It is of both temporal and spiritual significance, value and effect.
It has to do with individual morality, with mutual dealings and
associations of men even in ordinary, every-day affairs, with the great
problems involved in family unity and efficiency and with the little
things that make or mar the home, with work and play, with the duties
of citizenship, statesmanship and public service generally.
All these relationships are human and earthly, and the honorable
discharge of duties arising therefrom approaches ethical perfection.
But man's standard of ethics is of necessity unstable, variable
and, withal, unsatisfying to the soul having a healthful hunger for
spiritual nourishment.
Who of us has not felt at times the spontaneous yearning and
aspirations incident to our deep inborn conviction of life beyond
death? We may weaken these emotions by persistently ignoring them; we
may effectively stifle them by rude force; we may render them dormant
by the poisonous anodyne of false philosophy and the boastful pride
of man's mis-called wisdom; but kill them we can not, for they were
divinely implanted and are deathless.
And as there is a hereafter, in which every soul of us shall live in
continuation of the eternal existence of which earthlife is but a span,
so surely shall our status there be determined by the deeds done in the
body, whether they be good or evil.
Religion, then, has to do not only with this life but with that to
come. We are but sojourners on earth; and, profoundly important as
is this mortal experience, it is, after all, mainly a probation, and
essentially a preparation for eternity.
It is temporarily easier to be passive than aggressive, whether we
claim for our guiding code man's rules of ethics or the clear-cut
requirements of the Gospel of Christ. There are more good men on earth
than men who are good for much.
The Gospel demands something greater than avoidance of actual sins of
commission. The culpability of neglect and omission may justly condemn
the soul. Wilful spurning of Divine opportunity may work eternal loss.
Though the Scriptures affirm the possibility of progression after
death, nowhere do we find ground for assuming that failure to obey the
Gospel on earth will be nullified by immediate remission beyond. We
have no basis for computing the ages that shall be requisite to make
amends there for wanton failure here.
There is a time in the eternal existence of souls which has been
specifically made the time of repentance and test; and that is the
period of mortality. Paul's forceful admonition is of universal
application: "Lay hold on eternal life" while opportunity is found
(1 Tim. 6:12, 19). For, be it remembered that the Lord has spoken
concerning the wilfully unrepentant: "From him shall be taken even the
light which he has received, for my Spirit shall not always strive with
man, saith the Lord of Hosts." (D&C 1:33.)
Sin is conducive to lethargy in things spiritual; the Gospel inspires
to life and activity. Contentment with the things of this world, so
long as they go to suit us, with no thought of what shall follow, is
the devil's lullaby. In the moment of supreme complacency when we
are expressing by word, act, thought, or through sheer inaction, the
stultifying soliloquy "Soul, take thine ease," may come the summoning
decree: "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee."
Read Luke 12:16-21.
When will men awaken to the imperative yet persuasive summons to
repentance? Are not the awful vicissitudes of the days of war and death
sufficient to arouse us to some realization of the solemnities of
eternity? As a nation we have valiantly waged war for the vindication
of the rights, privileges, and liberties of men. As individuals we are
summoned by the call of God to resist iniquity, and to make peace and
reconciliation with Him through obedience to the laws and ordinances of
the Gospel.
Only through active, vital faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, effective
repentance of wrong-doing, baptism by immersion for the remission of
sins, and the bestowal of the gift of the Holy Ghost or the higher
baptism of the Spirit, can salvation be attained in the Kingdom of God,
for so the Holy Scriptures aver.
The pleading call of the ancient prophet is yet in force. Hear ye, and
heed: "Now I say unto you, that ye must repent, and be born again:
for the Spirit saith, If ye are not born again, ye cannot inherit the
kingdom of heaven; therefore come and be baptized unto repentance, that
ye may be washed from your sins, that ye may have faith on the Lamb of
God, who taketh away the sins of the world, who is mighty to save and
to cleanse from all unrighteousness." (Book of Mormon, Alma 7:14.)
