Gospel Story Finder

When Sam (short for Samantha) Southwick started high school in Grand Blanc, Michigan, she wanted to be involved. She knew that the secret to having a lot of fun in high school is to participate. She thought it would be either in cheerleading or playing on a sports team, but her plans didn’t work out easily. “I tried out for basketball. I tried out for cheerleading. I don’t know how many times I tried out for cheerleading, but finally I just stopped. Then I tried out for volleyball. It was fun, but I didn’t even make the first cut.”
Even in those moments of disappointment, Sam was a little bit proud of herself for following through and not quitting. But which was her sport? Where was she going to succeed? Repeatedly not making the team could have made her want to quit trying. But she kept on. Only now can she look back and see clearly what she needed to understand. “When you go into something with a positive attitude and the will to do it, then it actually becomes a lot easier. I was going through some of this for the wrong reasons.”
In Sam’s junior year, some of her friends were playing lacrosse. Because she was always willing to try something new, she started learning about the game and began the conditioning. “My friends helped me, and I’ve loved lacrosse ever since. We joke that it’s soccer in the air.”
Even after making the lacrosse team, Sam still had some learning to do. At first, she wanted to play offense. “It’s really fun to shoot on the goal and to make it. Everyone gets really excited. Offense is the glory place.” But her team needed her on defense—in the goal in fact.
Playing goalie is a scary position. To block a shot, she would get hit hard by a small rubber ball. Sam freely admits that she wasn’t very aggressive when she started out. “And on defense you’re trying to make sure the other team does not score, so you feel worried and responsible.”
Sam can still give you a blow-by-blow account of her first game as the goalie. “I was standing there thinking, What have I gotten myself into? Then they came down, running straight at me. Our defense didn’t really know what they were doing because we were new. I just stood there gripping my stick so hard. I was saying to myself, Just move, just move. It was really nerve-racking. I don’t think I blocked the first shot, but after that it got easier. I learned that when those balls hit you during the game, it doesn’t bother you because you’re just so intense. But after the game, you really feel it. You get hit everywhere.”
The team tied that first game. But two games later, after their first loss, Sam took it hard. She appreciated her team’s being supportive because they knew she felt responsible. “Losing takes an emotional toll on the goalie,” says Sam.
How does she deal with the pressure? Sam says, “I’ve actually said prayers in my head. I’ll ask myself, ‘Why am I praying about a sport when there are other things you should be praying for?’ But when I’m in those moments, I know that God really will help me.”
Losing is not fun, but Sam has learned that the old saying “Winning isn’t everything,” is actually true. Her philosophy is that sports are for fun and for learning how to deal with other people. “You learn how to communicate better with people and how to talk with them and get along. What I have learned playing goalie has helped me at my job.” Sam works as a waitress and sometimes has to deal with difficult people.
Even when you lose, Sam says, you can still feel great. “If you lose and you played as well as you can, you feel good because you feel like you actually did something. Winning looks good on your record, but it’s all about what you learn and how to deal with it.”

I have found the same thing true as I have ventured out into the world. As a young businessman, it was only proper in making good contacts to attend social hours before dinners. I was required by my employment to do so. I decided that when attending these affairs, I would not have a glass in my hand that could be interpreted as being anything other than nonalcoholic. The first few times I refused to have anything. I just stood, trying to find a place to put my hands conveniently. Peanuts and pretzels seemed to help.

Then a most remarkable thing occurred. After a few of the social hours, I noticed a quart of milk being brought in and put among the other bottles of spirits. Of course no one could draw the wrong inference from a glass of milk. Then, as the months progressed, I noticed they had to bring out two quarts as more and more of the men around held a glass of milk in their hands. This uniqueness became an asset. I am a living witness to you that living your religion, and staying as close to the Lord as you possibly can through all the times of your life, even though you are kidded and laughed at once in a while, is the greatest asset you can have. There is an inner sense of respect that develops for you that will help you in anything you attempt to accomplish.

