Gospel Story Finder

When we returned home from our mission I had a friend ask if I was able to have a personal relationship with each of my missionaries. With 230 missionaries in the mission it was impossible to spend the time you would like with each individual missionary. Before entering the MTC, like most mission presidents I was determined to be as prepared as possible to efficiently interview the missionaries. Knowing that time would be limited, I prepared a list of questions that I could ask in interviews to really get to know the missionaries.
I worked hard and had my questions ready. The day after we arrived in the mission field we had thirteen new missionaries arrive. After a welcome dinner, I took the first missionary into the office for their initial interview. I started with my questions to guide our conversation. About three minutes into the interview something happened. A spiritual feeling came over me; I knew this missionary as well as I had ever known anyone. I had a deep feeling of love for them. That love I can only describe as the kind of the love I have for my own children. I recognized their strengths, weaknesses and more importantly their potential. I had similar experiences with the other twelve missionaries that night. This same thing happened each time I interviewed our missionaries. I came to understand one of the powers of priesthood keys is to convey God's love and His personal concern for His children. I would later try to express this by saying, priesthood keys allow you to think things you wouldn't normally think, to see things you wouldn't normally see, to say things you wouldn't normally say, and to feel things you wouldn't normally feel. That was my experience everyday of my mission. No wonder those missionaries became like our own sons and daughters. I related more with the Book of Mormon account of Helaman describing those valiant young men he served with as his sons.

A story is told of a group of smoke jumpers. These brave men and women fight forest fires by parachuting onto the ground above a fire and fighting it from the top down, while others fight it from below.
During one particularly large forest fire, an elite team of smoke jumpers assembled for a briefing before taking off in their airplane. The dispatcher—a wise and experienced firefighter—told the smoke jumpers that things were very volatile and that he could not give them precise instructions. Rather, the dispatcher instructed, the smoke jumpers should contact him by radio once they had parachuted onto the ridge above the fire. Then he would give them instructions as to the course they should take to begin to fight.
Quickly the smoke jumpers took off in their plane, parachuted onto the ridge above the raging fire, and assembled themselves for action. As they viewed the fire from above, they could see half a dozen possible paths they could take to begin their work.
In keeping with their agreement with the dispatcher, the leader of the team took out a handheld radio, found the proper frequency, and called the dispatcher to request instructions as to which path to take. But only static came back from the radio; they could not hear the dispatcher at all.
Presuming that the dispatcher was busy with other tasks, the smoke jumpers decided to wait 10 minutes and try again. But when they tried the dispatcher the second time, they received the same result—dead air and static and no instructions.
The smoke jumpers conferred with each other. They could still see several paths down the mountain that would put them in a good position to fight the fire. But they were concerned that they didn’t have any direction from the dispatcher. They worried that if they started moving down the path that looked best to them, they might actually be moving counter to the course the dispatcher wanted them to take and they would be forced to retrace their steps.
So they decided to wait on top of the ridge. Fifteen minutes later they tried the dispatcher again. Nothing. They took off their backpacks and found a place to sit down. Thirty minutes became an hour; an hour became two hours. They regularly tried to contact the dispatcher. But as before, they received only static in return.
The smoke jumpers decided to eat lunch. After that, when they still couldn’t contact the dispatcher, they reclined on their backpacks and took a nap. They were frustrated. If the dispatcher would just pay some attention to them and tell them which way to go, they would happily follow that course and begin their firefighting efforts. But the dispatcher seemed to be ignoring them, probably preoccupied with others. And they had decided that they weren’t going to move without the dispatcher’s directions. After all, those directions had been promised to them before they parachuted onto the ridge.
Seven hours after the smoke jumpers arrived at the top of the ridge, a weary crew chief from the group fighting the fire farther down the mountain came up the trail and found the smoke jumpers. He was flabbergasted. Approaching their leader, he asked, “What are you doing lounging around on the ridge? We really needed your help. The fire almost got away from us because we didn’t have help to contain it. And all this time you’ve just been relaxing up here on the ridge?”
The lead smoke jumper explained their predicament to the crew chief. They had been promised instructions from the dispatcher. They had been vigilant in trying to obtain those instructions. But the dispatcher had ignored them, never responding to their calls. True, they could see several paths down to the fire. But they were afraid they would take the wrong one. So they decided to wait until they had the promised instructions from the dispatcher.
The crew chief held out his hand and took the small radio the smoke jumpers had been using. He then walked about 50 yards (45 m) down one of the paths that led toward the fire. He stopped and tried the radio. The dispatcher’s voice came through loud and clear. The crew chief then walked back to the top of the ridge and traveled about 50 yards farther down another path. He stopped and called the dispatcher. Again the dispatcher’s voice came back immediately.
The crew chief hiked back to the smoke jumpers and tossed the radio to the leader, saying, “You are in a dead spot. All you had to do was start moving down one of the trails, and the dispatcher could have easily given you course corrections and brought you right into the spot where we needed you. Instead you lounged up here, and you were totally worthless to us.”

A few years after my wife and I returned home from our mission, President Gordon B. Hinckley (1910–2008) asked us to meet with him. During that meeting, he extended a call to me to serve as a General Authority. He reflected on my experiences as a young missionary and as a mission president and told us that although there were many people who were qualified to be General Authorities, the Lord would use me because of my previous experiences and decisions.

Since President Thomas S. Monson announced the change in the missionary age, young people have been asked to counsel with their parents, counsel with their bishops, and counsel with the Lord through prayer. When you know it is the right time to go, then you should go. As you have patience and exercise faith, I know that the Lord will make His will known unto you.

