Gospel Story Finder

Peace and forgiveness. Early in 2005 my husband gave two men a ride. When my husband returned home, he discovered that his sapelu (machete) was missing. This really hurt him: he’d done a good deed, and this was how he was repaid. The incident bothered my husband to the point that he was having trouble finding peace.Several months later, we awoke to find that our house had been broken into. Worse, we realized the intruders had come into the rooms where our children and we had been sleeping. I was angry and thought, “If my husband was so upset about a knife, he will go completely nuts now!” But he had a spirit of peace that spilled over to the rest of us. He expressed gratitude that nobody had been hurt and hope that the people who had taken our things would use them to improve their lives.I was speechless at the change. Why was I not able to feel the same peace? Then I realized: while I had been “too busy” to start reading, my husband was firmly entrenched in the Book of Mormon. Kathleen Arp, Pesega, Samoa

In the four short years of Bimbo’s life, he had many experiences. One winter my brother had scarlet fever. In those days medicines were not as effective as they are now in controlling communicable diseases, so no one was allowed to leave the home during such illnesses. My father went to live with his parents for three weeks so he could continue his work. The rest of us, including Bimbo, were not supposed to leave the house.
A quarantine sign was placed in a window and no one came to visit but the doctor. Whenever Mother opened the door to let the doctor in, Bimbo would dart out. Then Mother or I had to chase him up the street and bring him back to his “prison” so he wouldn’t carry the disease to anyone. I don’t know who disliked the quarantine period most—me, my mother, or Bimbo.

One of those he learned much from was his mother. She was, he recalls, a “great cook.” His chocolate dessert is a family tradition.

In November of 1983 he flew to California to attend the Fair Oaks Stake conference. Arriving early at the stake president’s home, he was taken on a tour of the family’s vegetable garden.

“I saw that he had leeks, a very popular vegetable in Belgium. Not having grown them before, the president wasn’t sure how to prepare them. I said, ‘Let’s make soup.’ So that Saturday evening after our conference meetings, with the stake president in the kitchen, we prepared leek soup to serve twenty-two people the next day—the high council and other stake leaders. I think I’ll be remembered there as a soup maker rather than a General Authority!”

More than 2,500 Mexican Latter-day Saints gathered on 25 June 1989 for the creation of the Tecalco Mexico Stake, about thirty miles south of Mexico City. It was the one-hundredth stake organized in that country. Among the members of the new stake was Fidencia García de Rojas—at age 106 the oldest Church member in Mexico. The Church in Mexico had passed yet another historic milestone during the eighty-eight years that Fidencia had been a member.
When Sister Fidencia died a month and a half later, President Felipe Hernández Luis of the Tecalco stake commented that those attending the funeral were part of another historic moment—the death of a Mexican pioneer.
Sister Fidencia began attending Latter-day Saint church meetings sometime between 1889 and 1901. During that period, the Church had closed the Mexican Mission. As a result, Church leaders in Mexico had little direction from Church headquarters, and many units deviated from standard doctrines and practices. During this time, Sister Fidencia and her family—not yet members of the Church—attended the Tecalco Branch.
When President Ammon M. Tenney came to Tecalco in 1901 to reestablish the branch after the mission reopened, the leader of the branch, Julian Rojas, was initially unwilling to relinquish control. Brother Rojas finally relented, and President Tenney rebaptized him and seventy-five others on August 18. One month later, President Tenney baptized Fidencia, her parents, and her grandparents. From that day on, Sister Fidencia dedicated her life to serving the Lord.
She recalled that after the Tecalco Branch was again in contact with Church headquarters, people began joining the Church. The first full-time missionaries soon arrived, and Fidencia’s parents built an extra room onto their house for the missionaries to live in. As membership grew, Sister Fidencia was among the group of members and missionaries who worked hard to buy a building lot for a Latter-day Saint chapel. She also helped missionaries in nearby Ozumba with their room, clothes, and food, and she worked at the Mexican mission home.
During her time at the mission home, the American missionaries taught Sister Fidencia to sing hymns in Spanish and English. She later joined the legendary Tecalco Choir and sang with the choir until just a few years before her death.
In 1910, Mexico entered a civil war that lasted, off and on, through the 1930s. In August 1913, American missionaries had to leave the country, and Mexican leaders were once again left to themselves. But the Church was well established by then, and the civil war did not seriously impede Mexican Saints from administering the Church. They did so for more than four years.
Sister Fidencia witnessed an even greater disruption of the Church in Mexico in 1936, when a large body of members known as the Third Convention broke away from the main body of Mexican Saints.
By 1942, however, Arwell L. Pierce, newly called president of the Mexican Mission, had begun working to resolve misunderstandings. And in 1946, President George Albert Smith, eighth President of the Church, presided over a reunification conference in Mexico City. During the conference, more than twelve hundred Third Conventionists returned to the Church. Sister Fidencia attended the conference and visited with President Smith in her home. Hers was the first home President Smith visited when the traveled to Tecalco.
Other milestones for the Church in Mexico began to occur more rapidly as Sister Fidencia grew older. Together with family and other Church members, she made several trips to the Arizona Temple over the years to do temple work for herself and her family. In 1972 she attended the Mexico City area conference. And in 1983 she attended the dedication of the Mexico City Temple. During these years she remained dedicated to her family, to missionary work, and to her Church callings, two of which were particularly important to her.
As a Primary teacher, Sister Fidencia loved to teach children the gospel through stories, especially Old Testament stories. She gave her students a love of the scriptures, which she read daily. And she often recited from memory facts and stories from the lives of all of the latter-day prophets. She taught many of her own grandchildren in that calling.
As a visiting teacher, Sister Fidencia completed forty consecutive years of 100-percent visiting teaching. In February 1978, she received commendation for this accomplishment from Relief Society and mission leaders, who expressed appreciation for her service and compassion.
Sister Fidencia’s posterity remembers her for an even greater accomplishment: bringing five generations of their family into the Church. She and her first husband, Aniceto Rojas, the son of Julian Rojas of the early Tecalco Branch, had six children, two of whom survived to have children and grandchildren of their own. She and her second husband, Manuel Rosas, had three children.
Sister Fidencia survived both of her husbands and lived to see many grandchildren and great-grandchildren serve missions. Many of her descendants have served and continue to serve faithfully as leaders among the Mexican Saints.
To her family, the most precious gift Grandmother Fidencia left was the gospel of Jesus Christ. For her fellow Saints, Sister Fidencia’s many years of humble service left a legacy that spanned almost an entire century—a century during which Church members in Mexico struggled, overcame, and finally flourished.

