Gospel Story Finder

For thirteen years I was a devoted, “born again” Christian and an equally devoted anti-Mormon. As part of an organized evangelical program, I talked to people in stores, in parks, and in their homes, seeking to share the “good news of the gospel.”
Many of those people I encountered in my evangelical work were Latter-day Saints. I took every opportunity to tell them that their church was not of God, but was a cult inspired by Satan. I was well-read in anti-Mormon literature, and my heart ached for those “misguided Mormons.” They went about trying to “work” their way to heaven, believing in the words of a self-appointed prophet named Joseph Smith.
I told them again and again that those works didn’t count. Only those people who ask Jesus into their hearts will go to heaven, I said. All others, good and evil, share a fate of agony and eternal separation from God.
“What about those who have never heard of Jesus?” I was always asked. Having no answer, I quietly ignored the question.

Our dad is a police officer. A couple of years ago when we lived in Australia, Dad was working at a big convention. Important people from all over the world were coming. There were lots of protesters, and Dad’s job was to protect the people attending the convention. It lasted five days, and it was on the television news all the time because the protesters were angry and causing problems.
Dad worked long hours and was hardly ever home during that time. We watched television as much as possible to find out what was going on. One morning, Mum turned on the TV, and Dad was on the news! The protesters were getting out of control, and the police officers were having a difficult time protecting the people at the meeting. Mum turned off the TV, and we knelt down and said a prayer. We asked Heavenly Father to protect our dad.
When Dad got home that night, he was very tired. We told him we had prayed for him that morning that he would be protected. Dad smiled. He told us that he had been on the front line facing the protesters when the sergeant told him to leave the line and go cover a different area. After he left, several police officers were injured and had to be taken to the hospital. The sergeant had made him leave the front line shortly after we had finished our prayer.
We are children of God. We can pray to Heavenly Father anytime, anywhere. We know that He hears and answers our prayers.Jessica and Jaime Zurzolo, ages 11 and 6, Weippe, Idaho

In 2024, a big flood caused a lot of damage in eastern Spain. Elder Soares visited and shared his love with the members of the Church there.

We began to attend church. I didn’t want to accept the gospel at first, but the missionaries persuaded me to see what it was all about. As soon as I did, I loved it. I am so grateful for my mother. She received a testimony during that first visit of the missionaries. From her baptism until today, she never missed a Church meeting.

Family home evening is a time you can learn as a family and have fun! Jayden C. from Texas, USA, says, “One time we shot Nerf bows and arrows at each other for a family home evening activity. Dodging the arrows taught us about avoiding the fiery darts of the adversary. Now that I’ve been hit by Nerf arrows, I understand that the fiery darts of the adversary are not something you want to run into. These activities helped my siblings and me grow closer to our Heavenly Father and our family.”

He’d never forget the day he’d driven the car home from the paint shop, so gloriously white that it glowed. She had been waiting on the porch when he’d rounded the corner, his horn blasting across the neighborhood. She’d whooped and hollered and raced him to his driveway.

“It’s beautiful! It’s all white and pretty, and it’s ours!”

“You bet it is, kid. Hop inside and we’ll take it for a spin.”

They had gone to the toy store, had bought a red kite with long white streamers, and had taken it to the beach. The sky had been filled with puffy white clouds and a crisp breeze that carried the kite high into the sky and over the waves. He had given her the string, once he’d gotten the kite into the air, and she had run across the sand, her bare feet kicking a trail behind her. The kite had faltered, then fallen, slow and steady, until it had dipped into the ocean and disappeared.

“The kite! It’s drowning!”

“It’s okay.” He’d picked her up and lifted her onto his shoulders. “We’ll buy another one.”

“Wow, I’m on top of the world!”

“Ouuff, you’re on top of me, fatso.”

She had giggled and squealed, and for the first time he’d realized how much he really loved the kid.