I testify that as you are obedient to the will of the Lord, you will be blessed beyond measure.

When I was a young boy growing up in a little port town in Normandy, France, I remember reading a book about “Le Far West” that told of the settling of the United States. It described the faith and courage of the Mormon pioneers who had pulled all their belongings across the plains in handcarts. I had seen men on the docks pulling handcarts full of fish, and sometimes it took four or five of them to move the wooden cart. I felt an admiration for the Mormon settlers from that time on.
Little did I know that one day two young Mormons would actually knock on my family’s door. It happened after we had moved to southern France, while I was in high school. These Mormons didn’t look like pioneers at all. They had short hair. They shaved. They even wore suits and ties! They invited me to the English class at their meetinghouse. My parents gave me permission to attend.
I soon found out that these, too, were men to be admired, not necessarily for physical stamina, but for spiritual strength. They would occasionally visit our home, and though my parents made it clear from the start that they were interested only in “social” visits, I quizzed the elders more and more about their church, and I devoured every word of their answers.
My mother was Catholic, my father Jewish. They had always encouraged me to live a good life, to call upon God, and to believe in him. But these young men seemed to know him. I gleaned many ideas from their conversations with my parents, understanding more and more as time went on. If any of my friends laughed at the missionaries or criticized the Church, I sprang to its defense. I don’t think I fully realized it at the time, but I knew in my heart that the missionaries were telling the truth.
Many sets of missionaries visited our home during my high school years, but my parents, though always polite, were not interested in the Church. And I felt too young to take the discussions on my own. I drifted through periods of varying faith. We moved from Nice to Cannes, and I finally lost track of the elders.
Some time later, during a period of intense personal struggle, I found myself once again calling on the Lord. This time I understood that I had to rely on him totally. I felt a warm glow, a real confirmation that there was an Eternal Father watching over me who knew me personally and loved me. Not long after this experience, I was taking a letter to the post office when I saw two missionaries and rushed up to them. “You’re the elders, aren’t you?” I exclaimed, and then I told them about this marvelous feeling I had about my Father in Heaven. They understood completely. “It’s the Holy Ghost bearing testimony to you of the truth,” one of them said.
Then it hit me. I could talk to others about what had happened, I could tell them about my intellectual ideas and spiritual testimonies, and they wouldn’t understand. But the missionaries knew exactly what I was describing, experience by experience. We talked for a long time.
I was soon to leave for my military service. Nevertheless, my desire to be around the missionaries and members grew powerfully. As soon as I learned a new principle of the gospel, I put it into practice. Just before I left, one of the elders said, “You know, you live like a Mormon, but you’re trying to become perfect before you will join the Church. That’s the wrong way. It’s the Church that will help you achieve perfection.” They told me I had a testimony, but I still wasn’t sure.
In the military I had time to let my feelings grow and develop. There was lots of time to think, and I reflected deeply on my impressions of the Church. I was stationed with the mountain troops in Briançon, with no LDS branch nearby. But I guarded the things I had learned in my heart and let the seed of faith grow.
When I was released from the service, I faced a critical decision. My best friend from Normandy and I had planned for a long time to visit the United States, and I had saved my money so I could go. But his plans fell through. I had to decide whether or not to go by myself. I returned to Normandy, to walk the beaches and to think.
Anyone who could have eavesdropped on my mental conversation at that time would have known I already had a testimony. “I am well off here—I have my family and friends, I feel sure of myself, and this is the most beautiful spot on earth,” I told myself. “But what if I don’t go? I could miss an opportunity to learn even more about the gospel, to really gain a testimony of it. I could give up the trip, the dream of my young years. But to give up a chance to know more about the Lord’s church?”
In the U.S. I had the opportunity to develop many close relationships with Church members. I finally began to believe I did have a testimony—I can’t forget the wonderful feelings when, each time I’d ask myself a question, I would feel the Holy Ghost enlightening my soul, clearing away the doubt. I had had difficulty understanding why polygamy had been practiced. On a bus somewhere between Colorado and Utah, I glimpsed the vision, not a visual sight, but a spiritual insight, of the men who practiced it. And I saw how it was possible for such a thing to be pure, that it had come from God. That sort of clarification continued throughout my trip in the States.
I eventually ended up visiting some islands near Seattle, Washington. There, in a small apartment, I studied the Book of Mormon for ten days. My testimony continued to grow. The time had come to return to France, and in my heart I knew I would be baptized.
Several days after I returned home, the missionaries asked me to help them teach a lesson. The investigator was a science student, and he was struggling with some of the same questions I had confronted when I was studying the same subjects. I explained to him how I had found answers to the questions, and when we left he seemed satisfied and happy.
A few days later, the missionaries called to tell me he was joining the Church. “How about that,” I told myself. “Here I am, able to help someone else accept baptism, and not myself. This has lasted long enough!” I felt I had a testimony, but I fasted and prayed. I stayed up the whole night pleading with the Lord to seal this testimony in me. Finally, early in the morning, a sweet, peaceful calm filled my soul. I knew I had to tell the elders I was ready to be baptized.
As I rounded the last corner on my way to see the missionaries, I felt a strong force trying to keep me from going. It was like walking against a 70-mile-per-hour wind, which I had done before, only it was stronger. But this was spiritual. I was just about to give up and turn around. I knew this force wanted me to doubt everything, but I finally said, “No, no. I know there’s a God.” I felt that truth deep in the roots of my soul. I knew He would battle this force for me.
I reached the chapel door, just a normal chapel door, but I had to pull with all my might to force it open. When I entered I saw some members and felt their spirit, and the opposing force was gone, broken. I felt the sweet peace in my heart again, and felt it even more strongly several days later as I was baptized and confirmed. I still feel it to this day.

