Gospel Story Finder

Illustration by Allen Garns
Eighteen weeks into my fourth pregnancy, I woke up to some minor bleeding. I felt anxious when the bleeding didn’t stop, so I decided to go to the emergency room.
During the long drive to the hospital, I hoped and prayed that everything would be OK. At the worst, I thought the doctor would prescribe several days of bed rest.
When I was admitted to the hospital, the staff performed several tests. They found that the baby didn’t have a heartbeat. The diagnosis was “fetal demise.” The doctor couldn’t do anything further at that point, so he released me from the hospital.
I went home feeling sad and frightened. I was unable to sleep that night. When I got out of bed the next morning, I was prompted to go to an early-morning endowment session at the temple.
Near the end of the session, my eyes focused on the wedding and engagement rings on my ring finger. They had belonged to the great-grandmother I was named after. She passed away when I was five, and I had recently been reading her life story. I remembered that she had experienced many miscarriages when she was in her 20s.
All morning I had been fighting tears of sadness and fear, but in that moment, I felt a wave of peace. I felt comforted. Great-grandma had passed through similar trials in her life, and the Savior had helped her. I felt the assurance that He would help me too.
“He will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities” (Alma 7:12).
I am deeply grateful for the peace that comes from attending the temple, for a legacy of faithful ancestors, and most of all, for the atoning sacrifice of the Savior Jesus Christ.

We went on a hike with our Scoutmaster last summer, and he reserved one night for each of us to be alone and talk to our Father in Heaven. He told us we could pray to him, just like Joseph Smith did, and get an answer. The next morning we were back on the trail again, with our Scoutmaster urging us over “just one more hill,” and “just around the next bend,” and repeating his slogans like, “When you see a man on a mountaintop, remember he didn’t fall there,” or, “Make your mind tell your body what to do. Don’t let your body tell your mind what to do.” One of the best things about our Scoutmaster is that he’s not afraid to let us see him make a mistake or two. It lets us know he understands when we flub it. One time we lined two maps up crookedly and ended up climbing the mountain next to King’s Peak. We still laugh about that, and we named the mountain “Troop 112’s Mistake”. But the thing I appreciate the most about our Scoutmaster is that he’s my dad. For more than 10 years now I’ve been sharing him with three older brothers, a younger sister, and a troop of Scouts. But that’s not hard to do because my dad has always saved part of himself for me. That’s why he’s the best Scoutmaster I know.

