The
Life and Ministry of Joseph Fielding Smith
Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Fielding Smith,
(2013), 1–34
As taught by Sister
Jana Harris on the 5th of January, 2014
Sister Harris began our new year with the presentation and
discussion of our new curriculum on the Teachings of President Joseph Fielding
Smith. This lesson was 34 pages long in the manual and Sis. Harris did a great
job of hitting the highlights of a man that came from great spiritual lineage. (SS5th
R.S. Note: The following excerpts were discussed in the course of Relief
Society on the 5ht of January, 2014. Many items were not discussed due to time
constraints and the volume of history about the accomplishments of President
Joseph Fielding Smith)
During his 60 years as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve
Apostles, Joseph Fielding Smith saw many changes in the world. For example,
when he was called to the apostleship, many people still used the horse and
carriage as their primary means of transportation. At the end of his service in
the quorum, he often traveled to assignments by jet plane.
At birth, Joseph Fielding Smith joined a family rich in faith,
service, and leadership. His grandfather Hyrum Smith was the Prophet Joseph Smith’s brother and a
valiant witness of the Restoration of the gospel. The Lord appointed Hyrum to
“be a prophet, and a seer, and a revelator unto [His] church,” saying that
Hyrum’s name would “be had in honorable remembrance from generation to
generation, forever and ever” (D&C 124:94, 96). With his brother Joseph, Hyrum sealed his testimony with his
blood, martyred by a mob on June 27, 1844 (see D&C 135).
Joseph Fielding Smith’s father, Joseph F. Smith, shouldered
heavy responsibilities from the time he was a child. The firstborn child of
Hyrum and Mary Fielding Smith, he was five years old when his father was
martyred and nine years old when he helped his widowed mother drive her wagon
from Nauvoo, Illinois, to the Salt Lake Valley. He later served as a missionary
and as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. He was a Counselor in the
First Presidency when his son Joseph was born. From October 17, 1901, to
November 19, 1918, he served as President of the Church.
“A Child of Promise”
Joseph Fielding Smith “was born as a child of promise,” said
Elder Bruce R. McConkie of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Elder
McConkie, a son-in-law to President Smith, explained that Julina Lambson Smith
“had three daughters but no sons, and so she went before the Lord and, like
Hannah of old, ‘vowed a vow.’ [1 Samuel 1:11.] Her promise: that if the Lord would give her a son, ‘she
would do all in her power to help him be a credit to the Lord and to his
father.’ The Lord hearkened to her prayers, and she kept her promise to him.”3 On July 19, 1876,
Julina and her husband, Joseph F. Smith, welcomed a newborn son into their
family. They named him
Joseph Fielding Smith Jr., after his father.
Joseph Fielding Smith’s parents, President Joseph F. Smith
and Julina Lambson Smith
Work and Play as a
Young Man
Joseph learned how to work at an early age. His family owned a
farm in Taylorsville, Utah, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from their home,
where he and his brothers helped with irrigating, harvesting hay, and taking
care of livestock. At home, the family cared for a large vegetable garden,
several fruit trees, three long rows of grapes, a flock of chickens, three
cows, and a few horses. President Joseph F. Smith practiced plural
marriage, so the family had many mouths to feed and many hands to help with the
work. Because Joseph Fielding Smith was one of the oldest sons in the large
family, he was given some responsibilities that normally would have been given
to an adult. In addition to these responsibilities, he always kept up with his
studies for school.
Joseph’s first work outside the home and the family farm was
with his mother. He often drove a horse and carriage to help her fulfill her
duties as a midwife. In his late teens, he found employment at Zion’s
Cooperative Mercantile Institution (ZCMI), where he put in long and physically
demanding days. He later recalled: “I worked like a work horse all day long and
was tired out when night came, carrying sacks of flour and sacks of sugar and
hams and bacons on my back. I weighed 150 pounds [68 kilograms], but I thought
nothing of picking up a 200-pound sack [91 kilograms] and putting it on my
shoulders.”5
Gospel Study and
Spiritual Growth
Although baseball was important to young Joseph Fielding Smith,
he sometimes left games early, pulled away by an interest that was even more
important to him. At such times, he could be found secluded “in the hayloft or
in the shade of a tree to get back to his reading” of the Book of Mormon.7 “From my earliest
recollection,” he later said, “from the time I first could read, I have
received more pleasure and greater satisfaction out of the study of the
scriptures, and reading of the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Prophet Joseph
Smith, and the work that has been accomplished for the salvation of men, than from
anything else in all the world.”8 He began to establish
a pattern of personal gospel study when he received his first copy of the Book
of Mormon at age eight. He eagerly read the standard works and Church
publications. He carried a pocket-sized edition of the New Testament so he
could read during lunch breaks and as he walked to and from his job at ZCMI.