Since early childhood, Hal’s deepest dreams were to be married and form a family. He thought about his future children so often that he’d already given them the collective nickname “The Redheads,” imagining them with red hair like his mother’s.
This dream finally moved toward fruition during his service as a counselor in the Boston District presidency, a Church calling Hal had while he was pursuing his graduate work at Harvard University following his undergraduate studies at the University of Utah. As a doctoral student in the summer of 1960, Hal represented the district presidency at a single-adult devotional held at the Cathedral of the Pines in southwest New Hampshire, USA, a natural outdoor amphitheater of note in the region. At the event he saw a young woman in a red and white dress and was impressed by the pure goodness she radiated. He thought, “That’s the best person I’ve ever seen. If I could be with her for the rest of my life, I could be every good thing I ever wanted to be.”
The young woman was Kathleen Johnson from Palo Alto, California, USA, who hadn’t intended to be in New England that summer but, at the insistence of her friend, had attended summer school with her at Harvard. Following that outdoor devotional, Hal arranged to meet Kathy at church one Sunday and was happy to hear she enjoyed playing tennis. Hal had been playing tennis several times a week with a college friend and was a good natural athlete, so he assumed a game of tennis would be an ideal first date and a way for him to make a terrific impression. What Kathleen didn’t tell him was that she had been the captain of her high school tennis team! “She cleaned me out,” Hal still grumbles about the match. This was the first of his future wife’s remarkable examples of living humbly and then helping her husband to do so.
Following their marriage and Hal’s eventual appointment to the faculty of the business school at Stanford University, late one night in December 1970, just a few months before Hal was released as the bishop of the student ward in Palo Alto, Kathy asked a question seemingly out of the blue. As Hal climbed into bed after a demanding day, she leaned over and asked, “Are you sure you’re doing what you ought to be doing with your career?”
Her question caught him by surprise. Everything in their life seemed perfect. The future seemed bright and clear, even down to the Eyring dream home that Hal had recently outlined in his journal. It would include such niceties as “a room for projects, large enough and rough enough to work on and store a kayak,” along with “at least five electrical outlets by the kitchen table” and “a shed or bathhouse retreat for writing.”
“What do you mean?” Hal asked his wife.
“Couldn’t you do studies for Neal Maxwell?” she suggested, referring to the Church’s new Commissioner of Education. At this, Hal was truly dumbfounded. He had only met Neal A. Maxwell once, and he knew that Kathleen had never met him at all. He tried to describe to her why such a career shift would not be a good fit for him, yet she insisted he at least pray over the matter. This he did immediately, dropping to kneel by the bed and offering a short prayer. When no answer came, Hal felt the matter decided and soon went to sleep.
The following morning, however, Hal received two distinct spiritual impressions that would forever alter the course of his career and his life. He captured both in his journal. First, “Don’t use your human judgment to eliminate opportunities presented to you: pray about them all with an open mind.” And second, “Do the tasks you are assigned in the Church and your profession as well as you can; they are preparation.”
The first impression came as something of a rebuke that Hal would forever thereafter live by. After having previously rejected three different job offers without praying over them, into his mind came the words, “Don’t you ever make that mistake again. You don’t know which end is up in your career.”
With this spiritual direction fresh in his mind, Hal was prepared when less than three weeks later, Commissioner Maxwell called to schedule a meeting with him in Salt Lake City. Brother Maxwell got right to the point. “I’d like to ask you to be the president of Ricks College,” he said. Hal replied that he would have to pray about it. He did and the terse answer he received was, “It’s my school.” The rest, as they say, is history. His service in the Church since then has been as exemplary as it has been conspicuous, moving on to serve as Deputy Commissioner of Education and then Commissioner (twice), followed by calls to the Presiding Bishopric, the Quorum of the Seventy, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and as a counselor to three Presidents of the Church.
Photograph with President Hinckley from Deseret News
But in a very real sense to Hal, no calling in the Church was more important for him than another: “The pressures at every stage of life can tempt us to reject or neglect calls to serve the Savior,” President Eyring has taught. “Some of those calls may seem unimportant, but my life, and my family, was changed for the better by my accepting a call to teach a deacons quorum. I felt the love of those deacons for the Savior and His love for them.”2

Another time, Kim and Christy’s 13-year-old cousin and her parents dropped in unannounced from Los Angeles.

“They invited us out to dinner and we talked about the Church,” Christy said. “Our cousin seemed really interested, and her parents said it was okay for her to listen to the missionaries.”

Kim told about a home evening during which the missionaries taught about Christ, baptism, and temple work. “She was excited about her family being sealed together,” Kim said.

Now the cousin is being baptized. “And she’s working on her parents too,” Christy said.

“It doesn’t just have to be adults who are responsible for getting their families sealed,” Kim said. “Share the gospel with children and teenagers, and their parents may get interested too.”

When I was growing up, young men went on missions when they were 20 years old. Not all young men were expected to go on missions, as they are today. My father had always hoped I would go on a mission, and he had encouraged me. But as I got older, I wondered, Is that really what I want to do?
My priests quorum adviser, Dale Waite, was a great example and a wonderful teacher. One time he took us to a ward outing at a swimming resort. We had a good time swimming, playing volleyball, and just being together. That night we piled into Brother Waite’s car to go home—the car sure was full! Full of good memories of the evening’s activities, we were starting up the old highway in the dark of night, when Brother Waite asked, “Did any of you hear the First Presidency’s announcement today?”
None of us had; we were all ears. Brother Waite told us, “The First Presidency has announced that young men can be called on missions at 19 years of age.” When he said that, the Spirit of the Lord came over me, filling me from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet. I knew the message was, “You are going on a mission.” I had never had that kind of experience before, but the feeling that I was to go on a mission never left me.
When I came home from my mission, it was with the firm resolve that I would never be the same—and I never have been. And all that happened because a priests quorum adviser stayed close to the young men in his quorum, taught them the gospel, and helped them learn in a very simple way that they could go on missions and be touched by the Spirit of the Lord.

During her marriage, Deborah, from Michigan, USA, never had a problem managing her finances. But after she and her husband separated, bills became harder to pay. Although Deborah had enjoyed attending the temple regularly, she started struggling to pay her tithing and discontinued going to the temple.
She sought help from her bishop, who told her about the Church’s self-reliance class on managing personal finances, which was being held in her stake. Deborah agreed to go, but at first she didn’t see the reason to attend: “To tell the truth, I said to myself, ‘I don’t know why I’m here. I know how to budget my money. I’ve had a budget all my life.’”
Deborah met with the group and a facilitator. For two hours each week, they learned about both the temporal aspects of financial stability (like organizing a budget) and the spiritual aspects of financial stability (like being a faithful steward over income). “I never connected the two together the way this class connected them,” Deborah confides.
Deborah felt that her covenant connection with Heavenly Father helped her learn how to include Him in her financial decisions. “My Heavenly Father has always been there for me. … I have to include Him in everything.”
When Deborah acted on promptings and direction she received from her self-reliance group, she was able to put aside money for tithing, pay her bills, and even save money, all without increasing her income.
Deborah received blessings “both temporal and spiritual” (Mosiah 2:41) as she kept the law of tithing and applied gospel principles to her budget. Direction from her self-reliance group and inspiration from the Holy Ghost provided a way for her to get a temple recommend and return to the temple. “Everything that I said that I could not do, He showed me that I could do that and so much more,” she testifies. “What you do today determines your future, and I want my future to be that I can walk into that Detroit Temple and start doing the work for my ancestors again.”

