1 Opening

2. REVIEW

Emphasize again the reason for a review: to keep these things fresh in our minds.

REMINDER: ASK QUESTIONS!

3 PICTURE OF SEALING ROOM

What is an ordinance, as pertaining to our church? A sacred ceremony that has a spiritual
meaning and effect.

Ordinances performed by the power of the priesthood are essential to our exaltation. It is
through these ordinances that we receive the power of God in our lives.

What is a covenant?
It’s a sacred agreement between God and a person or group of people. God sets specific
conditions, and He promises to bless us as we obey those conditions. When we choose not to
keep covenants, we cannot receive the blessings, and in some instances we suffer a penalty as
a consequence of our disobedience. The saving ordinances of the priesthood are always
accompanied by covenants.

Why do we have to make covenants to get to heaven?

The covenant is what takes righteous living and makes it become something consecrated for
our benefit. In a covenant, God is promising that He will sanctify us and help us become more
like Him.
We know we make covenants in the temple, but we often aren’t sure what those covenants are.
This may be underscored by the fact that at the beginning of the Endowment ceremony, there
is a part where they reiterate the importance of these covenants and how sacred they are, and
they kindly tell everyone that if anyone doesn’t feel comfortable continuing and making those
covenants, they can leave.
Part of this lesson will be talking about the covenants we make in the temple. But another
aspect will be properly understanding covenants and their purpose.

What is the first ordinance performed and covenant we make in the Kingdom of God?

4 BAPTISM.

What do we covenant to do at baptism? (As people respond, ask them for the source.)
SHOW LIST OF EXAMPLES
This seems like an awful lot of mysterious legwork for an 8 year old or a convert just to find out
exactly what we’re covenanting. Why doesn’t the Lord give a complete list somewhere?
Because when I get baptized it’s really just me promising to do my best to follow Christ—to be
a disciple of Christ. And that can entail a lot of things. There’s no scripture about not stealing or
not committing adultery or doing those things in connection with baptism—there doesn’t need
to be! These are all just different aspects of us trying to be more like Jesus Christ. We can
break it down into a list, but this general concept holds.

5 TEMPLE COVENANTS

Now, why do I bring this up? Because in the temple we do make specific covenants, and we’ll
be talking about those today, but I worry that we zero in with laser beams on what those
covenants are that we are forgetting that when you take a step back, we are just covenanting
to follow Christ. That’s all we’re doing. There’s specific covenants, but the promise of
covenants is one of me promising that I will try and try and try to be like Christ.
READ TALMAGE QUOTE
If I wanted to be nitpicky, I could say, “Well, that’s not the covenant I remember. I don’t
remember something about being tolerant. But again—Talmage is taking this broader view. A
covenant is me saying I will try to be like Christ. And God saying He will help me. And boy, do
you promise that in the endowment. But conversely, boy, does God promise, through a lot of
symbols, that He will help you.

6 BASIC CONCEPTS OF TEMPLE COVENANTS

So, let’s take one step inward. And just get the basic concepts of what we’re covenanting in
the temple endowment. READ GORDON B HINCKLEY QUOTE
I’m also sharing this quote because we often feel like we can’t say what we’re covenanting in
the temple. So I’m sharing these quotes to help you see that prophets have talked about what
covenants we make in the temple.

7 THE ENDOWMENT COVENANTS

Finally, let’s take a look at exactly what detailed covenants we make in the temple.
Ezra Taft Benson lays it out for us. READ BENSON QUOTE.
So during the endowment, we covenant to obey the laws of obedience, sacrifice, the gospel,
and chastity, and then, finally, the law of consecration. Let’s go through each of these so we
can understand what we’re covenanting to do.

8 THE LAW OF OBEDIENCE

Read D&C 130:20-21.

Any blessing we receive is through obedience. That said… I don’t know about you guys, but I
feel like I’ve received a lot of blessings, in spite of my DISobedience. So…what gives? Discuss.
(Point is that even when we’re not perfect, God sees our efforts.)

READ JOSEPH F. SMITH QUOTE

Apparently, God delights so much in the willing heart that He gives us credit for TRYING.