Allow me to share two experiences from my recent interactions with the young men of the Church that have taught me about leading and following.
Recently my wife and I attended a sacrament meeting away from our home ward. Just before the meeting started, a young man approached me and asked if I would help pass the sacrament. I said, “I’d be happy to.”
I took my seat with the other deacons and asked one who was sitting next to me, “What is my assignment?” He told me I was to start passing at the back of the chapel in the middle section and that he would be on the other side of the same section, and together we would work our way to the front.
I said, “I haven’t done this for a long time.”
He replied, “That’s OK. You’ll be fine. I felt the same way when I started.”
Later the youngest deacon in the quorum, ordained only weeks earlier, gave a talk in sacrament meeting. After the meeting, the other deacons rallied around him to tell him how proud they were of their fellow quorum member.
As I visited with them that day, I found out that each week, members of all the Aaronic Priesthood quorums in that ward reach out to other young men and invite them to be part of their quorums.
These young men were all great leaders. And they clearly had some wonderful behind-the-scenes Melchizedek Priesthood holders, parents, and others who mentored them in their duties. Caring adults like these see young men not just as they are but as they can become. When they talk to or about the young men, they do not dwell on their shortcomings. Instead, they emphasize the great leadership qualities they are demonstrating.

In the past century, the truth of God has continued to go forth nobly as Joseph Smith prophesied. On September 3, 1925, President Heber J. Grant announced that the First Presidency had decided to open missionary work in South America. Following the Lord’s pattern for unlocking the door of the kingdom in all nations (see D&C 112:16–17, 19), the First Presidency called my grandfather, Elder Melvin J. Ballard, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, with Rulon S. Wells and Rey L. Pratt of the First Council of the Seventy, to go to South America. They were called to dedicate that land for the preaching of the gospel, to open a mission there, and to lay the foundation for establishing the Church in that vast continent. After a three-week journey by ship, covering more than 7,000 miles, the three missionaries arrived in Buenos Aires in December 1925.

On Christmas morning of 1925, at 7:00 a.m., Elder Ballard dedicated the land. The missionary work was slow and difficult in those early months. Of the 16 people attending the first Church meeting, almost all were German immigrants. In the first 10 months while grandfather was there, the missionaries saw only a small handful of converts join the Church; perhaps only one or two of them were native Latin people. In spite of this, the spiritual sensitivity of Elder Melvin J. Ballard caused him to make this remarkable prophecy:

The work of the Lord will grow slowly for a time here just as an oak grows slowly from an acorn. It will not shoot up in a day as does the sunflower that grows quickly and then dies. But thousands will join the Church here. It will be divided into more than one mission and will be one of the strongest in the Church. The work here is the smallest that it will ever be. The day will come when the Lamanites in this land will be given a chance. The South American Mission will be a power in the Church. [Melvin J. Ballard—Crusader for Righteousness (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1966), 84]

And as you are aware, brothers and sisters, there has been remarkable growth in the Church in South America.

Mar. 3, 1853 Says he, “If your father had stayed here, him and me would have owned all Kirtland now. I own the temple,” says he. It began to get dark. Says he to his wife and daughter, “Mother and Lilly, you did not ask Joseph if he had been to dinner.” Says he, “Where did you eat last?” Says I, “At Brother Nelson’s in Racine, Wisconsin.” Says he, “Three days ago? Why didn’t you tell us when you first came in?” Says I, “I had been without eating so long I forgot that I was hungry.”

He visited the temple, sorrowfully noting its deterioration from lack of care, and looked out over the city, where many homes that had been wrecked by a tornado were being left to decay. The town seemed to him to have declined much since the Saints had left.

So far, the life of Fetauai Unasa Tautiaga Tuifalefa Tiatia has been a model of accomplishment.
He began his teaching career over 27 years ago, after gaining a diploma from Samoa Teachers Training College, and went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in education. In the early 2000s, Fetauai received postgraduate degrees from the renown Malua Theological College, where he also qualified as an ordained minister in one of Samoa’s most prominent Christian denominations.
Along the way, he met and married the beautiful Lili Laufiso, and they had children—three girls and a boy. When it was time to choose a high school for them, given Fetauai’s own background in education, the couple considered their options carefully.
“We chose to take our girls to Vaiola College,” Fetauai says, referring to a high school in Savaii, Samoa, that is run and owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was an interesting decision for a practicing minister of a different faith, but he was impressed by Vaiola’s high moral standards and church-based values.
Little did Fetauai know at the time, this decision would spark a fire that would change his life.
His daughters soon began investigating their high school’s church. They took seminary classes, and in their family’s evening devotionals, they would share what they learned about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.
Fetauai and his wife grew fond of the missionaries who would visit their girls at home. Sisters Niutua and Laulu taught them Heavenly Father’s plan of salvation, and in April 2010, Fetauai’s daughters were baptised. Fetauai recalls that in their tear-filled farewell prayers, these sweet sister missionaries voiced their deepest desires that the rest of his family would also join the Church.
He also remembers an interesting family home evening lesson with a missionary couple from Utah. Elder and Sister Krogh brought over a tin of homemade cookies, which was wrapped up in a long piece of metal wiring. After the lesson, each person took a turn unwinding the metal wire off the tin until, finally, they were able to open it and enjoy the cookies inside. Elder Krogh then testified: it is only when we open (unwind) our hearts to the gospel that we can enjoy the sweetness of its blessings.
Little by little, these faith-building experiences worked a mighty miracle in Fetauai’s own heart, and soon, he could no longer withstand his yearning to join the Church. “[It was] like the feeling you have while in a long journey without water and . . . food in a desert,” he says.
Fetauai immediately called the local bishop to organise his own baptism, and less than a week later, this well-known educator and minister was now a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Fetauai was baptised in 2013, then sealed to his family for time and all eternity the year after. By 2016, he was a bishop, and in 2017 he was called to serve as president for the Savaii Samoa Pu’apu’a Stake.
On reflection, President Tiatia has one explanation for his eventful pathway to the true gospel of Christ. “Through all the challenges we faced and the decisions we made, we . . . review the beginning and finally say: ‘God is always at the helm of every soul.’”

