1. 1835-36 Journal: 29 Mar. 1836 to 3 Apr. 1836

2. The entries that we will discuss today are the last in the 1835-36 journal (and the Kirtland period of Church history). After over six months of almost daily writing, for nearly two years there would be no more entries in any journal for Joseph Smith. After almost two years of excruciating trials (originating from both inside and outside the Church), Joseph began writing again in March 1838. By that time, he had moved, along with Church headquarters, to Far West, Missouri.

3. “It is often said that the Kirtland period is one of the least- understood periods in Church history. Kirtland is truly a holy ground of this dispensation. The Church basks in the light of revelation today to a great extent because of the great Pentecostal outpouring that Joseph and the Saints received in Kirtland. The heavens literally opened to hundreds of our early Saints there. For many weeks surrounding the Kirtland Temple dedication, the Savior, past prophets, and angels communed directly with Joseph and Hyrum and other great leaders of our dispensation. Joseph prophesied that these Pentecostal events would ‘be handed down... to all generations’ and that we should celebrate them as a ‘year of jubilee, and time of rejoicing’ (HC 2:432–33). 

4. It has been said that we may yet discover that Kirtland is our most significant Church history site. Let me describe to you how important Kirtland is to the Church. In Kirtland were revealed basically all of the priesthood offices that we have in the Church today. This was the schooling period for the leaders of the Church. About one-half of the revelations recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants were revealed there, far more than at any other location. There in Kirtland is where the School of the Prophets began. There is where Joseph made his Bible translation. There is where the Pearl of Great Price was largely translated. There is where the first edition of the Doctrine and Covenants was printed. More heavenly manifestations occurred in Kirtland than in any other place. For example, in Kirtland the Father and the Son appeared or were seen in vision four times, and the Savior was seen at least six more times by Joseph Smith. In Kirtland is where significant keys were given. The Church headquartered in Kirtland longer than in anywhere else except Salt Lake City. We built our first temple and completed our first temple ordinances in Kirtland” (Elder Ballard, “What Came from Kirtland?” 6 Nov. 1994, BYU).

5. “Joseph is as a father to Ephraim & to all Israel in these last days. He mourns because of unbelief & negligence manifest with many who have received the gospel in obeying the commands of God. He fears lest but few be left to received an inheritance. There is not a greater man than Joseph standing in this generation. … Nothing short of a God can comprehend his Soul.” (Wilford Woodruff, Journals, 4 April 1837). Reason: What does this quote teach you about Joseph Smith the prophet?

6. Significant EventDate and Joseph’s AgeState Received Vision of Celestial Kingdom and of Salvation for the Dead, Including Little Children (D&C 137) Jan. 1836 (age 30) Ohio Dedicated Kirtland Temple (D&C 109) Mar. 1836 (age 30) Ohio Jesus Christ Accepted Kirtland Temple; Moses, Elias, and Elijah Restored Priesthood Keys (D&C 110) Apr. 1836 (age 30) Ohio Traveled to New York City and Salem, MA (D&C 111) Jul.- Sept. 1836 (age 30) Ohio to New York and Massachusetts Drafted Kirtland Safety Society Articles Nov. 1836 (age 30) Ohio Missouri Legislature Approved Bill to Create Caldwell County, MO, for Mormon Settlement Dec. 1836 (age 31) Missouri

7. “We had the humbling and overwhelming experience of sitting in the Kirtland Temple, the site of some of the greatest spiritual events of this, the dispensation of the fulness of times. Can you imagine what it would have been like for the Prophet Joseph and Oliver Cowdery to see ‘the blazing throne of God, whereon was seated the Father and the Son’ (D&C 137:3) or to see ‘the Lord standing upon the breastwork of the pulpit’ (D&C 110:2) and to hear him say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you; you are clean before me; therefore, lift up your heads and rejoice’ (D&C 110:5) or to witness the visit of seven prophets of past dispensations? Can you imagine their feelings on dedication day as they saw the apostle Peter come into the upper pulpits and sit between Joseph Smith, Sr., and Frederick G. Williams? The reality of this experience is captured by Heber C. Kimball as he described Peter in detail. He said Peter was ‘very tall..., [had] black eyes, white hair, and stoop[ed] shoulder[s]; his garment was whole, extending to near his ankles; on his feet he had sandals’ (Orson F. Whitney, Life of Heber C. Kimball [Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1967], p. 91). Brother Kimball also recounted how John the Beloved appeared to several in the Kirtland Temple near the same time. Can you imagine how the Prophet Joseph and Oliver Cowdery must have felt as Moses, Elias, and Elijah appeared to them and committed keys, dispensations, and sealing powers there—not unlike what occurred on the Mount of Transfiguration about two thousand years before” (Elder Ballard, “What Came from Kirtland?” 6 Nov. 1994, BYU).

8. Source: wikimedia.org Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery prayed behind the hanging temple curtains at the western pulpits of the lower court of the temple. At this place, Jesus Christ, Moses, Elias, and Elijiah visited them in vision. Warren Cowdery, Oliver’s brother, recorded the experience.

9. 3 Apr. 1836 Sunday The vail was taken from their minds and the eyes of their understandings were opened. They saw the Lord standing upon the breast work of the pulpit before them. and under his feet was a paved work of pure gold, in color like amber: his eyes were as a flame of fire; the hair of his head was like the pure snow, his countenance shone above the brightness of the sun, and his voice was as the sound of the rushing of great waters, even the Voice of Jehovah, saying, I am the first and the last. I am he who liveth. I am he who was slain. I am your Advocate with the Father. 

