Gospel Story Finder

It was in Fayette, New York, that the Church was organized on 6 April 1830. Among the 56 friends and believers who gathered at the meeting was David Lewis, an 11-year-old boy. David said later: “[After the meeting] I went home and asked my mother if she was willing that I join the Church.”

She asked, “What church?” When he told her it was The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she said, “Yes, David, you can do so if you please, but David, the whole world is against them, including all the good ministers.”

David replied, “I like the way Joseph speaks, he preaches baptism for the remission of sins, the laying on of hands for the reception of the Holy Ghost, etc.”

Only 29 days after the Church was organized, David Lewis was baptized on his 12th birthday by the Prophet Joseph Smith (David Lewis, reminiscence dictated to Andrew Jenson, 10 September 1908, LDS Church Archives; cited in Ensign, September 1978, 26).

We were moving in two weeks. I didn’t want to. We’d lived in the same brick house my whole life, and I liked it there. I had my own room upstairs with a window that looked out on the apple tree in the backyard. And I had my own friends.
But sometimes you don’t have a choice.
When Dad lost his job a year ago, he had a hard time finding another one. He started traveling a lot, looking for work and taking temporary jobs. We had to get used to his chair being empty at dinnertime. Our plates were never empty, at least, but sometimes the only food on the table was out of food storage and the garden.
One day I was at the table studying, when Dad suddenly walked into the kitchen, grinning. Mom was at the sink, fixing dinner. Dad took the squash out of her hand, set it on the counter, and grabbed her around the waist. “I think the next dance belongs to me,” he said. Then he started to whistle and dance with her.
Emily, Timothy, and Nathan were all upstairs. They came running down when they heard Dad’s happy voice. Melanie came in the back door, too, just then. She had been out delivering newspapers.
Mom was laughing. “What’s going on?” she asked. “Why are you so happy?”
“I finally have a permanent job—a really good one—again!”
Mom started to cry; then Dad started to cry. Suddenly we were all crying and laughing and hugging each other. It felt wonderful.
“The only thing is, we’ll have to move,” Dad finally said. He was still smiling, but I felt a weird sort of ache in my stomach.
“Move? Where?” I asked.
“Arkansas.”
Arkansas. I didn’t know anything about Arkansas. But suddenly Dad’s having a job didn’t sound like such a great thing after all. I knew how hard we had all been praying for him to get one, but I couldn’t see why Heavenly Father didn’t find him one right here.
I didn’t sleep well that night. The next day, I asked Mom, “If Heavenly Father is so powerful, why couldn’t Dad’s job be right here. Why do we have to give up our home?”
She didn’t answer right away, but kept folding towels. I watched her smooth a nice, fluffy green one and set it on the pile.
“Maybe it’s time for us to grow some more,” she said finally. “Maybe there are things we need to learn that we can’t learn here.”
“I can learn here just fine. I get good grades in school.”
“Ben, school is important. But this whole life is like school, and there are lots of lessons for you to learn outside the classroom.”
“I can learn outside the classroom here too.”
“It’s hard to move,” she admitted. “It’s hard for all of us. But, Ben, I have confidence in Heavenly Father and in our family. Your father and I think that Heavenly Father wants him to take this job. It’s always been hard for people to give up their homes, but sometimes Heavenly Father knows that it’s what we need.” She smiled, hugged me, and handed me the pile of towels. “Please put these away for me.”
After putting away the towels, I put on my roller blades and headed toward the park. Sometimes I like to talk to Heavenly Father while I’m rolling along. I know Mom and Dad do the same sort of thing, just not on roller blades. Dad says it’s good to pray whenever and wherever we need help, not just when we’re kneeling down. He says that prayer always helps when you’re working on a problem.
Well, this sure looked like a problem to me. There weren’t any other people around, so I said right out loud, “Heavenly Father, this is really hard for me. I don’t want Dad to be out of work, and I don’t want to move. Why does it have to be one or the other?”
At the park, I took the skating path, skating slowly along and listening for an answer to my prayer. No answer came, but it felt good to be on wheels, and the mountains ahead of me were beautiful. The sun was shining through the clouds. Just looking at them made me feel better somehow.
Did Arkansas have mountains?
Another question slipped into my mind. What if Mom and Dad were right and Heavenly Father wanted us to move? Who else had moved away from home? Were there any families in the scriptures who moved?
Lehi and his family had to leave Jerusalem, I remembered. And they weren’t the only ones. There were the Jaredites too. And in the Old Testament there was Jacob’s son Joseph. He didn’t go to Egypt because he wanted to, but he still went. And later on, Moses moved everybody out again. After four hundred years, Egypt must have seemed like home, even if the Israelites were slaves there.
I swooped down a dip in the skating path and up a rise on the other side. The more I thought, the more names there were in my head.
Joseph Smith was always leaving his home to escape the mobs. Even Jesus Christ had to leave home.
Missionaries leave home. But that wouldn’t happen to me for a long, long time. Ten years. I hadn’t even lived that long yet.
I stopped suddenly. I left Heavenly Father less than ten years ago to come to earth to live with my family. So I’d done it before. … And I could do it again!
A good feeling rushed through me. “Thanks, Heavenly Father,” I said.
It was time to go home. Mom and Dad had an encyclopedia in the living room, on the shelf under the television. I wanted to look at it. I was going to find out all about Arkansas.

