“These painful consequences of war were the direct result of their own wickedness, which in turn produced a literal fulfillment of earlier prophecies wherein the Lord had promised peace and protection to the inhabitants of this land if they would obey him and destruction if they did not. … Much if not all of the pain and suffering that could be viewed as ‘the wrath of God’ came by means of the meanness, the cruelty, and the thirst for blood that filled the hearts of the spiritually sick and dead” (McConkie et al., Doctrinal Commentary, 4:313).