This should be excruciatingly plain to us when looking at the plan of salvation. How many
degree of glory are we told about? 3. And a couple others in the celestial kingdom…and in His
house are MANY mansions….so…. Probably MANY.

What is the worst one like? So good we’d be willing to kill ourselves to get there.

Who goes there? The worst of the worst.

It’s not our place to judge whether they were trying or not.

Here’s what we do know: They chose Heavenly Father’s Plan. And we know that counts for
something.

So when we’re covenanting to be obedient, we’re saying that yes, we will try our absolute best
to be obedient. We covenant to obey the will of God—nobody else.

9 THE LAW OF SACRIFICE

Read Moses 5:5-8.

We talked last time about how when Adam and Eve were given their garment, it was the first
sacrifice. Well, they were told to keep doing it. I love how Adam is doing it, he has no clue why,
and then this angel comes and explains why. Because Christ sacrificed everything for us.
We don’t do animal sacrifices now; so what is our law of sacrifice? A broken heart and a
contrite spirit.

What does that mean? It’s a willingness to submit to the Lord, to build up the kingdom, in all
things. It means we are willing to give up all that we have, even our lives, in building the
kingdom of God.
READ BALLARD QUOTE

So…what is sacred? What is made sacred? We are. The first law was to obey. This one is a
step up—obey, even if it means giving things up.

10 THE LAW OF THE GOSPEL

The Law of the Gospel. What is that? Discuss.


Read 3 Nephi 27:20-21. The “gospel” boils down to the plan of salvation.

What does the word “gospel” literally mean? Good News.

The good news is: The Plan of Salvation.

READ BENSON QUOTE

Now, I don’t know about you guys, but I guess I’d assumed that if I covenanted to obey, I was
saying I’d follow the gospel. So why is this separate? What is the purpose?
The gospel’s purpose is to change us and make us more like Christ. The first covenants were
to obey God, and to sacrifice things in order to obey God. With this covenant, it’s just living the
gospel. We don’t need to be commanded in all things. Like the Mosaic Law or worse, like all
the additions the Pharisees added to it; we begin to understand right and wrong ourselves and
find that ourselves. So it’s a further step up from the first two covenants.
Now, when we covenant to obey the law of the gospel in the temple, we actually receive a
charge that goes along with it.

READ BRAD WILCOX QUOTE

To clarify: light-mindedness doesn’t mean we can’t make jokes, and loud laughter isn’t talking
about volume. These are spiritual matters; sacred matters, in the temple. This re-emphasizes
that the law of the gospel is about us becoming holy ourselves. We’re not just taking orders;
we’re figuring out God’s will for ourselves.

11 THE LAW OF CONSECRATION

Read D&C 42:29-31. Are we living the law of consecration now?

Well, we are making this covenant in the temple. Here is a misconception. We think the law of
consecration is the United Order. In reality, the United Order was an application of the Law of
Consecration. We still live the law of consecration.
READ BOTH MAXWELL QUOTES
12 THE LAW OF CONSECRATION 2
Consecration is giving ourselves, our time, our talents, everything—to the Lord. We come to the
point of the rich young ruler in Matthew 19. He asked Jesus what he needs to do to gain
eternal life. Jesus said to keep the commandments. The man then said he had done this since
youth. He’s been obedient and has sacrificed: WHAT LACK I YET? What does Christ tell him?
Give everything to the poor and follow Him. But in that giving is the greatest blessing.

13 TEMPLE COVENANTS

So, you can definitely see there’s some interesting relations within the covenants.You can think
about it in many different ways. One is an aspect of progression. That the covenants are
building on each other: you obey. Now you sacrifice to obey. Now you’re figuring out for
yourself what the laws of God are. Now you’re giving everything, absolutely everything, of
yourself.
Another is that these covenants are all just different aspects of the thing the Lord is trying to
get us to be. And it’s not that they’re separate; they’re connected and are part of one great
whole. Another aspect is how much they overlap; and in the middle, the culmination of it all, is
consecration.
Remember that, like baptism, a covenant isn’t necessarily a specific list. A covenant is you
trying to be like Christ. And all of these covenants are just different aspects, different parts,
different faces, of what Christ is going to turn you into.

What is he trying to turn you into? Divinity. Him.

