My dear Brothers and Sisters, like you, I have spent the last few weeks thinking a lot about the life, ministry and legacy of President Thomas S. Monson. One of the stories that he recounted 3 times in General Conference has been a favorite of mine. He tells of a time in 1965 when he was traveling in Australia from Sydney to Darwin to dedicate a first chapel built there. On the way they stopped off to refuel in a mining town called Mt. Isa. During the layover he met a woman named Judith Louden and her 2 children. Her husband was not a member of the church and they were the only members of the Church in the entire region. As part of their conversation, Sis Louden asked for advice about how she might influence her husband to show an interest in the gospel. President Monson said that he counseled her to include him in their home Primary lesson each week and be to him a living testimony of the gospel and urged her never to give up on her husband. President Monson then said, “We departed Mt. Isa, a city to which I have never returned. I shall, however, always hold dear in memory that sweet mother and those precious children extending a tear-filled expression and a fond wave of gratitude and good-bye.” He continued, that 10 years later he presided at a Stake Conference in Brisbane Australia where he recounted the story of Judith Louden in the priesthood session and described the impact her faith and determination had made on him. As he concluded the story, he said, “I suppose I’ll never know if Sister Louden’s husband ever joined the Church, but he couldn’t have found a better model to follow.”
Then, Pres Monson said, “One of the leaders raised his hand, then stood and declared, ‘Brother Monson, I am Richard Louden. The woman of whom you speak is my wife. The children [his voice quavered] are our children. We are a forever family now, thanks in part to the persistence and the patience of my dear wife. She did it all.’”
This story is important for me for a couple of reasons. First, it is important because one of those children, Ann Louden, was someone I knew as a Young Single Adult in the Brisbane Australia Stake.
The second reason is much more personal because there is another story that comes out of that Stake Conference. But it’s a story that President Monson never knew about. The Sunday General session convened the next day at the Kangaroo Point Chapel. It generally took my family about an hour and a half to get to that chapel, but for Stake Conferences we would always leave our home at about 7:00 am for the 10 o’clock session. My mother and grandmother always wanted to get there early so that they could get “a good seat in the chapel.” I must have been around 12 years old at the time, and I remember that I certainly did NOT appreciate my mother’s preparation. Frankly, I did not like attending Stake Conference. I thought that it was boring. As kids we weren’t just sitting for the 2 hours of the Conference: we ended up sitting for about 6 hours, taking into account all of the driving and all of the sitting before the session started. There was absolutely no way that my mother would let us run around while we were waiting for the session to start—we spent that time sitting in the pew! On this particular day my Mum was even more eager to be there early enough to get good seats because an Apostle of the Lord was going to be there and we didn’t have that opportunity very often as I was growing up.
Some forty years later, there are only two things that stand out vividly in my mind about that Stake Conference: the first is that President Monson told a joke—surprise, surprise!, and the second is the impact that joke had on me. There are lots of versions of this joke on the internet, but this is the one that correlates best with my memory:
A man bought a horse from a preacher. The preacher told the man that this horse had been trained in a very unique way. The only way to make the horse go, is to say “Hallelujah!” The only way to make the horse stop, is to say, “Amen!”
The man was pleased with his purchase and immediately got on the animal to try out the preacher’s instructions. “Hallelujah!” shouted the man. The horse began to trot. “Amen!” shouted the man. The horse stopped immediately.
“This is great!” said the man. With a “Hallelujah,” he rode off very proud of his new purchase. The man travelled for a long time through some mountains. Soon he was heading towards a cliff but he couldn’t remember the word to make the horse stop. “Stop,” said the man. “Halt!” he cried. The horse just kept going. “Oh, no, ‘Bible!, Church!, Please stop!” shouted the man but the horse just kept going, and even began to go faster. With each step he was getting closer and closer to the cliff edge. Finally, in desperation, the man said a prayer, “Please, dear Lord. Please make this horse stop before I go over the edge of the cliff, In Jesus’ name, AMEN.” The horse came to an abrupt stop just one step from the edge of the cliff.
