Teaching of Jesus to His Apostles

My brethren, as I look over this congregation, and as I have been sitting here this afternoon, impressed, as I know we all have been, in listening to those strains of sweet music, I have wondered just how the gospel of Jesus Christ will finally take root in the hearts of the children of men and how peace will finally come. ¶

Teaching of Jesus to His Apostles

I would like to read a few verses from the words of the Savior, which are found in the 14th chapter of John. Some of his apostles had asked him a number of questions; they were troubled; they no doubt had many things in their day to trouble their thinking. They did not quite understand his divine ministry and how the kingdom of God would come, and so a number of questions were asked. So we find Jesus saying to them: ¶

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. ¶

Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? ¶

Then Jesus answered and said unto him: ¶

... I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. ¶

Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. ¶

Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. ¶

Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works' sake. ¶

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father. ¶

And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. ¶

If we shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. ¶

If ye love me, keep my commandments, ¶

And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; ¶

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. ¶

I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. ¶

Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. ¶

At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. ¶

He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me, and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him. (John 14:1-21.) ¶

It is ^ great promise, my brethren. It does offer the way and the means by which we may live in harmony with those injunctions that we have received here in this conference. ¶

The Responsibility of Mission Presidents

I recently had the privilege of visiting the North Central States Mission. I would like to say just a word or two regarding those who preside over these missions. I never realized before what a tremendous responsibility it is. The men who are called to preside in these missions must take the young boys and girls who come to them and help them make their adjustments. They are called from all over the Church, they are not trained in the same homes, nor by the same home standards; they are not alike in their education, nor in their gospel training. Their temperaments and dispositions are different, and yet these mission presidents, with their wives who stand by their sides, take these young girls and boys and help them to adjust; and the marvel, my brethren, is that they do adjust, and very quickly do they get the spirit of their mission, and do a marvelous work. This is not a trite expression. It is a reality. ¶

They make friends, and are invited into their homes; they bear their testimonies, and people are responding to those testimonies, and are impressed with the majesty and the bigness of their message. Little by little this work in which you and I are engaged is growing and gradually spreading. As we think about it in terms of our present day conditions, we wonder sometimes how the little stone that was cut out of the mountain without hands will eventually fill the earth; but if we will just look back, it is not very long when we had in sections, for example like California, New York, Denver, Chicago, just missions, just small branches; today we have large stakes of Zion in all of these places. ¶

Visit to a Small Branch

Throughout the mission fields the branches are growing. I realize with you that there is a slowing up now because of war conditions, because of lack of missionary help, but even with that lack there is a growth that is heartening, and it gives to you and me assurances that the gospel of Jesus Christ, this message of Jesus -- the good tidings, is taking root in the hearts of the children of men, and they are translating these principles of truth into their lives and living them. ¶

We had the good fortune to visit a little branch a way up on the south shores of the Lake of the Woods -- just a few Scandinavian Saints. They had not had the elders there for a long time. They are carrying on by themselves, they have built their own chapel, and when we entered that little chapel, President and Sister Killpack, and Sister Young and myself, we found a neat, clean chapel. We found a branch of faithful Latter-day Saints, a way off from everybody. The nearest doctor, we were told is twenty-five miles away, and yet they were carrying on in the ministry of the Church, and were living the gospel of Jesus Christ. ¶

The chapel itself is a credit to the Church, made of rustic lumber, the benches are crude, with pine floor, but just as clean and neat as it could be. Around the chapel were little flower boxes made of rustic pine, decorating that lovely place. I thought to myself: "What a fine example of beautification." ¶

Here is the Church in action, away out in these little outlying places. One of the brethren in his prayer the other day, thanked the Lord that we were here in the tops of the mountains. We are grateful for that, but this Church is no longer a Church of the tops of the mountains. It is a Church of the plains, it is a Church of the islands of the sea, it is a Church for the world, and everywhere we go where the message of Jesus has been taught, we see the reflection of these truths, and men and women are living them, and are reflecting them in their lives, and that is what we found in the mission field. ¶