Guy remembers all too well his first year at the academy. Six torturous weeks of basic training come first—physical tests of fitness, obstacle courses, marching, climbing, running; psychological tests of loss of personal identity and of following orders no matter what. Cody Carr, a sophomore from Mantua, Utah, also remembers. “You feel like dirt for a while, but each little hassle has a purpose. You all start from zero, and any success you have depends on what you do at the academy.”
The fourthclassmen, or freshmen, are always required to be at attention except when in class, their own rooms, or the latrine. In most places they are not allowed to speak. To cross campus, they must walk only on the white marble borders crisscrossing the terrazzo, the terrace between the academic buildings and the dorms. Freshmen are assigned most of the details and are constantly critiqued by upperclassmen.
“They were always correcting us, and everything was exaggerated,” Cody said. “If there’s a tiny string sticking out from your uniform, they call it a cable. If your arm comes away from your side a quarter of an inch, they say it’s flying in the breeze. You had to run everywhere and could never go fast enough to satisfy them. They expected perfection.” Even at meals, freshmen, also called “doolies” (from the Greek word for slave), are required to sit at attention and to pass food to upperclassmen before they can eat.
Cadets learn that no privilege is to be taken for granted, from breathing on up. It is a big day when they are first allowed to wear civilian clothing or listen to music. Distractions are kept to a minimum because each cadet carries an academic load of 18–21 or more semester hours and is also required to participate in intramural sports. Academic failures soon find themselves back in civilian life.
“There’s a lot of strain,” Guy said, “but the Church is a real relief valve. It provides a way to get out and away from it all on Sundays. When you’re going through pressure, it’s either going to make you or break you. In my case it’s really strengthened my testimony. But there are a lot of things competing for your time—academics, extra-curricular activities, teams, squadron leadership—so it’s easy just to stay here on Sunday and not go to church. You’ll find that the active cadets have to have strong testimonies.”
LDS cadets, even doolies, are allowed to attend a weekly institute class. Guy remembers his first time at institute: “It’s great to see an upperclassman and not have him yell at you. The first time at institute I called an upperclassman sir, and he said, ‘My mamma named me Bill, not sir.’ That sort of put me at ease.
“The amount of contact you have with the Church during the week is limited. Until the academic year starts, doolies aren’t even allowed to go off base to meetings. So the institute is some of the first contact we have with the Church. It’s good to get away from the academic rigors for an evening, and an hour and a half isn’t much to sacrifice. Even now it’s one of the highlights of my week.”
LDS upperclassmen are friendly to LDS doolies, but they let them know they won’t receive any special treatment. Cody explained, “If your eyes wander a little as you’re walking along the terrazzo, one of the LDS upperclassmen might say, ‘What are you staring at mister? Planning on buying the place?’ Then he would add, quietly, ‘By the way, there’s a dance at the ward this Saturday, and you’re invited.’ They want you to know it’s nothing personal, that they respect you because they’ve been through the same thing.”
Both Guy and Cody agreed that being LDS is no disadvantage. Latter-day Saints are held in high repute because of the performance of past LDS cadets. For example, in 1978 both the number one and number two graduates were members of the Church.
“You’re respected if you uphold your standards,” Guy said. “Some nights, for example, I’ll come home late and jump into bed, and my roommate will ask me why I didn’t say my prayers. The other cadets will always order soft drinks for you instead of beer. Once you’ve established yourself, there’s no real friction. The ones who have problems are those who don’t live their own standards. They lose self-respect and the respect of their peers.”
On a typical day, Guy gets up at 4:30 or 5:00 A.M. to finish homework from the night before. Then he gets his room in inspection order, because inspections can come at any time. Breakfast is optional but must be eaten before 7:00. Cadets must be in full uniform and ready for the day by 7:05, and often there’s a squadron meeting until 7:45. Classes begin at 7:55 and last until evening, with some athletic events interspersed in the schedule. There is also a noon formation for lunch and daily marching so tourists can see the cadets. Academic call to quarters starts at 7:30 P.M. and lasts until 11:15. “That’s study time to spend as you need to,” Guy explained. “As you can see, the rest of the day is pretty well scheduled for you.”
“We have a saying here, ‘Sleep is optional,’” Guy continued. “Everything else takes precedence. If you want to get more done, sleep less. Sunday meetings and the weekly institute class really provide a break from that type of pressure, a chance to think about the other side of things.” And Guy does find time to study the scriptures and write in his journal. “I usually stay up until 11:30 or 11:45 and do it then,” he said. Like most of those who go from the academy to the Mission Training Center, he’s likely to discover that his military background will make missionary training seem easy by comparison.

