since Kristi liked to do things by herself, Elizabeth reached for a plastic plate. If the toddler dropped it, there wouldn’t be any sharp pieces to worry about.
“Yummy ’nana,” Kristi said.
Suddenly the doorbell rang.
“Who is it?” Elizabeth asked as she looked through the peephole. She didn’t recognize the long-haired man. Something about the bulge in his scruffy jacket made her shiver. Maybe he has a gun! she thought.
“I’m Ted Burroughs.”
Was he really Ted Burroughs? The last name was printed bold and black on the mailbox where anybody could read it. Elizabeth didn’t know if Mr. Burroughs had a relative named Ted.
Kristi was at the stage where any man she saw was “Daddy,” so she wouldn’t be any help. If only Billy were home …
Looking through the peephole again, Elizabeth couldn’t help staring at that bulge.
“Come on, honey. I’m much too tired to play games. Open the door.”
Instead of reaching for the chain, Elizabeth hurried toward the phone. She took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. Those bright red digits on the card made it easy to dial the right numbers quickly.
Elizabeth told the police dispatcher the exact address where she was baby-sitting. “There’s a stranger at the door. I’m not positive, but I think he may have a gun.”
“We’ll send an officer over immediately. Just keep the door locked. Give me the phone number there; I’ll call you right back on a nonemergency line.”
Elizabeth hung up and gathered Kristi in a big bear hug. “Everything’s going to be fine,” she promised.
Grabbing the phone before it rang a second time, Elizabeth felt better just hearing the familiar voice. The police dispatcher sounded so friendly, so calm. There couldn’t be anything to be afraid of—not really. Help was on the way.
The dispatcher kept talking until Elizabeth heard a car stop out front. “I think the officer is here,” Elizabeth told the dispatcher.
“Yes. We’re in radio contact. Just talk to me for a few more minutes until I get a report from the officer on the scene.”
Those few minutes seemed to crawl. Even though Elizabeth knew she was old enough to handle things the right way, she suddenly wished she were Kristi. It would be nice to have somebody hug you and whisper that everything was OK.
“Elizabeth, you can open the door now. Officer Jenkins just reported in.”
“Thanks for talking to me so I didn’t have a chance to get really scared.”
“You’re welcome. That’s part of our job. If you ever have trouble again, be sure to call us.”
Carrying Kristi to the door, Elizabeth slid the chain off the lock and unbolted the door. She couldn’t help shivering when she saw that the stranger was still there. At least there was a police officer right next to him.
“Elizabeth, this is Ted Burroughs. He’s the brother of the man who lives here.”
“I’m sorry—”
“Don’t you dare apologize!” Ted Burroughs interrupted. “You did exactly the right thing. I’m a night watchman. When I got off my shift, I decided to drop by for a visit. I’m sure my brother and sister-in-law will be pleased to know they have such a responsible baby-sitter.”
The stranger didn’t look nearly as scary when he smiled. Kristi smiled right back at him, extended her tiny arms, and yelled, “Daddy!”

Some of the missionaries in places that had been hard hit decided to make the most of the situation and make good use of their time even though tracting was impossible. “The sister missionaries in our area stayed in our home at this time so they’d have food and because no one was supposed to be out except for cleanup,” said Bishop Bob Horner of the Naches Ward, Yakima Washington North Stake. “They got on the phone and called everyone in the phone book, saying that they were from the Mormon church, and asking if people were okay.
“It was a time when people were scared to death, and it was comforting for them to talk with someone. They were so impressed that the sisters would care enough to call that Sister Karen Miller and Sister Colleen Cummings got 45 contacts through those calls. The sisters felt that since they were on the Lord’s time, they couldn’t waste it. They are two of the greatest missionaries we’ve ever had,” said Bishop Horner.

