Elder Joseph E. Cardon.
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I rejoice with all my soul this morning for this opportunity of again attending the annual conference of the Church. It has been my blessed privilege to attend these conferences for the last 16 or 17 years, and I have always felt in the different capacities in which I have labored, that I could not prosecute the work required at my hands unless I partook of the spirit of these conferences. I am happy to say today that this spirit is being manifested among the Latter-day Saints everywhere, so that in great numbers we are privileged, through the blessings of the Lord, to come to this place and partake of the spirit that is poured out in such rich abundance.
We do not, nor cannot, comprehend how blessed we are as a people. It is only necessary for us to go into the world and see what others have in order to appreciate the many blessings which the Lord has so abundantly bestowed upon us as His people, and I rejoice with all my heart that His work is being so generously carried among the children of men within the confines of our own beloved country.
It is a glorious privilege to know, my brethren and sisters and friends, that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, our Redeemer, and that Joseph Smith was a humble instrument in His hands in restoring the great work of the Lord, and that we have been made partakers of these glorious and blessed privileges which came through our acceptance of the Gospel of the Son of God. The world does not know that God lives, simply because they have not been willing to comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. If we do His will, we shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether it be of man, and it has been, in part at least, through our having done the will of the Father that we are able to testify to all the world that God lives and that Jesus is His beloved Son and our Redeemer.
The great Prophet Noah knew, through the inspiration of the Almighty, that the mission to which he was assigned was divine, and he went about under the direction of the Holy Spirit in the prosecution of the great mission which was placed upon his shoulders; and had the people of that generation believed in that message and humbled themselves as did Noah, they too would have known that the message which the prophet gave unto them was divine. The manifestations of the power of God alone are not sufficient to prove whether these truths are from God or not, but it is necessary that every human soul who can testify that he knows shall be in possession of the Holy Spirit, and that can come only through our obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.
When the Son of God asked His disciples, "Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?" They said: "Some say that Thou art John the Baptist, some, Elias; and others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets." "But whom say ye that I am?" "And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God." "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." Notwithstanding the fact that Peter had daily ministered along with the Savior, yet it was necessary that the Lord should reveal unto him the fact that Jesus was the Redeemer of the world. And so it is with us today. It is necessary that we should be in possession of the Holy Spirit in order to testify to each other that these great truths which have come into the world are divine, and that they are binding upon the children of men. I am happy in the thought also, that men in these latter-days have seen the Father and the Son, and have witnessed the ministration of angels and holy beings, but notwithstanding these miraculous experiences, we, too, may know just as assuredly as they of these divine truths, if we comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. The Holy Ghost is their witness unto the children of men and unto the world, and we can gain possession of that Spirit in the same way that others have, and this influence and power will lighten the hearts and the minds of all men.
I do know that God lives, and that He is ruling the destinies of the children of men, and that He answers the supplications of His humble children, and will reveal unto them the things that are necessary in order to go back into His presence. I know that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, and that if we will obey Him and follow the example and the pattern which He has laid for us to follow, we will associate with Him in the eternal worlds. I also know that through the great and mighty modern Prophet, Joseph Smith, this latter-day Gospel has been restored, and is being proclaimed to the nations of the world by authorized servants of God, who are endowed with divine authority to administer in the laws and ordinances of the Gospel, and make it possible for all men who will yield, obedience thereto to know for themselves whether this doctrine is of God or whether we are speaking by the spirit of man. "If any of you lack wisdom," the Apostle James has said, "let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering."
The inspiration of this scripture rested so mightily upon the boy prophet, that he went and supplicated the Almighty to know which of all the warring and jarring creeds was right and which he should follow, for, in his early boyhood, he knew that it was necessary to yield obedience to the requirements of his Father in heaven. Every son and daughter of God who will go humbly before Him may also know for themselves whether or not we speak of ourselves or whether we are in very deed, divinely commissioned servants of the Lord Jesus Christ. By that same spirit also we are able to testify that President Joseph F. Smith is a prophet of the true and living God, and a more humble, devoted, fearless man does not live in the world today. And those who are associated with him are men of God. There are no better in the world today; and we can, through that Holy Spirit, testify to all the world that they are prophets, seers and revelators unto the children of men.
I pray that the power and the Spirit of the Lord may permeate the hearts of those who are seeking after truth, wherever they may be, that they may come into the light and partake of the influence, power and glory that have come to us through our having yielded obedience to the laws and the ordinances of the house of the Lord.
May His peace and blessings be with the Saints everywhere, that they may follow the whisperings of the Holy Spirit, and yield obedience thereto, that upon all occasions we may know for ourselves whether or not we are following in that straight and narrow way that the Father hath laid, out for us. That we may be saved and exalted with Him and His Son and the righteous who have fought the good fight and endured to the end, I humbly pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choirs sang the anthem, "Daughter of Zion."