followHIM - Doctrine & Covenants 137-138 Part 1 : Dr. Steven C. Harper

Episode Date: November 27, 2021

What is the soteriology problem? Dr. Steven Harper returns to discuss Doctrine and Covenants, Section 137, and the centuries-long question of who gets saved by God. We discuss the nature of God, the redemption of the dead,  and the reality that death isn’t a deadline to determine a person’s salvation.Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.co/episodesFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Executive ProducersDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: MarketingLisa Spice: Client Relations, Show Notes/TranscriptsJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Rough Video EditorAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsKrystal Roberts: French TranscriptsIgor Willians: Portuguese Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-pianoPlease rate and review the podcast.

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith. And I'm John, by the way. We love to learn. We love to laugh. We want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow Him. Hello, my friends. Welcome to another episode of Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith, and I am here with my O Come All Ye Faithful co-host, John, by the way. John, you are O Come All Ye Faithful. It's that time of the year, John. O Come Hank, O Come Hank. Yes. I could have said my little drummer boy co-host, but I went with, Oh, come on. You faithful.

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Great face for radio. Right. Yeah. You can come to followhim.co, followhim.co for show notes, transcripts, and you can even read the transcript in French, Portuguese, and Spanish. Now, wow, we are covering the globe here, John. We have one, really one final episode to talk about the prophet Joseph Smith before we move on to different curriculum. So, John, we brought in, I would say, I would say the world's expert on Joseph Smith. He would say one of the world's experts on Joseph Smith. He might even not call himself an expert, but

talk to us. Who's here with us today? We are so glad to have Dr. Steve Harper back again. I'm, I've got a couple of books of his on my shelf. One that long before I really met Steve personally, I read Joseph Smith's First Vision, where he talks about all the different accounts. We know there were different accounts. People heard Joseph talk about it, write it down. He wrote some and put those all together beautifully. There's another book called Making Sense of the Doctrine and Covenants, which I have used a lot this year. And so, we're just glad to have him back. And I got a bio from the religious education website, and we'll let him update this if he needs to. But Stephen C. Harper is a professor of church history and doctrine at Brigham Young University.

In 2012, Steve was appointed as the managing historian and general editor of Saints, the story of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was named editor-in-chief of BYU Studies Quarterly in September 2018, served in the Canada Winnipeg Mission, and married Jennifer Sebring in 1992. They graduated from BYU in 1994. And I love that. They graduated in 1994. So, is that a dual graduation, Steve, at the same time? Steve Yep. She in art education, me in history. At the same time. That's great. He has an MA, Master of Arts in American History from Utah State.

His thesis analyzed determinants of conversion to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the 1830s. This is the part. When you hear this, it's going to sound really cool. He earned a PhD in early American history from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Lehigh, you got Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. You get Lehigh, you got Bethlehem. That sounds really, but it's Lehigh, H-I-G-H, Lehigh, like high up. He began teaching courses in religion and history at BYU Hawaii in 2000. That's a rough assignment. Joined religious education faculty in 2002 and mentioned a couple of books, dozens of articles. We're just really glad to have you back,

Steve, and I'm so excited and ready to take notes. It's thrilling for me to be with you again. You guys are doing immensely important work and the vast number of people that are paying attention are a testament to how important it is and how far reaching. Thank you. Well, Steve, we are lucky to have you. And I promised him I wouldn't gush. But I just need to say, he's going to be like, oh, you promised. I just need to say, the first time I saw Steve Harper speaking on Joseph Smith, my first thought was, no one this good looking should be this smart.

Wow, this guy knows his stuff. And I also didn't realize, this is going to become my friend. And he and his wife are as faithful and as good and as wonderful as you'd hope them to be from someone who knows so much. So I'm done gushing. That was just a quick gush. It was a mini gush. When I, on a previous podcast, I think, I don't know if it was part of the recording or not, but I asked Steve, so were you offensive or defensive line? And he said, what did you say, Steve?

I think this is kind of fun for people to know. I think you said I was a mediocre quarterback. Wow. That was an overstatement, John. That was a radical overstatement. Mediocre is a compliment. Yeah. That's an insult to all the other mediocre co-operatives out there.

Right. Was it President Eyring that said there were two of us in our deacon's quorum back in New Jersey? And that may be an exaggeration. That's funny. I have a terrible arrogance problem, and this is good for it. Yeah. Or bad. I don't know.