In a sigh of relief, the man leaned back in his saddle and shouted, “HALLELUJAH!”
How I wish that President Monson was here to recount that story in his own inimitable style! Of course, I don’t do it justice, but the story is not my point. The point is that, on that day, this 12 year old girl, who most certainly did not want to be at Stake Conference, was mesmerized by this large, imposing, and entertaining speaker who I had never heard of before, but whom I would never forget. That day was the first day that I remember enjoying Stake Conference. Six months later I came back with a very different attitude, and I have loved attending Stake Conferences ever since. President Monson knew something of the impact he had on the Louden family, but he never knew the impact that he had on this young kid. I will be eternally grateful to him for that.
Now, my dear Brothers and Sisters, for Latter-day Saints, the doctrine of agency is central to our understanding of the Plan of Salvation. President Dallin H. Oaks has taught that “Moral agency—the right to choose—is a fundamental condition of mortal life. Without this precious gift of God, the purpose of mortal life could not be realized. To secure our agency in mortality we fought a mighty contest the book of Revelation calls a ‘war in heaven.’ . . . The test in this postwar mortal estate is not to secure choice but to use it—to choose good instead of evil so that we can achieve our eternal goals.” In his address to his son, Jacob, Lehi taught, that because of the Messiah’s redemption, we “have become free forever. . . to act for ourselves and not to be acted upon.” He continued, “Men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself.” Then Lehi makes this impassioned plea of a father who is about to pass into the next realm of his eternal existence, “And now, my sons, I would that ye should look to the great Mediator, and hearken unto his great commandments; and be faithful unto his words, and choose eternal life, according to the will of his Holy Spirit” (2 Nephi 2:26–28).
In the premortal world we chose God and his plan. In mortality, no longer in the constant presence of God, with a veil placed over our memories, and living in a world of choices, we have the opportunity, the responsibility, to once again step forward and choose God. In thinking about this opportunity and responsibility I have found myself thinking deeply about the Old Testament patriarch Jacob and I would like to spend today sharing some of those thoughts with you.
Jacob is something of an enigmatic figure, whose story artfully weaves together the multi-colored threads from both the profane horizontal interactions of human relationships with the vertical interactions in the sacred realm of the Divine-human encounter. While his story is primarily centered on his becoming the great patriarch of the Abrahamic covenant, it is laced throughout with the all-too-human flaws that include deception, sibling jealousy, rivalry, and even threats of fratricide from his brother that, frankly, rivals any modern soap opera! These flaws are not what we normally associate with God’s chosen leaders. But maybe that has more to do with our expectations than with reality. We all know that the only “perfect” person to experience mortality was Christ. As we read in Hebrews, he “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15; cf. D&C 45:4). But the rest of us, including Jacob, are not one-dimensional individuals, either perfectly good or completely bad. Rather, he, like us, used mortality to learn how to become as God is. One of the characteristics that I love about the scriptures is that God chooses very imperfect people to participate in his work of salvation and as they respond to those invitations, we see him magnifying them. Please don’t misunderstand what I am trying to say. Jacob was undoubtedly among those whom his grandfather Abraham saw in the premortal realm whose souls “were good” and whom God had chosen to “make [his] rulers” (Abraham 3:23). What I am suggesting is that, just like us, in mortality he had to use his agency to “become,” and that was a process that took some time. In Jacob’s case the scriptural record gives us, what we might call, a rich portrait of that process of “becoming.” I hope that as we talk about him today that all of us will engage in the story, not just as passive onlookers, separated by some 4,000 years, but that we will be active participants in the story: trying to see ourselves in Jacob’s story, able to recognize that there is something of Jacob in all of us, both in his struggles and in his efforts to reach out and make the great Abrahamic covenant his covenant. This was a choice that he made, and it is a choice that each one of us will also encounter. If we are wise, we can learn important lessons from this great Patriarch of the Old Testament.
