SpiritDragon

@CarborendumThanks for the well thought out post.
 
I know that some wrestle with the inspired version of John 1 as it doesn't appear to be consistent within itself by having the word be the gospel in verse 1, but then default back to the Word being made flesh in verse 14 and that it doesn't seem logical to have the gospel be made flesh (i.e. everyone knows that the Lord is the word made flesh) and yet I think your post nails this succinctly that the "good news" or "good message" isn't only a message, but embodied in the Saviour Himself. Without Him there is no good news, and thus He is in very reality the good news made flesh.
As to the point that it's not a correction per se, but a commentary - the fact that in verses 14 and 16 the text returns to stating the Word is the Lord would indicate to me that you are correct or these would surely have been altered to go along with separating the Word and God to further delineation as the word being the gospel.

Welcome, @Striving to be like Him!   I'm glad you've joined us and hope you can find peace and joy on your journey.

I am a fan. 
It is a breath of fresh air to see Jesus Christ portrayed as having human qualities.
I like that they chose to give the apostles personalities.  
I have no idea if Matthew was autistic.  But I like what the actor is doing with the role.
I love what they did with Nicodemus.
By far - my favorite portrayal of Peter.
Just finished Season one.

@CarborendumThanks for the well thought out post.
 
I know that some wrestle with the inspired version of John 1 as it doesn't appear to be consistent within itself by having the word be the gospel in verse 1, but then default back to the Word being made flesh in verse 14 and that it doesn't seem logical to have the gospel be made flesh (i.e. everyone knows that the Lord is the word made flesh) and yet I think your post nails this succinctly that the "good news" or "good message" isn't only a message, but embodied in the Saviour Himself. Without Him there is no good news, and thus He is in very reality the good news made flesh.
As to the point that it's not a correction per se, but a commentary - the fact that in verses 14 and 16 the text returns to stating the Word is the Lord would indicate to me that you are correct or these would surely have been altered to go along with separating the Word and God to further delineation as the word being the gospel.

John 1:1 is quite a meaty verse. John really had a way with words.  And this is evident throughout his Gospel.  Why is Jesus "The Word"?  This verse is a wealth of etymology and semantics. And that was exactly what John was using to communicate so much in so little.
Written in Greek, the word John used was "Logos."  That in and of itself has a wealth of meaning. Logos means:
Word, speech, utterance, etc. Reason, logic, cause, motivation (Logos is the root of the English "logic") The controlling principle of the universe (cultural meaning in Ancient Greek) It is also the root of "Legend."  This means both "the legend of Bagger Vance" and the legend on a map that helps you identify symbols used thereon. I tend to believe that a little bit of all these meanings was part of John's message to us.
Additionally, one cannot make such a cryptic statement in Greek without also evoking the trinity (I use the word purposefully) of arguments: Logos, Pathos, & Ethos.  Does John mean to evoke a meaning distinct from Pathos & Ethos?  Does he mean to include all three?  Thinking in terms of the Trinity, this trinity of words seems appropriate.  But John really wants to focus on just one word -- whether unified with or distinct from the others.
He is the physical manifestation of the Plan of Salvation.  He is what is real.  He is physical.  The Father is Ethos (authority).  The Spirit is Pathos (heart/emotion, etc).  Separating them in this manner really does a disservice.  But this is part of the Trinitarian argument.  And it is also why we believe in the Godhead.  We cannot separate them in our worship.  They must be worshiped as one God.
Jesus was also the word because He was the messenger of the New Gospel that would replace the Law of Moses.  It is HIS message, HIS testimony, HIS gospel, HIS covenant, His Atonement.
The common wisdom is that the word "gospel" means "good news."   I slightly disagree with that definition (consider how we use "news" today).  Rather than "news" I'd say "message" (think about how they used the word "news" only 100 years ago).  But the full translation would be "God's Word."  Earlier English didn't distinguish "good" and "God".  If it was good, it was of God.  And God only did that which was good. 
Now, let's look at the JST:
My personal belief is that this was not a "correction" to the text. Joseph obviously wanted us to get away from the Trinitarian notion.  But the D&C still reminds us that Jesus IS God (D&C 18:33,47 & 19:18).  He's not "God, The Father", but he's still God.  So, it was perfectly accurate as it was.  So, why bother with the change?
I believe that he was trying to point out a specific meaning because it was more important than all the other meanings in the verse as John intended.  The primary point here is that the gospel is all about Jesus.  It is the Word, Covenant, & Doctrine of Jesus Christ.  What do you think Joseph's response would be if you asked him these three questions:
Was Jesus, in the beginning? -- YES Was Jesus with God? -- YES Is Jesus God?  -- YES So, this was not to "correct" anything.  It was more of a commentary to direct us to a specific concept as written.  Let's face it, most people don't really understand why John wrote this in this manner.  The Christian world already has many different interpretations which all have some validity to them.  But Joseph Smith was the Prophet of the Restoration.  He wanted us to focus on the most important meaning which usually gets lost in the translation.
The most important part of John 1:1 is:   The gospel is all about Jesus Christ, our Lord, our God our Savior & Redeemer.  See the word play?  That's why Jesus is the Word.

