Abraham would tell you, you should have read the
promise of God to him, Gen. xvii, 8, where God not only promised the land of
Canaan to his seed for an everlasting possession, but also to him. Then you
should have read the testimony of Stephen, Acts, vii, 5, by which you would
have ascertained that Abraham never had inherited the things promised, but was
still expecting to rise from the dead and be brought into the land of Canaan,
to inherit them. "Yes," says Ezekiel, "if you had read the
thirty-seventh chapter of my prophecies, you would have found a positive
promise, that God would open the graves of the whole house of Israel, who were
dead, and gather up their dry bones, and put them together, each to its own
proper place, and even clothe them again with flesh, sinews, and skin, and put
His Spirit in them, and they should live; and then, instead of being caught up
to heaven, they should be brought into the land of Canaan, which the Lord gave
them, and they should inherit it."
But, still astonished, you might turn to Job; and he,
surprised to find one unacquainted with so plain a subject, would exclaim:
"Did you never read my nineteenth chapter, from the twenty-third to the
twenty-seventh verses, where I declare, I wish my words were written in a book,
saying, that my Redeemer would stand on the earth in the latter-day; and that I
should see Him in the flesh, for myself, and not another; though worms should
destroy this body?" Even David, the sweet singer of Israel, would call to
your mind the thirty-seventh Psalm, where he repeatedly declares that the meek
shall inherit the earth forever, after the wicked are cut off from the face
thereof.
And last of all, to set the matter forever at rest,
the voice of the Savior would mildly fall upon your ear, in his sermon on the
mount, declaring emphatically: "Blessed are the meek, for they shall
inherit the earth." To these things you would answer: "I have read
these passages, to be sure, but was always taught to believe that they did not
mean so, therefore, I never understood them until now. Let me go and tell the
people what wonders have opened to my view, since my arrival in heaven, merely
from having heard one short song. It is true, I have heard much of the glories
of heaven described, while on earth, but never once thought of their rejoicing
in anticipation of returning to the earth." Says the Savior: "They
have Moses and the Prophets; if they will not believe them, neither would they
believe although one should rise from the dead." (Parley P. Pratt, A Voice of Warning [1837], 85-87)
