Gospel Story Finder

Let me share another experience. In our home our children liked to do jigsaw puzzles. We have probably all had the opportunity to do a puzzle. Some are made up of many small pieces. I remember that one of our children (I won’t give his name in order to protect his identity) used to focus on the individual pieces, and when one did not fit in the place where he thought it should, he would become angry and assume it was no good and want to throw it away. He finally learned to do the puzzle when he understood that each small piece had its place in the final picture, even when he did not know where it fit at a given moment.

In our squadron I had a dear friend who was an outstanding football player. Years before, his team played in a New Year’s Day bowl game. Before a sold-out stadium and a large television audience, his team lost by a huge score. It turned out he and a few other members of his team had not kept the training rules. They paid a dear price. They had to live with knowing they were not prepared to play the big game; they had to live with the final score for the rest of their lives.
Years passed. Two members of this same football team were in my flight training unit. One was an exemplary, well-disciplined student and a model pilot who had learned his lesson well from the football game.
However, the other had not learned to listen to those with more knowledge and experience. When his turn would come to learn emergency procedures and to precondition his mental and physical responses so they would be automatic, even instantaneous, my friend would put his arm around the airman instructor and say, “Check me off for three hours of emergency procedure.” Then, instead of training, he would go to the pistol range or play golf or go to the officers’ club. But he never learned the emergency procedures.
On one occasion he was asked what he would do in an emergency. His answer: “I am never going to bail out; I am never going to have an emergency.”
On an evening mission a few months later, fire erupted in his plane, and it dropped below 1,500 meters, spinning in flames. Noting the fire warning light, the younger pilot who was with him said, “Let’s get out of here.” And with the centrifugal force pulling against him, the younger man, who had taken his training seriously, bailed out. His parachute opened at once and he slammed to the ground, receiving serious injuries. But he survived.
On the other hand, my friend stayed with the airplane and died in the crash. He paid the price for not having learned the lessons that could have saved his life.

The Kuang Kuang Hao, a special express train, sped through the countryside in Taiwan, passing scenes of quiet rivers, hills dotted with Chinese burial mounds, scattered villages, and endless waves of rice fields. As I stepped off the train in Miao Li, the cold winter wind hit me in the face.
Despite the cold, missionary routine in my new area soon became settled. I enjoyed being a senior companion and had a good junior companion. I was comfortable giving the missionary lessons and interacting with the people.
In our branch I met a member named Hu Chin Hsi, who looked like a scarecrow with wild, straggly hair. His eyes were bright but sunken, and his body was thin and straight. He talked with enthusiasm but stopped often to wheeze and cough because he had a chronic lung and respiratory disease. Despite his struggles, Brother Hu was a faithful member and the branch clerk.
One cold winter night we rode our bikes to visit Brother Hu. He lived on a hillside, where the winter wind blew. His home made of loosely nailed planks with a dirt floor was just large enough for one man to lie down and store a few things in. Brother Hu explained he was poor because the money he made as a tax assessor was spent on medicine to keep him alive, and any leftover money was spent on food.
As the rainy season became more severe, we knew Brother Hu needed more help to survive until spring. We collected two extra comforters, some clothing, and some money for food. Brother Hu was grateful for the gifts, and with tears in his eyes, he thanked us over and over.
Everything seemed fine until we noticed he had nothing to keep his hands warm. I thought we could buy him a pair of cloth gloves, but I knew these gloves didn’t last long and often came apart. Brother Hu needed something dependable, long-lasting, and warm.
I had a pair of leather, fur-lined gloves that were given to me by a companion who had completed his mission the previous summer. He told me the gloves were rare and that it would be impossible to find or buy such gloves in Taiwan. The moist, cold tropical air of Miao Li proved how valuable a gift those gloves were, and I guarded them everywhere I went. But now someone else needed them.
When Brother Hu needed blankets, clothes, and money for food, we shared. Now he needed gloves, and I was more than willing to buy him some cloth gloves but not give him mine. I rationalized that I had two more winters as a missionary on this island and needed warm gloves. I even bought a pair of cloth gloves to give Brother Hu, but I was uneasy and unhappy.
I contemplated my behavior and realized I was being selfish. If it didn’t cause me any hardship or sacrifice, I was willing to give. But a rare possession like my gloves was a harder test.
Though it seemed like such a sacrifice at the time, I gave Brother Hu my leather, fur-lined gloves. I took the cloth gloves, which caught on my bike and totally unraveled two days later. What lasted, though, is my memory of Hu Chin Hsi with his cough and wheeze and what I learned from giving to him.