Yeah, bad for you. I remember you saying that in one of your talks. My wife says I have an arrogance problem. I don't, obviously. I don't know what she's thinking. This week, I like how the manual starts out. We have two revelations that are separated by more than 80 years and 1500 miles. So who's better to walk us through these revelations 137 and 138 than Steve Harper.

So Steve, we're going to kind of turn it over to you and we'll just kind of be the sideshow as we take us along with you. Well, yeah, sections 137 and 138, they come at the back of the book, even though section 137 was revealed on the 21st day of January 1836 in the temple at Kirtland, Ohio. So we're jumping back in time. Yep. All the way back to the months before the dedication of the temple. And then section 138 comes as a series of visions to Joseph F. Smith, the prophet's nephew, who's now the prophet himself, aged prophet, just one month from his own death. And the revelation comes on the third day of October, 1918. And we'll talk about the significance of those that year and the weeks surrounding it. So, you know, why don't we put section 137 where it belongs chronologically, which would be

right between sections 108 and 109? I don't know. I certainly wasn't part of that decision, but one thing that would happen if you did that is every footnote you've ever written or referenced in any manual to sections 109 through 136 would be bumped. So, in 1976, the prophets proposed to the saints that we canonize these two revelations. And we did so. We put them in the Pearl of Great Price for a few years. And then in 1979, I think, put them, tacked them on at the end of the Doctrine and Covenants. So there's going to be some of our listeners who remember this.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Some of us were alive who remember this. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Some of us were alive in those days. Yeah. Back in the old days. John, you don't remember this. I was there. I was about 13.

And I remember that was momentous. I mean, my dad couldn't stay seated on the couch. He was, look at this. And they even gave us a little insert that we printed on the same type of scripture paper to stick in there. I wish I had that now. I've upgraded, I guess. But I remember that. And then I remember when they moved it to the Doctrine and Covenants.

Wow, John. Pretty cool. We have church history on our podcast right now. Like we're interviewing someone from church history. We finally caught up to your life. I was in seminary when they said, turn in your Bibles and they handed us all a new one. And I will never forget opening it up

and seeing footnotes to the Book of Mormon in my Bible. That was a moment I won't forget as a sophomore in seminary. Yeah, it's pretty cool. That's awesome, John. And you don't look it. That's the good thing. You do not look it. You don't look a day over 80.

I was friends with David O. McKay and we worked on it. When Wilford and I roomed together at BYU. Yeah, so that's- Sorry, Steve. Yeah, we're getting off track here. Yeah, when Wilford and I roomed together at BYU. Yeah, so that's- Sorry, Steve. Yeah, we're getting off track here. Yeah, sorry. Go back to, so it was 76, and then what did you say, 79? I was around then, too, but John was paying better attention than I was.

I remember when Elvis died, I thought that was the president of the church. I was confused about all these things so it wasn't uh as well informed or or faithful since we're admitting things i remember thinking orville redenbacher was in the quorum of the 12 because he looked like marvin j ashton and i just could not tell the two apart so i thought why is that apostle selling so much popcorn? So, sorry. That's an honest mistake. Yeah, we can go through. That's an honest mistake.

Thank you. Yeah. Well, the thing about these two revelations, though they're far separated in time, is that they both address what in Christian theology is called the soteriological problem. And so let's start with that. The soteriology is theology that is about salvation. Who gets saved? How do you get saved? And Christians debate soteriology endlessly. In Joseph Smith's day, there's a serious soteriological problem. Christianity has it to this day, continues to be debated. But sections 137 and 138 solve it. They resolve it. The problem has three premises. And the problem is that these three premises and the problem is that these three premises can't all be reconciled apparently

right let me see if i can remember them first is that god presumably loves all his children and desires their salvation he doesn't he didn't create anybody to be damned uh the second is that salvation comes only through one's knowing, willing acceptance of Jesus Christ as Savior. And then third is many, maybe most people live and die and never know, never have any idea that they should or could accept Jesus Christ as their savior so this is a terrible problem is god too short-sighted or too narrow-minded or you know what's the nature of this problem he doesn't and the debates go back and forth right sending most of his children to a eternal hell does not sound very loving. I remember Joseph, Joseph Hilling McConkie talking about this once. He was a mission president in Scotland and he said that he spoke to a minister

there about the soteriological problem and you know, the fate of those who never heard as some, some people put it and he said, the minister responded, that's their tough luck. And that just makes me sick inside. I don't worship a God of tough luck. That's no kind of planning God.

