The Missionary Charge

The Call to the Labor treats the revelations that call men to the work. This page treats what they are told to do once called — the standing instructions that repeat from section to section, and the older texts those instructions run alongside.

What this page maps. Modern revelation, reported as the text gives it. The instructions below are quoted from the verse text; the revelations’ dates, places, and occasions are not in this wiki’s source text and are not stated. Several of these instructions run close to passages in the gospels, and this page reports that verbal correspondence as a textual fact. What the correspondence implies about the origin of the modern text — in any direction — is an external question outside this wiki’s scope.

Account

The repeated instructions

A small set of instructions recurs across the personal calls, in wording close enough that the repetition is itself the observation.

Go two by two. The exact run “two by two” stands at five frozen verses (counting rule: distinct frozen verses in the corpus, case-insensitive, punctuation-normalized, word-bounded), all of them in the Doctrine and Covenants: D&C 42:6, 52:10, 60:8, 61:35, and 62:5. Three of those five leave the arrangement to the travellers’ own judgment — D&C 62:5: “And then you may return to bear record, yea, even altogether, or two by two, as seemeth you good, it mattereth not unto me; only be faithful…” — and D&C 61:35: “And let them journey together, or two by two, as seemeth them good…”

Speak as with a trumpet. The run “as with the voice of a trump” stands at exactly four frozen verses, all in the Doctrine and Covenants: D&C 24:12, 29:4, 30:9, and 36:1. A second build, with “sound” for “voice”, carries the same figure at D&C 33:2, 34:6, 42:6, 75:4, and 124:106. (Searches on the shorter run also match the corpus’s several occurrences of “sound of a trumpet” — Matthew 24:31, Hebrews 12:19, Psalms 47:5, Joseph Smith—Matthew 1:37 — which are a different word and are disclosed rather than counted.)

Come back laden. The harvest figure of The Call to the Labor continues here as a promise about the return: “you shall be laden with sheaves upon your back” (D&C 31:5); “you shall be laden with sheaves upon your backs” (D&C 33:9); “ye shall be laden with many sheaves, and crowned with honor, and glory, and immortality, and eternal life” (D&C 75:5); and, of one man, “I will crown him again with sheaves” (D&C 79:3).

Leave the house that will not receive you. D&C 24:15, 60:15, 75:20, and 99:4 all instruct the missionary what to do at a refusal, and they do not agree in detail. Two make the gesture public and immediate — D&C 75:20: “And in whatsoever house ye enter, and they receive you not, ye shall depart speedily from that house, and shake off the dust of your feet as a testimony against them.” Two make it deliberately private — D&C 60:15: “And shake off the dust of thy feet against those who receive thee not, not in their presence, lest thou provoke them, but in secret; and wash thy feet, as a testimony against them in the day of judgment.” — and D&C 99:4: “And whoso rejecteth you shall be rejected of my Father and his house; and you shall cleanse your feet in the secret places by the way for a testimony against them.” The divergence between the public and the secret form is a fact of the text; the wiki does not reconcile them.

The commission passages set against the gospels

Four of these instructions stand very close to the charge given to the Twelve in Matthew 10. The verses are set out below rather than described, so a reader can check the correspondence directly.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 24:15: “And in whatsoever place ye shall enter, and they receive you not in my name, ye shall leave a cursing instead of a blessing, by casting off the dust of your feet against them as a testimony, and cleansing your feet by the wayside.” - Matthew 10:14: “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.”

Divergences: the gospel’s gesture is a shaking off, the revelation’s a casting off, and the revelation adds two things the gospel verse does not carry — the cursing-for-a-blessing formula, and the cleansing of the feet by the wayside. The run “dust of your feet” stands at exactly three frozen verses: these two and D&C 75:20, registered separately below. Mark 6:11 carries a fourth build, “the dust under your feet” (Mark 6:11) — disclosed, not paired.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 75:20: “And in whatsoever house ye enter, and they receive you not, ye shall depart speedily from that house, and shake off the dust of your feet as a testimony against them.” - Matthew 10:14: “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.”

This is the closer of the two modern builds: it keeps the gospel’s verb and its house. Divergences: the revelation adds the speed of the departure and the testimonial purpose, which in the gospel is supplied by the following verse rather than this one.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The sentence that follows in both texts: - D&C 75:22: “And it shall be more tolerable for the heathen in the day of judgment, than for that house; therefore, gird up your loins and be faithful…” - Matthew 10:15: “Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.”

