A COVENANT OF FIRE Sons of the Utah Pioneers Days of '47 Sunrise Service Assembly Hall July 24, 2006 By Elder Merrill J. Bateman Of the Presidency of the Seventy Brothers and sisters, this is a memorable time and season. First, today commemorates the 159th anniversary of the entrance of the Mormon pioneers into Utah. After nearly three and one-half months of travel, the small band of 143 men, three women, and two children found the “right place” as they completed the journey from Winter Quarters to the Salt Lake Valley. Also, July 2006 marks the 150th anniversary of the departure of the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies from the railroad terminus at Iowa City as they began their 1,300-mile trek on foot, pulling and pushing handcarts weighed down with almost 500 pounds of provisions.  Their destination was also this valley. Although few experienced the severe hardships encountered by the members of the two handcart companies, all of the pioneers stepped out into the unknown with courage, determination, and perseverance based on their faith in God. Faith was the driving force. It was not only a strong belief that propelled them forward, but a burning within that taught them the importance of “gathering to Zion,” to be with the Saints and build a “House of the Lord.” As the missionaries taught them the gospel in various parts of the world, their belief in God was kindled and rekindled by the Holy Spirit testifying to them of the reality of God’s personal nature, that He is the Father of all, that Christ is His Only Begotten Son, that He has a plan for His children, and that the Father and the Son had spoken again through a prophet. There are many pioneer examples of this fire within and the power and courage that it generates. I wish to share two stories this morning which illustrate not only the power of the Spirit associated with conversion, but also the inspiration received by the Lord’s prophet as he directed the gathering process. The first is the story of a young couple, James Lewis and Mary Ann Huntley Burnham. James was a Christian minister in southern Illinois when he and his wife, Mary Ann, heard the missionaries preach the fulness of the restored gospel. James immediately understood that he lacked the authority to preach. Embracing wholeheartedly the message of the Restoration, James and his wife were baptized in 1843, and, with their four small children, made their way to Nauvoo to join with the Saints. A year later, the couple’s small daughter, Marie Antoinette, passed away and it also became evident that James, the father, was suffering from a lung disease. The dust in the quarry undoubtedly exacerbated the disease where he labored cutting rock for the Nauvoo Temple. Nevertheless, he and Mary Ann could hardly wait for the temple to be completed so they could become endowed and sealed for eternity. In the summer of 1845, James’ health grew worse and life began to ebb away. His passing occurred on October 8th, four days before the birth of another daughter. These were trying times for Mary Ann and her little family of four. She was devoid of the world’s goods. She wrote her family in the eastern part of the country and told them of her plight. They invited her to return home. But, as her daughter wrote later, she had “cast her lot with the saints of God and would rather remain in poverty than have the wealth of the whole world elsewhere.”1 On January 5, 1846, Mary Ann received her endowment in the Nauvoo Temple. On February 6, 1846, she was sealed to her deceased husband, James. In spite of his death, she was now his for time and all eternity. Their dream of being sealed forever became a reality. When the Nauvoo exodus began in February 1846, Mary Ann and her little family remained in the city, as she was unable to fund their departure. She watched the Saints leave the city and then the mob assume control. By the fall of 1846, the mob determined that all remaining Mormons had to leave Nauvoo. With some warning, she exchanged her property for a wagon and borrowed a yoke of cattle. She and her four little children along with others were forced from the city at gunpoint. They crossed the Mississippi and camped on the Iowa side in September. Elder Gerald N. Lund describes the scene in the following terms: “Mobs finally came in and drove them out, picking up the men and throwing them in the river, driving the women and children with bayonets, threatening to kill them if they crossed back over the river.”2 Mary Ann remembers the mob searching her wagon for arms, the obscene language they used, and the fear that gripped her heart as she wondered what fate lay ahead for her and her four young children. On September 25, 1846, Brigham Young, camped at Winter Quarters, received word about the Battle of Nauvoo and the final expulsion of the poverty-stricken Saints. The last remnant had been forced to leave the city—the poor, the widowed, and the orphans who were now camped in eastern Iowa on the banks of the Mississippi. Upon learning of their situation, and