Steadily and persistently, he added to the strength of his testimony of the
restored gospel.
Young Joseph Fielding Smith sometimes left baseball games early
so he could read the Book of Mormon in his family’s hayloft.
But Joseph’s spiritual growth was not confined to silent
personal study. He faithfully participated in Church meetings and classes, and
he received priesthood ordinances and blessings. He was especially drawn to the
temple.
On April 6, 1893, Joseph attended the first dedicatory session
of the Salt Lake Temple. President Wilford Woodruff, the fourth President of
the Church, presided at the session and offered the dedicatory prayer. Seated
on the stand to the left of President Woodruff was his Second Counselor,
President Joseph F. Smith.
When Joseph Fielding Smith was 19 years old, he received a
patriarchal blessing. This blessing, pronounced by his uncle John Smith, who
was then serving as Church Patriarch, added to Joseph’s spiritual strength.
Joseph was told:
“It is thy privilege to live to a good old age and the will of
the Lord that you should become a mighty man in Israel. …
“It shall be thy duty to sit in counsel with thy brethren and to
preside among the people. It shall be thy duty also to travel much at home and
abroad, by land and water, laboring in the ministry. And I say unto thee, hold up thy
head, lift up thy voice without fear or favor, as the Spirit of the Lord shall
direct, and the blessings of the Lord shall rest upon thee. His Spirit shall
direct thy mind and give thee word and sentiment, that thou shalt confound the
wisdom of the wicked and set at naught the counsels of the unjust.” (SS5th
R.S. Note: Is this not the very same mandate that we all are receiving today by
both scripture and church leaders?)
Courtship and Marriage
As young Joseph Fielding Smith helped support his family,
studied the gospel, and prepared for priesthood blessings, his efforts did not go unnoticed by a young
woman named Louie Shurtliff. Louie, whose parents lived in Ogden, Utah, came to
live with the Smith family so she could attend the University of Utah, which at
the time was located across the street from the Smiths’ home.
At first, Joseph and Louie’s relationship was nothing more than
a formal friendship, but it gradually deepened into a courtship. Because the
couple had little money, their courtship was confined mostly to reading
together in the family parlor, talking with one another, taking walks together,
and attending Church socials. Joseph also enjoyed listening to Louie play the
piano. Occasionally they went to a performance at a local theater. By the end
of Louie’s second year of studies at the university, their courtship had
blossomed into love—so much that Joseph rode his bicycle the 100-mile
(160-kilometer) round trip, over rutted dirt roads, to see her in Ogden once or
twice when school was not in session.12
Eventually, Louie and Joseph discussed marriage. However, a
question remained in their minds: would Joseph be called to serve a mission? In
those days, young men and women desiring to serve missions did not approach
their bishops to be recommended for such calls. The processing of mission calls
was done entirely through the office of the President of the Church. A young
man never knew when he might find a mission call in the mailbox.
Louie graduated from the university in the spring of 1897 and
moved back to Ogden with her parents. One year later, with apparently no
mission call forthcoming, the couple decided to move forward with marriage
plans. As Joseph later said, “I persuaded her to change her place of residence,
and on the 26th day of April, 1898, we went to the Salt Lake Temple and were
married for time and all eternity by my father, President Joseph F.
Smith.”13 As Joseph and Louie
began their life together, they lived in a small apartment in the Smith
family’s home.
Heeding the Missionary
Call
In the early days of the Church, married men were often called
to serve full-time missions, so Joseph and Louie were not surprised when, on
March 17, 1899, a mission call signed by President Lorenzo Snow arrived in the
mail. But Joseph might have been somewhat surprised at his assigned field of
labor. Before receiving the call, he had had a conversation with President
Franklin D. Richards, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles,
about the possibility of receiving a mission call. Joseph later recalled: “[He]
asked me where I’d like to go. I told him I had no choice particularly, only to
go where I was sent. But he said, ‘You must have some place where you would
prefer to go to.’ I said, ‘Well, I’d prefer to go to Germany.’ So they sent me
to England!”14
The next day, the family gathered at home to bid farewell to
Joseph and to an older brother who had also been called to serve in England.
However, one family member was absent from the gathering. Joseph’s younger
sister Emily was hiding, ashamed about something she had done a few years
earlier. When Joseph and Louie had been courting, Joseph sometimes sent Emily
and other little children to bed early so he could spend time alone with his
sweetheart. Frustrated with this perceived injustice, Emily had often prayed
that the Lord would send her brother away on a mission. Now that he really was
leaving, she felt guilty about the part she might have played in his departure.