A couple of notes - also for @SpiritDragon 
First for #3. Anciently Gog was a land much to the north of Israel that would be more in line with Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and only a very little part of southern Russia near eastern Ukraine.  Magog was the king of Gog.  If a single country is to be named, it is most likely Georgia.  Obviously this is symbolic of something other than a current modern country.
Second for #’s 6 & 7.  There is a possibility that the city of Enoch and associated temple as well as Melchizedek and associated city of Salem and temple will all be restored – which could be the prophetic temple referenced as the Missouri Temple and Jerusalem Temple which could be brought back as they were taken which would negate the need to build and dedicate new temples.  
 
The Traveler

I'm interested in #4.  Recently, I've been having intimations of this.  But I don't know where I've read anything like it in scriptures.  I'm sure I have.  But I can't think of where.

What are your sources on point number 3?

A truly great insight. Thanks. A great supply of messengers on the order of John the beloved and the three nephites to call upon as needed.

Thanks everyone for the great insights! Truly appreciated. @zil2 I'm honoured that you returned to comment on my question 😃.

A truly great insight. Thanks. A great supply of messengers on the order of John the beloved and the three nephites to call upon as needed.

Here is the JST version:
15 And they were angry with Lot and came near to break the door, but the angels of God, which were holy men, put forth their hand and pulled Lot into the house unto them, and shut the door.

Here is what the Bible Dictionary says about angels
 
Angels
These are messengers of the Lord and are spoken of in the epistle to the Hebrews as “ministering spirits” (Heb. 1:14). We learn from latter-day revelation that there are two classes of heavenly beings who minister for the Lord: those who are spirits and those who have bodies of flesh and bone. Spirits are those beings who either have not yet obtained a body of flesh and bone (unembodied) or who have once had a mortal body and have died and are awaiting the Resurrection (disembodied). Ordinarily the word angel means those ministering persons who have a body of flesh and bone, being either resurrected from the dead (reembodied), or else translated, as were Enoch, Elijah, etc. (D&C 129).
There are many references to the work of angels in the Old Testament. In some passages the “angel of the Lord” speaks as the voice of God Himself (Gen. 22:11–12). The word angel is also sometimes used to designate a human messenger, as in JST Gen. 19:15 (Appendix), and may have some application also in Matt. 13:39–42.

There was an entire city full of worthy, righteous men and women that were bodily translated at the time of the patriarchs.

JST 18:22 also describes them as "holy men, and were sent forth after the order of God"; and the footnote for 19:1 says "angels" is from the Hebrew word for "messengers".  All this suggests they were men who held the Melchizedek priesthood.
Also, one possibility you missed is translated men - thus, physical, not yet resurrected beings.
(OT: Yes, this is zil, now zil2, because zil is seriously messed up. )

In D&C 129 we are given three grand keys for discerning the nature of messengers whether they be resurrected holy messengers (angels), premortal spirits of just men made perfect (possibly also post-mortal spirits of just men made perfect that are still awaiting resurrection), or a devil in disguise. It seems that as the resurrection had not yet taken place and that all messengers we receive on this earth have either lived here or will live here, that all Old Testament heavenly messengers (still often called angels) should be spirits, should they not? Perhaps I'm misunderstanding or misrepresenting something, but this is my understanding.
With that being the case, here is the seeming conflict with Genesis 19 (and likely others, but that's the text that caused me to see what appears to be an incongruence to figure out): The angels that come to rescue Lot and his family, seem to be of physical form able to grab him and pull him inside the door 
Also in the 3rd verse, these men ate the meal Lot had prepared for them. This also seems to suggest physicality as it coincides with a proof given in the account of Jesus' resurrection that he ate broiled fish after explaining that 'a spirit hath not flesh and bone as ye see me have'. Then in verse 16 of Genesis 19, the men take lot and his family members by the hand and convey them out of the city. If these messengers were spirits as one might otherwise suppose, this should not be possible given the grand keys given in D&C 129 that the spirits would not offer a hand that could not be felt. This leaves the apparent possibilities in my mind that either these men were mortals sent to help Lot, they were somehow resurrected beings before Christ, or there is something missing from or inaccurate about D&C 129.

Is there any commentary on these men visiting Lot (also introduced as angels) by any church leaders that anyone is aware of that helps explain this disconnect, or any other insights group members may have to share? 
 