Car horns blared and taxis and buses jostled for a place in the traffic. As Benjamin Misalucha sat in the marketplace watching the automobiles roll by, he reached for a handkerchief and mopped his brow. He hoped his wife would be done with the shopping soon. The weather was hot and muggy, as it often is in the Philippines, and he was eager to get home and relax with his children.
Then he noticed a sign, high on the side of one of the buildings overlooking the square. “No other success can compensate for failure in the home,” the sign read. He found himself contemplating the message and believing in its truth.
“During those times I was young, about 30, and had four children. We had everything, comparatively speaking, compared to other Filipinos, but I was not satisfied with life. In my heart I knew I was searching for something more,” he said.
He didn’t guess that the quotation from President David O. McKay had been inscribed on the sign by missionaries living in the building, the same kind of Mormon missionaries who had already visited with him for three weeks when he lived in Manila, the capital city. He had also been visited twice by the elders here in Davao, another large city in the south.
A short time later, Benjamin Misalucha was transferred by his pharmaceutical company to Cebu City, an important community on one of the central islands. It was in Cebu that Mr. Misalucha and his family would discover the secret of what had been lacking in their lives.
In a society in which sharing is so accepted, it might seem unusual that someone would stand out as being particularly kind and generous. But such was the case with the local Parent Teacher Association (PTA) president. Right from the start she went out of her way to help the Misaluchas adjust to their new city. Soon Mr. Misalucha was serving on the PTA board. He eventually found out that the PTA president was also the wife of the local Mormon bishop. His curiosity grew and grew.
“One day I saw both of them walking home, and I ran over to catch up with them,” Mr. Misalucha explained. “I told him I wanted to know more about his church. He said he could recommend a couple of nice young men who could teach me about it.”
For the next ten months, the elders became a regular fixture in the Misalucha home. Benjamin Misalucha would entertain them with stories about previous encounters with missionaries, before he fully understood who they were: “They knocked on my door and asked me if I was the head of the house. I was all hot and perspiring from doing some chores, so I told them, ‘No, I’m just the janitor here.’ It’s something I say jokingly to my family all the time, but they believed me!”
Avelina would always provide cold water or juice, cake, or even siopao (doughy, white, steamed Chinese bread stuffed with sausage and eggs). And of course, the children, who numbered five by now, would have fun teasing the missionaries and telling jokes before the serious gospel discussions began.
“I wanted answers from the Bible,” Benjamin said, “because I didn’t believe in the Book of Mormon yet. And they showed me answers in the Bible. I was totally perplexed by how they could always get answers to questions I couldn’t even answer myself.” Slowly, his perplexed state gave way to understanding. The missionaries could find the answers because they knew the truth. He summoned a family council.
“Take this individually into prayer,” he told his wife and children. At the next family council, they all voted in favor of becoming Latter-day Saints. The family was baptized on April 29, 1978, a Saturday.

Nine Scouts and three leaders from the Hobart First and Third Branches (Australia Melbourne Mission) were the only Latter-day Saints to join 60 fellow Scouters in an Easter camp at Maria Island.
To reach the island the boys had to travel one and a half hours by car and one hour by ferry from Triabunna. The island is a national park and wildlife sanctuary that abounds in emus and Cape Barren geese. (Emus, for the non-Australian reader, are flightless birds related to the ostrich.) It was first established as a penal colony, with its own brickworks. Later a company established a cement works and farming, but these eventually failed. Now it is great for camping, hiking, exploring nature and prison ruins, mountain climbing, and swimming.
The Scouts and their leaders made the rough sea crossing and backpacked all the gear and food to a well-watered and protected campsite a mile from the jetty. The boys were kept busy after setting up camp by keeping the emus out of the camp area, cooking meals over the open fire, gathering wood, exploring the ruins, getting footsore on a long hike, playing games, bush walking, and mountain climbing—some of the hardier ones went swimming.
On Sunday afternoon the Church Scouts and a few friends withdrew from the campsite and held a short sacrament and testimony meeting. This was followed by a quiet walk back to camp for the evening meal and then a gathering around the campfire for singing and talks.
The next morning they broke camp after breakfast and cleaned up the campsite. A final game of softball was played, and then the tractor and trailer arrived for the bulky gear. The final parade was held and two boys from the Hobart Third Branch were invested as Scouts.
Finally it was time to carry personal packs to the jetty to await the ferry. The gear was put aboard, and the trip home began, the ferry bucking and rolling through the rough water.
The Scouts had a fine time of fellowship, but possibly more important, more people gained an insight into Latter-day Saint standards because of the Scouts and leaders’ behavior.

