Gems from Elder Bruce R. McConkie

[JohnnyLingo]

Originally Posted by Elder McConkie

Heresy #4: There are those who believe that the doctrine of salvation for the dead offers men a second chance for salvation.

This is false, false, false. I know a man, now deceased, a non-member of the Church, who was a degenerate, old reprobate, who found pleasure, as he supposed, in living after the manner of the world. A cigarette dangled from his lips, alcohol strenched his breath, and profane and bawdy stories defiled his lips. His moral status left much to be desired. His wife was a member of the Church, as faithful as she could be under the circumstances. One day she said to him, "You know the Church is true; why don't you be baptized?" And he replied, "Of course I know the Church is true, but I have no intention of changing my habits in order to join it. I prefer to live the way I do. But that doesn't worry me in the slightest. I know that as soon as I die, you will have someone go to the temple and do the work for me and everything will come out all right in the end anyway." He died and she did [had the work done in the temple], and it was a total and complete waste of time.

There is no such thing as a second chance to gain salvation. This life is the time and the day of our probation. After this day of life, which is given us to prepare for eternity, "then cometh the night of darkness wherein there can be no labor performed." [Alma 34:33] For those who do not have an opportunity to believe and obey the holy word in this life, the first chance to gain salvation will come in the Spirit World. If those who hear the word for the first time in the realms ahead are the kind of people who would have accepted the gospel here, had the opportunity been afforded them, they will accept it there. Salvation for the dead is for those whose first chance to gain salvation is in the Spirit World.

Now, in the new revelation recently added to our canon of holy writ these words come:

"Thus came the voice of the Lord unto me, saying: All who have died without a knowledge of this gospel, who would have received it if they had been permitted to tarry, shall be heirs of the celestial kingdom of God;

"Also all that shall die henceforth without a knowledge of it, who would have received it with all their hearts, shall be heirs of that kingdom;

"For I, the Lord, will judge all men according to their works, according to the desire of their hearts." [D&C 137:7-9]

There is no other promise of salvation than the one recited in that revelation. Those who reject the gospel in this life and then receive it in the spirit world go not to the celestial, but to the terrestrial kingdom.

Oh, how I love that story. It's even better if you hear him say it on tape.


More to come!