Gospel Story Finder

Elder Donald L. Hallstrom tells of the time while living in Hawaii years ago at the time of the rededication of the Laie Temple-he was asked by the temple rededication committee to be responsible for security and transportation arrangements for President Kimball and his party-what he calls "behind the scenes." During that week he saw President Kimball close up ministering to others, dedicating a temple, and teaching.

Then in his own words,
"At the week's conclusion we were at the airport for the departure of President Kimball and his associates... President Kimball came to me to thank me for my meager efforts. Physically he was not very tall, and I am a large man. He grabbed me by my jacket lapels and sharply yanked me down to be at his height. Then he kissed me on the cheek and thanked me. After walking away a few steps, President Kimball returned. He grasped me in the same way and pulled me down again. This time he kissed me on the other cheek and told me that he loved me. Then he departed. The year before, a biography of Spencer W. Kimball had been published... At that time, I had obtained it and read it, and I found it interesting. However, after this very personal experience with Spencer Woolley Kimball, I went home from the airport and pulled that thick volume from our library shelf, feeling an intense desire to read it again. Over the next several days-every waking hour I was not otherwise obligated-I was reading and reflecting. You see, I was now reading about someone whom I deeply loved. I was now reading about someone whom I knew loved me. I was now reading about someone for whom I would do anything, because I knew whatever he asked would be for my own best good."

Some years ago I served on the Priesthood Home Teaching Committee and was assigned to attend stake conferences with the General Authorities to teach leadership principles relating to home teaching. During a Saturday night priesthood leadership meeting in the Raft River Stake in Idaho, Elder A. Theodore Tuttle of the First Quorum of the Seventy called on me to make my presentation. For about 15 minutes I waxed strong on the subject of home teaching and presented what I thought was a very comprehensive outline of methods that might be used to improve the performance of the brethren of the stake. The audience was courteously attentive except for a few yawns on the back row. These I attempted to cure with some interesting stories and all the enthusiasm I could generate. When I wound up the talk, I sat down feeling much like a football coach who had just given a rousing locker room pep talk.
Elder Tuttle had a very thoughtful look on his face as he arose to talk to the group. He began his presentation by saying something like this: “I tried to listen attentively to Brother Anderson’s presentation, but my mind kept wandering. I couldn’t help thinking about the home teaching families to which I am assigned at home. I have some real challenges in trying to reach and influence them, and they are a constant concern to me. Maybe I could just tell you a little about them, and you could help me with some suggestions.”
Elder Tuttle did not reveal any personal information that would betray a confidence, but he did proceed to illustrate some problems. Before long, hands were in the air; the priesthood members were offering suggestions and solutions, and everyone in the audience was involved in helping. Who were they helping? They were helping themselves learn how to solve home teaching problems.
And me? I was observing with awe the work of a great teacher and motivator. He was busy leading, delegating, enthusing, and the receivers of the learning were hardly aware of their change in attitude. They were busily involved, they thought, in solving someone else’s problems.

One Sunday morning more than a year ago, we awoke to a beautiful day in Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. The Caribbean sun was shining, and the sky was clear. A gentle breeze was blowing, barely ruffling the leaves on the trees; it was warm and peaceful and still. But far out to sea, beyond the reach of our physical senses that day, the deadly destroyer was coming our way, implacable and irresistible. The Hurricane Center, with responsibility to track and predict the path of Hurricane Georges, was constantly updating the information available on the Internet. In the peaceful, placid quiet of that morning, by virtue of those seeing eyes in the sky, I saw the predicted path of the storm, aimed like an arrow at the heart of Santo Domingo.

Within 48 hours the storm struck the island with intense and insensate fury, leaving in its path destruction, desolation, and death. The raw, elemental power of nature was astonishing. From the relative safety of our house, we saw trees doubled over by the force of the wind, which alternately shrieked and howled and roared; the punishing power of that wind drove rain into the house around the window frames, and the surging three-foot river of water in the street outside, brought about by the intense rain, finally crested and began to subside when it was within an inch of coming into our house.