ABRAHAMIC COVENANT
To understand Jacob’s journey of becoming, we must first set the stage with a basic overview and reminder about his grandfather, Abraham. In the ancient world people believed in a variety of different gods. These gods were often geographically based. The Mesopotamian pantheon, for example, was distinct from the pantheons in Canaan or Egypt and wars were often understood as battles between the gods to see whose god was the most powerful. Latter-day Saint scripture records that when Abraham was living in the land of the Chaledeans, he “sought for the blessings of the fathers” and desired to “become a greater follower of righteousness” (Abraham 1:2). Even though those around him, including his father, chose to worship “the gods of the heathen,” Abraham chose Jehovah to be his God (Abraham 1:5, 15–19).
The Biblical account records that when Abraham was in Haran, Jehovah directed him to take his family and relocate to a place called Canaan where He promised Abraham, “I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed” (Genesis 12:2–4). The account in Abraham 2:9–10 also contains Jehovah’s promise to include the blessings of Priesthood and the Gospel for Abraham and his seed. As Abraham left Haran and entered the land of Canaan he travelled through Shechem and close to Bethel where, in both places, he built altars to Jehovah (Genesis 12:6–8). (These two places will also be important in the Jacob story).
Once Abraham and his family had eventually settled in Canaan (after a trip to Egypt), Jehovah extended the promised blessings to include the promise of seed that would be as numerous as the stars in the heaven. Jehovah and Abraham then formalized their relationship with a sacred covenant (Genesis 15:3–18). The strength of Abraham’s commitment to this covenant becomes apparent when we see his willingness, as commanded by Jehovah, to sacrifice his son, Isaac (Genesis 22). One of the important aspects of this covenantal relationship was that Abraham continued to serve Jehovah wherever he was: in Haran, Canaan and also in Egypt. This covenant extended across geographic boundaries. Jehovah made a similar covenant with Abraham’s son, Isaac, “because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws” (Genesis 26:2–5).
JACOB'S JOURNEY TO BETHEL AND PENUEL
As Abraham’s grandson, and Isaac’s son, Jacob undoubtedly grew up learning about the covenant that Jehovah had made with his fathers. But as we all know, just because something is important to parents, it doesn’t always follow that it will also be important to the next generation.
Even before he was born Jacob’s mother Rebecca received a revelation while he and his brother, Esau, were still in the womb that God had indeed chosen Jacob to be a ruler, Rebeca learned: “Two nations are in thy womb. . . and the elder shall serve the younger” (Genesis 25:23). Unfortunately, the fulfilment of this revelation resulted in protracted tension between the two brothers.
The first step we see of Jacob’s seeking to “become” was his efforts to obtain the birthright. In the Ancient Near East the birthright son was generally, but not always, the first-born son. Financially, he received a double portion of inheritance, but in Judaism, there was also an important spiritual element. Just as the house of Israel was called God’s “first-born” (Ex. 4:22), so the birthright son had a special relation with God and was “set aside as a possession of God.”
Even though he was the second son, Jacob wanted that birthright and so he devised a way to obtain it. He waited until Esau came in from hunting and was hungry and then offered to provide him with some bread and a bowl of cooked lentils if he would vow to sell his birthright to Jacob (Genesis 25:29). Esau acquiesced, “Behold I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me?” Some have understood this event as evidence for the contrast in spiritual proclivity between the two brothers. For example, President Oaks notes, “The contrast between the spiritual and the temporal is . . . illustrated by the twins Esau and Jacob and their different attitudes toward their birthright. The firstborn, Esau, ‘despised his birthright’ (Gen. 25:34). Jacob, the second twin, desired it. Jacob valued the spiritual, while Esau sought the things of this world. When he was hungry, Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage. . . (Gen. 25:32).” President Oaks then cautions modern readers that “Many Esaus have given up something of eternal value in order to satisfy a momentary hunger for the things of the world.” Still, one wonders whether the birthright, particularly the spiritual aspect, was even Esau’s to sell, let alone Jacob’s to buy?
