Gospel topic
Missouri: Growth & Return to
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The time is speedily coming — we do not want to talk very much, though, about going to Jackson County, Missouri, because through our foolishness and weakness we would not care anything about building houses and making ourselves comfortable here. I know when we first started a colony in Brigham City, the people generally thought it was nonsense, perfectly useless, to plant peach trees, apple trees, currant bushes and the like, because we were going to Jackson County so speedily; and it was with the utmost effort that we were enabled to disabuse them of this idea. We are not going tomorrow, nor next day, this week or next week; but we are going, and there are many hundreds and hundreds within the sound of my voice that will live to go back to Jackson County and build a holy temple to the Lord our God. Be prepared to do these things that have been taught us during this Conference, and make ourselves worthy, and we will receive everything that I have read to you in this section. We have not time to explain these things. We bear our testimony in regard to what we know, and what God has done for us, and what we hope to do with His assistance, and leave it in that way.
President Lorenzo Snow
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Teach them to pay their tithing while they are young. You mothers, teach your children that when they get any money they should pay one-tenth of it to the Lord, however little it may be. Educate them to pay their tithing in full. Then we will have a people prepared to go to Jackson County. President Smith was talking yesterday about the land of Zion, and the time will come when there will be Temples established over every portion of the land, and we will go into these Temples and work for our kindred dead night and day, that the work of the Lord may be speedily accomplished, that Jesus may come and present the kingdom to His Father. He is coming soon, too. But we will not hear His voice until we build up Jackson County. Now we should make the preparation for this. We are not only going to have Zion throughout this continent, but we will have it over the whole earth. The whole earth is the Lord's. The time will come when it will be translated and be filled with the spirit and power of God. The atmosphere around it will be the spirit of the Almighty. We will breath that Spirit instead of the atmosphere that we now breath. But now it is for us to make the preparation, that we may be worthy to be called into the house of the Lord and receive our second blessings. I do not want the presidents of Stakes to send any person to our Temples to receive the highest blessings that have ever been bestowed upon man since the world began, until it can be said of him, "He pays his full tithing." When you find an honest, faithful Latter-day Saint who is worthy of receiving His blessings, send him along. I do not care how fast they come. The time is now at hand when the Latter-day Saints can be greatly and abundantly blessed, so that they can make the preparation in its fulness. Now, if I say anything more, I am afraid you may forget what I have said—I will take that back; I said it without thought. You will not forget, you cannot forget what I have said to you here. I do not know how soon we may be called to build up Jackson County; but I feel it is nearer at hand than Latter-day Saints generally believe. When you look upon Jackson County and its surroundings at the present time, it looks like an impossibility. There are perhaps thirty thousand people settled there, adjacent to the Temple location, and they are doing business very extensively. Looking at it naturally, it would seem as if a favorable arrangement for us to go back there could never arise. But when the Lord sets about to accomplish His purposes, He finds it easy to make it effectual. It will be so in this. I can imagine several ways in which the road would be perfectly clear, and the people be very glad for the Latter-day Saints to go back to Jackson county. As I said yesterday, establish the principles of Zion in your hearts, and then you will be worthy to receive Zion outside, with beautiful houses and castles, and lovely surroundings, and by and by go into a city the streets of which will be made of pure gold, where everything will be just as good and grand as the experience of millions of years has given to those who have to do with such buildings. Just read the last chapter in the Bible and see what a glorious city Latter-day Saints will have the privilege of living in, if they are faithful. And we will be able to build cities of our own after a time. It may be thought that I am going away into the future; but I do not say any more to you than I can find in the revelations of the Lord in the Doctrines and Covenants and in the Bible. It is all there; but only those can understand it who have the Spirit of the Lord.