Once I prayed and prayed for a nice school teacher for the new year. After many months of praying, I was put in my new class, and my new teacher is so nice and happy and teaches with love. I said a thank-you prayer to Heavenly Father for answering my prayers and for taking care of me and my worries. I am so happy that we can pray to Heavenly Father about anything, anywhere, and He’ll help us.
Ava C., age 7, Utah, USA

It was not until the last session of the General Authority, Area Seventy and General Officers Leadership Training, during the April 2021 general conference, that I finally received the spiritual witness I had been seeking since my call. I will never forget that moment.
This session’s agenda was for all 15 apostles and prophets to bear their testimonies and witness of Jesus Christ. The solemnity and sacredness of this occasion is glorious. It was Elder Neil L. Andersen’s testimony that changed my perspective and gave me the reassurance that I was searching for.
Elder Andersen explained how he felt when he was called to The Quorum of The Twelve Apostles. He said when he first sat in the seat that Elder Ulisses Soares now occupies, he looked up the row at the other 11 Apostles and the First Presidency, and feelings of personal inadequacy overwhelmed him. When I heard Elder Andersen say that, I sat up straight in my chair because I knew that what he had just said—and what he was going to say next—was specifically for me.
When Elder Andersen shared that sacred experience, it became sacred to me also. It was the confirmation that I needed.
I know that Heavenly Father and His Son did not call me because of anything I had done to qualify for this role, but it was because They love me. They know I can change, and They know I can help Them in Their glorious work: to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of all Their children. (See Moses 1:39.)

“And please, Heavenly Father, bless me to know what our family can do to help build the temple,” Mama prayed. Phoebe looked at Mama’s face and saw tears rolling down her cheeks, dripping onto her faded blouse. “Into bed with you now,” Mama instructed.
As she pulled the covers up Phoebe asked, “Why are you crying, Mama? Is it because Papa’s on another mission?”
“I do miss Papa. It will be a glorious day when we’re all together again,” Mama said. She tucked the quilts around Phoebe, tight against the bitter night. “But we have so much to be grateful for—our house here in Nauvoo, and six healthy, beautiful children. The Lord is watching over us, Phoebe.”
“But why are you crying, Mama?”
Mama sighed. “I just want so much to help finish the temple.” Mama stood up. “Good night, sweet Phoebe,” she said, and snuffed out the candle.
Phoebe found it hard to sleep. Her arms ached from scrubbing, wringing, and hanging laundry. Her thumb throbbed from pricking it again and again while mending. Even her back was tired from carrying wood.
All of Nauvoo was busy as the Saints worked to finish the temple. While the men did the heaviest labor of hauling and hammering, carving and cutting, the women and children helped by spinning, weaving, knitting, and embroidering the finest additions for the inside of the temple. They also kept the workers fed. A warm feeling filled Phoebe’s heart as she remembered dishing the soup from the big pot at the temple grounds.
“Over here, little sister,” a worker had called to her.
As she offered the soup to the stonecutter she noticed how he held the steaming cup in both hands, soaking the warmth deep into his freezing fingers. The workers only took a moment to relax, then back they went to the next task. “Thank you, little sister,” the man had called.
And with that memory, Phoebe was sound asleep.
As the sun lightened the sky, Phoebe awakened and began to prepare for church. Sunday was the day she missed Papa most. But there were many things she loved about the Sabbath. She loved how everyone looked their best for church, and she loved how even the babies quieted when the Prophet Joseph Smith stood to speak.
This morning the Prophet thanked the Saints for their hard work on the temple and hoped they would double their efforts. Tears formed in Mama’s eyes again, and Phoebe imagined she could hear her mother praying, “How I wish we had more to give.” But they had given everything. How could Mama’s prayer be answered?
Driving home in the wagon, Mama suddenly yanked back on the reins, jerking the wagon to a stop while straining to see something near the roadside. Phoebe peered over the side of the wagon and saw two brown, furry heaps.
“Why, there’s the answer to our prayer,” Mama said. She pulled her sewing scissors from her bag and asked the older children to help her.
“Buffalo,” said little Sarah, pointing a chubby finger.
Two dead buffalo lay in the underbrush and Phoebe wondered where they possibly had come from.
“Help me, children,” Mama directed. The older children pulled at the long mane hair and Mama cut and snipped until they had a large bundle of brown, coarse hair. It took a long time, but their work had just begun. The next day, they washed the hair squeaky clean with strong lye soap. Next, Phoebe brushed and brushed the hair with the carding comb till it was straight and tangle free. Mama spun the hair on a spindle, making yards of dark brown yarn.
All the while Phoebe held back the question until she couldn’t wait another minute. “What, why … how could we ever use such ugly, coarse yarn for something as beautiful as the temple?”
“You’ll see,” Mama replied.
At last the yarn was ready. As Mama began to knit, Phoebe watched in fascination as it slowly took shape. Suddenly, the image of the stonecutter’s cold, red hands came clearly to Phoebe’s memory.
“Mittens!” Phoebe exclaimed. “Mittens for the stonecutters. Now they won’t have to wait for a bowl of soup to warm their hands.”
By the time Mama finished she had knit eight pairs of brown mittens. “They’re beautiful,” Phoebe sighed as she touched each pair. She felt as if her heart was wrapped up in a warm mitten. Mama’s prayers had been answered and their buffalo mittens would help build the temple.

