Gospel Story Finder

After earning his PhD, the family moved to Bristol, England, where Christophe worked as a computer science professor for six years. He left academia for a time to accept a manager position at ELCA Informatique in Lausanne, Switzerland. In Switzerland, they were just two hours from family for the first time in nearly 13 years. They loved living in Switzerland.

BYU had regularly asked Dr. Giraud-Carrier if he would consider accepting a professorship at the Provo campus. The answer was always no. When the Giraud-Carriers traveled to Utah in 2004, the Computer Science department chair asked them again, “What would make you stay in Utah?” Both Christophe and Isabelle had a strong impression that they should accept a professorship at BYU. They said yes and moved resolutely forward with the direction the Lord was revealing to them.

She wore overalls to school. This was unheard of in 1936 when I was eight years old. And that wasn’t her only crime.
“Look at what ‘Overalls’ brought for lunch,” one of my friends whispered. I watched the girl pull out two slices of bread—no meat, no cheese, no peanut butter, no sandwich spread. Strange.
No one sat by her or talked to her, so I didn’t either.
That changed one cold, blustery, winter day when the snow was four feet deep with twelve-foot drifts. Because I lived in a small mining town 10 miles away from school, I usually left class early to catch the bus that the high school students also rode. But on this day my teacher made an announcement: “None of you will leave this room until you have handed in your projects and cleaned up after yourselves.” I watched the clock, hurrying as fast as I could. As soon as I finished, I grabbed my coat and raced after the bus. But it was no use. Groaning, I watched it drive off without me. My family had no telephone, and I could think of nothing to do but start walking.
I wrapped my hand-me-down brown coat tightly around me, lowered my head, and set off up the icy road. I had no hat, no gloves, and no boots. Then, as now, a few drivers thought it great sport to splash people, so I was soon soaked.
At the time there was an epidemic of scarlet fever, and nearly every house along the road had a quarantine sign on it, meaning that no one could enter or leave. Families without the disease did not welcome strangers for fear of catching it, so I had no chance of going inside to get warm. One very nice lady came out and gave me a warm hat, though, and said she was sorry that I couldn’t come in.
Five miles into my trek, I was so stiff and cold that I was beginning to doubt I could make it. Just then, two young ladies came running out from a farmhouse. “Would you like to come in?”
I nodded, and they helped me through the door. Inside, they hung my wet clothes by the fire to dry and wrapped me in a warm blanket. They asked me where I lived and then disappeared. Their mother spoke to me gently to calm my fears as she prepared supper. Before long, who should come through the door but the last person on earth I expected—the overall girl!
“I was in the barn doing chores and I saw you walking,” she said. “I told my sisters that you go to my school and that you don’t have scarlet fever.”
“Thanks.” I couldn’t believe how relieved I felt to see someone I knew. We talked until suppertime, and then her mother invited us into the kitchen. I especially liked the large slices of fresh homemade bread and homemade butter. Mmmmmmmm, good!
I learned later that her sisters had gone out and stood in the cold, waiting and watching for someone to come looking for me. When my parents drove slowly past, they were waved down and brought inside. Was I ever glad to see them!
I learned a lot about the overall girl that day and decided that she was better than all the snobs at school put together (including me). From then on I made it a point to sit with my new friend at lunch. Sometimes she would even trade her delicious bread-and-butter sandwiches with me.

