Lost Luggage, Redeemed Souls

Recognize the worth of what is precious

Elder Stevenson begins with the anxiety of lost luggage and contrasts it with an airport known for never losing a bag. This image teaches that what is precious deserves careful attention, deliberate stewardship, and faithful return.

I hoped someone was taking care of the bag and its contents. I hoped it would not be forgotten, neglected, or lost.

Tsuyoshi Habuta, the airport chief of baggage operations, believes losing luggage should never happen “because luggage is precious to passengers.”

When you hand off your luggage at Kansai Airport, you get a sense that they are saying to you, “We have your precious belongings. We are responsible for them now. We will return them to you.”

• The fear of losing something important is widely understood.
• The airport illustration shows that careful systems and loving attention can protect what is valuable.
• A culture of thoroughness and attention to detail helps ensure safe return.
• Small, consistent improvements and personal responsibility matter.
• This temporal example prepares the listener to understand a spiritual truth about souls.

• When have you felt anxiety over something valuable being placed in someone else’s care?
• What experience has taught you that small acts of diligence can make a big difference?
• When have you seen someone handle a responsibility with unusual care and love?
• How has an everyday experience helped you understand a gospel truth more deeply?

Trust Heavenly Father’s redeeming care for His children

The talk turns from luggage to souls, teaching that Heavenly Father sends His beloved children into mortality with divine love and a plan for their redemption. He knows each child, claims each soul, and intends to bring them home.

In a reverent way, I wonder what it is like for a loving Heavenly Father to send His most precious belongings, His children, away from their heavenly home, knowing they must pass through the challenges of mortality.

How beloved and precious His children are to Him.

You are mine. I know you. You are not alone. I have not forgotten you. I intend to bring you home.

This is more than logistics.

This is redemption.

• Heavenly Father’s children are His most precious possessions.
• Mortality is a journey filled with challenges, but we do not travel alone.
• God places earthly stewards in one another’s lives to help and strengthen us.
• Each person belongs to God and is known personally by Him.
• The plan of salvation is not merely about movement through mortality but about redemption and return.

• When have you felt that Heavenly Father knew you personally?
• What experience has helped you feel that you are not alone?
• When have you felt entrusted with helping one of God’s children?
• How have you seen God’s redeeming love at work in your life or in the life of someone you love?

Magnify your sacred call to minister

Elder Stevenson teaches that ministering brothers and sisters act in the Lord’s name to remember, nourish, watch over, and strengthen members of the Church. Ministering is a sacred stewardship over souls of great worth.

Please know you represent the Lord, scripturally aligned, serving those who are “numbered among the people of the church of Christ,” whose “names [are] taken, that they might be remembered and nourished by the good word of God, to keep them in the right way.”

We “are to ‘watch over’ Church members and ‘be with and strengthen them’ (Doctrine and Covenants 20:53).”

The greatest success in missionary work comes as we act in normal and natural ways; the same is true in ministering.

Consider your ministering assignment as “Christlike caring” of the Lord’s most treasured possessions, who at the end of their mortal journey can be claimed and redeemed by Him.

I invite you to implement small acts of kindness and care into your ministering, becoming better ministers of Jesus Christ.

• Ministering is done as a representative of the Lord.
• Those we minister to should be remembered and nourished by the good word of God.
• Ministering includes watching over, being with, and strengthening others.
• Normal and natural efforts are powerful in ministering, just as in missionary work.
• Ministering involves Christlike love, service, comfort, spiritual sensitivity, and helping others make and keep covenants.
• Small acts of kindness can become meaningful expressions of discipleship.

• When has a ministering brother, sister, leader, or friend remembered you at the right time?
• What simple act of kindness has had a lasting spiritual impact on you?
• When have you felt prompted by the Spirit to reach out to someone?
• How has serving another person helped you feel closer to Jesus Christ?
• What experience could you share about helping someone feel remembered and loved?

Strengthen the rising generation with light and truth

The talk gives special emphasis to children and youth, who need refuge, teaching, and spiritual formation in dangerous times. Investing in the rising generation brings eternal returns.