Rajinder sat in Primary with his arms folded. On one side of him was an empty chair. On the other side was a boy who couldn’t sit still. Rajinder felt very much alone.
He couldn’t help noticing how different he looked from the rest of the children. His skin was dark and smooth. Their skins were shades of pink, sometimes tanned or freckled from the sun. His hair was shiny black; theirs, brown or red or yellow. His eyes were large and dark instead of pale-lashed and blue.
Rajinder didn’t know how to go about making friends. Not only had his family just moved to a new country called Canada, they had also joined a new church with a name so long he could hardly pronounce it. And when someone in this new church talked to him, he was too shy to answer. He had finally decided that the best thing to do was sit quietly until it was over and then go home.
At home, Rajinder wouldn’t be lonely anymore because there he had lots of friends. At home, Rajinder had his dragons. He drew them in notebooks, on scraps of paper, and even on old pieces of cloth. He drew red dragons with smoke spiraling from their nostrils. He drew green dragons with flames shooting from their gaping jaws. He drew pink and blue baby dragons and black and purple grandfather dragons, dragons that slept, dragons that flew, and dragons that ate in great greedy gulps. When Rajinder was at home with his dragons, he was never lonely.
Then one Sunday Sister Werth, the Primary president, announced that each class would draw a large scene from the Book of Mormon, and all the pictures would be hung on the walls of the Primary room. The children were excited, and the very next Sunday during Sharing Time, everyone set to work.
For a while Rajinder tried really hard. He drew a Lamanite holding a sword, but the warrior ended up looking like a tall skinny dragon with no wings. Then he tried to draw a group of Nephite children clearing away rocks, but they looked exactly like a cluster of newly-hatched baby dragons popping from their shells. Finally Rajinder gave up and just watched.
Rajinder didn’t notice that Brother Olsen, his Primary teacher, was watching, too, with concern in his eyes. Rajinder couldn’t see Brother Olsen kneeling beside his bed that night, either, asking Heavenly Father to help him find a way to make Rajinder feel welcome. He didn’t see Brother Olsen sitting in his easy chair, reading the Book of Mormon and finally setting it down with a look of relief and excitement.
The next Sunday during Sharing Time, Brother Olsen took his class over to one corner of the room and spoke quietly. After that, Rajinder worked side by side with the rest of his class, his dark head bent over the paper, his eyes glowing with excitement. Standing nearby was Brother Olsen, looking very pleased and blocking the view of every curious child from another class who ventured too near.
Two weeks later, the drawings were all finished and ready to be hung. One by one the classes taped their artistic creations on the Primary room walls. There were drawings of fierce Lamanites, great Nephite kings, and prophets warning the people. There was a picture of Jesus in America, blessing the little children.
Then, at last, it was Rajinder’s turn. He and his classmates carried their picture forward and held it proudly for all to see. The other Primary children oohed and aahed. Sister Werth looked surprised. Rajinder’s class had drawn a beautiful picture of two great armies facing one another, ready for battle. On one side, eager to conquer, were the Lamanites with painted faces. On the other side, holding their flag of freedom, were the Nephites wearing their armor and shields. And here and there, standing alongside every third or fourth soldier, were dragons. There were red dragons with smoke drifting up from their noses, and green dragons with flames spewing into the air. There were big dragons and little dragons, there were angry ones and calm, thoughtful ones. They were the most magnificent dragons Rajinder had ever drawn.
Only one person in the whole Primary was frowning. Jenny jumped up from Sister Pierce’s class and pointed a finger. “You can’t put that picture up!” she exclaimed.
“Why not?” asked Brother Olsen, with a mysterious twinkle in his eye.
“Because the drawings must be from the Book of Mormon,” Jenny answered smugly. “Those are the rules. And there are no dragons in the Book of Mormon.”
Brother Olsen smiled at her. Then he opened his Book of Mormon and read Mosiah 20:11, emphasizing one word: “But they [the Nephites] fought for their lives, and for their wives, and for their children; therefore they exerted themselves and like dragons did they fight.”
Jenny sat down. Rajinder stood holding the picture and smiling the biggest, brightest smile anyone in Primary had ever seen.
Sister Werth hung the picture at the front of the Primary room, and during the weeks that followed, many ward members came to see it. The bishop especially liked the yellow dragon with brown spots that was blowing fire at the Lamanite leader. The ward clerk was partial to the little blue dragon coming from behind a tree. And the Relief Society president asked Rajinder to make her a copy of the big orange dragon wearing a breastplate.
Best of all, from then on, only some of Rajinder’s friends were dragons.

Since the SBAA hosts its annual conference in a different city each year, it’s not likely that it will be held in Louisville again for a long time. Chances are, most of these participants and volunteers will never see each other again. With the activities winding down, the youth want to give their new friends one last memorable experience.

On the last day of the conference all the children and their parents gather in the hotel lobby for a special goodbye. The youth have prepared a song called “We Are the Hands of Heaven” to leave a final, spiritual message. The song has been carefully prepared and rehearsed, complete with two flute players and someone “singing” the words in American Sign Language. The piano begins and the voices start out strong. But then someone looks out into the crowd and sees the smiling face of a new friend, looking up intently from where she is seated in her tiny wheelchair. Tears begin to stream down a few cheeks, then a few more, and finally hardly anyone is left with dry eyes. The song, still beautiful, is sung more softly than in rehearsal. No one seems to mind.

When the song ends, one little girl rushes toward two of the volunteers and says, “You made my eyes water!” A little boy moves his crutches as fast as he can to catch up with two priests. “Here’s my address,” he says a little shyly. “Will you write me?”

