To have the faith to remove a mountain would be a wonderful attribute, but to actually remove a mountain may be a colossal misuse of that faith. As far as we know, that kind of faith and the actual movement of a mountain only occurred once throughout the scriptures: “For the brother of Jared said unto the mountain Zerin, remove—and it was removed. And if he had not had faith it would not have moved; wherefore thou workest after men have faith.” (Ether 12:30) Did the mountain move just because the brother of Jared wanted to prove that he had the faith to do it? The scriptures do not give a reason why, so was there a legitimate reason that he wanted it moved? That is a fair question! It is hard for me to believe that the power of faith can be used superfluously. I believe a much more appropriate use of that kind of powerful faith would be as described by Nephi and attributed to faith in the Lord: “For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.” (3 Nephi 22:10)
There was a man who, though he never subscribed to a specific religious sect nor claimed to be a religious man; yet this contemporary man had the faith to remove a mountain. That man was Korczak Ziolkowski, a now famous sculptor, who was commissioned to sculpt the Crazy Horse monument from
the Thunderhead Mountain in South Dakota. The mountain is mostly made up of pegmatite granite. The project was first started in 1948, shortly after Ziolkowski was discharged as a highly decorated serviceman from the Second World War. The only part currently completed is Crazy Horse’s face. Ziolkowski’s children and grandchildren have continued the project after his death in 1982. It is a massive project, one that very few men would ever have the strength and energy to begin or for that matter the intelligence to calculate the process in order to move forward with such an undertaking.
The faith of the ancients was centered in Christ—by faith, men subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, and worked miracles. But this man claimed no such connection to Christ or any such iconic figure associated with faith. In the eleventh chapter of Hebrew, it states that “…faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” That describes very well, I believe, what drove Ziolkowski. This mountain monument, to him, was a dream (substance of things hoped for)—such a powerful dream that it consumed his every waking moment (evidence of things not seen). The energy that is derived from such dreams can drive a man to perform the unbelievable, the unimaginable, the almost superhuman performances. Performances that we can see, in all reality, in that mountain monument even as it stands today, a work in progress. My wife and I drove to South Dakota expecting to see something extraordinary, but what we saw was, to me, more than extraordinary. It was a miracle wrought by men, it was a mountain that was being displaced and replaced by a work of art. Long after we are gone and the world may be made desolate, Crazy Horse may still be standing. I marvel at such men who have enormous vision, such energy, and such intellectual power that they can transform something so humongous into a sculpture so well defined. Most people will start a project when they can envision the end and know that it will only tie them up for a defined periods of time. A project that will not extract too much energy from their reserve so that they will still have energy to do other things of interest to them. A project to move a mountain or to transform a mountain is all consuming of mind, energy and muscle. I have a great deal of admiration for the man and his family for moving forward with a project that, one day, will be one of the wonders of the world. When he started the project, he had no idea how long it would take; time was not a factor in his dream. I’m sure he knew before he started that he would not live to see it completed. When he saw the results and minor impact of his first blast of dynamite, he must have realized at that very moment, that it was a project that was going to take thousands, if not millions, of those blasts to move and shape that mountain. Many of those blasts have to be precise, because if too much granite is removed in a critical place, it could ruin the whole project. To form something with such precision out of such a large project leaves very little room for error. President Thomas S. Monson said, “Miracles are everywhere to be found when priesthood callings are magnified. When faith replaces doubt, when selfless service eliminates selfish striving, the power of God brings to pass His purposes.” (May 2006 Ensign, “Our Sacred Priesthood Trust”) In some cases, it is even to be found when the Priesthood is absent, but when the other factors are present, i.e. when faith replaces doubt, when selfless service eliminates selfish striving. God bless miracle workers wherever they are found, with or without the Priesthood.