The phrase “A House unto My Name” is easy to connect to the Temple. But section 124 isn’t just about building a temple — in 1841 the Kirtland Temple is far away from the bulk of Church members and the Nauvoo Temple has only recently had its groundbreaking. Instead, we might think of house in this case as a goal, and as more of a home instead of a building. In 1841 Nauvoo is just beginning to become a new home, a ‘house’ for the Saints under construction, a place not only for His house, but also a home for all Saints.

This home was meant to be for all those who sought righteousness. A home for the Saints, because of the nature of being a Saint, is meant to attract those who are righteous. But it also must be welcoming to all those who seek it. On this earth it is not possible to distinguish between those who are seeking righteousness and those who are not, so all must be welcome. And this means that the Saints need guidance for how to act and how to welcome and how to help others.

 

I can invite others to come unto Christ.

One of our major responsibilities as Latter-day Saints is to invite others to come unto Christ. How we make this invitation is an important issue. We often think of this as missionary work — but the invitation is more than simply approaching people to ask them to join. It starts with how we present ourselves, how we look like something that the righteous would want.

It’s this presentation that William W. Phelps, one of our most dynamic and prolific early poets, presents in the following poem. This poem was included in the first LDS hymnal prepared by Emma Smith, and remained in our hymnals for decades afterwards.

 

There’s a feast of fat things for the righteous preparing

by W. W. Phelps

There’s a feast of fat things for the righteous preparing,

That the good of this world all the saints may be sharing;

For the harvest is ripe, and the reapers have learn’d

To gather the wheat, that the tares may be burn’d.

Come to the supper—come to the supper—

Come to the supper of the great Bridegroom.

Go forth all ye servants unto every nation,

And lift up your voices and make proclamation,

For to cease from all evil, and leave off all mirth,

For the Savior is coming to reign on the earth.

Go set forth the judgments to come, and the sorrow,

For after to-day, O there cometh tomorrow,

When the wicked, ungodly, rebellious, and proud,

Shall be burnt up as stubble—O cry it aloud!

Go pass throughout Europe, and Asia’s dark regions,

To China’s far shores, and to Afric’s black legions,

And proclaim to all people, as you’re passing by,

The fig-trees are leaving—the summer is nigh.

Go call on the great men of fame and of power,

The king on his throne, and the brave in his tower,

And inform them all kingdoms must fail but the one,

As clear as the moon and as fair as the sun.

Go cry to all quarters, and then to the islands,

To Gentiles and Jews, and proclaim to the heathens,

And exclaim to old Israel in every land,

Repent ye!—the kingdom of heaven’s at hand.

Go carry glad tidings, that none need doubt whether

The lamb and the lion shall lie down together:

For the venom will cease, when the devil is bound,

And peace like a river, extend the world round.

Go publish the gospel, the truth of the Savior,

That the poor and the meek may begin to find favor,

And rejoice in their coming Redeemer and friend;

And lo! he is with you henceforth to the end.

O go and invite them, regardless of trouble,

The rich and the learned, the wise and the noble,

That the guests may be ready, (when Jesus shall come,)

To welcome forever, the holy Bridegroom.

Go gather the willing, and push them together,

Yea, push them to Zion (the saints’ rest forever,)

Where the best that the heavens and earth can afford,

Will grace the great marriage and feast of the Lord.

Go welcome his people, let nothing preclude you,

Come Joseph, and Simeon, and Reuben, and Judah.

Come Napthali, Issachar, Levi and Dan,

Gad, Zebulon, Asher, and come Benjamin.

Be faithful and just to the end of your calling,

Till Bab’lon the great—she is fallen! is fallen!

Then return and receive the just servants’ reward,

And sit down to the feast of the house of the Lord.

Come to the supper—come to the supper—

Come to the supper WITH the great Bridegroom.

1835

 

I can be a disciple whom the Lord trusts.

To present this invitation well, Missionaries should seek the trust of the Lord. This is not easy to do—it’s easy to struggle with feeling confident and with having the courage to face and talk to others. Despite the support of family, friends and fellow missionaries, feelings of inadequacy and even despair are not uncommon, as anyone who has served a mission knows.

Early in his mission, Clifford Oviatt penned the following lines about his struggles. Oviatt served in the Texas-Louisiana mission in 1939 before returning to his home in Alberta, Canada in 1941, when he married. He was one of our LDS cowboy-poets, although the following doesn’t seem to have much cowboy in it.

 

Two Months a Missionary

by Clifford L. Oviatt

Memory lingers as a hangman

Over all my thoughts so kind,

As I think of happy faces,

And of friends I left behind;

As I hold my pen it trembles:

In my throat, there’s something swells

Which I cannot seem to swallow,

And o’er my eyes a dimness wells.

When I think of all the kind hands,

Firm and ready, there to guide,

As I staggered down life’s roadway

There to help me at my side.

