Hank Smith: 00:00:01 Welcome to followHIM, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come, Follow Me study. I’m Hank Smith.

John Bytheway: 00:00:09 And I’m John Bytheway.

Hank Smith: 00:00:10 We love to learn.

John Bytheway: 00:00:11 We love to laugh.

Hank Smith: 00:00:13 We want to learn and laugh with you.

John Bytheway: 00:00:15 As together, we followHIM.

Hank Smith: 00:00:18 My friends, welcome to another episode of followHIM. My name is Hank Smith. I’m here with my amazing and funny co-host, John Bytheway. Hi, John.

John Bytheway: 00:00:29 Hi, Hank. How are you?

Hank Smith: 00:00:31 I am well. John, I feel like my Come, Follow Me studies have increased a thousand times from last year to this year just doing this podcast. How are you feeling on your Come, Follow Me studies this year?

John Bytheway: 00:00:45 This has been such a blessing. In fact, I went to Dollar Tree and invested in a red pen because I don’t have time during the podcast to sharpen my red pencil. So now I did an uptick in the technology and I’ve got my red ballpoint pen so I can take notes.

Hank Smith: 00:01:03 Yeah, for those of you don’t know Dollar Tree and John, are very close. It’s a very close relationship.

John Bytheway: 00:01:09 I once asked the cashier do they pay you a dollar an hour? How does that work?

Hank Smith: 00:01:12 Yeah, it’s all Dollar Tree. All right. John, I got to tell you this before we get into this interview. I received a message from a listener in China.

John Bytheway: 00:01:23 Wow.

Hank Smith: 00:01:24 A listener in China who said, he told me, he said, “I just want you to know that I love the podcast and it helps me feel not so isolated out here in China.” So we want to give a shout out to him, let him know he’s not alone. His name, some people might even know it. His name is Jimmer Fredette. And Jimmer, thank you for being a fan of the show and know that the show is a big fan of you. So keep doing that thing, Jimmer.

John Bytheway: 00:01:52 That’s so fun. I showed that to my son, because I have a picture of Andrew with Jimmer, when we went down to that father and son’s basketball thing they used to have, or I guess they still have it. Maybe not this year because of the pandemic, but I’ve got Andrew and Jimmer together. So that was a fun day. He was super nice.

Hank Smith: 00:02:10 That’s wonderful. So the followHIM and Jimmer Fredette, we are mutual fans of each other, mutual fans. John, who do we have with us today?

John Bytheway: 00:02:19 Oh, we are excited to have Jordan Watkins with us today. And I am going to go right into it and read his bio, if that’s all right. Jordan Watkins is from Alpine. That just sounds like a beautiful place to be from. Anything named Alpine. He received a PhD in American history from University of Nevada Las Vegas. He has a bachelor’s in history from BYU, a master’s in history from Claremont Graduate University. And his book manuscript, Slavery and Sacred Texts: The Bible, the Constitution, and Historical Consciousness in Antebellum America examines the ways in which antebellum biblical and constitutional debates over slavery brought awareness to the historical distance separating Americans from their hallowed biblical and revolutionary past.

John Bytheway: 00:03:10 So antebellum means before the Civil War. His interest in American History stems from a lifelong fascination with Latter-day Saint history and his work in that field has appeared in the Journal of Mormon History, Mormon Historical Studies, and a number of edited volumes. He has presented at conferences of the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic, the Society for US Intellectual History, the African-American Intellectual History Society and the Western History Association.

John Bytheway: 00:03:40 He was a volume editor of the Documents Series of the Joseph Smith Papers before joining the faculty in Religious Education. Wow. We are thrilled to have you here, Jordan and thank you for taking some time with us today.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:03:56 I’m very excited to be here.

Hank Smith: 00:03:58 Yeah. I think it’s fair to say he is a real historian. From that bio, I’m going, “Okay, okay. I’ve got it. He is a real historian.” What would-

Dr. Jordan Watkins.: 00:04:10 Not a lot else, but I am a historian.

Hank Smith: 00:04:14 That’s fantastic. What did Garrett teach us about pseudo scholarship? Jordan, I don’t think we’re going to have any pseudo scholarship here today. I’m excited for this. Let’s just jump right into the lesson material. Doctrine and Covenants, Section 20 and April 1830 are big, big days for us, but they were probably even big bigger days for the prophet, Joseph Smith. Let’s talk about the time between the Sections 18 and 19 and Section 20. We’ve got a couple of stories to share John and Jordan. I want to ask you about that time period. Let’s talk about this little group of followers and coming up on coming from the summer of 1829 into April of 1830. Where is Joseph Smith and who’s doing the work?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:05:13 Whenever I think about Section 20, I like to go back to 1829 to some of the revelations that start to talk about the Church. Right? So there’s an early revelation to Martin Harris Section 5 of the Doctrine and Covenants where the Lord say, “If this generation doesn’t harden their hearts, he’ll establish his church among them,” which is kind of anticipating this ecclesiastical organization. That’s repeated in Section 10 as well. In that section, the Lord also says that he doesn’t say this to destroy the church, but to build it up, which is kind of interesting, right? Because then we’re dealing with multiple concepts of church, and it’s in that same section, Section 10 where he says, “Whosoever repenteth and cometh unto me, the same as my church.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:06:07 So I think that’s quite fascinating, right? In the period before the organization of the Church the Lord is working with multiple sort of definitions of what church is. One of the reasons I find that interesting is because I think in the church there’s a tension between a sort of inclusivity and exclusivity because of the Church’s claims. And really early on, the Lord is saying, “This understanding of church, there’s an inclusive understanding and please don’t forget that.” It’s almost as if he’s preempting he knows the members of the Church are going to be prone to really emphasize the exclusive part and he’s saying, “Well, remember, there are other people out there who are seeking to build up my church who are in this broader definition part of my church.” So don’t forget that.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:07:09 If that is an important message in the early Church when they actually do need to set themselves apart in some ways, they have to establish their identity. If that inclusive message is important then, it’s probably even more important now. We have a pretty firm foundation, right? We don’t have to stake out our unique identity. That’s a given at this point. So I guess part of the point here to highlight some of these early revelations mentioning church is to say that we need to be builders, not destroyers.

Hank Smith: 00:07:44 I really like that.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:07:45 Yeah.