What success I had in business can be attributed more to the uniqueness that the gospel has given to me than to any of the training provided in schools, or experience in business. There seems to develop a trust in one who is willing to stand up for what he believes in that will stand him in good stead in his accomplishments in life.

“Mama! Mama! I’m sorry I got all wet, but Jalen was blowing bubbles in the pool!” Jordan shouted.
Jordan’s mother raced outside to find his baby cousin, Jalen, lying purple and lifeless on the deck of the pool near the stairs. She gathered up his body and began to pat his back. Jalen began to cough up lots of water.
Jalen’s parents had been upstairs. They rushed downstairs and took him to the doctor. Jalen’s PaPa and Grandma went with them. Then everyone began to notice that Jordan was soaking wet from head to toe—clothes, shoes, and all.
“Jordan, you are so brave! You pulled Jalen out of the pool without even taking time to take off even your shoes,” his mother said. “What happened?”
“When I went outside, I saw Jalen in the middle of the pool, and he was blowing bubbles. He was so scary looking that I didn’t want to touch him. But I got in the water and pulled him to the stairs. I didn’t know what to do next, so I went to get you.”
Jordan’s Aunt Amberly went to help him find some dry clothes. She asked, “If Jalen was so scary that you didn’t want to touch him, how did you know what to do?”
“Something told me what to do,” he told his aunt.
“Do you know that the feeling you had was like a still, small voice telling you what to do? Do you remember from Primary who the still small voice is?”
“I know—it was the Holy Ghost,” Jordan said. “I’m glad I listened to Him.”
Jordan Jones, age 6 (as told by his Aunt Dawn)Tupelo, Mississippi

Susan (name has been changed), like many adoptees, had a great curiosity about her birth parents. She was sealed as an infant to her adoptive family and felt the power and confirmation that these were her people—the ones she was meant to be with forever. She felt blessed by doing family history and temple work for this family. However, that didn’t take away her curiosity or her desire to offer the saving ordinances to the people on her birth line. She worried that she was being somehow disloyal to her adoptive family for having that desire. But after a loving conversation with her parents, she was assured that feelings of love and loyalty would not be diminished by pursuing the sacred work for her birth line.

On the way to priesthood meeting on Sunday mornings, Dad would make several stops. He would leave the car, disappear to the rear of the home, and then, in a minute or two, reappear. I inquired about why we were making the stops. “Oh, just a little missionary work” was his usual response. It wasn’t until I was a priest that I realized the missionary work being done was the quorum president knocking on bedroom windows reminding his sleepy quorum members of the need to attend their meetings. As the president of the Aaronic Priesthood, the bishop has the responsibility to see that all youth receive instruction concerning the doctrines of the kingdom as well as in the principles of honesty and charity. When the bishop encourages your attendance at meetings, he is not attempting to plan your life or adjust your schedules. He is attempting to show interest and concern because he knows the importance of partaking of the sacrament and the strength we gain by associating with each other.

At age 19, I moved to Jakarta and joined my mother. We had been separated for many years because mother had to find a job to survive when my father died. I was very lonely in this big city of 8 million people. I turned to the New Testament to study about the Savior. I had forgotten the scriptures for many years during my teenage years. One day, in early 1977, as I stood in the main train station seeing my friend off to his home town, a young lady came over and asked me about the starting date of the school year. She had mistaken me as her class mate. This introduction led me to the invitation to join her family at Church. What a miracle that was, a mistaken miracle I called it. I went with them to a small Church. I received a warm welcome. It was my first time attending a meeting of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The missionaries taught me and I accepted baptism and was confirmed a member of the Church on the 30th of April 1977.

I didn't know much at that time about the church, but I knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet. Yes I knew it! I felt my Heavenly Father's love. Somehow, I felt that life had a purpose and meaning. I could see a light for the future.

