4/17/2018 - Section 90:1-5

April 17, 2018

Section 90:1-5

Repentance Continual, Scripture Study, Spiritual Health and Energy,

There was a lovely conference talk in this past conference encouraging us to have what I remember as ‘continual repentance’. Too often I save repentance for my really big blunders. As far as my normal, daily blunders—I just try to do better on my own. But in this conference talk, he spoke about being aware of your efforts to be just a little better. I’m going to have to go back and read that talk now, because the first verse of this section reminded me of that when it says “I say unto you my son, thy sins are forgiven thee, according to thy petition for thy prayers and the prayers of thy brethren have come up into my ears.

I always think of the gospel as simple. Commandments are simple: Love the Lord God with all thy heart, might, mind and strength, and the second is like unto it Love thy neighbor as thyself. Those two basic statements include just about everything we do or think. Then there is the eternal principle that to every commandment there is an attached blessing. First we obey because we really want that blessing, but as we grow we begin to obey because it just feels so good.

I must stop now. We’re in a rush to pick up Sister Long and Sister Velasco for a doctor’s visit at the hospital, so I must stop now. But this is more than enough to give me good spiritual energy to go on all day long.

8/25/2021- D&C 90

The Lord watched over the church as it grew. My study guide has a concise history on how the leadership of the church was developed: “In April 1830, the Prophet Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery were sustained as “the first elder” and “the second elder” of the Church (D&C 20:2–3). At that time the Lord did not implement the organizational structure of the Church that we are familiar with today. In November 1831 a revelation instructed the Saints that “it must needs be that one be appointed of the High Priesthood to preside over the priesthood, and he shall be called President of the High Priesthood of the Church” (D&C 107:65; see D&C 107, section heading for the date of this revelation). In a conference held in Amherst, Ohio, in January 1832, Joseph Smith was ordained as the President of the High Priesthood in fulfillment of that divine instruction (see The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 2: July 1831–January 1833, ed. Matthew C. Godfrey and others [2013], 491–92). Then, on March 8, 1832, Joseph Smith called Jesse Gause and Sidney Rigdon to serve as his counselors in the Presidency of the High Priesthood. Jesse Gause did not remain faithful, however. and the Lord called Frederick G. Williams to take Brother Gause’s place in the Presidency on January 5, 1833 (see the additional historical background for Doctrine and Covenants 81 in this manual). On March 8, 1833, the Lord clarified that Sidney Rigdon and Frederick G. Williams were to be “equal with [the Church President] in holding the keys of this last kingdom” (D&C 90:6). They were subsequently ordained as counselors in the Presidency of the High Priesthood on March 18, 1833.”

I love v 1 “…I say unto you my son, thy sins are forgiven thee, according to thy petition, for thy prayers and the prayers of thy brethren have come up into my ears.” The Lord was referring to Joseph’s prayers, and the prayers of others of the church. I know President Nelson has expressed his thankfulness for the prayers of the ordinary church members, and has stated that those prayers have been sustaining help for him. I need to increase my prayers for our current prophet—for this verse is yet another proof that our prayers are heard and noted by the Lord—for our benefit and for the benefit of others. And that’s the very thing that the Lord speaks about in v 5:  And all they who receive the oracles of God, let them beware how they old them lest they are accounted as a light thing, and are brought under condemnation thereby, and stumble and fall when the storms descend, and the winds blow, and the rains descend, and beat upon their house.” 

In this section, the Lord speaks to all of the men who have worked to support and to help Joseph as he works to establish the Church as the Lord directs. And the Lord specifically blesses those who have done this. All of us will sometimes make the wrong decisions, but if – at the same time—we are working to learn the ways the Lord would have us live and have us do His work, then He shall be able to forgive our errors and our poor judgement---and hopefully lead us to do just a bit better the next time. And just like any parent, He watches us and reaches out to help us---especially when we are also reaching out to Him and asking for His help in our learning His ways. This is how we “may be perfected in [our] ministry”. (v 8)

V 11 speaks of the Christ’s Second Coming when “every man shall hear the fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language through those who are ordained unto this power, by the administrations of the Comforter, shed forth upon them for the revelation of Jesus Christ.”  We can access that power of the Holy Ghost now if only we ask, and then allow, the Holy Ghost to do his job in directing us in the ways we should go.

I love v 16, “And this shall be your business and mission in all your lives, to preside in council, and set in order all the affairs of this church and kingdom.”… for it always reminds me of Dylan’s patriarchal blessing which says: “As you have the qualities of being a leader in the church, continue to do those things which the leaders of the church ask you to do and you will have the opportunity to sit in council and to give counsel to other people. Always be humble and prayerful heeding the promptings of the Holy Ghost so that the counsel you give may be the appropriate counsel for the particular time and place.”

But back to Section 90-- for then the Lord continues with his advice that is good for all of us: Be not ashamed, neither confounded; but be admonished in all your high-mindedness and pride, for it bringeth a snare upon your souls. Set in order your houses: keep slothfulness and uncleanness far from you.” (v’s 17 & 18) I read this and want to look again to make sure that I do the work the Lord would have me do, and that I order my house which should include my being beware of pridefulness, of doing my best in my church calling, that I should support others who are working to do the things they were asked to do, that I should look for and recognize their strengths, and that I should love them.

V 24 gives me the way of achieving those very things: “Search diligently, prayer always and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good, if ye walk uprightly and remember the covenant wherewith ye have covenanted one with another.”

The Lord speaks to specific people in the section, and tells them that they would do best to repent and change some of their ways to allow them to become closer to Him. And then He tells all of us that he is always there, ready to help us, if we but ask for His help: “But verily I say unto you, that I the Lord, will contend with Zion, and plead with her strong ones, and chasten her until she overcomes and is clean before me.”  (v 36) He wants and works for our success, and all we have to do is to turn to Him, listen carefully, and then do our very best.

The Lord promised the members that “all things [would] work together for [their] good” if they were righteous and remembered the covenant they had made. We should remember this daily and find hope in the Lord’s promise that all things will work together for our good – and that includes the hard times that come into our lives. 

Elder Holland counseled: “We are to ‘search diligently, pray always, and be believing. [Then] all things shall work together for [our] good, if [we] walk uprightly and remember the covenant wherewith [we] have covenanted’ [D&C 90:24]. The latter days are not a time to fear and tremble. They are a time to be believing and remember our covenants” (“The Ministry of Angels,” Ensign Nov. 2008, 30).