Gospel Story Finder

My brothers, Billy, Tommy, and Jimmy, and I were gathered in the living room for family home evening. Father was talking about the importance of always prayerfully considering our actions before they become acts—thinking before doing. He said that Satan would rather we act on impulse, just like a fly that buzzes blindly into a spider web hidden in the shadow of an overripe July melon.
I guess that makes sense, I told myself. But what could possibly happen to a twelve-year-old boy like me?
Two weeks later, my brothers and I were sitting atop a huge rock on the crest of one of the forested hills behind town. The dry wind blew across our sweaty faces as we drank from bottles of water we’d brought in paper bags from home. After taking a swallow of cold water, Tommy thoughtlessly dropped his bottle back in his paper bag that was sitting near the edge of the rock. The bottle broke, its water spilling out. We all laughed, except for Tommy who glowered at the rest of us.
I lay back on the rock and gazed up at a buzzard that was circling high above. I wish I could fly, I thought. I also told myself that I was getting bored. To wish to do something I knew that I couldn’t do meant that I was running out of real things to do. I knew that my brothers were bored, too, because they were staring at the same buzzard and wishing that they could fly.
“Let’s play a game,” my oldest brother, Billy, said.
“What kind of game?” Tommy piped in crossly. “If it’s a running-around game, you can count me out. I’ll get thirsty, and I don’t have any water!”
“You can have some of mine,” Billy offered, “if you play.”
“What kind of game is it?” I asked.
Billy sat up. He took his water bottle out of his bag, slid down off the boulder, picked up a stick, and broke it in four pieces, each a different length. Then he dropped them into his bag and closed it up.
“Are you going to tell us about the dumb game or not?” my youngest brother, Jimmy, snapped impatiently.
“It’s kind of like tag, but different,” Billy explained as he picked up a small branch. “The one who draws the shortest stick from the bag is ‘It.’ He has to sit on this rock and count to fifty while everyone else hides. We can hide anywhere from up by the quarry down to the old graveyard.”
“What’s so different about that game?” Tommy asked.
“Well,” Billy went on, “the one who’s It uses this stick to tag with. Then the person tagged gets a stick, too, and he and It look for someone else together. Then—”
I sat up, my excitement growing. “Oh, I get it!” I interrupted. “Then they tag the third guy, and they all go after the last guy!”
Billy drew the shortest stick and started counting. Everyone else scattered.
About a half hour later, I was hiding behind an old shack. I saw Billy, Tommy, and Jimmy above me on the top of a hill, looking down on the dumped rocks from the quarry. We knew the area well because a lot of blue-belly lizards lived in those rocks, and we often tried to catch them. Anyway, now I knew that I was the last one left to be tagged! It was kind of scary in a fun sort of way because they were all after me! It would only take them a minute or two to see me and scurry down those rocks and tag me with their sticks.
I turned and bolted away. I looked back once and saw my brothers already close to the bottom of the hill. They had spotted me!
I lunged through the trees, jumping over rotting logs. I glanced behind me. I couldn’t see my brothers. For the moment I was safe from their sight, but I soon found myself in the middle of a clearing. They would spot me unless I lost myself in the tangles.
Suddenly I was face-to-face with a wall of thick brushwood. I’ll hide there until I can catch my wind, I thought as I protected my face with my hands and leaped through the dense undergrowth, not knowing what lay beyond, and not taking time to even think about it.
Everything beyond the wall of brushwood was a good ten to fifteen feet below me! I fell hard through its brittle branches and landed on my back.
The rest of the world above me was spinning—the sun, the clouds, the twisted tops of the towering oaks. And my wonder at what had happened. Rising between my right arm and side, protruding like a great spear with a big, ugly point, was the shaft of a long, iron spike from an old graveside!
I felt a stinging sensation on my arm and discovered that the point of the huge spike had torn my shirt and scraped the inner side of my arm. If I had landed few short inches farther to the right, the spear would have pierced my chest and my time on earth would have been brought to an immediate end.
I lay there listening to the sound of my pounding heart, glad it was still beating. Glad that when my brothers found me, after coming the long way around to where I lay in the old graveyard, it would be a happy tagging. As I waited, I remembered my father’s words at family home evening two weeks before. He had said that we should prayerfully consider our actions before they become acts. That we should let the Spirit, instead of blind impulse, be the guiding force in our day-to-day living. My father always said that it’s in our hearts and minds that God speaks to us.
In the quiet of the thicket that day, I promised Heavenly Father that from then on I would try to live as my father had counseled. As I gazed up and again caught sight of that buzzard high above me, I was glad that it was circling something else and not me!

