Joseph Smith and the Restoration of Temple Doctrine and Ordinances—The First Visions, Part 1

Nothing focuses the mind upon your mortality (and the ultimate purposes of life as taught us in the temple) quite like attending a funeral. So it was for Dorothy and I earlier this week as we attended—and sang together “Israel, Jesus Te Chama” with other returned missionaries from the Brazil South Central Mission—the funeral services for our mission president (yes, Dorothy and I met and served in the same mission!), Owen Nelson Baker (1935-2025). “Within a month” after returning from his first mission to Brazil (1956-58), Nelson wrote, “I saw in a vision my wife [Lucille Bawden] and married her three years later” in the Salt Lake Temple (in 1962). As we witnessed during our missions serving under them, and throughout their 62 years of marriage, as Nelson wrote, “we deeply loved and appreciated each other. . . . There has been a continual affirmation that we are a companionship for eternity.” This is what the promises pronounced in temple sealings look like!

Just five years after beginning his 33-year career as an in-house lawyer for Johnson & Johnson, Nelson received a remarkable revelation that he would be called back to Brazil. As his son Roger related during the funeral:

Nelson and Lucille [had contracted] to build their first home, on a lot backing onto a wooded area adjoining the [new] stake center [in East Brunswick, N.J.].[1]  He saved money and earned sweat equity by doing the finish carpentry and painting.  As he worked late into the nights, he listened to the music of Brazil’s great modern classical composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos.  Some of his most famous pieces are called the Bachianas Brasileiras, meaning roughly, Johann Sebastian Bach Brazilian-style.  During a particular section of music, Nelson heard in his mind a voice that told him, “I am sending you back to Brazil, as a mission president.”  Nelson’s mental response was simply, “When will we go?”  And the answer came: one and a half years from now.  Indeed, the call came 1.5 years later, to Brazil.[2]

Nelson was 37 when he and Lucille arrived in Brazil with three young children (their fourth of ultimately six children would be born in São Paulo during their service). Their sacrifices and consecration, then and throughout their life together, exemplified for all of us who served with them the transforming power of the gospel. In our first mission conference in November 1972, President Baker shared the “spiritual rebirth” he experienced during his first mission when, “after fasting [and prayer he] was filled with light and love for Brasileiros,” the same light and love the Bakers have shared with family, friends and fellow Saints in all their varied service, including to “their” returned missionaries, throughout their lives.

For me, the influence the Bakers’ covenant faithfulness has had in my life and obviously in the lives of so many others is a fitting introduction to our study of the Doctrine and Covenants this year in our Come Follow Me study. My goal this year in my own gospel study, which I hope to share in these temple blogs, is to focus on how Father in Heaven raised up and tutored Joseph Smith to preside over the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times and through him incrementally restored the fulness of His gospel, “line upon line,” including most importantly the temple doctrines and ordinances that are so key to the transformations of hearts and minds as exemplified by the lives of Nelson and Lucille Baker.

Joseph Smith’s foreordination. For me, the starting point in understanding how Heavenly Father worked through Joseph Smith and others to restore the fulness of His priesthood and gospel, including temple ordinances and doctrines, begins with the Prophet’s foreordination “before the foundation of the earth,” as President Nelson testified, “to be the prophet of this last dispensation, when ‘nothing shall be withheld’ from the Saints.”[3] As Brigham Young testified, who knew Joseph intimately and was personally tutored by him, “it was decreed in the councils of eternity, long before the foundations of the earth were laid, that he, Joseph Smith, should be the man, in the last dispensation of this world, to bring forth the word of God to the people, and receive the fulness of the keys and power of the Priesthood of the Son of God.”[4] Indeed, the Prophet, describing how “every man [and woman] who has a calling to minister to the inhabitants of the world was ordained to that very purpose in the Grand Council of heaven before the world was,” said of himself, “I suppose I was ordained to this very office in that Grand Council.”[5]

Thus, as we all did, Joseph received his “fist lessons in the world of spirits” (D&C 138:56) about the Father’s plan of salvation centered in the atonement of Jesus Christ. Moreover, Joseph’s foreordination also “determined, to a large extent,” as it does for all of us, his “placement among tribes and nations.”[6] As the scriptures explain, “the most High divided to the nations their inheritance . . . separat[ed] the sons of Adam [and] set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel” (Deuteronomy 32:8; see also Acts 17:26 (God “hath determined the times . . . and bounds of [man’s] habitation”)). In other words, God’s plan envisions not only when but where and into what family lines we will be born.

