1. Doctrine & Covenants

2. Doctrine & Covenants 133:4
The time will come when no man nor woman will be able to endure on borrowed light, each will have to be guided by the light within his self (Heber C. Kimball, Conference Report, 1956).

3. Doctrine & Covenants 133:6 “Solemn Assemblies”
In ancient Israel, as part of the Mosaic worship, frequent solemn assemblies were held. They were held in connection with their sacrifices and feasts.
In modern Israel solemn assemblies have been called in temples from time to time as the Lord has revealed or as his Spirit has indicated.

4. They are not held for the whole world or before the world but are for those who have sanctified and purified themselves before the Lord.
Dedicatory services for temples have always been solemn assemblies.

5. Doctrine & Covenants 133:7-16
The best measure of how close we are to the day of the Savior’s return is the extent to which the gospel has been declared among the nations of the earth.
Doctrine & Covenants 133:18
“Calling and Election Made Sure”
The four angels who are given power over the earth are kept from sending forth desolations upon the earth until God’s servants are sealed in their foreheads. The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that this sealing “signifies sealing the blessings upon their heads, meaning the everlasting covenant, thereby making their calling and election sure” (Teachings, 321).

6. Doctrine & Covenants 133:26 “The Lost Ten Tribes”
1. A host of scriptural passages attest that the tribes of Israel have been scattered among all the nations of the earth.
2. Why would God send Moses to Joseph Smith to give him the keys by which Israel was to be gathered if some other prophets had already accomplished the task?
3. Why would John the Baptist, and then Peter, James and John restore priesthood to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery if that priesthood and its keys were already on the earth.

7. 4. What of the statements the Lord made to Joseph Smith stating that he stood at the head of “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth” (Doctrine & Covenants 1:30). If priesthood, prophets, and covenants were already to be found upon the earth what truth can be found in such a statement? 5. If we are to accept the standard established in the revelations of the Restoration, we must maintain that none have the right to act in the name of the Lord (and surely that would include leading the tribes of Israel) save they have been “ordained by some one who has authority, and it is known to the church that he has the authority and has been regularly ordained by the heads of the church” (Doctrine & Covenants 42:11). The Doctrine and Covenants accepts none as prophets save those who have been called, ordained, and received the sustaining vote of the Church. The Lord’s house is and always has been a house of order. It is not wholly harmonious with the revelations and all we know about the Lord’s system of governing his people to suppose that the prophets called to lead the tribes of Israel back to the lands of their inheritance will be elders of Israel who trace their priesthood to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery and through them to Peter, James, and John.

8. Doctrine & Covenants 77:11, 128:21
“The Lord Shall Be Red in His Apparel”
Red symbolizes the ripeness of grapes. The Savior will deal with the wicked’s ripeness in sin. A reminder that he shed His blood for us (Revelation 19:13).

9. Having bled at every pore, how red His raiment must have been in Gethsemane, how crimson that cloak! No wonder, when Christ comes in power and glory, that He will come in reminding red attire, not only signifying the winepress of wrath but also to bring to our
remembrance how He suffered for each of us in Gethsemane and on Calvary! (Neal A. Maxwell, Ensign, May 1987, 72).

10. “The Little One Becomes a Strong Nation”
Doctrine & Covenants 133:58
“The Little One Becomes a Strong Nation”
The “little one” is the Church. Early in the Kirtland period of Church History, Wilford Woodruff attended a meeting in a log cabin above the Morley farm. Of that occasion he recalled the following:
On Sunday night the Prophet called on all who held the Priesthood to gather into the little log schoolhouse they had there. It was a small house, perhaps 14 feet square. But it held the whole Priesthood of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who were then in the town of Kirtland… When we got together… the Prophet said, ‘Brethren I have been very much edified and
instructed in your testimonies here tonight. But I want to say to you before the Lord, that you know no more concerning the destinies of this Church and kingdom than a babe upon its mother’s lap. You don’t comprehend it.’ I was rather surprised. He said, ‘It is only a little handful of Priesthood you see here tonight, but this Church will fill North and South America --- it will fill the world’” (Conference Report, Apr. 1898, 57).

11. “It Shall Leave Them Neither Root or Branch”
Doctrine & Covenants 133:64
“It Shall Leave Them Neither Root or Branch”
The wicked and indifferent persons who reject the gospel will have no family inheritances or patriarchal lineage. No ancestors or children.
Doctrine & Covenants 133:73
“Outer Darkness”
Hell is literally a place of outer darkness, darkness that hates light, buries truth, and revels in iniquity (Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, ).

12. “Earthly Government and Law”
Doctrine & Covenants 134
“Earthly Government and Law”
Even an evil government is better than none!
When every man has the power to enforce his own law is the worst!

13. Doctrine & Covenants 134:9-11
Because Joseph Smith felt so strongly about the government’s duty to protect the individual’s rights and because the American government had failed to protect the Saints in Missouri from the mobs, Joseph Smith decided to run for the office of president of the United States in He felt none of the candidates running for president would represent the cause of the Saints fairly and guarantee them their constitutional rights.
On April 9th 1844, during the General Conference of the Church, Joseph Smith’s campaign for the presidency was launched. “A series of thirty-seven conferences was scheduled to be conducted throughout the nation by the Twelve with the final conference held at Washington D.C. from September 7th through the 15th (Ivan J. Barrett, Joseph and the Restoration: A History of the Church to 1846, 577)
On 6 May 1844 a vice-presidential nominee for the Saints’ political party called the Reformed party, was selected. The nominee, though not their first choice was Sidney Rigdon, who was then living in Pennsylvania.