The room was small. Mirrored darkly in the panes of a tall china closet, it seemed even smaller. The deep afternoon hinted of spice, cedar, and old wool. The creak of a rocking chair and the ticking of a clock seemed quieter than mere silence.
Serious young men in the uniforms of two wars, flanked by snapshots of lacy babies and an embroidered rose, looked down out of their gilded frames onto a couch overflowing with pillows. The room was full of time-worn furniture and the dainty odds and ends a woman can accumulate in a lifetime.
Two windows spread sunlight through white curtains covered with moving leaf-shadows, highlighting here a ceramic ballerina on her crocheted doily, there a white pin jar, elsewhere a flight of plaster angels flapping up one wall toward a high ceiling.
In the best light a white-haired lady sat working, her knitting on her lap. She hummed softly to herself and glanced from time to time at the hands of the clock. When the door chimes sounded, she soon had the door open. “Come in,” she said warmly to the three smiling girls who stood outside, “I’ve been expecting you.”
She was expecting them because weeks earlier Laurel president Donna Muir had suggested that something should be done for the elderly. The young people of the Culver City and La Cienega wards, who meet together for activity night, agreed, and so they sought and received inspiration. The result was an innovative service project that would allow some of the widows and widowers in the area to give just as much as they received. Small groups of young people would visit selected oldsters and chat with them about their lives. The interviews would be recorded and preserved as a contribution to oral history. They decided that each group would take a small present to those they visited to show their love and appreciation.
And in other houses, other cassettes turned, other pens scratched, and warm, old voices escorted other young people into the heart of other times and other lives. It was a guided tour of history—not embalmed textbook history, but history still alive and breathing. Horizons of time, space, and personality were broadened, and everyone, young and old, knew that they were co-citizens of forever.
Several weeks after the last stop buttons had been pushed and the last goodbyes said, the young people hosted their elderly friends at a dinner where each of them was presented with a typed transcript of what he had said. It had nothing to do with a service project anymore. It was a get-together between friends.
The young men and women involved in the visits speak glowingly of the experience. Brother George Mitchell, an immigrant from Bulgaria, was visited by Alfred Griffith, Bruce Wright, Sandra Tong, and Myra-Lynn Jensen, who took an apple pie as a gift. Sandra later commented, “He talked for two hours, and when we left, he had just made it up to 1945. He has lived an interesting life. I never realized what a struggle immigrants to our country experience.” Myra-Lynn added, “The thing I remember is that he said that the apartment he lives in at the low-rent housing project is like a palace compared to the tar-paper shack he lived in when he first came to this country.”
Donna Muir, Mary Synold, and Diane Muir visited Sister Ruth Yancy, an elderly widow in poor health who devotes all the time she can to visiting disabled veterans at a veterans hospital. The young ladies, who took along a plate of cookies, were amazed at the amount of information Sister Yancy had given them. Diane said, “Older people seem so quiet, but they really have a story to tell. I didn’t know Sister Yancy at all, but I appreciate her as a person now. I can see the good she has done throughout her life.”
Sister Hazel Gotts, a widow who is a recent convert, was visited by Gerilynn Price and Mark Packard, the priests quorum group leader. They took her a cake. Mark reports, “I enjoyed talking with a person who has been around so long and seen so much. I think it’s a good way for the youth and older people to get to know and understand each other better. I had a very nice feeling when I left, knowing I had made someone happy, and I know she was very happy to know that someone cares about her. She enjoyed telling us about herself. I think it would be nice if the youth could establish a close relationship with the elderly people in the ward.”
The bishops of both wards suggested many people who would enjoy a visit, and five were chosen for the initial project. Youth leaders contacted each of these people to see if they would be willing to be visited. One elderly lady burst into tears and said, “Visit? With me? I’ve been so lonely.” Another replied, “The young people are so beautiful! I’d just love for them to come.” All five were eager to participate.
So the visits were scheduled, the preparations made.
Inside the house of the white curtains, the three young ladies complimented their hostess on her hand-painted china, broke the ice with a little small talk, and again explained their mission. Soon the tape recorder was set up, one young lady had her pen poised above a notebook ready to take notes, and the good sister started talking about her girlhood and her life. On the rare occasions when she ran dry momentarily, the girls were ready with well-conceived questions to start the flow again.
As they listened and the cassette turned, a wonderful thing happened. Years blurred and ran together, and the Laurels were no longer in the little house of sunlight and painted china. They were in Heber City, Utah, around the turn of the century, seeing life through the eyes of a young Mormon girl. They knew the bitterness of the winters, the headiness of mountain springs, the crushes, hopes, and secrets of being young. They met and loved all the old forgotten people, old and forgotten no more, who had filled a girl’s childhood. They visited a sawmill on the Utah-Wyoming border where she had spent some summers and smelled the sweetness of clean-sawed pine. They lived with her her first time away from home.
“It’s an awful thing to be homesick,” she said, closing her eyes and remembering, but with a smile. And then, in the present again for a moment, she leaned forward and asked, with a twinkle in her eyes, “Have you girls ever been homesick?”
Suddenly there was no generation gap—no time barrier between Utah then and California now—as the girls realized more fully than ever that people don’t stop being people just because they grow old. They forgot all about tape recorders and oral history for a while and talked friend to friend about homesickness, and family, and love, and all the other things that never stop mattering, and for a moment they glimpsed a more eternal perspective of existence and saw time as the sham it is.
Randy Tong, Gayle Allen, and Susan Langford visited Sister LaVern Brown who had suffered several severe falls and couldn’t get out much, and they presented her with a potted plant. The youth unanimously reported that it had been a delightful experience. Sister Brown later commented, “Oh, those young people were just so nice, but so quiet. I had to do all the talking.”
Sister Louella Norberg was visited by Kathy Peterson, Joele Chafant, Deanna Peterson, and Kiku Okauchi. Kathy said of the visit, “Joele, Deanna, Kiku, and I met outside her apartment and were standing there wondering how we should approach her when she stuck her head out and called, ‘Yoo-hoo, girls! Here I am!’ and invited us in to see her. It was fascinating. She told us things that happened over the years, and I really enjoyed it. I know she liked it a lot too because she kissed us all before we left.”
A kiss on the cheek in California—it’s a little thing, but it’s the sort of little thing that’s teaching youth all over the Church that service is truly its own reward.

When I was serving as a missionary in northern Mexico, a few days after the baptismal service of the Valdez family, we received a telephone call from Brother Valdez asking us to come to his house. He had an important question for us. Now that he knew the will of the Lord regarding the Word of Wisdom, and even though it would be difficult to find a new job, he wondered if he should continue to work for the cigarette company where he had worked for many years. Only a few days later Brother Valdez again asked us to come by and visit him. He had decided to quit his job because he was not willing to go against his convictions. Then with a smile and emotion in his voice, he told us that the very day he quit his old job, another company had called to offer him a much better position.

