The Falling Away And Restoration Foretold

A falling away from the true religion that Christ preached, from the ordinances he performed, and from the church he organized was foretold in the Bible. Confirming this loss of truth are many of history's great Christian reformers. Many of them sought to conform with the Holy Scriptures; some looked for the restoration "of all things" that Peter had prophesied. The Latter-day Saints not only recognize that this falling away did occur, but also announce that God has made himself known to mortal men in these modern times and has restored his church in detail as it was anciently.

Apostle Paul - A Falling Away Prophesied

BE not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means; for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first.

Martin Luther - Christianity Has Ceased to Exist

I have sought nothing beyond reforming the Church in conformity with the Holy Scriptures. . . .

. . . I simply say that Cristianity has ceased to exist among those who should have preserved it.

John Wesley - Gifts of the Holy Ghost No longer Found

IT does not appear that these extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost were common in the Church for more than two or three centuries. We seldom hear of them after that fatal period when the Emperor Constantine called himself a Christian; . . . From this time they almost totally ceased; . . . The Christians had no more of the Spirit of Christ than the other Heathens . . . . This was the real cause why the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost were no longer to be found in the Christian Church; because the Christians were turned Heathens again, and had only a dead form left.

Roger Williams - Waiting for New Apostles

AMERICAN poet and editor William Cullen Bryant, in discussing an early religious group in Providence, Rhode Island, wrote: "Mr. Williams.continued to be its pastor for only four years, when he withdrew, not only form his official relations, but also ceased any longer to worship with his brethren, having come to the conclusion that there is `no regularly-constituted Church on earth, nor any person authorized to administer any Church ordinance; nor could there be, until new apostles were sent by the great Head of the Church, for whose coming he was seeking.'"

Thomas Jefferson - Sees a Restoration of Christianity

THE religion-builders have so distorted and deformed the doctrines of Jesus, so muffled them in mysticisms, fancies and falsehoods, have caricatured them into forms so monstrous and inconceivable, as to shock reasonable thinkers. . . Happy in the prospect of a restoration of primitive Christianity, I must leave to younger athletes to encounter and lop off the false branches which have been engrafted into it by the mythologists of the middle and modern ages.

Apostle Peter - All Things to Be Restored

HE shall send Jesus Christ. . .whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.

Joseph Smith - The Gospel of Jesus Christ Restored Through a Modern Prophet

IN 1820, fourteen-year-old Joseph Smith knelt in a quiet grove in upper New York state and prayed for guidance in choosing a church to join. His prayer was answered by the visitation of two heavenly personages. One spoke to him and said, pointing to the other, "This is my Beloved Son. Hear Him!"

This second personage told young Joseph that he should join no existing church, but that he was to aid in the restoration of the pure gospel of Jesus Christ in these latter days. Members of the church he was latter to organize by direct commandment of the Lord-The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints-testify that this visit to Joseph Smith by the Father and the Son began the "restitution of all things" foretold by the Apostle Peter.

This is the message that Mormons give to the world: That God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, and that his Church, completely restored in all its ancient power and efficacy, is now upon the earth.