Moroni casting down his trumpet, is deeply symbolic to me. This became the brunt of many jokes, and of some outright mockery, but in this year of plagues and temple closure, please consider what his trumpet was calling us to do. I wrote about Moroni’s trumpet in my article, “Repentance is Joy“.
My sister: “he is checking his watch…” Hmmm… Perhaps…
I can best tell you what this means to me, and to all of us by sharing historic parallels through my testimony of Jesus Christ.
From the time Pilate is given to pass judgement of the one perfect man to the cross, Christ makes no defense. Corrupted priests and evil men incite the people to release a murderer and deliver our Savior to death, thereby condemning millions of their descendants to wander in unbelief and perish, as they tempt God, saying, “His blood be upon us…” Here truly is the Lamb, dumb before the slaughter, only raising his voice in final blessing before he pays his perfect sacrifice.
Indeed, it is the Father who answered this people, as it will be for us. He answered them with darkness, but they wouldn’t listen. He answered them with an earthquake and rending of the temple veil. At this point, they should have known, and yet these deceivers called him a deceiver and continued trying to assert their power over Earth and Heaven by setting a watch over the grave to prevent him from rising.
Our Savior gave it to us to call his sheep and raise our voice as the sound of a trumpet. We should not lightly pass over the fact that the temples are now temporarily closed, that the earth is quaking, that Moroni has cast down his trumpet and that the missionaries, awaiting opportunity to serve, are largely quiet, with relatively few souls seeking the Lord being able to find Him.
However, just as the disciples were multiplied in Jerusalem after the resurrection of Christ, so our world will be blessed by this temporary silence while we await the beautiful restoration of the blessings of our God. As this plague subsides and the others that we know are coming are invoked from Heaven, wicked men will continue to try to assert their power, but the temples will reopen. The work will continue with millions joining the church of God, and the angels will go forth with our missionaries and the kingdom will roll forward with them and with us.
Christ’s glorious resurrection was impossible to stop by unhallowed hands, and as he stepped from His tomb and called Mary, so he will call, and is calling, each of us by name. No matter how lost we may feel, with a perfect love, he will tell us:
The works of God continue,
Abbreviated Lyrics to “If You Could Hie to Kolob”
And worlds and lives abound;
Improvement and progression
Have one eternal round.
There is no end to virtue;
There is no end to might;
There is no end to wisdom;
There is no end to light.
There is no end to union;
There is no end to youth;
There is no end to priesthood;
There is no end to truth.
There is no end to glory;
There is no end to love;
There is no end to being;
There is no death above.
I cannot begin to put into words, my love for Him. Thanks be to our Father for the matchless gift of His Only Begotten Son! I pray we will hear Him, and Follow Him,
For after your testimony cometh the testimony of earthquakes, that shall cause groanings in the midst of her… And also cometh the testimony of the voice of thunderings, and the voice of lightnings, and the voice of tempests, and the voice of the waves of the sea heaving themselves beyond their bounds.
And angels shall fly through the midst of heaven, crying with a loud voice, sounding the trump of God, saying: Prepare ye, prepare ye, O inhabitants of the earth; for the judgment of our God is come. Behold, and lo, the Bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him.
D&C 88
We will know him on that day, and he will stretch forth his hand and say,
Behold, I am Jesus Christ, whom the prophets testified shall come into the world.
3 Nephi 11:10
We must prepare quickly. It is our privilege to be ready in that day!