29. Describe the law of consecration.
30. What purposes are designed to be accomplished in the law of consecration?
31. What circumstances prevented the successful operation of this law in Missouri?
SECTION IV.
1. Persecution.—From the very commencement the work of the Lord in these last days met with the most violent opposition. No sooner did Joseph Smith declare that he had received a revelation from God than it brought upon him the ridicule and wrath of many who heard of it. The stream of hatred grew broader and deeper as the work progressed. Joseph himself endured many vexatious persecutions, and those who believed in his teachings were doomed to share them. The first general persecution of the church, however, occurred in Missouri.
2. The people among whom the Saints settled in Jackson county, Missouri, were ignorant, jealous, bigoted, and superstitious. They were also given to Sabbath-breaking, drunkenness, profanity, horse racing and gambling. It will be seen at once, therefore, that there could be but little fellowship between them and the Saints. (See note 1, end of section.) Moreover, they were principally from the Southern states, and slaveholders; and as the Saints were from the free states of the north, they were inclined to be suspicious of them. It was an easy matter therefore, for demagogues to persuade the Missourians that it was the design of the Saints to supplant them in the possession of the country.
3. Expulsion of the Saints from Jackson County.—The saints themselves were not as prudent as they should have been. Many boasted that God would destroy the wicked and give their possessions as inheritances unto the righteous. Many more failed to live up to the moral precepts of the gospel, and were disobedient to the counsels of the Lord. This gave the wicked great power over them, and the result was that the jealously and wrath which had been burning for some time in the hearts of the old settlers finally broke out into deeds of violence. Almost the entire population about Independence arose and drove the Saints from the county under circumstances of the utmost cruelty.[[83]] Twelve hundred people were driven from their possessions; and about two hundred of their homes and one grist mill were burned. This was in the fall and winter of 1833-34. [See note 2, end of section.]
4. Zion's Camp.—The excited Saints found a temporary abode in Clay County—the next county north of Jackson—and in the meantime the Lord commanded the Prophet Joseph to gather up the strength of the Lord's house—the young and middle-aged men in the church—for the purpose of going to the assistance of their brethren in Missouri, and to redeem Zion.[[84]] In the spring of 1834, therefore, about one hundred and fifty of the brethren from the churches in the eastern states assembled at New Portage, Ohio, about fifty miles from Kirtland; and this number was increased to about two hundred by the time the camp reached Missouri. They took with them money to purchase lands, food and clothing to assist their destitute brethren, and it was also the determination of the camp to help their exiled friends maintain their possessions when the governor of Missouri re-instated them upon their lands.[[85]] But en route to Missouri the brethren did not live up to the requirement made of the camp. Some of them were disobedient, even rebellious towards the prophet, and the Lord was not well pleased with them.
5. As the camp approached Jackson county it was met by delegations inquiring into their designs for approaching Jackson county. Various reports had been spread abroad in respect to their intentions, and some of them were of a character to create alarm. In order to correct these false reports the brethren made the following statement: