The Articles of Faith Part 24

THE CHURCH AND ITS PLAN OF ORGANIZATION.

=Article 6.=--We believe in the same organization that existed in the primitive Church, viz: apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists, etc.

THE CHURCH IN FORMER AND LATTER DAYS.

=1. The Primitive Church.=--In the dispensation of the Savior's ministry, Christ established His Church upon the earth, appointing therein the officers necessary for the carrying out of the Father's purposes. As shown in the last lecture, every person so appointed was divinely commissioned with authority to officiate in the ordinances of his calling; and, after Christ's ascension, the same organization was continued, those who had received authority ordaining others to the various offices of the priesthood. In this way were given unto the Church, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors,[602] high priests,[603] seventies,[604] elders,[605] bishops,[606] priests,[607]

teachers,[608] and deacons.[609]

[602] Eph. iv, 11.

[603] Heb. v, 1-5.

[604] Luke x, 1-11.

[605] Acts xiv, 23; xv, 6; I Peter v, 1.

[606] I Tim. iii, 1; t.i.tus 1, 7.

[607] Rev. i, 6.

[608] Acts xiii, 1.

[609] I Tim. iii, 8-12.

=2.= Besides these specific offices in the priesthood, there were other callings of a more temporal nature, to which men were also set apart by authority: such for instance was the case of the seven men of honest report who, in the days of the apostles, were chosen and appointed to minister to the poor, thus leaving the Twelve freer to attend to the particular duties of their office.[610] This special appointment ill.u.s.trates the nature of the helps and governments[611]

set in the Church, to a.s.sist in the work under the direction of the regular officers of the priesthood.

[610] Acts vi, 1-6.

[611] I Cor. xii, 28.

=3.= The ministers so appointed, and the members among whom they labor, const.i.tute the Church of Christ, which has been impressively compared to a perfect body, the individuals typifying the separate members, each with its special function, all co-operating for the welfare of the whole.[612] Every office so established, every officer so commissioned, is necessary to the development of the Church and to the accomplishment of the work of G.o.d. An organization established of G.o.d comprises no superfluities; the eye, the ear, the hand, the foot, every organ of the body, is essential to the symmetry and perfection of the physical structure; in the Church no officer can rightly say to another, "I have no need of thee."[613]

[612] I Cor. xii, 12-27; Rom. xii, 4-5; Eph. iv, 16.

[613] I Cor. xii, 21.

=4.= The existence of these officers, and particularly their operation with accompaniments of Divine a.s.sistance and power, may be taken as a distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic of the Church in any age of the world,--a crucial test, whereby the validity or falsity of any claim to Divine authority may be determined. The gospel of Christ is the everlasting gospel; its principles, laws, and ordinances, and the Church organization founded thereon, must be ever the same. In searching for the true Church, therefore, one must look for an organization comprising the offices established of old, the callings of apostles, prophets, evangelists, high priests, seventies, pastors, bishops, elders, priests, teachers, deacons; not men bearing these names merely, but ministers able to vindicate their claim to position as officers in the Lord's service, through the evidences of power and authority accompanying their ministry.

=5. Apostasy from the Primitive Church.=--The question may fairly arise in the mind of the earnest investigator, have these authorities and powers, together with their a.s.sociated gifts of the Spirit, remained with men from the apostolic age to the present; in short, has there been a Church of Christ upon the earth during this long interval? In answer, let these facts be considered: Since the period immediately following the ministrations of the apostles of old, and until the present century, no organization has maintained a claim to direct revelation from G.o.d; in fact, the teachings of the professed ministers of the gospel for centuries have been to the effect that such gifts of G.o.d have ceased, that the days of miracles have gone, and that the present depends for its guiding code wholly upon the past. A self-suggesting interpretation of history indicates that there has been a great departure from the way of salvation as laid down by the Savior, a universal apostasy from the Church of Christ.[614]

Scarcely had the Church been organized by the Savior, whose name it bears, before the powers of darkness arrayed themselves for conflict with the organized body. Even in the days of Christ, persecution was bitterly waged against the disciples; commencing with the Jews, and directed first against the Master Himself and His few immediate a.s.sociates, this tide of opposition soon enveloped every known follower of the Savior; so that the very name Christian became an epithet of derision.