-- 95 --
REMEMBER THE SABBATH DAY
A Law unto Man from the Beginning
THE Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints accepts Sunday as the
Christian Sabbath and proclaims the sanctity of the day. We admit
without argument that under the Mosaic Law the seventh day of the
week, Saturday, was designated and observed as the Holy Day, and that
the change from Saturday to Sunday was a feature of the apostolic
administration following the personal ministry of Jesus Christ. Greater
to us than the question of this day or that in the week, is the
actuality of the weekly Sabbath, to be observed as a day of special and
particular devotion to the service of the Lord.
The Sabbath was prefigured if not definitely specified in the record of
the creation, wherein we read, following the account of the six days
or periods of creative effort: "And God blessed the seventh day, and
sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which
God created and made." (Gen. 2:3.)
In the early stages of the Exodus the Israelites were commanded to
lay in a double portion of manna on the sixth day, for the seventh
was consecrated as a day of holy rest; and this was signalized by the
Lord's withholding manna on the Sabbath day. See Exo. 16:23-30. There
is no proof that Sabbath observance by Israel at this early date was
an innovation; and it may be reasonably regarded as a recognition of
an established order by reenactment in the new dispensation. Later,
when the decalog was codified and promulgated on Sinai, the Sabbath law
was made particularly explicit, and the Lord's rest was cited as its
foundation:
"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour,
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, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, 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."
(Exo. 20:8-11.)
The keeping of the Sabbath as a day of surcease from toil and of
particular devotion came to be a national characteristic of the
Israelites, whereby they were distinguished from pagan nations; and
rightly so, for the observance of the Holy Day was specified as a
distinctive sign of the covenant between Jehovah and His people. See
Exo. 31:13.
In the course of Israelitish history successive prophets admonished
and rebuked the people for neglect or profanation of the Sabbath.
Nehemiah ascribed the affliction of the nation to the forfeiture of
Divine protection through Sabbath violation (see Neh. 13:15-22); and
by the mouth of Ezekiel the Lord reaffirmed the significance of the
Sabbath as a mark of His covenant with Israel, and sternly upbraided
those who observed not the day. (See Ezek. 20:12-24.) To the detached
branch of Israel, which, as the Book of Mormon avers, was transplanted
to American soil, Sabbath observance was no less an imperative
requirement. See Jarom 1:5; Mosiah 13:16-19; 18:23.
Long before the birth of Christ the original purpose of the Sabbath and
the spirit of its service had come to be largely lost sight of among
the Jews; and rabbinical rules had introduced numerous technicalities,
which made of the day one of discomfort and severity. This condition
was strongly denounced by our Lord in reply to the many criticisms
heaped upon Him because of the healings and other good works wrought by
Him on the Sabbath. "The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the
sabbath," said He, and then continued with the profound affirmation:
"The Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath." (Mark 2:27, 28.)
Christ came not to destroy the Law of Moses but to fulfil it; and
through Him the law was superseded by the Gospel. The Savior rose from
the tomb on the first day of the week; and that particular Sunday, as
also the next, was rendered forever memorable by the bodily visitation
of the resurrected Lord to the assembled Apostles and others. To the
believers in the crucified and risen Savior Sunday became the Lord's
Day (Rev. 1:10), and in time took the place of Saturday as the weekly
Sabbath in the Christian churches.
The Church of Jesus Christ teaches that Sunday is the acceptable
day for Sabbath observance, on the authority of direct revelation
specifying the Lord's Day as such. In this, a new dispensation, and
verily the last--the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times--the law of
the Sabbath has been reaffirmed unto the Church. It is to be noted that
the revelation, part of which follows, was given to the Church on a
Sunday (August 7th, 1831.)
