Gospel Story Finder

When I was young, my parents planted within me the pure love from my Father in Heaven. I began to know Him as my mom sang “I Am a Child of God” (Hymns, no. 301) to me, and over time my parents’ examples have been my greatest inspiration to come to know and love my Father in Heaven through service and by faithfully attending Church meetings and activities.

I clipped an item taken from the diary of Mrs. Rebecca Riter, entered December 25, 1847. She describes that first Christmas in the Valley of the Great Salt Lake:
“The winter was cold. Christmas came and the children were hungry. I had brought a peck of wheat across the plains and hid it under a pile of wood. I thought I would cook a handful of wheat for the baby. Then I thought how we would need wheat for seed in the spring, so I left it alone.”
In our bounteous lives, we may well reflect upon the more meager Christmas seasons of our pioneer ancestors.

At Chetham’s, surrounded by people whose values and standards differ from her own, Fleur is determined to keep her Young Women values. Although students aren’t allowed to smoke or drink at school, some of them do so when they go out to Manchester, a nearby city.

Fleur explains: “When they say, ‘Come to the pub with us,’ I just say, ‘No, thanks. I don’t drink.’” Now that Fleur’s fellow students know her standards, they respect her for not drinking or smoking.

When she goes out, Fleur spends time with friends who don’t drink, or she goes shopping or to the cinema. “I make my own sort of fun,” she says.

As a convert to the Church at the age of 17, I can still remember the feeling of serenity that the missionaries brought with them when they came to our home to teach our family the restored gospel. For me, it seemed to increase as they taught and then dissipate slowly after they left. I was later taught that those feelings were the influence of the Holy Ghost.

Each day will be a good day if we will think of the Savior and make Him the center of our lives, for He is “the light, and the life, and the truth of the world” (Ether 4:12). Following the Savior will help us to be honest. I would like to tell you about a twelve-year-old boy in the Philippines who is following the Savior.
Julius had gone to school without eating any breakfast, and during class his stomach began to make funny sounds. During recess he hurried to a nearby barbecue stand. He took two sticks of meat, ate the food, and went back to class.
When he returned, he discovered he had not given the pesos for the food. Without hesitation he ran back and paid for his snack. When he arrived back at the classroom, he found a very angry teacher. He had forgotten to ask permission to leave. She wanted to know what he had been doing. He told her everything. Then she put her arm on his shoulder and, facing the class, said, “Class, I want you to be honest like Julius.” She asked him why he returned the money when he could have kept it.
He answered, “Because I believe in being honest.”
“What is your religion?” she wanted to know.
Without hesitation, he said, “I am a Mormon.”
“Oh,” she responded, “no wonder.”
Julius is making each day a good day by always being honest.

Responding to inquiries about the gospel in 1990, missionaries began proselyting on the small island of Daru, located west of Port Moresby in the Gulf of Papua. Three months later a branch was established with more than 150 members. Despite initial missionary success, activation dropped as the branch struggled with organization and as some members returned to their nearby mainland villages.

Branch membership now exceeds 300, and activation has increased because branch leaders, with help from missionary couples, are involving less-active members. The growing branch, which dedicated a chapel in February 1993, is drawing increasing interest from the nearby mainland.

“On the mainland across from Daru, people in 10 villages are already asking for the missionaries,” says former branch president Charles Garry. “People learn from our members who return to their villages. Then they come over here to church, they listen, and they become very interested. Our teachings are new to them, and they are opening up their hearts. They want the Church to move faster to their villages.”

When I heard about the tsunami in the countries around the Indian Ocean, my cousin and I got permission to collect loose change around the house. We ended up with more than $20! We went to church and donated it. We were so happy!

I had been a member of the Church just over one year when I found myself in the Missionary Training Center on my way to the Philippines San Pablo Mission. While in the MTC, I spent many hours sitting in cramped rooms on hard chairs trying to learn Tagalog—a language I had never heard of before receiving my mission call.
Sometimes I struggled to confirm my desire to serve a mission, mainly because my family couldn’t understand why I would give two of the most precious years of my life to a religion I had just become affiliated with. They wondered if it wasn’t too much too fast.
But I knew that the Church was true. I also felt that it would be selfish of me not to share the blessings of the gospel with others, just as my best friend had shared those blessings with me.
Even with my testimony of the gospel, it was still difficult to watch all the missionaries around me receive letters of praise from their families while I didn’t. I even started to ask myself, “Why me? It would be so much easier if my family shared the same beliefs as I did. Why do I have it harder?”
One night, during this difficult time, I woke up suddenly in the middle of the night. While the other elders in my room lay fast asleep, I wondered why my sleep had been interrupted. Before long the answer came as I was prompted to write these words:
When the end of the day is just ahead,
And there’s still not time for you,
Just remember these four words:
Somebody had it harder.
When the night is cold and the air is still,
Your only friend’s the silent moon,
Just repeat: “Be not afraid.”
Somebody had it harder.
When you’ve run away to find yourself,
And all you have to show is a tired body,
Someone ran just as far;
Somebody had it harder.
He bled and sighed as they raised Him high;
For our sins He was a martyr.
No one who has ever lived
Has had it any harder.
My poem has been a blessing to me many times during my trials as a young missionary in a foreign country. I have had my ups and downs and my fair share of hard times. But every night as I kneel beside my bed I thank Heavenly Father for the One who had it much harder than I.