On 26 January 1880, everything was ready.
Elizabeth M. Decker wrote of the first wagons to go down through “the Hole”: “Coming down the hole in the rock to get to the river … is almost strait down, the cliffs on each side are five hundred ft. [about 155 meters] high and there is just room enough for a wagon to go down. It nearly scared me to death. The first wagon I saw go down they put the brake on and … [chained the rear wheels together so they slid as a unit instead of rolled] and had a big rope fastened to the wagon and about ten men holding back on it and they went down like they would smash everything. I’ll never forget that day.”

When I was learning to sew, I became very frustrated as my mother very carefully explained how to put a zipper into a piece of clothing. No matter how hard I tried to listen and comprehend, I couldn’t follow her instructions beyond a certain step. Then I had to go to her again for more directions on how to do it.
Finally I discovered that if I looked at a finished zipper while she gave instructions, and if I referred to that zipper while sewing my own, I could do it.

Anders soon wanted to share the gospel with others, so he invited friends and relatives into his home to hear about the wonderful new religion. His father-in-law, the mailman, and some neighbors believed and asked to be baptized.
“I’m not sure if I can baptize you,” Anders replied. “I’ll have to go to the mission president in Sweden to see if I have the authority to do so.”
Since such a trip by boat was expensive, those he had been teaching helped contribute the money that he needed to go to Sweden, where he was ordained an elder.
At Larsmo, in July 1946, Finland was rededicated to the preaching of the gospel, and in 1947 this country opened her doors to those religions that wished to establish missions.
Not long afterward, the Finland Mission was organized. Now in 1972 there are 23 branches of the Church there.
Because of Anders’ courage in worshiping God in the manner he believed to be right, many of his children and grandchildren, as well as friends and neighbors, are now members of the Church. The first branch president in the Finland Mission was Anselm Stromberg, grandson of Anders Johansson Stromberg, the latter name being added when it became necessary for everyone in Finland to choose a last name.

Bertha came into my life when I was thirteen years old and just beginning junior high school. How well I remember that first day of school. The building was large with endless halls and rows and rows of student lockers. Most of the students had come on school buses from small farms and neighborhoods. This was certainly not a big city group, but we were still anxious to be popular and accepted. There were so many of us that we were going to be using a former elementary school across the street for additional classrooms. I alternated between excitement and panic at the thought of finding my way around from one classroom to another.
I had worked hard all summer baby-tending and getting up at 5:00 A.M. to pick strawberries and cherries so I could earn enough money to buy nice school clothes. But even in all my fine new clothes, I felt awkward and uneasy.
My friends and I grouped together, trying to act in a casual manner to hide the fear we felt but didn’t dare admit. We were in awe as the older students moved confidently through the halls laughing and teasing each other. It was a relief when the bell finally rang and we all gathered in the big assembly hall where it was announced that each new student was to be assigned for the day to an older “big brother or sister” to show them around. The name of each new student was called out, along with the name of his or her “buddy” for the day.
When my name was called along with Bertha Brown, I heard several of my friends gasp. I had no idea who Bertha Brown was, but it was obvious that some of them did. As soon as we were excused to go meet our “big sisters,” I was surrounded by girls telling me to hide quickly before Bertha could find me. It was clear that to be assigned to Bertha was the worst possible fate. I was so confused. Part of me said not to hide—that would be a mean thing to do. But another part of me wanted to be popular with the other girls, and that’s the side that won.
So the game began—the hiding, the giggling, and the running from imagined danger. We managed to escape from Bertha for the moment, but not before I caught a glimpse of her. It was true that she was not pretty. She was even a little scary to look at with her unkempt, dry hair. Her clothes looked like something a grandmother would wear, and her shoes were brown and ugly.
All day the big story was how poor little Sheron had to hide from Bertha. The one time that I really saw Bertha’s face she looked so sad. How could we be so mean to her? I thought. She hadn’t done anything to deserve it. There we were, a whole group of girls, running away from one lonely person. I knew that what we were doing was wrong. I didn’t want to play that awful game. What I really wanted was to talk to Bertha and tell her I was sorry. I knew that she must be embarrassed. But I wasn’t brave enough, so I let everyone else lead me. But oh, I was miserable!
Later that day I forgot about Bertha when I was called to Mrs. Jensen’s office. She had been my very favorite teacher in elementary school, and now she was a counselor at the junior high. I could hardly wait to see her. All the way to her office I imagined all kinds of wonderful things. Maybe she wanted me to be her special assistant. Maybe she had something important that she wanted me to do. I almost ran through the halls in my eagerness to see Mrs. Jensen. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for her.
When I walked into her office, I could see tears in her eyes, and my heart nearly broke when she looked straight at me and said, “Of all the girls coming into seventh grade, I assigned Bertha to you because I thought that you were the one girl who would be kind to her!”
All the misery of the day came crashing down on me, and I sobbed as I realized that Mrs. Jensen did have an important assignment for me and I had failed her. I had failed Bertha. But, most of all, I had betrayed myself. The next day everyone else forgot about the game—and Bertha. I never did. I rarely saw her after that day. When I did catch a glimpse of her all alone, I wanted desperately to tell her how sorry I was. But I was too ashamed and too young in my understanding of compassion to know how much it would mean to her.
I never saw Bertha again after junior high, and yet she has been a very important part of my life. Even today I wish that I had found the courage to be her friend. How do you say you are sorry to someone that you have never spoken to and yet hurt so deeply that more than thirty years later you cannot forget?
I finally dealt with what I had done to Bertha one Easter when I was studying about the atonement of Christ. How grateful I am to the Savior for his sacrifice and for the realization that through his wonderful gift I can finally lay that burden down and find peace and forgiveness—not that I will forget, but that I can now use the lesson to improve my life and bless others.
Because of Bertha, I have never again knowingly been unkind to anyone, and I have tried to teach my children the same. I have a special place in my heart for those who don’t seem to fit in, for those who are lonely and forgotten. Because of Bertha, it is easier for me to see beyond the surface and understand the heart of those I meet. I have tried to make it up to her by the way I treat others, but I will always wish that I could see her and say, “I’m sorry, Bertha.”

