Great were the wonders that attended the labors of the three Nephite disciples who were to tarry on earth unto the end. Death had no power over them; they passed through the most terrible ordeals unhurt. Swords would not slay them; fire would not burn them; savage beasts would not harm them; prisons could not hold them; chains could not bind them; the grave could not entomb them; the earth would not conceal them. No matter how much they were abused or maltreated they triumphed over all their persecutors.
The age in which the three ministered was a peculiar one. Under ordinary circumstances the superhuman powers shown by them would have brought the wicked to repentance. But the happy age of peace and innocence that had followed the Savior's ministry was fast passing away; the people were hardening their hearts; they were relapsing into iniquity with their eyes open; they were sinning knowingly and understandingly. Angels from heaven would not have converted them; they had given themselves up to Satan, and every manifestation of the power of God in behalf of his servants only made them more angry, and more determined upon the destruction of those who sounded in their ears the unwelcome message of divine wrath. The hurricane might demolish the dungeon; the earthquake overthrow the walls of the prison; the earth refuse to close when the disciples were cast into it; these protests of nature simply caused their hardened hearts to conjure up fresh methods of torture and devise new means to destroy those whom they so intensely, and yet so unwarrantably, hated. But they ever failed; the three Nephites still live.
Of what change passed upon John, the Apostle, or how it was brought about that he should not taste of death, we are not told; but so far as the three Nephites are concerned we are informed that they were caught up into heaven, and there experienced a change that is not explained; and that they there saw and heard unspeakable things. Mormon, writing about them, says:
And now behold, as I spake concerning those whom the Lord had chosen, yea, even three who were caught up into the heavens, that I knew not whether they were cleansed from mortality to immortality.
But, behold, since I wrote, I have inquired of the Lord, and he hath made it manifest unto me, that there must needs be a change wrought upon their bodies, or else it needs be that they must taste of death;
Therefore that they might not taste of death, there was a change wrought upon their bodies, that they might not suffer pain or sorrow, save it were for the sins of the world.
Now this change was not equal to that which should take place at the last day; but there was a change wrought upon them, insomuch that Satan could have no power over them, that he could not tempt them, and they were sanctified in the flesh, that they were holy, and that the powers of the earth could not hold them;
And in this state they were to remain until the judgment day of Christ; and at that day they were to receive a greater change, and to be received into the kingdom of the Father to go no more out, but to dwell with God eternally in the heavens.
In the Bible we read of two men who lived before the Savior's advent—Moses and Elijah—who did not taste of death; we also read in the Book of Mormon of two—Alma and Nephi—who were translated.