80 years ago, a small plane carrying Latter-day Saint Joseph Tippets and 5 others crashed in the harsh Alaska wilderness. The tiny group of survivors spent the next 29 days in the dead of winter fighting for their lives.

The year 1940 might have been a banner year for our family. The health and financial hardships that followed my father’s 1930 graduation from medical school in Philadelphia were past. The family was happily located in Twin Falls, Idaho, where my father’s medical practice (eye, ear, nose, and throat) was thriving and where he served on the high council of the Twin Falls Stake. In January 1938, he and my mother had returned from his four months of valuable postdoctoral training in ophthalmology in Vienna, Austria, and Cairo, Egypt. After years of sacrifice since their marriage in 1929, my mother could at last contemplate a life of security as the wife of a prosperous physician. In January 1940, son Merrill would be four, and in March, daughter Evelyn would be one. In August 1940, I, their eldest, would be baptized following my eighth birthday.

God wants to commit responsibilities to each of us. They come in church callings or personal promptings to share His gospel. We show our commitment by choosing to magnify those callings from God. Doctrine and Covenants 27–28 discuss committing to God and warn about what it looks like when that commitment is in the wrong place.

When Emily Peterson’s husband passed away after a short but heart wrenching battle with brain cancer, she was left with grief, children to raise, and a business to run. But through it all, she felt the steady presence of her Heavenly Father—and of her husband, guiding her from beyond the veil. In this week’s episode, Emily opens up about love that endures, grief that refines, and a journey that is anything but solitary.

The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles sits boldly over the hills of Santa Monica. The modern building boasts a myriad of fountains and soaring terraces that provide 360-degree views of the surrounding valley and hills. Inside, Western art from the Middle Ages to the present is displayed. Among my favorite pieces housed in the museum is a small collection of paintings by Claude Monet. The first time I saw a Monet was there at the Getty. I rushed into the room, beyond excited to finally see my favorite artist’s works in real life. I turned the corner and came face-to-face with the first painting on display.

In November 1997, an Isuzu trooper carrying two missionaries, a counselor in the mission presidency, and his wife traveled through the jungle of Suriname, 25 miles away from the nearest city, Paramaribo. Baby alligators crawled among the dense coconut trees that hung heavily with heat and humidity.