Sectarian Priests Persecute and Revile Joseph Smith
Joseph Smith—History 1:23
23 It caused me serious reflection then, and often has since, how very strange it was that an obscure boy, of a little over fourteen years of age, and one, too, who was doomed to the necessity of obtaining a scanty maintenance by his daily labor, should be thought a character of sufficient importance to attract the attention of the great ones of the most popular sects of the day, and in a manner to create in them a spirit of the most bitter persecution and reviling. But strange or not, so it was, and it was often the cause of great sorrow to myself.
Elder Bruce R. McConkie wrote:
“Beware the leaven of the modern sects of Christendom—sects so near in one sense to salvation, and yet so far away in the eternal sense—sects that believe false doctrines. Beware of the leaven of the Baptists, that belief in Christ without more brings a spiritual rebirth. Beware of the leaven of the Lutherans, that men are justified by faith alone, without works of righteousness. Beware the leaven of all the sects and cults, for among them the fulness of the everlasting gospel is not found.”
(The Mortal Messiah: From Bethlehem to Calvary, 4 vols. [1979–81], 3:30.)
