Testimony

Testimony BY NEPHI TENSEN

In the fall of 1908, U. S. Senator Jonathan P. Dolliver de- livered an eloquent political speech in the Salt Lake Theatre. By way of illustrating the unwisdom of being too certain in our con- clusions, he said in a half humorous way, "After studying the evidences of Christianity for sometime, I decided that there were only two certitudes in religion, life and death." What the Senator p.afd partly in jest, unfortunately is the general conclusion of modern Christians respecting certainty in religious beliefs. Must we believe, with Dr. Benjamin Morse, of the University of Liverpool, that "imagination" (faith) "carries science on from discovery to discovery," that the "work of the imagination" is "proven by the test of experiment;" but that "in the psychical world there is no such touchstone of experiment?" Is there no "touchstone of experiment" in the realm of the psychical and re- ligious? Is faith a mere sentiment? Have all the soul's cries to Omnipotence for help ended in the "echo of their wailing cry?" What answer to these mighty questions did the Master of men send down through the centuries? "Ask, and it shall be given you seek, and ye shall find knock, and it shall be opened unto ; ;

you." "If any man will do the will of the Father, he shall know of the doctrine." Have Christians forgotten these promises, or must we believe that the religion of Jesus is merely an ethic signboard marking life's true way, but disassociated from superhuman power to plant the roots of truth in the soul? Must we believe that he who re- vealed to the race more vital truth than all who have gone before or have come after him, did not leave with man the life and power that make the seeds of truth germinate in the soul, and grow to the full fruition of positive conviction and fearless certainty? What was it that came to those who heard the Christ speak that made

664 IMPROVEMENT KRA them say, "Did nol our hearts bum within us while he talked with us hy the way?" Was it not the Eoly Ghost, the final "touchstone" I

of truth, the only token hy which we can truthfully confess the name of Christ ? A theologian of note, some months ago, speaking of the war, said, "It is thedeath of mystic Christianity. Let us will that it be the birth of an ethic Christianity that men really practice." Let us rather hope that it will be the birth of the "ethic Christianity" which is all-powerful, because it comes to us in the language, "Thus saith the Lord." Ethics alone has not and will not trans- form a life. Ethics alone never saved a soul. Only a knowledge of Christian ethics coupled with the positive conviction that the words of Christ are the words of God will completely subdue the selfish propensities of the human heart. Men may philosophize all they will, but they never did and they never will coin a word that will take hold of the soul and hold the soul like the word of God, fused into man's spirit by the Spirit of God. How can Edward Lewis say, (in the December, 1914, At- lantic Monthly) "the Church is beginning to doubt the historicity and reality of Jesus," and that "there is no whole-hearted attempt- to follow him," without starting a storm of denunciation from the pulpit ? Can it be that the truth spoken by a fourteen year old boy, in 1820, is dawning upon the minds of the modern clergy; and they are beginning to discover that they have only the husk of Christi- anity, a "form of Godliness," without the life and power of the Holy Ghost? George A. Gordon, in the Atlantic Monthly, June, 1913, asks in the words of Kant, humanity's universal question about religion, "What can I know?" And then, as if to give the answer hopefully, says, "Christians were not meant to rely solely upon the epic his- tory of the Master, to go back two thousand years to find the warrant for their faith." Mr. Gordon here unwittingly expresses the "Mormon" view of the "warrant for faith." Undoubting faith that did and does now reach out to God, and finds its present soul- satisfying "warrant," is the very life and strength of "Mormon- ism." The restored gospel, as one of its important proclamations to the world, declares, that "Christians were not meant" to linger always at the foot hills in the twilight of mere belief, but that it is their right and duty to ascend by trusting, conquering faith to the summit, where they can "walk in the light as God is in the light." "Mormonism" has come to reannunciate the Master's promise, "If any man will do the will of the Father, he shall know of the doctrine." The loss of the faith that made possible the realization of Christ's promises of religious certainty, is one of the saddest tragedies of all time. The dwindling away of the faith "once delivered to the Saints," that really brought to the soul the im-