I was blind and young and reckless,

Thinking naught but of myself.

How did they keep hoping, praying,

That some day I’d find the path?

In my prayers I ask for courage,

Ask for faith and strength and time,

That the Lord will bless my labors

In this work here, so sublime:

So that I may be found worthy

Of the trust that’s placed in me,

That with them I may be always

Throughout all eternity.

1940

 

The Lord wants me to welcome and accept others.

One of the biggest disconnects in LDS culture today may be between missionaries and the members of some congregations. Where the missionaries are welcoming of everyone, talking to anyone interested, the members are too often not accepting and welcoming of those the missionaries bring to their meetings. If Elder Gong needed to suggest to us that “no one sits alone”, then doesn’t that indicate that we sometimes have a problem?

Being welcoming of everyone can be hard—it often means trying to connect with those who are not like us at all, or whose personal mannerisms or habits we find off-putting. But in the following poem Joseph H. Ward suggests that a responsibility of the angels in heaven is welcoming everyone. Ward was a relative of the noted preacher Henry Ward and of his sister Julia Ward Howe (author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic) and a veteran of the US civil war. In 1872 he joined the LDS Church and moved to Utah, before publishing his collection of poems, “Ballads of Life” in 1886.

 

Evermore

By Joseph H. Ward

I BEHELD a golden portal in the visions of my slumber,

And through it streamed the radiance of a never-setting day,

While the angels tall and beautiful, and countless without number,

Were giving gladsome greeting, to all who came that way;

And the gates, forever swinging, made no grating, no harsh ringing,

But melodious as the singing of one that we adore.

And I heard a chorus swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling,

And the burden of that chorus was Hope’s glad word “Evermore.”’

 

And as I gazed and listened came a slave all worn and weary,

His fetter links blood-crusted, his dark brow clammy, damp;

His sunken eyes gleamed wildly, telling tales of horror dreary,

Of toilsome struggles through the night amid the fever swamp.

Ere the eye had time for winking, ere the mind had time for thinking,

An angel raised the sinking wretch and off his fetters tore.

Then I heard the chorus swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling,

“Pass, brother, through our portal, thou’rt a freeman evermore.”

 

And as I gazed and listened, came a mother wildly weeping:

“I have lost my hopes forever; one by one they went away;

My children and their father, the cold grave hath in keeping,

Life is but lamentation, I know not night nor day!”

Then the angel softly speaking: “Stay sister, stay thy shrieking;

Thou shalt find those thou art seeking, beyond that golden door.”

Then I heard the chorus swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling:

“Thy children and their father shall be with thee evermore.”

 

And as I gazed and listened came one whom desolation,

Had driven like a helmless bark from infancy’s bright land;

Who ne’er had met a kindly look — poor outcast of creation,

Who never heard a kindly word, nor grasped a kindly hand.

“Enter in; no longer fear thee; myriad friends are there to cheer thee;

Friends always to be near thee—there no sorrow sad and sore!”

Then I heard the chorus swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling,

“Enter, brother, thine are friendship, love and gladness evermore.”

 

And as I gazed and listened came a cold, blue-footed maiden,

With cheeks of ashen whiteness, eyes filled with lurid light;

Her body bent with sickness, her lone heart heavy laden —

Her home had been the roofless street, her day had been the night.

First wept the angel sadly, then smiled the angel gladly,

And caught the maiden madly rushing from the golden door;

Then I heard the chorus swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling:

“Enter, sister, pure thou shalt be, and redeemed for evermore!”

 

I saw the toiler enter, to rest for aye from labor,

The weary-hearted exile there found his native land;

The beggar there could greet the king as an equal and a neighbor,

The crown had left the kingly brow, the staff the beggar’s hand;

And the gate, forever swinging, made no grating, no harsh ringing,

But melodious as the singing of one that we adore;

And the chorus still was swelling, grand beyond a mortal’s telling,

While the vision faded from me, with the glad word, “Evermore.”

1886

 

We build temples unto the Lord to receive sacred ordinances.

We might see the Temple as not only “The House of the Lord”, but also as a place where we welcome those who have passed on into the Kingdom of God. We do not pass any judgment—no one verifies how righteous was the life of those who are receiving proxy baptism or any other ordinance in the Temple. Instead, we perform the ordinances for all, perhaps insulated by death and distance in time—often not knowing enough to have any opinion about their “worthiness” for the ordinances. That may not be as welcoming as the Angels that Joseph Ward describes above, but it is certainly a kind of welcoming.

In the following poem, Ellen Adair sees this kind of welcoming in temple work.

 

Temple Work

by Ellen Adair

What of the dead who, passing on,

Live not in Christ, but fall.

Shall not the circle be complete,

No kindred ties at all?