“Doctor Evans, we’re ready for you to begin.”
Justin looked down at the man on the operating table. There was a line drawn on the man’s stomach. Justin was wearing a surgical robe and a mask. There were rubber gloves on his hands. Nurses and others in green surgical gowns were all waiting for him to begin the operation.
There was, however, one tiny problem—Justin was 15 years old and didn’t know anything about surgery.
“So what do I do, just cut on the dotted line?” he joked.
Nobody laughed. “Doctor, we need to begin right away,” the woman next to him said.
“Doctor Sanchez is right,” a man said. “We need to begin right away.”
“Let’s see, I guess we need some kind of a knife or something.”
A nurse shoved a scalpel in his hand. Justin looked down at the stomach. He cleared his throat. “Give me a hint here, should I slice this guy deep or shallow?”
“Are you all right?” the woman they called Doctor Sanchez asked.
“Is this guy going to bleed a lot if I cut him open? I really can’t stand the sight of blood.”
“Would you like me to take over?” Doctor Sanchez said.
“Yes, please.”
The woman traded places, took up the scalpel, and cut along the line on the man’s stomach.
“Oh, gross,” Justin said a few minutes later upon seeing for the first time the exposed inside of the man. But after a while he got used to it.
After the operation as he removed the surgical gloves and gowns, Doctor Sanchez came over to him. “You and your practical jokes,” she said. “For a moment there it sounded like you didn’t know anything about what was going on.”
Justin smiled. “Yeah, right.”
A nurse came in the room. “Dr. Evans, your wife called.”
“I have a wife?” he blurted out.
Everyone in the room smiled.
“She left a number for you to call. She said it was important.”
He went to a phone and dialed the number. A woman answered.
“This is Justin.”
“Listen, I need to ask you something. Did you send in the house payment last month?”
“Do we own a house?”
“The bank called to say they haven’t got our payment yet.”
“I know I’m married to you, but could you tell me your name once again. I guess I’ve forgotten it. You know how I am with names.”
“Justin, this is no time for games. The deadline for Howard to enter the race for city commission is Thursday. He needs to know what you did with the petitions you handled for him.
“What color hair do you have? And when did we meet each other?”
There was a long pause, and then she said, “All right, tell me what’s wrong.”
“I’m 15 years old, and I’m not a doctor, and I’m not married, and I don’t have any idea who you are or who Howard is or what petitions you’re talking about. Basically that’s it.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll be right over.”
“How will I recognize you?”
“I’ll come to your office.”
“I have an office then, right?” he asked. Saying good-bye, he hung up and walked the halls until he found a door with his name on it. He stepped inside and sat behind the desk and tried to figure out what was going on.
A few minutes later someone knocked on the door. He opened the door and let her in. It was a woman.
“Are you my wife?” he asked.
“Yes, I am.”
“How nice to meet you. What’s your name?”
“Lori.”
“Lori, can you help me? I seem to be having a bad day. I don’t belong here. You know what I think? I think this whole thing is a dream.”
“You mean, here, right now, even me?”
“Yes, that’s what I think.”
“Why don’t you wake up then, if it’s just a dream?”
“I don’t know how to make myself wake up.”
“Pinch yourself.”
He pinched himself. Nothing happened.
“It must not be a dream then,” she said.
“But maybe I only dreamed I pinched myself, and it really is a dream.”
“If it is a dream, it’ll end soon, and you can get on with your life.”
“Maybe so. While you’re here, can I ask a few questions before this ends? On the phone you kept talking about mortgage payments and some kind of a petition for Howard.” He paused. “I guess the main thing I want to know is if being grown up is any fun at all?”
“Most of the time it is. Especially if you prepare for it when you’re young.”
“How do you prepare for it?”
“You make goals of what you want out of life. Then you work to achieve those goals.”
“Sounds boring.”
“Not really. Do you know what you always tell me?”
“To have pizza for supper more often?”
“Yeah, that too, but also you say, ‘If you can dream it, if you can plan it, if you can work hard for it, you can achieve it.’”
He smiled. “I say that? Sounds good.” He looked at her more closely. “Where did we get married?”
“In the temple.”
“That’s good, isn’t it? I’m glad we did.”
“The reason it happened is that when we were both young, even though we didn’t know each other, we both decided to plan for a temple marriage.”
“When you’re 15, like I am now, it’s kind of hard to think about planning for something that’s years away.”
“The tallest buildings have the deepest foundations.”
“Do I say that too sometimes?”
“No, I do,” she said with a smile.
“You’re smart, aren’t you? And attractive.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s been nice to meet you. Thanks for talking to me. Do we have kids?”
“Yes. Two with one on the way.”
“You’re pregnant now? It doesn’t show.”
“It will,” she put her hand on his shoulder. “Do you want me to drive you home?”
“No, I think I’ll just hang around here until I wake up from my dream, and then I’ll be 15 for real, and I’ll go on with my life.”
“Don’t forget to prepare for the future. It’s kind of important to me because I’m in your future. I’ll be doing some preparing too.”
“Should we kiss or something?” he said as she got ready to leave.
And then he woke up.
Doctor Sanchez was standing in the doorway. “Doctor Evans, we’re ready for you to begin the operation now.”
He stood up and looked around his office. “I must have dozed off. I had the strangest dream.”
“You’ve been working very hard lately. Oh, your wife called. She said Howard needs the petitions.”
“I’ll call him after the operation.”
Minutes later he stared down at the exposed stomach of a man on the operating table.
“Let’s see now. I just cut along the dotted line, right?”
Once again, nobody laughed.