in spite of the desperate straits of the Saints who had just crossed Iowa and were camped on the banks of the Missouri River, Brigham Young gathered together the priesthood brethren and said: “The poor brethren and sisters, the widows and orphans, sick and destitute, are now lying on the west bank of the Mississippi, waiting for teams and wagons and means to remove them. Now is the time for labor. Let the fire of the covenant, which you made in the house of the Lord burn in your hearts like flame unquenchable.”3 President Young then asked for those who had wagons and were able to cross Iowa to assist the destitute in joining the main body of the Saints. Within a few days, almost “a hundred wagons were moving east to rescue the poor.”4 The fire of the covenant spoken of by President Young is not an imaginary but a real force in the lives of all faithful Saints. The rescuers as well as the last remnants on the banks of the Mississippi were strengthened by it. Most, if not all of us, have felt the burning as well. A personal witness received at baptism lights the fire. The intensity of the flame increases as we face adversity and the furnace of affliction tempers our soul. The flame bursts into a full-fledged fire as we enter into and live temple covenants. Mary Ann arrived in Winter Quarters late in the fall of 1846 and the fire within was again required to help her save and prepare for the journey to the Rocky Mountains. Within a few months of arriving in Nebraska, the opportunity came to send her second and third sons (ages 10 and 8) with a family to the valley. Believing the separation would be a year or less, she gave her consent. But a short separation was not to be. For five years she scrimped and saved to gather the meager rations required and with the help of friends she left the banks of the Missouri in 1852 for the valley. Can you imagine the joy of reunion as this mother with her oldest son and daughter embraced once again the two sons they had not seen in five years? Although the mother and her four living children had little in terms of the world’s goods, they had everything that mattered—they had each other, they were an eternal family, and they were part of Zion. A verse in the Doctrine and Covenants refers to the tragedy of those initially left behind in Nauvoo and makes plain the Lord’s wishes regarding them. On January 14, 1847, a few months after the rescue, Brigham Young issued the following statement as the “word and will of the Lord”: Let each company bear an equal proportion, according to the dividend of their property, in taking the poor, the widows, the fatherless, and the families of those who have gone into the army, that the cries of the widow and the fatherless come not up into the ears of the Lord against this people. [D&C 136:8] James and Mary Ann’s story is a small sample of the faith and spiritual commitment that burned within those at Nauvoo. It is also typical of the feelings that moved converts all over the world to leave their lands and answer the call to “gather to Zion.” One hundred and fifty years ago this month, the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies left Iowa City bound for the Salt Lake Valley 1,300 miles to the west. Numerous stories of faith, courage, and determination emanate from this group as they proved faithful in their extremities. The Willie and Martin Companies were part of ten handcart companies that traveled to Utah between 1856 and 1860. Although the trek was arduous for everyone, eight of the ten companies traveled without serious problems. Only the Willie and Martin expeditions, however, suffered the severe tragedy of extreme weather. But even in tragedy, these Saints never lost their faith in the Lord nor His willingness to sustain them. The James Willie Company left on July 15, 1856, and the Edward Martin Company 13 days later on July 28. It was late in the season. The leaders of both companies had been warned about the possibility of snow in the higher elevations of Wyoming. In turn, they had discussed the matter with members of their companies. Some of the captains of hundreds had traveled the route many times and were confident that they could make it through. Three companies had already left and the Saints assigned to the Willie and Martin groups were anxious to be on their way. It had been 78 days since they left England and they had waited three weeks in Iowa for the carts to be built. May I share a story that illustrates the faith and conviction of those who traveled and suffered, but who never wavered. A branch president in the London Conference decided in the spring of 1856 that it was time for him and his family to gather to Zion. He then forwarded funds to the British Mission office in Liverpool sufficient to purchase an ox team to convey himself, wife, and four children from Iowa City to Salt Lake City. About this same time, the handcart plan was submitted to the Saints in Europe with the suggestion that those able to emigrate by ox or horse team might consider the handcart and