"And that thou mayest more fully keep thyself unspotted from the world,
thou shalt go to the house of prayer and offer up thy sacraments upon
my holy day. For verily this is a day appointed unto you to rest from
your labors, and to pay thy devotions unto the Most High. Nevertheless
thy vows shall be offered up in righteousness on all days and at all
times. But remember that on this the Lord's day, thou shalt offer thine
oblations and thy sacraments unto the Most High, confessing thy sins
unto thy brethren, and before the Lord. And on this day thou shalt do
none other thing, only let thy food be prepared with singleness of
heart that thy fasting may be perfect, or, in other words, that thy joy
may be full." (D&C 59:9-13.)
We believe that a weekly day of rest is no less truly a necessity
for the physical well-being of man than for his spiritual growth;
but, primarily and essentially, we regard the Sabbath as divinely
established, and its observance a commandment of Him who was and is and
ever shall be, Lord of the Sabbath.
-- 96 --
THE FOOLISHNESS OF GOD
And the Wisdom of Men
"For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness;
but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. . . . Because
the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is
stronger than men." (Cor. 1:18, 25.)
So spake Paul in olden days, and he knew whereof he spake. Rich in the
learning of Jews and Greeks, ripe in scholarship and experience, he
possessed breadth of foresight and depth of insight far exceeding the
average capacity of men; and to these superior qualifications of mind
must be added the transcendent spiritual endowments of the apostle, the
prophet, the seer, the revelator.
His abnegation and humility are no less striking than the incontestable
sincerity and genuineness of his avowals. Inspired philosopher as he
was, he discriminated with keen perception and clear vision between
knowledge and wisdom, and with masterly skill contrasted the fallible
teachings of men with the unshakable averments of prophecy.
The Greeks of Paul's time prided themselves on their learning,
philosophy, and science, much of which last was "falsely so called."
By such the preaching of the cross, the teachings of the Gospel, the
precepts of eternal life were accounted but vain babblings. Those pagan
Greeks were mindtrained but spirit-dwarfed. And that type of misshapen
monstrosity is not yet extinct.
The brutal protagonists of autocratic tyranny, whose barbarous kultur
impels to crimes innumerable and atrocities indescribable, profess to
regard the might of righteousness as but maudlin sentiment and puerile
weakness. Boastful of material achievements and the temporary success
of their diabolical system of selfishness and arrogance, they blaspheme
the name and power of the living God, whose will it is that every soul
be free.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the embodiment of the Divine will
and purpose. That Gospel enjoins obedience to righteous law as the
guaranty of individual liberty. It endures as the unchanging expression
of eternal wisdom, though by carnally-minded sinners ridiculed as
foolishness.
As early as 1833, in a revelation through the prophet Joseph Smith, the
Lord declared that both strong drinks and hot drinks were injurious to
the body. In that period the use of alcoholic beverages was common,
and the consumption of hot drinks, particularly as tea and coffee, was
well nigh universal. Promulgation of the Divine warning against these
harmful customs was treated as a fad born of fanaticism. Inexorable
fact has compelled acknowledgment of the Word of Wisdom (see D&C, Sec.
89) as the pronouncement of Nature's God. Prohibition of the use of
intoxicants has become a question of supreme international importance.
The efficiency of armies and navies is seen to be gravely conditioned
thereby. Some of the world's most eminent surgeons aver that the
habitual use of hot drinks is one of the most effective causes of
gastric ulcer and cancer, which are classed among the deadliest of
maladies.
The same revelation voices a direct inhibition against the use of
tobacco by man, and this avowal, now branded as extreme and uncalled
for, is destined yet to become the basis of secular enactment.
The immoderate use of flesh foods was specified by Divine utterance as
harmful. The exigencies of war enforced restriction of meat eating, and
the nation was bettered thereby.
Unchastity, the dominant vice of the ages, has been tolerated as an
irrepressible feature of the social system, and this notwithstanding
the warning fiat of Jehovah against marital infidelity and sexual sin
in all its hideous phases. The imperative demand for efficiency in this
crucial age of stress and struggle has literally forced a measured
though lamentably inadequate acceptance of the Divine requirement, for
the statistical data of incapacity due to so-called social diseases are
so astounding and show a condition so frightful as to make plain that
the very foundations of civilization are jeopardized.
