Gospel Story Finder

Each time I receive the Liahona (Spanish), I devote myself to reading the messages of President Hinckley and the other General Authorities. These messages and the other articles bring me strength in difficult times. Our Father in Heaven fills my life with blessings, and I know that this is his true Church.
Ana María Martínez Rollano,Old Town (Spanish) Branch, Mount Vernon Virginia Stake

When Elder Brook P. Hales was eight or nine, he was in a fast and testimony meeting where his father was presiding as bishop. His father invited the congregation to bear testimonies, and nearly everyone present bore testimony. “It was perhaps the first time I felt the Spirit bearing witness to me of the truthfulness of the gospel,” Elder Hales recalls.
That day when he was a young boy, Elder Hales didn’t bear his testimony. But it has grown stronger ever since. “The gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon is true, God loves us perfectly and is eager to bless us, Jesus is our Savior, and we are blessed to have the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost as we are worthy of it,” he says.

“Even though I forgot to read a few times, overall it was a success. I realized that before I started Elder Stevenson’s invitation, I was really only reading about 3 minutes each night, and by increasing my reading to 10 minutes each night, I saw a difference in my life. When I read, I feel more in tune with the Spirit and I can feel the blessings of spiritual protection every day. The same way that it can be hard to start reading after not reading the scriptures for a while, once I started the habit of reading, I couldn’t stop.
“I noticed that for me, when I read the scriptures right before bed, I normally fell asleep or didn’t get as much out of my reading. It worked best to read either in the morning or after school.
“I had a blast doing this and would challenge everyone to try it.”
Rachel A., 15, Colorado, USA

I learned about performing and persevering on my mission. I served in a little dusty village, Quiriza, Bolivia, near the Argentine border. We traveled by horseback in those mountain villages of Bolivia and lived at a high altitude in dusty, dirty conditions. I felt at times like Ammon and the sons of Mosiah when the Lord told them, “Be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls” (Alma 17:11).
My assignment from the mission president was to help build a chapel. It was a wonderful experience building that chapel, using adobe bricks, and bringing lumber, metal decking, and other building materials over a 20-mile, steep mountain pass. It required the same level of pondering, praying, performing, and persevering as we built the Quiriza chapel. I found that it was a labor of love, and because of that love gained by serving those people, it was far more difficult for me to leave Bolivia than it had been to leave home to serve my mission.

We help ourselves as we help each other. A family I know lived near a busy road. Travelers often stopped to ask for help. Early one morning the family heard loud pounding on their door. Tired and worried who it would be at 2:00 a.m., they wondered if, just this once, someone else could help. As the insistent knocking continued, they heard, “Fire—there’s a fire in the back of your house!” Good Samaritans help each other.

