Agency or Inspiration
Bruce R. McConkie
Bruce R. McConkie
February 27, 1973
Bruce R. McConkie was a
member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints when this address was given at Brigham Young University on 27
February 1973.
I've been many places with
my wife when, as we have met members of the Church, stake presidencies, high
councils, and the like, they've said to me: "We're surely glad to meet
you, Brother McConkie, and we're most pleased to have Sister Smith with
us." I've assured her that that was all right with me, as long as they
didn't call me Brother Smith. And now that's happened.*
I've sought the Lord
diligently, as is my custom, to be guided and directed this morning in what
ought to be said—sought him both for myself and for you, so that I might speak
and you might hear by the power of the Holy Spirit. Two subjects have occurred
to me. I thought that on the one hand I might talk about "Agency or
Inspiration—Which?" Or, on the other hand, I might talk about how to
choose a wife. It occurred to me I might consult the student body, but then I
said to myself, "No, it doesn't make a particle of difference which
subject it is; I'm going to say exactly the same things anyway."
My wife and I were having a
serious discussion recently, in which we were counting our many blessings. We
named a host of things that have come to us, because of the Church, because of
our family, because of the glorious restoration of eternal truth that has taken
place in this day; and then she climaxed the discussion by asking this
question: "What's the greatest blessing that has ever come into your
life?"
Without a moment's hesitation
I said, "The greatest blessing that has ever come to me was on the
thirteenth day of October in 1937, at 11:20 a.m., when I was privileged to
kneel in the Salt Lake Temple at the Lord's altar and receive you as an eternal
companion."
She said, "Well, you
passed that test."
I believe that the most
important single thing that any Latter-day Saint ever does in this world is to
marry the right person, in the right place, by the right authority; and that
then—when they have been so sealed by the power and authority which Elijah the
prophet restored—the most important remaining thing that any Latter-day Saint
can ever do is so to live that the terms and conditions of the covenant thus
made will be binding and efficacious now and forever. And so I'd like, if
properly guided, to make some suggestions that apply in all fields of choice—in
all fields, at least all major fields, of activity—but which apply particularly
to the matter of eternal marriage, singling that out as the one thing paramount
above all other.
When we dwelt in the
presence of God our Heavenly Father, we were endowed with agency. This gave us
the opportunity, the privilege, to choose what we would do—to make a free,
untrammeled choice. When Father Adam was placed in the Garden of Eden, he was
given this same power, and we now possess it. We're expected to use the gifts
and talents and abilities, the sense and judgment and agency with which we are
endowed.
But on the other hand,
we're commanded to seek the Lord, to desire his Spirit, to get the spirit of
revelation and inspiration in our lives. We come unto the Church and a legal
administrator places his hands upon our head and says, "Receive the Holy
Ghost." This gives us the gift of the Holy Ghost, which is the right to
the constant companionship of that member of the Godhead, based on
faithfulness.
And so we're faced with two
propositions. One is that we ought to be guided by the spirit of inspiration,
the spirit of revelation. The other is that we're here under a direction to use
our agency, to determine what we ought to do on our own; and we need to strike
a fine balance between these two, if we're going to pursue a course that will
give us joy and satisfaction and peace in this life and lead to eternal reward
in our Father's kingdom.
When we were with our
Father in the preexistent sphere, he observed and studied us; he knew how we
would respond to his laws when we were in his presence, when we had the
knowledge that he was our Father and that the teachings presented to us came
from him. We walked by sight. Now he's finding out how we'll respond when we
walk by faith, when we're outside his presence and we have to rely on other
things than the personal counsel that we once received from him.
Well, I'd like, if I may,
to present three case studies, out of which, perhaps, we can draw some very
realistic and sound conclusions as to what ought to be in our lives. I'll take
these illustrations out of the revelations that the Lord has given us.
"You
Have Not Understood"
Case study number one:
There was a man named Oliver Cowdery. In the early days, he operated as an
amanuensis to the Prophet. He was the scribe. He wrote down the words that the
Prophet dictated while the Spirit rested upon him in the translation processes
(the Book of Mormon was then being translated). Brother Cowdery was relatively
spiritually immature at that time, and he sought and desired to do something
beyond his then present spiritual capacity. He himself wanted to translate. And
so he importuned the Prophet, the Prophet took the matter up with the Lord, and
they got a revelation. The Lord said, "Oliver Cowdery, verily, verily, I
say unto you, that assuredly as the Lord liveth, who is your God and your
Redeemer, even so surely shall you receive a knowledge of whatsoever things you
shall ask in faith, with an honest heart, believing that you shall
receive." And then one thing he might receive is defined as "a
knowledge concerning the engravings of old records, which are ancient, which
contain those parts of my scripture of which as been spoken by the
manifestation of my Spirit."