Joseph and Louie knew that the call to serve in England had come
from the Lord. Joseph was eager to do his duty, and Louie was pleased that her
husband would serve a mission, but they both struggled with the idea of being
separated. When the time came for Elder Smith to leave for the train depot,
“Louie tried to be brave, tried not to let Joseph see her cry. But it was hard
to conceal red eyes. And Joseph was already so homesick just at the thought of
leaving that he did not feel much like talking with anyone. … There was a lump
in Joseph’s throat as he paused at the front door of the old home on First
North Street and kissed each of his loved ones goodbye: Mama, Papa, brothers
and sisters, aunties, and last of all, Louie. ‘Goodbye Louie, my precious. God bless
you and keep you safe for me.’”
Louie decided to live with her parents while Joseph was away.
This, she felt, would help her endure the loneliness of being separated from
her husband. And she would work in her father’s store, earning money to help fund
Joseph’s mission.
Planting Gospel Seeds
in England
From the time his train—uncomfortable and filled with tobacco
smoke—sped away from home, Elder Smith dedicated himself to his mission. His
journal entries and the letters he sent and received revealed the difficulties
he faced as a missionary and the faith and devotion with which he faced them.
At the end of his first day of missionary work in England, he wrote
in his journal: “This has been a very important day in my short life. I came
from my home less than a month ago for the purpose of preaching the gospel of
our Lord. … I have been out tracting today and delivered 25 tracts [pamphlets].
It is the first of this kind of work that I ever tried to do and it did not
come to me very easy. … I bore my testimony to the world for the first time
today, but will be able to do so better. With the help of the Lord I shall do
his will as I was called to do.” (SS5th R.S. Note: Even for a soon to be
prophet of God, bearing testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ was not an easy
thing to do, yet we too will receive the same help form Heaven for the same
purpose today!)
President Joseph F. Smith wrote the following words of
commendation in a letter to Elder Joseph Fielding Smith: “I like your spirit, I
have faith in your integrity, and I have pleasure and satisfaction in you. I
want you to cultivate wisdom and deliberate judgment and patience as well as
the Holy Spirit and the love of God.”21 Louie’s father, Lewis
Shurtliff, also expressed confidence in Elder Smith: “I have always felt that
you would fill a glorious mission and gain an experience that will fit you for
the exalted station that you are destined to fill in the future.”22
Elder Smith needed such encouragement, for he rarely found
anyone who would receive the message of the restored gospel. Years later, he
“told his son Joseph that conditions were so bad and the people so
disinterested that he reached a frame of mind where he thought that he could
not continue. One night he lay awake thinking of the need to work for passage
home.”26 But inspired by
encouragement from loved ones and strengthened by their prayers and his own
desire to serve, he overcame such thoughts. He knew that the Lord had called
him, and he knew that he needed to work diligently for the good of the people
he served and for the good of his family. He wrote: “I would rather stay here
forever than come home without an honorable record and release. … I pray that I
may have the spirit of the gospel and a love for my fellow man that I may be
able to stay here until I am released honorably. If it were not for the many prayers
that are offered up for me at home as well as my own I could not succeed.”27
Elder Joseph Fielding Smith was honorably released from his
mission on June 20, 1901. In his two years of diligent service, “he did not
make one convert, did not have opportunity to perform one baptism, although he did
confirm one convert.”28 However, he and his companions
had planted gospel seeds, helping many people find greater peace and
understanding, and he had grown personally as a student and teacher of the
gospel and as a priesthood leader.
A New Home and New
Responsibilities
Joseph arrived in Salt Lake City on July 9, 1901. After spending
a few days with Louie’s family in Ogden, Joseph and Louie returned to their
home with the Smiths and resumed their life together. Their marriage was
characterized by faith, diligence, and service, as they worked to establish a
home and family and to serve in the Church.
Louie Shurtliff Smith
Soon after Joseph returned home, he began looking for a job so
he could support his family. With help from a family member, he secured a
temporary job at the Salt Lake County clerk’s office. About five weeks later,
he accepted a position in the Church Historian’s office. As he learned more
about the history of the Church, he also became more aware of people who sought
to discredit the Church and its leaders. He worked tirelessly to provide
information in defense of the faith. This was the beginning of service that
would bless the Church for years to come.
In the spring of 1902, Louie was pregnant. She and Joseph were
grateful for their little apartment, but they looked forward to building their
own home. Joseph’s secure employment allowed them to start making plans. They
hired a building firm and made arrangements for Joseph to do much of the work
himself, thus cutting expenses. Their first child, a daughter named Josephine,
was born in September 1902, and they moved into their new home about 10 months
later. In 1906, after Louie suffered through a difficult pregnancy, they
welcomed another daughter into their home and named her Julina.