CTR by always telling the truth. There is an old story about a boy who took sheep to the mountain to tend them. “If you have any trouble with wolves, just blow the horn and yell, ‘Wolf!’” said the townspeople. “We will come and help you.” The boy was bored one day and blew the horn. The townspeople came running to help, and the boy thought it was a good joke.

Two other times he needlessly called, “Wolf!” and blew the horn. Each time, the people ran to help. Then came the day when a wolf really appeared and attacked the sheep. The boy blew the horn and called and called, but the townspeople thought that he was lying again. Nobody went to help, and many sheep were killed. Lying hurts you not only because of the direct harm it may cause you and others, but also because people will hesitate to trust you again. Always tell the truth.

You might be surprised to hear all the things Kevin does. For one thing, anyone who knows him would say he’s incredibly shy. But just as with many other obstacles in Kevin’s life, the Lord gave Kevin opportunities to work around his shyness and reach out to others.
Just after Kevin turned 15, one of his close friends started falling away from the gospel. Kevin wanted to help his friend come back. But he had never even borne his testimony out loud before—how was he supposed to do it now? “Facebook,” he thought. Kevin hadn’t used social media before, but if there was a good reason to start, this was it.
So Kevin began recording his testimony, typing out messages, and sending uplifting videos to this friend and others through social media. This was something he could do.
He started wondering if he could influence more people for good. He created a Facebook page to inspire others to live the Articles of Faith. His courage to bear his testimony also increased, and he began to reach out to others over the phone.
As Kevin’s desire to share the gospel grew, so did his testimony of missionary work. Kevin wanted more than anything to serve a mission, but he knew that as his condition worsened, it was more and more unlikely.
The next year a member of Kevin’s stake spoke on the importance of family history indexing. That day Kevin went straight home, created an LDS Account, and began to index. Because of his illness, Kevin had a hard time in school, and reading was a challenge. He spent hours at his computer searching for letters he could recognize. Yet, one by one, he matched the letters on the screen with the letters on the computer keyboard. He soon began to understand the importance and impact of family history work, so he made a Duty to God goal to index a number of names.
Halfway to the goal, however, his disease began to spread even more rapidly. He lost much of the mobility in his arms and couldn’t reach the computer keyboard. A hard trial? Yes. But impossible to overcome? No.
Kevin knew that if the Lord wanted him to accomplish his goal, He would again provide a way. And that’s what happened.
In December 2014, Kevin invited the youth from his stake to help him reach his goal. About 40 youth responded. Most of them had never indexed before, yet they too felt the importance of family history work and the desire to help their friend in need. So they planned a day when they could get together, bring computers, and bring in a few indexing gurus to help them take on the challenge.
When the day came to begin indexing names for Kevin’s goal, the youth from the stake video-conferenced Kevin so that he and his family could watch them from his hospital room. Kevin had never realized he had so many friends—even friends he thought he’d been unsuccessful in reaching out to joined in the effort to help.
That day the young men and young women of Kevin’s stake indexed hundreds of names. By the end of the year, they had met Kevin’s goal—and then some.
That day in the hospital, as Kevin sat in his bed and listened to his calling from the stake president being read to him, he thought again about how the Lord provides a way to accomplish His purposes. Though Kevin’s health prevented him from serving a full-time proselyting mission, Kevin still knew that the Lord would allow him the opportunity to serve and bless others in some way.
Kevin hasn’t led an easy life. He has endured many challenges, and his prayers certainly haven’t always been answered in the way he expected. But through all of his experiences, Kevin has learned what it means to put his trust in the Savior and to be trusted by the Savior. Whatever the Lord wants him to do, the Lord knows he can do it—and so does Kevin.
Kevin knows that as long as he puts forth his whole effort, the Lord will bless him and also make up the difference for whatever he isn’t able to do. As Kevin’s favorite scripture says, “The Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them” (1 Nephi 3:7). “It’s not about what I can do,” Kevin says. “It’s about what we can do.”