Last fall I found myself with a wonderful but challenging opportunity to develop and teach Primary training through a video made entirely in Spanish. At one time in my life I was a Spanish speaker, but recently I had been speaking Portuguese and knew what it would take to relearn Spanish. I did all the things each of you do to complete a task that feels extremely difficult. I found help from capable and dedicated Hispanic sisters. Together we studied, prayed, fasted, and worked long hours. The day arrived to go and do the thing the Lord had asked, and we not only were fearful but felt our work was inadequate. We had worked up to the moment of delivery, and nothing more could be done. I wanted to start over.
Each of our husbands gave us priesthood blessings, and peace and calm started to come. Like angels, help came in the form of a sweet husband who set the alarm on his watch so he could pray for me every half hour during the recording, a cameraman whose eyes radiated “Good job,” and Primary leaders who had confidence in the workings of the Spirit and were able to communicate that with power. We ended up with a finished film that was helpful for our Spanish-speaking leaders. All who participated in it were partly surprised and entirely grateful for its success. We walked as far as we could go, and when we thought we might abandon our carts and drop by the wayside, angels somehow pushed from behind.

“My teacher is going to be tardy,” said Cindy to herself as she sat on her front steps, watching teacher after teacher go into the school building. Today was the day that only teachers went to school. Teachers from all over the city were coming to a meeting. But where is my teacher? she wondered.
She had already seen smiling Miss Green. Now she waved to quiet Mr. Black, and he nodded his head at her.
“Have you seen Miss Martin yet?” called Mother.
“No,” replied Cindy. “I think my teacher’s going to be tardy!”
“Oh, dear,” said Mother.
Just then the school bell rang loud and long, as it always did at half past eight. A few teachers were still scurrying inside for the meeting. But where’s Miss Martin? Cindy wondered.
She stood up and walked down to the corner. She could see black cars, green cars, blue cars, tan cars, but she did not see her teacher’s little red car.
“Miss Martin,” said Cindy in Miss Martin’s you’d-better-listen voice, “Miss Martin, you are TARDY!”
Just then someone came into sight way down the street. It was Miss Martin running down the sidewalk with some papers in her hand.
Then just as Miss Martin reached Cindy’s corner she tripped and fell—WHUMPH! It was just what Cindy sometimes did on the playground. She ran to the corner, and there was poor Miss Martin, rubbing her ankle and looking very sad. And her papers were blowing all over the street!
Cindy hurried to pick them up. One paper went under a parked car. One was stuck on a tree branch. A cat grabbed one paper and was playing with it. Cindy finally gathered all the papers together and ran back to her teacher with them.
Miss Martin stood up, but the heel had come off one of her shoes. Her stockings were torn, and she began to rub her ankle again.
“Oh, Cindy,” said Miss Martin. “My car broke down. I have to give a report at the meeting so I started running to make sure I wouldn’t be late, and now look what’s happened.”
“Here are your papers,” said Cindy. “I’ll help you walk, Miss Martin; you can lean on me.” Cindy felt very important.
The teacher limped along for a few steps. Then she stopped. “Oh, dear, what am I going to do?” she questioned. “I can’t go to the meeting like this.”
Miss Martin looked at the heel that had come off her shoe. She looked at her torn stockings. Then she looked at Cindy.
“Let’s go to my house,” suggested Cindy. “My mom can help. And maybe I can get your heel back on.”
“I can give you some stockings,” said Cindy’s mother when she saw what had happened.
Cindy glued the heel back onto Miss Martin’s shoe with some quick-drying cement while Miss Martin changed her stockings. Mother helped Miss Martin put her papers in the right order again. And Cindy offered to help her into the schoolhouse.
So that’s how Cindy happened to go to the teacher’s meeting. It was a good thing Miss Martin was the last person on the program. She and Cindy arrived just in time!
Miss Martin’s report was all about good habits.
“One of the things children must learn is to be on time,” she said at the end of her talk. She looked straight at Cindy and smiled a big smile.
“That goes for teachers too!” said the tardy teacher.

