Scott Woodward: Following the murders of Joseph and Hyrum Smith in 1844, Sidney Rigdon, who had been Joseph’s first counselor, made the claim to church members in Nauvoo that he was the rightful successor to lead the church as its guardian. After his falling out with the Twelve Apostles, Sidney left Nauvoo and traveled to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he built up a church there, separate and apart from the church Brigham Young and the Twelve led to Utah. And today the only branch of the Restoration that claims its right of succession from Joseph Smith through Sidney Rigdon is The Church of Jesus Christ, also sometimes referred to as the Bickertonites. The Church of Jesus Christ is presently headquartered in Monongahela, Pennsylvania and is the third largest branch of the Restoration movement today. In this episode of Church History Matters, Casey sits down with Josh Gehly, a friend and ordained evangelist in The Church of Jesus Christ, to take a deep dive into the details of this movement. I’m Scott Woodward, and my co-host is Casey Griffiths, and today marks our eleventh episode in this series dealing with Succession in the Presidency. Now, let’s get into it.

Casey Griffiths: Welcome to Church History Matters. We are very excited today, and I’m glad to be here. I’m flying solo. Scott isn’t with me today, he’s teaching, but I’m happy to have one of my dear friends here who is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ, sometimes referred to and known as the Bickertonites, and Josh, you can call me a Brighamite during this conversation, if you want to.

Josh Gehly: I won’t, but that’s great. Thanks.

Casey Griffiths: Okay. And I won’t call you a Bickertonite, we’ll just say The Church of Jesus Christ, and I think everybody will know what we’re talking about. So, Josh Gehly, welcome to Church History Matters, and thank you for taking time out of your day to sit down with us. Let’s start with an introduction. Tell us a little bit about yourself and your role in the church and why you’re a good person to talk to about The Church of Jesus Christ.

Josh Gehly: Well, first, thanks for having me on. I am a active listener of the Church History Matters podcast. I really enjoy the fact that I get to listen to two incredibly and well-informed people talk about the history, especially—so much of this covers a time when we were one and the same.

Casey Griffiths: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Josh Gehly: And so I’ve been blessed to learn about some of those years, the sources that are coming out. It’s a wonderful time to enjoy and learn about the history of the restoration movement with the Joseph Smith Papers Project, everything that we can glean from some of the source material that’s available. So thank you for having me on. Thank you for the content that you’re producing. I’m Josh Gehly. I’m an ordained evangelist of The Church of Jesus Christ, which for me means that I’m part of a team that is ministerially overseeing the missionary programs of the church worldwide. Our headquarters is in Pennsylvania, and the very hard-to-read word is—Monongahela, Pennsylvania is where our headquarters is located, but we are an international church with about 30,000 members located all around the globe. And so we’re strong in many different parts, in many different countries, in about twenty-five countries around the world and growing and expanding. We opened up Cuba a couple of years ago. Spain just opened up for us. So it’s a continual—there’s three different congregations getting ready to open up in Uganda, in Africa, so the church is growing, it’s vibrant, and it’s a exciting, fun, dynamic church that I am blessed to be a part of and to share about today with your audience.

Casey Griffiths: And Josh, I was trying to think: how long have we known each other? I think we met in Independence, what, four or five years ago, probably.

Josh Gehly: Yep. I came out early on, and Phil Jackson was still alive. Do you remember Brother Phil, one of our apostles?

Casey Griffiths: I do. Yeah. Yeah.

Josh Gehly: I was a pretty young buck back then, but I was on a trip with him. So we met—it might’ve even been ten, twelve years ago.

Casey Griffiths: Ten, twelve years ago, my goodness. Really?

Josh Gehly: Yeah.

Casey Griffiths: But for as long as we’ve known each other, it feels like in the last year we’ve leveled up because you came to BYU and spoke in my classes and even we held a special meeting. You gave everybody a mini copy of the Book of Mormon. My students—well, we ran out, basically, and I was like, these kids already have a copy of the Book of Mormon, but they thought it was so cool to have one from another church. And then, boy, it was, like, a couple weeks later, we met again in Independence, where we both spoke at the Book of Mormon and Zion conference. And then—one of my favorite things we’ve done together was a couple weeks ago, I went to Pennsylvania, and you drove me around, and we visited the place where you guys hold your conferences and went to the headquarter church in Monongahela. So I’ve been to the mothership. I’ve plugged in. I’ve—that was a great day. And you were very gracious, by the way. Thanks for being such a good host.

Josh Gehly: Well, and we likewise were able to tour the Pittsburgh Temple with you before it was dedicated, which was an absolutely awesome experience, and being with the kids at BYU was incredible, and one thing I walked away from was, kudos: they know the scriptures. They had great questions. It was fantastic.

Casey Griffiths: Yeah, and kudos to you. You know the scriptures, you can play the guitar. One of my favorite moments was my students learned a hymn from your church, and we sang it all together, and that was a really, really choice moment for us. So, anyway, wonderful, wonderful experiences. So we’re grateful to have you here, and part of the reason why, you know, I wanted to bring you on is especially that day in Pennsylvania, but I think every time that we’ve met, I’ve just peppered you with questions. Like, I remember we were at the Pittsburgh Temple, and you jumped out of your car, and I think before I said, “Hi,” I said, “Why do you guys baptize in natural settings?”

Josh Gehly: Because that’s what Jesus did!

Casey Griffiths: That’s what Jesus did. You gave a great answer, but I’d been reading a history by Larry Watson, I read it on the flight to Pittsburgh, and I was just primed and ready to go, but, yeah, that was—we baptize in natural settings because Jesus did. And I think my follow-up question was, does a reservoir count as a natural setting, if it’s a man-made body of water?

Josh Gehly: We’ve gotten away with that before, I think. So we really do strive for a natural, free-flowing body of water. In Erie, when I was ordained a minister in 2009—2010 was the winter season. In February we chainsawed through 18 inches of ice to perform a baptism, and the entire congregation that day walked on water.

Casey Griffiths: Wow. Literally.

Josh Gehly: Literally. Quite literally.

Casey Griffiths: Miraculously, yeah. We’re a little softer than you. We have heated fonts in our church, and you got to see the font in the temple, and—but that’s just one of a bunch of things. The Church of Jesus Christ believes in the Book of Mormon, trace yourselves back to the early restoration movement—and a couple of weeks ago, we gave sort of a brief overview of your movement, but we wanted to hear directly from somebody who’s part of it. So can you give us a kind of rough sketch of the history of your church, and then we’ll go from there?

