Imagine this. You are a farm boy in 1820. Religious revival is the trend of the time. All around you, preachers are vying for your attention. But you just can’t figure out which church you should join. One day, you are reading your bible and come across James 1:5. It says, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” The verse hits you with such power that you just know what you have to do. You go into the woods. Upon finding an appropriate spot, you kneel down and start praying. You are pouring your heart out to God when the most awful feeling you have ever experienced comes over you. You can’t speak, you can hardly think. Just when you feel you are done for and are ready to give up, a pillar of light appears over you and the darkness is driven away. In the light stand two Personages. One of them calls you by name and then turns to the other saying, “This is my Beloved Son. Hear Him!”
Now what if I told you this was a true story? It is. This is the story of Joseph Smith, the prophet who restored the church of Christ on the earth. It may sound a bit strange to some, but this is what I believe. So how did I come to this conclusion? Let me explain.
It started with me watching TV when I was younger. Yes, TV. In between spots for my favorite Saturday morning cartoons, I would often see commercials advertising the Book of Mormon. These commercials usually gave a brief overview of the stories told in 3rd Nephi, focusing on the fact that Christ appeared to the people of the ancient Americas. Seeing this, I remembered something I had been taught in school. When the Spanish Conquistadors came to South America, the people there thought they were gods. This belief was based on a light-skinned, bearded god that they were expecting to return. In my young mind I thought that maybe there could be some truth to the idea that Jesus could have visited the Americas after His resurrection. I wasn’t curious enough to pick up the phone and call the number, but the seed had been planted.
Move forward several years in the future. I’m living in Utah and am visiting my dad and stepmom. That day they are meeting with missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Living in Utah, I had been exposed to this church but had decided that it wasn’t for me. I was, however, willing to listen to my parent's guests. As I had mentioned in an earlier post, I found what the missionaries had to say about Joseph Smith intriguing. I had read in the bible about how God used ordinary men and women to do His will, so why wouldn’t He do it again?
But I was thrown a bit by the idea of prophets in the modern world. The only prophets I was familiar with where the ones in the bible. The way I saw them, their primary duty was to tell everyone that Jesus was going to come and be our Savior. And since this had already happened, I didn’t really see the need for them. But as I learned and grew in the gospel, I began to see the purpose behind modern prophets. They were needed not just to tell everyone about Jesus, but also to lead and guide His people. Suddenly seeing Joseph Smith as a prophet seemed to make more sense.
Though I fairly readily believed in the mission of Joseph Smith, my testimony continued to grow as I moved through my life. One of the greatest points in my testimony comes from trying to write a book. Many of Joseph Smith’s critics say that he somehow wrote the Book of Mormon and then dictated it to his scribes rather than translating it. I know from my own escapade into writing how difficult it is to write a book. It’s been my experience that I have to keep pages of notes and outlines just to keep one plot line, a few subplots, and handful of characters straight. I can’t even imagine trying to keep straight the multiple plot lines, characters, genealogies, and timelines that are involved in the Book of Mormon. Then to memorize all of it and dictate it – word for word – as he would have had to have done. I just simply don’t believe it would have been possible.
Something that also added to my testimony was everything Joseph Smith was willing to go through for the sake of his teachings. Joseph Smith was beaten, tared and feathered, and imprisoned multiple times due to his expressions of faith. He ultimately died as a result of them. I don’t believe that someone who had simply made all of this stuff up would have been willing to go through everything he went through if he hadn’t seriously believed what he was saying.
All of this being said, I would like to make one thing very clear. I do not see Joseph Smith as some kind of deity. There are some who are outside of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints who think members of the church worship Joseph Smith. This is not true. While venerated, he is not worshiped any more than we would worship Moses, Elijah or any other prophet.
I genuinely believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. That he translated the Book of Mormon through power of God. I believe that he was chosen to bring forth the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I believe that through reading the Book of Mormon, people can be drawn closer to God and his Son, Jesus Christ. And I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
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