Seventeen-year-old Elizabeth Allen of Wellington, New Zealand, has a dream, and she intends to attain it.
Several years ago, she started coming to church with a family in her area. “When I first started attending church, I didn’t really have any intentions of becoming a member,” she says.
“But the more I attended church, the more I learned. And the more I learned, the more I understood, and the more I understood, the more determined I became to be baptized.”
Elizabeth’s parents have asked her to wait until she’s 21 to become a member of the Church, but Elizabeth has kept her dream of being baptized alive by attending Sunday meetings, seminary, and youth activities for the last five years.
“I have learned so much,” she says. “I have learned that Joseph Smith is a true prophet of God, that he translated the scriptures correctly, that it is important to obey the Word of Wisdom, and all about the plan of salvation.”

After Joseph Smith had completed translating the Book of Mormon, he still had to find a publisher. This was not easy. The complexity of this lengthy manuscript and the cost of printing and binding thousands of copies were intimidating. Joseph first approached E. B. Grandin, a Palmyra printer, who refused. He then sought another printer in Palmyra, who also turned him down. He traveled to Rochester, 25 miles (40 km) away, and approached the most prominent publisher in western New York, who also turned him down. Another Rochester publisher was willing, but circumstances made this alternative unacceptable.

Weeks had passed, and Joseph must have been bewildered at the opposition to accomplishing his divine mandate. The Lord did not make it easy, but He did make it possible. Joseph’s fifth attempt, a second approach to the Palmyra publisher Grandin, was successful.3

The Young Women of the Bartlesville Oklahoma Second Ward, Tulsa Oklahoma Stake, have been working for several years to earn enough money to make a temple trip. They originally intended to make the trip to Utah to do baptisms for the dead in the Salt Lake Temple. But when the announcement was made that a temple was to be built in Dallas, Texas, they decided to donate the money they had earned in money-making projects to the temple fund.

Although their temple trip has been postponed until the new temple is completed, the Bartlesville Young Women are excited to know that the temple will be close enough to make more frequent trips.

Andreia C., 17, Portugal
Right now, I’m a senior in high school, and this year I’m going to apply for college. When I’m old enough, I’m going to serve a mission. I can’t wait! I also love the color yellow, and I really like to sing, play the piano, draw, paint, and go on walks.
One of the most spiritual experiences I’ve ever had was quite simple, but it meant a lot to me. There was a time when I was going through some trials and each day I felt more and more incapable. I felt I should talk to Heavenly Father about it, so I did. I knelt down and spoke to Him as openly as possible. Once I finished praying, I opened the scriptures at random and I opened up to a scripture that really helped me with what I was going through at the time.
In my case, it usually takes me some time to find the answers to my prayers, but this experience was so important to me because it was the first time I received a direct answer. How the Spirit felt was really indescribable. After this experience, my testimony has definitely grown. It taught me that the Lord always answers our sincere prayers, even if it takes time.

His mother tells about the time the family car broke down several miles from town, near an old store ready for demolition. While dad, Royal, went to call someone to help with the car, Ron and his mother explored the old building. “Ron examined the ruined building carefully,” said his mother. “He even had me help take down the exact measurements of the rooms, the windows, the staircase, and we imagined what type of things were sold.” From the measurements and his memory, Ron constructed a miniature version of the country store. The rooms were to scale, and he even put the same type of window sashes and woodwork as in the original. He made it so the roof could be removed and recreated what he imagined the original might have looked like inside. Even though the building has since been torn down, Ron has preserved it in miniature.

President McKay recalls another vivid lesson from youth:
“I thank my earthly father for the lesson he gave to two boys in a hayfield at a time when tithes were paid in kind. We had driven out to the field to get the tenth load of hay, and then over to a part of the meadow where we had taken the ninth load, where there was ‘wire grass’ and ‘slough grass.’ As we started to load the hay, father called out, ‘No, boys, drive over to the higher ground.’ There was timothy and redtop there. But one of the boys called back, (and it was I) ‘No, let us take the hay as it comes!’
“‘No, David, that is the tenth load, and the best is none too good for God.’”

