2017 was a watershed year in the renewed Restoration of the gospel and the Lord's promise to bring again Zion. The Lord continued to pour out light and knowledge the following year, 2018, about a great many important topics, including the priesthood, unity, the divine nature of our heavenly parents, the great hope of the Restoration, the Covenant, and the necessity of seeking further light and knowledge from God. This compilation of lectures, papers, and Q&A sessions addresses these topics as they relate to the Father's work in fulfillment and vindication of His promises about the building of New Jerusalem and the establishment of Zion.
We should be certain we will see Zion-because it's been promised, and it's been prophesied from the beginning of time. When father Adam prophesied (being overcome by the Spirit in the valley of Adam-ondi-Ahman) and foretold what would happen to his posterity down to the latest generations, Zion was promised. And therefore, from the days of Adam on, all of the holy prophets have looked forward to that as the essential moment in the history of the world-because Christ will come and will redeem the world. It will be the end of the wicked; it will be the beginning of something far better. That's been the hope. That's been the promise. That's been what they've looked forward to.
I wonder how many of us share that same longing, that same hope, that same desire that Adam had in the beginning.
We have an opportunity. We have a bonafide, actual offer from God to allow us to be that generation to fulfill the promises. But we have the freedom of choice that allows us to elect to fail. We can also be severed, contentious, agents of disruption, and choose to discourage and break the hearts of our ancestors, just as generations before us have done. Today there are those living who would willingly accept the challenge to repent and follow God if we can send the Lord's invitation to them in humility.
Zion won't be composed of people who are presided over by anyone other than Christ Himself. As between one another, they're brothers, and they're sisters, and they're equals-having one heart, having one mind, and having all things in common-because there is no one who can exert control or authority over another. That's what we seek; that's what we're working for. However clumsy, however awkward, however difficult it may be for siblings to get along as they grow up through their childhood and adolescence, that's exactly how the people that will form Zion are going to begin.
We need to be willing to accept truth from wherever it comes. Some generation, at some point, still has a glorious, promised completion to anticipate. Why not now? Why not us? All that is required is to repent and return.
As we move along the path towards what is inevitable at this point (that is, the coming of the Lord and the establishment of a place of peace-a city of Zion and a New Jerusalem), more information needs to be in the possession of those who will find themselves there.
The culmination of the ages will require us all to face the conflicts, the unease, the anxiety, or (what the Lord described as) the distress of nations with perplexity (see Luke 12:17 RE). The paradoxes and perplexities will require us all to charge ahead-like Job's horse-to the battle. A final conflict may still be comparatively afar, but it is coming. It can be seen in the news, media, politics, and society of our day. It creeps ever closer and is even now only held at bay by the providence of heaven.
This is a time to prepare. We are now in a season to reclaim and restore incomplete gospel understanding. These are precious moments that need to be well spent.
November 30, 2020 Denver C. Snuffer, Jr. Sandy, Utah
