D&C Section Ninety Five

A year and a half before this revelation was given, the Lord had commanded the saints to build a temple (in Section 88). For some reason, this command was forgotten, overlooked, or maybe postponed. I tend to think it was the latter since it would take a lot of revenue to build a temple and having spent all they had just to get to Kirtland, they did not have the resources. The temple was needed so that the missionaries could be endowed with power as they went out to the nations of the earth. This would not be the temple endowment as we know it today, but it would be an endowment of priesthood keys and authority. Because they haven't started, the Lord chastises them in the manner a parent should chastise. Three times he tells them he loves them, that he is chastising them because he loves them. The chastisement is followed by two important things, one is the promise that if they keep the commandments they can accomplish building the temple because he will help them, and the second is instruction about how to go about it. The saints began four days later with George A. Smith bringing the first load of stone and Hyrum Smith and Reynolds Cahoon digging the trench for the walls.