While packing to attend Especially for Youth at a local college campus, I felt as though I should bring an extra copy of the Book of Mormon to pass out. Thinking only members of the Church would be there, I didn’t understand why I would have such a prompting, but I followed it anyway and packed the book.
During several mealtimes, I happened to sit by some girls attending a jazz band camp that was on campus that week. They had a lot of questions about the Church, and I felt the Holy Spirit guide me on what to say. Much of my time was spent teaching instead of eating. I offered the girls the Book of Mormon that I had felt prompted to bring. One accepted it. Then I knew why the Lord had prompted me to bring it.
Be sure to listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit and “trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding” (Prov. 3:5).

While ten-year-old David was picking up trash from the street and putting it into a garbage sack, an elderly neighbor walked over and thanked him, adding, “I used to watch your father do kind things like that when he was about your size. You’re a lot alike.” The compliment made David feel very happy.

Shortly after applying to officers’ candidate school in 1942, President Faust was summoned before a board of inquiry. Nearly all of the questions the board asked him centered on his standards and beliefs. Did he smoke? Did he drink? Did he pray? Though fearful of giving offense, President Faust answered each question without equivocation. Then he was asked whether the moral code should be relaxed during times of war.
“I recognized that here was a chance perhaps to make some points and look broad-minded,” he said. “I suspected that the men who were asking me this question did not live by the standards that I had been taught. The thought flashed through my mind that perhaps I could say that I had my own beliefs, but I did not wish to impose them on others. But there seemed to flash before my mind the faces of the many people to whom I had taught the law of chastity as a missionary. In the end I simply said, ‘I do not believe there is a double standard of morality.’”
To his surprise, he passed the inquiry and was selected for officers’ candidate school.

It helps to take the strangeness and fear out of going down the best-self route when you have not been there for a long time. For example, just before going on a date, you can stop and imagine ahead of time that you are behaving as your best and most competent self on that date, feeling good about keeping your thoughts and acts clean and pure. Then when you are there in reality, you will find it easier to do, just as people who perform in athletic events usually do much better when they pre-experience themselves performing in a perfect way.

One of the first converts in Hawaii, Jonathan Napela helped translate the Book of Mormon into Hawaiian.
Portrait of Jonathan Napela courtesy of Church History Library and Archives
Jonathan H. Napela was a well-respected judge on the island of Maui before he and his wife, Kiti, were baptized in 1851. After Jonathan was forced to resign his judgeship for joining the Church, he devoted his energy to building up the Church among Hawaiian speakers. Jonathan tutored missionary George Q. Cannon in the language, helped translate the Book of Mormon, and developed the first program for training missionaries in any foreign language.
As a result, more than 3,000 native Hawaiians joined the Church within three years. “It is very plain to us that this is the church of God,” Jonathan wrote. “There are many upon these islands who have obtained strong faith by the grace of God, through Jesus Christ the Lord, that we might receive the Holy Ghost.”5
In 1872, Kiti Napela contracted leprosy and was required to move to the leper colony on Moloka’i. Rather than staying among the Saints, Jonathan petitioned the colony to admit him as well. “During the brief time remaining,” he wrote to the board of health, “I want to be with my wife.”6 The petition was granted, and Jonathan became the branch president in Moloka’i. Jonathan worked closely with the local Catholic priest, Father Damien, to minister to all those afflicted with the disease. Jonathan eventually died of leprosy he contracted in the colony.

On 6 April 1853, the Church’s 23rd anniversary and the first day of spring general conference, President Brigham Young, his counsellors Heber Kimball and Willard Richards, and thousands of gathered Saints joyfully witnessed the laying of the Salt Lake Temple cornerstones. Just two weeks later, Jesse Haven, Leonard Smith, and William Walker arrived in Cape Town, South Africa, the first Latter-day Saint missionaries to set foot on the African continent.
The three elders immediately began preaching the restored gospel to individuals and in town hall meetings. On 23 May, the men hiked up Lion’s Head, a mountain near Cape Town, and organized a mission with Brother Haven as president. It is also believed they dedicated South Africa for the preaching of the gospel. Three days later, Joseph Patterson and John Dodd were baptized, and other baptisms soon followed.

