But it very much will be our next speaker. I rejoice in being with you tonight, calling upon the Lord that he might reveal additional information to us relative to our responsibilities to him. I suppose one of our greatest sins is the fact that we do not know the importance of our relationship with our Father in Heaven and the priesthood and the saints.

and what our full duty is. We ourselves have spent so many years under the influence of Christian laws, and our fathers before us, back to the days of the original apostles. But our characters are so cluttered up with the traditions of how to worship, and what we owe to our Father in Heaven, that it's nearly impossible for us to receive without debate and argument, and without procrastination, the things the Lord asks us to do. And the only reason he asks us to do these things is because he loves us and he has proposed to make us like himself. I ask you that he has given us our lives. It is his responsibility, if possible, to prepare us to return, into his presence, and to associate with him, to be congenial with him, to see as he sees, and do things as he does them, and to be able to receive to ourselves and to our glory everything that he possesses. So the purpose in his desire to teach us is not for gain or vain ambition.

But it's because of his love and his covenants with us and his desire to help us to regain our primeval condition and return into his presence. He fully realizes, having once been upon the earth, that we are beset with these terrible traditions in our character. And so the gospel has been organized in such a way that will enable us to overcome these things if we will surrender ourselves in a 100% way. It's calculated to do this very thing for us if we will surrender ourselves. If we don't surrender ourselves, why, we have no sense. Our bloodlines have been watched, some closer than others, by the powers on the other side.

But even though our bloodline has been washed, we have come into the lone and weary world, and through years of assimilating the natures of our characters to the systems of this celestial world, we have become contaminated with many doctrines and with many ways of life that are not right in the eyes of our Father in Heaven. So who knows?

But in order for us to receive our exaltation and become that pure people that the prophets have spoken of, there has to be a drastic change. We have to be shocked out of our present condition, and a drastic change has to take place in the nature of our character. Now, in every dispensation, And in every age, the Lord has revealed the same laws for us to obey in order to accomplish it. Now many of you may wonder what you can do in order to prove yourself faithful and true in the eyes of the Lord. And we have spoken about these things many times.

When you're here. But as Brother Harmon has often said, the people, when they're fallen in human nature, need projects. He was speaking particularly of temporal projects to keep our hands and eyes and feet busy and our thoughts in the right place. Which apparently is very true. But additional to that, we need spiritual projects which make us be faithful every hour of our lives. And for this reason, the Lord has restored the gospel with its ordinances, covenants, laws, and rules which we partake of and which, if obeyed, will make us live our religion every moment of our lives. Just to illustrate this, I might bring up the thought out of Mosiah here, to illustrate what I'm trying to say. Now I say unto you that it was expedient that there should be a law given to the children of Israel.

Yea, even a very strict law. Now we are children of Israel. We pride ourselves that we are the sons and daughters of Abraham. For they were a stiff-necked people, quick to do iniquity, and slow to remember the Lord their God. Therefore, there was a law given to them, yea, a law of performances and ordinances, a law which they were to observe strictly day by day to keep them in remembrance of God and their duty towards Him. That's what just about is known.

as it can be put, as what our characters are like, being true, pure Israelites, and as what is required of us to keep the law in remembrance and to know what our duty is towards God. The prophet here had particular reference to the act of burned offerings and sacrifices which the people performed.

under many conditions. Now, instead of the burnt offering and the animal sacrifice, the Lord has said, I want a conspired spirit and a broken heart. So instead of when you pray tomorrow morning, instead of you killing a sheep and burning it on the altar, or taking other material there, The offer and sacrifice of the Lord. What is required? A contrite spirit and a broken heart. And how many of you, when you approach an interview in the morning with Father, that you approach it with a contrite heart, a spirit, and a broken heart? Why a broken heart where a heart is broken?

Now that you have found out your awful condition in the eyes of your Father in heaven, and that you have found that he has placed you under a terrible condemnation, which has withdrawn his spirit from you, and your heart is broken, and your spirit filled with the depth of contrite-ness and humility, where do we approach?

are burned often or sacrificed as the flesh with a hotness a high-mindedness vanity because we are forced to do it because we fear if we don't something will happen to us with the only preparedness to ask to demand now we can see by the prophets before us they told us that this is a great moral battle to keep this spirit and characteristic morality under God alive in our character and not give way to the teachings, the customs, the ways, the mannerisms of the world. The Lord has instructed us in every conceivable way. He said, He said to our father that I will give you every key necessary for you to overcome death, hell, and the grave. And the only way we can overcome those three elements is by becoming like him, which finally gives us the advantage in power. So knowing.

