Doctrine & Covenants: EPISODE 40 (2025) – Doctrine & Covenants 109-110 – Part 1
Hank Smith: 00:00:00 Coming up in this episode on followHIM.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:00:02 If there’s anybody listening who feels that they’re too far off the path or too far gone, or they can’t come around, or that they can’t make it to the house of the Lord, I testify you can. The power of the Lord’s grace and His Atonement is beyond what you and I can comprehend to bring us back to Him and back to His house, to His presence.
Hank Smith: 00:00:33 Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of followHIM. My name is Hank Smith. I am your host. I’m here with my co-host, John Bytheway, who is a co-host of prayer, a co-host of fasting, a co-host of faith, a co-host of learning, a co-host of glory, a co-host of order. John Bytheway, that’s section 109 verse eight, I thought, man, John, John, John, John, it totally fits.
John Bytheway: 00:01:00 It’s like one out of five ain’t bad.
Hank Smith: 00:01:05 Yeah, you’re batting 200. John we are joined today by our good friend, Dr. Anthony Sweat. Anthony, welcome back.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:01:14 Hey, my brothers, what a privilege to be back on the big show and to be with you guys, just my friends, who I love with my whole soul. I’m grateful to get to do this work with you and talk scripture with you today.
Hank Smith: 00:01:27 It’s such a good day to have Anthony here. For those of you who haven’t been with us since day one, I’m guessing that’s quite a few of you. Anthony was our first guest on followHIM with I think two days notice.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:01:38 That’s when I peaked in my life right there. I was the first guest on followHIM. It’s just been downhill since there.
Hank Smith: 00:01:45 It was a good, good day. Now John, let’s talk Section 109, 110. You’ve spent time at the Kirtland Temple. You do church history tours. I’ve been there with you. Tell me what you think of when you think Kirtland Temple.
John Bytheway: 00:01:58 I think of Steve Harper. We watched a documentary about Kirtland. Anybody can watch it on BYUTV. It’s called Kirtland America’s Sacred Ground, and they’re interviewing our friend Steve Harper. He says everything, and he pauses, everything that I hold dear comes from Kirtland and he’s talking about the temple blessings and keys and everything that was restored there when I thought, yeah, everything I hold dear comes back to what started there. It’s true.
Hank Smith: 00:02:28 When you walk around those historic sites, it is quite personal, isn’t it Anthony? I don’t know anyone who has studied the history of the church and the temple like you have. When you think Kirtland Temple, what comes to mind? What are we gonna do today?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:02:42 I look at 1820, the first vision culminated in my mind in 1830 with the publication of the Book of Mormon and the organization of the church. Everything from 1830 is gonna culminate right here in section 109 and 110 culminates in Kirtland with this prayer in 109 and these glorious visitations in 110. Really what we’re gonna look at today is why we need an endowment and the restoration of priesthood keys that constitute the single greatest work that’s happening on earth today. This is a pivot point in the history of the church and in the history of the world.
Hank Smith: 00:03:23 John and I are excited to learn from you today. Anthony, before we go any further, I need a little help from our listeners. Our team has noticed that a lot of people who listen or watch our show don’t actually subscribe to the show either on their podcast app or on YouTube. I’m going to make a request that everybody listening, pause really quick and make sure you’re subscribing to the show because you’re part of our team that’s really gonna help us. I didn’t know that it helps us so much. John, now you were born back in the 19 hundreds. Do you know how to subscribe to something?
John Bytheway: 00:03:59 Yes, I do. I just ask one of my kids, Hey, subscribe, and I hand them the phone.
Hank Smith: 00:04:03 Okay. Yeah, that’s exactly how you would do it.
John Bytheway: 00:04:07 If you’re gonna imbibe, you gotta prescribe. That’s what we say.
Hank Smith: 00:04:11 I love it. John, we’ve had Anthony on the show quite a few times, so we probably don’t need to do a full bio, but for someone who’s, who’s Anthony Sweat?
John Bytheway: 00:04:22 We love Anthony. He’s so talented. I’m so glad he is here and not playing college basketball ’cause he was this close. He’s also a great artist. He got a bachelor’s degree in drawing and painting from Utah State before joining the religion faculty at BYU. He worked for 13 years with S&I, seminaries and institutes where he has really blessed my life and my kids’ lives involves the temple and that’s with the books, the Holy Invitation. The Holy Covenants, and you’ve got a new one coming out. The Holy Sealing. Is that out now?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:04:54 It should be out.
Hank Smith: 00:04:54 I’m holding it up right here.
John Bytheway: 00:04:56 Yeah, there it is. So excited for that. I just don’t feel like I had the resources like that to prepare me for the temple. Anthony has done a great work. You read those books, you’ll be much better prepared for what’s about to happen and that’s been a blessing sincerely, Anthony, to my children.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:05:15 Thank you. It was a blessing to write those and we hope this third and final book in that series will be a culmination of it. You know, kind of taking the approach with this one of, in the same way with the holy invitation of a big picture perspective of what sealing is doing. That was our thesis that we are approaching. We’re not gonna get into specifics of a marriage and resealing. We’re trying to look bigger picture doctrinally theologically. Hopefully that’ll bless people in all their varied situations with sealing to understand the bigger picture.
Hank Smith: 00:05:46 John, I was thinking this morning as we were preparing that one of the greatest compliments I think I can give, and I think you’d agree, is that I share a book with my children. I read a lot of books and I enjoy them, but not very many do I say to my children, this is now required reading in the Smith house. Quite a few of them are Anthony Sweat books. He didn’t ask us to do this, but Seekers Wanted.
John Bytheway: 00:06:11 That whole idea of being a seeker, yeah, that blessed me too, but I have to say on a personal note, running into Anthony at the Nauvoo Inn and having him treat my children with such joy and respect.
Hank Smith: 00:06:24 I need to say one more thing about Anthony. I know this is, I’m gushing a little bit, but Moroni 10 last year, John, that changed Moroni’s promise for me forever. Here is something we have talked about in our lives since we were in primary and the fact that Anthony came in here and showed us things about Moroni 10 that we had never seen, that he had never seen even.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:06:51 Yeah, I saw that in prepping for this. That was awesome. That was a great experience for me to go like, oh, I see what is happening here in this chapter.
Hank Smith: 00:06:59 I hope that everyone, we can link that in the description on YouTube where we can link it in our show notes. Everyone go back and listen to that one and then this is a compliment. I think Alex Baugh, who we all love, who’s coming on the show soon, said that Anthony’s episode on section 88, 4 years ago was the best thing. He said, the best thing I’ve ever heard on section 88, which is quite a compliment coming from from Alex Baugh.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:07:28 Our beloved Alex. I’d say, well now I gotta bring it on Section 109, 110 then.
Hank Smith: 00:07:33 Yeah, yeah.
John Bytheway: 00:07:34 You gotta bring it.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:07:35 I don’t know. I’m nervous now.