Fu Bi Hsia sprinted the last block to her home in a small Taiwanese village. The August sun poured out of the blue-glass sky, and the humid air covered her body like a hot heavy blanket. To escape the heat, she ran through the warm grass and along the edge of the benjo (open ditch) where an old woman was beating her clothes clean against a large rock.
Reaching her home, Bi Hsia paused in the front yard to look for her goose, Goldie. A few of her mother’s pigs snorted and rolled in the dirt, her father’s water buffalo lay partway in the benjo, and a stray dog nipped at her heels. But Goldie was not in sight.
Goldie and all the goose’s brothers and sisters had been purchased at the market on Bi Hsia’s ninth birthday. Over a period of many months, they had all been used for food—all except Goldie. Bi Hsia kept Goldie for a friend. They went on long walks together, clucking their way past rice fields and through ditches, walking barefoot in cold puddles, and chasing barking little dogs down narrow alleys. She had given her goose an American name, because America was so big and far away and because she believed that everyone who came from there was rich and important. Goldie was important too.
Bi Hsia bounded through the gate and up the stairs to her home. “Mother!” she called.
The two-room house was made of concrete. The main room (the living-sleeping area) was bare except for a few chairs, a television, and some rice-straw mats. These were rolled out at night and used for mattresses.
Bi Hsia found her mother in the kitchen, stirring a pot of chicken egg soup. She stuck her nose over the rim of the pot and sniffed. “Smells good.”
Her mother’s elbow nudged her aside. “Get out of there. Your father has invited guests for supper.”
“Guests? Who are they?” She stuck her finger quickly into the broth as her mother’s eyes searched the cupboard for more eggs.
“They’re Mormon elders. One is from Taipei, and the other has come all the way from America. He will be staying in Taiwan for two years to teach people about his church.”
Bi Hsia’s finger was in her mouth. She sucked the soup juice off with a loud slurp. “How did Daddy meet them?”
“At the market, quite by accident. And don’t you dare stick your finger in there again, unless you want me to spank you!”
Bi Hsia jerked her hand back. “When will they come?”
“Soon,” replied her mother. “Go get changed into your best dress. And get Sun Ming washed. He is all covered with dirt.”
The missionaries arrived in a taxi. It had a dented fender and a motor that chugged louder and louder as the car drew near. The elder from Taipei stepped out first. “I’m Elder Lin, Lin De Fu,” he said, in the custom of saying his surname before his given name. (Fu is Fu Bi Hsia’s surname.) “This is my companion, Elder Wheeler.”
“Ni hau ma (How do you do)?” Elder Wheeler stepped forward and offered his hand to Bi Hsia’s father. The American’s words sounded strange and stilted, and his thin face seemed hard and expressionless. His hair was like yellow rice straw, and his pale eyes were cold and as far away as the country he came from. Bi Hsia felt her throat tighten with apprehension.
Her father spoke up boldly. “Ni tsung nali lai (Where are you from)?”
“Utah.”
It was a strange name. Bi Hsia said it quietly to herself, over and over, Yu ta. Yu ta.
Her mother smiled, saying in Chinese, “It’s a long way for anyone to come.”
The elder’s brow wrinkled as he studied her face. “Pardon me. I do not understand.”
Elder Lin put his hand on Elder Wheeler’s shoulder and said something to him in English, too rapidly for Bi Hsia to understand. Elder Wheeler listened intently, then laughed at himself. “Yes. A long way.”
The adults moved into the kitchen. Bi Hsia sat on the back step to wait for them to eat their meal. It was not considered polite for children to be served with the guests. She held Sun Ming in her arms, listened to the murmur of their voices, and thought about the faraway places she had never been. She wondered if this elder would ever understand her country’s customs and accept her people as they were. She didn’t think so—not coming from America, where no one ever had to live without the necessities of life because people there always had lots of things of their very own.
Bi Hsia sat and reflected, and in the distance a light evening breeze tossed a weightless white feather in the air. A feather! She got up, paused for a moment, then placed Sun Ming on the grass at her feet. “Now don’t go anywhere,” she said firmly. “I won’t be gone long.”
All of Goldie’s feathers were there in a little pile by the garden. Bi Hsia knew that they were eating her goose for supper. It was not proper for her to object. Her family was very poor, and her mother needed meat to serve to the guests. Chinese custom was very strict about children honoring and obeying their parents. And Chinese pride was firm on the point of offering the best that one could.
Bi Hsia did not cry. She walked heavily, as if her limbs were lead weights. She sat on the porch for what seemed like forever and watched the sun die in the sky above Taiwan.
When the elders were ready to leave, Bi Hsia followed them out to the front of the house. The elder from America offered her his hand, and she wanted to hold hers back. He took it and squeezed, and she pulled quickly away. He reached down and lifted her chin. “I hope we can become friends,” he said in slow, painful words.
Bi Hsia kept her eyes turned away from his face, looking past him to where the lights from the houses on their street shone smaller and smaller as they receded into the distance. Her mouth remained silent, bur her heart thumped loudly inside her ribs. Never! Oh, never, never, she thought, knowing that if it wasn’t for him and his companion, she would still have Goldie. She watched the elders get into a taxi, and she was glad when it drove away.
Bi Hsia awoke early the next morning. The sun was just peeping through the sugar cane, and her parents and brother were still asleep on their mats. She rose quietly and tiptoed to the door. Outside there was a small scrape, the sound of quick footsteps on the porch, a whisper, and a wild, hissing sound. She opened the door.
At her feet lay a huge white goose, the biggest that she had ever seen. It was bound so that it could hardly move, but its head was free, and it was honking and trying to flap its wings. As she bent to free it, out of the corner of her eye she saw something move down by the benjo.
It was Elder Wheeler! He was sprinting across the grass toward Elder Lin, who waited on the road with two bikes. As Bi Hsia watched, Elder Wheeler reached his bike, paused for a breath of air, and glanced back. Their eyes met across the distance and held. Then a smile spread slowly across his somber face. It was a sad, happy smile, a smile filled with understanding. That’s when Fu Bi Hsia knew for certain that the elder from America was not so very different.

