My brethren and sisters: I want to say that I endorse with all my heart the remarks which have been made this afternoon by Elder Stapley, President Smith, and Elder Moyle, and I join with them in expressing my love and admiration for President David O. McKay, who has given this Church fifty years of unselfish service. I remember him for almost that number of years. During all of that time he has traveled through the nations of the earth representing this Church, explaining the gospel principles, and bearing his testimony to the divinity of this great work.

I had a friend once who was educated along literary lines. He told me one day that the finest sentence in all literature is in the Bible. When I asked him to repeat it he said, "God said, Let there be light: and there was light"  Gen. 1:3 I suppose from the standpoint of beauty and majesty that sentence has no parallel, and yet I thought of another sentence, a sentence of only three words, spoken by the angel on the morning of the resurrection. The angel said, "He is risen"  Mark 16:6 I believe that was the most important announcement ever made to the world.

I rejoice in the stability of this Church, in the soundness of its doctrines, and I am very happy that all of those doctrines are in agreement with the Holy Bible.

I read a book the other night which suggested that the stories of the resurrection, and the stories of the miracles performed by Jesus originated during a period of myth making. I confess that I am somewhat annoyed when a supposed leader of a Christian church will make a statement like that. Strip the Christian religion of the doctrine of the resurrection, and you lose its motivating power, as was stated so well by President McKay the other day. There is no doctrine which received more attention of Christ's twelve apostles, whom he sent into the world, than the resurrection. To deny it is to be ruled entirely by skepticism and unbelief. Mankind needs to have a conviction concerning the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

There are those who have relied entirely on their finite understanding and their human vision which, to say the least, is darkened "by the shadows of earth." The human soul needs an anchorage. Man cannot live by bread alone. Mankind needs a vindication against the tyranny of death and against the ravages of time and decay. Jesus Christ and the prophets have supplied that vindication. The Savior supplied it when, in the throes of agony and death, he said to the felon on the cross: "To day shalt thou be with me in paradise"  Luke 23:43 also, when he appeared to Mary in the garden, when someone said, "Woman, why weepest thou?" She said unto him, "Because they have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid him."

Jesus said unto her, "Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou?"  John 20:15 She supposed him to be the gardener, and said unto him, "Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away." Jesus said unto her, "Mary." She turned herself and said unto him, "Rabboni, which is to say, Master" (see  John 20:13-16

In all the writings, either ancient or modern, there is nothing more beautiful, more touching, and more reassuring than these words quoted by John. Jesus again supplied that vindication when he faced the apostles in an upper room and when he talked and ate with them: "A spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have"  Luke 24:39 said the Master. Again he supplied it when he restored the wavering faith of Thomas Didymus: "Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand and thrust it into my, side: and be not faithless, but believing"  John 20:27 That circumstance led up to the last Beatitude, probably the mightiest of them all: "Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed"  John 20:29

That doctrine is the very foundation of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus again supplied it when he appeared to Saul of Tarsus on the way to Damascus when he asked the question: "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?"  Acts 9:4

And last, but not least, he gave to the modern world a vindication and an irrefutable witness when he appeared to Joseph Smith, the Prophet, in a grove of trees in New York, where God spoke these words:

"This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!"  JS—H 1:17

The strongest fortification you and I can have against the uncertainties of life is the testimony which we have received from our Father in heaven concerning the resurrection. May we cherish it, and may we keep it strong; and may we always be valiant for the truth. I pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.