My family lived in São Paulo, Brazil. On the other side of our street, there was a forest of mangrove trees. Mangrove forests have rivers crossing through the trees. The ground is very muddy.
Many people built houses on that muddy ground. They put huge logs in the mud. Then they built their house on top of them. But when it rained, the river overflowed. The water got into their houses. Then the people had nowhere to sleep at night.
When that happened, my father would invite all of them into our home. Sometimes there were as many as 15 people! He brought them into our living room and gave them blankets. Mom made them something to eat. Then they slept in our house until the next day.
This happened at least three or four times. I remember thinking, Not very many people would take strangers in. My father was letting people we barely knew sleep in our house! But then I thought, They have nowhere else to go.
My parents always did things to help people. But their service was more than just helping and giving. It was showing love to our neighbor, even when our neighbor was somebody we didn’t know well.

Danny was worried. He was excited about spending the night with his friend Jonathan, but he had a problem. This would be the first time he had stayed overnight with a friend, and even though Jonathan was his best friend, Danny had never mentioned his pillow. Could he take it with him? Danny wasn’t sure. He decided to ask his older sister, Linda.

Linda looked up from the TV set. “You’d better not, Danny. You’ll get teased about wanting to sleep with it.”

“But I always take it when I go to Grandma’s house.”

“Grandma would never tease,” said Linda. “But Jonathan’s big brother might, and then you would be embarrassed.”

“But I don’t think I can sleep without it.”

“Oh, sure you can,” Linda reassured him. “You’ll be so busy talking and laughing that you won’t even think about your pillow.”

Danny wasn’t so sure. It was the only pillow that felt comfortable when he went to sleep. Maybe he’d better ask Mom.

Danny stood in the kitchen doorway, watching Mom cook. That meant that it would soon be time for him to leave, because he was eating dinner with Jonathan. Maybe I should stay home, he thought. Then I won’t have to worry about my pillow.

When his mother saw Danny in the doorway, she grinned and said, “Hi, sport. Are you about ready to go?”

“Mom, do you think I should take my pillow to Jonathan’s house?”

“Do you want to?”

“I think I do, and I think I don’t. I don’t really know.”

“Well,” said Mom, “why don’t you take your pillow with your other things. Maybe they don’t have enough pillows, and they’ll be glad that you brought yours.”

Danny immediately felt better. “You don’t think Jonathan’s big brother will tease me?” he asked.

“No,” said Mother. “You’re going to be sleeping in Jonathan’s room with him. Thomas has his own room. He probably won’t even see your pillow.”

Danny grinned happily. “I’m going to go pack it now. Do I still have to take my toothbrush?”

Mother grinned back. “Yes, you do, young man. You wouldn’t want to sleep on that pillow with bad breath!”

Danny laughed and ran upstairs to get his things. Stacking everything on his pillow, he waited for Mom to take him to Jonathan’s house.

Jonathan was standing by the door when Danny arrived. The two boys ran to Jonathan’s room to unpack Danny’s suitcase and play. He looked at the twin beds. There were pillows on both of them.

“This is where you’ll sleep,” said Jonathan, and he placed the suitcase at the foot of one bed.

Danny held out his pillow. “I brought my own pillow in case you needed an extra.”

“Oh, we have enough, but you can sleep with yours if you want.”

Danny put his pillow on the bed, carefully putting the other one on a chair. Then he and Jonathan sat on the floor to build a block city. They hardly knew how hungry they were, until Jonathan’s mother called them for dinner.

Dinner together was fun, and they had a great time playing board games in the family room until it was time for bed. Danny looked around Jonathan’s bedroom. The block city was still there. His pillow was still there.

When Danny jumped into bed and snuggled under the blanket and felt the familiar pillow beneath his head, he was cozy and comfortable. Smiling, he raised his head to talk to Jonathan. But Jonathan was still walking around the room.

“Are you looking for something?” Danny asked.

“Yes, my brown bear. I always sleep with him.”

Danny sat up straight, a look of surprise on his face. “You always sleep with a brown bear?”

“Yes.” Jonathan lowered his voice. “I even took him with me to a hotel once.”

Danny laughed and held up his pillow. “I’ll tell you a secret, Jonathan. I always sleep with my pillow.”

The boys laughed together, and Danny jumped out of bed. “Come on. I’ll help you look for your bear.”

They found the bear sitting behind a stack of blocks. Jonathan picked it up, holding tightly to the brown body. He whispered to Danny, “You’re my best friend.”

“You’re my best friend too.”

