June 2016 Visiting Teaching Message
Temple Ordinances and
Covenants
Prayerfully study this material and seek to
know what to share. How will understanding “The Family: A Proclamation to the
World” increase your faith in God and bless those you watch over through
visiting teaching?
All the ordinances necessary for salvation
and exaltation are accompanied by covenants with God. “Making and keeping
covenants means choosing to bind ourselves to our Father in Heaven and Jesus
Christ,” said Linda K. Burton, Relief Society
general president.1
Elder Neil L. Andersen of
the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said, “The Lord said, ‘In the
ordinances … the power of godliness is manifest.’
“There are special blessings from God for
every worthy person who is baptized, receives the Holy
Ghost, and regularly partakes of the sacrament.”2
“When men and women go to the temple,” said
Elder M. Russell Ballard of
the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, “they are both endowed with the same power,
which is priesthood power …
“… All men and all women have access to
this power for help in their lives. All who have made sacred covenants with the
Lord and who honor those covenants are eligible to receive personal revelation,
to be blessed by the ministering of angels, to commune with God, to receive the
fulness of the gospel, and, ultimately, to become heirs alongside Jesus Christ
of all our Father has.”3
Additional Scriptures
Living Stories
In 2007, four days after a massive earthquake
in Peru, Elder Marcus B. Nash of the Seventy met branch president
Wenceslao Conde and his wife, Pamela. “Elder Nash asked Sister Conde how her
little children were. With a smile, she replied that through the goodness of
God they were all safe and well. He asked about the Condes’ home.
“‘It’s gone,’ she said simply.
“… ’And yet,’ Elder Nash noted, ‘you are
smiling as we talk.’
“’Yes,’ she said, ‘I have prayed and I am at
peace. We have all we need. We have each other, we have our children, we are
sealed in the temple, we have this marvelous Church, and we have the Lord. We
can build again with the Lord’s help.’ …
“What is it about making and keeping
covenants with God that gives us the power to smile through hardships, to
convert tribulation into triumph … ?”
“The source is God. Our access to that power
is through our covenants with Him.”4
Consider This
How do temple ordinances and covenants
strengthen and empower us?
Notes
Linda K. Burton, “The Power, Joy, and
Love of Covenant Keeping,” Liahona, Nov. 2013, 111.
Neil L. Andersen, “Power in the
Priesthood,” Liahona, Nov. 2013, 92.
M. Russell Ballard, “Men and Women in
the Work of the Lord,” Liahona, Apr. 2014, 48–49.
See D. Todd Christofferson, “The Power
of Covenants,” Liahona, May 2009, 19, 20–21.