The second is the universal charge to strengthen and nurture the rising generation, to bring up children “in light and truth.”

In the perilous times in which we live, the rising generation needs a defense and refuge from the storm.

There is no greater need and no greater return on this investment than when it is made with Primary children, young men, young women, and young adults.

These precious souls are beings of potential beyond measure whose destiny it is to walk through eternity in halls of celestial glory.

• All disciples share responsibility to strengthen the rising generation.
• Today’s youth face serious spiritual dangers and need protection and refuge.
• Teaching and investing time in children and youth yields eternal blessings.
• Work with Primary children, youth, and young adults is especially important.
• Young people have divine potential and eternal destiny.

• Who influenced you for good when you were young, and what did they do?
• When have you seen a child or youth respond to love, testimony, or truth?
• What experience have you had serving in Primary, Young Women, Young Men, seminary, or with young adults?
• How have you seen the Lord magnify efforts to bless the rising generation?

Teach youth to follow Jesus Christ and hear the Holy Ghost

Elder Stevenson explains that strengthening the rising generation includes helping them receive the name of Christ in their hearts, take up His cross, seek remission of sins through Him, and learn to hear the Holy Ghost.

By motivating, teaching, and encouraging our young people to receive the holy name of Jesus Christ in their hearts and minds, to joyfully take up the cross of Christ, and to walk in holiness as His disciples and emissaries.

We teach this, “that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins,” even Jesus Christ.

Inspire them to “sincerely and persistently do the spiritual work needed to develop the crucial, spiritual skill of learning how to hear the whisperings of the Holy Ghost, [giving them] all the direction [they] will ever need in [their lives].”

Teach the rising generation to know, love, and emulate their Savior, Jesus Christ.

“He is the strength of youth.”

They will respond.

• Youth need to be taught to center their identity and discipleship in Jesus Christ.
• They should be invited to take Christ’s name into their hearts and minds.
• They need to understand that remission of sins comes through Jesus Christ.
• Learning to hear the Holy Ghost is a crucial spiritual skill.
• As youth come to know and love the Savior, they can walk in holiness and discipleship.
• The Lord will help them respond to true teaching and loving encouragement.

• When did you begin to understand that Jesus Christ was the source of forgiveness and strength?
• What experience helped you recognize the whisperings of the Holy Ghost?
• How have you seen a young person grow through faith in Christ?
• What gospel habit has helped you keep the Savior in your heart and mind?
• What could you share about the strength that comes from living the standards of Jesus Christ?

Help one another return safely home

In his conclusion, Elder Stevenson reminds us that although each person is accountable for individual choices, we all need help along the way. As one family under God, we should care for one another with the hope of a safe return to our Heavenly Father.

Unlike pieces of luggage, each of us is ultimately responsible for our decisions, beliefs, and actions, assisted by heavenly and earthly ministering angels.

Therefore, as disciples of Jesus Christ, we rise with renewed determination to succor and care for those with whom we come in contact.

In the end, we are all one family.

We all need help along the way.

We each possess a tag that marks us as a child of a loving Heavenly Father.

This precious soul has great worth to one day be redeemed by its holder, never to be forgotten, neglected, or lost.

I rejoice in that redemption and celebrate the great privilege we have to participate in that work until that day when we safely return to the one who created and loves us with a perfect love.

• Each person is accountable before God for personal choices and actions.
• Even with personal responsibility, we are helped by heavenly and earthly ministers.
• Disciples of Christ should succor and care for others.
• All people belong to one family under Heavenly Father.
• Every soul has great worth and is marked by divine identity.
• The work of redemption includes helping one another return home to God.

• When have you felt helped by ‘heavenly and earthly ministering angels’?
• What experience has taught you that we truly need one another?
• When have you felt the worth of a soul—your own or someone else’s?
• How have you seen someone helped along the covenant path by another person’s care?
• What personal experience could illustrate the hope of returning home to Heavenly Father?