Having thus dealt with the
specific problem, then the Lord revealed a principle that applies to it and all
other like situations: "Yea, behold, I will tell you in your mind and in
your heart, by the Holy Ghost, which shall come upon you and which shall dwell
in your heart. Now, behold, this is the spirit of revelation" (D&C
8:1–3).
Well now, Oliver did what a
good many of us would have done. He had the instructions I have read, and he
assumed that they meant what they seemed on the surface to say, which was that
if in faith he asked God he'd have power to translate. But in his condition of
relative spiritual immaturity, he hadn't yet learned what was involved in
asking of God, or how to generate the kind of faith or do the specific thing
that has to be done in order to get an answer to a prayer. And so he asked. And
as you know, he failed; he was totally unable to translate. This caused some
concern, I suppose, to him and the Prophet. The matter was referred back to the
Lord, whose promise they had been attempting to conform to; and the answer
came, the reason came, why he couldn't translate: "You have not
understood; you have supposed that I would give it unto you, when you took no
thought save it was to ask me" (D&C 9:7).
Now, seemingly, that's all
he'd been instructed to do, to ask in faith; but implicit in asking in faith is
the precedent requirement that we do everything in our power to accomplish the
goal that we seek. We use the agency with which we have been endowed. We use
every faculty and capacity and ability that we possess to bring about the
eventuality that may be involved. Now this is translating the Book of Mormon,
it's choosing a wife, it's choosing employment, it's doing any one of ten
thousand important things that arise in our lives.
The Lord continued:
I say
unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it
be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within
you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right.
But if it
be not right you shall have no such feelings, but you shall have a stupor of
thought that shall cause you to forget the thing which is wrong; therefore, you
cannot write that which is sacred save it be given you from me. [D&C 9:8–9]
How do you choose a wife?
I've heard a lot of young people from Brigham Young University and elsewhere
say, "I've got to get a feeling of inspiration. I've got to get some
revelation. I've got to fast and pray and get the Lord to manifest to me whom I
should marry." Well, maybe it will be a little shock to you, but never in
my life did I ever ask the Lord whom I ought to marry. It never occurred to me
to ask him. I went out and found the girl I wanted; she suited me; I evaluated
and weighed the proposition, and it just seemed a hundred percent to me as
though this ought to be. Now, if I'd done things perfectly, I'd have done some
counseling with the Lord, which I didn't do; but all I did was pray to the Lord
and ask for some guidance and direction in connection with the decision that
I'd reached. A more perfect thing to have done would have been to counsel with
him relative to the decision and get a spiritual confirmation that the
conclusion, which I by my agency and faculties had arrived at, was the right one.
"Why
Are You Asking Me?"
Now, case study number two:
There was a man whose name is not so much as preserved to us in the ancient
record. He's known as the brother of Jared. From other sources we know his name
was Moriancumer. He was the spiritual leader, initially, of the Jaredite
people. As they started their progress from the Tower of Babel to their
American promised land, he was the one that got in communion with the Lord to
get the direction, the spiritual guidance, that they, as a people, needed.
And some very interesting
things occurred. They got to the waters that they were going to cross, and the
Lord said to him, "Build some barges." But interestingly, the Lord
didn't tell him how to build the barges. He'd done it on a previous occasion;
he didn't need instruction; there wasn't any revelation that was necessary to
guide him. So he built the barges.
But this time they were
going to be used under some peculiar and difficult circumstances, and he needed
something more than was now present in them: he needed some air. And this was a
problem that was beyond him. So he took that matter up with the Lord, and
because it was totally beyond his capacity to solve, the Lord solved it for him
and said, "Do thus and so and you'll have air."
But then the brother of
Jared—having confidence because he was talking to the Lord, because he was
communing and getting answers—asked another question: he asked for a solution
to a problem that he should have figured out by himself and not taken up with
the Lord. He said, "What will we do for light in the vessels?"
And the Lord talked to him
about it a little and then he said this: "What will ye that I should do
that ye may have light in your vessels?" (Eth. 2:23). In effect,
"What are you asking me for? This is something you should have
solved." And he talked a little more, and he repeated in essence the
question: "What will ye that I should prepare for you that ye may have
light when ye are swallowed up in the depths of the sea?" (Eth. 2:25). In
other words, "Moriancumer, this is your problem. Why are you troubling me?
I've given you your agency; you are endowed with capacity and ability. Get out
and solve the problem."
Well, the brother of Jared
got the message. He went up into a mount called Shelem, and the record says he "did
molten out of a rock sixteen small stones; and they were white and clear, even
as transparent glass" (Eth. 3:1).