the disposition of his children. And having had thousands of years of experience with the best of them, he has taught us to do everything. He's told us how to clothe our bodies. Now that's an important thing, isn't it? A very important thing to everybody except the needy. But to most everybody else, it's one of the most important things outside of eating that you can do.

is the covering of your body. And how many of you, with your contrite mind and broken heart, debate and argue and get up in altercation with your Heavenly Father over the manner of your death? Think of it. Just how many? Every day that you pray, try to make some excuse that your employment, your association, the condition of your body, the condition of your health, you can't stand this, you can't stand that. Imagine how you would feel, how you do feel when your children get up in altercation with you when you're teaching along those lines. So that's one of the most important things in life.

In this spiritual life, which leads many to destruction, there is power to cover the naked body by the gates. So, taking care. Simply and beautifully. Time, conditions, age, has nothing to do with it. He has specifically instructed us in a manner even. The Doctrine and Covenants is full of revelations respecting the type of mannerisms we should develop in our character. Our laughter should not be loud and so forth. You have all read these things. I'm just drawing them to your attention. But instead of voicing like the Gentiles or the wicked in our speech, in our singing, In our laughter, in our walking, in everything that we do, we should pattern after the way the Lord has told us and pattern. We should receive it without dispute and without debate or altercation. Now you can see, with the application of all these rules, they're actually covenant.

the application of all these covenants that the Lord has given us in our physical life, how that we would be automatically given or separated from the people in the world. Which would make it easier and more possible for us to turn to God and his people if we would just do it physically. So hold your back.

the furniture you have. Everything is related to principle. It's connected with your character. And Father has given it all to us. He has given all these views and regulations that he calls ordinances, performances, and covenants. And he has placed us under covenant to make these performances strictly every day and thus by making them every day we draw closer to him and we are taught how to more fully observe these laws and keep in mind our duties to him and thus his spirit is given to us whereas if we don't make these performances daily we develop the spirit of procrastination and procrastination until finally we lose the spirit of the Lord and the spirit of these performances and forget the duty we owe him. Just like if we don't pay our financial dues to the Lord all the time. It's very easy to forget it. Big and young the prophet said, I can never pay back.

the baptizing that I owe to the Lord. Listen up. It's a performance that we have to meet and to keep in mind. Prayer, personal and family prayer is a performance that is imperative to keep in order to remember our duty to the Lord and what our true association is with Him. and yet how many of you are thinking this very minute how hard it is or how impossible it is to get the family together to have your family care and your private your private interviews with your heavenly father but this is a daily strict performance and why has he made it this strict because of our stiff methods and because we are twist to do the nicotine and slow to remember the Lord our God. I like the attitude of Sister Barlow. I've been with her when she has been under stress, when she has asked the Lord her blessings, and the Lord's given her blessings. And every time I notice that before she writes the threats in her face, she says, now I must thank the Lord.

For the blessing he has given me. Now there's a strict performance. Is it not? The spirit of gratitude. This performance. Rather than waiting for a day or two. Then it's forgotten. And the performance isn't made. For these laws have been given to us. As children of Israel. For the purpose of protecting. Our character. The Lord knowing.

What we do and what we will do under given circumstances. And so daily we are procrastinating the day of our retirement. And we're not making the progress that we should make. Because we are not strictly performing as we have made a covenant to do. And that's all that we have got to do, my dear government officials.

The redemption of Zion belongs to the Lord. And you're not powerful enough to convert your little fingers to anything. None of you. But you do have the wisdom and the revelation and the strength and the know-how to live every hour under the direction of the Spirit of the Lord upon your arising in the morning before you do.

a thousand and one things for wicked man you should go out of your sleeping place and interview the lord and express gratitude to him that he has permitted you to awaken and to arise and to ask his spirit and power to be upon you in the performance of your duty and to direct you through that day That's a simple thing. A simple gesture of gratitude. And then begin to work under the direction of that expression of gratitude. And take up your duties one after another. And that's all that you're required to do. Maybe at noon you'll sit down in your chair and your spirit will go over. It's Brother Jerry, or Brother John, or Pastor Ross who did it at night.

I had to think about that. Yes, each duty that devolves upon you is formed under the direction of your public. The simplest of children can remember that, and thus we can say at the close of this day, to the best of my ability, though I am weak. My character appears awful in the eyes of my father. I feel like I have done my best.