The second, and more telling example, that Jacob was still in the process of becoming is his effort to again displace his brother in order to receive the blessing which his elderly father, Isaac, sought to give to Esau (Genesis 27). At the instigation of his mother, and knowing that his father’s “eyes were dim” (Genesis 27:1), Jacob sought to imitate Esau by putting on Esau’s clothes so that he would smell like Esau, and attaching animal skins to his hands and neck so that he would feel hairy like Esau. He then took his father’s favorite meal to him. Isaac suspected that something was not as he intended and twice during their conversation, asked his son to identify himself. Both times Jacob falsely declared that he was Esau (Genesis 27:19, 24). It is perhaps not coincidental that one of the meanings of Jacob’s name in Hebrew is “he who deceives.” Isaac then gave Jacob a blessing that corresponded with the revelation his mother had received many years before: “Therefore God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine: Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee: be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother’s sons bow down to thee: cursed be every one that curseth thee, and blessed be he that blesseth thee” (Genesis 27:28–29). When Isaac found out about Jacob’s deception he was understandably upset, but still acknowledged that Jacob would be blessed (Genesis 27:33).
As you can imagine, Esau’s reaction was not so measured. With a play on words, he declared, “Is not he rightly named Jacob (Hebrew = ya‘qōb)? For he hath supplanted me (Hebrew = ya‘qǝbēnî) these two times: he took away my birthright; and, behold, now he hath taken away my blessing” (Genesis 27:36). In his anger at being replaced or supplanted again by Jacob, Esau determined that after his father’s death he would slay his brother (Genesis 27:41). Given this animosity, Rebecca and Isaac decided to send Jacob on a journey to his mother’s family in Padan-aram, or Haran (Genesis 27:43; 28:2), hoping that the period of separation would give time for Esau to cool down but also hoping that this would be an opportunity for Jacob to find a wife. Although his mother expected Jacob to only “tarry with [her brother for] a few days” (Genesis 27:44), the journey ended up taking twenty years, and she would never see her son again.
Before he left Beersheba, Isaac gave his son one more blessing, pleading for God to also extend the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant to him: “May God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people; and give thee the blessings of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham” (Genesis 28:2–5).
JACOB'S JOURNEY TO HARAN AND BACK
Jacob’s journey from his home in Beersheva to Haran serves as a major theme in Jacob’s story line not just because of the miles travelled and the time it took, but because of the spiritual metamorphosis that takes place within him during the journey. As you’ll recall, Haran was not just the home of his mother’s family, it was also the place where Jehovah first invited Abraham to enter into a covenant relationship with him. In many ways Jacob’s journey was a re-creation of his grandfather’s journey. Bracketing this journey are two important spiritual experiences which define that metamorphosis: one at Bethel at the beginning of the journey and one on the banks of the Jabbok River on his way home.
The man who returned from this journey was not the same one who left Beersheva. While he certainly gained a family and wealth, more importantly, he gained a yearning to make the covenant of Abraham and Isaac, his covenant as well.
In 1989, as a student, I attended a Forum address at BYU in Provo. The speaker was a philosopher name Abraham Kaplan who made a comment that I have thought about a lot in the ensuing years. He asked why the scriptures repeatedly talk about “the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?” Why the repetition? Isn’t the God of Abraham the same as the God of Isaac and Jacob? Wouldn’t it be easier to just refer to the God of Abraham? His answer was that the phrase, “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob” is a reminder to all readers that both Isaac and Jacob had to make their own covenant with God. They could not simply rely on the fact that their father had made the covenant. What was important for Jacob was his personal relationship with God!
BETHEL
The first stop on Jacob’s journey was at a place that he would call Bethel. “And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep” (Genesis 28:11). I have never been able to read that verse in the same way since I visited Bethel many years ago. Clearly he had lots of options for pillows!
“And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and theGod of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again to this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of” (Genesis 28:12–15).