A few years ago, while serving in Mexico, I had the opportunity to visit a small branch of the Church in a rural part of the country. The members met in a small, rented warehouse for sacrament meetings. They sat in plastic chairs on a cement floor, as did the branch president and his counselors. The day I visited, there were a handful of people in attendance. As I sat in my own plastic chair and looked upon the group of individuals, I wondered what message Heavenly Father wanted me to share with this small band of Saints in a distant part of the vineyard. While I prayed, the Spirit communicated to me the following words: “Tell them I know them and I love them. Tell them I weep when they cry, and I rejoice when they are happy. Tell them I hear their prayers and am answering in a way best for them.” As I shared this message with these individuals, I felt Heavenly Father’s profound interest in and love for each of them and His yearning for their joy and happiness.

Mandy: Dad, if somebody called somebody else a really mean name and then the second somebody punched the first somebody, who would need to repent?
Dad: Well, the first somebody would need to repent of the mean name, and the second somebody would need to repent of the punching.
Mandy: But wouldn’t the first somebody be worse because she started it?
Dad: Does it matter who’s worse? Both have done wrong, and both need to apologize and repent.
The next day—Mandy: Linda, I’m really sorry I punched you. How can I make it up to you?
Linda: You can get out of my sight, you toad!
Mandy: Thanks, Linda. I will.
That night—Dad: Somebody seems a lot happier.
Mandy: Somebody is.

Not long ago, a friend recounted to me an experience he had while serving as a mission president. He had undergone a surgery that required several weeks of recuperation. During his recovery, he devoted time to searching the scriptures. One afternoon as he pondered the Savior’s words in the 27th chapter of 3 Nephi, he drifted off to sleep. He subsequently related:
“I fell into a dream in which I was given a vivid, panoramic view of my life. I was shown my sins, poor choices, the times … I had treated people with impatience, plus the omissions of good things I should have said or done. … [A] comprehensive … [review of] my life was shown to me in just a few minutes, but it seemed much longer. I awoke, startled, and … instantly dropped to my knees beside the bed and began to pray, to plead for forgiveness, pouring out the feelings of my heart like I had never done previously.
“Prior to the dream, I didn’t know that I [had] such great need to repent. My faults and weaknesses suddenly became so plainly clear to me that the gap between the person I was and the holiness and goodness of God seemed [like] millions of miles. In my prayer that late afternoon, I expressed my deepest gratitude to Heavenly Father and to the Savior with my whole heart for what They had done for me and for the relationships I treasured with my wife and children. While on my knees I also felt God’s love and mercy that was so palpable, despite my feeling so unworthy. …
“I can say I haven’t been the same since that day. … My heart changed. … What followed is that I developed more empathy toward others, with a greater capacity to love, coupled with a sense of urgency to preach the gospel. … I could relate to the messages of faith, hope, and the gift of repentance found in the Book of Mormon [as] never before.”19
It is important to recognize that this good man’s vivid revelation of his sins and shortcomings did not discourage him or lead him to despair. Yes, he felt shock and remorse. He felt keenly his need to repent. He had been humbled, yet he felt gratitude, peace, and hope—real hope—because of Jesus Christ, “the living bread which came down from heaven.”20
My friend spoke of the gap he perceived in his dream between his life and the holiness of God. Holiness is the right word. To eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ means to pursue holiness. God commands, “Be ye holy; for I am holy.”21

During the time on the plains, young Joseph learned many lessons of faith from his mother. Upon awakening one morning, the Smiths found that their best team of oxen was missing. The young boy and his uncle, Joseph Fielding, set out and searched an entire morning in vain. Fatigued and discouraged, they returned to camp. There they found Mary Fielding Smith on her knees, pleading for God to help them in this search, since the loss of the oxen would mean further delay in reaching their destination.
Arising from prayer, this youthful pioneer mother told her brother and her son to have breakfast, and she would bring back the cattle. She started toward the river, despite her brother’s protests that further search was futile. Ignoring first her brother and then a herdsman from a Missouri wagon train who tried to tell her that he had seen the oxen headed in the opposite direction that morning, Mary Fielding Smith continued walking to the river. Then, turning at the bank, she motioned to her brother and son to join her. As they did, they found the oxen tied to a clump of willows, hidden from sight. Someone had apparently put them there, planning to return after the pioneer group had moved on.
President Smith later said that this experience was “one of the first practical and positive demonstrations of the efficacy of prayer I have ever witnessed.” The impression it made on his mind was to aid him all through his life.

