The 2nd counselor in the bishopric (a.k.a.) my home teacher called me in a panic on Friday morning. He asked me to speak on Sunday. Considering my week at work had been LONGGGG, I still had one day to go, and I had plans at a friend's on Friday evening, this was not exactly how I wanted to spend my Saturday.
Oh, and was it something easy like pay your tithing... go to church... the plan of happiness????
Stress.
But... I cannot say No to Brother Johnson. He is such a great home teacher. I mean GREAT. He goes over and beyond the call of duty. He calls every week to see if we need something. Fixes anything that is broken, put in my backyard, and the sprinkling system ... see...the guilt would have been worse than the anxiety.
So I spoke.
I'm posting it in all its glory. Mostly to remember that if they call me again I can say ... "Hey, can I just read my old talk?"
*** My Talk***
As I was sitting on the stand I was thinking about asking the bishop if I could make this a little more like my Sunday School class. I would like to have Sister Sanders come up on the stand and sit next to me and when, not if, I loose my place or train of thought, she could intercede on my behalf with a wonderful story or applicable scripture until I am ready again.
I’m not sure how she feels about that, but I’m sure that it would make me feel a whole lot better.
I appreciate the confidence Brother Johnson has in me by asking me to speak today. Although asking me on Friday morning on my way to work wasn’t very nice, so I made sure to tell Kerry on Facebook so I’m hoping he got in a little bit of trouble.
I was asked to speak on Elder Bednar’s April 2009 conference talk- Honorably Hold a Name and Standing in the Lord’s Holy house. With an emphasis on “true temple worship”.
(I think I said something here about this being an inspired call by Brother Johnson, because this time of year, I’m am planning a conference for BYU, a rather large conference, and my tendency is to say, I’m really busy, so just take a number and I’ll get to you as soon as I can. This attitude has slipped into my worship as well and I think that the Lord would like me to change that attitude.)
Let me share an example. With our lives as busy as they are, we sometimes treat temple worship like the way we would Utah County’s newest, most popular fast food establishment. We want to get in and get out as fast as possible and on to the next item of our day. The world we live in is like this. And sometimes that attitude can sneak into our temple worship; it sneaks into our Sunday workshop – our daily worship. It becomes something to check off our list so we can move on. Grocery store, temple session, laundry, scriptures, soccer practice, clean the bathroom.
This, however, is not true worship.
In his talk, Elder Bednar shares this. I have come to understand better the protection available through our temple covenants and what is means to make an acceptable offering of temple worship. There is a difference between church-attending, tithe-paying members who occasionally rush into the temple to go through a session and those members who faithfully and consistently worship in the temple.
No more is it something to check off our lists, instead, we become, as President Howard W. Hunter said, a temple-attending and a temple-loving people, were we learn more richly and deeply the purpose of life and the significance of the atoning sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So what is and what isn’t true temple worship, or just worship in general? The answers are right before in the scriptures. Sister Sanders knows that I like to use the scriptures a lot when I teach. That way I have a less chance of saying something that will get me into trouble. So if you want to follow along with me, I’m going to start in Alma 31.
Alma is now on a mission to the Zoramites. They have become a wicked people. They have lost key points of the gospel, the have lost their focus, they no longer believed in Christ, they have perverted the ways of worship. Their worship became a “once a week, for a set period of time” schedule… I’m going to start in verse 22…
22 Now, from this stand they did offer up, every man, the selfsame prayer unto God, thanking their God that they were chosen of him, and that he did not lead them away after the tradition of their brethren, and that their hearts were not stolen away to believe in things to come, which they knew nothing about.
23 Now, after the people had all offered up thanks after this manner, they returned to their homes, anever speaking of their God again until they had assembled themselves together again to the holy stand, to offer up thanks after their manner.
Now I know I’m not as bad as the Zoramites, but there have been weeks were I have been so busy with what I call my “daily reality” that my worship is really similar to those lovely Zoramites. There have been Sunday’s where I come home from church and lay my scriptures on the table only to pick them up the following Sunday, to go and worship for “another specific time”, like the Zoramites. That is not true worship. I know better.
So if we see what true worship isn’t, where can we find an example of what true worship is?
For that we only need to turn a few pages to 3 Nephi. Chapters 11-24 give us the greatest example of true worship, really the perfect example of true worship. The example of the Savior Jesus Christ. I could read every chapter and in each one there would be wonderful examples. But there is one scripture that really stands out. It tells us exactly what to do. It is found in 3 Nephi 17, verse 3. These are the words of the Savior…
3 Therefore, go ye unto your homes, and aponder upon the things which I have said, and ask of the Father, in my name, that ye may understand, and bprepare your minds for the cmorrow, and I come unto you again.