One day, after we had reached the Coppermine River, we were paddling on the river during a blizzard. It was the end of July and the snow was flying! The current was powerful, but the head-wind was so strong we were struggling for progress. Bob said, “Dad, look at the shore.” I did … We were standing still. And when we stopped paddling, the wind blew us upstream! So we stopped and pulled over to the shore and gathered what wood we could for a fire to warm our hands.

Another time we were stuck on a boulder in a bad set of rapids, and it seemed as though we might stay there forever. But after a prayer and a quick maneuvering of the boat, we broke free.

Once we reached the river, we were determined to regain our lost time. We didn’t mind moving, because when we’d stop we’d start to chill. Even at night we slept cold. The ground was ice, and the wind was cold. We had some small containers of fuel, but just enough to warm our food. And so we paddled and rushed on. Our worst day on the river we traveled 5 kilometers. Our best day we traveled 80 kilometers, and we went over the falls and flooded our canoe at the last set of rapids out of eight we covered that day. The map showed eight sets of rapids, and we decided, because of our haste, to run them without studying them first, a foolish thing to do.

We slowly regained our lost time, and by the end of the trip, arrived in the small Eskimo village at the mouth of the river right on schedule. We had one half of a meal left. Our canoe was so badly damaged we had to abandon it (after notifying Canadian officials). We had sailed over every set of rapids on the river but one (whether we were tired or afraid of the one we carried our equipment around I’m not sure), so we didn’t claim any records. But Bob had been lost and now was found. The day after we returned home, he went to see the bishop and expressed his desire to serve the Lord. He is now serving in the Illinois Chicago Mission.

To any father who is trying to help his son decide to go on a mission, I would say that the most important thing is to know your son. Not everyone needs to go on a trip down the Coppermine River. The same kind of building experiences can take place at home, working in the garage together, playing a game of tennis, maybe just going for a walk where the two of you can be alone. I wouldn’t have gone on the Coppermine River if I hadn’t felt inspired to do so.

And to you young men who know you should be going on a mission, I would remind you that for every person there will be wilderness areas, Gethsemanes, Sacred Groves—places where we learn to rely on the Lord completely and call on him in fervent prayer. Don’t try to tempt the Lord by placing yourself in a dangerous situation, but be prepared to follow the promptings of his Spirit, wherever they may lead you.

Since starting on those paths, we have come to learn how truly merciful God is, how deeply He loves us, and how perfectly compelling His love is for us. When I was 16 years old and not smart enough to know very much at all, the Spirit touched my heart and I realized the significance of the woman that you marry. Starting at that time I began to pray that the Lord would find for me the woman who would be my eternal companion. Those prayers were answered, and all that we now enjoy in our family with children and grandchildren is largely responsible to her.

