Hello, everyone. This is my book of Mormon, and I'm Marie Kent. When are we today? December, 1834, and

things are happening in Mormon history. See, there's this building currently under construction.

Little building, not particularly structurally sound, you may have heard of it, called the

Kirtland Temple. It will be completed and dedicated

in March 1836 in one heck of a church service. For now, though, it's just in progress. The early

Mormons call themselves the saints, and so right now, the saints are more concerned with

recovering from being rather emphatically pushed out of Missouri.

Joseph Smith is a prophet, and he says that the promised land of Zion is in Missouri, so

shouldn't they go back? And what about that naysayer, E.D. Howe. He's publishing all those

anti-Mormon letters over in Painesville, and that's just not cool.

Which brings us to what we're reading today.

Letter three from writer Oliver Cowdery to his publisher counterpart, W.W. Phelps.

His November letter, letter number two, primarily addressed how people, meaning you and me,

and also the dog that's barking next door, should view apostles

and leaders of God.

Namely, they're just normal people.

They've got flaws, which is weird, because Joseph is also giving revelations from God on

the regular.

So, so many of them have a gist of, God says I need to tell you this thing, and remember,

God only talks to me, so I'm more important than you.

Personally, I'm having a hard time squaring up the Joseph doesn't need to be perfect message

of these letters with the reality of Joseph's self-aggrandizing revelations.

...