Josh Gehly: Absolutely. So we believe ourselves, like you, Casey, just on a different side of the fence, to be the true succession of The Church of Christ that was established in 1830 by an angel. And so we believe that we are the continuation and living entity of that upon the earth, that we represent the restored gospel as Jesus delivered it. In 3 Nephi 27, when he said, “This is my gospel,” 3 Nephi 11, when he said, “This is my doctrine,” we believe we uphold that doctrine. We believe we preach and declare that gospel message for the lost and dying souls of men and women in these, the latter days. It is our fervent desire to build the kingdom of God on earth and to be that living entity. So the history is we find common ground. 1830 to 1844, that’s my church, okay? That’s where I find myself in the Restoration. And so there’s things happening within that organization that sometimes makes an entire podcast happen over a couple of days, right? As you and Scott have trudged through some of the incredible and sometimes difficult to talk about history that happened during that time period, but we trace ourselves to those foundations. My church, and what—one thing I thought was fantastic when you guys brought up Sidney Rigdon—because that’s where we are today in the succession: we believe that when a president of an organization dies, naturally the vice president would lead that organization and naturally become president. So we honor Sidney Rigdon’s position as the only surviving member of the First Presidency at the time of Joseph Smith’s death. A couple of historical facts: I mean, Joseph Smith—and these are things you guys brought out, fairly, was—

Casey Griffiths: Yeah.

Josh Gehly: —Joseph did lay hands upon Sidney that would allow him to lead the church if Joseph was ever absent, and we humbly submit, you don’t get much more absent than dead.

Casey Griffiths: That’s true.

Josh Gehly: And he even clarified—after the apostles were ordained in 1835, he clarified that they were subordinate to the First Presidency within that period of time, within that church structure. And so based off of that, we would believe that when Joseph Smith and Hyrum both died, they were the two other extant and active members who were part of the First Presidency at the time, that Sidney Rigdon naturally should have led the church from there, and we would argue he did and that we are the succession of that today. We are the only surviving church that is extant today that traces its historical roots and line of succession through Sidney Rigdon. There have been other breakups. We actually had a split at one time that miraculously came back together, which is a great testimony and a beautiful thing, but that’s who we are and where we trace ourselves within the lineage and within the history. Joseph Smith running for president of the U. S.: Boom! When they couldn’t get a secular candidate, who was the natural choice to be his running mate? Sidney Rigdon. And so it just, for us, makes sense. Now, we honor the position that he held, but you and I have even had conversations that just because he held a position and we honor that and we respect that, doesn’t mean we agree with everything he taught or everything we preached, and we certainly would agree, as some of your podcasts have stated, about his health at the time because of the intense sufferings that he went through. But that’s the lineage from us to Pittsburgh, because Sidney went back to Pittsburgh because you can’t be a vice presidential running mate within the same state, okay? So he was back in Pennsylvania, preaching. He had a congregation that converted. That congregation, out of that group—which, by the way, went ultimately bankrupt and defunct, and Sidney moved away.

Casey Griffiths: Yeah.

Josh Gehly: And out of the ashes of all of that ultimate failure, there was a gentleman named William Bickerton who had been ordained into the priesthood within that organization, who eventually carried forward the gospel. He had an incredible experience where the Lord set him up on a mountain, and he showed him a great chasm, and he was commanded by the Lord to preach the gospel, and so he started in, basically, a little bit south of Pittsburgh, preaching on the streets. A few people started to believe, and without that happening, there’s a 0 percent chance I’m here today talking to you. So, through William Bickerton, our church eventually grows, the Lord commands us to set apart and ordain twelve apostles, and the church gets established, organized again, and goes forward in spirit and in truth, and we believe we’re the successor today, not just through a history, but also through the miracles, the blessings, the gifts of the Spirit, the abundant and filling, vibrant life of Christ that breathes through us through His ray of—His Holy Spirit.

Casey Griffiths: And that is one thing that I love about your church, is I’ve heard you refer to yourself sometimes as, like, Pentecostal Latter-day Saints.

Josh Gehly: That’s kind of a moniker that others have applied to us, yeah.

Casey Griffiths: That’s something from other people. Okay.

Josh Gehly: But I embrace this in this way: I embrace it to say, if you’re telling me that my church holds the same spirit that was present on the day of Pentecost, I would say, “Amen. That’s us.”

Casey Griffiths: Yeah. Sidney Rigdon—let everybody know: about how long was William Bickerton affiliated with Sidney Rigdon for?

Josh Gehly: It was a short time, just a couple years. William Bickerton arrives in the ’40s, and so if you consider that, it’s—he’s arriving basically around the time period of Joseph’s death, migrates over to Pittsburgh. In about—I think it’s ’45, give or take—he starts to join the restoration movement through the Church of Christ as it was at that time in the Pittsburgh area. From there, it’s only a short number of years before things start to—Sidney tried to buy a farm property of 300 acres for $15,000. He put $6,000 down. He could never make the follow-up payment, and when he did that, there were a number of ministry in the church that felt that that was not an inspired move, and William Bickerton was a part of that, but when the Allegheny farmland went default, then the group, the organization, just did not have any grapple, any hold. And William Bickerton, his testimony is, “I found myself alone,” and he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t want to take anything unto himself. He wasn’t seeking anything at the time, but he had a congregation at the time, I think it was of nine people, that he was still ministering to and wondering what he should do. And that’s when the Lord gave him the vision, and he carried forward from there. So it is rapid fire, quick, relatively quick in terms of history of what happened and when and how.

Casey Griffiths: So is it fair to say that when William Bickerton had that vision, that that’s kind of the moment that he took over as the leader of your movement, taking Sidney Rigdon’s place? Is that accurate to say it that way?

Josh Gehly: Absolutely. Absolutely.

Casey Griffiths: Okay, and William Bickerton continues to preside, mostly in Pennsylvania, but I understand there was a colony kind of set up in Kansas so that you could minister to the Native Americans. Is that correct also?

Josh Gehly: Absolutely. Our church has always been seeking to bring the gospel to the house of Joseph on the reservations and wherever the Lord would send us. I’m very active in missionary work in Guatemala. That’s a part of my international outreach that we do, and our desire is to bring the gospel to the lost and scattered of the house of Israel, starting with Joseph, and that’s something that’s been in us for a very long time, a heartbeat of our church, which we get by reading the Book of Mormon and who God brought to these lands and that this land is a promised land set aside by God for his kingdom in these, the latter days.

Casey Griffiths: William Bickerton’s leading the church, and then you mentioned there was a schism. The thing I like about this story is, like you mentioned earlier, it seems like whenever we read about a schism, it’s—that’s it. It’s over. But the schism actually is healed, but tell us a little bit about that period in church history, because that seems a little tumultuous.

Josh Gehly: It was tumultuous, as it is—and it’s sensitive for anybody whenever there’s, you know, we hear about a division, but there was two main centers of the church: one was still in the Pittsburgh area, and the other was in Kansas, and Pittsburgh was heavily supporting Kansas for a significant time during that period. Otherwise, the saints in Kansas probably would have starved to death. So as that all was happening—and today, modern day St. John, Kansas is the town that was started by our church originally in that area, and it still exists today.