Around the area where we lived, most of the trees were either uprooted or split by the fierce winds. Trees, branches, power lines, and telephone poles were down all over town. Streets were blocked, traffic was difficult, and power was cut off for more than a week. Although the damage was great, it would have been much greater but for the warnings from those who track and predict and counsel people to be prepared. Virtually all of those who were adequately prepared came through the hurricane relatively unscathed. I am grateful to those men and women who devote time and attention to track and monitor those storms. Their timely warnings and counsel save lives and protect people. Those who disregard the warnings pay the price of willful failure to listen to those guardians whose calling it is to watch and warn and save.

A few days ago, I heard two accounts of God leading His children to safety on the coast of Thailand when that monstrous tsunami wave struck.

The other account I heard was related to me by a Latter-day Saint who was led to safety by the Holy Ghost. He checked into a hotel on the ocean front in Thailand the day before the wave struck. He walked out on the beach. He felt uneasy. He went back to his hotel determined to check out. The hotel staff, I think worried that he didn’t like the hotel, pressed him for a reason. They only reluctantly agreed to his leaving. He moved to another hotel, away from the beach. It was on higher ground. Because of that, he not only survived but stayed to serve the survivors.

After being sealed to their families or being baptized for the dead in the Washington Temple, several boys and girls wrote their impressions:
“I would like to bear my testimony that I know that this Church is true and I’m glad to be a member. When my dad wasn’t a member of the Church I thought that we would never be sealed. My dad grew stronger in the Church, and he was baptized last year. Now we are sealed in the temple and I’m very happy! Now I can live with my family for time and eternity. I love my family very much.”
Sylvia Haarsma

There are different shades of truth telling. When we tell little white lies, we become progressively color-blind. It is better to remain silent than to mislead. The degree to which each of us tells the whole truth and nothing but the truth depends on our conscience. David Casstevens of the Dallas Morning News tells a story about Frank Szymanski, a Notre Dame center in the 1940s, who had been called as a witness in a civil suit at South Bend [Indiana].
“‘Are you on the Notre Dame football team this year?’ the judge asked.
“‘Yes, Your Honor.’
“‘What position?’
“‘Center, Your Honor.’
“‘How good a center?’
“Szymanski squirmed in his seat, but said firmly, ‘Sir, I’m the best center Notre Dame has ever had.’
“Coach Frank Leahy, who was in the courtroom, was surprised. Szymanski always had been modest and unassuming. So when the proceedings were over, he took Szymanski aside and asked why he had made such a statement. Szymanski blushed. ‘I hated to do it, Coach,’ he said. ‘But, after all, I was under oath.’”

When an LDS classmate invited Horváth Attila, 16, to sacrament meeting, Attila liked what he saw. “Then, when my friend told me that the Church was very family-centered, I became even more interested.” Within weeks, Attila was baptized.
Three months later, his father asked to hear the discussions. “I knew enough about the Church by that time,” says Attila, “that I could help my father learn about it. The knowledge I had received in seminary helped me explain the scriptures to him. But since he smoked and drank coffee a lot, I didn’t have the faith that he would be baptized. I was amazed when I saw how—with the help of our Heavenly Father—he was able to rid those things from his life. Two months later, I baptized my father!
“Then, when my mother saw how happy my father and I were in the Church, she also started to be interested. I baptized her three months after baptizing my father! The next day, my whole family came to Church and bore their testimonies. It’s not possible to say what kind of feeling it was for me.”

Years ago, when I was serving in Primary, I was telling a story about someone who had been recently baptized. I pointed out that this friend might be one of the most pure and clean members of the Church. Then, on the front row, a hand shot up and an older boy declared, “I can be just as clean as he is because I’ve been baptized and take the sacrament.” I awkwardly answered, “Yes, that’s what I meant—what he said.”