Hank Smith: 00:07:37 Thank you everyone for letting us gush a little bit there about our friend. Let me read from the Come, Follow Me manual and we will be underway. The lesson this week is called, It Is Thy House, a Place of Thy Holiness. The doors of the Kirtland temple weren’t supposed to open until eight o’clock on the morning of March 27th, 1836, but Saints who were hoping to attend the dedication services started lining up as early as seven. An overflow location and then a second session were needed to accommodate everyone and it wasn’t just the living who were eager to be present. Multiple witnesses saw angels inside the temple and even on the roof during and after the dedication. It really did seem that the armies of heaven had come to sing and to shout with the Latter-day Saints. Why the great excitement on both sides of the veil? After centuries, there was a house of the Lord again on the earth. The Lord was fulfilling His promise to endow His Saints with power from on high and this He declared was only the beginning of the blessing. The era we now live in with accelerated temple work and ordinances available to millions of the living and the dead had its beginning in Kirtland when the veil over the earth was beginning to burst. Beautifully written. Anthony, you and I have been talking about this for months. How do you wanna get started?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:08:58 I think we should get started with what President Nelson said in his 2024 talk just to set the stage. Also, obviously we hope that what we say here can act as an enhancer, but that their own personal study of section 109 and 110 of them sitting down with that text in that revelatory space that this doesn’t replace that, that this enhances it. President Nelson in his 2024 talk Rejoice in the Gift of Priesthood Keys, he mentioned section 109 specifically. He said, quote Joseph Smith’s dedicatory prayer of the Kirtland temple is a tutorial about how the temple spiritually empowers you and me to meet the challenges of life in these last days. I encourage you to study that prayer recorded in Doctrine & Covenants section 109. That’s a prophetic directive in General Conference to the whole church. I hope that all of us take that very seriously. Even in my rereading of section 109 and 110 multiple times to prep for this recording. While some things stood out, I learned a lot in the process. I would start there with the prophetic directive. I gotta give a little backstory of course, but upfront, let’s make sure we’re taking that directive to heart and studying these sections directly in the word on our own.
Hank Smith: 00:10:22 Yeah. I have found when President Nelson gives a directive like that or any prophet, I think, I don’t know if I have time for that and then I find I actually have quite a bit of time that I waste. It would be good for me and anyone else listening who thinks, man, I should do that. Well I’m on the same boat with you. Let’s do it.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:10:40 Is it okay if I give a little history? ’cause we gotta see why this was such a culminating event.
Hank Smith: 00:10:45 Yeah.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:10:45 And I don’t wanna drown us too much in history ’cause I wanna be in the text, but we’ve gotta see what built up to this.
Hank Smith: 00:10:51 Anthony, from what I’ve read, 1836 seems to be a good year for Joseph Smith and he doesn’t have many of those.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:10:59 Yeah, this is a highlight year. This has been things building up for years and years to get to this zenith point in the history of the church in particular. After Joseph organizes the church and publishes the Book of Mormon, one of the first things he does is he starts translating the Bible and as Joseph translated the Bible, he learned about high priesthood or that there were great high priests who had power. They had spiritual power to do the work of God. They had power to perform miracles and to have angels minister to them to set at defiance the armies of nations. They had power to receive revelation and call on the heavens and have them here. They had great spiritual power and these are people like Moses and Melchizedek and Enoch and others and the Lord revealed he wants to create a kingdom of priests like them in the latter days, great high priests and the church is only a handful of months old.
00:12:02 He tells ’em to gather to Ohio in section 38 verse 32. He says, there, I will endow you with power from on high. The first time we get that, then the church gathers to Ohio and when they get there, Joseph holds a conference in June of 1831. It’s one of the most important conferences that’s happened in the church. He sits down with about 60 elders and there he ordains the first high priest. In this dispensation, they gather according to the history that they might receive an endowment. They are going to fulfill the promise to receive an endowment. Joseph promises them that if they are pure, that within three days they can see the Savior face-to-face. At this June, 1831 conference, I don’t know about you or any of the listeners out there, could you imagine being invited to a three day conference and the prophet promises you that if you’re holy enough that within three days you can see the Lord.
00:13:00 Some of them at this conference do. They experience great miraculous powers and visions. Lyman White, Harvey Whitlock and others, they see Jesus, they see the Father and the Son. Joseph sees the Father and the Son. However, many of them don’t experience a divine outpouring of power. They don’t feel they’ve been endowed. That’s where you get section 67 where it says, if we read section 67, 10 to 13, there were fears in your hearts. You have not been sufficiently humble. This is the reason and then the Lord tells them, sanctify yourselves and the days will come that you shall see Him and He re-promises this gift. Joseph’s big question is, okay, how do I make a bunch of men more holy? What should I organize and you guys know exactly where this is going. The Lord says, then section 88 comes organize a school of the prophets.
00:13:56 They have it as their thesis, section 88 verse 68 again, which is sanctify yourselves and the days will come that you see him. It’ll be in God’s own time and God’s own way and according to his own will, but they’re promised they can come into the presence of God. The Lord’s gonna lay out a ton of requirements or things to help sanctify them. He’ll lay out things like be obedient, be temperate and chaste. Live the law of consecration, live the higher laws of the gospels all there in section 88. I go over that in the podcast if they link to that, so I won’t rehash that here. He tells them, wash each other. Become clean from the blood and sins of this generation. He starts to lay all of this out. In January of, that’s January of 1833 they organize what we call the school of the prophets.
00:14:47 Joseph is gonna work with them. In that same revelation, the Lord says, okay, meeting on the Isaac Morley farm was great in his little log cabin, but you need to establish a house, even a house of learning, a house of fasting, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God. In section 88, verse 118 and 119. That’s where the Lord tells them, build a temple. That is gonna be their directive that they’re gonna do their very best to fulfill. That’s in the winter of 1833. The Lord’s gonna rebuke them a few sections later in section 95 for not getting started yet. That’s where you get the great story of Hyrum Smith right after 95 comes going and clearing the ground like, all right, let’s do this and they’re gonna work. They are gonna sacrifice. They are gonna labor. They are going to scrimp and dedicate and consecrate be obedient in this command for the next three years. They’re gonna work to build this magnificent house of glory, house of the Lord. That sets the scene for what we’re building up to, to dedicate this as a whole, and I wanna talk a little bit too about some of the pre-meetings ’cause they’ll be important to understanding section 109. Anything you guys, well, what do you want to add there? What have I missed in building up that history?
John Bytheway: 00:16:02 What do we say to people that, oh, you don’t need a temple. God’s everywhere. God’s in nature. Why would God require them to make a building? What you’ve just described, Anthony, is what happened to them personally as preparing to build the temple. It was becoming a temple people as they built it.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:16:19 Process of building a temple, built them into temple like people, but I would also argue God needs sacred space. God needs a holy place to manifest himself to his people. That’s what he says in these revelations. He wants sacred ground as well and he wants us to prepare that ground to prepare ourselves as well. I think it’s a dual thing.
Hank Smith: 00:16:43 Hmm. When you sit outside the Kirtland temple, I’ve sat there many times, there’s a couple of benches there over on the side and you look up at that, you really take some time to think what it would’ve been like to be there. In the 2025 era of temples it is not all that impressive, but when you put yourself back in 1836, the awe hits you where you think, how did they do this?
John Bytheway: 00:17:15 The phrase is out of their poverty. We built this house.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:17:19 This temple, to put it in perspective, there are around 2000 Latter-day Saints in the greater Ohio area in 1836. That is like your stake building a temple. Back in the day, it was hard enough for your stake to put on a road show let alone to build a house of God. Maybe to put it more in perspective, it’s a little bit almost like a student stake because that’s about how much money they have. You’re getting roughly 2000 people who are gonna construct this magnificent edifice in a three year period of time and who have very little resources, but they have consecrated hearts, willing hands, and every one of ’em go to work. The great Eliza R. Snow said this about it. Quote, at the time the saints were few in number and most of them very poor and had it not been for the assurance that God had spoken and had commanded that a house should be built to his name of which he not only revealed the form but also designated the dimensions, an attempt toward building that temple under the then existing circumstances would’ve been by all concerned, pronounced preposterous. That was Eliza R. Snow’s summary of their circumstances, what they accomplished and anybody who sees that building today, it’s remarkable and the Lord’s gonna reward them with heavenly blessings that are almost incomparable to other times in the history of the church.