10. 3 Apr. 1836 Sunday Behold your sins are forgiven you. You are clean before me, therefore, lift up your heads and rejoice, let the hearts of your brethren rejoice and let the hearts of all my people rejoice, who have with their might, built this house to my name. For behold I have accepted this house and my name shall be here; and I will manifest myself to my people, in mercy, in this House, Yea I will appear unto my servants and speak unto them with mine own voice, if my people will keep my commandments and do not pollute this Holy House. Yea the hearts of thousands and tens of thousands shall greatly rejoice in consequence of the blessings which shall be poured out, and the endowment with which my servants have already been endowed and shall hereafter be endowed in this House. and the fame of this House shall spread to foreign lands, and this is the beginning of the blessing, which shall be poured out upon the heads of my people. even so amen.

11. And now, as pertaining to this perfect atonement, wrought by the shedding of the blood of God—I testify that it took place in Gethsemane and at Golgotha, and as pertaining to Jesus Christ, I testify that he is the Son of the Living God and was crucified for the sins of the world. He is our Lord, our God, and our King. This I know of myself independent of any other person. I am one of his witnesses, and in a coming day I shall feel the nail marks in his hands and in his feet and shall wet his feet with my tears. But I shall not know any better then than I know now that he is God’s Almighty Son, that he is our Savior and Redeemer, and that salvation comes in and through his atoning blood and in no other way. God grant that all of us may walk in the light as God our Father is in the light so that, according to the promises, the blood of Jesus Christ his Son will cleanse us from all sin. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.

12. 3 Apr. 1836 Sunday After this vision closed, the Heavens were again opened unto them and Moses appeared before them and committed unto them the Keys of the gathering of Israel from the four parts of the earth and the leading of the ten tribes from the Land of the North.

13. Elder Bruce R. McConkie explained: “Israel’s great lawgiver, the prophet whose life was in similitude of the Messiah himself, the one who delivered Israel from Egyptian bondage and led them to their land of promise, came to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery on 3 April 1836, in the Kirtland Temple. He gave them: (1) ‘the keys of the gathering of Israel from the four parts of the earth,’ and (2) the keys of ‘the leading of the ten tribes from the land of the north’ (D&C 110:11). Since then, with increasing power and in great glory, we have gathered, from their Egyptian bondage as it were, the dispersed of Ephraim and a few others, initially to the mountains of America, but now into the stakes of Zion in the various nations of the earth. The gathering of Israel is a reality. When the ten tribes return they will come at the direction of the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for he now holds and will then hold the keys of presidency and direction for this mighty work.” (“This Final Glorious Gospel Dispensation,” Ensign, Apr. 1980, p. 22.)

14. 3 Apr. 1836 Sunday After this Elias appeared and committed the dispensation of the gospel of Abraham, saying, that in them and their seed all generations after them should be blessed.

15. Elder Bruce R. McConkie stated: “The man Elias brings back ‘the gospel of Abraham,’ the great Abrahamic covenant whereby the faithful receive promises of eternal increase, promises that through celestial marriage their eternal posterity shall be as numerous as the sands upon the seashore or as the stars in heaven for multitude. Elias gives the promise— received of old by Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—that in modern men and in their seed all generations shall be blessed. And we are now offering the blessings of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to all who will receive them.” (In Conference Report, Apr. 1983, 28; or Ensign, May 1983, 22.)

16. 3 Apr. 1836 Sunday After this vision had closed, another great and glorious vision burts burst upon them, for Elijah, the Prophet, who was taken to Heaven without tasting death, also stood before them, and said, behold the time has fully come which was spoken of by the mouth of Malachi, testifying, that he should be sent before the great and dreadful day of the Lord come, to turn the hearts of the Fathers to the children, and the children to the fathers, lest the whole earth be smitten with a curse. Therefore, the Keys of this dispensation are committed into your hands, and by this ye may know that the great and the dreadful day of the Lord is near, even at the doors.

17. President Joseph Fielding Smith wrote: “What was the nature of this restoration? It was the conferring upon men in this dispensation of the sealing power of the priesthood, by which all things are bound in heaven as well as on earth. It gave the authority to Joseph Smith to perform in the temple of God all the ordinances essential to salvation for both the living and the dead. “Through the power of this priesthood which Elijah bestowed, husband and wife may be sealed, or married for eternity; children may be sealed to their parents for eternity; thus the family is made eternal, and death does not separate the members. This is the great principle that will save the world from utter destruction. “Vicariously the dead may obtain the blessings of the gospel—baptism, confirmation, ordination, and the higher blessings, which are sealed upon them in the temples of the Lord, by virtue of the authority restored by Elijah. Through the restoration of these keys, the work of the Lord is fully inaugurated before the coming of Jesus Christ in glory. “These keys of the binding, or sealing power, which were given to Peter, James, and John in their dispensation, are keys which make valid all the ordinances of the gospel. They pertain more especially to the work in the temples, both for the living and for the dead. They are the authorities which prepare men to enter the celestial kingdom and to be crowned as sons and heirs of God. “These keys hold the power to seal husbands and wives for eternity as well as for time. They hold the power to seal children to parents, the key of adoption, by which the family organization is made intact forever. This is the power which will save the obedient from the curse in the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. Through these keys the hearts of the children have turned to their fathers.” (Doctrines of Salvation, 2:118–19.)