Hank Smith: 00:07:46 Yeah, I really like that. That Section 10, verse 67 that you quoted, “This is my doctrine–whosoever repenteth and cometh unto me, the same is my church.” We did talk about this with Dr. Haws, but it’s something that is worth repeating that we are not… Let’s fight with other Christian churches, right? That’s not what the Lord is asking of us is to stake our claim against those churches, yet we see that plenty of times. I did that as a missionary, I think.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:08:23 Well, so do they, right? As early missionaries. You’ll get to this later on, but think of Parley P. Pratt going to the Shakers, and really having it out there and shaking his coattails, and leaving the meeting in anger and the Lord in later revelations is saying, “You’re not supposed to preach the gospel with contention.” But I think part of it is related to this inclusivity and exclusivity, right? There are some claims about exclusivity that are made in the Church and that are part of the revelations, but at the same time I think the Lord is trying to remind us always, “But don’t  forget the bigger picture here. They’re all my children and I’m interested in all of them and their salvation, right?”

Hank Smith: 00:09:16 Wow. Well said. Well said.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:09:17 We mentioned this too. We talked about this too briefly in Section 18, verse 20. It’s easy to remember 18:20. It’s kind of important, but “Contend against no church, save it be the church of the devil,” which is “Oh!” And this is as you said before, this formal organization even happened and it’s kind of the Lord’s drawing a different boundary about what a church is. I’m glad you brought that up.

Hank Smith: 00:09:44 Yeah. Me too, me too. Let’s just mention a couple of things before we jump into the section. So after the experience of the Three and Eight Witnesses, Joseph Smith moves back to Harmony, Pennsylvania. He goes back. That’s where his farm is that he bought from his father-in-law. That’s where his wife, Emma is. But he leaves Hyrum and Oliver in Palmyra to watch over the printing. And something interesting happens that I think this is such a good story, John. Did you find that? Where can our listeners find this next story. They’re going to want to find this.

John Bytheway: 00:10:24 I think they could find it here. This is what we call a book if you go back in time. It’s in the Gospel Library, the Saints book and I am on page… If you use pages, page 80. Well, I’ll just read it. I’ll use my most interesting voice. “That fall while the printers made steady progress on the Book of Mormon, a former judge named Abner Cole began publishing a newspaper on Grandin’s press. So remember, the Book of Mormon was being printed at the EB Grandin’s press building in Palmyra. Working at night in the shop after Grandin’s staff went home, Abner had access to printed pages from the Book of Mormon which was not yet bound or ready for sale.

John Bytheway: 00:11:09 Abner soon began poking fun at the gold bible in his newspaper and during the winter, he printed excerpts from the book alongside sarcastic commentary. When Hyrum and Oliver learned what Abner was doing, they confronted him. ‘What right have you to print the Book of Mormon this way?’ Hyrum demanded. ‘Do you not know that we have received the copyright?’

John Bytheway: 00:11:30 ‘It’s none of your business,’ Abner said. ‘I have hired the press and I will print what I please.’  ‘I forbid you to print any more of that book in your paper,’ Hiram said. ‘I don’t care,” Abner said. Unsure what to do, Hyrum and Oliver sent word to Joseph in Harmony who returned to Palmyra at once. He found Abner at the printing office casually reading his own newspaper. ‘You seem hard at work,’ Joseph said. ‘How do you do Mr…’ He was on his phone. I mean, today that’s what would be going on, right? But now he was reading his own newspaper and says, ‘How do you do, Mr. Smith?’ Abner replied dryly, ‘Mr. Cole,’ Joseph said, ‘The Book of Mormon and the right of publishing it belonged to me and I forbid you meddling with it.’

John Bytheway: 00:12:13 Abner threw off his coat and pushed up his sleeves, ‘Do you want to fight, sir?’ he barked pounding his fists together. ‘If you want to fight just come on.’ Joseph smiled. ‘You would better keep your coat on,’ he said. ‘It’s cold and I’m not going to fight you.’ He calmly continued, ‘But you have got to stop printing my book.’  ‘If you think you are the best man,’ Abner said, “Just pull off your coat and try it.’  ‘There is a law…’ “

Hank Smith: 00:12:38 Man, this guy he really wants to box. He wants to fight.

John Bytheway: 00:12:43 And Joseph could wrestle people. When I first heard this, I wondered what might happen. ” ‘There is a law,’ Joseph responded, ‘And you will find that out if you did not know it before. But I shall not fight you for that will do no good.’ Abner knew he was on the wrong side of the law. He calmed down and stopped printing excerpts from the Book of Mormon in his newspaper.” That’s the whole thing from Saints.

Hank Smith: 00:13:07 That is just fantastic. I love that story. I think I’m going to share that. I have four boys and I like that statement. “I will not fight you, it will do no good.” I think I am going to share that with my… I have a couple of older boys who think that sometimes fighting does a body good.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:13:24 We just talked about the Lord telling them not to fight against other churches.

John Bytheway: 00:13:28 -Not to contend.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:13:29 Yeah. And Joseph’s kind of going, “Okay.”

Hank Smith: 00:13:32 The other thing we need to talk about just a couple of items before we jump into the section, Jordan. I want to mention, one the printer’s manuscript. A lot of people don’t know that there are two different basically original manuscripts. One is the manuscript that Oliver Cowdery actually took down as Joseph dictated, but then following that, it seems they’d learn their lesson from having just one original copy. So they make a second copy called the Printer’s Manuscript and that’s Oliver Cowdery going back through and rewriting the entire thing.

Hank Smith: 00:14:17 We think about, “Oh, yeah. He just had to make another copy.” But can you imagine sitting down and rewriting the entire thing? There’s also a man I’d like to mention by the name of John Gilbert. John is, I think, he is on staff, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:14:34 Yes. I think he’s the Chief Compositor of the type.

Hank Smith: 00:14:41 Yeah. We often talk about Grandin being kind of the printer, but he’s more of the businessman. This guy John Gilbert is the one who’s actually setting the type for the Book of Mormon. I just wanted to mention him. He gave a lot of interviews and important interviews it says that he was actually quite proud of the fact that he set most of this type after the book becomes a little more famous. Robin Scott Jensen, who’s writing this.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:15:11 He’s a historian at the JSP, so he’s good.

Hank Smith: 00:15:15 Okay, great. It says, “What I find interesting about John Gilbert is of course we all know the story that the Book of Mormon manuscript was not punctuated. It was one giant run-on sentence, which isn’t totally true. There are a few scattered punctuation marks here and there.” Sounds like my middle school term papers, which isn’t totally true. There are a few scattered punctuation marks here and there, but essentially John Gilbert had to punctuate the entire Book of Mormon manuscript. He says, “And you know, I’m not an English major. I’m a History major, but I know enough about the English language to know that punctuation matters in engaging with a text. It’s subtle, but it’s important to know the phrasing or ending of a sentence.”