I have a friend like you. More than forty years ago we were in the mission field together. In the years that followed he went off to war. In his loneliness he picked up with careless companions. He married out of the Church. He followed habits which had made him feel he would not be welcomed. He moved from one part of the country to another. His identity was lost.
One Sunday I found myself in a California city for a stake conference. My name and picture had been in the local newspaper. The phone rang at the stake center as the stake president and I entered the building that morning. The call was for me, and the caller identified himself. He wanted to see me. I excused myself from the meeting I was to have held early that morning and asked the stake president to carry on with it. I had something more important to do.
He came, this friend of mine, timidly and somewhat fearfully. He had been away for a long time. We embraced as brothers long separated. At first the conversation was awkward, but it soon warmed as we discussed together days spent in England many years ago. There were tears in the eyes of this strong man as he spoke of the Church of which he had once been so effective a part, and then told of the long, empty years that had followed. He dwelt upon them as a man speaks of nightmares. When he had described those wasted years, we talked of his returning. He thought it would be difficult, that it would be embarrassing, but he agreed to try.
I had a letter from him not long ago. He said, “I’m back. I’m back, and how wonderful it feels to be home again.”

Then, about two years ago, a friend of mine died by suicide. The phone call I received that delivered the news will be etched in my mind for the rest of my life. I beat myself up for months, wondering what more I could have done for this person. How I could have been a better friend. How I could have called more. How I could have invited this person more. I had so many thoughts of regret and self-blame that went on and on.

And finally, I recently hit a point of exhaustion I’d never felt before. My friends, family members, and even coworkers had been opening up to me about their current challenges, and the more they opened up to me, the more I would try to take on what they were struggling with. I was hyperfocused on that idea of “fixing,” and I felt powerless to do so.

So when that song came on at work, tears instantly flooded my eyes as I stopped typing and listened to the music. It was all I could do to mutter a small prayer: “Heavenly Father … I’m exhausted.”

Then God, in His loving grace, answered my prayer by patiently teaching me. These words instantly came to my mind: “You’re exhausted because you’re trying to be the fixer. And that is what I sent my Son to do.”

I felt incredibly humbled in that moment. I’d been trying to do a job that was never mine to do in the first place.

As Sister Reyna I. Aburto, Second Counselor in the Relief Society General Presidency, taught: “Sometimes, the natural man or woman in us makes us think that we have been called to ‘fix’ other people. We have not been called to be ‘fixers’ of others, and we have not been called to lecture or to scorn. We have been called to inspire, to lift, to invite others, to be fishers of people, fishers of souls so they receive the opportunity to be spiritually healed by Jesus Christ, our Savior and Redeemer.”1

I’ve learned that because of the world we live in, we will constantly be with people, including ourselves, who are imperfect. And living in an imperfect world means that we will all experience challenges in this life, including difficult things that are beyond our control. That’s why God sent Jesus Christ—so He could help us.

Heavenly Father reminded me that day in my office that it wasn’t my job to heal my grandma. I wasn’t to blame for my friend’s death by suicide. And it certainly wasn’t my role to take on all the burdens and weaknesses of those around me.

Let us remember the Savior “descended below” all things (Doctrine and Covenants 122:8) because He is the Master Healer.

That’s a truth I’m continually learning to hold on to when I feel that need to solve everyone’s problems. I now strive to allow the Savior to guide and teach me.

Our simple mandate from Him is to “bear one another’s burdens” (Mosiah 18:8), which entails loving, supporting, listening, comforting, praying, fasting, forgiving, and serving. We can do that as we turn to follow the Savior. And as we let Him offer His healing hand to us and to those we love, our burdens will truly become light.