When Ron was about 17 and I was about 12, his teacher told him that he needed to gain a testimony of his own. He said to me, “I intend to find out for myself if the Church is true. I’m going to pay any price to know for myself.”
Over the next few weeks, I watched him. I’d find him on his knees praying. I’d see him reading the Book of Mormon. I was amazed at how diligent he was.
One morning a few weeks later, I found Ron lying on his bed with his knees tucked up on his chest. He had great pain in his lower right abdomen.
My mom called for an ambulance. As we stood there over my brother, Ron said to my dad through gritted teeth, “Please, I need a priesthood blessing.” I didn’t know if my dad knew how to give a priesthood blessing. I’d never seen him do it. But he laid his hands on my brother’s head and pronounced a blessing of healing. About the time my dad said, “Amen,” Ron jumped off the bed and said the pain was totally gone. He was absolutely thrilled that the Lord had answered his prayer through that blessing.
My parents still took my brother to the hospital to be checked. All the doctors could say was that Ron’s symptoms sounded like he had had a ruptured appendix, but now they could find no trace of a problem.
Later that day, Ron told me, “Gene, I now know that the gift of healing is real. When Dad put his hands on my head, I felt the Spirit of the Lord go through my whole body. I know the priesthood is real.”
Then he said, “I also now know for myself that the Church is true. Not because of the healing, but because of what has been happening to me in reading the Book of Mormon. I’ve got my testimony by reading and praying over every page. I know all that we’ve been taught in the Church is correct, and I am going on a mission.” I’d never heard Ron say that before. It was evident to me, even as a young boy, that he had really been impacted by something.

Ailsa Marshall was in her second year at the famous Birmingham Conservatoire in England, and nothing seemed to be going right. She couldn’t sleep or eat properly, and her memory consistently failed during complex piano pieces.
She considered giving up, but her tutor persuaded her to enter the second-year piano competition—the David Brook Prize—an annual event sponsored by the former student’s parents after he was killed in a car crash.
“I didn’t expect to get through the preliminaries,” Ailsa explains. But the judges recognised a special quality to Ailsa’s music, and she was given a place in the finals.
The finals were to take place in the famous Adrian Boult Hall in Birmingham, but finding a time to practise in the hall was difficult. Ailsa’s teacher was finally able to find a vacant space, but it was on a Sunday.
“I’d rather not practise on that day,” Ailsa told her.
“Is it because of your church?”
“Yes.”
“Couldn’t you compromise just this once?” she persisted.
“I’d really rather not, thank you.” Ailsa was equally persistent.
To Ailsa’s relief, a Saturday slot became available just in time. “I didn’t feel I could ask for the Lord’s help and not keep his Sabbath holy,” she says.
As the big day approached Ailsa became increasingly nervous, and her eating problems returned. The family was very worried. Because of urgent commitments, Ailsa’s dad could not get down to Birmingham, so they did the next best thing.
“I drove down from Cleveland to stay with family friends and asked the head of their house, Brother David Cook, to give her a blessing,” Sister Marshall recalls.
David’s wife Jean remembers, “It was a most unusual blessing. Every bit of Ailsa that needed to perform well was mentioned—her fingers, her foot, her mind and intellect, and her nerves.”
“It left me with a feeling of complete composure,” adds Ailsa. The feeling stayed with her throughout the performance.
“Ailsa’s music was breathtaking,” comments Jean. “Her rendition of Rachmaninoff’s Prelude was incredible.”
When the results were summed up, Ailsa was awarded joint first prize. But perhaps even more special to Ailsa was the compliment David Brook’s father gave her. “I’m thrilled you chose those particular pieces of music. They were my son’s favourites, and you played them as he would have done.”

We may be relatively small in number, but as members of this Church we can reach across these widening gaps. We know the power of Christ-centered service that brings together God’s children regardless of their spiritual or their economic status. One year ago the First Presidency invited us to participate in a day of service celebrating 75 years of the welfare program, which helps people to become more self-sufficient. Millions of hours were contributed by our members all around the world.

