Gospel Story Finder

What are you doing? That’s where I was going to put the tent!
But these are the best trees for the hammock.
Ugh! You always do everything wrong!
Clara’s so annoying. She never listens to me!
You might disagree with her, but that doesn’t mean you can’t work together.
Maybe Clara and I can try harder to get along.
Will you help me set up the tent over here? That way it won’t block the good view from the hammock!
Sure!

Recently on a flight home, I found myself next to Steve, who shared with me parts of his personal story. He had graduated from high school, entered the U.S. Army as a communications specialist at 18 years old, and soon began working at the White House, providing communications support to the President of the United States. From age 18 to 26, he served two U.S. Presidents. His stories were fascinating!
“Steve,” I said, “you have to write these stories down for your posterity! They need to have these stories firsthand from your perspective.” He agreed.
Then the Spirit prompted me to ask him what he knew about his ancestors. Steve knew plenty about his mother’s side, including a story of how his family had once eaten dinner with Abraham Lincoln while he had been campaigning through the countryside during the 1860 U.S. presidential election.
He knew very little about his father’s side, however. He really wanted to know more. I pulled out my phone and opened the FamilySearch app. “Steve, we can find your family right now!”
I connected to the in-flight Wi-Fi. I rested my phone on the tray table in front of me so we could both see. We searched FamilyTree. Within minutes we were both staring at his great-grandfather’s marriage certificate to his great-grandmother.
“That’s them!” he said. “I remember her last name now!”
The spirit of excitement poured over both of us. We worked on building profiles for his lesser-known ancestors for the next 45 minutes. He asked me to promise him that we would continue searching together in Colorado. We exchanged contact information as the plane was landing.
Here we were, flying 30,000 feet (9,144 m) in the air, with a device as small as my hand, searching for a man and a woman married 100 years ago who had been lost to him and his family. Incredible! But we found them. Families were linked. Stories were remembered. Feelings of gratitude were felt for the technology and the tools. It was nothing short of a miracle.
Jonathan Petty, Colorado, USA
Photograph from Getty Images

One day in my fourth-grade religion class in Jamaica, my teacher asked all the students to tell about their religious beliefs. Since I was the only Mormon in my prep school, I was chosen to represent The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
By the time it was my turn, my heart was beating a hundred miles a minute. I was never much of a public speaker, and I didn’t have a loud voice. When I stood up, I just stared at the sea of eyes before me and tried to speak about some of our beliefs. I first spoke about the Word of Wisdom, then talked about the sacrament, about how we used bread and water to represent the Savior’s body and blood when he died for us.
Before I could say another word, everyone started laughing at me. Tears stung my eyes as I wondered what I had said to make them laugh. I quickly wiped my eyes and went to my seat amid chants of “Bread and water, bread and water.” By the end of the day I was still being teased, so when it was time to go home I was overjoyed. I still don’t know why they decided to make fun of what I was saying.
When I got home, I took my mother’s huge Bible off the shelf and began looking at some of the pictures. As I was flipping a page, I glimpsed a scripture and quickly turned back to it. It was Matthew 10:32: “Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.” [Matt. 10:32] As I read the words over and over, a feeling of peace washed over me as I realized it didn’t matter who laughed at me, as long as I was doing what was right.

Last summer the priests quorum of the Eagle Eighth Ward in Eagle, Idaho, took part in a four-day high-adventure service project on the Duck Valley Indian Reservation. Over the course of the four days the young men painted two homes, built wheelchair ramps and railings for four homes, replaced the windows in the home of a local minister, and built a sand volleyball court, fire pit, two tables, and two barbecue grills at the branch meetinghouse. At an inter-tribe rodeo, the priests also distributed over 420 blankets, boots, and winter coats that had been collected by one of the priests for his Eagle Scout project.
The young men and their leaders also visited local members’ homes and shared spiritual lessons. On Sunday, local leaders asked them to provide talks and lessons for the branch services. Trent Anderson, one of the priests, said of the experience, “This high adventure helped me learn more about charity, service, and the culture of another people. We finished all the work we had expected and even some other projects given us while we were there. It helped our testimonies grow by trusting in the Lord and in His power.”