During high school, I didn’t really do anything against Church standards, but I also didn’t do much to strengthen my testimony. When I was 18, I was tired of just going through the motions each day without the constant companionship of the Spirit. And even though I’d heard many people bear their testimonies on how the Book of Mormon had blessed their lives, I’d never read the whole thing. So I decided to read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover.
As soon as I began reading, I felt so much more joy in my life. As time went on and I got further and further into the Book of Mormon, my testimony grew immensely and I was able to feel the influence of the Spirit each day.
One scripture excerpt became my motto: “If there be no righteousness there be no happiness” (2 Nephi 2:13). This scripture helped me stay diligent in my study.
On a chilly Sunday evening in October, I sat quietly on temple grounds and finished the Book of Mormon. I took Moroni’s promise to heart and prayed to know if what I’d suspected all along was true—if the Book of Mormon is the word of God.
Since then, the Spirit has confirmed to me that the Book of Mormon is true. I have a firm testimony of its life-changing power, not only for me but also for all who sincerely read it.

For Vishakha it all started in India. That was where Vishakha Ram was invited to go to something called “institute” with a friend. She hesitated because she didn’t really think religion was her thing, but she finally agreed. On her first visit, she found a small class studying about preparing for an eternal marriage. Vishakha was amazed. “They were actually talking about these things. I grew up as a Hindu, and we don’t have the concept of eternal marriage. But in this class it was interesting to me because everything was so pure and clear. It was just like looking at pearls. It was really beautiful.”
Vishakha didn’t have the opportunity to join the Church in India because she went to Berlin, Germany, on a student exchange program. But she remembered the Church and the institute class she had found so interesting. When she arrived in Berlin, she called the missionaries, and they also took her to institute. She arrived just in time to see a great change take place at the Berlin institute. The Church had finished building a new institute addition adjoining the stake center. This shared building provides room for sports such as volleyball and basketball, a kitchen, a lounge, a library, and plenty of classrooms. The center would now support a new emphasis called institute outreach.
Just a year and a half since her baptism, Vishakha, 26, from the Lankwitz Ward, was called as student council president at the institute. Now there are activities or classes nearly every night of the week at the Berlin outreach center. She is attending the Church history class with 25 other students. For their institute, Vishakha says, “the class is mighty big.” She is excited to get some more activities going, more chances to go out to museums and concerts, more fun activities like playing games, maybe an evening to watch movies, and more testimony meetings. “So far,” says Vishakha, “there hasn’t been a dance course. We want to do that.”

Brother McConkie tells the story of Reed Smoot, who was the first Latter-day Saint to represent Utah in the United States Senate. During his service he became highly respected by his colleagues and was one of the men selected to help decide who would be nominated as a candidate for president of the United States.
“His party had won the presidency the last several elections, and most observers thought the trend would continue. It was almost conceded that this convention would name the next president of the United States. … During this convention the leaders assembled there said to Senator Smoot, ‘Senator, you may have the nomination if you want it. There is one stipulation: You will have to soft-peddle the fact that you are a Mormon.’ Senator Smoot is reported to have replied, ‘I would rather be a deacon in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints than be president of the United States.’” (P. 33.)

The youth planned camp to include service projects, a testimony meeting, and activities designed to build spiritual strength and group unity—important things for leading any group, class, or quorum. For example, the youth replaced worn-out picnic tables at the camp so the young men and young women could work and serve together. Stephanie T. learned that leadership includes helping others use and develop their talents: “We put together new tables without power tools. We learned to let the ones with know-how lead and to include the others by having them measure and then stain the tables. It was a humbling experience and changed me for the better.”

