“Are you being a good girl?” questions my nearly 90-year-old Uncle Bob every time we meet.

I'm hardly a girl any more, nevertheless, my concerned uncle wants to know if I am being good. My uncle, Dr. Robert D. Matheson, has played a big part in my life. Uncle Bob is the one who blessed me as a baby and baptized and confirmed me as an eight-year-old. As a temple sealer, he performed the wedding ceremonies of four of our children. As a skilled surgeon, Uncle Bob also operated on me twice.

Although Uncle Bob grew up in the mining town of McGill , Nevada , under difficult circumstances and has experienced many challenges, he, nevertheless, has accomplished much in his life. He has been a faithful and stalwart member of the Church, a loving husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather.

Following Bob's mission to Canada , he was drafted into the service during World War II. After his plane was shot down over Germany , he was held captive for 13 months in a German POW camp and nearly starved to death. After the war, Uncle Bob married and then attended medical school.

Now almost ninety, Uncle Bob is no longer the person I once knew and loved. His brilliant mind resides somewhere else, but his caring concern is still evident in the one question he asks when he sees me. For that matter, it's the same question he asks every person he greets. Still knowing my name, Uncle Bob asks, “Janet, are you being a good girl?” Or he'll ask my husband, Larry, “Are you being a good boy?”

At my age, it's actually quite flattering that someone still thinks of me as “a girl,” instead of a middle-age grandma. I remember as a little girl the many times we visited the Matheson home. Gracious and loving, Uncle Bob welcomed visitors with a hug and a kiss and then usually sent guests home with produce from his garden. At the time I was baptized, Uncle Bob was just finishing up his surgical residency at LDS Hospital . My Aunt June was struck with polio during the 1950s polio epidemic. She spent an entire year in the hospital and then spent the rest of her life in a wheelchair. This was indeed a challenge as Bob and June had three small, very lively boys at the time. Later, three girls joined the family. Having a family of six children and an immobile wife required Bob to do a lot of extra work to keep their home functioning well.

Uncle Bob's question is a very good question. You might consider his question as a condensed temple recommend interview. Whenever he poses it, I do ask myself, “Am I being a good girl?” I hope I will be able to answer “yes” not only every time he asks, but all the time. However, being human I know I don't always qualify in every aspect of my life. Mary Ellen Wood Smoot served as the general Relief Society president from 1997 to 2002. When Mary Ellen was twelve years old, she not very willingly gave up attending a Valentine's party to travel to the Northwest. Her parents were helping their oldest daughter, Maurine, and her baby girl move to Washington State to join her husband. Mary Ellen and her younger sister, Ruth Ann, were needed to help unpack boxes. On the way, her mother, LaVora, was driving on rainy roads in Oregon, and lost control of the car, which then rolled two and a half times. Mary Ellen and her father, with minor injuries, crawled out the driver's side of the car. They found that Maurine and her baby were all right, but LaVora and Ruth Ann were pinned under the hood of the car. The road was deserted and the nearest town was twelve miles away.

“Then something happened that I will never forget,” recalled Mary Ellen. “I watched my father, who always had a great deal of faith, bow his head in prayer and ask for the Lord's help.” He said, “Mary Ellen, as I lift the car, you pull your mother out.” She watched her father lift the heavy Buick enough for her to pull her mother out. Ten-year-old Ruth Ann was able to scramble out herself, having only sustained bruises. LaVora, however, was seriously injured with a broken pelvis, ribs, and collar bone. Mary Ellen, with cut and bleeding knees, knelt beside her mother, who, in terrible pain and near death, said, “Mary Ellen, always remember who you are and be a good girl.” ¹ I spent several months researching and writing about the life of Mary Ellen Smoot and I know that in her 75 years she has followed her mother's admonition to be “a good girl.” Sister Smoot is the devoted mother of 7, grandmother of 50, an energetic community and Church leader. More important than her credentials is the goodness you feel in her presence, her devotion to the gospel of Jesus Christ, and her love for people.