Casey Griffiths: Is there still a branch in St. John, Kansas, or?

Josh Gehly: Not anymore. Not anymore.

Casey Griffiths: Okay.

Josh Gehly: That’s dried up. But even today—William Bickerton famously prayed over that area for the Lord to protect it from tornadoes, and it has never had a tornado since. Now, if I didn’t jinx it, we’re 150 years on good, solid ground with that prayer, so praise the Lord.

Casey Griffiths: Okay.

Josh Gehly: And so the schism happened because William Bickerton took a walk with a woman, who was married, in the woods. He said it was to counsel her on her marriage. That was deemed very inappropriate from our church’s standpoint on the possibility of adultery. Ultimately the only people that know what happened that day are the two people that took a walk into the woods, okay? So we don’t know, but eventually William Bickerton’s wife left him because of that scenario. She went back to Pittsburgh. There was essentially a divorce. Our church’s position is a divorced person cannot—at that time, would need an investigation into the situation, can’t keep ministering at that point. There would be a pause, at least for review. We honor the marriage covenant very seriously, and we’re seriously taking into account the accusations of what was being levied against William Bickerton at the time. That did cause a split, because William Bickerton did not stop preaching. He continued on. There was a time when, essentially, there was a division in two. Over several years, that eventually reconciled, and William Bickerton died an active, faithful member of the church, thank God. The leader of the church who was helping us through that time period of schism was William Cadman, who would be my great-great-great-grandfather.

Casey Griffiths: I wasn’t going to bring that up because I didn’t brag on you, Josh, but you are the scion, I guess, of former presidents of your church, which is kind of cool. And it seems like William Cadman is a name—there’s at least two William Cadmans that lead the church, aren’t there?

Josh Gehly: Yeah: William Cadman’s son—so after William Bickerton we have William Cadman leading the church. He leads it all the way to his death, and he and William Bickerton die—they’re contemporaries. They die around the same time period, 1905-ish, and after that, one of the apostles that was living in Kansas that had moved back and sided with the church when Kansas was happening, Alexander Cherry, stood with the church in Pittsburgh, and he helped. He was instrumental in unifying everything, and Brother Alexander Cherry led the church from that point on, and then after his death, W. H. Cadman, the son of William Cadman, continued on.

Casey Griffiths: And W. H. is your grandfather?

Josh Gehly: He’s actually a great-great-uncle to me. So he would be, like, a great-great-great-uncle.

Casey Griffiths: Oh, okay. And then, as we keep moving forward, the first time I encountered the church, Paul Palmieri was president of the church.

Josh Gehly: Yep. Brother Paul Palmieri.

Casey Griffiths: Paul Palmieri, okay.

Josh Gehly: It’s hard when you’re reading off of a history book, right? So . . .

Casey Griffiths: And any twists and turns from Alexander Cherry down to the present that you want to highlight as we’re describing the history of your church?

Josh Gehly: Well, some of the wonderful parts of the history, even during those years of where there was maybe a break and then the Lord brings the—the Lord was working with this church. The reports that came in when we organized the Twelve Apostles, the year is roughly 1862, is that the building shook under the power of God as His—the word of the Lord came forth, and he said, “Set apart and ordain the Twelve. Set apart, set apart, and ordain.” And when those ordinations took place, the reports are the building shook under the power of God and what the Lord had done. Just, it’s a marvelous thing that we see the Lord working. One thing that I can be very proud of for my church and in our history is the fact that we stood opposed to the Ku Klux Klan at the height of its ancestry, right in their face, and we ordained blacks into the priesthood all throughout the 1800s. We had a black apostle as early as 1904, Brother Penn. We have a black apostle today, Brother Jim Crudup. And so we’re a diverse church, and I celebrate the diversity that’s in our church, and we’ve always stood opposed to separation of races. That’s something our church has always stood very strongly against. There’s even minutes in our church history from the 1800s of us actually removing a minister from the ministry because he opposed the integration of races that was present within our church. So I’m very proud of that. There’s no church or organization that dates itself back that far that would have perfection, okay? There’s obviously mistakes, and people have opinions along the way, but I’m very proud of our church and how the Lord used us and for the men of God that he called in our church to help lead us during those times.

Casey Griffiths: You mentioned something I hadn’t heard before, which—is there a story there when you say you stood up to the Ku Klux Klan? Like, were they active in the area where the church was, and were there run-ins between your congregants and members of that organization?

Josh Gehly: Yeah, there was a minister down in Florida. I know this story through some of the members in the Quincy branch that exists today, and there was a minister who was white that was being threatened by the Ku Klux Klan because he was preaching in that area and converting African Americans who were within that community. They went up to him and threatened him, and our minister, who stood in front of the Ku Klux Klan, says, “I know how to light a match, too, boys. You guys can get off my porch.” So, he stood right in front of them, and we have a congregation today down in Quincy, Florida, that, praise God, ties itself historically to that missionary effort.

Casey Griffiths: Very cool. Very cool. Let’s see here, so we’ve—up to Alexander Cherry, about the early 1900s. Tell us a little bit about succession in your church, because that’s kind of the general theme of this podcast series is how we came to be led by Brigham Young in my church, and you’ve told us a little bit about Sidney Rigdon and William Cadman and William Bickerton, but tell us how the president of the church is chosen today in your church.

Josh Gehly: Sure. If the president were to pass away today, the first counselor would automatically become president, and then at the next duly formed general conference, there would be an election. We hold elections every two years. And so the first counselor would assume the office of president until that next term would be up for a vote, and then there would be an election. And today, as you accurately stated on one of your previous podcasts, today that is an election that’s done every two years. We only elect—the ministry, the ordained ministers, the elders, evangelists, and apostles of the church are assembled at a general conference, and they would vote. It is only a member of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, because today our church presidency is within our quorum, so we only have twelve ordained apostles, and the three are today within the Twelve. The ministry would vote and nominate a brother from within the Quorum of the Twelve to be holding the office of church president, and they would also elect his first and second counselor at conference, and then that would be something that is very democratic. Our church process in that way is very democratic. We’re seeking the Lord to inspire us, even in the nomination process. It’s really not—even though it’s democratic, it’s really not political. There’s not people vying. Our quorum’s very united and led by the Spirit, which I’m thankful for. It sounds like when it’s democratic, like it could go a certain way, it does not: not within the church. You hear of brothers just seeking the Lord’s revelation to lead us of who’s God’s calling to lead the church. And even when our last president was first elected he was nominated by a brother who was just filled in the Spirit of God, and it just washed over. There were visions of a golden hue that came down amongst the conference and went throughout the congregation, and the Lord led us with a very high hand, which I’m so grateful for. So that’s our process today, and—yeah, so if a member were to pass away, that would automatically, our first counselor would automatically become president, and every two years there’s an election, and there’s a max of an eight-year term for a president today, unless the entire Quorum of the Twelve nominates him for a last standing extra two, and ten years would be the cap.