Hank Smith: 00:18:54 The fact that it’s still there, it’s almost 200 years old now. It’s not perfectly done. That’s one thing I love about it. It is definitely an imperfect building. It’s by divine design that it is still there.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:19:09 It is. The Lord will touch on this in section 110. He prophesies that the fame of that house will spread to foreign lands and that prophecy has been fulfilled in our day. I don’t know the numbers, how many tens of thousands visit that building every year. This would be a good time to say how grateful we are to our fellow laborers in their own way in the restoration of the community of Christ for how well they took care and used that building and were great stewards. We’re grateful that our church now, what was it in March of 2024? I think we were able to purchase it from them. The fact that we still have that we owe a huge debt of gratitude to them and their stewardship over that magnificent building so that those prophecies can be fulfilled, that the fame of this house would spread to foreign lands.
Hank Smith: 00:19:58 It is really something. You don’t have to go to Kirtland to feel the power of it, but if you have the opportunity, it’s worth seeing.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:20:06 Yeah. I think it was Elder Holland one time who said, you don’t have to like go to the holy land to know that Jesus is the Christ, but if you do go, it ought to count for something. He said something like that.
John Bytheway: 00:20:16 Anthony, this background is really helpful. I love that you said they were told to build this and they didn’t do anything and they were told again, and the phrase that always jumps out at me is, you’re walking in darkness at noonday. It’s like, I want to give you so much more. You have to build this house and become a people who can build it. Then when they did, all these things we’re gonna talk about today that happened are amazing.
Hank Smith: 00:20:43 I don’t know if the incredible Walter Rane has ever heard of our show, but if someone knows him out there, thank him for the picture. It’s called the Kirtland Temple. If you haven’t seen it, use your Google and thummim and go check this out. It hangs in the Kirtland historic sites visitor center. Isn’t that the original?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:21:02 That’s the original there. Yeah.
Hank Smith: 00:21:04 I know you’re a Walter Rane fan.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:21:07 Huge. I’m actually the unofficial president of his fan club.
Hank Smith: 00:21:10 Yeah, I will be the vice president then. Yeah.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:21:12 Okay.
Hank Smith: 00:21:13 In a way, Brother Rane is showing what they did. They took their gifts and contributed them.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:21:20 Contribute to it. I mean, we’ve heard these stories for a long time, but one of them that’s sweet to me is in February of 1836 is they’re starting to near closer to completion and they’re getting the details. It’ll be the women of the church who come together and donate materials. They’re the ones who sew the veils of the temple that can be hung in those courts to divide it up. I’m not sure if some of us realize that they saw those veils or those curtains that they would hang up around the pulpits as dividing the outer court from the inner court, almost like Solomon’s temple, Holy of Holies. Everybody is pitching in in every way they can to build this monumental building. It’s really incredible.
00:22:05 The first time I saw it, I’d only seen it in pictures, and the first time I was privileged enough to see it in person, I actually was blown away by how big it is. It was bigger than I thought. It was more beautiful than I thought. I had always kind of seen it as a glorified chapel, which that’s bad on my part, but that’s how I had seen it in photos and when I saw it, I thought, man, this thing is incredible. Not just the events of course that happened in it, but the preparation for those events to create this structure. Could you imagine that thing in 1836 in the Ohio Reserve? It had to have been one of the greatest buildings in the vicinity for hundreds and hundreds of miles.
Hank Smith: 00:22:47 If you’re interested in what Anthony talked about there with the Solomon’s temple, we did an episode with Dr. Matt Gray on Leviticus where he walks through that tabernacle temple. We can’t do that here, but if you’re interested, go back there. We can link that one in our show notes as well. Dr. Gray sets us up in a beautiful way with the ancient temple and what these saints are doing in the 1830s.
John Bytheway: 00:23:14 Just the fact that we’re talking about a temple, not a chapel, but a temple. To me, it’s like, what happened to that? What happened to that in, you know, most of Christianity was it? Oh no. That one temple was all we needed at the time. What happened? Here’s in the restoration, all this talk of temples, temples, temples.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:23:32 Yeah. When the Lord tells the Saints to establish Zion in section 84, one of the very first things he tells them is that a temple needs to be reared so that the glory of the Lord can be there and his presence can be there. From the very beginning, Zion and Joseph will say, what’s the whole point in gathering is to gather around a temple where the Lord can teach us of his ways. This temple is central. That restoration of a holy house for the Lord to teach his people of his kingdom and his ways to manifest himself and to give them power. What a testament of the restoration of bringing all things back.
John Bytheway: 00:24:14 The importance of it was such that, do you guys remember the movie? It was called Mountain of the Lord, you remember?
Hank Smith: 00:24:20 Yeah.
John Bytheway: 00:24:21 It was mostly Wilford Woodruff. To me, one of the things that says the urgency and the importance of it, like you’re saying, Anthony is Brigham Young barely gets into the valley, barely gets out of the wagon, puts his cane down in the ground and says, here we will build the temple of our God. It’s like first thing he does.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:24:41 You just made him sound like he was like a hundred and he was probably like 45.
John Bytheway: 00:24:47 He was sick that day. Brethren, here, here we’ll build the temple of our God and Wilford Woodruff was like, oh, there was a perfectly placed stick in a rock by the prop guy, but he grabbed and pounded it into the ground, is like, here’s the spot. First thing is what? What do we eat? First thing is, is that lake salty? No. First thing is where are we gonna build the temple?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:25:09 Boom. Right here.
Hank Smith: 00:25:10 Yeah.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:25:11 Brigham also, when Joseph and Hyrum are martyred, first thing he says is, we’re gonna finish this Nauvoo temple and endow and seal the Saints. It’s temple from the get go. It’s temple in Kirtland. It’s temple in Nauvoo, it’s temple in Salt Lake, it’s temple today with our modern prophets continuing to lead with those same keys and revelatory direction from the Lord. It’s centered. It really is. Everything in the Doctrine & Covenants, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. The thrust of the Doctrine & Covenants pushes us to the holy temple. It culminates, it pushes us to the house of the Lord.
Hank Smith: 00:25:55 Anthony, this is something you may be covering as we talk here. When I take a group to Kirtland, one of the most common questions I get is, did they do temple ordinances here? Is there a sealing room? Is there an endowment room? Tell us what you would say.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:26:12 The Kirtland temple, for as magnificent as it is, it was a preparatory temple and a lot of it is because in section 110, those keys from Moses, Elias and Elijah had yet to be restored in the Kirtland temple. They did not do work for the dead in the Kirtland temple. They did not do the presentation of the Endowment in the Kirtland temple. They did not do sealings of families and children. The Kirtland temple, they did do some ordinances. I’ll read a little bit about that ’cause it’ll help us understand. 109, they did washings and anointings and blessings there and they met there to fast and to pray with uplifted hands. They would go there covenanting to live these laws. It was a preparatory temple, but by the way, that wasn’t for everybody. Joseph mostly did these washings and anointing blessings only with priesthood leaders in the church.
00:27:09 A few hundred men would’ve received those. It was not for everybody. It’s a limited temple and it’s limited who gets it. It will be in the Nauvoo temple where the presentation of the Endowment, work for the dead, sealing of families and extending that to all worthy adults. That’s where that extends, but that does not happen in Kirtland. So in a lot of ways it’s been referenced, if you wanna think of it this way as an Aaronic temple, a preparatory temple for the higher Melchizedek temple that came from the keys that get restored in Kirtland, but that manifest themselves in Nauvoo.
Hank Smith: 00:27:47 Yeah. It’s Joseph who says, if you’re gonna climb a ladder, you gotta start with the bottom step. This is maybe one of the steps.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:27:54 This is a key step to get ’em to where they’re at, but that is important. That’s why when you go in it, you won’t see baptismal fonts and sealing rooms and and endowment rooms that are sectioned off in a progressive state. It’s a great house of the Lord. But remember the Saints did not have any chapels at this time either. It was their gathering place. It was like a tabernacle where the Saints could gather together and learn and preach and fast and pray and administer some preparatory ordinances.
