Elder M. Russell Ballard, shortly before the October 2018 General Conference experienced the passing of his wife Barbara. Our prayers are with him and their family. He also spoke of his grandfather, President Joseph F. Smith saying: “In the Lord’s due time, the additional answers, comfort, and understanding about the spirit world President Smith sought, came to him through the marvelous vision he received in October 1918.
When his son Albert Jesse died, Joseph F. wrote to his sister Martha Ann that he had pled with the Lord to save him and asked, “Why is it so? O. God why had it to be?”[1]
Despite his prayers at that time, Joseph F. received no answer on this matter.[2] He told Martha Ann that “the heavens [seemed like] brass over our heads” on the subject of death and the spirit world. Nevertheless, his faith in the Lord’s eternal promises were firm and steadfast.
In the Lord’s due time, the additional answers, comfort, and understanding about the spirit world President Smith sought came to him through the marvelous vision he received in October 1918.
That year was particularly painful for him. He grieved over the death toll in the Great World War that continued to climb to over 20 million people killed. Additionally, a flu pandemic was spreading around the world, taking the lives of as many as 100 million people.” The losses of close family to ‘premature’ death continued as did President Smith’s resultant suffering.
And… so it was on October 3, 1918, having experienced intense sorrow over the millions who had died in the world through war and disease as well as the deaths of his own family members, President Smith received the heavenly revelation known as “The Vision of the Redemption of the Dead.”
President Ballard said: “Among the many things President Smith saw was the Savior’s visit to the faithful in the spirit world after His own death on the cross. From the vision I quote:
“But behold, from among the righteous, he organized his forces and appointed messengers, clothed with power and authority, and commissioned them to go forth and carry the light of the gospel to them that were in darkness, even to all the spirits of men [and women];[3] and thus was the gospel preached to the dead. …
“These were taught faith in God, repentance from sin, vicarious baptism for the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands,
“And all other principles of the gospel that were necessary for them to know in order to qualify themselves that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. …
President Joseph F. Smith alluded to his vision in General Conference the next day, but waited to publish the full vision that we now know as “The Vision of the Redemption of the Dead…Doctrine and Covenants 138“.
References:
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Joseph F. Smith to Martha Ann Smith Harris, Aug. 26, 1883, Church History Library; see Richard Neitzel Holzapfel and David M. Whitchurch, My Dear Sister: The Letters between Joseph F. Smith and His Sister Martha Ann(2018), 290–91.
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In many instances, the Lord directed Joseph F. Smith in his personal life and in his ministry as an Apostle and President of the Church through inspired dreams, revelations, and visions. Often these precious gifts from the Lord were recorded in his journals, sermons, reminiscences, and official records of the Church.
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See the reference to “our glorious Mother Eve” and the “faithful daughters who … worshiped the true and living God” (Doctrine and Covenants 138:39).
