Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:00:04             Think of all the demands on our time. We have never, I don’t think, been busier. The options for spending our time are so great and many of those things are good. Maybe our effort to make time to attend the temple, to pay attention in the temple. And there’s a great article by Michael Austin on the Sacrament of Attention and he says there’s a reason we use the term pay attention. It costs us something.

Hank Smith:                      00:00:37             Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of followHIM. My name’s Hank Smith. I’m your host. I’m here with the voice of gladness himself, John Bytheway. John, I am serious. You know how many people listening have heard your voice through the decades? You’re not that old, but through the decades they’ve heard that voice of gladness.

John Bytheway:               00:00:55             No, that’s kind of old.

Hank Smith:                      00:00:57             Yeah.

John Bytheway:               00:00:59             Yeah. I started when I was five.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:01              Yeah, I remember that first talk.

John Bytheway:               00:01:03             What I wish I’d known in kindergarten. That’s right.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:07             Hey John, we are privileged to have returning to the show, Dr. Jordan Watkins. Jordan, welcome back.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:01:13             Thank you. So excited to be here.

Hank Smith:                      00:01:15             Jordan, I have been looking forward to this for a long time. It was months ago that you and I talked about what you were going to do this year. We have made it through the Missouri period. What comes to mind when you think these early years in Nauvoo we’re not gonna be there very long?

John Bytheway:               00:01:30             I’m fixated on section 128 when I went as a 12-year-old to do baptisms for the dead. I love the activity ’cause we went to Der Rathskeller afterwards and had pizza. The idea of vicarious work and a connection to the spirit world. The older I get, the more I think how incredible and amazing this is to be able to do things here that have an impact there. Where else can you do that? I love it. I love talking about it. It’s fascinating.

Hank Smith:                      00:02:00             And what does that say about the Lord that this is part of his work, Jordan, as you’ve been studying for this today, and I knew you loved it before we even talked, what are we gonna do today? What are you excited for?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:02:12             We’re gonna do a lot. I’ll just say that I’d actually like to start in an unlikely place, a Serbian writer. There’s this short story that he wrote in 1981. His name’s Danilo Kiš. He publishes this short story. I’ll summarize the story for you. It’s about a scholar who travels to Stockholm. It’s at the invitation of her guide, the narrator’s guide, she spends this night at the Royal Library of Sweden. She discovers something in the library called the Encyclopedia of the Dead. She notices that each room is arranged alphabetically and within these books she finds a record of every person who has died, including her father, who had passed just a couple of months before. And she writes this. What makes the encyclopedia unique, she explains is the way it depicts human relationships, encounters landscapes, the multitude of details that make up a human life. The reference to my father’s place of birth is not only complete and accurate, but is accompanied by both geographical and historical details because it records everything.

                                           00:03:22             So this encyclopedia, the narrator explains it’s the creation of a religious organization who, the narrator actually says this. They must have members all over the world digging tirelessly and discreetly through obituaries and biographies, processing their data and delivering them to the headquarters in Stockholm. The narrator goes on to say the compilers are motivated by a belief in the resurrection, says they compile their vast catalog in preparation for that moment. Their democratic program stresses an egalitarian vision of the world of the dead. A vision that is doubtless inspired by some biblical precept and aims at redressing human injustices and granting all God’s creatures an equal place in eternity. So this is a 1981 fictional short story written by the Serbian writer eventually publishes this with a collection of other short stories and includes a postscript later on in the published version saying I subsequent shortly after this is published, I saw a magazine article about these people out in Salt Lake City who have these unusual archives in the granite of the Rocky Mountains who painstakingly gather all of these records from around the world. And the article even mentions they do these baptisms for the dead to secure the retroactive baptism of their ancestors. The article says they take their task very seriously. That whole story speaks to this human concern with the dead.

Hank Smith:                      00:05:05             Yeah, yeah.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:05:06             It’s a general concern including records of the dead and of course that’s gonna be much of our focus for today.

Hank Smith:                      00:05:13             Wow, Jordan, what a way to start. That is fantastic. Now John, Jordan was with us four years ago. I’m guessing some listeners have joined us since then. So could you tell our new listeners about Jordan?

John Bytheway:               00:05:26             Yes. Jordan Watkins is an associate professor of church history and doctrine at BYU. He was born in Alpine, Utah, served in the León Mexico mission. He has a bachelor’s in history from BYU, a master’s in history from Claremont Graduate University, a PhD in American history from UNLV. He’s been a co-editor on the Joseph Smith papers. He authored Slavery and Sacred Texts, the Bible, the Constitution, and the historical consciousness of Antebellum America. Wow. Antebellum means pre civil war. Is that right?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:06:02             You got it.

John Bytheway:               00:06:03             He’s currently editing a primary source collection on slavery and religion in the 19th century for Rutledge. He and his wife Maddie have two boys, Emerson and Holland. They’re three years old in two months at the time of this recording. That’s a fun time. We’re really glad to have you back. I’m already fascinated, just the introduction Hank was worth being here.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:06:28             Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:28             That was fantastic.

John Bytheway:               00:06:30             Somebody’s whispering in their ear.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:06:32             Yeah, it’s interesting stuff.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:33             That was beautiful. Jordan, you have a brand new baby to get him to sleep did you just read him some of the historical articles that you comb through?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:06:44             Yeah I just pull out my book.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:45             Well not your book, not yours.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:06:48              No. Just pull out my book, read a few lines and he’s down.

Hank Smith:                      00:06:52             Yeah. That’s so great. Well we’re grateful for Maddie for letting you go because that’s a lot of work. A 3-year-old and a two month old.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:07:02             She’s adapted to it better than I have.

Hank Smith:                      00:07:04             Has she? Why don’t we get started with the Come, Follow Me manual because I know that Jordan has a lot to share. The title of this lesson is A Voice of Gladness for the Living and the Dead. In August, 1840, a grieving Jane Neyman listened to the prophet Joseph speak at the funeral of his friend Seymour Brunson. Jane’s own teenage son Cyrus had also recently passed away. Adding to her grief was the fact that Cyrus had never been baptized and Jane worried what this would mean for his eternal soul. Joseph had wondered the same thing about his beloved brother Alvin, who also died before being baptized. So the prophet decided to share with everyone at the funeral what the Lord had revealed to him about people who pass away without receiving gospel ordinances and what we can do to help them. The doctrine of baptism for the dead thrilled the Saints; their thoughts turned immediately to deceased family members. Now there was hope for them! Joseph shared their joy and in a letter teaching this doctrine, he used joyful, enthusiastic language to express what the Lord taught him about the salvation of the dead: “Let the mountain shout for joy and all ye valleys cry aloud; and all ye sees in dry lands tell the wonders of your Eternal King!” Wow, what a way to start. Alright Jordan, where should we go from here?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:08:24             We’re gonna get eventually, I promise we’ll get to Jane Neyman and Cyrus and Seymour Brunson and 128. We’ll get there. It could be useful to start, a little broader framework and then we’ll get through a lot of the context of baptism for the dead along with some of these other sections. One of the ways to frame this comes in section 19 of the Doctrine & Covenants. That’s where the Lord instructed Martin Harris to impart freely of his property to fund printing of the Book of Mormon. Now his subsequent instructions have clear thematic ties to baptism for the dead. Before this, describing the depths of his own suffering, he said, I God have suffered these things for all that they might not suffer if they would repent. Christ’s incarnation and atonement is a singular kind of proxy work. It’s the most far reaching act, the most ample provision in behalf of the living and the dead in all of human history, his body stood in for all of our bodies, not only saving us from unnecessary suffering, also allowing us the opportunity to emulate him in providing charitable proxy work for the living and the dead.