Emily tried hard all summer. She didn’t dig up any more carrot seeds, even when the green tops popped up along the row. But she did weed the garden while she waited. And she swam and ran and played. She even learned to wait for other things—for ice cubes to freeze in the freezer, for her turn to ride on the back of a camel at the zoo, and for lots of other things. She even learned to wait to talk to Mom or Dad when they were busy.
While Emily waited, the plants grew in the garden. When it was time, she helped to pick pea pods and yellow beans, and tall green onions. At last it was time for the carrots.
Dad showed her how to loosen the dirt around the carrots and then how to hold the green tops and pull out the carrots one by one. Emily filled her basket with long, fat carrots. Then she ran to the house to show Mom. “Look how big they grew!”
“Yes, they did,” Mom said, “and so did you!”
“Did I get taller?” Emily asked.
“You grew taller and wiser.”
“Wiser?” Emily asked.
“Waiting made you wiser.”
“Waiting made me want to eat carrots,” Emily said, “so I’m going to eat one right now!”
“Wait until I wash one,” Mom said.
But Emily didn’t wait. She took a big carrot and washed it herself. “Now I will eat the best carrot I have ever eaten,” she said. And she did.

People sometimes yield to temptation when a situation arises that makes it possible for them to make money easily. The opportunity clouds their ethical judgment. One man, for example, held a position of trust in which thousands of investors relied on his assertions about the financial stability of a particular company. Had he told the truth about the company’s poor financial health, he would have lost the company as a client. For six years he lied, accepting bribes from the client in exchange for his silence. Eventually, the truth became known, the company collapsed, investors lost hundreds of millions of dollars, and this man went to prison.

