Visions of a Personal Nature—I ask, Is there a reason for men and women being exposed more constantly and more powerfully, to the power of the enemy, by having visions than by not having them? There is and it is simply this—God never bestows upon his people, or upon an individual, superior blessings without a severe trial to prove them, to prove that individual, or that people, to see whether they will keep their covenants with him, and keep in remembrance what he has shown them. Then the greater the vision, the greater the display of the power of the enemy.
(Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1954], 338.)
As I read the above statement my President Brigham Young, I can't help but think of the night when the Prophet Joseph Smith was beaten and tarred and feathered, and Sidney Rigdon was dragged by his heels over the frozen ground until he was unconscious. This took place shortly after they both had received the vision of D&C 76 which revealed the three degrees of glory.
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