Fellowship, Sacrifice, and Riches Laid Up in Heaven

My brethren and sisters, I feel in my heart that we should be a very grateful people. One of the great poets said that the crime of ingratitude was among the basest of crimes, and I believe it. I am grateful unto God for the prophets and apostles that He has established in this Church. I am thankful unto Him that one of the apostles presides in this meeting. They are given us by the Lord "for the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come in the unity of the faith." ¶

The Apostle John said, that "if we walk in the light, as he [God] is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." What joy, what pleasure is there outside the pale of the fellowship of our brethren and sisters ? To have fellowship one with another, to have a membership in the Church of the first born, is worth more than all the joys of the world, or the gold and the silver that are hidden in the depths of the earth. If a brother dislike a brother, if he has a feeling in his heart against one of his brethren, that feeling engenders prejudice in him against other brethren. It colors his opinions, and it is apt to warp his judgment with respect to all mankind. It is necessary that we walk in the light in order that we may have fellowship one with another, and we will not then depart from the path of virtue and rectitude, and make shipwreck of our faith. ¶

The Apostle Paul said : "For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye, through his poverty, might become rich." What have we gained by reason of the earthly poverty and sufferings endured by the Lord Jesus Christ? We have gained eternal life, or the means of obtaining eternal life, and God has said : "Behold, he that hath eternal life is rich." We can see this same principle exemplified in the lives of the Latter-day Saints who are sending their sons and daughters into the world to preach the Gospel. Many a mother in Israel, because of the strain upon her financial resources in keeping her son in the mission field, is wearing a last year's hat, dress and coat. As a servant of the Lord, I say unto you, that the sacrifice you are making is sacred unto the Lord. By your faith and self-denial you are placing within the reach of men and women the means of securing the riches of eternity. ¶

We are walking in the path of humility, and God is making us a power for good in the world. After all, brethren and sisters, there is more strength in the humility that comes from trusting in the Lord Jesus than in the strength of worldly power. "When I am weak," said Paul, "then am I strong." So long as the Latter-day Saints put their trust in God; so long as they walk in the light, they will be clothed with a power that is invincible. They are guided and led by men who ¶

are blessed with inspiration and revelation from God : they have been led out of the darkness of the world into the sunshine of political and religious liberty. If we continue to pray to the Father and work hard to have our prayers fulfilled or answered, God will give us a goodly portion of His Holy Spirit. No man or woman need ever be afraid that the Almighty will suffer His chosen people to be led astray by any man or set of men. I care not for the theories men may frame as to our existence, or the beginning of our existence. I know that God has said, through His Holy Spirit, that we are His sons and daughters, and that is comforting to my soul. We stand upon a sure foundation, for our faith rests not in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. ¶

It is true that many of our young men who go into the world to preach the Gospel, are not learned, that is, so far as worldly wisdom is concerned ; but I believe, my brethren and sisters, that you and I, in a measure, at least, are responsible for this. God, in His wisdom, has caused Church schools to be established. He has placed at the head of these great institutions men of God, men of wisdom, men of character like President Brimhall, whose whole souls are in the work of the Lord. They yearn for the redemption and the advancement of our young men and young women. Are we giving them earnest support ? Are we giving them, not only the support of our faith and prayers, but are we sending our children to these schools, in order that they may become qualified to go forth as ministers of the Lord Jesus Christ? I have noticed in the mission field that young men who have attended these Church schools, are ready and qualified to enter upon their missionary labors at once. They are learned, to a certain extent at least, in proportion to the time that they have been under the instruction of teachers in these institutions, in the principles of the Gospel. But, more than all that, they come to the mission field with the Spirit of God in their hearts. They have the spirit of the work, which, after all, is of infinitely more value than the letter of the law, for "the Spirit giveth life." And when these boys, if you please to call them boys, stand before congregations, they speak, not in the wisdom of men, but by the power of the Holy Ghost. The Book of Mormon declares that when a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost his words are carried unto the hearts of the children of men. In many of the pulpits throughout Christendom today men are preaching more to win the praise of men than the approval of God, and their words, therefore, are as "sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal." But the servants of God, blessed with the Holy Ghost, the power that comes from above, and which enlightens the understanding of the people, preach under that influence, and their words go direct to the hearts of their hearers. ¶

A long time ago there were certain men, alchemists, they were called, who sought to transmute the baser metals into gold, but they failed. By right use, we may convert our gold and silver into "treasures in heaven." Croesus, the rich king of antiquity, when he was dying, said: "What I have kept I have lost; what I gave away I have." His worldly possessions were slipping from his grasp but the money he had given for good ¶

and holy purposes was treasure laid up in heaven awaiting him "where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal." We shall not be blessed for the amount of money, nor for the number of acres we have left behind us, but we shall be blessed and rewarded for that which we have given for the upbuilding of God's kingdom, and the advancement of righteousness in the earth. Is tithing a sacrifice? No, not in one sense of the word. It is the best investment we can make, for it is a treasure laid up in heaven. The tithing that we pay will make us rich, but the means that we leave behind us will not be to our advantage when we go to the spirit world to be judged according to the deeds done in the body. ¶

Let us bring up our children in the fear of the Lord. Let us educate them properly; send them to institutions where they are taught the word of God, where the heart, as well as the intellect is educated. God sets great store on the heart. Solomon said : "Keep thine heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life." ¶

I am reminded of a story told by the late Count Tolstoi, which I think will illustrate the point I wish to impress upon your minds, viz : that there is something else that should be sought besides worldly wealth; and that, after all, the pursuit of, and the acquisition of earthly riches do not bring lasting pleasure and joy. The Count relates the story of a man who was land hungry. You know lots of men, don't you, that are land hungry, they want to go into a strange country and get much land. This man was one of that class, his present possessions were insufficient for his desires. So he journeyed to a faroff country, where there was a large tract of land to be secured for a low figure. He came to a vast domain, and the owner of it said to him : "Leave your money here, and all the land you can encompass between now and sunset shall be yours, but if you fail to get back to this point by sunset, you lose your money and the land, too." This was at sunrise, the man laid down his money and started out on a line due east. He walked at first, but the greediness of his soul quickened his pace into a run. He went in this direction as far as he dared to, for the sun was mounting high in the heavens. Then he ran in a northerly direction until the sun was in the meridian. Weak, and well nigh exhausted he laboriously and painfully ran toward the west, and the sun was rapidly nearing the western hills. Mustering all of his remaining strength for the final effort, bordering on the verge of absolute exhaustion, he managed by painful exertion and agony of mind and body to reach the starting point just as the sun sank out of sight. He had won the land, but in doing so, sacrificed his life, for he fell down, beside his money, dead. His servant dug a hole to bury his body, and the man was soon forgotten. Do we not find similar cases among people we know? They exhaust their lives, spiritually and physically, to amass wealth. They disregard the welfare of their children. Their sole object in life is gathering money. They neglect their Church duties. They feel that they cannot afford to pay their tithing; and when life's race is ended, when they are nearing the end of their earthly existence, behold, they are so exhausted that they pass away ¶

and miss their reward in the eternal mansions of our Father. ¶

God grant, my brethren and sisters, that our souls may ever be attuned to the dictates of the Holy Spirit; that our lives may begin and end in the service of the Lord, in the spirit of sacrifice, that every one of us may always have a humble heart and a contrite spirit. God grant that we may never forget what hath been done for us by the Lord, is my prayer, in the name of Jesus. Amen. ¶