Two hundred years ago, a young teenager named Joseph Smith received his first divine manifestation in a grove of trees near his home. As part of that experience, which we call “the First Vision,” God the Father and his resurrected son Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph and talked with him in the same way the Lord talked anciently with Moses and Abraham, that is, “as one man talketh with another” (Abraham 3:11; see also Exodus 33:11).
This appearance of deity was an initial step in a series of events in which the Lord Jesus Christ revealed lost truths of his gospel and re-established his church. We often use the term restoration to broadly describe this process.
The personal appearance of Jesus Christ to commence the restoration serves as an important reminder that while we say the gospel and the church were restored through the prophet Joseph Smith, they were restored by the Lord Jesus Christ.
In addition to sending angelic messengers to teach and ordain and confer, Jesus’s role in leading the restoration was very involved and intimate, as is his role in leading his church today. However, the Savior’s role as a restorer goes far beyond restoring his gospel and his church. His role in the restoration can be viewed as a symbol of his desire and power to restore each of us personally and individually.
To Restore
In the New Testament, we read the following two accounts that reference one aspect of Jesus’s power to restore:
And it came to pass also on another sabbath, that he [Jesus] entered into the synagogue and taught: and there was a man whose right hand was withered. … [And Jesus] said to the man which had the withered hand, Rise up, and stand forth in the midst. And he arose and stood forth. … And … he said unto the man, Stretch forth thy hand. And he did so: and his hand was restored whole as the other.
(Luke 6:6-10, emphasis added)
Jesus restored this man’s withered hand.
And he [Jesus] cometh to Bethsaida; and they bring a blind man unto him, and besought him to touch him. And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town; and when he had spit on his eyes, and put his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw ought. And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking. After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly.
(Matthew 8:22-25, emphasis added)
Jesus restored this blind man’s sight.
The word restore comes from the Latin “restaurare” meaning “to give back” or “to build up again,” to “repair, rebuild, [or] renew” [1]. So, a restoration is when something is fixed, corrected, rebuilt, re-established, repaired, healed, or put back to how it should be. Many of the Savior’s actions can be described as a restoration. For example, “resurrection” is the act of restoring life.
Lessons from the First Vision and the Restoration
Jesus Restores Us from Apostasy
Jesus Christ established His church by giving His authority to the Apostles that he had ordained to lead the church in his absence. The Apostles themselves prophesied, however, that the Priesthood authority would eventually be taken away when the people rejected the truth. For example, Paul wrote that the Second Coming wouldn’t come until “there come a falling away first” (2 Thessalonians 2:3), and Peter taught that “heaven must receive [Jesus Christ] until the times of the restitution of all things” (Acts 3:21).
Just as the Church had fallen apart and the world had been in apostasy, don’t we often feel like we’re falling apart, and don’t we often distance ourselves from God? President Faust told us of some of the “precious things” that were lost for many centuries during the Great Apostasy: Priesthood authority, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and knowledge of the nature of God [2].
When I’m feeling personally distant from God, I look for those precious things. Do priesthood power, the companionship of the Holy Ghost, or personal knowledge of God ever feel absent from my personal life, or at least not as central as they should be? Do those things ever need to be “brought back” into my life? When that happens, Jesus is the one who restores those things.
Jesus Restores Us in His Timing
Jesus appeared personally to Joseph to begin the restoration. But the restoration didn’t happen all at once. Jesus restored his church and his gospel in stages. A few years after Jesus first appeared to Joseph, Jesus sent his servant Moroni to give Joseph the directive to translate the Book of Mormon and restore the truths inside that book. Then, a few years later, Jesus sent his cousin, John the Baptist to restore the Aaronic Priesthood. Then, a while later, Jesus sent his Apostles, Peter, James, and John, to restore the Melchizedek Priesthood. Then even later, Jesus appeared again to Joseph in the Kirtland Temple. But the Restoration didn’t end then or even with Joseph. In the April 2018 General Conference, Elder Christofferson referred to some of the very recent changes in the Church as “one more step in the unfolding of the Restoration” [3].
