When we rehearse the grandeur of Joseph Smith’s First
Vision, we sometimes gloss over the menacing confrontation that came just prior
to it, a confrontation intended to destroy the boy if possible but in any case
to block the revelation that was to come. We don’t talk about the adversary any
more than we have to, and I don’t like talking about him at all, but the
experience of young Joseph reminds us of what every man, including every young
man, in this audience needs to remember.
Number one, Satan, or Lucifer, or the father of lies--call
him what you will--is real, the very personification of evil. His motives are
in every case malicious, and he convulses at the appearance of redeeming light,
at the very thought of truth. Number two, he is eternally opposed to the love
of God, the Atonement of Jesus Christ, and the work of peace and salvation. He
will fight against these whenever and wherever he can. He knows he will be
defeated and cast out in the end, but he is determined to take down with him as
many others as he possibly can.
So what are some of the devil’s tactics in this contest when
eternal life is at stake? Here again the experience in the Sacred Grove is
instructive. Joseph recorded that in an effort to oppose all that lay ahead,
Lucifer exerted “such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so
that I could not speak.”
As President Boyd K. Packer taught this morning, Satan
cannot directly take a life. That is one of many things he cannot do. But
apparently his effort to stop the work will be reasonably well served if he can
just bind the tongue of the faithful. (Elder Hollalnd “We Are All Enlisted” Oct
211 General Conference)