Joseph was always willing to participate in the Lord’s work of
salvation, and he received many opportunities to do so. In 1902 he was called
to serve as one of the presidents of the twenty-fourth quorum of the seventy,
including duties as the quorum instructor. (At that time, the Church had more
than 100 quorums of the seventy. The members of those quorums were not General
Authorities.) Joseph was also called to serve on the general board of the Young
Men’s Mutual Improvement Association and as a member of the high council of the
Salt Lake Stake. He was ordained a high priest by his brother Hyrum, a member
of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. In the April 1906 general conference, he
was sustained as an Assistant Church Historian, and the following January he
was appointed to a special committee whose purpose was “to prepare data for a
defense of the church against assaults made upon it by its enemies.”29
Although much of Joseph’s Church duties took him away from home,
he and Louie also found time to serve together and enjoy each other’s company.
In his journal entry for November 1, 1907, he wrote, “With Louie, I spent the
greater part of the day in the Salt Lake Temple, one of the happiest days of
our lives and the most profitable to us.”32
Trials and Blessings
Joseph set many of his Church responsibilities aside in March
1908, feeling a need to stay home with Louie as much as possible. She was
suffering from a severe, unremitting illness related to the early stages of her
third pregnancy. Despite prayers, priesthood blessings, solicitous care from
her husband, and careful attention from doctors, she continued to worsen. She
died on March 30.
In his grief, Joseph wrote: “During this month which has been
one of constant anxiety and worry for me, I have passed through trials and
experiences of the deepest and most painful kind. And through it all I have
depended on the Lord for strength and comfort. After suffering most
excruciating pain for three or four weeks and after an illness covering a
period of nearly two months my beloved wife was released from her suffering … and
departed from me and our precious babies, for a better world, where we
patiently and in sorrow await a meeting which shall be most glorious.” Joseph
said that his wife “died firm in the faith and true to every principle of the
gospel.”33
Joseph was soon overwhelmed with the task of raising two little
girls in a motherless home. His parents invited the young family to live with
them. Even with this help, the widower realized that his little children needed
the care of a loving mother.
Ethel Reynolds Smith
As he did with all important decisions, Joseph made this issue a
matter of fervent prayer. Ethel Georgina Reynolds, a clerk in the Church
Historian’s office, became the answer to his prayers. Joseph invited her to
join him and his daughters on an outing in the park on July 6, 1908. The outing
was successful, as all four of them enjoyed each other’s company. Ten days
later, Joseph and Ethel enjoyed a date together without the children, and soon
thereafter they were engaged to be married.
Ethel and Joseph were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple on November
2, 1908. Years later in a letter to Ethel, Joseph wrote, “You do not know how
often I have thanked the Lord that I made no mistake when I needed a companion.
You were sent to me.”34 In addition to being
a loving companion to Joseph, Ethel quickly became a second mother to Josephine
and Julina.
Service as a Member of
the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
Just before general conference in April 1910, President
John R. Winder, First Counselor in the First Presidency, died. Elder John
Henry Smith, who had been serving in the Quorum of the Twelve, was called to
serve in the First Presidency, leaving a vacancy in the Quorum of the Twelve.
The First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve met in the Salt Lake Temple
to discuss men who would be qualified to fill that vacancy. After counseling
together for about an hour, they were unable to “reach any unanimity of feeling
on the matter. Finally President Joseph F. Smith retired to a room by
himself and knelt in prayer for guidance. When he returned he somewhat
hesitatingly asked the 13 other brethren whether they would be willing to
consider his son Joseph Fielding Smith Jr. for the position. He was
reluctant to suggest it, he said, because his son Hyrum was already a member of
the council and his son David was a Counselor in the Presiding Bishopric.
Church members, he feared, would be disgruntled to have another of his sons
appointed as a general authority. Nevertheless he felt inspired to offer
Joseph’s name for consideration. The other men seemed immediately receptive to
the suggestion and sustained President Smith in it.
“Apparently President Smith confided the choice of Joseph to his
[Joseph’s] mother prior to the conference announcement. Joseph’s sister
Edith S. Patrick says, ‘I remember mother telling us that in 1910 father
came home from his temple council meeting and seemed very worried. When asked
what was troubling him, he said that Joseph had been chosen as one of the
Twelve. He said the brethren had unanimously selected him and he said now he,
as the president, would be severely criticized, having his son made an apostle.
Mother told him not to worry one minute as to what people might say. She knew
the Lord had chosen him and said she knew he would be a credit to his calling.’
“… It was the custom at that time not to notify the chosen
person in advance but rather to let him hear of his appointment when his name
was read in conference for a sustaining vote. Thus it was that when Joseph
Fielding left for conference on April 6, 1910, he had no knowledge of having
been selected.” As he entered the Tabernacle, an usher said to him, “Well
Joseph, who is the new apostle to be?” He responded: “I don’t know. But it
won’t be you and it won’t be me!”
Just before the name of the newest member of the Quorum of the
Twelve was read, Joseph felt a prompting from the Spirit that the name might be
his own. Still, he later said that when his name was announced, “I was so
startled and dumbfounded I could hardly speak.”
