“Those Branches Which Are Ripened”

Joseph F. McConkie, Robert L. Millet
The Lord will cut off from his Church those branches of Israel-individuals and groups-who have ripened in iniquity, those who might have proven to be a chosen people but refused to make proper choices. These persons- called in premortality but not chosen in the flesh- shall never know the consummate privileges reserved for the true and faithful (see D&C 95:5-6; D&C 121:34-36).

“Branches Which Are Ripened”

As the authors have written elsewhere, both Zion and Babylon make “definite requirements of its citizens, and as the time approaches the millennial day each of these communities will insist upon the total devotion and consecration of its citizenry. To read the signs of the times is to recognize that in the future fewer and fewer individuals will be ’lukewarm’ Latter-day Saints; that the myopic and misguided of the religious world will grow in cynicism and confusion; that the ungodly will, as time goes by, sink ever deeper into a despair known only to those who revel in iniquity; that wickedness will widen and malevolence multiply until the citizens of Babylon seal themselves to him who is the father of all lies.”

Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Vol. 2

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