Harold B. Lee served as a stake president during the 1930s. Times were hard—many people had lost their jobs. Worried about the 4,800 families in his stake whose fathers had no work, he called a meeting of all the bishops.
Harold: Every needy family in your wards must be given food and a few small gifts for Christmas. Visit them on Christmas Eve, and when you have finished, report back to me.
On Christmas Eve morning, he was driving to work. He saw a small boy walking in the snow without a coat or gloves.
Harold: Where are you going?
Boy: I’m going uptown to a free picture show.
Harold: Well, hop in. I’m going uptown, too.
Harold: Son, are you ready for Christmas?
Boy: We aren’t going to have any Christmas at our house. Daddy died three months ago and left Mama and me and a little brother and sister.
Harold: Give me your name and tell me where you live. You will have a Christmas. I promise that you won’t be forgotten.
That night, when the last bishop came to report, Harold realized that he had forgotten his promise.
Harold: Bishop, do you have enough to make one more visit? There is another family who needs our help.
Bishop: Yes, I have enough. Give me the address, and I’ll make the delivery.
President Lee went home. He was grateful that the little boy’s family was provided for but felt sad to have nearly forgotten them.
On Christmas morning, President Lee made a promise to himself.
Harold: From now on, I will be more aware of others’ needs. I will know my people better, and I will find out how I can help them.
He developed a welfare program to store food and other necessities for the members of his stake. When the leaders of the Church saw what he was doing, they called him to expand the program for the whole Church. The Church welfare program continues to provide for needy Latter-day Saints today.

“Grandpa plays the piano and violin and so do I. I really enjoy hearing him, especially when he plays his two favorite pieces. He once told me about playing the violin at his high school graduation program. His sister Helen, who played the piano for him, whispered, ‘Would you like to tune up?’ ‘No,’ he said and he played the entire number a half note off from the pitch of the piano. I guess it sounded pretty bad.”

Early in our married life my young family and I were laboring through graduate school at a university in New England. [My wife] Pat was the Relief Society president in our ward, and I was serving in our stake presidency. I was going to school full-time and teaching half-time. We had two small children then, with little money and lots of pressures. In fact, our life was about like yours.

One evening I came home from long hours at school, feeling the proverbial weight of the world on my shoulders. Everything seemed to be especially demanding and discouraging and dark. I wondered if the dawn would ever come. Then, as I walked into our small student apartment, there was an unusual silence in the room.

“What’s the trouble?” I asked.

“Matthew has something he wants to tell you,” Pat said.

“Matt, what do you have to tell me?” He was quietly playing with his toys in the corner of the room, trying very hard not to hear me. “Matt,” I said a little louder, “do you have something to tell me?”

He stopped playing, but for a moment didn’t look up. Then these two enormous, tear-filled brown eyes turned toward me, and with the pain only a five-year-old can know, he said, “I didn’t mind Mommy tonight, and I spoke back to her.” With that he burst into tears, and his entire little body shook with grief. A childish indiscretion had been noted, a painful confession had been offered, the growth of a five-year-old was continuing, and loving reconciliation could have been wonderfully underway.

Everything might have been just terrific—except for me. I am ashamed beyond expression to tell you how I then acted. I lost my temper. It wasn’t that I lost it with Matt—it was with a hundred and one other things on my mind; but he didn’t know that, and I wasn’t disciplined enough to admit it. He got the whole load of bricks.

I told him how disappointed I was and how much more I thought I could have expected from him. … Then I did what I had never done before in his life—I told him that he was to go straight to bed and that I would not be in to say his prayers with him or to tell him a bedtime story. Muffling his sobs, he obediently went to his bedside, where he knelt—alone—to say his prayers. Then he stained his little pillow with tears his father should have been wiping away.

If you think the silence upon my arrival was heavy, you should have felt it now. Pat did not say a word. She didn’t have to. I felt terrible!

Later, as we knelt by our own bed, my feeble prayer asking for blessings upon my family fell back on my ears with a horrible, hollow ring. I wanted to get up off my knees right then and go to Matt and ask his forgiveness, but he was long since peacefully asleep.

My relief was not so soon coming; but finally I fell asleep and began to dream, which I seldom do. I dreamed Matt and I were packing two cars for a move. For some reason his mother and baby sister were not present. As we finished I turned to him and said, “OK, Matt, you drive one car and I’ll drive the other.”

This five-year-old very obediently crawled up on the seat and tried to grasp the massive steering wheel. I walked over to the other car and started the motor. As I began to pull away, I looked to see how my son was doing. He was trying—oh, how he was trying. He tried to reach the pedals, but he couldn’t. He was also turning knobs and pushing buttons, trying to start the motor. He could scarcely be seen over the dashboard, but there staring out at me again were those same immense, tear-filled, beautiful brown eyes. As I pulled away, he cried out, “Daddy, don’t leave me. I don’t know how to do it. I am too little.” And I drove away.

