Orson Pratt, in a sermon dated March 2, 1851, delivered on board
the Ellen Maria and recorded by George D. Watt said the following about
Moses’ appeasing God’s wrath in Exo 32-33 and, as a result, God changing His
mind:
The Lord continued on the mount.
But in the presence of all this power and glory, the children of Israel
gathered together their ear rings, and other jewels, and gold, and melted it
together and fashioned it in [the] manner of [a] calf, after [which] they fell
down and worshiped it, and said: This be thy gods, O Israel, that brought thee
up [out of the] land of Egypt. There [was] the glory of God upon the mount,
they could behold it, and yet in the face and eyes of this, they fell down and
worshiped a golden calf, and called it their god. Now, if the Lord had not been
a long suffering Being, what [would he have] done on that occasion? Why, his
anger [would have] waxed hot, [and they] would have [been] swept off, the whole
of them, that fell unto this idolatry. [He is a] jealous God; when he sees the
people worship [an]other being, [he] feels angry with them. He was angry with ‘em,
and intended to destroy them: Let me alone, [that I] may destroy them. [He]
said to Moses [that] he would spare him, and raise up of his seed a great
nation [that] would serve [him]. He did not like to have it, so he pled with
the Lord that he would not suffer his anger to burn against his people, [that
he would] remember them for his covenant sake. The Lord was entreated by Moses,
although he sent upon them a severe affection, because of their idolatry. (Liverpool
to Great Lake City: The 1851 Journal of Missionary George D. Watt, ed.
LaJean Purcell Carruth and Ronald G. Watt [Lincoln, Nebr.: University of
Nebraska Press, 2022], 131-32)
Elsewhere in this sermon, commenting on D&C 103:16 (“Therefore,
I will raise up unto my people a man, who shall lead them like as Moses led the
children of Israel”), Orson expects another prophetic figure who will mediate
for God’s people in a way similar to Moses on Exo 32-33:
[Even] if we are ever so pure, we
do not know: in time to come, we may be placed in circumstances somewhat similar
[to] that children [of] Israel were. We have reason to expect this, because the
Lord has revealed this to us in revelations given through the Prophet Joseph,
[in the] Book [of] Covenants, that he intended to lead this people as he led
them in ancient times. He says, in [a] revelation given in 1834: I will raise
up a Moses, and that he would deliver his church in the last days from bondage
and oppression, as he delivered his people in ancient times. The Lord did not
say that Joseph Smith was [the] one he speaks of. One in future: I will raise
up one like a Moses etc. Would this be one not known to us, when it will indeed
come to pass? When it does, let us all be prepared to remember what took place
when the Lord redeemed Israel in ancient times, by meditating while in our afflictions,
or any circumstances whatever, that when the day shall come, we may not fall as
they fell in ancient times. (Ibid., 133-34)
