Report on the Northern States Mission

(President of Northern States Mission). ¶

I rejoice in meeting you. I know you have gathered here, each and every one of you, to receive light, and to be encouraged in the principles of the Gospel that you have espoused ; and as you have come seeking, so ye shall go away filled. ¶

I enjoyed the spirit of our services this morning, and I have enjoyed the spirit of the service this afternoon. The song that was just rendered by Elder Kirkham ever inspires me. It arouses within me a feeling, a knowledge of God and His works, that is impossible for me to express, for I know that my Redeemer lives. This morning I was thrilled in every fibre of my being while listening to the prophet of the Lord. I was reminded of the song, "Come, listen to a prophet's voice And hear the word of God, And in the way of truth rejoice, And sing for joy aloud." ¶

How many of us will listen to the voice of the prophet of God and go home singing and rejoicing because of the teachings that he has given us this day concerning our duty to ourselves and our children? ¶

I am proud, my brothers and sisters, to feel that I am representing the Northern States and the missionaries laboring there. I have enjoyed every minute of the time I have been in that part of the world, because of the association I have with so many men and women who love the Lord — men and women who are struggling to keep the commandments of the Lord and magnify His holy name in their walks and conversations among the people. It has been my privilege to labor with about eight hundred Elders and a dozen lady missionaries in that mission. Out of that eight hundred, we have had only one man go astray so far, in the field, as to lose the spirit of his calling. We think this a wonderful record compared with hundreds of big men of the world, who confess the looseness of their morals both before and after marriage. ¶

We have a most sacred duty to discharge to the children who have been given to us by our Father in heaven. They are an heritage from the Lord, and we have been given the privilege of being their fathers in the flesh. The scriptures say that we correct them and they give us reverence. I wonder if all the Latter-day Saints correct their children and their children give them reverence, so that they are growing up to be worthy sons and worthy daughters of our Father in heaven, able to stand before the world pure and clean and nobly represent His cause. Upon that principle alone we ought to be, and will be, if we can remain true to our covenants, the salt of the earth ; for there are no people living upon the earth today who have made more sacred covenants concerning their virtuous actions than have the Latter-day Saints, and none ought to be more clean and pure. I am very proud of the young men who have been sent to the Northern States Mission. They may have neglected their opportunities for education ; they may not have reverenced the name of Deity, as they should ; they may have neglected to give honor to their parents, but they have listened to the promptings of the Spirit and given sufficient heed to parents that they are clean and pure before God concerning their morality. And when the Spirit of God fires the souls of such men it is life giving to the people who listen to them, and the heads of thousands are bowed because of the virtue of the young men and women of Zion. ¶

We sing and pray, and thank God every day of our lives for a prophet to guide us ; we thank Him for the Gospel to enlighten our minds, and I think, my brethren and sisters, that we ought to take seriously the warning concerning our children, and concerning our own lives. We ought never to forget with what a pleading voice our President declared that be would sooner bury his children or die himself, and be taken to the cemetery than to have them lose their virtue or lose their testimony, and wander away from the truth that God has given him and enabled him thus far to teach his children. ¶

How many of you, my brothers and sisters, have sought in kindness and in love to so teach your children, and gather them around you so closely that they will not be tempted to go astray. To so teach them that they will love their homes and love their surroundings, and honor their parents in their lives when they go out from the parental roof? It is, indeed, an inspiration to me to see the sons and daughters of President Smith greet him with a kiss as they meet each day and receive in turn his fatherly greeting. How many of us, as parents, have so taught our children or have kept so close to them that the first time they meet us each day they feel like coming up and putting their arms around us and giving us a child's kiss, and we in turn kissing them? I wonder how many of us are so near to our sons that we can sit down by their side as they are budding into manhood and put our arms around them, and warn them against the vices of the world, and teach them, if they have not been taught, to lose every limb of their body, before they lose their virtue. Teach them that it will bring the deepest sorrow ; teach them that it will bring a sting to them forever to lose the greatest gift that God has given us. During the past year, strong, hearty, big business men, have shed tears in confessing to me that they have not formed in early manhood the standard of morality that they understand the Latter-day Saints to have, and they were sorry to say that they deceived their wives. I say to mothers and fathers in Israel, that Joseph F. Smith meant purity and morality and clean living as strongly as anything else in the world ; for if we can keep our children pure and clean, they will not go far away from the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as restored to us through the Prophet Joseph. ¶

Should our Elders in the field sin they would never have the heart to face the world, and call them to repentance, because Satan will whisper, "Why are you out here? You ought to go home. You have done wrong. You have violated the sacred covenants that you made. You have no right to call the world to repentance," etc. And so, my brothers and sisters, on this score alone we ought to gather our sons and daughters around us and teach them the great strength of being clean and uncontaminated from the wicked ways of the world. ¶

We, as a rule, guard our daughters, and we are able to rear them so that they are clean and pure before God ; but I am afraid we are not as careful with our sons. If they associate with evil companions, perhaps a few years older than themselves ; they hear things that are wrong; they receive a wrong conception of the most important things of life, and ere we are aware they may have done many things they are sorry for. Had their fathers begun teaching these vital truths to their boys of fourteen and fifteen, had they put their arms around them and made companions of them, they could send them out in the world, and in to life so strong they would come back, no matter how long the time, as clean as when they left their mother's arms. ¶

