Gospel Story Finder

I know a young mother who has a great talent in music. She sings beautifully and plays the piano with great feeling and ability. Every week she gives a lesson to each of her four little children. Every day she spends a few minutes alone with each child, sometimes sharing with them her love for art or music. Besides blessing her children and her husband with great talents, she leads a choir and gives joy to many with her singing. When women develop their talents, it is a blessing to themselves and their families.

One day I went to a birthday party. The first part was watching a PG-13 movie, so I didn’t go to that part. I went in the middle of the party, and we ate pizza and cupcakes. After that we started watching another movie. It looked bad. I told my friend’s mom that I couldn’t watch it, so she turned it off and we played appropriate video games instead. I feel that I made the right choice. I will follow the prophet’s counsel to never watch bad movies in my life.

After the missionaries have gone, Tasha Higgins, 17, talks about a recent Young Women activity.
“The Laurels set up a maze with chairs,” she explains. “We blindfolded the others and had someone doing what the Holy Ghost does, giving quiet directions to them. Then we had someone right behind them saying no, don’t go that way, and giving them wrong directions. They had to decide who they were going to listen to.”
That’s just like life, Tasha says. The way to make it through the maze is to listen to the still, small voice. And when you do, it prompts you to be more Christlike in whatever you do. Those are promptings the youth in the Winchester Ward are eager to heed, and so are other LDS youth in the Huntsville stake, which includes additional towns nearby.

Mutual can also be an opportunity to participate in missionary work. It is a great place to invite less-active members or friends of other faiths to feel the Spirit in a casual, less intimidating setting.
Brother Dahlquist told the story of a priesthood leader he met in Uruguay. After talking with him for a minute, Brother Dahlquist discovered that this man went through a period of inactivity in his youth. When Brother Dahlquist asked what happened, this man said, “When I was 12, I received a visit from a deacons quorum president and his counselor, and they invited me to come play soccer at Mutual. And so I went, and I brought some friends for moral support. My friends and I outnumbered the quorum that was there, but we had a great time. After the activity, the quorum president came to me and said, ‘Why don’t you come on Sunday? We’d love to have you.’ The rest is history. I went on a mission. I married in the temple, and I am now serving in the stake presidency.”

This prompted my reading some lines that you may have heard before:
Only a Dad
Only a dad, with a tired face,
Coming home from the daily race;
Bringing little of gold and fame
To show how well he has played the game,
But glad in his heart that his own rejoice
To see him come home and to hear his voice.
Only a dad, of a brood of four,
One of ten million men or more,
Plodding along in the daily strife,
Bearing the whips and scorns of life
With never a whimper of pain or hate,
For the sake of those who at home await.
Only a dad, neither rich nor proud,
Merely one of the surging crowd,
Toiling, striving, from day to day,
Facing whatever may come his way;
Silent, whenever the harsh condemn,
And bearing it all for the love of them.
Only a dad, but he gives his all
To smooth the way for his children small;
Doing, with courage stern and grim,
The deeds that his father did for him.
These are the lines that for him I pen;
Only a dad, but the best of men.
(Edgar A. Guest. Source Book of Poetry, Al Bryant, comp.; Grand Rapids, Zondervan Publishing House, 1968.)

I grew up in Argentina. I was not a member of the Church when I was young. But my family kept a Bible on our shelf. It was large and had beautiful pictures. We didn’t read it together very often. But I loved to look through its pages and see the pictures and stories.
My favorite was the story of Noah. I loved seeing Noah, the flood, and the animals. I liked how the ark kept Noah and his family safe from the storm.
Years later, I was baptized into the Church, got married, and had my own family. One night in family home evening, I talked about how Noah’s ark and our home were alike in many ways. Each provided safety from the scary storms of the world.

