JOSEPH THE MAN

 

Joseph Smith once described himself as ‘a huge, rough stone rolling down from a high mountain; and the only polishing he got was when some corner got rubbed off by coming in contact with something else, striking with accelerated force against religious bigotry, priestcraft, lawyer-craft, doctor-craft, lying editors, suborned judges and jurors, and the authority of perjured executives, backed by mobs, blasphemers, licentious and corrupt men and women – all hell knocking off a corner here and a corner there……..

Thus, he said:  I will become a smooth and polished shaft in the quiver of the Almighty.”   (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p 304)

Persecuted from the age of 14, tarred and feathered, imprisoned, suffering personal tragedy and loss and betrayed by friends certainly made Joseph a polished arrow shaft in God’s quiver.

An arrow shaft is generally polished so that it can fly truer and faster for one’s most important shot. For God’s most important shot, being this last dispensation, He truly did use His most polished arrow shaft, the man Joseph Smith, who willingly rolled down the mountain…….

But what of the woman behind the man? Joseph could never have accomplished God’s purpose for him by the age of 38 had he not had a wife of equal spiritual stature as himself. Perhaps out of all the love tragedies, there is not one greater than that of Joseph and Emma Smith.

Joseph and Emma shared an unbreakable bond of faith. I am certain Emma was foreordained to share in the work that Joseph accomplished as the prophet of the Restoration. She trusted God and joined Joseph in the work despite all odds.

The differences between them were startling: she was rich, he was poor, she was well-educated and he was a farm boy with questionable sanity because of his claims. Her parents were opposed to the marriage but Emma was a woman of faith who made her choice which led her to great tragedy.

Emma was Joseph’s partner in every way. She was with him when he received the gold plates. She was his first scribe and she was deeply invested in their protection. The difficulties she suffered in her life with Joseph are too lengthy to list here. Her greatest tragedy is that she had 11 children, six of which died in infancy. All this by the age of 39 when she became a widow with five children.

When Parley P. Pratt visited Emma, 'a woman of commitment in sorrow', in Nauvoo where she remained after the saints travelled west, she told him 'I believe Joseph was everything he professed to be'.

Emma lived almost 35 years after the martyrdom of her prophet-husband. A few days before she died she told her nurse, Elizabeth Revel, that Joseph had come to her in a vision and said: "'Emma, come with me, it is time for you to come with me'.

As Emma related it, she said, 'I put on my bonnet and my shawl and went with him; I did not think that it was anything unusual. I went with him into a mansion, and he showed me through the different apartments of that beautiful mansion'. And one room was the nursery.

In that nursery was a babe in the cradle. She said, 'I knew my babe, my Don Carlos that was taken from me'. She sprang forward, caught the child up in her arms and wept with joy over the child. When Emma recovered herself sufficiently, she turned to Joseph and said, 'Joseph, where are the rest of my children?'

He said to her, 'Emma, be patient and you shall have all of your children'. Then she saw standing by his side a personage of light, even the Lord Jesus Christ." (Gracia N. Jones, My Great-Great-Grandmother, Emma Hale Smith, Ensign Aug 1992)

In my mind, Joseph was only half a polished shaft in the quiver of our God. The other half was Emma.

“Nevertheless, neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord”

-        1 Corinthians 11:11

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

(Art: But For A Small Moment by Liz Lemon Swindle)