Essentials in Church History: A History of the Church from the Birth of Joseph Smith to the Present Time (1922), with Introductory Chapters on the Antiquity of the Gospel and the "Falling Away"Smith, Joseph Fielding
History
Essentials in Church History: A History of the Church from the Birth of Joseph Smith to the Present Time (1922), with Introductory Chapters on the Antiquity of the Gospel and the "Falling Away"
Smith, Joseph Fielding
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- History
All of these offices in the Church, are essential to the advancement
of the members and cannot be discarded with impunity. Paul said, the
Lord "gave some apostles; and some prophets; and some evangelists; and
some pastors and teachers; for the perfection of the saints, for the
work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." These
were not merely to remain in the Church during the formative period, or
for a brief season in order to start the work, and then to be replaced
by other officers of another kind. Men were ordained to these callings
"for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity
of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect
man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ" (Eph.
4:12-13). Evidently, then, as long as there is imperfection in the
Church among the members, in doctrine, knowledge, or love, they fall
short of "the stature of the fulness of Christ."
These officers are all needed and cannot justly be removed, for the
Lord never so intended. The writer of the epistle to the Ephesians
also further compares all these officers to the various parts of the
human body and says: "From whom the whole body fitly joined together
and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the
effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of
the body unto the edifying of itself in love." This same apostle also
likens the spiritual gifts to the physical body, declaring each to
be essential in the Church, just as the parts of the body are each
necessary and one part cannot say to another, "I have no need of you,"
for all are necessary that all men may "profit withal."
Chapter 2
The Falling Away
The Body of the Church Destroyed
Notwithstanding that the early officers of the Church were endowed
with the Holy Priesthood and exercised the spiritual gifts, which were
to remain until all came "unto a perfect man unto the stature of the
fulness of Christ," there came a great and terrible change, absolutely
destroying the perfect body of the Church. In its place arose a strange
organization which eventually gained dominion over the earth and ruled
the destinies of men, not in love unfeigned, but in blood and carnage
most appalling, and with an iron hand.
The Falling Away Predicted
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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