Reading 1 - Many years ago President Spencer W. Kimball and
several other Church leaders visited the small cathedral in Copenhagen,
Denmark, that houses Bertel Thorvaldsen’s famous statues of Jesus Christ and
the Twelve Apostles. Speaking of this experience, Elder Rex D. Pinegar said:
“As we looked at those beautiful works of art we noted that Peter was
sculptured with large keys in his hands. … As we were ready to leave the
cathedral, the Danish caretaker … was standing near the door awaiting our
departure. President Kimball shook his hand [and] thanked him for his kindness
in letting us visit the cathedral. Then the president began an explanation of
the church established by Jesus Christ and of its importance to us. … Gathering
President Tanner, Elder Monson, and Elder Packer closer to him, the president
continued, ‘We are living apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ. There are Twelve
Apostles and three others who are the presidency of the Church. We hold the
real keys, as Peter did, and we use them every day. They are in use
constantly’” (in Conference Report, Oct. 1976, 104; or Ensign, Nov. 1976, 69).
Reading 2 – Matthew 15:21-28
Reading 3 – Joseph Fielding Smith wrote: “Our Savior,
himself, declared on occasions that he was sent only to the lost sheep of the
house of Israel. His teachings were confined almost entirely to the ministry
among the Jews, one notable exception being his conversation with the woman of
Samaria at the well, but this seemed to be incidental. His language seems harsh
towards the woman of Canaan, when he said, ‘It is not meet to take the
children's bread, and to cast it to dogs,’ but being struck by her great faith
as expressed in her answer, he had compassion on her, and granted her prayer.
The reason our Savior did not carry his message to other peoples than the Jews
is due to the fact that the times of the Gentiles had not arrived in which they
were to participate in the gospel. After his resurrection he commissioned his
disciples and said unto them: ‘Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he
that believeth not shall be damned’ “ (Joseph Fielding Smith, The Restoration
of All Things, p.161).
President Ruben J. Clark wrote: “The woman was Canaanite,
one not of the chosen seed, the one reply made to him in all his recorded
ministry that successfully challenged one of his own sayings: ‘Truth, Lord: yet
the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table.’ Deeply
touched, Jesus answered: ‘O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as
thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.’”
Reading 4 – Matthew 15:32-38
Elder Bruce R. McConkie has written: “Were there Gentiles as
well as Jews among those restored to health and vigor? The people of the area
were made up of both cultures; and, as we have seen, in the case of the Syro
Phoenician woman who pled for the crumbs that fall from Israel's table, the
compassion of the Great Healer, following great faith, extends beyond the
children of the kingdom and takes in the Gentiles who are without. Matthew says
simply: ‘The multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to
be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see: and they glorified the God of
Israel’ [Matthew 15:30-31]. It is, thus, the same thing we have seen before in
Galilee where Israel dwelt. The new dimension here is not what was done, but
those upon whom the blessings were showered.
"Let us try to realize the
scene. They have heard of Him as the wonder worker, these heathens in the land
so near to, and yet so far from, Israel; and they have brought to Him `the
lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others,' and laid them at His feet. Oh,
what wonder! All disease vanishes in the presence of Heaven's Own Life
Incarnate. Tongues long weighted are loosed, limbs maimed or bent by disease
are restored to health, the lame are stretched straight; the film of disease
and the paralysis of nerve impotence pass from eyes long insensible to the
light. It is a new era, Israel conquers the heathen world, not by force, but by
love; not by outward means, but by the manifestation of life power from above.
Truly, this is the Messianic conquest and reign: ‘and they glorified the God of
Israel.’ ” (Edersheim 2:46) (Bruce R. McConkie, The Mortal Messiah, Vol.3,
p.15,16).
Reading 5: Matthew 16:13-19
Reading 6 – Alma 5:44-46
"Jesus in His teachings says, 'Upon this rock I will
build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.' What
rock? Revelation." Joseph Smith (TPJS, p274)
Reading 7 - President Thomas S. Monson said: "Still others searched for Jesus in
councils of debate. Such was the historic Council of Nicea in 325 AD. There,
with the help of the Roman Emperor, the delegates did away in Christendom with
the concept of a personal God and a personal Son—the two separate and distinct
Glorified Beings of the scriptures. The Creed of Nicea, the 'incomprehensible
mystery' of which its originators seemed so proud precisely because it could
not be understood, substituted for the personal God of love and for Jesus of
the New Testament an immaterial abstraction. The result was a maze of confusion
and a compoundment of error. Jesus will not be found in councils of debate. Men
of the world have modified his miracles, doubted his divinity and rejected his
resurrection." (CR, October 1965, pp142-143)
Reading 8 - President Joseph F. Smith taught: “The
Priesthood in general is the authority given to man to act for God. Every man
ordained to any degree of the Priesthood, has this authority delegated to him.
“But it is necessary that every
act performed under this authority shall be done at the proper time and place,
in the proper way, and after the proper order. The power of directing these
labors constitutes the keys of the Priesthood. In their fulness, the keys are
held by only one person at a time, the prophet and president of the Church. He
may delegate any portion of this power to another, in which case that person
holds the keys of that particular labor” (Gospel Doctrine, 5th ed. [1939],
136).
Reading 9 – Matthew 17:1-9
Bible Dictionary – Transfiguration, Mount of
Moses 1:11
Reading 10 – Bruce R. McConkie wrote: “Moses and Elijah were
translated - taken into heaven with physical bodies - so they could return,
with their bodies, to confer keys upon Peter, James, and John on the Mount of
Transfiguration. Of these two ancient prophets, President Joseph Fielding Smith
says: "They had a mission to perform, and it had to be performed before
the crucifixion of the Son of God, and it could not be done in the spirit. They
had to have tangible bodies. Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection;
therefore if any former prophets had a work to perform preparatory to the
mission of the Son of God, or to the dispensation of the meridian of times, it
was essential that they be preserved to fulfill that mission in the flesh. For
that reason Moses disappeared from among the people and was taken up into the
mountain, and the people thought he was buried by the Lord. The Lord preserved
him so that he could come at the proper time and restore his keys, on the heads
of Peter, James, and John, who stood at the head of the dispensation of the
meridian of time. (Deut. 14:5 6; Alma 45:18 19.) He reserved Elijah from death
that he might also come and bestow his keys upon the heads of Peter, James, and
John and prepare them for their ministry” (Bruce R. McConkie, The Mortal
Messiah, Vol.3, footnotes, p.67, 4. ).
D&C 63:20:21
2 Peter 1:16-18