                                           00:09:42             In other words, I’m saying Christ’s vicarious sacrifice, enlivens gives life to all other kinds of proxy work allowing us to become saviors on mountain Zion from the beginning, from the foundation of the earth. And we’ll get to this point again later. Vicariousness was and is the plan. It’s not a plan B, it’s plan A. What I hope we see throughout these sections is proxy work all over them. Certainly in the teaching of baptism for the dead everywhere else too. And hopefully that allows us to see proxy work throughout our lives to become emboldened, empowered to emulate Christ in doing for others what they may not be able to do for themselves.

Hank Smith:                      00:10:26             That’s fantastic.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:10:28             When I started to prep for this conversation, I thought maybe we just do a straightforward chronological approach. The background up front, talk through the revelations with that context in mind. After spending some time with these sections, section 128, which we’ve mentioned in particular, I think a different approach might be better. We know that Section 128 has a remarkable structure and logic. It’s rooted in a specific historical moment and we’ll talk about those details. It moves freely through time and space draws on several biblical passages, chronicles the appearance of various, I’m gonna say historical figures. At times you even wonder, did Joseph Smith lose his train of thought while offering the letter? He is kind of going off. He never does. He always brings it back to bear on the subject at hand. My point is I wanna use Section 128 as a model for this conversation.

                                           00:11:22             It might make sense to work through each of the sections, take some contextual side trails along the way, all in an effort to try and shed some light on these sections. I’ll just say too, I think it’s important to say that I’m gonna draw on the scholarship of friends and colleagues who’ve done so much heavy lifting on these sections. Scholarship itself can be a kind of proxy work. Many people have already done this work and I’m drawing upon them. So style of 128, right where Joseph just names all the people who have shown up. I would just wanna, at the outset, some of these individuals I’m gonna be drawing on Phil Barlow, Sam Brown, Alex Baugh, Alex Smith, Lisa Tate, Chad Orton, Matt McBride, Ryan Tobler, Jenny Webb, Andy Hedges, John Durham Peters, Mike McKay, Amy Harris. There are others. That’s a list of names. Amy Harris has recently written a very fine book on the theme of Redeeming the Dead in the Doctrine & Covenants.

                                           00:12:19             Those are some of the scholars we’re gonna be drawing on to walk us through these developments. We’ve already mentioned Alvin. I think that’s an important context to begin with. I mentioned Section 19. Section 19 talks about a book. The Book of Mormon talks about a body, the body of Christ, bodies and books ushered in the restoration. Another example of this is Moroni showing up in 1823. Joseph recalled in his records saying his hands, arms, feet, legs. He says that the owner of the body then spoke and told Joseph Smith about what? A book, so you have a body and a book. What did Joseph have to do? He had to resurrect that book. And what is the book about? Well, we know what the book’s about. It’s about a history of struggle, struggle of a people, destruction of a people, separation of a family despite the best efforts of parents, separation and destruction of a people despite the best efforts of prophets.

                                           00:13:20             What does Joseph do? He helps resurrect this record. He allows for these fathers to cry from the dust to tell their descendants what God had done for them. What does Moroni do at that initial appearance? He also points to another record the Bible. He quotes biblical passages including Elijah’s return. Elijah’s gonna turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the children to the fathers like Book of Mormon prophets. Elijah’s gonna help heal the separation between generations, between the living and the dead. I’m just suggesting that right at the outset of the restoration, it sets the stage for past prophets either in person or through proxy records to appear to Joseph to give him truth, powers, practices that he couldn’t otherwise obtain. Joseph can’t obtain them by himself. He needs those people to come back to him. He needs their bodies to return and he needs the records and then that allows us in turn to help in the proxy work.

                                           00:14:24             All of that points to a divine interdependence. We need each other. We need our bodies, we need our records. There’s a problem that Elijah’s appearance or the promise of Elijah’s return highlights. We could describe it as a problem of separations, separation between God and his children. Separation between or among God’s children. Even separation between God’s children and the earth. I’m thinking of separation in spatial terms, distance from God. Also attitudes. We know that separation in and of itself isn’t a negative thing. Separation can allow us to grow to having some separation from each other gives us a sense of identity. Selfhood. Separation can also be of course, destructive, divisive, alienating. It can lead us to turn from God to turn on each other and to turn against the earth. We wanna overcome these separations. Elijah’s return I think is in part an answer to those separations.

                                           00:15:33             You mentioned Alvin in the introduction. Think about that as this initial separation that Joseph Smith experiences. Joseph experienced a lot of death throughout his life. That really begins with his oldest brother Alvin, who died in 1823. Alvin was beloved son, beloved brother, who made an outsized contribution to the family economy, a kind of proxy work on behalf of his younger siblings. After Moroni’s appearance in 1823, Alvin encourages Joseph to follow the angel’s instructions. As you know, a few months later in November he died. He was prescribed calomel for severe stomach cramps that may have made it worse and he died many decades later. A brother William Smith stated that the local Presbyterian minister at least intimated strongly that Alvin had gone to hell. And we don’t know exactly if that happened. It’s certainly the case that many Christian ministers of the day warned unchurched and unconverted individuals that hell awaited them.

                                           00:16:35             Now this relates to this broad theological quandary arising from belief in a just God and the fact that so many of God’s children live and die without knowledge of Christ. In 1823 Joseph doesn’t have that answer, clearly wondered about his brother’s fate. He doesn’t even seem to have the answer when he gets the vision. Section 76. Perhaps it gave him some comfort. He may have assumed that okay, I guess Alvin will be in the terrestrial kingdom ’cause you need a baptism. January of 1836 he sees a vision of Alvin in the celestial kingdom, which we’ll talk about later on in the year. That probably put many of Joseph’s concerns to rest because he learned that yes, all who have died without a knowledge of this gospel, who would’ve received it if they had been permitted to tarry shall be heirs of the celestial kingdom of God.

                                           00:17:27             Now that vision itself didn’t mention baptism for the dead. Joseph and other saints must have wondered, we know we need baptism. Alvin’s in the celestial kingdom doesn’t quite understand how that works. I think it does inform his teaching. In 1838, he answered a series of questions that he said people often asked him. One of the questions was this, if the Mormon doctrine is true, what has become of all those who have died since the days of the apostles? This is 1838. He says, all those who have not had an opportunity of hearing the gospel being administered to by an inspired man in the flesh must have it hereafter before they can finally be judged. He doesn’t say anything about baptism for the dead. He’s got this sense that there’s an opportunity there. Alvin’s death highlights these core problems. I’m suggesting that his death and other deaths and others suffering opens Joseph up to profound revelation. That’s sort of broad contextual pieces that can then allow us to jump into some of these sections.

