The Perean Mission Begins

165:6.1As they sat think­ing, Si­mon Pe­ter asked: “Do you speak this para­ble to us, your apos­tles, or is it for all the dis­ci­ples?” And Je­sus an­swered:

165:6.2“In the time of test­ing, a man’s soul is re­vealed; trial dis­closes what re­ally is in the heart. When the ser­vant is tested and proved, then may the lord of the house set such a ser­vant over his house­hold and safely trust this faith­ful stew­ard to see that his chil­dren are fed and nur­tured. Like­wise, will I soon know who can be trusted with the wel­fare of my chil­dren when I shall have re­turned to the Fa­ther. As the lord of the house­hold shall set the true and tried ser­vant over the af­fairs of his fam­ily, so will I ex­alt those who en­dure the tri­als of this hour in the af­fairs of my king­dom.

165:6.3“But if the ser­vant is sloth­ful and be­gins to say in his heart, ‘My mas­ter de­lays his com­ing,’ and be­gins to mis­treat his fel­low ser­vants and to eat and drink with the drunken, then the lord of that ser­vant will come at a time when he looks not for him and, find­ing him un­faith­ful, will cast him out in dis­grace. There­fore you do well to pre­pare your­selves for that day when you will be vis­ited sud­denly and in an un­ex­pected man­ner. Re­mem­ber, much has been given to you; there­fore will much be re­quired of you. Fiery tri­als are draw­ing near you. I have a bap­tism to be bap­tized with, and I am on watch un­til this is ac­com­plished. You preach peace on earth, but my mis­sion will not bring peace in the ma­te­rial af­fairs of men—not for a time, at least. Di­vi­sion can only be the re­sult where two mem­bers of a fam­ily be­lieve in me and three mem­bers re­ject this gospel. Friends, rel­a­tives, and loved ones are des­tined to be set against each other by the gospel you preach. True, each of these be­liev­ers shall have great and last­ing peace in his own heart, but peace on earth will not come un­til all are will­ing to be­lieve and en­ter into their glo­ri­ous in­her­i­tance of son­ship with God. Nev­er­the­less, go into all the world pro­claim­ing this gospel to all na­tions, to ev­ery man, woman, and child.”

165:6.4And this was the end of a full and busy Sab­bath day. On the mor­row Je­sus and the twelve went into the cities of north­ern Perea to visit with the sev­enty, who were work­ing in these re­gions un­der Ab­ner’s super­vi­sion.