If you're a good basketball player, and are tall enough, and can jump high enough, you can do a lay-up.  You accomplish a lay-up when you leap three feet into the air and simply dunk the basketball into the 10-foot-high net.  The crowd cheers, and you run down the floor with the feeling that you've done something great.

I've never in my life done a basketball lay-up, but it occurs to me that the Savior has commanded us all to do spiritual lay-ups.  He says:  “Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt ...”  (3 Nephi 13:20).

Helaman counseled his sons to “lay up for yourselves a treasure in heaven … which is eternal, and which fadeth not away.”  (Helaman 5:8).

How do we fulfill this commandment to do lay-ups?  How are we to make deposits of treasures in our celestial safe deposit boxes?  What are the treasures we can lay up?  I would love to build that account.

I accomplished a spiritual lay-up when I was baptized at age 20 and made covenants to always remember my Savior and to keep His commandments.  A crowd on the other side of the veil cheered when I made that lay-up.  The crowd was composed of my progenitors and my future posterity.  They had been holding their collective breaths to see if I'd really carry through and do it.  Their salvations depended upon me making that lay-up.  They were rooting for me.  They were actually praying for me.

Joseph Smith said that “Enveloped in flaming fire, they are not far from us, and know and understand our thoughts, feelings, and motions, and are often pained therewith.”  (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pg. 326).

Job says that we “shouted for joy” when it was announced in our pre-earth life that we would be sent to earth to receive bodies and to experience mortality.  (Job 38:7). That's probably what the crowd did when I made that baptismal lay-up.  I'd previously made covenants with those people that I'd see to it that they would have temple ordinances performed in their behalf.  Their salvations depended upon my making that baptismal covenant.  The crowd went wild when I made the lay-up.

Baptism is a treasure that neither moth nor rust can corrupt.  Nothing can corrupt it except my own disobedience.  So much light has come into my life since my baptism that I don't want to ever again experience the darkness that was in my head prior to making that lay-up.  That was 56 years ago.  I've been glowing ever since in that wonderful feeling of accomplishment as I've been running up and down the floor.

I made another supremely important lay-up when I took my bride to the temple to be sealed to me.  I dunked it that time.  That treasure is mine forever.  All I have to do to keep that treasure is to keep the commandments, be consistently kind, and diligently do everything I can to keep that treasure polished and shining.  I have no doubt but what the premortal crowd composed of our 10 children, our 56 grandchildren, the 250 great grandchildren and their posterity all shouted for joy when Marjorie and I made that spiritual lay-up.

What we do really does matter.

What you do is going to affect thousands of lives—either positively or negatively.

Our children's children surely rejoiced at the births of each of their parents.  The births of our 10 children were most definitely lay-ups of treasures.  Because of temple covenants, nothing can take them away from us.

We might have wished that we could have been through having babies when Ivy arrived, but Eli's children shouted for joy when he was allowed to be number 10.  Marjorie cried when she realized that she was pregnant at age 46, but what a treasure we were blessed with!

You accomplished a spiritual lay-up when you gave a Book of Mormon to your friend.

You accomplished a spiritual lay-up when you finished reading the Book of Mormon again last week.

There was loud cheering in your head when you finished reading the New Testament for the 5^th time.  You knew that you'd done a great thing.

You did a spiritual lay-up when you changed that lady's flat tire, and took dinner to that sick or bereaved family.

You do a spiritual lay-up every time you pay tithing.  You might think that you're putting the Lord in your debt, but “He doth immediately bless you” (Mosiah 2:24), so you're still in debt.

But your celestial safe deposit box is getting fuller.

The compliment you gave someone was a lay-up.  So was the uncalled-for smile.

It was a spiritual lay-up when you bit your tongue and didn't make that biting remark.

It was a lay-up when you bore your testimony.  It even got recorded in heaven.  (D&C 62:3)

It was a lay-up when you successfully passed up that temptation.  The unseen crowd cheered again, and you felt good about yourself.

“Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt ...”

We're all building that account.  Nothing can erase that smile, that kind remark, that generous act, or that testimony.  Your account is a lot fuller than you think.

Keep working at your lay-ups.  You get better the more you practice.