And that's all that you have to do. Have your interview. That he will protect you through your sleep. Eight or ten hours of sleep. With wickedness hanging over the earth. And you being completely out. Paralyzed. And asleep. To ask him that he will send angels to watch over you. And bless you with peace. That you might be protected with spirit in your body. I can read more. In the history.

if we would follow these simple rules. And they're so simple and so easy. It doesn't require the English tongue to accomplish it. It just requires this contact spirit and this broken heart. We've got to get to the place where we're willing to receive the word of God on faith, by faith, and apply it. I know that too many of us don't believe.

that were under condemnation. You in this building tonight don't believe they're under condemnation because they have cheated lightly the things of God and because of their unbelief and their vanity. You here tonight have aspirations, holy things, and think the creations of God are wonderful, yes, but not the creations of man.

They're lined with a seat over and sandals through the seat. That's no degree a sign of humility, excellence, or faith. That's a sign, and a silly sign at that. There in Raleigh, Jesus Christ came dressed in the night through the clothes, according to the customs of the day. Back when Joseph Smith was holding a meeting, he walked through the building in his clothing. He walked through the room without his clothes.

And his clothing was so much like the clothing that Joseph and the other brethren wore that the brethren didn't even notice him. So these other performances by the map indicate nothing. But they're what I said they were. They don't understand the work of the Lord. The Lord wants a performance like that. He wants us to come to understanding of why we're under condemnation. He wants us to realize what he has done for us.

And what he allowed his son, his beloved son to do for us. Then when we understand that and understand what little we have done, our hearts will break. Our hearts will break and we will weep and weep and weep as our Savior wept and wept and wept and as his Father wept and wept. We will join their weeping.

and we will join their broken hearted condition with our broken heart when we think of what they have done and what the saints have done that we might become Adam and Eve in our own right I want to tell you it should break our heart and when we think of our wasted lives Even though we have not committed the great sins of theft, murder, and adultery, that are great sinful lies, up until the hour that we have become enlightened, because we haven't received the Word of God. We have neglected it. We haven't received the covenant He has wanted to. And for many years, We have been assimilating our own character into the likeness of the character of our Gentile friend's customs, not knowing the difference in our ignorance. Our hearts should become broken when we find out our awful state compared to our Father in Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ, which He saw.

And in this comparison, we find that we are right on people. in our nature. But brethren and sisters, the judgment, the judgment will not compare us with each other. The judgment will be a comparison with God. Our character is the character of God. That's what the judgment will be. And so we, to more or less agree, fall under this indictment.

They all, without ceasing, continue to commend themselves, by measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, find themselves favored of themselves, and forget what the Lord said of themselves. They're being adherent to the principle of the fullness of the gospel.

This is just about the place we mentally find ourselves in. And we forget what Father has said of ourselves, that you are under condemnation. You stay under condemnation until you repent of your sins and receive the new covenant. And this new covenant comprises the ordinances and the laws and the commandments relating to the fullness of the gospel, which has been given to us that by strict performance we might perfect the nature of our character. We are saved under this condemnation until we receive this and repent and begin to not only save, but do just the glorious.

opportunity, my dear brothers and sisters. The brethren who are interested in us on the other side are working with us, and they hold out great hope for and peace for and guidance and suggestions, and they're doing wonderful work. And if you could see them, you would rejoice at their appearance, at what they're doing. This people is their people.

But the people that they have brought up, we belong to them. And they're expecting something else. But we must begin to perform, brethren and sisters. I know what my weaknesses are. And I know if I don't perform, I procrastinate. And I know that's an evil in their eyes and in the eyes of my Father in Heaven. And my heart is kept.

in a broken condition. I must perform by the hour because the nature that I have developed and that has been placed in me is a nature to forget, to procrastinate, to put off, and to not perform. All that's required of me is to perform swiftly as I have promised I would do and as I have made covenant that I would do.

Now all of you brothers and sisters are under the same responsibility. No less that I am. You're far more learned and intelligent than I am. And I know that you know you as well as I know mine. And so you know that you've got to stack yourselves up and stick yourselves as though you were a little child and learn how to perform by the hour.

According to your covenant. And leave you and me. If you do this. Do what is right. Let the consequence follow. If you do this. If you will perform. According to what the president has told you. And according to the covenant you have made. Wives and husbands. And children. If you will perform by the hour. Within a few months. The smile.

An adoration of the Lord will be upon you, and the Governing will be proud to see you and to place their confidence in you. It's just as simple as teaching with consent. The great power is this, the fighting. If only you could stand with me for one minute, every one of you would be able to answer, yes, there is I. I can stand with you for one minute.

It's good. It's really good.