With this scene the troubled horizontal human interactions that permeated Jacob’s narrative in Beersheba are replaced by a vertical Divine interaction between Jacob and Jehovah. Something very important is going on here. The Prophet Joseph taught that with the dream of the ladder, Jacob saw the “mysteries of godliness” and President Marion G. Romney compared Jacob’s encounter here to a temple experience. Certainly there are good reasons to support this assessment. The ladder, for example, symbolizes a person’s leaving behind the world and climbing through successive stages of holiness until he or she enters the heavens and the presence of God. That Jacob understood it as a temple experience is evident by the name he chose for this site—Bethel—which in Hebrew means, “the house of El, or God.” In the Jacob narrative, this is the first time that God interacts directly with Jacob and it is here that he extends the invitation for him to join his father and grandfather and also enter into a covenant with Jehovah. It was an invitation for Jacob to choose Jehovah rather than the gods of the Canaanites where he dwelled. This is the very experience that Isaac had hoped for as he sent his son on his way. President Romney further taught that with this vision, “Jacob realized that the covenants he made with the Lord. . . were the rungs on the ladder that he himself would have to climb in order to obtain the promised blessings—blessings that would entitle him to enter heaven and associate with the Lord.”
There are indications that Jacob accepted the covenantal invitation: he set up a pillar, as a memorial stone of what had taken place there, and he promised to return to God a tenth of all that he would give Jacob (v. 22). But there are also hints that Jacob had some reservations about the covenant. He wanted God to prove himself before he fully committed. Notice the “If. . . then” statement that Jacob vows: “And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, So that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God” (Genesis 28:20–21; emphasis added). Only after God had proven himself to Jacob would he choose Jehovah to be his God. The thought that haunts me a little is that, if I hold up and look into a spiritual mirror, I can see parts of Jacob in myself. Please remember though that Jacob is just beginning his journey.
IN HARAN
Jacob then continued his journey to Haran. The story is familiar to us. He met and fell in love with Rachel, worked seven years for her hand in marriage, only to be deceived by her father Laban on the wedding night when he replaced Rachel with Leah. Scholars have noted the connection between Jacob’s deception with Isaac, and Laban’s actions here. Jacob then works another seven years for Rachel’s hand, during which time his family grows to include 12 sons and one daughter, and then another six years for some livestock (Genesis 31:38–42), for a total of twenty years. Then Jacob receives another dream wherein the God of Bethel directs him to take his family and return to the land of his fathers (Genesis 31:11–13). His stay in Haran served as a time for Jehovah to show Jacob that he was indeed with Jacob and had looked after him and given him bread to eat and raiment to put on. The only thing left for Jehovah to do was to show Jacob that he could return to his father’s house in peace. That part of the vow would be fulfilled near the Jabbok river as Jacob was about to reenter the land promised to Abraham and Isaac, and which was offered to Jacob at Bethel.
PENIEL, ON THE JABBOK RIVER
As Jacob and his family approached Canaan, he knew that even though twenty years had passed, the issue with Esau had not been resolved. He, therefore, sent word to Esau seeking to initiate a reconciliation, but when he heard that Esau was coming with four hundred men, Jacob “was greatly afraid and distressed” (Genesis 32:7). Now, for the first time since the covenant invitation at Bethel we see Jacob seeking out the God of his fathers and thinking about the great covenantal promise that he had received at Bethel. Perhaps even more telling of the transformation that has taken place in Jacob is the humility in which he petitions the Lord: “O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, the Lord which saidst unto me, Return unto thy country, and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee: I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all the truth, which thou has shewed unto thy servant; . . . . [when] thou saidst, I will surely do thee good, and make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude” (Genesis 32:9–12).
Jacob waited for Esau to arrive at the Jabbok River, and it was there that he had the second of his divine encounters. “And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of his thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him. And he [the man Jacob was wrestling] said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he [Jacob] said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. . . . And he blessed him” (Genesis 32:24–29).