Once when I was six years old, my sister, Jessica, and I were at the department store at the mall with my mom. We were looking at things, and we didn’t know our mom was leaving. I went to another section close to where my sister was. Then I noticed that my mom and Jessica were gone. I said a prayer, and I felt like I should find Jessica first. I found her, and then we found my mom in the shopping line. I am glad I listened to the Spirit.
Natasha Jones, age 8Copley, Ohio

Many years ago, Sister Hazard and I stayed in a high-rise hotel in the middle of downtown San Francisco. We were in our room on about the 17th floor when an earthquake hit. It was scary and fascinating to look out across the city and watch enormous high-rise buildings swaying back and forth. It was even more fascinating to feel the swaying of our own building. We saw and felt firsthand how critical the foundation of a building was to its structural integrity and success. We were scared, but we were safe.

While I was at my friend’s birthday party, we were voting on movies to watch. There were two out of the five that I knew I shouldn’t watch. I told my friend that I didn’t want to watch those two movies. She wasn’t very happy about that, but she did respect my values. We ended up watching a movie that I felt was appropriate. I am glad I have the gospel standard to follow: “I will only read and watch things that are pleasing to Heavenly Father.”
Kaitlyn M., age 11, Washington

Carly W. from Rexburg, Idaho, is a busy helper. At home Carly helps out by taking care of her family’s cats, dogs, and chickens. Because Carly is one of the best students in her class at school, she helps other children with math and reading. In Primary Carly’s singing helps other children to feel the Spirit.
Because Carly has done such a good job helping others, some of her friends decided to help her too.
Carly was born with a disease called spina bifida. This disease makes it hard for Carly to use all of her muscles. Doing things like walking on uneven ground and climbing up stairs can be hard for her. At school, Carly wasn’t able to play on the playground because the playground equipment was hard for her to use. There were other children who also couldn’t play on the playground equipment.
“Sometimes I felt bad and frustrated at recess because I couldn’t play on the playground,” Carly says.
One of Carly’s friends, Halli Jo, and Halli Jo’s mom decided to earn money to build a playground that Carly and all the other students at the school could use.
Halli Jo, her mom, and a lot of other people worked to earn money for the new playground. It took a lot of work, but they were able to earn enough money to build a new playground that all the students could play on.
“It was a lot of hard work,” Halli Jo says. “But it never made me sad to do the work—it just made me love Carly more.”
Carly is happy to be able to play on the playground with her friends. She says, “I like walking up the ramps and going down the slides. Me and my friends have fun together.”

Such a family was Oskar and Albertina Andersson, who became members of the Church in 1915. After World War II, Oskar, Albertina, and seven of their children who had married members made the heart-rending decision to sell all they owned and “travel to Zion.” From 1949 to 1950, 29 members of the Andersson family left Sweden. Oskar and Albertina left their home, three children, and four grandchildren, whom they would never see again. They arrived in a desert and a city where the people spoke a language they did not understand. But for these faithful members, being close to the temple was more important than anything else.
Members of the Andersson family have since served as missionaries and Church leaders in all parts of the world, including as an Area President in Africa and a temple president in Sweden.