Nelson and Lucile Baker Sealing in Salt Lake Temple

Joseph, a descendant of Joseph of Egypt and Jesse, the father of King David. That God foreknew and foreordained the family lines into which Joseph Smtih would be born is amply attested in scripture, especially Restoration scripture such as Lehi’s quotation from the brass plates of Joseph of Egypt’s vision of our day (2 Nephi 3:5) in which the Lord revealed to him:

A choice seer will I raise up out of the fruit of thy loins; . . . And unto him will I give  commandment that he shall do a work for the fruit of thy loins, his brethren, which shall be of great worth unto them, even to the bringing of them to the knowledge of the covenants which I have made with thy fathers. . . . And he shall be great like unto Moses, . . . . unto him will I give power to bring forth my word unto the seed of thy loins—and not to the bringing forth my word only, saith the Lord, but to  the convincing them of my word, which shall have already gone forth among them. . . . And out of weakness he shall be made strong . . . unto the restoring thee, O house of Israel, saith the Lord. . . . And his name shall be called after me [Joseph of Egypt]; and it shall be after the name of his father. And he shall be like unto me; for the thing, which the Lord shall bring forth by his hand, by the power of the Lord shall bring my people unto salvation (2 Nephi 3:7, 9,11, 13, 15; see also JST Genesis 50:33).

In four consecutive visits to seventeen year-old Joseph on September 21-22, 1823, Moroni quoted, among other verses, verse one of “the eleventh chapter of Isaiah,” which states, “And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots" (Isaiah 11:1). The Lord later explained that the “stem” referred to Christ, and the “rod” to “a servant in the hands of Christ, who is partly a descendant of Jesse as well as of Ephraim, or of the house of Joseph, on whom there is laid much power" (D&C 113:1-4). Elder Bruce R. McConkie of the Quorum of the Twelve opined “that the prophet here mentioned is Joseph Smith.”[7] Thus, the Lord revealed about 3400 and 2500 years, respectively, before Joseph Smith’s birth, that He would “raise up” a seer named Joseph, who would be named after his father (recall that he was the third, not the first son of Joseph Smith, Sr.). As a descendant of Jacob’s birthright son, Joseph (and more specifically Jacob’s birthright grandson Ephraim)[8], and an heir in the royal Davidic line, Joseph Smith could “rightly” claim “the priesthood, and the keys of the kingdom” (D&C 113:3–6; see also D&C 86:8-9 (“thus saith the Lord unto you, with whom the priesthood hath continued through the lineage of your fathers—For ye are lawful heirs, according to the flesh”). Notwithstanding this latter-day Joseph’s “weakness,” the Lord prophesied, He would “make [him] strong," grant him “much power” and through him, “by the power of the Lord,” bring to pass the “restoration” of the house of Israel to the temple and other “covenants” which the Lord had made with Joseph of Egypt’s fathers, namely Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Joseph’s early spiritual education. Joseph’s preparation for his foreordained role as prophet, seer and revelator was greatly influenced by his parents’ spirituality. Both Joseph Smith, Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith received what they believed were divine manifestations reassuring them of God’s existence, if not satisfying their mostly futile efforts to “connect with a church.” As the Smith biographer, Richard Bushman, describes, Joseph Sr. had a series of “prophetic dreams,” including one involving travelling in a “barren field,” which an attending spirit informed him represented “the world which now lieth inanimate and dumb, in regard to the true religion or plan of salvation.”[9] In 1803, dangerously ill with tuberculosis at age 27 with two young children, Lucy “wrestled with the question of whether she was ready to die. She later wrote, ‘During the night I made a solemn covenant with God: that, if he would let me live, I would endeavor to serve him according to the best of my abilities. Shortly after this I heard a voice say to me: “ . . . Let your heart be comforted, ye believe in God, believe also in me.”’”[10] For a time she attended Methodist meetings. Joseph Sr., in order to “oblige” his wife, she wrote, went with her. But when Joseph Sr.’s father and older brother angrily denounced him (their Universalist beliefs contradicting Methodism), he desisted. She was “considerably hurt” and “retired to a grove not far distant, where I prayed to the Lord in behalf of my husband—that the true gospel might be presented to him and that his heart might be softened so as to receive it.” That evening she had a dream in which she was assured that her husband one day would “hear and receive with his whole heart” the “undefiled gospel of the Son of God.”[11] While they religiously led their family in morning and evening prayers and, as their son William later remembered, his mother “made ‘use of every means which her parental love could suggest, to get us engaged in seeking for our souls’ salvation,’”[12] Bushman summarizes the Smith’s religious culture (as opposed to their native spirituality) as “eclectic:”

