Obviously, when the scriptures speak of having ’all things common,’ it refers to the law of consecration. Many assume that the Nephite version of consecration and the United Order as practiced in this dispensation are virtually the same thing. However, under the United Order, property was not “commonly” owned. Bruce R. McConkie said, “The United order is not a communal system; it is not one under which all things are held in common. Rather, after a person has made his consecration, the Lord‘s agent forthwith reconveys to the donor ’as much as is sufficient for himself and family’ (DC 42:32).” (Mormon Doctrine, p. 813). Under such a system, the member of the United Order is a steward over his own property (DC 42:32).
In contrast to the stewardship concept of the United Order, the early saints in the Old World did not claim ownership of any property. Truly, the bed they slept on belonged to the group, the clothes they wore belonged to the group, the furniture they used belonged to the group, for not one of them said…that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common (Acts 4:32). This version of the law of consecration would require more humility, charity, and purity than the way the United Order was practiced. Presumably, the Nephites practiced this version of the law of consecration, for they had all things common among them. “The lesson of 4 Nephi suggests that…only the law of consecration will do away with ’money and private property,‘ which are the ’insuperable obstacles to the achievement of utopia.’” (Don Norton in Approaching Zion by Hugh Nibley, xvii)
Marion G. Romney
"Becoming a people which is collectively pure in heart is not an impossible dream or an idealistic goal…When we reach the state of having the ’pure love of Christ,’ our desire to serve one another will have grown to the point where we will be living fully the law of consecration. Living the law of consecration exalts the poor and humbles the rich. In the process, both are sanctified. The poor, released from the and humiliating limitations of poverty, are enabled as free men to rise to their full potential, both temporally and spiritually. The rich, by consecration and the imparting of their surplus for the benefit of the poor, not by constraint, but willingly as an act of free will, evidence that charity for their fellowmen characterized by Mormon as ’the pure love of Christ.’ (Moro. 7:47.) This will bring both the giver and receiver to the common ground on which the Spirit of God can meet them.
“It is the mission of the Church of this last dispensation to develop another people who shall live the gospel in its fulness. This people are to become ’pure in heart,’ and they shall flourish and be blessed upon the mountains and upon the high places. They shall be the Lord’s people. They shall walk with God because they shall be of one heart and one mind, and they shall dwell in righteousness, and there shall be no poor among them.” (Conference Report, Nov. 1981 Ensign, “Living Welfare Principles”)