The Restoration Of The Gospel

THE RESTORATION OF THE GOSPEL — This statement presupposes two fundamental facts: (1) the former existence of the gospel upon the earth; (2) its loss — disappearance, etc. Was there a divine church? It is as much our mission on earth to proclaim the existence of the gospel in earlier dispensations as anything can be. The world today wonders why we sent missionaries to so-called Christian nations rather than confine our proselyting efforts to the socalled heathen nations. The answer is important. Christianity so-called has lost the knowledge of the true gospel of Jesus Christ as established in former times. ¶

And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. ¶

For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. (Matthew 24:4-5.) We go into the world to teach them the former as well as the latter-day gospel of Jesus Christ. Did not the prophets Isaiah and Micah say: ¶

And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. ¶

And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. ¶

And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. ¶

O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord. (Isaiah 2:2-5; see also Micah 4:1-3.) Not many years ago in Knoxville, Tennessee, I saw a sign done in bronze on the corner of a bank building which read in substance: "The Church around the corner teaches the old-fashioned gospel of Jesus Christ." This very attempt on the part of this great church to distinguish itself from other presentday churches is evidence sufficient of the necessity of missionary work to be done among those professing faith in new-fashioned religions conceived of men and among those who deny all faiths, deny even the existence of God. ¶

We have a mission to preach the gospel— the existence and the true conception of God to our fellow men, the establishment of his Church upon the earth by his Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ. We cannot, in fact, proclaim the restoration of the gospel without proclaiming its pre-existence. The restoration must bring back that which was originally established. Something else would not be a restoration; neither can you restore that which is already here. ¶

We can restore only that which is lost, gone, disappeared. Restoration means to bring back that which we formerly had. ¶

The foundation upon which the Church of Jesus Christ is organized in these latter days is the statement of Jesus Christ to the boy who, in the strength and simplicity of his faith, prayed to God for enlightenment upon this very subject. Where is the Church of Jesus Christ to be found? The boy of fourteen asked the Lord which of all the sects was right and which he should join. He was told by the Lord that he must join none of them, for they were all wrong, that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight, that they drew near to him with their lips but their hearts were far from him. ¶

They teach for doctrine the commandments of men, having a form of godliness but they deny the power thereof. ¶

He again forbade the boy to join any of them. A restoration of the divine Church was later to be effected through the instrumentality of this boy as he grew to manhood, the Prophet Joseph Smith. The Angel Moroni later told the Prophet in September of 1823: ¶

Behold, I will reveal unto you the Priesthood, by the hand of Elijah the prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. (D. & C. 2:1.) Joseph Smith was not only given the priesthood — the keys of which Elijah held, but previously he and Oliver Cowdery had also received the apostolic priesthood at the hands of Peter, James, and John, with authority and direction once again to select twelve apostles. ¶

The priesthood of God was thus once again restored to the earth, the authority by which the divine Church should be reestablished on the earth, so vital to the world at large, whether Christian or heathen, is this restoration, that every bearer of the priesthood should be wellversed in the historic facts such as we have of the original foundations of the gospel — its disappearance and its restoration as well as the first principles of the gospel itself. What could be more appropriate for the large body of the priesthood of the Church than periodically to direct its study to these matters of such great historic value to us and to our missionary work. We have studied them now for three years. ¶

We have not been left without evidence of an apostasy from the gospel as given us by the Savior. Our course of study prepared by Elder James L. Barker has given us many important historic facts with which we should be familiar. ¶

Others will find and, from time to time, add more to our fund of knowledge just as Elders Parley P. Pratt, James E. ¶

Talmage, and B. H. Roberts, and others have done in the past from historic sources. The scriptures themselves prophesy of the falling away from the true gospel of Jesus Christ. ¶

We read: ¶

I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with longsuffering and doctrine. ¶

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. (II Timothy 4:1-4.) For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. (II Peter 1:21.) But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. ¶

And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. ¶

And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: ¶

whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not. ¶

(Ibid., 2:1-3.) The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish. ¶

The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. ¶

Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate: therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left. (Isaiah 24:4-6.) And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people. ¶

Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters. (Revelation 14:6-7.) This gospel now restored to earth is a plan of life and salvation, a means by which through our obedience we can be brought back into the presence of our eternal heavenly Father crowned with glory, immortality, and eternal lives. It has always had a universal application. It was the same gospel in Jerusalem, Constantinople, Ephesus, or Rome. It is eternal in its endurance. If we were to go to any of these cities or any place else to which the Apostles of Christ carried the true gospel and they claimed to be the rightful successors of Christ, we would have one absolute, unchangeable, accurate, and at the same time simple standard by which we could judge the validity of their claims, assuming as the facts compel, that after a relatively short time the teachings of those professing to be the followers of Christ differed in practically every country if not in every great city. It has been the purpose of these priesthood courses which Brother Barker has outlined, for us to put these various, present-day claims to this test — Do any of their teachings and practices conform to Christ's? ¶