Men have been prone to turn deaf ears to the voice of God, delivered
through the prophets always in season to avert threatening calamities;
and have rested in the lethal contentment of self-confident ability to
deal in their own way with the problems of life. How surpassingly wiser
would it be, as shown in the light of our dearly-bought experience,
to acknowledge the wisdom of God's beneficence, and profit thereby.
Prophecy is direct and sure, science laggard and tentative. One is
the advance message from God, the other man's belated and ofttimes
distorted version of the truth.
Mormonism proclaims the Gospel of Christ as the panacea for the ills
of men and nations. Its proclamation to the world is the assurance of
peace on earth and good will among men, through obedience to the laws
and ordinances of the Gospel. The veriest moiety of the wisdom of God
transcends the accumulated knowledge of men in its entirety.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is calling aloud to
every nation, kindred, tongue and people: Have faith in God. Deal
justly with one another. Make amends for past wrongs before opportunity
is forfeited. Strive to enter in at the gate to the Kingdom of God
while yet you may, for verily the time is short, and the coming of the
Lord is near. Repent and be baptized, every one of you, and ye shall
receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, by which ye shall be guided in the
paths of truth and inherit salvation at the great and terrible day of
the Lord which is nigh, even at your doors.
-- 97 --
FREEDOM THROUGH OBEDIENCE
Release from Autocracy of Sin
"COME unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give
you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and
lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is
easy, and my burden is light." (Matt. 11:28-30.)
A blessed invitation indeed!
Seemingly faint at heart over the unbelief of the people, our Lord had
sought strength in prayer. With the soulful eloquence characteristic of
the anguish-laden communion which at recurrent periods He had with the
Father, the Savior voiced His reverent gratitude that God had imparted
a testimony of the truth to the humble and lowly whom He likened unto
trusting babes, rather than unto men proud in their learning and
arrogant in self-assumption.
Then turning to the common people, the multitude who had just witnessed
His miracles and listened to His lofty yet simple precepts, He urged
anew their acceptance of Him and His Gospel in one of the grandest
outpourings of spiritual emotion recorded for man to read.
His summoning yet pleading call was addressed to priestridden and
Rome-governed Jews. Many of them yearned for release from thraldom, but
the national spirit had been so broken that most of them had become
inured to vassalage and tolerant of bondage.
The priestly hierarchy was boastful of its status, and strove
effectively to deceive the people into the belief that they were free
while sweating under the burdens of unrighteous exaction.
What had Christ to offer in mitigation of their grievous state?
Certainly not the emancipation for which false rabbinical precept had
led them to look--the reestablishment of the throne of David as an
earthly kingdom, destined to subjugate all other nations by force of
arms and make supreme the scepter of rehabilitated Israel.
Christ's kingdom was not, is not, nor ever shall be a merely secular or
political dominion. His throne and crown are not of earthly make.
The people of Israel had brought themselves into bondage. Their
vanished glory and fallen status had been foretold as an alternative
fate, which would fall upon them if they departed from the covenant and
proved recreant to the God of their fathers. But more burdensome than
Roman mastership was the literal serfdom of priestly misrule. Rome was
tolerant and conciliatory, while those who for the time sat in Moses'
seat gloried in the shackles they had riveted upon the people through a
blasphemous misapplication of the Law.
To the overladen and weary Jews came the offer of rest and peace.
The Lord pleadingly invited them from drudgery to pleasant service,
from the well-nigh unbearable burdens of ecclesiastical exaction and
traditional formalism to the liberty of true worship, from slavery to
freedom.
But they would not.
The Gospel He offered was and is the embodiment of liberty, untainted
by selfish license. True, it entailed obedience and submission; but
even if such could be likened unto a yoke, what was its burden in
comparison with the incubus under which they groaned?
The offer, the call, the invitation is in full force and effect today.