[614] See Notes 1 and 2. See "The Great Apostasy, Considered in the Light of Scriptural and Secular History," by James E. Talmage, Salt Lake City, 1909.

=6.= In the first quarter of the fourth century, however, a change in the att.i.tude of paganism toward Christianity was marked by the conversion of Constantine the Great, under whose patronage the Christian profession grew in favor, and became in fact the religion of the state. But what a profession, what a religion was it by this time! Its simplicity had departed; earnest devotion and self-sacrificing sincerity were no longer characteristic of the Church's ministers; these professed followers of the humble Prophet of Nazareth, these self-styled a.s.sociates of the meek and lowly Jesus, these loudly-proclaimed lovers of the Man of Sorrow, lived amid conditions strangely inconsistent with the life of their great Exemplar. Church offices were sought after for the distinction of honor and wealth accompanying them; ministers of the gospel affected the state of worldly authority; bishops sought the pomp of princes, archbishops lived as kings, and popes like emperors. With these unauthorized and unscriptural innovations came many changes in the ordinances of the so-called church: the rites of baptism were perverted; the sacrament was altered; public wors.h.i.+p became an exhibition of art; men were canonized; martyrs were made subjects of adoration; blasphemy grew apace, in that men without authority essayed to exercise the prerogatives of G.o.d in calling others to what still bore the name of spiritual office. Ages of darkness came upon the earth; the power of Satan seemed almost supreme.

=7.= For a special consideration of the evidence of a general apostasy from the Church of Christ, the student must consult authorities on ecclesiastical history. While the fact of the apostasy is admitted by but few such writers, the historical events which they chronicle suggest the awful truth. We may trace, from the days of the apostles down to near the close of the tenth century, a constantly changing form of Church organization, which, at the later time named, bore but little semblance to the Church established by the Savior. This falling away is admitted by some historians, and as we shall presently see, it was definitely foretold by authoritative prophecy.

=8.= John Wesley, founder of a powerful sect, declared that the distinctive gifts of the Holy Ghost were no longer with the church, having been taken away on account of the unworthiness of professing Christians, whom he characterized indeed as heathen, with only a dead form of wors.h.i.+p.[615] In the Church of England "Homily Against Peril of Idolatry" we read "So that laity and clergy, learned and unlearned, all ages, sects, and degrees of men, women, and children of whole Christendom--an horrible and most dreadful thing to think--have been at once drowned in abominable idolatry; of all other vices most detested of G.o.d, and most d.a.m.nable to man; and that by the s.p.a.ce of eight hundred years and more." Milner, an author on church history, admits a pitiable condition of the Church in the tenth century, and finds in that sad state a fulfillment of scriptural predictions.

[615] John Wesley's Works, vii, pp. 26-27. See Note 4, following Lecture xii, in connection with Article 7, "Spiritual Gifts," page 238.

=9. This Great Apostasy was Foretold.=--The infinite fore-knowledge of G.o.d made plain to Him even from the beginning this falling away from the truth; and, through inspiration, the prophets of old uttered solemn warnings of the approaching dangers. Surely Isaiah was gazing upon the era of spiritual darkness when he declared, "The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant."[616] And how deeply impressive is the declaration of Jeremiah, "For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water."[617]

[616] Isa. xxiv, 5.

[617] Jer. ii, 13.

=10.= The prophecies of the apostles relative to the false teachers so soon to trouble the flock, already quoted,[618] declare the apostasy then rapidly approaching. Paul warned the Saints of Thessalonica that they be not deceived by those who cried that the second coming of Christ was then at hand, "For," said the apostle, "that day shall not come except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called G.o.d, or that is wors.h.i.+ped; so that he as G.o.d sitteth in the temple of G.o.d, showing himself that he is G.o.d."[619]

This falling away had begun even in the days of the apostles:--"Even now," says John, "are there many anti-Christs."[620] And Paul, in addressing the Galatians, declared, "There be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ."[621]

[618] See pages 192-193.