Later that day, he went home to share the news with Ethel, who
had not been able to attend the meeting. He began by saying: “I guess we’ll
have to sell the cow. I haven’t time to take care of it anymore!”35
Elder Smith held many positions of trust and responsibility
while serving as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve. For the first eight
years of his ministry as an Apostle, he served unofficially as a secretary for
his father. He served in this capacity until his father passed away in November
1918. In this role, Joseph Fielding Smith acted as scribe when his father
dictated the vision of the redemption of the dead, now found in Doctrine and Covenants 138.
Elder Smith served as Assistant Church Historian, as Church
Historian for almost 50 years, as a counselor in the Salt Lake Temple
presidency, as president of the Salt Lake Temple, as president of the Utah
Genealogical and Historical Society, as the first editor and business manager
of the Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine, and as the chairman of the
Executive Committee of the Church Board of Education. He also served as the
chairman of the Church Publications Committee, an assignment that required him
to read thousands of pages of manuscripts before they were prepared as lesson
manuals and other Church publications.
He was set apart as Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve
on October 6, 1950, and he served in that capacity until April 1951, when he
was set apart as President of the Quorum of the Twelve. He served in that
capacity from April 1951 to January 1970, when he became President of the
Church. From 1965 to 1970, he also served as a Counselor in the First
Presidency while continuing in his responsibilities as President of the Quorum
of the Twelve.
In his first address at general conference, Elder Joseph
Fielding Smith spoke directly to anyone who would “raise his voice against the
actions of the authorities who preside over the Church.” He issued this stern
declaration: “I wish to raise a warning voice to all such who hold membership
in the Church, and say unto them, that they had better repent and turn unto the
Lord, lest His judgments come upon them, lest they lose the faith and be turned
from the truth.”36
Throughout his ministry, he continued to raise a voice of
warning. He once said: “I have considered that it has been my mission, having
been so impressed, I think, by the Spirit of the Lord in my travels in the
stakes of Zion, to say unto the people that now is the day of repentance. … I
feel that it is my mission to cry repentance and to call upon the people to
serve the Lord.”37
This no-nonsense, straightforward approach to teaching was
tempered by gentleness and kindness. Elder Boyd K. Packer once witnessed
this in a meeting when Joseph Fielding Smith was chairman of the Church’s
Missionary Committee. “A report was presented concerning an accident involving
two missionary elders in a Church-owned automobile. An elderly vegetable vendor
had run a stop sign with his truck. The missionary car was struck broadside and
totally wrecked. The driver of the truck was cited by the police. He had no
insurance. Fortunately, neither missionary was seriously injured.
“President Smith sat silent as the members of the committee
considered the matter. After some discussion they instructed the managing
director of the Missionary Department to retain an attorney and press the
matter in court.
“Only then was President Smith asked if he agreed with that
course of action. Quietly he said: ‘Yes, we could do that. And if we press with
all vigor, we might even succeed in taking the truck away from the poor man;
then how would he make a living?’
“‘We looked at each other, a little ashamed,’ Elder Packer said.
‘Then we allowed that the Church could buy another missionary car, go about its
work, and leave the matter alone.’”38
“A Kind, Loving
Husband and Father”
When Elder Smith was called to the apostleship, he had three
children: Josephine and Julina and Ethel’s firstborn child, Emily. Seven months
later, the family welcomed another daughter. Ethel and Joseph named her Naomi.
Because of complications at birth, Naomi had to struggle for her life, and the
family feared that she might not live long. But, as her father later said, she
“was saved through the power [of] prayer and administration after it appeared
that breath could not enter her body.”39 Ethel later gave
birth to seven other children: Lois, Amelia, Joseph, Lewis, Reynolds, Douglas,
and Milton.
President Smith’s assignments as an Apostle often took him away
from home for long periods of time. But when he was home, he focused his
attention on his family. His wife Ethel described him as “a kind, loving husband
and father whose greatest ambition in life is to make his family happy,
entirely forgetful of self in his efforts to do this.”40
The children in the Smith family were amused by the impression
some people had of their father—as a severe, stern man. “One time … after he
had preached a rather vigorous sermon on the importance of properly governing
one’s children, an annoyed woman approached two of his little daughters and
expressed sympathy for them [and said,] ‘I’ll bet your daddy beats you!’” In
response to this accusation, the girls just giggled. They knew their father
much better than she did—he would never hurt them. When he came home from his
long trips, “it was happy times, from the moment they eagerly met him at the
train depot until they sadly bade him farewell again several days hence.” They
played games, made pies and ice cream, went on picnics, rode the train, and
visited nearby canyons and lakes. They enjoyed hearing stories about his Church
assignments all over the world.41 They also worked
together, staying busy with chores around the house.42
President Smith’s sons played sports, and he attended their
games whenever he could.43 He also enjoyed
playing sports with them, particularly handball. He had fun with them, but he
was competitive. His sons Reynolds and Lewis remembered times when the two of
them teamed up against their father. He let them choose which hand he could use
during the game. Even with one hand behind his back, he always “soundly
trounced them both.”44
Sadness and Hope
Elder Smith’s assignments away from home were difficult for
Ethel and the children, and the weeks of separation were also painful for him.