Citing more than 80 marriages and baptisms similar to the Cardosas’, President Antonio Mascarenhas, president of the Republic of Cape Verde, recently honored the Church for helping strengthen family life. Other government leaders have publicly admired Church members’ emphasis on self-reliance and caring for neighbors. As President Moreira puts it, “In the pages of the history of Cape Verde, historians will speak highly about the Latter-day Saints.”

About a year ago, some friends of our family were hospitalized in very serious condition. Rosana and Angel Blanco Rodriguez and two of their children were in their kitchen when they smelled gas. Brother Rodriguez went to investigate. When he touched a gas hose, a small leak exploded, igniting a fire. Seeing his two small children in danger, Brother Rodriguez used his own body to extinguish the flames. He was the most critically injured of the four.
When Mama told our family about the accident, she told us of the love she and Papa felt for their dear friends. She explained that because we live far away, we could not help Brother and Sister Rodriguez by taking care of their other children, their house, or their business matters. But there was a special way we could help them, she said. We could have a family fast and pray that the Lord would bless the Rodriguez family. All of us, even the younger ones, could participate. Our parents had always fasted on the first Sunday of the month and on other occasions, but we had never fasted as a family before. We decided to try it.
We began Saturday at lunchtime. We all fasted—Papa and Mama; Douglas, age 13; Francini, age 11; Debora, age 7; and me, age 9. We said a prayer and asked the Lord to bless our friends. Mama put a reminder—“Our First Family Fast”—on the refrigerator, the water faucet, the microwave, and the kitchen wall, so we would remember not to eat or drink anything.
I did not feel thirsty during those hours, even with the intense heat here in Amazonas, Brazil. I didn’t feel hungry, either. I was able to understand a little how Jesus might have felt when He fasted for 40 days. I felt how good it is to do something to help others.
On Sunday Papa gave each of us an envelope for our fast offerings and helped us fill out the form. At church that day, we gave the money to our branch president. We concluded our fast at lunchtime.
The Rodriguez family eventually returned home with some injuries. As we and many other friends continued to fast and pray for their recovery, the Lord continued to bless them. After several months of care, they were completely cured and were left almost without scars.
Each month since our first family fast, we have fasted and prayed for a united purpose.
I am grateful to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to learn about Jesus Christ and how much He did for me. I want to follow His example always.

We just had a zone conference at the Peter Whitmer farm, where the Church was organized in 1830. Our mission president talked about the first missionary of the restored Church, Samuel Smith. He was Joseph Smith’s younger brother and about the same age as most of the missionaries in our zone.
Just after the Church was organized, Samuel took a few copies of the Book of Mormon and went out to preach the gospel. Nobody believed him, and he was frustrated, just as we are sometimes. He left a Book of Mormon with Reverend Greene, a methodist minister, and it was passed on to a carpenter who studied it and was baptized. Samuel Smith didn’t think that his mission was a success, but that carpenter was Brigham Young! So sometimes great results come from what seems like an unimportant incident.

Queen Eleanor: Independent Spirit of the Medieval World Eleanor was Queen of France when she went on the second Holy Crusade. She was Queen of England during the years ascribed to Robin Hood. The inspiration of poets and troubadours, she was imprisoned by her husband, besieged by her grandson—and loved by her subjects.Polly Schoyer Brooks11 years and up

Several weeks ago my mind was stimulated when Elder Douglas L. Callister of the Seventy was asked to give a brief history of his grandfather LeGrand Richards in a quorum meeting. Among other interesting things he reported was this: When Elder Richards was a young bishop, he visited those who were less active. He boldly invited them to speak in sacrament meeting to the subject “What my membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints means to me.” Remarkably, several of them responded positively, and that experience put them on the road back to full activity in the Church.