In late December 2008 I sat in the celestial room of the Seoul Korea Temple, thinking about the new year ahead. I had been married in this same temple some two months earlier, and lately my days and weeks had seemed packed full with work, my Church calling, and my newly established family. I had been going to institute classes regularly, but now I considered that perhaps I would stop attending.
As I prayed for direction for the new year, I felt a distinct impression to continue attending institute. I also felt prompted to increase my temple attendance. As I left the temple that day, I was filled with a sense of peace and gratitude for the new direction the Lord had given me. I felt strongly that if I would follow the direction I had received, I would be blessed.
Beginning in January I began serving as a temple worker in the Seoul Temple. This required that twice a week I travel about an hour to the temple to fill my shift. In addition, twice a week my wife also made an hour-long trip, one for serving as a temple worker and the other one for attending a Book of Mormon institute class with me.
As I took on these additional commitments, it soon became clear that I would have to cut down my work by several hours each week. Since I work in sales, I am paid according to how many clients I maintain. I realized that by cutting back my work hours, I might also face a substantial cut in pay. However, I remembered the impression I had received, and I knew that everything else would work out if I fully committed myself to following the Lord.
As I attended institute and the temple more regularly, many blessings began to flow into my life. I noticed some marked changes. I felt the Spirit closer and more often, and my testimony of the restored gospel grew. My wife and I received great benefit from serving in the temple and attending our institute class. And unexpectedly, I also received temporal blessings. Somehow, despite my reduced work hours, I was able to meet more clients than ever before. My income didn’t decrease; instead, it almost doubled.
I know that these wonderful blessings came from the Lord. I am grateful that He gave me the comfort to know that when we “seek … first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, … all these things shall be added unto you” (3 Nephi 13:33).

As I stood in the family circle above the baptismal font, I watched our little grandson Clayton walk timidly down the steps with his daddy. Raising his arm to the square, his father said the baptismal prayer, then buried him in the water that sloshed and splashed around them.
After the last song had been sung and the closing prayer said, the families of the newly baptized children reverently left the meetinghouse. Later, as we celebrated the occasion, one of the children looked up from his ice cream and asked, “Grandma, were you baptized in shiny blue water?”
“No,” I chuckled. “When I was baptized, we didn’t sit in draped, carpeted rooms with soft music and inspirational talks. No one wore white coveralls and there weren’t clusters of relatives standing above a tile font.”
“Tell us about it, Grandma,” the children pleaded. And so I told them my story.
Well, you see, Hurricane was just a pioneer town in Southern Utah when I was little. We planned for me to be baptized in the Hurricane Canal on my birthday. I was so excited I could hardly wait. And then, just four days before my birthday, the canal broke.
The farmers were frantic. Peach orchards and hayfields were dry. Every man in town went up the river with his pick and shovel to help fix the break, but it was a bad one. The day before my birthday, I climbed the slope to the canal, hoping to see just one trickle of water. Instead, the hot, dry winds had caked and cracked the mud in the bottom, curling it up into little clay dishes. “Oh mama, what shall we do?” I asked. “How can I be baptized when the canal is dry?”
“You can always go to the hot sulphur springs, like your sisters did,” she suggested.
“But their birthdays were in the winter. We’d scald in July!”
Mama knew better than to suggest postponing the date. It was family tradition for each of us to be baptized on our eighth birthday.
“Let’s see what other choices you have,” Mama said. “Come with me.”
The cow’s watering trough was just outside the corral under the apricot tree, with a hole in the fence for the cows to poke their heads through.
“You could be baptized here,” she said. I regarded the long strings of floating green moss and shuddered. “You can scrub the trough with the broom and fill it with fresh water from the cistern.”
“But Mama …” I wailed.
“If being sorry would fix the canal, the water would be running in it now,” she said, cradling me in her comforting arms.
I had heard Uncle Ren say that the canal might be mended by sundown, so just before dark I climbed the bank, hoping to see the frothy head of the stream. But the cracked clay was only curled deeper. Heavy of heart, I trudged home and plopped down on my bed in the peach orchard, where we slept in the summertime. Looking up at the evening sky I watched the first stars appear. “Please, Heavenly Father,” I prayed, “help the men get the water in the canal by tomorrow.”
I wasn’t surprised when a short time later I heard a little splash of water coming through the headgate high on the bank above our house. Scrunching my feet under me, I sat on my heels and listened. The sound grew until it was the full-grown tumble of water splashing over the rocks and, finally, rippling through the ditch past our place. The canal had been fixed before sundown, but the water had miles to race before reaching town.
“Oh thank you, Heavenly Father,” I whispered. Then I hugged my pillow and drifted to sleep, lulled by the merry music of laughing, tumbling water.
By the next afternoon, all of the debris and froth from the new stream had washed itself on through the canal and the water ran placid and smooth. I put on my clean white nightgown and Uncle Ren Spendlove came in his faded bib overalls. Mama walked to the canal with us. Sitting in the shade of the willows along the bank were my playmates and cousins, waiting. Uncle Ren stepped down the slick muddy side into the water then, reaching up, gave me a hand. Ripples of light danced on the stream, and a few willow leaves glided like canoes through the mottled shade. The wind held its breath as Uncle Ren said the baptismal prayer. I felt the rush of water in my ears, and he brought me up blubbering. He held onto me until I had caught my breath. Then I noticed everyone watching and smiling at me and I felt wonderful and loved.
“Mama, I’m baptized!” I exclaimed. Reaching for my hands, she pulled me up beside her. She had said that baptism was a sacred ordinance, and when she hugged me, dripping wet as I was, I knew it was true.

