Hank Smith:                      00:00:00             Coming up in this episode on followHIM.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:00:03             When he did come to Utah, he went to see Brigham Young. By this point, Thomas B. Marsh has had some really severe health problems and suffers from palsy. As Brigham seeing him after 18 years. He at first doesn’t seem to recognize him. He asked Thomas to speak and Thomas speaks, and then Brigham says, truly it is you.

Hank Smith:                      00:00:33             Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of followHIM. My name is Hank Smith. I’m your host. I’m here with my co-host whose heart is full of good cheer. Now, John, you can’t disagree with that one. You disagree every week, but this one you can’t disagree.

John Bytheway:               00:00:50             I try to have a native cheery temperament. I heard that someplace.

Hank Smith:                      00:00:55             You do. I have known you, it’s over 15 years, John, since we first met, and very rarely have I seen you not of good cheer. It’s happened once or twice, but very, very little.

John Bytheway:               00:01:07             I’ve been real tired.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:09             Yeah. Hey John. It is a privilege today to have back on the show Dr. Susan Easton Black. Susan, welcome back to FollowHIM.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:01:22             Thank you. It’s great to be with both of you again. I love your show. Love what you’re doing.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:27             That voice, I guarantee is now familiar to so many who are listening.

John Bytheway:               00:01:32             Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:33             John, how many times, I know this has happened to me, honestly, I can’t even count. When I tell people, they’ll say, where do you work? And I’ll say, oh, I work in the religious education department at BYU. Do you know Susan Easton? I had Susan Easton Black as a church history professor. That class changed my life, changed everything. Yes, I’ve heard that before and yes, I know Susan.

John Bytheway:               00:01:57             Yeah, and she could get up and speak without notes about the prophet Joseph Smith for hours. Hours. It’s always inspiring.

Hank Smith:                      00:02:07             The best of the best, honestly.

John Bytheway:               00:02:08             Yeah, you are treasure.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:02:12             Thank you. Well, big blessing. Add the great subject material. How can you, Joseph Smith, how great is that?

Hank Smith:                      00:02:17             Yeah. John, we finished last week with the dedication of the Kirtland Temple, Dr. Anthony Sweat. We hinted at the fact that things change after the dedication. What do you think of when you think post temple dedication in Kirtland?

John Bytheway:               00:02:36             I know both of you have had this experience where you leave the temple, you’re on a wonderful spiritual plane and then maybe you get a text that says, Hey, you owe Intermountain Healthcare $300. That happened to me yesterday. Suddenly it’s, I don’t wanna say back to the real world because that somebody said that leaving the temple to Elder Groberg and he said, wrong, the real world is in here. That world’s temporary. That world’s gonna end, but this is the real world here in the temple. That’s what I think of because we just left 110. We just left the Savior appearing. Then here comes the finances and everything else as they go to 111. So there’s kind of a contrast between those two.

Hank Smith:                      00:03:19             Susan, as you’ve looked at these sections in this time period, what are we gonna do today?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:03:26             I think everybody will really like today. I think they’ll feel like they can really relate.

Hank Smith:                      00:03:32             Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:03:33             Each one of the sections we’re talking about, somebody has a concern, somebody has a worry. Like you said, section 111, Joseph Smith is worried about finances. By section 12 Thomas B. Marsh is worried about the Quorum of the Twelve. Not all of them are keeping the commandments. I always find it interesting. He never includes himself in that thought, but then 113, you get Elias Higby and others are worried about doctrine and they pick something random out of Isaiah. Two different chapters. Then the last you get David W. Patten wondering how really can he go on a mission and be ready to go? He’s got merchandise, he’s got things that are going on in his life. How much is he willing to sacrifice? I think you asked me ’cause you knew I could really worry and teach everyone how to do that.

Hank Smith:                      00:04:29             You could relate to having worries.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:04:32              Yes, everyone is concerned. Answers are forthcoming, which I think is wonderful.

Hank Smith:                      00:04:38             Mm-hmm. As I was preparing, I thought of Moses chapter one. Moses has this incredible experience with the Lord and then it came to pass that Moses looked upon Satan. Satan came tempting him. Does seem that this darkness follows. I’m sure you both know this. Moses continues to fight through that darkness. John, I am convinced that everyone listening knows Susan. However, there may be a new member of the church who is thinking, wait, who? Why don’t you give us a little bit of a background. We honestly could take an hour to do this, so you’re gonna have to give us the highlights.

John Bytheway:               00:05:22             Yeah. She was raised in Long Beach, California. I’ve always wanted to be raised in something that had beach in the title. That just sounds really nice. The Great Salt Lake Beach doesn’t do it. Anyway, Long Beach, she was the first woman to teach in religious education at BYU. She also was the first woman to receive the Karl G. Maeser Distinguished Faculty award for her research and writing. We don’t wanna embarrass you, but that’s our highest award given a professor at Brigham Young University. I mean, I couldn’t even get a key to a part-time office, but they gave her that.

                                           00:06:01             She taught at BYU for 38 years. She’s a guest lecturer and instructor now at Utah Valley University. She’s written over 150 books, 150 books.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:13             I don’t know if I’ve read that many John.

John Bytheway:               00:06:14             Here’s one of them, right here. She served two missions for the historic sites department, a mission as a psychologist for LDS Social Services, a mission to the Nauvoo Illinois Temple, a mission to the St. George Temple Visitor Center and a mission to the priesthood and family department of the church. Kim asked me this morning, are you recording today? Who have you got? And I said, Susan Easton Black. And she went, ohh, because she’s told me she had her at BYU a long time ago and could sit there and listen for hours.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:47             Yeah, I’ve heard the same thing John.

John Bytheway:               00:06:51             Let’s not talk today. Let’s let Susan talk.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:52             Yeah, John, I’m gonna give a little challenge here. If anybody listening had Susan as a professor and would like to leave her a message, come over to YouTube, leave a message there. We’ll make sure they all get to Susan. If you were born in the 19 hundreds and you don’t know what YouTube is, you can come over to our website, followHIM.co and you can leave us a message there and we’ll make sure all of these get to Susan. Susan, honestly, 38 years at BYU, that’s thousands of students.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:07:24             Thousands of students but always the best students.

