The Gift of Eternal Life

All of the gifts of God are supernal, surpassing any gifts we might exchange on earth. Still, one gift surpasses all the rest. This ultimate gift is called by the Lord Himself “the greatest of all the gifts of God” (D&C 14:7; see also 1 Nephi 15:36). In fact, this gift encompasses the rest of God’s gifts because it is the central purpose of the plan of happiness. This gift is the gift of eternal life, which is the central purpose of the plan of happiness.

Eternal life means knowing the Father and the Son and becoming one with them (see John 17:3, 21). It means dwelling in God’s presence as an eternal family in eternal glory (see D&C 130:2). It means becoming even as God is and receiving all that He has—“glory, and salvation, and honor, and immortality, and eternal life; kingdoms, principalities, and powers!” (D&C 128:23). It means becoming kings and queens, priests and priestesses—serving under the direction of our Father in Heaven to accomplish His work and glory, namely, “to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man” (Moses 1:39).

Eternal life means much more than living forever, for the Lord calls that state “immortality,” a gift freely given to all people through the magnificent power of the Resurrection. Eternal life, however, is “the greatest of all the gifts of God,” writes Elder McConkie, “for it is the kind, status, type, and quality of life that God himself enjoys. Thus those who gain eternal life receive exaltation; they are sons of God, joint-heirs with Christ, members of the Church of the Firstborn; they overcome all things, have all power, and receive the fulness of the Father.”[i]

Philo Dibble described Joseph Smith Jr. and Sidney Rigdon as they receive the Vision, now recorded as section 76 of the Doctrine and Covenants.

A Vision of Our Eternal Potential

On February 16, 1832, the Father opened the heavens to the Prophet Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon, who saw a vision while other eyewitnesses were present, including my ancestor Philo Dibble. The account, now canonized as Doctrine and Covenants section 76, states that those who receive eternal life will be called “the church of the Firstborn. They are they into whose hands the Father has given all things—they are they who are priests and kings, who have received of his fulness, and of his glory; and are priests of the Most High, after the order of Melchizedek, which was after the order of Enoch, which was after the order of the Only Begotten Son. Wherefore, as it is written, they are gods, even the sons of God—wherefore, all things are theirs, whether life or death, or things present, or things to come, all are theirs and they are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s” (D&C 76:54–59).

This is deep doctrine, which the Prophet Joseph Smith shared with a congregation gathered at King Follett’s funeral in Nauvoo: “Here, then, is eternal life—to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all gods have done before you, namely, by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.”[ii]As with any child, we have the potential to become like our parents.

I love these inspired words of Christian writer C. S. Lewis, who wrote of our eternal potential: “It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would strongly be tempted to worship. . . . It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.”[iii]

The Fulness of the Father

Eternal life means becoming a joint-heir with Christ. The Savior says in John 14:2, “In my Father’s kingdom are many mansions. . . . I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:2). Commenting on this verse, the Prophet Joseph Smith says it ought to read like this: “‘In my Father’s kingdom are many kingdoms,’ in order that ye may be heirs of God and joint-heirs with me.”[iv]

It is significant that even Jesus Christ, the Son of God, needed the gift of grace to receive of the fulness of the Father’s glory, for “he received not of the fulness at the first, but received grace for grace” (D&C 92:13). In essence, we offer to the Father our gift (our free will, or agency) for His divine gift (the enabling, exalting power of grace). We read that Jesus continued “from grace to grace, until He received a fulness” (D&C 92:13). As Latter-day Saints, we understand the concept of receiving the fulness to mean becoming like the Father and receiving His glory. We rejoice that this marvelous promise extends to us as well. In our own humble way, if we will keep the Father’s commandments, we grow each day, receiving “grace for grace” and eventually “of his fulness,” becoming glorified in the Son as the Son is in the Father (see D&C 93:20). By growing in faith, repenting of our sins, and freely offering our gift of agency to obey God, we become a little our Savior each day. “As many as believe in his name,” says John, shall receive of his fulness. And of his fulness have all we received, even immortality and eternal life, through his grace” (Joseph Smith Translation, John 1:16, Bible appendix).

We receive of the Father’s fulness as we grow from grace to grace—exercising faith in Christ, accepting baptism by immersion for the remission of our sins, receiviving the gift of the Holy Ghost and obeying His promptings, then living up to our temple covenants.

