Courtesy of HBLL Special Collections

This gallery illuminates several examples of people who exerted themselves in order to receive visionary revelation. Some examples include: Joseph Smith, Karl G. Maeser, George H. Brimhall, and John M. Whitaker. In writing up that list, I noticed I didn’t list any women. I regretfully also noted how difficult it was for me to name any. In my defense, I can think of plenty of women who receive inspiration, but have these women received a singular visionary revelation? This is not to say that those monumental shifts are superior. In fact, I acknowledge those instances are certainly the exception to the rule, but I wanted to place some women on the list. I did gather a list of some names (LDS and non-LDS women) for further research. In my research, I came across Lucy Mack Smith, and I found some stories I really liked.

After six years of marriage, Lucy became very ill, was diagnosed with “confirmed consumption,” the disease from which her sisters Lovisa and Lovina had died. The doctors had given up hope and condemned her to death. Lucy stated she didn’t feel prepared for death and judgment at all. “I knew not the ways of Christ, besides there appeared to be a dark and lonesome chasm between myself and the Savior, which I dared not attempt to pass.” Though fatigued and bedridden, Lucy spent the night pleading with the Lord to spare her life so she could bring up her children and “be a comfort” to her husband.

“My mind was much agitated during the whole night . . . During this night, I made a solemn covenant with God, that, if he would let me live, I would endeavor to serve him according to the best of my abilities. Shortly after this, I heard a voice say to me, ‘Seek and ye shall find; knock and it shall be opened unto you. Let your heart be comforted; ye believe in God, believe also in me.’

Lucy’s recovery began immediately and she began her lifelong search for a religion that would teach her and her family the way of salvation.

Camlyn Giddins, Gallery Educator

It’s quite easy – even expected – for us to question the need for something when we don’t fully understand the reason why it was created in the first place.  In a small, unobtrusive space in Education in Zion, the history of Family Home Evening is told.

First Presidency, 1915

In the dawn of the 20th century, Joseph F. Smith and other leaders saw a problem.  Children and teenagers had so many auxiliary church programs dedicated to their spiritual education and welfare that they were receiving more instruction there than they were in their own homes.

Additionally, many parents saw teaching in the home as supplementary to the instruction their families received at Church, instead of the other way around.  Sadly, this apathetic mindset is still common today as many LDS parents send their kids off to Young Men/Young Women or Sunday School, considering that to be sufficient for their family’s spiritual instruction.

President Frank Taylor, Granite Stake

In an effort to free up more time for parents to spend with their children, President Smith put together a committee charged with reducing the overlap of the Church’s teaching organizations.  In 1907 this committee recommended that certain programs be merged (out of which came the Primary program as it functions today) and that all auxiliary organizations of the Church place more emphasis on teaching in the home.

In 1909 a stake president named Frank Taylor (son of President John Taylor) set aside Monday evenings for Home Evening in an effort to follow the Church’s emphasis on strengthening the family.

By the spring of 1915, “Family Home Evening” as it came to be known, had become so successful in that stake that President Smith and the First Presidency officially adopted it church-wide, proclaiming the following:

“If the Saints obey this counsel, we promise that great blessings will result.  Love at home and obedience to parents will increase.  Faith will be developed in the hearts of the youth of Israel, and they will gain power to combat the evil influence and temptations which beset them.”

John S. Boyer Family

So what is the big deal?

For nearly 100 years now, families and prophets have testified again and again of the protection and blessings experienced from participating in Family Home Evening.  It represents one of the biggest “deals” of our faith, the deal we made to God to take care of His children as our own – or perhaps in the case of us young adults on campus, the deal we made to bear one another’s burdens and comfort those in need of comfort.

What better opportunity to keep our covenants in extending a loving hand of social and spiritual enlightenment than to attend and participate in Family Home Evening?

- Adam Watson, Communications Major and Education in Zion Gallery Educator