Hank Smith:                      00:07:28             Yeah, we’re unbiased. But yeah, before we leave some background here, John, just so you know, Susan doesn’t spend all of her time reading and writing with all that she’s done. She is a master pickleball player and before that ping pong. She just expanded from

John Bytheway:               00:07:47             Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:07:47             ping pong to pickleball.

John Bytheway:               00:07:50             Tell us about your latest pickleball achievement. Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:07:53             Well, I don’t know if it’s a real achievement, but I did play in the stadium of fire pickleball tournament for the one or two of us there. I came in third.

Hank Smith:                      00:08:04             Third place for the one or two of us.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:08:08             I do like the game. It’s very fun. I have the philosophy, use it or lose it and you gotta move.

Hank Smith:                      00:08:14             Gotta keep moving.

                                           00:08:16             John, with all that you read and all that we’ve learned, I don’t know of a person who does more. This is the way she is John. She’s full of life.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:08:23             Hey, thank you. Sure glad I showed up today.

Hank Smith:                      00:08:26             Yeah. Yeah, John, you’re right. We need to let Susan teach. I’ll jump into the Come, Follow Me Manual and we’ll turn it over to her. The lesson is sections 111 through 114. The title is, I Will Order All Things for Your Good. The manual starts this way. Have you ever had a spiritual experience that made you feel confident and secure in your faith in Christ, but then life’s afflictions tried your faith and you found yourself struggling to recover the peace you felt before? Something similar happened to the saints in Kirtland. Less than a year after the spiritual outpourings connected with the dedication of the Kirtland temple, troubles arose. A financial crisis, conflict in the Quorum of the Twelve, and other trials caused some saints to waver in their faith despite their earlier experiences. We can’t avoid trials, so how can we keep them from threatening our faith and testimony?

                                           00:09:22             Maybe part of the answer can be found in the Lord’s counsel in section 112. Given while adversity in Kirtland was swelling, the Lord said, purify your hearts before me. Rebel not. Gird up thy loins for the work and be thou humble. As we follow this council, the Lord will lead us by the hand through adversity and into healing and peace. Beautiful. Susan, I think we’re ready to go. I noticed that section 111 is in Massachusetts. Section 112 is in Ohio. Section 113 does not give a location. We are all over the map here, all over the map.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:10:00             You’re in for a geography lesson, right?

Hank Smith:                      00:10:02             Right. Yeah. Susan, how do we wanna start?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:10:07             Okay, well I’d like to tell everyone about Salem, Massachusetts. You realize it’s named after the Royal City of Melchizedek so long ago. Salem, Massachusetts was one of our early cities in America being founded in 1626. But I think for most of us, the reason we know so much about Salem, Massachusetts is remember they had the witch trials. So in 1692, there’s a history of witchcraft. So it’s 70 years after the town is founded, some friends, all female, got together. They started doing what the townsfolk called witchcraft. What they did was so simple, they merely got what was called Venice glass and it was a mirror and they got an egg and they would spin the egg. For that there was a trial and 19 of this group, for preaching they thought what they were learning from this spinning egg were literally hung until dead.

                                           00:11:11             And you’d think that most towns would want to push that down and hide it, but Salem, Massachusetts has made a big deal out of it. So for example, today they have an elementary school called Witchcraft Heights. They have a knoll in town they call Gallows Hill. On their police cars they have witches. They’ve made kind of a big deal about they are the witch hunt town. And then we say, well Joseph, what are you doing there? When obviously most of the churches in Kirtland and some have moved on to Missouri, you with your brother Hyrum and Sidney and Oliver have left literally the body of the church and gone to what by that point was called the largest, well, it was the sixth largest town in the United States, but it was a seaport that will soon be passed by Boston and New York City. What’s he doing out there?

                                           00:12:17             The answer goes like this. It’s almost as odd as the witch hunts itself. Joseph Smith is struggling. What he’s struggling with is indebtedness. The issue is is that at that temple dedication and prior to that, people from the north and east were contributing finances to the building of the temple. But once the temple was dedicated, finances dried up. Then you add to the issue, people in Kirtland have been asked to give money to the poor and bleeding in Missouri financially. The church via Joseph Smith is being hit two ways. One is we still have lots of bills to pay on the Kirtland Temple. Two, there are still poor and bleeding in Missouri that are trying to now get out of Clay County and work their way to Farr West in Caldwell County. Issues are big and at this point there’s a convert to the church and his last name is Burgess.

                                           00:13:21             And this Jonathan Burgess, tells Joseph Smith and other church leaders that he knows of a widow who’s now died, but she has a house and it’s in Salem, Massachusetts and in the cellar of the house there’s some buried treasure. Now, we’d look at it today and we go, we wouldn’t buy into it, you know, at least we hope not. But Joseph is looking for where are there options? Where can I get money? Notice this is before the Kirtland Safety Society. This is his first attempt to pay off the bills, and the result will be is that Joseph now is heading out to Salem, Massachusetts. And notice verse one, I the Lord your God am not displeased with your coming this journey. In other words, it’s okay. You brought Hyrum, Sidney, Oliver, not withstanding your follies, in other words, come on Joseph. I see this as follies.

                                           00:14:28             But then the Lord is saying that he has much treasure in this city. Well, eventually Burgess leaves and heads back to Kirtland. But then you look, Joseph stays out there and he stays out there a month with his friends and they try to find the house. They try to find the house, and finally they figured out where the house is located, but they find that people are living in it. They don’t know can they rent it? Can they buy in it? Can they get in to get the treasure? The Lord then gives us revelation telling Joseph that there are treasures in this town. We find by 1843 they’ve formed members of the church. There’s over a hundred of them in Salem that missionaries have gone there. And then the other big treasure, of course, is their family genealogy that was being kept there as well as any other place and in many cases better that the treasure is knowing who lived there and who lived there.

