Gospel Story Finder

Right now I’m on the other side of the world serving in the Japan Sapporo Mission. The apartments here usually don’t get the New Era, but my loving mother always puts forth the extra effort to send a copy to me each month. When I get an issue I usually read it from cover to cover the night it comes, like I just did the issue I got today. The New Era always adds an extra little spark to my day, and brings out feelings that I’ve felt. I just wish that I had found it before my mission. It has always been in my home, but I seldom took the time to read more than an article or two. I wish there were some way I could tell all those “Roberts” out there what a support this magazine can be and how many questions it can answer. It’s really helped me here on my mission, and just think where I’d be if I had used its help before. Anyway, thank you for the great job you do in making the New Era. You’re part of the support troops of God’s army, bringing to the front the tools to combat Satan!
Elder Robert SchofieldJapan Saporro Mission

Moxy Maxwell Does Not Love Stuart Little, by Peggy Gifford. Moxy has tried to do her summer reading assignment. She really has. It’s just that there are so many other things to do first … go swimming, plant an orchard, rest in the hammock. See if she finishes her book before school starts again!

And I met no one at the pageant who did not believe that he was at the right place, doing the right thing, at the right time. For example, I met three girls who were converted at pageant. One of them had desperately wanted to see it, and not knowing exactly where it was being held, she had borrowed a car and followed a car with a Utah license plate.

Will you join me as we look in on a typical Latter-day Saint family offering prayers unto the Lord? Father, mother, and each of the children kneel, bow their heads, and close their eyes. A sweet spirit of love, unity, and peace fills the home. As father hears his tiny son pray unto God that his dad will do the right things and be obedient to the Lord’s bidding, do you think that such a father would find it difficult to honor the prayer of his precious son? As a teenage daughter hears her sweet mother plead unto the Lord that her daughter will be inspired in the selection of her companions, that she will prepare herself for a temple marriage, don’t you believe that such a daughter will seek to honor this humble, pleading petition of her mother, whom she so dearly loves? When father, mother, and each of the children earnestly pray that the fine sons in the family will live worthily that they may, in due time, receive a call to serve as ambassadors of the Lord in the mission fields of the Church, don’t we begin to see how such sons grow to young manhood with an overwhelming desire to serve as missionaries?

Like all homecomings, mine was bittersweet. I spent two years as a missionary for the Church in the Scotland/Ireland Mission, speaking Mandarin Chinese. The call was unique, and not a day went by that wasn’t similarly special. My mission took me to soaring heights, but also to lows I never thought I’d experience. It filled my life with a wide range of color and emotion I hadn’t thought possible, things I figured were exclusive for other people, but not for me. It felt like I’d spent my whole life playing a video game, and suddenly I’d been dropped straight into it for real.

The day I arrived in the mission field, I found a question staring me in the face everywhere I looked: Why did you come? Companions, the mission president, and ward members all asked us why we came on a mission. I had a good, general response to it. But, for whatever reason, maybe because I repeated it so much, those words began to sound hollow. So, I began to question, and one day, not too long into my mission, I woke up with the scary realization that I honestly had no idea why I had come.

Serving a mission had always been in my future. It was something I’d planned on and even enthusiastically looked forward to for my entire life. And yet somehow I didn’t understand fully what a mission would entail. I’d have to talk to people? Teach them? Why did something so basic come as such a shock to me? Was I really prepared for this? How did I get here? Why had I come?

It wasn’t until a few months later I was posed a different question, which put everything into perspective.
“Why do you stay?”

That was a more immediate question, so it required a more immediate answer. Rather than looking deep into the past for a reason I wasn’t sure was there, I could look at myself in the here and now and decide. Why did I stay today? Why would I stay tomorrow? Well, for one thing, I couldn’t well give up on something I’d just started. The work was anything but comfortable, but I didn’t feel so out of place as I sometimes had back home. I knew I was accomplishing something, even if I wasn’t sure what it was. But there was something more than that. As I pondered, I realized that throughout all of the ups and downs and lefts and rights, the highs and lows and every shade of color you can imagine, there was one thing underpinning it all. It was the grace of Jesus Christ.