On a recent trip to Hermanus, South Africa, I learned the importance of agency. This small coastal town is about a 90-minute drive from Cape Town and is one of the many beautiful beach towns along the coast. The waves were rolling in as I headed down to the beach to surf with a friend.
Once we had off-loaded the surfboards, I stood in the warm white sand and stared at the beach, squinting at the sun in disbelief. The lifeguard had already put up the swimming zone flags, but they were less than 50 meters (165 feet) apart! The beach was several hundred meters long, and all the good waves were outside the swimming zone. How was anybody supposed to swim between those two red-and-yellow striped flags? Was he just being lazy because he didn’t want to watch all the way down the beach?
My friend and I are pretty good swimmers, so we decided to head out to the right of the flagged area. As I walked out through the white water, I could feel the strong pull of the water washing past my legs, but I could still stand against the current, so I kept going. When I was in deep enough, I got on my board and paddled out to the unbroken swells. The waves kept coming, and we surfed for a while, enjoying catching the waves and watching each other catch the waves.
I turned around to look at the beach and suddenly noticed that I was rapidly drifting away from where I had started—the flags were far away! What I didn’t know about and couldn’t see was a large sandbar on the ocean floor, and as the tide was coming in, the water was washing over the sides of the sandbar, creating a powerful wash on both sides of the flagged area. The lifeguard knew that; he had been sitting there the whole day watching the water, so he knew where it was safe to swim.
I turned my board around and began paddling back toward the swimming zone. I paddled my hardest, but there was no way I could swim against the strong current. I was drifting farther out to sea! Panicking, I got off my board and tried to walk. My feet just touched the ocean floor, and I felt my toes dragging in the sand beneath. I could not hold myself against the thousands of tons of water moving past me, so I had to get back on my board. I lay there, powerless and drifting. I waved to my friend to help, but he was caught by the same current.
“Would the lifeguard still rescue me, even though I had ignored his warning?” I wondered. I had made the decision to swim in the no-swim zone and now had to accept the consequence—loss of control. I was being pulled by forces much stronger than I was. My only hope was to catch a wave back to the beach before I was pulled into the sharp rocks at the end of the beach. Eventually, a wave came, and I managed to ride it back to shore as did my friend.
We sheepishly walked back to the swimming zone and enjoyed the rest of the day surfing between the flags. Each time one of us began drifting too close to the edge of the swimming zone, we would warn each other to come back.

It was nearly three months later that Brother Hanson took us on a winter Scout camp. The entire object of the outing was for us to learn how to build a fire so we could cook and keep warm in sub-zero temperatures. We hiked for what seemed like miles, and even though Brother Hanson was close to seventy years old, we had a difficult time keeping up. Finally he brought us to a place where there was a frozen pond beside a clear spot in the trees, and there he turned us loose to build our fires.
It didn’t take long for us to discover that the frozen pond was much easier to clear off than the lumpy rock-strewn ground. In no time at all most of our fires were constructed on the thick, just-offshore ice, ready to go.
That’s when I noticed Brother Hanson. He was going to all the extra effort of clearing snow down to the bare dirt before laying out his wood. I stood and watched him for a minute, knowing him well enough to realize that he never did anything without a reason. Then I moved my pile of sticks over beside his and proceeded to do exactly as he was doing.
A while later, Brother Hanson and I were enjoying roasted hot dogs and warming our cold toes next to the crackling flames, while the rest of the troop ran frantically in circles as their fires flickered to death in pools of puddling ice.
“There’s a lesson to be learned here,” Brother Hanson stated matter-of-factly.
The boys practically howled.
Brother Hanson leaned back on his log and stretched his huge feet out lazily in front of him.
“You tell me what the lesson is,” he said, nodding at Bryan.
“Fire melts ice,” Bryan declared wisely.
Brother Hanson glanced toward Jonathan.
“That you should always build your fire on solid ground,” Jonathan concluded.
Brother Hanson looked directly at me. “Philip, what do you think?”
I quoted his own words, as if reading from a book, “‘If you build your house upon a rock, which is the gospel, and the rain descends and the floods come and the winds blow, which are the trials and temptations of life, your house will not fall.’”
What followed was a moment of surprised silence as Brother Hanson stared at me. Then, when I started to fear that he was angry and that I shouldn’t have been quite so cocky, I heard a deep rumbling sound, which I realized was actually Brother Hanson chuckling.
The chuckles soon turned into outright guffaws that made his face go red and caused his breath to come in ragged gasps. Pretty soon all the rest of us were laughing right along with him. After a few minutes he stopped, pulled himself up straight on his log, and wiped his face with his sleeve. “That’s what I like to see—a boy who learns his lesson right the first time!”

