--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young, Newel K. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 19 number: 1 published: 1915-11 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young, Newel K., "Man Sent of God," *Improvement Era* 19, no. 1 (November 1915): 30–32.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1901unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1901unse start_page: 30 end_page: 32 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1915-11) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1901unse publication_year: 1915 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1915, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Man Sent of God Man Sent of God ii BY NEWEL K. YOUNG "God's plan is an eternal plan. What is inwrought there abides. Noth- ing conceivable can give such abiding worth to a man's life as that he should have identified his aims with the eternal purposes of God." — Henry Churchill King. In a former paper we have shown that the feeling and con- viction that one is sent into the world of God is an abiding source of inspiration and strength throughout life. We saw, too, that while it is instinctive, we have had revealed to us through our modern prophet that we are so sent. We noticed, briefly, the effects of this feeling and conviction on the lives of Jesus, the Prophet Joseph, and our two greatest national heroes in American history. Then we gave the testimony of the great modern scholars, a college president, and sought the witness of our own souls ; we found this feeling to be universal also. We purpose now to cite other examples, to find the basis or ground work of this instinct or feeling; and to call attention to the opportunity and responsibility of those who are charged with the training of the young to cultivate this feeling until it blooms into the fruitful flower of an eternal conviction. We will find it both interesting and instructive to review the lives of the following men, to see the suggestive witness of how great a part the belief that they were sent into the world by God to do each his own work has played in the making of their lives. Nephi, Samuel, King David, Moroni (both of them), Daniel, Livingston, Jacob Riis, Henry Churchill King, President Joseph F. Smith, and Elder Heber J. Grant. Each reader may add to the list a host of others. Nor will it be less interesting to trace the effects of this feeling in our own lives. The revelation that man is sent into the world to do the Father's business is grounded or rooted in the great basic, fun- damental truth of the literal Fatherhood of God and the common sonship of man, culminating in the brotherhood of Christ. From this doctrine of the common Fatherhood of God spring all the "mighty hopes that make us men." This great truth, that man is MAN SENT OF GOD 31 God's offspring, his child, charges life with meaning and rich worth now and here, and secures in certainty his future, after death. This is well understood by those of us who accept as the sure word of God the Holy scriptures, but for those who in the too common spirit of the day question our purely religious sources, I will give the witness of some of the scholars of our own time, at just this point. Dr. Gordon says, "Life is a great training-school of which the earth is only the primary department. Christ is the first fruits, the example, after which little by little our Father is patterning all his children." While Prof. Wm. Adams Brown speaks thus, "It was because he [Jesus] realized as no one before him had ever realized, what divine Fatherhood might mean for a human life, and because he entered so completely into the experience of sonship. It was, in a word, because he showed us once and for all what man at his best may be, and so made belief in his ultimate destruction for ever impossible. * :|: :;: He gives such dignity to human nature that its endless continuance seems natural and worthy. He discloses to us all capacities within ourselves which justify our instinctive hope ; and the new experience of sonship into which he leads, gives us the pledge of endless life in the Father's house." The witness of President Henry Churchill King that I wish to give reads thus, "Nothing can give such meaning to life as to know that one has a part, a real part, his own unique part, the part of a son of God, to play in life, that he has his own individual flavor that no other soul can exactly reproduce. He has the joy of a divine calling, of a divinely given individuality, and the joy of giving this in those personal relations in which he is placed." My own testimony is that no other thought or conviction has given me such joy and comfort and inspiration as the assurance that God is my Father. It has enriched and glorified life for me, even in the midst of pain, and poverty and sorrow. It enlarges and enriches every relation of life, and makes holy and enduring all the loves and affections of the heart. I have watched the effects of the faith that God is our Father, on the lives of scores of our young people from the very time that it first entered their hearts, and have noted their growth in beauty and strength and Godliness under its influence. If God is our Father, then he has called us to do his work ; and when we make the dominant motive of our lives the doing of "Father's will," it is no abject submission, no giving up of life, but is rather the glorious sharing of a joyful partnership of son and Father, and leads one into the fulness of life — rich, enduring, eternal life. In noting the influence upon the Savior's life of the belief 32 I M PRi >VI-.M ENT EF \ that he was sent to do his Father's business, we should call atten- tion to the part his mother played during his boyhood — the rich, awful, critical years of youth. "His mother kept all these say- ings in her heart." All the sayings that told of the mission of her boy, that pointed to him as a Child of promise, were treasured in her heart. Ah ! can we not in memory and appreciation of our own mothers' part in the making of our manhood, get some in- sight here into the part played by this the greatest of all women, divinely chosen to bear and rear the Son of God, in the nurture and making of this Man who became our Christ? I believe this humble, pure, loving woman did exert a great influence in making their village home in Nazareth a fit place in which to rear the Christ-child. The biographer Luke has said, ''The child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom : and the grace of God was upon him." I hold that for a child's father and mother to have treasured in their hearts the feeling that their child is sent into the world to help to do the Father's business is a rich heritage to which every child is entitled. This feeling should be cultivated until the parents' and the child's lives are aglow with it. All their relations with each other, their words and acts, their attitude toward life always and everywhere, should be enriched and glorified by this feeling. Consider just here the part Hannah took in Samuel's life ; the influence of the mothers of Helaman's sons ; the encourage- ment-given our boy-prophet, Joseph, by his mother, and perhaps of equal or greater importance the sympathetic support of his father : and the wonderful influence of Lincoln's mother upon his whole life. Then let us never forget the remarkable testimonies that President Joseph F. Smith and Elder Heber J. Grant bear of the mighty influence their mothers had upon their lives. Very early their godly mothers had instilled into their hearts the faith that they were to work as God's servants among his people. Only by giving such inspiration as is suggested in the last two paragraphs may parent or teacher or friend give the help that is needed by our boys and girls if they are to fulfil the promises of the Lord to and for them. Only so can we turn their faces to the stars, and plant their feet firmly in the way of life. Thus may they come into a fulness of the richest possible service of their loved ones and their fellows, thereby realizing the supreme joy of life here, and eternal lives hereafter. KAYSVILLE, UTAH