Seven years ago Stephanie and I sat down at “the closing table” to finalize the purchase of our home. That day we entered into a very detailed agreement with a lender and others, some of the terms of the contract we had set, some were set by other parties. The contract bound all parties involved to act in a certain way and laid out penalties for failure to hold up our respective ends. We felt empowered that day as we closed on our house, there was a sense of accomplishment, ownership, and responsibility, even a little excitement at the thought making our first mortgage payment (though that excitement faded quickly). In a similar way, though with important differences, we can make arrangements with the Lord. We call them covenants.
A covenant in the context of the restored gospel is different from worldly agreements or contracts where both parties negotiation and seal with handshakes and signatures. The parameters of covenants are set solely by the Lord. We are free to choose to accept the terms or leave them, but they aren’t placed on the alter for negotiation. Instead of signing papers like closing on a home loan, when we covenant with God, we show that agreement through sacred priesthood ordinances. As we receive these ordinances by covenant we are “endowed with power” even “the power of godliness" (D&C 43:16, D&C 84:20).
Exercise Faith in the Lord (7 min 9:45)
Because the Lord sets the terms of our covenants, we must exercise our faith in Him as we receive them. It can be tough and sometimes makes no earthly sense what we’re asked to do or endure in this life. As I look out on this congregation, I know you! We have lost loved ones both to death and sin, we have fought through illnesses, infertility, financial struggles, wavering testimony, addictions, emotional and mental burdens. Perhaps at times we’ve ask questions that start with “why” only to find silence. It is very contrary to our natures to give up control and accept terms where we can’t see and spell out all the reasons and rationale. But friends, isn’t that exactly what we’re here on earth to do?
"And we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them” (Abraham 3:25).
"For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father” (Mosiah 3:19).
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9).
God knows the end from the beginning, and though we might not understand all the reasons and rationale behind what He asks of us, He does. And what’s more, He has promised to reveal it to us. He does not and never has asked us to walk with blind faith, having no witness of our own. To the prophet Nephi, the Lord revealed the vision of the tree of life and confirmed to the young man that the things his father Lehi, the prophet, was instructing and asking of them were from God. See, Nephi had made covenants to follow the prophet and when he reached the end of his own understanding and he faced that chasm whose bridge is faith, he didn’t rant on Facebook about how Lehi needed to get with the times and he didn’t march on church headquarters tendering his resignation from his covenants. He went to the Lord directly and said, “I’m keeping my covenants, and there are some things here I don’t understand, I know that that lack of understanding is on my end and not thine, and I will keep walking whether thou reveals more light and knowledge at this time or not, but if it be thy will I want to understand more fully that I might walk more faithfully.” His brothers struggled and he asked them “Have ye inquired of the Lord?” to which they replied “We have not; for the Lord maketh no such things known unto us” (1 Ne 15:8-9). They were so sure the Lord wouldn’t teach them more, they never bothered to ask.
My invitation to us all is to remember that we have made covenants and honoring covenants requires faith. When we feel that faith is weakening let’s go to the Lord and ask Him to strengthen our faith and give us more understanding. And then we keep being obedient, for when we obey the Lord is bound. He will keep His promises and we will receive the strength that we need. I testify that we can have our own Nephi experiences, right now in 2015. We go to our Father in Heaven in faith and humility and receive revelations. I have done it and so have many of you.
Covenants Bring the Power of Godliness (3 min, 9:55)
As we take upon us and keep our covenants, we are blessed with power. Just this hour, we’ve one by one participated in the sacred ordinance of the Sacrament. We promised to take His name upon us, to remember Him, and to keep His commandments. The Lord promised that our souls would become sanctified and that we would always have His spirit to be with us. In the temple we make other covenants with different requirements and promises, but the pattern is the same. Through these priesthood ordinances we are blessed with great blessings, the Doctrine and Covenants calls this the power of godliness.
