=1. The Primitive Church.=--In the dispensation of the Savior's
ministry, Christ established His Church upon the earth, appointing
therein the officers necessary for the carrying out of the Father's
purposes. As shown in the last lecture, every person so appointed was
divinely commissioned with authority to officiate in the ordinances of
his calling; and, after Christ's ascension, the same organization was
continued, those who had received authority ordaining others to the
various offices of the priesthood. In this way were given unto the
Church, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors,[602] high
priests,[603] seventies,[604] elders,[605] bishops,[606] priests,[607]
teachers,[608] and deacons.[609]
[602] Eph. iv, 11.
[603] Heb. v, 1-5.
[604] Luke x, 1-11.
[605] Acts xiv, 23; xv, 6; I Peter v, 1.
[606] I Tim. iii, 1; Titus 1, 7.
[607] Rev. i, 6.
[608] Acts xiii, 1.
[609] I Tim. iii, 8-12.
=2.= Besides these specific offices in the priesthood, there were
other callings of a more temporal nature, to which men were also set
apart by authority: such for instance was the case of the seven men of
honest report who, in the days of the apostles, were chosen and
appointed to minister to the poor, thus leaving the Twelve freer to
attend to the particular duties of their office.[610] This special
appointment illustrates the nature of the helps and governments[611]
set in the Church, to assist in the work under the direction of the
regular officers of the priesthood.
[610] Acts vi, 1-6.
[611] I Cor. xii, 28.
=3.= The ministers so appointed, and the members among whom they
labor, constitute the Church of Christ, which has been impressively
compared to a perfect body, the individuals typifying the separate
members, each with its special function, all co-operating for the
welfare of the whole.[612] Every office so established, every officer
so commissioned, is necessary to the development of the Church and to
the accomplishment of the work of God. An organization established of
God comprises no superfluities; the eye, the ear, the hand, the foot,
every organ of the body, is essential to the symmetry and perfection
of the physical structure; in the Church no officer can rightly say to
another, "I have no need of thee."[613]
[612] I Cor. xii, 12-27; Rom. xii, 4-5; Eph. iv, 16.
[613] I Cor. xii, 21.
=4.= The existence of these officers, and particularly their operation
with accompaniments of Divine assistance and power, may be taken as a
distinguishing characteristic of the Church in any age of the
world,--a crucial test, whereby the validity or falsity of any claim
to Divine authority may be determined. The gospel of Christ is the
everlasting gospel; its principles, laws, and ordinances, and the
Church organization founded thereon, must be ever the same. In
searching for the true Church, therefore, one must look for an
organization comprising the offices established of old, the callings
of apostles, prophets, evangelists, high priests, seventies, pastors,
bishops, elders, priests, teachers, deacons; not men bearing these
names merely, but ministers able to vindicate their claim to position
as officers in the Lord's service, through the evidences of power and
authority accompanying their ministry.
=5. Apostasy from the Primitive Church.=--The question may fairly
arise in the mind of the earnest investigator, have these authorities
and powers, together with their associated gifts of the Spirit,
remained with men from the apostolic age to the present; in short, has
there been a Church of Christ upon the earth during this long
interval? In answer, let these facts be considered: Since the period
immediately following the ministrations of the apostles of old, and
until the present century, no organization has maintained a claim to
direct revelation from God; in fact, the teachings of the professed
ministers of the gospel for centuries have been to the effect that
such gifts of God have ceased, that the days of miracles have gone,
and that the present depends for its guiding code wholly upon the
past. A self-suggesting interpretation of history indicates that there
has been a great departure from the way of salvation as laid down by
the Savior, a universal apostasy from the Church of Christ.[614]
Scarcely had the Church been organized by the Savior, whose name it
bears, before the powers of darkness arrayed themselves for conflict
with the organized body. Even in the days of Christ, persecution was
bitterly waged against the disciples; commencing with the Jews, and
directed first against the Master Himself and His few immediate
associates, this tide of opposition soon enveloped every known
follower of the Savior; so that the very name Christian became an
epithet of derision.
[614] See Notes 1 and 2. See "The Great Apostasy, Considered in
the Light of Scriptural and Secular History," by James E. Talmage,
Salt Lake City, 1909.
=6.= In the first quarter of the fourth century, however, a change in
the attitude of paganism toward Christianity was marked by the
conversion of Constantine the Great, under whose patronage the
Christian profession grew in favor, and became in fact the religion of
the state. But what a profession, what a religion was it by this
time! Its simplicity had departed; earnest devotion and
self-sacrificing sincerity were no longer characteristic of the
Church's ministers; these professed followers of the humble Prophet of
Nazareth, these self-styled associates of the meek and lowly Jesus,
these loudly-proclaimed lovers of the Man of Sorrow, lived amid
conditions strangely inconsistent with the life of their great
Exemplar. Church offices were sought after for the distinction of
honor and wealth accompanying them; ministers of the gospel affected
the state of worldly authority; bishops sought the pomp of princes,
archbishops lived as kings, and popes like emperors. With these
unauthorized and unscriptural innovations came many changes in the
ordinances of the so-called church: the rites of baptism were
perverted; the sacrament was altered; public worship became an
exhibition of art; men were canonized; martyrs were made subjects of
adoration; blasphemy grew apace, in that men without authority essayed
to exercise the prerogatives of God in calling others to what still
bore the name of spiritual office. Ages of darkness came upon the
earth; the power of Satan seemed almost supreme.