We are all aware of Hurricane Mitch, which devastated Nicaragua and Honduras last October and November. With terrific force it flooded homes and caused mud slides. More than 10,000 people died and another two million were left homeless. This very strong hurricane destroyed homes and covered streets with mud that seemed as hard as cement.

Almost immediately the Church began sending life-sustaining food, clothing, medicine, and blankets to help both members of the Church and those of other faiths. Once the shipments arrived at their destination, Church members came by the hundreds to unload the trucks and assemble the supplies into boxes. The items in each box would sustain a family for a week.

Our dear President Gordon B. Hinckley, who is the chairman of the General Welfare Committee, felt troubled by the suffering in Central America. One sleepless night he felt a prompting to go and offer his love and support to those who had endured this great loss. The prophet’s visit lifted the spirits and gave hope to thousands. “As long as [the Church] has any resources,” he told them, “we will stand by you in times of trouble.” And I testify to you, brothers and sisters, that he truly is a prophet of God. And I sustain him with all my heart.

“Once I was sitting with a six-year-old granddaughter, and she said, ‘I want to learn how to study in my scriptures.’ And I thought, ‘Well, she’s only six. Can she really get anything powerful out of the scriptures?’ So I said, ‘Let’s turn to 1 Nephi, chapter 1, and if you read anything you understand or if it means anything to you, you can underline it. And if you want to say something about it, you can write about it.’ So we started with that verse: ‘I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents’ (1 Nephi 1:1), and she stopped and said, ‘I have goodly parents.’ She was getting it from the first line. She marked her scriptures, and she said, ‘I’m going to finish the Book of Mormon before I’m baptized.’ ‘Some days,’ she said, ‘I don’t understand anything.’ But it was powerful for her to read the first verse of the Book of Mormon, the first time she tried it.”Sister Julie B. Beck