I have gone back to these scriptures over and over again. They apply to so much more than just being single. We are constantly in different waiting periods in our lives—waiting on blessings or answers or major life changes. My husband and I right now have been waiting and hoping to have children. I’ve watched as sisters and friends have gotten pregnant and had children while we’ve prayed and waited for the same blessing.
This wait has been hard and often heartbreaking, but there have been many blessings and opportunities at the same time. I have been able to complete a graduate degree, grow within my career, create a home where family and friends feel loved and welcome, continue to serve in Church callings and volunteer, and seek personal revelation and direction. My husband and I are trying to use this time to become the type of people (and hopefully future parents) that God wants us to be. We can’t shorten the wait, but we can try not to waste it.
Sometimes it’s hard to keep this perspective. Like Paul wrote, sometimes we’re “full” and other times we’re “hungry.” It’s through Christ and His grace that we’re ever able to be both together, to find that careful balance between contentment and hope. Where so much of life is made up of waiting, I’m trying not to miss the blessings and lessons that can come at the same time.
Lori Fuller Sosa has worked on the Friend magazine for more than a decade and loves it. Since writing this article, she and her husband are now expecting a baby! They’re very excited and trying to make the most of this new wait.

Daniel’s panic on the stage at the election convention did not come from shyness. It stems from a fear of microphones and cameras developed when he was interviewed over and over again by television reporters featuring him on TV as an adoptable child. Before the age of 11, he was adopted twice. Both adoptions were terminated. And he lived in many foster homes in between. Then the Larry King family of Bountiful adopted Daniel. He now happily belongs to a loving family of eight children. “I’m an uncle, too!” he proudly exclaims. When it’s mentioned to Daniel that he went through some hard times as a little boy, he says, “Yep,” (his face tenses, then relaxes) “but I got over ’em.”

Consider what you might do if placed in this situation. Early one morning, one of our senior couples serving in South Africa was awakened by a loud knocking at his door. Upon answering the door Elder Packer found two uniformed, armed policemen. They instructed him to dress and that he needed to come with them. They arrested him and placed him in a holding cell with all of the men who had been arrested that night. Some were intoxicated; some had committed robberies and many other offenses. He remained in the cell some nine hours and amazingly was not accosted or hurt. While in the cell, he asked himself, "Why would the Lord allow me to be placed here? He must have something in mind." He decided to discover the reason, and so he began speaking with the men. He even persuaded some to begin singing a few hymns with him. He realized, though innocent, there was an opportunity to stop worrying about himself and begin worrying about those around him. In other words, he put the needs of others ahead of his own.
As the day concluded, the missionary was being called "Elder" by the prisoners. They not only sang the hymns but they defended the missionary from less-than-honorable jail mates. He befriended several who were as innocent as he was. Many were blessed by the Lord through Elder Packer's sacrifice; and Elder Packer was lifted to a new level of understanding and vision of how the Lord can use him, even in prison. Forgetting his own discomforts, he placed others ahead of his feelings and fears.

For many youth, the reward for finding out so much about their ancestors was taking their names to the Snowflake Arizona Temple to do baptisms and confirmations for the dead.
“It was the neatest experience to go to the temple and do baptisms for the people in my family I had worked so hard to find,” says Janalie Wilkins. To complete her Individual Worth Value Project, she spent time at her local family history center learning how to use the Personal Ancestral File (PAF) computer program and researching her relatives on the Internet.
“At first, it seemed overwhelming,” admits Janalie. “But then I remembered the scripture about baptisms for the dead: ‘They without us cannot be made perfect—neither can we without our dead be made perfect’ (D&C 128:15). I have a testimony of that now. Doing genealogy work is very important and helps us grow closer to Heavenly Father.
“And it’s not just for old people,” she adds with a grin. “There are millions of people waiting for their work to be done.”

I’ve had many problems with my temper. I used to yell at people because I thought they were such idiots. My temper had a very short fuse. The way I overcame my “short fuse” was by reading the Book of Mormon, writing my feelings down on paper, and making a conscious effort to change. After about a week, I could tell that I wasn’t getting mad at people nearly as often.
Elder John O. Leyer, 19Indianapolis, Indiana

Lethbridge, Alberta, is quite a long way from the Sweetwater River in Wyoming, but during a recent pioneer trek, they looked a little bit the same. Three boys from the Lethbridge Stake—Randy Bullock, Drew Walters, and Brett Barfuss—were inspired by a story they heard about three young men who helped rescue members of the Martin Handcart Company. The young men carried many Saints through the icy river, risking their own lives to save others.
The boys in Lethbridge reenacted the brave service rendered by those young men so long ago. And although they didn’t risk their lives to carry their friends across Lee’s Creek, all the youth felt of the sweet spirit that service brings.

