We’ve Got Mail

Fond memories

I love being a missionary. It has brought so much joy to my life. But I have to tell the truth. Being in the mission field is tough, and since I’ve been here, I’ve been feeling a little inadequate. One day when I was feeling down, I picked up the June 2000 New Era special issue about missionary work, and I immediately felt the spirit of the MTC come back to me. The Spirit comforted me and gave me a great desire to serve. Having the Spirit, along with hard work, makes a missionary happy. Thanks for helping me when I felt a little down.

Elder Joshua Lindsay
Arizona Tempe Mission

Source of strength

I love getting the New Era. It is really a great magazine. I especially like it because I don’t have to worry about what might be written in it. It is also a great source of strength, with articles that help me with troubles I’ve had or when I need a spiritual boost.

Maren Poulson (via e-mail)
Lafayette, Colorado

Thanks for the Idea

I want to thank the youth who send their ideas to the Idea List. Each month it helps me because I sometimes get tempted to do wrong. By reading the Idea List and following the teachings, it really helps me progress with my life. I am sure I will never forget these ideas.

Nancy Nair
Ba, Fiji

The New Era Contest Comes to an End

After 30 years, the annual New Era contest has been discontinued.

However—this is just the end of a contest, not of your opportunity to develop and share your talents. We still rely on you, our readers, to share your faith-promoting, true personal experiences, your poetry, your music, etc. We still want and need to hear from you.

Creative talents and abilities don’t depend on a contest. Elder Neal A. Maxwell has said: “While true creativity is something that can be shared by those who appreciate the works of creation, true creativity does not depend entirely for its satisfactions upon ‘consumers.’ It is a highly personal experience in which we are grateful to the Lord for helping us to see beauty and truth and the order of things, for restructuring our understanding of things, if necessary, to accord with things ‘as they really are’ (Jacob 4:13). Creative experience is intrinsically satisfying” (New Era, Aug. 1982, 7).

We encourage you to continue to develop and share your talents. Take classes, study, practice, maybe even teach someone else. Enter school and community contests if you wish. Use your talents to create thoughtful, personal gifts for family and friends. And in all you do, give thanks to the Creator who has given you, His child, wonderful gifts. Above all, be sure that what you create lifts and elevates and expresses truth and testimony. As you use the creative skills you have learned and developed, be more concerned with pleasing God than with pleasing the world.

Now, to all who have participated in the contest over the years—thank you. You did well. And those of you who were planning to contribute to the New Era in the future—what are you waiting for? We still need and want you. If you would like writer’s guidelines, please write or e-mail us at the editorial office addresses listed in “We’ve Got Mail.”