Joy! Conference by the Numbers: October 2024 General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
Did you hear the word joy mentioned at the October 2024 General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? If you didn’t, you might not have been paying attention!
You would have heard it many times from Elder Kearon in his talk Welcome to the Church of Joy. You would have also heard it from Sister Yee in her talk The Joy of Our Redemption. Elder Egbo did not have a talk with joy in the title, but his talk Focus on Jesus Christ and His Gospel did mention the word joy quite a bit.
As a side note, if you’re interested in hearing some thoughts from people on the street about joy and happiness, you might be interested in the YouTube channel Choose Joy by Lisa Washburn.
And President Nelson talked about joy as we anticipate the coming of Christ. Some people think about the second coming of Christ in terms of the wars, calamities, and disasters that will come to the earth. However, President Nelson is focused on the joy that will come as we anticipate His coming. As President Nelson says:
The best is yet to come, my dear brothers and sisters, because the Savior is coming again! The best is yet to come because the Lord is hastening His work. The best is yet to come as we fully turn our hearts and our lives to Jesus Christ.
I bear my solemn witness that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I am His disciple. I am honored to be His servant. At His Second Coming, “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.” That day will be filled with joy for the righteous!
There were many other emphasized words during conference which you can see in the infographic below. Which words and messages stood out to you?
As an additional note, it would be hard to let a Conference by the Numbers go by without making note of President Nelson’s recent 100th birthday. I previously highlighted the ages of all the ordained apostles in October 2023. The graph this year focuses on the First Presidency. At an average age of ~94.6 in October, this First Presidency is the First Presidency with the most life experience in the history of the church!
A few notes on the First Presidency age graph
Data for the First Presidency age graph came from the Wikipedia article Chronology of the First Presidency (LDS Church). Ages of the First Presidency were calculated as they were constitued on January 1st of each year; one minor exception was made for 1857 when Daniel Wells was added on January 4th.
It should be noted that some of the presidencies (e.g. Brigham Young, David O. McKay) called additional counselors to assist the presidency. I did not include these additional counselors unless they were specifically called as a 3rd Counselor. The only time this factored into the dataset above was for 1982 with Gordon B. Hinckley as a 3rd Counselor.
I also did not include Assistant Presidents which were called along with Joseph Smith in the earliest days of the church (e.g. Oliver Cowdery, Hyrum Smith, etc.).
As a result, almost all data points above are with three traditional members of a presidency: president, first counselor, second counselor.
There are some notable gaps when a first presidency was not organized in the early days of the church. These gaps are represented on the graph.
Past Years’ Conference by the Numbers
You can find some past Conference by the Numbers here:
April 2024
October 2023
April 2023
October 2022
April 2022
October 2021
April 2021
October 2020
If you’d like to see past versions before October 2020 and some other analyses, visit my Visual Scriptures site.
