“And again, to another, that he may prophesy concerning all things;” (Moroni 10:13). To prophesy is to speak words that are so true and that are uttered with such power and authority that they literally come into being. It is because of such prophecy, in fact, that we all exist today. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.” (John 1:1-3). To speak with the gift of prophecy is to understand and to be in perfect alignment with the will of the Lord, such that we will exercise all faith and make any sacrifice to ensure that the prophecy is fulfilled. A common trope in fictional stories about prophecies is that those who take steps to avoid a foretold future are doomed to unwittingly bring about the very future they had tried so hard to avert. But this is not how the actual gift of prophecy works. We are not idle pieces on a board to be moved to and fro by the hands of fate with no free will of our own. We are agents unto ourselves, endowed with power from on high to shape our own destinies. If a prophecy is fulfilled or a promised blessing is realized, it is because we kept our eye focused on the glory of God and exercised the faith and moved heaven and earth and humbly submitted to everything that our Father saw fit to inflict upon us to ensure that the Word becomes our reality. We follow the prophets - those who have been given the gift of prophecy - so faithfully not merely because they know and can tell us what the future is, but much more because they invite and inspire us to roll up our sleeves and do our part to make sure that the promised future comes to pass. I hope that we can all come to realize that the gift of prophecy is intended much more for the present than for the future. I read somewhere recently that people are cautious about the possibility of time traveling to the past because they fear that some small action taken in the past could have a ripple effect that could cause huge changes in the present but they don't really think about the possibility that making small changes in the present could have a ripple effect that would cause huge changes in the future. To the degree that we honor and reverence whatever small portion of the gift of prophecy we are blessed with such that we do everything we can to turn the words of prophecy into literal reality, the Lord will bless us with more and more light and truth and knowledge until we have brought about the perfect day through our faith and diligence and the grace of God.