The frame is identical and the contents of the comparison differ at both ends: the gospel weighs Sodom and Gomorrha against a city, the revelation weighs the heathen against a house. The formula “more tolerable for” stands at eight frozen verses, including Alma 9:15 and Alma 9:23, where the comparison is again differently filled.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 24:18: “And thou shalt take no purse nor scrip, neither staves, neither two coats, for the church shall give unto thee in the very hour what thou needest for food and for raiment, and for shoes and for money, and for scrip.” - Luke 9:3: “And he said unto them, Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, neither money; neither have two coats apiece.”

Both texts forbid the same short list. Divergences: the gospel’s prohibition is absolute and stops there; the revelation’s is paired with a provision clause naming five things the church is to supply in the very hour — including scrip and money, which the same verse has just forbidden the missionary to carry. The run “two coats” stands at six frozen verses; “purse” at nine.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The same prohibition against the Matthew form: - D&C 24:18: “And thou shalt take no purse nor scrip, neither staves, neither two coats, for the church shall give unto thee in the very hour what thou needest…” - Matthew 10:10: “Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat.”

Three words run identically. The gospel closes on a wage principle — “the workman is worthy of his meat” (Matthew 10:10) — where the revelation closes on the church’s obligation to supply; the nearest modern form of that wage principle is registered just below.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 31:5: “Therefore, thrust in your sickle with all your soul, and your sins are forgiven you, and you shall be laden with sheaves upon your back, for the laborer is worthy of his hire. Wherefore, your family shall live.” - Luke 10:7: “And in the same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give: for the labourer is worthy of his hire. Go not from house to house.”

The sentence is word-for-word but for the spelling of its first noun. Divergences reported: the gospel’s principle governs staying put in one house; the revelation’s is attached to the harvest figure and to a promise about the missionary’s family. The sentence in its modern spelling stands at three frozen verses — D&C 31:5, 84:79, and 106:3.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 99:2: “And who receiveth you receiveth me; and you shall have power to declare my word in the demonstration of my Holy Spirit.” - Matthew 10:40: “He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.”

Divergences: the gospel’s relative pronoun is “He that”, the revelation’s a bare “who” (D&C 99:2); the gospel extends the chain a second link to the sender, the revelation instead turns to the missionary’s power. The run stands at exactly three frozen verses — these two and D&C 84:89.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 111:11: “Therefore, be ye as wise as serpents and yet without sin; and I will order all things for your good, as fast as ye are able to receive them. Amen.” - Matthew 10:16: “Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.”

The run stands at exactly these two frozen verses. The divergence is the second half of the pairing: the gospel’s counterweight to serpentine wisdom is the harmlessness of doves; the revelation’s is sinlessness. The gospel’s sheep-among-wolves image has no counterpart in the revelation’s verse.

Other clauses in these sections

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The opening of D&C 33 carries the two-edged-sword sentence in a form that runs nearer the epistle than any of its sister revelations: - D&C 33:1: “…whose word is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of the joints and marrow, soul and spirit; and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” - Hebrews 4:12: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”

This pairing was disclosed but left unregistered on The Call to the Labor, which registers the shorter form at D&C 6:2. What section 33 adds beyond that shorter form is precisely the epistle’s closing clause about the discerner of thoughts and intents, and the soul-and-spirit pair — both absent from D&C 6:2. Divergences remaining: the epistle’s three coordinated terms and its “any twoedged sword” against the revelation’s “a two-edged sword” (D&C 33:1); the epistle’s “piercing even to” against the revelation’s bare “to”; and the reversed order of the two body-pairs.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 33:2: “For verily, verily, I say unto you that ye are called to lift up your voices as with the sound of a trump, to declare my gospel unto a crooked and perverse generation.” - Philippians 2:15: “That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world;”

The run stands at exactly three frozen verses — these two and D&C 34:6, which reads “cry repentance unto a crooked and perverse generation” (D&C 34:6); disclosed, not separately paired. Divergences: the epistle’s noun is “nation” (Philippians 2:15), the revelations’ “generation”, and the epistle places the saints in the midst of it where the revelation sends them to declare to it.

[Textual] — paraphrase. () - D&C 33:3: “For behold, the field is white already to harvest; and it is the eleventh hour, and the last time that I shall call laborers into my vineyard.” - Matthew 20:6: “And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle?”

