Phelps reports the Kirtland manifestation: the day of the Lord near, even at the doors
background
On: great and dreadful day of the LORD
Source quotation · William W. Phelps, letter to Sally Phelps, Kirtland, April 1836, p. 3 (BYU Vault MSS 810).
On Sunday, April 3, the twelve held meeting and aministered the sacrament. It was a glorious time. The curtains were dropt in the after noon. A[…] there was a manifestation of the Lord to Br. Josep[h] and Oliver, by which they learned that the great & terrible day of the Lo[rd] as mentioned by M[a]lichi, was near, even at the doors. Could not get ready to start for Missouri, on Monday— had to wait to raise Money to purchase land: Monday & Tuesday went heavily though I attended a feast at Father Johnson’s on Tuesday after noon. Wednesday was set apart as day of prayer to end the feast of the passover. and in honor of the Jubille of the Church: it being six years old this day:
William W. Phelps to Sally Phelps, April 1836 · William W. Phelps, holograph letter to Sally Phelps, Liberty, Clay County, Missouri, from Kirtland, Ohio, April 1836, signed “WW Phelps”; four pages, headed “Letter 27” and paginated 187 on the first page. L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Vault MSS 810, William Wines Phelps papers, series 1, item 10; digital images in BYU’s CONTENTdm collection SCMisc (record 54671; page 3 is record 54669). Page 3, from “On Sunday, April 3” through “six years old this day:”. Transcribed from the page image. Spelling, capitalization and punctuation as written; line ends joined; “&” kept. Square brackets enclose letters supplied where the paper is torn or stained (“Josep[h],” “Lo[rd],” “M[a]lichi”); “[…]” marks a word lost at the torn right edge.
Source reuse and transcription
Manuscript of 1836, public domain; BYU’s record for the item states “Public domain.”
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Published revision history
2026-10-05T15:53:51+00:00
On Sunday, April 3, the twelve held meeting and aministered the sacrament. It was a glorious time. The curtains were dropt in the after noon. A[…] there was a manifestation of the Lord to Br. Josep[h] and Oliver, by which they learned that the great & terrible day of the Lo[rd] as mentioned by M[a]lichi, was near, even at the doors. Could not get ready to start for Missouri, on Monday— had to wait to raise Money to purchase land: Monday & Tuesday went heavily though I attended a feast at Father Johnson’s on Tuesday after noon. Wednesday was set apart as day of prayer to end the feast of the passover. and in honor of the Jubille of the Church: it being six years old this day:
Pratt: Elijah came before the great and dreadful day
proposed fulfillment
On: Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet
Source quotation · Orson Pratt, as reported by G. D. Watt, 28 August 1859; Journal of Discourses 7, pp. 78–79, five paragraphs from “Then Elijah is not dead.” through “of Ohio, many years ago.”
Then Elijah is not dead. If we could have a view of the heavenly host at the present day, we should see Elijah there. But he is to be sent from heaven on a mission to our earth. "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and dreadful day of the Lord shall come." We need never look for the coming of the Son of God—for the day when he shall suddenly come to his temple and sit like a refiner of silver, and as with fuller's soap to purify and purge the sons of Levi, &c., until Elijah the Prophet is sent. But the great question is, Has he been sent? If he has, it must have been of a very recent date, for the great and dreadful day of the Lord has not yet come; for there are still wicked men upon the earth. What is the testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith? We believe him to be the Prophet of the Lord in this great and last dispensation. We Latter-day Saints believe this fact. What did he testify in the Kirtland Temple, after it was built and consecrated and dedicated unto the Lord of hosts? He testified that he, in connection with others, had the ministration of Elijah the Prophet, who appeared to them in great glory. You can read this in the History of Joseph Smith, the Prophet: we can read all the instructions that were given in relation to his particular mission.
We cannot suppose that that great Prophet is coming down upon the earth to wander about among the nations, and to continue in this wicked world. If he is sent at all, he will be sent with power and authority, like other angels sent from heaven, to bestow the same authority that is upon himself on some individuals on the earth, that they may go forth holding the same authority that Elijah himself held, having the same keys, receiving the same instructions, in regard to the Latter-day dispensation—a mission, in other words, sent from heaven by Elijah as a ministering angel to seek out the chosen vessels, and ordain them, and send them to administer to the inhabitants of the earth. This is the way the Lord commits dispensations: instead of sending angels to wander on the earth, he sends them to ordain others, to restore the authority, and set the work agoing. This Church had already been organized, and certain authority and officers had been restored; but no Elijah had yet come. John the Baptist had come, in fulfilment of the 3rd chapter of Malachi and the 40th chapter of Isaiah: he came to restore the Priesthood of Levi, in order that those holding it might be purified as gold and silver, to offer an offering in righteousness when the Lord should suddenly come to his temple.
