Dec 19th Sunday I met with the Twelve in the
morning & held a council, & in the evening I met
at the Seer & herd a deliverd by
Elder who opened by prayer read a chapter
in the & spake as he was led by the
Spirit of God. he spake of the parable of
of the clay in the hands of the potter: That when
it marreded in the hands of the potter it was
laid aside to go into the next batch & was a vessel of
dishonour but all clay that formed well in the
hands of the potter & was pliable was a vessel of
honour & thus it was with the human family &
ever will be. All that are pliable in the & are obedient to the commands of God are
vessels of honousr & God will receive them [Jeremiah 18:1-6]
Joseph the Seer said the above was a true explai-
nation of the parable
(After had occupied
the meeting a season) Joseph the Seer arose & read a
chapter in the containing the parable
of the vine & its branches & explained it much to our edif-
ication & said "if we kept the commandments of
God we should bring forth fruit & be the friends of
God & know what our Lord did [John 15]. "Some say Joseph is
a fallen Prophet because he does not bring forth more
of the word of the Lord" "why does he not do it
"are we able to receive it No (says he) not one in this
room. tHe then chastized us for orur wickedness
& unbelief knowing that whom the Lord loveth he
chasteneth & scourgeth evry son d& daughter whom
He receiveth & if we do not receive chastizements then
are we Bastards & not sons. [Hebrews 12:5-8] On Revelation He
said "A man would command his son to dig
potatoes, saddle his horse but before he had done
either tell him to do sumthing els. this is all considerd
right "But as soon as the Lord gives a command
ment & revokes that decree & commands sumthing
els then the prophet is considerd fallen &c"
Because we will not receive chastizment at the
hand of the Prophet & Apostles the Lord chast-
izeth us with sickness & death. Let not any man
publish his own righteousness for others can do that
for him." sooner let him confess his sins & then he
will be forgiven & he will bring forth more fruit
when A man is chastized he gets angry & will
not endure it. The reason we do not have the
secrets of the Lord revealed unto us is because
we do not keep them but reveal them. we do not
keep our own secrets but reveal our difficulties
to the world even to our enemies then how would
we keep the secrets of the Lord says I can
keep a secret till dooms day
He spoke of
love what greater love hath any man than that he
lay down his life for his friend [John 15:13] then why not
fight for our friend untill we die & many other
things of interest was spoken
Elder arose & said one thing lay with
wait on his mind ie that we should be prepared
to keep each commandment as it came from
the Lord by the mouth of the prophet & as the Lord
had commanded us to build a we
should do it spedily
