Before I get into bed at night, I always kneel and have prayer.  As part of my prayer last Saturday night I prayed specifically for direction about the lesson on knowledge that I'd be teaching the High Priests the next day.  I thus went to bed thinking about the lesson, and about our need to be in daily pursuit of the acquisition of knowledge.  My body and mind relaxed, and I rested through the night.

When a person follows this procedure, he opens the way to revelation.  The Spirit has a difficult time speaking to a person in the middle of a busy day when one's cares and occupations are front and center in his mind.  But a person's mind goes blank during a restful night.  As his first consciousness happens in the morning, the Holy Ghost has an opportunity to speak and be heard.  It's therefore profitable to pay attention to one's first waking thought.

On this occasion my waking thought was a single word.  I knew exactly what it meant, and from whence the thought came.  The word was "drifting."  Unless we daily set aside time to read from the scriptures and from the words of the prophets, we're drifting.  If we're drifting, the winds and the currents that are constantly moving our world will gradually move us off course, and we'll fail to reach our goal.

For instance, there is currently a lot of noise in the world about people's rights and freedom to choose.  Those are noble-sounding words.  But the thrust of them is that a person has the right to choose whether or not to be a parent, whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, whether or not to have a same-gender marriage, and whether or not to submit oneself to "death with dignity" or assisted suicide.  There are many flattering and well-phrased falsehoods being taught by the world, and unless a person is regularly feeding his mind with correct principles, he is in danger of imbibing false ideals and of drifting off course.

Joseph Smith said that "A man is saved no faster than he gets knowledge, for if he does not get knowledge, he will be brought into captivity by some evil power in the other world, as evil spirits will have more knowledge, and consequently more power than many men who are on the earth.  Hence it needs revelation to assist us, and give us knowledge of the things of God."  (History of the Church 4:588).

In that quotation Joseph Smith pointed out two things that are needed if we expect to reach our goal of salvation and exaltation.  Those two things are revelation and knowledge.  We open ourselves to receive revelation as we pursue the acquisition of knowledge through study, prayer, meditation and church attendance.

Perhaps the best place to receive revelation and knowledge is in the temple.  If one's mind is prepared, one can't go to the temple without receiving revelation.  Do you want answers to the perplexities of life?  Go to the temple.  If possible, plan to stay there for more than one session.  It's on the second or third session that you'll receive your answer.

Once upon a time I was totally stressed out.  I was a bishop with eight or nine children.  I'd taken a full-time job in town with the reasoning that my older boys were old enough to run the farm, and thus free me up to bring in some extra income.  In reality, I was still running the farm, and working as many hours as I had previously.  I found myself cringing every time the telephone rang.  I was snapping at my children.  I didn't like the person I was becoming, and I didn't like my outlook and feelings.  I needed some answers to why I was feeling this way.

I went to the temple.  I went all by myself.  I went through an endowment session, and then sat in the celestial room and prayed.  Nothing came.  I got another name, went through another endowment session, and again sat in the celestial room and prayed.  As I did so, a one-liner went through my head.  Like my experience with the single word "drifting," I immediately knew the source of the one-liner.  The still, small voice rarely speaks discourses.  It usually gives us just a sentence, or perhaps a single word.  They're often things that haven't been in our minds up to that point.  In this case the one-liner was:  "It is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength."

There was my answer.  I immediately knew what I had to do.  I was to go home and quit the job that I had in town.  I did so, and life became sweet again.  In retrospect I should have been smart enough to figure that out on my own, but I wasn't.  The Lord was only too happy to tell me what to do, but I had to first humble myself, go to the temple, and schedule time to do more than one endowment session.  The revelation came after I'd done the second endowment.  To show gratitude for the instruction I'd received, I got another name and went through a third session.

I thought it interesting that the Holy Ghost put a scripture in my mind as the answer that I sought.  When I heard the words, "It is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength," I thought, "That comes from the Bible."  I went home and looked it up.  It turned out that those were king Benjamin's words from Mosiah 4:27.  Could the Holy Ghost have put those words in my mind had I not already read them?  Probably.  But the fact that I'd studied my scriptures undoubtedly made things easier for the Spirit to speak to me.  I also made it easier for the Spirit to speak to me by taking myself out of the busy world, going to the temple, leaving my cares outside, and focusing on spiritual things.