Hank Smith: 00:15:55 Gilbert introduces paragraphing. So the formatting structure, the way in which people pause at certain phrases is coming from someone who’s not a believer in Joseph Smith. I find that absolutely fascinating that here’s this man, and I don’t know if he’s inspired or not, but he is putting in the punctuation. And then one last person I want to mention is Thomas Marsh. Jordan, do you want to tell us a little bit about Thomas Marsh. I have his story here.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:16:29 Correct me, if I’m wrong but as I recall he’s from New York. Actually, I believe he works in a press for a time, but I know he leaves his home very young. We don’t know all the reasons why. In the subsequent revelation given to him, it mentions his background briefly. But eventually he hears about this golden bible, something of that nature and finds his way to Palmyra and shows up just as the first 16 pages are coming off the press. And Martin Harris is there and Martin is obviously excited. He’s put a lot of work and money into this endeavor. Marsh shows up and Martin excitedly, I would imagine shows him, “Hey, look at what the prophet has produced?”

Hank Smith: 00:17:23 Right. And he joins the Church. The book isn’t even focusing off the press and here he reads just 16 pages of it, receives a witness of its truthfulness and moves forward. That to me is amazing. And Thomas B. Marsh is going to become a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:17:43 Right, right. 1835. He’s a member of the Quorum of the Twelve. He’s one that eventually like a number of the early converts leaves the Church for a time, but finds his way back to Utah, and back into the Church.

Hank Smith: 00:17:57 Wow. And you mentioned Martin Harris, and I think we just need to give one last shout out. We have been talking about Martin for many weeks, right, John? I mean…

John Bytheway: 00:18:06 Yeah.

Hank Smith: 00:18:07 Martin Harris has been a subject for us for a long time, but everyone just kind of remember this date that on August 25th, 1829, Martin Harris mortgaged his farm to Grandin for $3,000 to print 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon. I just feel like let’s just give a moment of fist pump to heaven for Martin Harris, because to me that is, I don’t know. To me that is just a beautiful and amazing thing that he was asked to do, and he came through.

Hank Smith: 00:18:46 All right. Should we jump into this… Is there anything else? Before we get into Section 20, Jordan. Before we get in, what else do we need to know? What else do you teach your students before they get into to this section?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:19:05 Well, this is a section you’ve already talked about but Section 18 is really crucial to understand in relationship to Section 20. So Section 18, of course is directed to all… Well, it’s actually directed to three audiences, right? Oliver Cowdery. Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer, and then this future 12 Disciples. Just before that in Joseph Smith’s History, just before this revelation in Section 18, Joseph says that they are at the Whitmer home in Fayette, New York. They’re working on the translation at this point. So June of 1829, and they are praying about a question and the question they have is John came in May. He delivered the priesthood of Aaron and he said that he acted under the authority of Peter, James, and John, and said that they had the keys to a higher priesthood and that that would be given to us at some future point.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:20:06 So now here we are in June of 1829 and they’re asking about that promise. There’s a really interesting account that says that “The word of the Lord came to us in the chamber,” meaning the room in the Whitmer home, “commanding us that I should ordain Oliver Cowdery to be an Elder in the Church of Jesus Christ that he also should ordain me to the same office and after having been thus ordained we should proceed to ordain others to the same office according as it should be made known unto us from time to time. Also, commanding us,” and this is I think what is most relevant here, “also commanding us that as soon as practicable we should call together all those who had already been baptized by us to bless bread and break it with them to take wine, bless it, and drink it with them. And doing all these things in the name of the Lord.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:20:53 But to defer our own ordination until we had called together our brother and had their sanction.” So I think that’s really notable because it seems like the Lord here is saying call all the believers together and organize yourselves, and don’t ordain each other as elders until you have called them together. By the way, it’s pretty interesting that this source… So this is from Joseph’s Smith’s History, 1839, and in the first draft of this history, James Mulholland who is a scribe for Joseph Smith, he’s writing this down and he says that, “The Lord said to defer our own ordination until we had called the church.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:21:35 It doesn’t quite finish and then that’s crossed out. Well, there’s no church in June of 1829, but that tells us something about being careful about reading these historical documents. Sometimes, they’re projecting their views onto the past, and sometimes they catch it like they do here and say, “Wait, we didn’t have a church. Cross out church. Just say call together our brethren.” But what that does tell us is that by the summer of 1829, I think Joseph is quite seriously thinking about the organization of a church.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:22:12 I also mention this because in Joseph Smith’s History, that 1839 history, what is now Section 18 of the Doctrine and Covenants directly follows that account of the void hearing the voice of the Lord in the room in the Whitmer home. And in Section 18 of the Doctrine and Covenants the Lord describes Oliver Cowdery as being an apostle, or he’s called with the same calling as the apostle, Paul, which… And maybe it’s important here to note too that in the late 1820s and early 1830s, the term apostle was used synonymously with elder and with disciple.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:23:00 So for example actually in June of 1830 after the Church is organized, John Whitmer gets his Elder’s License and in that Elder’s License, he’s referred to as an Apostle of Jesus Christ. Now, somebody comes along later, I think in 1835 and crosses that out and you can see it crossed out. But those terms take new meaning over time. And I think that’s an important lesson about the Restoration in general that all of these terms and ideas are developing over time. But Section 18, the real reason I wanted to mention it is because in that section, the Lord told Oliver Cowdery “to rely on the things he had written,” meaning the Book of Mormon and noted that it contained all things concerning the foundation of His Church.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:23:56 He promised that, “Hey, Oliver, if you build up this church according to my gospel, according to the Book of Mormon, the gates of hell will not prevail against you.” So then in the summer of 1829, Oliver Cowdery starts using the Book of Mormon to create a document called the Articles of the Church of Christ. And this is actually notable in part because this is the first document that contains the church’s first name, The Church of Christ. And notice this, this is how it opens. A commandment from God unto Oliver how he should build up His Church.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:24:31 It’s written in the voice of the Lord, which I think is pretty interesting and that’s of course similar to many of Joseph’s revelations. I think Oliver is wanting it to be received in that way. And then it goes on to repeat some of the language and the revelations given to Oliver Cowdery. So Section 18, you can find some of the language there in his Articles of The Church of Christ. It contains much of the content from the Book of Mormon on these particular issues about baptism, about ordination of priesthood and teachers, about the administration of sacrament, about church meetings.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:25:08 So I think that’s important to know that the question becomes, okay, well, what is the relationship between Oliver Cowdery’s Articles of The Church of Christ and the Articles and Covenants, which we now know as Section 20. It’s hard to know that for sure. We actually also don’t know for sure when Section 20 is produced. Parts of it may be produced as early as the summer of 1829 because in Joseph Smith’s History, it’s also included after the experience in the room in Father Whitmer’s home. But we also think that he probably doesn’t finish this document until after the Church is organized because of the way that it talks about that day on April 6th as something that has happened.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:26:05 So this is a curious revelation, and it is received as a revelation even though it’s quite different from Joseph’s classic revelations. In Joseph’s classic revelations, we have the voice of Lord speaking directly to his audience, including Joseph Smith. And that’s not the case in Section 20. What that suggests, I think is that there’s a very active process by which this revelation is produced. I think that’s true of every revelation, but it’s not a passive process, right? God is working through his prophet. He’s not . . . .

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:26:47 I remember this from a class at BYU when I was an undergrad. Joseph Smith is not a fax machine. He’s not a human fax machine, right? God works through the mind of that prophet. And I think in this instance we have a really interesting case of that. Joseph, I think is perhaps reflecting on the Book of Mormon in producing this text. Perhaps, he even is reflecting on Oliver Cowdery’s document. But unlike Cowdery’s document, it doesn’t present itself explicitly as a revelation in the same way that Cowdery’s does, which is again I think also interesting.

Hank Smith: 00:27:26 Well, Jordan, I was just going to say that I love… You’re giving our listeners, and John and I a skill here, which is don’t assume that the terms and the development of the Church happens the way you think it would with your 2021 knowledge, right? A lot of people think, “Well, didn’t…” They were using terms Aaronic Priesthood, Melchizedek Priesthood when they got them, right? No, no. This was a developing thing. It wasn’t okay, the Lord is going to lay out the plan here and we got to get bar codes on the temple recommends, it was more, they’re kind of, I don’t know if I want to say winging it, but they’re figuring it out as they go.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:28:13 I think that’s an essential lesson here. When it comes to the things of God, for some reason we think to ourselves God works in sort of an instant rather than through a process. But that kind of neglects the human element here. We know the phrase, Elder Holland’s said it that, “We’re imperfect people as all God has ever had to work with and he deals with it, and so should we.” And that’s an excellent point, but we can also add to that, not only is it all he has, but people are actually part of his work and his glory, right? So if the Restoration itself is not part of this process that allows us to make mistakes and repent, and grow, and develop, then what’s the point, right? If the purpose is for us to become like Jesus Christ, why would he not also use the process of the Restoration as a means to that greater end?

Hank Smith: 00:29:17 That is a beautiful connection. Because if we don’t come at it with that lens, we might end up really confused going, “Wait, their name wasn’t The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from the very beginning? Was the Lord not… Did he not know the name of His Church?” No, he’s letting human beings figure this out as they go. And that’s my experience in life. John, I don’t know about you. You’re very spiritual. You two both are very spiritual, but for me I’m figuring this out as I go, in parenting, in marriage, in my own spirituality. It’s a day-by-day thing where I’m figuring things out.

John Bytheway: 00:29:59 Well, one of the things that I just love about the Doctrine and Covenants as a whole is the majority of the sections are answers to a question, because they’re figuring it out. How do we do this? How do we do this? Or we just read this in the Book of Mormon, do we need to do this? And then of course going through the JST and all these questions came up, and the Lord knows the answer, but maybe sometimes he waits until we ask. And then sometimes they’re sorry they asked, I think. He puts a further, burdens and obligations on him and everything. Maybe I shouldn’t have said that, but you know what I mean.

Hank Smith: 00:30:34 Yeah. Well, I’m with you. So Jordan, what I’m hearing is Section 29 was not… Or Section 20, I should say was not a sit down, write it out in one sitting. It sounds like years maybe.

John Bytheway: 00:30:47 Yeah. It doesn’t appear to be like… And many of his other revelations are like that where somebody shows up and says, “I’m interested what the Lord wants from me,” and Joseph is like take out a pen, right? In the case of Orson Pratt, he’s too shy to actually write his own revelation. But this appears to be more of a process. Now again, we can’t say for certain because the dating of these documents is complicated. But it does seem like he begins before the Church is organized perhaps as early as summer of 1829, and doesn’t end until soon after the Church is organized.

John Bytheway: 00:31:28 The Articles and Covenants was the first revelation published in the Church’s newspaper, The Evening and Morning Star. It’s actually the only revelation that appeared there twice. It became the second section of the first edition of the Doctrine and Covenants right after, as you might guess the preface. Its importance is also suggested by the fact that there are various extent copies remaining. And what that suggests is that they made multiple copies of this document, because it was so important. Even a newspaper, not affiliated with the Church, The Painseville Telegraph published what actually might be our earliest version of this revelation that’s actually published in the Joseph Smith Papers. And in doing so, the editor described the Articles and Covenants as the Mormon Creed.

John Bytheway: 00:32:20 I think in part of the reason for that is because it contains similar kinds of information to other creedal documents. An account of the organization’s history, a description of beliefs, instructions about things like baptism or administration of the Lord’s supper, church duties and offices. It really orients the early member’s lives in a pretty profound way. You could think of it as the constitution of the Church perhaps comparable to something like Section 42 and the way the Law of Consecration sort of orients early members of the Church.

Hank Smith: 00:33:00 It could be considered a manual. We have a Handbook of Instructions. This feels like a Handbook of Instructions in part.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:33:09 Yeah. I think that’s fair to say. I think it’s worth repeating what you mentioned a little bit earlier, this handbook will take on new meaning over time as they gain new insight and understanding about things like priesthood, right? But yeah, I think it does function in that way. In fact, we know that it functions in that way because a couple of months later in that June 9 conference, they are reading this document and then they are using it to perform the sacrament, to give out licenses, right? So they do use it as a manual.

John Bytheway: 00:33:52 I think what you said, Jordan about making copies of this and taking out, I mean if you were a missionary, and taught people about the gospel, well, then what do we do?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:34:01 That’s what I would say, yeah.

John Bytheway: 00:34:04 It was like, “Okay, so believe this. I’ll see you later.” Should I organize a branch or what does a branch do? What happens there? This becomes an early Handbook of Instructions. I think I read that that’s one of the reasons it was copied is so the missionaries could go out and how do I organize a branch? What does that look like exactly?

Hank Smith: 00:34:26 Yeah. When I was a kid, this was one of those sections where we hid it as a family and I started looking ahead going, “Oh, wow.”

John Bytheway: 00:34:33 Like 84 versus long.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:34:36 It was long. Yeah, it was a Jacob Chapter 5 moment, right?

John Bytheway: 00:34:39 Yeah.

Hank Smith: 00:34:40 We’re going to be here all day. Where do you take your students as you jump into this, Jordan?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:34:48 There are maybe three or four different sections here. We could say that the first section, maybe even the first just four verses, I read it almost as we’re a church too. We’re official too. There’s even some evidence perhaps that what goes on, on April 6th occurs in relationship to a law in New York that has been passed that you have to organize in a particular kind of way. So in some ways, it presents itself as a church among churches. But pretty quickly it also presents itself as a sort of the church among churches.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:35:27 Following that Section, you have the second Section. I don’t know verses 5 through 12 or so, which I think is indicating Joseph has received authority from God. And this is kind of what’s cool about this, I think, it’s kind of the early history of the Church summarized in these passages. This might be our first earliest account of the First Vision, right? Notice that passage after it was truly manifested under the First Elder that he received remission of his sins. He was entangled again in the vanities of the world. Now, we don’t think that’s all that detailed of an account, but that might be our first account because Joseph doesn’t write his first account until 1832.