About 11 o’clock we drove up to the home of Mons Andersen, and out came Sister Christine Andersen to bid us welcome and put her arms around us one by one and kiss the rest of them. When my turn came, that was something I was not used to, so I didn’t know what to do. For some reason I didn’t run away. A host of neighbor children and aged folks came around us and shook hands with us. I guess they bid us welcome, for I could not understand a word of English. The children were at Sunday School but soon arrived home. They also kissed us welcome, and by that time I was kind of getting used to it. But they surely made us feel at home.
There was another striking thing that helped me on my way toward investigation. It was just when lots of fruit was ripe, such as strawberries, gooseberries, and early apples. Those who have met Sister Andersen know what a loving disposition she had. She said, “Go out and help yourselves.” If it had not been for her loving way, I could barely have thought she meant it. But she surely did. It was something different to what it was in Norway. I was getting closer to joining the church.
Now I hadn’t had time to think of what to do to earn a living in a strange land with a strange language. On Friday morning, July 26, 1872, there came a man to the house of Mons Andersen who wanted a boy to help him in the field. His name was Peter Petersen. My wages were $8.00 a month. I worked with him 20 months. I must now tell a little that happened in that time. It was customary at that time that newcomers should be rebaptized. So Peter Petersen’s wife, Karen Larsen Petersen, told me, “There will be baptisms today. So you must hitch up the horses and take these people down to the mill pond to be baptized. And you must be baptized too.” I told her I would be glad to take them down, but I was not ready for baptism yet.
That coming winter I started to go to school so I could learn a little English. I had also gone with Mons Andersen’s boys to Sunday School. Eischa Pack was the teacher at that time. They were reading in turns out of the Bible; but when it came my turn to read, Brother Pack would read my verse, and there was not even a moment wasted. I was glad although I could not understand what they said. Yet I got to enjoying Sunday School. Sister Karen Larsen Petersen became sick and died on February 7, 1873, and that ended my schooling at that time. But I learned enough so I got into the Third Reader.
Now I had been studying the gospel and praying about it. I knew Jesus’s answer to Nicodemus as we find recorded in the third chapter of John: “Except a man is born of water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of Heaven.” [John 3:5] So on August 30, 1873, I was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by Mons Andersen and confirmed by Abraham Lossee in Lehi.

Brent Robinson rescued a woman’s son who was stranded on a cliff. “A lady knocked at our door and said her son was trapped. We got a rope, and I climbed to where he was stranded. I couldn’t get him down from below the cliff, so I came down to him from above and then pulled him up with the rope,” Brent said. Brent, 16, is from Post 363, Kanab Third Ward, Kanab Utah Stake.
Brent advised hikers to always travel with a partner and not to take shortcuts. “Stay on the trail or you’ll get in trouble,” he said. Daniel warned swimmers to know the water they’re swimming in and not to swim in conditions beyond their capability. Kristin advised everyone to learn how to swim and to become familiar with lifesaving techniques. Brother Crockett advised those who find themselves in an emergency to do something, rather than just watch, which complemented Brother Johnson’s advice to “be quick and alert, but think things out before you act. Keep calm and don’t panic. Move as quickly as possible and listen for guidance from the Lord.” Mike Poppleton said Scouts should pay attention during classes on lifesaving techniques so that when an emergency does arise, they’ll be able to think of what to do. And the entire group agreed that proper training is vital and that people should be careful about what they do if they have had no training.

She was sure it was late fall of 1993. At least that’s what Amy Westerby thought when she left Provo one morning to travel to Antelope Island located in the middle of the Great Salt Lake in Utah. Somewhere along the way, she seemed to go back in time 600 years before Christ.
Amy had been selected to play the character Susan in the new seminary videos where truths from the Book of Mormon are played out in modern scenarios. This day she was there to participate in the opening shots of the video called I Will Prepare the Way, where her character walks along a long, white sand beach. She was also going to get the chance to see Nephi’s boat being built.
According to Amy it was amazing to see a huge wooden boat being constructed before her eyes. And the men playing Nephi and his brothers were so realistically dressed. It felt a little like a time machine. “It was great just to be there,” said Amy, “and watch the whole thing happen.”
The video first follows the story of Nephi being commanded to build a ship. His brothers ridicule him, but Nephi knows that the Lord will not give him a commandment without preparing the way for him to accomplish it. Then the story switches to a modern one where one girl, Susan (played by Amy), feels inspired to help another girl, Linda (played by Coco Warner), become active in the Church again. Like Nephi, she has some people in her life who tell her it can’t be done. But, like Nephi, she has faith that the Lord will help her find a way.
Coco had to try to imagine what it would be like not to understand about faith and how she would react to the persistence of a new friend. Coco said, “I wasn’t the cool cheerleader type in high school like my character is. But I did know people like her that when you first meet them you think they are perfect and that they have everything. When you get to know them, you find out they are really insecure about a lot of things. I just tried to remember people like that who kept everybody at a distance or seemed kind of untouchable, but when you break through and really talk to them, they are down to earth and have their problems just like everybody else.”
The ship was finished at last. The sun was setting, turning the sky all colors of red and gold. It was the perfect concluding shot for the video. The ship became a symbol, a symbol of something the Lord asked to have done and of the help he gave to those who listened to him. Just like Nephi building the ship, we all are asked to build friendships to help each other stay close to the Lord through participation in the Church.
The video shows that sometimes miraculous things are accomplished by people who didn’t start out knowing if they would succeed or not. They had faith, and the Lord helped them find a way.