Casey Griffiths: And the eight-year term limit is a relatively new thing, as I understand it, right? When was that implemented?

Josh Gehly: It was implemented right around the time that my father, Brother Joel, was elected president, and that was around 2018. So Brother Paul Palmieri actually brought it in. He was our last president. He helped bring it to the floor conference with the apostles’ support, and that was passed during his lifetime, but he was grandfathered in, so his year one happened when that was passed, and he was already—he was aged at the time, so that was—he was probably not going to see another eight years out.

Casey Griffiths: So prior to that time, did most church presidents serve until their death? They serve for life?

Josh Gehly: Yes, most. Not all. Not all, but most.

Casey Griffiths: Who are the exceptions to that? Because it sounds like William Cadman and several others served until they passed away.

Josh Gehly: The president that followed W. H. Cadman did not serve until the end of his life. He was a counselor. He became president, and he served a full term. So I think he was around three years, and I’d have to check whether Brother Furnier was after him, but I believe it was W. H., then Brother Gorie Ciaravino, and then Brother Furnier. I believe Brother Gorie chose not to be elected.

Casey Griffiths: Okay.

Josh Gehly: He stepped down of his own choice. He stayed within the Quorum as an active Apostle.

Casey Griffiths: So when you say elections take place every two years, is it possible that the Quorum of the Twelve could get together and take a current president and not elect him after two years, just basically say, “We’re going to choose somebody else. We’re going to elect somebody new”?

Josh Gehly: Well, the authority would lie with the general priesthood, with all of our ministry, and that could happen at the general conference, so sure. Yeah, every two years a different brother from the Quorum of Twelve could be elected as president of the church. That certainly would be open to happen.

Casey Griffiths: Well, this is super useful, and maybe a couple other clarifying questions: how does an apostle get chosen? Is that revelatory or democratic or somewhere in between the two?

Josh Gehly: It’s revelatory. The apostles pray about that, and they would seek, and there’s always usually multiple experiences of the Lord giving dream, vision, confirming. I know personally, just because I have a father that was in the quorum, he had had a number of experiences, and when he was called in, there was a vision. Brother Phil Jackson had the vision, and he saw a mantle coming down on my father as he was being interviewed within the quorum. So there’s confirming experiences that happen, and then that is ratified. Everything we do is ratified by the body of our general priesthood. So those nominations, when I was nominated to be an evangelist, it was a revelatory process. There were revelations that I was called of God to be ordained an evangelist. I had had experiences, other brothers had had experiences, and when that was brought before the general priesthood, it was ratified and confirmed. So our check and balance system is always at the floor of conference within our priesthood.

Casey Griffiths: All right, you’ve caught us up a little bit. One last question: could a person, and does a person, that’s serving as an apostle, choose to retire? Or isn’t a person an apostle until they pass away?

Josh Gehly: They can choose to retire. We regard that very highly. So that is an option that they can choose to take. An evangelist can choose to retire, a minister in our church can choose to retire, and we still regard them very highly for their calling and how they served the Lord in our day and time, but that’s an option for any office of the church.

Casey Griffiths: Okay. Okay.

Josh Gehly: And when we say “retired,” one thing that’s very unique about our church, and I should maybe bring this out, it’s very special to us: literally nobody is paid within the church. We take the Book of Mormon as paramount scripture in our life as the word of God, and we fear the word of the Lord when it talks about priestcraft, and so we have with great respect to how the Book of Mormon addresses any form of paid ministry, none of our ministers, none of our ordained offices, none of our apostles—there’s not a single paid person on staff in The Church of Jesus Christ.

Casey Griffiths: Except for, like, a janitor or a custodian, right? Those are the—

Josh Gehly: Nope!

Casey Griffiths: No! Not even the janitors or the custodians.

Josh Gehly: We—nobody is paid in The Church of Jesus Christ. Yep. It’s all a volunteer effort for love for the Lord. So when you talk about cleaning the building, we all pitch in. We might—I mean, it would be up to a local branch to hire out a company to do cleaning if they want professionally or hiring out a lawn service, but those might not be members of the church, per se.

Casey Griffiths: Okay. Well, good. We got a great overview. Let’s try something a little different here, where we want to talk about differences and similarities. I think we’re going to start with differences and end on similarities so that we end on a positive, harmonious note.

Josh Gehly: Yeah.

Casey Griffiths: Let’s start out by talking about some of the ways that you’re different. Most of our listeners are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints based in Salt Lake City. What do you see as the main differences between your church and our church?

Josh Gehly: Sure. There’s some key differences that I think would be very obvious when somebody immediately walks into our buildings. I mean, I was so blessed to walk into your temple, Casey, with you, before it was dedicated, right? In Pittsburgh. One of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful building I’ve ever toured. Our buildings don’t look like that, and we don’t have temples per se. Now, we do recognize the word temple in Hebrew means House of the Lord, and in that sense, in general worship practices, all of our buildings, okay, in that ways are houses under the Lord for worship and for the great ekklésia, as the New Testament in the Greek describes the word church as the ekklésia: as the gathering. So we all gathering into our church buildings, but we almost take an emphasis on our simplicity, okay? Our buildings are not—we want them to look great and be presentable, but they’re very simple and straightforward structures, and to have a building sell to somebody else and be used by somebody else down the road, that’s fine. If we were to grow and buy a different building or build a different structure, that’s okay. It would just—it would just happen that way. So no temples within The Church of Jesus Christ. Our structure—there’s some, maybe some differences in structure and ordination. So we very much so have a Quorum of Twelve Apostles leading our church, and Christ is the foundation. He’s the cornerstone, and we have Twelve Apostles. We do not have any other apostles outside of that. Okay, so our Quorum of Twelve are our apostles. I remember listening to a podcast where even in some of the ’40s or early ’50s there might’ve been some apostles ordained for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints out West that were not within the Quorum of Twelve. Is that right? You and Scott were talking about that. I learned that. I didn’t know that, you know?

Casey Griffiths: I don’t know if most of our listeners would know that because it’s really rare to have apostles that aren’t members of the Quorum of the Twelve, but it has happened, but it’s gotten more and more rare. Like, I think it’s been well over fifty years since the last time that happened, but that is interesting, yeah.