Patience in the Journey

Sometimes we are discouraged by our slow progress on our journey home. The Prophet offered the early Saints a sense of how long this journey will take. “When you climb up a ladder,” he says, “you must begin at the bottom, and ascend step by step, until you arrive at the top, and so it is with the principles of the gospel—you must begin with the first, and go on until you learn all the principles of exaltation. But it will be a great while after you have passed through the veil before you will have learned them. It is not all to be comprehended in this world; it will be a great work to learn our salvation and exaltation even beyond the grave.”[v]

Elder David A. Bednar added, “We will not attain a state of perfection in this life, but we can and should press forward with faith in Christ along the strait and narrow path and make steady progress toward our eternal destiny.”[vi] In other words, the direction we are traveling, not the speed, is what matters most.

We take hope, of course, in the small and steady incremental progress we make during our earthly sojourn. For example, think of a newborn infant. She can do very little but eat, cry, and mess her diaper. But then she grows up and increases in wisdom and knowledge, becoming at first a young woman and then perhaps a wife and mother. In the span of a few mortal years—the blink of an eye to our Father—this infant has become a mature and contributing woman.

With this eternal view, we hope that we can be transformed through the power of Christ into what our Maker intends for us. Regarding this process, President John Taylor wrote, “It is for the exaltation of man to this state of superior intelligence and Godhead that the mediation and atonement of Jesus Christ is instituted; and that noble being, man, made in the image of God, is rendered capable not only of being a son of man, but also a son of God, . . . and is rendered capable of becoming a God, possessing the power, the majesty, the exaltation and the position of a God. As it is written, “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” [1 John 3:2.]”[vii]

Hope Offered in Holy Temples

This eternal perspective of our divine potential as children of God comes to us not only in the scriptures and the writings of modern prophets but also in holy temples. There we covenant to forsake sin and remain unspotted from the world. There we receive promises of our divine potential, that we may rule and reign under our Father’s direction if we are faithful to our covenants. There we seek the peace of the Spirit and find quiet dignity to face the challenges of life.

I love this beautiful promise of the peace that comes with regular temple worship: “A temple is a retreat from the vicissitudes of life, a place of prayer and meditation providing an opportunity to receive inner peace, inspiration, guidance, and, frequently, solutions to the problems that vex our daily lives.”[viii] I testify that this is true.

For these reasons and many more, President Howard W. Hunter inspired us to “be a temple-attending and a temple-loving people,” adding, “We should hasten to the temple as frequently, yet prudently, as our personal circumstances allow. . . . As we attend the temple, we learn more richly and deeply the purpose of life and the significance of the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us make the temple, with temple worship and temple covenants and temple marriage, our ultimate earthly goal and the supreme mortal experience.” The temple truly is the pinnacle of our earthly experience, and there we receive our greatest assurance of our eternal potential as children of God. 

How grateful we are for the promise of eternal life! The assurance of this promise is the Holy Ghost, who comforts us as we press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope and a love of God and of all mankind (see 2 Nephi 32:20).

Notes

---

[i] Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1996), 237.

[ii] Joseph Smith, comp., History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 6:306.

[iii] C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (New York: HarperCollins, 2001), 14–15.

[iv] Smith, History of the Church, 6:365.

[v] Smith, History of the Church, 6:306–7.

[vi] David A. Bednar, “Clean Hands and a Pure Heart,” Ensign, November 2007, 82.

[vii] John Taylor, The Mediation and Atonement (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1892), 140–41.

[viii] Franklin D. Richards, “Happiness and Joy in Temple Work,” Ensign, November 1986, 70.

Henry Wells Jackson, Mormon Battalion and Civil War Veteran

Statue at San Diego Mormon Battalion Historic Site

Henry Wells Jackson was a wandering Mormon hero who was motivated by duty to God, country, and family. His life was marked by many significant firsts.[1] He was among the first to march west to California in the Mormon Battalion, the first U.S. military unit based on religious affiliation. He was among the first to pan for gold only weeks after its discovery at Sutter’s sawmill. He served in Utah’s early territorial militia and mail service between Utah and California. Years later, he was commissioned a Union lieutenant in the Civil War and was shot by Confederates while leading an assault on a railroad bridge, becoming the first Latter-day Saint known to be killed in an American national war. He was the Civil War’s first and only battle fatality from Utah.[2] This essay will focus on his service in the Mormon Battalion and then reenlistment in the Mormon Volunteers. An expanded version will be delivered at the Mormon History Association's annual meeting in San Antonio, Texas, on June 6, 2014. This year marks 150 years since Lt. Jackson's death.