June 18 and 19 also found another group of young Latter-day Saints from ten stakes in Spanish Fork, Utah, together in Santaquin Canyon. By 3:00 P.M. Friday many had already arrived. Registration continued until 6:00 P.M. with over 350 people signing up to spend the next two days together.
After a full day of registration and other activities, the youth filled the lodge to hear Elder Marion D. Hanks. Using the opening song as a springboard, he explained the difference between moving your arm up and down to the piano and really leading the music. “It’s all in the spirit of the song,” he said. “You need to feel what you are leading and make it a part of you. So it is with the gospel. We need to live it.” After Elder Hanks’ address, the youth cleared the lodge of chairs and made ready for a dance.
Six o’clock in the morning came too early, but everyone made it out of bed after some struggle. After the posting of the colors the Spanish Fork youth gathered in the fresh canyon morning to listen to one anothers’ testimonies. A breakfast of sausage, scrambled eggs, hot cakes, and hot chocolate was ready to eat as soon as the closing prayer was given. High councilors and their wives from all the stakes prepared the breakfast. It only took 30 minutes to fill all the plates once, but that didn’t account for the many return trips. The rest of the morning was jam-packed with workshops.
As the group finished lunch, a master of ceremonies took over, and a talent show was underway. Skits, songs, readings—many different talents were presented. Soon everyone in the lodge was laughing as hard as those on stage. As soon as the talent show ended, everyone got in on the act. Teams of ten were formed, and relay contests opened with nail driving. Three-legged races are common, but has anyone ever tried a four-legged race with three people tied together? As the last relay ended, so did the fun of the two-day conference.

A year ago I went with President Kimball back to his home in Arizona. And we visited the home where he grew up as a little boy. We climbed the winding stairs up to a bare room. And there the little boy, before he was a deacon, read the Bible by lamplight. We looked out the window from that upstairs room, and we saw the barns out in back where the cows had been. He used to milk nine cows every morning and night, the old-fashioned way. And as he milked the cows he learned the Articles of Faith, he learned the hymns, and he learned the Ten Commandments. He wrote them down on a little card and put them on the ground where he could look as he milked the cows.
And as he did these things, he made decisions about things he would and would not do. He was growing up, and he knew there were a lot of things that were good and a lot that were bad. He decided that when someone offered him a cigarette, he would say no. If someone offered him tea or coffee he would say no. If they suggested that he be immoral, he would say no; to lie or to cheat, he would say no. He made those decisions when he was a little boy, before he was a deacon. He would do as his mother had taught him. He would keep the commandments.
And so as he grew older and the boys all came around and said, “Spencer, will you have a cigarette? Will you have a drink of whiskey? Will you have some coffee?” he didn’t worry about hurting their feelings. He had decided just once to say no, and after that it was easy always to say no to the bad things. And that is how he has lived his life all these years.

“As a young man in high school I was told that I would be better advised to be a plumber than an artist. I didn’t follow that advice, and with a lot of effort and some good teachers, I achieved my goal. My recently completed doctoral dissertation was concerned with the psychological process of learning to create art. I now work as an artist-teacher.”

Dr. Grant L. LundAssistant Professor of ArtSoutheast Missouri State University

Superior Branch of the Missoula Montana Stake put on its very first road show. With only five active members in the Mutual, the youth recruited members of the branch presidency and a couple of Primary children to participate with them. With the help and confidence building of their leaders, they wrote their own script, made their costumes, and found help with providing live music. Those participating were Vince Price; Shaleen, Lane, and Deana Morgan; Rick, Buffy, and Grant Seemann.