Hank Smith: 00:28:25 Yeah. Joseph himself is learning. Yeah. He’s not thinking, okay, well this is a preparatory temple to what I’m gonna give you later. He himself is wowed by what he’s learning. Is that right? Is that fair?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:28:37 I think that’s fair. There’s no indication at this point that he has any concept of the work for the dead. As I’ll read, he has a vision of Alvin as we know in this temple, his brother Alvin, that passes away and he is surprised by it. So there’s things Joseph is learning from the get-go about Elijah and the restoration of sealing power, but there’s evidence that he’s still learning about sealing. Joseph is learning line upon line and bit by bit. This Kirtland temple is that preparatory step to lead to these greater culminating ordinances in the temple that manifest in Nauvoo.
Hank Smith: 00:29:13 This isn’t just three years. You go back to September of 1823, Moroni appears. He’s talking about this.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:29:22 Yes. If I grabbed a hundred Latter-day Saints and said, who restored the priesthood to Joseph Smith? The kneejerk reaction is what?
Hank Smith: 00:29:32 John the Baptist, Peter, James and John,
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:29:35 Peter, James and John, crucial and important. They gave Joseph the priesthood keys and powers necessary to administer the covenant of baptism and to organize the church. Read about those keys in section 27 and in section 128. However, that is not who Moroni mentions when Joseph’s a wee 17-year-old, he says, Joseph, I will reveal unto you the priesthood by the hand of Elijah the prophet. We’ll touch on that when we get to section 110. Why is Elijah’s priesthood this pinnacle priesthood? The Lord has been pointing Joseph’s mind to this moment since 1823. We’re gonna see that coming 13 years later in 1836, and there’s a lot that Joseph’s gonna learn in those years and up to then and later about what Elijah and his keys are doing.
Hank Smith: 00:30:27 I’ll reign in my excitement.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:30:29 Oh, so exciting.
Hank Smith: 00:30:31 This is what we do for fun.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:30:33 So awesome.
Hank Smith: 00:30:33 It is. Have we got the background do you think?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:30:37 One more bit of background history that can be helpful is that by January of 1836 the temple had been finished enough to the point that in the third floor where those dormer windows are those offices or the school meeting house, Joseph has an office at the far end of those and they start holding some sacred meetings starting in January of 1836 up in those third floor rooms while the rest of the temple is having the finish work done. So let me just read a little bit from Joseph’s own journal here on January 21st, 1836, Joseph and a number of church leaders, including his father and Oliver and Hyrum, Joseph says that they went to the printing loft by the temple where there was a schoolhouse quote where we attended to the ordinance of washing our bodies in pure water. We also perfumed our bodies and our heads in the name of the Lord.
00:31:32 They then went to the third floor of the temple on this far west school room where Joseph’s office was and Joseph says, quote, they went there to attend to the ordinance of anointing our heads with holy oil. They then anointed that oil and blessed each other. Joseph says, we invoked the blessings of heaven. They had great glorious visions. When this happens is during these January meetings, this is when Joseph has his vision of the Celestial Kingdom open up where he sees the Father and the Son. He sees Adam, Abraham and he sees his own mother and father and then sees his brother Alvin in the Celestial Kingdom, and that’s where we get the great teachings that almost act as a, he wonders how Alvin had obtained the Celestial Kingdom and the Lord tells him that all those who would’ve received the gospel had they been permitted to tarry can be heirs of that kingdom.
00:32:24 So it lays the groundwork ironically for the temple keys that will be restored in section 110 from Moses, Elias and Elijah. Joseph not only does that with some of the church presidents he calls them, he also is going to meet with other key church leaders like the Twelve and the Seventy and the High Councils of Kirtland and Missouri. There a few days later, they hold the same meetings. They go through washings and anointings and blessings and prayer, and they have glorious visions. This is just from their record quote, the gift of tongues fell upon us in mighty power. Angels mingled themselves with their voices with ours while their presence was in our midst and unceasing praises swell our bosoms for the space of a half an hour. Joseph says he finally went home at two o’clock and he recorded in his journal the Spirit and visions of God attended me through the night. This is in January of 1836 months before March of when the Kirtland temple will be dedicated. But if we understand that those preparatory meetings happened, then when we read about Joseph praying for the anointing to be sealed upon them in section 109, you understand better, oh, they had some preliminary meetings in here preparing them for an endowment of power and experiencing miraculous visions that might contextualize section 137 and the vision of Alvin a little bit more too.
John Bytheway: 00:33:57 You get the sense that the Lord was anxious to give them blessings, which I love. When I think of Elder Kearon’s statement of him being in relentless pursuit of us, he was relentlessly say, well, you just build the temple so I can outpour so many blessings even before the dedication, like you said in January. That’s interesting.
Hank Smith: 00:34:20 One thing that we’ve learned on our Voices of the Restoration episodes John, with Dr. Dirkmaat is Joseph Smith’s example of having unanswered questions. Alvin dies in late 1823, right Anthony?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:34:36 Yeah. Yep.
Hank Smith: 00:34:38 There’s an unanswered question right there. What happens?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:34:41 Mm-hmm.
Hank Smith: 00:34:41 What happens to Alvin? Then 1830 the church is organized, but Alvin’s not there. Then section 76, there’s a Celestial Kingdom, but you have to be baptized. Oh, well I guess Alvin’s not gonna be there. Where are we at now? Yeah, we’re at 10 years of an unanswered question. Then section 137 in 1836, it’s now been 13 years of an unanswered question. Alvin is in the Celestial Kingdom, but still the question is, well, how’s that? How’s that? Section 76 I thought you had to be baptized to go to the Celestial Kingdom and Anthony, isn’t it 1840s where that question is answered? I know that not everybody gets a chance to listen to our Voices of the Restoration, but I thought that was such a profound example of what you do with an unanswered question.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:35:34 Yeah. You wait and you let the Lord reveal things line upon line. Sometimes we want the answer, the solution, the fix right away. But remember the Lord is going to be doing his work of atonement, making things at one, complete, whole all the way up through the end of the millennium before he subdues all enemies under his feet. We’ve gotta learn to let the Lord work with us individually, with his church, with the world line upon line, precept upon precept over time.
John Bytheway: 00:36:08 I can think of other examples of that same idea. One of my Bythewayisms I love to tell my students you want Google speed answers to golden questions. Google, Siri, Alexa will tell you something like that. But golden questions they come in God’s time. I’m thinking of what we learned Hank from John chapter six. Remember way back then, remember that New Testament thing where Jesus says, you have to drink my blood. There’s a Levitical law against that, right? They must have been, we can’t. That’s when some no longer followed him and Jesus says, will you also go away? But Peter knows I’m gonna stick with you ’cause someday I’ll get the answer. You have the words of eternal life. Where would we go? And he does. The Lord later reveals, this is what you’re gonna do in remembrance of me. As a remembrance you’ll take the wine or the water. That was to me is one of those of Peter saying, I know I’m gonna get this one day so I’m gonna stick with you ’cause one day I know I’ll get the rest of the story.
Hank Smith: 00:37:20 I’m confused now, but I trust. I trust. I’m, I’ll move forward waiting.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:37:24 Yeah.
Hank Smith: 00:37:25 Yeah. Anthony, let’s keep going. What do you wanna do next?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:37:27 Okay. Joseph writes in his journal on March 26th, the day before of section 109. He just says, after breakfast I met with the presidency to make arrangements for the solemn assembly, which occupied the remainder of the day. End of quote, Oliver Cowdery records in his journal: met in the president’s room with President Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon, my brother, Warren Cowdery and Elder Warren Parish and assisted in writing a prayer for the dedication of the house. Joseph says his prayer was given by revelation like Elder Rasband and others today who have talked about modern dedications of temple and the Lord giving them lines of phrases of things to say to dedicate this temple. But Joseph says this was given by revelation. It was not a spontaneous prayer. He wrote it down. By the way, one of the reasons why it might have taken all day is because they also will print the prayer, meaning there’s a printing office that’s right by the Kirtland temple at this time.