I have personally experienced, though only once, the exhilaration of a real balloon flight. It was during the exciting time immediately following World War II when in Holland, my native country, many public festivities were held to celebrate the regained liberty after five years of war. There were big parades, neighborhood dance festivals, and in some cities manned balloon flights to attract large crowds for yet other festive events.
A friend taught me a lot about ballooning in preparation for a flight that I was promised to be able to make as a guest, when at some future date the weather conditions would be suitable.
I learned that we would go up in a class A gas balloon filled with coal gas and that it would ascend until its weight would be in equilibrium with the air around it.
I also learned that in the wicker basket under the balloon there were navigational instruments, maps, and ballast sandbags, which could be emptied overboard to make the balloon rise higher.
Furthermore, I discovered that if gas is released from a balloon through a valve, it descends. But this was not all! I also heard from my friend many delightful stories about previous balloon flights. On one occasion, as the story goes, clouds developed unexpectedly during a flight, and the two men in the wicker basket had not the faintest idea over which part of the country they were sailing.
They decided to lower the balloon, and all of a sudden they saw a Dutchman walking on a lonely country road. When they were able to draw his attention, one of the men in the basket shouted: “Where are we?” And the lonely walker looked up, cupped his hands around his mouth, and shouted back, “You are in a balloon.”
To make their urgent request for direction more clear, the man in the balloon cried vigorously, “Where are you?” And the man called back at the top of his voice, “I am on the ground!”
Discouraged, the balloonists unloaded some ballast and sailed again into the clouds, while one of them remarked: “The man down there must be a bureaucrat.” The statements he made were perfectly true, but totally useless!
After what I have shared with you thus far, I have come to the conclusion that a strong parallel can be drawn between the steady rise of a balloon and our spiritual upward mobility.
Just as gas is necessary to fill a balloon to push it upward, so must the individual be filled with inner motivation in order to move upward. Just as the balloon can rise higher by throwing ballast overboard, so must a person be willing to rid himself of unnecessary ballast that limits his rise in spirituality.
When I made my balloon flight, strangely enough, I did not have the feeling that I was going up. I had the impression that I remained stationary, as it were, and the world floated silently away from me.
Later, when through the missionary effort I joined the Church, I gained as a new member that peaceful feeling of being safely placed in the environment of true gospel living and that Babylon had floated away from me. As it was expressed by an early European balloonist: “I felt as though I had left behind me, all the cares and passions that molest mankind.”
I testify that we all can have that peace of mind if we are willing to rid ourselves of the ballast that prevents us from rising to greater spiritual heights. It will facilitate our ascent to a loving Father in Heaven, who will, in his due time, await our return after our journey through life.
Let us, therefore, get rid of our sandbag of impatience and learn to be more patient with our spouses and children, our friends and neighbors, because the Lord has counseled us to “continue in patience until ye are perfected”! (D&C 67:13.)
And for those of you who do not know what the word patience really means, I offer a simple definition: Patience is learning to hide your impatience.
And how many of us still go through life with a ballast bag called criticism? We should, instead, give more praise wherever and whenever possible because we have been told and retold, “Cease to find fault one with another.” (D&C 88:124.) And let us in this respect also remember that the faults and shortcomings we see in the members of our own ward or branch are of less consequence to us than one of the smallest in ourselves.
Furthermore, do we still have a sandbag with unfriendliness in our basket, even though the Savior asks us to be friendly and loving? As he said: “Ye are they whom my Father hath given me; ye are my friends.” (D&C 84:63.)
While on our spiritual flight, let us totally empty our ballast bag of pride and be more humble in all things, always remembering the Savior’s glorious promise to all: “And inasmuch as you have humbled yourselves before me, the blessings of the kingdom are yours.” (D&C 61:37.)
And will we really ascend in our spiritual balloon if we are not prepared to dispose of our sandbag of greed? Living prophets have counseled us to pay an honest tithing and to give a generous fast offering; and, moreover, the scriptures reveal in a very candid way: “Wo unto [them] that [do] not give [of their] substance to the poor.” (D&C 56:16.) And, unfortunately, some people think they are being generous because they give so much free advice!
Finally, we must get rid of the heavy ballast of frustrations. All of us must discover in the wicker basket of our personal spiritual balloon those frustrations against which we continually have to be on guard. It was revealed unto us, and we have already heard it twice from this pulpit in this conference: “The works, and the designs, and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated, neither can they come to naught. … Remember that it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men.” (D&C 3:1, 3.)
The only way we can move upward from our present level of spirituality and performance to a higher level is by doing away with the ballast that holds us back. We have to learn to live the commandments, not only for our own good, but also for the good of other people because we reform others unconsciously when we keep the commandments of God and live the teachings of the Church. That’s another way of doing missionary work and lifting the spirituality of those around us.
Therefore, let’s start our flight today. If we are still at ground level, let’s cut the cords; and our rise will start immediately! However, even that will not ensure our continuous spiritual mobility. Our balloon will rise only so high and then will begin to stall. At that time we have to investigate what ballast we need to get rid of in order to rise even higher. If you find it hard to cut the cords, you will find it even harder to do away with the sandbags to lighten your load.
The balloon trip of our spiritual upward mobility is a demanding and sometimes difficult adventure, and only the person with true perseverance will make it to the highest realm!
In closing, after talking about flying, sailing, and rising, I would like to give some down-to-earth guidelines.
To those who are within the sound of my voice this day and who have already entered the wicker basket of their spiritual balloon through baptism into the kingdom of God but who are just sitting there, waiting inactively for things to happen, cut the cords that hold you back from lift-off.
To those who are quietly drifting at the same elevation with little upward mobility, take a close look at the ballast that prevents you from going to a higher level of performance. Make a decision and remove the restraining weight from your spiritual flight.
I give you a solemn promise that if you do this, you will enjoy a feeling of spiritual euphoria because you will elevate yourself.
I testify—as one who twenty-three years ago was baptized into the kingdom of God in Toronto, Canada—that my flight since my baptism has been a magnificent one, with breathtaking scenes and spiritual panoramas and with the never-failing knowledge that my day-to-day flight plan is made available to me by an understanding, loving, forgiving Heavenly Father.
The same is true for all of us! How do I know this? Because I know with all my heart that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ. He is the Savior of mankind, the great mediator for the salvation and exaltation of all of our Heavenly Father’s children, if they are willing to follow his outlined flight plan. Of which I testify this day, gratefully and happily, and in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Another “father” who was placed in my life was a member of my stake presidency. President Merrill was always at our stake dances, Young Women camps, and youth conferences.
As I was preparing to leave for college, President Merrill felt I needed some fatherly advice before heading into the world. His voice was gentle and soothing. I could feel his concern. I knew he loved me. He told me he would go as far as the Salt Lake Temple to attend my wedding.
A few years later, I called my father to announce my engagement. He was cold and indifferent. Nothing had changed. I tried not to cry. I turned to my Heavenly Father in prayer, and the Spirit reminded me of President Merrill’s promise. I wondered if he would remember what he had told me several years before. Did he really mean it? I picked up the phone and dialed his number. President Merrill answered. I stumbled through telling him of my engagement and asked if he remembered his promise to me. “What temple are you getting married in?” he asked.
“The Salt Lake Temple,” I answered.
“Then I will be there,” he said. He drove 13 hours in the snow to be there for me. When I walked into the sealing room with my future husband, he was the first person I saw. He was my father that day!