As we’ve previously shared, Music & the Spoken Word is nearing its 5,000th week in a row of continuous network broadcasting. July 13, 2025, marks 96 years since a young man, Ted Kimball, climbed a 15-foot ladder to a microphone suspended high in the air. From that single hanging microphone, the sounds of the Tabernacle Choir and organ at Temple Square would be carried over the airwaves for the first time. Ted stayed there, high in his perch, for the duration of the broadcast announcing the songs along the way.
In the ensuing years and decades, Spoken Word messages of hope, joy, peace, and many other timeless principles have been delivered to the world.
Today we’d like to share some of God’s timeless principles as presented by Richard L. Evans, J. Spencer Kinard, and Lloyd D. Newell, all former presenters of this program.
Richard L. Evans: “Faith is that quality of trust which prevents the uncertainty of the future from destroying the opportunities of the present—which brings peace in the midst of confusion, and sleep even while some problems are unsolved. Faith is trust, belief, conviction, a force in the lives of all balanced men, and it leaves an awful emptiness when it dies or departs.”[1]
Spencer Kinard: “And thus it is with prayer. We may not know quite how it works, but we don’t need to. The Lord has not burdened us with complicated formulas. He has made the process of prayer so simple that a humble child on his knees can make it work. The only requirements are that our desires be righteous and our supplication be sincere. The Lord stands ever anxious to assist us.”[2]
Lloyd D. Newell: “Knowing that God’s love for us is real and unchanging can calm the storms of life and bring meaning amid uncertainty. God will not forget us or forsake us. In this we have peace—a peace that comes from knowing that the world and its affairs remain in the loving and all-powerful hands of Him who created it in the beginning.”[3]
I add my witness to each of theirs that God’s timeless principles of faith, prayer, and love are in full force and effect today. For “God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”[4]
[1] Richard L. Evans, “Faith Is Not to Have a Perfect Knowledge,” Music & the Spoken Word, Nov. 30, 1952.
[2] J. Spencer Kinard, “Prayer Power,” Music & the Spoken Word, Mar. 23, 1980.
[3] Lloyd D. Newell, “The Sustaining Power of God’s Love,” Music & the Spoken Word, Nov. 25, 2001.
[4] Mormon 9:9; see also Hebrews 13:8.
May 18, 2025
Broadcast Number 4,992
The Tabernacle Choir
Orchestra at Temple Square
Conductors
Mack Wilberg
Ryan Murphy
Organist
Linda Margetts
Host
Derrick Porter
Simple Gifts
Shaker Song; arr. Ryan Murphy
I Know That My Savior Loves Me
Tami Jeppson Creamer; arr. Ryan Murphy
Prelude in Classic Style
Gordon Young
Homeward Bound
Marta Keen Thompson; arr. Mack Wilberg
Lord, Through Changing Days, Unchanging
Henry Smart; arr. Mack Wilberg
It Is Well with My Soul
Phillip Paul Bliss; arr. Mack Wilberg