allow the excess funds to be used to help others. Because the branch president’s wife was unused to travel and the ages of their four children ranged from six years to eleven months, he decided the family should go by ox team. As emigration time approached, others in the branch indicated their desire to emigrate and be with him in the same company. Knowing that most could not afford an ox team, the branch president wrote British Mission headquarters asking to be reassigned to the handcarts and for the balance of his funds to be shared with others in his branch wanting to emigrate. At the Sunday sacrament and testimony meeting in which the branch president announced that his family would travel by handcart, a sister arose and gave her testimony using the gift of tongues. The interpretation was clearly given to the branch president, but he refrained from interpreting it for obvious reasons. After a pause, another sister arose and gave the interpretation as follows: “I, the Lord, am well pleased with the offering made by my servant . . . ; and notwithstanding he shall see the angel of death laying waste on his right hand and on his left, on his front and on his rearward, yet he and his family shall gather to Zion in safety, and not one of them shall fall by the way.” The good branch president, his family, and many of his branch members were part of approximately 600 members of the Martin Handcart Company, the last to leave Winter Quarters in late August 1856. Of those who began, about 450 entered the Salt Lake Valley on November 30 as one out of four was buried along the way. All could testify as to “the angel of death laying waste” during the journey. One morning along the trail, after a very cold night, it appeared that the promise given to the branch president would not be fulfilled. The parents awoke to find their four-and-one-half-year-old, blue-eyed, fair-haired boy dead. The father took the child and began anointing him with consecrated oil and praying over him, calling upon the Lord to keep His promise that not one of the family should fall by the way in gathering to Zion. The body was cold and not a heartbeat or other sign of life was in the child. The father continued to administer, to chafe the limbs and body, and to call upon the Lord to fulfill His promise. After what seemed a very long time, the father thought he saw a slight flutter in the child’s throat; this encouraged further rubbing, chafing, and administration, until finally, by God’s power and blessing the child opened his eyes and life returned. Through the rest of his life, the father was convinced that the boy would have been given up for dead and laid to rest with hundreds of others along the trail had it not been for the gift of the Spirit which inspired a faith and assurance that God would answer his prayers as he administered to a little boy who was looked upon as dead. (See Juvenile Instructor, 37:12; June 15, 1902.) Like Abraham of old, the branch president, “when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went” (Hebrews 11:8). By faith, the branch president followed a prophet’s voice to “gather to Zion.” He was willing to share his means with others even though it meant increased hardship “for he looked for a city . . . whose builder and maker is God” (Hebrews 11:10). Brothers and sisters, I pray that we may not shrink when adversity crosses our path. Elder Neal A. Maxwell has written: How [can] we expect to be joyous and to receive all that “the Father hath” if we do not strive to become like Him? And, in fact, can we, on our scale, be like Him without sharing in the “fellowship of his sufferings”? . . . If in all this there is some understandable trembling, the adrenaline of affliction can help to ensure that our pace will be brisk rather than casual. His grace will cover us like a cloak—enough to provide for survival but too thin to keep out all the cold. The seeming cold is there to keep us from drowsiness, and gospel gladness warms us enough to keep going.5 Sometimes I wonder if we are tried enough. It is obvious that our trials are different. In many cases, today’s trials may be good fortune, excess wealth, selfishness, the pervasiveness of and easy access to pornography, the need to protect family and especially children from moral decay, and the challenge of good being called evil and evil good. It is my prayer, brothers and sisters, that the fire of the covenant will continue to burn within us, providing a compass for the decisions to be made and the courage to make those decisions, that we may remain true to the heritage provided by our pioneer fathers. This I ask in the name of Jesus Christ, amen. Notes: 1. Mary Ann Burnham Freeze, Burnham Family Records in possession of Marilyn S. Bateman. 2. Gerald N. Lund, “The Fire of the Covenant,” in The Best of Women’s Conference, Bookcraft, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2000, 305. 3. Black and Hartley, Iowa Mormon Trail, 163. 4. Black and Hartley, Iowa Mormon Trail, 163. 5. Maxwell, Neal A., Even As I Am, 108, 209.