Hank Smith:                      00:15:31             Susan, someone might say, this is a crazy idea to go get money here. But I mean, Joseph Smith’s a human being. I can think of in my life how many ideas I’ve thought, hmm, I wonder. I wonder if that will work. And it completely backfired. There’s listeners out there who probably every one of us can go, oh yeah, I remember that dumb idea. I lost a lot on that idea. I’ll be vulnerable here John. One time I bought a stock, it was a penny stock. You know, it’s a penny, it’s gonna go up to $40. It kept going up, kept going up. I bought it at its highest point. Yeah, John, I am good. I am so good. It from the moment I bought it. It never went up again and it went down to zero. I know this might seem like a way to criticize these men, but they’re human beings. We’ve all done something like this where we thought maybe there is, maybe this will work out financially.

John Bytheway:               00:16:36             I just like almost the tone of voice of the Lord. I’m not displeased with you, notwithstanding your follies, they’re just, sounds like I’m shaking my head up here, but I’m not displeased. I know what you were trying to do and maybe I can turn this for some good. As you mentioned Susan, was it Robert Smith and his genealogy that was here, an ancestor of Joseph

                                           00:17:00             Right. You’d say, how did they spend their time when they were looking for the house? They’re preaching, they’re telling the people about the church. They’re acting the part as missionaries, the seeds that they planted for others who came thereafter. But I relate. I think sometimes we really go off on a tangent and it’s not the right tangent, but at least we’re moving.

Hank Smith:                      00:17:25             Right? Doing something.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:17:26             At some point we get reigned back in. But I like the Lord is not angry and it’s not like he’s being really rebuked. Perhaps we can feel like it will be okay with us too.

Hank Smith:                      00:17:40              It’s okay. Even though not the best idea, but let’s turn this into something useful.

John Bytheway:               00:17:48             It’s kind of like Hank your penny stock thing. Okay, Hank, what have you learned? Kind of okay, I’m not angry, but I am always concerned that you’re learning and growing. So what have you learned by this? You know, I like that tone of voice.

Hank Smith:                      00:18:02             Yeah, me too.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:18:04             I liked that the Lord will deal mercifully with his children. Sometimes I think we’re too hard on ourselves. We’re all trying. Maybe someone should write the song. Try, try, try. This is an example of Joseph trying to solve actually a big problem. That’s an important problem that does need a solution. I like his effort. But eventually you get, be thou humble and the Lord thy God will lead you by the hand. In other words, smart as you’re being your follies, it’s time to be humble.

Hank Smith:                      00:18:42             Yeah, there’s a better way to go about this. I can see the Lord saying, why don’t we try my way? John, what scripture is it where he says your way is like a purse with holes where you put your stuff in and it just falls out and

John Bytheway:               00:18:55             It all falls out.

Hank Smith:                      00:18:56             Yeah. Let’s consider my way.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:18:59             I like this one verses one and two where he says, I have much treasure in this city. Truly the history in the city is amazing for you, for the benefit of Zion. And you wonder if we have really reaped all of that treasure. Yet he says, and many people in this city whom I will gather out in due time for the benefit of Zion through your instrumentality. In other words, what the Lord is saying is that people are the treasures. Sometimes we look beyond the mark. We don’t realize the greatness in the individuals that we actually interact with. And then he says verse three, therefore it is expedient that you should form acquaintance with men in this city as you shall be led, as it shall be given you. I think that is with us instead of walking through town, just going to the market head down. Let’s do it fast. Taking the time to make an acquaintance ask a question can reap its rewards now or later.

Hank Smith:                      00:20:05             Hmm. What is it that President Monson always said, never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved. Joseph has a problem that needs to be solved but doesn’t see the treasure is actually in the people and I love it. Where should we go next?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:20:23             Okay, well let’s do 11. Wherefore be as wise as serpents and yet without sin. You think the serpent with even you go, Hey, we gotta be as wise as the serpents, but do it without sin and I will order all things for your good as fast as you’re able to receive them. Amen.

John Bytheway:               00:20:45             That verse 11 has been a fallback verse for me. Hank, as you know, I was 33 years old the day I got married, so I fulfilled all my eligibility as a YSA and then I became an SA. That verse became very important to me. I don’t know if everyone can apply it the same way. I’m looking at this whole section, I am not displeased. Listen to the pronouns. Verse two, I have much treasure. Verse two, I will gather. Verse four, I will give. Verse five, I will give you power. Verse six, I will do mercifully. Verse 11, I will order all things for your good. I thought I had the right order in sequence for things. Here the Lord’s saying, well actually I will do that. I will order all things for your good as fast as you are able. I figure that he is a really good judge of when I’m able, that was a fallback verse for me as a young single adult, that the Lord saying, I’ve got this. I will order all things. I will judge if you’re able to receive them yet.

Hank Smith:                      00:21:47             And what good is it if I’m gonna give you something that you’re not able to receive?

John Bytheway:               00:21:52             Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:21:54             Susan, you could, out of the three of us at least, and I’m sure out of a lot more than that could get into Joseph Smith’s head here. I mean he’s only 31 or he is going to be 31 soon when he leaves Massachusetts. What has he learned?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:22:11             I think he’s learned that the Lord is in charge. He’s perhaps remembering those days with Josiah Stowell and the treasures. You know, the money diggers at that time period, he reverted back to something that he had tried in his youth and it didn’t work then. It doesn’t work now. And it’s kind of like the Lord. He doesn’t chasten him, but he lets him go through the fall. He is almost like history repeats itself and we fall back to what we’ve done as children. And the Lord may be testing him again to see will you really listen to me? And as John said, let me help order that life for you and I will give you what you need. And eventually we do know that those debts were paid off, but it will take years even after Joseph has left Kirtland as you get Oliver Granger and others asked to stay behind and to pay off those debts.

                                           00:23:15             And even you get Brigham Young years later, at one point he literally advertised wherever Joseph had gone, including Salem, Massachusetts, saying, if you knew a man named Joseph Smith and you have odd against him if you felt like he owes you money, his debt is my debt. Brigham Young will make sure that all of those debts are covered. And once he has done that, he says, now I will be worthy to meet the prophet Joseph again. In other words, this order that we’re talking about, it may occur in our lifetime or thereafter. As you get those who emulate the prophet Joseph and themselves serve as a prophet, wanna make sure that no one has ought against him over any kind of financial issue.

