PROVO, Utah — Presiding at the first session of the 2023 Seminar for New Mission Leaders at the Provo Missionary Training Center in Provo, President M. Russell Ballard spoke lovingly of the devotion shown by brothers Joseph and Hyrum Smith as key to the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
President Ballard, Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, is the great-great-grandson of Hyrum Smith and pointed out that Tuesday, June 27, will be the 179th anniversary of the day Joseph and Hyrum were martyred in Carthage Jail.
“All who know of the great and eternal principles for which Joseph and Hyrum gave their lives surely must stand with reverence at their courageous faith and are inspired by the testimony of truth they sealed with their precious blood,” President Ballard said.
His testimony to the new leaders of 138 missions who were in attendance at the Provo MTC on Thursday, June 22, was met with a feeling of great reverence. Other mission leaders around the world watched the broadcast from their missions.
President Ballard shared that Joseph and Hyrum knew their fate. Hyrum said to Joseph five days prior to their death, “Just as sure as we fall into their hands, we are dead men.”
Following the conclusion of Zion’s Camp in 1834 where he suffered from cholera, Hyrum received a priesthood blessing in which he was told he would “have the power voluntarily to lay down thy life to glorify God.” While Joseph would later encourage Hyrum to not accompany him to Carthage, Hyrum would not leave his brother’s side, President Ballard said.
President Joseph F. Smith, sixth President of the Church and great-grandfather of President Ballard, said that “during the entire ministry of the Prophet …. [Hyrum and Joseph] were never separated from each other as much as six months at any given time.”
And Joseph Fielding Smith, Hyrum’s grandson and the 10th President of the Church, said of Joseph and Hyrum, “They were together through most of the trials and difficulties that beset the Saints. Together they shared joy and sorrow, and side by side they stood in their unjust imprisonments, persecutions and sentences of death.”
President Ballard said the same feelings of unity that Joseph and Hyrum had for each other should likewise be shared by every missionary companionship.
Joseph said of his brother, “he possesses the mildness of a Lamb, and the integrity of a Job; and in short the meek and quiet spirit of Jesus Christ; and I love him with that love that is stronger than death.”
When counseling together about whether or not to go to Carthage, Hyrum told Joseph, “The Lord is in it. If we live or have to die, we will be reconciled to our fate.”
Once there, the two were imprisoned, President Ballard said. And Joseph still pled for Hyrum to be liberated. Hyrum stayed.
When a mob rushed up the stairs to the room where Hyrum, Joseph and others were being held captive, “Hyrum, ever the older brother, was holding the door in an attempt to protect his companions,” President Ballard said. Hyrum was shot. Then John Taylor was also shot. In an attempt to “draw the mob’s attention” away from others in the room, Joseph ran to the second-story window, was shot, and fell to his death, President Ballard recounted.
“I think we can all understand the horrible shock and grief members of the Church must have felt as news of the martyrdom spread,” he said.
Dan Jones, who had also been in Carthage for a time with Joseph and Hyrum, described the sadness as unequaled, with Nauvoo’s shops and businesses closed once the news spread through the city.
Despite her grief, Lucy Mack Smith, Joseph and Hyrum’s mother, said she heard a voice calming her in her agony, “I have taken them unto myself, that they might have rest.”
Hyrum’s own son, President Joseph F. Smith, was 5 years old when his father was killed. When he later served as President of the Church, he returned to Nauvoo and Carthage. “I despise this place,” he said of the latter.
But in the years that followed, President Joseph F. Smith said he had a vision in which he saw his father and Joseph “continuing their missionary labors in the Lord’s kingdom. … In eternity they have joined forces with other prophets and patriarchs to complete their great and eternal work.”
President Ballard shared this history of Joseph and Hyrum with a call to today’s missionaries that they not forget the sacrifices of those who have preceded them in the work of salvation.
“Now no missionary should ever fail to understand and appreciate the great price others have paid to establish once again the Church of Jesus Christ upon the earth,” President Ballard said. “No assignment or challenge of any missionary should hold him or her back from boldly declaring the gospel truths that are ours to have.”
Then speaking directly to the new mission leaders, he said, “Joseph was called to his work by the Lord just as you and your missionaries have been called to yours — by the Lord through His Prophet.”
