Symbolism substitutes one thing to represent another. There is always “this” that stands in the place of “that.” The value of the symbol is in teaching about “that” by employing “this” as a teaching tool.

In temple symbolism, the “this” used has no real value, but “that” holds eternal value. If an unbelieving person obtains access to “this” temple symbol, but fails to understand its relationship to “that” which is eternal, they have nothing of value. Likewise, when the symbol this has no meaning for those who believe in the temple, then it fails to have any value for the believer as well.

God’s highest truths frequently use symbols. Christ used parables to teach about that by using the familiar to substitute as a representation. He explained that this was to prevent those who were unworthy of the symbol from comprehending the truths. Seeing, they “see not” and hearing they “hear not.” (See, NC Matt. 7:2; Mark 2:13.) So we understand that merely getting this without understanding that is worthless.

Temple rites are a gift from God that is filled with this for that. Ignorance leads to apostasy because the ignorant cannot see that this holds powerful value to teach about that. Even the greatest symbols can become nothing when they are not understood and are discarded by the ignorant. Then “they shall return again to their own place, to enjoy that which they are willing to receive, because they were not willing to enjoy that which they might have received. For what does it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift.” (T&C 86:4)

Before the temple endowment was given, God explained what He intended to accomplish through the future rites: “I say unto you that your anointings, and your washings, and your baptisms for the dead, and your solemn assemblies, and your memorials for your sacrifices by the sons of Levi, and for your oracles in your most holy places, wherein you receive conversations, and your statutes and judgments for the beginning of the revelations and foundation of Zion, and for the glory and honor, and endowment of all her municipals, are ordained by the ordinance of my holy house, which my people are always commanded to build unto my holy name.” (T&C 141:12) God intended the symbols to convey glory, honor and a gift or endowment upon the people who received them. The symbols are not the real thing, but they teach and point to the real thing that is required for salvation.

In the temple ceremony there are symbols for certain virtues that are called “keys.” These keys use hand contact and words as the symbol (this) to substitute for the actual virtues of obedience, sacrifice, chastity, gospel and consecration (that).

In the Egyptian ceremonial there was a symbolic weighing of the heart against the Ma’at feather, along with the 42 negative confessions that a person had not sinned, had not robbed with violence, had not stolen, had not uttered lies, had not committed adultery, and so on. These rites were intended to teach the person to avoid bad behaviors and acquire the seven virtues of truth, justice, balance, order, compassion, harmony, and reciprocity.

Like the ceremonies of Egypt, the restored temple rites were also intended to symbolize the acquisition of the virtues of obedience, sacrifice, chastity, gospel and consecration. The ceremony also put the initiate through a symbolic judgment in the presence of a judge who conversed with the initiate through the veil, asking for them to present the symbols (this) to demonstrate they had acquired and were in possession of the required virtues (that).

Anyone can learn of the ceremonial symbols without possessing the required virtues. But to satisfy the God-judge who meets mankind as they pass through the veil at death, the initiate must possess the actual virtues these key words and hand contacts represent. They must have the real thing.

Throughout the restored temple ceremonies the symbols are introduced sequentially, first on the right side. Therefore, interpreting the symbols focuses on understanding the significance of the right side.

To teach Christ’s gospel using symbol, part of the temple ceremony included putting a robe on the left shoulder and tying a girdle around the waist on the right hip. By putting the robe on the left shoulder, the right shoulder was left uncovered. Anciently, clothing was valuable, and most labor was manual. A bare shoulder could become calloused through work, and if scratched or cut, could heal. But a torn robe took effort and time to repair, and any injury to the garment would shorten its life. Therefore, clothing was protected from this daily labor when possible by leaving the weight-bearing shoulder uncovered. Leaving the right shoulder bare in the temple ceremony symbolized that at that stage of the initiation there was still the need to carry a burden on the right side. The work was not done.

The belly is the symbolic center of our appetites and passions. Tying the bow of the girdle on the right side symbolized the need to bind the belly, or control the appetites and passions that so often lead to sin and conflict. The bow symbolized the effort required to conquer the unruly body.

There was also a bow over the right ear for the man, the bow having three loops. Placing these over the right ear symbolized the need to hear, or hearken. The three loops above the ear symbolize first the Godhead who are above. These loops secondly also symbolize the fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob whose names are often used to identify the true God. By obeying the true God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the person can accomplish the labor symbolized by the bare shoulder and bind the inappropriate appetites and unruly passions portrayed in the knotted girdle on the right hip.

When the individual achieves these required developmental improvements symbolized in this robing, then they remove all these accouterments and put them on again. Removing them was the symbol that all progress made will not be enough if you are unwilling to lay them aside, sacrifice what you have obtained from God, in order to receive more. Nothing can be gained if you are unwilling to change as often as God may require of you. Even if you mourn the loss of what you must lay aside, when God asks it of you it must be done to progress further.