Lugging a bucket of warm, foamy milk, I stepped from the barn and slammed the heavy door behind me. A chill wind blasted across the barnyard and tore at the buttons on my coat, almost snatching my cap away. Ducking my head into my collar, I pushed toward the house, possessed with an anxious longing to escape the late autumn’s icy breath. I glanced at the gray, forbidding sky and hoped it wouldn’t snow, at least not until Ma and Pa and the girls returned from Uncle Tommy’s.
I was almost to the house before I saw him. He was shuffling tiredly down the dirt lane that came from the highway to our farm. Squinting against the onslaught of the wind, I watched him approach, all the while loathing him for coming.
I didn’t know him, and yet he was familiar, not as a person but as a representative of the motley mob of defeated wanderers who had stopped at our door in the past. I recognized the slumped shoulders; the hollow cheeks; the sunken, searching eyes; the rumpled, ill-fitting clothing; the dusty shoes; and the apologetic reluctance—all of which characterized this singular breed. They were cast-off by-products of these lean Depression years of the 1930s. Their only crime had been misfortune and circumstances. Nevertheless, my own selfishness caused me to despise them.
“Hi, son,” he greeted me, a cautious humor in his voice. “This wouldn’t be the Lorenzo Platt place, would it?”
I glanced toward the empty house. No one would know, I told myself. Still, I couldn’t bring myself to lie, even to him. “Yeah, it is,” I mumbled.
“I wasn’t sure,” he said with a smile that revealed a chipped front tooth. “The barn wasn’t finished before, and the house wasn’t painted.”
“We did that last summer,” I replied tartly, trying to discourage conversation.
“Sure looks nice.” Uneasily he looked around, obviously stalling. I knew what he wanted. They were all the same. Pa had never needed more excuse than that they were hungry, discouraged, displaced, or cold. He had always brought them into the house, given them a chair by the stove, a place at the table, and a home for the night.
I had especially disliked these gaunt, faceless guests who intruded and disrupted our home. If Pa had been content to offer them a bowl of beans and a place on the front step to eat, I could have ignored their intrusion, but that wasn’t Pa’s way. When night fell, Pa didn’t send them off to the barn loft; he offered them a bed in the house, usually mine. I would sleep on the couch, always resenting the one who supplanted me.
“Why do we have to do it?” I had accused Pa one afternoon while we were stacking hay. “Why can’t they find their own place and their own food? We’ve got to work for ours. Let them work for theirs.”
Pa had picked up a fork full of hay and carried it to the corner of the stack and said gently, “Every night and morning when I pray, I thank the Lord we have work, that we can provide. We’re not rich, son. No one is these days, but we have sufficient. I wouldn’t trade places with any of those men. It isn’t their fault that the winds blew the land away and tore them from their farms. It isn’t their fault that these are hard times. No, son, I don’t condemn them. My heart aches for them, and as long as I have a single chicken, a meager cup of beans, or a crust of bread, those men won’t leave here hungry.
“But Pa,” I protested warmly, “you do all that for the folks in the ward, too. Whenever they need something, they always come to you. It just isn’t fair, even if you are the bishop. But I wouldn’t mind that, because they’re our folks, our neighbors, and our friends. But not those others.”
Pa didn’t listen. He continued to reach out to them, and they continued to come. Although they were complete strangers, they all seemed to know that here was home for the night.
As I stood in the cold wind eyeing this new stranger, this intruder, I was determined to send him away as I had wanted to do with the others.
The man stuffed his hands into his pockets, glanced at me, and then kicked at the dust with the toe of his battered boot. “Is your pa here, son?”
I shook my head. “He’s over at my Uncle Tommy’s helping out. My ma and sisters are with him. Uncle Tommy and Aunt Lacerne are both sick. Been that way for a week or so. Won’t be back till tomorrow afternoon. I’m here alone.”
I watched the spark of hope in his eyes flicker and then die. He glanced about the place. Like all the others, he was too proud to ask. I wasn’t about to extend an invitation, not today when the decision was completely mine.
“You can come back tomorrow,” I suggested with calloused indifference. “He’ll be back then.”
“I see,” the man mumbled, knowing what coming back tomorrow implied. He looked back down the long dusty lane to the highway then peered over my shoulder toward the house. There was a longing not easily concealed in his famished eyes. He turned toward the barn and then back at me. But there was no encouragement in my unflinching stare. This man represented the whole mob that had imposed upon me, crowded me at the kitchen table, and forced me from my bed. Sending him down the road was a vindictive retaliation against all of them.
“Well, I guess I’ll be on my way,” he said more to himself than to me.
As he turned to go, I said, “I’ll tell Pa you stopped.”
The man nodded his head and waved weakly. “You’ve got a nice place here,” he commented, motioning to the barn and house with his hand. “I’ve got a boy about your age watching after my place, too. What’s left of it. It’s not as big and nice as yours, but he’s got plenty to do. I sure hope he’s getting along. Well, tell your pa I stopped by. He won’t remember me, but he helped me once before.”
I didn’t watch him pass through the front gate and start down the lane. Not even I could do that. With as much indifference as I could muster, I stepped up on the porch, put the white pad in the strainer, and poured the milk in, listening to it drip into the clean bucket below.
Suddenly I thought of Pa. Just before he had climbed into the truck and driven over to Uncle Tommy’s, he had given me his last-minute instructions. Now his words flashed into my mind, and I couldn’t drive them out: “Son, I’ll trust you to watch after things. I wish I didn’t have to leave you alone this long, but we’ve got to help Uncle Tommy out. If we don’t get the rest of that corn in, his cattle aren’t going to have much this winter. I don’t know how good it is now. I know the frost got a lot of it. If you need anything, run over to Brother Ramsey’s place. I told him you’d be here alone.”
“Pa, I can do it,” I protested, hurt that he had deemed it necessary to speak with Brother Ramsey. I was 17 and felt capable of taking care of things for the three days.
“I know, Son. You can handle things as well as I can.”
His unconditional confidence mocked me now. A gnawing shame bore into my soul.
The last drops of milk pattered into the bucket. Without thinking I glanced up and gazed down the lane toward the departing figure, hunched and plodding against the wind. I don’t know why, but I thought of his son. It was strange that I had never considered that these wanderers could possibly have families, folks who cared, who wondered whether they were safe, had enough to eat or a place to lay their heads. Suddenly, so unexpectedly, he became a real person.
A horrifying vision leaped to my mind’s stage, a vision I could not close my eyes to. The man was transformed. He was no longer a stranger, a mere wanderer, tacitly begging for a place to stop for the night. He became Pa! And I was the selfish youth who had refused him even a corner in the barn. It was a shattering revelation, one that staggered me with its vividness, one that made me loathe the merciless boy who had sent him away.
Leaving the milk on the porch, I started down the lane on a run, impelled by an awful dread that this man would escape me in the cold, dreary dusk. The terrible realization of my heartless act haunted me.
“Hey, mister,” I gasped when I was still several yards away. The man stopped and turned around. “I didn’t ask you if you wanted to spend the night. You can you know.”
“Well, I didn’t mean to …” the man stammered.
“I’m not much of a cook,” I pressed, “but I can give you something and a place to stay.” He looked down the road as though debating. “It’s getting colder. There’ll be frost for sure tonight,” I pointed out.
To my relief he came back with me. Neither of us spoke as we returned to the house. I invited him in and stirred up the coals in the stove and insisted he pull up a chair to warm himself. I could tell he was cold through and through. He rubbed his hands together and reached out to the warmth, beckoning it to penetrate his chilled body.
“Ma left some lima beans,” I apologized, wishing Ma were there to fix something nice. “But there’s bread, and we’ve got lots of milk. I can’t fix anything like Ma, but it will fill you up.”
The man nodded, “Anything, son. Beans sound good.”
We ate supper in silence. I gave him three bowls of beans, a half loaf of Ma’s bread, and a quart of milk. He wouldn’t have eaten it all, but I insisted. I could see he was hungry, and I knew he wouldn’t ask for more.
“I didn’t mean to make a pig of myself,” he apologized.
“We don’t eat steaks and stuff, but what we’ve got we have plenty of, and you’re welcome to it.”
By the time the work was done, darkness had settled and there was nothing to do but go to bed. “Son,” he began, “if you’ve got a blanket I can go out to the barn and bed down. I’ll get up early in the morning and be on my way and won’t have to even bother you. You’ve been real good to me, son.”
“You can’t sleep out there. Pa never lets folks sleep out there, not when we’ve got plenty of room in the house. I’ll fix you up.”
“Then I can lay down by the stove,” he replied.
“No, Mister, we’ve got beds. Come in here.” I led him into my room. “I think there’s enough quilts. If you need more, we’ve got plenty.”
“Isn’t this your room, son?”
“Not tonight,” I explained simply.
The man seemed embarrassed and unsure of himself. “I appreciate all this, son. I stopped by here once before on my way to California looking for work. Your pa took me in, just like you’ve done.” He took a deep breath and shook his head. “You know, there’s a lot of mean folks in this old world, folks that don’t care about anyone but themselves. Folks like that could turn a man sour on everybody. I know. When I was looking for work, sometimes I was bullied and cheated and sent on my way. I’d get real mad. All I was doing was trying to make enough to send back to my family and keep them going. But these other folks didn’t care. As soon as the fruit was picked or the cotton in, then they sent us on our way. It wasn’t my fault I was in hard times. I got to hating.”
He paused and looked down at his dry, calloused hands. “Then I remembered your pa. He didn’t make me eat on the front steps and sleep in the hay in a ditch like most folks. I was somebody to him.” He smiled wanly and brushed his eyes with the back of his hand. “I had to come back. You see, I’m on my way back to Arkansas to get my family. Going to take them out to California. But I had to stop here.”
I nodded my head and looked at the floor. For a moment there was a heavy silence. “Well,” I mumbled, “if you need anything, Mister, just call.”
“Son,” the stranger said just as I turned to go, “you got a good pa. You’re Mormon folks, aren’t you?” I nodded. Out of his coat pocket he pulled a worn copy of the Book of Mormon. “Your pa gave me this. I haven’t read it yet because I don’t read too good, but I’ve kept it with me. I’ve heard a lot of bad things about you Mormons, but I haven’t believed any of it.” He rubbed his rough, chapped hands over the book’s cover. “They said you weren’t Christians and such.” He wagged his head. “But I don’t believe them. How could I? I’ve met just one Christian man in my life. It was your pa. I’m going to get my boy to read me this book and maybe then I’ll find out why your pa’s so different.”
The next morning I was up early to milk. The stranger was up and dressed and ready to head down the road, but I said he couldn’t go until he’d had breakfast. I milked, and he went with me and helped me feed the stock and strain the milk. All the time he talked about his boy and his family. All the while I could picture Pa talking about Ma and the girls and me like that man talked about his folks. I shuddered to think I had almost sent him away.
After breakfast I put a loaf of bread in a brown paper sack and wrapped a chunk of cheese in wax paper and handed them to him. “I wish I could give you more,” I said.
“You’re just like your pa, son. Your pa can be proud of you,” he said hoarsely. With that he turned and started toward the front gate.
As I watched him start down the lane, it seemed his head was a little higher, his shoulders were not so stooped, and his step had more spring in it. I didn’t take my eyes off him until he reached the highway and walked over a little rise out of sight.
It was late afternoon when Ma and Pa and the girls came home. I was out in the barn cleaning the stable. Pa came out as soon as he took the things from the truck into the house.
“How’d things go, Son?”
“Good.” I leaned the fork against the wall. “A man came.”
“Who?”
I shook my head. “I didn’t ask. He was just passing through. Like the others.”
“You put him up, didn’t you?” There was an edge of panic in his voice as though he was worried that someone in need had come and he had not been there to help.
“Yeah,” I replied. “I did what I could.”
Pa sighed, then took a deep breath, obviously relieved.
“I didn’t finish cleaning out the pig pen, though. I ran out of time.”
There was no rebuke in Pa’s look or tone of voice. “There will be time for that. If you looked after the man, that’s all that matters for now.”
Suddenly I felt hot tears burning in my eyes. I didn’t even care that Pa saw me. I didn’t care that I was 17 and supposed to be grown up. I felt something inside me warm and reassuring, something that almost burst my soul. Pa put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me down on a bale of straw beside him. He didn’t say anything for a long time. We just sat there together, knowing what the other was feeling. I knew Pa’s eyes were filled with tears too, but I wasn’t ashamed. In a strange kind of way, I was proud we could shed tears together.
Finally he squeezed my shoulder tight and whispered, “Son, you’re a man now. You’ve proved it today.”
I swallowed hard, remembering the stranger, glad he had come. I offered a silent prayer that before nightfall he would find another man like Pa.