I hold here a little piece
of amorphous quartz that's clear as transparent glass. I picked this up in a
wilderness area outside of a little community called Crystalina, in a nation
called Brazil, in South America. The Brethren thought I was off touring
missions, but actually I was doing a little rock hunting. And in that
connection, I hope you got the message that the brother of Jared was a rock
hound also.
Well, the brother of Jared
took sixteen little crystals of some sort (he could hold all of them in his
hands); he took them up on the mount. The record says, "He did carry them
in his hands upon the top of the mount" (Eth. 3:1), and then he said in
effect to the Lord, "Now this is what I hope you will do." You really
don't tell the Lord what to do, but you get some inspiration and you use your
judgment, and then you talk the matter over with him. And so Moriancumer said
to the Lord: "Touch these stones, O Lord, with thy finger, and prepare
them that they may shine forth in darkness; and they shall shine forth unto us
in the vessels which we have prepared, that we may have light while we shall
cross the sea" (Eth. 3:4).
And the Lord did what the
brother of Jared asked, and this is the occasion when he then saw the finger of
the Lord; and, while he was in tune, he received revelation that exceeded
anything that any prophet had ever gained up to that moment. The Lord revealed
more to him about his nature and personality than ever theretofore had come
forth, and it all came about because he'd done everything that he could do and
because he counseled with the Lord.
There's a fine balance
between agency and inspiration. We're expected to do everything in our power
that we can, and then to seek an answer from the Lord, a confirming seal that
we've reached the right conclusion; and sometimes, happily, in addition, we get
added truths and knowledge that we hadn't even supposed.
"They
Shall Counsel Between Themselves and Me"
Now case study number 3: In
the early history of the Church, the Lord commanded the Saints to assemble in a
certain place in Missouri. The decree went forth: "Assemble."
Specifically, the decree went forth, "Let the Presiding Bishop come here
and do such and such." Now notice what happened. The Lord is talking:
As I
spake concerning my servant Edward Partridge, this land is the land of his
residence, and those whom he has appointed for his counselors; and also the
land of the residence of him whom I have appointed to keep my storehouse;
Wherefore,
let them bring their families to this land, [and
here's the point] as they shall counsel between themselves and me. [D&C
58:24–25]
You see, the Lord said
"assemble" to Zion. The details and the arrangements, however,
the how and the when and the circumstances are
to be determined by the agency of those who are called to assemble, but they
are to counsel with the Lord. Now, when you counsel with the Lord, you talk
something over. I bring my children in and we counsel on a problem. I don't
tell them what ought to be; I say, "What do you think? What's your
evaluation? What do you want to do in this situation? What's the best thing to
do?" And they tell me what they think, and if I happen to have any wisdom
or judgment on the matter, I express my views. Well now, the Lord has all
wisdom, all knowledge, and all power; he knows how to govern and control and
direct us in a perfect manner. He lets us determine what we should do, but he
expects us to counsel with him.
Now, after the Lord had
said this to the Presiding Bishopric of the Church, he gave the principle that
governed in that situation, and it governs in all situations. And this is one
of our glorious revealed truths. He said:
For
behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things; for he that is
compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not a wise servant;
wherefore he receiveth no reward.
Verily I
say, men should be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of
their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness;
For the
power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves. And inasmuch as men
do good they shall in nowise lose their reward.
But he
that doeth not anything until he is commanded, and receiveth a commandment with
doubtful heart, and keepeth it with slothfulness, the same is damned. [D&C 58:26–29]
You know, they said to the
Prophet Joseph Smith, "How do you govern so great and diverse a people as
the Latter-day Saints?"
He said, "I teach them
correct principles and they govern themselves."
Now, that's the order of
heaven. That's how the Almighty operates. That's how the Church is supposed to
operate. We're supposed to learn correct principles and then govern ourselves.
We make our own choices, and then we present the matter to the Lord and get his
approving, ratifying seal.
"Counsel
with the Lord in All Thy Doings"
Now, those are the three
case studies; let us come to the revealed conclusion. There was a man named
Alma, a mighty and a great prophet. He had a son named Helaman, who was a holy
and righteous man, following the pattern that his father had set. And to
Helaman, Alma said this: "O, remember, my son, and learn wisdom in thy
youth; yea, learn in thy youth to keep the commandments of God. Yea, and cry
unto God for all thy support" (Al. 37:35–36). Do you think that if you're
counseled to pray to the Lord for support, both temporal and spiritual, that
that's all you have to do? The Lord's prayer says, "Give us this day our
daily bread." Do you go out and sit down in the desert or on the mountain
and pray with all the fervor you can possess, "Give us this day our daily
bread," or do you go out and plant crops and raise herds and do everything
that you can in your situation to accomplish the end result?
Well, continuing:
"Yea, let all thy doings be unto the Lord, and whithersoever thou goest
let it be in the Lord; yea, let thy thoughts be directed unto the Lord; yea,
let the affections of thy heart be placed upon the Lord forever" (Al.
