"By This All Will Know That You Are My Disciples"

By Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf
Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

Many years ago Sister Uchtdorf and I were traveling through southern Germany. It was just before Easter, and we invited a good friend, who was not a member of the Church, to join us in our Sunday worship service. We loved this dear friend, so it was normal and natural to share with her how we felt about the Savior and His Church and to invite her to come and see! She accepted the invitation and joined us at the meetings of a nearby branch.

If you have ever brought a friend to church for the first time, you can probably relate to the way I felt that Sunday morning. I wanted everything to go perfectly. Our friend was a highly educated, spiritual person. I earnestly hoped the meetings of this branch would make a good impression on her and represent the Church well.

The branch met in some rented rooms on the second floor of a grocery store. To get there, we had to take the stairs at the back of the building, passing the strong aromas from goods stored there.

As the sacrament meeting began, I thought about my friend experiencing this for the first time, and I couldn’t help but notice things that made me cringe a little. The singing, for example, didn’t exactly sound like the Tabernacle Choir. Restless, noisy children could be heard during the sacrament. The speakers did their best, but they were not skilled at public speaking. I sat uncomfortably through the meeting, hoping that maybe Sunday School would be better.

It wasn’t.

All morning I worried about what our friend must think of this church we had taken her to.

Afterward, as we drove home, I turned to talk to our friend. I wanted to explain that this was just one small branch and it didn’t really represent the Church as a whole. But before I could say a word, she spoke up.

“That was beautiful,” she said.

I was speechless.

She continued, “I’m so impressed with how people treat each other in your church. They all seem to come from different backgrounds, and yet it’s clear that they genuinely love each other. This is what I imagine Christ wanted His Church to be like.”

Well, I quickly repented of my judgmental attitude. I had wanted picture-perfect meetings to impress my friend. But what the members of this branch had achieved was a heart-perfect spirit of love, kindness, patience, and compassion.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2025/04/27uchtdorf?lang=eng