John Bytheway:               00:18:36             Jordan, I love that really brief explanation of, look, the atonement was a vicarious event. This is not new. We should all understand that doing vicarious work should not be strange. It’s what the atonement of Jesus Christ was. I remember watching that movie Mountain of the Lord where Wilford Woodruff explains that Joseph was learning line upon line and I go way back to King Benjamin of a hint of this idea in Mosiah 3:11 for behold his blood atoneth for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam who have died not knowing the will of God concerning them or who have ignorantly sinned and way back then there’s this hint that hey, wait a minute. Some people will never hear it. They will die not knowing the will of God concerning them. It took time and took some line upon line seeing Alvin and all of that for them to get all the way to 128.

Hank Smith:                      00:19:40             The more I’ve studied the Joseph Smith family, the more you love Alvin, the way they talk about him. When you first come into church history, you talk about Hyrum, Lucy Mack, Joseph Sr, maybe even Samuel, and you think, oh yeah, they did have an older brother. At first Jordan I thought, oh how sad he didn’t get to be part of this. This year I’m seeing he was a big part of this. He keeps showing up in Joseph’s thoughts and his visions. So yeah, there is a Smith family member playing a role on the other side almost this whole time.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:20:14             Which highlights that point of proxy work we’ll get to in 128 how we need them and what a perfect illustration of they need us. Because we have bodies and we can perform these ordinances, we can do stuff here, but we need them. And the story of Alvin highlights that point. Without Alvin, Joseph maybe isn’t asking these kinds of questions. He’s not wondering, he’s not thinking about it. I think it’s a perfect illustration of some of the central teachings of these sections. Joseph Smith’s development of his understanding for work for the dead came in relationship to the saints suffering. His own suffering regarding Alvin and others he’d lost, but also the saints suffering more generally. Winter of 1838 Saints were religious refugees by the way, throughout the 19th century. Most of their contemporaries do not want them as neighbors.

Hank Smith:                      00:21:07             Oh yeah, we’ve watched that.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:21:08             That was true in Missouri. That was true throughout the 19th century, especially as converts come from the British Isles in Northern Europe. They’re described by some of their contemporaries as poor, lazy, immoral, violent. Not everyone felt that way about them. In fact, this is one of these periods when Joseph and other leaders are languishing in prison, Saint’s journey to Illinois. They find refuge across the Mississippi River in Quincy and the people of Quincy provide them some much needed temporary relief and maybe that inspires some of Joseph’s thinking about providing more enduring relief across the veil. In succeeding months, the Saints began to gather in what was called Commerce becomes Nauvoo and they gathered on the other side of the river in Iowa territory in October of 1839, a stake was organized there. John Smith, Joseph’s uncle was the president. Alanson Ripley was the bishop before.

                                           00:22:03             Long questions are arising about, well where do we gather? Now this question comes in part because of section 124, a section in which the Lord provides instruction of saints on building a temple and on building what is called the Nauvoo house. It’s also about gather to Nauvoo in that revelation, the Lord says, I accept your offering. You did what you could in Missouri. It’s no longer required of you to build the city of Zion and build a temple there. You’re gonna build it here in Nauvoo. That leads to some questions including the question asked by John Smith. A couple of weeks after that January 1841 revelation John Smith travels to Joseph Smith to find out what the Lord wanted the Saints in Iowa territory to do. Do we have to come across the river to Nauvoo given the Lord’s instruction in section 124? That may be what they were asking and the Lord responds in section 125 that they could gather in places appointed by Joseph to this is verse two, build up cities unto my name that they may be prepared for that which is in store for a time to come.

                                           00:23:12             Again, I hear the Lord saying no longer required that all of your saints, all the saints gathered at Jackson County. Certainly also, you don’t all have to gather to Nauvoo. It’s also a reminder too, he’s saying, build up cities in my name. We don’t have to wait for God and we shouldn’t wait for God to establish Zion. God’s not gonna build Zion for us. That’s what he says in section 58. You must be anxiously engaged in a good cause. We’re not anxiously engaged in the good cause of building up Zion. We’re not gonna become the people who are worthy of the heavenly Zion. Verse three, the Lord instructs them, build a city in Iowa territory and says, let the name of Zarahemla be named upon it. That name had already been chosen by the saints by the way, so he is just confirming that like, yeah, that’s a good name.

                                           00:23:56             Of course that name is a prominent city in the Book of Mormon. The fact that they’re naming it Zarahemla, what does that tell us? Well, it tells us that they care about the Book of Mormon, highlights their affinity for that book and of course it sets a precedent for place names in Utah and elsewhere where we have Book of Mormon names showing up for some of our cities. Verse four, the Lord instructs them to gather as Nauvoo and all the stakes which I have appointed. I think this relates to our broader theme. It’s as if the Lord suggested that, yeah, Nauvoo can stand in for, be proxy for Jackson County for the time being.

Hank Smith:                      00:24:32             Okay.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:24:33             Seeking to establish Zion as it’s put in this revelation. Essaying to be the Lord’s saints, striving to be the Lord’s saints just as valid, just as important in Nauvoo, in ancient or modern Zarahemla in Nashville, Iowa, which most people don’t know about or Nashville, Tennessee or anywhere else throughout the world. Just as valid there as it is in Jackson County. Wherever we live. I think the Lord is saying we can strive to live as Christ-like and Zion-like people.

Hank Smith:                      00:25:06             I’m sure we have listeners Jordan all over the world who will never see Nauvoo. We’ve all been there. It’s like a beautiful memorial. As you walk around the buildings that remain and you see the temple up on the hill, you don’t have to go there to have a testimony of Joseph Smith and to feel the power of the saints, but there is a spirit of place still. There’s a spirit there.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:25:29             There absolutely is. Just before my mission, I did a semester at, I think they called it the Joseph Smith Academy. It was really BYU Nauvoo and I spent a semester there. It was wonderful from a certain perspective, it’s among the probably top 10 boring cities, towns in the world.

Hank Smith:                      00:25:50             Especially after about five o’clock, you know in the fall.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:25:53             Exactly. Exactly. There is a spirit of that place that is still there. You can sort of feel it in the air.

Hank Smith:                      00:26:03             Scott Esplin, Dr. Esplin loves the phrase, come see the place that the angel says to the women at the tomb, come see the place and there is something about, let’s see the place. Alright, Jordan, let’s go to 126. I’m excited to get to 128. You’re gonna have to tap the brakes on me saying, no, these are important too.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:26:22             Let’s do this 126 on the surface, themes and messages of 126 are quite distinct from 125. This revelation to Brigham Young also raises questions of where to live and where to work in the section. Just as the Lord had told the Saints he no longer required them to build the temple in Jackson County and that their offering was acceptable to the Lord. Now he tells Brigham, President of the Twelve that he was no more required to leave his family and to preach and that his offering was acceptable. Now, Brigham had served, of course, several missions since his conversion in 1832. What did those missions mean? Well, they meant temporary separation from loved ones. His, as the revelation says, his labor and toil and journeys for the Lord had come at a great cost. 1832, his first wife, Miriam Works, had died leaving behind Brigham and two children, two young children in 1834, Brigham remarries. He marries Mary Ann Angell and an angel indeed she was. Within a month he was on Zion’s camp and then missions continue after the birth of their first child. In October of 1834, more children and more missions follow. Late 1837, Brigham had to flee from Kirtland due to persecution, leaves Mary Ann to care for their five children. Probably heard that when they’re reunited in Missouri. Brigham says, you look as if you were almost in your grave. Given all that, given all that she was doing, it’s kind of surprising she wasn’t.

