Promises to Be Fulfilled in Our Day

I desire to read a portion of the 86th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the same being a communication from the Lord Jesus Christ to the Prophet Joseph Smith, — and the address is made to all the Saints and elders of the Church. ¶

Promises to Be Fulfilled in Our Day

The Lord admonishes the Latter-day Saints to have faith and confidence in the former promises made by the prophets of old, and gives us an assurance that we are living in a day when these great and precious promises are to be fulfilled; and the language which I now quote is as follows: ¶

"Therefore, thus saith the Lord unto you, with whom the priesthood hath continued through the lineage of your fathers — ¶

"For ye are lawful heirs, according to the flesh, and have been hid from the world with Christ in God — ¶

"Therefore your life and the Priesthood have remained, and must needs remain through you and your lineage until the restoration of all things spoken by the mouths of all the holy prophets since the world began. ¶

"Therefore, blessed are ye if ye continue in my goodness, a light unto the Gentiles, and through this Priesthood, a savior unto my people Israel. The Lord hath said it." ¶

How great and wonderful is this promise, that through this ¶

Church and this Priesthood shall be restored ultimately all that has been predicted and prophesied of concerning the great things God would do for men; and that these things are to be fulfilled and realized in our time. The Latter-day Saints are a people with a mission and a destiny, and we have not forgotten, I am sure, by the presence of this vast assembly, that we are still pursuing our destiny. We did not aspire to it, the Lord appointed it unto us, and the fulfilment of these promises surely can be and shall be realized in the Lord's own due time, and through his providing. ¶

The People, Place and Plan in the Accomplishment of These Promises

Three things seem to me to be essential in the accomplishment of these wonderful promises: The Lord must have the right kind of people to do his work; he must have them in the right place, and they must have the right plan. I said the Latter-day Saints are a people with a mission, they are entitled to that mission. ¶

The Descendants of Joseph the Right People of Promise

I was thrilled not long ago when I read an article appearing in one of our national magazines. The author was discussing the question: "Are the Jews the Chosen People of God?" He denied them the right to claim for themselves and their posterity all the blessings pronounced upon all the sons of Jacob, but limited their blessings to their own particular line— the tribe of Judah. After tracing the history of the Jews and the several tribes of Israel the author concludes: "If we could find in the earth somewhere today the descendants of Joseph, we would find the chosen people of God,"because the blessings of Joseph were so much greater than the blessings of his brethren that you will recall they despised him and were jealous of his blessings, and sold him into Egypt; but the Lord was with him and raised him up and made him mighty to become the deliverer of his father's household. I say, when I read that statement my soul thrilled with a new sensation of gratitude to God that I live to see the day when Joseph's children are being gathered again, and realize that the Latter-day Saints are of Joseph, children of his favored son, Ephraim, gathered "one of a city and two of a family,"a few from the midst of the nations of the earth, whither they have been scattered, and brought to the land of Zion. The Lord has selected and picked them. They were chosen spirits before they were born. He knew them in the spirit world. He held them in reserve to come forth at the right time. ¶

God Has Gathered Them to the Right Place

He has brought them to the right place. Joseph's blessings were to obtain above the blessings of his progenitors, even to the utmost bounds of the everlasting hills. It is no chance circumstance that we are here. Notwithstanding all the drivings, the sorrows and distresses, ¶

at Nauvoo and Missouri, the difficulties in gathering the Saints from the Old World — these were but God's providences in gathering his people to the right place. ¶

I was deeply impressed with the statement made not long since by a man who has been gathering statistics of an eminent character, wherein he calls attention to the fact that while the United States is but seven percent of the world's land, and has but six percent of the world's population, nearly one-half of the world's natural wealth is in the United States of America. This surely is a choice land above all other lands. And then, as I thought of our habitations in these mountains, I feel a confidence in the statement that taking a survey two hundred miles from this city in either direction, and circumscribing a district within that radius, there may be found more natural wealth than in any other like territory in any other portion of this choice land. We are not only in the right nation, we are in the right part of that nation. ¶

I used to think about it while laboring as a missionary in the Northwest, for there was some thought, evidently, in the mind of the Prophet at one time that he might go to the northwest country, for he offered the services of the Latter-day Saint men to man the military posts along the old Oregon Trail. Tie said, "we can render this service cheaper than any one else since we expect to be in that country when we have concluded our service for the government." But the measure was defeated. You remember the discussion brought out the statement of Daniel Webster to this effect: "What do we want with this vast wilderness of shifting sands and cactus, prairie dogs, etc." He said he would not vote one dollar from the public treasury to bring the Pacific Coast one mile nearer Boston than it was at that time. And another senator said in the same discussion that he would not give a pinch of snuff for all the Rocky mountain country. And yet it was through the inspiration of the Almighty that the Prophet Joseph Smith, almost at that time, said that the Saints would continue to suffer and be driven to these mountains, and many should live to see them become a mighty people. God's providence has been over the gathering of the Latter-day Saints to this place. This is yet the place . for the Latter-day Saints. ¶