May I share a letter from a grateful recipient of their loving service. He writes:
“The young women [of my ward] very literally saved my life. I was a young bishop, just 29, the father of four beautiful little girls, including a small baby, when Heavenly Father called my wife home to Him. As I met with each of our little girls and asked them what impact this change would mean to them, the concerns of six-year-old Emily, the oldest of the four, were many, including, ‘Who is going to comb and curl my hair for church and put ribbons and clips in it?’ That was a good question to me as well. Who? I was consumed with the idea that life would be as ‘normal’ as possible for all of us—which meant that I would have to learn a whole new way of life. I was their father, and I was going to be the only parent. I realized that I was not equipped with the motherly skills that I needed. I called upon the young women of the ward to train me to be able to satisfy at least the needs of hair care. They came to my home, numerous times, to begin my training. They even showed me how to care for my six-month-old Natalie as far as washing her hair without so much trauma. By the time I ‘graduated,’ I could whip up a mean (but simple) hairdo. Much more than the skill, those young women gave me confidence as a father of daughters—that I could love them, care for them, be there for them, no matter how the rest of my life continued.” Thank you, Brother Michael Marston, for your tender letter.

Weather, distance, and school schedules prevent many Thai members from attending church, so the Ubon Ward decided to set a date and encourage as many people as possible to attend.
A lot of members here in Thailand have difficulty coming to church because of school meetings, bad weather (most of our members travel by motorbike), and distance. The members in my ward, the Ubon Ward, face all of these challenges and more, which makes attending church difficult.
One Sunday, I was wondering how we could help the members recognize the blessings of exercising the faith to worship together more often. The idea came to me, “What if we picked a Sunday to focus on getting every member to church that day?” If we were able to get everyone to come on the same day, it would allow members to really see and feel the strength of the ward.
Other leaders and members in the ward liked the idea and became involved in planning for it. We decided on a date, June 17, 2018—the Sunday closest to the anniversary of when the Ubon Thailand Stake was founded—and started sending messages about it through social media. We named the event “Let’s Come to Church on the Same Sunday! 200 Sacrament Meeting Attendance—Ubon Ward Can Do It.”
Practically the whole ward was involved in encouraging each other to come. Everybody kept sending messages persuading others to join the event. Members also invited returning members and friends who weren’t members. And so many people said yes!
We realized that this was more than just a fun event to see how many people could come. We wanted it to be an especially spiritual experience to help motivate members to make attending sacrament meeting a priority. So in the months leading up to the event, the bishopric encouraged people to avoid any activities that might minimize the importance of the sacrament or the worship of the Lord.
We even made bookmarks to help people remember the event and the Spirit that we knew would be there because of everyone’s efforts to attend. The bookmark had the name of the event and also a scripture: “I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High” (Psalm 82:6). We chose this scripture because we wanted everyone to realize that they are children of God and have the potential to be like Him.
Members planned for a long time to all be able to attend on the set day. Finally, the day came. But so did obstacles. It rained heavily the evening before and continued raining all through the night. Another obstacle for some members was that an important school meeting was happening at the same time as church.
We asked everybody to pray for these obstacles to be removed or overcome. At about 7:00 a.m. Sunday morning, the rain stopped. And when we arrived at church, we found those families who needed to go to the school meeting. When we asked them about their other meeting, they said, “We have to come to sacrament meeting first.” It was a great testimony to me of the importance of the Lord’s sacrament.
Members brought a lot of friends and neighbors to the meeting. One sister in the ward brought eight friends who had never been to church before! As more and more people arrived, we needed to open the overflow room. The count of the sacrament attendance was 215 people! All through the meeting, I could feel that the Holy Ghost was with us and that God helped us to be successful in this endeavor.
After this amazing Sunday, the number of people who regularly attend sacrament meeting increased. This included three Melchizedek Priesthood holders who began attending church regularly with their families. One family even had two of their children baptized and confirmed the following month.
Our stake leaders saw what a good experience this was for our ward and decided to hold a similar event. For the stake event, the members in the stake each made a commitment to attend their own wards on the same Sunday. The event also had great success throughout the stake—I know that one ward in our stake had 208 people attend! I am so grateful for the blessings that I and my ward and my stake have received because of these events and for the Spirit we felt preparing for and participating in them.