Hank Smith:                      00:27:57             Not something you say to your wife though.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:28:01             Yeah, just try that. Yeah, see how that goes. Yeah, don’t try that at all. Probably an indicator of all she had been doing. April of 1838, Joseph received a revelation he actually already received in a revelation like this, in April of 1838, the Lord instructed Brigham is not canonized. Lord instructed Brigham not to leave his family again until he had amply provided for them. Frankly, I’m not sure that happened. I’m not quite sure how it could have happened. The Saints were driven from Missouri soon after this. Mary Ann recalls living in 11 residences over the course of three months and she was pregnant at the time. Saints moved to Illinois. Brigham in the Twelve. As you know, they’re called to go to the British Isles. It’s hard to imagine worse conditions when they leave. We all remember the story or many of us know the story of Brigham and Heber being very sick, riding away in the back of a wagon and shouting, hurrah for Israel and that’s a beautiful story.

                                           00:29:00             What we don’t talk about often is the impoverished and sickly conditions of Brigham’s family. Mary Ann had given birth to their seventh child 10 days earlier and all seven children were sick when Brigham left. Within two months she’s out of food. She lives on the Iowa side. She’s out of food, so what does she have to do? Well in the winter, she gets in a skiff with her infant and rows across the Mississippi River and the waves soak them. They get to Nauvoo, they go to some friends, some friends give them some potatoes and flour, help them survive. She makes that trip many times. She’s actually eventually given a plot in Nauvoo and what does she do? She plants a garden. She builds a cabin. She puts blankets over the doors and windows. Remarkable what Mary Ann Angell emphasis on angel does while her husband is away. She is doing a proxy work for her husband.

                                           00:30:15             She was preaching the gospel. Now, when he gets back to Nauvoo on July 1st, 1841, he sees the condition. Joseph Smith comes to their home eight days later. He sees the condition of things he probably already knew about the condition of things. To some extent, he dictates a revelation on the spot and I imagine the Lord had in mind Mary Ann as much as Brigham when he said, your offering is acceptable to me. I have seen your labor and toil. It’s a beautiful thing to hear from the Lord. That’s his word to all of us, to all people who labor for and weep for Zion. We’ll all hear, I think, I hope, those words in time. So then what does the Lord do? He says, Brigham, you can send the word abroad, but now you’re not gonna go abroad yourself. Brigham and the Twelve are now gonna authorize missionaries.

                                           00:31:08             They’re gonna author missives to stand in for them again, proxy. The records and the other missionaries will stand in as proxy for Brigham and the Twelve. Brigham serves a couple of short missions in the years to come, but of course most of his work after this is focused on administrative work from church headquarters. In fact, Joseph gives a discourse shortly after in which he says the Twelve now stand next to the First Presidency and attend to the business of the church, and they had earned the right to remain with their families. All of us have to find balance between caring for those closest to us and those at a distance, and Brigham was caring for those at a distance. Now it was time for him to care for those closest to him. We have to figure out that balance. Christian life is life and community.

                                           00:31:58             The community we seek is really with all God’s children. We’re trying to figure out how to love of course ourselves, our families, love the world. It’s a great challenge. Gospel living requires that of us. One other thing I’ll say about Brigham Young here, he’s told to take especial care of his family from this time henceforth and forever. Aftermath, he gets to work. They build a better home. Also, his family, as we know, becomes one of the largest families in American history, which would give new meaning to this instruction. I think it’s fair to say that not all of Young’s family members believed that he took special care of them. His 56 wives divorced him. There’s a prominent sort of extreme example, Eliza Young who later lectures on Brigham Young and writes an expose and says that this system is horrible on the other end of the spectrum.

                                           00:32:53             Consider this from Clarissa Young Spencer, one of his daughters. She writes this a couple of decades later. Perhaps it’s informed by golden age mentality. I think her words are rather striking. On the day of my birth, a company of the Saints had made the customary trip to Brighton and they had no sooner reached their destination than word was brought to my father that my mother had taken ill. To the great disappointment of his people my father turned around and went immediately back to the city in order to be with Mother during her ordeal. As I was his 51st child, the birth of a baby was far from being a novelty in the family. His consideration for each of his wives or any other member of his family was such that he would willingly forego any pleasure of his own if he could be of any comfort or assistance to them. She added his constant thoughtfulness for our happiness and wellbeing endeared him to all of us. The bond between my father and me, she said was as close as if I had been his only child and I am sure that each of the other children felt the same way. I shall always be grateful that I was born his daughter. In her view at least Brigham had taken especial care of his family.

Hank Smith:                      00:34:14             That’s great, Jordan. If you asked my daughter about me, I think you’d get some truth. Our kids know. Our kids have a front row seat. Okay, Jordan, what should we do next

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:34:26             On to 127 and 128 as 126 suggests we’re called to care for those closest to us, henceforth and forever. We’re also called to care for all God’s children, the living and the dead. Sections 127 and 128 are two letters that Joseph wrote to the Saints while in hiding in September of 1842. Now we’ll get to the background and immediate context in detail. First a few words about why these sections are unique. When the 1844 edition of the Doctrine & Covenants was published, it had 110 sections, only four of which dated from the Nauvoo period. This includes what are now sections 124. In some ways, section 124 was understood to be the Nauvoo revelation. We also had 127 and 128 Joseph approved of those sections for inclusion in the Doctrine & Covenants. Now as you know, by the time the Doctrine & Covenants is published in 1844, it also included Section 135.

                                           00:35:34             Joseph didn’t authorize Section 135 I’m sure he was okay with it. Right? That’s the section on the martyrdom which was quickly added after Joseph’s death. The other sections we just spoke about 125 and 126, along with several other sections, they are added in 1876 when Orson Pratt put together a new edition of the Doctrine & Covenants. At that same time, Pratt added portions of Joseph’s letters from Liberty Jail. Those great letters 121 through 123. What does that mean? That means sections 127 and 128 are the first letters as far as I can tell to be published in the Doctrine & Covenants, the letters themselves are not dictated revelations. They do contain revelatory passages. They do contain moments where the Lord is delivering instruction. They aren’t in and of themselves dictated revelations. Joseph understood their value and believed they needed to be included in the cannon. The first few verses of section 127, Joseph is writing about his enemies pursuing him.

                                           00:36:47             Again pursuing him, and again, we’ll come back to that immediate context. He also refers to persecution more generally that he’s faced throughout his life. Deep water is what I am wont to swim in. It has all become second nature to me and I feel like Paul to glory in tribulation. That’s a remarkable thing to say and it’s born of experience. Now, Joseph experiences persecution throughout his ministry. I suspect his imprisonment in Liberty Jail is a kind of hinge point at which he begins to glory in tribulation. I don’t think he starts out that experience glorying in tribulation. He wouldn’t have been praying to God, asking where God was if he was glorying in that moment. As he gets the answer, as he waits to get the answer, as he gets the answer, as he learns that, yep, in time you’ll triumph over all your enemies.

