"I will give unto you a pattern in all things, that ye may not be deceived; for Satan is abroad in the land, and he goeth forth deceiving the nations—Wherefore he that prayeth, whose spirit is contrite, the same is accepted of me if he obey mine ordinances. He that speaketh, whose spirit is contrite, whose language is meek and edifieth, the same is of God if he obey mine ordinances. And again, he that trembleth under my power shall be made strong, and shall bring forth fruits of praise and wisdom, according to the revelations and truths which I have given you. And again, he that is overcome and bringeth not forth fruits, even according to this pattern, is not of me. Wherefore, by this pattern ye shall know the spirits in all cases under the whole heavens."
Prolific polyglot and Yalie Noah Webster was an interesting character. From a young adulthood as a freethinking federalist to a more religious, more conservative, educator as his days prolonged, Webster's most lasting contribution to American society is undoubtedly his dictionary. As an independent LDS scholar, I have frequent recourse to its definitions, since it can give the closest approximation to the language of Joseph Smith and the revelations received through him. The American vernacular has evolved, as all languages do, over the 200 years since its publication, and lexical and semantic drift can be best locked down through its prescriptive snapshot from work completed over 20 years of reading, writing, and speaking with Connecticut yankees, culminating in his landmark 1828 volume of about 70,000 entries.
I find his work especially important because, as a literature scholar, I critique and develop readings which inevitably involve making arguments with words about the meaning of words. And because Smith's words form the Doctrine and Covenants appear in my native tongue, I frequently have to dispel the illusion, even to myself, that the words themselves transmit transparently to me what messages a people from a different age and with a different culture would have captured in their original context. A tool like Webster's 1828 edition is sometimes valuable to check in case what seems like the only valid reading on the surface might not have an alternative reading available.
Case in point, the term "ordinance."
To my modern LDS ears, this term conveys clearly the set of rituals through which we make covenants with Christ through authorized representatives. It can also be used for Priesthood rituals that aren't covenantal, but its core meaning centers less on the ritualistic nature, and more on the use of the rituals and their symbolism to bind us to oneness with the Lord in various ways--immersing ourselves in water to take upon ourselves His name, a laying on of hands to receive His spirit as a gift, etc. In the context of a fledgling church whose recent converts bring an array of ecstatic modes of worship into the sabbath-day meetings of their new Christian confession, without the benefit of a General Handbook of Instructions worked out over decades to help worship conventions to settle folks into, deception was a large concern. Doctrinally, the church taught that all could, should, and must seek out manifestations of the Spirit, its Prophet having an applicable personal history with powers beyond his nature for the revelation of truth from God. But this individual liberty and responsibility to seek higher sources for the benefit of all contained within its principle the danger of chaos and confusion if the manifestations could not be verified and structured into something orderly. God is not a God of confusion, after all, but Satan delights in whispering lies by degrees to even the very elect so as to sow doubt about the provenance of true revelations, and to flatter the unchosen beyond the scope of the Lord's callings to them.
The above passage communicates ways to avoid the repeated need Smith and other Church leaders had to mold congregations toward the fruits of the Spirit with as little calling out, and as much calling in (and calling upward!) as possible. The theme is repeated from at least two earlier sections that revelations do come, but they come in orderly ways, but in this passage there is a condensed set of interpretive "keys" to help ordinary saints avoid deception. A member claiming to receive or relay revelation via prayer can now be tested under conditions. A member claiming to convey truth through teaching and public reasoning can now be tested under conditions. A worshiper who claims to be overcome with the Spirit into undertaking actions beyond his normal volition can now be tested under conditions. The conditions include paying attention to the praiseworthy and wisdom-conveying fruits coming from such actions and words. They also include a judgment upon the attitudes of the saints as manifest in their delivery, whether it be meek or haughty, contrite or prideful, edifying or destructive--all of which seem to offer fairly binary clarity to even outside observers.
But the other sine qua non appears to be about "obeying" ordinances. On the surface, this is valuable anchoring: Someone can't draw others away from Christ and the covenants necessary for accepting Him and still rightly claim revelation from the Spirit. That would make the Spirit self-contradictory. But, on the other hand, a wide variety of spiritual manifestations may be helpful in reaching each individual in their individual circumstances and personal idiosyncrasies to motivate them toward covenant making and further covenant keeping. The Spirit, again in a very binary way, promotes covenant making and keeping.
But Noah Webster records a more obscure semantic possibility in the term "ordinance" that might be hidden to our modern minds unless we consult him on what that word likely meant to the saints of the 1831. Ordinance can also mean "appointment". And this requires we allow an alternative reading. Obeying ordinances can mean keeping covenants and still also mean a second thing: obeying those ordained by divine appointment. Just as we must make and keep individual commitments with Christ, and some breaking of the covenants may be obvious enough as a sign to others not to pay attention to our claims about what we think God has told us or them to do or not do, those who actively speak or act against the Prophet's counsel, or more locally, their Bishop's revealed counsel, are likely also in a position of distance from God's guidance in other ways as well. A Kirtland area former Campbellite trembling under what they claim is the Spirit, who isn't heeding Partridge's counsel on how to contribute to the material needs of the poor in the Kirtland area or who thinks they know better than Smith who should go to Missouri and who should stay in Kirtland, probably isn't trembling under the right spirit in the first place. And that would be pretty plain to judge as well.
If you want to avoid deception, follow the Prophet. If you want to avoid deception, take your bishop up on his counsel. If you want to avoid deception, listen to your spouse, especially as you pray with and for each other. This doesn't mean you have to accept everything without reflection, or do things they tell you to do that run counter to your own conscience--the likelihood any of them would is so remote that it seems inappropriate to even mention the possibility--because you are responsible for your own acts, because good advice can sometimes be just advice, not revelation, and because they don't know you and your relationship to God as well as you know you and your relationship to God. But routinely, actively, or egregiously ignoring them is also quite likely coming from a place of self-deception, not least because just because others can't know the inside of our relationship with God better than ourselves doesn't mean they don't see outward signs we haven't yet admitted to ourselves about its health or direction.
It's worth dwelling another moment on the other repeated condition in this passage, also repeated across several Sections of this week's assignment (51-57) which deal with the Lord's directions on largely material and mechanical matters: the contrite heart.
For the import of this word, we'll have to go back further than Webster, however, to the Hebrew root "dakka," which is sometimes translated as "oppressed" in relation to military defeats or occupations of collectivities, but whose core sense is being "crushed," "bruised," or "broken." When the Lord expects a sacrifice of a broken heart and a contrite spirit, He's not delighting in our brokenness, but in the state that draws us to Him to seek a revival, to be filled with His hope, love, and grace. And He knows what that crushing feels like. He was pierced on the cross, but was crushed under all of creation's guilt and undeserved suffering in Gethsemane. In that place of the olive press, He was trodden upon, smashed into yielding that precious anointing oil mixed with that precious blood, "rubbed together" with us as the Latin root for "contrite" would express it--as a heavy stone grinds the other to a perfect fit of flatness--until we obtained the means to become pure through Him.
Follow the Prophet, keep your covenants, and remain contrite before the Lord, and you'll never be deceived in any eternally important matter. Christ saves, and is not hiding the way to Him. It's a strait and narrow path, to be sure, but His light flows both directly to us, and through authorized conduits to enable our advancement. To ensure our steps are forward and not backwards or sideways, we'll need to make and keep our covenants, and listen to His watchmen on the towers, common judges in Israel, and partners in our family.
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