00:38:31 They would’ve written it down and set the type and printed it up so that Joseph could read from a printed copy that they will then include in the Messenger and Advocate. They’re spending a lot of time getting this prayer right, getting it written, getting it printed, letter by letter typeset. The next day is Joseph goes to dedicate this. He pulls this out and reads this revelatory prayer, which is what section 109 is. I think Joseph’s giving us a model of powerful prayer, revelatory prayer here. The scene of the day, it’s Sunday, March 27th. It’s a Sabbath day. That’s the day of the dedication. Hank, as you read, they wanna start it at nine, but so many people get there they open the doors early and they can’t accommodate everybody, so they send some into overflow buildings in the schoolhouse next door so that they can hold their own meeting. Joseph will hold another dedicatory session later that week for those who couldn’t fit in, but according to Joseph, they crowd a thousand people in there.
John Bytheway: 00:39:31 Which is hard to believe.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:39:33 Yeah, personal space violated everywhere.
John Bytheway: 00:39:36 I am looking in that going, how did they do that? No flashing exit signs anywhere, but how did they get a thousand in here?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:39:46 Yeah. I want you to picture the people come in and crowd in. They have those beautiful four tiered pulpits on both ends of the lower and upper court. They’re in the lower court, so you can paint a visual in your mind, look towards the, what we would call the Melchizedek pulpits, and on the top row is Frederick G. Williams, Joseph Smith Sr. in the top center seat, the patriarch of the church and the prophet’s father obviously, and then WW Phelps. Second to the top is Sidney Rigdon, Joseph Smith Jr. in the middle and Hyrum Smith, third row down, David Whitmer, Oliver Cowdery and John Whitmer. Fourth row down on the one where the sacrament table is so to speak, is the presidency of the high priest. We would probably call that the stake presidency today. On the opposite pulpits, the Aaronic pulpits on the other side top row, you have the bishopric of Kirtland.
00:40:42 Second row you have the bishopric of Missouri or Zion. Third row down you have the teacher’s quorum presidency, which at that time were adult men. Fourth row down you have the deacon’s quorum presidency, again, adult men, and then in the pulpits on the sides, those corner ones that looked like choir seats, the Quorum of the Twelve were sitting in one, the high council sitting in another, the elder’s quorum presidency and the other just a really, really cool scene of the power of the priesthood, structure of the church to guide the saints of those who are in those callings. At that time, Sidney Rigdon is gonna be the one who conducts the meeting, has a large part of the dedicatory session. Sidney Rigdon will read Psalms 96 and 24. The choir then sings Adam-ondi-Ahman. Sidney gives an opening prayer. He then gives a sermon based off Matthew 8:18 to 20 about how foxes have holes and birds have nest, but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head.
00:41:42 He preaches on those three verses for two and a half hours.
John Bytheway: 00:41:46 Incredible.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:41:48 You thought that high council talk was long. Sidney is a powerful preacher. This is from the Messenger and Advocate quote, no one unequated with the manner of delivery and style of our speaker can from reading form any adequate idea of the powerful effect he is capable of producing in the minds of his hearers. To say that he did exceedingly well would be halting praise, so his two and a half hour talk was epic. People just loved it. They then sustained Joseph as the prophet and seer, and by the way, the way they sustained him was when Sidney puts his name to sustain Joseph, everybody in that room stands up to sustain him, which is a cool visual as well. At this time, they already have to have a 20 minute intermission. Nobody leaves, no one gives up their seat except for a few women, according to the record, had to care for some children, but they stay put.
00:42:49 They then come back, they sing a hymn. They sustain the First Presidency and the Twelve as prophets and seers. Then Joseph arises to give this dedicatory prayer. That’s what sets it all up. I think. With that, should we get into 109? Finally, I like to give breakdowns of sections so you can maybe know how to approach it on your own at home. This is just my own breakdown, so nothing official, nothing definitive. You might see different verses, but to me verses one through five is Joseph’s intro and his plea to the Lord. Verses six to 42 these are promises of endowment and the blessings of the temple. Verses 43 to 53 is a prayer for the church’s enemies verses 54 to 67 is his prayer for the rest of the world and in particular for the House of Israel, and then verses 68 to 80 is a prayer for a blessing upon the church’s leaders and the church as a whole. Those five sections, you know it’s not a perfect breakdown, but that can maybe help you at home see some shifts and some focuses as you go through this prayer.
John Bytheway: 00:44:07 Love that.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:44:08 Let’s start in the first section verses one to five, his intro and his plea. I love in verse one, the first thing he says is thanks be to thy name, oh Lord God of Israel who keepest covenant. I love that. I would mark and highlight that. On my Instagram I recently posted a little something and I made a little comment about the oath and covenant of the Father, and I put in parentheses, yes, God has covenants too that he keeps, and when I wrote that I thought, is that accurate? Is that doctrinally accurate? And then I read this in section 109 verse one that he, God keeps covenants. One thing that I would say up front here that back to Joseph’s pattern of prayer, one of the things you’ll notice through this whole section is Joseph will say, as thou hast said, or based on like this promise, Joseph is pleading for God to fulfill his promises that God has made like you promised us, your glory would be here.
00:45:11 You promised you’d manifest yourself. You promised, and he’s pleading in a humble way for God to fulfill the very covenant promises that the Lord asked. That might be a great insight for you and I, as we pray, is rather than only asking for what we want to look at what we want and ask ourselves what has God promised in connection to what we need and then to call upon God to fulfill those promises because he keeps his covenants. I just love that right from the very get go, you keep covenants and I’m gonna call upon those promised blessings.
John Bytheway: 00:45:51 I’m embarrassed to say sometimes I’ve quoted my patriarchal blessing to heavenly Father. Look, it says right here in paragraph five that you’re gonna do this right?
Hank Smith: 00:46:00 You signed this.
John Bytheway: 00:46:03 I love that and I like the way you said it Anthony he’s humbly saying, we’ve tried to do this so that this promise can be fulfilled. We’ve tried to do this so that this covenant can be fulfilled.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:46:13 Yeah, I don’t wanna frame it as Joseph being demanding, but he’s definitely showing he’s listening. He’s listening to the Lord and he is like, I know you’ve promised this, and I wanna call on the fulfillment of that promise. Again, in the intro, his big plea is in verse four where he says, we ask the Holy Father in the name of Jesus Christ, the son of thy bosom, and whose name alone salvation can be administered to the children of man. We ask thee oh Lord, to accept of this house, the workmanship of the hands of us, thy servants, which thou did command us to build. You could almost hear Joseph saying, please accept this as your house. We’ve built this for you. We’ve done our very best. Will you accept this? By the way he’s gonna close next to verse four, I would mark verse 78. He is gonna close the prayer in verse 78 by again saying, oh hear, oh hear, oh hear us, oh Lord, like three times that triple pleading and answer these petitions and accept the dedication of this house unto thee, the work of our hands, which we have built unto thy name. He almost repeats verse four, comes back to it to close off the prayer. That’s his plea. That’s what he’s hoping will happen.
Hank Smith: 00:47:38 If I wanted to mark the triple calling upon the Lord, where would I find those?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:47:43 That was in verse 78. Started in verse six, I blocked out six to 42 for some of these promises of endowment from six to nine, he’s going to cite Doctrine & Covenants 88:117 to 120 where the Lord commands them to build a house, a house of prayer, a house of fasting from that, so that’s six through nine. Quoting section 88, President Nelson, he said this about these verses, quote, this list of attributes is much more than a description of a temple. It is a promise about what will happen to those who serve and worship in the house of the Lord. They can expect to receive answers to prayer, personal revelation, greater faith, strength, comfort, increased knowledge, and increased power. I actually like to take those verses and ask myself, am I a man of prayer? Am I a man of fasting? Am I a man of faith, a man of learning, a man of glory, a man of order? Am I a man of God? And if I’m not, how can the holy temple help me to become such? Back to what we’ve said, this isn’t so much of them building a building. It’s what the temple’s building in us, my testimony that the more we worship in the house of the Lord, these attributes, these godlike attributes will be built in our lives as well.