Josh Gehly: Fair enough. Yeah. And that’s—that has not happened for us, that I’m aware of. And so our evangelists are the missionaries of the church. We don’t have an office of patriarch, so our evangelists are our Quorum of Seventy. We have—we’re a little less than seventy today, but we have a quorum of seventy evangelists that are overseeing the missionary programs around the world. We have elders that are our pastors that are shepherding and presiding over congregations all around the world, and we have the ordinations that we find in the New Testament of teacher and deacon, and there’s also a female ordained office within the church. It’s not considered part of the priesthood per se, but it is an ordained office in the church, and that’s the ordained office of deaconess. You find that in Romans chapter 16, when Paul commends Phoebe as a deaconess, he uses the same word as Acts chapter 6, diakoneó, when he commends Phoebe as a deaconess of the church. She was basically holding church services in her home, which is very common for us as well as we expand in our missionary programs to hold house meetings, and she was holding church meetings in her home under great threat and possible duress, and Paul commends her. And so we have the ordained office of deaconess as well. Those are the ordained offices of the church and a basic structure of the church from an ordination standpoint, and then there’s the greatest calling in The Church of Jesus Christ, and that is the calling to have faith on the Lord, repent of your sins, and be baptized into the living kingdom of God on earth. And that is the ultimate calling in the church. I’ll never forget Brother Paul Palmieri used to always preach that: the greatest calling I ever received was the calling to serve Jesus Christ in his church and be a member and be reconciled and have my sins washed away and be reconciled unto the Lord, and that’s the great calling. That’s the doctrine of Christ that we desire to follow.

Casey Griffiths: Okay, so basic ordinances in the church are baptism—gift of the Holy Ghost is a ceremony where hands are placed upon a new convert and they’re given the gift of the Holy Ghost, part of your beliefs as well.

Josh Gehly: Yes, and there’s no age of baptism, in fact, so we believe in essentially an age of accountability, where if the doctrine of Christ is faith, repentance, baptism, you would have to be old enough to repent. We honor the words of Mormon in Moroni chapter 8 very seriously where he talks about children being baptized as an abomination, and so we’re very cautious on that. And so for us, there’s no set age. We look for the fruits of repentance to be upon a young person that would be old enough to understand the gospel message of Christ, of who Jesus is and what he did for them and feel that convicting, repentant spirit fall upon them from the Lord to desire to turn—the word repentance in Hebrew means to turn—to turn from their ways and face the Lord. And that’s something that the Lord calls out and speaks, and we turn and hear Him and witness Him for ourselves and become His own, and so we believe in that through that doctrine of faith, repentance, and baptism, that baptism would happen at an age of accountability. There’s young people where that in our church happens in their twenties. There’s young people that that happens in their teens, different ages. It varies. The very youngest you might see in our church would be around 12.

Casey Griffiths: Oh.

Josh Gehly: But that would be probably less common.

Casey Griffiths: That’s what I was going to ask is if there’s a minimum age requirement, because if it’s whenever you feel like it—I mean, if you had a 4-year-old say, I really want to get baptized, would you say maybe wait a couple of years, or . . . ?

Josh Gehly: No. We’d say no. And we would quote the scriptures, yeah.

Casey Griffiths: Yeah, you’d say no. Okay.

Josh Gehly: Ordinance-wise, we do believe in anointing with blessed oil. We also would bless our infants and our children that would come into the congregation. When Christ was at the Temple Bountiful, and when he was on the earth, he took the children in his arms, and he blessed them one by one. We do the same thing in the church. That’s an ordinance within our church. We perform marriages in our churches. We have a number of ordinances within the church that we practice and perform that I didn’t necessarily hit on. Even when a minister can’t be present and somebody might be far away, we take Acts chapter 19 when the same thing was happening to Paul. He couldn’t be everywhere at once, and so he would literally anoint a garment, a handkerchief, and have somebody take it to those who were sick. We have done the same thing. During COVID a lot of anointed handkerchiefs went out amongst the saints. We have a number of ordinances that we perform that some of them might be somewhat unique or somewhat familiar to different ones reading through the scriptures, but they’re all going to be based out of the New Testament era of the church. You’re going to see all of our ordinances come out of the Book of Acts or out of the Gospels or out of Third Nephi, Fourth Nephi, the Book of Mormon in the Book of Mormon, the Book of Moroni. That era of time is where we’re drawing out our structure, where we’re drawing out our ordinances and what we’re doing and why we’re performing.

Casey Griffiths: And there’s an interesting ordinance that you and I have discussed on several occasions, which is the washing of feet, which happens fairly regularly in your church. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Josh Gehly: Sure. So in John chapter 13, the Lord’s in the upper room. He has already served the Lord’s Supper to the disciples. It says in John 13, after supper, the Lord disrobes, and he begins to kneel down and wash Peter’s feet, and this was a role for the lowest servant in the house to perform when people were coming into a house. And Jesus takes this role of a servant, and he kneels down before Peter, and Peter jumps up and says, Lord, you’re never going to wash my feet. Like, I’m not going to subject you to that, Lord. Why would I do that? You’re my Lord. You’re my master. Jesus says, if I, your master and Lord, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. So we take that instruction from the Lord, and we perform this as an ordinance in the church. So we do it about every three months, because he doesn’t say how often to do it—he just instructs us to do it. And really, the main scripture we have, we don’t have many scriptures on this, because for us, our scriptures are the Bible and Book of Mormon. So John 13, that’s really the window. There’s not much else. Little bit in the New Testament of people washing feet, but really it’s John 13, and so—and Jesus even says, if you don’t do this, you have no part with me. So we desire to have part of Christ, and it’d be—we want all of our congregation to have a part of this ordinance. So on this kind of special, set aside Sunday that happens about once every three months, after the Lord’s Supper, which we partake in every Sunday with bread and wine, after that would conclude, we would have a feet-washing service where the sisters would take a certain part of the sanctuary and would wash each other’s feet, and the brothers would have a different part of the sanctuary or maybe go in the back, and they would wash each other’s feet. Everything is public and open in our meetings. That way a visitor can witness and sit right down next to us. It is a closed practice. Our communion is closed. Our feet-washing is closed for the active baptized members of our church, but anybody can witness and watch what we do. When we wash each other’s feet, there’s a basin, you take a foot, you’re kind of—you’re not really scrubbing, okay? There’s no soap. You’re gently washing their feet, and you’re offering a prayer. You’re praying out loud for that person. You’re humbling yourselves before them and praying to the Lord for them in their lives. It’s a beautiful ordinance, and it’s something that’s very special and unique. I know of many churches that do it for the ministry only, you know? Or different—I’ve heard of different ways that it happens in different organizations, but a congregational feet washing, it’s a blessed gift in the church.

Casey Griffiths: You mentioned women wash other women’s feet and men wash other men’s feet. Is it everybody in the congregation, all adults and children, or how’s that break down?