The shared run is short — three words — and is registered because the surrounding material matches too: the parable’s householder “went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard” (Matthew 20:1), and the revelation’s own clause is a calling of laborers into a vineyard at that same hour. “The eleventh hour” stands at exactly three frozen verses: this one, Matthew 20:6, and Matthew 20:9. What the revelation adds — that this is the last such call — has no counterpart in the parable.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The harvest instruction of section 33 against Ammon’s report of a finished harvest: - D&C 33:7: “Yea, verily, verily, I say unto you, that the field is white already to harvest; wherefore, thrust in your sickles, and reap with all your might, mind, and strength.” - Alma 26:5: “Behold, the field was ripe, and blessed are ye, for ye did thrust in the sickle, and did reap with your might, yea, all the day long did ye labor; and behold the number of your sheaves!”

Divergences: the revelation commands in the future, the Book of Mormon verse reports in the past; the revelation’s field is white already to harvest, the record’s was ripe; and the revelation extends the might-clause with mind and strength. The sheaves that close the record’s verse recur two verses later in the revelation, at D&C 33:9 — disclosed, not paired.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 33:10: “Yea, open your mouths and they shall be filled, saying: Repent, repent, and prepare ye the way of the Lord, and make his paths straight; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand;” - Matthew 3:3: ”…The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.”

Nine words run together, the revelation inserting one “and”. The run “make his paths straight” stands at seven frozen verses: these two, 1 Nephi 10:8, Mark 1:3, Luke 3:4, D&C 65:1, and D&C 133:17. Divergence: in the gospel the words are the wilderness voice’s own, quoted by the evangelist from a prophet; in the revelation they are given to the missionaries as words to say.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The clause that closes the same modern verse: - D&C 33:10: “…saying: Repent, repent, and prepare ye the way of the Lord, and make his paths straight; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand;” - Matthew 3:2: “And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

The revelation joins in one verse what the gospel divides between two consecutive verses, reversing their order. The run “the kingdom of heaven is at hand” stands at nine frozen verses, including Alma 10:20, Helaman 5:32, D&C 39:19, and D&C 42:7 — a distribution disclosed, not paired.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 33:13: “And upon this rock I will build my church; yea, upon this rock ye are built, and if ye continue, the gates of hell shall not prevail against you.” - Matthew 16:18: “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

Divergences: the gospel’s rock is identified in the same breath with a man addressed by name, which the revelation’s verse does not do; and the revelation makes the promise conditional — “if ye continue” (D&C 33:13) — where the gospel states it flatly. “Upon this rock I will build my church” stands at exactly three frozen verses: these two and D&C 128:10, where the revelation cites the gospel verse by chapter and verse. The gates-of-hell clause is more widely spread, standing at nine frozen verses including 3 Nephi 11:39 and D&C 10:69, which are paired with each other on The Lost Writings.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 36:6: “Crying repentance, saying: Save yourselves from this untoward generation, and come forth out of the fire, hating even the garments spotted with the flesh.” - Acts 2:40: “And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation.”

Six words identical, and in both texts they are given as words spoken rather than described. The run stands at exactly three frozen verses — these two and D&C 109:41. What the revelation adds — the fire and the garments — comes from a different source verse, registered immediately below.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The remainder of the same modern verse: - D&C 36:6: “…and come forth out of the fire, hating even the garments spotted with the flesh.” - Jude 1:23: “And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.”

Divergences: the epistle’s garment is singular, the revelation’s plural; the epistle spots it “by the flesh” (Jude 1:23), the revelation “with the flesh” (D&C 36:6); and the epistle’s fire is something others are pulled out of, the revelation’s something the hearers are told to come out of themselves. That one modern verse thus stands beside two different source verses at once — Acts 2:40 for its first half and Jude 1:23 for its second.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The close of section 36: - D&C 36:8: “I am Jesus Christ, the Son of God; wherefore, gird up your loins and I will suddenly come to my temple. Even so. Amen.” - Malachi 3:1: “…and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in…”

The divergence is person: the prophet speaks of the Lord in the third person and of his temple; the revelation speaks in the first person and of my temple. The run “suddenly come to” stands at four frozen verses — these two, D&C 133:2, and 3 Nephi 24:1, where the Malachi text is given to the Nephites at the Father’s command.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 61:38: “Gird up your loins and be watchful and be sober, looking forth for the coming of the Son of Man, for he cometh in an hour you think not.” - Luke 12:40: “Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.”

