2.329 Until We Shall Meet Before the Judgement-Seat of Christ

In Matthew 5:13, Jesus calls us the salt of the earth, a bold reminder that our lives are meant to carry his flavor, his truth, and his love to the world. Join me each day to explore one verse of scripture and one thought, striving to stay full of savor and truly live as savory salt. Hello my friends, it's great to have you with me.

Today let's be anxiously engaged in a good cause and bring to pass much righteousness. Would you die for the testimony you currently have? We're reading this week Doctrine and Covenants sections 135 and 136 as well as Mormon chapter 7 through Ether chapter 2.

And we're going to stay on this thought that we had yesterday and started the week inside of Doctrine and Covenants section 1. A powerful section talking about the martyrdom of the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum Smith. We're going to dive straight in here because I believe perhaps one of the strongest, most powerful modern testimonies of these two as well as the Book of Mormon comes from President Holland.

And we're going to dive in through the scripture first and then to his words. First, Doctrine and Covenants section 135, verse 5 is our verse. We find out that it's actually a verse from the Book of Mormon, but because it's in Doctrine and Covenants, we'll count it here.

These are the verses in the book of Ether chapter 12, that Hyrum read the morning that they were going to turn themselves in to the jail. Verse 5 says, "And it came to pass that I prayed unto the Lord that he would give unto the Gentiles grace that they might have charity. And it came to pass that the Lord said unto me: If they have not charity, it mattereth not unto thee.

Thou hast been faithful, wherefore thy garments shall be made clean. And because thou hast seen thy weakness, thou shalt be made strong, even unto the sitting" Now that's a powerful section. I am reading that they've done all that they can to testify of the work that they're doing.

And then we get a moment in General Conference. I don't know if some of you remember this or not. This was 2009, October of 2009 in a very, very powerful talk and testimony by at that time Elder Jeffrey R.

Holland called "Safety for the Soul." And I want to share with you the rest of this episode will be his words. A few short verses from the 12th chapter of Ether in the Book of Mormon before closing the book. Hyrum turned down the corner of the page from which he had read, marking it as part of the everlasting testimony for which these two brothers were about to die.

I hold in my hand that book, the very copy from which Hyrum read, the same corner of the page turned down, still visible. Later when actually incarcerated in the jail Joseph the Prophet turned to the guards who held him captive and bore a powerful testimony of the divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon. Shortly thereafter, pistol and ball would take the lives of these two testators.

As one of a thousand elements of my own testimony of the divinity of the Book of Mormon, I submit this as yet one more evidence of its truthfulness. In this their greatest and last hour of need, I ask you, would these men blaspheme before God by continuing to fix their lives, their honor, and their own search for eternal salvation on a book, and by implication a church and a ministry they had fictitiously created out of a whole cloth? Never mind that their wives are about to be widows and their children fatherless.

Never mind that their little band of followers will be yet houseless, friendless, and homeless, and that their children will leave footprints of blood across the frozen rivers and an untamed prairie floor. Never mind that legions will die and other legions live, declaring the four quarters of this earth, that they know the Book of Mormon and the Church which espouses it to be true. Disregard all of that and tell me whether in.

No other book in any religious history. And still it stands. Failed theories about its origins have been born and parroted and have died.

From Ethan Smith to Solomon Spalding, to deranged paranoid, to cunning genius, none of these frankly pathetic answers for this book has ever withstood examination because there is no other answer than the one Joseph gave as its young, unlearned translator. In this I stand with my own great-grandfather, who said simply enough, "no wicked man could write such a book as this, and no good man would write it unless it were true and he were commanded of God to do so." That's all for today my friends. Lift up your hearts and rejoice.

Cleave unto the covenants you have made and together we will be Savory Salt. WX.org.