The Wheat Doll, by Alison L. Randall, illustrated by Bill Farnsworth. Mary Ann takes her beloved wheat doll, Betty, everywhere. But then Betty gets lost outside on a stormy day. After months of searching, Mary Ann finds a special surprise one spring day.

Childhood abuses or neglect of children that occur after birth are more publicly visible. Worldwide, almost eight million children die before their fifth birthday, mostly from diseases both treatable and preventable. And the World Health Organization reports that one in four children have stunted growth, mentally and physically, because of inadequate nutrition. Living and traveling internationally, we Church leaders see much of this. The general presidency of the Primary report children living in conditions “beyond our imaginations.” A mother in the Philippines said: “Sometimes we do not have enough money for food, but that is all right because it gives me the opportunity to teach my children about faith. We gather and pray for relief, and the children see the Lord bless us.” In South Africa, a Primary worker met a little girl, lonely and sad. In faint responses to loving questions, she said she had no mother, no father, and no grandmother—only a grandfather to care for her. Such tragedies are common on a continent where many caregivers have died of AIDS.

When I was 17, my oldest brother, John, passed away. He was only 27 and left behind a wife and young son. I could not have endured through this tragedy without the scriptures to lead and guide my life.
If you have ever had anyone close to you pass away, then you know the pain that strikes in every part of your being. It hurts for a long time. Even though we learn to be happy again and move on, no matter how much time passes, there’s still a pain.
When my brother passed away, I learned that it was OK to let myself hurt. It was OK to be sad. I didn’t need to be so strong all of the time. Sometimes there are challenges where we have to rely on others. And I learned I had to rely on the Lord.
About nine months before my brother passed away, I had prayed to my Heavenly Father to find a scripture I could use as a theme in my life that year. I was reading my scriptures and came across Proverbs 3:5: “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.”
This scripture struck me with such force that I knew this was supposed to be my theme scripture for that year. For the next nine months, I tried to “trust in the Lord.” In every experience I went through, those words would echo in my mind.
About a week after John’s death, the words in Proverbs echoed in my mind again, and I realized why the Lord wanted me to practice trusting in Him. When my brother passed away, I could have asked my Heavenly Father, “Why? Why did this have to happen to us?” But that question never crossed my mind, because for nine months the Lord had been preparing me to trust in Him. Instead, I was ready to bring comfort to other family members around me who needed it. I felt the peace that comes from the knowledge that family is eternal, and I knew that I hadn’t seen John for the last time. Although at times I feel that pain that comes from losing someone you love, I know that my family can be together again after this life. This scripture in Proverbs brought me hope, peace, and guidance in a time of great need.

Because his father was a bishop, young Harold witnessed Church welfare at work. “Then as now, the bishop was responsible for the care of those in need,” wrote President Gordon B. Hinckley, a longtime friend. “Bishop Lee ran his own storehouse, the commodities coming from his own pantry. In the night, the family would see him take a sack of flour, they knew not where, because confidences concerning those in trouble were to be strictly observed.”

Even though Rachael Eucker, 15, is a city girl, she and her friends and Young Women leaders from the Lindsay Ward, Val Vista Arizona Stake, had just planted an acre and a half of corn by hand. It was part of their Experiment upon the Word project for the Young Women. At the beginning of the year, Rachael and the Young Women in her ward agreed to take on a challenge. They would read the Book of Mormon and devote two Saturdays a month to a Gardening for Humanity garden. These gardens use empty lots in city areas to raise food for homeless shelters and food banks. Rachael committed to read the Book of Mormon. Then she went the extra mile and committed to help in the garden every single time her ward went.
The day after planting corn, Rachael was stiff and sore, but she knew that the good feelings she got from service would last longer than the pain. She was also able to compare her repeated days in the garden to the scriptures. “We had talked about the lasting effects of service and how you feel the effects of what you do for a long time after. That made sense to me. I was thinking that it was like when you read the scriptures and feel the Spirit. Eventually that feeling goes away, so the only way you can keep having that feeling is by going back and reading more and more.”
Then the corn didn’t grow. It had been bad seed. Again the girls were able to draw a conclusion when they heard that all their hard work was wasted. Lynn Allred, the Young Women president, told the girls, “Even though we did all we need to do—we watered it, nourished it—it didn’t grow because it was bad seed.” Now Alma 32:32 will always be vivid to them.
After spending a Saturday morning thinning carrots, Elizabeth Lassetter, 16, said, “I think the gardening we are doing is completely connected to what we are doing with the scriptures. Everything is related to how the Lord teaches through nature.”
The corn was replanted, and the melons were starting to form in another plot. The girls were busy helping to keep the weeds under control, watering daily, waiting for the day they could harvest. Again the lessons in the garden compare to the scriptures. Becky Payne, 15, said, “When we do the work, we can harvest. With the scriptures, you have to work hard to get results. You have to be consistent and put constant effort into it.”
The day for the harvest would come, and the girls would pick the fruits of their work and donate to those who are hungry. As for themselves, with their reading, the harvest is one of faith. They will “pluck the fruit, … which is sweet above all that is sweet, … and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not” (Alma 32:42).