Divergences: the gospel’s preposition is “at” where the revelation’s is “in”; the gospel supplies “when”, the revelation drops it. The revelation prefixes an instruction the gospel verse does not carry — the girding, watchfulness and sobriety — and names the Son of Man in the clause before rather than inside it.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 66:9: “Lay your hands upon the sick, and they shall recover. Return not till I, the Lord, shall send you. Be patient in affliction. Ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” - 3 Nephi 27:29: “Therefore, ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you; for he that asketh, receiveth; and unto him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”

Eleven words identical. The same couplet is registered from D&C 4:7 on The Call to the Labor, which lists the couplet’s five frozen verses; this is the instance embedded in a list of travelling instructions rather than standing as a section’s closing sentence. The Book of Mormon verse continues past the couplet into a restatement the revelation does not carry.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The opening title of section 62: - D&C 62:1: “Behold, and hearken, O ye elders of my church, saith the Lord your God, even Jesus Christ, your advocate, who knoweth the weakness of man and how to succor them who are tempted.” - Hebrews 2:18: “For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.”

Divergences: the epistle grounds the succouring in the sufferer’s own experience of temptation, which the revelation’s verse does not state; the revelation grounds it in knowledge — of the weakness of man, and of how. The spelling of the verb differs. The nearest Book of Mormon statement, Alma 7:12, grounds the same capacity in a taking-on of infirmities — disclosed, not paired.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 111:4: ”…I will give this city into your hands, that you shall have power over it, insomuch that they shall not discover your secret parts; and its wealth pertaining to gold and silver shall be yours.” - Isaiah 3:17: “Therefore the LORD will smite with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, and the LORD will discover their secret parts.”

The three-word object with its verb stands at exactly three frozen verses: these two and 2 Nephi 13:17, which carries the prophet’s verse. The divergence is directional and complete: in the prophet the discovering is a judgment executed by the Lord, in the revelation it is a thing promised not to happen to the servants. Reported as a verbal correspondence; the wiki draws no conclusion from the reversal.

Significance

Read one at a time, these are ordinary travelling instructions. Read together, two things stand out. The first is how much of the charge is about refusal — what to do when a house will not receive you occupies four separate sections, and the four do not give the same instruction: two send the missionary out shaking the dust publicly, two send him to do it in secret so as not to provoke. The text supplies both and reconciles neither.

The second is how densely the charge sits against Matthew 10. Seven of the connections registered on this page pair a modern instruction with a verse from the gospels’ sending passages, and in several cases — the dust of the feet, the two coats, the wise serpents — the modern verse keeps the older words and changes what stands on either side of them. Reporting that correspondence is a textual matter and this page reports it. Explaining it is not.

Key references

D&C 24:15, 24:18 — the dust of the feet; no purse nor scrip, with the church’s provision clause
D&C 31:5 — the sickle, the sheaves, and the laborer’s hire
D&C 33:1–13 — the fullest single run of the charge: the two-edged sword, the eleventh hour, the words to say, the rock
D&C 36:6 — one verse standing beside two source verses at once
D&C 60:8, 60:15 — two by two; the dust shaken in secret
D&C 61:35, 62:5 — the pairing left to the travellers’ judgment
D&C 75:19–22 — the blessing left, the dust shaken, the day of judgment
D&C 99:1–4 — house to house; receiving and rejecting

The Call to the Labor · Servants Named in the Calls · Commissions Revoked and Changed · Emma Smith · Index · Connections

Sources

Doctrine and Covenants sections 24, 31, 33, 36, 60, 61, 62, 66, 75, 99, 111 (verse text only; headnotes excluded). Cross-references quoted from Matthew 3, Matthew 10, Matthew 16, Matthew 20, Luke 9, Luke 10, Luke 12, Acts 2, Hebrews 2, Hebrews 4, Philippians 2, Jude 1, Malachi 3, Isaiah 3, Alma 26, and 3 Nephi 27; other references are cited, not quoted, inside distribution disclosures.

Every quote is verbatim from the frozen source text, cited to its exact reference and checked character-for-character; no quote crosses a verse boundary. Twenty-two connection records are registered here, all [textual] and all asserted_by: wiki — none of these sections names a source for the clauses paired, and the one section in the corpus that does name Matthew 16:18 explicitly, D&C 128:10, lies outside this page’s range and is only disclosed. Phrase distributions are counts of distinct frozen verses in the corpus, derived by search at the time of writing. Dates, places, and occasions are not supplied.