The doctor’s words, “Chris, you have a tumor. Chris, you have cancer,” sent waves of shock, fear, and despair through me. I had felt sure the lump was a hernia or maybe a swollen lymph node, but it was not.
After my 15-year-old son’s diagnosis, events happened very quickly. The following morning we were at Primary Children’s Medical Center in Salt Lake City for more CT scans, a bone scan, an MRI, a bone marrow aspiration, and a tumor biopsy. The news was not good. Chris had a small tumor on his pelvis near his left thigh. It was diagnosed as Ewing’s sarcoma, a type of bone cancer. Chemotherapy was scheduled to begin the next week.
As a nurse, I knew what we were in for medically. But I never expected the overwhelming fear and gloom that came over me. Those feelings soon changed, however.
Chris wasn’t even home from the hospital a day when his friends Ben Williams, Ben Brookes, and Jeremy Lamb picked him up so they could go to another friend’s house to watch videos and eat. That by itself calmed me. They were doing normal teenage things, and I was so relieved to see them not treating Chris any differently. I later found out the boys didn’t even talk about Chris’s cancer. “Why should they?” Chris asked.
When the chemotherapy began, so did the inevitable side effects, including hair loss. I don’t know why it bothered me so much, but it did—probably more than it bothered Chris. At first, there was hair on his pillow. Then it was in the sink. Finally, Chris shaved off what hair was left. Later that afternoon with Chris napping on the couch, the two Bens and Jeremy knocked at the door. As they came in, they doffed their hats to show Chris their cleanly shaved heads. They laughed together and watched a video of them all shaving each other’s heads.
“Now I wasn’t the only one with a shaved head. I just had the smoothest,” explained Chris.
A few days later at school, the four boys were walking down the hallway when a girl said, “They look like they have cancer.” Alone, that remark could have been devastating. Together, they just laughed about it.
One Sunday, as my husband and I sat in fast and testimony meeting with Chris’s older brother, Jeremy, fear continued to engulf me. Chris had been hospitalized again with a fever and low blood counts. We were new in our ward, and very few people knew of Chris’s condition. As I listened half-heartedly, a high councilman stood at the pulpit to bear his testimony. He talked about his love for some of the youth he’d met in another ward in our stake. He talked about how three of the priests there had shaved their heads for a friend who had cancer. Then his voice broke slightly when he said, “That boy lives in our ward now and is my home teacher.
“I wonder,” he continued, “if our youth would be that supportive.” The challenge was taken and met. That afternoon, our ward was graced by several very bald young men, including Chris’s older brother, Jeremy.
“One Sunday before sacrament meeting we were all lined up, and all of us were bald. The congregation just laughed,” Chris said.
Since that time, both the young men and young women of our ward continued to support Chris and our family. During one particularly hard hospitalization, friends traveled an hour to visit him and cheer him up. Two days after he came home, they picked him up and took him out for all-you-can-eat pizza.
Each day the young men of the ward would gather at the Owenses’ home across the street from us. They are the only ones with a usable basketball court, and the young men would come to play ball. As I watched out the window as they played, Chris would sometimes stop playing and just sit on the grass with some of the younger kids who had gathered and laugh with them as they’d steal his hat and rub his smooth head. “Even though it was my hardest summer, it was also my funnest,” said Chris.
And the love and support didn’t stop. Last September after church, we noticed a crowd of young men, young women, children, and their leaders walking toward our door. As they filled our small living room, they surprised Chris with a homemade quilt and pillow. The blocks of the quilt were each designed by different young women or young men with their own well-wishes, jokes, and funny pictures. They asked Chris to take the quilt and pillow with him to the hospital so he could be reminded of them and their love.
“The comments and pictures on the quilt made me laugh,” said Chris. “When I saw them coming up our driveway, I thought it must be some kind of activity, and I wondered why I hadn’t been told about it. It was a neat thing for them to do.”
After the young people had presented the quilt, the Sambongis, our neighbors from Japan, gave Chris his gift, a sembazuru, which translated means 1,000 paper cranes. The Sambongis told Chris that in Japan, cranes are said to live as long as 1,000 years, and that a paper crane will take away sickness when it flies away. They also gave him a note:
“Dear Chris, These paper cranes were made by a lot of people, including people in our ward and those you have never met before. We all pray for your recovery, and may the Lord bless you.”
The Lord has blessed us—with good neighbors, friends, professionals, and especially strong, loving young men and young women. And Chris knows it too.
The youth and the leaders of the Orem Sharon Park Third Ward, and Chris’s three friends from the Sixth Ward have been great. Their kindness and thoughtfulness during a very painful and difficult time has helped much more than they’ll ever know.