A short time later in my dream, I realized in one stark, horrifying moment what I had done. I slammed my car to a stop, threw open the door, and started to run as fast as I could. I left car, keys, belongings, and all—and I ran. The pavement was so hot it burned my feet, and tears blinded my straining effort to see this child somewhere on the horizon. I kept running, praying, pleading to be forgiven and to find my boy safe and secure.

As I rounded a curve nearly ready to drop from physical and emotional exhaustion, I saw the unfamiliar car I had left Matt to drive. It was pulled carefully off to the side of the road, and he was laughing and playing nearby. An older man was with him, playing and responding to his games. Matt saw me and cried out something like, “Hi, Dad. Come over. We’re having fun.” Obviously he had already forgiven and forgotten my terrible transgression against him.

But I dreaded the older man’s gaze, which followed my every move. I tried to say “Thank you,” but his eyes were filled with sorrow and disappointment. I muttered an awkward apology, and the stranger said simply, “You should not have left him alone to do this difficult thing. It would not have been asked of you.”

With that, the dream ended, and I shot upright in bed. My pillow was now soaked with perspiration and tears. I threw off the covers and ran to the little metal camp cot that was my son’s bed. There on my knees and through my tears, I cradled him in my arms and spoke to him while he slept. I told him that every dad makes mistakes but that they don’t mean to. I told him it wasn’t his fault I had had a bad day. I told him that when boys are 5 or 15, dads sometimes forget and think they are 50. I told him that I wanted him to be a small boy for a long, long time, because all too soon he would grow up and be a man and wouldn’t be playing on the floor with his toys when I came home. I told him that I loved him and his mother and his sister more than anything in the world and that whatever challenges we had in life, we would face them together. I told him that never again would I withhold my affection or my forgiveness from him, and never, I prayed, would he withhold them from me. I told him I was honored to be his father and that I would try with all my heart to be worthy of such a great responsibility.

A friend of mine related the following experience. His father and his father’s cousin lived in the same community and were competitors in the construction business. A bitter rivalry, started in the beginning by some contract bidding, grew up over the years and was eventually inherited by the immediate families, even after the death of my friend’s father. It was difficult for them to be civil to one another, even in their church callings, where my friend was the bishop of one ward and his cousin in another. The situation became worse.
Suddenly my friend found himself with a call to serve as a mission president. He and his family were thrilled with the prospect, but he had an uneasy feeling. He kept asking himself if he were really worthy for such an important call. He knew he was living the Word of Wisdom, was a full tithepayer, faithful in his Church activities, was morally clean, and so forth, but the uneasy feeling persisted. …
In the midst of his preparations he was returning from his office one afternoon when something said to him, “You must go to your father’s cousin and correct this situation that exists between you. You cannot go out to teach the gospel of love while this feeling exists between you.”
So he went to his cousin’s home, rang the doorbell, and waited fearfully, but there was no response. He turned away feeling that at least he had tried and that this attempt would conclude the matter. But the uneasy feeling did not go away.
The next day at a funeral service his cousin came in and sat across from him. He asked his cousin if he could talk to him after the service. I quote from my friend’s account:
“When I rang the doorbell he invited me into the living room and congratulated me on my mission call. We talked a few minutes about unimportant things and then it happened. I looked at him with a feeling of love which replaced all the old bitterness, and said: ‘I have come to ask forgiveness for anything I have ever said or done that has tended to divide us and our families.’
“At this point tears came into our eyes, and for a few minutes neither of us could say a word. This was one time when silence was more powerful than words. In a few minutes he said: ‘I wish I had come to you first.’ I replied, ‘The important thing is that it is done, not who initiated it.’
“At this moment we had a rich spiritual experience which caused us to purge our lives and our souls of those things which had separated us. That experience has resulted in our having proper family relationships. Now I could go on my mission and teach the true meaning of love because for the first time in my life I had experienced its deepest dimension. Now I could honestly say that there wasn’t a person in the world that I didn’t love and appreciate. Since that day my life has never been the same, for it was then that I learned in a most positive way, as I had never understood before, this injunction of the Master to his disciples: ‘A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another’” (John 13:34).