He tells us to go home and ponder - ponder upon the things which he said. To take worship home and let it help us prepare - prepare for “our morrow” with a spiritual eye. This is true worship – how our temple worship as well as our daily worship should be.
So what happens when we follow this counsel? What blessings await us? Wonderful blessings! – laid out right before us in the scriptures. Let’s go to the Old Testament. I am going to go to Isaiah Chapter 2, starting with vs 2-3, verses that many of us are very familiar with. I am on page 863 of the Old Testament. My brother, who teaches seminary, pointed these scriptures out to me and they took on a whole new meaning.
Read Isaiah Chapter 2 vs. 2 and 3.
2 And it shall come to pass in the alast days, that the bmountain of the LORD’s chouse shall be destablished in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all enations shall flow unto it.
3 And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us ago up to the bmountain of the LORD, to the chouse of the God of Jacob; and he will dteach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of eZion shall go forth the flaw, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
We read here that we will flow or in other words, He will gather us together at the temple, and that the temple experience will teach us. It will teach us God’s way and will help us to walk in His paths.
Now that is usually where I stop reading, but my brother pointed out to me that there is more, a lot more, so let’s keep going in verse 4 it says… and they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks: That one was a little more difficult for me, my first thought was, “I don’t get it”, so I looked it up…
A plowshare is the cutting blade of a plow,
a pruning hook is a tool with a hooked blade that is used for pruning plants.
Swords, spears, plowshares, and pruning hooks all have blades; but as swords and spears represent war, anger, malice, resentment – plowshares and pruning hooks are useful and conducive to work, they represent instruments of peace and prosperity.
So vs 4 is telling us that the temple will change our swords and spears, to peace and prosperity and that neither shall they learn war any more, which to us may be that we no longer learn or perhaps lean towards competitiveness, envy, anger, or resentment. That will all be done away with.
Now let’s keep going to verse 5. I’ve never really read verse 5 before, but it is and profound and the blessings are beautiful.
5 O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us awalk in the blight of the LORD.
There are two blessings here,
The first, to walk in God’s light. To walk in God’s light is to be blessed with a more spiritual approach to life, a stronger desire to be righteous,
And the 2nd - the light of the Lord – set in the context of the temple, has immeasurable worth. It is explained further in D&C 88:11 – I’m going to summarize it, rather than turning to it…
The Lord’s light – the light we receive from the temple…enlighteneth the eyes, quickeneth understanding, infuses joy into the soul and dispels darkness so that the “dark veil of unbelief (is) cast away”
So here is my compiled list from those verses of blessings we received by true temple worship as laid out by Isaiah:
- The gift of being gathered together at the temple so that we do not wander alone
- Help – to learn God’s way
- Help – to walk in His paths
- Blessings –of peace and prosperity
- That war – or perhaps, more applicable to us – competition, envy, anger, and resentment will not be part of our lives.
- The gift of being able to see our lives and our family with a spiritual eye
- Stronger desires to be righteous
- More understanding of God
- Joy of the soul
- And The driving out of darkness and unbelief
And there are even more blessings. Turn with me to Alma 26. A story that our youth know really well. The story of the great missionary Ammon. I am on page 272 of the Book of Mormon.
In the first few verses, Ammon is talking to “his quorum” his brethren, explaining the great joy, the rejoicing he feels in bringing the repentant Lamanites “out of the darkness, even the darkest abyss and into the light.” So great was his joy at being an instrument of God. I’m going to start in verse 3
3 Behold, I answer for you; for our brethren, the Lamanites, were in darkness, yea, even in the darkest abyss, but behold, how amany of them are brought to behold the marvelous light of God! And this is the blessing which hath been bestowed upon us, that we have been made binstruments in the hands of God to bring about this great work.
And then on to vs. 5.
5 Behold, the afield was ripe, and blessed are ye, for ye did thrust in the bsickle, and did reap with your might, yea, all the day long did ye labor; and behold the number of your csheaves! And they shall be gathered into the garners, that they are not wasted.
In his talk Elder Bednar explains that the sheaves in this analogy represent the newly baptized members of the church and the garners are the holy temples. – verse 5 again And they shall be gathered into the garners, that they are not wasted.
Now remember what we just read a few minutes ago. Isaiah’s promise to us that we too can be gathered, in the garners. Gathered to the temple.
And there is more if you continue reading, Ammon begins to list those protective blessings, that Elder Bednar said are available through our temple covenants when we faithfully and consistently worship in the temple. Let’s start in vs 6.
