One of the most remarkable characteristics of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is its worldwide uniformity. If you go to McDonalds in a third world country, the Big Mac doesn’t always taste the same. But if you go to a Sacrament meeting in a third world country, though you sit on a dirt floor, in a room with no more than a handful of members, and no one is speaking English—still, the taste of the spirit is just as sweet. So it was in the days of Alma, for the priests were careful not to teach something that wasn’t in the program. It was forbidden to do so. The result was that the Lord did pour out his Spirit upon them, and they were blessed, and prospered in the land (v. 24).
An Armenian convert who was baptized while in Austria wrote, “In the International Branch in Vienna, I felt the real Spirit of the Church because they had so many members. When I moved to the Armenian Branch, there were very few members, 10 or 15, attending every Sunday. So it was a little bit odd for me, but now I understand that it is not the quantity of the people necessary to feel the Spirit. The Spirit is the same, No matter where you go, the Church doesn’t change.” (Church News, Feb 14, 1998)
“’The Church is the same wherever you go!’ I grew up hearing this from returning vacationers and from missionaries reporting their missions. And I understood what they meant. They didn’t mean that the same hymns were sung elsewhere- though they were- or that everyone used the same lesson manuals, or that everyone thought the same. They meant the gospel felt the same wherever they went. This resulted from the presence of the Holy Spirit, which is the universal way we recognize the things of God. It’s the same when you learn something new or see something from a new slant, and suddenly it all makes sense. You know it’s right, because it feels right and is consistent with other glimpses of truth that you’ve had.” (Book of Mormon Symposium Series, edited by PR Cheesman, MS Nyman, and CD Tate, Jr., 1988, p. 105)