A year later, I reflected on the previous Christmas and thought about what I could do to have a better Christmas in the mission field. I realized that my feelings of sadness the year before came from focusing on myself instead of on the Savior. I also realized that Christmas is a time to remember the Savior’s birth and that I should be happy to serve Him as His representative.
In talking with my companion, we decided to buy lollipops to give to members, investigators, children, and anyone else we came across on Christmas Day. We also practiced Christmas hymns to sing. Joy flooded my heart on Christmas Day as we met with people, sang hymns, and gave away lollipops.

Rick Weirich couldn’t see through the viewfinder of his video camera because of the tears in his eyes. But he kept the camera pointed at his two sons on the field. His sons were standing by the pole vault venue with their arms around each other, the younger one comforting his older brother. Moments before, they had been competing against each other in the pole vault at a regional track and field meet in Texas to decide who would go on to the state championships. The brothers had had big plans. They wanted to place first and second in regionals and go to state together. Chris had broken his pole on his first try, and, on his final try with his backup pole, he was eliminated when he didn’t clear the height.
Before younger brother Matt set up for his next attempt, he stopped. He had something more important to do. He needed to see if his brother was all right. He needed to say some reassuring words to Chris. For a moment these two brothers, who had been competitors, stood together, sharing the burden of disappointment.
The parents, Rick and Brenda, didn’t need videotape to record the scene. It was being recorded in their hearts. What they saw wasn’t failure but a huge success. Their sons cared more about each other than they did about winning.

While his mother was the dominant influence in Heber’s life, the Lord placed many others in his path to help guide and direct him. One of the first of these associations was with President Brigham Young (1801–77). Young Heber, too poor to own a sled, entertained himself in the winter by catching hold of passing vehicles, sliding on the snow a block or two, and letting go. One day when he was six years old, Heber caught hold of President Young’s sleigh. As Heber later told the story, President Young “was very fond of a fine team, and was given to driving quite rapidly. I therefore found myself skimming along with such speed that I dared not jump off, and after riding some time I became very cold.”
Finally President Young noticed Heber, told his driver to stop, tucked the cold child under buffalo robes, and then asked who he was. When President Young discovered that the boy was Jedediah M. Grant’s son, he expressed his love for Heber’s father and the hope that Heber would be as fine a man. Before President Young dropped Heber off, he invited the boy to visit him in his office. Thus began a friendship that lasted until President Young’s death. Of this friendship, Heber said, “I learned not only to respect and venerate him, but to love him with an affection akin to that which I imagine I would have felt for my own father, had I been permitted to know and return a father’s love.”5

There is a hammock in our backyard. After treatments I sit in that hammock most of the day just feeling sorry for myself. I look up at the trees and think, lucky trees. Trees don’t get cancer. I look up at the birds. Lucky birds. They can just fly away from their problems. I wish I could fly away.
On one of those days after I’d been sitting on the hammock crying and feeling sorry for myself, I went into my house and watched television. The Jerry Lewis Telethon was on. The parents of children who had multiple sclerosis were telling what it is like to have a child with the disease. Most of them talked of the hope they had for a cure for their child’s condition. One woman, however, said she didn’t have any hope that her child would even live much longer, but she said that she was going to love her child as much as she could as long as she could. She also said that her family had grown tremendously from the experience. They’d learned not to let sorrow drown out their happiness.
I was so mad at myself. I was bitter. I had so much to be thankful for, and I was wasting so much of my precious time. That little boy seemed so happy. He was smiling, and his parents also seemed happy. I’m sure they felt pain because they knew they were going to lose their son, but they weren’t letting that get in their way. They were making the most of every minute they had with him.
I realized then that it doesn’t matter how much time I have left. What is really important is what I do with what I have. I decided to fight to the end.