Hank Smith:                      00:24:07             I love that. I had not connected Josiah Stowell and the silver mine, but I can see a little bit of him going, oh wait, what if there is a?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:24:17             What if we try this? Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:24:20             Yeah. I remember this. Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:24:22             Reminds me of Elder Holland when he talked about the resurrected Christ. Is there at Galilee and Peter says, I go a fishing and he is like, Peter, why are we here?

Hank Smith:                      00:24:32             Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:24:32             Why are we having the same discussion?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:24:36             Yeah. Similar.

John Bytheway:               00:24:38             Peter, do you love me?

Hank Smith:                      00:24:39             Well, yeah. Then why are we back here?

John Bytheway:               00:24:41             Why are we here? You’re supposed to be a fisher of men now. Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:24:47             If I needed fish, I can get fish.

John Bytheway:               00:24:50             I can get fish. I love that part of the talk.

Hank Smith:                      00:24:53             Oh wow. What a great connection. John and Susan, thank you for that. I love the humanity of Joseph Smith.

John Bytheway:               00:25:00             He’s only 31.

Hank Smith:                      00:25:02             Yeah, He’s a kid. Do you remember thinking, you know 30 was old?

John Bytheway:               00:25:09             Yeah. Yeah. I used to.

Hank Smith:                      00:25:10              Yeah, he’s young and maybe this’ll work. By the way, why don’t I take all the leadership of the church with me away from the church right? I could see the Lord going, okay, well there’s still some things to learn. Susan, anything else about 111? Do you wanna talk about?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:25:29             I think it’s interesting that 111 notice and how quick we hearken back to what we first talked about. But you get April 3rd then 1836, and now we’re August 6th, April, May, June, July, August. It only takes about four months or so for suddenly things to start unraveling. Typically we think of when you’re on a high, you’re really moving on that high. But you gotta be careful. You gotta be grounded. You gotta know what you stand for.

Hank Smith:                      00:26:04             Yeah, that’s fascinating. Coming out of this Kirtland temple experience, everything’s gonna be good for me here on out. Nothing could go wrong. Let’s go try this.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:26:18             Now some of the biggest trials are waiting.

Hank Smith:                      00:26:20             Susan, as we move forward into 112, I notice something. We go from section 111, August 6th, 1836 to section 112 July of 1837. We are almost a year without a published revelation in our Doctrine & Covenants. I don’t think this has ever happened before up to this point, as anybody at home is reading, they notice that there’s probably a lot in that little tiny space on the page here. Between 111 and 112, what happens?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:26:56             It’s a very difficult year for Joseph Smith. One of the ways they learned about some letters they claimed were Joseph’s handwriting, but ultimately found they were forged. It was because Joseph’s handwriting prior to where we’re at during that year, you’d look at and he’s shaking all over the place. He writes his J and the O and the S. The forger didn’t pick that up. He’d say, well Joseph, why are you shaking? What’s going on? Well actually it’s still indebtedness. They don’t have a solution for it. Well the next idea they come up with was, let’s form a bank. We’ll call it the Kirtland Safety Society. We’ve got an idea for this bank. We’re gonna send Orson Hyde to the legislature there in Ohio and we’ll send Oliver Cowdery, we’ll send you to get plates made back East. The legislature voted no. It wasn’t like we were the only group trying to set up a bank, but we didn’t have the funds to set up the bank, the principles.

                                           00:28:02             So instead, we did form a group that acted the part of a bank. We even had a building on Temple Square, but we called it the Kirtland Safety Society anti no, we’re really not a bank anti-bank company. But they acted the part of a bank and they actually formed a stock company. You get 205 Latter-day Saints get stock from that company and eventually you’re gonna see, well, it’s starting to fall apart. But eventually, as you look at the United States, you got 26 states and it starts, starts in New York. There’s a run on the banks and banks begin to collapse all over the states, including the Kirtland Safety Society. But when the society finally collapses, the average investor is getting back 12 and a half cents on every dollar they put in the bank. Do you remember when we all had roommates? You’d come home and you’d go, where’s my sweater? You know, I just bought some milk. My cereal is gone. Money among friends, difficult money.

Hank Smith:                      00:29:08             Oh that’s hard.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:29:09             That’s the prophet’s name on it. Sidney Rigdon. Very, very difficult. Suddenly you get on the streets of Kirtland, the gossip talk and eventually leads to great persecution. And Joseph having to pretty much flee for his life is the word on the street is Joseph Smith, fallen prophet. You’d look and you’d say, what’s going on in that year? I say, a pretty tough time for the church. Those that are good really rise up and defend the prophet. As we move on to section 112, you’re gonna get Thomas B. Marsh is very worried. Here’s the concern again about members in his quorum that are starting to say Joseph Smith’s fallen prophet, William McClellan, John Boynton.

Hank Smith:                      00:29:59             These are Apostles.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:30:00             Luke and Lyman Johnson. You get apostles that are starting to waver. Even Parley P. Pratt at one point, as he writes his autobiography says, these are my darkest days. As you get this wavering trying to decide as they’re choosing sides for Joseph Smith, I like this quote. He says, no quorum in the church was entirely exempt from the influence of those false spirits who are striving against me for the mastery. Even some of the Twelve were so far lost to their high and responsible calling as to begin to take sides. Kirtland goes from united at the temple dedication. Never could there have been a happier people.

John Bytheway:               00:30:48             Right? Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:30:50             Then you’d say, what goes on in this year? Well, the money thing, the divisions are very difficult as families split apart. Apostasy is everywhere. People are choosing sides. Churches are forming from our church. In other words, very, very difficult time and especially very difficult for Joseph Smith who still got the problems we talked about, you know, in Section 111, he’s still got bills for the Kirtland temple. He’s still got money that’s being sent now as they’re trying to form a new town there in Farr West. Very, very different.

Hank Smith:                      00:31:26             Yeah. Ugh. It’s almost like fourth Nephi starts out so great and then, and

Dr. Susan Black:               00:31:33             It’s only a few pages. Did you notice? Yeah. And then boom, we’re back to wars.