Laying the groundwork for the Second Coming
The Restoration is about more than the deaths of Joseph and Hyrum. President Ballard said Joseph translated the Book of Mormon, received priesthood keys, reinstituted ordinances, organized The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, called missionaries, built temples, and taught “principles that are necessary to prepare a people for the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
The example Joseph and Hyrum gave as companions showed allegiance to family and Heavenly Father, President Ballard said.
“Joseph and Hyrum — missionary companions — true and faithful to one another and to God. Their example of love and support on their mission is an example for every missionary companionship.”
President Ballard also noted that today’s missionaries will never go through exactly what Joseph and Hyrum did, “but all can learn from these two powerful missionaries how to support and strengthen one another.”
He noted that they may face discouragement in their labors but invited them to remember how Joseph and Hyrum overcame the challenges of Richmond, Liberty and Carthage jails and “find the power of the Savior to hold you steady.”
Whether missionaries know everything about the Restoration or have all of the Savior’s attributes or understand how to teach and act as His disciples, President Ballard said all of them can learn how to do and be those things.
“All of your missionaries need to devote themselves to this great cause,” he said. “… All of us, by following the example of Joseph and Hyrum Smith, can protect, support, teach and love one another as missionary companions with the same dedication as they did on their mission.”
As President Ballard concluded with his testimony of Jesus Christ as the Son of the Living God, he also left a call with new mission leaders that the gospel message protected and shepherded by Joseph and Hyrum “must be carried by us powerfully into the lives of our Father’s children wherever we find them” until the Lord declares His work as done.
President Ballard’s involvement with missionary work
The involvement of the Smith and Ballard families in preaching the gospel in this dispensation is remarkable, said Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
Speaking of this legacy while introducing President Ballard, Elder Cook spoke of the missionary foundation laid by President Ballard and his family.
- In 1830 Samuel Smith, Joseph’s and Hyrum’s brother, was called as the first missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in this dispensation. He went forth with several newly printed copies of the Book of Mormon.
- One of the earliest missionary guides contained significant instruction from President Joseph F. Smith, President Ballard’s great-grandfather. It was titled “The Elder’s Manual.”
- Elder Melvin Joseph Ballard, President Ballard’s grandfather, was called to serve in the Eastern and then Northern States Missions from 1896 to 1898.
- Elder Melvin J. Ballard was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles on Jan. 7, 1919. As assigned by President Heber J. Grant on Dec. 25, 1925, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Elder Ballard dedicated all of South America “for the preaching of the gospel to all the peoples of the South American nations.”
- From 1900 to 1950, although the total number of missionaries increased to 50,143, many young men and women who desired to serve missions were not able to because of wartime restrictions and the Great Depression. However, during this time in 1948, M. Russell Ballard was called to serve as a missionary in England, where he served as a counselor in the mission presidency.
- As a counselor to his mission presidents, Elder Ballard was responsible for teaching the missionaries. During this time, he introduced the Andersen Plan — or “A Plan for Effective Missionary Work” — to the Nottingham district and eventually to all of Europe.
- In 1974, President Ballard and Sister Barbara Ballard were called to preside over the Canada Toronto Mission. While serving as a mission president in 1976, he was called to the First Quorum of the Seventy; he completed his three-year term as mission president as a member of the Seventy.
- From 1984 to 1985 Elder Ballard continued to influence missionary work as he served as the executive director of the Missionary Department. President Boyd K. Packer was the chairman of the Missionary Executive Council.
- In 1985 all mission leaders worldwide gathered together in Salt Lake City as President Packer and Elder Ballard introduced the “Uniform System For Teaching the Gospel.”
- On Aug. 15, 2002, Elder Ballard was assigned to chair the Missionary Executive Council. Elder Cook served with him as executive director of the Missionary Department during the creation of “Preach My Gospel.”
“There is no General Authority of his generation who has been more intensely involved in missionary work,” said Elder Cook of President Ballard.
President Ballard, he continued, has been “at the forefront of presenting the gospel to our Father in Heaven’s children throughout his adult life. And through his inspired guidance and direction, we are again blessed to have ‘Preach My Gospel,’ second edition.”