Hank Smith: 00:36:15 That’s big news I think. I think that could be considered a very short account of the First Vision given here. This is years before the first account that we have.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:36:27 And it accords well with that 1832 account where Joseph is emphasizing I went in and prayed and got a remission of my sins. I was forgiven of my sins. It also aligns in suggesting that he then got entangled again in the vanities of the world. That’s like 1832 account that he repents and God sends an angel, right?

Hank Smith: 00:36:54 This is cool.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:36:55 It’s an early text about our history in this revelation. It mentions the Book of Mormon of course. It mentions the Three Witnesses. I like to highlight this part when I teach my students. So it’s got this phrase here, the holy… All of this demonstrates that the holy scriptures are true and that God does inspire men and call them to his holy work in this age and generation as well as in generations of old. Now, we can talk a little bit as we get to the next section about the theology in this document, but what really is sort of radical about belief among these people at this time is belief in a new prophet, right? Most of Joseph’s American contemporaries believed that the Bible was the ultimate and final word of God, right? Sola scriptura. And they rejected the idea that you could have new revelations that would somehow be as binding as the Bible.

John Bytheway: 00:38:02 That kind of comes up, skip ahead a little bit to Section 21 where, “Okay, this is his word. You shall receive as if from my own mouth and all patience of faith.” This idea of a living prophet. And as you were saying that, Jordan I’m thinking about Jesus coming along with the Sermon on the Mount and saying these completely audacious things. Like you’ve heard it said of old time, but I say and for them it was the old prophets. That’s what you rely on and would you say these folks, “Hey, this is all about the Bible. And now whoa, this whole idea of no, “We’ve got a living prophet as well.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:38:39 Yeah. To drive home that point you’re making, there are a few people in this period who are starting to challenge the idea that it’s the Bible alone. So I studied the Transcendentalists a little bit. So Ralph Waldo Emerson, Theodore Parker, others. Ralph Waldo Emerson gives an address in 1838 to the graduating class of Harvard Divinity School and he says a lot of things in that address. One of the things he says is men have come to speak of revelation as somewhat long ago given and done. And part of what Emerson wants to say is, “Why can’t God speak to me today?” Theodore Parker will say similar kinds of things. He’ll say, “God made the Bible for the soul, not the soul for the Bible.” In other words, why would it be the Bible alone? Why can’t God speak to me today?”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:39:28 Now, that’s pretty radical stuff. Emerson doesn’t get invited back to Harvard for 30 years. So that’s not seen as being okay. And I guess I would also note that Transcendentalists are not saying what Joseph’s saying. What makes Joseph’s position right more radical is he saying, “No, it’s not just that me through my conscience can reach the divine. It’s that we have prophets like we had prophets in old, and those prophets can produce written revelations that are as binding as the biblical text.” That’s what makes this, I use the term radical. It’s radical for Joseph’s contemporaries.

Hank Smith: 00:40:12 Yeah. I don’t think Joseph would have been invited back to Harvard Divinity School either.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:40:17 He never would have been invited in the first place, right?

Hank Smith: 00:40:22 I like how you’re breaking this up for us. So we’ve got our first section here. We’re a church among churches, but we’re also the Church, which is fascinating to me because we have that same concept today. Yes, we’re a church among churches. By the way, we’re the church among churches. We have that same kind of tension today. Then the history, I like that you’ve done this 5 through 12. I’ve never really noticed that before. Look at this just brief, concise history. What do we do after that? Where do you go from 13?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:40:51 That third section, I think is outlining beliefs. And I just talked about how radical the idea of having a new prophet was. Many of these beliefs and these verses are not all that unique. What do we get? We get creation. We get the Fall. We get the need for an Atonement. Those aren’t beliefs that would have set the Church apart from their Christian contemporaries. Now, we should know, “Yeah, of course Joseph’s understanding of these concepts in their particulars will evolve and develop over the years and they will become distinctive.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:41:37 But right here in 1830, in this section, a Christian maybe could have happened upon this section and gone because they didn’t know that somebody was claiming to be a prophet producing it. Gone, “Yeah, I believe that stuff.”

John Bytheway: 00:41:53 And what did you call it? It was sometimes called The Mormons’ Creed? Somebody wrote that. Because that’s what I see here. This is like basic Christianity about Jesus coming and all the things that he did. In fact, one of the things I love to show my students with paper scriptures is when you find a page that has that many footnotes on it, then you know it’s doctrinally rich. This is page 35 that we’re looking at right now.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:42:25 It kind of highlights what are the basics. These are the basics. And again, it’s no surprise that this document has a relationship to the Book of Mormon, right? If you’re a member of this church, you believe in these basic teachings, right? We sometimes forget that every early member of the Church was a convert from another Christian denomination. And they would have seen this and gone, “Okay, good. I’ve believed in these things. I now believe in some other things too. But these things are central.”

John Bytheway: 00:43:01 These first principles. I think I’ve talked about this before, sorry. But I had somebody ask me once, “Hey, how many years you taught the Book of Mormon? What’s the one thing that you’ve noticed?” And I said, “It’s first principles. How often faith in Christ and repentance are mentioned together? And how sometimes followed by baptism, Holy Ghost…” I’m looking at verse 29. “And we know that all men must repent and believe on the name of Jesus Christ and worship the Father in his name, and endure in faith on his name to the end”. I mean, it’s this basic restatement. So I like the way you said, that people would read and go, “Yeah, okay, yeah. This is what I’ve always known and there’s more.”

Hank Smith: 00:43:44 Yeah, and you’ve got the, what Elder McConkie would call the Pillars of Eternity here, right? You’ve got Creation, Fall, and Atonement.

John Bytheway: 00:43:50 The Fall and the Atonement.

Hank Smith: 00:43:52 Resurrection. Yeah.

Dr. Jordan Watkins 00:43:55 Yeah. I think that’s right. There are a few things that maybe would stand out a little bit. So verse, what is it, 27, those would come after who should believe in the gifts, spiritual gifts, gifts of the spirit. Now, there were people in this period who did believe in gifts of the spirit, charismatics as they were called, many evangelical groups. But there were also others who were saying, what are called Cessationists, right? They believe that the gifts ceased with the Apostles. So this does distinguish them in some ways in suggesting these are people who believe in a return of the spiritual gifts.