Transgression of the law is primarily or indirectly the cause of all
suffering. Obedience to righteous law is the price of liberty. In such
obedience lies happiness.
By a government of the people, administered in equity, every man is
under wholesome restriction in compliance with which he finds privilege
and protection.
Irresponsibility is directly opposed to enduring freedom. But what
are the restraints of democracy in contrast with enslavement under
autocratic rule? How easy the yoke, how light the burden, and how
glorious the blessings of righteous government!
The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the expression of the eternal truth that
shall make men free. It prescribes obedience, compliance, voluntary
submission as the conditions of enfranchisement in the kingdom of
God. In its conflict with sin the Gospel neither slays nor makes men
prisoners. Its weapons are persuasion, invitation, and awakening
summons. Its antagonists suffer self-inflicted punishment, bring upon
themselves imprisonment within the bars of lost opportunity, and
formulate their own sentence of eventual banishment as alien enemies of
the truth.
Liberty through obedience was the theme of Benjamin, the ancient
prophet and king who thus addressed his penitent people, respecting
their acknowledgment of Christ as the Author of salvation:
"And under this head, ye are made free, and there is no other head
whereby ye can be made free. There is no other name given whereby
salvation cometh; therefore, I would that ye should take upon you
the name of Christ, all you that have entered into the covenant with
God, that ye should be obedient unto the end of your lives." (Book of
Mormon, Mosiah 5:8.)
And unto the repentant and obedient of the present day the Lord has
spoken through the prophet Joseph Smith:
"Abide ye in the liberty wherewith ye are made free; entangle not
yourselves in sin, but let your hands be clean, until the Lord come."
(D&C 88:86.)
The Lord has spoken, saying to all men and nations: Come unto me in
faith, doubting not; repent of your sins; be baptized for the remission
thereof; and ye shall receive the Holy Ghost and He shall guide you in
the truth that shall make you free.
-- 98 --
HE WENT AND WASHED
And Came Seeing
THE ninth chapter of John contains an absorbingly graphic account of
a man who had been born blind, yet who was made to see through the
ministrations of the Lord Jesus Christ. As in every other miracle
wrought by the Savior, the outward or visible procedure in this case
was strikingly simple.
Jesus anointed the sightless eyes with clay, and said unto the man:
"Go, wash in the pool of Siloam." The sequel is thus tersely recorded:
"He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing."
The man had been a mendicant, a blind beggar, and as such was
a familiar character in his neighborhood. Word of the miracle
spread and a great stir arose among both the common folk and the
learned Pharisees. The day of the healing was the Sabbath, and the
hypercritical Pharisees laid stress on this point as proof that He who
had given sight to the blind man was obviously a sinner, for He had
healed on the Holy Day, whereon all manner of work was forbidden.
With the assurance characteristic of a sincere mind that knows whereof
it speaks, and with incisive directness, the happy recipient of our
Lord's bounty replied: "Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not: one
thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see."
Then the inquisitors questioned the man anew as to the precise means
by which his eyes had been opened; but he refused to repeat what they
had already treated with derision, and ironically inquired if they were
about to join the disciples of the Healer. This served but to increase
their anger. They boasted of being disciples of Moses, but as for
Christ, whom they referred to as "this fellow," they furiously declared
that they knew not whence He came.
They were enraged that an illiterate beggar should answer so boldly
in their scholarly presence; but the man was more than a match for
them all. His rejoinder was maddening because it flouted their vaunted
wisdom, and, withal, was unanswerable.
"Why, herein is a marvellous thing," said he, "that ye know not from
whence he is, and yet he hath opened mine eyes. Now we know that God
heareth not sinners: but if any man be a worshipper of God, and doeth
his will, him he heareth. Since the world began was it not heard that
any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. If this man were
not of God, he could do nothing."
Unable to cope in argument or demonstration with the erstwhile
sightless beggar, those blinded Pharisees could at least exercise their
official authority, however unjustly, by excommunicating him from the
congregation of the synagog, and this they promptly and wickedly did.