This dispensation of the gospel was ushered in by many miraculous events, but of all these, the restoration of the priesthood holds the keys to our own salvation.
The totally unexpected appearance of God the Father and Jesus Christ to the young Joseph Smith inaugurated this epoch, yet years were to pass before the full impact of their visit became known.
Likewise, the stunning appearance of Moroni, bearing with him the news of long-gone, civilizations whose record he had himself hidden away, was also a prelude.
Two key events of this latter dispensation occurred along the banks of the Susquehanna River and in the quiet, frontier woods of Pennsylvania in May and June of 1829. The Lord's granting of authority to the people of this age was the return of the priesthood to the earth. It had been gone for more than 14 centuries.
The priesthood, both Melchizedek and Aaronic, is quite simply the authority granted by God to mortal men that enables them to act in His behalf. Without that express permission from Him, given through the laying on of hands from someone who already has it, the works of the Church would go unacknowledged by God.
Put another way, the great, significant works of the Church have their roots in that long ago springtime.
Perhaps it seems odd to think of the priesthood in that way. After all, consider what members of the Church do. They preach, they build temples, they send out their sons and daughters as missionaries, they perform roadshows, name babies, get married, offer counseling and help to the troubled, collect histories, sponsor ball games, teach lessons, work in service projects, take food to invalids, visit members in home teaching and visiting teaching assignments, pray with and for each other - in short, a wondrous celebration of life and service expressed in thousands of forms. And all receive their sanction from the restoration of priesthood authority. Indeed, the whole history of the Church's growth - from a small gathering of believers in a log cabin in 1830, through the migrations and settlements in Nauvoo and the trip West, to this day's preaching of gospel truths in the recently opened countries of Eastern Europe and Africa - began with the restoration of the right to once again proclaim the gospel with power and authority.
All of this array of activities is done within the framework of service, which is the final obligation and responsibility of the priesthood. The Lord made it quite clear that the priesthood was an empowerment of service to others. King Benjamin, whose years of service are recorded in the Book of Mormon, put it directly: "When ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God." (Mosiah 2:17.)
And in the same spirit, the Lord also has warned us against viewing priesthood authority in any other light than that of service. From his dreary confinement in Liberty Jail, the Prophet Joseph Smith wrote this revelation: "There are many called, but few are chosen. And why are they not chosen? Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men, that they do not learn this one lesson - That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and that the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness." (D&C 121: 34-36.)