Captain James Allen

Mormon Battalion Service

On July 1, 1846, at Council Bluffs, Iowa, Captain James Allen of the U.S. Army met with Brigham Young to recruit five hundred Mormon men to march west to California in support of the war against Mexico.[3] Some twelve thousand Latter-day Saints were scattered across Iowa, and initially many of the potential recruits fiercely opposed serving a federal government that had forsaken them. They had been expelled first from Missouri and then Illinois.

John Steele recorded his strong opposition to fighting for the United States: “I will see them in hell before I will fire one shot against a foreigner for . . . those who have mobbed, robbed, plundered and destroyed us all the day long and now seek to enslave us to fight for them.”[4]

  

President Young, however, saw providence in this offer. Months earlier he had sent his nephew Jesse C. Little to the nation’s capital to seek financial opportunities for emigration, charging him, “as a wise and faithful man, [to] take every honorable advantage of the times you can.”[5] At the encouragement of non-Mormon advocate Thomas L. Kane,[6] Little wrote to President James K. Polk on June 1, explaining the Saints’ intent to go west and hinting that they wanted to remain loyal to the United States but might look for help from foreign governments. President Polk wanted to maintain the balance of power in California and authorized Colonel Stephen W. Kearny to form a battalion to march to California.[7]

President Young urged the men to enlist and donate their funds to help the Saints move west. One recruit, Daniel B. Rawson, recorded his change of heart: “I felt indignant toward the Government that had suffered me to be raided and driven from my home. . . . I would not enlist. [Then] we met President Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball and [Willard] Richards . . . calling for recruits. They said the salvation of Israel depended upon the raising of the army. When I heard this my mind changed. I felt that it was my duty to go.”[8] Nineteen-year-old convert Henry Wells Jackson also heeded the call to serve and consecrated his earnings. He enlisted as a fife player in Company D along with Rawson and the newly softened Steele.[9]

 

Henry likely viewed this military service as a grand adventure.That sense of adventure must have worn thin, however, as the footsore battalion marched some nineteen hundred miles through the deserts of the Southwest—from Council Bluffs to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas Territory; to Santa Fe, New Mexico. The journey was arduous. Three sick detachments traveled north to Pueblo, Colorado. Meanwhile, often marching without enough food and water, the rest of the battalion created a wagon road from Santa Fe to the Pima Indian villages in Arizona.

Wagon road through Box Canyon, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.

Courtesy of Mike Stangeman.

Final Approach to San Diego

Sgt. Daniel Tyler recorded the difficult final approach to the San Diego area in the Anzo-Borrego region: “We here found the heaviest sand, hottest days and coldest nights, with no water and but little food. . . . At the time the men were nearly barefooted; some used, instead of shoes, rawhide wrapped around their feet, while others improvised a novel style of boots by stripping the skin from the leg of an ox. . . . Others wrapped cast-off clothing around their feet.”[10] 

On January 19, 1847, Box Canyon had to be widened so the wagons could pass. Tyler recorded: “As we traveled up the dry bed, the chasm became more contracted until we found ourselves in a passage at least a foot narrower than our wagons. Nearly all of our road tools, such as picks, shovels, spades, etc., had been lost in the boat disaster [at Yuma, Arizona]. The principal ones remaining were a few axes, . . . a small crow bar, and perhaps a spade or two. These were brought into requisition, the commander [Philip St. George Cooke] taking an ax and assisting the pioneers.”[11]

Philip St. George Cooke

On January 27, the battalion boys cheered when they saw the Pacific.[12] Their long march ended on January 29, and they camped about five miles north of San Diego. The day after arriving, Lt. Col. Philip St. George Cooke praised their endurance: “History may be searched in vain for an equal march of infantry. . . . With crowbar and pick and ax in hand we have worked our way over mountains which seemed to defy aught save the wild goat, and hewed a passage through a chasm of living rock more narrow than our wagons.”[13] His remarks were “cheered heartily.”[14] Through their hardships, they had formed a wagon road to the Pacific and helped define the southern boundary of the United States.[15]  