Because Christ obeyed, and sacrificed, and partook of ordinances, and eventually, really, truly,
gave up all of Himself. And if we want to be like Christ, we need to do that, too.
Think back to why we made these covenants. Because they turn us into Christ.

14 WHERE COVENANTS FIT IN

In our first lesson we talked about how the Endowment teaches the Plan of Salvation. Creation,
Fall, Atonement, Adam, Eve, progression, room to room, etc.
Well, this is what makes the Endowment so incredible. You’re getting those teachings and that
progression. At the same time, throughout those teachings, you’re making those covenants.
At the same time, you’re receiving and learning about symbols, which we’ll talk about next
time.
And you’re also learning special instructions that sort of tie all of those things together.
If you think of all we’ve covered so far just on the Endowment—it’s no wonder that people
come out with their heads swimming! It’s a lot of stuff!

15 WHERE COVENANTS FIT IN 2

Now, let’s finally go back to the thing I left out. Chastity.

Obedience, Sacrifice, Gospel, and Consecration all relate pretty closely. They build on each
other. Chastity sort of seems like a black sheep here.

Why do you think Chastity is part of the covenants?

16 SEALING ROOM MANTI TEMPLE

This is one reason why: part of the purpose of the Endowment Ceremony is that it’s preparing
you to be sealed. In the Nauvoo Temple, you went through the Endowment Ceremony, and
then you and your spouse went straight into a room off of the Celestial Room to be sealed.

17 CELESTIAL ROOM - ST. GEORGE

In fact, you can still see this in some of the older temples. For example, here in St. George,
there are sealing rooms connected to the Celestial Room, including one big one in the tower.

18 CELESTIAL ROOM SALT LAKE

They’re also in the Salt Lake temple. Now, the sealing ordinance is its own distinct ordinance.
But if we connect the endowment and the sealing—like they’re supposed to be connected—
we gain new insights.

What new things might knowing that the endowment and the sealing are so connected teach us?
Well, the endowment is teaching us about this journey back into God’s presence. It’s about our
plan of salvation, our redemption, our becoming divine. But of course, we know that in order to
achieve that, we need to be sealed to a spouse. So it’s not surprising that at the pinnacle of the
endowment, when we’re in the very presence of God (symbolically), we go with our spouse,
and are sealed to them for eternity.
After all, couldn’t it very well be that one of the many reasons eternal marriage is the only way
we can become like God is because there are some things we can only learn from being sealed
eternally together, the divine masculine with the divine feminine? There is a reason that
Heavenly Father perfectly understands men and women. I believe that Heavenly Father would
not be the Heavenly Father I know without Heavenly Mother.

19 SEALING ROOM PHILADELPHIA

So, we know that the Endowment had those specific covenants, right. Let’s go back to those
who might be anxious to know exactly what they’re agreeing to.

What are we covenanting to do in the sealing?

Read D&C 132:19 (stop after “all heights and depths”).

Well, here it says what happens to us. The promise that God makes to us.

What’s the promise that we’re making to God?

This is best seen with a step back like we talked about before. A covenant is a promise to be
like God; to be like Christ. And their promise is to help us achieve that. Except here it’s a
promise you’re both making together. And even something else:

Read D&C 132:18. Stop after “make a covenant with her for time and all eternity.”
What?! I thought a covenant was a promise between me and God!?!? Why am I making a
covenant with another mortal like me? She (or he) can’t make me divine! Or can she? Yes she
can. And I can make her divine. We make each other divine. If in the endowment I am
consecrating myself unto God—literally giving myself to God—in the sealing, I am giving myself
to my wife. And she is giving herself to me. And by giving ourselves to each other, we will help
each other be divine—

D&C 132:20: “Then shall they be gods.”

So in a way, I am still making a covenant with a God—a God in embryo. Maybe then, we can
see, why temple marriage is so much more than just a marriage.

20 NEXT WEEK

There is usually some fear or apprehension when it comes to making covenants. But if we
understand the other side of the promise—what God is promising for us—that fear goes away.
And few things teach that side of the covenant as well as the Temple endowment ceremony.
Next time we’ll be talking a little bit about that, about the symbols of the temple.
Share personal thoughts and testimony about temple covenants and sealing.