Hank Smith:                      00:31:39             Susan, let me ask you a question that I get sometimes, which is, how can people who have had such incredible experiences, you think Kirtland Temple, then you get the Johnsons, Boynton and even Parley. How can people go from that to, you know what? I don’t think Joseph is a prophet. I’ve lost confidence. How did this person go from there to here?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:32:04             For some of us, it’s because we don’t write down our spiritual experiences and our feelings of what happened. You know, it becomes something where you say, well, here’s what I remember, but it’s lost out there somewhere. But in the case of John F. Boynton, I really like this man. He was the only college graduate to serve in the Quorum of the Twelve. He’s your only guy to have attended college. He had majored in science and actually went on to become a very famous scientist in the United States. The fire extinguisher. He is credited with making that. He also helped create the torpedo, which still defends our shores. He married a wife after his first wife died in a hot air balloon going over New York City. The first man to do that. I mean he’s got all kinds of things. He lifted up an object, a ship had sunk off the coast in San Francisco and he invented a levee system that we still use the same levee system, parts of it today to lift large objects out of bodies of water.

                                           00:33:12             But you’d say John F. Boynton, he was called to the Quorum of the Twelve as a bachelor. Some of our listeners may wanna hold out right? for Boynton. What happened to him? He found a woman to marry. They were married by the prophet Joseph Smith, one of the first people he married there in Kirtland, Ohio. But you’d say for Boynton, he was one of the principals of the Kirtland Safety Society. He didn’t have a lot of money as he goes into the society, but he’s one of the original principals. He and Lyman Johnson sent for merchandise back east with the idea they were gonna make a fortune would be able to pay for the merchandise when it arrives from the money which they had made as principals for the Kirtland Safety Society. Well, when the society falls apart, they’re sitting with all this merchandise and they say, Joseph a fallen prophet.

                                           00:34:06             You might find it of interest that John F. Boynton eventually goes into the Kirtland temple. He has a pistol, threatens Father Smith. Difficult things happen for him. And then finally he says, I say goodbye to religion. He never returns to religion, although he does come out at Brigham Young’s request. He gives a series of lectures at Temple Square in Salt Lake City for three weeks. You could listen to his idea for making different kinds of buttons, tar roofs, things like that. Or you could watch perhaps a relative’s laboriously build on the Salt Lake temple.

Hank Smith:                      00:34:42             Wow.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:34:42             Which we do.

                                           00:34:45              He was a guest of Brigham Young there in the Lion House. Brigham Young asked him to stay and said there wasn’t anybody in the church like him. In other words, he had dozens of patents to his name. We’re still living in log cabins and Boyton’s a genius out there. He said no and went back home and died in Syracuse. He was smart and his time and his name went up in neon lights. He’s the most recognized Latter-day Saint during the time of Brigham Young because he’s giving lectures all over the US about his scientific experience. Then you look at the Johnsons, they all go back to Father Johnson. Remember Hiram, Ohio, you go, okay, Johnsons, what happened to you guys? They started out good enough to obviously be named in the Quorum of the Twelve on February 14th, 1835 with the rest of them. When they come in the quorum, their family is pretty well to do.

                                           00:35:46             They are principals there in that Kirtland society. The Johnsons had not known what it was like to be poor. Suddenly the society falls apart and their lives are dramatically different. As their lives become different, they conclude they will stay behind. As the church moves on to Missouri and try and recoup their fortune, they never do. Finally, after we take them separate, Luke Johnson comes back to the church after about eight years. He’s tired of eating the corn husks. He’s ready to be part and he is selected by Brigham Young to settle out in Tooele, which you wonder how much Brigham Young really liked him.

                                           00:36:33             And he becomes a sheriff and very famous. You know, people liked him. And for Lyman Johnson, he ends up in Michigan. He dies a horrible drowning accident there as he’s on a toboggan heading out into the lake. Stories are filled with tragedy, but the place where they’re making a decision is right where we’re talking about Doctrine & Covenants 112. Which way will you go? We always think like the rod of iron. We can fall off either way, we can fall off because we’re under zealot. I get that one. And we don’t keep the commandments. That’s what Thomas B. Marsh is worried about. Hey, I’ve got members of my Quorum not keeping the commandments. Or we can fall off ’cause we’re over zealot. Like the case of William McClellan who forms his own church. And you’re like, wait a minute. The blessings are in the center.

                                           00:37:27             You gotta hold on. You can’t listen to voices on either side. You gotta make your stand. Stand in holy places. Be a credit to yourself, to your family, to the Lord. Thomas I think it’s so interesting he’s worried about those in his quorum, but he is never looking at himself. I have wondered that as a mom you look at your kids and you’re like, come on, come on. Remember where you were raised? You know what you can do. I had someone say to me, your children didn’t turn out perfect. And I’ve had an occasion to say, well, for sure not. Look who raised them. How would it be possible to have them absolutely perfect. But aren’t they wonderful? They all are that. But I relate to Thomas’s worries at the same time. He perhaps needed to look at himself.

Hank Smith:                      00:38:18             Wow. It can happen to any of us. Sometimes you think, oh, I’ve seen so much. I felt so much. It could never happen to me. I would never have doubts. I would never fall away. But that safety society, if I lost everything, if I lost my net worth, which isn’t great, but if I lost it all, I don’t know. Would it cause me to, to start to doubt and start to question everything I had once experienced?

John Bytheway:               00:38:45             I know Hank, you like to talk about false expectations. Well, if he’s the President of the Church, he must be really good at banking too. Or if he says, let’s do this bank, maybe that’s a pure revelation or something.