That is why I went on my mission, and why I stayed; nothing else has taught me so much of the Savior and allowed me so much unfettered access to His divine power and love. Christ is real. He lives, He loves each of us, and He is with us in ways we cannot even imagine. Trust in Him, hold fast to His teachings, live by His words, and even in the darkest of night, life will carry a special glimmer that you cannot find anywhere else. That is so necessary in missionary life, but oh so much more vital in our daily lives.

Though getting there was difficult, the Saints finally made it to the Salt Lake Valley, where Brigham Young dug his cane into the soil and said, “Here we will build the temple of our God.”
Davis Esplin, 11, learned a lot from performing the part of Brother Brigham. “I have a new respect for Brigham Young because I didn’t know how hard it was to build the temple.”
After dedicating the cornerstone, it took 40 years to complete the Salt Lake Temple. By that time, Wilford Woodruff had become President of the Church. He dedicated the temple on 6 April 1893. There was even a special dedication session for children under eight so that more Primary children could attend.

The Christmas story is so real to Jamie, a little mute boy, that Christmas morning brings a long-awaited miracle.

When I feel like the lesson is boring or we have already talked about it, I try to participate more. Share your questions and ideas. It makes the lesson seem different if you ask different questions.
Jenny Foley, 13North Ogden, Utah

Have you ever just looked at yourself and thought: “Wow! I would look amazing if only …”? Or have you ever compared yourself to every other girl on social media? I have. That was me all my teenage years and before I got married and then pregnant. Even when my husband would tell me that I looked perfect, I always thought, “If only this or that … ,” then I would look and feel better. But in all reality, would those “if onlys” make any of us feel better? In my case, I know that losing weight would only be the beginning, and then I would’ve found something else to “fix” on my body and the cycle would just go on and on.

While my friends and I were playing on the school playground, they started saying bad things about a boy who was sitting alone. He didn’t have many friends, and people were often mean to him. I thought, “What would Jesus do?” Then I told them that we shouldn’t make fun of him just because he looked different. Instead, we should be his friends. Since that day I have never been mean to him.

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.

Brett was excited. He had just gotten a letter from his big brother Tony. Tony was a missionary. Before Tony left, Brett promised him that he would do missionary work too.
Dear Brett, Did you know that when you serve others, you are doing missionary work? I can’t wait to hear about all the missionary work you are doing. Love, Tony
Mom, I want to serve others so I can do missionary work like Tony. What can I do?
I know Mrs. Hampton could use some help raking her leaves on Saturday. Would that be a good way to do missionary work?
Yes! Then I could write Tony and tell him all about it.
The next Saturday, Brett sat down to write Tony a letter.
Dear Tony, I hope you are having as much fun as I am doing missionary work. We helped Mrs. Hampton today in her yard. She gave us a plate of cookies. Dad asked her if she wanted to come to church with us, and she said yes. Love, Brett
Brett folded the paper and stuck the letter and one leaf from Mrs. Hampton’s yard inside an envelope.
I can be a missionary too!

During this season, the hearts of those who are confined reach out and yearn for a Christmas visit. One Christmas while visiting a care center, I sat and talked with five elderly ladies, the oldest of whom was 101. She was blind, yet she recognized my voice.

“Bishop, you are a little late this year!” she said. “I thought you would never come.”

We had a wonderful time together. One patient, however, looked longingly out the window and repeated over and over, “I know my boy will come to see me today.” I wondered if he would, for there had been other Christmas seasons when he had never called.

Luis Espinal has found an interesting solution to this kind of peer pressure. “I know people who have vices they would like to eliminate,” he says, “but they don’t think they have anyone to help them. I try to be a good friend to them, and I bring them all to church. Some don’t stay, but some continue coming, and some become members.”