In my mind’s eye I see Russell Nelson, Jr., newly arrived from his home in heaven and staring up into the eyes of his father as though to say to him (as Joseph Smith said to Newel K. Whitney), “You prayed me here; now what do you want of me?”
I do not know that his father, who is the general superintendent of the Sunday School and the father of nine daughters, wants him to become a famous surgeon. I believe he will lead his son wisely as to what his earthly vocation will be, but I am sure he will want this boy to go on a mission, that hope of great adventure which comes into the early life of all Latter-day Saint boys. If this is the father’s desire, he will start early to prepare his son.
The first prayers the baby will hear will be that he will grow up to go on a mission and to be married in the temple. Both of the words “mission” and “temple” he will not understand; but later, when comprehension comes, they will be so ingrained in his memory that they will be a part of his being. Later, as he lisps his own prayer, he will find the words “make me worthy to go on a mission” easy to say. Neither will he stumble over the words “marry” or “temple.”
If his father is wise, his boy’s early years will be filled with stories of the experiences of the missionaries of the past. He should begin by telling of his own ancestors, to give the boy knowledge that mission adventures are not the exclusive property of the leaders but that the followers had equally miraculous adventures. But, of course, he will want to learn of the heroic journey of Samuel H. Smith and his companion from Far West on an eastern missionary journey. He will want to learn of the missionary journey of Heber C. Kimball and Brigham Young when they, ill from fever, arose from their beds and started out, how Brother Kimball was poisoned and was saved by the loyal work of his companion, and how they miraculously found money in the purse, just enough for each day’s journey. But he will need to know, too, that today with our affluence he may not find money; he will find something far richer—the great joy that comes from seeing people’s lives miraculously changed as they accept the gospel.
He will need to know that he must develop physical stamina, not for athletics but for his mission. He will play basketball to develop wind and limb to serve the Lord.
As he grows, he will need to talk man-to-man, or rather boy-to-man, why all this should be. His father will say, “For your mission, son, you will need to learn by heart many things. And so we shall now start.”
Then his father will teach him the simple truths that are important. They will memorize the prophecy in the book of Nephi about the descendant of Joseph who, bearing the name of his ancestor, would do great things. And then his father will tell him the story of the modern Joseph, the fulfillment of that prophecy—what he did to be a great boy. He will learn that boys do not need to wait until they are men to be great.
He will thrill with the ancient prophecy of the angel who would fly through the heavens having the everlasting gospel to preach to all the world and how this prophecy was actually fulfilled through angelic visits to the young boy prophet.
In the same manner they will comb the scriptures, doctrine by doctrine, and learn those vital to missionary work. They will read together the great boy-literature of the world. The chivalry at the court of King Arthur will be mirrored in his treatment of girls and, later, young women. And he will learn the place of animals in his life when he runs the Trail of the Sand Hill Stag with Seton and will learn the immense power of nature as he survives a ride down a snow avalanche with Enos A. Mills.
He will also learn of the winter journey to rescue the handcart company, victim of the Wyoming blizzards. His father will see to it that he gets the feel of a real blizzard and the helplessness of the brave people who had only the Lord to depend on for deliverance. He will be taught these lessons at the home evening, at the dinner table, at bedtime, in camp, on hikes and journeys. And driven home at all these stages will be the theme that the greatest adventure a boy can have is to go on a mission and learn to depend on the Lord when faced with a bitter, cold, or hostile world, and that the greatest joy he can experience is to give of his all in the service of the Master in bringing souls unto him.
Having seen and heard his father pray, he will want to pray too and will soon learn about the whisperings of the Spirit, which comes into his “feeling,” as Nephi pointed out to his rebellious brothers. (See 1 Ne. 17:45.)
He will need to learn also of the important principle of obedience. Teach him that the Lord Jesus Christ was completely obedient to his father and that if your son would be a successful missionary, he must be completely obedient to those in authority over him. Faithfully learning this lesson before he goes into the mission field will equip him for his work there.
Give him responsibility, and teach him to forget himself in service to others. These, coupled with obedience, will help him to find true humility—all of which are vital factors for his reception of the Holy Ghost.
And so, through his growing years he will apply the truth of all things. Lay the foundation well, Brother Nelson; it begins at birth and its effects cease not until the mission of life is complete.
Meanwhile, his mother will have a hand in his growth also. Faith-building begins in the cradle and ends not at the grave. In the formative years your boy will need to learn how to give and take, how to get along, how to put up with inconveniences, how to be patient and tolerant, how to resolve differences with playmates and, later, with missionary companions.
He will need long training in neatness and in the handling of his clothing. He will need to know the “rubbing board” techniques of washing his clothes and how to keep them white and clean. Ironing and pressing should be second nature. He will need to learn that bodily cleanliness goes with spiritual cleanness and that the body is the expression of the spirit.
He will need to know how to cook—how to make the food he prepares taste good and at the same time meet his many nutritional needs. Nothing will buoy up a missionary like a tasty meal. Why shouldn’t this boy learn to cook well? And while he is about it, he should learn that the dusty, ill-kept room with its unmade bed is the devil’s best means of discouragement.
Just as surely as he walks, his manner, his attitude, his clothing, his complete self will be concrete evidence of what he is in his soul. He cannot conceal himself. Teach him, then, that these things reveal his spirit and show what he really is and that the success of his mission will be found in how his spirit speaks to the spirits of those he meets.
In the process of his growing, make sure that he will learn how the Church came to be and where it has gone from there. And let him learn to know that faith in the Lord Jesus Christ will give men reason for their repentance from sin, which is the great doctrine that brings hope; that baptism by immersion is both a covenant and a sign of acceptance; and that the gift of the Holy Ghost is what makes him, and his father and his mother, different from the world; and that it will make those he converts different also.
He will not consider the Book of Mormon dull reading if you will make it live for him while he is growing. And if he learns that reading scripture by the Spirit with an open heart and a searching mind is indeed hearing the voice of the Lord, as the Lord told the Twelve it is (see D&C 18:34–36), you will have him on his way to becoming a missionary.
He began to prepare for his work here before he came to earth, when he repudiated Satan and all of his subtle sophistries. Now he is to prove that he can live in a body and control its earthly tendencies and temptations as he did as a spirit before his arrival here in mortality.
As with Russell Nelson, Jr., so it is with all boys—and girls too. Let us not leave out the girls—they also may go on missions. These young folks may become great of themselves, but with the faith and teaching of their fathers and mothers they will become greater. The Eternal Father taught his Only Begotten Son. He depends on us to teach our children truth that they may better serve the Father of their spirits and live.
To those who may not have had these training opportunities in their childhood, through humility and diligent effort in their teen years, they can still achieve the same thing.
Two years on a mission will give the experience and practice in the great virtues of which I speak. It will confirm that the Lord truly speaks in this day, for he will constantly whisper the truth of this great latter-day work into the soul of the valiant missionary.
Later he will know this whispering in the affairs of his adult years and, following it, will find the true entrance to the things which will give him eternal life in the kingdom of our Lord.
The Lord has said that to bring one soul to him brings joy and that to bring many souls gives proportionately greater joy. The prepared youth will find that joy on his mission. It will sustain him through his life.

