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(00:00) Proclamations are major declarations from prophets, seers, and revelators. This proclamation states that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.
(05:11) There are three parts: prophetic declarations, prophetic warnings, and prophetic counsel. Prophetic declarations are clear statements of our core doctrines.
(14:04) The Family Proclamation warns that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.
(16:35) Prophetic counsel is given for successful marriages and families.
(20:06) Faith and prayer.
(22:05) Repentance and forgiveness.
(28:21) Respect, love, and compassion can be combined to define charity. Respect is to see the value God has placed in every person.
(37:02) Love is a choice, not just an emotion.
(45:07) Compassion is to feel what others feel.
(50:24) Balancing work and wholesome recreational activities.

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The post Ep 351 | The Family: A Proclamation to the World, Come Follow Me 2025 (December 15-21) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) The 9th Article of Faith explains that the restoration is ongoing.
(04:05) President Woodruff issued Official Declaration 1 in 1890. This Manifesto led to the end of the practice of plural marriage.
(08:59) Elder Bruce C. Hafen invites us to examine ambiguity in the church with open eyes and hearts.
(17:00) The Church today disavows all theories church leaders and members advanced to explain the priesthood and temple restrictions.
(20:21) During an era of great racial division in the United States, the Saints were persecuted for their anti-slavery stance.
(24:57) Joseph Smith ordained Walker Lewis and Elijah Abel to the priesthood. Later, in 1852, President Brigham Young officially announced that black members would no longer be given the priesthood. The power to decide is given to the President of the church in D&C 107.78-80.
(35:50) The 2013 edition of the scriptures adds an insightful paragraph to Official Declaration 2. Church records offer no clear insights into the origins of the priesthood restriction.
(42:39) Three slaves came into the Salt Lake Valley in the first pioneer company. Brigham Young did not segregate congregations or deny membership to African Americans.
(52:27) Brigham Young felt the priesthood restriction would be temporary and that it would be removed at a future time.
(53:47) In 1978 President Spencer W. Kimball received a revelation extending priesthood and temple blessings to all worthy male members of the church.
(56:37) The Warmth of Other Suns, by Isabel Wilkerson, gives accounts of African Americans during the great migration in American history. The Clark family experienced tragic persecution in 1951.
(1:01:12) The Church today unequivocally condemns all racism, past and present, in any form. The love of others should be what characterizes the Latter-day Saints.

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The post Ep 350 | Articles of Faith and Official Declarations 1 & 2, Come Follow Me 2025 (December 8-14) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) The doctrine of salvation for the dead is revealed in Section 137.
(01:43) Divine curiosity is a catalyst for revelation.
(07:25) Joseph marvels at how Alvin obtained Celestial glory without being baptized. He learns that all who have died without a knowledge of the gospel, who would have received it, shall be heirs of the Celestial Kingdom.
(12:30) All children that die before the years of accountability are saved in the Celestial Kingdom.
(19:23) After losing dear family members, Joseph F. Smith receives revelation about the Spirit World.
(25:11) Joseph F. Smith has a vision of Jesus coming into the Spirit World after His crucifixion.
(28:33) Those in the Spirit World see the absence of their bodies as bondage. The body and spirit are very much connected.
(32:44) Coats of light and coats of skins in Genesis 3.21.
(34:16) The great feast in a temple setting as contained in D&C 138 and Isaiah 26. The Saints are invited to rise from the dust and enter into kingship.
(44:29) The Savior organizes the righteous to preach to the spirits in prison, but then he resurrects the righteous. Perhaps the work of saving the dead is for our dispensation.
(51:17) As children of God we are all connected and will continue preaching the gospel in the Spirit World after death.

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The post Ep 349 | D&C 137-138, Come Follow Me 2025 (December 1-7) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) D&C 136 details the will of the Lord as the Saints move west. Winter Quarters was a place to prepare for the final trek to the Great Basin.
(04:31) D&C 136 reads differently and Brigham Young’s personality seems to come through.
(14:25) Some of the events that led Joseph Smith to Carthage Jail. Plural marriage.
(17:00) Joseph established the Nauvoo Charter and the Nauvoo Legion to protect the Saints from persecution.
(27:21) The August 1843 election and its consequences.
(33:24) William Law was hurt by the way he was excommunicated and also felt economically persecuted. He and others start the Nauvoo Expositor.
(36:49) The Nauvoo City Council votes to destroy the printing press of the Nauvoo Expositor. Dallin H. Oaks’ legal paper in the Utah Law Review cautions about the dangers of presentism.
(40:12) Joseph Smith is charged for destroying the press. Thomas Sharp calls for his extermination with powder and ball in the Warsaw Signal. Joseph is told by the Lord to flee to the Rocky Mountains. Many in Nauvoo urge him to come back. Joseph surrenders to authorities and is brought to Carthage Jail.
(50:15) Joseph Smith is charged with treason for declaring martial law and calling out the Nauvoo Legion.
(51:55) Joseph Smith’s final hours before the martyrdom.
(58:39) John Taylor recovers and writes Section 135 in tribute to the prophet.
(1:00:26) Joseph Smith has given us so much more knowledge of Christ. He produced more canonized scripture than any other. He stands at the head of the largest dispensation on earth and brought forth the keys and ordinances to redeem the dead.
(1:05:21) Joseph Smith restored essential doctrines associated with the nature of God and man. Vital questions are answered in the revelations of the Restoration.