Smith and Mack relatives comprised an inventory of late eighteenth-century alternatives. Joseph Sr.’s dreams linked him to radical Protestantism with its taste for spiritual manifestations. Solomon Mack [Lucy’s father] underwent a classic evangelical conversion at the end of his life. Lucy’s crisis in 1803 took the same form. . . . Asael [Smith, Joseph Sr.’s father, a Universalist, who believed all would be saved by a loving Heavenly Father,] used Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason to quash Jospeh Sr.’s flirtation with Methodism. . . . Orthodoxy seem inaccessible, inanimate, and hostile, but the distance between the Smiths and the churches did not harden their hearts. They were anguished souls, starved for religion.[13]

Joseph’s search for salvation and First Vision. Such influences undoubtedly informed Joseph’s searching about religion, which he began “at about the age of twelve years.”[14] Notwithstanding his very limited formal schooling (consisting, as thoroughly documented by Brian C. Hales, of “basic instruction in ‘reading, writing and the ground rules of arithmetic’ comprising ‘less than two years of formal schooling’”)[15], he searched the scriptures, “believing as I was taught, that they contained the word of God,” attended religious camp meetings[16] and even joined for a time “the probationary class of the Palmyra Methodist Church.”[17] These two influences—his own reading of the scriptures and his (mostly disappointing) association with church leaders and congregants in Palmyra—led to the faith crisis that drove him to the grove near his home now called “sacred”: “From the age of twelve years to fifteen I pondered many things in my heart . . ., my mind become [sic] exceedingly distressed for I became convicted of my sins and by searching the scriptures I found that mankind did not come unto the Lord but that they had apostatized from the true and living faith and there was not society or denomination that bult upon the gospel of Jesus Christ as recorded in the new testament and I felt to mourn for my own sins and for the sins of the world.”[18]

When considering how God was preparing His chosen Seer to restore His gospel, including its crowning temple ordinances, and understanding that God speaks to His servants “in their weakness, after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding” (D&C 1:24), the Book of Mormon Central team asks what I consider to be a key question: “What did Joseph Smith (as opposed to LDS members or scholars generally) learn from the First Vision?[19] Setting forth tables summarizing “both first- and second-hand reports” of what Joseph “heard and saw in his vision,” the writers conclude that, while “there will always be some remaining question as to what precisely the Prophet himself took away from his vision or how it otherwise affected him personally” (noting, for example, that it is unclear how long the vision lasted), “based on the explicit details of the surviving accounts,” two things are “obvious”: (1) Joseph “learned of the reality of a personal God and a personal Savior who answer prayers and are concerned for the well-being and salvation of humankind” (and perhaps most importantly to him, as he recounted in his 1832 account, Joseph knew that Jesus had spoken to him, saying “Joseph <my son> thy sins are forgiven thee. go thy <way> walk in my statutes and keep my commandments behold I am the Lord of glory I was crucifyed for the world that all those who believe on my name may have Eternal life”[20]) and (2) “the Great Apostasy, which New Testament apostles had prophesied must occur before the Second Coming of the Lord (e.g. 2 Thessalonians 2:1–12)” was real.[21] What Joseph understood at that time about the nature of the Godhead is less clear. Moreover, Joseph himself stated that there were “many things” which he heard and saw in his vision which “I cannot write at this time” (Joseph Smith–History 1:20), meaning perhaps that they were too sacred to reveal, at least in the public context in which his 1838 history was written.