According to a very fun website1 that I found, it was thirty-six years, one month, and ten days ago that, as a freshman student at BYU, I sat where you are sitting today. I listened carefully as President Ezra Taft Benson, then president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, gave a talk titled “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet.”2 He shared how we could more faithfully follow the living prophets and better keep the commandments of God.
The Spirit was strong that day, and I was motivated by President Benson’s remarks. I thought to myself, “I am going to follow his counsel to be a better follower of the prophets and to be more faithful in keeping the commandments of God. But I can do better than that. From this point on, I’m not even going to make any mistakes!”
Now, I know all of you are a lot smarter than I was as a freshman. You can see the impossibility, and perhaps the silliness, of my well-intentioned commitment.
As I was exiting the devotional, I paused to use the restroom. I was concentrating so intently on my new commitment—to not make any mistakes—that I didn’t notice the cute little stick figure wearing a triangular dress on the restroom door. It wasn’t until I had turned the corner that I realized where I was. There, standing in front of a large mirror, was a young woman brushing her long, black hair. I hadn’t even made it out of this very building before I had failed at my new commitment!
Now, as an aside, I am still grateful to this day to that young woman for not calling for security. Can you imagine the look on the security officers’ faces as I tried to explain that I was concentrating so hard on never making another mistake that had I made a mistake?
In my mind’s eye I can see and hear the security officers as they would have looked at each other and said, “Yeah, right! Book ’em, Danno!”
Today I come to you hopefully a little wiser to share some counsel on something I have worked on ever since that day.