Hank Smith: 00:49:10 Anthony, what you just said reminds me of one of my favorite BYU speeches. Listen to this. Becoming endowed with divine power is a little bit like going through a university program or degree. Just because we’ve been accepted doesn’t make us educated. The education comes slowly, even painfully, especially when everything is due at the same time around finals. Rarely does learning come dramatically or all at once. Most of it comes almost imperceptibly. Over time, the tuition of education is paid by persistence, but because of dedicated diligence, we’ve developed more power and capacity in our respective lives and fields than we had just a few years ago. In the Lord’s Temple we similarly grow in power and capacity by degrees as we learn and diligently implement the holy covenants and concepts over time. Now, listen to this John. You and I may fail to understand some assignments.
00:50:13 The Temple textbook often requires a lot of rereading to grasp the meaning, but the master teacher’s rubrics of standards is very clear, this most blessed professor holds open door office hours every day, and he is more than happy to revise your grade as you redo the assignments again and again as you figure things out. He believes in mastery learning and his semester never ends. But stop skipping or sleeping through class and don’t you dare drop out because you think it’s too hard or too confusing or not for you. Go to his class again and again and let him teach you. You will find yourself learning and growing and becoming endowed with more divine power and capacity as you do. John, I don’t know if you’ve ever read or listened to this devotional. It’s called We Need an Endowment. The speaker has great hair. His name is Dr. Anthony Sweat, and I’m just gonna encourage everyone, please go to speeches.byu.edu. look up We Need an Endowment. It will pair perfectly with your study this week. That was a good devotional, Anthony.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:51:25 Thanks buddy. Thanks for proofreading a version of it Hank, giving me feedback on it. Those were probably all your lines.
Hank Smith: 00:51:33 Yeah, I remember actually writing that specific section.
John Bytheway: 00:51:37 I love the lines, learn, grow, and become. I feel like maybe this is just me, but I feel like ever since President Dallin H. Oaks talk, the Challenge to Become was that in 2000 more of an emphasis on not just what we’re supposed to know, not just what we’re supposed to do, but the whole outcome is what are we becoming. Even in our brief discussion today, what were these people becoming by preparing a temple, a house of the Lord, and then what does the Lord want us to become? When I hear become, I love that word, it’s a process.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:52:12 It is a process, and maybe that links in really well with Joseph’s prayer. If we can jump to verse 15, look what he says here, that they may grow up in thee and receive a fullness of the Holy Ghost. Now, those are two powerful lines. Joseph is praying for the Saints here that we can grow up in the Lord. He’s almost referencing here a little section 93, grace by grace growth, and I love that line, a fullness of the Holy Ghost. Our prophets have taught repeatedly that through the holy temple and the Endowment of power from on high, we receive a fullness of the Holy Ghost. This is Elder Renlund, quote, by making and keeping Temple covenants, we learn more about the Lord’s purposes and receive a fullness of the Holy Ghost. We receive increased capacity to fulfill our purposes in mortality. President Nelson in 2024 said, we are promised in the temple we may receive a fullness of the Holy Ghost. Imagine what that promise means in terms of having the heavens open for each earnest seeker of eternal truth. End of quote.
00:53:27 I think it’s important for us to grasp here that just as anybody can be influenced by the Holy Ghost, when we get baptized, we are commanded to receive the Holy Ghost. We have to live our lives in such a way to receive that constant influence of the Holy Ghost, but we are then pointed towards the Holy Temple where we are promised a fullness of the Holy Ghost or a greater endowment of power that comes through the covenants and concepts of the Holy Temple, that if we’ll implement those, the Holy Ghost will be more poured out even more fully upon us. We have to go receive that. We don’t receive the Holy Ghost in a day. We don’t get endowed with power in an hour. It takes a lifetime of learning to implement the covenants and the concepts to really receive a greater, greater portion of this fullness of the Holy Ghost that’s prayed here and promised here.
Hank Smith: 00:54:28 But one might go into the temple for the first time and come out saying, oh, I don’t feel all that different. Yeah, that’s because you’ve experienced a tiny portion.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:54:37 Yeah. I mean that’s like a little bit also like saying, I went to the gym and lifted for 10 minutes and my body’s not transformed. Yeah, some of us are just built naturally like Hank or John, but the rest of us
Hank Smith: 00:54:53 have to work at it a little bit.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:54:55 Have to work at it day by day. In verse 20, he says, no unclean thing shall be permitted to come into this house to pollute it. There he’s gonna make a reference to section 97 of the Doctrine and Covenants where the Lord says, build a house unto my name. Do not suffer any unclean thing to come into it, that it be not defiled, and if so, my glory shall rest upon it. Yea and my presence shall be there for I will come into it and all the pure in heart that shall come into it shall see God. A few comments with that. Number one, President Eyring said he connects seeing God and being insufficiently pure President Eyring says this, President Russell M. Nelson made clear for us how we can see the Savior in the temple in the sense that he becomes no longer unknown to us.
00:55:52 President Nelson said this, we understand him. We comprehend his work and his glory, and we begin to feel the infinite impact of his matchless life. Then President Eyring says, if you or I should go to the temple insufficiently pure, we would not be able to see by the power of the Holy Ghost, the spiritual teaching about the Savior that we can receive in the temple when we are worthy to receive such teaching, there can grow through our temple experience, hope, joy, and optimism throughout our lives. That hope, joy, and optimism are available only through accepting the ordinances performed in holy temples. There’s a a few things to unpack there, but the Lord does want us to come into His house worthy. If there’s anybody listening right here who, sometimes we are extremely hard on ourselves, I love in this very prayer where Joseph says in verse 21, and when thy people transgress any of them that they may speedily repent and return to thee.
00:56:57 None of us are free from sin and imperfection and fault and failure. None of us. The greatest way that we can live the gospel is to speedily repent. When we see ourselves drifting from a standard or a teaching that we know we should be living, and if they’re serious, then we visit with our priesthood leaders. We work with them to be worthy to go to the Lord’s house in openness and honesty, not demanding perfection. For many of us, the Lord wants our dedication and that dedication is often manifest through repentance. I just love that connection, like let’s be clean and if any of us have drifted, let’s speedily repent so that we can come into this house knowing that we’re being honest and open before the Lord.
Hank Smith: 00:57:44 Anthony, I’m so glad that you said that it’s built into the program. It doesn’t say, and if thy people transgress, and when thy people transgress, that’s a very hopeful thing that you’ve said. It’s not meant to keep you out. It’s meant to bring you in.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:58:03 Yep. Let’s never forget that repentance is part of the gospel. It is just as joyful as faith. Faith, repentance, baptism, Holy Ghost, all four of those are positive. Not three out of the four. All four of them are wonderful gifts. It’s not a question of if we’re gonna sin, it’s only a question of if we’re gonna repent.
Hank Smith: 00:58:27 Yeah.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:58:28 I’ve come to know in my life a Lord of mercy who delights in mercy, both in my own life as I’ve had to grow in degrees, try to receive more and more of the Holy Spirit and become bit by bit endowed with power. The Lord has been so merciful with me, conditioned on repentance always, but I’ve also had the privilege to witness him be so merciful with others conditioned on repentance. If there’s anybody listening who feels that they’re too far off the path or too far gone or they can’t come around or that they can’t make it to the house of the Lord, I testify you can. The power of the Lord’s grace and his atonement is beyond what you and I can comprehend to bring us back to him and back to his house, to his presence.
John Bytheway: 00:59:25 I had the same thought, Hank, when thy people transgress, I love the comma and then the any of them. Don’t count yourself out of this group right here. I thought that was beautiful. The question isn’t if we’re gonna sin the question is if we’re gonna repent. Yeah, that’s good. Beautiful.