Josh Gehly: All the active, baptized members. All the active, baptized members. So it would be probably teenagers and up would be what you—that are baptized—would be participating, and the beauty of this ordinance is, like John 13, you’ll see a newly baptized member, brother, where they come in, they—maybe they were baptized two weeks before, and all of a sudden you see an apostle kneeling down in front of them, washing their feet. It just—there’s a humbleness to it, there’s a certain spirit of servitude and service to it that just is something that is a treasure. It’s a treasure.

Casey Griffiths: This is one way that we might be more similar than you think. We do have a washing ordinance.

Josh Gehly: Right.

Casey Griffiths: It takes place inside temples, and there’s no quarterly—it’s just whenever you want to go to the temple, you can experience it, and it is similar, too, in the sense that women perform it for other women, and men perform it for other men. I love this about you guys. I remember when I was in Pennsylvania, you showed me one of the basins, and I wanted to take one home as a souvenir, but such a sweet and meaningful act that you do for each other. I’m saying that because my own experiences, you know, in our temples, that’s one of my favorite things to do. We call it the initiatory ordinance, but it’s a washing and an anointing, and it’s really a neat thing. Like, I was in the temple the other day, and my old bishop was—just happened to be the person that was there, and I hadn’t seen him in years, and it was really neat to connect with him again on that level. Scripture is the Bible and the Book of Mormon, but that doesn’t mean you’re closed canon: You’re open to the idea of revelation, but you guys kind of have a unique model of how revelations are received in the church and accepted in the church. Can you walk us through that just a little bit?

Josh Gehly: Yeah, this is kind of special and unique, so I think this is a great question to talk about, just to give a landscape of who we are and how we function.

Casey Griffiths: Yeah.

Josh Gehly: For us, Bible and Book of Mormon is the Word of God today. We don’t accept any other book as canon or as scripture today, but we read through the pages of the Book of Mormon and we read Ether chapter 4, where the promises are given to the Gentiles and the revelation of the brother of Jared is promised to come forth in the latter days, and we look forward to that sealed portion, like it says in 2 Nephi chapter 27, being opened and read and preached from the housetops. So we desire that. We look forward to that prophetically. The brass plates that are never to be dimmed in time, the Book of Mormon says. It’s coming forth. It’s translation. So we believe there’s coming a day when we are going to need a suitcase filled with scriptures to come to church and can’t wait for that to happen. And so—or maybe it’s still all on the cell phone at that point: I don’t know. We do have an open canon from what we believe the Book of Mormon prophesies will come forth in the latter days. Revelation and the Lord speaking tied even into the gifts that we have in the church is also open, but we do not necessarily canonize them today. So our revelation—we believe God can speak, that He can speak to whomever He wants. He spoke to Nebuchadnezzar, an unrighteous king. He spoke to Pharaoh, an unrighteous king, and gave them dreams and gave them experiences. So we believe God is limitless on how and whom He chooses to talk to. Sometimes those revelations, even to an unbeliever, can set a standard for the believer. But for us, we would only examine experiences that would come to the church through an active, baptized member of the church. That would be how we would view—receive an experience. If somebody receives an experience that they think is so profound, the Lord has spoken so seriously, they believe that might be a revelation to the whole church or to the world, they would pass that into their presiding minister. If their presiding minister and the ministry that might be at that branch—because, like, at my branch, we have a congregation of about forty, and there’s four ministers in my branch. Technically, that includes my dad. He doesn’t count. He’s never there. You know, he’s always traveling for the church, but—so we would—the four of us would look at that experience and consider, and we have a criteria to examine it on: is this a revelation from the Lord? If we felt united in the spirit that it was—and sometimes a revelation can be given just to an individual for their life, for the branch, for its well-being, or maybe this is for something bigger than that, so something broader than that, something more than that. Then the local ministry could pass that directly to the apostles. If the apostles reviewed it and felt it was a revelation, they would bring it before General Conference, and the Ministry of General Conference would discuss the revelation and could either pass it back or approve it as a revelation, and we keep those revelations in our records and have access to them both through our minutes and through some separate accounts. Oftentimes the apostles follow up with a letter to the church, include the revelation, include some scripture, talk about it, talk about why it’s relevant and important for us, and we go forward. And so there’s a lot of experiences like that that we are blessed—and some of the most powerful meetings I’ve ever been in have been at conference when the ministry is discussing a revelation and the Lord just starts speaking. The gift of tongues comes forth, there’s singing in the spirit, there’s visions that are happening, multiple people seeing the same vision, and all these beautiful experiences that are happening, all over a dream that we’re discussing, and I’ve also been in meetings where we don’t have that, and maybe there’s some contrary opinion, and the experience maybe gets passed back. That’s okay. So that’s how revelation is passed through our membership. Sisters can receive revelation for the entire church. Unordained brothers can receive revelation that could be relevant for the entire church. That’s all possible within The Church of Jesus Christ.

Casey Griffiths: Arlene Buffington’s hymns that you mentioned earlier, is that an example of a revelation that came to somebody and then was accepted by the church? Would that fall into that category?

Josh Gehly: They actually came in the back door a little bit. I hate to say it that way, but they started happening and getting disseminated really quickly, and actually, with the latest publication of The Songs of Zion, the Quorum of Twelve wrote a letter in there that said, yes, these are revelations to the church. We’ve—they happened, they got disseminated, all of a sudden we had hymnbooks around, and the church had never formally acted on them. It just was things we were singing and glorifying God for. The process of it hadn’t happened yet, but the apostles put forth the letter and said, yes, these are revelations to the church. So it happened a little bit maybe not strict procedure, but, man, they’re the greatest songs. I’m so thankful we have them.

Casey Griffiths: Very, very cool. Very cool. And, again, it has an honored place on my shelf, The Songs of Zion. You have some really interesting and unique beliefs concerning Native Americans and the promises made to them in the book of Mormon. You started down that road, and I stopped you, so here I’m going to let you go crazy. Tell us a little bit about what you guys believe concerning the house of Lehi.

Josh Gehly: Sure. So we believe that the Book of Mormon is a revelatory book, and it is intended and spoken and prophesied of to be used in these the latter days for the gathering in the House of Israel and for the building up of the kingdom of God upon the earth where we will build—as 3 Nephi chapter 21 says, we will build the holy city, the New Jerusalem, on the promised land somewhere—for us, it really doesn’t matter where: I just want to be there, wherever it is—and that we would build up the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Zion upon this earth before Christ returns. That’s our great hope and our great mission. We believe that that comes first from the Gentiles, which we believe that we are Gentiles. The Book of Mormon says that it comes forth, in the title page, by way of Gentile, and so we believe that the gospel was restored to the Gentiles and that that is to be taken back to Israel so that the first shall be last and the last shall be first. So the Jews who were the first to receive Christ and reject him will ultimately be the last to receive him at the end in the kingdom of God and on this earth. And so it’s our duty as Gentiles to bring the gospel back to the house of Joseph and allow 2 Nephi chapter 3 to be fulfilled, which we believe when we read—and this is actually very similar that’s—it’s interesting: David Whitmer came to almost the identical conclusion as our church.