I had often seen the battered old green truck sitting in the field under the big, scraggly elm trees that surrounded a broken-down cabin. Nobody lived on the ranch now, but I liked to explore the area, looking for old relics.
The day Sam went down there with me was one of those hot, lazy summer days when you’re restless for something to do. Sam had brought his BB gun. My dad would never let me have one. He said that they were only good for mischief.
When Sam and I came to the ranch lane, we turned in and wandered over to the pond, which was muddy around the edges and covered with algae.
“What this pond needs is some ducks,” I said. “They’d clean it up.”
“Right,” Sam agreed, raising his gun to his shoulders and aiming at nothing, “and I could clip them off with my trusty gun.”
We walked over to the truck and sat on the running board in the shade. We pulled up blades of field grass and chewed on the ends and looked out across the field.
“Who owns this truck?” Sam asked. “Your dad?”
“No,” I said, “one of my uncles.”
“Does it run?”
“I don’t think so.”
Sam stood up and walked around the truck, examining it. “It’s pretty old and beat up. I guess he’s just junked it down here.”
“I’m not sure about that,” I said as I looked at the truck. The tires still had air in them, and nothing looked broken, just old.
“Let’s take a few shots at it,” Sam said enthusiastically.
“Why?” I asked.
“Just for fun,” replied Sam. “The truck’s no good. It won’t hurt anything. Come on, move out of the way.”
I followed him out a little way into the field, where he raised his gun and shot a hole through the truck’s windshield. The sun glistened on the hole and the small sparkling cracks spreading out from it.
“Now, see how close you can come to my hole,” Sam said, handing me the gun. I hesitated, then raised the gun and shot. I made another hole, not very close to his. We took turns for a while until the windshield was full of holes. Sam shot a couple of times at the headlight. It was fun, in a way, to hear the craack! when one of us hit the mark, but a very uneasy feeling was creeping over me. “Let’s go now,” I said finally.
“We’re just getting a good start on this thing,” Sam said. “We can shoot it as full of holes as a sieve.” He laughed and raised his gun again.
“Look,” I said, getting a little angry. “It’s my family’s property, and I say we’re leaving.”
Sam lowered his gun, looked at me a minute, and shrugged his shoulders. “Whatever you say.”
The next day our family left for our vacation to Yellowstone Park. We had a great time on our trip, looking at geysers and boiling mud pots and beautiful scenery. The day after we got home, my dad asked me to go down to the ranch with him to clear out the irrigation ditch. We climbed into the old blue pickup and headed for the ranch. After turning off the dirt road, we bumped across the field in the direction of the old truck.
Suddenly Dad put on the brakes and leaned forward. “What in thunder happened to that!” he exclaimed, nodding toward the truck. He slowly drove over to it, and we both got out. I was as surprised as Dad was. The hood was open, and wires were hanging out on both sides. The carburetor was in pieces and scattered on the ground. Looking inside, we saw that the radio was gone and that the instrument panel on the dashboard had been smashed in. The seats had been slashed. My dad turned and looked at me quizzically, but surprise showed clearly on my face too.
“This must have happened while we were gone,” he said. “I drove down around this way before we left and didn’t notice any damage to the truck.”
I heaved a big sigh of relief. He didn’t suspect me at all. I wasn’t guilty, anyway, I told myself. I certainly hadn’t done all this damage. I thought that my dad might ask me if I had any idea who had done it, but he didn’t.
That night at dinner Dad told Mom about the truck. “This is going to make a hardship on Uncle Cy,” he said.
I looked up quickly, my roast beef dry in my mouth. “Did the truck run, Dad?” I asked. “I’ve never seen Uncle Cy driving it.”
“Sure it did. He drives his car to get around, but he uses—used—the truck for hauling hay and garbage, things like that.”
“It looked so old and worn out.”
My dad looked at me sharply. “It was old,” he said, “but it served his needs. He sure can’t afford to buy a new one. He only has his retirement, nothing extra.”
Suddenly even Mom’s gooseberry pie didn’t look very good. I picked at my dinner a little more.
“Sometimes, Son,” my father said, startling me, “something isn’t very valuable in itself, but it has value for the person who owns it.” He looked at me so closely that I wondered if he knew, after all.
I excused myself and went out into the backyard and sat under the spreading branches of the willow tree. Uncle Cy had always been good to me. He was my grandpa’s brother, and he lived by himself in a tiny house with a coal stove and a big sheepdog. Mom took dinners to him sometimes. I still had a little horse that he had whittled for me.
I kept telling myself that I hadn’t really ruined Uncle Cy’s truck. The windshield and the headlight could have been replaced. Still, I felt responsible and guilty. Finally I came up with a plan.
On Saturday I went up to see Uncle Cy as soon as it stopped raining.
“Michael!” he said, slapping me on the back. “Glad to see you. Sit down a minute. I need an excuse to rest.” He motioned to a weathered gray bench under an old apple tree, and we sat down. “The rain was refreshing,” he said, wiping his forehead with a blue bandanna, “but it’s still hot.”
It was hot, all right, but I felt a chilly feeling in my stomach as I mumbled, “I was sorry to hear about your truck.”
Uncle Cy stuffed his bandanna into his pocket thoughtfully. “I was too. I don’t know how I’ll get hay to my horses this winter. I like to pasture them down at the ranch, where there’s water.”
“Well,” I said, shifting my weight carefully on the splintered boards of the bench, “maybe I could help you with that. I thought that maybe I could haul the bales in our wheelbarrow.”
Uncle Cy looked at me, and his old blue eyes were shining. “Michael,” he said, patting my leg, “that’s mighty thoughtful of you. Maybe we can work that out if I can get my hay hauled down there and into one of the sheds.”
“Dad will do that with his truck, I’m sure.” I didn’t look right at him. “I thought I could help with the garbage, too—maybe help you dig a hole to put cans and stuff in. We could burn the rest.” I was talking fast, and my palms were wet.
“That would be wonderful, Michael, but I couldn’t pay you very much.”
“Oh,” I said, looking up quickly into his ruddy face, “I don’t want to be paid. I just want to help.”
He looked steadily at me, and I looked at the grass and dandelions. “You’re a fine boy, Michael. Your dad can be real proud of you.”
I glanced up at Uncle Cy and saw tears shining in his eyes. I smiled at him, then took off up the lane.
As I neared home, my mind felt easier. I would help Uncle Cy with his work, and no one would ever need to know about my part in damaging his truck. But as I remembered his face and how pleased he was with me, something uncomfortable stirred in the back of my mind.
The next week school started. I went up to Uncle Cy’s two nights after school, and we dug the hole. I helped him smash cans and dump them into the hole. I burned garbage and cleaned up around his yard. When I’d finished, Uncle Cy put an arm around my shoulders. “I always thought that you were a good boy, Michael,” he said, “but I didn’t know how good until now.”
On Saturday we hauled Uncle Cy’s hay down to the ranch. The three of us loaded it, and Dad and I took it down. After we stacked the bales in an old shed, we sat down on the end of the truck bed and took a drink of cool water from Dad’s canteen.
“Uncle Cy’s really touched by all the help you’ve been giving him,” Dad said, “and I want you to know that I’m proud of you.”
I said nothing. The battered truck sat nearby in the sunlight accusingly, its wires hanging out like some wounded thing.
“Anything you want to tell me, Son?” Dad said quietly.
Suddenly, in a big relieving rush, I blurted it all out. “I don’t know who finished it off for sure,” I concluded. “Probably Sam and maybe someone else.”
Dad didn’t say anything for a while. He looked out over the fields.
“I guess you’re pretty disappointed in me,” I finally ventured.
“Well,” he said, “at least I’m glad that you told me. I kind of wondered if you knew something about it. What’re you going to do now?” he said.
I swallowed hard. “I thought that I was doing something about it, helping Uncle Cy out and all.”
“Yeah, that’s something, all right. But I wondered if you were going to tell him too.”
“Oh, Dad, do I have to?”
“No, you don’t have to. You didn’t have to tell me.”
“He thinks I’m such a great kid. If I tell him, he’ll know that I’m just a vandal.”
Dad laughed a little. “Maybe his opinion won’t be that bad. What you think of yourself is the most important, and I have a hunch that you’ll like yourself better if you tell him. Another thing, Sam needs a chance to make amends too. Maybe the two of you can haul those bales this winter.”
Dad was right. I felt as though a big weight had been lifted off my chest after I talked to Uncle Cy later that afternoon. Blackbirds called from the pond, and a meadowlark sang from the power lines as Dad and I climbed into the truck and drove home.