When the music gets going, it’s hard to hold the audiences down. Feet start tapping, heads bobbing, and children patting out rhythms on their chairs. Music warms the hall and pulls people into the imaginative worlds of lost loves, of Luke Skywalker, of Sleeping Beauty and Spanish flamenco dancers. The concert closes too soon; the audience yells, whistles, shouts “bravo” and “encore”—and the group does another number or two.
Whether bouncing through the energetic “Stars and Stripes Forever,” jiving to “Disco on the Danube” (a contemporary version of a Strauss waltz), floating a romantic medley of Barry Manilow’s hits, or peacefully performing “The Lord Is My Shepherd,” the Mormon Youth Symphony and Chorus works a special magic on its audiences. Part of the spell is the music itself—but even more, what is communicated through the music. This is no ordinary performing group, as audiences are quick to understand.
“I’ve heard the New York Philharmonic and the Chicago Symphony play this piece, but I’ve never listened before with tears in my eyes. Can you tell me why?” asked a member of the Music Educators Conference who had just heard Mormon Youth perform “The Pines of Rome.”
“The young people in the group are not only superb musicians, they radiate goodness,” said one nonmember at a recent California concert. “It makes me wonder, who are these young people?”
Well, they’re law students, medical students, high school and college students, bank tellers, electricians, gardeners, teachers, florists, printers, accountants, and many other people between 16 and 30 years old. Some are single, some married, and all 375 are excellent musicians. And most important, they want to share their testimonies through the music they perform.
“When you join, you know that you’re in the group for more than just musical reasons,” said Kevin Call, principal violist who’s soloed in the Tabernacle with the group several times. “My motivation for joining is to use my music as a missionary tool.”
Janice Call, who sings with the chorus, agrees. “When you’ve put on a good performance, you can feel the Spirit so strongly. You feel like you’ve developed your talents for a good reason, and that you’re in the group for a purpose—to help people get closer to the Lord.”
“It’s difficult to describe the exhilaration you feel when you’re performing,” said Kathy Broadbent, whose three sisters have also sung with Mormon Youth. “I guess the only way to describe it is, I just love my Heavenly Father and feel so warm inside to know that I can do something for him and am using a talent he’s given me. We’re touching people with the music, and that’s something I think he would have me do.”
It’s hard to measure the impact of the group. Letters pour into the Mormon Youth office monthly asking what makes the group so unusual and asking for more information about the Church. And the impression the group gives of the Mormon Church can only be measured by attitude changes—and converts.
One woman who was asked never to return home after she joined the Church convinced her mother to attend one of the concerts, and her mother’s attitude toward the Church completely changed. “I’ll be able to go back to my home now,” said the daughter. Another man who had been investigating the Church for three years decided to join after hearing the Mormon Youth perform in Sacramento, California. And another couple in Modesto, California, said they were so affected by the spirit at the two Mormon Youth concerts they attended that they decided to join the Church.
The influence of the group has an international appeal, too. A Mormon Youth Christmas special was the first LDS programming to be allowed in France, and after it aired, three more programs were requested. A segment that aired on Norwegian television opened countless doors that had previously been closed to the missionaries in Norway. The Bicentennial special that aired in the U.S. on July 4th came in third in the ratings nationally, and prompted a wealthy New Yorker to offer to send the entire group to Russia to tour. And the stories of how the group has touched people and helped with missionary work go on and on.
“With our weekly radio program alone we reach a potential listening audience of 144 million in the United States, Canada, and Europe,” said Robert Bowden, conductor of the group (and guest conductor of the Boston Pops when he lived in Massachusetts). “We also do 20 concerts a year and usually one or two television specials. In fact, we just won a regional Emmy for one of them.”
With such a busy performance schedule and only one rehearsal a week, the musicians need to be a dedicated lot, he added. That’s one reason being a member of Mormon Youth is a Church calling.
“Mormon Youth is not a social organization but a working organization,” said Brother Bowden. “I tell people auditioning that if they want to join for social reasons, they’re in the wrong place. We’re working for the Church and the missionary program.
“Often we’ll rehearse the music one Saturday morning and record it the next. It takes a top player or singer to do this, one who sight reads well, too. I marvel at what this group can do. They know they’re serving the Lord, so they want to be as professional as they can.”
When the group is touring, the challenges are varied. Usually they’ll have at least one performance a day, and between travel, standing in lines for food, and getting little sleep, it can be quite a wearing experience.
“You have to learn how to be discreet while yawning on stage,” said one musician.
“The hardest part of touring is that we get so tired,” said Linda Taylor, an alto. “There isn’t really time to relax. But when you perform, all the inconveniences disappear. Every time we sing ‘I Know That My Redeemer Lives’ I get chills all over.”
Meals are often served in ward cultural halls or provided by host families, or the musicians fend for themselves in the cities they visit. “You can’t just walk into a restaurant with seven busloads of people,” said Ray Furgeson, president of the group. “It takes a lot of planning long before we go on the road.”
Staying with host families is one highlight of a tour. “The sightseeing is fun, but to me one of the best parts of touring is staying with the LDS families,” said Jim Lamoreaux, a tenor. “They take you in like you’re one of their kids and roll out the red carpet for you. When you leave it’s like you’ve known them all your life.”
As always, the group weaves its particular magic while on tour, just as on the home front. At the end of the California tour last summer, the seven bus drivers (some LDS, some not) gathered together and addressed the group. “We’d like to thank you for the privilege of traveling with you,” said their spokesperson. “We have enough roses for each of the girls, just to tell you thanks for being such a great group.” And 14 dozen roses were presented to the young women.
“Music is a very powerful force,” said Brother Bowden. “How many times have you gone to Church, and because of a musical number or hymn, tears have come to your eyes? It can be a force for our Heavenly Father, though some music can be a force for the devil. You have to be careful about how you use music.
“These young people have decided how to use their talents, and have caught the spirit of what they’re doing. They can take a piece of music and do more than I could ever expect them to, because they have the spirit of what’s going on. You can feel it in the audience—a hush—and you realize the people are feeling the music and saying, ‘My goodness, listen to that!’ It’s exciting to be a part of that.”
And undoubtedly each member of the group would agree. That’s why some of them didn’t mind the year and a half waiting list to get in. Or why they all sacrifice Saturday mornings for rehearsals when the ski slopes whisper gentle little enticements.
“When I think of the happiness that playing with Mormon Youth has brought me and the people who listen and how blessed I am for the privilege of playing with the symphony, it fills my whole soul with so much joy. For me, walking that path is a step toward heaven,” said Steve Duncan, percussionist. “The sacrifice and long hours are really worth it.”

The light shining in your faces comes from the Lord. This same light led the way for 15-year-old Mary Elizabeth Rollins and her 13-year-old sister, Caroline, on a dark day in Independence, Missouri.
It was 1833, and an angry mob roared through the streets of Independence, wreaking havoc. In their path was the home of Brother William W. Phelps, where the printing press was kept. He had been printing revelations received by the Prophet Joseph Smith. The mob demolished the printing press and threw the wreckage into the street. However, they stacked up the printed pages in the yard so they could burn them later.
Mary Elizabeth and Caroline had been hiding by the fence, frightened spectators to all this destruction. Even though Mary Elizabeth was terrified, her eye was fixed on those precious pages. She and her sister ran out from their hiding place, gathered up the scriptures, and bolted. Some members of the mob saw them and ordered them to stop. But the brave girls ran into a large cornfield, where they dropped breathlessly to the ground. They carefully laid the pages of revelations between the tall rows of corn and then covered the pages by lying on them. The mobsters looked and looked for the girls, coming quite close at times, but never did find them. Eventually they gave up their search.
I believe the light of the Lord directed Mary Elizabeth and Caroline as to what to do and where to go for safety. That light shines for you, and it will guide you as it did the Rollins girls. It will keep you safe even when danger lurks.

Chris is from St. Mary’s, Georgia. His parents, Artie and Carolyn Jones, met the missionaries in 1978, when Chris was only two. Chris said, “The first time my dad went to church, he saw a lot of people that he recognized in the community that respected him. That was one thing he really noticed.”

The Jones family was baptized and, as Chris has been told, they received a lot of ridicule for joining the Church. When Chris looks back, he is so appreciative of the fact that his parents were able to raise him and his two brothers and one sister in a way consistent with the principles of the gospel. And Chris grew up knowing that someday he would serve a mission. “If it is part of the Church and the Church is true, then I’ll do it.”

In fact, Chris says his mother helped him keep that in mind. “My mom was the one that pulled us out of bed at 5:15 in the morning to go to seminary for four years. It was a struggle. I hated getting up at 5:15. But it was through a combination of my mother and going to seminary that I gained a testimony of the gospel. Up until then, I always knew the gospel was right. I just didn’t know why it was right.”

As Chris gained a testimony, he found that living the gospel principles helped him learn about prayer. “I can’t recall a prayer that I’ve never received an answer to. Receiving an answer is a matter of allowing the Lord to answer you and give you His answer. A lot of times if you pray with your own answer in mind, you look for that answer. If another answer comes, then you’re not ready to receive it.”

Chris loved playing football in grade school and junior high. He started at linebacker all during high school. And, as Chris points out, football in Georgia is serious business. His high school would have 10,000 fans attend its Friday night games. During his junior year, he began getting attention from college scouts. It was exciting, but his mom would remind him not to get too interested because he was going on a mission.

When the scouts showed up, that was the time Chris had to face the possibilities of playing football at the college level. His high school coach told the scouts that he was a hard-working player and was an honor student. Finally concrete offers started to come—full-ride scholarships through four years of college, worth thousands of dollars.

“I asked,” said Chris, “if they would hold a scholarship for two years. One coach was shocked. I told him I was going to go on a mission for my church. He just stared at me and said, ‘You’re going to give up 80 thousand dollars to serve a mission for two years?’ He got mad at me. But I didn’t get offended.” After that, his coach started turning away college recruiters interested in Chris.

Eventually, State University of West Georgia called. The school offered him a scholarship. It turned out that Chris would be able to play a year and a quarter, essentially two seasons, before turning 19 and receiving a mission call. “I knew that all things were possible with the Lord. There were people saying that I couldn’t serve a mission and play ball, yet the Lord provided a way to do both.”

Chris struggled at West Georgia, not on the field where he started as a true freshman but in the permissive atmosphere in the dorms. He didn’t like what was going on around him. He was more determined than ever to go on a mission. And it was on his mission that Chris put football behind him completely. He told his coaches that if they needed to talk to him, to go through his parents. He didn’t keep up on what the team was doing. He says that the only way to serve on a mission is completely and with total focus.

At the conclusion of his mission, Chris decided that he could not return to the atmosphere at his former college. He thought that was also a decision to give up football, and he was willing to do it.

Just as Chris was completing his mission, his mission president contacted BYU about Chris. At first, becoming a BYU football team member didn’t seem like a possibility, but he was invited to try out. He received a full-ride scholarship but was redshirted a year. Once Chris thought sitting out a year would be horrible, but now it was a blessing. He was able to concentrate on his major, a difficult one, in manufacturing engineering and technology. He feels that the Lord has guided his life because at BYU he has had the opportunity to continue missionary work as a ward mission leader. Football will fall by the wayside. That’s fine with Chris. It no longer has his heart.

There is, however, one thing Chris has always wanted—a championship ring. He just missed taking state in high school. And his college team won the conference the year he left on his mission. Knowing this, some friends on his mission got together and bought Chris a ring—a CTR ring that he wears continually. It’s become his championship ring.

Whenever Chris looks at it he is reminded of what he believes deep inside. “Right makes you happy. If you do what is right, everything will fall into place.”

During the sixty years that Mary was with the Salt Lake Tabernacle Choir and the fifty-eight years she was pouring out her love for children and Primary workers through the pages of The Children’s Friend, she was also spending part of her time with crippled and ill boys and girls who were being cared for in the Primary Children’s Hospital.
Mary helped in the planning with Sister Felt and Sister Anderson when the original hospital was opened in 1922. It was housed in an old home on North Temple Street that was given to the Primary for a convalescent home and equipped by the Church. There they welcomed boys and girls who needed only limited medical help, but their dream was to be able to provide a shining new fireproof hospital where all medical services could be given.
A project was launched to secure funds for such a building. While the Church, friends of the Primary, and others who loved children contributed amounts both large and small for a new building, much of the money for it was given through the efforts of Primary children. Each boy and girl was asked to buy one brick for a dime, and the children contributed more than $18,000 to the brick project. Many children, excited by the joy that comes through sharing, asked friends and family to give money for the hospital instead of buying birthday and Christmas gifts. The smallest contribution received from a child was two pennies, but that, too, was accepted with gratitude.
In order to properly handle all the funds, the Primary sisters were advised to select a board of trustees and incorporate the Primary Children’s Hospital. It was Mary R. Jack who signed those articles of incorporation and remained as secretary of the board until her release in 1970.

When the Manti Utah Temple was under construction some 120 years ago, George Paxman worked as a finish carpenter. He and his young wife, Martha, had one child and were expecting another.
While hanging one of the heavy east doors of the temple, George suffered a strangulated hernia. He was in terrible pain. Martha laid him in a wagon and took him to the town of Nephi, where she put him on the train and took him to Provo. There he died. Spurning marriage, she remained a widow for 62 years, supporting herself with needlework.

Although the grand Tabernacle Organ was not completed for the October conference in 1867, it could be played. Sixteen-year-old Joseph was small for his age, and he found he could not reach the foot pedals of the new organ. An accomplished musician, he had been appointed as Tabernacle organist, and he worried about not being able to play the notes with his feet. It took some thinking, but he came up with the idea of attaching cork to the soles of his shoes—and it worked!
Born in Norwich, England, April 2, 1851, Joseph J. Daynes displayed a rare musical talent when only four. When he was eleven his family immigrated to the Salt Lake Valley. With a little harmonium (small organ) strapped across his shoulders, Joseph walked most of the way.
During the time he was organist of the Tabernacle, Joseph Daynes wrote music for hymns and composed the marches that were played for the funerals of Brigham Young and Wilford Woodruff.

