Conference Address

This is the first privilege I have had for many years to attend all the sessions of a general conference. I believe about the last time I was able to attend all the sessions was when I sat on the stairway which used to lead from this stand down to the lower rooms. It has been a long time since that stairway existed. However, I appreciate the privilege of attending this conference and hope the faith and prayers of you people will be in my behalf while I hold this position. ¶

Reason for Progress

I am reminded — and it has already been mentioned today — that this is our centennial year, and we have been looking back over the past and had called to our attention in many ways the growth and development and achievements over the years. Wherever the Church has been, there has been outstanding progress. Surely this Church has been blessed with something above all others. What blessing could it be? What is the motivating power behind the success of this people? What is it that carried the pioneers through all their hardships, their trials and persecutions, privations, their loss of all which the world holds dear? What gave them the courage to follow their leaders across a vast and dangerous wilderness and settle in the most barren place of all? What made them sacrifice the little they had to build temples and this tabernacle in which we worship God? What made the men go out as missionaries and leave their families in dire straits? What made the women willing to send ¶

their men and assume the great burden of bearing, rearing, and supporting their families alone? What is this great power? ¶

The Power of Testimony

There is no blessing on the earth to be more desired than a testimony that God lives, that Jesus Christ is his Son, and that this gospel is the divine plan of life and salvation. With this sure knowledge in our hearts it gives a meaning and a purpose to our lives which guide even our smallest actions and give us courage to endure all things in the hope for the future. This great power and blessing is a true and living testimony which is worth any sacrifice to keep the commandments of God, and God has promised to bless those who do his will. ¶

Brigham Young said: ¶

If all the talent, fact, wisdom, and refinements of the world had been sent to me with the Book of Mormon and had declared in the most exalted earthly eloquence the truth of it, undertaking to prove it by learning and worldly wisdom, they would have been to me Lke the smoke that rises only to vanish away. But when I saw a man without eloquence, or talents for public speaking who could only say, "I know by the power of the Holy Ghost, that the Book of Mormon is true, that Joseph Smith is a Prophet of the Lord," the Holy Ghost proceeding from that individual illuminated my understanding, and light, glory and immortality were before me. I was encircled by them, filled with them, and I knew for myself that the testimony was true. (Golden Nuggets of Thought, Ezra Marler, p. 35.) ¶

That is the kind of testimony that members of this Church have. That is the kind of testimony that gives us the power and the courage to go forward and accomplish the things which have been done in the past and which helps us today, a gift from God through the Holy Ghost, a burning knowledge within. I thank God for those testimonies which have brought us many blessings and privileges. I thank God for the testimonies of the great souls, living and dead, who have succeeded these early members. All down through Church history we have the lives and the examples of our leaders to inspire us to greater effort. ¶

And so it is today. A nobler group of men cannot be found on earth because they have the priesthood of God and a testimony to guide them. Nor is this blessing confined to the leaders of the Church. I am constantly inspired by the beautiful spirit, the fervent testimony, the great desire to accomplish God's will in those whom I meet from day to day. They truly have a testimony as great as the pioneers. ¶

I feel very humble and very grateful when I think of all the splendid people working for God throughout this Church. We cannot help but progress if we keep these testimonies, and I thank all you good people for your faith and prayers in my behalf, and I pray that I may always be remembered in your prayers, for I cannot do the ¶

work assigned to me without the blessings of the Lord and your faith and prayers in my behalf. ¶

I thank God for the testimony which burns within my soul, that I know this is the true gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, that Joseph Smith was a true Prophet of God, and the others who have succeeded him to our present prophet and President, George Albert Smith, are called of God. I bear you this testimony and by virtue of my office and calling pronounce the blessings of God upon you, his people, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. ¶