During the summer of 2005, Greg’s work relocated our family from Dallas, Texas to American Fork, Utah. We purchased a home that was very happily situated just a few hundred yards from the doors of the Mount Timpanogos Temple. That temple was always before our eyes: Playing kickball with the kids on the green space—the temple. Early morning drives with Ryan to Jazz Band—the temple. Sitting at soccer games, the elementary school playground, our front steps—the temple. The proximity of our family to that House of the Lord influenced my living. It made everything about everyday life feel sacred and hallowed.
I’ve thought a lot about that since then and I have decided that “sacred” is really how living should feel. And “hallowed” is how caring for, or providing for, a family should feel. Living near that temple brought those feelings to me in a way I have not forgotten.
This observation has become a symbol to me of what I will call today “reverent living”.
Definition of Reverence
Elder Lionel Kendrick taught that, “To be reverent is not just to be quiet.” It isn’t just arm-folding and sobriety, like we commonly think. He said that “Reverence involves thinking, speaking, feeling, and acting as we would in the presence of the Lord.” (1)
“Reverent living” is faith, love, gratitude, and humility in everyday life. It is deliberately processing your surroundings and finding in them that which is godly. “Reverent living” is the ability to see the sacred, the beauty and the hand of the Lord in our lives. Then in awe, we behave accordingly.
It’s no wonder that President Marion G Romney said that reverence, or ‘reverent living”, is, “…the depth of one’s nature…” (2), “…the soul of true religion…” (3), and “…a sign of spiritual maturity, strength, and nobility.” (4)
And David O McKay confirmed that “The greatest manifestation of spirituality is reverence”. (5)
From whence it springs? From a love of God!
So, from whence does this kind of “reverent living” spring?
Our journey to “reverent living” starts when we “have paid the price to know the glory of the Father and His Son. (6) Because “…those who have the most profound reverence…are the people who know Him best. (7)
God is our Heavenly Father and we are literally his Spirit Children. His Plan of Salvation gifts to us the opportunity to become like Him. The Plan provides bodies that Christ’s Atonement makes immortal and perfect, and mortal life with experiences and growth that Christ’s Atonement can make clean. As our understanding of God, His Plan and His Son increases, so does our respect and honor for them. It brings us to a place of humility. Our mind is opened more and more to the truth that all things—life—is spiritual. (8) That is when we will “Stand all Amazed”. (9)
Elder Perry taught that “Reverence is an attitude toward Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. It is a private feeling. It is something we feel inside our hearts no matter what is going on around us. “(10) Reverence is internal. When you are developing faith and testimony, you are changing into a respectful, reverent person with decorum and dignity. (11)
Much like other character traits that we are to develop in this life, it is gradual. It is line upon line, and precept upon precept. (12) All of us started as little children, and President Romney says we were “not naturally inclined” at that time to reverence. But, we can, and we must, grow grace for grace. (13) That awe, or to revere, step by step changes our natures into reverent people.
Here is one experience that I remember from my personal line upon line journey:
When I was about 13, I attended a Girl’s Camp. One night I was lying on a big, granite rock in Big Cottonwood Canyon, looking up at the night sky. There were sparkly stars covering the entire sky. In that moment of awesomeness, I had the distinct impression that little me, tiny on that boulder was loved and cared for by the Supreme Being who had power to create universes. But instead of feeling insignificant, I was filled with warmth. Even in His grandeur, I knew that to Him, I was significant and loved.
Experiences like that one, one by one on top of another, plant in us a knowledge that just in living, we are walking and standing on holy ground. And when we know it, we will act reverently. (14)
Personal Times of Reverence- Linked to the Plan of Salvation
I do much of my recording of personally significant feelings and ideas on my little blog. And just for curiosity, I did a little search of my entries from the past few years. I searched for the word “sacred”.
I typed it in, and the entries fell down the page: Family History cemetery research, having a newborn, funerals, Nauvoo, evenings with a house full of bathed and fed preschoolers in Minnesota, the hall of prophets at the Conference Center in Salt Lake, dinner dates with Greg, scriptures by my boys beds at night, an afternoon watching my little boys play in the forest, reading the Ensign, going to the temple, covenants, our bodies, mothering, and responsibilities in the kingdom.
Most of these experiences are SO everyday….why did they feel so sacred?
Because--- they are all pinned directly to Heavenly Father and His Plan of Salvation, with Christ as our Savior. All of those things revolve around—life-giving, bodies, tests and trials, ordinances, family, mothering, sociality, and finally, death.
Ta-da. Earth Life, as part of the Plan of Salvation!
Things that Hold us Back
So, if the adversary wanted to cheat us of the companionship of the Holy Ghost and its attendant “reverent living”, and I testify that he does, then he would attempt to cheapen God, His Plan and Christ, our Savior.
Those evil objectives are the core of all the arguments from the great agnostics and antichrists of the Book of Mormon. And the work of the Korihors and Zeezroms of our day is just the same. If the adversary can strip us of the understanding of God and a belief in His plan, then people can be their own Gods. They can focus on self and the things of the world. It is a “ploy”, as McKay would say, to steal from people “a sense of the sacred”, to steal from them “Reverent Living”.
