Beliefs of Melvin J. Ballard Part 4

Viewpoint on Mormonism, the program that examines the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from a Biblical perspective. Viewpoint on Mormonism is sponsored by Mormonism Research Ministry. Since 1979, Mormonism Research Ministry has been dedicated to equipping the body of Christ with answers regarding the Christian faith in a manner that expresses gentleness and respect. And now your host for today's Viewpoint on Mormonism. So glad you could be with us for this edition of Viewpoint on Mormonism. I'm your host, Bill McKeever, founder and director of Mormonism Research Ministry.

With me today is Eric Johnson, my colleague at MRM. We continue looking at some of the beliefs of Elder Melvin J. Ballard. He served as an apostle in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints up until his death in 1939. But the reason why we are devoting some time to looking at his beliefs is because, not too terribly long ago, there was an article on thechurchnews.com titled, President Ballard Opens Up About One Thing He Wishes He Could Ask His Grandfather. And of course, it's highlighting Mormon apostle M. Russell Ballard, who was the grandson of Melvin J. Ballard. He was speaking to a group in Boston, a group of about 12,000 people.

This was on October 20, 2019. And in this statement, he had a regret. He wishes that there was something that he could have asked his grandfather that he never had the opportunity to ask. And according to the article, it says, I've often thought if I had known that this was going to happen to me, this matter of coming along many years later and moving about in his footsteps, I would have wanted to know more about what it meant to be an apostle. And of course, he's explaining the fact that if there was one thing he could have asked him, it would have been he would have wanted to know more about what it meant to be an apostle.

And Eric and I found that as a little bit odd. Here you have a very famous and influential person in your family tree who served as an apostle in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And that just struck us as a kind of a strange question of all the questions you could have asked, given the fact that he had a pretty long career, though he died at a fairly young age.

He was only 66 years old when he died in 1939. But to be ordained an apostle under the leadership of Heber J. Grant, the seventh president of the church, who was the last of the prophets of Mormonism who practiced polygamy, also to be alive during the time of the Manifesto in 1890, though he was a young boy at the time, but to go through all that tumultuous history in Mormonism. And that is the question he could come up with.

That just seems a little bit odd. So we were going through looking at some of the things that I probably would have wanted to ask about certain beliefs that the Mormon Church has had, and what his grandfather probably believed on those issues. And so we're going through some of the things that we know for a fact that his grandfather did believe and teach about. So today we're going to cover the subject about obedience. What did M. Russell Ballard's grandfather, Melvin J. Ballard, believe when it comes to the subject of obedience?

He says this in a conference report, April 1915, page 57. Sometimes we discover that those who have entered into a covenant to serve God do not live any better lives as Latter-day Saints than they lived as Methodists or Baptists, and this will stand against them as covenant breakers. We had covenanted and agreed when we were baptized to obey all God's laws and keep all the requirements that he would make known onto us for our perfection and salvation. Now, does that statement sound out of line, Eric, with a lot of other statements that we have heard Mormon leaders make on this subject?

This idea that you have to obey all God's laws. But before you answer that question, it seems interesting to me how he says a lot of Latter-day Saints don't live any better lives as Latter-day Saints than they lived as Methodists or Baptists. You think that was kind of a dig at the Methodists and Baptists, that they must not be living very good lives.

Now, there probably are a lot of professing Methodists and Baptists who maybe don't live very good lives. But I'm sure there's also many who do, in fact, live good lives, just as he is admitting here that there's a lot of Latter-day Saints who certainly aren't living the lives that they probably should be living, given the covenants that they have made when they were baptized into the Mormon Church, as well as when they go to the temple, or even as they promise when they partake of the sacrament. But getting to that notion of how many commandments is a Mormon supposed to keep if they are hoping to receive their perfection and salvation, which of course would be in the context of celestial exaltation.

Well, this is something that Spencer W. Kimball, 12th President of the Church, talked about a lot, including his book, The Miracle of Forgiveness. Let me just give you one quote, pages 208 and 209, he said, "'This progress toward eternal life is a matter of achieving perfection. Living all the commandments guarantees total forgiveness of sins and assures one of exaltation through that perfection, which comes by complying with the formula the Lord gave us.'" And then he cites Matthew 5.48, "'To be therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.'" He says this, "'Being perfect means to triumph over sin. This is a mandate from the Lord. He is just and wise and kind. He would never require anything from his children which was not for their benefit and which was not attainable.

Perfection, therefore, is an achievable goal.'" Now, you might criticize Spencer Kimball and say that, well, it's not a book that was ever part of the canon or anything else, but I think that Kimball does a great job of explaining, as he says in chapter 1, that this life is the time for you to be able to do this. He cites from 1 Nephi 3.7, which says that God wouldn't give any commandments that couldn't be kept, otherwise he wouldn't be a good God. And then he cites out of Alma chapter 34 to show very clearly that it has to be done in this life. So the book, The Miracle of Forgiveness, is all about doing exactly what Ballard says here, that you have to keep all the requirements that he would make known onto us for our perfection and salvation. That is very clearly aligned with the standard works, and I'm talking about the unique standard works, because I do think that Matthew 5.48 was taken out of context in what was cited by Kimball, because very clearly the Book of Mormon says you need to keep all of the commandments, how often?