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The post Ep 348 | D&C 135-136, Come Follow Me 2025 (November 24-30) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) Section 133 was intended to be an appendix to the Doctrine and Covenants.
(00:55) The role of government is to maintain a balance between rights and responsibilities.
(06:59) Section 133 is a companion to Section 1. Prophecies in the Bible will be fulfilled as the Latter-day Saints gather the House of Israel.
(17:35) Temple imagery in D&C 133 and its connection to Isaiah 52 and Moroni 10.
(26:38) Rising from the dust as a symbol of enthronement and heavenly kingship.
(28:09) Moroni’s appendix parallels many of the ideas in D&C 133 and Isaiah 52.
(31:17) Come out of “digital” Babylon and build Zion.
(32:44) Literal and symbolic interpretations of the divided land becoming one again.
(36:06) The members of the Godhead are separate beings, but perfectly united in purpose.
(41:13) The Millennial possibility of a pure, unified language and people.
(42:20) Symbols of cosmic conflict in section 133: Mount Zion, the Great Deep, and North Countries. Rival religions at the time of Israel had images that were also associated with these ideas.
(51:40) Loving kindness or ḥesed means a very deep feeling of love.
(54:16) The parable of the ten virgins. They that are wise have taken the Holy Spirit for their guide.
(56:07) John prophesied that an angel would fly through the midst of heaven with the everlasting gospel.
(58:06) The 144,000 have priesthood authority and represent all the tribes of Israel.
(1:00:08) The symbolism and significance of the Savior’s red garments.
(1:07:39) Elder Holland’s statement regarding previous dispensations and how their hope rested on us.

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The post Ep 347 | D&C 133-134, Come Follow Me 2025 (November 17-23) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) Three grand keys on the nature of ministering angels and spirits.
(02:04) Joseph Smith teaches that God has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s. Traditional Christianity has lost the understanding of Heavenly Father’s physical nature.
(07:53) God resides on a globe like a sea of glass and fire.
(09:08) Joseph asks the Lord about the timing of His Second Coming.
(10:34) Truths learned in mortality will rise with us in the resurrection. Blessings are predicated upon obedience to law.
(12:52) Section 130 prepares the Saints for truths that are revealed in the temple.
(13:46) The crowning blessing of the gospel is to seal families for eternity. There are requirements for making marriage eternal.
(18:39) Elder Howard’s story of the silver as it relates to eternal marriage. If you want something to last forever, you treat it differently.
(24:23) 1st Scenario: If we choose to neither be married nor given in marriage in the eternities, we will remain separately and singly without exaltation. The compensatory grace of Jesus Christ will make this blessing available to all who were deprived of it through no blame of their own.
(28:25) 2nd Scenario: If our marriage is not sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise then it is not in force when we are out of the world.
(30:03) 3rd Scenario: If we marry in the temple and strive to keep the covenant, we will inherit the highest degree of the celestial kingdom and have continued increase. We will be as God, participating in His divine nature. The covenant allows for mistakes, repentance, and forgiveness.
(37:01) Section 132 addresses plural marriage. Plural marriage played a role in Joseph’s martyrdom in 1844.
(38:52) Plural marriage can be compared to Abraham’s test.
(41:15) Plural marriage was practiced by the Patriarchs in Genesis.
(42:59) The historical background of Section 132.
(45:44) The RLDS Church (now The Community of Christ) contended that the President of the Church should be a direct descendant of Joseph Smith and that plural marriage was never taught by Joseph Smith. This letter to Emma (D&C 132) was used as a polemic against the RLDS teaching that Joseph did not practice plural marriage.
(46:55) The Temple Lot Case was a property dispute between the RLDS Church and Church of Christ. In these proceedings, women testified under oath that they were married to the prophet Joseph Smith. This legal dispute provided a wealth of information about plural marriage in the Nauvoo period.
(48:46) Plural marriage is not a requirement for exaltation. One man and one woman is the Lord’s standing law of marriage.
(51:38) In D&C 132 the Lord gives several reasons why plural marriage was commanded.
(53:51) Baruch Spinoza’s advice in our quest to understand the past.
(54:41) Joseph Smith wrestled with plural marriage as early as 1830 or 1831 as he worked on his translation of the Bible. We have few details of his marriage to Fanny Alger during the Kirtland period.
(59:53) During the Nauvoo era Joseph taught several close friends about plural marriage. Estimates are given of how many members lived this law.
(1:01:45) The Saints during this time thought differently about temple sealings than we do today. They believed that the law of adoption and dynastic ties increased their glory.
(1:07:36) Wilford Woodruff saw that adoption theology wasn’t right and worked to bring the Church into a greater understanding of what it means to seal families for eternity.
(1:08:52) There were 3 types of plural marriages: time, time and eternity, and adoptive/dynastic/eternal only. Some examples of Joseph’s dynastic marriages include Elizabeth Rollins Lightner and Helen Mar Kimball.
(1:15:11) A timeline of how long plural marriage was practiced. The Reed Smoot Hearings.
(1:17:27) None of Joseph Smith’s plural wives ever accused him of abuse or deception. Despite the difficulty of understanding plural marriage, we testify that Joseph was a prophet.