And thankfully, the God of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ is not the God of tough luck. He's the God of a perfect plan that resolves the soteriological problem. And there's a great scholar named Jeff Trumbauer. He's not the only one, but he's written the most interesting and compelling book about the history of this issue. The book is called rescue for the dead not a latter-day saint and doesn't doesn't have a dog in the fight doesn't care uh you know that the restored gospel has come back he's interested in it as a scholar he's written about it but what's the book called again? Rescue for the Dead. And it's about the idea of posthumous salvation. Can people who have died without becoming Christian be saved?

What's the history of thought about that question? That's what the book covers. Prestigious Press, Oxford University Press, really well done, and talks about the restored gospel in it. But the most interesting thing I learned from this book is that the early Christians did not make the assumption that makes the problem, the soteriological problem a problem in other words uh the problem didn't become a problem at the time of jesus peter didn't have the problem paul didn't have the problem it becomes a problem four or five hundred years later because augustine and others have a powerful influence in turning Christianity to the idea that death becomes a deadline that determines a person's salvation, right?

That's not in the Bible. Paul preached that baptism could be done for the dead, and he took it for granted that it was, and that it was a legitimate part of the gospel of Christ. Peter taught, as you all know, that Jesus visited the spirits of the dead so that they could be judged just as justly as people who lived here on earth. So, the first Christians, the heirs of the New Testament, don't assume that death is a deadline that determines your salvation. It's not this arbitrary deadline, right? If you're saved by the time you die, you're in. If you're not, of Western Christianity.

And it remains that way until January 21st, 1836, when Joseph Smith is high in the temple at Kirtland. He's up on the top floor in the Garrett office on the far western end. He's there with his father, with the two bishops, his counselors, some others, leaders of the church, and they're having a really beautiful meeting anticipating the solemn assembly that's going to come in March and the endowment of power that the Lord has promised. And they're praying, they're giving each other priesthood blessings, and then the heavens open, and that's how section 137 begins. Section 137 is a text from Joseph Smith's journal for that day, January 21st, 1836. It's a little different in our Doctrine and Covenants because it's been rendered into the first person. In Joseph's journal, it's written in third person by his

scribe. The heavens were opened upon us and they beheld, but we published it as if it's Joseph's first person voice in the Doctrine and Covenants. I beheld the celestial kingdom of God and the glory thereof, whether in the body or out, I can't tell. Here he's echoing Paul who saw the heavens. I saw the transcendent beauty of the gate through which the heirs of the kingdom of heaven will enter, which was like circling flames of fire, the blazing throne of God,

whereon was seated the Father and the Son. I saw the beautiful streets of that kingdom, which had the appearance of being paved with gold. He sees Abraham and Adam and his mom and dad. So this tells us that the vision is in the future. His father's sitting by him in the room. So this is a prefiguration of what will be. Wow.

And he sees Alvin, his oldest brother, who's been dead since 1823. He's been dead almost 13 years. Now, this causes Joseph to marvel. As our listeners may know, Alvin dies long before the Church of Jesus Christ is restored. He dies just a couple of months after Joseph learns about the Book of Mormon plates. And so, as far as Joseph knows, Alvin has gone to hell. That's what the Reverend Stockton said when he preached his funeral sermon. And Joseph didn't like it then. He doesn't like it now. It seems utterly unjust and unmerciful. How could someone with Alvin's character and disposition,

his goodness be consigned to hell just because of the timing of his death? What kind of a plan is that? What kind of a God would do that? Yeah. Tough luck, right? Tell us about a little bit about Alvin, Steve, just for those who maybe don't know much about him. What did they say about him? Good idea. He was heroic to Joseph. Joseph wrote in, uh, in the book of, um, um, the book of the law of the Lord. There's a beautiful entry in there, uh, where Joseph says Alvin was the oldest and noblest

of my father's family. He was, he was one of the noblest of the sons of men. My heart broke when he died. It was tough. It was tough on Joseph. Alvin was one who looked after Joseph. He was the consummate big brother. He was a great big brother. He looked after his parents, right?