Let’s revisit the story in Matthew 8 where Jesus restored the blind man’s sight. It is interesting that the man’s vision did not come back completely all at once. At the beginning of the story, the man was blind. Then Jesus touched his eyes and asked him if he could see correctly. The man said he could now partially see, but not clearly enough to distinguish things like people and trees. So, Jesus touched his eyes again and then his vision was completely restored. Similarly, sometimes the ways that Jesus heals and restores us come in stages. And sometimes we have to wait years for the blessings we have been promised. But they will come.
Jesus Restores Us from Sin
In Joseph Smith–History, Joseph tells us that during his first vision he asked the Lord which church to join, and he was instructed to not join any of them. We are very familiar with that part of the vision, but we know that there was more to the vision because Joseph also said, “and many other things did he [the Lord] say unto me, which I cannot write at this time” (Joseph Smith–History 1:20). In an earlier draft of his history [4], we read some additional notes from Joseph about this vision.
In these notes, we can see that Joseph struggled to know exactly what words could accurately describe such a miraculous event and to know which parts of his sacred experience he could appropriately share with others at that time. But Joseph does tell us that one of the main reasons he had been evaluating the various churches to find the true gospel was because he was seeking a forgiveness of his sins. He wanted to be saved. Joseph said, “My mind became exceedingly distressed, for I became convicted of my sins….” He also said, “I felt to mourn for my own sins….” The “distress” that Joseph felt that made him “mourn” and feel “convicted” is part of the godly sorrow that worketh repentance (see 2 Corinthians 7:10). Joseph was humbly penitent, but didn’t know how to receive forgiveness. Joseph felt broken. He felt like he was lacking. He, personally, needed to be restored. In these notes, Joseph tells us that one of those “other things” that the Lord told him in that vision was “thy sins are forgiven thee.” So, Jesus didn’t just come to restore his church. He came to personally minister to a young boy who was hurting and to restore him and to spiritually heal him. Similarly, Jesus can restore each of us individually and personally—restoring us from the destruction of our sins.
Repentance and Restoration
When we sin, we spiritually fall. We lose our worthiness and the companionship of the Spirit. But Jesus’s restorative powers of redemption and forgiveness can restore our worthiness, restore the companionship of the Holy Ghost, and restore us back to the presence of God. Repentance allows us to access Christ’s restoring power. Understanding the true relationship between our repentance and Christ’s restoring power can help us avoid two common preventers of repentance: complacency and despair.
In recognizing and accepting the Savior’s loving desire and infinite power to restore, we should be careful to not let that wonderous gift make us complacent in our efforts to repent and change. In the Book of Mormon, Amulek taught that the Reedemer “should not come to redeem [us] in [our] sins, but to redeem [us] from [our] sins” (Helaman 5:10, emphasis added). And Alma, in his words to his son Corianton, was very adamant at explaining that the word “restore” does not mean that Christ will restore us “from sin to happiness” (Alma 41:10) and that “the word restoration more fully condemneth the sinner, and justifieth him not at all” (Alma 41:15). Thus, Christ’s restoring power does not absolve us from our duty to repent.
On the other hand, the Book of Mormon also teaches us that repentance is “all we [can] do” (Alma 24:11, emphasis added). Christ’s restoring power is not a validating checkmark that simply affirms that we have sufficiently paid the price for our sins. When we sin, we too often mistakenly feel so discouraged at the magnitude of the price that needs to be paid for our sins that we feel too overwhelmed to change. Paul calls this despair “the sorrow of the world” because it discourages repentance (see 2 Corinthians 7:10). Compare that worldly despair on one hand to the godly “distress” that Joseph Smith felt which encouraged him to turn to the Lord. To avoid the despair that discourages repentance, we should remember that repentance is not about paying the price for our sins. Jesus did that. The whole price. He already paid the whole price to restore the balance (see “His Grace is Sufficient” by Brad Wilcox [5]). “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed’ (Isaiah 53:5). Repentance isn’t the process of restoring our own worthiness. That’s what Jesus does. He restores us. He makes us worthy. He already paid the whole price. For us, our duty, repentance, is the process of allowing Jesus to restore us, opening our hearts so that He can change our hearts—change our desires. Yes, sometimes our repentance requires that we work to fix our mistakes, but we don’t do it in order to pay for our sins; we do it as a sign that Christ is changing us, “that we have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually” (Mosiah 5:2).