Hank Smith:                      00:38:59             It’s a revelation. Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:39:01             Therefore, it’s gotta work. Maybe that was saying that if he’s a prophet, he’s gonna be perfect. And everything he puts his hand to, they’re saying, well, he was a prophet at one time. The Book of Mormon is still true, but he’s a fallen prophet. Now, is that kind of where they’re going or do they leave completely?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:39:18             That’s where you’re going. You get your first break off church. We can call them that. They believe Joseph was a prophet, but now so-and-so was a man named W Clark in 1831 and by the time of Joseph’s death, you’ve had nine different men have risen up and saying Joseph was a prophet. Now it’s me. We just need to be careful. I remember at one point when Thomas B. Marsh comes back to the church after 18 years. During those 18 years, I had an occasion to follow his life through these random libraries. During those 18 years, he tried to support himself as a school teacher. Now we can all speak to the folly of that but you’d say for him his favorite class to teach was biblical geography. And that’s a tough class to have kids like, but especially if you’ve never seen it. You’ve never been over there. But when Thomas B. Marsh comes back into the church, he announces to the people, oh, I’ve suffered all these things. Thank you. Welcome me back. And he promises that he will never fall again. Brigham Young then stands up and says, I have to pray every day that I will be faithful. You look at the two men, wow, you gotta make a stand and you go, Hey, this is what I’m willing to do. So we end up on the Lord’s side.

Hank Smith:                      00:40:45             John, I think this might be just a good little time to shout out out to our friend Ashly Stone, who does what’s called the Come Back podcast. I was interviewed on that podcast. It is spectacular. What she’s doing is exactly what we’re talking about today. Inviting people who have left to come back. I like what you said there, Susan, between section 111 and 112, I wrote, this is a decision point for so many. How many people leave? Some people call this the Kirtland apostasy.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:41:15             The tragedy of Shinehah, which Shinehah was a codename for Kirtland.

Hank Smith:                      00:41:19             Okay.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:41:21             At one point I wrote 50 volumes, 48,000 pages on everyone that knew Joseph Smith. If George were a funner person, I wouldn’t have to do that. But when you look at it, I then went through and did all the statistics on it. You’re a less than 50% chance you’re gonna hang in there unless you do make those choices. If you look at the early Saints.

John Bytheway:               00:41:50             Isn’t that something? Wow.

Hank Smith:                      00:41:52             Such a trying time.

John Bytheway:               00:41:54             I’m still stuck on 48,000 pages. Oh my goodness. In fact, I remember once in Nauvoo, off on a tangent for a minute, mentioning I had an ancestor and Susan said, who’s that? And I said, his name was Samuel Alexander Pagan Kelsey. And Susan went, oh yeah, okay, yeah, I know him. Because she knows these people.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:42:16             Well, I do love them.

John Bytheway:               00:42:18             Yeah. I don’t want to get off Kirtland, sorry, but I just thought that was amazing that you have this database in your brain. I was amazed how many young people listen to followHIM Hank, I was at education week and I, you listen? you do? you know, and do you watch or do you listen? But anyway, what does it mean for a bank to fail? They’ve probably seen It’s a Wonderful Life, but how could we explain what happens when a bank fails? It’s not backed by gold or silver. Is that what happened?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:42:49             Right. So this was a time that banks weren’t backed by gold or silver. And just as an aside, we know about Nauvoo and they have 38 general stores and I could just go off, but they never establish a bank. They have hotels, they have mills, they have dress shops, whatever it is, but there’s no bank. I think this Kirtland Safety Society had a real impact. But at that time in the United States paper money was only as good as the principals of the bank. In other words, the people who were in the bank and money down the street would look different than money you got from other banks. And Kirtland Safety Society notes were hard to pass to other banks.

John Bytheway:               00:43:37             There wasn’t a US currency around. They didn’t have George Washington on a dollar bill. Wasn’t there a lot of bartering going on? I’ll give you a couple of cows if you’ll do this and

Dr. Susan Black:               00:43:48             Right. You had something called long credit and short credit. So if I liked you John, and I was confident you could pay me back, I’d give you long credit so you’d have more time to pay me back. If I didn’t know you and you walked in, then I’d do short credit. What you’d probably find of interest today, you look and you’d say, women do the shopping. Women are at the malls. If the men are there, they’re sitting in the middle trying to figure out what to do waiting for their wife to come out of a store. Right? But back then men did. Men did the shopping because it was always bartering. By the end of the day, you could look and say, I was making a uniform shop, but by the end of the day, I’ve got apples, oranges, everything that I bartered with.

John Bytheway:               00:44:34             Weren’t there some outside influences that were trying to make it fail that bought up a bunch of shares and then came in and said, here’s my shares, give me cash or something?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:44:45             It wasn’t until the banks began to close throughout the United States that you get that it would be like us going in saying, here’s my bank statement. I want the money. We all know at banks now. Yeah, I want the whole balance. Banks now you can say, I have this much money, but the banks then take it in the front door, push it out the back door for buying cars, houses. It was the same with the Kirtland Safety Society.

John Bytheway:               00:45:14             Yeah. That’s why I think young people might not understand why, how a bank fails, but it’s ’cause that money isn’t all sitting in a safe back there.

Hank Smith:                      00:45:22             Yeah. It’s loaned out to other people so they can go buy things and then they’ll pay interest on that, which the bank makes money, but oh man, if everybody goes to get their money at the same time,

Dr. Susan Black:               00:45:36              any bank’s in trouble.

Hank Smith:                      00:45:37             Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:45:37             In It’s a Wonderful Life. But then Mr. Potter says 50 cents on the dollar so people, they’ll go to Potter. I just wondered if people wonder what that means for the Kirtland Safety Society to fail. Maybe they’re okay. I just wondered.

Hank Smith:                      00:45:51             And what does Jimmy Stewart say, John?

John Bytheway:               00:45:53             Oh, don’t you see, Potter’s not selling, Potter’s buying. No, no, no. We can get through this. We gotta have faith in each other.

Hank Smith:                      00:46:04             That was perfect. That was great. To anyone out there who wasn’t born in the 19 hundreds, they’re gonna think, is John okay? He’s okay.

John Bytheway:               00:46:12             What’s happened to his voice right there?