Then Danny went to sleep on his pillow, and Jonathan went to sleep holding his brown bear.

Watoy paused under the colorful Filipino flag outside his school before heading inside.
“Good morning, class,” his teacher said. “It’s time for our morning prayer.”
All around him, Watoy’s friends each touched their foreheads, chests, and shoulders to form the shape of a cross. Then they recited the prayer they always said at the beginning of class. As usual, Watoy didn’t join them. Instead, he closed his eyes, bowed his head, and said his own silent prayer. He prayed about different things each time, the way he was taught to pray at home and in Primary.
When he finished and looked up, he saw that his teacher was watching him with a confused expression on her face.
“May I talk to you after school?” she said.
Watoy swallowed and nodded. Was he in trouble?
When classes had ended for the day, Watoy’s teacher walked over to him.
“I see that you never cross yourself or recite our morning prayer,” she said. “Will you please tell me why?”
Watoy breathed a sigh of relief. His teacher wasn’t upset, just curious! He thought about how to answer.
“Well,” he began, “in my church, when we pray, we talk to Heavenly Father about many different things. And the cross reminds us of when Jesus died. But Jesus is not dead. He lives!”
His teacher thought about this for a moment and then nodded slowly.
“Thank you for sharing this with me,” she said.
As Watoy walked to football practice, he felt warm and good inside. He liked teaching others about Jesus Christ.

I found myself sitting in the backseat of our car, the one we call the Green Machine, wondering how I got myself into this mess. We were helping my older sister move away from home for the first time, and I didn’t want to be there. I dreaded saying good-bye. I didn’t know what to say or do.
Why had I come, I asked myself. Because you’re a fool, I answered. A fool who thought your sister would want someone there besides Mom and Dad. She probably couldn’t care less, or so it seemed to me by the smiles and chatter that came nonstop from the front seat.
I shifted restlessly, hoping we were almost there, and thinking back to the argument we’d had just a couple of weeks ago.
“Will you hurry up with the hair dryer!”
“I’m drying my hair as fast as I can!”
“Well, could you let me use it for a minute? I have to leave.”
“So do I, but I can’t curl my hair unless it’s dry. Besides, I thought I’d have enough time because you said you were going to take a shower.”
“I was, but you used all the hot water.”
Bicker, bicker. Finally, we both got so fed up that we stopped talking to each other. We always seemed to fight like that. Funny though, a couple of hours later we’d be joking, laughing, and borrowing each other’s clothes as though nothing had happened. We were never angry with each other for long.
My thoughts were interrupted as we pulled up to a small, brick house, stepped out of the car, and went inside.
I lugged one of my sister’s suitcases around, while following my parents and dreading the moment when we would say good-bye. I’d have to hug her and then say something like, “I’m going to miss you” or “Have fun in California,” and then she’d hug me back and say, “I will.” Blech!
I walked outside and paced up and down the cracked sidewalk, awaiting the inevitable, as my dilapidated tennis shoes crumbled the dry leaves that had fallen from the tree in the yard.
Footsteps sounded behind me and I turned to see my sister coming toward me, a big smile on her face. I stood where I was, my hands in my pockets, as she set the box she was holding on the ground and came towards me.
We hugged each other, and I said, “I’m going to miss you. Have fun in California.” I let go, and she grinned and said, “I will.”
I turned away and crossed the street to the curb, unwilling to let her see my watery eyes. As I leaned against the car and lifted my tear-stained face to the wind, I softly whispered, “I love you.”

My second point is, the Holy Spirit has the power to guide. A 15-year-old girl felt that she needed to find new friends. Have you ever felt that way? She writes, “Now, I don’t know if you have ever had to change friends, but it honestly was the hardest thing I have ever had to do.” She decided to put her problem in the hands of the Lord, and she also counseled with her parents. She says that after several months “she wanted to just give up.” One afternoon she was casually talking to her seminary teacher, and she confided her problem to him. Then he said, “I really don’t know why I am asking you this, but do you happen to know these girls?” This girl answered with a yes. And then he said, “Have you ever thought about being friends with them?”

“I told him that there was no way that I could fit in with them. He then asked me if he could talk to one of the girls. I decided I would let him, if he promised not to embarrass me.

“Well, that next day I received a phone call from one of the girls. Now, you have to understand that this girl was on student council, and I hate to use the term, but she was ‘extremely popular.’ She asked if I would like to go to the basketball game with her that night. That night was one of the funnest, most peaceful nights of my life. The next day at school, she introduced me to two other girls. We all instantly became friends. This event has changed me.”

She concludes by saying, “I don’t know about you, but I would much rather have the Lord, who knows the outcome of everything, direct my life than me, who just sees things as they are at the time. He is right by our side, walking us through life, even when we feel so alone” (letter on file in the Young Women office).