In 1940, Lily, was called to serve a stake mission. She and her companion knocked on doors, made appointments, and did their very best to teach the gospel. This was often difficult for Lily because Fred was inactive at the time and people would tell her to leave them alone and go teach her own father. One day in early April, Lily and her companion knocked on the door of a man with the hope of being able to teach him the gospel. He told the two young women that when Lily's father had quit smoking and returned to activity in the church, they could come back and he would listen to them. Lily went home in tears and reported the conversation to her father.

At some point in his life, Fred had taken up smoking. He rolled his own cigarettes and always carried the "makings" : a sack of Bull Durham tobacco and a packet of cigarette papers--in his front shirt pocket. On May 1st, Fred announced he had quit smoking and would go to the temple. On May 2nd or 3rd, Fred told Lily to get on her "wheel" [bicycle] and go to the bishop to get a temple recommend for him. Lily explained that she couldn't get a temple recommend for him; he had to be interviewed by the bishop. Fred insisted: and because Lily had been taught to obey her father and also because she knew it wouldn't work, she went to the bishop. To her surprise, the bishop signed a recommend, telling her that if Fred said he was worthy to go to the temple, he was worthy, and there wouldn't be any man more worthy of a recommend.

Of course, the stake president's signature was needed. Once again, Fred told Lily to get on her "wheel" and go get the stake president's signature. Once again she argued, but in the end obeyed her father, knowing that the stake president couldn't and wouldn't sign the recommend. However, Brother "B" , the stake president, took the recommend and signed it, telling Lily that if Fred said he was worthy to go to the temple, he was worthy. Lily was upset and angry and let Brother "B" know it. How, she asked, could he, a stake president, disregard church policy and sign a temple recommend for Fred without first interviewing him. Then the stake president told Lily a story. Several years previously when Brother "B" was running the flour mill, Fred had pulled his wagon and team into the flour mill behind a widow who was buying cracked wheat. Fred caught brother "B" with his thumb on the scale: which meant, of course, that the widow would pay for more cracked wheat than she received. Fred told Brother "B" that if he ever caught him doing that again, he would throw Brother "B" off the loading dock and stomp him. Brother "B" was a larger man than Fred, but he knew that Fred was capable of stomping him: and would. The stake president said it had been his habit for years to alter the weight; however, after Fred's warning, he never let his hand get anywhere near the scales. He told Lily that her father "was the most honest man he'd ever encountered in his entire life and if her father said he was ready to go to the temple, he was ready. All the stake president needed was Fred's word.

Six days later, on May 9th, Fred entered the Manti temple to be sealed to Jenny and their five youngest children. In his front shirt pocket, was a brand-new, unopened sack of Bull Durham tobacco. For the rest of his life, Fred carried that same sack of tobacco in his front pocket: unopened. He never talked about it and his children never questioned him, but my mother believed it was her father's way of reminding himself of the promises he made when he and his family were sealed for time and eternity in the temple. When Fred died, that sack of Bull Durham was still unopened.

A friend of mine named Bret went to a local ski resort with some friends to ride the Alpine Slide, a hillside attraction patterned after a toboggan run. There were two parallel tracks on the slide, and one of Bret’s friends wanted to race. They waited until no one was in front of them, then pushed off down the mountain.
Halfway down the slide they came to a sharp curve with a warning sign, “Caution, Slow.” Bret thought this was his chance to pull ahead, so he approached the curve at full speed.
The toboggan jumped the track. Thrown free, Bret slammed into the hillside, then slid a long way over tough, rocky terrain. He wasn’t dressed for protection, and his entire right side was scraped from his ankle to his wrist.
That evening his dad soaked Bret in the bathtub so he could peel the clothing away from the torn skin. Bret fainted from the pain. He spent the next three days in bed taking medication, wondering if the agony would ever end.
“I learned a lesson I’ll never forget,” Bret now says. “I couldn’t believe how bad it hurt and how long it took to get better. The people who put up those warning signs knew what they were doing.”
Bret had started out doing something that seemed safe and fun. And that’s exactly what it should have been. But then he deliberately ignored the warnings, got going too fast, and before he knew it, the situation took control of him.