Hank Smith:                      00:46:14             Yeah. That was really good Susan. This apostasy, I’m thinking about the prophets, his own feelings of these are friends.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:46:26             You’d say amidst all the tragedies that’s going on, something really miraculous happened and it was about Heber C. Kimball at this point, this time, a great hardship. The Lord now reveals to the prophet Joseph that obviously they’ve got to do something for the salvation of the church. As leaders are starting to fall, it’ll be at this point that the Prophet Joseph now approaches Heber C. Kimball, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, who’s a potter by trade. Okay? He approaches him in the Kirtland temple and he whispers to him and he says, Brother Heber, the Spirit of the Lord has whispered to me, let my servant Heber go to England and proclaim my gospel and open the door of salvation to that nation. Heber later wrote that the idea of such a mission was almost more than I could bear up under. I was almost ready to sink under the burden which was placed upon me.

                                           00:47:24             Nevertheless, he determined to go to England. He penned the moment I understood the will of my Heavenly Father I felt a determination to go at all hazards. So you’d say, what’s the salvation of what’s going on in Kirtland? And I’d say, you ever heard the story of Heber C. Kimball? Within the year you’d say, how did he do along with his associates that went with them? And you’d say, 1500, join the church. You try to balance it out, which we learned that if you’re not willing to move the Lord’s work forward, somebody will rise up and take your place.

Hank Smith:                      00:48:03             Wow. I love that Susan. Something good is happening even though you can’t see it, it looks terrible for the church here. You look, oh wow, look at all that’s happening. The church is being ruined when actually the next wave of energy is coming across the Atlantic. Right?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:48:23             So much so that by the time Joseph will die out there in Carthage, you’ve got a fourth of Nauvoo is British born and bred. Like for example, at one point you’d say for Wilford Woodruff, he hasn’t even been in England 60 days and he has already baptized 600 people, including preachers from another church and a constable that comes to arrest him.

Hank Smith:                      00:48:52             Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:48:53             So you look and you’d say they’re coming in. It’s like your next wave. It’s your rescue wave coming to help the hands that hang down. You know, analogy in our lives, just when we think life has taken a really tough turn that the crusaders are coming. Yeah. They’re boom boom, they’re marching on, they’re coming to help those who have stood in their place but now need help like Aaron helping Moses, right? They’re gonna hold up the arms and help you move forward and stay true to the faith. Anyway, always grateful for the English saints and for the courage of Heber C. Kimball that arrives on British shores. He actually jumps off the little dinghy that’s taken into shore so he can be the first missionary there in England and then see’s out there in Preston, the political sign truth will prevail and amen. You know, truth will prevail despite the hardship that they’ve left behind.

John Bytheway:               00:49:55             I feel like this is the Lord ordering all things. It seems counterintuitive in a time of crisis to say, Heber go across the ocean instead of Heber I need you right now. I need you by my side. But instead he says, go across the ocean and then later ends up sending almost all the Twelve to the British Isles, which is amazing. But here’s the Lord with the big picture ordering all things for them. As it said in 111.

Hank Smith:                      00:50:28             Susan, if we focus in on 112, Thomas B. Marsh, we’ve heard of him before, but can you give us some background? He was an early convert.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:50:38             Right. Thomas B. Marsh, he’s a young man, actually runs away from home when he is about 14, ends up in New York City, becomes a grocer and feels impressed that he should head out to western New York. He gets out in western New York, he is, gets off there in the Palmyra area, goes to the Grandin Bookstore, and he finds just in the trash can 16 pages of the Book of Mormon that had been spoiled because maybe too much ink or something. So they weren’t going to use them. He takes it home, he goes back to New York City, he gets his wife, family and moves to Palmyra. He’s very early person that comes into the church. He was very faithful. And you go, well, how can you take somebody who’s that faithful that gives up everything, who’s selected as the original President of the Twelve who takes the Twelve with him on a mission to the Eastern States?

                                           00:51:41             Then you’d say, gets this revelation in which he’s being told, Hey, love the Twelve you’re to preach the gospel, the word apostle means one who is sent, get out there. If you’re an apostle, he is sitting home too long. I like reading the Church News. I wanna know where are they going now. You know, Elder Gong was in Provo here for Education Week. You look and they’re just all over the world. You know, in a time when a lot of people may be more fearful to travel, they’re on the go. But then you look and you’d say, Thomas, tell me it’s gonna be something big that would take you out. And I go, no, it’s so simple. It’s not until he moves to Farr West and we’ve all heard the story of his wife is sharing the milking duties with the next door neighbor, George Washington Harris’ wife.

                                           00:52:37             The issue is all over cheese. So you realize it’s a cholesterol story it’s bad from beginning to end. You know, it’s not gonna work out good. But Mrs. Marsh, she’s holding back a pint of the strippings where you can make better cheese from this milking of the cows and it eventually leads to courts being held at the bishop level, the stake, and eventually to the prophet Joseph Smith. Each one of those conclude that, hey, it has the issue between the two women that really, if anybody’s at fault, it’s Thomas’s wife. Thomas decides with his wife over the prophet Joseph. It’s so simple. It should have been neighbors sitting down talking. You want more cheese? Good for you.

John Bytheway:               00:53:28             Oh fine. Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:53:30             Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:53:32             Yeah. That’s heartbreaking to think like you said, just a little spirit of humility and sit down, let’s work this out. I never knew it went to courts, church courts you mean.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:53:43             And finally Thomas will be the one that writes an affidavit and sends it to Willburn W. Boggs, who Boggs is trying to figure out in 1838, which way do I go? Boggs gets this and oh, Brigham always said, Thomas B. Marsh never shot anyone, but he did seem to pull the trigger on this one. Suddenly you get an extermination order against the saints forcing them now out of the state of Missouri. Thomas, pretty difficult. But where we’re at in this one, you know, the Twelve are told verse 14 to arise, gird up their loins, take up their cross, follow Christ, feed his sheep. But they’re told in 15, the Twelve must be careful about exalting themselves. Don’t rebel against the First Presidency. You know, in other words, Twelve by verse 28, the Twelve must purify their hearts before going into all the world to preach the gospel to every creature who has not received it. In other words, get out there, you have the keys, Joseph holds the keys. The Second Coming is coming. They have a huge responsibility. But have you ever noticed that in your life when you’re about to get a calling, that difficulties all come and then you get the calling and then they really come right? But I think the Lord is mindful of us.

John Bytheway:               00:55:12             Isn’t there a reconciliation and Thomas B. Marsh comes back at some point?