Unfortunately, in general, “good girls” and “good boys” are becoming rather rare commodities in the world. “Good” is often ridiculed while “Bad” is glorified. Bad behavior makes headlines. A movie titled Superbad , according to the review I read, lives up to its name.

In contrast, Amanda Rammell, who was Miss Idaho in the 2007 Miss USA pageant, garnered national attention for declaring that “the Brit Pack: Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton,” are horrible role models for young girls. Yet, they have an enormous amount of influence. Their misconduct gets so much attention that the Associated Press, the world's largest news gathering service, staged a news blackout of Paris for a week. A reporter wrote, “Miss Idaho counts herself among women leaders advancing their own campaigns, large and small, to offer good-girl alternatives.” Amanda used the Miss USA pageant to urge teens to look within their families and communities for positive models. Her grandmother's endurance working a farm and her mother's lessons of compassion were a good influence on her. She said, “The most beautiful women I know are my mom and my grandma because of the lives they led. Every wrinkle on their faces tells a story. It's like a poem.” ²

In February 2007 Olympic wrestling gold medalist Rulon Gardner's plane crashed into Lake Powell in southern Utah . During the hours he was trying to swim to shore in frigid water, Rulon had a near-death experience. Only days later he spoke to students at a Massachusetts prep school about it. He said, “I saw God. I saw Jesus. I saw my dead brother. They told me it's time to come home.” He responded, “Please, not yet. I'm just starting to get good.” ³

Some people think that whether they are good or bad matters only to them, that this is their life and they can do whatever they please for their choices affect no one else. That is absolutely not true. Future generations are deeply affected by our choices, and past generations are concerned about them. A friend of mine related: “Once when I was in college, I found myself in a compromising situation and clearly glimpsed my grandfather's disapproving face. He had passed away just a year earlier, and we had always been close. I quickly got myself out of that situation and since then, referred to grandpa as “my guardian angel.” Following a difficult labor and delivery of her first child, this young mother was not doing well at all. Her husband gave her a blessing and promised that guardian angels would be present to protect her through the night. Whenever she awoke that night, she saw her grandfather sitting in a chair “smiling a sweet, soft, faraway kind of smile that let me know he was taking care of everything. Now each time a new child comes to us, I think how Grandpa must have been the last to kiss it good-bye and softly whisper in its ear, “I'll be watching you, so be good!”

What does it mean to be good? There is a difference between doing good and being good. Being good is to keep the commandments, to lead honorable and chaste lives, to strive to be disciples of Jesus Christ. Mosiah 2: 22 tells us, “And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments.” It's really not that hard to be good; a good life is actually much easier to live than a bad one, which becomes fraught with the complex consequences of sin.

President Gordon B. Hinckley said, “It's not enough just to be good. We need to be good for something. We must contribute good to the world. The world must be a better place for our presence. And the good that is in us must be spread to others.” ⁴

It's not likely that many of you will meet my Uncle Bob and have him ask you the question, “Are you being a good girl? Are you being a good boy?” But one day each of us will meet our Savior, as Enos said: “I rejoice in the day when my mortal shall put on immortality, and shall stand before him; then shall I see his face with pleasure.” Every one of us will stand before the Lord Jesus Christ and, in essence, He will pose the question, “Have you been a good girl? Have you been a good boy?” May we each be able to answer with a resounding, “Yes. Yes, I have been a good and faithful servant,” so that we might “enter into the joy of the Lord.” (Matthew 25:21.) The Lord will then say to us, “Come unto me, ye blessed, there is a place prepared for you in the mansions of my Father.” (Enos 1:27.)

1 Relief Society Scrapbook, 5.

2 Michael Martinez, “Idahoan Plays Up Good Girls,” Chicago Tribune, quoted in Deseret Morning News, March 27, 2007, A-1.

3“Gardner Back to Speaking Just Days after Plane Crash,” deseretnews.com, Feb. 28, 2007.

4Gordon B. Hinckley, Standing for Something ( New York : Times Books, 2000), 58.