“I have a secret, Lisa,” Katie said after she finished her milk. She put her glass on the kitchen table and swung her legs.
“What is it?” Her sister stopped eating her cereal.
“It’s something that you can see,” Katie said, swinging her legs faster.
Lisa looked all around. “I don’t see a secret. What is it?”
Katie shook her head. She slid off her chair and hopped around the table. “Dad, I have a secret.”
Dad looked up from feeding the baby and smiled at Katie. “Give me a clue.”
“It’s something that you can see.”
Dad looked really hard at Katie. He wrinkled his brow. “You grew ten inches?”
Katie laughed.
“No. Look again.”
“I can’t see your secret,” said Dad. “You’ll have to tell me.”
Katie shook her head. She ran around the table to her mother. Mother put her arm around Katie and kissed her. “I have a secret,” said Katie, bouncing up and down on her toes.
“That white mustache?” Mother asked, dabbing Katie’s mouth with a napkin.
“No. Something else. Something that you can see.” Katie looked down at the floor.
“We will have to guess later, Katie,” said Mother. “Now, let me tie your shoes so that you can go to preschool.”
“No thank you,” said Katie.
“Do you want me to tie your shoes?” asked Lisa.
“No thank you,” answered Katie.
“Shall I tie them?” asked Dad.
“No thank you, Dad.” Katie giggled.
“Someone will have to tie them, Katie. You can’t go with your shoes untied,” Mother said.
Katie jumped up and down, then held up one foot so that everyone could see her shoe. “That’s my secret. I tied them all by myself!”

One of my miracles was completing a marathon. However, running for 26.2 miles seemed like an insurmountable goal and I had many legitimate fears and concerns. Recovery from my brain surgery was very difficult. I could not hear well, had a hard time swallowing, and speaking was challenging. Sitting up for more than a few minutes caused me to feel weak and lightheaded. I couldn’t exert much physical energy without feeling pain and throbbing in my head. If I couldn’t even sit, stand, and walk a few steps without sitting down, how would I ever complete such a grueling task?

With small and simple goals of walking for five minutes, then 10 minutes, then 30 minutes, before finally running for sustained periods of time, I began to change. I scheduled a time to run each day with good friends that helped motivate me to keep going. In rain or shine, early morning or night, I kept running.

Part of my training included running a half marathon with my mom, Keilani, and a dear friend who was an experienced runner. My friend was a great source of strength as she prepared us for the race, encouraged us to pace ourselves, remain hydrated, and never give up. We relied deeply on her experience, encouragement, and perspective!

I was also blessed by the indomitable determination of eight-year-old Keilani. We ran the first nine miles without much trouble, but things became difficult at mile 10. Keilani, was in a lot of pain because her shoes were too small and she ultimately wore a hole in her sneakers. But she never gave up. Each time she wanted to stop, we took turns encouraging each other and singing, joking and telling riddles. Even when the race was most difficult and we stopped to stretch, Keilani looked me in the eye and said “I am not giving up! I am finishing this race!”

When we finally reached the finish line, Keilani through tears said “Mom, we did it! We finished as family!” We went through the highs and lows of the race together. We encouraged, supported, and sustained each other, and we finished as a team. It is my deep desire that my family, myself, and each of you will never give up on our faith, testimony, and love for the gospel and each other. I hope that at the end of our earthly race we will be together hugging, crying, and rejoicing that “We did it! We finished as a family.”