All the time. Well, he also uses a phrase, covenant breakers. Kimball does the same thing. In fact, he uses it even in that same context, that if you claim to be a Latter-day Saint and you've made covenants to keep all the commandments, or to obey all God's laws, is the phrase he uses.

And you don't! You are a covenant breaker, and that's exactly what Spencer Kimball said. He did not have very good things to say about covenant breakers, that's for sure. But you mentioned the connection with Spencer W. Kimball, and I want to take the rest of the show to bring out another comparison between what Ballard believed and what Spencer Kimball also believed, and that is this notion that perhaps something could be done by an individual after they die to make up for lost time, that even though they may have died being only terrestrial kingdom material, and I should explain that in Mormonism there's three degrees of glory, the celestial kingdom at the top, the terrestrial kingdom, and then the telestial kingdom, there's this belief by some Latter-day Saints that if they only qualified for the telestial kingdom when they died, that through good behavior they might be able to advance to the next level, the terrestrial, or maybe even on to the celestial kingdom. What did Melvin J. Ballard say about that in a discourse that he gave at the Ogden Tabernacle on October 22, 1922, found in a book called Three Degrees of Glory, pages 26 and 27? He wrote, the question is often asked, is it possible for one who attains celestial glory in time in the eternal world to live so well that he may graduate from the telestial and pass into the terrestrial, and then after a season that he may progress from that and be ultimately worthy of the celestial glory? That is the query that has been asked. I have just read the answer so far as the Telestial Group is concerned. Where God and Christ dwell, they cannot come worlds without end.

I take it upon the same basis, the same argument likewise applies to the terrestrial world. Those whose lives have entitled them to terrestrial glory can never gain celestial glory. One who gains possession of the lowest degree of the telestial glory may ultimately arise to the highest degree of that glory, but no provision has been made for a promotion from one glory to another. But yet, how many times have we talked to Latter-day Saints, Eric, who give us the impression that though they're not doing what they should be doing now, and they all admit that if you ask them, all you need do, folks, is to ask a Latter-day Saint, if you were to die right now, do you have the assurance that you qualify for the celestial kingdom? I think an honest Latter-day Saint, in looking over their lives and all the times they find themselves having the need to repent of their shortcomings, would have to admit, no, they don't qualify right now.

And they'll tell you that that's okay because they believe that God has allowed them the opportunity to make up for lost time. And they may not use that phrase exactly, but basically that's what they're saying, that they will be allowed to make up for lost time or abandon opportunities to be able to eventually end up in the celestial kingdom after they die. Well, it sounds to me like Melvin J. Ballard certainly did not agree with that. I mean, let's look at some of the things he says here when the question is asked, is it possible for one who attains telestial glory in time in the eternal world, now the telestial glory would be the bottom level, to live so well that he may graduate from the telestial and pass into the terrestrial, and then after a season that he may progress from that and be ultimately worthy of the celestial glory. He makes it clear that that's not going to happen, and that's exactly what we find Spencer Kimball teaching as well. Now, I know that there's some who say, well, Brigham Young was a little confusing on this issue, and he did kind of hint that that might be possible. Well, do you want to gamble on that as a Latter-day Saint, that it might be possible? Because let's be serious, Brigham Young said a lot of things that were kind of confusing, vague, and even contradictory. But it seems here that Melvin J. Ballard, a Mormon apostle and also the grandfather of M. Russell Ballard, who's venerating his grandfather for the position that he held, and that's why we're talking about this today, is because it was brought up by M. Russell Ballard on his trip to Boston, Massachusetts. He obviously had a lot of respect for what his grandfather believed, and this is what his grandfather believed, which is not really out of harmony with what other Mormon leaders have said as well, when it comes to this notion that an individual might be able to jump kingdoms and go from, let's say, the telestial to the terrestrial, or the terrestrial to the celestial. It doesn't sound like that's possible within the context of Mormonism, and to assume otherwise, you would think, Eric, it might be a bit dangerous. Well, maybe for some it's dangerous, but for many others we're talking to out on the streets, when you ask them if they were to die right now where they would go, they admit to you they're going to the terrestrial kingdom, and you ask, well doesn't that bother you? And you know what the answer oftentimes is?

No! I figure that I'm doing the best I can, and if God doesn't take that as good enough, then I guess I'll just end up in the terrestrial, I'll be happy there. But that's not what the leaders have tried to get their members to think, what is the purpose of the temple but to have eternal families? They seal together in the temple, they learn the special new names, and they learn the tokens, all of that is part of a process hoping that they're going to be able to get the celestial kingdom, but I have found many Latter-day Saints don't even really have a great desire to go there. And you have to think about that in the context of Mormonism, for a Mormon to give up that desire is to really give up a hope that many Latter-day Saints really look forward to. If you ask most Latter-day Saints what is it that you really look forward to after you die, they will tell you it's to be with my family.

But yet when you ask more pointed questions, you find that the person you're talking to doesn't qualify. Thank you for listening. If you would like more information regarding Mormonism Research Ministry, we encourage you to visit our website at www.mrm.org where you can request our free newsletter, Mormonism Researched. We hope you will join us again as we look at another viewpoint on Mormonism.