Elder Christofferson explained, “…those who do not appreciate holy things will lose them. (And) absent a feeling of reverence, they will grow increasingly casual in attitude and conduct. They will drift from the moorings that their covenants with God could provide. Their feelings of accountability to God will diminish and then be forgotten. Thereafter, they will care only about their own comfort and satisfying their uncontrolled appetites. Finally, they will come to despise sacred things, even God…” (15)
“The world in which we live in will do everything in its power to draw reverence out of us and leave us empty shells.” (16)
We must leave what seems so normal in the world—and the philosophies, and the intellectualism, the selfishness. We must reject the ideas that we see splashed on the TV screen, and in movies, and in song lyrics. “Get thee hence”! (17) Like Christ with the money changers at the temple— sheer from our lives all that offends God and runs counter to His plan for us. (18)
Those things will halt our personal ability to feel the Spirit, and thus they rob us of reverence.
Result of Reverent Living
As we grow towards this goal of “reverent living” we will see our desires change to mimic Heavenly Father’s Plan for us:
We will have a respect for life.
We will resist behaviors that would injure our bodies.
We’ll desire children, and want to raise them in families.
Fathers will want to provide, and mothers will want to nurture.
Interactions with friends and strangers will be kind because we know that they are children of God.
We’ll be submissive to challenges and trials.
We’ll doggedly hold onto the promises we made in baptismal and marriage covenants.
We’ll dignify death and wait for life eternal.
Because of what we know, President Romney said that “…Latter-day Saints should be the most reverent people in the world…” (19)
Conclusion
Many of us here today are familiar with, or even remember the delivery of, Elder Bruce R McConkie’s last Conference talk entitled, “The Purifying Power of Gethsemane.” (20) Some time ago I read the events surrounding that talk in a Biography written by his son, Joseph. I share them today because I think that it is a powerful synopsis of “reverent living”. Throughout a lifetime of spiritual scholarship and righteous living, Elder McConkie developed a relationship with God, and Christ, and The Plan. That knowledge brought to his life and to his gospel teaching a seriousness, a sobriety, a reverence, a holiness that lives on through his words today.
In April of 1985, Elder McConkie was gravely ill with terminal cancer. As April Conference approached, his strong desire was to be able to deliver a talk. One day, his wife recalled that Elder McConkie entered the kitchen while she was making pie and asked if she would like to hear his talk. “He…started to read me his talk and the tears streamed down his face, and he didn’t get more than a couple of sentences out and I thought to myself, ‘You don’t make apple pies when someone is saying these things to you.’” And so she sat down. She asked him how on earth he would be able to deliver the talk because he was ‘so touched’ that he couldn’t even read it. As the day came closer, the doctors told him that he would be too weak to speak and worried that he would pass out at the pulpit. But he was intent on delivering this last testimony and pleaded with his family to pray that he would have the strength and composure he needed.
Joseph describes the day, “As he rose to speak, his face was drawn and thin, his skin so yellow…his steps those of a man many years his senior: nevertheless, he stood tall and spoke with confidence and power.” And these are the words that he said, “I am one of His witnesses, and in the coming day I shall feel the nail marks in his hands and in his feet and shall wet his feet with my tears. But, I shall not know any better then than I know now that he is God’s Almighty Son, and that he is our Savior and Redeemer….God grant that all of us may walk in the light of God, our Father.” (21)
Brothers and Sisters, that is my desire and my hope, too—that our faith and testimonies of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ will develop and grow until we, too “walk in the light of God our, Father”. And that walk, I believe, is “reverent living”.
1- L. Lionel Kendrick, “Enhancing Our Temple Experience,” Liahona, Jul 2001
2- Marion G. Romney, “Converting Knowledge into Wisdom,” Tambuli, Oct 1983
3- Marion G. Romney, “Converting Knowledge into Wisdom,” Tambuli, Oct 1983
4- Marion G. Romney, “Reverence,” Ensign, Oct 1976
5- David O McKay, Conference Report, Oct. 1956
6- L. Tom Perry, “Our Prophets and Apostles Speak to Us: Reverence,” Liahona, Mar 2002
7-Marion G. Romney, “Converting Knowledge into Wisdom,” Tambuli, Oct 1983
8- D&C 29:34
9- LDS Hymns # 193, “I Stand All Amazed”
10- L. Tom Perry, “Our Prophets and Apostles Speak to Us: Reverence,” Liahona, Mar 2002
11- Idea from See Marion G. Romney, “Reverence,” Ensign, Oct 1976
12- 2 Nephi 28:30
13- D&C 93:12-13, and idea from D. Todd Christofferson, “A Sense of the Sacred,” Liahona, Jun 2006, 28–31
14- Gordon B Hinckley, “Reverence and Morality”
15- D. Todd Christofferson, “A Sense of the Sacred,” Liahona, Jun 2006, 28–31
16- Earl Swain, CES Director at BYU-I Devotional, 18 March 2008
17- Moses 1:16
18- John 2: 13-17
19- Marion G. Romney, “Reverence,” Ensign, Oct 1976, 2
20- Bruce R. McConkie, “The Purifying Power of Gethsemane,” Ensign, May 1985
21- The Bruce R McConkie Story, Joseph Fielding McConkie, Deseret Book, 2003