Peter, James, and John had also been sent as Apostles to restore the Apostleship to the earth; for no man held that power and authority: and in order that it might be restored, it was needful that an Apostle, holding the office, and authority, and the keys, should lay his hands upon an individual to restore these keys, and authority, and power to act in the Apostleship. Peter, James, and John, therefore, restored to the earth the same authority and power that they themselves had. But no Elijah had yet come. Years had passed along, and the Temple in Kirtland was at length built and consecrated unto the Most High God.
The time had now arrived for other ordinances to be made manifest, for other things to be revealed, for greater light to shine forth, for other keys, powers, and authorities to be bestowed upon chosen vessels of the Lord. The full time had arrived for the prophecy of Malachi to be fulfilled, when the hearts of the fathers should be turned to their children, and when the hearts of the children should be turned to their fathers, lest the Lord should come and smite the whole earth with a curse.
In order to restore a mission of that kind and magnitude, Elijah had to be sent. We have the testimony of the servants of God in this Church that this was accomplished in the Kirtland Temple, in the State of Ohio, many years ago.
Orson Pratt on Elijah’s latter-day mission · Journal of Discourses, vol. 7 (Liverpool: Amasa Lyman), discourse by Orson Pratt delivered in the Tabernacle, Great Salt Lake City, 28 August 1859, reported by G. D. Watt, beginning p. 74. Selected unit pp. 78–79. JournalofDiscourses.com transcription retrieved 30 September 2026, collated word by word against the Internet Archive JoDV07 OCR text layer, with page images inspected where the witnesses differed; wording and spelling follow the print, punctuation and capitalization follow the electronic witness. HTML markup removed and whitespace normalized. No passages omitted within selected units. Print readings restored: “in fulfillment of the 3rd chapter” → “in fulfilment of the 3rd chapter”.
Source reuse and transcription
Nineteenth-century historical source text, public domain. Print witness: https://archive.org/details/JoDV07/page/n81/mode/2up.
Community response to this revision: 0
Published revision history
2026-10-01T14:02:23+00:00
Then Elijah is not dead. If we could have a view of the heavenly host at the present day, we should see Elijah there. But he is to be sent from heaven on a mission to our earth. "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and dreadful day of the Lord shall come." We need never look for the coming of the Son of God—for the day when he shall suddenly come to his temple and sit like a refiner of silver, and as with fuller's soap to purify and purge the sons of Levi, &c., until Elijah the Prophet is sent. But the great question is, Has he been sent? If he has, it must have been of a very recent date, for the great and dreadful day of the Lord has not yet come; for there are still wicked men upon the earth. What is the testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith? We believe him to be the Prophet of the Lord in this great and last dispensation. We Latter-day Saints believe this fact. What did he testify in the Kirtland Temple, after it was built and consecrated and dedicated unto the Lord of hosts? He testified that he, in connection with others, had the ministration of Elijah the Prophet, who appeared to them in great glory. You can read this in the History of Joseph Smith, the Prophet: we can read all the instructions that were given in relation to his particular mission.
We cannot suppose that that great Prophet is coming down upon the earth to wander about among the nations, and to continue in this wicked world. If he is sent at all, he will be sent with power and authority, like other angels sent from heaven, to bestow the same authority that is upon himself on some individuals on the earth, that they may go forth holding the same authority that Elijah himself held, having the same keys, receiving the same instructions, in regard to the Latter-day dispensation—a mission, in other words, sent from heaven by Elijah as a ministering angel to seek out the chosen vessels, and ordain them, and send them to administer to the inhabitants of the earth. This is the way the Lord commits dispensations: instead of sending angels to wander on the earth, he sends them to ordain others, to restore the authority, and set the work agoing. This Church had already been organized, and certain authority and officers had been restored; but no Elijah had yet come. John the Baptist had come, in fulfilment of the 3rd chapter of Malachi and the 40th chapter of Isaiah: he came to restore the Priesthood of Levi, in order that those holding it might be purified as gold and silver, to offer an offering in righteousness when the Lord should suddenly come to his temple.
Peter, James, and John had also been sent as Apostles to restore the Apostleship to the earth; for no man held that power and authority: and in order that it might be restored, it was needful that an Apostle, holding the office, and authority, and the keys, should lay his hands upon an individual to restore these keys, and authority, and power to act in the Apostleship. Peter, James, and John, therefore, restored to the earth the same authority and power that they themselves had. But no Elijah had yet come. Years had passed along, and the Temple in Kirtland was at length built and consecrated unto the Most High God.
The time had now arrived for other ordinances to be made manifest, for other things to be revealed, for greater light to shine forth, for other keys, powers, and authorities to be bestowed upon chosen vessels of the Lord. The full time had arrived for the prophecy of Malachi to be fulfilled, when the hearts of the fathers should be turned to their children, and when the hearts of the children should be turned to their fathers, lest the Lord should come and smite the whole earth with a curse.
In order to restore a mission of that kind and magnitude, Elijah had to be sent. We have the testimony of the servants of God in this Church that this was accomplished in the Kirtland Temple, in the State of Ohio, many years ago.