Retain in Remembrance

In his final message in general conference President Nelson said this in the context of temple closures because of COVID-19: “Meanwhile, keep your temple covenants and blessings foremost in your minds and hearts. Stay true to the covenants you have made.” As I think about this invitation to keep our temple covenants and blessings in our minds and heart, I’m led to wonder how we can effectively do that. With the demands of daily life it can be hard to keep that kind of focus. It reminds me of the Book of Mormon phrase that is repeated several times to “retain in remembrance” their own fathers and the Lord. The people of Nephi did “retain in remembrance” the name of their first leader so that subsequent kings were called by his name (Jacob 1:11). King Mosiah did invite his people to “remember, and always retain in remembrance, the greatness of God” along with our own nothingness (Mosiah 4:11). When Alma questioned the people of Zarahemla who were straying from the gospel path, he asked this: “And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, you that belong to this church, have you sufficiently retained in remembrance the captivity of your fathers? Yea, and have you sufficiently retained in remembrance his mercy and long-suffering towards them? And moreover, have ye sufficiently retained in remembrance that he has delivered their souls from hell?” (Alma 5:6) He wanted them to always remember what the Lord had done for their fathers in delivering them and showing mercy and long-suffering. He witnessed to his son that he did indeed remember: “He has also brought our fathers out of the land of Jerusalem; and he has also, by his everlasting power, delivered them out of bondage and captivity, from time to time even down to the present day; and I have always retained in remembrance their captivity; yea, and ye also ought to retain in remembrance, as I have done, their captivity” (Alma 36:29). He kept foremost in his mind his fathers and the way the Lord had blessed and helped them.

I believe these passages tie in well with President Nelson’s invitation to remember the temple and its covenants. The Nephites sought to remember their fathers just like Malachi said we need to do, that the “the heart of the children” should turn “to their fathers” (Malachi 4:6). Perhaps that is how we follow President Nelson’s invitation; as we continue to learn about our own families and ancestors we are putting the temple and its covenants foremost in our minds and hearts. If we “retain in remembrance” the stories of our past and in particular how the Lord has blessed our family in our lives and in the lives of our ancestors, we are fulfilling one of the purposes of the temple to bind families together and create a “welding link” between us and our fathers (Doctrine and Covenants 128:18). And as we remember them we must seek to “remember Him” and His greatness compared to our nothingness before Him. It is through the goodness of the Savior that the covenants of the temple are available to us; it is through Him and His great atoning sacrifice that we can be sealed together in families and rise again from the dead. Indeed the symbolism of the temple points powerfully to Him as we covenant to keep the commandments of the Lord there. As we seek remember Him and His house that He invites us to, we will have His Spirit and the spirit of that holy place to be with us even when we cannot be there in person.