Overpopulation is in the global zeitgeist. Some extremists welcome Covid-19 as a way to depopulate the planet. These twisted folks think Thanos had the right idea. But the idea behind overpopulation has been morphing for over two centuries.

Thomas Malthus (1766–1834), the first self-proclaimed population prophet, prophesied what is now called the “Malthusian catastrophe”. He argued mass famine would soon dramatically reduce the global population. By 1846 the “Malthusian Law of Population” had become so integrated into society that even Charles Dickens’ Scrooge is ranting about the need to “decrease the surplus population”.

Malthus was wrong. Spectacularly wrong.

But most don’t realize just how right Malthus appeared to be, even if a bit of a scrooge. In 1800, the industrial revolution was only dawning, and everything Malthus saw seemed to confirm his theories. Harvard professor Steven Pinker points out just how impoverished the world was:

”In 1800…most people everywhere were poor. The average income was equivalent to that in the poorest countries in Africa today (about $500 a year in international dollars), and almost 95 percent of the world lived in what counts today as “extreme poverty” (less than $1.90 a day).”

How could you not believe Malthus? In fact, no one (but God) could have known just how mistaken Malthus was.

So what changed the trajectory from perpetual poverty to a planet that can easily sustain billions of inhabitants?

The Answer = 1820

See the graph from Steven Pinker’s book Enlightenment Now (my emphasis added):

Steven Pinker describes the growth like this:

“The story of the growth of prosperity in human history depicted in figure 8–1 is close to: nothing . . . nothing . . . nothing . . . (repeat for a few thousand years) . . . boom! … Between 1820 and 1900, the world’s income tripled. It tripled again in a bit more than fifty years. It took only twenty-five years for it to triple again, and another thirty-three years to triple yet another time. The Gross World Product today has grown almost a hundredfold since the Industrial Revolution was in place in 1820…” Enlightenment Now

If you look closely at the data, the trend actually becomes visible around the founding of the United States and the Bill of Rights, but the inflection point hits just a generation later in 1820. Why?

Pinker, an atheist, was simply following the data when he found the 1820 inflection point. But I don’t think the data points to 1820 by chance. It’s the year of the “First Vision” of the boy prophet Joseph Smith.

The First Vision was when a 14-year-old farm boy in upstate New York was visited by God the Father and Jesus Christ after a humble prayer in a sacred grove of trees (see a new fantastic video on the first vision).

Two hundred years ago, during Passover season, the Lord of Glory, the light of the world, the Creator and Redeemer of this world, and worlds without end, Jesus Christ visited a 14-year-old farm boy named Joseph Smith. And BOOM, the entire world (whether we recognized it or not) was literally enlightened.

A fantasy of mine would be to go back in time and take a poll of the global emotional state of happiness on that day two hundred years ago. I would like to see the extra bounce in people’s steps. The extra love in people’s hearts on that day when the Creator of this universe paid humanity an in-person visit.

JOSEPH’S GREAT PROPHECY OF ABUNDANCE

This leads us to a prophecy of Joseph’s which has been unarguably fulfilled. And no one is talking about it. It came near the height of Malthusian hysteria, on April 23, 1834.

Joseph inquired of the Lord on how to build the “United Order of Enoch” (or “City of Zion”). The Lord’s answer flew in the face of Malthus and the common sense of the time. The Lord’s answer may have seemed strange to the early Saints who were just kicked out of their homes by mobs in Missouri. They were robbed, dying, and homeless. In context, this revelation from the Lord is striking:

“And it is my purpose to provide for my saints, for all things are mine. But it must needs be done in mine own way; and behold this is the way that I, the Lord, have decreed to provide for my saints, that the poor shall be exalted, in that the rich are made low.

“For the earth is full, and there is enough and to spare; yea, I prepared all things, and have given unto the children of men to be agents unto themselves.” Doctrine and Covenants 104:15–17

In the past two centuries since 1820, the earth has provided the average global resident with 100 times more wealth than our ancestors who were devoted to building Zion in the 1800s. What’s more, there are nearly 7 billion more people living now than in 1820, and extreme poverty has been flipped from 95% to 8%.

Joseph was right. Spectacularly right!

Time has proved that there is “enough and to spare”.

A century later in 1935, the Apostle David O. McKay, was speaking on building Zion:

“If we have in mind the physical Zion, then we must…improve the means of communication until with radio in our pockets we may communicate with friends and loved ones from any point at any given moment.”

Long before 1820, God knew that we would have the resources to build Zion right down to the “radios in our pockets” that we are now using to talk face-to-face while under Covid-19 quarantine. He has provided.

There is no argument against the fact that God has already given the world every physical resource we need to build Zion. The only ingredient left is our hearts. Are we willing?

I can’t wait to see everyone online this weekend at General Conference.

Originally written by Jeffrey Harmon on medium. Reshared with permission.