This is a question that my father taught me to carefully consider years ago. As I was growing up, my parents assigned me chores around the house and paid me an allowance for that work. I often used that money, a little over 50 cents a week, to go to the movies. Back then a movie ticket cost 25 cents for an 11-year-old. This left me with 25 cents to spend on candy bars, which cost 5 cents apiece. A movie with five candy bars! It couldn’t get much better than that.

All was well until I turned 12. Standing in line one afternoon, I realized that the ticket price for a 12-year-old was 35 cents, and that meant two less candy bars. Not quite prepared to make that sacrifice, I reasoned to myself, “You look the same as you did a week ago.” I then stepped up and asked for the 25-cent ticket. The cashier did not blink, and I bought my regular five candy bars instead of three.

Elated by my accomplishment, I later rushed home to tell my dad about my big coup. As I poured out the details, he said nothing. When I finished, he simply looked at me and said, “Son, would you sell your soul for a nickel?” His words pierced my 12-year-old heart. It is a lesson I have never forgotten.

Tim leaned on the dented fender of his old Honda and scowled at his barren surroundings.
Lanely, the sign had said. What a dump, he thought.
Another hot wind carried a dust cloud across the road. The town’s only gas station sat a hundred yards off the interstate. During the tourist season, you could sit outside the garage and watch car after car fly by on the freeway, but hardly any of them stopped in Lanely.
Tim had stopped there but not to take pictures or admire the three-block skyline. Behind him, the station’s owner, a man old enough to be Tim’s grandfather, examined the engine in the hot shade of the hood.
Tim’s tan face looked angry and exhausted. Red, matted hair, drenched in sweat, added to his tired appearance. He scowled at his watch. Great, he thought, I’ll be late for the game. He had never missed a football game. Now here he was, stuck in some dump, for no good reason. Why did Mom make him go to his uncle’s funeral anyway? It wasn’t like he’d seen him in the last 10 years. And he had wasted his morning with a bunch of other people he hadn’t seen in 10 years. He didn’t want to do that again.
“Well,” said the owner, emerging from under the hood, “it looks like you might be here for a while. Your water pump’s bad. That’s why your engine keeps overheating.”
Tim rolled his eyes and threw up his hands at the news. He fumed for a moment then kicked the car’s front tire angrily.
“Great,” he grunted. “How long is that going to take?”
“Oh, a couple hours, I reckon.” The owner wiped his greasy hands on a rag that looked even greasier. “I think I have the part here. But my other mechanic is home sick today. If you want to lend me a hand, it would move things along a little.”
He pulled a red handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead. The boy’s face was very familiar; the strong nose and the firm, square jaw awakened a shadow in Jack’s memory. “Where are you headed, anyway?”
Tim let a second drift by before answering. “Over to the coast. A town called Cranston.”
Jack hadn’t thought about Cranston for a long time. It reminded him of …
He took a closer look at the young man. A surprising resemblance, he told himself. Maybe it was just his imagination. “C’mon,” he said, gesturing toward the car. “Let’s get this thing in the garage.”
Tim stood still for a second, then moved to help push the car. The sooner it was fixed, the sooner he could get out of here.
Jack was under the hood again. Tim leaned on the fender and peered down at the engine, but it was just one greasy, tangled mass to his eyes, and he slipped into daydreaming. He had lost track of time, but it seemed like they’d been in there a while. Occasionally Jack would ask for a certain tool, and Tim found most of those indistinguishable too.
Inside the garage, they were out of the sun, but the heat still bore down on Tim, squeezing more sweat from his body. Soiled auto manuals filled a rickety bookcase on one wall. The odors of gasoline, motor oil, and something mildewy blended to give him a headache. It was the silence that Jack found intolerable. He wiped his shiny forehead with his sleeve.
“So you’re from Cranston,” he said, not looking up from the engine. “Does the name Nate Vaughan mean anything to you?”
Tim answered without moving. “He was my grandad. Never met him. I think he died when my mom was really young. How did you know him?”
“Why, he used to live here in town,” Jack said. He glanced at Tim. “There’s a strong family resemblance, I might add.”
Tim let out a flat grunt. “I think I remember my mom saying something about that once, but she hardly talks about him.” He went back to staring at the engine.
Jack resumed working but tried to continue the conversation. “Yup, he and I were friends for years before your mother was born. We worked as ranch hands together, and he was best man at my wedding.”
Tim glanced at his watch. He didn’t care for reminiscing, but he was going to be here for a while. When the old man paused, Tim said, “I heard he went crazy.”
To Tim’s surprise, Jack didn’t even look up but kept loosening a certain nut. For a moment Tim thought he hadn’t been heard, but then Jack replied calmly, “Did your mother tell you that?”
