Let's say you were stuck on a desert island with only a small group
of people, and you wanted to set up a basic branch of the Church.
What passage of scripture would you need in order to do that?
The most useful passage that you could have is section 20
of the Doctrine and Covenants.
Section 20 contains all the basic instructions a person needs to set up
and operate a branch of the Church.
Some scholars have called it the Constitution of the Church.
The early members of the Church called it the Articles and Covenants
of the Church of Christ.
The Articles and Covenants were received in preparation for the organization
of the Church, which took place on April 6, 1830, at the Whitmer Farmhouse
on their farm in Fayette, New York.
A recreation of the Whitmer Farmhouse now stands in that location.
It was built in 1980 for the sesquicentennial
of the Church's organization.
As you can see, the Whitmer Farmhouse is not very big, but 60 people crammed
into the Whitmer Farmhouse the day that the Church was organized,
and all of them listened to the Articles and Covenants, which Joseph Smith had
received several weeks earlier, and committed to the Church of Jesus Christ.
In fact, on this day, the first baptism of the Church of Christ took place.
People baptized included Joseph Smith Senior, Joseph Smith's father.
Also, Orrin Porter Rockwell was baptized on this day, and many other members
were baptized in nearby Seneca Lake.
Now, the Articles and Covenants themselves are unique.
There's a fusion between the revelations Joseph Smith was already receiving
and the Official Declarations produced by prophets and apostles in our time.
So it's like a revelation, but also a little bit like the Family
Proclamation, where it's clear there was some collaboration between Joseph Smith,
Oliver Cowdery, and the Lord on what should be placed into this.
Joseph Smith, in noting how the Articles and Covenants were created, later noted,
"In this manner did God continue to give us instructions from time to time
concerning the duties which now devolved upon us, and among many other things
of the kind, we obtained of Him the following,
that is the Articles and Covenants by the Spirit of Prophecy and Revelation."
So this came by revelation, but it's clear that Joseph Smith
and Oliver Cowdery were working together to pull text from the Book of Mormon
and assemble a document that give everybody the basics about
the Church of Christ.
This document, among other things, contains a number
of ground-breaking items.
For instance, the original name of the Church,
which was the Church of Christ, the foundational events of the Church,
the foundational doctrines of the Church, the foundational practices of the Church,
and five other titles for Joseph Smith explaining his duties within the Church.
Doctrine and Covenants, section 20, can be broken down easily
into three basic sections.
One, the foundational events and authority, two, the foundational
doctrines, and three, the foundational practices or applications.
Let's talk about each one.
Verses 1 through 16 are the foundational events of the restoration and constitute
what's effectively the earliest history of the Church that's written.
It might even contain the earliest reference to the First Vision
because it says in these verses that the first elder of the Church, Joseph
Smith, received remission of his sins.
That lines up closely with several accounts of the First Vision
where Joseph recounted that the first thing the Savior said to him
was that his sins were forgiven.
Secondly, it talks about the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and the work
of angels during this time to give Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery
the authority that they needed to bring forth the gospel.
Now, secondly, Doctrine and Covenants 20 also explains
the foundational doctrines of the Church.
These are found in about verses 17 to 36.
The foundational doctrines, as you might expect, are the basics
a person needs to know about what Latter-day Saints believe.
It starts with the creation of the earth by God in Heaven, and that God
created man, male and female, after His own image and in His own likeness.
This male and female, Adam and Eve, were given Commandments by God,
but they transgressed those Commandments, and men and women became sensual
and devilish and fallen man.
In response to this came the most fundamental doctrine that the Church
believes, which is that God gave His Only Begotten Son, as it is written in the
scriptures which have been given of Him.
Section 20 says, "He suffered temptations but gave no heed to them.
He crucified, died, and rose again on the third day, and ascended into heaven." And
this, Joseph Smith would later call the most fundamental teaching in the Church.
In 1838, Joseph Smith taught, "the fundamental principles of our religion
are the testimony of the Apostles and prophets concerning Jesus Christ,
that He died, was buried, and rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven.
And all of the things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it."
So as great as something like word basketball or green jello
might be, it's only an appendage.
The main idea that we teach and we share is that Jesus Christ came,
died for our sins, and was resurrected and ascended into heaven.
Section 20 also introduces a few key theological concepts that the
Latter-day Saints need to understand.
For instance, section 20 says the justification through our Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ, is just and true.
Sometimes understanding the gospel is just knowing what the words mean.