What do you do when you run into pornography? One day Christian Monzón of Asunción, Paraguay, borrowed a cell phone from a friend at school to play games on it. He discovered that the phone had pornography stored in it.
There was no doubt in Christian’s mind what his friend should do about that, so Christian helped him see the need to get rid of the offensive pictures. Christian calmly explained how damaging material like that can be. He said, “If you were a father, you wouldn’t want your son looking at that.”
Part of what Christian told his friend came from For the Strength of Youth. Christian says the pamphlet helps him in every phase of his life. “I wouldn’t be where I am without it,” he says. He has also given copies to a couple of friends at school. They told him it gave them guidance they needed with specific problems.

Members of the Palo Alto First Ward, Menlo Park California Stake, watched in anticipation as a three-bedroom, two-bath, fully-carpeted home on Eighth Avenue was built last summer. Complete with a sun deck protected by overhanging oak boughs, the house is like many others in the region except for one thing—it was built, and then sold, by the priests quorum in the Palo Alto First Ward.
The project was undertaken with a fourfold goal in mind: (1) to strengthen quorum brotherhood, (2) to put the principle of work into action, (3) to raise money for a special summer activity, and (4) to prepare for missionary service. A year’s worth of work went into the planning, construction, and selling of “the House.” After paying off the loan and other expenses incurred in the project, the quorum made a profit of $10,000. Eighty percent of this went into a missionary trust fund for quorum members, ten percent was divided among the members, and ten percent went into a fund to finance quorum activities.
Each member of the quorum had specific tasks for which he was responsible. Some of these included lot acquisition, demolition, carpenter foreman, payroll and accounting, shingling, electrical work, heating, sheet metal work, plumbing, and interior design and color coordination. The quorum was assisted by members of the teachers quorum and four nonmembers who are now actively participating in and/or investigating the Church and its programs. Adviser for the entire project was Young Men president and priests quorum adviser Dick Jacobsen.

“Mom, do you believe in miracles?” I asked my mother later that morning as I helped her clean the family room.
“Of course. Why do you ask?”
“What do you think a miracle is?”
Mom thought for a moment. “I suppose a miracle is something that doesn’t normally happen, and when it does happen, it’s because the Lord helps it happen that way. For example, when you had an earache in the middle of the night last year and there was no way to get you to the doctor, Dad gave you a priesthood blessing. Right away the pain stopped, and you went to sleep. That wasn’t a huge miracle, but it was a miracle.”

Emily was playing with blocks when her dad slowly walked through the front door, dropped his briefcase on the floor, walked up the stairs, and sat on his bed.
I think your daddy had a hard day. I’ll go see what is wrong after I answer the phone.
Emily knew her dad’s job was hard sometimes. She didn’t want her dad to be unhappy.Because Mom is busy and can’t help Dad right now, I will.
Emily went upstairs and quietly peeked into her parents’ bedroom. She saw Dad sitting on the edge of the bed with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. Emily remembered the words to the Primary song she sang on Sunday: “Jesus said love everyone; treat them kindly too.”
As Emily thought about the song, an idea came to her mind. She ran to her bedroom and began to hunt through her toy box. She set aside the dolls, cars, and smooth rocks until she found her favorite thing in the whole world—a beautiful red princess ring.
Emily rushed back into her parents’ room.Hi, sweetie, what’s up?Dad, I know you are sad right now. I want to give you my red princess ring. It always makes me feel better.
Emily climbed on Dad’s lap and dropped the ring into his hand.Emily, are you sure? I know this is your favorite ring.I’m sure. I want you to be happy.You make me very happy. You are my sunshine.
Emily felt warm all over as Dad gave her a big hug. She had helped Dad be happy, and that was worth all the rings in the world.

I continued to travel each weekend to various parts of the world. Many months later, I was assigned to a conference in a city noted for its particularly flagrant violations of God’s laws. The Saints there were wonderful, but oh, the decadence and debauchery that seemed to be all around them.
As I returned from the especially hectic weekend, I began reading in the scriptures. I thought about Sodom and Gomorrah. Could they have been much more wicked than this? And yet the Lord promised to spare them for fifty righteous souls—or even down to ten—but they were not found.
I let my imagination go and seemed to see a band of destroying angels loosed from heaven—thundering across the land. And even before I had time to think about the situation, I seemed to see myself standing in front of these determined destroyers, declaring, “Hold, hold, hold”; and they held. “Go back,” I said: and their horses reared, their eyes flashing in impatience. The destroyers’ anxiousness showed, but they held.
The leader looked me squarely in the eye and challenged, “By what right do you ask us to hold? Have you not seen the evil of the land?”
I replied, “Yes, I know of the sordidness of the world. I see the constant mocking of God’s laws, the merchandising on his holy day, the constant breaking of his commandments. I see the evil that exists almost universally. Yes, yes, all these things are true, still …” Then I became concerned. What right had I to ask them to hold?
My eyes began to fall from his penetrating gaze, but something inside kept searching, searching, until finally a laserlike beam locked onto a misty memory made many months ago and faithfully filed away for such a time as this. A vista of a beautiful green valley passed before me and moved to the front of my consciousness.
I raised my eyes and met his as he again said, “What right do you have to ask us to hold?”
Then with the confidence of sure knowledge and spiritual direction, I replied, “You must hold, for you see, I have been through Cache Valley on a Sunday afternoon.”
There was no hesitation, no anger, no look of surprise, no disappointment, only obedience; and he turned and rejoined his group, and they left.