On a rare break from working on our family farm in southern Idaho, my brother, several of his friends, and I went to a motorcycle park outside of Boise, Idaho. We rode up and down the backcountry on our motorcycle for hours, having a lot of fun. It was a wonderful break from the rigors of our busy summer.
One of my brother’s friends had a four-wheeler. At the time, four-wheelers were very expensive, so there were very few of them on the trails. Knowing this was a rare opportunity to ride one, I asked the owner if I could take it for a short ride. He kindly said, “You bet!”
Because we had been taking a short break to eat and have a drink of water, I did not have my helmet on when I asked him if I could ride the four-wheeler, so when he said yes, I excitedly climbed onto it without much thought for safety. I pulled the rip-cord ignition and felt the engine come alive beneath me. I was so excited; this was my first ride on a four-wheeler!
It soon turned into a first for me in learning a lesson I had not anticipated that day. I put the four-wheeler into gear, and it lurched forward as if it were just as excited to have me ride it as I was to be on it. Just as it went forward I heard a voice say to me very clearly, “Put your helmet on.” I thought the voice was my brother or maybe one of his friends. I turned and looked at them, but they were all facing away, sitting on the tailgate of our pickup, talking and laughing, paying no attention to me.
I stopped the four-wheeler, got off, and put on my helmet. I thought very little of the voice and its directions until a short time later. Once I was back on the four-wheeler, with my helmet on, I rode up a ravine to access the trails. I had a blast! It was so much fun. After about 10 minutes I began the descent back down the ravine to my brother and his friends.
On my way down I neglected to pay attention to the ruts carved into the trail from motorcycles that had ridden on it after a rainstorm. Unfortunately, the four-wheeler’s right front tire settled into a rut, which made a 45-degree turn to the left of the trail in front of me. Before I could apply the brakes, the four-wheeler pulled hard to the left, but I did not. I flew over the handlebars and landed several feet down the trail. I landed directly on top of my head.
Fortunately, I had not been moving at a very high speed, so the impact was not very painful, nor did I hurt myself in any way. As the four-wheeler sat just off the trail, idling quietly, I pulled my helmet off to inspect the damage. I noticed the top of the helmet was scratched and damaged severely from the impact on the hard trail. In an instant I remembered the voice that had said, “Put your helmet on,” and I uttered a quiet prayer of gratitude to my Heavenly Father.
It has been very rare for me to actually hear a voice prompt me, but on that day a voice protected and preserved me. I know it was the Holy Ghost. I do not know why I was preserved from the harm and pain I might have experienced, but one thing I do know: our Heavenly Father lives and is mindful of all of His children. I know God loves us. I know He loves me. I am deeply grateful for the gift of the Holy Ghost and its protective promptings.

In 1837, when the Church was struggling in Kirtland, Ohio, the Prophet Joseph Smith called Heber C. Kimball to go to England to open the work there. Brother Kimball exclaimed in self-humiliation: “O, Lord, I am a man of stammering tongue, and altogether unfit for such a work; how can I go to preach in that land, which is so famed throughout Christendom for learning, knowledge and piety; … and to a people whose intelligence is proverbial!”
But then on reflection he added: “However, all these considerations did not deter me from the path of duty; the moment I understood the will of my Heavenly Father, I felt a determination to go at all hazards, believing that He would support me by His almighty power, and endow me with every qualification that I needed; and although my family was dear to me, and I should have to leave them almost destitute, I felt that the cause of truth, the Gospel of Christ, outweighed every other consideration” (quoted in Orson F. Whitney, The Life of Heber C. Kimball, Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1967, page 104).
He traveled over the sea and commenced the work in Preston, Lancashire, with the very devils of hell opposing him and his companions. And thus began a work in that part of the world that has blessed for good countless lives.

A few weeks ago, a brother complained to me, “When I was away on business recently in another part of the country, I went to church and no one spoke to me. I felt very lonely, especially since I was so far from home.” I paused and then asked, “How many people did you speak to?” At first he was a little annoyed, feeling I had not been sympathetic, but then he smiled and said: “You’re right. I did hold back instead of reaching out.”