I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: ¶

Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. ¶

But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. (Galatians 1:6-8.) (Italics added.) For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him. (II Cor. 11:4.) The pertinent facts have had to be searched out from the writings of almost countless men for nigh onto two thousand years, all of them written with few, if any, exceptions by men who have in turn found the subject matter of their writings as a matter of intensive research. By their very nature the facts found have not lent themselves to too great a simplification. The priesthood quorums for the past three years have struggled with these lessons. ¶

Some of them put themselves in the spirit of the researcher and have succeeded in getting the greatest benefit therefrom. They are the ones who have qualified themselves from secular history itself, written for the most part by the clergy, directly affected by the recital of the facts, the changes of doctrine which actually took place in their own churches, the departures from the simple truths enunciated by the Savior himself, the establishment of pagan practices within the church, to establish the departure of all the churches of the world in 1830 from the simple truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ. ¶

We need only refer to a few examples which are so clearly set forth in the priesthood manuals of the last three years. Take, for example, baptism without authority, performed otherwise than by immersion; the doctrines of infant damnation, of transubstantiation, of predestination, of an immaterial God who created man both body and soul out of nothing, that man may be saved by grace alone, indulgences, absolutions, intercession of saints, along with the miraculous power of relics, of masses, of the worship of images in churches, of purgatory, of monasticism. Such a marked departure from the simple principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The change was so obvious, thinking people were compelled to participate in the great Reformation as soon as the Bible itself came into their hands. ¶

We are told that by the year 1520 there were eighteen translations of the Bible in German, eleven in Italian, four in Bohemian, and two in Dutch. Thus those who read the Bible for the first time were shocked at the depth and the breadth of the departure which had taken place in the churches of the world from the simple truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ. These are the benefits which have come to those who have studied earnestly the priesthood manuals of the last three years. ¶

Others have struggled without getting so deeply into the spirit in which this great work entitled The Divine Church was written. It has been a subject that could not be mastered without effort. ¶

Let me say it was not written without effort. There seems to be a relationship between the effort of the author and that required by the student to master the course. Others, we are advised, fell by the wayside and substituted other courses more to their individual liking. They have not prepared themselves to meet these issues so vital and current today in our intercourse with our fellow men in spreading the light which is ours among our neighbors at home and abroad. ¶

For next year we have prepared a course of study to consider the restoration of the same divine Church upon the earth with the restoration of its simple principles and practices. We hope our priesthood leaders will accept these lessons in the spirit in which they are written. In studying them, go back constantly in considering the restoration to the history of the departure therefrom on the part of the churches of the world. We want to continue to perfect ourselves in this respect through a continued study of the important history outlined in the manuals of the last three years. It should be our purpose in teaching and studying these lessons on the restoration, whether we be teacher or student, to relate our studies back to the apostasy by a comparison of the details of the restoration of the gospel with the principles which were taught in the churches of the world in 1830. In this manner can we learn in the next two years as we consider these lessons on the restoration written by Elder Roy A. Welker as much or more of the facts contained in our previous three manuals on the divine Church, dealing as they do with the apostasy as we did during the past years themselves. This is important, too, because many who shall have occasion to attend the priesthood quorum meetings this year and next year were not present during the past three years. The question naturally arises — how can we study the restoration as I have tried to emphasize, without some study of what we are restoring? Answering the question, if the world once had it, what has it done with it? The very fact that these three volumes of Elder Barker's on The Divine Church were not as simple as some desired is added reason why we should read them a second time, and those in the meantime who have been advanced into the Melchizedek Priesthood, or who have returned from the armed forces or from missions or both, might have the benefit of them for the first time. We advocate very seriously a first reading of these manuals by all who have not already mastered them. ¶

The dividends to be received from a study such as suggested, are certain, not alone in qualifying us to teach others, but above all to give to each of us a broader foundation of knowledge upon which our own faith may rest. ¶

We never lose sight in all our classwork and study of the fact that the glory of God is intelligence. Knowledge is power. Truth is joyous. ¶

Furthermore, in the study of the restoration we should advise ourselves of present-day doctrines of the churches of the world. In many instances we will find that these doctrines have changed somewhat since 1830 to conform more nearly to the teachings of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. ¶

We may expect as time goes on, in fact, we may hope that the churches of the world will continue not only to see, but also to appreciate the light which was brought to the earth by the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ in these latter days through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith and realize that just as the church was organized by the Savior when he was upon the earth, so must it continue throughout the restoration. ¶

We hope the people of the world will learn to appreciate the words of Paul to the Ephesians: ¶

And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: ¶

Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: ¶

That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive. (Ephesians 4:11-14.) May the Lord hasten the day when the peoples of the world will realize the source of this light which is enlightening the world. It should be the purpose of the priesthood of the Church so to qualify themselves that they may individually and collectively be a light set upon a hill. ¶

Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. ¶

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. (Matthew 5:14, 16.) ¶