Hank Smith: 00:59:45 I like the four Rs of verse 21. Repent, return, restored and reverence.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 00:59:52 That’s great Hank.
Hank Smith: 00:59:53 That’s the pirate’s favorite letter too. Arrrrr.
John Bytheway: 00:59:56 No, it be the C.
Hank Smith: 01:00:02 I could feel the rolling of the eyes across the listeners. I sense great disturbance in the listeners.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:00:13 Can we jump to verse 22?
Hank Smith: 01:00:15 Oh yes. This is one of my favorites
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:00:17 And we ask thee, Holy Father, that thy servants may go forth from this house armed with thy power and that thy name may be upon them and that thy glory be round about them and thine angels have charge over them. Mark right there. Four blessings of the temple, you’ll be armed with greater power. I don’t know a single soul who doesn’t need greater power to do good and to be good and to do right and to do God’s work. We all need to be more armed with power. Second blessing, the Lord’s name will be upon them. In the temple as Elder Bednar has taught, he gave a great talk back in 2009 called Honorably Holding a Name and a Standing. He taught that in the holy temple we more fully and completely take upon us the name of Jesus Christ, that the waters of baptism point us to the Lord’s house.
01:01:18 We are more able to have the Lord’s name upon us. Third blessing, the Lord’s glory will be round about them. By the way, without getting too deep on that one, the Lord’s glory is centered in bringing other people up to eternal life. This is my work and my glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. We glorify the Lord by bringing other people up to him. So how will the Lord’s glory be round about us? It’ll help us in our families and in our relationships and in our wards to bring other people to Christ and to the Father. The Lord’s glory will be upon you. I read that as you and I’ll better be able to serve in our families and in the church to do his work. And then last, angels will have charge over you and I. We’ll have help from the other side of the veil to teach, to bless, to guide, to lead, to correct. I don’t know. Those are four pretty good blessings of the holy temple right there in that one verse alone.
John Bytheway: 01:02:23 I just put numbers in the side of that verse for those four promises, angels have charge over them. Yesterday I was talking to Kim about this idea. Don’t you think if there’s a whole lot of delegating here in the way we do things in the kingdom of God on Earth, that there’s gotta be a lot of delegating there? We’re talking about who these angels might be. I have a quotation from John Taylor. This is my favorite President John Taylor quote. It’s one of those that just gets better and better. He said, God lives and his eyes are over us and his angels are round and about us. It gets better. And they are more interested in us than we are in ourselves. And then it gets better. 10,000 times but we do not know it. The idea of angels being more interested in us than we are in ourselves, then put the number 10,000 to it. Whoa. They are interested in us more than we are in ourselves, which is astonishing ’cause we all know people who are pretty interested in themselves, but this has said 10,000 times more. 10,000 interested. What a beautiful statement that the other side cares about what we’re doing.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:03:46 Yeah. Joseph Smith said, the heavenly priesthood will unite with the earthly priesthood.
John Bytheway: 01:03:54 Oh man.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:03:55 The heavenly priesthood are not idle spectators. I love that phrase. They’re not idle spectators. As you were saying that, John, I pulled up this quote from Joseph F. Smith. When messengers are sent to minister to the inhabitants of this earth, they’re not strangers, but from the ranks of our kindred friends and fellow beings and fellow servants. In like manner, our fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters, and friends who have passed away from this earth, having been faithful and worthy to enjoy these rites and privileges, may have a mission given to them to visit their relatives and friends upon the earth, bringing from the divine presence messages of love, warning, reproof, and instruction to those whom they learn to love in the flesh.
John Bytheway: 01:04:43 Hank, I’m gonna hold this up and will you read it?
Hank Smith: 01:04:45 It says, don’t underestimate your family on the other side of the veil, Jeffrey R. Holland. That’s beautiful, John.
John Bytheway: 01:04:55 I know that so many of us as listeners have lost our parents. There’s times when I’ve just been thinking of my dad and then the thought came to me. I wonder why I am thinking about him so intensely right now. Could he be helping me right now with this? Some of those moments, I think uh-huh, I think he is. I love that promise. It expands our view of the plan, doesn’t it? On the other side of the veil, they’re helping us. The other side of the veil is involved in this process that we’re going through.
Hank Smith: 01:05:30 John, if you remember, we had Dr. Derek Sainsbury with us. He’s come on twice. It was, this was the first time he was on. We were talking about this very subject. He off the cuff said, well, you know that angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost. I stopped him. I said, what? He said, yeah, angels, our ancestors, they’re gonna speak to us through the Holy Ghost second Nephi 32. I know that verse, but I’d never seen it like that. Of course, it’s gonna feel like the Holy Ghost. I like what you said there, John, with a little touch of them who they are. Anthony, didn’t Joseph Smith say they can’t be saved without us, and I think I understand that they don’t have bodies. I do. But then didn’t he reverse it and say, and we cannot be saved without them.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:06:23 And then he actually adds a third group and neither they nor us can be saved without those that died in the gospel also. He in context seems to be talking about those that died without the gospel and that were performing this work in their behalf, but he is also hinting that there are people on the other side that are laboring in our behalf, the faithful who have died in the gospel as well. There’s two-way interaction here. Without going off too much on sealing since Cindy and I wrote that third book on sealing, part of what sealing is doing and that these keys that are gonna be given to Joseph is to create a link for families to organize heaven, and the church has taught heaven is organized by families. It’s not so much about living with each other. Sometimes when we talk about sealing, we’re like, oh yeah, we’re gonna be together as though we’re in the same celestial living room or something.
John Bytheway: 01:07:21 Same condo or something.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:07:22 Yeah. The eternal family barbecue. That falls apart really quickly. We realize that what sealing is doing, probably more than anything, is it’s creating a divine network to facilitate the eternal reach of all of God’s children so that none of them are lost and all of them could be ministered to, brought into the covenant. That desire to. It’s a network of eternal ministry and that sealing creates that network that extends on both sides of the veil. It’s powerful. I don’t want to get too definitive or declarative on who these angels are that minister or that have these angels that have charge over us, but it seems that the sealing network is creating a linkage of those who do have a ministry to us, it seems logical that they’ll come from our own family lines. They and us laboring together on both sides. It’s a beautiful thought.
John Bytheway: 01:08:28 Yeah. I love the renewed emphasis for the youth on the temple. I think it started probably when Elder Bednar talked about, Hey, the youth are great with computers and technology, and maybe they can start really helping us do family history. I mean, do you remember the first time you heard deacons called to be family history specialists? Oh, what a cool thought that was. Now, when you go to the temple, it is so easy to take a member of your family, one of your cousins. You take those names to the temple. Perhaps that’s more the norm now is that you’re taking a member of your family and making that network, as you said, I love that.
Hank Smith: 01:09:08 I think our grandparents who did the laborious family history work would be exceedingly astonished at how I can go onto my phone.
John Bytheway: 01:09:20 Family name. Boom.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:09:22 Ordinances ready.
Hank Smith: 01:09:24 Ordinances ready. Oh, yeah. This person needs some temple work done. I remember once walking out of the temple and I was at the prayer roll and I was writing a name on one of the papers there. My wife, she said, isn’t that interesting that we come here and we get a little piece of paper with someone’s name on it and we’re gonna do a work for them, and then we leave a little piece of paper with someone’s name on it. She said, I wonder if these are the names that those on the other side pick up and say, I’ve gotta go do a little work.
John Bytheway: 01:09:52 Oh, I love that, Sara that’s awesome. Sarah bringing it home. That’s cool. Our friend Sheri Dew, I love this statement of hers, the gospel of Jesus Christ reaches across the street, across the world, and across the veil.
Hank Smith: 01:10:10 Thine angels have charge over them. I think we could spend a long time there, Anthony, but let’s keep going.