Dr. Susan Black:               00:55:18             Yes, he does come back in the fifties. Thomas is rebaptized. He receives his endowment in the endowment house on Temple Square and then moves up to Ogden where he spends his days. Let’s read a couple of verses in Section 112. I think it’s interesting that the revelation was given to Joseph Smith. It was Thomas B. Marsh that was very concerned about it. I think it’s interesting that it’s received on the very day that Heber C. Kimball and Orson Hyde are preaching the gospel in England as they first are preaching it. So you get that crossover. But Thomas B. Marsh is actually the scribe of it. He’s writing it down. I like verse one, verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, my servant Thomas. So he is actually writing that. I have heard thy prayers and thine alms have come up as a memorial before me in behalf of those thy brethren. So he has been praying about those in his quorum who were chosen to bear testimony of my name and descended among all nations kindreds tongues and people, and ordained through the instrumentality of my servants. I like this because Thomas has a calling. He is praying for those who are in his quorum. You know what it says to me? I teach 13, 14 year olds at Sunday school. I need to be praying for them, not necessarily for me to give a really great lesson but for them to have a good life and stay true.

Hank Smith:                      00:56:56             Hmm. I noticed in verse three, you have abased yourself, like great job. I didn’t have to humble you, you humbled yourself. It seems the Lord likes that kind of effort. I’m trying to humble myself.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:57:16             I think the most quoted of Section 112 has gotta be verse 10, be thou humble and the Lord thy God shall lead thee by the hand and give thee answers to thy prayers.

Hank Smith:                      00:57:28             Susan, this would be probably a good question for you and for you John, where do you find your humility from Susan? You’ve done a lot yet you don’t come in here saying, Hey, where are my green Skittles? I need my water at 68 degrees. You come in very much like, hi guys, let’s have some fun. Where have you come by that and John, I mean you’re as humble as I pretend to be, both of you. Tell me about humility, where you’ve seen it, how you’ve tried to emulate that.

Dr. Susan Black:               00:58:00             I think that you gain humility being in a family, the world outside can cheer you on and say, oh wow, I wanna be just like you. Your humility comes in the home. If you can be, you can own what they think of you in the home, it can ground you better.

Hank Smith:                      00:58:23             That will help you go, okay, maybe I’m not as perfect as everyone thinks I am. Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:58:30             It sure helps to read these stories in the scriptures, doesn’t it? When I think of Moses going, now I know that man is nothing which thing I never had supposed. Why isn’t that a youth conference t-shirt? Well, man is nothing Youth Conference July, 2025. Why don’t we have, if Moses can say that, we know enough of our own weaknesses and we know the Lord knows them exactly. So that’s why I like verse one back in 111. I’m not displeased even though I’ve seen your follies Thomas B. Marsh. It makes me happy to hear of these people coming back. He was invited to write a letter to the First Presidency for permission to receive, to be received back into the church. So this is May 5th, 1857. I’ll just read the last part, but you can find it in a BYU studies quarterly, Thomas B. Marsh said, I know what I have done.

                                           00:59:29             A mission was laid upon me and I have never filled it. And now I fear it is too late, but it is filled by another. I see the Lord could get along very well without me, and he has lost nothing by my falling out of the ranks. But, oh, what have I lost? Riches, greater riches than all this world or many planets like this could afford. But oh brethren, can you speak one word of comfort to me? Can I be saved at all in the kingdom of God? Can I find peace among you? Oh, if I can but enjoy your smiles and the smiles of the church of Jesus. I shall be content to depart or remain in so great peace. I know the Lord has been mindful of me, and although I was very stubborn, he has followed me up. He has visited me with scourging and with visions and dreams, brethren, oh, that I were worthy to call you brethren, but what shall I call you?

                                           01:00:16             You run very near to me. I love you better than I do any set of mortals on this earth. You have been diligent in accomplishing the work given you while I miserable me have played time away among harlot churches only seeking for nourishment to my soul where there was no bread of life. And I love you and I hate myself. I wait here at Florence anxiously for a letter addressed to your old and now truly unworthy and truly sincere friend signed Thomas B. Marsh P.S. my love to all the saints and may the richest blessings of the fullness of the everlasting gospel be with and rest upon you now and forevermore. Amen. TBM Thomas B. Marsh. This article continues upon receiving official approval Thomas B. Marsh was rebaptized at Papillion Creek in Nebraska while en route to Salt Lake Valley by Andrew Cunningham on 16 July, 1857. So what a letter I just, I’m so glad the Lord is forgiving. You know? That’s a humble heart right there. In that letter, don’t you think?

Hank Smith:                      01:01:25             Man, that’s tough.

Dr. Susan Black:               01:01:27             Know only that when he did come to Utah, he went to see Brigham Young by this point, Thomas B. Marsh has had some really severe health problems and suffers from palsy as Brigham’s seeing him after 18 years. He at first doesn’t seem to recognize him. He asked Thomas to speak and Thomas speaks. And then Brigham says, truly it is you. And eventually has Thomas come then speak to the saints there in the tabernacle. But it’s interesting. Thomas came back to the church and after his return, there will be vacancies in the Quorum of the Twelve.

Hank Smith:                      01:02:10             Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               01:02:10             But Thomas will not be reinstated.

Hank Smith:                      01:02:14             Yeah. Susan, isn’t it same for one of the Johnson brothers who returned, you said he goes to Tooele. I think he becomes a bishop.

Dr. Susan Black:               01:02:23             Right. He becomes a bishop out there and a sheriff.

John Bytheway:               01:02:26             That Lyman or Luke?

Dr. Susan Black:               01:02:28             It’s Luke. But you wonder the time out of the church, like Parley P. Pratt, you know, doesn’t seem to skip a beat. He’s back in Orson Pratt comes back in really, really quick. But the longer the time out, the less the opportunity. So it’s not only what they missed being out, but then when they come back, their opportunities for service don’t appear as great.

Hank Smith:                      01:03:00             Yeah, I think Luke Johnson’s the only person to serve as an apostle than a bishop. Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black:               01:03:08              I think you could be right on that.