My mom told this story at the baptism of my nephews Nathan & Jacob as an illustration of the power of prayer and the power of listening to the promptings we receive as answers to our prayers.
When my brother John came back from his mission (he was in the Philippines), he brought my other brother Dan a silver ring. Dan loved this ring and wore it constantly even though it was a little too big. One day, Dan was at school when he looked down and realized that the ring was missing. He looked all over school and even asked his friends to help him look but no ring. He came home from school and asked my mom if she had seen his ring. She said no and so they started looking for it. They cleaned his room, no ring. They looked all through the house but still no ring. My mom asked Dan if he had prayed about finding the ring and he said that he had prayed. My mom suggested that he pray again. Dan prayed and after he prayed, he saw in his head a black plastic garage bag. A few days earlier, Dan had been cleaning up after his dog, Maddie and the contents of that outdoor clean-up was in that garage bag (you can guess what was in the bag). Dan did not want to go look in the bag but he decide that he would. He opened the smelling bag and took a stick to move things around to see if he could see something in the bag. As he did that, he saw something catch his eye on the top of the pile. It was his ring! Dan knew that there is no way that anyone but the Lord would have known where his ring was and he knew that his prayer had been answered.
I think this experience is not only about the love the Lord has for a sad teenager who lost something of importance to him but it is also about the fact that nothing is lost to the Lord. If it is his will, he can lead us to all things; things as simple as a silver ring to as complex as a lost soul. All things can be found-no matter if it is in a haystack or in a black plastic garbage bag full of doggie doo-doo.
