CHARLES G. FINNEY and JOSEPH SMITH

MEMOIRS OF CHARLES G. FINNEY CHAPTER I. BIRTH AND EARLY EDUCATION


I was born in Warren, Litchfield county, Connecticut, August 29, 1792. When I was about two years old, my father removed to Oneida county, New York, which was, at that time, to a great extent, a wilderness. No religious privileges were enjoyed by the people. Very few religious books were to be had. The new settlers, being mostly from New England, almost immediately established common schools; but they had among them very little intelligent preaching of the Gospel. I enjoyed the privileges of a common school, summer and winter, until I was fifteen or sixteen years old I believe; and advanced so far as to be supposed capable of teaching a common school myself, as common schools were then conducted.

My parents were neither of them professors of religion, and, I believe, among our neighbors there were very few religious people. I seldom heard a sermon, unless it was an occasional one from some traveling minister, or some miserable holding forth of an ignorant preacher who would sometimes be found in that country. I recollect very well that the ignorance of the preachers that I heard was such, that the people would return from meeting and spend a considerable time in irrepressible laughter at the strange mistakes which had been made and the absurdities which had been advanced.

When about twenty years old I returned to Connecticut, and from thence went to New Jersey, near New York city, and engaged in teaching. I taught and studied as best I could; and twice returned to New England and attended a high school for a season. While attending the high school I meditated going to Yale College. My preceptor was a graduate of Yale, but he advised me not to go. He said it would be a loss of time, as I could easily accomplish the whole curriculum of study pursued at that institution, in two years; whereas it would cost me four years to graduate. He presented such considerations as prevailed with me, and as it resulted, I failed to pursue my school education any farther at that time. However, afterward I acquired some knowledge of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. But I was never a classical scholar, and never possessed so much knowledge of the ancient languages as to think myself capable of independently criticizing our English translation of the Bible.

The teacher to whom I have referred, wished me to join him in conducting an academy in one of the Southern States. I was inclined to accept his proposal, with the design of pursuing and completing my studies under his instruction. But when I informed my parents, whom I had not seen for four years, of my contemplated movement south, they both came immediately after me, and prevailed on me to go home with them to Jefferson county, New York. After making them a visit, I concluded to enter, as a student, the law office of Squire W, at Adams, in that county. This was in 1818.

Up to this time I had never enjoyed what might be called religious privileges. I had never lived in a praying community, except during the periods when I was attending the high school in New England; and the religion in that place was of a type not at all calculated to arrest my attention.

When I was teaching school in New Jersey, the preaching in the neighborhood was chiefly in German. I do not think I heard half a dozen sermons in English during my whole stay in New Jersey, which was about three years.

Thus when I went to Adams to study law, I was almost as ignorant of religion as a heathen. I had been brought up mostly in the woods. I had very little regard to the Sabbath, and had no definite knowledge of religious truth.

I had never, until this time, lived where I could attend a stated prayer meeting. As one was held by the church near our office every week, I used to attend and listen to the prayers, as often as I could be excused from business at that hour.

In studying elementary law, I found the old authors frequently quoting the Scriptures, and referring especially to the Mosaic Institutes, as authority for many of the great principles of common law. This excited my curiosity so much that I went and purchased a Bible, the first I had ever owned; and whenever I found a reference by the law authors to the Bible, I turned to the passage and consulted it in its connection. This soon led to my taking a new interest in the Bible, and I read and meditated on it much more than I had ever done before in my life. However, much of it I did not understand.

Mr. Gale was in the habit of dropping in at our office frequently, and seemed anxious to know what impression his sermons had made on my mind. I used to converse with him freely; and I now think that I sometimes criticized his sermons unmercifully. I raised such objections against his positions as forced themselves upon my attention.

In conversing with him and asking him questions, I perceived that his own mind was, as I thought, mystified; and that he did not accurately define to himself what he meant by many of the important terms that he used. Indeed I found it impossible to attach any meaning to many of the terms which he used with great formality and frequency. What did he mean by repentance? Was it a mere feeling of sorrow for sin? Was it altogether a passive state of mind, or did it involve a voluntary element? If it was a change of mind, in what respect was it a change of mind? What did he mean by the term regeneration? What did such language mean when applied to a spiritual change? What did he mean by faith? Was it merely an intellectual state? Was it merely a conviction, or persuasion, that the things stated in the Gospel were true? What did he mean by sanctification? Did it involve any physical change in the subject, or any physical influence on the part of God? I could not tell, nor did he seem to me to know himself, in what sense he used these and similar terms.

We had a great many interesting conversations; but they seemed rather to stimulate my own mind to inquiry, than to satisfy me in respect to the truth.

But as I read my Bible and attended the prayer meetings, heard Mr. Gale preach, and conversed with him, with the elders of the church, and with others from time to time, I became very restless. A little consideration convinced me that I was by no means in a state of mind to go to heaven if I should die. It seemed to me that there must be something in religion that was of infinite importance; and it was soon settled with me, that if the soul was immortal I needed a great change in my inward state to be prepared for happiness in heaven. But still my mind was not made up as to the truth or falsehood of the Gospel and of the Christian religion. The question, however, was of too much importance to allow me to rest in any uncertainty on the subject.