Jerrison had made certain he read his English assignment: Ernest Hemingway’s “The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber.”
With any luck, Jerrison figured Mr. Hammel shouldn’t call on him to respond to the story about a man who wounded a lion in Africa, then ran from the beast’s charge—leaving guide and gun bearer to deal with it until later finding his courage again. There were over 30 students in the class. Three or four would be sufficient for enough discussion to do the Hemingway story justice, then move smoothly to the next author. At least that had been the pattern of Mr. Hammel’s literature challenges in past English classes here at Churchill High School.
But the law of averages wouldn’t prevail, Jer reasoned, because Mr. Hammel now suspected he was LDS. Jer was the only active Church member in his school, and his family was one of the few LDS families in the entire eastern Canada community. And hadn’t Jer just had the courage, or the gumption, or the gall, or whatever you call it, to disagree with the teacher just the week before? At issue was the presence or absence of deity in Mark Twain’s “The Mysterious Stranger” and whether there was any hope for an afterlife. Lars Hammel had been quite adamant about that. Jer had never seen his teacher so unyielding on any point. Perhaps Mr. Hammel deserved his reputation as an unrelenting atheist.
“Miss Cromar,” came Mr. Hammel’s inquisition, “What did you think of the lion incident in Hemingway’s Mr. Macomber?”
Dana smiled awkwardly. “He, well, he ran away from the lion. He was a coward.”
But Mr. Hammel would not let Dana off so easily. “Why is that being a coward, Miss Cromar? Wouldn’t any of us run from a lion suddenly charging directly at us from the tall grass? And wouldn’t we expect a professional guide who makes his living at this sort of thing to have the skills necessary for dispatching the creature?”
It wasn’t normal conversation, thought Jer. But then what English teacher speaks normally? Even a sympathetic one?
“I, I guess so, Mr. Hammel.”
“You’re easy to get along with, are you not?” The teacher looked down at her from his oak desk.
“Yes, yes,” she agreed.
“And Mr. Allred, do you concur with Dana here?”
“Macomber ran away. He was a nerd. Even his wife thought so.”
Mr. Hammel paused thoughtfully. “Well, let us see what Mr. Broman has to say about Mr. Macomber’s temporary lack of courage.”
Jerrison felt too tall in his seat now. He ran large hands through his dark hair. His mouth groped to synchronize with precisely the right words. “Relatively speaking, I don’t think the man was as much of a coward as some might think,” Jer heard himself say.
“Eh? Intriguing thought here. Why do you say that, Mr. Broman?”
“Well, he chose to go on the lion hunt. He didn’t have to go on a safari like that. And no one forced him to shoot at the lion, or wound it in the first place. And he did finally overcome his fears.”
Mr. Hammel waited. “And is that all there is to it, Mr. Broman?”
“It’s just that this is only an example of one-time courage. Physical courage.” Jer found that it came out easily. But then, “His greatest fault might have been talking so much about the whole thing.” Jer felt all eyes on him now, and he turned his heavy thumbs up above the desk. “I’ve seen greater examples of true courage in everyday life than shooting a lion, anyway.”
“An example, please?”
“Well, my aunt …” Did Jer have to go into all this?
“Your aunt?” It was true what they said about Mr. Hammel. Couldn’t he see that this matter was becoming more than Jer had intended it to be?
“I guess some would think she didn’t have much to live for each day. Robert, her husband, left her, and she has a Down’s Syndrome baby, and she has to work nights …”
“Is she not remarriageable?” Mr. Hammel said evenly. The class tittered.
“Not much chance of getting remarried right away. Not to just anyone, right now.” Jer squirmed.
“I see, Mr. Broman. And tell me, how would you compare this item of literature with what you read of Twain’s ‘Stranger’?”
“I liked Hemingway better. I like to read about courage.” Now he was warming up. “At least if it’s real courage. And if the author tries to honestly discover the full meaning of courage, not just an outside veneer.”
“Mm, Mr. Broman. Could you please see me after class? I’d like to talk with you privately if you don’t mind.”
When Jerrison appeared at the long oaken desk, Mr. Hammel was smiling only faintly. “I’m intrigued with your definition of courage,” he said. “Tell me more about your aunt, Aunt …”
“We call her Ren, Rennie.”
“Your Aunt Rennie. You say she has courage.”
“Every day. The child—and her job. They’re her lions.”
“And she handles this without lashing out at the world?”
“Ren … doesn’t usually talk about it.”
Mr. Hammel frowned. “Yet, what choice does she have?”
“She’s always smiling. But she knows Becky will always be dependent on her.” Jer felt an impatience stealing over himself now.
“Then there’s no reason to smile?”
“Some might say that.”
The teacher turned his head. For several minutes he did not speak.
Jer was about to say something, maybe “See you tomorrow” or now that he thought of it, a clever “Who’s next, Thoreau?” But then it didn’t seem so clever, and he heard Mr. Hammel speaking, low at first, then with more voice.
“Your aunt is a remarkable woman,” he said at last. “I know someone like her.”
“Who is that?” Jer said softly.
“Not really important. But you have not yet told me what it is that gives your aunt her courage.”
“First,” Jer said, “you must tell me your background. What is your feeling about God. Do you agree with Mr. Twain?”
“Yes, I see. That is a hard point. I don’t know. Jerrison, I would like to meet with you tomorrow, or the next day, after the last class.”
“Wednesday? I think I could do that. Right after school?”
The next day Jer thought he noticed a change in Mr. Hammel’s mood. The man appeared brisk and abrupt. He stood talking to another teacher, something about sophomores and assignments. “I’m in charge of the 10th graders’ get-acquainted party,” he was saying. “These kids are so glum these days about helping the new ones. Can’t get the haves to mix in and include the have-nots. No compassion.”
When the other teacher walked away, the two just stood there. Jerrison waited. Finally, Mr. Hammel looked directly into Jerrison’s eyes. “What is it that gives this woman the strength, as you say, to fight lions … every day?” He said it as a statement, not a question.
“Are you certain you want to know?” Jer asked.
“Yes, I would not have asked a year ago, or perhaps even a month ago. No, certainly, not even a month ago. Before I knew you. Now, go on, tell me.”
“The same thing which enabled Daniel to subdue his lions, the ones in the den.” Jer had not managed any eloquence. But he had said it.
Mr. Hammel studied him. “You are a Mormon, are you not?” he broke the silence.
“Yes.”
“And you … you’re saying …” he broke it off. “Yes, I see what you are saying. It is very clear.”
Two days later, Mr. Hammel again asked Jer to remain for a few minutes following class. “Mr. Broman.” His voice seemed again aloof and piercing. “I have a special assignment for you. For extra credit, of course. Would you write me a story about courage. What it means to have courage? Compare it with Mr. Macomber, if you will.”
That night, Jer struggled with the assignment. What did Mr. Hammel want from him? He had told him how he felt. What else could he say? He asked his father about it. “What do you regard as courage, Dad? True courage? It’s an English assignment.”
His father seemed slightly puzzled. Jer tried to help, without putting any words in his father’s mouth.
“Let’s put it like this. Is a man a coward for running away from a charging lion?”
“Yes, I think so. But wasn’t there anyone around to stand up to the lion?”
“The guide. An Englishman stopped the animal a few feet away. Stood there and pumped lead into a roaring lion.”
“I’d say that was an act requiring some courage. But who attacked whom in the first place?”
“The American. He shot the lion. Macomber. He hit it in the flank with a bad shot.”
“Oh. Sounds like the lion had a bit of courage himself, eh?”
“I told Mr. Hammel that there are many greater acts of courage, if an author wants to write about courage.”
“You said that?”
“Yes. I told him about Rennie.”
“You did?”
“I think she has courage.”
“You know what, Jer? I think you’ve got it. Courage.”
Later that night, on the assigned paper, Jer wrote:
“Many of us think of courage as a single act of dramatic proportions, with the world watching, reporters ready to describe in detail the slaying of the lion in our lives. But if the world was watching to give us a badge or a compliment, giving life our best wouldn’t be that difficult. The real test comes in rising to meet the challenge every day, and again, with no fanfare, when you are alone, and you know what you ought to do, and determine to do it with your full zeal and strength.”
On Friday Mr. Hammel asked Jerrison what grade he thought his paper deserved.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “I wrote it because that’s the way I feel. Not for a grade. It’s the way my aunt is.”
“That’s why I’m giving you an A,” Mr. Hammel said. “For courage. And your aunt … I’m giving her an A, too.”
“I’ll tell her that.”
“Oh, and a … tell her I’d like to test her courage—helping me with the backward ones at the class get-together coming up. I haven’t reached them in a dozen years. Maybe your aunt can give me some clues. Anything.”
“And the baby?” Jer asked.
“My mother. Put up with me. I guess she’s got the courage to put up with your aunt’s baby for one afternoon.”

In 2021, the service-mission programme started in the UK. This led me to look at serving again. I am now two months into my service mission—it is the best decision I have ever made. I was set apart at the same time as my younger brother, Elder Joseph Peedle, who is serving in Helsinki, Finland. It was amazing to be set apart on the same day! During my preparation for starting my mission, I learnt a lot about being patient and how things are done in the Lord’s timing.
My service mission has saved me. It has given me purpose and focus. I felt lost for a long time and this mission ‘found’ me. I love the gospel and I love our Saviour and our Heavenly Father. Trust in the Lord, everything will work out!