He sacrificed quite a bit he put off uh starting his own family his own marriage and so forth to make sure his parents were looked after as they aged make sure they had a home and the whole family loved him lucy his mom and her memoir goes on at length too about about his role in their family and about his goodness to all them. So it was heartbreaking and it was devastating to have a religious authority condemn him to hell. Just didn't make sense to Joseph. And yet he feared it was true, right? Joseph feared for a long time that Presbyterianism was true. That meant that God was arbitrary and sovereign and damned most people to hell for no reason that you could fathom, right? It was his inscrutable sovereign will, said the most famous Presbyterian minister in American history. So that's what you've got to work with even into 1836,

if you're Joseph Smith. By now, the Book of Mormon has said that unaccountable infants are not damned just because they die. But as far as Joseph knows, there's no salvation for Alvin. There's nothing in the restoration to this point that says that Alvin and the millions of others like him have any chance. Even section 76, right? I mean, 76 came what year? 32.

32. And they saw the heavens, but no indication of those who had died. Yep. There's nothing in the text that I can see that answers the question what about those who never heard okay what about rescue for the dead so the lord is letting this go on the lord must have a sense for a dramatic tension right uh this is brilliant if you're uh that's

a great line what's alvin doing here yeah you're writing the narrative arc of the restoration let's say you wanted to give the the authors of saints some real uh opportunity to have some dramatic tension and tell a true story this is the way you would do it if you were the creator of the world you would let would let Joseph wait and stew about this terrible problem, the problem of death and the disruption it causes to your cherished relationships, right? This is the problem that afflicts every family, every person who ever lived. It's the awful, terrible problem of death. And one very fine scholar of religion, the British scholar Douglas Davies,

has written a couple of books about the restored gospel, and he says that the brilliance of it is the story it gives for the conquest of death. Latter-day Saints don't typically use those words, but all he really means there is that the theology of the restored gospel has a better plan of salvation that solves the problem of death than any other. And he's exactly right about that. Hey, Steve, I could use, I listen to Christian radio a lot when I'm driving, and sometimes I hear that phrase that you use, the sovereign God, and it's not one that we use that much. And I thought, yeah, I guess that's true. When you use that right now in talking about kind of a predestination philosophy, what did you mean?

This is a great question. So you will hear many Christians, especially certain wings of Protestantism, put a lot of emphasis on the sovereignty of God. And that's an important doctrine to them because what is at stake is God's power. And it's oftentimes understood in terms of contingency. Is God contingent? Is God influenceable? Is there anything that could happen that could make god um anything less than absolutely completely and totally sovereign so think about that yes in control so a person who puts highest value on that attribute of god is not inclined to like things like the restored doctrine of agency, for example. Okay, that's what I thought, yeah. The idea that we can act and have free will to them is a threat to God's sovereignty.

Right. Who knows if it might, you know, if Hank to uh to do something might upset god's plans right and hank might be predestined to do one thing by god and then he does something else and all of a sudden god's whole plan is upset he didn't see it coming yeah yeah and so they can't they can't imagine that they don't allow for it um so martin luther uh wrote about the bondage of the will for example um and certainly john calvin probably foremost is among those who emphasize the sovereignty of god so it's it's followers of those traditions, especially the Calvinist tradition, who will not like any part of the Restoration that says God is passable. Passable is another word you'll sometimes hear, meaning God has passions, right? The Presbyterian Creed, the Calvinist Creed says God is without body, parts, and passions. And Latter-day Saints know and talk a lot about, oh, he is with body and parts.

Joseph saw him in the vision. But at least as important theologically in the earliest days, and still, is passions. Is God able to feel love? Is he influenced by love, by mercy, by, are his heartstrings ever pulled? Yeah, Enoch saw him weep. that testify that God is indeed passable. But if so, then that may mean he's contingent, and if so, that may mean he's something less than absolutely sovereign, and if so, that may mean he is not God. Not at least in the Greek philosophical sense, where God is the one thing that really exists,

and he's wholly and entirely and completely other than us. He doesn't have passions because that's what humans have. That's what the Greek gods had. And the Neoplatonic Greek philosophy reacts against that and says that's not God. Anything like the Greek gods of mythology is no God at all and so the earliest Christians adopt the Greek Neoplatonic ideas and attribute that that's how their God forms up in their imagination and And those ideas pervade early Christianity. Augustine, who defines soteriology largely for the Protestant tradition, has those views. And Joseph Smith just breathes them in. He doesn't know any different until the 21st day of January 1836.