I was particularly struck with the fact that the prayers that I had listened to, from week to week, were not, that I could see, answered. Indeed, I understood from their utterances in prayer, and from other remarks in their meetings, that those who offered them did not regard them as answered.

When I read my Bible I learned what Christ had said in regard to prayer, and answers to prayer. He had said, "Ask, and ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall he opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that knocketh it shall be opened." I read also what Christ affirms, that God is more willing to give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him, than earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children. I heard them pray continually for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and not often confess that they did not receive what they asked for.

They exhorted each other to wake up and be engaged, and to pray earnestly for a revival of religion, asserting that if they did their duty, prayed for the outpouring of the Spirit, and were in earnest, that the Spirit of God would be poured out, that they would have a revival of religion, and that the impenitent would be converted. But in their prayer and conference meetings they would continually confess, substantially, that they were making no progress in securing a revival of religion.

This inconsistency, the fact that they prayed so much and were not answered, was a sad stumbling block to me. I knew not what to make of it. It was a question in my mind whether I was to understand that these persons were not truly Christians, and therefore did not prevail with God; or did I misunderstand the promises and teachings of the Bible on this subject, or was I to conclude that the Bible was not true? There was something inexplicable to me; and it seemed, at one time, that it would almost drive me into skepticism. It seemed to me that the teachings of the Bible did not at all accord with the facts which were before my eyes.

On one occasion, when I was in one of the prayer meetings, I was asked if I did not desire that they should pray for me! I told them, no; because I did not see that God answered their prayers. I said, "I suppose I need to be prayed for, for I am conscious that I am a sinner; but I do not see that it will do any good for you to pray for me; for you are continually asking, but you do not receive. You have been praying for a revival of religion ever since I have been in Adams, and yet you have it not. You have been praying for the Holy Spirit to descend upon yourselves, and yet complaining of your leanness." I recollect having used this expression at that time: "You have prayed enough since I have attended these meetings to have prayed the devil out of Adams, if there is any virtue in your prayers. But here you are praying on, and complaining still." I was quite in earnest in what I said, and not a little irritable, I think, in consequence of my being brought so continually face to face with religious truth; which was a new state of things to me.

But on farther reading of my Bible, it struck me that the reason why their prayers were not answered, was because they did not comply with the revealed conditions upon which God had promised to answer prayer; that they did not pray in faith, in the sense of expecting God to give them the things that they asked for.

This thought, for some time, lay in my mind as a confused questioning, rather than in any definite form that could be stated in words. However, this relieved me, so far as queries about the truth of the Gospel were concerned; and after struggling in that way for some two or three years, my mind became quite settled that whatever mystification there might be either in my own or in my pastor's mind, or in the mind of the church, the Bible was, nevertheless, the true Word of God.

This being settled, I was brought face to face with the question whether I would accept Christ as presented in the Gospel, or pursue a worldly course of life. At this period, my mind, as I have since known, was so much impressed by the Holy Spirit, that I could not long leave this question unsettled nor could I long hesitate between the two courses of life presented to me.


THE VISION IN THE GROVE FROM THE DIARY OF JOSEPH SMITH, 1832

~WRITTEN IN HIS OWN HANDWRITING~

From Merl Edwards Website....


I have corrected the spelling so you can read it. There was little
punctuation. I inserted some to make it easier to read.




"I was born in the town of Sharon in the state of Vermont, North America, on the twenty third day of December AD 1805, of goodly parents who spared no pains to instructing me in the Christian religion. At the age of about ten years my Father Joseph Smith Seignior, moved to Palmyra Ontario County in the State of New York and being in indigent circumstances were obliged to labour hard for the support of a large family having nine children, and as it required the exertions of all that were able to render any assistance for the support of the family therefore we were deprived of the benefit of an education. Suffice it to say I was merely instructed in reading and writing and the ground rules of Arithmetic which constituted my whole literary acquirements.

At about the age of twelve years my mind became seriously impressed with regard to the all important concerns for the well fare of my immortal soul which led me to searching the scriptures, believing as I was taught, that they contained the word of God, thus applying myself to them, and my intimate acquaintance with those of different denominations led me to marvel exceedingly, for I discovered that they did not adorn their professions by a holy walk and Godly conversation agreeable to what I found contained in that sacred depository.

This was a grief to my soul, thus from the age of twelve years to fifteen, I pondered many things in my heart concerning the situation of the world of mankind, the contentions and divisions, the wickedness and abomination, and the darkness which pervaded the minds of mankind.