Not long ago I glanced out the window of the mission home kitchen in Santiago, Chile. There behind the house I could see a large English walnut tree with a big pile of dirt under it. Playing in the dirt pile, I spied two little boys. It had rained recently and both boys were covered with mud. I could barely tell who they were. When they saw me looking out the window smiles broke out on their faces, and then I could tell it was my son Chris and his friend David. Chris’s face was so covered with mud that when he smiled his teeth showed through like six small marshmallows on top of a chocolate cake.
Later when it was time to come in and David had gone home, I sent Chris upstairs to bathe. We joked about how it would take three tubs full of water to get him clean. The first would have to be shoveled out just like pure dirt, the second, dipped out with a bucket like runny mud, and maybe we would be able to wash the third down the drain.
After Chris had soaked for a few minutes, I went in to help him get really clean and we had a serious talk that I hope he will never forget.
We worked together to get one hand scrubbed clean and then he compared it with the other that was still dirty. “Boy, Dad,” he said, “it’s sure great to have clean hands.” I explained how true that is, and said, “I want you to know that it is not the dirt of the earth that makes people’s hands really dirty. If a boy steals, if he is mean to his friends and hits them on purpose, if he tells his parents he will do something and then doesn’t, or if he is naughty or disobedient in other ways, this causes real “dirt”—the kind that you can’t wash off with soap and water. It’s the kind of dirt that you have to wear all the time and, even though others can’t always see it on you, you know yourself that inside you are not clean.”
I want all my dear, young friends to know there are different kinds of dirt; one you get on your hands from working and playing. This you can wash off. The other kind of “dirt” comes from doing bad things, sometimes called sin, that seem to stain your heart but can be “washed” away when you repent.
First you must do all you can to correct the wrong you have done. Then ask your Father in heaven and others to forgive you, so your hands and heart will be “scrubbed clean” from the dirt of wrong-doing.
The Savior said, “… entangle not yourselves in sin, but let your hands be clean, until the Lord comes.” (D&C 88:86.) He also said to those who had repented and were living pure lives: “Behold, your sins are forgiven you; you are clean before me; therefore, lift up your heads and rejoice.” (D&C 110:5.)
I hope that you will often get your hands dirty with hard work and play, but I hope that throughout your lives this is the only dirt you will have to get rid of and not the kind that stains your heart through sin or disobedience. I want Chris and all other children to remember that should you slip and fall into sin, you can be washed clean by true repentance.
What joy it is to have clean hands and a pure heart!

On June 7, 1844, a group of dissenters, including several prominent Church members who had apostatized, published the first issue of the Nauvoo Expositor. This newspaper denounced Joseph Smith as a “fallen prophet,” a political demagogue, an immoral scoundrel, and a financial schemer. It accused Mormonism of promoting such activities and it maligned other individuals. Those attacked by the paper included several members of the Nauvoo City Council as well as the new mayor, Joseph Smith. After lengthy discussion, the council decided the libelous newspaper violated public nuisance laws. They voted to stop the paper before it aroused anti-Mormon mobs. Therefore, the city marshal destroyed the press, scattered the type, and burned available papers.
Owners of the paper then charged the city council with fomenting a riot (even though the destruction of the paper had been accomplished in orderly fashion). Council members were arrested and went through court proceedings which eventually legally acquitted them. But before this procedure could take place, anti-Mormon newspapers stirred up such a commotion that Joseph Smith mobilized the Nauvoo Legion and placed the city under martial law. Illinois Governor Thomas Ford was informed of the controversial actions and personally investigated. He obtained pledges that both sides would observe strict legality and nonviolence. Ford traveled to Carthage, Illinois, the county seat, to conduct negotiations between the opposing parties, and decided a trial would be the best solution.
The fifteen men named in the riot charge presented themselves at Carthage on June 25, where a justice of the peace freed them on bonds pending trial. Later that evening Joseph and Hyrum Smith were served an improperly issued writ charging them with “treason” for declaring martial law in Nauvoo. It was enforced without a hearing and the two were held in Carthage Jail. John Taylor, Willard Richards, and others accompanied them to jail.
On June 26 Governor Ford visited the Prophet in jail and was satisfied that the city council’s action and mobilization of the Legion had been taken for legal procedures. Ford left two companies of the anti-Mormon Carthage Greys (the local militia) to guard the jail. Although he promised to take the prisoners with him if he visited Nauvoo, the governor ignored this promise and left for the city of the Saints on the morning of June 27.
At Carthage, June 27, 1844, a body of men daubed their faces with mud and gunpowder, rushed the jail, and quickly overpowered the cooperative guards, who had agreed in advance to load their guns without balls. The mob rushed upstairs to the jailer’s sleeping room where the four Latter-day Saint leaders waited. Shots punctured the thin bedroom door. Hyrum Smith was the first to fall mortally wounded. John Taylor was struck from the doorway and from shots fired through the window. Seriously injured, he rolled under a bed to safety. Joseph Smith ran to the window. He was struck by two balls from the open door, another from outside the window. He was struck by a fourth ball as he plunged through the window. The attackers rushed outside to assure themselves that the Prophet was dead, leaving Willard Richards, still behind the door, uninjured. Someone shouted that a posse of Mormons was coming. The rumor was untrue, but the mobs fled.
They had killed the Prophet, believing that his death would mean the end of Mormonism. But members of the church recognized Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum, the Patriarch to the Church, as martyrs to the Lord’s cause. Faithful members reaffirmed their belief in the ultimate triumph of the latter-day work restored through the Prophet. Joseph Smith had risen from obscurity to national renown, and the Saints believed that his name would be “had for good and evil among all nations,” (JS—H 1:33) as promised by Moroni. They thus set about the task of carrying forward a sacred mission that had only just begun.