In the Allentown Branch, Reading Pennsylvania Stake (USA), Tracy Norton, the Young Women president, and the young women in her ward used True to the Faith while studying the Articles of Faith, a project they hoped would give them confidence to share the gospel by helping them better understand the Church’s basic points of beliefs.
“I try to use True to the Faith for my lessons as much as possible and encourage the young women to use it with their questions,” Sister Norton said. “True to the Faith covers many topics relating to the struggles the youth face and offers the Church’s stance on those and other important topics. I believe it’s important to introduce a source they can go to for answers.”
Sister Norton believes that because they were able to focus on individual topics, the young women she teaches were better able to understand each principle.
“Using True to the Faith helped increase my understanding of the gospel and helped me have a stronger testimony,” said 14-year-old Genesis Felix, a member of the Allentown Branch. “I keep the book with my scriptures now and often use it to look up topics I don’t completely understand.”

When the sunshine tickled my nose, I woke up. I pulled my quilt a little higher and started to roll over. Then I remembered! It was March 17—the day my family had been waiting for had finally arrived. I jumped out of bed and skipped down the hall, humming, “I Love to See the Temple”* to myself.
After breakfast Mom helped me into my favorite blue dress. Then I helped her dress my baby brother, Curtis, in his Sunday clothes. Today was not Sunday, but it felt just as special. Six months ago my parents had adopted my little brother. He was so cute. His cheeks were really chubby, and when he smiled at me without any teeth, he made me laugh.
Because my parents had been sealed in the temple, I knew that I was born in the covenant. That meant I was sealed to them. But because my brother was adopted, he wasn’t born in the covenant. Today we were going to the Logan Utah Temple to have him sealed to us so our whole family could be together forever someday if we live righteously.
When we arrived at the temple, Mom carried Curtis, and I held her hand. Dad carried three small suitcases. The grass was starting to turn green, and a few birds were singing in the bare branches of the trees. Right in front of the temple were some pretty yellow and purple flowers.
We walked through the front doors, and I felt a warm hug without anyone touching me. A man looked at the recommends my parents showed him. A nice lady led us down a hall to the nursery. My parents gave my brother and me a hug, and Dad handed my little red suitcase to the lady. Then my parents went to another part of the temple. The nice lady let me color a picture, and she rolled a ball to Curtis. He laughed. He loves balls.
After a while, the lady helped me change into my new white dress. Then we changed Curtis’s diaper and put his new white clothes on him. The lady said, “The temple is Heavenly Father’s house, and we should be reverent when we walk through the halls.”
“I don’t know if Curtis knows what reverent means,” I said.
She smiled and said, “Heavenly Father loves little children very much, and He’ll understand if Curtis is a little bit noisy.”
As we walked down the halls, I noticed the white carpet. I also saw some pictures of Jesus on the walls. It was easy to be reverent in such a quiet place. We came to a door that was closed. Another lady softly opened the door, and I looked inside. I saw my grandpas and grandmas and my uncles and aunts. They were all smiling at me. Then I saw my mom. She was dressed in white. She looked like an angel. She held out her arms and gave me a hug. Then she reached for Curtis and held him tight, too.
A man dressed in a white suit, called the sealer, greeted us. He talked about the blessings and promises we could receive through temple ordinances if we live worthily. The sealer then told us what to do. He blessed us by the power of the priesthood, and Curtis was sealed to our family. I looked up at my dad. There were tears on his cheeks. He took Curtis in his arms and held him tightly. Mom had tears in her eyes, too. She squeezed my hand, and I felt her love.
When we stood up, the sealer knelt down so he was just my height and asked me, “Do you know what forever or eternity looks like?”
I shook my head and said, “No.”
Then he told my family to stand together and look into a mirror. There was another mirror behind us, too. I looked, and I saw my mom holding Curtis and my dad holding me. I was surprised because I could see us again and again and again and we never seemed to stop. Then the sealer whispered to me, “That is what forever looks like.”
Now, whenever I remember that special day, I think about what forever is like. I imagine my family going on and on, always being together and smiling. I like to think about forever. It gives me a warm feeling inside.

