Of Covenants and Promises

Of Covenants and Promises

I once had to explain to someone why God was seemingly partial to some people in the scriptures and seemed to ‘not like’ other people.  So now to my grandchildren, I will try to help you understand according to my understanding.

As a start let us make sure that we know we are all God’s literal offspring.  We say that we are His children and we sing the song “I Am A Child of God”.  In the scriptures it is said that God is no respecter of persons.  That means that He treats every one the same.  Thus we can expect that He will have no favorites.  How then do we account for the three degrees of glory? Shouldn’t every one of His children then get the same reward?  This is explained in what is called the plan of salvation or the plan of happiness. 

Our Father in Heaven operates under eternal laws.  There is an order in the universe and He and every one of His children is subject to the laws and order of the universe in which we find our existence.

Knowing that in order to progress in our development we must obtain a body, we were given that opportunity to come here to get our bodies.  The problem that we have in getting a body was that it was like a wild unbroken horse, it needed to be tamed and put under the subjection and control of the spirit that it housed.  That was the plan.  Our Father went through the same process and we have to go through that process as well in order to be like Him and return to his kingdom.

When Adam was in the Garden of Eden, he and Eve partook of the fruit of a tree that would make him wise in the fact that he would be able to discern good from evil.  This was a blessing to him in his mortal and our mortal state.  We would then know right from wrong.  Of course we would have to have some instruction.  This instruction came by way of commandments or laws from our Father, God.  Elder Neal A. Maxwell has stated that the commandments were given to men in order to help us from hurting others and ourselves.  Since we did not know what to do on our own, He provided what we call a conscience or a guiding light.  We refer to the Spirit of Christ as this guiding light.  In addition, if we made a covenant with Him to keep his commandments He would promise to send us the Holy Ghost to further help us by knowing what we were doing was right and good.

All men were offered this opportunity, but because at times the covenants were not available to men on the earth, there was a backup plan, which would make the covenants available after men had left the mortal state if they were willing to make those covenants. He knew that some of his children would not want to keep the commandments, but that too was part of the plan.  They would not get the promises.

We had to have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ that if we kept the covenants and laws that are operative, we would come back into the presence of our Father.  We were given a period of time to learn all we needed to know to make good choices.  Eight years of age was the time determined for us to learn enough to make wise and correct choices.  After this time we were deemed able to discern between good and evil and to make our first covenant. This is the covenant of baptism.  In the covenant we are immersed in water to symbolize a burial of the old person and a rebirth of the individual as a clean person.  It also is a reminder that there will be a resurrection of our earthly body, because Christ made it possible for the resurrection.  Although the words of the prayer at baptism do not specifically give the terms of the covenant, they are spelled out in the Book of Mormon and also in the words of the prayer over the bread and water in the sacrament.  Baptism is not complete without confirmation.  In this ordinance we are confirmed members of the church and given the gift of the Holy Ghost.  Additional blessings and promises may be given according to the inspiration of the priesthood bearer who administers that ordinance.

We covenant to always remember Jesus Christ and keep his commandments.  This is our covenant, as a part of this ordinance we receive a promise.  With every covenant that we make with our father, he promises us specific things related to that covenant.  If we do not do what we covenant to do, or in other words break our covenant, then we will not receive what God has promised.  Thus, some people will get a different reward or promise from our Father than others, because of the covenant.  For those who do not make the covenants with the Lord, our Father, they will be given an opportunity to do this later, if they did not have an opportunity in this life.

The promise given at the time of baptism is that He will give us His spirit (the Holy Ghost) to be with us always to help us in the decisions of our life.  This is also called The Comforter. 

The ordinance of the sacrament is done every week in our Sunday meeting.  This is called sacrament meeting.  The main purpose is to allow every one in the congregation the opportunity to partake of the bread and water and renew the covenant to always remember Him and keep His commandments.  Because this ordinance is repeated weekly and so often, we sometimes have a tendency to make it commonplace.  When we take the sacrament as just something that we do every Sunday and do not think about what is happening during this time, we may miss the opportunity to understand that when we partake of the sacrament we covenant to keep the commandments.  If we are not keeping the commandments and partake of the sacrament anyway, we then loose the spirit of the Lord and are left to our own devices, and may impede our progress to come close to God. Thus, we have the warning from the apostle Paul to refrain from the sacrament, until we have cleared up the transgressions.

If we keep the covenant that we made at baptism, we can make more covenants with the Lord.  We go to the bishop and get a recommend to go to the temple.  The bishop will ask us if we keep the commandments.  Those commandments that we are required to keep to be worthy to enter the temple are; keeping the word of wisdom, paying a full and honest tithing and other offerings, attending sacrament and other meetings, supporting the general and local authorities, treating our family with respect, being honest in all our dealings and living the law of chastity. 

The covenants that we make in the temple are those, which are necessary to receive the promise from the Lord to enter into the highest degree of the celestial kingdom and live with Him eternally.  I will not detail those covenants, but will say that they are very important and are within the capacity of all of God’s children to make and obey.  The consequence of breaking those covenants is very serious, because the individual looses the promises that the Lord gives to those who do make the covenants.  To quote the Lord, “I the Lord am bound when ye do what I say, but if ye do not what I say, you have no promise.”

Thus covenants and promises are bound together.  We make the covenants and the Lord gives the promises. The children of Israel in the Bible were a covenant people, because they made covenants with the Lord.  We in the church are a covenant people, because we make covenants with the Lord. 

Keep your covenants so that you may obtain the promises. Breaking a covenant with the Lord is never justified no matter what the excuse.