John Bytheway: 00:44:34 What would you say, Jordan about verse 32 that a man may fall from grace? Wasn’t that a contrast with Calvinism of the time.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:44:45 Yeah. So that’s a clear rejection of Calvinist belief, right? Unfortunately, whenever we talk about Calvinism, we only talk about like this one thing. When it’s really rich theologically in so many ways. But the idea of predestination, right? You are elected for salvation or damnation and you can’t do anything about it. And along with that idea is this concept of the perseverance of the Saints. If you are elect, you will remain elect. You cannot fall from that elect position. So this passage, it seems like a direct response to that, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:45:27 There is a possibility that man may fall from grace. Now, it bears noting I think that during the revivals of the 18th and then early 19th centuries, there is somewhat of a theological shift from Calvinism to what is called Arminianism. Not Armenianism, but Arminianism. It’s tied to a Dutch theologian, Jacobus Arminius. He emphasized that the individual had a role in accepting or receiving the grace of Christ. So that is a rejection of Calvinism. And during the revivals, many of the evangelical groups, Methodist, Baptists, others started to embrace that concept a bit more.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:46:11 I mean, that’s why you would go to a revival so that you could perhaps be moved to embrace the grace of Christ, right? So I suppose what I’m suggesting is it’s kind of this verse wouldn’t have stood out as strange to those from Evangelical backgrounds who have already started to accept this Arminian emphasis on receiving you, have the ability to receive the grace of Christ as an individual.

Hank Smith: 00:46:37 That’s interesting. A lot of the early converts and maybe I actually haven’t done my historical research on this, but it seems that Brigham Young comes from Methodism a little bit. John Taylor, Wilfred Woodruff. Maybe it was easier for someone to bridge into this new religion from Methodism than it was from maybe Presbyterianism.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:47:00 Yeah. I think that’s probably true. I mean, we could also talk and maybe we will talk a little bit about Restorationists, right? Like the Campbellites. Now, they also have some serious problems with Joseph Smith, but it’s no wonder that a lot of the converts come from in and around the area of Kirtland where there are these Restorationist groups people who are talking about the restoration of certain things, right? But I think Evangelical groups were more prone to accept this message.

John Bytheway: 00:47:38 I love what comes after that verse about that there’s a possibility that man may fall from grace. Therefore let the church, and notice who is being addressed, take heed and pray always lest they fall into temptation. So there’s some counsel that comes after that idea that it is possible to fall from grace. The perseverance of the saints is not what we’re talking about here. Then again in verse 37, and again, “by way of commandment to the church” and we see why they would read this a conference because this a commandments for all of us.

Hank Smith: 00:48:14 And it seems now they shift into, “Okay, now that we know what we believe, is this like how we’re going to put this into practice? Is that what comes next, practices?”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:48:25 Yeah. I think that’s the 4th Section. That’s the really long section. That’s the section where your kids might tune out a bit, right? It turns to instructions regarding ordinances, offices, duties. Now, again, it bears emphasizing. We’ve said it before, these offices are not clearly associated with Aaronic and Melchizedek Priesthoods at this point. Now, they will become associated with those priesthoods later especially after 1835, but nonetheless, it is clear that certain offices have certain rights. That’s one of the other things that is starting to set this church apart, right?

Hank Smith: 00:49:05 I wanted to ask one thing or maybe just say one thing and you could comment on this. And that is, I think when I read this with my family and I read “deacon, teacher, priest.” In my kid’s minds, They’re automatically going to come 12, 14, and 16. And that’s not the case here.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:49:24 No. That’s not the case here. It probably bears emphasizing that not all men have the Priesthood that conferred upon them or are ordained to an office during the 19th century. In fact, I’ve seen some recent research by Paul Reeve that suggests… I’ve got one example here. 1842, Salem, Massachusetts. 66 members of the church, one priest, one elder. Now, it wasn’t always that way, but I think maybe around 40 of the adult male membership. It depends on the where you’re at. So that’s a 20th century development that we are preparing every male to receive the priesthood. That is not the case in the 19th century and certainly not the case at the churches in the Church’s beginning.

Hank Smith: 00:50:23 So it doesn’t sound like it would be odd at all to be a member of the Church, be a man and not hold any office of any priesthood?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:50:30 Which probably bears emphasizing. We have come to, and hopefully I think we’re moving away from this, we have come to conflate priesthood and men more than they did in the early church probably because of that, right? This idea that every adult male can get the priesthood. We’ve probably come to make that conflation in ways that they perhaps would not have because they were not conferring the priesthood upon all male members of the church.

Hank Smith: 00:51:02 Right. So they wouldn’t say we’d like to thank the priesthood for stacking the chairs, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:51:07 They would never say that.

John Bytheway: 00:51:09 Yeah. I’m glad you bring this up. I think that the Come, Follow Me manual suggests a great talk to go read from President Oaks in April of 2014. In fact, I have my students write a paper on this. Tell me what the difference is between the keys of the priesthood, the authority of the priesthood, the power of the priesthood, and who holds it and who uses it, and things like that?

John Bytheway: 00:51:31 I think in that talk that the Come, Follow Me Manual recommends that we read, he even says we shouldn’t refer to the men as the priesthood. It may be holders of the priesthood, and some of them may be and not all of them may be, but I’m glad you brought that up.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:51:49 Yeah. Maybe something to note there too, and maybe I already mentioned this, but they do immediately start using this document in relationship to the offices for example. So at the June conference that follows Joseph and Oliver Cowdery ordain some of the members to these offices. Samuel Smith one of the original members of the Church is ordained as an elder. Joseph Smith, Sr. and Hyrum Smith are ordained as priests at that June conference. So they are taking this instruction and applying it pretty immediately.

Hank Smith: 00:52:24 I have always loved in Section 20 that the Lord has a bigger church in mind than this small little group of six people, right? Because we’ve got to visit the house of each member and they’re probably looking at each other going, “We all live in the same house.”

John Bytheway: 00:52:39 Yeah. We’ve got the Colesville branch, the Harmony Branch. They’re just basically three families, right? In fact, Craig Osler said something really funny about this because if you’ve ever been to the Fayette, the Whitmer home, he said there are 60 people in there. He says, “That could be the first miracle of the Church if you’ve got 60 people in there.” Because it’s you walk in there, you think, “You have 60 people in here. Were they smaller back then?”

Hank Smith: 00:53:06 And he says if you go from one place to another, you can take a recommend with you basically, right? That you’re worthy.

John Bytheway: 00:53:12 A license, yeah.

