I have heard bits and pieces of this talk here and there and I have always wanted to read it. I have highlighted in bold the parts that stood out to me. This is not the entire talk, it is very long. It is pretty much the second half of the talk though. If you would like to read the entire talk you could look it up. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
The One Pure Defense
President Boyd K. Packer
President Boyd K. Packer is President of the Quorum of
the Twelve Apostles.
This address was given to Church
Educational System religious educators on February 6, 2004, at the Salt Lake
Tabernacle.
…With an individual testimony, they
will be safe in the world.
…We know also that the being from the
unseen world who confronted the boy Joseph in the Sacred Grove is always near,
for as Peter said, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as
a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
Now, by moral and social and political and even intellectual standards,
we seem to be losing.
But mankind also knows that in the final windup scene Satan cannot win.
The world is spiraling downward at an ever-quickening pace. I am sorry to
tell you that it will not get better.
…
It is my purpose to charge each of
you as teachers with the responsibility—to put you on alert. These are days of great spiritual danger
for our youth.
Morally Mixed-up World
I know of nothing in the history of the Church or in the history of the
world to compare with our present circumstances. Nothing happened in Sodom and
Gomorrah which exceeds in wickedness and depravity that which surrounds us now.
Words of profanity, vulgarity, and blasphemy are heard everywhere.
Unspeakable wickedness and perversion were once hidden in dark places; now they
are in the open, even accorded legal protection.
At Sodom and Gomorrah these things were localized. Now they are spread
across the world, and they are among us.
I need not—I will not—identify each
evil that threatens our youth. It is difficult for man to get away from it.
The First Line of Defense
You, with the leaders and teachers in
the priesthood and auxiliaries, are not the first line of defense. The family
holds that line. Satan uses every
intrigue to disrupt the family.
The sacred relationship between man
and woman, husband and wife, through which mortal bodies are conceived and life
is passed to the next generation, is being showered with filth.
Surely you can see what the adversary
is about. The first line of defense, the home, is crumbling.
The very purpose for the Restoration
centers on the sealing authority, the temple ordinances, baptism for the dead,
eternal marriage, eternal increase—centers on the family!
The Lord placed the responsibility
upon parents first, saying: “Inasmuch as parents have children in Zion, or in
any of her stakes which are organized, that teach them not to understand the
doctrine of repentance, faith in Christ the Son of the living God, and of
baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of the hands, when
eight years old, the sin be upon the heads of the parents. . . . And they shall
also teach their children to pray, and to walk uprightly before the Lord”
(D&C 68:25, 28).
There is “the shield of faith
wherewith” the Lord said “ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the
wicked” (D&C 27:17).
The Armor Is Fitted at Home
This shield of faith is handmade in a
cottage industry. What is most worth doing ideally is done at home. It can be
polished in the classroom, but it is fabricated and fitted in the home,
handcrafted to each individual.
Many do not have support in the
family. When that shield is not provided at home, we must, and we can, build
it. You and the leaders and teachers then become the first line of defense.
The Prophets Have Warned
We are now exactly where the prophets warned we would be.
In preparation for what is coming,
the Lord warned, “In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist
in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days, I have warned you, and
forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation” (D&C
89:4).
Moroni spoke to us: “O ye Gentiles,
it is wisdom in God that these things should be shown unto you. . . .
Wherefore, the Lord commandeth you, when ye shall see these things come among
you that ye shall awake to a sense of your awful situation” (Ether 8:23–24).
Paul prophesied, “In the last days
perilous times shall come” (2 Timothy 3:1), then word by word and phrase by
phrase, described exactly what our present conditions are now. He spoke of
“blasphemers, disobedient to parents, . . . unholy, without natural affection,
. . . incontinent, . . . despisers of those that are good, . . . lovers of
pleasures more than lovers of God; . . . ever learning, and never able to come
to the knowledge of the truth,” and other things (2 Timothy 3:2–4, 7).
Could he have described our plight
more accurately? Read the prophecy very carefully.
The Power of Scriptures
Paul prophesied, also, that things will not get better. “Evil men and seducers shall wax
worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived” (2 Timothy 3:13).
Fortunately, he told us what to do
about it: “But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast
been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child
thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation
through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration
of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for
instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:14–16).
In His supernal prayer for the
Apostles, the Lord said, “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the
world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the
world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word
is truth” (John 17:15–17).
