Present-day Conditions

Sitting in this large audience are a number of men in the service of their country. They wear the uniform of United States soldiers. It is always a fine thing to have them in our midst. On the banks of the Potomac River in Washington at Arlington Cemetery, is the tomb of the Unknown Soldier whose body was brought from France at the close of the First World War. Carved on the tomb is a message of beauty. It reads: "Here lies in honored glory an American soldier known but to God" -- a message that all Americans may do well to keep in mind. ¶

I wish to have the help of my Father in heaven while I speak to you this afternoon. ¶

Present-day Conditions

The Puritan preacher, John Eliot, known as the apostle to the Indians, wrote as a preface to his Bible after having translated it into the Narragansett language: "Work, with faith in Jesus Christ, can accomplish all things." It was a motto peculiarly fitting to his times; it is peculiarly fitting in our own day. It meant as Frederick Harrison has aptly written that to toil in producing things needful for human life is to offer up ourselves to the law of creation which ordained that life on this earth could only be sustained by the sweat of man's brow. The terrible times through which we are passing are destined to leave war within every nation as well as our own. It may prove harder to win peace than to win war. There will be a dearth of food, of clothing, and saddest of all, a lack of Christian fellowship. Are the religious forces influential enough to set an example of self- denial, of self-restraint, of discipline and a renewed faith in the teachings of the Savior of the world, who taught that peace can only come as people love the Lord their God, and their neighbors as themselves? ¶

We have too often failed to give ourselves to the word of the Lord. We have run after wealth, praise, and honor, and thought that Christ may be found by seeking eminence and power. This is not so. Many of us will have to learn that it is not the outward and physical, but by the inward and physical that men become true men. Did not the Master say: "Whosoever will save his life shall lose it.... " He taught that the majesty and sanctity of living is for the invisible: that is to say for honor, truth, fidelity, and the kingdom of righteousness. ¶

There were honored names that took part in the great religious changes that came into the world in the sixteenth century. The daring and forceful methods of John Calvin, Martin Luther, Melanchthon, Zwingli, and John Knox, and many others left their results upon the world. We do not doubt their integrity to what they considered the fundamental doctrines of Jesus Christ, but sin and disaster have been growing to the present day. There are in this country two hundred and fifty different religious creeds with a total membership of some eighty million souls. The burning question of the hour is: Where is the simple and pure religion of Jesus Christ as taught by the Master two thousand years ago? The Bible has suffered at the hands of those whom it sought to help. Men have failed to read its teachings through to the end with an intelligent thoroughness. They have made selections according to their human knowledge "and have missed its spirit and the trend of its instruction, and the glorious uplift of its truths." ¶

Christian Belief of the Future

What will be the characteristics of a religion of Jesus Christ as humanity returns to the old way -- the way of Christ our Savior? The followers will hold to the power of the priesthood of God, to authority, and liberty, to the doctrine of individual salvation, the spirit of truth that binds people into a Christian society. The unity of the Church of the living God will be envisaged by a society, for which Christendom waits. It will be the religion of Jesus Christ, and not a religion about Jesus Christ. Thus we come to the supreme test of religion -- revelation. This was the fundamental teaching of the prophets of the Old Testament. Isaiah in richness of spiritual expression wrote ages ago: ¶

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening up of the prison to them that are bound. To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified. (Isaiah 61:1-3.) ¶

Our Savior came to save. He sought out the lost souls who had wandered far away. Sin was in the world then as it is today. He came to redeem the lost by the principle of repentance and holy baptism by one who has the power of God. If the Christian world has forgotten this, then it has lost its divine power. "All great truths," it has been said, "are simple truths." If the followers of Jesus will begin to teach the ways of the gospel of Christ in that humility which comes of the genuinely pure heart and the high regard for the intellect, then the divinity of the gospel will take new root in the souls of men. It will be Christianity again. ¶

A Message Given Through the Restoration of the Gospel

A new message of the Redeemer is in the world today. It says in part: ¶

We believe in God, the Eternal Father, and in his Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost. ¶

We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam's transgression. ¶

We believe that through the atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel. ¶

We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; second, Repentance; third, Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost. ¶

We believe that a man must be called of God, by prophecy, and by the laying on of hands, by those who are in authority to preach the Gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof. ¶

We believe in the same organization that existed in the primitive Church, viz., apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists, etc. ¶

We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul -- We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things. (The Articles of Faith.) ¶

This message is purifying and refining. It will correct the abuses of human society; the abuses that obstruct the pathway of God's work. It is revelatory, "fulfilling the largest meaning and possibility of revelation." And furthermore, we have a truth: "Whatsoever principles of knowledge we attain unto in this life will rise with us in the resurrection." This provides a scope of unlimited progress, and makes due place for all the human instincts that constitute the spiritual nature of man. It limits man to his highest possibilities. This new message meets the supreme test of religion -- revelation. For in him is the supreme Sonship: "The glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." What we have this day has redeemed you and me far more than we have realized. Our world must go forth with the teaching that God does live, and we freely give that which we have freely received. We will become a power through our idealism and faith. All of this, the Prophet Joseph Smith meant when he declared in words as revealed from God: ¶

Ye must grow in grace and in the knowledge of the truth. (Doc. and Cov. 50:40.) ¶

May we all abide more and more each day by the laws and commandments of God. I ask in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. ¶