I found Ginky yesterday. Boy, was I surprised! “Mom!” I shouted. “I found Ginky!”
Mom wasn’t surprised at all, and she told me a story: “When you were a tiny baby and round all over, your daddy brought you this blanket. He held you and the blanket in one arm and said, ‘Blanket, blanket,’ lots of times. You said, ‘Ginky.’ Dad smiled and said, ‘Blanket.’ Both of you were talking about the same thing.”
I had to laugh at that.
“Pretty soon,” Mom went on, “we all got used to calling your blanket Ginky, the way you did. ‘Here’s Ginky,’ your daddy or I would say, or ‘Won’t you let us wash Ginky just once, real quick?’ But you never wanted Ginky to be washed.”
“I didn’t want Ginky swooshing around in all that soap,” I told her.
Now Ginky smells kind of stuffy and dusty from being in the drawer so long. Ginky used to be soft. I remember stroking my cheek with Ginky and wrapping it around my arm (the one with the good-tasting thumb) before I went to sleep.
At first Ginky had a satin edging that I could curl around my fingers. I could make a scratchy noise on it, too, with my fingernail. But the satin is almost all worn off now.
Lots of babies have blankets. But there isn’t another Ginky.
You know, I took Ginky to bed with me last night—just for remembering. I didn’t really need to. I tried wrapping Ginky around my arm. I tried scratching the worn-out satin. I even tried sucking my thumb.
But my thumb just doesn’t taste good anymore. After a while, I got all tangled up in Ginky. I wanted to go to sleep, so I folded Ginky carefully beside me. “Good night,” I said.
This morning Ginky was still there, looking kind of raggedy on my pillow. I packed Ginky away in my special box. Mom says that when I’m a big person, we’ll open my box and look at all the things I saved as I was growing up.
My picture album and my doll without any hair and a drawing I made of a fire engine were in my box already. I think Ginky belongs there with those other things.

The group was diverse with as many dreams and challenges as attendees. Nagaraj Govindhraj, Naga Sai Kiran Gubbala, and Madan Govindraj all traveled from Chennai to the conference. Each found something that addressed their particular situation.
Madan, aged 24, is working in Bangalore. He has a diploma in computer engineering and has been doing marketing for a nongovernmental organization while studying through BYU-Pathway Worldwide, an online certificate and degree program offered through Brigham Young University-Idaho. He hopes to eventually earn a master’s degree.
“At the conference, I learned how to go for a better job while studying and how to find jobs in sectors related to my field,” he said. “I also learned how to handle the stress of working and going to school at the same time, which was very helpful.”

When it gets too cold outside, the children like to do arts and crafts inside. Bryan built a construction-paper model building that won a fourth-place ribbon at the Fairbanks Fair. He also designed and built a rocket and a tank out of construction paper. Daniel likes to draw helicopters and monsters. Sometimes he draws on paper with colored pencils; sometimes he draws on the computer.

Laurie learned this by trying to be more Christlike in her relationship with her husband. She had a need for order; her husband did not. She shed many tears after she repeatedly criticized her husband for his casual and not very tidy ways. However, Laurie realized that her feelings and actions were not in line with the Savior’s example. Rather than condemning her husband, she determined to work on her own attitude. She thought of how Christ would have handled such situations, and planned how she would react to her husband’s next offense. With a Christlike attitude, she found there was no room for fault-finding. She ceased to react unpleasantly. Though it took weeks before her husband’s untidiness no longer bothered her, she found that while she waited for her husband to come home each day, she found herself planning to listen to him, to join him in a few quiet moments, and to help him relax from the tensions of the day.

These actions did not decrease her need for order. But as she learned to deal with the problem cheerfully, this approach became second nature. As much as she wanted it, her husband never did improve enough to be considered tidy. But after a while it did not matter much, because she found that her ability to control her temper was enormously satisfying, far more than having all his socks in the dresser drawer. She had, in fact, come a long way toward achieving emotional integrity.

A few years later, when I was about 10 years old, my mother and I went to a special meeting. Because so many people were there, we sat in the choir seats behind the speaker. With Mother’s help I had brought a notepad and a pencil so I could take notes. As the speaker started talking about the Holy Ghost and I started taking notes, I began to feel the influence of the Holy Ghost so powerfully that I couldn’t take notes and I started getting tears in my eyes. I kept my head down, and the tears rolled down my cheeks and dropped onto the page where I’d been taking my notes.

At our meetings you partake of the sacrament, symbolic of the torn flesh and spilled blood of our Savior, giving you an opportunity to renew your covenant to keep the Lord’s commandments that His spirit may continue to be with you. A teenage girl in Scotland told of being with nonmember friends. She wanted to be part of the group and thought, “Surely one little drink wouldn’t hurt—why not?” Then she realized her celestial kingdom goal. After that, she said, the ridicule didn’t matter. She had felt of His Spirit and could feel of His influence at that moment.