Hank Smith: 00:53:14 They’ve got to be thinking, “We all know each other.” I like to sometimes call it kind of a patriarchal blessing for the Church that, “Hey, you’re going to get bigger. Hey, you’re going to succeed. Hey, this is going to be great, so get ready.” And it’s got to be kind of an exciting document in that way.

John Bytheway: 00:53:33 Yeah, that’s kind of an implied message. This church is going to stay and it’s going to grow and you’re going to need some order here and how you do things. When did we decide you become a deacon at 12 and a teacher at 14. Now, it’s the 12th year. It’s not 12th birthday anymore.

Hank Smith: 00:53:54 Yeah, I’m going to pretend to be smart here. I actually read a book called Mormonism in Transition.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:53:59 Yeah, it’s good.

Hank Smith: 00:54:00 Thomas Alexander, and that’s really that shift from 1880 to 1930 is the Church changes dramatically. And then John, that’s where a lot of that comes from is this the idea of curriculum and Young Men’s, Young Women’s programs, all of that Primary, all comes into its own there in that 50-year period.

John Bytheway: 00:54:23 I think maybe it’s a good time just to bring up I love this phrase that I believe is President Nelson’s phrase, I may be wrong, but the idea of “a continuous Restoration.” I like to tell my students, “Hey, these documents are new relatively. We’ve had the Bible for thousands of years, but we’ve only had the Book of Mormon for a couple of hundred.” We’re learning things and still the Restoration continues. I like that idea.

Hank Smith: 00:54:53 Jordan, I want to ask you a question. With the understanding of these priesthood offices changing so much, is it still appropriate for me to use Section 20 to talk to deacons today, teachers today, priests and elders today. Would you feel like this is still a usable document when it comes to those priesthood offices?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:55:16 Certainly. I would add the maybe the caveat that it’s a usable living document in the sense that… I think it is important as a historian to try and understand the original meaning of these texts, right? But after I’ve done that work, why should I not then work to apply these revelations to my own life? I think God wants us to do that and we just know that the early Church was doing that, right? So in June of 1829, when they get Section 18 of the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Lord explains what the 12 Disciples will be doing, they maybe read that in one way in 1829.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:56:08 Well, in 1835 when the Quorum of the Twelve was actually called and the Church has been through so much since then, they may read it in a bit of a different way at that point, and that’s perfectly fine. Now, again, I do think we have to be careful and recognize that we are making applications that they may not have made. But that’s an okay thing. Can’t that be part of as, John suggested, sort of the process, “the Continuing Restoration” that we go back to these texts and treat them like living documents and allow them to continue to teach us.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:56:45 And in that sense, Hank, I think your comment about a patriarchal blessing is spot on. I read my patriarchal blessing one way when I received it, and then I lived my life and realized that, “Oh, not quite how I thought it would go. But I went back or I’d go back and read it again and draw new meanings in light of my new contexts, and I think the Lord wants us to be doing that.”

Hank Smith: 00:57:14 Oh, that’s excellent because I’m seeing things here that priests and teachers still do visit the house of each member that’s taken on different title and different names over the years, Home Teaching, now Ministering. But it’s still there. Teacher’s duty is to… I have a son who is in the teacher’s quorum. I would love to tell him, you’re watching over the Church, right? Make sure there’s no lying, and backbiting, and evil speaking. Hey, everyone should be doing that.

John Bytheway: 00:57:49 Just the other night in young men’s, “All right. We’re all going. Bring your snow shovel. We’re going to shovel some driveways.” It was a watching over the church physical kind of thing that they could do. My boys took off and did it. It was great.

Hank Smith: 00:58:03 Let’s keep going here because I want to talk about the actual day of organization. How far does this fourth section go? Is that really the rest of it?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:58:12 Yeah. I think it’s kind of the rest of it. Maybe some kind of standout things to mention might be… So there’s a mention about candidates for baptism, right? And that candidacy follows the Book of Mormon except this one phrase “that they will truly manifest by their works, that they have received the gift of Christ under the remission of their sins,” right? So in verse 37, it includes requirements for baptism and it follows the Book of Mormon. The one addition it adds is this phrase that the candidates will truly manifest by their works that they have received the gift of Christ under the remission of their sins.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:58:56 Now, Oliver Cowdery’s Articles of the Church of Christ included a similar but different phrase. His phrase was that each member shall speak and tell the church of their progress in the way of eternal life. Now, that idea of sharing your conversion story accepting Christ’s grace, that was not uncommon among many denominations in this period, and I think that’s probably what Oliver Cowdery is tapping into. But you notice the difference there. Cowdery is placing an emphasis on words. The Articles and Covenants is placing an emphasis on works, and I think Cowdery’s feeling like this is undermining the doctrine of grace. He commands Joseph Smith in the name of God to change this passage.

Hank Smith: 00:59:51 Wow, okay. I’m excited to hear about it.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 00:59:56 And Joseph’s response, “Who are you?” what was that they fought about. No, they didn’t fight it. Abner Cole.

Hank Smith: 01:00:05 He’s like, “Take your coat off.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:00:07 Let’s go. He said, “By what authority he took upon him to command me to add or diminish to or from a revelation or commandment from Almighty God.” By the way, that language is in Section 20, which echoes passage in Revelation. But that highlights an important point. These early members are figuring out what it is to have a prophet. Joseph is figuring out what it means to be a prophet. And this isn’t of course the end of this, right? There will be future settings in which Oliver Cowdery is chastised for maybe paying attention to Hiram Page or placing sort of faith in somebody else who has not been designated as God’s prophet, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:00:59 And Joseph incidentally, right? Joseph doesn’t, in those situations just say, “Hey, don’t you remember Section 20, and we’ll talk about Section 21? Don’t you remember those Sections?” He’s like, “Well, okay. I guess, I need some more insight here, right? Which tells you something perhaps about his kind of growing into the role of prophet as well.

John Bytheway: 01:01:21 I love that. That is so important. They are figuring it out. Let’s have patience with them and not hold them to a standard that they should have it all figured out and they should be doing everything perfectly. Well, do we hold ourselves to that same standard? We’re still trying to figure out how to receive revelation. We’re still trying to figure out our own patriarchal blessings, and our duties, and our callings. We’re still trying to figure it out.

Hank Smith: 01:01:49 It’s funny. I gasped hearing that someone’s going to command the prophet.

John Bytheway: 01:01:54 Oh, I know.

Hank Smith: 01:01:55 But in that day, Oliver probably would have said, “What? What’s the problem?”

John Bytheway: 01:01:58 I’m one of the Elders of the church.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:02:01 Well, also note that Oliver had written a document that he thought would be used. And it doesn’t get used, it gets sort of pushed aside. By the way in the Revelation Book One. Revelation Book One is a book of the earliest revelations. So they would there would be copies and then they decided, “Well, we probably should have a book of all these revelations, right? In Revelation Book One, this revelation says, “Given to Joseph Smith, the seer.” And then there’s an addition by Oliver Cowdery and to Oliver, an Apostle. Oliver, he had done a lot. He was very invested and he wanted to make sure that people knew his place, even though sometimes he didn’t know his place, right? And Joseph to some extent is willing to say, “Get some pushback.” Right?