In the April 2009 general conference, Elder Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles taught, "This 'power of godliness' comes in the person and by the influence of the Holy Ghost. The gift of the Holy Ghost is part of the new and everlasting covenant. It is an essential part of our baptism, the baptism of the Spirit. It is the messenger of grace by which the blood of Christ is applied to take away our sins and sanctify us (2 Ne 31:17)... The gifts of the Holy Spirit are testimony, faith, knowledge, wisdom, revelations, miracles, healing, and charity, to name but a few (D&C 46:13-26)” (The Power of Covenants, D. Todd Christofferson, April 2009 Conference).
The Holy Ghost has a transformative power on our soul. He manifests to us the power of godliness, or in other words helps us become more like God. The process of becoming sanctified can require great changes within at times. We can see a symbol of how this change can occur within each of us through the transformation of the old Provo Tabernacle into a House of the Lord. In December 2010, the Provo tabernacle caught fire. This wonderful dedicated building which held conferences, sacred meetings, cultural events and musical firesides was destroyed. How could it be that something so precious and good wouldn’t be protected by the Lord? Ten months after the fire, President Monson announced that it would be restored and rebuilt, this time not as a tabernacle, but as a temple. It’s not that the tabernacle was bad or unholy, but the Lord could make it better. He saw what it could be and the lives of His children it could bless to have another temple. In His wisdom, a tragic destroying fire became an opportunity to sanctify. With all the responsibilities that Father in Heaven holds, if He can be aware of a building fire and do good with it, imagine what He can do with you and me - His own children! When we feel life’s fire heating up and we’re feeling consumed, as we continue in faith keeping our covenants we can see the power of godliness being manifest in two ways. One, our own growth and sanctification, just as the tabernacle is now being transformed into a beautiful temple. Two, we can be a tool for the sanctification of others, just as the new temple will bless countless souls living and deceased.
Elder Tuttle Story by President Packer (3 min, 9:55)
The following story is the kind of transformation the Holy Ghost can make within us as we spend a lifetime making and keeping covenants.
In the [1986] October conference after Elder A. Theodore Tuttle spoke on faith, President Hinckley, who conducted that session, said:
“I should perhaps be guilty of an indiscretion, but I think I will risk it and say that Brother Tuttle has been seriously ill and he needs our faith, the faith of which he has spoken. It will be appreciated if those who have listened to him across the Church would plead with our Father in Heaven, in the kind of faith which he has described, in his behalf” (in Conference Report, Oct. 1986, p. 93).
And the prophet, President Benson, endorsed what President Hinckley had said and appealed himself for fasting and prayers of faith for the recovery of Brother Tuttle.
But Brother Tuttle did not recover. He died seven weeks later.
In the following conference (April 1987) President Packer related the following:
"Now, lest there be one whose faith was shaken, believing prayers were not answered, or lest there be one who is puzzled that the prophet himself could plead for the entire Church to fast and pray for Brother Tuttle to live and yet he died, I will tell you of an experience.
"One Sunday when Brother Tuttle was at home, confined mostly to his bed, I spent a few hours with him.
"He was deeply moved by the outpouring of love from across the world. Each letter extended prayers of faith for his recovery. Many of the messages came from South America, where the Tuttle family had labored for so many years.
"He insisted that he did not deserve more blessings, nor did he need them. Others needed them more. And then he told me this: 'I talked to the Lord about those prayers for my recovery. I asked if the blessings were mine to do with as I pleased. If that could be so, I told the Lord that I wanted him to take them back from me and give them to those who needed them more.'
"He said, 'I begged the Lord to take back those blessings and give them to others.'
"Brother Tuttle wanted those blessings from our prayers for those struggling souls whom most of us hardly remember, but whom he could not forget.
"The scriptures teach that 'the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much' (James 5:16).
"Can you not believe that the Lord may have favored the pleadings of this saintly man above our own appeal for his recovery?