Imagine having the opportunity to share the gospel with people from 11 different countries at the same time! That’s what Mark Fletcher was able to do during the summer. He was selected as a youth ambassador for the city of Phoenix and given the opportunity to visit Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic. Everywhere he went, with city officials, at camps, and in social gatherings, Mark was recognized as a Latter-day Saint and often answered questions about his standards.

Then similar youth ambassadors from 11 countries gathered in Phoenix, and Mark was able to talk about the Church with them as well. It was great to follow his brother’s example of missionary work in Brazil by sharing his testimony with youth from all over the world.

It was at Dixie that Kalin was first introduced to the Church. He became friends with some Polynesian players who were returned missionaries. Kalin says, “They welcomed everybody. They were so friendly and nice. I felt comfortable around them.”
One of his new friends, Jack Damuni, tells what happened. “I was in my room doing some homework. A Catholic friend came in and started asking me questions about the Church. Kalin walked in, sat on my bed, and just listened. We were talking about the Godhead and how the Spirit lets you know if things are true, and about our purpose here on earth. Kalin wasn’t saying anything. I turned and looked at him, and he started crying. I knew what was happening.”
Of course, Kalin remembers everything about that day. “Religion had always interested me. I listened to what both of them were saying. I was really struck by a lot of things Jack said. It was a good feeling that I had.”
They were an hour late for a team meeting. The coach bawled them out for being late until they told him they had been talking about the Church and were too involved to think of anything else.
As they were walking back to the dorms, Kalin started asking more questions. “Hey, Jack, what was that I felt back there? I felt something that really touched me. It made me cry.”
Jack said, “Remember when we were talking about how the Holy Spirit lets you know when things are true? That’s what it was.”
Kalin said, “It’s a good feeling. I felt calm.”
As Kalin began taking the missionary discussions, some strange things started to happen. Jack had warned his friend that once he started reading the scriptures and became interested in the Church, people would try to convince him that the Church was wrong. It happened just as Jack said.
“People started being involved in my life who never had been before,” said Kalin. “They were telling me how racist the religion is. To me, the black and white thing has never been an issue—never has been and never will be. I can’t honestly see anyone entering the celestial kingdom if they are prejudiced. Christ said we are all his children.”
Jack Damuni baptized his friend and watched him grow and progress as he became more and more involved in the Church. Two years later, Jack was Kalin’s teammate on the Brigham Young University football team. They are still very close, like brothers. Jack has seen a big change in Kalin. “He’s focused. Everything he does is focused on the gospel.”

Let me explain what I mean with this account told by a young journalist in his own words.

I was . . . driving to a scene I didn’t want to see. A man . . . had accidentally backed his pickup truck over his baby granddaughter in the driveway of the family home. It was a fatality.
As I parked. . . I saw a stocky, white-haired man in cotton work clothes standing near a pickup. Cameras were trained on him, and reporters were sticking microphones in his face. Looking totally bewildered, he was trying to answer their questions. Mostly he was only moving his lips, blinking and choking up.
. . . I can still see in my mind’s eye that devastated old man looking down at the place in the driveway where the child had been. Beside the house was a freshly spaded flower bed, and nearby a pile of dark, rich earth.
“I was just backing up there to spread that good dirt,” he said to me, though I had not asked him anything. “I didn’t even know she was outdoors.” He stretched his hand toward the flower bed, then let it flop to his side.
. . . I went into the house to find someone who could provide a recent photo of the toddler. A few minutes later, with all the details in my notebook and a . . . studio portrait of the . . . child. . . in my. . . pocket, I went toward the kitchen where the police had said the body was.
. . . Entering the kitchen, I came upon this scene:
On a Formica-topped table, backlighted by a frilly curtained window, lay the tiny body, wrapped in a clean white sheet. Somehow the grandfather had managed to stay away from the crowd. He was sitting on a chair beside the table in profile to me and unaware of my presence, looking uncomprehendingly at the swaddled corpse.
The house was very quiet. A clock ticked. As I watched, the grandfather slowly leaned forward, curved his arms like parentheses around the head and feet of the little form, then pressed his face to the shroud and remained motionless.
In that hushed moment I recognized the makings of a prize-winning news photograph. I appraised the light, adjusted the lens setting and distance, locked a bulb in the flashgun, raised the camera and composed the scene in the viewfinder.
Every element of the picture was perfect: the grandfather in his plain work clothes, his white hair backlighted by sunshine, the child’s form wrapped in the sheet, the atmosphere of the simple home. . . . Outside, the police could be seen inspecting the . . . pickup while the child’s mother and father leaned in each other’s arms.
I don’t know how many seconds I stood there unable to snap that shutter. I was keenly aware of the powerful story-telling value that photo would have, and my professional conscience told me to take it. Yet I couldn’t make my hand fire that flashbulb and intrude on the poor man’s island of grief.
At length I lowered the camera and crept away shaken with doubt about my suitability for the journalistic profession. Of course I never told the city editor or any fellow reporters about that missed opportunity for a perfect news picture.
Every day, on the newscasts and in the papers, we see pictures of people in extreme conditions of grief and despair. Human suffering has become a spectator sport. And sometimes, as I’m watching news film, I remember that day.
I still feel right about what I did. [James Alexander Thom, “The Perfect Picture,” Readers Digest, Aug. 1976, p. 113–14]

