The Northwestern States Mission

Since our last Conference it has been my happy pleasure to go on the streets of Portland one evening and witness a street meeting ¶

being held by the missionaries there. Sister Ada Strong of Salt Lake City was speaking and gave a most excellent discourse on the divine mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith. A well-dressed gentleman walked into the crowd and stood right near my side. He said in an undertone voice, loud enough that I could hear what he was saying : "There they are, telling the same old story, and there is nothing to it." ¶

I wish that gentleman were here today. I wish that he could witness this vast gathering of men and women, the cream of the earth, and I wonder if he could then make such a statement. I wish that he might hear this wonderful choir that we have listened to today with so much pleasure and interest, I wish he could hear this world-famed organ of ours ; and I wonder if he then could say there is nothing to this work. ¶

Is it possible, brethren and sisters and friends, that a young man such as Joseph Smith was, with five colleagues, one hundred years ago — these boys as they were, all under thirty-one years of age, six of them together in a room — could effect and establish an organization out of which has grown a Church that today stands the marvel of the world? It is ridiculous to think that, brethren and sisters, in the light that this man thought of it. So I want to give you that thought today. ¶

I am happy to contemplate the words of men like the grand old man known as the Dean of American Education, Dr. Winship, who said that Utah stands positively in the forefront of all the States of the Union in her activities for the saving of the youth. He said that he had praised Utah and the Mormons in every State of the Union, and had never had anything to apologize for. ¶

Dr. Nixon Carver said : ¶

"I have never found more sound and wholesome personal habits than among the Mormons ; I have never mingled with a people who showed fewer signs of dissipation; I have never studied groups of people who seemed better nourished and more healthful ; I have never known of a people who took greater pains to educate their children." "This gives a clue to the success of the Mormons as colonizers and Nation Builders." "I have studied the philosophy of the world, both ancient and modern, but the greatest of all philosophies is the philosophy of Mormonism." ¶

George Wharton James, an American writer, said: ¶

"The boy Joseph Smith was but a hundred years ahead of his time. Yet, he being dead yet speaketh. The work he began has never ceased. Who can explain Joseph Smith? What is their test? Is it not beyond all reason that a lad, born of poor parents, devoid of any save the commonest education, too poor to buy books, should have accomplished what he did in less than forty years, unless there was some great reason for it?" ¶

"Let anyone, even a literary genius after forty years of life, try to write a companion volume to the Book of Mormon and then almost daily for a number of years give out 'revelations' by the score that internally harmonize one with another, at the same time formulate a system of doctrine for a new church, introduce many new principles, resuscitate extinct priesthoods, and formulate a system of church government which has no superior on earth." ¶

"To deny to such a man wonderful power over the human heart and intellect is absurd. Only fanatical prejudice can ignore it. However he may be accounted ¶

for by the reasoning mind, Joseph Smith the Mormon Prophet was one of the wonders of his time." ¶

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the great novelist and spiritualist, said he believed that Joseph Smith was a true medium. ¶

Many of the notables whom I could mention are just as loud in their praise and have a true appreciation of this wonderful Church and its organization. ¶

I remember a year ago listening to the words of President Nibley when he said among other things, "Brethren, make sacrifices for missions." I would like to tell you just one instance that has come to pass in my own observation. ¶

Two boys from a nearby Stake, brothers they were, both received calls to go on missions. Their father was in poor circumstances and had a heavy mortgage on his property. He was unable to even pay the interest that had accumulated for a number of years. These boys willingly accepted the call and came to Salt Lake City. One of them was called to the Southern States and the other to the Northwestern States. After they had attended the mission school for two weeks the older boy said : "Brother, we have only twenty dollars between us, not enough to take us both to our fields of labor. You take this money and go to the Northwest, and I shall go back home and help father on the farm." ¶

The younger brother said : "No, brother, you are the older, you go." But the older remonstrated, and said, "No, you shall go." And finally the younger boy took the twenty dollars and came to the Northwest. The first thing he knew his brother had not gone home, but had gone to the Southern States. And these two boys are in the field today. Last year that good father not only was blessed by having two sons in the mission field, but his finances were such that he paid all of the back interest on the mortgage, and he was able to make a substantial payment on the principal of the mortgage on the property. ¶

God bless you. The missionaries in the Northwest, I think, are as happy as young men and young women could be. I want to say that the Lord has greatly favored me and blessed me in my association with the leaders of this Church, and I love, respect and admire them. And I am blessed in the wonderful companionship that I have with one of the sweetest companions in all the world. She too is enjoying her work in the mission. I pray God's blessings to be with you and with us, that we shall continue onward and upward with this work unto the perfect day, which I pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen. ¶