                                           00:37:50             By the way that shows up in verse two, section 127. He’s reflecting back on what the Lord had told him in Liberty Jail. He’s also told that if he endured his affliction well God would exalt him on high. This Liberty Jail experience broadens his vision. Initially what is he worried about? He’s worried about himself and he’s worried about the Saints. He’s hearing reports of their suffering. I think the Liberty Jail experience really expands his understanding and his vision to think even broader. Verse three of 127, Joseph again referred to what the Lord had told him in Liberty Jail that his enemies would face God’s justice. Then what does he do? He moves on from that really quickly, sort of like, okay, that’s in the Lord’s hands. Now, I’m not suggesting Joseph doesn’t think about his enemies going forward. He does and he has things to say about them.

                                           00:38:44             He turns his focus elsewhere. In Liberty Jail as Joseph turns inward, replaces anger with hope and love, he turns upward to God. The Lord then gives him revelations that further empower him to turn outward and as we’ll discuss even backward to bless all God’s children. I think it’s notable that within a short period of time after he’s out of prison, he sends a letter to the Quorum of the Twelve. This is December of 1840 Quorum of the Twelve are on missions as we’ve indicated. Joseph wrote these memorable lines, which will sound familiar. Love is one of the leading characteristics of deity and ought to be manifested by those who aspire to be the sons of God. A man filled with the love of God is not content with blessing his family alone. As section 126 says, must do that as well, but he also needs to range throughout the whole world being anxious to bless the whole of the human family.

                                           00:39:47             He actually says, this has been your feelings and caused you to forego the pleasures of home that you might be a blessing to others who are, and I love this phrase, candidates for immortality. So lines about preaching the gospel, also think they’re very much tied to teachings on baptism for the dead. In fact, Joseph talks about baptism for the dead in the same letter. Part of the point I’m trying to make here is the Liberty Jail experience, other contexts of suffering and separation, separation from the Saints or from loved ones or even feeling separated from God. Those moments for Joseph are incubators for his revelations. They’re incubators for his revelations of teachings that aim to address all human suffering and in large measure by addressing the fragility of human connection. Verses four and five, Joseph turns Revelator. Now we hear some of the word of the Lord.

                                           00:40:49             The Lord commands the Saints to continue the work on the temple. That would be the Nauvoo temple and then he proceeds to offer instruction on this big topic baptism for the dead. Now, large chunk of context here to outline the origins of baptism for the dead. We could start with an obvious point. It was a point I tried to make through the short story that I shared at the beginning. Throughout human history, the living has done work for the dead in every culture, caring for the body, prayers for the deceased, creating records of their lives. There’s a book by the cultural historian Thomas Laure entitled The Work of the Dead. It’s not about Latter-day Saints. It’s a history of how the living have cared for the dead. Much of that work is through history, religious in nature. Scholars have examined work for the dead done by early Christians, for example, including praying for the dead and even baptism for the dead.

                                           00:41:54             We know the passage in 1 Corinthians 15:29, Paul, he’s not lecturing on baptism for the dead. He’s talking about resurrection. He is defending resurrection in asking why some people are baptized for the dead if the dead rise not at all. We know that some early Christians perform baptisms for the dead. That appears to have been a more limited practice and it appears to have been done for those who believed but had not been baptized. Now, in subsequent centuries, work for the dead became a point of contention and division. Augustine rejected the idea that salvation could be found after death. In later centuries Protestant reformers, they condemn the Catholic view of purgatory and the practice of praying for the dead, mostly believing with some caveats, mostly believing that the dead immediately go to heaven or hell. Protestants viewed prayers for the dead as an example of Catholic’s misplaced emphasis on works which they believed undercut the doctrine of grace.

                                           00:43:04             Now, Protestants don’t entirely get rid of all of the sacraments. Of course, practice baptism and the Lord’s supper. For most of them, these ordinances are commemorative. They’re not salvific. They do not save. In fact, there’s a very prominent theological dictionary written not long before Joseph Smith is born by a man named Charles Buck and there’s an entry on baptism and it reads in part and he’s Protestant, baptism is not essential to salvation he writes. To suppose it is essential is to put it in the place of that which it signifies. If baptism is unessential, no need for baptism for the dead. By the way, he has an entry in that dictionary on baptism for the dead. When he says, yeah, this was formerly in use, he cites First Corinthians 15:29. Then he provides an interpretation that suggests that baptism wasn’t literal. Ancient Christians didn’t do baptisms for the dead.

                                           00:44:05             What I’m saying is Latter-day Saints in early America are not only unique for the practice of baptism for the dead, they’re actually unique in their view of baptism in describing it as essential. Even Baptists. Did they think baptism was important? It’s in the name. Did they think it was essential that it saved you or had some salvific fully transformative power? No. It was a sign of your belief in Christ, a token of your belief. In some ways, we have more in common with Catholics than Protestants. Our faith is in some ways, I’m gonna use the term sacramental, ritualistic. We believe that your sins are remitted through baptism. That’s essential. Now, is it also a symbol and a sign and it’s those things as well. If we insist on the necessity of baptism, then that does create a conundrum regarding those who have died without them.

                                           00:45:14             When the 1830s again, the Saints are like, no, you must be baptized. Yet, what about all the people who have died? Now, I’ll mention two interesting precedents for baptism for the dead in the United States. According to one 19th century historian, there was a group of German Pietists who had immigrated to Pennsylvania who performed baptisms for the dead. He writes that in 1738, a man was baptized for his deceased mother and another man was baptized for his deceased father. The historian says the idea of thus securing immunity for deceased or absent kinsfolk and friends struck the popular fancy. According to this historian, he says, this practice continued into the 1830s. That would’ve been the exception. I don’t know of any other instances in early America. I’ll give you a more interesting, I think an immediate precedent. May of 1840 Brigham, we know where he is at.

                                           00:46:18             He’s on a mission. He writes to his wife Mary Ann and he tells her about a vision, a vision had by a convert to the church named Ann Booth. Now, if you wanna read more about this, Chris Blythe has written a very good article on it. Brigham sends news of this vision and he actually includes in his letter, a transcript of her account of the vision. I’ll read a part of it. She says, being carried away in a vision to the place of departed spirits, I saw 12 prisons, one above another, very large. On arriving at the uppermost prison, I beheld one of the 12 apostles of the lamb who had been martyred in America. This is a reference to David Patten, an original member of the Quorum of the Twelve who had died at the Battle of Crooked River. In 1838, shortly before a couple years before the record goes on to state, Patten was standing at the door of the prison holding a key in his hand with which he unlocked the door and went in.

