Be Ye Followers of Me

Paul gave the Corinthians a sense of the kind of suffering that the apostles endured in his day as he sought to help them follow the Priesthood keys they held.  He wrote, “For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were appointed to death….  Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwellingplace; And labour, working with our own hands: being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it: Being defamed, we entreat: we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day” (1 Corinthians 4:9-13).  They were not living lives of ease as pampered leaders of the church, but they suffered all manner of hunger and persecution and reviling from the world.  And ultimately they would nearly all give up their lives for the work of the Lord.  But those early apostles followed the teachings of their Master as it relates to dealing with rejection and persecution: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” (Matt. 5:44).  Though we don’t have many details of their experiences, the early apostles, including Paul, were powerful examples of what it means to be a Christian in the face of adversity.  Instead of reviling their enemies, they blessed them; instead of fighting against persecution they suffered it; instead of railing against those who defamed they entreated the world to righteousness. 

               In the same chapter Paul also encouraged the Corinthians to follow his example as an apostle.  He said, “For though ye have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers: for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel. Wherefore I beseech you, be ye followers of me” (1 Corinthians 4:15-16).  I believe Paul was speaking of more than just the fact that he was their missionary who had taught him the gospel—he was an apostle and special witness of the Savior.  Though we may have “ten thousand” teachers in the gospel, our most important earthly teachers are the apostles—not because of some elevated personal status, but because they have the keys of the Priesthood to lead the church.  President Eyring told of an experience he had before he was an apostle teaching about Paul in Ephesus to a group of Latter-day Saints.  After his remarks, Elder James E. Faust told him that he had neglected the most important thing he could have taught about Paul.  President Eyring recounted, “He said that I could have told the people that if the Saints who heard Paul had possessed a testimony of the value and the power of the keys he held, perhaps the Apostles would not have had to be taken from the earth.”  President Eyring continued, “That sent me back to Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. I could see that Paul wanted the people to feel the value of the chain of priesthood keys reaching from the Lord through His Apostles to them, the members of the Lord’s Church. Paul was trying to build a testimony of those keys.  Paul testified to the Ephesians that Christ was at the head of His Church. And he taught that the Savior built His Church on a foundation of apostles and prophets who hold all the keys of the priesthood.”  I believe here in the epistle to the Corinthians Paul similarly wanted them to understand the importance of the apostles and their keys; though they were “fools for Christ’s sake” and despised of men, they were the leaders Christ had chosen to direct His church.             

             The Prophet Joseph Smith said this about the importance of following the modern day apostles: “I will give you a key that will never rust,—if you will stay with the majority of the Twelve Apostles, and the records of the Church, you will never be led astray.”  That is an invaluable key for us to navigate the complexities of the world we live in; our safety lies in following the prophets and apostles Jesus Christ has called in our day.  If Paul were to write to us today, I am confident he would say similarly to the Corinthians: “Be ye followers of them.”