Nevertheless, these two foundational ideas—that God, through the mediation of His Only Begotten, forgives sins, and that His church, while then no longer on the earth would be restored (as reported in 3 of the 9 first- and second-hand accounts)[22]—set the stage for all that would follow and, more importantly, prepared Joseph to ask and receive further light and knowledge. As important as any theological take-aways for Joseph, perhaps, was the idea that he had been “called of God” (JS-H 1:28), as he noted in his 1838 history (just as, he would later learn in more detail, Enoch, Abraham, Moses and other prophets had been). Feeling so called, Joseph knew that God was aware of him and had high expectations for him.

Moroni, Joseph’s angelic teacher and mentor. This idea, which we learn so powerfully in the temple, that God knew him and had a work for him to do, together with the knowledge he received that God heard and answered prayers (as the apostle James had testified), was more responsible than perhaps any other thing he learned from his First Vision to prepare him for the next step in his spiritual education—Moroni’s appearance. Feeling “condemned” by his conscience for his “weakness and imperfections” (JS-H 1:29), recognizing that they were “ not consistent with that character which ought to be maintained by one who was called of God as I had been” (JS-H 1:28), he retired to his bed and “betook [him]self in prayer and supplication to Almighty God for forgiveness of all my sins and follies” (JS-H 1:29). In his 1835 account, he added, “I repented hartily for all my sins and transgression, and humbled myself before” God[23]. Praying in faith, with “full confidence in obtaining a divine manifestation, as [he] previously had” done (JS-H 1:29), Moroni appeared and began what President Russell M. Nelson summarized as Joseph’s “early tutoring, making [in all] at least 20 visits to him in the 1820s,” constituting “a season of refinement as Joseph incrementally began to understand what Moroni meant when he told Joseph that ‘God had a work for [him] to do’ (JS-H 1:33).”[24]

Former Church historian Steven C. Harper has taken an insightful look into how God “tutored” his newly called prophet over the next four years, most importantly in the first law of the gospel, obedience, which the Savior had admonished him to keep in his First Vision. For example, Harper notes that while Joseph, between his First Vision in 1820 and Moroni’s appearance in 1823 demonstrated that he had the spiritual gift of seership through “one or more seer stones” he discovered during these intervening teenage years, he had not yet learned to apply this gift to become the “prophet, seer and revelator” he would need to become to translate the Book of Mormon.[25] That “strict” obedience to God was one of the primary lessons God was teaching Joseph during this formative period (even after he received the plates) is evident from the historical and scriptural record (eg., see D&C 3:4-6 given in 1828: man “who sets at naught the counsels of God, and follows after the dictates of his own will and carnal desires, . . . must fall and incur the vengeance of a just God upon him” and “how strict were your commandments; . . . And behold, how oft you have transgressed the commandments and the laws of God, and have gone on in the persuasions of men”). We will explore in more depth in future blogs the temple doctrines contained in the scriptures Moroni expounded to Jospeh Smith, including, most importantly Malachi 3 and 4. Suffice it to say for present purposes that Moroni began almost immediately to “train” Joseph on the cardinal principle of obedience. Harper notes that in her history Lucy Smith noted that “Moroni told Joseph [during his visits on the evening of September 21] to tell his father what he had heard and seen, but Joseph had not. ‘Why?’ the angel asked him” when he appeared to him again the next morning. “‘I was afraid my father would not believe me,’ Joseph replied. Moroni then promised that Joseph’s father would believe every word. ‘I obeyed,” Joseph wrote, tellingly.”[27]