And let's let people know Augustine is, oh, sorry, Hank, is what, about 5th century? Yeah, 4th and 5th century. I can't remember his exact years, but Christian era, Northern Africa and the Roman Empire. It had a huge influence on Christian thought after that. So, what was the book? Confessions of St augustine yeah yeah which is a unbelievably brilliant book it's so deeper so much deeper than me he's everybody should at least read some augustine and i'm not saying you're going to figure him

entirely out he's a complex wonderful character uh wrote the city of god and his confessions is his memoir his autobiography um a huge influential figure in christian theology uh he had a huge influence on the protestant reformers and they had a huge influence on the world into which Joseph Smith launched the Restoration. And the Restoration is a response against and alongside and with these ideas. Steve, I've heard critics of the church say, oh, Joseph Smith is just borrowing from the ideas around him. He's just grabbing the ideas around him. And from what I'm hearing from you and from others that I've listened to, these are not common ideas around him. He's going completely opposite of some of the common ideas around him.

Is that true? Well, yeah, it's a great question, Hank. So where does the restoration come from and if you're not willing to be open to the possibility that it comes from god then you have to explain it it exists right you can't pretend the restoration doesn't exist so the way you explain it is to say well it's it's just in the air. There's he's just, you know, it's everywhere. And Joseph is just clever enough to to grab it and paste it together. And that works if you're not really, really.

Interested in the answer to the question in my opinion um but it doesn't work if if you want to know in your bone marrow where the restoration comes from uh it's it's an answer that satisfies your need to know and you can sort of put the restoration behind you but i can't do that. It doesn't work for me. The evidence is just not there. Not for me, it isn't. There's just too much in the restoration.

I mean, I've read everything Joseph wrote that's still on record, 1,588 pages of his journals, his letters, and his revelation texts are deeper than he is. They're more profound. They're beyond him. When he got done with section 76, he said, dang, he says, that revelation is so far beyond the narrow-mindedness of man, I am constrained to exclaim it came from God. He marvels at his own revealed products uh he's not

the originator of these ideas anybody who who supposes so should read his earliest autobiography it's easy to access if you google circa summer 1832 history, it will pull it up. First thing, it's on the Joseph Smith Papers website, six pages long, two sentences. And there you'll get a sense for what it's like to listen to Joseph Smith write his own stuff. Two sentences, six pages. He was economical with his punctuation. He was economical with his punctuation. He was sparing. And then if you think two and a half years before he wrote that with his own hand, he dictated the Book of Mormon in a single spring. And then if you'll pay serious attention to the Book of Mormon, you will, like Joseph, say, dang, that came from God.

There's no chance that he is the originator. I don't want people to misunderstand. I'm not saying he's dumb. He's anything but. But he is not the mind that gave us the Book of Mormon or section 76 or even section 137. Section 137 was foreign to Joseph. He wasn't expecting it. It caused him to marvel. He had not thought of the idea. He had not realized that the soteriological problem was based on an assumption that nobody was identifying. It was hidden in plain sight that the whole Christian world was assuming that nobody was identifying, was hidden in plain sight, that the whole Christian world was assuming that death was a deadline that determined everything. And Jesus had to show Joseph a vision of his big brother in heaven to get Joseph to be open even to the question or to the insight of the revelation he needed.

And as soon as Joseph says, I'm marveling, how is it that Alvin could be there? The Lord says, I was hoping you would ask. I've got some restoration to do, right? The dramatic part of section 137 is the vision of Alvin in heaven with a host of VIPs. But the most important part of the revelation, the part that's vital,

the part that Jesus wanted Joseph to know at this point is in verses 7, 8, 9. So the voice of the Lord came to me saying, everyone who's died, not just Alvin, but everybody who's died in his situation without a knowledge of the gospel, who would have received it if they had been permitted to, will be heirs of the celestial kingdom. And that's true for everybody in the future in that situation too, because I, the Lord, judge everybody according to their works, according to the desires of their hearts, not the timing of their death. What a person does with the Savior's atonement when they know it is the determining factor of their salvation, and everyone will know it. Now, 137 doesn't tell us everyone will know it yet. You'll see that that joseph has already begun thinking that way uh he wrote a newspaper article

