Seminary-Notes

A Vision of Christ

[Seminary-Notes]
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FOR YOUR INFORMATION...
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As you discuss the Savior's mortal life with your students and what it might have been like to have the wonderful opportunity of associating with Him, you may wish to share the following experience of Elder Melvin J. Ballard:

Away on the Fort Peck Reservation where I was doing missionary work with some of our brethren, laboring among the Indians, seeking the Lord for light to decide certain matters pertaining to our work there, and receiving a witness from him that we were doing things according to his will, I found myself one evening in the dreams of the night in that sacred building, the temple. After a season of prayer and rejoicing I was informed that I should have the privilege of entering into one of those rooms, to meet a glorious Personage, and, as I entered the door, I saw, seated on a raised platform, the most glorious Being my eyes have ever beheld or that I ever conceived existed in all the eternal worlds. As I approached to be introduced, he arose and stepped towards me with extended arms, and he smiled as he softly spoke my name. If I shall live to be a million years old, I shall never forget that smile. He took me into his arms and kissed me, pressed me to his bosom, and blessed me, until the marrow of my bones seemed to melt! When he had finished, I knelt at his feet, and, as I bathed them with my tears and kisses, I saw the prints of the nails in the feet of the Redeemer of the world. The feeling that I had in the presence of him who hath all things in his hands, to have his love, his affection, and his blessing was such that if I ever can receive that of which I had but a foretaste, I would give all that I am, all that I ever hope to be to feel what I then felt.

This quotation is found in several published sources. Here are two:

Bryant S. Hinckley, Sermons and Missionary Services of Melvin J. Ballard, p. 156.
Leon R. Hartshorn, Exceptional Stories from the Lives of Our Apostles, pp. 11-12.