I rejoice in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I rejoice in the testimony I have that God lives, and that Jesus Christ is His son and the Savior of the world. I rejoice that the Latter-day Saints believe in God and in His Son, Jesus Christ, and believe that He actually lived, and lives today, and is able to counsel them, and render unto the world His Father's mind and will concerning the walks and conversations of men and women in the earth. It gives me pleasure, beyond my power to express, to have the privilege of laboring with men and women who night and morning kneel down and in humility pray for me as well as for those who are at home, men and women who earnestly desire to be guided and directed to teach and say and do the things ihat will build up the kingdom of God and magnify His name, in the earth. ¶

We, as Latter-day Saints, pray for Joseph F. Smith every day of our lives, and in our hearts we sustain him and uphold him, as our leader and as the man to whom our Father gives ability to proclaim the things we need. He has given us this day instructions concerning our children ; and I say it behooves us to go home and find some way to reach our sons and daughters who may be careless, and estranged from us ; if there are any such. I venture the assertion that there are fathers in Israel who have never had their arms around their sons for many days and years, and in consequence there is a barrier between them. We should have the power to break that barrier down that keeps us from loving and counseling and helping our own flesh as we should. We sustain Joseph F. Smith, and we ought to heed his counsel and example and take the first opportunity to bring about conditions that there may be love between father and son such as should exist. ¶

We ought to sustain each other with our faith and prayers ; and by our daily actions we ought to sustain each other in business. We ought to look after each other's interests, that we shall not be crowded out of our place. We ought first to remember our brother, that he in return may remember us, and by so doing grow strong together. We are told to love our enemies, and I believe the Latter-day Saints, of all the people of the world, have loved their enemies, have builded them up when they have come in among us in such a way that they are stronger and more prosperous than ourselves. ¶

We have something like two hundred students in Chicago, studying medicine, dentistry, mining, law, architecture, and other things. When they come back here, if they were known as John or Bill or Dick, they still are frequently dubbed John or Bill or Dick. They may have taken first honors in their college work; they may have stood head and shoulders above some other men, still it makes no difference. But when some common boy from some other state comes here to locate among us, it is "Dr." So and So, it is "Prof." So and So; it is this and that and the other with never a thought of who they used to be or what their present attitude toward our welfare is. I say, my brothers and sisters, we should give our boys a fair chance, we ought at least to give them an equal opportunity with those we know nothing of. If I were to be operated upon, I should like to have the knife in the hand of a man who knows that my spirit came from God, who has a prayer in his heart that I may recover, and who will do everything in his power, and do it in a better way because my life is more sacred to him than to those who know not what life is, neither know God or keep His commandments. ¶

I know some of the men who came here from other towns and states, I know their lives, and I tell you that it will pay you to stand by Bill and John and Dick when they come home. When these professional men to whom I refer go into other places they seek membership and fellowship with the churches in order to get their patronage but here they join our enemies ; they take sides with those who seek to destroy our faith and sacred honor, yet we love and support and build up these very men. I would like our own to have a little more chance after being away for years. We need to love our enemies, but not so much that we turn our own out of house and home and out of the country that our parents and grand-parents have made. I love the students that labor with us as missionaries, students who stand well with their professors and college students worthy of your patronage. Some of the presidents of graduating classes in different colleges have been nothing more than returned Mormon Elders, men who have filled 'missions, and gone back to school, and because of their leadership, are honored by their fellowmen ; but when they come home, in some instances they find they have not a bit more or not an even chance with those who believe that when we die we are gone forever. ¶

We ought and do pray for the President of the Church; we pray for the Twelve, and we sustain them, and we ought also to pray for every individual member of the Church, and we ought to sustain them too, that they may receive an inheritance in Zion, that through their lives and works and successes, this kingdom may be built up. When we need men in any line, we ought to call men who have the Spirit of God in their bosom, and who would do everything to save our lives or property, or that which is entrusted into their care, and in turn use their substance to the building up of this great cause instead of spending it in trying to undo what God has set us to do. ¶

I rejoice in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I rejoice in the achievements of the past, and I hope most earnestly that we shall sustain each other so well that we in the future, as young men and young women, will build well upon the foundations that have been laid by our noble sires. We will never be able to do it if we so love our enemies that we give them preference in our business life and associations and companionship over those who bow the knee with us. ¶

Some colleges of the east so recognize our people that numbers of our students who have come there to enter college have received entrance credit for work done as missionaries. They regard the training of young men who have done missionary work as qualifying them mentally to go on with college work more than had they been doing labor in other lines. ¶

The Lord bless us, and help us to "listen to a prophet's voice, and hear the words of God," and in the way of truth abide, that we may sing for joy aloud. God bless the mothers and fathers of the missionaries and answer your prayers upon their heads, and in turn answer their prayers upon your heads, that Zion may grow and prosper until the honest in the earth shall sing praises unto the Master, until all shall know that our Redeemer lives, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. ¶

The congregation sang the hymn, "We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet." ¶

Benediction was pronounced by Elder Heber C. Jex. ¶