A Fire That Removed Hesitation

Christian Benevolence

The following is from the Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt, page 106:

…”I was instructed to prepare for a mission in the coming spring, in connection with my brethren of the quorum (of the Twelve Apostles).  I now returned home …and began to make preparations for my mission, but the state of my affairs was such that it seemed almost impossible for me to leave…, my wife was sick, my aged mother had come to live with me and looked to me for support, age and infirmity having rendered my father unable to do for himself or family.  I was also engaged in building a house and in other business, while at the same time I was somewhat in debt and in want of most of the necessaries of life.

Under these embarrassed circumstances, I hesitated for a while whether to attempt to perform the mission assigned me or stay at home and finish my building and mechanical work.  While I pondered these things, with my mind unsettled,  I continued my work, with a feeling of hesitation whether it was a duty to sacrifice all the labor and expense to which I had been in my preparations and unfinished work or whither it was a duty to stay and complete it, I was called suddenly to administer to a brother by the name of Matthews, who was taken… dangerously ill…I knelled down to pray, but in the midst of my prayers we were interrupted by the cry of fire! Fire!

We sprang from our knees and ran towards my house, which was all in a blaze, being an unfinished, two story frame building, open to the fresh breeze and full of shavings, lumber, shingles and so forth, while a family occupied a small apartment of the same and no water near.

 

Our utmost exertions barely accomplished the removal of the family and their goods; the building, tools, boards, shingles, & building materials all were consumed in a few moments.  Thus closed all my hesitation; my works of that nature were now all completed and myself ready to fill my mission.  One gave me a coat; another a hat; a third, house room;  a fourth, provisions; while a fifth forgave me the debts due to them and a sixth bade me God speed to hasten on my mission.

Taking an affectionate leave of my family and friends in New Portage, I repaired to Kirtland, ready to accompany my brethren.  While they made ready I paid a visit to an adjoining township called Mentor; and visiting from house to house, I attempted to preach to them; but they were full of lying and prejudice and would not hear the Word.

I then appointed a meeting in the open air, on the steps of a meeting house owned by a people called “Campbellites,” one Mr. Alexander Campbell being their leader, they having refused to open the house to me.  Some came to hear and some to disturb the meeting and one Mr. Newel soon appeared at the head of a mob of some fifty men and a band of music. 

They formed in order of battle and marched round several times near where I stood, drowning my voice with the noise of their drums and other instruments.  I suspended my discourse several times as they passed and then resumed.  At length, finding that no disturbance of this kind would prevent the attempt to discharge my duty, they rushed upon me with one accord at a given signal, every man throwing an egg at my person. 

My forehead, bosom and most of my body were completely covered with broken eggs.  At this I departed and walked slowly away, being insulted and followed by this rabble for some distance.  I soon arrived in Kirtland and was assisted by my kind friends in cleansing myself and clothes from the effects of this Christian benevolence.”