A small plane flew low over the trees and buzzed the camp. It was a signal, and several campers knew who the message was for. “Hey, your dad’s here. He just flew over.” One girl needed a warmer sleeping bag, so her father was going to drop it by, literally. Several girls ran out into an open area waiting for the plane to reappear. It came in low and slow. As the plane reached the playing field, a black plastic bag was pushed out a window and landed with a soft plop. No one seemed particularly amazed by this unusual way of delivering a forgotten sleeping bag. After all, this was Alaska, and many families own small planes. It’s almost a necessity if your work or home is away from a city.

Among those who were in dire circumstances on the plains was my wife’s great-grandmother. She was part of the Hunt wagon company.
Today, my wife’s gravesite in the Salt Lake City Cemetery looks down at the gravesite of her great-grandmother, Mary Penfold Goble, who died in the arms of her daughter as she was entering this valley on December 11, 1856. She was buried the next day. She had lost three of her children on that long journey. The feet of a surviving daughter were terribly frozen.

“So it has been all through my life. If I have undertaken to do anything, and the Lord has wanted me to do something else, He has had to tell me. When we were sent to England, we were sent by revelation. I went into the Staffordshire potteries with Brother Alfred Cordon. We were doing a splendid work, baptizing almost every night, and I thought it was the finest mission I ever was on. I went into the town of Hanley one night, and attended meeting in a large hall, which was filled to overflowing. The Spirit of the Lord came upon me and said that that was the last meeting I should hold with that people for many days. I told the people that that was the last meeting I should be with them. After the meeting, they asked me where I was going. I told them I did not know. In the morning I asked the Lord what He wanted of me. He merely said, ‘Go to the south.’ I got into the stage and rode eighty miles. The first man’s house I stopped at was John Benbow’s in Herefordshire. In half an hour after I entered the house I knew exactly why the Lord had sent me. There was a people there who had been praying for the ancient order of things. They were waiting for the Gospel as it was taught by Christ and His Apostles. The consequence was, the first thirty days after I got there I baptized six hundred of those people. In eight month’s labor in that country I brought eighteen hundred into the Church. Why? Because there was a people prepared for the Gospel, and the Lord sent me there to do that work. I have always had to give God the glory for everything good that has happened to me; for I have realized by what power it came.” (Deseret Weekly, 7 Nov. 1896, p. 643.)

When I was a young man, I was a home teacher to a very old sister. She taught me from her life experience.

When she was a little girl, President Brigham Young came to Brigham City, a great event in the town named after him. To honor him, the Primary children, all dressed in white, were lined up along the road coming into town, each with a basket of flowers to spread before the carriage of the President of the Church.

Something displeased her. Instead of throwing her blossoms, she kicked a rock in front of the carriage, saying, “He ain’t one bit better than my Grandpa Lovelund.” That was overheard, and she was severely scolded.