6 Yea, they shall not be beaten down by the storm at the last day; yea, neither shall they be harrowed up by the whirlwinds; but when the astorm cometh they shall be gathered together in their place, that the storm cannot penetrate to them; yea, neither shall they be driven with fierce winds whithersoever the enemy listeth to carry them.
So the 1st protective blessing – They (or we) shall not be beaten down by the storms.
2nd protective blessing – Neither shall we be harrowed up by the whirlwind
3rd protective blessing – and when the storm cometh we shall be gathered together that the storm cannot penetrate us
4th – neither shall we be driven with fierce winds whither-so-ever- the enemy listeth to carry us
And the 5th and 6th protective blessings can be found in vs. 7 –
we are in the hands of the Lord, we are his. And he will raise us up at the last day. We are in His Hands and He will raise us up.
Sister Sheri Dew, in her talk No One Can Take Your Place, said “This is one reason every worthy adult may go to the temple, he or she emerges surrounded and protected by God’s power.
Elder Bednar shares other story in his talk about how true worship truly changes us.
The exodus from Nauvoo in September of 1846 caused unimaginable hardship for the faithful latter-day Saints. Many sought shelter in camps along the Mississippi River. When word reached Brigham Young at winter quarters about the condition of these refugees, he immediately sent a letter across the river to Council Point encouraging the brethren to help—reminding them of the covenant made in the Nauvoo Temple. He counseled: Now is the time for labor. Let the fire of the covenant which you made in the house of the lord, burn in your hearts like flame unquenchable. Within days, wagons were rolling eastward to rescue the struggling Saints.
What was it that gave those early Saints such strength? It was the fire of the temple covenant that burned in their hearts. A burning that they gained by true worship.
One last story about the blessings that we receive when we truly worship. This is a story shared by President Monson:
To some it may seem strange to see ships of many nations loading and unloading cargo along the docks at Portland Oregon. That city is 100 miles from the ocean. Getting there involves a difficult, often turbulent passage over the bar guarding the Columbia River and a long trip up the Columbia and Willamette Rivers
But ship captains like to tie up at Portland. They know that as their ships travel the seas, a curious saltwater shellfish called a barnacle fastens itself to the hull and stays there for the rest of its life, surround itself with a rocklike shell. As more and more of these barnacles attach themselves, they increase the ship’s drag, slow its progress, decrease its efficiency.
Periodically, the ship must go into dry dock, where, with great effort the barnacles are chiseled or scraped off. It’s a difficult, expensive process that ties up the ship for days.
But not if the captain can get his ship to Portland. Barnacles can’t live in fresh water. There, in the sweet, fresh waters of the Willamette or Columbia, the barnacles die and some fall away, while those that remain are easily removed. Thus, the ship returns to its task lightened and renewed.
Sins are like those barnacles. Hardly anyone goes through life without picking up some. They increase the drag, slow our progress, decrease our efficiency. Letting them build up, one upon another, they can eventually sink us.
In His infinite love and mercy, our Lord has provided a harbor. Just as the ship captains had their Portland harbor. We have a harbor. We have the temples, were, if we truly worship, our troubles, hardships, those things that truly weigh us down, fall from us, we feel stronger , our souls lightened and renewed, we can go efficiently about our work and His.
(didn’t use this part – time was getting short)
We may face different levels of opposition in our quest for true worship. Elder Bednar reminds us that such opposition is not new. While the Salt Lake temple was under construction, Brigham Young encouraged the Saints: If you wish this temple built, go to work and do all you can…Some say, “I do not like to do it, for we never began to build a Temple without the bells of hell beginning to ring. I want to hear them ring again. All the tribes of hell will be on the move, but what do you think it will amount to?”
In D&C 6:32-34 we read,
32 Verily, verily, I say unto you, as I said unto my disciples, where two or three are gathered together in my name, as atouching bone thing, behold, there will I be in the cmidst of them—even so am I in the dmidst of you.
33 aFear not to do bgood, my sons, for whatsoever ye csow, that shall ye also reap; therefore, if ye sow dgood ye shall also reap good for your ereward.
34 Therefore, fear not, little aflock; do good; let earth and hell combine against you, for if ye are bbuilt upon my rock, they cannot prevail.
(started again here)
In closing I would reiterate a few words from
President Boyd K. Packer in his address, “The Holy Temple”.
No work is more of a protection to this Church than temple work,
No work is more spiritually refining
No work we do gives us more power
No work requires a higher standard of righteousness.
Our labors in the temple cover us with a shield and a protection, both individually and as a people. So come to the temple – come and claim your blessings.
True temple worship provides our safe harbor, our shields and protections, a place where life’s barnacles and oppositions fall from us and our souls are lightened and renewed.
May we strive for this through true worship, true temple worship, is my hope and prayer.
In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