It was a routine, the same routine Marie Claude had followed every morning for years. Get up early and care for the animals. Feed Daisy, Belle, and Lady, the horses. Feed Fido, the bull in the barn. Feed three pigs, three sheep, two dogs, four ducks, and any other animals calling the farm home at the moment.
From upstairs, Christine heard Marie Claude come in the house and bolt the back door against the wind. She could imagine her hanging her flannel coat on the peg in the kitchen. Then she heard her pull a chair across the floor and put breakfast dishes on the table.
For as long as Christine could remember, Marie Claude got up early to take care of the animals. But today the routine was different—the movements slower, the pauses longer, the sighs heavy and audible.
And Christine knew why. Last night, Marie Claude had finally told her boyfriend good-bye. He was a decent fellow, a nice man. But he didn’t understand. He’d had the missionary discussions, even been to church a time or two. But all this religion, meetings every Sunday, marriage in a temple—for him it just wouldn’t do.
And now Marie Claude, who loved him and had dated him for a couple of years, who had argued with him before, had sent him away. She sat at the breakfast table, numb, almost crying, wrenching solace from the everyday routine.
At the end of the promenade, there’s a gazebo. To get there, Christine had to mount steps again. Quickly she bounded up them, the end of her run in sight. And as she ran, her mind flashed ahead, like a video on fast forward.
Here was Marie Claude again, but this time she was smiling. Dressed in embroidered chiffon, she sat by a cheery window in a friend’s house, holding hands with an amiable young man in a blue sweater.
It was amazing. When they laughed, it was the same laugh. The smile was the same smile. They looked like each other, they talked like each other. They both had kind eyes. You’d think they were brother and sister, not fiances.
Yet there on the table was their wedding announcement, and it really did seem like a dream come true—“C’est avec joie que nous vous annonçons notre mariage qui aura lieu au Temple de Washington, D.C., mercredi le six mai.” (It is with joy that we announce our marriage in the Washington, D.C. Temple on May 6, 1987.)
André and Marie Claude. They met at church, and fell in love quickly. But after years of struggling to feel right about something that was wrong, it was easy for Marie Claude to do something that felt so true.

Not long ago I glanced out the window of the mission home kitchen in Santiago, Chile. There behind the house I could see a large English walnut tree with a big pile of dirt under it. Playing in the dirt pile, I spied two little boys. It had rained recently and both boys were covered with mud. I could barely tell who they were. When they saw me looking out the window smiles broke out on their faces, and then I could tell it was my son Chris and his friend David. Chris’s face was so covered with mud that when he smiled his teeth showed through like six small marshmallows on top of a chocolate cake.
Later when it was time to come in and David had gone home, I sent Chris upstairs to bathe. We joked about how it would take three tubs full of water to get him clean. The first would have to be shoveled out just like pure dirt, the second, dipped out with a bucket like runny mud, and maybe we would be able to wash the third down the drain.
After Chris had soaked for a few minutes, I went in to help him get really clean and we had a serious talk that I hope he will never forget.
We worked together to get one hand scrubbed clean and then he compared it with the other that was still dirty. “Boy, Dad,” he said, “it’s sure great to have clean hands.” I explained how true that is, and said, “I want you to know that it is not the dirt of the earth that makes people’s hands really dirty. If a boy steals, if he is mean to his friends and hits them on purpose, if he tells his parents he will do something and then doesn’t, or if he is naughty or disobedient in other ways, this causes real “dirt”—the kind that you can’t wash off with soap and water. It’s the kind of dirt that you have to wear all the time and, even though others can’t always see it on you, you know yourself that inside you are not clean.”