Having his family join the Church when he was six, Alexandr Masenkov looked forward to the day he would receive the priesthood. Now, as a priest, he is finding that each office in the Aaronic Priesthood prepared him for the next.
“I was ordained to the office of priest when I turned 16. I realized the weight of my responsibility to bless the sacrament because of how important this ordinance is for every Church member. I prepared for it all week. As I blessed the sacrament the first time, the Spirit touched my heart. Once, my father and I were assigned to take the sacrament to a man who was blind and paralyzed. It was the first time I had blessed the sacrament outside of the meetinghouse. I felt I had a responsibility to be a servant and a witness of Jesus Christ and to do what He would do if He were there.”Alexandr Masenkov, Nevsky Branch, St. Petersburg Russia District

“Just meet me at 6:30 tomorrow night,” she tells her friends, being purposefully vague about what she’s planning. Aarika has invited 20 nonmember friends to participate in something she promises “will get you into the Christmas spirit.”
That something is a night of caroling to people in a rest home and a visit to the Los Angeles Temple grounds. Aarika thought this would be a great missionary tool to help introduce her friends to the Church.
It isn’t her first missionary experience, and it certainly won’t be her last. If there’s one thing Aarika knows, it’s how to tell people about the gospel. Then again, she’d never done anything like this with this many people.
So Aarika went to work. A week before Christmas she arranged for her friends to meet at the home of Bruce and Kathryn Ghent. He is Aarika’s stake president, and Sister Ghent volunteered to prepare a light dinner in her home.
Of the 20 friends invited, 12 came, and none of them knew what they’d be doing. They showed up because they were curious and because they liked Aarika.
“I had prayed before I did this. I was scared to death,” Aarika recalls. “You have to know how scared I was to do this. I had fasted and prayed that the girls would feel the Spirit, so I knew I needed something to get them in the spiritual zone.” That’s where the caroling came in.
After dinner, the group drove to a rest home to sing to the residents. But instead of “Jingle Bells” and “Winter Wonderland,” Aarika borrowed hymnals from her ward, and the girls sang Christmas hymns about the Savior’s birth. “Some of my friends had never been caroling. We sat with the people; we sang to them. And my friends were saying, ‘I love this.’”
Aarika was too.
After the rest home visit, it was time to go to the Los Angeles Temple to see the grounds decorated with Christmas lights. Aarika gave a short explanation about why the Church has temples; then she took them into the visitors’ center to watch The Lamb of God.
The group also saw another short film, Luke 2, followed by a walk around the temple while drinking hot chocolate and looking at the lights.
“My friends asked me tons of questions and kept asking me, ‘What am I feeling? I love this feeling.’” It was then that Aarika took the opportunity to bear her testimony.
“The best part was seeing my friends look at the Church in a different way. I think that night they actually felt why I love the gospel so much,” she says. “We grew close that night, and it strengthened my testimony.”