Testimony of a Convert

In one of the meetings of the missionaries, with the local missionaries, one of the sisters who has been a member of the Church for only about two years, and who has now been called as one of ¶

the local missionaries, bore her testimony. Her husband is not a member of the Church. She comes from a family of refinement, her associates are people of education, and she herself impresses one as being a woman of culture and of great faith. In bearing her testimony she related this experience. She said: "My associates, many of my friends do not subscribe to the things that I am trying to live. We are frequently invited out in company where smoking is indulged in, and where cocktails are served. There is no moral issue with my friends regarding these things, and it does provoke a challenge with me, my husband not being a member of the Church. The other evening we were at a dinner party and cocktails were served. I pushed mine to the side, and my friend sitting next to me said: 'Aren't you going to drink your cocktail?' I told her no, and she said: 'What's the matter with you?' I said: Nothing's the matter with me, I am living a great principle, and I would not let a little cocktail rob me of the strength and power of living that principle." ¶

That is all that was said regarding that. I thought to myself: "Thank God for the gospel of Jesus Christ that is translating itself into the lives of people who will but put themselves in a position to permit it." ¶

The Faith of a Soldier

Another instance. In one of our meetings in Minneapolis there came into our meeting an officer of the air force and his wife. I did not recognize them until at the close of the meeting they came up and, lo and behold, it was a boy from my own stake. In the evening at St. Paul, where we held another meeting he was called upon to speak, and bore a fervent testimony. The humility of it was impressive. But here is the lovely thing about it, my brethren: That boy had been over in Europe, in combat service, I don't know how many missions he had had over Germany, but on his last mission he was severely wounded, and his copilot had to take over. His plane was damaged, but fortunately they were able to get back to England. The boy was hospitalized, and finally sent over to this country, where he convalesced in the Bushnell Hospital. His leg is still stiff, and he will never again be able to go back into combat service. He is now teaching, training. After his return, while he was in Bushnell, he came down home one night to visit his worthy father, Bishop James W. Vance of Alpine, one of the stalwarts of my stake. We invited him into our home. I had recommended that boy for the mission field, and so I said to him, "Paul, tell me, how did you adjust yourself? You had been out preaching the gospel of peace, and on your return you were inducted into the. service; you went over Germany, perhaps over the very land where you had labored. How did you make the adjustment?" ¶

He said: "Brother Young, I learned one thing. As I flew over Germany I felt in my heart that I was shooting down bombers and not people, that I was bombing installations, and not people. I kept that uppermost in my mind, and I believe the Lord has helped me to preserve that attitude in my military service. ¶

He bore testimony of that in our meeting, thanking the Lord for the faith that had stood him in hand. ¶

The gospel, my brethren, does translate itself into the lives of bur people if we will permit it. It is for us. These injunctions that we have had given us in this conference, they mean for us strength and power, and they mean for us the power and ability to make our lives real, harmonizing with the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and only in living it may we be able to do that. ¶

A Missionary Incident

I bear you my testimony, my brethren. I am grateful for the testimony that I have of this work. I cannot with you go out and prove its divinity -- no man can do that -- we may offer every inducement and do everything in our power to make people feel that our message is scriptural, but when it comes to the last analysis of the thing, it is the testimony that is in the human heart that bears witness of the divinity of this work. ¶

While laboring as a missionary in England, over thirty-eight years ago, one of our investigators, a whole family of them, in fact, the mother being the leader, said, "Brother Young, we have found that your doctrine is scriptural, we believe in that, but if you can convince us that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, that he saw God and that Jesus Christ talked with him, we will be baptized." ¶

"Sister McManus," we said to her,' "we cannot do that or prove that to you, but if you would know the will of the Father, if you would know of the truthfulness of our message, you, yourself must do the will of the Father, and you shall know. 'He that will doeth the will of the Father shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself.' ". - ¶

We bore that testimony to her, and she made it a matter of prayer, and later she and her family were baptized. That is the way it works, my brethren. It is through faith in God, it is through testimony that this work will be carried forward, and it is the living of the gospel, and the testimony that will finally bring peace into the human heart, and make possible the establishment of the kingdom of God in the earth. May it speedily come, I humbly pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. ¶