Church Welfare and Self-Reliance employee Peniette Seru joined a group of Church members who visited a small village in Fiji’s south to deliver SolarBuddy lights to families.
She smiled as she recounted her experience distributing lights to young people who live in homes with no electricity. “One hundred and fifty other lights were donated to a children’s heart hospital (in Suva) to be given to children who come in from outer islands,” she said.

“I first learned about the Church welfare program in Dad’s store, where a part of the back room served as the pickup station for needy Church members. The welfare program had just begun, and supplies were meager—a few sacks of flour, some potatoes, several grapefruits that were usually withered. There were eight or ten food items, and that was all. I often remember Dad saying, “That isn’t good enough’ as he filled the welfare sacks to be picked up. Then he’d add to the sacks some of his own commodities from the front of the store. He taught me a great deal about giving.

We can find examples of those who understand this principle all around us. One sister I know recently served as a volunteer guide at a convention for the blind. Church members were asked to participate with members of other denominations in helping participants find workshops, rooms, and information. But this sister’s service went beyond the convention. She became the friend of a lonely woman who had no family to look after her. She helped the woman with shopping, daily tasks, and trips to the doctor. When the woman was seriously ill, this sister sat by her bed to give comfort. At the woman’s death, the sister made all the funeral arrangements and contacted the one relative the woman had mentioned.

Such dedicated service went far beyond what most of the volunteers did at the convention! They met the needs of the moment, but she went beyond that to give real Christlike service. That’s what remembering Christ is about. It is practicing the principles he lived and taught and becoming more and more like him. Through doing as Christ did, our understanding deepens and our ability to serve grows. We become more able to “put off” the “natural man” (see Mosiah 3:19) and to learn to heed the promptings of the Spirit.

President Henry B. Eyring
The Eyrings’ young son gets lost, prays for help, and is found.

My father died when I was seven. I was the oldest of three small children our widowed mother struggled to raise. When I was ordained a deacon, she said how pleased she was to have a priesthood holder in the home. But Mother continued to direct the family, including calling on which one of us would pray when we knelt together each morning. I was puzzled. I had been taught that the priesthood presided in the family. There must be something I didn’t know about how that principle worked.

When my father died, my mother presided over our family. She had no priesthood office, but as the surviving parent in her marriage she had become the governing officer in her family. At the same time, she was always totally respectful of the priesthood authority of our bishop and other Church leaders. She presided over her family, but they presided over the Church.

Examples: “One of my best friends grew up with a strong Buddhist background. At first, I doubted that she would join the Church. But I mentioned it from time to time, and gradually she became curious about the gospel. She prayed daily. She read the scriptures. But she had so many questions I began to feel she might always have some belief in the Church but not join it. Then one day she told me she had decided to be baptized, that she had felt the witness of the Holy Ghost that the Church is true. I was very happy then.

Karl Haglund: Just about any guy in the Church knows what it’s like to walk into a dorm room in college or into a high school locker room or something like that and see a whole wall or locker just covered with pictures. Someone else may walk in and out and maybe not seem to be bothered by them, probably because he has put himself on the level of accepting and being a part of this type of situation. But when a Church member walks in and sees them, he walks out feeling shabby for maybe the next couple of hours, just remembering what he has seen.

Once I acted in the same hasty manner. My wife, Marti, began having problems early in her pregnancy, and I instantly gave her a strongly worded blessing, promising her that her health would be protected and that the baby would live. As soon as I finished I knew that I had acted incorrectly that the unborn baby had actually died.

After fasting and praying, I requested that a fellow priesthood holder assist me to give her a second blessing. This time I carefully listened for the Lord’s guidance and found that I was unable to promise that the baby would live—but rather that Marti would be the mother of other healthy children. That baby did not survive, but we have four children in fulfillment of the blessing. Although in the second blessing I hadn’t said what I wanted to say, Marti and I both enjoyed the peace that comes from the comforting of the Spirit.