This narrative raises many questions: Who was the man with whom Jacob wrestled? Was he a divine or mortal being? Why did they wrestle? What was the blessing that Jacob was seeking? Why was Jacob’s name changed? The text itself is silent on most of these questions although we can certainly make some inferences. Jacob himself gives us two clues. He understood it to be time of personal redemption. Later in life when he blessed Joseph’s sons he referred to “the Angel which redeemed me from evil” (Genesis 48:16). The second clue is that he “called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved” (Genesis 32:30). Whereas in Bethel, he had simply seen a ladder which symbolized the way to enter the presence of God, in Peniel he now experienced God face to face. So, what was the blessing he wrestled for? The immediate context would suggest that it was for a peaceful reunion with his brother Esau the next day, which would fulfil the final element of the “if” clause from Bethel that he could return to his father’s house in peace—and this was exactly what happened.
But in a larger sense, it seems to me, that the blessing that he wanted now, more than ever, was to enter into the covenant offered to him at Bethel. God had proved his reliability to Jacob in the 20 years since Bethel and Jacob was now ready to follow in the footsteps of both his father and grandfather and choose Jehovah to be his God, without any conditions. As part of the consummation of that covenant, his name was changed from Jacob (“he supplants or deceives”) to Israel, “let God prevail” (Genesis 32:28). For Jacob/Israel, it was God’s will, not his, that was now most important in his life.
As Jacob then traveled down the Jabbok river, crossed over the Jordan River and reentered the land promised to Abraham, Isaac and now Jacob he “came to Shalem, a city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan. . . . And he bought a parcel of a field, . . . And he erected there an altar and called it El-elohe-Israel, “God is the God of Israel” (Genesis 33:18–20). At this point in time, Jacob is the only one named Israel, so he is erecting an altar to publically declare that, in a world of choices, he, Israel, had now chosen his God!
CONCLUSION
My dear Brothers and Sisters, how I love the story of Jacob! It reminds me of so many important principles that I need to remember during my own spiritual journey of life. It reminds me that, like Jacob, I live in a world of choices, all of which compete for my time, energy, and loyalty. None of us live lives that are free from struggles, whether they be associated with family conflicts, financial, medical or emotional concerns, or a myriad of other life stresses. Nevertheless, God offers to each of one of us Bethel-like invitations; invitations to enter into covenants so that he can bless our lives in ways that may be difficult for us to even comprehend! Like Jacob, we are all on our own spiritual journeys of “becoming.” The question for all of us to consider is not whether God will reach out to us, but rather, how will we respond to his covenantal invitations? What will we do to put ourselves in situations where we can see the hand of God in our lives so that we can have confidence in his promises, even during times of struggle?
The story of Jacob gives me hope that God can use even imperfect people like me to play a part in the building of his kingdom. President Russel M. Nelson has reminded us that, “[Heavenly Father] has worked with normal human beings ever since Adam and everyone has been imperfect except his beloved son, Jesus Christ.” In the premortal realm, Abraham saw that “there were many of the noble and great ones” whose “souls were good” and about whom God declared: “These will I make my rulers.” (Abraham 3:22–23). Prophets have declared in our day that we, like Jacob, were among those “noble and great ones.” But, like Jacob, we have to become!
The story of Jacob also reminds me that the blessings of the covenant are not automatic. I have to show God that I want them and that I am willing to wrestle to claim them. President Nelson has encouraged every member of the Church to “keep on the covenant path” and then he reminds us, “Your commitment to follow the Savior by making covenants with him and then keeping those covenants will open the door to every spiritual blessing and privilege available to men, women and children everywhere.”
Brothers and sisters, I know that like Jacob, I am a very imperfect being. No one knows my imperfections better than I do. Nevertheless, I testify that the power of the covenant is real. I testify that God wants me and all of us to have, not only our own Bethel experiences, but also our own Peniel experiences. Even though I am still on my own spiritual journey, I testify that the journey of “becoming” is absolutely worth it. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.