A World Spiritually Diseased
Spiritual diseases of epidemic proportion sweep over the world. We are not
able to curb them. But we can prevent our youth from being infected by them.
Knowledge and a testimony of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ are like
a vaccine. We can inoculate them.
Inoculate: In—“to be within” and oculate
means “eye to see.” We place an eye within them—the unspeakable gift of the
Holy Ghost.
Nephi told us that “angels speak by
the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ.
Wherefore, I said unto you, feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the
words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do” (2 Nephi 32:3;
emphasis added).
Narrow Way
It is a very narrow and straight path
laid out for you teachers.
“Strait is the gate, and narrow is
the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew
7:14).
...Activities are like spices and
desserts that flavor a balanced meal. These must always be of the standard to
reflect the gospel. Do not leave out the nourishing nutrients that build the
spirit; it is not the entertainment that protects them.
The teaching of the restored gospel
of Jesus Christ must not be regarded as just one among your offerings. It is
more important than any or all of the activities put together. You may provide
them activities, but you must not leave the teaching undone.
The auxiliaries have been organized
and have the responsibility for most of the activities. Teach your students to
be faithful and active in the wards and branches and stakes, to have a deep
regard for the priesthood leaders called to preside over them.
I repeat, the way is straight and
narrow. You must not wander from it.
Have Faith—Courage
When our youth feel surrounded and
outnumbered, remember what Elisha told his servant when he saw that “an host
compassed the city both with horses and chariots.” The servant was frightened
and said, “Alas, my master! how shall we do? [Elisha] answered, Fear not: for
they that be with us are more than they that be with them. And Elisha prayed,
and said, Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see. And the Lord
opened the eyes of the young man; and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was
full of horses and chariots of fire” (2 Kings 6:15–17).
You are not responsible to cure the
world’s environment. You can, with parents and priesthood and auxiliary leaders
and teachers, send young Latter-day Saints out as leaven into the world,
spiritually nourished, immunized to the influences of evil.
“The glory of God is intelligence,
or, in other words, light and truth. Light and truth forsake that evil one. . .
. [You are] commanded . . . to bring up your children in light and truth”
(D&C 93:36–37, 40).
A Defense and a Refuge
“The gathering together upon the land
of Zion,” the Lord said, “and upon her stakes, may be for a defense, and for a
refuge from the storm, and from wrath when it shall be poured out without
mixture upon the whole earth” (D&C 115:6).
They need not fear. We need not fear. Fear is the opposite of faith.
I have been in the councils of the
Church and seen many things. I have seen disappointment and shock and concern.
Never once have I seen any fear.
Our youth can look forward with hope
for a happy life. They shall marry and raise families in the Church and teach
their little ones what you have taught them. They, in turn, will teach their
children and their grandchildren.
Isaiah and Micah prophesied: “It
shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house
shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above
the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and
say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the
God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths:
for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from
Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:2–3; see also Micah 4:1–2).
In our day the house of the Lord has been
established in the tops of the mountains, and nations do flow unto it. The word
of the Lord—the Old and New Testaments—has gone forth from Jerusalem. Now the
law goes forth from Zion. And you are teachers of the law.
We Will Not Fail
We will not fail!
“How long can rolling waters remain
impure? What power shall stay the heavens? As well might man stretch forth his
puny arm to stop the Missouri river in its decreed course, or to turn it up
stream, as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon
the heads of the Latter-day Saints” (D&C 121:33).
It has been fifty-nine years since I
sat on that cliff on that tiny speck of an island in the Pacific Ocean and
decided to be a teacher. I knew then that a teacher would not be rewarded with
wealth; the reward is more lasting.
During those years, whole nations
have been born and died as the evil one has worked his will. I have seen the
borders of Zion enlarged to cover the whole earth (see D&C 82:14; 107:74).
I do not know now any more surely
that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, the Only Begotten of the Father, than
I did then as a soldier boy sitting on the cliff on that tiny speck of an
island. There is one difference—now I know the Lord.
I bear witness of Him and invoke His
blessings upon you who teach, as fathers and mothers, as grandfathers and
grandmothers, upon your families, upon your classes, upon your work. I bless
you that His power and inspiration will follow you in such a way that those who
come within your influence will have that protective testimony born within
them. I invoke this blessing upon you as a servant of the Lord and in the name
of Jesus Christ, amen.