=7.= For a special consideration of the evidence of a general apostasy
from the Church of Christ, the student must consult authorities on
ecclesiastical history. While the fact of the apostasy is admitted by
but few such writers, the historical events which they chronicle
suggest the awful truth. We may trace, from the days of the apostles
down to near the close of the tenth century, a constantly changing
form of Church organization, which, at the later time named, bore but
little semblance to the Church established by the Savior. This falling
away is admitted by some historians, and as we shall presently see, it
was definitely foretold by authoritative prophecy.
=8.= John Wesley, founder of a powerful sect, declared that the
distinctive gifts of the Holy Ghost were no longer with the church,
having been taken away on account of the unworthiness of professing
Christians, whom he characterized indeed as heathen, with only a dead
form of worship.[615] In the Church of England "Homily Against Peril
of Idolatry" we read "So that laity and clergy, learned and unlearned,
all ages, sects, and degrees of men, women, and children of whole
Christendom--an horrible and most dreadful thing to think--have been
at once drowned in abominable idolatry; of all other vices most
detested of God, and most damnable to man; and that by the space of
eight hundred years and more." Milner, an author on church history,
admits a pitiable condition of the Church in the tenth century, and
finds in that sad state a fulfillment of scriptural predictions.
[615] John Wesley's Works, vii, pp. 26-27. See Note 4, following
Lecture xii, in connection with Article 7, "Spiritual Gifts," page
238.
=9. This Great Apostasy was Foretold.=--The infinite fore-knowledge of
God made plain to Him even from the beginning this falling away from
the truth; and, through inspiration, the prophets of old uttered
solemn warnings of the approaching dangers. Surely Isaiah was gazing
upon the era of spiritual darkness when he declared, "The earth also
is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have
transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting
covenant."[616] And how deeply impressive is the declaration of
Jeremiah, "For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken
me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken
cisterns that can hold no water."[617]
[616] Isa. xxiv, 5.
[617] Jer. ii, 13.
=10.= The prophecies of the apostles relative to the false teachers so
soon to trouble the flock, already quoted,[618] declare the apostasy
then rapidly approaching. Paul warned the Saints of Thessalonica that
they be not deceived by those who cried that the second coming of
Christ was then at hand, "For," said the apostle, "that day shall not
come except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be
revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself
above all that is called God, or that is worshiped; so that he as God
sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God."[619]
This falling away had begun even in the days of the apostles:--"Even
now," says John, "are there many anti-Christs."[620] And Paul, in
addressing the Galatians, declared, "There be some that trouble you,
and would pervert the gospel of Christ."[621]
[618] See pages 192-193.
[619] II Thess. ii, 3-4.
[620] I John ii, 18. See further II Peter ii, 1-3; Jude 17, 18.
[621] Gal. i, 7; also Acts xx, 29, 30; I Tim. iv, 1-3; II Tim. iv,
1-4.
=11.= Not less conclusive are the prophecies contained in the Book of
Mormon relating to this great falling away. Nephi, son of Lehi,
predicted the oppression of the North American Indians at the hands of
the Gentiles, and declared that at that time the people will be lifted
up in self-pride, having departed from the ordinances of God's house;
true, they will build to themselves many churches, but in these they
will preach their own wisdom, with envyings, and strife, and malice,
denying however the power and miracles of God.[622]
[622] II Nephi xxvi, 19-22; see also xxvii, 1; xxviii, 3, 6; xxix,
3; I Nephi xiii, 5; xxii 22-23.
=12. Restoration of the Church.=--From the facts already stated, it is
evident that the Church was literally driven from the earth; in the
first ten centuries immediately following the ministry of Christ, the
authority of the priesthood was lost from among men, and no human
power could restore it. But the Lord in His mercy provided for the
re-establishment of His Church in the last days, and for the last
time; and prophets of olden time fore-saw this era of renewed
enlightenment, and sang in joyous tones of its coming.[623] It has
been already shown that this restoration was effected by the Lord
through the Prophet Joseph Smith, who, together with Oliver Cowdery,
in 1829 received the Aaronic Priesthood under the hands of John the
Baptist; and later the Melchizedek Priesthood under the hands of the
former-day apostles, Peter, James, and John. By the authority thus
bestowed, the Church has been again organized with all its former
completeness, and mankind once more rejoices in the priceless
privileges of the counsels of God. The Latter-day Saints declare their
high claim to the true Church organization, similar in all essentials
to the organization effected by Christ among the Jews; this people of
the last days profess to have the Priesthood of the Almighty, the
power to act in the name of God, which power commands respect both on
earth and in heaven. Let us consider the organization of the
priesthood as it exists to-day.
[623] Dan. ii, 44-45; vii, 27; Matt. xxiv, 14; Rev. xiv, 6-8.