Among the “strict” commandments God gave Joseph at that time was not to show the plates and other sacred objects “to any person” except as he “should be commanded” (JS-H 1:42). Moreover, as his mother later described, “he must beware of covetousness; and he must not suppose the record is to be brought forth with the view of getting gain; . . .and, that when he went to get the plates, he must be on his guard, or his mind would be filled with darkness.”[28] That this was a temptation to which God knew Joseph was vulnerable was to be borne out almost immediately. As he went to the Hill Cummorah to find the plates as instructed by the angel, Harper notes (quoting Oliver Cowdery’s later account) that an “invisible power,” tempting him to consider the “wealth and ease” that might be available to him because of the plates, “‘had so powerfully wrought upon him’ by the time he arrived that the angel’s instructions [to reject all temptations to get gain] ‘had entirely gone from his recollection.’” Thus, subject to such influence, when he attempted to take the plates, he was “shocked” “by an invisible power,” which prevented him from doing so. Joseph “cried out to the Lord, ‘Why can I not obtain them?’ Moroni’s reply came: ‘You have not kept the commandments of the Lord which I gave unto you.’” Moroni then showed him a vision of “the prince of darkness, surrounded by his innumerable train of associates,” but seeing is not the same as gaining experience. As Lucy explained, Joseph needed to become “not only willing, but able” to keep God’s commandments.[29]

Just one year after his initial visit, Lucy reported, Moroni told Joseph he could obtain the plates “if he would keep them in his hands, take them straight home, and immediately secure them there in a trunk with a good lock and key.” The whole family eagerly awaited the event. However, after lifting the plates from the stone box, “the thought flashed across his mind that there might be something more in the box” from which he might profit, thinking he could return later for it. Contrary to Moroni’s instructions, he laid the plates down as he turned to cover the box and, when he turned back to get the plates they were gone. Praying fervently, Moroni appeared, explaining that “he had not done as he was commanded” because he yielded to the temptation “to secure some imaginary treasure.” Bitterly disappointed and weeping, he returned to tell the family. When his father responded that he “would have taken them,” Joseph responded, “you do not know what you say. I could not get them for the angel of the Lord would not let me.” Harper observes that this was “yet another learning opportunity that helped train [Joseph] into a steward of the Book of Mormon plates, and into a seer who could translate the sacred writings inscribed on them.”[30]

Brazil South Central Return Missionary Choir, Nelson Baker Funeral

More will be said in future blogs about what Joseph might have taken away from his translation of the ancient Nephite record about temple ordinances and doctrine. However, even in these tender teenage years of his preparation, we can learn valuable lessons, not the least of which is the importance of demonstrating our ability to keep certain standards of worthiness as a prelude to receiving sacred things. In summarizing how God prepared His prophet (and how He prepares us), President Nelson concluded: “Moroni’s careful tutelage instilled confidence and nurturing, while preparing Joseph for future communications with a host of heavenly beings,” numbering, he stated, upwards of  60 angels during his lifetime that Joseph saw in vision or was visited by. “Each came as directed by the Lord for various purposes. . . . Although we know little about the details and purposes of many of the other angelic visits, their cumulative impact provided Joseph with an extraordinary perspective of past dispensations and the ability to restore and renew plain and precious things,”[31] especially, as we will explore in future blogs, the priceless ordinances of exaltation we receive in the temple. How grateful we all should be to angelic mentors, whether sent from the presence of God, like Moroni, or associates in God’s holy work, like Nelson and Lucille Baker, who prepare us to receive, throughout our lives, the spiritual treasures conferred upon us in the temple, even the “power of godliness.”