Flag Raising at Fort Moore, Los Angeles, July 4, 1847

Peacekeeping and Construction

For the next five months in southern California, they performed occupation duties. They served as a reliable unit to block John C. Frémont’s unauthorized bid to control California. They built Fort Moore in Los Angeles and managed to complete it in time to celebrate California's first Fourth of July celebration.[16] Toward the end of their service, the U.S. Army desperately sought their reenlistment to provide military stability. Chief among those recruiters was their latest commanding officer, Colonel Jonathan D. Stevenson, who delivered a flattering speech on June 22. Robert Bliss summarized the speech in his journal: “Gave us the praise of being the best company in the Southern Division of California; the most intelligent & correct Soldiers. Said we were universally esteemed & respected by the inhabitants & in Short we had done more for California than any other people.”[17] 

The Mormon Volunteers in San Diego

The battalion was mustered out in Los Angeles on July 16, 1847. Henry was among eighty-one Mormons who reenlisted as a company of Mormon Volunteers and served eight more months.[18] He had no family on the way to Utah, so he likely reenlisted to earn more money and continue providing military stability. Many of those who reenlisted were either unmarried or reenlisted for financial reasons. The Mormon Volunteers reenlisted only on condition that they be discharged by March 1848, allowing time to plant crops in the Salt Lake Valley, and that they be furnished with pay and rations for their trek.[19]

 

Replica uniform of Seventh New York Regiment of Volunteers. Courtesy of Paul A. Hoffman.

Most of this ragged little company, including Henry, began serving in San Diego, where they were newly attired in uniforms belonging to the Seventh New York Regiment of Volunteers.[20] With Captain Daniel C. Davis in command, one of their first duties was to remodel the leaky pueblo barracks. They also helped keep the peace and constructed a brick courthouse. Col. Richard B. Mason, acting military governor of California, offered high praise: “Of their services . . . , of their patience, subordination, and general good conduct, you have already heard, and I take great pleasure in adding, that, as a body of men, they have religiously respected the rights and feelings of these conquered people, and not a syllable of complaint has reached my ears of a single insult offered, or outrage done, by a Mormon volunteer.”[21] Although a few of the men were dishonest, the battalion's overall service was exemplary.

Reconstructed Sutter's sawmill and millrace

During this period of service, several battalion boys traveled northward to work for John Sutter, digging the millrace where gold was discovered on January 24, 1848. Less than two months later, on March 14, the Mormon Volunteers disbanded, and Henry joined the battalion boys at nearby Mormon Island (now under Folsom Lake), where he panned for gold for about a year. He and many other battalion members made substantial deposits in the Utah gold account, an important resource to back the early Utah currency.[22] Historian Kenneth N. Owens concludes that “without the 1848 gold discovery and the rush for riches that followed, the development of the LDS church and community in the Great Basin must certainly have taken an alternative course. The difficult economic challenges the Saints faced in their valley in the mountains would have intensified.”[23] 

Early Mormon currency

As Brigham Young predicted two years earlier, the Mormon Battalion became “the salvation of Israel.” They consecrated money that helped the emigrating Saints. They created important roads that paved the way for future settlement of the Southwest. They helped stabilize California. They deposited gold that shored up Utah's fledgling economy. And they become confident frontiersman who helped colonize the western United States.

Notes

---

[1] Henry Wells Jackson was born in Chemung, Chemung County, New York, on March 10, 1827, to William Jackson (1787–1869) and Mary Troy (1795–1838). Henry and his brother James joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in New York and moved to Nauvoo, Illinois.

[2] Henry Wells Jackson’s life story is briefly summarized in Robert C. Freeman, “Latter-day Saints in the Civil War,” in Civil War Saints, ed. Kenneth L. Alford (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2012), 280–81.

[3] The causes of the war and the Mormon Battalion’s involvement are detailed in Sherman L. Fleek, History May Be Searched in Vain: A Military History of the Mormon Battalion (Spokane, WA: Arthur H. Clark, 2006).

