In Miserable Conditions, Joseph Found a way to Have Fun

Joseph Smith playing with his sons

Since I’m a horrible teaser, I often heard my mom state, “It isn't fun unless it’s fun for everyone.”Now that I’m a parent, I can understand her frustration. But if absolutely no one is having fun, then what do you do? It becomes necessary for a least one individual to step forward and try to make the situation better. This is the position Joseph Smith found himself in late fall/early winter of 1838 at Adam-ondi-Ahman. Surrounded by State militia, and no roof to protect the Saints from the elements, what did Joseph suggest?

                   a.      Make hot soup for the State militia

                   b.      Play a game of town ball (an early version of baseball and also sometimes referred too as rounders)

                  c.       Have a snowball fight

                  d.      Have a scripture chase tournament

Yesterday’s answer:

                    a    An ex-African American slave

Salt Lake City’s Eighth Ward assigned Samuel D. Chambers, a former Mississippi slave, to serve as an assistant to the deacons, who took care of the ward meetinghouse and did ushering. A regular guest at the stake deacons meeting, more than once he was the only person there other than the stake officers. His testimonies, which quorum clerk Thomas C. Jones recorded, impressed his fellow deacons, most of whom were adults. Samuel joined the Church at age thirteen while a slave in Mississippi. Although lacking contact with the Church for a quarter century, he maintained his testimony. Becoming a free man in 1865, he earned enough money to gather to Zion in 1870 at age forty. His fervor is felt in his recorded testimonies given between 1873 and 1877: “I’m glad that I ever took upon me the name of Christ.” “The knowledge I received is from my God. It is a high and holy calling, without the testimony of God we are nothing.” He enjoyed serving he Church because he “did not come here to sit down and be still.” His desire was to “be active in doing what he can for the building up of the kingdom of God.” He attended meetings, ushered at the tabernacle, tithed fully, and endured as a stalwart until his death in 1929 at age ninety-eight.

Nearly Everything Imaginable, Walker, Ronald W., Doris R. Dant ed., (Provo, Utah: BYU Press, 1999), 284-285.