[1] It was during this period, in the 1960’s, that Nelson first began to have a transformative influence in my life. I was in my early teens attending early morning seminary classes in the New Brunswick Ward when “President” Baker (as we all referred to him) was called to teach our seminary class. [2] Funeral Remarks by Roger Baker (used with permission), January 20, 2025. President Baker loved great literature, music and art, especially Brazilian music. Roger shared how, in connection with his responsibility for J&J’s legal work in South and Central America (and elsewhere in the world), Nelson “travelled several times a year to Brazil. On one long nighttime flight, he began to hear the most beautiful, sublime music from within the airplane. He asked a flight attendant what the music was.  ‘What music?’ she responded. He searched his heart to understand what he was hearing, and a voice whispered to his mind that he was being permitted to hear the music of the soul of the Brazilian people.” [3] Russell M. Nelson, “Hear Him.” Liahona, May 2020, quoting D&C 121:38. [4] “Joseph Smith—Prophet of the Restoration: Lesson 54—Sections 135–36,” Doctrine and Covenants Instructor’s Guide: Religion 324–325 [Lesson 54], quoting Discourses of Brigham Young, 108, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-instructors-guide-religion-324-325/joseph-smith-prophet-of-the-restoration-lesson-54-sections-135-36?lang=eng#title1. [5] Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, ed. Joseph Fielding Smith, Deseret News Press, 1938, 365, quoted in part in Lesson 54. [6] “Chapter 21: The Foreordination of Covenant Israel and Their Responsibilities,” Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/doctrines-of-the-gospel-student-manual/21-covenant-israel?lang=eng#p3. [7] Bruce R. McConkie, The Millennial Messiah: The Second Coming of the Son of Man, Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1982, 339–40, quoted in “Lesson 34: 2 Nephi 21–24,” 2017 Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/book-of-mormon-seminary-teacher-manual-2017/introduction-to-the-second-book-of-nephi/lesson-34-2-nephi-21-24?lang=eng. See also R. Scott Loyd, “Joseph Smith: a witness of Christ,” Church News, December 18, 2010, https://www.thechurchnews.com/2010/12/18/23227496/joseph-smith-a-witness-of-christ/#:~:text='%20Such%20wording%20suggests%20the%20individual,Second%20Coming%20of%20the%20Savior; RoseAnn Benson, “Joseph Smith and the Messiah: Prophetically Linked,” Religious Educator 3, no. 3 (2002): 65–81, https://rsc.byu.edu/vol-3-no-3-2002/joseph-smith-messiah-prophetically-linked#:~:text=Both%20Lehi%20and%20Joseph%20Smith,3%3A7%2C%2011)(“ Some Latter–day Saint commentators believe that both the stem and branch refer to Jesus Christ, citing Jeremiah 23:3–6 and Zechariah 3:7 and 6:12 as evidence. In Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Zechariah, the King James translators capitalized the word Branch. The Joseph Smith translation did not correct any of these capitalizations. Thus, without a closer look, we might conclude that they all refer to Christ. However, while Jeremiah and Zechariah identify Christ as the Branch in context, they are not necessarily analogous to the branch in Isaiah 11:1. As further evidence, the word branch is translated from two different Hebrew words in these passages. In Jeremiah and Zechariah, the Hebrew noun is semah, whereas the Isaiah passage uses the Hebrew noun neser. Additionally, Isaiah refers to neser as the branch the Lord plants so that He might be glorified—not Christ but what He plants (see Isaiah 60:21). Elder Bruce R. McConkie stated, ‘Joseph Smith is the chief branch for our day.’”). [8] Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 2:268-69 (“Joseph Smith was a pure Ephraimite”). [9] Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., 2005, 25-26. See also discussion about Joseph Sr.’s “seven dreams” or “visions,” ibid. 36. [10] Curtis Ashton, “Early Struggles of the Smith Family,” Church History, March 1, 2019, https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/content/historic-sites-palmyra-vermont-new-york?lang=eng. [11] Lucy Mack Smith, History of Joseph Smith: By His Mother, Lucy Mack Smith, Salt Lake City, Utah: Bookcraft, 1956, 43-45. See also Bushman, 25. [12]Bushman, 26. [13] Ibid. [14] Ibid. 37. [15] Brian C. Hales, “Joseph Smith’s Education and Intellect as Described in Documentary Sources,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 59 (2023), 1-32, https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/joseph-smiths-education-and-intellect-as-described-in-documentary-sources/#:~:text=Abstract:%20Although%20Joseph%20Smith%20has,him%20as%20an%20accomplished%20scholar. [16] See