A revelation to the Prophet Joseph Smith sent groups of Latter-day Saints to Missouri to lay the foundation of Zion. It wasn’t long, however, before mobs confronted them. In scenes from Legacy, families arrive in Missouri (1); soon mobs tar and feather some of the Saints (2), storm the printing office (3), attack the Haun’s Mill settlement (4), and finally force the Saints to leave (5).

James and Drusilla Hendricks came to Missouri in 1836. In 1838, James was paralyzed by a bullet. For the next year, Drusilla nursed him, held off the mobs, and did what she could to keep her family alive.

The day came when they ate the last of their food. Then “the conflict began in my mind,” Drusilla wrote. Recalling her parents’ warning that her husband would be killed, she asked herself, “Are you not sorry you did not listen to them?” Answering her own question, she replied, “No I am not. I did what was right. If I die I am glad I was baptized for the remission of my sins, for I have an answer of a good conscience.” Then she heard a still small voice saying, “‘Hold on, for the Lord will provide.’ I said I would, for I would trust in Him and not grumble.”

James survived, though still an invalid, and the family made it to Utah, united in faith and hope (in Kenneth W. Godfrey and others, Women’s Voices: An Untold History of the Latter-day Saints [1982], 96).

Such was Walter Stover of Salt Lake City. Born in Germany, Walter embraced the gospel message and came to America. He established his own business. He gave freely of his time and of his means.
Following World War II, Walter Stover was called to return to his native land. He directed the Church in that nation and blessed the lives of all whom he met and with whom he served. With his own funds, he constructed two chapels in Berlin—a beautiful city that had been so devastated by the conflict. He planned a gathering in Dresden for all the members of the Church from that nation and then chartered a train to bring them from all around the land so they could meet, partake of the sacrament, and bear witness of the goodness of God to them.
At the funeral service for Walter Stover, his son-in-law Thomas C. LeDuc said of him, “He had the ability to see Christ in every face he encountered, and he acted accordingly.”

“When Virginia was 16 she wanted to spend a weekend in Orlando with five friends,” recalls her mother, Barbara Smith. “I was very much against it, but there was no reason not to allow her to go. She had never done anything to show we couldn’t trust her. It turned out that she had a wonderful time and didn’t do anything she wouldn’t have done if we had been there.”

Once your parents realize they can trust you to do what’s right, they will allow you to make more and more decisions on your own. As Virginia’s mother pointed out, how could she say no to a daughter who was so responsible?

I felt the same way for six years and even now the feeling sometimes comes back vaguely. It’s a lonely and self-centered feeling, and service seems to be the only key, but it isn’t always the first key. I suffer from a chemical imbalance, and service was an impossible task before I became aware of my illness. So for six years I struggled to live day by day before receiving proper medical treatment.
Cling to the gospel principles. Study and pray continually. Know that Christ died for you and that he loves you infinitely. These things never took away the terror or loneliness I experienced, but they carried me through those horrible times, so that now I can look back and say, “I’m alive, and although those times were horrible, I did all I could.” My character has grown because of those experiences, because I lived to feel the joy of life.
Through all the pain, be positive and love others, for love is our purpose. Life is a joy to me now and suicide would’ve only taken that joy away.
Name withheld

East meeting West was a big event for James Lee Gilchrist of the Norwich Branch, Ithaca New York Stake. The Scout earned a scholarship to attend a week-long junior leadership training seminar at the Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico.
The scholarship is based on academics, leadership, and Scouting achievement. James returned to share his newfound knowledge and experience with other Scouts in his council. He is the highest ranking Scout in Troop 77 and recently earned his Eagle.

One day I received a party invitation from one of my best friends, Joshua. The only problem was that his party was going to be on Sunday. I told him that I really wanted to be with him on his birthday but that Sunday was the Sabbath Day and not a day for me to go to parties. I asked him if he could change it to Saturday so that I could go. I learned that since he is Jewish, his Sabbath Day is on Saturday. Joshua understood why I couldn’t come to his party. Instead, I took a present to his house on Tuesday after school and shared leftover cake from his party. Tuesday even turned out to be his real birthday, and it was fun to share it together. He had even saved a party bag and treats for me!

• After my baptism and confirmation, my mother drew me aside and asked, “What do you feel?” I described as best I could the warm feeling of peace, comfort, and happiness I had. Mother explained that what I was feeling was the gift I had just received, the gift of the Holy Ghost. She told me that if I lived worthy of it, I would have that gift with me continually. That was a teaching moment that has lived with me all my life.