Hank Smith: 01:03:03 Right.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:03:03 Now, he clearly corrected him there. It’s a different setting in part because of the context, in part because of Joseph’s own personality.

Hank Smith: 01:03:13 Oh, man. I can’t tell you how much I like this. And I will add that the tension between grace and work is still going on today. I mean, if we still have that in the Church today like where do we fall on that, it kind of depends on which church leader you’re listening to along that spectrum. So I love that that was happening on the first month of the Church is this tension between grace and works.

John Bytheway: 01:03:41 I think another phrase that they added, isn’t it true in verse 37 that we were just on is “the broken heart contrite spirit phrases,” which I love those. And I made a note because I wanted to comment that… And I heard Sheri Dew talking about the process of making a wild horse to a tame horse, and what is the phrase that we use at least to break them? She said a broken heart is one that’s submissive to its master. So I like that idea, which is also a Book of Mormon and it’s in the Bible too of a broken heart and a contrite spirit. As part of that requirements for baptism, I just wanted to… Isn’t that true, Jordan that was also added?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:04:31 I think you’re right. I don’t know when it’s added, but I think that is one of the phrases that is added, and that bears mentioning too, right? That this is a text that is revised. Not heavily, but it is revised as are a number of the revelations. That tells us something about the process of revelation, right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:04:50 I think that point too is interesting. Joseph is not saying throughout his life he emphasizes the need for Christ, right? And the revelations do as well, and the grace of Christ. I think one of the things that this is anticipating is members of the Church are going to have to do a lot of work. They are going to be called to do hard things. So it’s sort of anticipating all of that work that they will have to do as members of the Church in emphasizing works.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:05:25 Maybe it bears mentioning, and then we maybe we can move to actually… I guess, we haven’t actually talked about the organization of the church yet, but there are these phrases in here, right? The prayers for the sacrament. And those come out of the Book of Mormon, right? But I love this thought that BH Roberts… So BH Roberts, a convert to the Church, an amazing thinker of the Church, early historian of the Church, he said this about those prayers. He said these prayers of consecration are the most perfect forms of sacred literature to be found.

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:06:06 When I read that, I’m like, “Really? Are they? I think we read them so much, we hear them so much that we just take them for granted.” Truman Madsen who wrote a biography of Roberts said that Roberts found these “prayers to embody in masterful rich, heavily freighted phrases the whole of the gospel”. That’s pretty cool stuff, right? Again, I think we just take it for granted like okay, there’s the sacrament prayer. But for Roberts, this was actually sort of proof of the divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon. So it’s, of course, I think important that we find these prayers in the Church’s organizing document.

John Bytheway: 01:06:58 Thank you for saying that. And I think that in the Come, Follow Me Manual, it actually says as you read about the sacrament in the Doctrine and Covenants, Section 20, “Try to read these sacred prayers from the perspective of someone hearing them for the first time. What insights do you receive about the sacrament, about yourself? How might these insights affect you, the way you prepare to take the sacrament this week?”

John Bytheway: 01:07:24 And I have a friend who you guys might have heard of, Brother [Gary Pohl 01:07:28] and he just… I love the way he said it once, he said, “If Heavenly Father had a favorite scripture,” and he said, “I don’t know if he does, but if he did, he might arrange it, so that his people would hear it often.” He might even arrange it so the person saying it would be kneeling. And all of us would be listening. I’m really intrigued with the things the Lord has us repeat and this one is a weekly thing. And it is slow down and see how beautiful and rich this prayer is and what it’s saying.

John Bytheway: 01:08:04 I was going to ask you because I was intrigued by this that it says before the prayer here that the priest would kneel with the elder or priest will kneel with the Church. And I wonder did they used to all kneel down for that time?

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:08:22 Yeah. I think that is the case. Now, the difficulty here is the records. Even, if they are kneeling every time, they’re not going to tell us that because it’s just something they do. But I do think that’s the case and I think one of the reasons we don’t is just kind of logistics. We’re sitting in those pews, and that’s not going to work. But I think it would have been the case and somebody probably could tell us that yes, they would have all knelt for these prayers.

Hank Smith: 01:08:55 Wow. I get a chance to do this in my New Testament classes. I feel kind of left out sometimes in these Church History discussions going, I don’t know what I’m doing. But we do study the sacrament in the New Testament classes. And I love to ask my students questions they probably haven’t thought of. Why are there two prayers? Why don’t we do this in one? Why are there two symbols instead of one? Why do we sing before, right? All of these things that we just do. If you go through it, you think, “Well, there’s probably meaning behind everything that we do.

Hank Smith: 01:09:30 I’ve often told my students take a dollar bill, something you handle every day and find something new on it. And if they actually stop and look at it, they go, “Oh, I’ve never noticed that. Oh, I’ve never noticed that. I’ve never even looked at that before. What does that mean?” And we can do that with the sacrament. We can stop for a second. Something we deal with often and say, “Let me look in closely at this?” It’s rich. There’s so much there. I’ve had students draw out the most interesting ideas. They’ve said the Atonement overcomes two deaths, spiritual death and physical death. And maybe there’s two prayers.

Hank Smith: 01:10:08 They said that the Savior had two experiences, the Garden of Gethsemane and the cross, and perhaps each prayer… They just draw out things that they never would have seen before. Can’t we just slow down a little bit and really taken a look at the sacrament and all the little things that we do around it? It’s been a fun experience to hear my students draw out things I never would have seen.

John Bytheway: 01:10:33 Stephen Covey in Spiritual Roots of Human Relations, a book that my dad had from the ’70s or something. He equated Moses 1:39 with the sacrament. Immortality, that’s the bread. That’s Jesus’s body. That’s accomplished. He was resurrected, the First Fruits in eternal life. That’s because of his blood, that’s the wine, the water, the Atonement. I can’t think of the sacrament now, and the bread, the water, without equating immortality, eternal life. And another just fun insight, and I love Jordan, as you mentioned that this is from the Book of Mormon. This is from Moroni going back and getting… And I’ve had students ask why are they in both places? Well, I think this answers the question. This is what Oliver was told to do in Section 18, right?

Hank Smith: 01:11:25 I wonder if Moroni elbows Mormon,” I put that in there. This is good stuff.”

Dr. Jordan Watkins: 01:11:29 It’s good stuff, yeah.

John Bytheway: 01:11:32 Please join us for Part II of this podcast.