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The post Ep 346 | D&C 129-132, Come Follow Me 2025 (November 10-16) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) During the Nauvoo period, Joseph Smith receives substantial revelation pertaining to the ordinances of the temple.
(03:45) The historical background of Section 125.
(05:58) “Essaying” is a term that means trying. Becoming a Saint is a process.
(07:39) Through the help of the Lord, Brigham Young and the Twelve gathered many converts in England. A revelation is given to Brigham commending him for his efforts and he is relieved of future travel abroad.
(17:33) Joseph Smith reveals proxy ordinance work for the dead. Ezekiel’s visionary experience of the ancient temple.
(19:39) Missouri is trying to extradite Joseph on charges of attempting to assassinate the previous Governor, Lilburn Boggs. Joseph goes into hiding for a time. The Nauvoo Charter helps prevent his extradition.
(21:35) Orrin Porter Rockwell is also accused of the assassination attempt on Boggs. Rockwell is captured and spends many months in a Missouri prison.
(30:29) While in hiding, Joseph writes encouraging epistles to the Saints with an outlook of gladness and joy.
(34:13) The Lord always shows us our blessings and abundance. Satan emphasizes only what we lack in an effort to discourage us.
(37:41) Chaos and creation narratives in antiquity are tied to the temple, covenants, and recording. One example is the Enuma Elish (The Tablets of Creation). When Tiamat steals the Tablets of Destiny, the rites of the temple cease. Moses’ reception of the tablets from God may have a connection to these ideas.
(49:10) Baptismal fonts in our temples have associations with ancient symbols.
(56:42) We need the dead and they need us. This welding link tying families together is Heavenly Father’s plan.
(1:00:17) Michael Wilcox’s parable of The Keys.
(1:11:34) Kim Sorenson’s account of receiving direct blessings from making family history a part of her daily schedule.

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The post Ep 345 | D&C 125-128, Come Follow Me 2025 (November 3-9) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) Joseph Smith and his companions escape from Missouri custody in April 1839.
(08:34) The Saints beautify Nauvoo. An overview of this section.
(11:03) Joseph has not fallen from grace. The Lord emphasizes Joseph’s prophetic role even though he has weakness. What are our expectations of prophets?
(14:31) The significance of official proclamations. Watchmen on the tower warn the Saints of the coming enemy. The disintegration of the family is one of the biggest challenges of our day.
(19:11) The Lord asks Joseph to make the first official proclamation calling the nations of the earth to give heed to Zion.
(22:42) The Lord’s global approach to Zion, inviting all to come unto Christ.
(24:42) Specific Saints that have passed away are remembered by the Lord. The story of Edward Partridge and his trials in Nauvoo.
(31:37) The Lord commands that a temple be built in Nauvoo. Temples are where the Saints receive the fulness of the priesthood.
(39:15) The doctrine of baptism for the dead was taught at Seymour Brunson’s funeral. The Saints performed these in the Mississippi River for a short time until the temple was ready. The Lord will meet us where we are and guide us to higher places.
(45:17) D&C 124 can prompt meaningful discussions about what happens in the temple. Appropriate communication about the temple is important.
(53:13) In the temple we put on sacred vestments as a symbol of changing our very natures as we come into the grace of Jesus Christ. Endowment, sacred vestments, investiture, “putting on,” are all related to the Greek word enduo.
(55:40) Nine individuals receive the endowment in the upper room of the Red Brick Store in May 1842.
(1:00:32) The Lord’s emphasis on the Nauvoo House is a reminder to be more inclusive.
(1:05:03) Ammon and Aaron’s different approaches to missionary work.
(1:08:22) The scourge placed on the inhabitants of Kirtland is removed by President Benson in 1979.
(1:10:11) Priesthood leaders are gifts given by a loving Heavenly Father.