When they reached the starting point on the Moose River, Sister Lamb, the activity specialist, showed the girls how to load the canoes and took her place in the first one. As the canoe began floating away, she called to Kim Barclay still standing on shore, “Kim, throw me a paddle.” At the same instant that Kim tossed her one, Sister Lamb added, “Make sure it’s one that floats.” It was too late to check. As the paddle slapped the water, it floated.
The six canoes started drifting down the river towards Nina-Moose Lake, and it was time to check the maps. Each boat had one in a waterproof bag. Quickly the girls learned that portages are measured in rods and that there are 320 rods to the mile. They scanned the map, mentally figuring the length of the portages that lay ahead—“25 rods, how far would that be? Oh no, here’s one that’s 120 rods.” At the end of the first day, after having made seven portages, ranging from 24 to 96 rods, the numbers on the map started to take on new meaning as the distances were measured in shaky legs and sore shoulders.
Soon the girls started taking on the same attitude that the original French voyageurs had about making portages. They were willing to carry incredible amounts, often carrying nearly their own weight in packs and equipment, rather than make two trips across the portage with lighter loads. Sitting on a rock waiting for the others to make it across one of the longer portages, Sarah Crompton said, “I thought I couldn’t make it until I got to the end. Then it didn’t seem so bad.”
In the evening, camp was set up in designated campsites, and the girls showed off their outdoor cooking skills. Instant pudding was prepared with red-tinged but safe-to-drink lake water. It was hard to mix smooth with just a spoon, but hunger makes for nonfussy eaters. Lumps were okay with everyone.
The girls could make a pan of boiling water into mashed potatoes and creamed chicken or spaghetti enough to serve ten. But there are limits to what a campfire can do. As Brenda Crepeau was reading the recipe from the back of the box of skillet lasagna, she asked, tongue in cheek, “How do I turn the oven to 400 degrees? I don’t see any knobs on this fire!”
Evening camp was a time to swim in the pure water of the lakes and just relax tired arms from paddling and tired legs from hiking. The sunsets made the water shimmer as it turned the surrounding forested hills into silhouetted sentinels. The loons, with their haunting cries, floated low in the water, their white speckled backs catching the last rays of light. As soon as the last blush of sunset faded from the sky, an annoying buzz rose like a cloud from the damp grass. The mosquitoes were better than any clock to indicate that it was bedtime. It was time to suspend all the food packs high between two trees out of the reach of marauding bears.
One morning, as soon as all six canoes were loaded and launched, the group met in the middle of the lake. The girls held on to the gunnels of neighboring canoes as maps were unfolded and the course for the day discussed. According to the map there seemed to be two choices. Either they could paddle across the lake, unload, and hike across a 120-rod portage, or they could stay in their canoes and attempt to paddle up a small stream to the neighboring lake.
To the girls there seemed to be no question—anything to get out of unloading the canoes and portaging. Stake President Hennebry, who along with his counselors were accompanying the girls as priesthood advisers, pointed out some potential problems. Nobody in the group had been this way before. No one was absolutely sure that the stream on the map would be wide enough to handle a canoe. The portage was steep and difficult, but it was a sure thing. It was the group’s decision. They would take a vote.
The thought of missing a long, hard portage was enticing. The majority was willing to take a chance on what seemed to be the easier route, the stream.
When the first canoe reached the mouth of the stream, it was blocked by a beaver dam. “No problem,” said Andrea Miles, Karen Johnson, and Ganine Conner, “we’ll pull our canoe over the dam and scout on ahead and see what the stream looks like.”
It was deceiving. Because of the beaver dam, the stream widened into a pond and looked at first like it was going to be the easy route everyone hoped it would be. All six canoes were lured in, and they followed the twisting, curving stream. Another beaver dam was crossed, then another. The stream was getting so narrow that the canoeists could hardly fit a paddle between the edge of the canoe and the bank.
The stream became shallow, and the girls had to get out and walk. At first, everyone tried to keep her shoes dry, but as one by one they slipped off of dry footing and into the sticky mud, they gave up and tried to wade. The mud was waist deep, and they had to tow the canoes behind them. The sucking, gooey mud pulled at each leg with every step. They abandoned any hope of staying clean and dry. But where was the next lake? Wouldn’t it be around the next curve, or the next? Finally their leaders said that it was hopeless. The stream was becoming nothing more than a swamp, and still the lake was nowhere in sight.
Tired, muddy, and discouraged, the girls turned their canoes around and started back the way they came. Only it was harder getting out than it had been getting in. They had broken the beaver dams during their entrance, and the water had drained out of the ponds leaving them high, but certainly not dry.
After slogging through a mile or so of mud, the last canoe was again back at the starting point. After rinsing off and climbing back in their canoes, the group gathered for a moment of thought. They had wasted the whole morning in a useless attempt to find an easy way. Now they would have to turn around and take the long portage, the trail so clearly marked that would take them to the next lake. The comparisons to life were only too obvious. As the girls tried to clean up a bit, rest, and eat lunch, they were subdued as they thought about their experience. Slowly, they began to draw analogies to their own lives.
Sister Rice, the Young Women president said, “Much of the time we think we can gamble and take the easy way, but it often gives us nothing but grief. We became mired down so we could hardly move, but we repented of our decision and turned around. It was hard just getting back to where we had started from. If we had been wise, we would have taken the ‘straight and narrow’ way, the portage, and been ahead.”
Later at the last night fireside, President Hennebry again reminded the girls of their experience. “You’ve experienced something you can relate to life. But on this trip you can remember the experience without remembering the pain. Satan has a map which marks what seems to be the easy way that will still get you where you want to go. It’s an attractive lie. Just like our experience in the swamp. At first the barriers were easy to cross, but it made it so much harder to come out. In life if you find that you have chosen the wrong stream, no matter how hard it is, repent and come back.”
The lesson on making decisions was a valuable one. The girls learned from it and remembered. Throughout the rest of the trip, if anyone jokingly asked, “Hey, there’s a stream on this map. Do you think we ought to try it?” they would be shouted down with a loud, “No, thanks.”
The trip of nearly 50 miles and 8 lakes was tough, but there were few complaints. Karen Chase noticed this especially, “It’s amazing to see people’s talents. It’s been great to be together, and I didn’t hear a single complaint.”
The trip was a confidence builder for Michelle and Brenda Schroeder. “I didn’t realize what we were getting into, but it’s beautiful,” said Michelle. Then with an arm around her sister, Brenda, she said, “And I’ve been glad to be with my sister before she goes away to college.”
Brenda had her own thoughts on the trip. “I thought I would die. I didn’t think I could carry any of that stuff, but I did. Then I knew I could do it again.”
On the last day as the group was heading back to the parking lot to meet the van and truck that were to pick them up, Sonda Donley, loaded with two heavy packs, one in front and the other on her back, was smiling but walking slowly uphill on the final portage. She said, “I feel fine. I just wish I could pick up my feet.”
After returning the canoes to the outfitter, washing their faces in the luxury of hot running water out of a tap, and combing their hair in front of a real mirror, the Summiteers spread out a map and mentally retraced their route.
When their fingers stopped at Gebeonequet Lake and the stream that went nowhere, they made a resolve. On future canoe trips and in their own lives, they would follow the correct paths. And because of their associations with fine leaders and advisers and by relying on their Heavenly Father, they knew that their feet would be guided as was promised in the scriptures.
“I will lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things I will do unto them, and not forsake them” (Isa. 42:16).