“Father, where are you going?” George asked.
“To the court,” he was told.
“May I come too?”
“No,” his father said sternly.
George knew that his father’s word was law. But there were musicians at court, and George longed to hear them play. Father said that music was frivolous, not work for men. George must become a lawyer and forget about music. His father didn’t know that George spent hours practicing in secret on a clavier (a forerunner of the modern piano) in the attic.
But George needed to hear others play, so he decided to go to the court at Weissenfels anyway. It couldn’t be very far from his home in Halle.
He watched as his father climbed into the carriage; then, as the horse pulled it down the street, George ran behind the carriage. By the time they reached the edge of town, George’s breath was coming in great gulps, and the carriage started to pull away. The distance between George and the carriage became greater, no matter how hard he ran.
Suddenly the carriage stopped. The driver climbed down, ran to the boy, picked him up, and carried him to the carriage.
“What are you trying to do?” his father scolded him. “A seven-year-old boy cannot run as far as Weissenfels. I told you that you could not come. Why did you disobey me? You may sit with the driver, but you’ll be punished when we get home.”
When they entered the castle, George heard music. He followed the sounds to a large room where a man was playing the organ. The boy listened happily until the last note died away. “May I play?” he asked.
“Only for a minute.”
George sat on the bench and began to play. He was thrilled at the beautiful tones that filled the room. Not until he had played the last note did the man speak to him. “Who are you?” the man asked.
“George Frideric Handel,” he answered.
“You play well. How old are you, and who is your teacher?”
“I’m seven, but I don’t have a teacher. My father doesn’t want me to be a musician.”
Just then George’s father entered the room. “I’m sorry, Your Grace,” he said, “if my son has disturbed you.”
“You are the boy’s father?” the duke asked. “He tells me that he has no music teacher. Don’t you realize that he is very talented? Get him a music teacher at once, and bring him to play for me again.”
“Yes, Your Grace,” George’s father said meekly.
When they returned home, George was sent to bed in disgrace. But the very next day Father arranged for the organist of the largest church in Halle to teach George, and he was allowed to prepare for a life in music.

In Curitiba, Brazil, 4,330 members from the temple district, supported by a choir of 1,700 voices, presented a most inspirational program through song, dance, and video. The enormous soccer stadium where the event took place was filled with spectators. The wind had been blowing, and rain threatened. I offered a silent prayer asking Heavenly Father to look with mercy upon those who had prepared so diligently for our entertainment and whose costumes and presentations would be damaged if a heavy rain or wind enveloped them. He honored that prayer, and it wasn’t until the end of the show and later on that evening that rain fell in abundance.
A history of the Church in Brazil was portrayed in song and dance. A particularly moving scene was the portrayal of Elders James E. Faust and William Grant Bangerter, who served as missionaries in Curitiba in 1940. As their photos were displayed on large screens, a tremendous cheer went up from the audience. All in all, it was a glorious event.

In tracing our family names, we often find them spelled differently, depending on the source. This was the case of a university student in Provo, Utah, who caught the vision of this linking of generations. He was walking through the library one evening and remembered hearing someone in the Searing family tell about a town in New York State that had been named after an ancestor. So he decided to look up the town. He stumbled across a very old copy of a gazetteer of New York and read about a man named Simon Searing who helped settle Long Island in the mid-1600s. Could Simon be his ancestor? He had to know. He began research in earnest and traced his line back several generations. But still he needed to bridge the gap between the 1800s and the 1600s. Then a miracle occurred. He unexpectedly located a history of a Syring family. The families in the Syring book ended in the same generation he had reached in his own research. Not only was he able to connect many generations, but he also linked himself to the early settler Simon Searing.

After several weeks of formal discussions, the missionaries asked if I would be willing to be baptized. I told them sure. Then they told me that before I could be baptized, I needed to be living the Word of Wisdom.
I hadn’t been drinking or abusing drugs as much as in the past. Things were changing in my life; I felt more hopeful than I had in ages—but surely those habits would be impossible to break completely. Besides, I had already given up so much in embracing the gospel—including several friends who thought I was crazy for showing interest in the Mormon Church. I had persisted because I felt that the gospel was true. But could I completely abandon long-standing addictions?
The missionaries offered to give me a priesthood blessing to help me. Immediately afterward, I threw away all the drugs and alcohol I had. And that night the desire to partake of anything that was against the Word of Wisdom left me. It was a true miracle.
I was baptized in June 1978. A little more than a year later, Bruce and I were married in the Washington D.C. Temple.

The morning session was opened by the president with a polished and stirring address. Next we called on his second counselor. He was obviously flustered. … (We had previously indicated that both counselors would probably speak in the afternoon session. We were to go to his home for the noon meal. He had known there would be time to go over his notes, so he had left them at home.)

For want of his notes, he turned to testimony, giving an inspiring account of an administration he had performed during the week. A brother, given up by his doctors, had been called from the very shadows of death by the power of the priesthood. I do not know what was on his notes, but surely it could not have compared in inspiration to the testimony he bore.