In this excerpt, Henry Eyring starts with a gentle, friendly approach allowing a member to choose whether he/she will follow the brethren or not. However, by the end of the excerpt, if you choose poorly, you will have losses beyond your power to imagine.
Doctrine and Covenants (D&C) 1:14 and 38 sets the tone for the Latter-day Saint.
14: “…they who will not hear the voice of the Lord, neither the voice of his servants, neither give heed to the words of the prophets and apostles, shall be cut off from among the people.”
38: “…What I the Lord have spoken I have spoken…my words shall not pass away, but shall all be fulfilled, whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same.”
James Faust said in the October 2005 conference: “I do not know how we can expect to be in full harmony with the Spirit of the Lord if we are not in harmony with the President of the Church and the other prophet, seers, and revelators”.
N. Eldon Tanner provided this little nugget in the August 1979 Ensign: “We are most fortunate to have a living prophet at the head of the Church to guide us, and all who heed his counsel will be partakers of the promised blessings which will not be enjoyed by those who fail to accept his messages…Whose side are we on? When the prophet speaks the debate is over”.
Henry Eyring in the referenced conference talk in April 2019 GC repeated the root word ‘sustain’ 32 times. Do you think he was making a point? There is little doubt in an active LDS person’s mind that to question the prophet is blasphemy and will lead to apostacy.
It should be mentioned here that it is the current prophet the member is to follow blindly. Teachings of ‘former’ prophets do not count, if the current prophet says otherwise. Think polygamy, masonry, blacks, Adam-God, ‘I’m a Mormon’ campaign, Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Journal of Discourses, ‘Miracle of Forgiveness’, “Meet the Mormons” 2014 movie, Mark Hoffmann, temple signs/tokens/wording, etc.
In Conclusion:
LDS members are expected to follow the counsel of the prophets, seers, and revelators without questioning. Free agency, so valued by the church, ends when the living prophet speaks.