“On fast Sunday, Íngrid is the first in our family to get up and bear her testimony in sacrament meeting, and she bears her testimony like an adult,” says her dad. “Sometimes she’ll ask me, ‘Are you going to bear your testimony today?’ I’ll usually tell her I’m not sure, because it’s hard for me to speak in public. And she’ll tease me by saying, ‘If you don’t, I’ll call you from the pulpit to come up and do it.’ I’ll say, ‘Don’t you dare!’ She smiles happily if I do go up.”

Ramona Morris was born into a Christian home with parents who attended the Methodist church. During her late teens, she stopped attending regularly because she felt that church was more about money and people’s status than about Jesus Christ. Following some disappointing experiences with a few churches, Ramona stopped attending for a while.
One day, years after giving up on organized religion, she saw the movie Meet the Mormons. She didn’t give much thought to it. Shortly after that, she saw some missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints sheltering on her gallery, or porch, from the rain. As a kind gesture, she gave them an umbrella.
Ramona and the missionaries exchanged the umbrella several times over the coming weeks. Eventually, the missionaries asked if she would be interested in learning about the gospel. At first, she told them no but came around after discovering that her grandmother had listened to a couple of lessons from two missionaries while in England working as a nurse after leaving Barbados as a part of the Windrush generation. However, she was naturally still a little nervous because 90 percent of her family was Methodist.
The new church was five minutes from her grandmother’s home near Rendezvous Hill. It had always been a source of curiosity, but she had never felt prompted to attend or to ask questions. “I asked the missionaries to give me the gospel lessons,” she recalls, “but it wasn’t easy with so many of my family being Methodists.”
The lessons began, but progress was slow. “I think the missionaries were going to drop me soon,” she shared, recalling her slowness of understanding the gospel. The missionaries asked me to go to church many times, but I didn’t want to go because I was afraid my family would find out I left my childhood religion.”
A few weeks later, she informed the missionaries that she would be traveling. The pair then gave her some homework. “I was planning on going on a cruise,” she said, “and the missionaries asked me to read the Book of Mormon during the week. I agreed just to get them to stop asking me.”
While on the cruise, she lost an expensive camera lens and had a massive panic attack in front of the dining area passengers. With the help of another passenger and a Barbadian waiter, she was able to locate the equipment in the ship’s lost and found.
Once she had returned to her room, she told her mother what had happened. Right then, she laid her hand on the Book of Mormon. She felt peaceful and began reading it. “Two months later I was baptized.”
Ramona’s mother came to the baptism after seeing the transformation in her daughter and was impressed by what she saw. “She liked the feeling she got when she was at the church and realized that it was different,” said Ramona.
Her mother started taking missionary lessons and was baptized four months after Ramona and a few days before her daughter’s birthday.
During the following year, Ramona enjoyed a temple trip to the Dominican Republic for a young single adult conference. “It was a special experience for me, even though I was sad because my grandmother had just passed away.” Reflecting on her experience, she added, “Later, during FSY (For the Strength of Youth) 2019, I was able to go and complete my grandmother’s temple work in the Dominican Republic. It was very emotional for me,” Ramona said.
Ramona had been her grandmother’s caretaker during the last part of her life. During that time, “I was going through a difficult time when my grandmother passed in 2018, I needed something to help me get out of the way I was feeling.”
Knowing her situation and needs, her missionary friends suggested she investigate The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints’ Pathway program. At first, the program wasn’t available in Barbados. This program is now called PathwayConnect and has grown from 50 students in three U.S. cities to tens of thousands of students in numerous locations worldwide.
Today, Ramona has a year left before she graduates with a bachelor’s in marriage and family studies. “I’m so grateful I kept on pushing through, especially in the difficult times,” she said.
She plans to continue her schooling until she has her master’s degree in marriage and family therapy. Ramona now teaches others about PathwayConnect while she continues her own educational goals.

Inside the locker room, you could hear the fans cheering. The Iowa, USA, women’s high school varsity basketball championship game was about to begin. The team in black jerseys—who’d clawed their way into the finals—were ready.
Sixteen girls listened attentively to an inspiring pump-up speech from team manager Hailey B., 16.
In her pregame speech, Hailey told them, “We’ve worked hard for this the entire season, and now it’s our chance to prove we can be champions.” Then they stormed the court as the crowd roared.
Oh, and by the way, Hailey’s team won the state title, 46-42.