Casey Griffiths: Hmm.

Josh Gehly: But we were not intersecting or having religious dialogue together. So David Whitmer interpreted 2 Nephi 3 about the choice seer in a very similar way as we do, where we believe prophetically that the choice seer has not come forth yet, but that Lehi was prophesying in that chapter to his son Joseph. And he—in the context of that, it’s out of the loins of his son, Joseph, where we believe this choice seer will come, who will be used as a latter-day deliverer to deliver the house of Israel back to a knowledge of Christ, and he’ll be used to translate records from the tribes wherever they’ve been scattered, and we’ll ultimately see the great glory of Zion established on this earth. So that’s our hope and our desire and fervent expectation of a choice seer to come in these, the latter days. So we—one of the differences there might be we don’t necessarily read that text and consider Joseph Smith, Jr. to be the choice seer that’s being prophesied of there. What’s great is it’s just a hopeful prophecy for us. So even if you’re a Latter-day Saint, you could read it and maybe a little differently and go, well, that’s wonderful. Because if this happens, it means the great glories that are promised are being unfolded. So it’s a safe place for us to disagree, I think.

Casey Griffiths: It is, and we disagree there. You know, we think the choice seer in 2 Nephi 3 is Joseph Smith, but you see it differently. I will say one nice thing about talking to you guys is you guys use the same chapters and verses in the Book of Mormon as we do.

Josh Gehly: We do.

Casey Griffiths: When I’m talking to Community of Christ, I have to be, “2 Nephi chapter 1, verses 275a” and stuff like that, because they use a different versification than we do, so. And this idea of the Native Americans as sort of a chosen, destined people plays into the New Jerusalem. Like, I note you guys quote passages like 3 Nephi 20 and 22—

Josh Gehly: 20 and 21, 22.

Casey Griffiths: —a lot, yeah. Tell us a little bit about that.

Josh Gehly: Well, those are prophecies of Christ as he’s at Temple Bountiful, in our Book of Mormon—our Book of Mormon’s a red letter Book of Mormon, so those are all peppered with red letters, and that just means that the words of Christ in our Book of Mormon—we’ve never made any changes to the words consciously, but the only change we made was color coding. So Jesus’s words, like you would find in a Bible that you would get off of a bookstore anywhere around the country, would be a red-letter Bible. Our Book of Mormon’s a red-letter Book of Mormon. So when you go into, like, chapter 20, 21, 22—this is all Christ speaking at Temple Bountiful during and sometimes after his ascension that he did on the face of the land there. And so when he does, he prophesies that for Israel that would be repentant, like in chapter 21, Israel, that if they would be repentant—if there’s not repentance, there’s judgment. That’s prophesied there in 3 Nephi 21. “But if they will repent and hearken unto my words and harden not their hearts, I will establish my church among them, and they shall come into the covenant and be numbered among this . . . remnant of Jacob.” So I believe I’ve been adopted in to these promises as a Gentile and that we will assist this remnant of Jacob, okay, “whom I have given this land for their inheritance.” And so this land, we believe, is a land that is to be inherited by the house of Israel in the latter days, as the kingdom of God is established, and “that they may build a city, which shall be called the New Jerusalem. And [they] shall . . . assist my people,” again referencing Israel, “that they may be gathered in, who are scattered upon all the face of the land, in unto the New Jerusalem.” And we believe that’s our duty, is to declare the gospel out to the scattered, the lost and scattered of the house of Joseph and of the house of Israel, and so we seek that and seek their redemption back to Christ. We send missionaries all throughout this land onto the reservations and Central America to declare the gospel to those who may be descended from this record and try and gather them in to the glorious gospel for the restoration of the house of Joseph, that this might be the day that Jacob’s face might shine again after years of being downtrodden, scattered, and distressed, that Christ might redeem them and make them His.

Casey Griffiths: And I’m going to admit to a little bit of holy envy here: I read a great article that pointed out in early church literature, 3 Nephi 20-22 was quoted a lot, and like you said, it’s a prophecy of Jesus Christ. It’s a prophecy about the destiny of the house of Lehi and the New Jerusalem that’ll rise on this continent. When I talk to my students nowadays and I say, “What do you think was the most quoted chapter?” they’ll usually say 3 Nephi 11 or Moroni 10.

Josh Gehly: Sure.

Casey Griffiths: I wish that we emphasized these prophecies a little bit more because, as you mentioned, they come from Jesus Christ. They really do provide this great millennial vision for where we’re going to and tie the Book of Mormon into it, too, so I commend you guys for highlighting that, and just for using the Book of Mormon in general, like, that’s—the nice thing about sitting down with a member of your church is I can have an intense discussion about the Book of Mormon, and it clearly gets used. Some other churches we interact with, even some restoration churches, aren’t very familiar with the Book of Mormon. You guys know your stuff, and that’s impressive.

Josh Gehly: Yeah, it’s—the Book of Mormon is the heartbeat of our church. Without it, the blood would not flow: we wouldn’t have life.

Casey Griffiths: Well, we’ve highlighted some differences: you don’t use temples, we might see certain passages of the Book of Mormon maybe a little bit differently from each other. Let’s highlight some similarities: Where are some places where we come together and we can agree on things?

Josh Gehly: I think some of the ways that we agree on are what we’re speaking of right now: We both carry the Book of Mormon, and I commend—and my holy envy that I would share, that I often share with you, is the fact that you empower tens of thousands of missionaries, young people, around the country to speak about the Book of Mormon, and I find that wonderful, and what brings us together in common ground is our past. We both believe that we are descended from the angel that flew through the midst of heaven, so we have a common core foundation there, and the gift and the fruit of that is the Book of Mormon, and so we hold it in equal regard: both of us uphold it as Scripture, as the living, breathing Word of God, and that it’s inspired. There’s so much there that unites us. To me, those are the two common core foundations for us that I find to be similar, and I’d love to hear observations from you, Casey, on things you’ve seen, but, the two that I would always go back to is zeal, love, passion for Book of Mormon, so much so that I have been educated from you and from your teachers who have taught and studied the Book of Mormon, and I find that wonderful and enriching in my life. On the same hand, we’re coming from the same source at—somewhere down the line, we trace ourselves back to the angel that flew through the midst of heaven, and we both read Revelation 14:6-7 and say, ah, Jesus commanded that angel to come to the earth, and that’s my church. That’s the beginning. And we both agree on that. That’s a beautiful, beautiful piece of unity as well.

