The Time Shall Come

This entry is part of my general conference application series.

The Time Shall Come, by L. Whitney Clayton
Of the Presidency of the Seventy


I enjoyed the account of a then-young Elder Clayton (as a missionary) wondering about the interior of the Government Palace as he tried to teach people in the plaza outside. Later, he toured the interior if that very building as a representative of the Church, and his "young missionary wonderings about the palace were fulfilled in a way that [he] would never have dreamed possible."

I don't have experiences of wanting to go inside of palatial buildings as a representative of the Lord from my mission to Idaho, but I did think about and ponder some of the accounts that Elder Clayton shared as he recounted the impressive growth of the Church. Before interpreting King Nebuchadnezzar's impressive and revelatory dream about the gospel filling the whole earth, Daniel testified:

There is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days (Dan. 2:28).

More often, though, I would think about the experience that Wilford Woodruff recounted from 1934 where Joseph smith, a modern prophet, testified:

I want to say to you before the Lord, that you know no more concerning the destinies of this Church and kingdom than a babe upon its mother’s lap. You don’t comprehend it. . . It is only a little handfull of Priesthood you see here tonight, but this Church will fill North and South America—it will fill the world.

Hearing of growth is exciting. Being an active participant in that growth is even better! After telling of the growth of the Church in South America, Elder Clayton said, "Every year the Church spreads farther and farther across the globe."

I'm often lean to the side of the visual learners, so here are two videos that help me get excited about the growth of the Church:

This one was done by the Church and shows Church growth by stake through time. (It uses the creation of new stakes to illustrate the growing Kingdom of God.)

I made this one after seeing the previous one using stakes; it shows the same growth, but as a function of the number of temples.

Can you feel the excitement of this fantastic growth? My family has moved across the country a couple of times, and we've seen varying degrees of establishment of the Church. We went from Utah where it felt like members of the Church were a majority—many of which were lifelong members, to Texas where there were more recent converts and Church members were noticeably fewer and farther between, to Florida where it seems that the majority of Church members were not raised as Church members.

I'm not satisfied, though. I want to see even more growth!

I just need to work on having the courage to be more active in pushing that stone that King Nebuchadnezzer dreamed of around the world!