Conference Address

My brethren and sisters, it is with humility that I stand before you to occupy a few moments of your valuable time. At this season of the year and in the year such as we now enjoy, we might very well look back upon our immediate past and ask ourselves the question whether or not the counsel and advice that was given from this stand eleven and a half years ago has yet become a cardinal principle of our lives and of our activities. Have we, all of us, in our homes today a year's supply of the necessities of life? Have we all up-to-date accounted to the Lord for our tithing? Have we fasted during the year and accounted to the bishop for the savings thus effected? Have we contributed as liberally as we might to the fulfilment of the 1947 welfare budget? These are important questions in our lives today, as important, and maybe more so than ever before, and if we have not done this, then we certainly lack the faith and the courage to do what our great leaders have suggested. ¶

Testimony of Welfare Program

I've often had occasion to say as I traveled through the Church in the welfare work that President Grant, when he called me to the general welfare committee, did not ask me if I was converted to this great principle of the Church taking care of its own; he simply told me that I had been called to this work and was expected to go forth and do those things which were necessary to build up this plan among our people. I felt very much impressed this morning with what President Smith said to us about what we see and hear. That is not the important thing. The important thing to you and to me is the thing that we feel, and I am here to tell you today, brethren and sisters, in all humility that there has never been a moment in my life since President Grant called me to this welfare work that I haven't felt well in it and felt that I was doing something that the Lord desired should be done. And so governed by the standards that our prophet has set us here today, it gives me pleasure to bear my testimony to you that there is still great need in the world today and in this Church for this great welfare program. ¶

Opposition of Adversary

In reading The Life of Brigham Young the other day I came across this passage: ¶

It was revealed to me in the commencement of this Church that the Church would spread, prosper, grow and expand, and that in proportion to the spread of the gospel among the nations of the earth so would the power of Satan rise. ¶

And I have a conviction within me that we have had the power of the adversary made manifest against us in endeavoring to promulgate this welfare program among our people, and I believe that the adversary has used some of his strongest workers to keep you and me from following the advice and the counsel of our leaders as we should have done, and we have not been as diligent in performing these duties that devolve upon us in this welfare plan as we should have been. ¶

If we had maintained the standards of the Church in connection with our welfare work in the last eleven and a half years, we could have blessed the people of Europe many times more than we already have because we would have had many times more than the eighty-three cars that have gone over there to alleviate their suffering. As far as I have been able to determine in our lives, brethren and sisters, if we consider this matter seriously, we have not been imposed upon; we have not suffered. This welfare program has been no burden to us. I want to tell you that those people in this Church who have taken the advice and the counsel of our brethren literally have been blessed. ¶

Observance of the Sabbath Day

There is another thing that is close to my heart today, and I seem impelled to speak upon it, and that is that the bounties of this earth have been promised to the Latter-day Saints and to all the children of our Heavenly Father if we keep the Sabbath day holy. We certainly have plenty of reason to give this matter consideration in connection with our welfare work. One of the earliest commandments that were given to man was that we should remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy: ¶

Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: ¶

For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it. (Exodus 20:9-11.) ¶

Brigham Young said on this subject: ¶

Now remember, my brethren, those who go skating, buggy riding or on excursions on the Sabbath day — and there is a great deal of this ¶

practised— are weak in the faith. Generally, little by little, the spirit of their religion leaks out of their hearts and their affections, and by and by they begin to see fault in their brethren, faults in the doctrines of the Church, faults in the organization, and at last they leave the Kingdom of God and go to destruction. . . . The Lord has directed his people to rest one-seventh part of the time, and we take the first day of the week, and call it our Sabbath. This is according to the order of the Christians. We should observe this for our own temporal good and spiritual welfare. When we see a farmer in a hurry, that he has to attend to his harvest, and to haying, fence-making, or to gathering his cattle on the Sabbath day, as far as I am concerned, I count him weak in the faith. He has lost the spirit of his religion, more or less. Six days are enough for us to work, and if we wish to play, play within the six days; if we wish to go on excursions, take one of those six days, but on the seventh day, come to the place of worship, attend to the Sacrament, confess your faults one to another and to our God, and pay attention to the ordinances of the house of God. (Discourses of Brigham Young, p. 165.) ¶

Obedience Brings Blessings

And there is one other matter on this subject that I would like to read while I am on the subject generally, and that is in the Doctrine and Covenants we are promised that by keeping the Sabbath day holy the fulness of the earth shall be ours, and so I repeat again, that there is a pretty simple formula if we have faith in the work of the Lord. If the fulness of the earth is ours, we'll never have any trouble meeting our welfare budget; we'll never have any trouble taking care of those people who need assistance at our hands. The trouble with us is that we lack the courage to rely implicitly upon the work of God and to do as he has advised us to do. ¶

We are much richer in this Church today than we give ourselves credit for being. There isn't a people upon the earth today who are as rich as we are. Just think of the blessings that are ours, and in what rich abundance we enjoy them. We have faith; we have truth; we have virtue; we have charity; we have humility; we have thrift, industry, ambition, enthusiasm; and, as a result of all of these virtues, my brethren and sisters, we have the necessities of life in the midst of the people in this Church in rich abundance. Now, if we are rich, and I am sure we are, then we should take to heart the words of the Prophet Joseph Smith, revealed to him by our Heavenly Father because he was not speaking as man to man, but he spoke when he uttered these words as the mouthpiece of our Heavenly Father. He said: ¶