I have spent all my church life looking forward to Sundays.  Sunday is the day when I can take myself out of the world, forget most of my cares, focus on spiritual things, and serve my fellow man.  It's a day of rest from the noise of the world.  But last April I noticed that all of that changed.  Now I look forward to Wednesdays.  Wednesday is the day I go to Boise and serve as an ordinance worker in the temple.  For 6-1/2 hours every week I get to be in that peaceful atmosphere where evil doesn't penetrate.  I spend the time serving many, many people, both living and dead.  I'm happy, I'm thinking good thoughts, and I'm rubbing shoulders with 40 of the finest, most worthy men that I've ever known.  There are 1200 of these men and women serving in the Boise Temple as ordinance workers.  That's an army!  And what a wonderful army to be associated with!

Serving in the temple has done something wonderful to me.  For three months before I was called, I was expecting to be.  I had noticed that Abraham "sought for the blessings of the fathers, and the right whereunto (he) should be ordained to administer the same."  (Abraham 1:2).  I took license from that and asked my bishop and stake president if I could serve as an ordinance worker.  During our stake temple week in April, when I was in the temple for two consecutive days, I was called in to visit with President Waite, was interviewed, was asked which shift I would like to serve, and was set apart on the spot.  On Sunday I went to Boise for a training session.  On Wednesday I was serving my first shift.  After several weeks of service, I had had the opportunity to do everything that an ordinance worker does.  After several months I had everything memorized, and was able to concentrate almost exclusively on making the temple experience meaningful to the patrons that I served.

But the most meaningful thing was what happened inside me.  During the time that I waited for my call—and thereafter—I concentrated on my worthiness.  I'd always said that I wanted to be a temple worker when I grew up.  I've finally grown up.  I'm more worthy, and feel better about myself than I ever have.  There's a peace inside me that exceeds what I've felt before.  I'm in control of my thoughts, my passions, and my emotions.  I don't feel critical of people.  I don't feel any inclination to lose my equanimity and say or do things that I'd regret.  This is a miracle, and I owe it to the temple.

Harold G. Hillam, our recently-released temple president, told me about the saints in Manaus, Brazil with whom he became acquainted when he served there in his assignment as a general authority.  Manaus is a major inland city in the Amazon basin.  Our own Theo Davis is presently serving as a missionary there.  It is 1000 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, but ocean liners are able to reach it by coming up the Amazon.  There are no roads leading to Manaus.  To get to the temple the saints in Manaus must make a 4-day journey by boat and then a 3-day journey by bus.  Despite their poverty and hardships, they do it regularly, and in droves.  They even come with their children so that sealings can be performed.  President Hillam met the saints as they arrived at the temple and debarked from the buses after 7 days of being crammed together in uncomfortable conditions.  Despite those conditions they were happy and smiling and grateful to be at the temple.  They always stay a whole week.  They arrive at the temple early in the morning to be ready to serve in the first session, and stay until the temple closes at night.  President Hillam was there to bid them farewell as they boarded the buses to take them home again.  He said that the change in the people was astonishing.  They'd been happy when they arrived, but the peace that surrounded them when they left was a thing to be envied, admired and emulated.

Because of the faithfulness of the saints in Manaus, they'll shortly have their own temple.

I don't know that increased temple attendance by the people in the La Grande Oregon Stake would ever make it possible for a temple to be built closer than our Boise Temple; but I do know that increased temple attendance would make more peaceful saints, and cause the people around us to envy, admire, emulate and want what we have.

Temple attendance is a win/win situation.  It makes better people of us, and unstops the dams that keep people from progressing in the Spirit World.  Four times in the Doctrine and Covenants it says that "whatsoever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."  (D&C 124: 93; 127:7; 128:8; 132:46).  We understand about "binding" and "sealing," but to what does "loosing" refer?

Joseph Smith said that, "There is a way to release the spirits of the dead; that is by the power and authority of the Priesthood—by binding and loosing on earth."  (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pg. 192).  "As soon as the law of the Gospel is obeyed here by their friends who act as proxy for them, the Lord has administrators there to set them free."  (Ibid, pg. 367).

The people in spirit prison are entitled to know what is being done with their names and in their behalf by people in mortality.  Imagine the joy they feel when the angels, who must be constantly coming and going, finally come for them.  I believe that it's their privilege to witness temple ordinances being performed in their behalf.  I believe that all of them are anxious to have the work done.  There are few pains as exquisite as suspense.  Many of these people have remained in a state of expectation for a very long time.  In April 2005 President Eyring quoted Wilford Woodruff as saying that "he believed few, if any, of the ancestors of the Latter-day Saints in the spirit world would choose to reject the message of salvation when they heard it."  (ENSIGN, May 2005, pg. 78).