                                           00:47:24             According to the account, John Wesley greeted David Patten and announced that deliverance had come. According to Ann Booth’s vision, Patten preached baptism and confirmation, and then she says this, a river of water clear as crystal appeared, Patten entered the water with Wesley and baptized him. Patten ordained Wesley to the Aaronic Priesthood and Wesley baptized the other prisoners. Patten confirmed them. Members of the church gave them the gift of the Holy Ghost. Ann Booth also records that she had a reunion with her deceased grandfather and her mother who blessed her. Brigham and other leaders in Britain, they knew about this vision. They wrote home about it. We also know that Joseph Smith knows about it because a couple of months later, in October of 1840, he gives a sermon on baptism for the dead and he refers to the vision. He says this, according to Vilate Kimball, Joseph taught that the dead will have the gospel preached to them in prison, but there is no such thing as spirits being baptized.

                                           00:48:31             Joseph does not wholly discard sister Booth’s vision. Now, what does this all mean? I’m not entirely sure. Joseph may have received a revelation on baptism for the dead before ever hearing of Booth’s vision or maybe Booth’s vision inspired him to reflect further on a subject he’d already been thinking about and to receive revelation on that subject. In either case, Joseph appreciated the vision’s emphasis on the need for the dead to be baptized even as he taught spirit can’t be baptized. Latter-day Saints believe baptism is necessary. Latter-day Saints also believe that baptism requires bodies that corresponds with an emphasis on, I’m gonna use the term embodiment in Joseph’s revelations. Bodies are essential to exaltation. We need bodies also to perform certain works. Of course, our bodies are the source of much suffering during this life. Joseph’s revelations teach that our souls are made up of body and spirit and that both are crucial components of salvation.

                                           00:49:39             Our belief system prizes materiality, and in the late 1830s, the Saints knew that the dead who would’ve received the gospel would be in the celestial kingdom, but given the emphasis on baptism and embodiment, they weren’t quite sure how that made sense or at least if they gave it much thought, they might not have been sure how that would make sense. That’s some of the immediate context. There’s an even more immediate context for Joseph’s introduction of the practice and teaching of baptism for the dead, and this is also tied up with death. This separation, a very severe separation of separation of the spirit from the body is a central context for Joseph to introduce this practice. Reports of Ann Booth’s vision is crossing the Atlantic. What are the saints doing in Nauvoo? They’re staring down death on the banks of the Mississippi River. Many of them had arrived in Commerce on the banks of the Mississippi River and what happens?

                                           00:50:43             They get sick. They get sick with malaria and they don’t know why. They don’t know what the cause is, but they’re getting sick. Some are miraculously healed, others die. One of those who dies is Seymour Brunson. In fact, the record says that moments before he died, Joseph was actually there. He says that David Patten, the same David Patten we’ve just mentioned was in the room from across the veil and urged him to join him on the other side. Days later at Brunson’s funeral service, this is August 15th, 1840, Joseph introduced the practice of baptism for the dead. We have an account. We don’t have contemporary accounts. We have recollections. According to the account of Simon Baker, Joseph referenced 1 Corinthians 15. Then he speaks to a widow in the audience whose son had died before he was baptized. We believe this to be Jane Harper Neyman, and according to Baker, Joseph told the widow and the saints that the living could be baptized for the dead. About a month later, Harvey Olmsted, member of the church baptized Jane in behalf of her son, Cyrus. Vienna Jaques was on horseback acting as a witness in the Mississippi river.

John Bytheway:               00:52:08             Vienna Jaques was something else, someone I never heard about as a kid or church history, whatever. In seminary. Now we’re finding out all these things, donating her means and she was a powerhouse.

Hank Smith:                      00:52:21             Our friend Dr. Anthony Sweat, who was just with us for the Kirtland Temple dedication, he’s an artist. He’ll say he’s such a good artist he became a religion teacher. If you want to look this up, it’s called First Baptism for the Dead and you’ve got Jane Neyman there and Vienna Jaques is it?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:52:43             There’s some uncertainty about how to pronounce her last name.

John Bytheway:               00:52:47             Jackie? Jacques. Jean.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:52:50              I say Jaques.

Hank Smith:                      00:52:51             Yeah. She’s on horseback in the river. Witnessing.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:52:56             Yeah. I’ll add that. Brett Rogers, a historian of the Church History Library, recently published her biography.

Hank Smith:                      00:53:02             Oh, okay. Wow.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:53:03             Or a biography of her, so yeah, check out the the painting and check out the book.

John Bytheway:               00:53:10             If you’ve ever been in the high council room in practically any stake center, you’ve got, I think there’s a set of certain paintings. There’s the resurrected Christ saying, go ye into all the world, preach the gospel to every creature, baptizing them. It just sounds essential there. I picked up a book once, it’s called Will the Real Heretics, Please Stand Up and it’s by an evangelical named David W. think you say it, Bercot, B-E-R-C-O-T, I really appreciated he looked at early Christianity and then he made comments. In fact, there’s a section called Our Need For Doctrinal Humility. Listen to this. He said, interestingly, we evangelicals seem to recognize the need for some type of initiation ceremony, a rite of passage to mark the Christian rebirth. Strangely enough, we had generally rejected the historical ceremony of the baptismal rebirth and have developed our own special ceremony, the altar call.

                                           00:54:15             When Peter preached to the Jews on the day of Pentecost, his hearers asked him, what shall we do? Did Peter tell them to walk up to the front of the crowd and invite Jesus to come into their hearts? No. He told them, repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins. After Philip explained the gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch, what did he do? He immediately baptized him. Likewise, when God demonstrated to Peter by the outpouring of the Spirit on Cornelius, that Christianity was open to Gentiles, the first thing that Peter did was to baptize Cornelius and his family. When Paul preached in the middle of the night to the Philippian jailer and his household, did Paul then hold an altar call? No. The scriptures say, then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in the house, and he took them the same hour of the night and washed their stripes and immediately he and all his family were baptized. Then Mr. Bercot says, since we feel the need to associate our spiritual rebirth with a fixed day and hour, why don’t we tie it to baptism rather than to the altar call? Actually, the altar call and associate prayers are a product of the revival movements of the 18th and 19th centuries, and they were virtually unknown to any Christians before that time. You must be born again. Those words that are often repeated in the standard works and how we interpret that as a baptism by water and of the Spirit maybe baptism and confirmation.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:55:45             That’s related to the conversations that Oliver Cowdery and Joseph Smith are having about section what becomes Section 20. They have a disagreement about some of the language. Oliver Cowdery, who essentially wrote another version of the articles of the church, had a phrase in there that the members need to come up and tell about their path in salvation, their conversion story. Joseph is like, nope, that’s not it. So yeah, that’s a crucial context.

Hank Smith:                      00:56:12             Yeah. Thanks, John. Yeah, that was good. Jordan, what do we do next?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        00:56:17             During this same period, Joseph worried about more proximate separations. What I mean by that is during the summer and fall of 1840, his father Joseph Smith Sr. was sick. Joseph Junior was threatened with removal from Illinois in September, 1840, same month that Jane Neyman was baptized for her deceased son. Missouri authorities initiated extradition proceedings against Joseph Smith. Extradition involves the removal of a person in one state to another state for trial. In this case, Missouri authorities wanted to extradite Joseph back to Missouri to be tried for crimes he allegedly committed during the what’s called the Mormon War. Now we have a great passage from Lucy Mack Smith’s history that highlights the close relationship between these contexts and the new teaching of baptism for the dead. So she says, on a Saturday evening in mid-September of 1840, Joseph Smith Sr. was so sick that he vomited blood.

