Growing up, I admired Superman, Captain Marvel and others, they were the superheroes of my day. For a time, they became an obsession for me. When I was around 9 or 10 years of age, I remember sitting on the base of the magazine rack, in the local drugstore, reading the latest magazine issues of super heroes, with my cape hanging on my back. I couldn’t buy them because I didn’t have the few pennies it took. The kind drugstore owner knew that I couldn’t buy any, so he would let me read them there. My friends and I would argue over which superhero was the strongest. One of us would say one and another would argue for another. We would even elaborate by saying,” Yea, but, Superman can pick up a whole building.” Another would say, “but Captain Marvel can stop a train,”etc. These Superheroes were transplanted beings, transplanted from other planets, such as Krypton or whatever, because no mere human could do what they did. The wonderful imaginations of youth!
Now, as a man in his eighties, I have different hero’s; real human beings who lived outstanding lives. My main hero, was a young man who lived and died long before I was born, but never-the-less he is a real and living hero to me. He was not only strong physically but he was very smart, too. His most outstanding characteristic, however, was his spirit. He had a spirit that must have been nine feet tall, somehow squished inside his six foot frame. His name is Joseph Smith Jr., you may have noticed that I said his name is, not was, because to me and many others he lives on in the great work he began under the direction of messengers from heaven. One of those messengers, by the name of Moroni, addressed Joseph by name and said to him, that; “God had a work for me to do; and that my name should be had for good and evil among all nations, kindreds and tongues, or that it should be both good and evil spoken of among all people.” (Joseph Smith History 1:33) That statement alone is enough to qualify him for the status as a prophet, as his name is, and has been both good and evil spoken of among most all nations and people.
Joseph was instructed at the feet of holy angels, men who had lived on earth in ancient times. While inspiration flowed to him he wrote and wrote. He, it was, who was selected to initiate the “Restitution of all things in these the last days” (as foretold in the New Testament). He it was who restored the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it was in Christ’s day with the same organization and Priesthood authority with; prophets, apostles, seventies, elders, teachers and deacons, with all members correctly called to be saints, just as members of His church were called in the meridian of time. Joseph was criticized and persecuted by priests, ministers and ruffians, nearly all of his short life, for saying and doing what he was commanded to do. He knew his death was near and stated, “I go like a lamb to the slaughter.” While the local justice system had him illegally incarcerated, he was cruelly martyred on June 27, 1844, by an armed mob with painted faces. He was merely 38 years young, but his work was done, so he was taken home where he could finally rest from the persecution that seemed to follow him everywhere he went while in mortality.
I, and millions of others, both living and dead, are the benefactors of the work that he did under the direction of heavenly messengers and tutors. Revelation and inspiration was a frequent event in the life of Joseph, the Latter-day Prophet, and I will always be grateful. He is a superhero and always will be in my mind, and he was born right here on this earth. He taught and inspired millions to know, to have faith in and to come closer to the Lord Jesus Christ than any other man who has ever walked the earth. He may have died on the 27th of June 1844, but he lives on for those of us who love and honor the young prophet and think of him often and thank him for being our benefactor. He was and is a true Saint.