Not so! our Father is so kind

He sent Elijah down

To tell our modern prophet

That the dead might win their crown.

So in His mighty wisdom

He bade men choose a place

Whereon to build a house of God

And there redeem the race!

A precious boon, where wondrous love —

Our dead — in life denied —

Can gain this blessing for mankind

Receive the heritage of truth

And thus be sanctified.

I’ve heard of gifted singers

Who labor but for fame.

Bedecked in costly jewels

While the world applauds their name.

Give me a robe of white.

No jewels would I wear.

Save redeemed souls of men.

Rich? Aye, beyond compare!

Our Savior on Mount Zion

Permits us share the sacred shrine,

Accepts our humble labors,

All glory shall be thine!

If we but help the weakest soul

To rise and worship thee.

To see and understand the truth

How glorified we’ll be.

1920

 

The Lord blesses people who strive to obey His commandments.

What kind of home we have makes a difference, of course. Zion, the kind of home we are talking about, the home we find in the House of the Lord, requires those who live there to find ways of living in harmony and righteousness. That means those who live there should ‘strive to obey His commandments.’ And what blessing comes from living in this kind of Zion? Peace.

Sarah Mitton’s poetry appeared frequently in LDS periodicals in the first half of the 20th century and Mitton was prominent in the Relief Society. Sadly, I haven’t been able to find out much about her life—she never married and the information on Family Search is sparse.

 

The Lord Will Bless His People

by Sarah E. Mitton

The Lord will bless his people,

If they but seek his face;

If they will trust his promise,

And heed his love and grace.

The God who rules the heavens,

Who bids the winds be still,

Will bless his chosen people,

If they will do his will.

 

He’ll open heaven’s windows,

And send the cooling rain;

Thus crowning earth with blessings

More than she can contain.

Then ever trust his promise,

Each word he will fulfil,

If we but love and serve him

And do his holy will.

 

God guides the flying ravens,

Supports the fainting flower,

Our safety is to trust him

To guide us hour by hour.

He made the grassy pastures,

Each blade grows at his will;

Life’s aim should be to serve him

And do his holy will.

 

What worth are we, if from us

PHis arm he take away?

How quickly would we crumble,

And join earth’s vast decay!

He is our constant helper;

He bids our fears be still;

We’re obligated to him;

Then, strive to do his will.

1914

 

The Lord can guide me through my patriarchal blessing.

Just like the Saints in 1841, we are trying to build a new home that will also serve as a ‘house unto my name.’ As counsel specific to each of us, patriarchal blessings provide a unique kind of help for creating and maintaining a home that is a kind of house for God to dwell in. By thoughtfully applying the counsel in these blessings, we can come closer to establishing a home that is both righteous and welcoming to others.

The following poem is  Eliza R. Snow’s elegy on the death of the LDS Church’s first patriarch, Joseph Smith Sr., in 1840.

 

Elegy

by Eliza R. Snow

Zions noblest sons are weeping;

See her daughter, bathed in tears,

Where the Patriarch is sleeping.

Nature’s sleep—the sleep of years.

Hush’d is every note of gladness—

Ev’ry minstrels bow’s full low—

Ev’ry heart, is tun’d to sadness—

Ev’ry bosom feels the blow.

 

Zion’s children lov’d him dearly;

Zion was his daily care:

That his loss is felt sincerely,

Thousand weeping saints declare;

Thousands, who shar’d his blessing

Thousands, whom his service bless’d,

By his faith and pray’rs suppressing

Evils, which their lives opprest.

 

Faith and works, most sweetly blessed,

Prov’d his steadfast heart sincere;

And the power of God, attended

His official labors, here,

Long, he stem’d the powers of darkness,

Like an anchor in the flood:

Like an oak amid the tempest,

Bold, and fearlessly he stood.

 

Years have witnessed his devotions,

By the love of God inspired:

When his spirit’s pure emotions,

Ware [where] with holy ardour fir’d.

Oft, he wept for suff’ring Zion—

All her sorrows were his own:

When she pass’d thro’ grievous trials,

Her oppressions weigh’d down.

 

Now he’s gone; We’d not recall him

From a paradise of bliss,

Where no evil can befall him;

To a changing world like this.

His lov’d name, will never perish,

Nor his mem’ry crown the dust;

For the saints of God will cherish

The remembrance of the JUST.

 

Faith’s sweet voice of consolation,

Soothes our grief: His spirit’s flown

Upward, to a holier station,

Nearer the celestial throne;

There to plead the cause of Zion,

In the council of the JUST—

In the court, the saints rely on,

Pending causes to ADJUST.

 

Though his earthly part is sleeping

Lowly, ‘neath the prairie sod;

Soon the grave will yield its keeping—

Yield to life, the man of God.

When the heav’ns and earth are shaken—

When all things shall be restored—

When the trump of God shall waken

Those that sleep in Christ the Lord.

1840