uh not long after this where he said you know the gospel will have to be taught to the spirits in in who are dead but it'll it'll wait until section 138 the joseph f Smith, before we have a prophet who elaborates how the soteriological problem gets solved, the mechanisms that Christ put in place, the process, the plan that resolved the problem. So 137 says the problem is going to be solved. The Lord always had in mind that this would be part of the plan and 138 tells us how the problem will be solved okay so this revelation is a i mean i i wish i had the right words this is ray of light oh man that every family every family in joseph smith's time has the the soteriological problem affects them personally joseph and emma and their babies right uh the

book of mormon was huge for them uh every family has lost to death. And this revelation is the beginning of the restoration of knowledge that gives my family and every other family a great big sigh of relief and praise the Lord for his great plan. But this precedes, though, baptism for the dead in section 124, right? So they were so excited about that, too. Very much so. That's the next step. This revelation comes 1836, and then the world falls apart, right? Joseph ends up out of Ohio into Missouri, out of Missouri into Illinois.

And just about as soon as he can, when things get settled enough in Illinois, he will restore baptism for the dead there. And that's the trajectory for the rest of his life, right? He's implementing the knowledge and power he receives in the Kirtland Temple for the remaining few years of his life amid a massive onslaught of opposition against him. You know, years ago, I remember reading an essay that said, well, yeah, I mean, Joseph came up with the very comforting doctrine in section 137 because he was hurt by Alvin's death.

And I thought, you know, that's a non-sequitur it does not necessarily follow um that's just a person who doesn't believe explaining the fact that uh joseph is devastated by alvin's death so he invents the doctrine of redemption for the dead. Okay, that's one conclusion you could draw. Why not, though, just as easily and more faithfully decide every family is afflicted by the problem of death, including Joseph's, and he seeks and receives a divine revelation that is the solution to the problem. I favor the second interpretation of the same fact. I don't know why we can't believe that. The statement that I believe Joseph Smith made, and you can tell me if I got it right,

but didn't he say, I can taste the principles of eternal life, and so can you, and good doctrine tastes good? And isn't this one of those that you just hear it and go of course the god that i love and the god that i worship of course it would be like this yeah compare that to the god of tough luck or to the god of arbitrary sovereign will think about that arbitrary will whatever There's God's inscrutable will. There's no method to the madness, no plan, at least not one that we can know or discern. It's just God in all his power. We are powerless pawns, and most of us damned to hell for reasons we can't fathom. Some of us arbitrarily saved.

I don't. Man, if that's God, I just want to throw my hands up in the air and quit. But that's not the God of the restored gospel. It kind of reminds me of the Zoramites. We have been elected to be saved and you haven't. And there's no explanation, no reason. It's just, for which holiness, O God, we thank thee, which is almost laughable when you read it. We're elected to be saved, you're not. And it sounds arbitrary, like you said.

Arbitrary. Arbitrariness and God seem to me antithetical to each other. We believe in a planning God, a loving God, a capable God, right? The revelations of Joseph Smith do something more profound than Luther or Calvin ever accomplished, in my opinion, or Augustine. Those theologians who were way smart, I mean, much, much smarter than me by many times, they could not conceive, and this is partly because they're still looking through Neoplatonic Greek philosophical lenses, they could not conceive of a God who could be completely sovereign and decide to use that sovereignty to endow his children with agency. And provide a plan for them and say, here's the plan.

And if you decide to go this way, this is what will happen. If you decide to go this way, this is what will happen. And if so, we'll provide a savior and bring you back through redemption and resurrection. That kind of God who can think of endless permutations to the plan and provide everything you need without stealing your ability to determine your own destiny, that's a great God. That's why I'm a Latter-day Saint. That's the only gospel I know that reveals a God who is powerful enough, loving enough, capacious enough to endow all of his children with agency and still be able to say the works and the designs and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated, neither will they come to not. He reveals it all through a 30-something-year-old farm boy.

A kid, right? A kid. He's young. That was beautifully articulated. And I underlined three statements in 7, 8, and 9 that kind of say, okay, who would have received it? Verse 7. Who would have received it? Verse 8. And according to the desire of their hearts, we worship a God who can read our hearts and knows where we're at. And those lines give me a lot of comfort because I do stupid things, but the Lord knows I love him. The Lord knows I regretted that. Okay, that was dumb. I'm sorry. I often, you know, people don't think maybe I'm a Christian because of whatever, but God knows I'm a Christian. Jesus knows I rely on him. He knows my heart. And that's, I love that he could say that he would have received. Whoa, how do you know that?

