Thursday, March 31, 2022

Gregory Stewart on the use of "Elias" to Denote a Forerunner

  

The name, or title, of “Elias” has been used to refer to many individuals through the scriptures. The Lord committed to “Elias” the key to of restoring all the things that the prophets spoke, from the beginning of the last days [D&C 27:5} . . .

 

Elias

 

Many presume that this Elias [in D&C 110] is the actual man who was named Elias, and is the first referenced in the scriptures. We don’t know much about him except that he lived during the time of Abraham, and he appeared in the Kirtland temple and restored keys to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery . . . It is curious to me that Elias came to commit the keys of the gospel of Abraham. Apparently, the keys of the gospel of Abraham weren’t held by Abraham, but by Elias. This is all we know via canonized scripture. Perhaps Abraham was this Elias who was sent to commit the keys of his gospel. Perhaps it was Noah sent as Elias, as it is believed that Noah’s and Abraham’s lifetimes overlapped, and as the angel Gabriel (Noah) is identified as Elias who appeared to Zacharias and Mary, the mother of Jesus. We just don’t know at this time. . . .

 

Another Elias Will Come in the Last Days

 

The holy scriptures testify that Jesus Christ will come again in the last days to usher in the millennial dispensation. Before he arrives, he will once again send an Elias before him to prepare the way before him.

 

JST Matthew 17:13-14

 

13 But I say unto you, Who is Elias? Behold, this is Elias, whom I send to prepare the way before me.

14 Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist, and also of another who should come to restore all things, as it is written by the prophets

 

Who is this Elias and why isn’t anyone talking about him? We have yet to see an Elias in the last days that will make bare the arm of the Lrod and will wield that spirit and power of Elias as Elias’s of past dispensations have.

 

We have to see Elias stand before the nations of the world and say “Repent . . . or else.” Then fight the battle of the saints, and destroy the wicked by fire.

 

2 Ne 30:10

 

10 For the time speedily cometh that the Lord God shall cause a great division among the people, and the wicked will he destroy; and he will spare his people, yea, even if it so be that he must destroy the wicked by fire.

 

Given the enormity of the mission placed on this last Elias, his works will eclipse the works of all Elias’s that came before him.

 

The Lord said that there was “another who should come and restore all things, as it is written by the prophets”. This last Elias will be the Last Seer of the Last Days, to restore all things, and he has been prophesied in our scriptures. His role to play prior to the second coming of Jesus Christ will be monumental, but nobody is talking about him. We find him among the verses of the standard works as he will live his life before the Lord declares him to the world—hidden. (Gregory Stewart, The Last Seer of the Last Days [2022], 1, 2, 10-11, comments in square brackets added for clarification, emphasis in original)

 

Further Reading

 

 “Elias” as a “forerunner” in LDS Scripture