A Good Place to Be

by Margaret Wilding

Our Sunday School class circus was entertaining but I didn’t think it could change my life.

It was our usual Sunday School class circus. Dennis was trying to balance on the back legs of his chair and tipped over, pulling the guys on either side of him down as he fell. Roger had some new jokes to tell, and Allan was doing tricks with his face. Elaine and I were writing notes to each other. The rest of the class was much the same, either laughing at the boys or providing their own entertainment. I had no idea that something the teacher would say that day would change my life.

The year we were 14, we didn’t quite know who was going to be our teacher each week. Each new teacher would give up and refuse to teach us again. But then we got one teacher who stuck with us, each week trying to give a lesson that we would listen to. This particular Sunday, our lesson had been on Joseph Smith. Just before the end of class, our teacher turned to us and said, “Joseph Smith was 14 when he prayed and got an answer to his prayer. You are 14. You can pray and get answers to your prayers too.”

Somehow that really hit me. The thought that I could pray and get an answer about something really important interested me.

I had been raised in the Church, baptized at eight, and went to church every Sunday and to every activity during the week. But I still needed to know for myself that the Church was true. My parents, my grandparents, my teachers all said that it was true, but I needed to know for myself. I decided to take my Sunday School teacher’s advice and pray about it.

That night, as I finished asking for blessings on my family, I asked the Lord if the Church was true. I waited for the answer—nothing. I was a little discouraged. I wanted an answer right away.

I still kept going to church, listening to the lessons, participating in Mutual activities, giving family home evening lessons. Every night I prayed to know if the Church was true. Still nothing.

Then one night, after many weeks of nightly prayers on the subject, I was feeling really bad that I hadn’t received any type of answer to my prayer. I talked to my Heavenly Father like I would talk to my own father and told Him how much I needed this answer. I explained how hard I was trying to find out what was right. I finished my prayer and was still kneeling when a sentence came into my mind. It wasn’t really a voice, but it was a sentence that had not been there before. I heard, “This is a good place for you to be.”

I had a wonderfully comfortable feeling. I still didn’t know for sure that the Church was true, but I knew that the Lord was aware of me and answered my prayer. He told me that church was a good place for me to be. I knew that if I kept going to church, to Mutual, and seminary, and continued to pray, that eventually my prayer would be answered completely.

My answer was just the first step, but it was a step that led to more answers.

Illustrated by Roger Motzkus