When Ashlee Broadbent and Carolyn Betz found out that two of their special-needs friends, Claudia and Liz, would be attending the school’s spring prom, they wanted to help. They helped Claudia and Liz design their own prom dresses, which were custom-made by a friend. Then they organized a group of 20 friends and rented a bus to travel to the dance together. The night of the prom, Carolyn’s sister gave Claudia and Liz a full-blown makeover, doing their hair, nails, and make-up. Ashlee took photos and waved good-bye as Carolyn, Claudia, and Liz left for dinner and the dance with the rest of the group. At age 15, Ashlee wasn’t yet old enough to date.
“We wanted to give them an extra special time. It started out as a simple project,” Carolyn says. “We came away with two new friends.”

“That Ye May Know,” by Gary L. Kapp“Arise and come forth unto me, … that ye may know that I am the God of Israel” (3 Ne. 11:14).
Gary L. Kapp
“I don’t remember ever not having a testimony of Jesus Christ, but it wasn’t until I arrived in the mission field that I began a serious study of His life, especially in the Book of Mormon. At that time, I truly began to feel the burning in my heart that comes from a sure knowledge that Jesus is the Savior of the world and the Son of God.
“All of my life I have wanted to give as much of my time and talent as possible to sharing my testimony through art. I sincerely hope my love for the Savior is evident in my art and that it will somehow strengthen the testimonies of those who view it.”

I remember the occasion of more than 50 years ago when, as a missionary, I was speaking in an open-air meeting in Hyde Park, London. As I was presenting my message, a heckler interrupted to say, “Why don’t you stay with the doctrine of the Bible which says in John [4:24], ‘God is a Spirit’?”
I opened my Bible to the verse he had quoted and read to him the entire verse: “God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”
I said, “Of course God is a spirit, and so are you, in the combination of spirit and body that makes of you a living being, and so am I.”
Each of us is a dual being of spiritual entity and physical entity. Jesus’s declaration that God is a spirit no more denies that He has a body than does the statement that I am a spirit while also having a body.

I know that Dad thinks about Church, though. And about God and Jesus. I know because when I was baptized, Dad was there, sitting right next to Mom and Uncle Henry, and he squeezed me afterward in a way that I will never forget. I can still feel it. There were tears in his eyes and the same kind of look that he had the day I scored at that soccer game and the Sunday Bishop Huxley blessed my baby sister. And I know because when my pet lizard died, Dad said that God would look after it, that Heavenly Father wouldn’t have taken the time to make something that He didn’t love.

Wisdom, courage, and faith are exemplified in the life of another young woman from another country. She had achieved outstanding success in her profession. She was slightly older than what is usually considered the marriageable age. She had made the decision at a young age that if she were to marry, she would marry only in the temple. In her area single young men who were members of the Church were almost non-existent. I suppose she despaired of ever being married. However, one day she met a young man. Although he was not a member of the Church, she dated him. They fell in love. He proposed. She told him she would marry him but would do it only in the temple. He agreed to take the missionary lessons and was converted and baptized. They waited a year and kept themselves worthy for temple marriage. I met her on her wedding day. I think I have never seen a more lovely, happy bride. She had determined years before the eternal blessings she was willing to live for and on this day realized the wonderful feeling of having achieved this most important, eternal goal, in spite of almost impossible obstacles.

Following a family study period on Sunday morning you prepare to leave for Sunday School with your mother and your younger brothers and sisters, but Dad is missing. You find him in the basement watching a football game on television.
“I’ll try to get there in a little while,” he says. He reasons that no one will miss him at church, and he has few opportunities to see his favorite sport.
The bear that blocks the path may appear small, but it could grow quickly into a grizzly bear for both you and your dad. Besides setting a good example through your own church attendance, it may become necessary to say a prayer for the courage to respectfully express how you feel.
“Dad, we’ll all miss you. Our family doesn’t seem complete when you’re not there.”

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.

