Remembering Our Fathers

This morning I finished listening to Fresh Courage Take, a historical fiction novel by Dean Hughes that chronicles the journey of the some of the Saints from Nauvoo to the Salt Lake Valley in 1846 and 1847.  I’ve read many stories about the pioneers and the sufferings they went through over and over again, but this book was a vivid reminder to me of just how excruciating the ordeal was.  I was particularly stunned by the description of what the Mormon Battalion had to suffer as they walked over 3,000 miles across desolate country.  There were days when they had to march long hours across the hot desert with little food and little water, and it’s miraculous that any survived the grueling journey.  Not only did they have to suffer all of these physical hardships, but they did it knowing that their wives and children were suffering through a winter at Winter Quarters amidst sickness and in crude shelters.  It’s hard to comprehend why the Lord required so much of these early Saints.  They were by no means a perfect people, but the physical challenges they overcame are almost incomprehensible to those of us who live in such comparative ease and comfort (even if we aren’t “rich” by today’s standards).  And so as I think about Thanksgiving today, I feel deeply grateful in particular for those faithful pioneers. 

               One of the themes that came across in the talks I heard from President Hinckley is that we need to remember the early Saints and tell their stories again and again.  On one occasion he said, “Many of you are descended from pioneers in this Church. They struggled so hard; they paid such a terrible price for their faith. Be true to them and true always to the Church they loved so much.”  In April of 1997 he remarked, “Whether you are among the posterity of the pioneers or whether you were baptized only yesterday, each is the beneficiary of their great undertaking.  What a wonderful thing it is to have behind us a great and noble body of progenitors! What a marvelous thing to be the recipients of a magnificent heritage that speaks of the guiding hand of the Lord, of the listening ear of His prophets, of the total dedication of a vast congregation of Saints who loved this cause more than life itself!  Small wonder that so many hundreds of thousands of us—yea, even millions—will pause this coming July to remember them, to celebrate their wondrous accomplishments, and to rejoice in the miraculous thing that has grown from the foundation they laid.”  In another talk, after mentioning the story of his wife’s great-grandmother who died at the end of her journey with the handcart companies in 1856, he commented, “What a story it is. It is filled with suffering and hunger and cold and death. It is replete with accounts of freezing rivers that had to be waded through; of howling blizzards; of the long, slow climb up Rocky Ridge. With the passing of this anniversary year, it may become largely forgotten. But hopefully it will be told again and again to remind future generations of the suffering and the faith of those who came before. Their faith is our inheritance. Their faith is a reminder to us of the price they paid for the comforts we enjoy.”  We must never forget their fortitude and devotion and the terrible price they paid to preserve their faith for future generations. 

               One of the most important verses of scripture—which is highlighted by the fact that it is contained in some form in all four standard works—is Malachi’s prophecy that in the last days Elijah would “turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers” (Malachi 4:6).  I believe that one way we in our generation should interpret “fathers” is those noble pioneers who came before us.  We can perhaps learn from the way the Book of Mormon looked to their fathers and thanked the Lord for the blessings given to them.  For example, the people of King Benjamin—about 500 years after Lehi lived—did “give thanks to the Lord their God, who had brought them out of the land of Jerusalem, and who had delivered them out of the hands of their enemies” (Mosiah 2:4).  Alma encouraged the people of Ammonihah to similarly remember Lehi and his family’s journey, “Do ye not remember that our father, Lehi, was brought out of Jerusalem by the hand of God? Do ye not remember that they were all led by him through the wilderness?  And have ye forgotten so soon how many times he delivered our fathers out of the hands of their enemies, and preserved them from being destroyed, even by the hands of their own brethren?” (Alma 9:9-10)  Helaman named his sons after Lehi and Nephi in hopes that they would likewise remember the goodness of their fathers, “I have given unto you the names of our first parents who came out of the land of Jerusalem; and this I have done that when you remember your names ye may remember them; and when ye remember them ye may remember their works; and when ye remember their works ye may know how that it is said, and also written, that they were good” (Helaman 5:6).  In the Jaredite account we also read of their gratitude for the way the Lord blessed their fathers in coming to the promised land.  For example, Shule “remembered the great things that the Lord had done for his fathers in bringing them across the great deep into the promised land” (Ether 7:27).  Similarly, hundreds of years later Shez “remembered what the Lord had done in bringing Jared and his brother across the deep” (Ether 10:2).  We too, no matter how many years pass, must remember the great faith and sacrifice of our pioneer mothers and fathers—whether we claim them through our lineage or simply by our membership in the Church—and use their examples to increase own faithfulness in the trials of our time.