Because I know men's and women's hearts and I can read them. You sound like Nephi, right? I'm a wretched man, easily beset by sins, but I know in whom I've trusted. My God has been my support. My desires are right. And he knows it. And even though he watches me sort of falter, he knows the desires of my heart. Yeah. There's this great moment in the end of the New Testament where Jesus says, Peter, do you love me?

Right. And Peter, his actions have not said that I love you. Right. If you take the denials to be moments of weakness. His actions haven't said it, but Peter says, search me, you know everything. Lord, you know all things. And since you know all things,

I know that you know that I love you. I mean, that is a, that is a search me, search my whole soul. Yeah. And you'll find that every ounce of me loves you, even though sometimes my actions don't reflect that. There's just great comfort in that. Who would have received it?

I love that. He knows us. And he knows for since, what, 100 AD to 1831, none of this was on the earth. He can read their hearts. And that's being sovereign. That's sovereignty, right? He's got a plan for that. He's got a plan for that. And we can, then that penetrates, like you said, Steve, every family who has, you know, this problem. I think of those who have lost sons or daughters or a spouse to suicide and to think, oh, well, you know, they must be, you know, that action is,

there must be going to hell. And God's saying, no, I know them. I know them. I know them inside it out. You, you know, I, I, I i just think this doctrine this kind of sovereign god is the god you can that can calm your fears he may be the only being who knows the despair of a person who takes their own life and therefore can relate and redeem that. What comfort that is. I'm heartened by that. What comfort a God that has justice and mercy perfectly, what comfort to know that's the one who's going to judge me, my relatives who have passed, those who have made mistakes. And I remember on my mission once, somebody treated us really rudely. And I remember leaving and kind of saying to my companion, do you, I mean, I'm 19. Do you think that was their chance? Because, you know, I say they have a chance. And I thought, I don't, if they believed what most people believe about us,

maybe they wouldn't want to listen to us anyway. And I don't think that was their chance because they don't know. And that gives me comfort too the lord can read that a lot of people it's not what they know it's what they think they know that isn't true and and the lord can sort that out too great comfort in the in seven eight and nine for me it's a beautiful revelation isn't it unbelievably profound powerful tastes good it is the restored gospel i had a a friend say to me once you know after leaving the church she said i now get to believe that everybody's a good person i now get to believe that non-latter-day saints get to go to heaven and i i can't i was so frustrated

going yeah you didn't leave that church because that church doesn't exist the church you're describing i'm not a part of this is uh steve you've said it before section 76 and now section 137 section 138 opens up heaven and makes it huge, right? Available to everyone who wants it. I believe the same thing as the good sister, except exactly the opposite. I believe almost everybody's a wretched person, including myself, an enemy to God from the fall who wants to become a saint through the atonement of Jesus Christ. And I believe he's mighty to save all, as he puts it repeatedly in section 76. And I believe that the restored gospel as taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

is the only consistent theology that has Christ at the center of that redemption for everybody and still leaves people to choose, right? A universalist would say he's going to save everybody whether they want to be or not. The restored gospel says he's going to save everybody who desires his salvation and to a degree of salvation that they choose, that they want. That's pretty darn great. That's the section 76 thing and i've circled in verse 7 in verse 8 in verse 9 and in verse 10 the word all all who have died all that shall die the lord will judge all and beheld all children uh that's that's really inclusive and really

merciful latter-day saints tend to get a bit of a whipping for being exclusive. But, and then, you know, individual Latter-day Saints like my sometimes rotten self might deserve that. But the restored gospel does not teach that. That is not the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. If someone were to just listen to Steve's episodes, I mean, listen to how they connect. And we didn't mean to do this on purpose. Yeah, section 76 connects to this's episodes. I mean, listen to how they connect. And we didn't mean to do this on purpose. Yeah, section 76 connects to this. Right.

We did Joseph Smith's first vision with him and Alvin's death with him. Then we did 76 with him. And now we're doing 137 and 138. It's almost as if there was a hand behind this saying, if someone just is a Steve Harper fan is not going to listen to any others, they're going to get the whole thing, the whole set in those three episodes.