My mind became exceedingly distressed for I became convicted of my sins, and by searching the scriptures I found that mankind did not come unto the Lord but that they had apostatized from the true and living faith, and there was no society or denomination that built upon the gospel of Jesus Christ as recorded in the New Testament, and I felt to mourn for my own sins and for the sins of the world, for I learned in the scriptures that God was the same yesterday, today, and forever, that He was no respecter to persons, for he was God, for I looked upon the sun, the glorious luminary of the earth, and also the moon rolling in their majesty through the heavens, and also the stars shining in their courses and the earth also upon which I stood, and the beast of the field, and the fowls of heaven, and the fish of the waters, and also man walking forth upon the face of the earth in majesty, and in the strength of beauty, whose power and intelligence in governing the things which are so exceeding great and marvelous, even in the likeness of him who created them, and when I considered upon these things my heart exclaimed, well hath the wise man said it is a fool that saith in his heart there is no God.

My heart exclaimed all these bear testimony and bespeak an omnipotent and omnipresent power, a being who maketh laws and decreeth and bindeth all things in their bounds, who filleth eternity, who was, and is, and will be, from all Eternity to Eternity, and when I considered all these things and that being seeketh such to worship him as worship him in spirit and in truth, therefore I cried unto the Lord for mercy for there was none else to whom I could go and obtain mercy, and the Lord heard my cry in the wilderness, and while in the attitude of calling upon the Lord in the 16th year of my age
a pillar of light above the brightness of the sun at noon day came down from above and rested upon me and I was filled with the spirit of God, and the lord opened the heavens upon me, and I saw the Lord, and he spake unto me saying, Joseph my son thy sins are forgiven thee. Go thy way, walk in my statures, and keep my commandments. Behold, I am the Lord of glory. I was crucified for the world that all those who believe on my name may have Eternal life behold the world lieth in sin at this time and none doeth good, no not one, they have turned aside from the gospel, and keep not my commandments. They draw near to me with their lips while their hearts are far from me, and mine anger is kindling against the inhabitants of the earth to visit them according to their ungodliness, and to bring to pass that which hath been spoken by the mouth of the prophets and Apostles. Behold and lo, I come quickly as it is written of me, in the cloud, clothed in the glory of my Father, and my soul was filled with love and for many days I could rejoice with great joy, and the Lord was with me, but I could find none that would believe the heavenly vision, nevertheless, I pondered these things in my heart."

From "The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith," by Dean Jessee, Page 6. There is also a photocopy in Joseph’s own handwriting in this book. Also printed in "Joseph Smith’s 1832 Account of His Early Life," and "The Diaries and Journals of Joseph Smith, An American Prophet’s Record" by Scott Faulring.


There is NO MENTION OF ASKING WHICH CHURCH TO JOIN and GOD NEVER SAID NOT TO JOIN ANNY OF THEM. THAT WOULD MAKE GOD A RESPECTOR OF PERSONS OR DENOMINATIONS AND GO AGAINST THE BOOK OF MORMON ITSELF.


There are at least 6 versions of the "Vision in the Grove" that we now know of.


The original version of the Vision in the Grove does not fall into any of the pitfalls that the later versions fall into. It has been proven by our enemies that there was no religious revival in New York in the year 1820, when this Vision occurred. (The revival was in 1823 or 1824.)

The original version does not mention any religious revival, so there is no conflict. Also, it has been said by our enemies, that the spirit of darkness that fell upon Joseph before the Vision occurred, was a sign that the vision was occult, or of Satan.
The original version says nothing about any darkness! Neither does the original version say that all of the other Christian Churches are an abomination unto the Lord. So the later versions fell into the pitfalls (or anachronisms) of being written out of their correct time element.


1. From the Diary of Joseph Smith, the only one written in his own handwriting, written in 1832. Joseph saw the Lord. (one person). From Joseph Smith’s Diary. ("Personal Writings of Joseph Smith", by Dean Jessee, pg.6.)

2. Written down by early Church leaders, G. A. Smith, John Taylor and Brigham Young. This one says Joseph saw an angel. It does not mention the Father or the Son. Date unknown. (LDS Journal of Discourses.)

3. Recorded by Warren Parrish from a conversation of Joseph with a Jewish minister named Joshua. It says Joseph saw one personage, then another like the first, and many other angels. ("Personal Writings of Joseph Smith", by Dean Jessee, pg.75 - 1835.)

4. Official version canonized by the Mormon Church in the "Pearl of Great Price." (Taken from the "Times and Seasons" vol. 3-pg.748.) It says Joseph saw two personages, and both spoke to him. (1838.) From "The History of Joseph Smith." Over 62,000 changes were made in this history by those who went to Utah. ("Mormonism, Shadow or Reality" by the Tanners.) Much of this altered History was put into the RLDS and LDS Church Histories.!

5. Orson Pratt wrote about this vision in his book published in 1840, ("An Interesting Account of Several Remarkable Visions.") Saw two personages. (His source is unknown.)

6. The Wentworth Letter version. Written in 1842 by a scribe, (from Times and Seasons, vol.3, pg. 707.) It says Joseph saw two personages, the Father and the Son, both looked the same and they spoke to him. It is so similar to the Pratt account, that it had to be copied from that account! (See article on this web site called "The Pratt Pamphlet and the Wentworth Letter."). Would Joseph have copied an account of his own personal vision written by Orson Pratt in 1840?