Molly could never wait for something to happen. She did all she could to make something happen quickly.
Most of the time Molly’s impatience did not get her into serious trouble. She was just in the habit of hurrying with everything she did.
One day Molly’s teacher, Miss Raymond, said, “Class, your project this month concerns a member of this classroom. How many of you have noticed that Naryana isn’t at school today?”
Ten sixth-grade hands waved above Molly’s head. Molly hadn’t noticed, but, then, she hadn’t paid any special attention to Naryana.
“Naryana Ranjappa is Indian,” Miss Raymond said as she pulled down their geography map. “But she is not an American Indian. She is from India.” Molly watched Miss Raymond place her long pointer on a country across the Arabian Sea and to the east of Africa. “Naryana was born in India and for a short time lived in England. From there she moved to our city here in the United States.”
“Wow!” Howard Higgins said. “She’s come a long way!”
“And she is not happy here,” Miss Raymond continued. “You must have noticed how sad she is. That is a problem we might be able to help her solve. What can we do to make her smile and be happy?”
“Miss Raymond?” Molly wiggled at her desk until her teacher called on her.
“Yes, Molly?”
“Miss Raymond, I have an idea to make Naryana feel more at home. Why couldn’t we have an Indian festival with something about the customs of her country?”
“That’s a wonderful idea, Molly,” their teacher answered, and all the students agreed.
Looking at her class, Miss Raymond said thoughtfully, “If you like the festival idea, you’ll have to find out about Indian customs without telling Naryana. Perhaps if we surprise her it will bring a smile to her face.”
All the children liked the idea and began working right away. The different ways of this country on the other side of the world made them want to learn more and more about it.
Janice checked out from the library a large picture book about India with photographs of people and animals wandering through narrow, crowded streets. Howard brought a calendar picture of an Indian girl who had a red mark on her forehead. She was wearing a beautiful yellow silk dress called a sari. The whole class learned about India in small groups, at recess, or after school without Naryana discovering their surprise.
Naryana was tiny for her age when compared to her classmates. Most of the time she sat quietly staring down at her desk.
The night before the festival many of the children stayed after school and helped decorate the room. They swirled and curled brightly colored designs with poster paint. They hoped that the decorated elephant, the model of the Taj Mahal, and the traditional welcome of fresh fruit and flowers would all help to bring a smile to Naryana’s face. The children felt the excitement grow as the room took on a festive look.
The next morning everyone came to school early. The boys and girls stood silently around the room waiting for Naryana to come to class.
Within a few minutes Naryana walked into the room. Her eyes widened with surprise. She looked at the decorations and at the boys and girls and they looked at her. Would she smile? they wondered.
Molly carefully led Naryana to the center of the room. As she looked around at the colorful decorations from her native land, Naryana smiled. But Molly noticed that it was a sad kind of a smile. It pushed at her cheeks, but it did not change her face as they had hoped it would. The festival began as fruits, nuts, and flowers appeared as if by magic. One of the girls played “Song of India” on the piano and Miss Raymond read Kipling’s poem “Rikki Tikki Tavi” to them. They ate, sang, and laughed while sitting on the floor in traditional Indian fashion.
It was a wonderful festival, but Molly was not satisfied. She had hoped for a wide, happy smile from Naryana, but only a shy, little smile had lighted the face of the girl from India.
Later at home, Molly decided that the fruit and colorful designs at school had meant little to Naryana. She wanted to make her happy but would have to do it in another way. Molly tried to think of something really special that she could do for Naryana. She looked around her bedroom, wondering if she might give her a gift. Molly saw her brush and comb set, her stuffed giraffe, and her dolls, but nothing seemed to be suitable.
Molly finally decided to go over to Naryana’s house. Maybe I can cheer her up, she thought. As she ran up the walk Molly suddenly stopped. Naryana was sitting alone on her front steps with her eyes searching the ground.
“Hello, Naryana,” Molly said with a cheery voice.
Startled, Naryana looked up but she didn’t smile. “You’re Molly aren’t you?” she asked.
“Yes,” Molly answered, surprised that Naryana knew her name. Naryana invited Molly into her house. The rich-looking brass ornaments and brightly woven fabrics decorating the walls were beautiful. As the girls went back to Naryana’s bedroom, Molly caught the pleasant smell of spices and perfume that filled the hall.
Naryana had twin beds in her room and Molly immediately noticed two photographs hanging on the wall between them. They were pictures that looked like Naryana but not the girl Molly knew. Each of these pictures showed a face that was bright-eyed and happy.
“I’m the one on the right,” Naryana explained, “and the other one is Shani, my sister. We are identical twins.”
“But where is she?” Molly asked.
“In Devonshire, England. We left her there with relatives, because she was too ill to come here with us.”
Molly watched Naryana’s eyes fill with tears and her chin begin to quiver as she talked.
“Shani had a bad accident and can not be moved until she is better.”
“Naryana, we didn’t know you had a twin sister in England. Miss Raymond didn’t tell us.” Suddenly, Molly knew how she could make Naryana happy. It might take weeks, but it would be worth every bit of time and trouble.
It was hard for Molly to keep a secret, but she didn’t tell anybody about her plan for over a month. When she was sure she couldn’t keep the surprise any longer, a package arrived from her brother.
After lunch that day, Molly came flying breathlessly into the classroom, carrying a package and her family’s tape recorder. She went straight up to Miss Raymond’s desk and whispered something to her.
“Oh, Molly! Yes, of course,” she said. “Let’s play it right now.”
Miss Raymond called the class to order. They all felt the excitement of something about to happen.
“Molly has a wonderful surprise for us.” Miss Raymond announced.
Everyone sat quietly when Molly stood up proudly and said, “You may know that my brother is on a mission in southern England. Well, I wrote to him several weeks ago and asked him to do me a favor.”
Molly glanced back at Naryana and saw her raise her head and watch attentively as Molly continued, “He sent me this tape and I want to play it for you now.”
She turned on the recorder and a sweet voice began speaking, “Dear Naryana and Miss Raymond’s sixth-grade class: It is raining here in Devon, and the flowers and bushes outside my bedroom window seem to grow with each raindrop even though we are well into fall. I want to tell you that Doctor Hardwell says I am slowly getting better …”
From then on the tape from Shani was a treat for everyone. On previous occasions, Naryana’s rare smiles never quite filled her face, but now she was beaming when she heard her sister’s words filled with hope.
For Naryana and for them all this voice was a miraculous bridge over time and two continents.
For Molly, it was a lesson in friendship and patience. Sometimes, Molly decided, best things do come from waiting.