14. The Presidential Campaign of 1844
The following are some of the men who ran for President of the United States in 1844:
Martin Van Buren (had been defeated twice)
Henry Clay
John C. Calhoun
Lewis Cass
Richard Johnson
Joseph Smith
James K. Polk (A late comer who won the election)

15. He received replies from Clay, Calhoun and Cass.
Prior to running for President of the United States, the Prophet wrote to the men running and asked what their intentions were toward the Latter-day Saints.
He received replies from Clay, Calhoun and Cass.
(Polk entered the race later, so he did not have a chance to respond).
Clay and Calhoun’s responses were so offensive that it gave rise to the following comments Joseph Smith made about the two men.
He said that they were wish-washy politicians and that their doctrine was that which fed mobs.

16. It was not announced to the people until January of 1844.
In Wilford Woodruff’s journal he stated that as early as December 1843, Joseph Smith was determined to run for President.
It was not announced to the people until January of 1844.
They tried to get James A. Bennett from New York to be Joseph’s running mate for V.P. but he declined.
Perhaps Joseph was running for President of the United States to legitimize Mormonism.
Sidney Rigdon was eventually recruited.
(Paul went to Rome to appeal before Caesar to legitimize Christianity).

17. Joseph’s Political Platform
February 1844
Joseph’s political platform was completed with the help of William W. Phelps and John Bernheisel (a family physician who had political inclinations). Both were gifted men. Joseph had the platform in mind, but William W. Phelps was most likely the one who wrote it.
1. Congressional Reform: Reduce the Congress by two-thirds.
2. Lower salaries for those in Congress:
They should be public servants and therefore only the best would seek the position.

18. Prisoners should work to pay their debt to society.
3. Prison Reform:
Prisoners should work to pay their debt to society.
Prisons should be turned into seminaries to teach inmates a better way of life.
He thought that only murderers and rapists should receive the harshest treatment.
Joseph proposed that murderers should be put to death.

19. 4. Military:
It should be based on honor and moral responsibility. Joseph did not believe in a court marshal, but if a man were to betray
the trust of his country, he believed that man should never be allowed to hold a public office.

20. 5. Slavery:
Legislatures should be petitioned to abolish slavery by the year 1850.
It would be taken care of by the sale of public lands to pay the owners of the slaves a just compensation for allowing them to go free. Many people were upset with this idea because it would cost millions of dollars.
The Civil War alone cost 10 times that amount, and they still lost their slaves.
Joseph was opposed to slavery.

21. 6. State rights: He opposed State rights for obvious reasons
6. State rights: He opposed State rights for obvious reasons. He said that it was the doctrine that fed mobs. He was in favor of a strong central government that administered fairly the laws and that the state was not supreme (Remember that Missouri did just about anything they wanted to the Mormons). 7. He advocated a strong National Security: More economy and less taxation. Joseph advocated a federal banking system and a judicious tariff to protect U.S. interests abroad.

22. 8. Joseph was an expansionist:
He said that Oregon, California, Mexico and Canada should all be invited to join with the United States.

23. A lot of missionaries were called to advocate the policy on government espoused by Joseph Smith as well as to preach the gospel.
The Twelve were sent out for the same reasons.
Richard L. Bushman called Joseph a “Pro-test Candidate.” Why?
Because Joseph was not impressed with those who were running and what they would do for the Saints.
Bruce R. McConkie told his son Joseph McConkie that he felt the reason the Twelve were sent out was that Joseph knew he was going to die and did not want any harm to come to them.

24. “We do not believe it right to interfere with bond servants”
Doctrine & Covenants 134:12
“We do not believe it right to interfere with bond servants”
This verse was intended to appease slave holders and avoid placing the Saints in the crossfire between the Southern and Northern states over the issue of slavery, though there was very little sympathy in the Church for the same. The Church had enjoyed some missionary success in the Southern states, particularly, Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky, and it was feared that if they came out against slavery it would invoke persecution similar to that which they had experienced in Jackson County. “For you will see,” wrote one Mormon, “that if madam rumor, with her thousand poisoned tongues, was once set afloat the story that this society had come out in favor of the doctrines and abolitionism, there would be no safety for one of us in the South” (Messenger and Advocate, 2:313).

25. The Prophet Joseph Smith sensed the precariousness of the situation and took measures to avoid trouble; he and other Church leaders during the spring of 1836 used the Messenger and Advocate to voice disapproval of the abolition movement. “I do not believe that the people of the North have any more right to say that the South shall not hold slaves, than the South have to say the North shall,” he wrote (Messenger and Advocate, 2:289), though he taught that the slave master must treat him slaves “with kindness before God.”

26. In the spring of 1844, in order to give the Saints a candidate for whom they could vote in good conscience, the Prophet announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States. In so doing he also announced a most enlightened platform which included a provision for Congress to pay slave holders a reasonable price for their slaves with money obtained from the sale of public lands, and from deduction of pay from the members of Congress. The idea, which was ignored, received wide public acclaim eleven years
later when it was proposed by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The Prophet continued, “The southern people are hospitable and noble. They will help to rid so free a country of every vestige of slavery whenever they are assured of an equivalent for their property” (Smith, History of the Church, 6:207).