When the risen Lord visits the remnants of Israel in America, He gives them divine standards for righteous living, along with he power and authority to minister in all things for the salvation of His children within the covenant framework of Zion. Moreover, He grants them a higher perspective of how they fit into the grand design of Elohim for the future gathering of Israel from the four quarters of the earth in the fulfillment of the sacred promises to their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In this manner, the Savior lifts the vision of the multitudes that listen to Him with rapt attention in Bountiful to higher spiritual insights of hope and renewal. Just as He has caused them to be gathered to the temple for instruction, in like manner will the Father, through the Son, gather His children from their long dispersal over time, back to holy places of refuge and enlightenment as part of the gospel plan of redemption. The Savior’s instruction to the ancient American Saints about the gathering—including His interpretive citation of the Old Testament prophets, especially Isaiah—is a magnificent reaffirmation for us today of the covenant patterns of Zion that will evolve under guidance from the Almighty as part of the Restoration of all things leading up to the Second Coming.
President Brigham Young has said:
We are to build up and establish Zion, gather the House of Israel, and redeem the nations of the earth. This people have this work to do, whether we live to see it or not. This is all in our hands… .
It is obligatory upon us to see that the House of Israel have the Gospel preached to them; to do all that is in our power to gather them to the land of their fathers, and to gather up the fulness of the Gentiles before the Gospel can go with success to the Jews.
We are now gathering the children of Abraham who have come through the loins of Joseph and his sons, more especially through Ephraim, whose children are mixed among all the nations of the earth. (Discourses of Brigham Young, comp. John A. Widtsoe [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1954], 437)