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| Source Everything that is done in the Church—the leading, the teaching, the calling, the ordaining, the praying, the singing, the preparation of the sacrament, the counseling, and everything else—is done by ordinary members, the “weak things of the world.” |
We honor President James E. Faust. We miss him.
His beloved wife, Ruth, is with us this morning, and we express our love to
her. We welcome those who have been named to the positions that President
Hinckley has outlined.
Speaking for all of us who have been sustained
today, we pledge to do our very best to be worthy of the trust placed in us.
We have sustained the general officers of the
Church in a solemn, sacred procedure. This common procedure occurs whenever
leaders or teachers are called or released from office or whenever there is
reorganization in a stake or a ward or a quorum or in the auxiliaries (see
D&C 124:123, 144; see also D&C 20:65–67; 26:2). It is unique to The
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
We always know who is called to lead or to
teach and have the opportunity to sustain or to oppose the action. It did not
come as an invention of man but was set out in the revelations: “It shall not
be given to any one to go forth to preach my gospel, or to build up my church,
except he be ordained by some one who has authority, and it is known to the
church that he has authority and has been regularly ordained by the heads of
the church” (D&C 42:11; emphasis added). In this way, the Church is protected
from any imposter who would take over a quorum, a ward, a stake, or the Church.
There is another principle unique to the Lord’s
Church. All positions to teach and to lead are filled by members of the Church.
This too has been set forth in the scriptures. One verse in the Doctrine and
Covenants established the order of leadership in the Church for all time. It
was unprecedented, certainly not the custom of Christian churches then or now:
“Wherefore, I the Lord, knowing the calamity
which should come upon the inhabitants of the earth, called upon my servant
Joseph Smith, Jun., and spake unto him from heaven, and gave him commandments;
…
“The weak things of the world shall come forth
and break down the mighty and strong ones, …
“… That every man might speak in the name of
God the Lord, even the Savior of the world;
“That faith also might increase in the earth;
“That mine everlasting covenant might be
established;
“That the fulness of my gospel might be
proclaimed by the weak and the simple unto the ends of the world, and before
kings and rulers.
“Behold, I am God and have spoken it; these
commandments are of me, and were given unto my servants in their weakness,
after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding”
(D&C 1:17, 19–24).
I am deeply grateful for those scriptures,
which explain that the Lord will use the “weak things of the world.”
Each member is responsible to accept the call
to serve.
President J. Reuben Clark Jr. said: “In the
service of the Lord, it is not where you serve but how. In the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints, one takes the place to which one is duly called,
which place one neither seeks nor declines” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1951,
154). The Church has no professional clergy. The call to leadership positions
worldwide is drawn from the congregation. We have no seminaries for the
training of professional leaders.
Everything that is done in the Church—the
leading, the teaching, the calling, the ordaining, the praying, the singing,
the preparation of the sacrament, the counseling, and everything else—is done
by ordinary members, the “weak things of the world.”
We see in the Christian churches their struggle
to fill the need for clergy. We do not have that problem. Once the gospel is
preached and the Church is organized, there is an inexhaustible supply of
faithful brothers and sisters who have that testimony and are willing to answer
the call to serve. They commit themselves to the work of the Lord and live the
standards required of them.
Members have had the Holy Ghost conferred upon
them after their baptism (see D&C 33:15; 35:6). The Holy Ghost will teach
and comfort them. They are then prepared to receive guidance, direction, and
correction, whatever their position or needs require. (See John 14:26; D&C
50:14; 52:9; 75:10.)
This principle sets the Church on a different
course from all other Christian churches in the world. We find ourselves in the
unusual position of having an endless supply of teachers and leaders, among
every nation and kindred and tongue and people, all over the world. There is a
unique equality among members. No one of us is to consider himself of more
value than the other (see D&C 38:24–25). “God is no respecter of persons:
but in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted
with him” (Acts 10:34–35; see also Romans 2:11; D&C 1:35; 38:16).
When I was a young man, I was a home teacher to
a very old sister. She taught me from her life experience.
When she was a little girl, President Brigham
Young came to Brigham City, a great event in the town named after him. To honor
him, the Primary children, all dressed in white, were lined up along the road
coming into town, each with a basket of flowers to spread before the carriage
of the President of the Church.
Something displeased her. Instead of throwing
her blossoms, she kicked a rock in front of the carriage, saying, “He ain’t one
bit better than my Grandpa Lovelund.” That was overheard, and she was severely
scolded.
I am very sure that President Brigham Young
would be the first to agree with little Janie Steed. He would not consider
himself to be worth more than Grandpa Lovelund or any other worthy member of
the Church.
The Lord Himself was very plain: “And whosoever
will be chief among you, let him be your servant” (Matthew 20:27). “The same is
appointed to be the greatest, notwithstanding he is the least and the servant
of all” (D&C 50:26).
Years ago when I first received an appointment
that resulted in my picture being in the newspapers, one of my high school
teachers, evidently quite astonished, was heard to say, “That just proves that
you can’t tell by looking at a frog how high he is going to jump!”
The image of that frog, sitting in the mud
instead of jumping, illustrates how inadequate I have felt when facing the
responsibilities that have come to me.