On April 18, 1924, he was traveling by train to preside at a stake conference.
Ethel was seven months pregnant at the time, doing her best to care for the
children at home. In a letter to her, he said, “I am thinking of you and wish I
could be with you constantly for the next few weeks, to help take care of you.”45 As he thought of
home, he closed the letter with a poem he had written. Some of the words to
that poem now appear in many Church hymnbooks under the title “Does the Journey
Seem Long?”
Does the journey seem long,
The path rugged and steep?
Are there briars and thorns on the way?
Do sharp stones cut your feet
As you struggle to rise
To the heights thru the heat of the day?
Is your heart faint and sad,
Your soul weary within,
As you toil ’neath your burden of care?
Does the load heavy seem
You are forced now to lift?
Is there no one your burden to share?
Let your heart be not faint
Now the journey’s begun;
There is One who still beckons to you.
So look upward in joy
And take hold of his hand;
He will lead you to heights that are new—
A land holy and pure,
Where all trouble doth end,
And your life shall be free from all sin,
Where no tears shall be shed,
For no sorrows remain.
Beginning in 1933, the happiness in the Smith home was sometimes
interrupted by a heavy “burden of care,” as Elder Smith had expressed in his
poem nine years earlier. Ethel began to suffer from “a terrible illness which
she could not understand. At times she was plunged into the depths of
depression and at other times her mind raced beyond control forcing her
exhausted body to do more and more. The tender love and support of her family,
prayers, and blessings, even hospitalizations did not seem to help.”47 After four years of
suffering, she died on August 26, 1937. Writing of her death, her bereaved
husband recorded, “A better woman could not be found, or truer wife and
mother.”48 In the depths of his
sorrow, he felt the comforting knowledge that he and Ethel Reynolds Smith were
bound together for the eternities by a sacred sealing covenant.
A New Friendship Leads
to Marriage
When Ethel died, five children still lived in the Smith home.
Two of them would soon move away—Amelia was engaged to be married, and Lewis
was preparing to serve a full-time mission. This would leave 16-year-old
Reynolds, 13-year-old Douglas, and 10-year-old Milton. Concerned about these
motherless sons, Joseph Fielding Smith pondered the idea of marrying again.
With this idea in mind, Elder Smith soon focused his attention
on Jessie Ella Evans, a famous soloist with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Jessie
had sung a solo at Ethel’s funeral services, and Elder Smith had sent her a
note to express his appreciation. That note had led to conversations by
telephone. Elder Smith and Jessie had not known one another before this
exchange, but they quickly became good friends.
Elder Smith spent days thinking and praying about the
possibility of asking Jessie to marry him. Finally he wrote her a letter in
which he hinted that he would like to have a more personal friendship with her.
Four days later, he worked up the courage to deliver the letter in person. He
took it to the city and county offices, where she worked as the county
recorder. Later he recorded the following in his journal: “Went to County
Recorder’s office. … Had interview with recorder, very important, and left her
the letter I wrote.”49 Following a week in
which he traveled by train to stake conference meetings, Elder Smith returned
home and once again visited with Jessie.
In his typical straightforward style, Elder Smith wrote in his
journal, “Met Miss Jessie Evans and had [an] important interview with her.”
With mutual feelings of admiration, they made arrangements for him to meet
Jessie’s mother and for Jessie to meet his children. Less than a month later,
on November 21, 1937, she accepted an engagement ring. The two were sealed in
the Salt Lake Temple on April 12, 1938, by President Heber J. Grant, the
seventh President of the Church.50
Elder Francis M. Gibbons, who served as a secretary to the
First Presidency when President Smith was President of the Church, described
the relationship between Joseph Fielding Smith and Jessie Evans Smith: “Despite
a difference of twenty-six years in their ages and differences in temperament,
background, and training, Joseph Fielding and Jessie Evans Smith were
remarkably compatible. She was an irrepressible extrovert, full of fun and good
humor, who enjoyed the limelight of public attention. Joseph, on the other
hand, was a quiet, retiring introvert, dignified and detached, who always
seemed somewhat uncomfortable in a public setting and who never sought to call
attention to himself. The thing that bridged the wide gulf between these two
disparate personalities was the genuine love and respect they had for each
other.”51 This love and respect
extended to Jessie’s mother, Jeanette Buchanan Evans, with whom Jessie had been
living until the marriage. Sister Evans joined her daughter to live in the
Smith home and helped care for the children.