President Hinckley said that "when we engage in proxy work in the temple, (we) become as saviors to those on the other side who have no means of advancing unless something is done in their behalf by those on earth."  (ENSIGN, November 2006, pg. 11).

Twenty years ago I read in the ENSIGN one of the most significant and instructive articles that I've ever read anywhere.  I insert it here:

MORE THAN NAMES

The page was faded and yellowed, and jagged, uneven holes punctuated the spidery script.  It was the record of a christening that had taken place in Spain on the nineteenth of February 511 years ago.

The date had been fairly easy to decipher.  A concerted effort, seasoned with years of experience and a fervent prayer, had eventually given the worker the name of the father, then the mother, but the child's name simply was not there.  Years, mildew, and hungry mice and insects had gnawed away at the page, leaving it illegible.

The extractor had come across the entry on the microfilm the day before, and after a diligent effort had gone home, resolving to return to it after a day of prayer and fasting.  But today the record was still impossible to read.  The worker had gone on, but was compelled to return to it often throughout the afternoon.  Finally, she determined to give it one last try before forcing the unsettling entry out of her mind.

As she turned the microfilm knob, the name almost leapt off the page.  She stared unbelieving at the clearly formed letters.

"Elena Gallegos, the name is Elena Gallegos," she excitedly called aloud.  A handful of workers, aware of her struggle, quickly clustered around, marveling at the name plainly displayed on the terminal.

As she hurriedly copied the name, a warm closeness encircled her.  "I felt as though I was being hugged," she explained afterward.  Later when she returned to the entry to double-check her work, the words were once again illegible.

To those working in the Church's extraction program, such experiences are common, though there is nothing common about them.

"Spiritual experiences happen almost daily to those involved with this work," explains D. Norman Allred, coordinator for the extraction program in the Camp Verde Arizona Stake.  "Many of us don't have spiritual experiences every day.  But this work is akin to temple work; a special power attends you."

For almost fifty years the Church has been microfilming genealogical records throughout the world as part of its mission to redeem the dead.  Now the Church vaults contain more than 1.5 million rolls of microfilm, a number that is growing by about four thousand rolls a month.  Copying vital information from the films is the role of the extraction program and is an essential part of the Church's genealogy program.

The number of names extracted yearly has grown from about twenty thousand names extracted in 1977 to more than thirteen million names in 1985.  About 875 stakes throughout the Church have extraction programs, with roughly 12,500 volunteers participating.  About 85 percent of the names sent to the temples for baptisms, endowments, and sealings come from this program.

The efforts of the name extractors in the Camp Verde Arizona Stake are representative.  For nine years the stake has consistently met established goals and standards, both in quantity and quality, with well over two hundred thousand names extracted annually!  The approximately thirty "genealogy missionaries" in their stake donate thousands of hours yearly, with an impressive accuracy rate.

But the real story is more than numbers and statistics.  It is a story of commitment, dedication, and—above all—love.

The Camp Verde Stake, made up of seven wards and two branches, lies in the heart of Arizona about two hours north of Phoenix, covering an area roughly 140 miles wide by 85 miles long.  The Verde River bisects the stake, providing a natural physical division between the spectacular red rock beauty on the west and the pine-covered mountains on the east.

In 1978 John E. Eagar, president of the new Camp Verde Stake, set out to bring the blessings of genealogy work to the members of his stake.  The seeds had been planted years before when President Eagar had served as mission president in the Costa Rica San Jose Mission.  While there, he represented the Church in obtaining permission from Costa Rican officials to have thousands of government records microfilmed.  President Eagar had developed a firm testimony of genealogy work and now petitioned Church officials to allow his stake to do extraction work.

The Church Genealogy Department had just completed a pilot extraction program in St. George, Utah, and felt the experiment was successful enough to duplicate on a widespread basis.  Camp Verde was given the go-ahead to establish a Spanish name extraction program.

President Eagar turned to Lauritz G. Petersen, a stake high councilor who was also a professional genealogist.  Brother Petersen had recently retired from his job as a researcher for the Church Historical Department and was teaching genealogy classes at Yavapai College in Cottonwood, Arizona.  Would he accept the call to set up and oversee the extraction program in the Camp Verde Stake?