John Bytheway: 01:10:15 Yeah, we really could.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:10:15 Let’s keep going. Let’s look at some of these other blessings and again, President Nelson has told us to read this section and look for how the temple blesses us. Look at verse 24. We ask the Holy Father to establish the people that shall worship and honorably hold a name and standing in this thy house to all generations and for eternity. We’re blessed through the temple and the later covenants and ordinances are revealed that we can honorably hold a name and standing in the house of the Lord, like as part of his people for all generations and for all eternity. Verse 25, we’re promised that no weapon that is formed against us shall prosper. Connect it to verse 26, no combination of wickedness will have power to rise up and prevail over thy people upon whom thy name shall be put in this house. These are huge blessings that come from temple work.
01:11:22 Here’s at least seven blessings that section 109 says can come to us through worship in the temple. Verse 15, you’ll get a fullness of the Holy Ghost. Verse 22, you’ll be armed with God’s power. Verse 22, God’s name will be upon you, his glory round about you and his angels have charge over you. Verse 24, you’ll hold a name and a standing in God’s house for all generations and all eternity. Verse 26, no combination of wickedness will have power to prevail over you. I’m gonna add a few more on there. Verse 34, as all man sin, forgive the transgressions of thy people and let them be blotted out forever and couple that with verse 42, speaking of the elders being faithful and preaching the gospel at the end of 42, they’ll be clean from the blood of the wicked. There’s a promise that your sins will be forgiven you and you can become clean from the blood of this wicked generation.
01:12:26 And then in verse 35, let the anointing of thy ministers. That’s why I touched on that in the context that some of them had already been washed and anointed and blessed. Let the anointing of thy ministers be sealed upon them with power from on high. There’s a minimum seven blessings of endowment that are listed right there in section 109. My wife and I, Cindy, as I was prepping for this, I shared with her some of those verses and we were talking. She said, you know, those are big concepts, big phrases, but we started to share with each other back and forth about how we had seen some of these that are evident in our own lives. I would invite any listener at home, look at these blessings that are listed here. Talk with your family members or your loved ones or the people who are around you.
01:13:20 Talk with them about how you’ve seen some of these blessings from the house of the Lord be present in your life. These are big, big promises, and I think they’re part of what President Nelson was telling us in his 2024 talk to study and find the powers that help you and I meet the challenges of our life. Let’s just never forget that endowment is not a ceremony. Endowment is a spiritual capacity. Endowment is a capacity or an ability to know God, to do his work, to overcome the adversary and to ultimately receive a fullness of his exalted blessings. 109 is laying out what some of those blessings are to help us do that.
Hank Smith: 01:14:04 Anthony, let me repeat what you just said with a question. I’ve heard you say this many times. There is a difference between the presentation of the Endowment and the Endowment. I’ve even heard you say, if I can get that one thing.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:14:19 That one concept.
Hank Smith: 01:14:20 That one concept, it’s gonna be well worth my time.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:14:25 Yes.
Hank Smith: 01:14:25 Why is that so important to you?
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:14:27 That’s so important to me because I know I have sometimes confounded those two ideas that because I went through the ceremony or because I went through the ritual or I made the covenants, or I received the promises, that somehow I’m endowed with power. Remember, section 84 says, in the ordinances thereof, the power of godliness is manifest or it’s shown to us. In other words, ordinances act almost like a door that open up possibilities for us, but we have to go through that door and claim them. The moment that happens, it makes me say, oh, okay. These covenants and concepts that are being presented to me in the Endowment are manifesting God’s character and will, or they’re making possible things that I can obtain. If I will live the concepts and covenant, it makes endowment be active on my part. That’s why I say, you and I don’t get endowed with power in an hour.
01:15:33 Let me give a personal experience in the current presentation of the Endowment, of course, we’re given sacred information. We covenant to only reveal that at certain places to not do it publicly. People might be like, how does that endow me with power? The moment you and I start to go, oh, you’re teaching me a concept that I am symbolically entering into a closer relationship with God and that he wants to see if I can be trusted in the same way that a spouse or a child might come to you and I and say, Hey, mom, hey dad. Hey honey, we gotta talk about something and don’t air it to the neighbors, to the ward members. In the same way that a priesthood leader or Relief Society President has to receive information in a ministering interview but can’t share it because it would betray confidence. In the same way in your work, you’re given maybe some information that shouldn’t be shared. You have to develop a character of confidence where people can trust you. This is a long way for me saying recently, the other day I had something come up and somebody asked me a question and I’ll keep it somewhat vague, but I just had to say to the person, I can’t go into that with you because that’s confidential information and I hope you can respect my need to keep that confidential.
Hank Smith: 01:17:01 I made a promise.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:17:03 Yeah, I made a promise. Where I learn that kind of behavior is I learn it in the Endowment. I learn it in the Lord saying, oh, this person has self-control and is willing to be trusted with confidential or sacred or private information. Therefore, I can trust them more. Joseph Smith one time said, why does the Lord not reveal his mysteries unto us? Because we cannot hold them, but share them when we shouldn’t. I literally go through the Endowment presentation and I say, what is this teaching me to know or to feel or to do to be a more God-like person? And then I go try my best to implement that in my life and I notice that I have greater spiritual power. That’s why I wanna separate there’s a difference between presenting these concepts and receiving the power from them in our lives.
John Bytheway: 01:17:54 Mm-hmm. As with so many things in the gospel, I feel like the older I get, the more I think that’s not an event, that’s a process. There’s a difference between a temple wedding that’s an event, but a celestial marriage, that’s an ongoing process of ups and downs and repentance and working together, and when I even look at the article of faith number four, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Ongoing process. Repentance, ongoing process. Baptism. Okay, there’s an event of baptism, but that is an event that signifies that process of being born again, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost as a reception of it, a process every day, and I think the more I think about it, the more everything is a growth becoming process.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:18:45 Receiving the Endowment of power is a process in the same way that building a celestial marriage is a process or being born again is a process.
Hank Smith: 01:18:54 Sometimes we say things in a way that describe this inaccurately things like, I took out my endowments, or I was endowed last week. Again, probably not a big deal. I don’t want that to come across like it’s a big issue, but we could talk about it differently in a way that would more accurately describe what’s happening.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:19:18 A good question to ask ourselves is, do I have more spiritual power in my life today than I did five years ago, 10 years ago, 20 years ago? Am I growing grace by grace? Am I, to use this phrase from this section, am I growing up in thee and getting more of a fullness of the Holy Ghost? Ask ourselves questions like, do I comprehend God better? Do I understand his work better? Am I more full of faith, hope, and charity? Am I more humble? Am I more able to serve others? Am I better in particular at being a great family member? Because eternal life is family life. This is why endowment is an ability. If we say somebody is endowed, they have some sort of a capacity or they have some sort of a strength, they have some sort of an ability. These are questions we can ask ourselves to say, am I growing in my capacity? That’s why the great talk from Brad Wilcox tying into section 88 to every kingdom there’s a law given. We have to be able to abide by those laws. We have to grow in our ability to do so. It hints at this continued growth throughout life and into the next, not just a momentary event. It’s not a one-time event. It’s a eternal pursuit.
Hank Smith: 01:20:47 Anthony, you brought up verse 35. Let the anointing of thy ministers be sealed upon them with power from on high. Now, I know when I give a blessing to someone who is sick, there’s two parts to that blessing. There’s an anointing and a sealing. Are those tied together in the temple the same way? I mean, I know I start with an anointing in the temple and I finish with a sealing.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:21:11 That blessing is sealed in the temple. Yeah. That word, without getting too specific, that word is part of our initiatory blessings if we pay attention to it.
Hank Smith: 01:21:24 Same words, we use those same words in giving a blessing to a sick.
Dr. Anthony Sweat: 01:21:28 Yeah.
John Bytheway: 01:21:29 I love that.