- Verily thus says the Lord unto you my servants, concerning the parable of the wheat and of the tares: Behold, verily I say that the field was the world, and the apostles were the sowers of the seed. And after they have fallen asleep, the great persecutor of the church, the apostate, the whore, even Babylon, that makes all nations to drink of her cup, in whose heart the enemy, even Satan, sits to reign, behold, he sows the tares. Wherefore, the tares choke the wheat and drive the church into the wilderness.
- But behold, in the last days, even now while the Lord is beginning to bring forth the word, and the blade is springing up and is yet tender, behold, verily I say unto you, the angels are crying unto the Lord day and night, who are ready and waiting to be sent forth to reap down the fields. But the Lord says unto them, Pluck not up the tares while the blade is yet tender (for verily your faith is weak) lest you destroy the wheat also. Therefore, let the wheat and the tares grow together until the harvest is fully ripe, then you shall first gather out the wheat from among the tares. And after the gathering of the wheat, behold and lo, the tares are bound in bundles and the field remains to be burned.
- Therefore, thus says the Lord unto you with whom the Priesthood has continued through the lineage of your fathers — for you are lawful heirs according to the flesh, and have been hid from the world with Christ, in God; therefore, your life and the Priesthood have remained, and must needs remain through you and your lineage until the restoration of all things spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets since the world began. Therefore, blessed are you if you continue in my goodness a light unto the gentiles, and through this Priesthood a savior unto my people Israel. The Lord has said it.
SECTION 84
A revelation given at Kirtland, Ohio, 6 December 1832, through Joseph Smith Jr. explaining the parable of the wheat and tares.