An experience of Lucy Mack Smith, the mother of Joseph Smith, describes so well the treatment of Mormonism by some.” She states:
In a few days Mr. Whitermore accompanied me to the house of another niece, named Ruth Stanly, sister to Mrs. Whitermore. Soon after we arrived, Mr. Whitermore introduced me to the Reverend Mr Ruggles, the pastor of the [I leave the name out] church to which he belonged.
“And you,” said Mr. Ruggles, upon shaking hands with me, “are the mother of that poor, silly, boy, Joe Smith, who pretended to translate the Book of Mormon.”
I looked him steadily in the face and replied, “I am, sir, the mother of Joseph Smith, but why may I ask do you call him a foolish, silly boy?”
“Because,” said his reverence, “that he should imagine he was going to break down all the churches with that simple Mormon book.”
“Did you ever read that book?” I inquired.
“No,” said he, “it is too far beneath me to be worthy of my notice.”
“Then I think, sir,” I said, “you do not abide by that scripture which saith, ‘search these things’; and now, sir, let me tell you boldly that the Book of Mormon contains the everlasting gospel, and it was written for the salvation of your soul by the gift and power of the Holy Ghost.”
“Pooh,” said the minister, “nonsense, but I have no fears of any members of my church being led away by such dogmatism, for they have too much intelligence.”[1]
The minister’s response graphically demonstrates the case in point. It is typical that prejudice toward any group, and in this case Latter-day Saints in particular, is not justified by sincere investigation.
In response to the minister’s statement that his members had too much intelligence to believe the Mormon message, the Prophet’s mother made this astonishing, and to the minister what must have been a preposterous statement:
“Now, Mr. Ruggles,” said I, and I spoke earnestly, for the Spirit of God was upon me, mark my words: as sure as God lives, before three years we will have more than one-third of your church, and sir, whether you believe me or not, we will take the very deacon too.”[2]
According to Mother Smith, subsequent to her confrontation with the minister, 70 of his best members converted to Mormonism, even including the Deacon of the parish, Samuel Bent. He was excommunicated from the minister’s congregation for doing so. He remained faithful throughout his life, and passed away at Garden Grove, Iowa, August 16, 1846, while traveling west with the pioneer saints.[3]

Margaret Lenan Ellis was volunteering as a public affairs specialist when she was tasked with searching out and joining her local community interfaith organisation. With no such organisation in Ballarat, Victoria, she founded the Ballarat Interfaith Network. Its purpose is to demonstrate our connection as part of the human family, expanding understanding and building bridges between faiths, philosophies, and spiritual perspectives. Over the past 20 years, the network’s events have built friendships, respect, peace, love, and service to God and others.

I remember teaching an extremely intelligent woman who had a hard time accepting anything until she had nailed down every intellectual loose end. However, at long last we heard her say, “I cannot deny this feeling any longer.”
She joined the Church and was very happy for the next few years, but she gradually let her intellectual doubts creep back in and ultimately left the Church.
Fifteen years went by, and she came to visit our family. We took her to Temple Square. As we started up the circular ramp leading to the statue of the Savior, she paused and tearfully said, “Here comes that feeling again. My heart still yearns for what my mind won’t accept!”

For many weeks I felt clean and happy. I loved talking about my baptism and how my heart seemed to be growing. My family and Primary teacher reminded me often that the Holy Ghost would help me know what was right and wrong.
A few days ago I had to take a test in school, and I was really nervous. I kept thinking how easy it would be to copy from the girl sitting next to me. I knew that cheating was wrong, but I was desperate to get a good score. Then I remembered that the Holy Ghost would help me. I said a prayer in my heart asking for strength to make the right choice.
The rest of the day, I felt as happy as I had at my baptism. After school, I ran to our car and gave Mom a hug. “I got 100 percent on my test!” I exclaimed.
“That’s great!” Mom said.
“And I didn’t even cheat.”
Mom frowned. “You wanted to cheat?”
“Well, I thought about it,” I admitted. “But I had a feeling inside that it was wrong. So I prayed for help and just tried my best.”
Mom smiled. “I’m glad you listened to that feeling.”
I’m glad too. Really glad. I always want to be worthy of my companion—the Holy Ghost.

Lisa and Joanne Church are new Nauvoo residents. Their father is the temple engineer. They have a strong connection to both this temple and the one built last century. “My great-great grandpa Hayden Wells Church left his home in Tennessee and came to Nauvoo,” says Lisa, 17. “He heard the missionaries sing and was so impressed.”
“He came here and was baptized by the Prophet Joseph,” adds Joanne, 14. “It was hard for him to leave his home behind and come to Nauvoo. He’s such an example to me. His testimony made me want to come here and see the things he saw and share the feelings he felt.”

Members from all over the Church contributed to the rescue of the German Saints. President Stover was part of an event which he would call “the most beautiful and inspiring thing that has ever been my privilege to witness during my entire membership in the Church.” It began on a visit to Holland when he graphically described the suffering of the German members. Cornelius Zappey, president of the Netherlands Mission, was so moved that he asked the Dutch members if they would plant seed potatoes in their flower gardens for their former enemies. They responded enthusiastically, and in November of 1947, they sent 60 tons of potatoes to Germany, along with 96 barrels of herring. They sent another 60 tons of potatoes in 1949.