                                           00:57:33             The next morning, Joseph Jr. shows up. She writes, he came in and told his father that he should not be troubled anymore for the present with the Missourians, after which he informed his father that it was then the privilege of the saints to be baptized for the dead. These two facts, fact one that Joseph Smith Jr. was safe from extradition for the time being, and fact two, that the dead could be brought out of Spirit prison. Mr. Smith, Joseph Smith, Sr. Was delighted to hear and requested that Joseph should be baptized for Alvin immediately. Joseph Smith Sr. then proceeds he’s very sick. He’s essentially on his deathbed. He proceeds to bless his children. Lucy writes that after the blessings, he paused and said, I can see and hear as well as I ever could. Now we’ll discuss seeing and hearing a lot today. Then came a second pause before he said, I see Alvin then came a third pause and he said, I’m gonna live seven to eight more minutes.

                                           00:58:48             He died about eight minutes later. Lucy says, we found that her record’s not always accurate, but I find these passages so interesting. She notes that they’re compelled to attend to his funeral the next day or run the risks she says, of seeing Joseph and Hyrum torn from their father’s corpse before it was interred and carried away by their enemies to prison. After we deposited his last remains in its narrow house, she wrote, my sons fled from the city. Hyrum was baptized for Alvin. Soon after this, he actually was baptized again for Alvin later the next year. Why? We’re not quite sure, maybe that was after the temple font was completed. The point to make here is contexts of suffering, persecution, death, separation, those were springboards for revelation. They certainly were for Joseph. I think they can be that for us as well. Joseph had had this vision of the celestial kingdom in 1836 suggesting that the dead, who would’ve received the gospel would be in the celestial kingdom. Now the saints could do something about it. They knew that was the case. Now they can do something about it, so they did. I love what Vilate Kimball said in a letter to her husband, Heber, who again is on his mission in the British Isles. She says, the waters, meaning the waters of the Mississippi River have been continually troubled. They’re flocking to the Mississippi River.

John Bytheway:               01:00:31             Yeah.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:00:31             Remember again, Brigham, Heber, Wilford, they’re not in Nauvoo for this big announcement. They’re on missions in the British Isles. Many of them learn about the practice from letters written by their wives. October, 1840, Phoebe writes to Wilford, there has been quite a number of deaths, she says, in Commerce, people are dying. And then she says, oh, and Joseph has taught on the livings being baptized for the dead, that they may be judged according to men in the flesh. Joseph, she writes, had explained that members could be baptized for their kindred dead, including children, parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, uncles and aunts, and that as soon as the dead are baptized, they are released from prison and their friends can claim them in the resurrection and bring them into the celestial kingdom. Of course, we believe that the dead have the option to accept or reject those baptisms and ordinances. It’s agency. You can hear in Phoebe’s statement, the exuberance of the Saints.

John Bytheway:               01:01:38             The waters are continually troubled.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:01:40             Continually troubled. They’re not being baptized for distant relatives. Somebody who they’ve found in their family tree, they didn’t have that language. They’re being baptized, in fact, Joseph’s instructing them to be baptized for close family members. They were baptized for those who they knew and for those whose deaths they had mourned. Now, throughout the 19th century, the work expands both in terms of the kind of work done for the dead and the scope of who the Saints perform the work for, but initially this focus is on very proximate family members. Now, Joseph himself does eventually write to the Twelve about the teaching. I mentioned actually the December, 1840 letter. That letter with the great statement about a man who’s filled with love of God is not content with blessing his family alone. Later on in the letter, he says, I presume the doctrine of baptism for the dead has ere this reached your ears and may have raised some inquiries in your mind respecting the same. This is an interesting time. You might learn about baptism for the dead when you’re on your deathbed and Joseph shows up to your home and he says, guess what, dad? The living can be baptized for the dead. You might hear about it on your mission and somebody sends a letter, right? Things were changing rapidly theologically during this period, but Joseph says, I cannot in this letter give you all the information you may desire on the subject, but aside from my knowledge independent of the Bible, I would say that this was certainly practiced by the ancient churches in St. Paul endeavors to prove the doctrine of the resurrection from the same. I first mentioned the doctrine in public while preaching the funeral sermon of Brother Brunson and have since then give general instructions to the church on the subject.

                                           01:03:24             He proceeds to explain the Saints have the privilege of being baptized for those of their relatives who are dead, who they feel to believe would have embraced the gospel if they had been privileged with hearing it and who have received the gospel and the Spirit through the instrumentality of those who may have been commissioned to preach to them. While in prison we’ll get much more about that from his nephew, Joseph F. Smith, and his vision. Without enlarging on the subject, you will undoubtedly see its consistency and reasonableness and it presents the gospel of Christ in probably a more enlarged scale than some have received it. I love that phrase, but as the performance of this rite is more particularly confined to this place, it will not be necessary to enter into particulars. At the same time, I always feel glad to give all the information in my power, but my space will not allow me to do it.

                                           01:04:18             You see that sort of phrasing through many of these documents, Joseph often felt he lacked the language, the space, the time to appropriately convey his visions and revelations. That’s certainly true with baptism for the dead. Just a month later, Joseph received more instruction on baptism for the dead. We’ve mentioned his January 1841 Revelation section 124. In it, the Lord provides instruction to build a temple, to build a Nauvoo house. By the way, isn’t that interesting? If you read section 124, there’s almost equal emphasis on building the Nauvoo house and the house of the Lord. That’s an interesting thing. What does it suggest? I think it suggests that these endeavors are tied together. We’re called to offer Christ-like hospitality and saving ordinances to all God’s children. What a beautiful way to live the two great commandments building habitations for God, providing hospitality for God’s children and taking care of both temporal and spiritual needs.

                                           01:05:23             Then the Lord specifically addresses baptism for the dead. Build a house unto my name for the Most High. This is again, section 124 for the Most High to dwell therein that he may come and restore again, that which was lost unto you, or which he hath taken away even the fullness of the priesthood. Of course, much more on that in Section 128. For a baptismal font, there is not upon the earth that they, my saints may be baptized for those who are dead. For this ordinance, belongeth to my house. Saints continue to work on the temple. They get to work on a temple font. In the meantime, as permitted by the Lord, they continue to perform baptisms for the dead in the Mississippi River. Some numbers. In 1841, the Saints in Nauvoo performed almost 7,000 baptisms for the dead in the river. Nehemiah Brush was baptized in behalf of more than a hundred individuals.