For instance, an 1828 dictionary defines the word justification as follows,
"In theology, a remission and an absolution from guilt
and punishment by an act of free grace by which God pardons the sinner
and accepts him as righteous on account of the Atonement of Jesus Christ." In
other words, justification means that you're not
going to get punished for what you did.
If you imagine the statue of justice with a blindfold and with a sword and with the
scales, justification means that someone is paying off the debt that you incurred
through the sins that you committed.
We believe that justification is a free act that everybody is saved in this sense
by Jesus Christ because of His grace and because He came and sacrificed for us.
When we accept Jesus Christ, we're justified.
But section 20 also brings into account a second term, which is sanctification.
See, the problem with justification is just because you're not
going to get punished for what you did, doesn't mean that you're a good person.
You're still a lousy person that did all those wrong things.
Sanctification is when you go from being the person that commits sins to the
person that doesn't want to commit sins.
In an 1828 Dictionary, sanctification was defined as "the act
of making holy." So if justification means you're not going to get punished for what
you did, sanctification means you can eventually turn to the person that doesn't
want to do this sin in the first place.
If we imagine justification by imagining the statue of justice and the scales being
balanced so that we don't get punished, we need to imagine sanctification
by imagining the statue of Christ with His arms welcoming us in and us seeing Him as
he really is because we have become like Him.
We don't just want to not get punished for what we did.
We want to be good.
That's the whole aim of the gospel, to become like Jesus Christ.
Becoming like Jesus Christ doesn't just mean that you're justified,
it means that you're sanctified.
The last part of section 20 introduces the foundational practices of the Church.
For instance, practices like blessing babies or performing baptisms
or the Sacramental prayers are found in section 20 of the Doctrine and Covenants.
Each One of these documents is very valuable and is still
utilized every Sunday in the church wherever you are in the world.
The basic ordinance of the Church, baptism, confirmation, the Sacrament,
and blessing children are established in section 20, and the higher ordinances
of the Church, such as the temple, initiatory, endowment, and sealing,
will come along a little bit later.
In order to perform these ordinances, you have to have people
set apart and specifically told to perform these ordinances.
So section 20 also contains the basic descriptions of what a deacon, teacher,
priest, and elder do within the Church.
These offices are crucial in order for a branch to function.
There have to be officers at the Church, and they have to have authority
to carry out ordinances and bless and help the people around them.
Now, the most important officer of the Church, even if it's just a branch-sized
church, is the President of the Church.
And in Section 21 of the Doctrine and Covenants, Joseph Smith
is given a key number of titles to establish exactly what his role is.
He was called the seer, a translator, a prophet, an apostle, and an elder.
We can talk about each one of these and what they mean.
For instance, John A.
Widtsoe said that a seer is "one who sees with spiritual eyes.
He receives the meaning of that which seems obscure to others.
Therefore, he is an interpreter and a clarifier of eternal truth.
He foresees the future and the past and the present." A translator,
traditionally, is spoken of by us as one who translates
from one language to another.
But in the early restoration sense, it meant someone who was not only able
to discern and understand the language, but also the intention
of the original authors of the scripture.
Just after Joseph Smith has finished translating the Book of Mormon, he's
going to start another big project, which is to start translating the Bible and
producing the Joseph Smith Translation.
Joseph Smith was also called a prophet, which is defined clearly
as a witness of Jesus Christ.
You might remember in the Book of Revelation, it says that "the testimony
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." And a prophet, in a very simple sense,
is someone who's as a testimony of Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Ghost.
Finally, Joseph Smith was designated as an apostle, defined as a special witness
of Jesus Christ, or an elder, defined as someone who is a minister
of the Lord Jesus Christ, who holds the Melchizedek priesthood.
A minister serves as a fellow servant with the Lord and acts as a Lord agent,
his appointment to preach the gospel and to perfect the Saints.
Joseph Smith, at this point, and Oliver Cowdery were
the two officers of the Church.
A branch of the church had been established, and now we are eventually on
our way from not just becoming a branch, but larger congregations like wards
and stakes, eventually into a global religion like the Church is today.
But it all started with a small group of dedicated people
on that farm in Fayette, New York.
No matter where we're at or no matter how big or small the congregation you meet
with is, the same basic rules are there, and the same basic doctrines,
our fundamental belief in Jesus Christ, are absolutely critical in understanding
and knowing what Latter-day Saints teach, believe, and strive to be like.