The Scriptures Teach of Jesus, the Restorer
In addition to restoring us from sin, Jesus will restore anything in our lives that needs to be restored. In Preach My Gospel, we read, “All that is unfair about life can be made right through the Atonement of Jesus Christ” [6]. All that is unfair can be made right by Jesus. Jesus is a Restorer. The scriptures teach us many ways in which Jesus restores us:
- For when we are lonely, Jesus said, “I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up” (D&C 84:88).
- For when we are lost, Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd” (John 10:11), and we know that the Shepherd will find his sheep.
- For when we are in darkness, Jesus said, “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12), and the scriptures teach that his word is “a lamp unto [our] feet” (Psalm 119:105).
- For when we are discouraged or grieving, Jesus will comfort us. “[H]e hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4). He has promised the Comforter to comfort us (see John 14:26).
- For when we are hurt or wounded or broken, Jesus has risen “with healing in his wings” (Malachi 4:2).
- For when we are, like Alma the Younger, in pain which is “exquisite and … bitter,” Jesus, the Son of God, offers us joy which is “exquisite and sweet” (Alma 36:21).
- For when we overwhelmed or “heavy laden,” we can come to him whose “yoke is easy” and whose “burden is light,” and he “will give [us] rest” (see Matthew 11:28-30).
- For when we face spiritual justice, he extends his “arm of mercy” (3 Nephi 9:14). When we need compassion, “[his] bowels are filled with compassion” (3 Nephi 17:6).
- For when we need help, he is “full of grace.” When we need answers, Jesus is “full of … truth” (John 1:14).
- For when we are faced with fear, Christ’s “perfect love casteth out fear” (1 John 4:18).
- For when we have lost a loved one, “[Jesus] hath gained the victory over the grave; and also in him is the sting of death swallowed up” (Mormon 7:5).
Jesus knows what we are going through. He knows how to help. “He will take upon him [our] infirmities, … that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to [our] infirmities” (Alma 7:12).
If you are sad, hurt, tired, lonely, depressed, lost, discouraged, burdened, worn out, afraid, worried, unhappy, or in pain—if you are weak, exhausted, scared, overwhelmed, stressed, unsure, or doubting—if you are in despair or distress—if you have been betrayed or abandoned—turn to Jesus. Whatever is wrong, he can make it right. That is the lesson of the Restoration—Jesus is a Restorer. He fixes things. He heals things. He restores things. He will restore you. Sometimes, he sends his restoring help through parents and bishops and doctors and counselors and prophets, through friends and ministering sisters and ministering brothers, and through his Spirit. Often, like Joseph, we need to ask before we receive and patiently allow for his timing. But we can trust that there will come a “restoration of all things” (D&C 27:6, emphasis added), “for it is requisite that all things should be restored to their proper order” (Alma 41:2, emphasis added).
Indeed, all can be restored by Jesus, the Restorer — Jesus, the Christ.
References
- Online Etymology Dictionary, c.f. “restore.” https://www.etymonline.com/word/restore
- James E. Faust, “The Restoration of All Things,” April 2006 General Conference. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2006/04/the-restoration-of-all-things
- D. Todd Christofferson, “The Elders Quorum,” April 2018 General Conference. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2018/04/the-elders-quorum
- “Circa Summer 1832 History.” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/first-vision-accounts/1832-account
- Brad Wilcox, “His Grace is Sufficient,” BYU Devotionals, 2011. https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/brad-wilcox/his-grace-is-sufficient/
- Preach My Gospel, Lesson 2. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/preach-my-gospel-a-guide-to-missionary-service/lesson-2-the-plan-of-salvation