How to Secure Permanency in the Right Place

A very significant thing is that as you read the history of the past, the peoples who have survived have been the owners of the soil and the tillers of the land, and the keepers of flocks. By natural inclination it is the occupation of the majority of the Latter-day Saints; indeed, it was the natural occupation of the majority of the children of Israel in ancient times, to be the tillers of the soil and the keepers of flocks. While you Latter-day Saint brethren on the farms have had a trying time, be ye patient and do not desert the very foundation of our independence in this country — the farm. Better days for you will ¶

come if you can weather the storm, and you will preserve not only for yourselves but for the Church a permanency that is essential in working out this great problem. We are in the right place, and yet while this vast wealth may be here it is not easily accessible and can only be had with much labor, much patience and persistence. I doubt if there is another section in all the world that would call forth more physical strength, greater faith, patience and endurance, with a longrange vision of waiting and laboring to reach the destiny, than in these Rocky mountains. Lofty mountains, an inspiration! Clear streams of water, health-giving! Pure air, every setting is here to develop the finest physical race that has ever graced this footstool of God. The Lord brought the Latter-day Saints to the right place, and we are engaged in the right business to make us the kind of people the Lord wants us to be. ¶

The Right Plan Revealed to Gathered Joseph

And then we have the plan revealed, as you heard this morning from our President, by the visitation of no less a personage than the Lord Jesus Christ himself. It is his plan, and it contemplates a solution of every problem that now vexes this distressed world. The Lord saw the needs of this hour, 1924, more than a hundred years ago, and he provided for it a plan, and those who follow it shall survive, and those who do not accept the plan shall be shaken; for this is a time when all that can be shaken will be shaken, and that shall stand which God has planned. I said that the plan contemplates a solution of all the problems that now vex us, and I am thinking of political problems. I thought of it this morning as one of the brethren was speaking. I shall not be surprised if this shall be the last national campaign that we shall conduct in this country with the two great parties that have so long obtained here, arrayed one against the other. I tell you that the day is coming that the Prophet Joseph Smith predicted, when the Constitution shall be in peril, when it shall be necessary for the men of all parties who stand for the Constitution and law and order, to stand together, or this thing that we hold so sacred and dear, that our fathers established, cannot be preserved. Now the Latter-day Saints, by reason of the fact that they have been taught that God established the Constitution of the United States, adhere to it as earnestly and devotedly as to any other of our principles of faith and belief. By reason of the training we have received we are on the side of the Constitution,, on the side of law, on the side of order. In the training and discipline that has come to us in the keeping of the Word of Wisdom, in the payment of our tithes and offerings, God was but preparing us to meet the emergencies of this hour. It is his plan, and we shall succeed if we adhere to it being led successfully through all the difficulties; and directed safely to that goal and haven, our natural heritage, the realization of all these sacred promises that have been made by all the prophets since the world began. ¶

However, We Must Adhere to Our Standards

I tell you Latter-day Saints, however, that we need to adhere to our standards as never before in the history of this Church, because sin is rampant. Self-indulgence is the key word of the hour in the world, and I confess that I tremble and fear when I see the things that men boast of as the evidence of our high civilization, being really the very things that brought the ruin and the destruction of empires that have long since perished. I say it is a time when we need to adhere to our standards, to protect ourselves against the waves of sin and immorality that shall come in from the world. And yet I have no fear, if we shall be true to his plan for in it is our redemption and our salvation. ¶

We Have an Inspired Interpreter for the Plan

I am grateful that we not only have the plan, but we have an inspired consulting engineer, an inspired man who can and does receive from time to time, the word of the Lord for this people in interpreting that plan, so that we never come to difficulties in understanding the plan. If we are in doubt, we know where to go, and we do receive the continual inspiration of the Lord for the government and guidance of his people. Behold, the plan is unfolding under the guidance of God's inspired servants. And each hour shall find God's provision adequate for that hour's need, if this people shall only -listen to the voice of the servants of the Lord, whom he has appointed to lead and guide and interpret his plan and purpose. Through obedience I am as sure as that I live that we shall see realized and fulfilled all of these wonderful things that the Lord has promised shall come. Though exiled, as many have been, driven from their homes, and much like Joseph, if not sold into Egypt, banished into the wilderness where it was thought they might perish, yet that which happened to Joseph shall yet happen to his Saints in latter days. Into the place God has led us, under the training he has given us, under the plan he has provided, he is preparing this people to become the saviors of the whole house of Israel, not to feed them physical bread, but the bread of life, that will be more essential and necessary for the world's salvation and preservation than any other kind of bread. These things I am as sure as that I live shall come. ¶

Let Us Keep the Great Vision Before Us

I pray God to bless us, that we shall keep the vision of it before us and be working towards it, and see in the practical things that we have been given in each of these commandments the Lord has revealed for the government and guidance of our own lives. It is after all a bigger thing than merely yielding obedience to the Lord's wishes; for he must have had an object, and that object is to fit and prepare us to meet the emergencies of this hour, to succeed in weathering the ¶

storms, and to come through — the salt of the earth, the light of the world! The power to do it is here — not only the plan, but the power and right to execute it in the bestowal upon men of the holy Priesthood. ¶

God bless the Priesthood and his Church for the comfort and salvation of all flesh. May God speed the day that we shall be prepared to take those steps. The Lord is waiting for this people, and for the world to bring to pass his righteous purposes, and if we shall prepare ourselves, he is ready and willing to lead us to our glorious destiny! May he grant it unto us who now live, if not in our day, in the day of our children, or our children's children — but it shall come; whether to me, whether to you, I cannot say, but it will come to those who are true to the truth! Many may fall away, lose the faith, but those who stand true and faithful shall be victorious, and they shall be the recipients of all these great things. God speed that day I pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. ¶