the First Vision podcast, Episode 2: “What is to be done?” in the LDS Gospel Library app, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/first-vision-accounts/first-vision-podcast/episode-2?lang=eng. [17] Bushman, 37, quoting The Papers of Joseph Smith [PJS], ed. Dean C. Jesse, 2 vols, Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 1989-92, 1:5. [18] Ibid. 38, quoting PJS 1:3-4, 271. [19] Book of Mormon Central Team [BMC], “What Did Joseph Smith Learn from the First Vision?” March 25, 2020, https://pearlofgreatpricecentral.org/what-did-joseph-smith-learn-from-the-first-vision/. [20] Joseph Smith Papers [JSP], History, circa Summer 1832,3, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/3 (spelling and punctuation in original). [21] BMC, “What Did Joseph Smith Learn from the First Vision?” [22] Ibid. (the Pratt 1840, JS 1842 and Hyde 1842 accounts). See BMC Team, “Joseph Smith’s Firsthand Accounts of the First Vision,” https://pearlofgreatpricecentral.org/joseph-smiths-firsthand-accounts-of-the-first-vision/ and “Secondhand Accounts of the First Vision,” https://pearlofgreatpricecentral.org/secondhand-accounts-of-the-first-vision/. [23] JS, “Sketch Book for the use of Joseph Smith, jr.,” Journal, Sept. 1835–Apr. 1836; JS Collection, CHL, JSP, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/journal-1835-1836/25. [24] Sarah Weaver, “Testimony of Joseph Smith ‘Crucial,’ President Nelson Tells New Mission Leaders”, Church News (Salt Lake City News Release, 25 June 2021), https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/testimony-of-joseph-smith-crucial-president-nelson-tells-new-mission-leaders. [25] Steven C. Harper, “Probation of a Teenage Seer: Joseph Smith’s Early Experiences with Moroni,” in Raising the Standard of Truth: Exploring the History and Teachings of the Early Restoration, ed. Scott C. Esplin, Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 26-28 (Joseph “knew that he had the gift” of seership Moroni described (when he told Joseph, that God had prepared two stones or “seers” called “Urim and Thummin” for the “purpose of translating” the Book of Mormon (JS-H 1:35)) “because he had already discovered it through his [previous] use of seer stones”) and note 13, https://rsc.byu.edu/raising-standard-truth/probation-teenage-seer-joseph-smiths-early-experiences-moroni. See also Church History Topics, “Seer Stones,” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/seer-stones?lang=eng#aside1_p3. Seership, the use of divinely appointed “means” (including divinely prepared stones such as the Urim and Thummin) to reveal events past, present and future (Mosiah 8:16-18) was not the only spiritual gift Joseph displayed early in his life. Lucy describes how in 1824, when urging her children to attend church with her, Joseph responded that, while he did not wish to prevent her or any of the rest of the family “going to meeting,” he asked that she not ask him to join them. Later, telling his family that they “might set it down as a prophecy,” he then referred to a church leader who, while talking “very piously,” would within the year take the cow of a widow with eight children to satisfy a debt. “At that time,” Lucy wrote, “this seemed impossible to us, yet one year had scarcely expired when we saw Joseph’s prophecy literally fulfilled.” Lucy Mack Smith, 90-91. See also Harper, 34. [26] Harper, 29. 27] Ibid. 30. [28] Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1845, p. 82, The Joseph Smith Papers, accessed February 4, 2025, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1845/89; see also Harper, 29.

[29] Harper, 29. Nevertheless, Lucy recorded, Moroni’s lesson was so powerful that it stayed with Joseph throughout his life: “The angel showed him by contrast, the difference between good and evil; and the consequenses which <would> follow both obedience and disobedience to the commandments of God, in such a striking and forcible manner, that the impression was always bright in his recolection, until the very end of his days. And, in giving a relation of this circumstance, not long prior to his death, he remarked: that ever afterwards he was willing to keep the commandments of God.” Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1845, p. 85, JSP, accessed February 4, 2025, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1845/92. [30] Ibid. 34-35. [31] Sarah Weaver, “Testimony of Joseph Smith.” Image“First Vision” by Walter Rane. Image via The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.