President Lorenzo Snow
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Through this man, Joseph Smith, the Lord has said to us what I have been reading. As some of the brethren stated in their addresses here, I think that there was need of a reformation among the Latter-day Saints. I believe that that reformation has already commenced. One of the evidences of this to me is that the Latter-day Saints throughout all the Stakes of Zion have done that which they never did before in regard to paying their tithing. They have paid twice the amount of tithing this year and last year than they paid two years ago. It is wonderful how the Saints have reformed in this duty especially in view of the fact that the Latter-day Saints have always had trouble to reform themselves in money matters. They could not do it in the day in which this revelation was given. Joseph tried to develop them so that they would conform to the law of consecration, which is in advance of the law of tithing, and is a principle which, as sure as I am speaking, you and I will one day have to conform to. When that day comes we will be prepared to go to Zion. We will not take possession of the land of Zion by force. If we should do, it would turn out to us as it did with the people who were upon the land of Zion when this revelation was given. As the Lord here tells us, there are only two ways in which we can come into possession of that land. One way is by purchase, "and if by purchase, behold you are blessed." The other way is by blood, "and if by blood, as you are forbidden to shed blood, lo, your enemies are upon you, and ye shall be scourged from city to city, and from synagogue to synagogue, and but few shall stand to receive an inheritance." These are the words of God. They did not come to us today, nor yesterday, nor last year, but they did come to the people of God some years ago. They came to the Latter-day Saints who were upon the land of Zion at that time. I do not know that it would be right to say that they are of more importance to us than they were to them. But there is this about it: The Latter-day Saints in these valleys have had an experience that the Saints then did not have. We have learned that which they did not learn. They were badly persecuted and driven forth from the land of Zion, and as the revelation says, "but few shall stand to receive an inheritance." There are some perhaps within the sound of my voice who will receive an inheritance in Jackson county before they pass into the next life. I have not heard at any previous conference such talk as has been given to the Latter-day Saints at this conference. It is talk that bears upon it reformation and preparation. When we think of the wonderful reformation that has been accomplished in the matter of tithing, it is a manifestation that a grand preparation is coming. Do you suppose that the Lord would ever send you and me back to Jackson county until He could feel perfectly assured that we would do those things which the people of Jackson county failed to do for lack of experience and faith? Jackson county is the place, the point that we should have continually in view. A brother the other day said that he had a thousand dollars and he was keeping it to purchase land in Jackson county, as soon as it would be proper to do so. We cannot consider ourselves prepared, however, to go back to Jackson county when we fail to pay our tithing. I do not wish to say very much about tithing, for I think I have said enough. In the settlements that we traveled through coming from St. George, I talked very strongly about it, because I knew it was a command of the Lord that the people should repent and reform from the great neglect that we had all been guilty of more or less. I felt determined about it then with all my heart and soul, and I did not know but that the Saints might think I was going a little too far. To ease their minds upon this I told them that I should never come again to talk to them as I talked at that time. But I said they must do what they had been told if they calculated to be Latterday Saints. The reformation in this line has been effectual. There are some, I am told, that do not think it is right to pay tithing. That need not surprise anybody. But the great mass of the people are doing well in relation to this. Let us all exercise faith for the Lord to open the way that we may go back to Jackson county. A short time ago something occurred in this connection that was a little extraordinary. Two men came here — good, honest men, as I have every reason to believe — and to our surprise they wanted to establish a union between the Latter-day Saints and the Josephites. We asked them to explain themselves. They said they had received a revelation that the time had now come to build a Temple in Jackson county, and in order that this might be accomplished, they had felt it was their duty to go to the Josephites. They do not believe in the Josephites any more than we do; but they went there and had a conversation with the president and counsel of the Josephites. It was proposed that they send four of their elders, that we send four of our Elders.and that the Hedrick. ites (to which body these two men belonged) have four of their elders, and that all these Elders should meet on the land of Zion and see if they could not make some arrangement by which the Temple could be built. Of course, we could see very well that there was no use trying in that direction; but they seemed to have faith that it could be effected. In part these men may have had a manifestation. I believe that they were about right on the point that the time had arrived to build a Temple; at least, the time is arriving when that Temple should be built; but it will not be built by that class of people. It will be built by the Latter-day Saints in connection with the Lamanites.
President Lorenzo Snow
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Counselor in the First Presidency To know of the history and to visit the places of prophetic historical renown in Jackson, Clay, Caldwell, and Daviess counties in Missouri, is to experierce a feeling, a sense of the nearness of these mighty events of the future that will transpire in these consecrated places. No doubt this is due in part to the increasing awareness of that which has already occurred, and of its relationship to the future, serving to make it more alive and vital. And even so, one cannot deny, on the other hand, that time is getting shorter. The blueprint of God’s plan is before us; the fulfillment of prophecy occurs almost daily; the balance of time is waning. In the words of
President Alvin R. Dyer
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Of the Seventy
Elder William R. Walker
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Sister Rebecca McDavitt Morgan
Elder Jeremiah J. Morgan
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When Elder Morgan began serving as stake president of the Liberty Missouri Stake in 2009, the stake boundaries were around three hours driving from one end to the other. Now three more stakes have been formed from that stake — the Far West, Grand River and Shoal Creek Missouri stakes. “It’s a miracle,” Sister Morgan said. “Missouri is an incredible place to be. … I’m not sure that there’s anybody who loves Missouri more than Jeremiah and Rebecca Morgan.” Living close to many Church historic sites, Sister Morgan knows, “So many beautiful things happened there, and so many beautiful things will happen there. The Lord is preparing a place and a people.”
Sister Rebecca McDavitt Morgan
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