[619] II Thess. ii, 3-4.

[620] I John ii, 18. See further II Peter ii, 1-3; Jude 17, 18.

[621] Gal. i, 7; also Acts xx, 29, 30; I Tim. iv, 1-3; II Tim. iv, 1-4.

=11.= Not less conclusive are the prophecies contained in the Book of Mormon relating to this great falling away. Nephi, son of Lehi, predicted the oppression of the North American Indians at the hands of the Gentiles, and declared that at that time the people will be lifted up in self-pride, having departed from the ordinances of G.o.d's house; true, they will build to themselves many churches, but in these they will preach their own wisdom, with envyings, and strife, and malice, denying however the power and miracles of G.o.d.[622]

[622] II Nephi xxvi, 19-22; see also xxvii, 1; xxviii, 3, 6; xxix, 3; I Nephi xiii, 5; xxii 22-23.

=12. Restoration of the Church.=--From the facts already stated, it is evident that the Church was literally driven from the earth; in the first ten centuries immediately following the ministry of Christ, the authority of the priesthood was lost from among men, and no human power could restore it. But the Lord in His mercy provided for the re-establishment of His Church in the last days, and for the last time; and prophets of olden time fore-saw this era of renewed enlightenment, and sang in joyous tones of its coming.[623] It has been already shown that this restoration was effected by the Lord through the Prophet Joseph Smith, who, together with Oliver Cowdery, in 1829 received the Aaronic Priesthood under the hands of John the Baptist; and later the Melchizedek Priesthood under the hands of the former-day apostles, Peter, James, and John. By the authority thus bestowed, the Church has been again organized with all its former completeness, and mankind once more rejoices in the priceless privileges of the counsels of G.o.d. The Latter-day Saints declare their high claim to the true Church organization, similar in all essentials to the organization effected by Christ among the Jews; this people of the last days profess to have the Priesthood of the Almighty, the power to act in the name of G.o.d, which power commands respect both on earth and in heaven. Let us consider the organization of the priesthood as it exists to-day.

[623] Dan. ii, 44-45; vii, 27; Matt. xxiv, 14; Rev. xiv, 6-8.

PLAN OF GOVERNMENT IN THE RESTORED CHURCH.

=13. Orders and Offices in the Priesthood.=--The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints recognizes two orders of priesthood, the lesser called the Aaronic, the greater known as the Melchizedek order.

_The Aaronic Priesthood_ is named after Aaron, who was given to Moses as his mouth-piece, to act under his direction in the carrying out of G.o.d's purposes respecting Israel.[624] For this reason, it is sometimes called the Lesser Priesthood; but though lesser, it is neither small nor insignificant. While Israel journeyed in the wilderness, Aaron and his sons were called by prophecy and set apart for the duties of the priest's office.[625]

[624] Exo. iv, 14-16.

[625] Exo. xxviii, 1.

=14.= At a subsequent period of Israel's history, the Lord chose the tribe of Levi to a.s.sist Aaron in the priestly functions, the special duties of the Levites being to keep the instruments and attend to the service of the tabernacle. The Levites thus chosen of the Lord were to take the place of the first-born throughout the tribes, whom the Lord had claimed for His service from the time of the last dread plague in Egypt, whereby the first-born in every Egyptian house was slain, while the eldest in every Israelitish house was hallowed and spared.[626]

The commission thus given to the Levites is sometimes called the _Levitical Priesthood_;[627] it is to be regarded as an appendage to the priesthood of Aaron, not comprising the highest priestly powers.

The Aaronic Priesthood, as restored to the earth in this dispensation, comprises the Levitical order.[628] This priesthood holds the keys of the ministering of angels, and the authority to attend to the outward ordinances, the letter of the gospel;[629] it comprises the offices of deacon, teacher, and priest, with the bishopric holding the keys of presidency.

[626] Numb. iii, 12-13, 39, 44-45, 50-51.

[627] Heb. vii, 11.

[628] Doc. and Cov. cvii, 1.

[629] Doc. and Cov. cvii, 20.