Tim thought he felt tension hovering in the air. “Yeah, a long time ago. She said that’s why my grandma left him and moved to Cranston.”
The owner handed Tim his wrench. “Give me that one second from the end,” he said, wiping his forehead on his sleeve again. He didn’t speak again until he had resumed work on the engine. “Well, son, you’re not getting the whole story there. I knew your grandma, and she was a fine woman. I knew your mother, too, when she was really young. Your Grandpa Nate loved them both very much; he was a wonderful husband and father.”
“Then why did he leave them?”
“Now, see, that’s what I want to set straight.” He extracted himself from the engine and leaned against a nearby workbench, wiping his hands on a rag. “You see, all three of them used to live here in town. One day your grandpa met two traveling preachers, and they showed him this.”
He stepped over to the bookcase and pulled a volume off the shelf with a worn hand. He handed it to Tim, who examined the book briefly. It was old but not dusty, bound in worn, brown leather. The yellowed title page read, “The Book of Mormon.” The name sounded familiar. Tim shrugged his shoulders. “Okay. So what? People don’t up and leave their families over a book.”
Jack slowly turned the wrench over his hands. His eyes stared off into space. “The first time Nate met the missionaries and saw the Book of Mormon, he knew it was true. He asked the missionaries to baptize him that same week. I still remember how excited he was when he first told me about it.” He gripped the wrench firmly in his hands and looked thoughtfully at Tim. “Your grandma, on the other hand, didn’t like the whole deal at all. Among other things, she said she didn’t believe someone should change religions. Nate was sad that it upset her, but he couldn’t just stop believing what he believed to be true. Eventually your grandmother took your mother and moved in with relatives in Cranston. I don’t think Nate saw them much after that, and I didn’t either. Nate passed away not long after.”
Tim shrugged again. “I don’t get it. What made him do that?”
The owner tilted his head a little to the left and pondered for a moment. Then he drew in a deep breath and said, “Tim, it’s not easy to explain in a few words, and I don’t know exactly how Nate felt or what he experienced. I’m not him.”
They were quiet for a moment. Tim wanted to say something, but waited. Jack continued.
“That was a very busy time for both of us, but I remember how one day we were out fishing not far from here. I knew that Nate and his wife were having some troubles then, though I didn’t understand all the circumstances and everything. Eventually we started talking about it. I told him that I thought he was risking a lot for this religion, with his marriage and all. He nodded, said he knew that. So then I asked him straight out why he was doing it. He was really quiet for a minute, and then he said, ‘Jack, do you remember those nights out on the trail when we slept under the stars?’
“We used to stay awake for hours talking about God and life and what we were supposed to be doing with our time. We put a lot of thought into it, but never got very far. Anyway, Nate told me, ‘I finally found answers for those questions we always wondered about.’ Sometimes Nate had told me that he was afraid of being alone. He was afraid that one day his friends and family would all be gone, and he’d be alone. But now he said that he knew that God knew and loved him. He said that God would help him in his hard times, that he was helping him right then.
“I remember being amazed at the excitement and passion he spoke with. He was a changed man, and there was something in his voice that gave me hope.”
Jack paused. A placid thoughtfulness had settled over his face. “Now, I didn’t understand everything he told me right then, and it was actually a long time before I did, but by the time he finished speaking I had this beautiful, peaceful feeling that made me want to believe everything he’d said. I never doubted Nate after that.” Jack looked at the engine, then handed Tim the wrench. “I think we’re done.”
Tim took the wrench and stepped back from the car. He stood silently, staring at the tool. Alone. Or not? The idea hadn’t occurred to Tim before, but now it made him think. Jack’s words carried a power. They stirred up questions too. Did his grandad have any more relatives here? Where was he from? How did he meet grandmom?
Tim’s trance was snapped by the slamming of the hood of his car. “You’re ready to go,” the old man told Tim. “That’ll get you to Cranston, no problem. Just a little late.”
Late. The game. Tim had forgotten it. “Ummm, great. Sounds good,” he finally mumbled.
Tim wrote a check while Jack cleaned up. Neither said much until Tim was about to climb into his car. He offered the owner his hand and thanked him.
The owner shook his hand and nodded. Then he handed him a scrap of paper with a number scrawled on it. “My pleasure. Listen, I’ve got a lot of pictures and stuff from when I used to work with your grandpa. Why don’t you come back up and take a look at them sometime? Or you’re always welcome just to come and talk.”
Tim nodded and got into his car. As he started the engine, he leaned out the window and said, “Thanks. I’ll come back as soon as I can.”