I am very sure that President Brigham Young would be the first to agree with little Janie Steed. He would not consider himself to be worth more than Grandpa Lovelund or any other worthy member of the Church.

Many years ago, on a Halloween night, it was my privilege to be of assistance to one who had temporarily lost his way and needed a helping hand to return. I was driving home from the office rather late. I had been stalling on Halloween, letting my wife handle the trick-or-treat visitors. As I passed St. Mark’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, I remembered that a dear friend, Max, lay ill in that very hospital. As he and I had become acquainted years before, we discovered that we had grown up in the same ward, although at different times. By the time I was born, Max and his parents had moved from the ward.
That Halloween night, I drove into the parking lot and entered the hospital. As I stopped at the desk to inquire as to his room number, I was informed that when Max had registered at the hospital, he had listed as his religious preference not LDS but rather another church.
I entered Max’s room and greeted him. I told him how proud I was to be his friend and how much I cared about him. I talked about his career in banking and as an orchestra leader on the side. I discovered that he had been offended by a comment or two from others and so had decided to attend another church. I said to him, “Max, you hold the Melchizedek Priesthood. I would like to give you a blessing tonight.” He agreed, and the blessing was provided. He then informed me that his wife, Bernice, was also very ill and was, in fact, in an adjoining room. At my invitation, Max joined me in giving a blessing to her. He asked me to help him. I coached him. He anointed his wife. There were tears and embraces all around as I sealed the anointing with Max, his hands on his wife’s head with mine, making that Halloween evening one ever to be remembered.
As I left the hospital that night, I stopped at the desk and told the receptionist that with the permission of Max and his wife the record should be changed to reflect their membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I waited and I watched until it was changed.
My friends Max and Bernice are now both on the other side of the veil, but they spent the last period of their lives active and happy and receiving the blessings which come with testimonies of the gospel and attendance at church.

A true story from Argentina.
“Can we go to the plaza?” Ivan’s sister Cristal asked.
Ivan looked outside. “I want to,” he said. “But maybe we should wait until the sun goes down. It’s really hot.”
The plaza was a big field of grass near their home. They loved to play tag or hide-and-seek there with their friends. But the plaza didn’t have any shade for them to rest from the heat. And this summer, it was a big problem.
Cristal was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “What if we planted some trees? That way the plaza would have shade. Then we could play even when it’s hot!”
Ivan smiled. “I love that idea!”
Ivan and Cristal told Papá all about their plan. “I’ll ask the city for permission,” he said.
A few weeks later, they had the permission they needed and were ready to start! Papá took Ivan and Cristal to the big tree that grew behind their house. Under the tree, a bunch of little trees were growing.
“When the big tree blooms, it drops seeds to the ground,” Papá explained. “Then little trees grow from them. They’re like tiny miracles of nature!”
Papá showed them how to carefully dig up the little trees. Ivan and Cristal gently planted them in flower pots.
Then, one Saturday afternoon when the sun was hidden behind the clouds, Ivan and Cristal loaded the little trees onto a cart. Slowly, they pushed it to the plaza. Ivan’s younger brothers and sisters helped carry buckets of water. Mamá and Papá brought some shovels.
Together, they picked out a spot for each tree. They dug holes and planted each tree with love. Mamá showed them how to dig trenches around the trees to water them. “Trees need sunlight, water, and lots of nutrients to grow strong,” she said. “Just like kids!”
Ivan thought of the tree behind their house and imagined what the trees would look like someday. “Can you believe it?” he said. “Someday these trees will be taller than us!”
In the spring, the trees would dazzle everyone with their beautiful, bright pink flowers. In the summer, their shade would stretch across the plaza. And in the fall, the leaves would cover the ground in a yellow carpet.
Every day, Ivan and Cristal visited the plaza to check on the trees. They made sure each tree had enough water. And every time a new leaf or branch sprouted, they felt so proud. Their hard work was paying off!
Ivan felt happy thinking of all the people who would enjoy the shade at the plaza someday. He had helped make the earth a more beautiful place for all of Heavenly Father’s children.