Of course Brother Petersen would serve wherever asked; it was a bonus that the calling happened to deal with one of his great loves, genealogy.  But establishing the program—finding space in already-full meetinghouses, coordinating the work, ordering equipment and supplies, and calling the right people—ran head on into more obstacles than anyone had anticipated.

"I'm sure Satan was waging an all-out battle against us.  He didn't want us to be successful," says Brother Petersen, reflecting on the difficulties nine years ago.

The first year was tough.  Despite the efforts of dedicated people, the fledgling program seemed doomed to fail.  Lauritz Petersen was depressed and ready to quit.  Sincere prayer, fasting, and soul-searching for days that stretched into weeks, then months, had brought no clear answers.

Finally one evening, after a particularly anguished prayer, Brother Petersen settled into bed, telling his wife, "That's it, I'm quitting.  This just can't be worth what it is costing the members of this stake."  He finally drifted into an uneasy sleep.

"Lauritz, Lauritz."

He was awakened hours later by a voice calling his name.  He turned to check his still-sleeping wife.

"Lauritz, Lauritz Petersen."

Puzzled, he glanced toward the foot of the bed, but the bedroom wall had disappeared, and hundreds of people filled the room.  A dark-complexioned man of medium height detached himself from the crowd and came toward him, repeating his name insistently.

"Lauritz, what do you see over here?" the man asked, gesturing to where the dresser should have been.

"Many people, singing and dancing in a circle."

"That's right," the man affirmed.  "They are those whose names your stake has extracted.  Because of your work, they have been able to have their temple work done.  What do you see on this side?" he continued, gesturing to the left.

"People praying."

"Can you hear what they are saying?" he prompted.

As he strained to hear the voices, suddenly the sounds became distinguishable.  "Father, please bless Lauritz Petersen," they pleaded.  "Bless him to carry on with this work and not quit."

"These are the people whose names are on the records in your possession, but have not yet been extracted," the man explained.

"Who are all of these people?" Brother Petersen questioned, pointing to the multitudes straight ahead, whose eyes stared into his own.

"Their names are on the records that will be sent to you if you carry on with the program," the spokesman continued.  "Lauritz, this is an important work.  Please don't quit."

"I won't," Brother Petersen promised.  Then the room was once more empty and he found himself gazing at the bedroom wall.

"I knew the Lord wanted the extraction program in this stake," he says.  "It didn't matter who ran it or what problems we had; it would be successful."

Brother Petersen lay awake for the rest of the night, making plans to revamp the program.  But one thought kept haunting him:  " 'How did all of those people know my name?'

"It was certainly a testimony to me that the Lord knows each of us individually and cares about what we are doing," he adds now.

One of the answers he received that night was that Norm and Sandra Allred should be the program's coordinator and trainer.  Today, anyone involved in the Camp Verde program will tell you that Brother and Sister Allred have been the key to this program's success.

—Derin Head Rodriguez, ENSIGN, January 1987, 12-15.

Everything that we do in this Church is directed toward the temple.  All teaching, administering, service, and ordinances are intended to have as their culmination the saving and exalting ordinances and covenants of the temple.  Boyd K. Packer points out that these covenants are more than important.  They're more than necessary.  They're crucial to our exaltation.  No wonder that when properly taught, all men want them.

How blessed we are to have been able to receive these ordinances and make these covenants for ourselves while here in mortality.  How blessed we are to have a temple just two hours away.  What a priceless opportunity is ours to be able to receive these ordinances and covenants for others who cannot do so.  How grateful those people must be for our efforts.  Joseph Smith said that in the next life they will "embrace our knees."

In the April 2007 general conference President Hinckley told about a widow in Idaho Falls.  He said that over a period of 15 years she acted as proxy in giving the temple endowment to 20,000 individuals.  "She completed her 20,000th endowment on a Friday and returned on Saturday to do five more.  She passed away the following week.  "Just think," he said, "of what this one little woman did.  She performed these vicarious endowments for as many people as are assembled in this Conference Center this morning.  Think of the reception she must have received on the other side."  (ENSIGN, May 2007, pg. 85).

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I am grateful for the temple.  I'm grateful for my covenants.  There is nothing more important on this earth.  I pray that the Lord will help us all to keep ourselves focused on what is truly important so that worldly winds and waves will not divert us from our goal.

—James E. Kerns

18 November 2008