Joseph Fielding Smith and Jessie Evans Smith at the piano
Ministering to a World
in Turmoil
The new Sister Smith, addressed as Aunt Jessie by Elder Smith’s
children and grandchildren, frequently joined her husband as he traveled to
stake conferences. Local leaders often invited her to sing in meetings, and
occasionally she persuaded her husband to sing a duet with her. In 1939,
President Heber J. Grant assigned Elder and Sister Smith to tour all of
the Church’s missions in Europe.
Although World War II had not yet erupted when the Smiths
arrived in Europe, tensions between the nations were increasing. On August 24,
while the Smiths were in Germany, the First Presidency instructed Elder Smith
to see that all missionaries in Germany were transferred to neutral countries.
He coordinated this work from Copenhagen, Denmark. During this transferal of
missionaries, Wallace Toronto, the mission president in Czechoslovakia, found
it necessary to send his wife, Martha, and their children to Copenhagen for
safety. He remained behind to ensure the safe evacuation of four missionaries
who had been detained. Days passed without any word from them. Martha later
recalled:
“The day finally came when all trains, ferries, and boats made
their last runs from Germany and we prayed that Wally [President Toronto] and
his four young charges would be on that last ferry as it headed for its home
port. Seeing that I was very worried and getting more upset by the minute,
President Smith came over to me, put his protecting arm around my shoulders and
said, ‘Sister Toronto, this war will not start until Brother Toronto and his
missionaries arrive in this land of Denmark.’ As the day advanced into early
evening, a telephone call came. … It was Wally! The five of them had come out
of Czechoslovakia with the British Legation on a special train that had been
sent in for them, boarded the last ferry from Germany, and they were now on the
coast [of Denmark] waiting for transportation to Copenhagen. The relief and
happiness felt in the mission home and among the 350 missionaries was like a
dark cloud lifting to reveal sunshine.”52
A Trusted Teacher and
Leader
As a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, Joseph Fielding Smith
often stood before Latter-day Saints to testify of Jesus Christ, teach the
restored gospel, and call the people to repentance. He delivered more than 125
sermons in general conference, participated in thousands of stake conferences,
and spoke at events such as genealogy conferences and radio broadcasts. He also
taught by the written word. For many years he wrote a feature in the Church’s
Improvement Era magazine, answering questions submitted by readers. He also
wrote other articles for Church magazines and the Church section of the Deseret
News. During his service as an Apostle, from 1910 to 1972, his writings were
published in 25 books, including Essentials in Church History, Doctrines of
Salvation, Church History and Modern Revelation, and Answers to Gospel
Questions.
Through listening to his sermons and reading his writings,
Church members came to trust President Smith as a gospel scholar. Even more,
they learned to trust and follow the Lord. As President N. Eldon Tanner
said, Joseph Fielding Smith “influenced the lives of hundreds of thousands of
people as he lived and taught by word and pen every principle of the gospel. He
left no doubt in the minds of anyone that he knew that God is a living God and
that we are his spirit children; that Jesus Christ is the Only Begotten Son of
God in the flesh; that he gave his life for us that we might enjoy immortality; and that by
accepting and living the gospel we may enjoy eternal life.”58
Elder Bruce R. McConkie observed:
“The life and labors of President Joseph Fielding Smith were
characterized by three things:
“1. His love of the Lord and the absolute, unswerving fidelity
with which he sought to signify that love by keeping his commandments and doing
ever those things which would please the Lord.
“2. His loyalty to the Prophet Joseph Smith and the everlasting
truths restored through him; to his grandfather, the Patriarch Hyrum Smith, …
[who] met a martyr’s death; and to his father, President Joseph F. Smith,
whose name is enshrined forever in the celestial city as one who endured valiantly
in the cause of him whose blood was shed that we might live.
“3. His own gospel scholarship and spiritual insight; his own unwearyingly
diligence as a preacher of righteousness; and his own course of feeding the
hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the widow and the fatherless, and
manifesting pure religion by precept as well as by example.”59
President of the
Church
On a Sabbath morning, January 18, 1970, President David O.
McKay’s mortal life came to an end. The responsibility of Church leadership now
rested on the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, with 93-year-old Joseph Fielding
Smith as their President.
On January 23, 1970, the Quorum of the Twelve met and officially
sustained President Smith in his calling as President of The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints. President Smith selected Harold B. Lee as
First Counselor and N. Eldon Tanner as Second Counselor. Then all three
men were set apart to fulfill their new responsibilities.
