This past week my family and I went down to Southern Utah. The sights there are beautiful and the change of scenery was relaxing, but as we traveled I noticed more than the scenery. I noticed that other visitors were speaking different languages. People from other countries around the world had come to see Utah!
Many of us here in Utah have desires to leave the state and visit other places like California, Hawaii, the Bahamas, Central America, Europe, or Asia, and we take our own state for granted. While we leave to seek other wonderful landmarks, we probably fail to realize that people from those parts want to come see what Utah offers. In this, a prophecy is fulfilled.
President Gordon B. Hinckley, the prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints preceding Thomas S. Monson, shared, "On a dark and winter day in 1849, in the old tabernacle, when the people were hungry and cold, Brigham Young said that the day would come when this would become the great highway of the nations and people from over the earth would visit us here. We are witnessing that day and the fulfillment of that remarkable prophecy."
What the true prophet prophesies will come true because it is what God would tell us if He was upon the earth speaking to us. Doctrine and Covenants, section one and verse 38 states,
"What I the Lord have spoken, I have spoken, and I excuse not myself; and though the heavens and the earth pass away, my word shall not pass away, but shall all be fulfilled, whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same."
President Thomas S. Monson, in general conference, told us, "Our Heavenly Father did not launch us on our eternal voyage without providing the means for whereby we could receive from Him guidance to ensure our safe return. I speak of prayer. I speak too of the whisperings from that still, small voice; and I do not overlook the holy scriptures, which contain the word of the Lord and the words of the prophets- provided to us to help us successfully cross the finish line.
At some period in our mortal mission, there appears the faltering step, the wan smile, the pain of sickness- even the fading of summer, the approach of autumn, the chill of winter, and the experience we call death...
As the result of Christ's victory over the grave, we shall all be resurrected... Our Heavenly Father rejoices for those who keep His commandments. He is concerned also for the lost child, the tardy teenager, the wayward youth, the delinquent parent. Tenderly the Master speaks to these and indeed to all: 'Come back. Come up. Come in. Come home. Come unto me."
I know and testify that there is a true prophet and seer on the earth today that guides us and tells us what Heavenly Father desires that the world knows. His name is Thomas S. Monson, and he is the prophet until he returns home to our Heavenly Father; and after his work is finished God will call another prophet in his stead, but never will our Father and our Lord forsake us and revoke his mouthpiece from the earth again.