                                           01:06:16             Sarah Cleveland was baptized for about 40 individuals. Franklin Richards was baptized for his brother who had been killed in the Hans Mill massacre. Decades later Wilford Woodruff, he’s reflecting. Wilford Woodruff, of course, is very important figure for a number of reasons. One is the development of temple work. He broadened that work in significant ways. Decades later he’s reflecting back on this moment, and he says this, when the prophet Joseph had this revelation from heaven, what did he do? There are witnesses here of what he did. He never stopped till he got the fullness of the word of God to him concerning the baptism of the dead. Before getting the fullness he went into the Mississippi River, so did I as well as others, and we each baptized a hundred for the dead without a man to record a single act that we performed. Why did we do it? Because of the feeling of joy that we had to think that we in the flesh could stand and redeem our dead. We did not wait to know what the result of this would be or what the whole of it should be. Isn’t that beautiful? He’s sort of saying like, yeah, we didn’t all have it all figured out. How are we not going to flock to the Mississippi River to perform these baptisms for the dead?

Hank Smith:                      01:07:32             I’ve had a hard time finding a good source for this. There’s a story that President Packer was taking questions from a journalist and someone said, do you really intend to do this temple work for every person who’s ever lived ? Do you have any idea how big that, yeah I mean, and President Packer, I guess said something like, it’s a big job.

John Bytheway:               01:07:54              Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      01:07:55             Take a thousand years and a thousand temples probably.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:07:58             That’s excellent.

Hank Smith:                      01:08:00             It’s a big job. It’s a beautiful doctrine.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:08:03             There’s much more to say about it. I’ll note that in section 124, the Lord does reference baptisms for the dead by those who are scattered abroad. They’re not doing them in the British Isles. Remember what Joseph said in his letter. It’s mostly confined to this place. We actually do know that Saints in other areas, including Kirtland, performed baptisms for the dead. In October of 1841 Joseph says, no more baptisms for the dead until we have that font completed. It’s weeks after that in that Brigham Young dedicates a temporary wooden baptismal font in the basement of the unfinished temple. A few weeks after that, the Saints began to perform baptisms in the font. We have a couple of exceptions in terms of baptisms being performed out of the font after that. For the most part, the practice of baptism for the dead is then confined to the temple font. Every other teaching and practice of the restoration, there’s development over time and in relationship to the Saints circumstances.

Hank Smith:                      01:09:08             Did they even write down who they’re being baptized for or was it like ?

John Bytheway:               01:09:12             Was somebody recording it or…?

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:09:13             Initially, I presume that in some cases they didn’t even record it. We do have some records of baptisms for the dead from before these letters. Before sections 127 and 128. There was some sense that we should keep some record not at the level that that they got to after these letters. Why do we need temples to perform these? The Lord says we do so I guess that’s a good reason why, because he allows exceptions. I don’t have the answer. God doesn’t need a house. He’s not looking for a nice place to reside. I would say it this way, at least for the early saints, the process of building temples, especially for these saints who don’t have much financial means, that’s gonna uniquely prepare them to be endowed with power from on high. The fact that they have to sacrifice so much to build a temple, how are they then gonna feel when they enter that temple and receive those ordinances?

Hank Smith:                      01:10:17             Right? The building of the temple makes you something.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:10:20             Like the building of Zion makes you something. God doesn’t give it to you. You build it and you become something in the process. It’s also interesting to note that the physical labor of construction prepared them to receive these ordinances are tangible. You feel them. It’s physical. When they completed the temple, they worked with the same eagerness that led them to flock to the Mississippi River to be baptized for their dead. Even though in Nauvoo they knew their time was very limited. It does make me wonder about today. I don’t help in building a temple. I mean, I pay my tithing.

Hank Smith:                      01:10:56             I’m not out there with my wheelbarrow, right? In fact, they’d kick me out. They’d say, get outta here. You’re gonna hurt yourself.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:11:02             You’re slowing the work. It does lead me to wonder, what do we do today? Obviously donating a tithe is not nothing. That’s something, what kind sacrifice do we make? I wonder if at some level time has taken the place of physical exertion. Both are still required to some extent and in different parts of the world it still takes longer to get to a temple, even though it’s becoming easier. Many of us, I should say, it costs relatively little time to get to the temple, but you have to spend the time in there and we’re asked to give up that time. We sometimes think, wow, people, what? What did they do in the past? They just had so much time. I mean, they were busy. You had to work the land to actually eat. Think of all the demands on our time. We have never, I don’t think, been busier. The options for spending our time are so great and many of those things are good. Maybe our effort to make time to attend the temple, to pay attention in the temple. There’s a great article by Michael Austin on the Sacrament of Attention, and he says, there’s a reason we use the term pay attention. It costs us something. Give the time and then to pay attention. Maybe that’s what prepares us to be endowed from power from on high today.

Hank Smith:                      01:12:31             Yeah, it’s not going out there with a wheelbarrow and working, but it is maybe doing the same thing to me as that working did to them. I really like that. Jordan, you might think the Lord’s work is sometimes a paradox. He says, if you lose your life, you’ll get it. You’re going, that makes no sense. To pay your tithing, the windows of heaven will open. You’re like, well, I’m giving something away. How? How am I getting something back? Maybe it’s the same way with the temple. I don’t have time to go to the temple. Oh, go to the temple. You’ll have more time or there’s something that will happen to you.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:13:07             Maybe one way to say it is you’ll have eternity. I’m thinking of those revelations on the law of consecration, right? It’s like, give me everything because it’s actually mine. Show me that you know that it’s mine and then if you keep this law, what will I give you? I will give you the kingdom. All that the father hath will be yours. Are we the kind of people who can use that kind of time, use that kind of power? Well, and I think the temple can prepare us for that sort of thing.

Hank Smith:                      01:13:43             President Hinckley said, what appears to be a sacrifice turns out to be an investment which pays you dividends for the rest of your life. I think he was talking about missions, but I think our time in the temple is the same way. It feels like a sacrifice. It ends up being an investment that keeps paying dividends.

John Bytheway:               01:14:01             Remember too, there is another soul, another immortal soul on the other side that has benefited from your time in the temple. That’s huge. Someone else out there. That’s why I like when they call it temple service, a service that reaches across the veil. That’s kind of incredible to think about. I found a statement by Elder Richard G. Scott. He said, do you young people want a sure way to eliminate the influence of the adversary in your life? That’s a pretty big statement. A sure way to eliminate the influence of the adversary in your life. Immerse yourself in searching for your ancestors. Prepare their names for the sacred vicarious ordinances available in the temple, and then go to the temple to stand as proxy for them to receive the ordinances of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost. As you grow older, you’ll be able to participate in receiving the other ordinances as well. I can think of no greater protection from the influence of the adversary in your life.

Dr. Jordan Watkins:        01:15:09             And it feels like we’ve heard similar things recently from our prophet.

John Bytheway:               01:15:12             Yeah, this is 2012. A sure way to eliminate the influence of the adversary. Find your ancestors, prepare their names, which has never been easier. Couple of touches on a phone.

Hank Smith:                      01:15:23             As a parent of teenagers John, I want that. That’s high on my list of to reduce the effects of the adversary in my children’s lives. I have an answer right here. Here’s something I can do.

John Bytheway:               01:15:39             We had a mission farewell in my ward this last Sunday. Elder Mason Ontiveros thanked the bishop for the temple trips that they took. He said, first I was thinking about the refreshments or whatever we get afterwards. Then he thanked him for that time in the temple. I loved that. That would be the thing that lasted with him as he heads off to Columbia, is time in the temple.