Thanks, SD

I am learning that it may be more complicated than that.  Luther basically drew a caricature of the Jews as being unitedly over-legalistic (and hijacked Paul's writings to reinforce that caricature), because a) it was rhetorically and politically useful for him to equate those filthy, scheming, legalistic, Christ-killing Joos with the Catholic priesthood; and b) he was a bit of an anti-semite anyways.  
Modern scholars and archaeologists are coming to understand that first-century Judaism had a rich doctrine of divine grace; it's just that Jews of the era believed that the mechanism of extending that grace was through the Torah itself rather than some notion of Yahweh actually descending from His heavenly throne to live as a mortal.  The Greek words generally translated as "grace" and "faith" in English renderings of the the Pauline epistles, in the first century A.D. connoted the "generosity" (or "protection")  and "loyalty" that characterized the reciprocal patron-client relationship that was at the heart of the Greco-Roman economic and social order; and "justification" tends to denote the state of reconciliation that exists when both the client and patron are living in up to the terms of their covenant relationship.  Paul's trepidation about what he calls "the law" or "the works of the law" aren't really about the dangers of a conscious effort towards obedience or righteous living per se; they are about the Jewish notion that it was the Torah (literally, "the law") that was the agent of God's salvation. 
The faith/works dichotomy is a bit of a red herring, in this regard.  The litmus test for salvation is the covenant itself.  This Russell Nelson fellow, with all his talk of a "covenant path", just may be on to something . . .
 

One of our sons (teenager) has been struggling with health-related issues for the past few months and we still cannot get a proper diagnosis. It has been exhausting for him and our entire family. Honestly, I feel quite shaky emotionally and I'm not that kind of person but it has been so overwhelming and frustrating to see our own child like this and even do we are doing everything we can, we still cannot get proper answers. I'm not sleeping well and I'm not able to do my best at work either.
Having said that, I know the power of prayer, I have been fasting and praying constantly. I  know the Lord doesn't abandon us when we most need him but can I please ask you to keep my family and our son in your prayers today? I believe when we unite as brothers and sisters in prayer, anything is possible.
Thank you all in advance, I truly appreciate it.

Thanks so much for this, I had somehow missed it, but really appreciate it and thought it deserved more than a mere reaction click!
 

My understanding was that the Lord was saying no one has ever come to him with so much faith, not that he had never shown himself to anyone. 
So people had come with faith sufficient to see God, but not to the Brother of Jared's level. If you'll forgive the oversimplification, you could say that if the faith necessary to see God is an 18 out of 20, then certain men had come before him with an 18 or even a 19, but no one had ever before come with a perfect 20 out of 20. 

The guidlines for youth "For the Strength of Youth" (FSY) has been updated.  But really, it is an overhaul.  As we went over the changes as a family, we recognized that the overall change was that instead of stating everything as a "rule" or a "Church position," everything was basically a "guideline."  The only rule repeated very clearly is that we are to obey the Law of Chastity.
When we discussed the change from "rules" to "principles," I commented that this can be both good and bad.  I kinda rambled for a bit about why...  Then my son summed it all up with one phrase:  "We're separating the wheats from the tares."

I tend toward JAG's view. I reject the cynical view that words only mean what we assign to them, but I do think that God speaks to us in language we can understand and depends on the revelation of the Spirit to make the meaning clear. I do not know what the Lord specifically meant in this instance; I tend toward a very literal reading of most scripture, but even the most literal of scriptures is a use of tokens (in this case, written words) to represent external realities that cannot be immediately physically addressed.
I reject out of hand the obsession of Catholicism, indeed of larger Christianity, with metaphorical figurative interpretations of pretty much everything so as to be able to explain pretty much anything. It's the religious version of string theory*. On the other hand, I'm aware that you can't make a "literal interpretation" of words when the words themselves do not have absolutely concrete meaning. We can describe a story, an idea, a perfume, a horse, and a woman with the word "beautiful", but the specific meaning of the word changes in each case. What does "beautiful Savior" mean? More specifically, what does it mean to "take it literally"?
*A string theorist's wife walked into his office and found him kissing his secretary. As she was storming out, the man leapt to his feet and called out, "Wait! I can explain everything!"
Don't you just love physics humor? Physicists must all be dads.

My understanding is that the Brother of Jared was the first to break through the veil by himself, because of his faith, to see the face of God. All the previous prophets had to be changed, by the Lord to be able to see him.

Or maybe he was only speaking of the "group" that Jared belonged to.

Another take or interpretation...
I saw a caterpillar when it was a caterpillar, but I did not see it as a Moth.
It is very possible that others saw and talked with the Lord, but they did NOT see what his mortal form would appear as.  They saw his immortal spiritual form, but not what his physical form in mortality would appear as.
If this is what the Brother of Jared saw, I am not sure how he accomplished such a feat.