From the front porch of my grandparents’ home, I could see the dark blue, spiny-backed ridge line of a mountain range. The road atlas called them the Clear Creek Mountains, but my Grandpa McClary said they were the Windmakers, though I never heard anyone outside of our family refer to them by that name.
“Why do you call them the Windmakers?” I asked my grandpa one summer evening as we sat on the porch, watching the sun’s last rosy light creep higher on the mountainside.
“Feel that breeze?” Grandpa replied. I did, a cool little gust that ruffled my hair and sent a shiver down my shoulders. Grandpa leaned back on his chair and wrapped his fingers behind his head. “That puff comes right from those mountains. I can tell you almost the exact spot, right up that big canyon next to that feather of snow,” he nodded. “Every day about this time, the wind blows down from those mountains. That’s why I call ’em the Windmakers. Someday I’ll let you in on a secret I know about those mountains.”
“Secret?” The word grabbed my attention, as it would capture the interest of any nine-year-old boy talking with his grandfather.
“Yes, secret. When the time’s right, you’ll understand it,” he promised, a trace of intrigue in his voice. “Don’t try to get it out of me; I won’t tell.”
So I had to be satisfied that I’d learn the secret of the Windmakers at a later time. But it was always on my mind when Grandpa, my father, and I made our annual fishing trip to the mountains.
The trip actually began 300 miles away from the Windmakers, in my hometown. On the first weekend in August, my father came home from work at noon, and we began a ritual honed to perfection through the years. We packed our car and said good-bye to my mother and little sister, Melissa. Then we began the long drive to my grandparents’ home in Springvale, a small town in the shadow of the Windmakers.
On Saturday morning, we’d spread out our camping and fishing gear in Grandpa’s backyard. Then we’d pack all of the equipment in the back of Grandpa’s pickup truck and pull a canvas tarp over it. One of Grandpa’s neighbors, Mr. Dahlstrom, always peeped over the fence during our preparations. “So, Jess, looks like you plan to do some serious fishing this week,” he’d greet. “That we do, Henry, that we do,” Grandpa replied happily.
It took all morning and some of the afternoon to get everything ready, carefully organizing every fish hook, tent peg, and frying pan. We never took much food. “We’ll live off the land, by our wits,” Grandpa winked. When we finished packing, Grandpa always looked solemnly at his truck and pronounced final approval. “We are now ready to go fishing. To the mountains, gentlemen.”
After that, my father turned the truck around and parked it front first in the driveway. “To make our getaway even faster on Monday,” my father explained. “When it comes to fishing and your grandfather, every second counts.”
Sundays, of course, we went to church. Although it was the ward my father grew up in and most people there knew our family, Grandpa took special delight in introducing us to anyone within earshot. “This is my son Richard, and his son, Jason. You remember Richard from his days as a deacon here. He was the ornery one in the bunch, but he turned out all right somehow. Credit his mother for that, I suppose.
“Anyway, he and Jason have come this week to exact a fearsome toll on the fish of the nearby mountains. Next week, I’ll let you know who was victorious—the fish, or the fishermen,” Grandpa pledged.
Early on Monday, when the sky was still black, we’d arise. Grandma McClary always had a huge breakfast on the table for us. “Last decent meal you three will get until you come back,” she teased. After eating, we were off, three generations spanning 50 years, yet close enough to fit snugly on the seat of a pickup truck. Our destination: the Windmakers, their dark outline only now taking shape against the pink morning sky.
The excitement of those mornings still lingers: Grandpa’s unfailing good humor; all of us singing on the drive to the mountains, always very loud and off-key; the fragrance of a forest morning, fresh pine and dew; and the conversation between my father and grandfather, always about good friends, good memories, and good lives.
Ninety minutes into our drive, two tracks of dirt veered away from the main road. We followed the little road a few miles to a small meadow at the foot of a dozen large trees. It was there, with the stream close by, that we pitched camp.
“In the name of our honorable family, I christen thee Camp McClary!” Grandpa exulted while jamming a shovel into the ground.
It didn’t take long for us to set up camp, a tribute to Grandpa’s meticulous packing. After the tent was up and everything in place, we broke out our rods and reels and tugged on our waders. Soon we stood at the water’s edge, casting Grandpa’s hand-tied fishing flies into the riffles and pools.
We worked our way upstream, hopscotching from boulder to boulder, from one bank to the other. Most years the fishing was good, and when one of us caught a fish, the other two invariably let out a whoop. We kept only what we needed. “It would break your grandmother’s heart if we came back a few pounds heavier,” Grandpa said.
The best memories of all, though, are of Grandpa. He was tall, white-haired, and handsome. On our outings to the Windmakers, he always wore a tattered blue hat with a dozen fishing flies hooked to it. He called it his lucky cap, and said it was as important on those fishing trips as his rod and reel.
Late in the afternoon, we hiked back to our camp. Grandpa fried our trout in his homemade lemon butter. Nothing ever has tasted quite as good as those high mountain meals cooked over a campfire. For dessert, Grandpa always had a bag of gingersnap cookies, though I never saw him pack them. We’d sit on the edge of the creek, the three of us, eating cookies and going over the day’s adventures. When the breeze kicked down the canyon in the early evening, Grandpa would lean back and announce: “The Windmakers.”
Tuesdays and Wednesdays were spent fishing. When Thursday came, the truck was loaded, though not quite as carefully as the Saturday before. We drove back to Springvale, arriving about noon. Grandma treated us to a sumptuous lunch, and we took turns grumbling about how bad the food was on our trip. “We stared starvation right in the eye,” Grandpa dead panned. “But your meal here, Sarah, has brought us back from the edge.”
“We were so hungry that we almost forced ourselves to eat some of Dad’s cooking,” my father chimed in.
On Friday, Dad and I returned home. Grandma and Grandpa stood in their driveway, waving good-bye until we turned a corner and went out of sight. We got home a little tired, with some trout in our ice cooler and enough wild tales of our adventure to the Windmakers to last until next August.
I started accompanying my father on the trips to the Windmakers when I was five, and for a decade, the trips varied only slightly. Never did I think that things might someday change. Then, suddenly, they did.

In the McLean Virginia Stake, youth and adults worked with 1,503 microfilmed parish birth records from Ireland, clearing them for temple work. Then the youth were baptized in the Washington D.C. Temple on their behalf.