Some parts of the hike were really steep, and a lot of us slipped on the loose rocks on the path. Joshua Rona, another Cub Scout, fell and hurt his foot. But Ian Boyd and Steve Rona, two older Scouts, made a foot brace for him out of a bandanna. It was pretty tricky.

I just wanted to thank you for publishing “Fear Not; Only Believe” by President Gordon B. Hinckley (Jan. ’00). It was so inspiring and true. I was touched by his words of love, and I felt they were meant for me. It was like reading a letter from someone who really cares. We are so fortunate to have a living prophet who speaks God’s will.
Elder Selby M. FauateaPhilippines Manila Mission

“Since we can’t do anything on the house until the Evanses move,” he said, “we’d better start building the barn. It will be winter before long, and we need a place for the animals.” He walked off the approximate dimensions, and we looked around for some rocks to mark the corners. There were no rocks in that New Mexico soil so he drew a line in the sand with a stick.
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After we got back with the lumber, Ed and I lifted and held the boards while Papa nailed them in place. Soon we had a good start on the barn.
One morning we woke up to find the ground covered with snow—in New Mexico, imagine! Enough to make angels, or play fox and geese, but not enough to stop work on the barn. The snow melted during the day, and that night when we got home Mama showed us where the water was running down inside the dugout. The next day Papa went to town for something to seal the leak.
Before the next storm came the barn was nearly finished and the animals were cozy inside. We had some hay in the loft and Ed and I coaxed to sleep there.
“Not until we move into the house,” Papa said. “It’s too far away from the family now.”
The barn was built like a shed, with a steep roof slanting to one side only. The day Papa was hanging the door, Mr. Lenstrom, who had come over to help, was busy on the roof. I climbed up to see what he was doing and saw he was working with a plane, scraping up curls of wood.
“Why are you doing that?” I wanted to know.
“I’m making this board smooth.”
“What for?”
“So you can slide down it without getting slivers in your backside.”
I wondered if he’d tried it once. “That’s a good idea,” I told him. “I’ll help you.”
We worked until we had the board so slick that Ed and I could shoot down it like a slippery slide, with a scary sail into the air before we hit the ground.

Shortly after I returned from my Swiss-Austrian mission, I was called up to serve in the U. S. Army. Soon I found myself on the troop ship USS Breckenridge bound for Korea. And because of my particular assignment, no one from my training unit was aboard that same ship. I felt very much alone among 600 complete strangers, and I was extremely concerned about the real possibility that I would soon be engaged in combat.
At times like that, one realizes the tremendous importance of close friends and comrades who can look after and protect each other, if the need arises.
Aboard that ship one day, a scripture that I had used as a missionary came to my mind which provided a sense of peace and security that I did not find anywhere else. That scripture is an invitation from the Savior to all of us: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matt. 11:28–30).

A poet set to verse the sorrow of opportunities forever lost. I quote a portion:
Around the corner I have a friend,
In this great city that has no end;
Yet days go by, and weeks rush on,
And before I know it, a year is gone.
And I never see my old friend’s face,
For Life is a swift and terrible race. …
But tomorrow comes—and tomorrow goes,
And the distance between us grows and grows.
Around the corner!—yet miles away. …
“Here’s a telegram, sir. …”
“Jim died today.”
And that’s what we get, and deserve in the end:
Around the corner, a vanished friend.

School was hard because of the other kids. They pushed, hit, said mean things, told lies, and stared. I couldn’t fight back, so all I did was pray. Sometimes my prayers were answered right away, and other times the answers took a long time. But I trusted Heavenly Father, so I kept praying.

The Gadfield Elm chapel is the first Church-owned meetinghouse outside of the United States. It is the location of a conference held on June 14, 1840, at which Elder Willard Richards was chosen president. Donated by the United Brethren, who joined the Church en masse during the spring and summer of 1840, the chapel was used extensively until most of the newly baptized Saints emigrated to join the Saints in Nauvoo. Although it fell into disrepair, happily, it is currently being restored with a new roof.