"We do not know all things, but is it wrong to suppose that our prayers were not in vain at all? Who among us would dare to say that humble folk here and there across the continent of South America will not receive unexpected blessings passed on to them from this man who was without guile?
"May not lofty purposes such as this be worked out in our lives if we are submissive?
"Now, I know that skeptics may ridicule such things. But I, for one, am content to believe that our prayers were accepted and recorded and redirected to those whose hands hang down in despair, just as Brother Tuttle had requested."
He Rescues the Covenant Makers (5 min, 10:00)
Ultimately all covenants lead us to Jesus Christ. He is the One who rescues us, by making and keeping covenants we choose to accept that rescue effort. About 3 in the morning the day after the Savior miraculously fed the five-thousand, the disciples found themselves caught in a storm on the sea of Galilee. As their tiny vessel was mercilessly “tossed with waves: for the wind was contrary”, the disciples saw what they thought was a spirit coming towards them, “and they cried out for fear” (Matthew 14:24, 26). Surely these expert sailors knew the dangers of sudden storms on Galilee’s waters, yet they were fiercely obedient to the Master, remember it was Jesus who “constrained his disciples to get into a ship, and to go before him unto the other side [of the sea of Galilee]” (Matthew 14: 22).
- Why would the Lord let this happen, why to His own disciples?
- Didn’t the Savior know the danger of such a treacherous voyage in the middle of the night?
- Where was He now when they needed Him most?
These may feel like very familiar questions we have asked at some point in our own life. No one, neither obedient nor disobedient are immune from the storms of life. But when we obediently answer the Master’s call with “I’ll go where you want me to go… say what you want me to say… be what you want me to be" even - and especially - when such obedience or covenant keeping is contrary to the world or leads us “to paths that [we] do not know” (Hymn 270, I’ll Go Where You Want Me To Go), “[He] will not leave [us] comfortless: [He] will come to [us]” (John 14: 18). And so it was here on the sea of Galilee, walking towards the fearful disciples, "Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good cheer; it is I; be not afraid.” (Matthew 14:27). We can find the Savior in so many places. He is in the joys of our life and He is in the trials. It's not so much a matter of where we find Him so much as it is THAT we find Him. When we are facing that wonderful peace in life and seemingly witnessing our own feeding of five-thousand, we should remember "it is I" and we can be of good cheer and not fear. When we are facing the darkest trials we should likewise remember, "it is I”, be of good cheer and not fear. Remember our covenants, and have faith that God is faithful and always keeps His end. So what about when we feel utterly alone and it seems as though He has not come to us when we we need Him most, what was Christ doing when the disciples were first caught in the storm? The scripture reads, “He went up into a mountain apart to pray” (Matthew 14:23). Brothers and Sisters, let us wait patiently on the Lord just a little longer, for if we don’t see Him walking on our stormy sea toward our vessel, it may just be that He taking sacred time to pray for us.
Master the tempest is raging!
The billows are tossing high!
The sky is o’ershadowed with blackness.
No shelter or help is nigh.
Master, with anguish of spirit
I bow in my grief today.
The depths of my sad heart are troubled.
Oh, waken and save, I pray!
The winds and the waves shall obey they will:
Peace, be still.
Whether the wrath of the storm-tossed sea
Or demons or men or whatever it be,
No waters can swallow the ship where lies
The Master of ocean and earth and skies.
Indeed there is nothing that “can swallow the ship where lies the Master of ocean and earth and skies”. We must become that ship where-in lay the Master. I testify that making and keeping our covenants transforms us into that vessel, that temple the Lord needs us to be and nothing can capsize or destroy us. Covenants bring power to overcome life’s trials and access the Atonement of Jesus Christ more fully.
Master, the terror is over.
The elements sweetly rest.
Earth’s sun in the calm lake is mirrored,
And heaven’s within my breast.
Linger, O blessed Redeemer!
Leave me alone no more,
And with Joy I shall make the blest harbor
And rest on the blissful shore.
In the sacred name of Jesus Christ, amen.
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