Sam, Basketball, and The New Era

Sam is a great example to his basketball teammates.  He has shared his beliefs and values with the members of his high school team on several occasions.  He wrote an article about his experiences and the New Era published it in the Sept. 2011 issue!  You can read what he wrote:

Understand Doctrine

Finding the Answers

By Sam Magnusson

I have two big things in my life: church and sports. I found out that I had to combine the two when I tried out for my high school basketball team.

I started going to practice during the summer right before my freshman year. As I got to know the older players and their personalities, they started to notice I didn’t do a lot of things they did—I didn’t cuss, smoke, do drugs, look at pornography, or even go on dates yet. They started to make fun of me slightly. In a high school of about 1,500 students, only 4 of us are members of the Church. So you can guess we got teased a bit. But it didn’t bother me much, and I was happy to stand up for what I knew was true.

As the season drew on, my teammates started to ask me more about the Church. There weren’t big, important questions, just things like “Why don’t you date?” Then one day during study hall, some of the players started talking about their families, and that conversation turned to religion. So they asked deeper questions about the Church like “What is repentance?” and “Do you believe in a heaven and a hell?”

I always carry a copy of For the Strength of Youth in my backpack, so I pulled it out to help answer their questions. We talked about the Church for over an hour. When it was over, there were two questions I could not answer. I promised to look up the answers and get back to them. That night I looked up the answers, and my mom suggested I bring extra copies of For the Strength of the Youth and also the book True to the Faith.

The next day while we studied together, when the boys asked questions, I pulled out the books and passed them around. We had another long and deep discussion about the Church. I asked if anyone wanted to keep the books, and some people did. Later that week we had another talk about other churches, not just mine, and my coach, who is very religious, talked about his and other beliefs.

I don’t know if anything good will come out of this, but I know that my team members now know more about the true gospel and why I am different from them. My testimony had been strengthened, and I have gained the courage to talk about and stand up for what I know is right and true.