It finally came! I knew what it was when the mailman rang the doorbell. He smiled at my mom and handed her the envelope. Our mailman takes mission-call envelopes to the door instead of leaving them in the mailbox.
A mission-call envelope is big and wide. It comes from the Church headquarters in Salt Lake City. And this envelope was for my older brother Mike.
When the envelope came, Mike, my sister, and my other brother were all at school. Mom, Dad, and I waited for them to get home. Dad called Grandma and Grandpa. They wanted to be here with us for the big moment of opening the envelope.
Mike got home first, and he and Mom got out a big world map. Finally, the rest of the family got home. Mom wanted us to take turns guessing where Mike would go. We each had a pin with our name taped to it. We stuck the pin in the map where we thought Mike might go. Dad said a prayer, and then it was time for Mike to open the envelope. We were all excited to find out where the Lord wanted Mike to serve a mission.
Mike slowly turned the envelope over. Grandma kept saying, “Open it, open it.”
Carefully, Mike opened it and looked at the letter. He read, “You are called to serve in the Salta Argentina Mission.”
Everyone was surprised! We didn’t know where Salta was. Then Mike read the date when he would report to the Missionary Training Center. It was about two months away. Everyone was smiling, but Mike smiled biggest of all. He was excited to teach the people in Argentina about Jesus Christ. We all looked at the map to find Salta. Then we looked on the Internet to learn more about it.
What a night! I was happy for my brother. I am glad he gets to teach people about Jesus Christ. One day when I am ready to go on a mission, I will get an envelope myself. Then I will smile like Mike did when he got his.

I knew of a girl in my high school many years ago who had a very poor reputation. How much was simply a vicious rumor and how much was truth I don’t know. But she did associate with a rebellious group who broke many of the rules. And even though she was a member of the Church, she was often seen smoking and drinking. After our school high graduation, I didn’t see her or give her any thought for years. If anyone had asked me what she was like, I could only have described the girl I vaguely knew in school.

But then, more than five years after high school, I was in the temple one night when I heard this girl’s name read from a list of brides who were about to be sealed to their husbands. What a delight it was to see that a great change had obviously taken place in her life. But I shouldn’t have been surprised, because the gospel is changing people all the time.

A little while later, another of Candace’s relatives, her great-great-aunt, Lorna Call Alder, was lying in the darkness of her family’s home, not sure what would happen next. Angered at the U.S. government, Pancho Villa was headed straight for the town of Dublan, threatening to kill any and all Americans he found. And although the colonists had been living in Mexico for many years, they had remained loyal to the United States. The entire town was in grave danger. The people of Dublan made preparations to flee, should it be necessary, and then waited for the bishop, who happened to be Lorna’s father, to instruct them.

Lorna remembered and recorded exactly what her father told the people. “Calmly and without wavering he said, ‘Go to your homes, pray to your Heavenly Father for protection, turn out your lights, and go to sleep. The Lord will be with you this night.’”

With a great deal of faith, the Saints did exactly as they were told. At about three in the morning Villa’s army reached the north end of town. Villa stopped his army and looked out over Dublan. Much to his astonishment, he saw what appeared to be the campfires of a large army. Frightened, Villa led his men in another direction, avoiding the town completely.

No one knows for sure what Villa saw that night. Some people think that it might have been a prairie brush fire reflected in the windows of the homes in town, which could have looked like the campfires of an army. Others believe that heavenly beings protected the town that night. But no matter what he saw, the people in the town then and now believe it was a miracle.