Marcus sat on the couch and watched cartoons. Mom picked up the toys and clothes he and his little sister, Julie, had left on the floor.
But it was hard for Marcus to hear the TV because Julie was crying.
Mom, can you make Julie be quiet? I’m trying to watch cartoons!
Marcus, it’s time for Julie’s nap. I want you to turn off the TV and do something else.
Marcus didn’t want to turn off the TV, but he did. He looked for something else to do. He saw his crayons, but he didn’t want to color.
He found a soccer ball, but he didn’t have anybody to play with. He picked up a toy, but its batteries weren’t working. He walked to Mom’s bedroom to ask for some new batteries.
When Marcus got to the bedroom, he saw Julie asleep in her crib. Mom was asleep on the bed next to some folded towels and a basket of socks.
Mom’s tired.
Instead of waking her up, Marcus decided to help her.
In the kitchen, he began putting the clean dishes in the cabinets, just like Mom always did—only a little louder.
After a couple of minutes, Mom walked into the kitchen. Marcus was sitting on the counter, trying to put away the plastic cups.
Marcus! What are you doing?
Surprise! I wanted let you rest.
Thank you, Marcus. I was very tired.
Mom gave Marcus a big hug and a kiss. As much as Marcus loved to watch cartoons, doing something to make Mom happy made him feel even better.

One young woman decided after reading her patriarchal blessing that she wanted to do something grand to help the poor and needy. After unsuccessfully trying to give aid to some people she saw on the street, she thought she’d failed. Then she got home and found her brother crying because he’d been teased at school. After taking him out for ice cream and listening to his troubles, she learned a lesson. “The poor are just as likely to be in your home as on the streets,” she says. “There are all sorts of needy people in the world—those who need food and shelter, of course—but also those who need love, counsel, and encouragement.” (Read the rest of her story at lds.org/go/needyNE11.)

I’m grateful for the gift given to me of ears to hear. One of my great-grandfathers, John Bennion, walked or rode his horse from over Jordan to this place to hear his name called out to go on a mission to Dixie. His journal doesn’t say much, except just that the next day he prepared to go, and he went. His assignment was to be a sheepherder. In his journal there is a record of an evening in which he met with Erastus Snow. He said another man was in the room; his name was Henry Eyring. And somewhere in St. George that night was Bishop Miles Romney. They talked about sheep. And you might have thought they were talking about something temporal. But not to those men, because they knew they were God’s sheep, and they knew they were for God’s people. And they knew how to listen, and they knew how to do what they heard.
John Bennion went on another mission to Wales and back again to this valley. Henry Eyring went on to Colonia Juarez, as Miles Romney did. And they left for me a tradition which I deeply appreciate. They were the yeomen of the Church, the soldiers of the Church, and my great-grandfathers. You can’t find in their journals records of the positions they held, just of the instructions they heard, and knew were from God, and followed. I’m grateful to my parents who handed me that heritage undiminished. I’m grateful to my wife, who more than once has heard when I did not and gently said, “Would you pray about it?” If my sons and daughters will listen to her, and hear through her what God has in mind for them, we will pass the heritage on again.

When I was a young boy, one of our neighbors had a herd of dairy cows. One of his cows died, leaving a newborn calf, which he gave to me. I took care of the calf, fed it, and raised it. The day my dad took it to the stockyards to be sold was a day of mixed emotions for me: I had grown attached to my calf, and yet I was looking forward to receiving the rewards of my labor. My only request was that the money I received from selling the calf be in silver dollars. I remember Dad coming home that night and dropping 20 silver dollars into my hands. Money was hard to come by, and I thought I had all the money in the world. I counted, admired, and polished each coin carefully. When Sunday came, I reluctantly put two shiny coins into my pocket to pay my tithing. As hard as it was to surrender my precious silver dollars to the bishop, I still remember now how good I felt being obedient to the Lord.
On the way home from church, my mother told me how proud she was of me. Then she said, “Your grandfather always told us children that if we would faithfully pay an honest tithing, the Lord would bless us and it would be the best investment that we could ever make.”