These feelings fix it so that thereafter one
can never feel superior to anyone, not anyone.
For a long time, something else puzzled me.
Forty-six years ago I was a 37-year-old seminary supervisor. My Church calling
was as an assistant teacher in a class in the Lindon Ward.
To my great surprise, I was called to meet with
President David O. McKay. He took both of my hands in his and called me to be
one of the General Authorities, an Assistant to the Quorum of the Twelve
Apostles.
A few days later, I came to Salt Lake City to
meet with the First Presidency to be set apart as one of the General
Authorities of the Church. This was the first time I had met with the First
Presidency—President David O. McKay and his counselors, President Hugh B. Brown
and President Henry D. Moyle.
President McKay explained that one of the
responsibilities of an Assistant to the Twelve was to stand with the Quorum of
the Twelve Apostles as a special witness and to bear testimony that Jesus is
the Christ. What he said next overwhelmed me: “Before we proceed to set you
apart, I ask you to bear your testimony to us. We want to know if you have that
witness.”
I did the best I could. I bore my testimony the
same as I might have in a fast and testimony meeting in my ward. To my
surprise, the Brethren of the Presidency seemed pleased and proceeded to confer
the office upon me.
That puzzled me greatly, for I had supposed
that someone called to such an office would have an unusual, different, and
greatly enlarged testimony and spiritual power.
It puzzled me for a long time until finally I
could see that I already had what was required: an abiding testimony in my
heart of the Restoration of the fulness of the gospel through the Prophet
Joseph Smith, that we have a Heavenly Father, and that Jesus Christ is our Redeemer.
I may not have known all about it, but I did have a testimony, and I was
willing to learn.
I was perhaps no different from those spoken of
in the Book of Mormon: “And whoso cometh unto me with a broken heart and a
contrite spirit, him will I baptize with fire and with the Holy Ghost, even as
the Lamanites, because of their faith in me at the time of their conversion,
were baptized with fire and with the Holy Ghost, and they knew it not” (3 Nephi
9:20; emphasis added).
Over the years, I have come to see how
powerfully important that simple testimony is. I have come to understand that
our Heavenly Father is the Father of our spirits (see Numbers 16:22; Hebrews
12:9; D&C 93:29). He is a father with all the tender love of a father.
Jesus said, “For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and
have believed that I came out from God” (John 16:27).
Some years ago, I was with President Marion G.
Romney, meeting with mission presidents and their wives in Geneva, Switzerland.
He told them that 50 years before, as a missionary boy in Australia, late one
afternoon he had gone to a library to study. When he walked out, it was night.
He looked up into the starry sky, and it happened. The Spirit touched him, and
a certain witness was born in his soul.
He told those mission presidents that he did
not know any more surely then as a member of the First Presidency that God the
Father lives; that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, the Only Begotten of
the Father; and that the fulness of the gospel had been restored than he did as
a missionary boy 50 years before in Australia. He said that his testimony had
changed in that it was much easier to get an answer from the Lord. The Lord’s
presence was nearer, and he knew the Lord much better than he had 50 years
before.
There is the natural tendency to look at those
who are sustained to presiding positions, to consider them to be higher and of
more value in the Church or to their families than an ordinary member. Somehow
we feel they are worth more to the Lord than are we. It just does not work that
way!
It would be very disappointing to my wife and
to me if we supposed any one of our children would think that we think we are
of more worth to the family or to the Church than they are, or to think that
one calling in the Church was esteemed over another or that any calling would
be thought to be less important.
Recently, one of our sons was sustained as ward
mission leader. His wife told us how thrilled he was with the call. It fits the
very heavy demands of his work. He has the missionary spirit and will find good
use for his Spanish, which he has kept polished from his missionary days. We
also were very, very pleased at his call.
What my son and his wife are doing with their
little children transcends anything they could do in the Church or out. No
service could be more important to the Lord than the devotion they give to one
another and to their little children. And so it is with all our other children.
The ultimate end of all activity in the Church centers in the home and the
family.
As General Authorities of the Church, we are
just the same as you are, and you are just the same as we are. You have the
same access to the powers of revelation for your families and for your work and
for your callings as we do.
It is also true that there is an order to
things in the Church. When you are called to an office, you then receive
revelation that belongs to that office that would not be given to others.
No member of the Church is esteemed by the Lord
as more or less than any other. It just does not work that way! Remember, He is
a father—our Father. The Lord is “no respecter of persons.”
We are not worth more to the onrolling of the
Lord’s work than were Brother and Sister Toutai Paletu‘a in Nuku‘alofa, Tonga;
or Brother and Sister Carlos Cifuentes in Santiago, Chile; or Brother and
Sister Peter Dalebout in the Netherlands; or Brother and Sister Tatsui Sato of
Japan; or hundreds of others I have met while traveling about the world. It
just does not work that way.
And so the Church moves on. It is carried upon
the shoulders of worthy members living ordinary lives among ordinary families,
guided by the Holy Ghost and the Light of Christ, which is in them.
I bear witness that the gospel is true and that
the worth of souls is great in the sight of God—every soul—and that we are
blessed to be members of the Church. I have the witness that would qualify me
for the calling I have. I’ve had it since I met the First Presidency those many
years ago. I bear it to you in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
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