As a college student, I heard a wonderful Relief Society lesson on service. The teacher said, “If you pray for Heavenly Father to open your eyes to the needs of others so you can help them, He will do so.”
That sentence stayed with me. I wanted to serve others but hadn’t thought to ask Heavenly Father for help. So I decided to give it a try. The next morning I knelt and prayed, “Heavenly Father, if there is anyone who needs my help today, please let me know.” I finished my prayer and headed to class.
Amid the hustle of the day, I forgot my prayer. During the afternoon I went to the grocery store. As I stood in line to pay for my groceries, I noticed an elderly woman who used a cane for support. I smiled at her and glanced at the groceries she was buying. I thought, How is she going to get those groceries into her house? I pushed aside the thought, finished paying for my own items, and headed out of the store. I noticed the woman standing next to her car while a store employee loaded her groceries into the trunk. The thought came to me again: How is she going to get those groceries into her house?
With some frustration, I countered: But what can I do? Follow her home? I had an immediate strong feeling that this idea was correct, so I gave in and drove down the road after her. I kept thinking: This is crazy! Why am I following this woman home? Soon we arrived at her apartment complex. I ran over to her and asked, “Can I help you with these groceries?”
Puzzled, the woman looked at me and asked if I lived nearby. I told her I did not. “Do you work here?” she asked.
I explained that I had seen her in the grocery store and had worried about how she would carry all those groceries into her home. At that point she looked up at me with tears in her eyes and said, “I was wondering the entire way home how I was going to get my groceries into my home.”
Later, as I drove home, my own eyes blurred with tears. I had experienced the wonderful influence of the Holy Ghost touching two lives through the power of prayer. The words of Alma 17:9 came to me: “They … prayed much that the Lord would grant unto them a portion of his Spirit to go with them, and abide with them, that they might be an instrument in the hands of God.”
I am grateful to Heavenly Father for the special gift of the Holy Ghost that not only blesses our lives but also helps us bless the lives of others.

I recently read the December 1994 issue of the New Era and came across the story titled “The Lights Still Glow.” It brought me a lot of comfort because I, like the author, have lost my mother. Although it was two years ago, the holidays are still a very hard time for me. As I read this article, I felt a gentle peace as I was reminded that I will see my mother again. Even though the article was printed 15 years ago, its message is just as powerful now as it was back then.
Karen M.

Yesterday I found an old August 1980 New Era lying around in our missionary apartment. In it was an article called “A Celestial Missionary.” It was about Elder Tolman of the Virginia Roanoke Mission. I would like to say to the family of this great man that in a sense I owe my life to Elder Tolman. My life has not been the same since I read that article. I am very thankful to his family for raising one of the most Christlike people I have ever read about. Thank you for touching me.
Elder Simon KeyteCanada Toronto Mission

I would like to acknowledge the work that is put into the New Era. I am the editor of the branch paper, and am finding it a challenge to get it out every month. About four years ago I had a letter published in Feedback. Because of that letter, I gained a very special friend. Lori Wall saw my letter and found it very close to her ideals. She wrote to me, and we have been writing to each other ever since. We hope someday to meet each other. I feel that I have known her since the time before we came to earth. I know that I have come to know a very special spirit and sister. Thank you so much for helping us meet each other. I hope that you have made someone else as happy as myself.
Petra MillsOrange, N.S.W., Australia

Norberto says the Church has brought him many blessings in his life, but the best blessing is that he and his family were sealed in the temple on January 5, 1997. A special Church fund paid for his parents to travel to the temple in Johannesburg, South Africa. But his parents had to sell the house they lived in to pay for the children to go with them.

During their journey, they were stopped by men who gathered around their wagon and tried to prevent them from going any farther. But after talking among themselves, the men said, “As you are Virginians, we will let you go on, but we believe you soon will return for you will quickly become convinced of your folly.” But Bathsheba and her family never thought of the gospel as “folly,” and events such as this only caused them to cling more strongly to their beliefs.

In another case, a 12-year-old nonmember, motherless girl from an unfortunate environment was befriended by her peer group of Beehive girls and was made to feel welcome, wanted, and loved. Their adviser commented, “Many of the girls seemed more concerned about her happiness than about their own.”

How did you first get interested in marching band? I grew up with the L.D. Bell High School band when my sister entered the program. I remember going to one of her first competitions. I was blown away! I always admired watching her march with the other kids.

North Las Vegas Nevada Stake
The Primary children of the North Las Vegas Nevada Stake had a special picnic and learned about Primary children around the world.

That same day, the Martin company was still 325 miles (523 km) back on the trail, continuing to suffer from cold and inadequate food. A few days earlier, they had crossed the Sweetwater River to reach what is now called Martin’s Cove, where they hoped to find protection from the elements. One of the pioneers said, “It was the worst river crossing of the expedition.” Some of the rescuers—like my great-grandfather David Patten Kimball, who was just 17 years old, along with his young friends “George W. Grant, Allen Huntington, Stephen Taylor, and Ira Nebeker—spent hours in the frigid water,” heroically helping the company make the Sweetwater crossing.