37:36). Now note: "Counsel with the Lord in all thy doings, and he will
direct thee for good" (Al. 37:37).
What was Oliver Cowdery's
problem? "You took no thought save it was to ask. . . .You must study it
out in your mind" (D&C 9:7–8).
Well, do you want a wife?
Do you want anything that's right and proper? You go to work and you use the
agency and power and ability that God has given you. You use every faculty, you
get all the judgment that you can centered on the problem, you make up your own
mind, and then, to be sure that you don't err, you counsel with the Lord. You
talk it over. You say, "This is what I think; what do you think?" And
if you get the calm, sweet surety that comes only from the Holy Spirit, you
know you've reached the right conclusion; but if there's anxiety and
uncertainty in your heart, then you'd better start over, because the Lord's
hand is not in it, and you're not getting the ratifying seal that, as a member
of the Church who has the gift of the Holy Ghost, you are entitled to receive.
"Yea, when thou liest
down at night lie down unto the Lord, that he may watch over you in your sleep;
and when thou risest in the morning let thy heart be full of thanks unto God;
and if ye do these things, ye shall be lifted up at the last day" (Al.
37:37). If you learn how to use the agency that God has given you, and if you
try to make your own decisions, and if you reach conclusions that are sound and
right, and you counsel with the Lord and get his ratifying seal of approval
upon the conclusions you've reached, then you've received revelation, for one
thing; and for another thing, you're going to have the great reward of eternal
life, be lifted up at the last day. Now, we're not all equal by any means; some
have one talent and capacity and some another. But if we use the talents we
have, somehow we'll come out all right.
On the recent Monday when
we were celebrating Washington's birthday, I was down at my mother's sawing a
log in the backyard. She came out to give me some direction and see how I was
doing it, and she wasn't very pleased. She thought I ought to do it
differently. She went back into the house and in a few minutes my younger
brother arrived. She said to him, "I think you'd better go out in the
backyard and give Bruce some help and see that he does this thing right."
And then she said to him, "Bruce isn't very bright." Well, so I'm
not. So I start where I am, and I go forward from there. I start using such
talent as I have, and I begin to apply principles of eternal truth to my life.
And I consult and counsel with the Lord in the process. And no matter where I
am, the gospel takes me forward and onward and upward, and blessings flow to me
that will ennoble and sanctify and improve me in this life and eventually give
me glory and honor and dignity in the life to come.
We Have
the Spirit of Revelation
Now, I think we've said
enough; the principles are before us. Let me just do one thing more. Let me do,
in effect, what my friend Alma would do. After he'd preached a sermon, he said,
"And this is not all. Do ye not suppose that I know of these things
myself?" (Al. 5:45). That is, he'd given them the case studies, he'd
quoted the revelations, he'd told them what was involved, and then he bore
personal testimony. This is what we ought to do in the Church. We ought to
learn how to teach by the power of the Spirit, so that when we get through
talking about the gospel subjects we'll know whether what we've said is right,
and we'll be in a position to bear testimony, not alone of the truth and the
divinity of the work, but also that the doctrine we proclaim and the
everlasting truths which we expound are right, that they are the mind and voice
and will of the Lord. Now, the glorious, wondrous thing about this work and
about these doctrines is that they are true. There isn't anything in this
world, no truth that we can conceive of, to compare with the truth that the
work we're engaged in is true, that the Lord's hand is here. It's a literal
fact that we have the gift and power of the Holy Ghost. We have the spirit of revelation,
the spirit of testimony, the spirit of prophecy. These things must be, or else
we're not the church and kingdom of God; we're not the Lord's people.
Now, the fact is that we do
have them; revelation works. Don't shy away from getting revelation. Joseph
Smith said, "God hath not revealed anything to Joseph, but what He will
make known unto the Twelve, and even the least Saint may know all things as
fast as he is able to bear them" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph
Smith,p. 149). We're entitled to the spirit of revelation. But what I'm
attempting to teach this morning is that there's a how and a procedure, and
there are conditions precedent, and it is our obligation to go to work on our
problems and then counsel with the Lord and get the ratifying seal of the Holy
Spirit on the conclusions that we've reached; and that ratifying seal is the
spirit of revelation.
God grant us wisdom in
these things. God grant us the courage and the ability to stand on our own feet
and use our agency and the abilities and capacities we possess; then let's be
sufficiently humble and amenable to the Spirit to bow our will to his will, to
get his ratifying, confirming seal of approval, to get in our lives, in that
way, the spirit of revelation. And if we so do, there's no question about the
result: it's peace in this life; it's glory and honor and dignity in the life
to come. Which may God grant for all of us. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
