Live Up to Your Privileges

By President Emily Belle Freeman
Young Women General President

In July of 1830, Emma was 26 years old; she was so young. She was three and a half years into her marriage. She had lost a baby boy—her first. His little grave is just down the lane from her home. As I stood at that window, it was not hard for me to imagine what might have filled her thoughts. Surely she worried about their finances, about the increasing persecution that threatened their safety, about their future. And yet the work of God was everywhere around her. Did she also wonder about her place in the plan, her purpose in His kingdom, and her potential in the eyes of God?

I think she may have.

Just across the way, the gift of God’s priesthood authority and keys had been restored to the earth. This was a time when Emma actually needed power from heaven. In the midst of great heartache, exhaustion, and uncertainty, I imagine Emma wondered about this gift of God’s priesthood that could unlock the power from Him that she so desperately needed.

But Emma didn’t just stand at that window and wonder.

While the Prophet Joseph was being tutored in keys, offices, ordinances, and how to assist in the service of the priesthood, the Lord Himself, through His prophet, gave a revelation to Emma. Not Nauvoo-Relief-Society-president Emma—this revelation was given to 26-year-old Emma in Harmony. Through revelation, Emma would learn about the inward sanctification and covenant connection that would increase the ability of those priesthood ordinances to work in her life.

First, the Lord reminded Emma of her place in His plan, including who she was and whose she was—a daughter in His kingdom. She was invited to “walk in the paths of virtue,” a path that included ordinances that would unlock God’s power if Emma held on to her covenants.

Second, in her season of deep mourning, the Lord gave her purpose. Emma didn’t just have a front-row seat to the Restoration; she was an essential participant in the work taking place. She would be set apart “to expound scriptures, and to exhort the church.” Her time would “be given to writing, and to learning much.” Emma was given a sacred role to help prepare the Saints to worship; their songs unto the Lord would be received as prayers and “answered with a blessing upon their heads.”

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2024/10/13freeman?lang=eng