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The post Ep 344 | D&C 124, Come Follow Me 2025 (October 27-November 2) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) Historical background.
(02:17) Joseph Smith demonstrated majesty in chains while in custody in Richmond.
(05:35) Ten eternal truths we can apply to our lives from the Liberty Jail experience.
(07:38) #1: God is aware of your trials, you are not alone.
(11:11) #2: Your suffering will end. It will not last forever.
(12:41) #3: Be faithful in tribulation and endure it well.
(17:59) #4: Thy friends do stand by thee. Share your burdens.
(24:18) #5: Other people, like Job, survived their challenges.
(25:29) #6: God allows agency, but justice will prevail in the end. The Missourians eventually pay a bitter price for their actions.
(29:13) The classic problem of evil.
(31:54) #7: Mortality is oftentimes painful, but we are promised that joy will swallow up the suffering through divine compensation.
(38:33) Like Job and Joseph, we can communicate directly with God about our how we really feel.
(41:01) #8: All these things shall give thee experience and shall be for thy good.
(44:40) #9: Jesus is familiar with our pain and knows what we need to be saved.
(47:17) #10: Their bounds are set. Suffering is calculated for our benefit.
(48:36) An alternate view of D&C 122.9. Perhaps this verse applies to Joseph Smith only and is not universal in its application.
(51:05) An overview of the ten truths.
(54:56) Lyman Wight collects affidavits which are used to seek redress from the federal government. It is our duty to seek truth and light.
(57:39) The persecution in Missouri was both religious and political, but the main complaint against the Saints was their religion.
(1:00:26) A discussion about unrighteous dominion. Power comes from righteousness, not from position or compulsion.
(1:10:45) The end of this section contains an invitation to understand dominion as it is taught in the temple. A description of God as a Man of Holiness, who invites His children with meekness to partake in all that He has.

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The post Ep 343 | D&C 121-123, Come Follow Me 2025 (October 20-26) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.

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(00:00) The Saints leave Kirtland. The pattern of prosperity and pain in church history.
(05:06) In January 1838, Joseph and Emma leave Kirtland, never to return. Their enemies follow them to Missouri.
(11:16) In Section 115 the Lord puts His name on the Church.
(14:20) On April 26, 1839, the Quorum of the Twelve lay the cornerstone of the temple in Far West, fulfilling the command in Section 115.
(17:13) W.W. Phelps’ reaction to the Quorum of the Twelve and his later change of heart. Our worst days do not define us.
(18:47) More stakes are to be built nearby for the Saints to come and join Zion. This brings about the revelation regarding Adam-Ondi-Ahman in Section 116.
(23:37) The Danites are a zealous group of members who defend the church and want to force out any dissenters. Sidney Rigdon gives the Salt Sermon, prompting the Danites to issue a written resolution to the dissenters in June 1838.
(27:19) May we learn to be more wise than the Danites!
(31:18) Was Joseph Smith a Danite?
(32:25) John Corrill’s witness of Danite culture.
(34:45) Sampson Avard leads the Danites in many of their extreme behaviors.
(37:33) Oliver Granger is to sell all the property in Kirtland for as much as he can after the Saints leave. The message from the Lord to Oliver applies to us when we face difficult assignments. When you fall, rise again.
(42:29) Not all the Saints left Kirtland by July 1838. William Marks and Newel K. Whitney are commanded to leave in Section 117.
(44:50) The law of tithing is given to the whole church in Section 119.
(49:22) A knock down at Gallatin and the Judge Adam Black affair lead to increased tensions.
(52:23) Reed Peck’s account of Joseph Smith’s sermon in October and Joseph’s determination to fight back against the Missourians.
(53:49) After many Saints’ homes were burned by Missourians, there is a pivot point in the Mormon War. The Danites now go on the offensive. Lyman Wight is given authority to defend the Saints from Hyrum Parks.
(58:12) Thomas B. Marsh and Orson Hyde secretly leave the Saints and write an affidavit against the Church and send it to Lilburn W. Boggs, the Governor of Missouri.
(1:00:29) Governor Boggs issues the Extermination Order. 17 Saints were murdered and 14 were injured in the Haun’s Mill Massacre.
(1:04:13) Joseph is taken to prison and the Saints evacuate Missouri. George Hinckle’s role in the surrender.
(1:07:59) God is with us in darkness. The light will come again.

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The post Ep 342 | D&C 115-120, Come Follow Me 2025 (October 13-19) appeared first on LDS Scripture Teachings.