Several years ago in Osaka, Japan, I received a telephone call from one of the Japanese officers of the Church requesting an appointment. I invited him to my hotel room and there listened to one of the most intelligent and articulate young men I had ever met.
He was a college graduate. He had majored in a special field of science and was employed by a stable, conservative corporation. One of his classmates, who had been at the top of the graduating class in the same field, was employed by a young, progressive firm in Tokyo. Several times in recent months this classmate had tried to entice his friend to change jobs. One of the vice-presidents of the firm in Tokyo made contact with the Church member, saying he could set his own salary at three or four times what he was then making.
The response was, “If there is the slightest question in the minds of the officers of my church about my leaving Osaka, which would require my being released from my Church position, it doesn’t matter how much money you offer me, I will have no interest in your proposal.” The vice-president replied, “I am not a Christian. I know nothing about your religion, but you are the kind of man I want in my organization.”
Should he move from Osaka to Tokyo, which would require his release from his Church assignment? Of course, I assured him that he could serve the Lord in Tokyo as well as in Osaka.
He moved to Tokyo. Later, while visiting that city, I received another call from the same man. We visited for quite some time. He had become extremely successful. He had broadened his experiences and was now a consultant teaching top management personnel in major corporations how to operate their companies. His time was in great demand. He was earning a large income. But he was neglecting his Church work and his family responsibilities.
I told him I wouldn’t tell him what he should do, but that there was a scripture that would tell him if he truly was converted: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matt. 6:33.) I sensed that this scripture might have caused a little antagonism; however, we parted as good friends.
A few weeks after I returned home, I received a letter from him. He said he had his priorities straightened out. He had resigned from the company. His first priority now would be his family and the Church, and his second priority would be employment. Setting priorities and then reviewing them to see that we are not straying is one of the most valuable lessons we can learn.

One of these small acts of kindness was performed by Sister Lucy Carr, and led to my first contact with the Church. Sister Carr, a pioneer of the gospel in South Africa, was a schoolteacher at a primary school where my sister Carol also taught. One day, Sister Carr gave Carol a copy of a Church-produced magazine called The Friend, recommending that it had some good stories for Carol to read to her grade 1 class. She accepted the magazine and followed Sister Carr’s recommendation.

Carol then noticed it was a magazine published by a church and asked Sister Carr a few questions about it and the Church. Over a short period, the questions continued. When the time was right, Sister Carr asked Carol if she would be interested in having the full-time missionaries visit her and answer more questions. Carol agreed and as a result, joined the Church in 1971.

Sister Lucy Carr—for taking that step of sharing the gospel in a normal and natural way with my sister Carol, which led to my baptism and conversion.

One day, Heber J. Grant’s uncle asked Heber and his cousin a question.
Uncle: Have you boys ever read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover?
Cousin: Not yet.
Heber: Me neither.
Uncle: How about a little contest then? I’ll give the first boy to finish the book a nice pair of buckskin gloves.
Heber really wanted the gloves. He started reading that same night.
Cousin: How many pages did you read last night, Heber?
Heber: I read 25.
Cousin: I’m going to beat you! I stayed up most of the night and read 150!
Heber was disappointed that he would probably lose the contest, but he kept reading the Book of Mormon anyway. He read slowly so he could understand it better.
Heber: I finished reading the Book of Mormon today, Uncle Anthony.
Uncle: You did? Congratulations! You’ve won the contest.
Even though Heber’s cousin had gotten a fast start, he hadn’t read a page since. Heber was grateful he had won the gloves. But even more important, he was grateful he had gained a testimony of the Book of Mormon.

“I remember more than 30 years ago when I was first called to be a visiting teacher, I was assigned a young woman who never came to church,” recalls Catherine Carr Humphrey of the Hillside Ward, Rancho Cucamonga California Stake. “She impressed me in those early 1970s as a hippie type. I faithfully went every month and knocked on her door. She would open the inside door but leave the screen door shut. I was never really sure what she looked like. She would not say anything. She would just stand there. I would look cheerful and say, ‘Hi, I’m Cathie, your visiting teacher.’ And as she would say nothing, I would say, ‘Well, our lesson today is on …’ and try briefly to say something uplifting and friendly. When I was through, she would say, ‘Thank you,’ and shut the door.
“I did not like going there. I felt embarrassed. But I went because I wanted to be obedient. After about seven or eight months of this, I got a phone call from the bishop.
“‘Cathie,’ he said, ‘the young woman you visit teach just had a baby who lived only a few days. She and her husband are going to have a graveside service, and she asked me to see if you would come and be there with her. She said you are her only friend.’
“I went to the cemetery. The young woman, her husband, the bishop, and I were at the graveside. That was all. I had seen her only once a month for a few minutes at a time. I hadn’t even been able to tell through the screen door that she was expecting a baby, yet even my inept but hopeful visiting had blessed us both.”