[4] John Steele, “Extracts from the Journal of John Steele,” Utah Historical Quarterly 6, no. 1 (1933): 6–7, in Fleek, History May Be Searched in Vain, 54.

[5] Jesse C. Little’s report as cited in B. H. Roberts, A Comprehensive History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1930), 3:67.

[6] On May 13, 1846, Kane attended a Mormon conference in Philadelphia where Jesse C. Little was speaking. Thus began Kane’s lifelong advocacy for the Mormons’ cause. See Matthew J. Grow, “Liberty to the Downtrodden”: Thomas L. Kane, Romantic Reformer (New Haven, CT: Yale, 2009), 47–56.

[7] See David L. Bigler and Will Bagley, eds., Army of Israel: Mormon Battalion Narratives (Logan: Utah State University Press, 2000), 31–37.

[8] Daniel B. Rawson, as cited in Norma Baldwin Ricketts, The Mormon Battalion: U.S. Army of the West, 1846–1848 (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1996), 13.

[9] This telling of Henry Jackson’s life story relies heavily on two family histories: The Story of Eliza Ann Dibble and Her Three Husbands, Orson Spencer, Henry W. Jackson, and Julius A. C. Austin, comp. Marilyn Austin Smith (n.p., 1995) and “Hidden Personalities among Mormon Battalion Members,” by Don Smith; https://familysearch.org/photos/stories/1079244/daniel-browett-hidden-personalities-among-mormon-battalion.

[10] Daniel Tyler, A Concise History of the Mormon Battalion in the Mexican War, 1846–1847 (Salt Lake City: n.p., 1881), 244–45.

[11] Tyler, Concise History, 248. This wagon road became part of the Butterfield Overland Mail Route.

[12] Tyler, Concise History, 252.

[13] Lt. Col. Philip St. George Cooke, Order No. 1, quoted in Bigler and Bagley, Army of Israel, 17.

[14] Tyler, Concise History, 255.

[15] See Michael N. Landon and Brandon J. Metcalf, History of the Saints: The Remarkable Journey of the Mormon Battalion (American Fork, UT: Covenant Communications, 2012), 7.

[16] For more detail, see Fleek, History May Be Searched in Vain, 321–23.

[17] Robert S. Bliss, “The Journal of Robert S. Bliss, with the Mormon Battalion,” Utah Historical Quarterly 4 (July/October 1931): 96.

[18] Although Col. Stevenson, 7^th New York Regiment of Volunteers, was glad when some of the battalion members agreed to reenlist, he privately confided to Col. Mason, military governor of California, worries that they might try to take over southern California to aid their Utah settlement. See confidential letter, Col. J. D. Stevenson to Governor Mason, July 23, 1847, Records of the 10th Military Department, 1846–1851, National Archives Microfilm Publication, microcopy 210, roll 2.

[19] John F. Yurtinus, “The Mormon Volunteers: The Recruitment and Service of a Unique Military Company,” Journal of San Diego History 25, no. 3 (Summer 1979): 242–61.

[20] Col. J. D. Stevenson, 7^th New York Regiment of Volunteers, wrote to Col. R. B. Mason, July 23, 1847, stating that the reenlisted members of the Mormon Battalion were dressed “from cap to shoe, in the uniform of my Regiment.” In Charles Hughes, ed., “A Military View of San Diego in 1847: Four Letters from Colonel Jonathan D. Stevenson to Governor Richard B. Mason,” Journal of San Diego History 20, no. 3 (September 1974): 33–43.

[21] Richard B. Mason to General R. Jones, Sen. Exec. Doc. 18 (31-1), Serial 557, 318–22, in Bigler and Bagley, Army of Israel, 394–95.

[22] Henry Jackson’s deposits to the Utah gold accounts are listed by amount in J. Kenneth Davies and Lorin K. Hansen, Mormon Gold: Mormons in the California Gold Rush, 2^nd ed. (North Salt Lake City: Granite Mountain, 2010), 83–84, 153. For a discussion of Mormon Battalion involvement in the gold rush, see Kenneth Owens, “Far from Zion: The Frayed Ties between California’s Gold Rush Saints and LDS President Brigham Young,” California History 89, no. 4 (2012): 5–23.

[23] Kenneth N. Owens, Gold Rush Saints: California Mormons and the Great Rush for Riches (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004), 369.