On one occasion, an ancient mathematician named Archimedes was asked by his king to determine if the king’s new crown was solid gold or if the goldsmith had dishonestly substituted some silver for gold. Archimedes pondered the solution; finally an answer came. So overjoyed was he by this discovery that, according to legend, he ran about the city crying, “Eureka! Eureka!”—meaning, “I have found it! I have found it!”

Now I would like to conclude with one other little experience. I was down in Toquepala, Peru. We were dedicating a chapel. Many of the men who were employed in that mining town were Americans. After the dedication they had a dinner at one of the homes. As we moved around in the home, a young boy came to me and said, “Brother Kimball, I’m thinking about a mission. Would you give me a blessing?”
I said, “Why, of course. I’d be very happy to give you a blessing, but isn’t that your father I met in the other room?”
He said, “Yes, that’s Dad.”
I said, “Well, why don’t you ask him to give you your blessing?”
“Oh,” he said, “Dad wouldn’t want to give a blessing to me.”
So I excused myself. In time I ran into the father, and I said, “You have a wonderful boy there. I think he would like to have a blessing from his father. Wouldn’t you like to give him a blessing?”
He said, “Oh, I don’t think my boy would want me to give him a blessing.”
But as I mingled among these people and saw the father and the son a little later, close together, I could understand that they had come together in their thoughts and that the boy was proud to have his father bless him, and the father was delighted to be asked.
I hope you boys in this audience will keep that in mind. You have the best dad in the world, you know. He holds the priesthood; he would be delighted to give you a blessing. He would like you to indicate it, and we would like you fathers to remember that your boys are a little timid maybe. They know you are the best men in the world, but probably if you just made the advance, there would be some glorious moments for you.
Brethren, it is wonderful to be with you here tonight. And may peace be with you, and as has been said so many times in these days, only righteousness pays dividends. God bless you, and I bear my testimony to you boys, to you men, that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ. It is a great program of salvation and exaltation, and it is the only way, and there never was found happiness in unrighteousness. I bear my testimony to you in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

On my mission, it sometimes felt like people’s hearts or doors would never open to the gospel. Especially during our hardest times, my mission companion and I would fast to bring hope and happiness into our work.
First, we would kneel in prayer, asking our Heavenly Father to help us be positive, take setbacks well, and recognize His hand in our lives and our work. We also prayed that by having more optimistic attitudes, we could better represent our Savior, Jesus Christ. Then later, when we felt tempted to fall back into negative attitudes, we would say a small prayer, asking Him to bless us with the perspective to find the good (or at least the funny) in any situation.
Although we didn’t always have more success after those fasts, we were able to feel the Spirit more and kick negative feelings to the curb—usually through plenty of jokes and laughter.

On 28 October 1985 Elder Thomas S. Monson of the Quorum of the Twelve held a conference for the Saints in the Snederflers’ apartment in Prague, attended by 56 people. “I thought the floor of our apartment was not going to be able to hold us all!” laughs Sister Snederfler. “But it was a wonderful meeting.”

“Elder Monson dedicated our apartment and the entire building for the gathering of the Saints in Prague and Czechoslovakia,” says Brother Snederfler. “It was a marvelous spiritual experience from which all present received new strength and dedication to build up and expand the kingdom of God.” At that time, Elder Monson also ordained Jirí a high priest. “I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit and another command from God to serve better and with gladness in my heart.”

Inspired by a story in the June 1987 issue of the New Era, the youth of the Richmond Branch, Lexington Kentucky Stake, decided to build a garage as a service project and fund raiser.
In spite of sunburns, splinters, and smashed thumbs, over 20 teenagers spent two days in hot July weather framing and sheathing walls, raising trusses, and subroofing the structure. They not only raised the shell of the garage, but they earned a substantial amount of money for future activities. Because of their hard work the youth received a lot of coverage from the local newspaper and were featured on a Lexington television station.
The best reward from the project, however, was the sense of unity it gave the youth in this branch. Several less active youth and teenagers who had just moved into the area were involved, and one participant said the best thing about the project was that “it brought us closer together.”

Years ago, my adventurous son Jeff and I were traveling on an old bus bouncing along on a dirt road in Central America at 1:00 a.m. We took the early, early bus because it was the only bus that day. A half hour later, the driver stopped for two missionaries. When they got on, we asked them where in the world they were going so early. Zone conference! And they were determined to do whatever it took to get there. At 2:00 a.m. two more elders boarded the bus and enthusiastically greeted their fellow missionaries. This scene repeated itself every half hour as the bus climbed the remote mountain road. By 5:00 a.m. we had 16 of the Lord’s finest as fellow passengers and were basking in the spirit they brought on board.
Suddenly, we screeched to a halt. A massive mud slide had buried the road. Jeff said, “What do we do now, Dad?” Just then, the zone leader shouted, “Let’s go, elders. Nothing is going to stop us!” And they scrambled off the bus! We looked at each other and said, “Follow the elders,” and we all sloshed through the mud slide, trying to keep up with the missionaries. There happened to be a truck on the other side, so we all hopped aboard. After a mile, we were stopped by yet another mud slide. Once again the elders plowed through, with the rest of us close behind. But this time there was no truck. Boldly, the zone leader said, “We will be where we are supposed to be even if we have to walk the rest of the way.” Years later, Jeff told me how those missionaries inspired and motivated him tremendously as he served the Lord in Argentina.
Although we overcame the mud slides, we were all spotted with mud. The missionaries were somewhat nervous about standing before their president on zone conference day when he and his wife would be carefully checking their appearance.