Wo unto you rich men, that will not give your substance to the poor, for your riches will canker your souls; and this shall be your lamentation in the day of visitation, and of judgment, and of indignation: The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and my soul is not saved! ¶

Wo unto you poor men, whose hearts are not broken, whose spirits are not contrite, and whose bellies are not satisfied, and whose hands are not stayed from laying upon other men's goods, whose eyes are full of greediness, and who will not labor with your own hands! ¶

But blessed are the pure in heart, whose hearts are broken, and ¶

whose spirits are contrite, for they shall see the kingdom of God coming in power and great glory unto their deliverance; for the fatness of the earth shall be theirs. (D. & C. 56:16-18.) ¶

Here is another promise of all that we need to accomplish all of God's purposes here upon the earth, temporally as well as spiritually: ¶

For behold, the Lord shall come, and his recompense shall be with him, and he shall reward every man, and the poor shall rejoice; . . . (Ibid., 19.) ¶

The Spirit of Service

We have the spirit of contribution, and I am sure that spirit of contribution goes hand in hand, my brethren and sisters, with the spirit of missionary work which we are doing in this Church. Think of it, four thousand missionaries in the field preaching the gospel! I say that this spirit of contribution is with us because what are we doing in our missionary work? We are contributing the knowledge to those to whom we send our missionaries, that we have the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's a spirit of sacrifice; it's a spirit of service; and along with the teachings of the spiritual doctrines that we have been given in this day and age through our prophets go the temporal needs and salvation of our people. And that is what our great welfare program does. ¶

Honor to Parents

You know there is one other thing that our program does that is certainly praiseworthy. The Apostle Paul when he was speaking to the Ephesians said: ¶

Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise;) ¶

That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth. And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. . . . Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. (Ephesians 6:1-3; 11.) ¶

This great welfare program of ours is calculated to bring father and son, and son and father into that close relationship and communion that Paul would have had exist in the Church his day. And it is just as essential to us today that we should do it. I want to say that tied in with that great principle is the great eternal principle of free agency that all of us prize so highly. We had to have our free agency in the councils in heaven, and through the use of that free agency we chose to come here to work out our temporal salvation and through our obedience to the laws and commandments of God to become literally his sons and his daughters. ¶

Value of Free Agency

Are we going to lose that free agency today while we are.here in this mortal existence earning that eternal salvation for which we were placed here upon this earth? Are we going to sacrifice our chances to retain our own free agency for anything that the world has to offer? All we have to do is just to examine any movement that may be brought into our midst whether it be social or political or what not, and if it has the earmarks of an attempt to deprive us in the slightest respect of our free agency, we should avoid it as we would avoid immorality or anything else that is vicious. I am sure that free agency is as necessary for our eternal salvation as is our virtue. And just as we guard our virtue with our lives, so should we guard our free agency. ¶

It has been my experience, my brethren and sisters, to the extent that I have had experience in this mortal sphere, that wherever I permit anyone to perform any of the functions which the Lord expected I should perform for myself, that to the extent I do this, I be-, come that other man's slave. And I tell you if we were ever to get in this Church in the position where we were relying upon some outside source for our finances, for our sustenance, just so sure would that outside force undertake to dictate to us what we should do. Those of us who can read only need to read what has passed in history. Whenever there has been any influence or any powers which have undertaken to control the welfare of mankind to the extent that they have contributed to their support, they dominated them in their lives. There isn't a social order on earth today but what if we were to follow it long enough and far enough would rob us of our free agency, and I tell you I am grateful to my Heavenly Father today for the knowledge and the conviction that I have within me that there is only one source in this Church from which you and I as faithful Latter-day Saints should receive any assistance in time of need, and that's the way the Lord has revealed. ¶

Let us look carefully into every movement on the face of the earth today that undertakes to bind the hands of men; that undertakes to deprive them of their own free agency in life and prevents them from deciding every moment of their life whether they'll go to the right or to the left. ¶

Support of Welfare Program

This great welfare program of ours is something that we should love and we should cherish, because bound up with that is a principle which will establish ourselves upon the face of this earth so that we will be free men and free women as long as we follow the dictates of our conscience and the counsel and advice that come from our Heavenly Father through his servants. And I hope and pray, my brethren and sisters, that we will not let eleven and a half years go by again without taking more seriously the counsel and ¶

advice that come constantly from our leaders to put our houses in order and let our sons and daughters take care of their mothers and fathers. Let us bring into the families of which Brother Benson so beautifully spoke this morning, that love and affection and that devotion which will not permit outside interests to come in and perform any of the family functions, whether they be temporal or spiritual. And there isn't a son or daughter in Israel who will not be blessed with the abundance of which we have spoken here this afternoon if he will but contribute of that which the Lord has given him to the maintenance of less fortunate members of his family. And I promise you that there wouldn't be a family in this Church, if we would live up to this principle, but what in and of itself without assistance from any outside source, would be self-sustaining. ¶

May the Lord help us to become such, I pray in Jesus' name. Amen. ¶