So, Steve, we think you're inspired. That's all. Well, I'm pleased to be here. And this whole thing is inspired. It's brilliant work. You've articulated some things just beautifully. That's a sociological problem. This is just beautifully i that's a soteriological problem this is this is just great let's keep going i was going to mention that look at verse nine

i will judge you according to your works and comma the desires of your hearts right according to the desires of your heart so i'm going to find my elder Ballard quote. It's taking into account everything that went into your decision making. Well, I put a footnote there to section 46, verse 9, which does have the word and according to the works and according to the desire of their hearts. And our friend and colleague, Brad Wilcox, used that in his general conference talk about the kid who says, I'm just too much of a hypocrite. And he says, well, you're a hypocrite if you hide it or lie about it or blame the book of Mormon that has that idea of commandments and the desires of their hearts. I can't remember where it is right now. Let me read this and then we'll turn it back over to Steve. This is Elder M. Russell Ballard. Quote, I feel that judgment for sin is not always as cut and dried as some of us seem to think. I feel that the Lord recognizes differences in intent and circumstances. When he does judge us, Elder Ballard says, I feel he will take all things into

consideration, our genetic and chemical makeup, our mental state, our intellectual capacity, the teachings we have received, the traditions of our fathers and our health and so forth. That to me is a sovereign God who can know all of that and make decisions based on, on all of that information. That's the God of the restored gospel. Let I misstated that. Let me read verse 46, verse nine.

Verily I say unto you, they are given for the benefit commandments. No, let's see what's given the gifts the gifts spiritual gifts are given for the benefit of those who love me and keep all my commandments comma and him that seeketh so to do and that that's a good parallel text for this i think one way to read these passages is um is the lord look, your works might sort of be, you know, amateur or juvenile or, or half, but, but I can see the desire that's, that's motivating them. And I will take that

into account too. Right. That to me is very comforting and powerful. Yeah. Comforting and powerful. Absolutely. It calms your fears and say, you know what? I'm willing to put my judgment in those hands, right? Like I know that that judgment will be just, right? It'll be right. Do we want to talk about the last verse before we move on all the children who die before they arrive at the years of accountability are saved in the celestial kingdom of heaven did they realize what that meant at this time 1836 they do realize what it means because joseph has received a couple of revelations before this. Section 29 talks about the way people become what I call a fully developed free agent. It talks about the four components, you might say, that

you have to have to be a fully developed free agent. There has to be a law in the universe that says this choice is wrong and this choice is right. You have to have knowledge of that, right? Just because the law exists, if I don't know it, I'm not able to act on it in my own free will. So I have to have knowledge of it. I have to have power. I have to have the ability to choose between the alternatives. And that requires also, as Section 29 says, and 2 Nephi says, an opposition, a bitter and a sweet, some force influencing me to pick the wrong choice, as well as the enticement from the Lord to pick his. When all those things are present, you've got a fully developed free agent.

And section 29 teaches them. And then it says children begin to become accountable this this doesn't happen uh miraculously at midnight right on their birthday right but but generally speaking around eight you know kids are capable of this kind of agency and they grow into it then section 68 if I'm remembering right, says, Joseph, it's age eight when you can, generally speaking, count on kids to be able to exercise their agency sufficient that they can choose to make the covenant for themselves. Verse 10 of section 137 says, years of accountability. The Latter-day Saints know that that means around age eight.

And this is incredibly comforting doctrine. There's almost none of these families that have not lost infants or children before age eight, including Joseph and Emma Smith over and over and over. And it's really beautiful to them to know that their children are not damned as much of the Christian tradition would have them be if not for this restored truth. Wow. This had to be fun for Joseph's dad,

who was a universalist. He'd be like, oh, I was so close, right? I was on to something there. Yeah i i was on to something there yeah he was on to something this he he and his ancestors swung to universalism from calvinism which said just about everybody's damned by god's arbitrary sovereign will and then universalism says everybody's going to be saved by god's arbitrary sovereign will. And the restored gospel says, well, it's more complicated than that. God's will is not arbitrary. It is sovereign. He has decided in his master plan to make his children agents so they get to pick for themselves whether they want to be saved or damned. It's their will, not just his, that matters to him.

And that is the best gospel. And when Joseph Sr. heard that gospel, he said, ah, that's the one. That's the one that tastes good. That's what I've been waiting for. Yeah, that's fantastic. I've heard you say before, to Joseph's mom, any church is better than no church. And to Joseph's dad, no church is better than the wrong church. Right?

Right. And that's a perfect tension for Joseph to be a part of growing up. That gives us the sacred grove, the kid in the sacred grove. Please join us for part two of this podcast.