Orson Pratt, Parley’s brother, was the second youngest of the Apostles. Ordained at 23, he was only a few weeks older than Lyman Johnson. The service that Orson had already rendered to the Church provides an excellent example of how young adults can be a force for good.
Orson was baptized on September 19, 1830—his 19th birthday. Shortly after, Joseph Smith received a revelation for him that said that Orson was God’s son, that he was blessed because he believed, and that his responsibility was to preach the gospel (see D&C 34:3–6). Accordingly, Orson served numerous missions, including one with Lyman Johnson in 1832 in which they baptized nearly 100 individuals and ordained several elders.
When Orson was called as an Apostle, he was not in Kirtland. On April 23, 1835, in the city of Columbus, he learned that his presence was required at a meeting in Kirtland on April 26th.
Not knowing the purpose of the meeting, he immediately made his way there. Unaware that he had been called as an Apostle, he walked in while the congregation was “praying, and wishing for his arrival.”9 Feeling the support of the Saints, Orson accepted his call.
As an Apostle, he prepared a pamphlet that contained the earliest printed account of Joseph Smith’s First Vision. As a pioneer in 1847, he kept a detailed record of the trek west. He also wrote many missionary pamphlets and was a strong defender of the Book of Mormon.

In 1981, my father, two close friends, and I went on an adventure in Alaska. We were to land on a remote lake and climb to some beautiful high country. In order to reduce the load we would have to personally carry, we wrapped our supplies in boxes, covered them with foam, attached large colored streamers, and threw them out the window of our bush plane at our intended destination.
After arriving, we searched and searched, but to our dismay, we could not find any of the boxes. Eventually we found one. It contained a small gas stove, a tarp, some candy, and a couple packages of Hamburger Helper—but no hamburger. We had no way to communicate with the outside world, and our scheduled pickup was a week later.
I learned two valuable lessons from this experience: One, do not throw your food out the window. Two, sometimes we have to face hard things.
Years before, during our misadventure in Alaska, I had quickly learned that blaming our circumstances on others—the pilot launching the food out in fading light—was not a solution. However, as we experienced physical exhaustion, lack of food, sickness, and sleeping on the ground during a major storm with only a tarp to cover us, I learned that “with God nothing shall be impossible.”

The porpoise is
A gentle soul,
Innocent of guile.
She frolics in
The waves and wears
A Mona Lisa smile.
Once sailors thought
A Lorelei
Was luring them astray.
But it was just
A porpoise—
A merry, friendly
Porpoise—
Inviting them to play.

At this point it may not be improper to again solemnly warn the officers and members of the Church against all conduct that tends to immorality and unchastity. We are being continually, though most falsely, accused of teaching and practicing sexual vice under the garb of religion. No charge could be more utterly false; for no system of philosophy, no code of ethics, no articles of religion since the world was first peopled, ever taught more strictly and emphatically than does the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the paramount necessity of personal purity in the relations of the sexes. Of this the Saints are well aware. Let us see to it, then, that our actions correspond with our faith; for we may be sure that no prominence of opposition, no ties of family, no influence of wealth can save us from the penalty if we break the law of God in this regard. But a few weeks ago it became the sad duty of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to sever from the communion of the Saints one of its members who had violated the law of chastity. He was a man of education, of experience, of judgement, of long standing in the Church, but neither these nor his exalted position to the Priesthood could save him from the penalty of the law he had so flagrantly broken. And as with him, so with all others. The law must be administered by the officers of the Church with justice and impartiality, with malice towards none, but with due regard to the commands of God and the honor of His holy name. Hear it, O house of Israel! ye who are seeking to attain to the Celestial Kingdom of our Father—none but the pure in heart can see God; none but those who have sanctified all their affections and passions by entire and complete subservience to His laws can dwell in His eternal presence! Let us also remember that the condition of a community, as a whole, depends upon the conditions of the individuals composing it; as are its component parts, so is it in its SIC entirety. If the individual members of a people are wise, just, intelligent, honest, honorable and pure, that community will be distinguished among other communities by those peculiar virtues. To apply the lesson to ourselves, each one for himself, if we wish to see the Church of Christ prepared as a bride for the Savior, we must, individually, live our religion and exemplify in our own lives those virtues which we know must adorn the bride before she can enter the presence of her Lord. This matter of personal purity, faith, diligence and good works is one that we cannot delegate to our neighbor, or make the responsibility of other men and women; but each must do his own duty, each bear his own responsibilities, each set his own house in order (D&C 93:43), each magnify his calling (D&C 84:33), each live near unto God, if he expects God to draw nigh unto him. (James 4:8).