Elder Ezra Taft Benson, who was present at that meeting,
recalled: “We had a wonderful spirit of unity in our meeting and great evidence
of affection as the brethren threw their arms around each other as the new
leadership was selected and set apart.”61
Elder Boyd K. Packer shared his personal witness of
President Smith’s calling:
“I left the office one Friday afternoon thinking of the weekend
conference assignment. I waited for the elevator to come down from the fifth
floor.
“As the elevator doors quietly opened, there stood President
Joseph Fielding Smith. There was a moment of surprise in seeing him, since his
office is on a lower floor.
“As I saw him framed in the doorway, there fell upon me a
powerful witness—there stands the prophet of God. That sweet voice of Spirit
that is akin to light, that has something to do with pure intelligence,
affirmed to me that this was the prophet of God.”62
“Called by the Lord … to Other and Greater
Labors”
On August 3, 1971, Jessie Evans Smith passed away, leaving
President Joseph Fielding Smith as a widower for the third time. As a result,
President Smith went to live with his daughter Amelia McConkie and her husband,
Bruce. His other children regularly took turns visiting him and taking him for
rides. He continued to go to his office each weekday, attend meetings, and
travel on Church business.
On June 30, 1972, President Smith left his office on the first
floor of the Church Administration Building toward the end of the day. With his
secretary, D. Arthur Haycock, he went to the Church Historian’s office,
where he had labored prior to becoming President of the Church. He desired to
greet all those who served there. After shaking their hands, he went to the
basement of the building to shake the hands of the telephone operators and
others who worked in that area to show his appreciation. This was his last day
at the office.
On Sunday, July 2, 1972, just 17 days before his 96th birthday,
he attended sacrament meeting in his home ward. Later that afternoon he visited his
firstborn child, Josephine, with his son Reynolds. That evening, as he sat in
his favorite chair in the McConkie home, he passed away peacefully. As his
son-in-law later said, President Smith had been “called by the Lord whom he
loved so much and served so well to other and greater labors in his eternal
vineyard.”77
President Harold B. Lee, who was now the senior Apostle on
the earth, visited the McConkie home when he heard of President Smith’s
passing. He “walked quietly to the couch, and, kneeling, took one of the
Prophet’s hands in his. He remained in that position for some time, not
speaking, in prayer or meditation. He then arose to express his condolences to
the family, his admiration for their father, and his admonition to them that
they honor President Smith by living worthily.”78
Tributes to “a Devoted
Man of God”
At President Smith’s funeral services, President N. Eldon
Tanner referred to him as “a devoted man of God, one who has served so nobly
both God and his fellowmen and who has led by example his family and all over
whom he has been called to preside; one of whom it can truthfully be said he
was a man without guile and without pride. It could never be said of him,”
observed President Tanner, “that he ‘loved the praise of men more than the
praise of God’ [John 12:43].”79
President Harold B. Lee said: “Brother Tanner and I have
loved this man these last two and a half years. It hasn’t been pretended. He
begat love, because he loved us, and we have stood by him, as he stood by and
trusted us.”80
A newspaper that had been critical of President Smith, even questioning
his call to the Twelve over 60 years earlier, now published the following
tribute: “Joseph Fielding Smith, a man stern in devotion to his creed, yet
tender in regard for essential needs of people everywhere, gave wise counsel to
his associates, loving care to his family and exalted leadership to his church
responsibilities. He will be missed, but remembered with special esteem.”81
Perhaps the most meaningful tribute was the declaration of a
family member, President Smith’s son-in-law Bruce R. McConkie, who
described him as “a son of God; an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ; a prophet
of the Most High; and above all, a father in Israel!” Elder McConkie
prophesied, “For years to come his voice will speak from the dust as
generations yet unborn learn the doctrines of the gospel from his writings.”82
As you study this book, the teachings of President Joseph
Fielding Smith will help fulfill that declaration. His voice will “speak from
the dust” to you as you “learn the doctrines of the gospel.”
President Joseph Fielding Smith “used three great words that I
can never forget,” recalled President Gordon B. Hinckley. Those words were
“true and faithful.” President Hinckley said, “In his public addresses, in his
private conversation, in his prayers to the Lord, he pleaded that we might be
true and faithful.”1 President
Thomas S. Monson shared a similar memory: “Even in his advanced years,
[he] always prayed, ‘May we be true and faithful to the end.’”2
“True and faithful.” For President Joseph Fielding Smith, this
was more than an often-repeated phrase. It was a heartfelt expression of his
hope for all people. It was also a description of his life, from his childhood
through his service as President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
(SS5th
R.S. Note: May we too be “true and faithful” in all we do and say…)
Please read this lesson in its entirety, as many precious items
could not be discussed due to the time constraints.
Sisters Margo Lybbert and Lisa Erskine were sustained as
Achievement Day Leaders.
Sister Misty Amendola was sustained as the Nursery Song
Leader.
Madeline Harris was baptized a member of the church on the 4th
of January, 2014.