press of the truth verifying the Holy Spirit, marked the end, in the world, for a time, of soul-saving religion. The dying of this faith was the dissolution of man's partnership with God. It was

the beginning of the night of the world's spiritual darkness, dur- ing which no star of hope pierced the dense blackness. Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll, a product of the faithless, hopeless and life- less theology formulated of the sentiment and myth that survived the loss of primitive Christianity, voiced in poetic sentences the despair of his contemporaries, when he stood beside the open grave of his brother and cried, "Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We cry aloud and the only answer is the wail of our echoing cry. From the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word !" What is the answer of modern Christianity to this "wailing cry" which has "echoed" down through the centuries of doubt and darkness, since faith dwindled to a mere insipid sentiment? Catch it as it comes from those who stand within the "narrow circle of the pulpit:" "We cannot know. We can only believe." But listen to the answer that comes from the "Mormon" pulpit: "The soul that cries aloud has, in the past, received, and does now receive, its certain answer. The lips of the dead are not 'voiceless !' From the 'lips of the dead' there has come an answer in the very time in which we live." Moroni, the history of whose contemporaries was buried beneath the dust of centuries, in a glorious, resurrected body, stood on this earth in the morning of the nineteenth century and talked to a farmer's son, and be- queathed to the doubting race the record written in gold, which is one of the last and most soul-satisfying answers to the old and yet ever new question, "If a man die, shall he live again?" "I want to know," was the heart resolve that marked the be- ginning of the mightiest religious movement of modern times. Perfect faith in the word and promise of God made the resolution realization. And tens of thousands of faithful souls who have heard of Joseph Smith's first prayer, have trustingly looked up to God, and then in their hearts have exclaimed, "I know that my Re- deemer lives." "Mormonism," through the examples of its modern triumphs" of faith, has brought to its faithful devotees the "testimony of Jesus," that makes man certain that there has come down to us from a former age the veritable word of God from which man may learn his divinely planned mission and destiny that living ;

prophets now speak the mandate of the Almighty in words that make the soul glow with the gentle warmth breathed bv the Spirit of God that the soul's sincere seeking after the Great All-Father ;

is not vain; that faith gives wings to praver, and carries the soul's fervent words and wishes to the ear of Beneficence; that through the atoning blood of Christ the contrite, obedient soul may be made

666 IMPROVEMENT 1£RA as white as snow and that death does not end all, but is the portal ;

to the life that willendure when the stars have ceased to shine As a conclusion to these rambling paragraphs, which do not. and were not intended to, follow the cold rules of logic, it might not be unfitting to mention a recent instance of the manifestation of the power of God, tending to establish the validity of the ministry of the priesthood of the Church of Christ. A boy, fifteen years of age, who lives in the neighborhood of the writer, for several years had leakage of the heart. The mother of the boy consulted five different doctors, in the hope of finding some human skill that could restore her son to health. But her seeking was all in vain. The last man of medical knowl- edge and surgical skill consulted, admitted frankly that the boy could not be healed. The mother was disconsolate. But the boy had locked up securely in his heart a power, greater than that possessed by all the doctors. He said to his mother, "Can't I be healed through the prayers and administrations of the elders by the power of God?" "Of course, you can," said the faithful mother. The writer happened to be one of the elders who administered to this boy. The boy is now perfectly well and sound. A young man who is investigating "Mormonism," to whom the writer re- lated this story of healing, asked, at the conclusion of the story, "How do vou know that the boy was healed by the power of God?" "Because," said I, "men of science said he could not be healed, and he is now well." May we of the younger generation of Latter-day Saints re- member that the "testimony of Jesus," is the strongest shield against the "fiery darts of the wicked;" and the only way, in this world of doubts, discouragements and distracting cares, to the "peace of God," which is more beautiful than the smile of spring- time, and truer than the fatigue that closes the eyes in sleep.