Casey Griffiths: Yeah. In fact, if I can put you on the spot a little bit, when we were driving around Pennsylvania, you talked a little bit about your sort of journey as a person of faith. It was totally fascinating to me because you intersect with us a little bit in the sense that part of your journey was, like you said, hearing teachers from our church, but also being influenced by people. With the starting point that there’s no set age for baptism, can you tell us a little bit about your conversion and how you came to know that the Book of Mormon was true and want to be an active part of your faith?

Josh Gehly: Absolutely. So I was touched in the Spirit and blessed my whole life in the church. I’ve been blessed to have seen the sick healed, seen the lame walk, and seen the blind to see. I can testify to those things. We could spend podcasts together of me praising God for those great blessings and things that I’ve witnessed. And yet, as a young person, the world traps you, and Satan is good at laying snares, right? That cunning one, that evil one, whispering lies to us and distracting us. So I was baptized young. I was baptized at 13. I had a number of friends in the church that were a little bit older than me. I was one of two siblings. My brother was a little older. I was kind of friends with his friends. And so I saw them all making their covenant with the Lord, repenting, being buried in the liquid grave, Spirit of God pouring out upon them, and them changing, and I witnessed that, and I recognized that was something I wanted in my life. I wanted the Lord in my life. So I was baptized at 13 years old. When we did, it was November 7, 1999. We went into the waters of Lake Erie. I was blessed that my great-grandfather performed the baptism at the water, and when he did, it was November, it was cold, but the water to me felt warm. It was just one of the gifts that God had given to me where I wasn’t cold at all. I could have stood in the water. I could have just swam and laid there all day. It was a beautiful moment.

Casey Griffiths: I was going to ask if you had to chainsaw the ice or anything like that, but . . .

Josh Gehly: There was snow on the ground, but the water was not frozen yet. That would be exceptionally early for Erie to have ice covered on the water, but there was snow on the ground. It was a cold day. You know, from there, my greatest mistakes and my greatest doubts came after that moment. There was a time period where I was approached to be ordained in the church as a teacher, and I said, no, thank you, and I went off to college, and I was out the door. And I had one foot in and one foot out, so to speak. I knew I believed in the Lord. I knew I loved the church. I didn’t necessarily have any plans on running away or leaving the Lord or abandoning the faith, but I was struggling, and I was trying things, and I was exploring what a secular school at a state school had to offer. At the time, I was even questioning some of the things that I was reading, like, how could the name Jesus Christ be there so many years before Christ came? And reading the Book of Mormon critically, and what do I really believe? And my very first class at Penn State was on biological anthropology, and I was getting an archaeology degree, and the professor stood in front of the class and said, “If anybody has any strong religious beliefs, leave them at the door. They’re not welcome in my classroom.” He launched into his teaching, and I was just sitting there looking around just stunned, like—like, I wasn’t planning to interrupt him to give him a testimony, but I was just stunned at the audacity that was displayed. He ended up being my academic advisor and was a great man, but challenged me, challenged my faith. And so I really, my freshman year, was challenged. I read the Bible and the Book of Mormon multiple times, cover to cover, and I really challenged myself on what do I actually believe? And you and I were talking—I went everywhere. That’s the first time I went to a Latter-day Saint church. I went to Islamic meetings. They don’t allow an outsider like me to come to their most special meetings, but even if they were presenting something, I would go and listen—I went to everything. And I was doing stuff midweek, going to different things, and was just trying to explore and find out what I believe, and those are the moments when I met Hugh Nibley through some of his writings. Those are the moments when I met Daniel Peterson and some of his writings, encountered FARMS for the first time, started to read about Jack Welch’s discovery of chiasmus. And now I’ve actually gotten to meet Jack. It’s amazing! You know, I think I nearly cried when I—I was in tears when I met him. He had no idea what an impact he had in my life, you know? But that was when I began to find answers. My church—I’m so proud of my church, and I’m so active in it, but my church, a hundred years ago, didn’t have professors. Fifty years ago, we didn’t have professors. We were dirt-poor coal miners, and William Bickerton was a coal miner. William Cadman was a farmer. They didn’t have two pennies to rub together. I’m proud of what we built out of nothing for the Lord, giving from—scrapping by and trying to make something and trying to do something that Jesus was telling us to do, but we didn’t have the resources or the research, and I wanted something—I promised I would read every critique, but I would also read every counter, and I wanted to try and find some balance to that, so I’ve read everything Brent Metcalfe’s ever written. I’ve read it. I’ve also read everything John Sorensen’s ever written, and I find myself standing with John Sorensen in Guatemala, metaphorically, going, yeah, I think this is where it happened. But be that where it may, I found answers from sincere Book of Mormon believers from your church that wrote things and taught things, and in those moments, I was praying my Moroni 10 prayer, and I believe I received the answers and the fulfillment in my soul that the Book of Mormon is the Word of God, and I’ll testify to that to the day I die.

Casey Griffiths: Well, thank you for that. I mean, like I said, I love—Brother Joel, your dad, came to Utah a couple of weeks ago, and he introduced himself by saying, “I’m the leader of the third largest church in the restoration, but the second largest that believes in the Book of Mormon.” It was a little jab at Community of Christ.

Josh Gehly: Amen.

Casey Griffiths: And I’ve got to say, that is one thing that I and my students have both been impressed with, is the fidelity that members of your church show towards the Book of Mormon and the Restoration. Like, when you were in my class, I could tell a couple of my returned missionaries were trying to get in at you on the Book of Mormon, and you were able to answer them chapter and verse, and I think that caused a few of those kids to step back and say, wow, this guy’s the real deal. He’s studied, and he knows what he’s talking about. And, boy, that’s a place where I think our two churches can honestly connect is to say we both love the Book of Mormon, and we want to share and help people understand how great that book is and what it means to us, so thank you for sharing that.

Josh Gehly: Absolutely. It’s wonderful to share my faith, and it’s just a great joy to be with you.

Casey Griffiths: Good to have you with us.

Scott Woodward: Thank you for listening to this episode of Church History Matters, and another big thanks to Josh Gehly for being our special guest on today’s episode. In our next episode, Casey and I sit down with Andrew Bolton, a friend and member of the Community of Christ branch of the Restoration who served as an apostle in their Council of Twelve Apostles from 2007 to 2016. You really won’t want to miss this one. If you’re enjoying or gaining value from Church History Matters, we would love it if you could pay it forward by telling your friends about it, or by taking a moment to subscribe, rate, review, and comment on the podcast. That makes us easier to find. Today’s episode was produced by Casey Griffiths and edited by Nick Galieti, with show notes and transcript by Gabe Davis. Church History Matters is a podcast of Scripture Central, a nonprofit which exists to help build enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making Latter-day Saint scripture and church history accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. For more resources to enhance your gospel study, go to scripturecentral.org, where everything is available for free because of the generous donations of people like you. While we try very hard to be historically and doctrinally accurate in what we say on this podcast, please remember that all views expressed in this and every episode are our views alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Scripture Central or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us.