As the symbolic journey continued, the robe and girdle were again donned and changed. This time the robe moved to the right shoulder and the bow is tied on the left hip. Because the symbols are interpreted from the right side, this movement shows that the hard work has been accomplished, and the robe can be safely worn upon the shoulder. The physical battle is over and the body has been controlled. They have won honor through their progression in light and truth. There is no longer a knot or tie on the right hip, but only the smooth girdle surrounding the belly because desires, appetites and passions have been defeated. Progress has been made. This is why they were part of temple worship.

I will be talking at the following venues and dates:

January 12-13: South Carolina Area Conference: Book of Mormon Covenant Conference (speaking on the 13th)

March 3: Centerville Theatre (speaking at 3 p.m.)

April 19-21: Conference: A Hope in Christ: The Temple This conference will involve some interesting sessions on Saturday that I plan to attend. I’m also hoping to meet more of you who are there.

There is a new video about the restoration that is linked below:
The Christian Restoration: Part 4.

It is the fourth installment of a planned seven-part series on the restoration of the gospel.

I hate this subject. I hate that is it necessary to discuss such indignities. There is so much that needs to be taught and learned. It perplexes me why it is necessary to address so basic and obvious an evil to people who say they want to follow God.

Among us are those whose aggressive preaching of evil sexual practices provokes the Lord to reiterate to us the words of Jeremiah:

My heart within me is broken because of the prophets, all my bones shake, I am like a drunk man and like a man whom wine has overcome, because of the Lord and because of the words of his holiness. For the land is full of adulterers, for because of swearing the land mourns, the pleasant places of the wilderness are dried up, and their course is evil and their force is not right. For both prophet and priest are corrupt, yea, in my house have I found their wickedness, says the Lord. Wherefore their way shall be unto them as slippery ways in the darkness, they shall be driven on and fall therein for I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation, says the Lord. And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria: they prophesied in Baal and caused my people Israel to err. I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem a horrible thing: they commit adultery and walk in lies, they strengthen also the hands of evildoers that none does return from his wickedness. They are all of them unto me as Sodom and the inhabitants thereof as Gomorrah. (OC Jeremiah 8:18)

It does not matter if this sin is advocated under a new name. No change of vocabulary will justify this sin. Calling it celestial does not make it less hellish. Teaching it is no sin to engage in adultery because you and your victim were bonded to one another before the foundation of the world is a lie designed to seduce the foolish.

The restoration began with the Lord offering to extract us from this perversity. In the first message to Joseph Smith Christ quoted language from scripture to describe the world. The rest of Paul’s passage from which Christ’s words were taken declares that people are, “lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. From such turn away, for of this sort are they which creep into houses and lead captive silly women loaded with sins, led away with diverse lusts, ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” (NC 2 Tim. 1:8) Diverse lusts can be given any name a clever man or woman chooses, but it does not improve the sinful and destructive nature of the failure.

There are many ways to prevent Zion. One of the most successful tools to bar individuals from rising up to Zion is to have them defile the marriage relationship through sexual sin. Having sexual relations outside the marriage covenant is unholy, ungodly and designed to create so corrupt a people that they will be barred from God’s presence.

There is a great mountain to climb. A beast guards the passageway. That beast takes many forms. Sexual sin is one of its forms. Do not let it destroy you.

There are false teachings advocated in secret by people who are either deceived by a false spirit or willingly sinful. These false teachings include such notions as: It is not a sin to have sexual relations outside of marriage if both participants are unmarried. This, of course, is false, and the scriptures condemn such fornication and sexual impurity. “As touching the gentiles who believe, we have written and concluded that they … keep themselves from things offered to idols, … and from fornication.” (NC Acts 12:9) “Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God has both raised up the Lord and will also raise up us by his own power. Do you not know that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid. What? Do you not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body? For two, says he, shall be one flesh. But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. Flee fornication. Every sin that a man commits is against the body of Christ, and he who commits fornication sins against his own body.” (NC 1 Cor 1:23) “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like; of the which I tell you, as I have also told in time past, that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” (NC Gal. 1:21)

Fornication will prevent you from inheriting the kingdom of God. It is as offensive as adultery, and often condemned in the same statement alongside adultery.

Those who teach this evil often conceal their teachings from the public, choosing to do so in secret. They teach it secretly because they are ashamed of this false, repugnant idea. Teaching in secret is an indication they recognize what they teach is false.

By concealing their sin, they hope their lies will protect them. The scriptures make it clear this will do them no good. “Last of all, these all are they who will not be gathered with the saints, to be caught up unto the church of the Firstborn and received into the Cloud. These are they who are liars, and sorcerers, and adulterers, and whoremongers, and whoever loves and makes a lie. These are they who suffer the wrath of God on the earth. These are they who suffer the vengeance of Eternal fire. These are they who are cast down to Hell and suffer the wrath of Almighty God” (T&C 69:27).

Part of the success of such false teachings comes from carefully keeping it hidden. Hiding their false teachings only makes them liars who love and make a lie to advance their adultery and whoredoms.

From all such teachings and teachers you should flee. Their teachings are calculated only to corrupt, deceive and destroy.

There is a reason why such a serious sin as adultery ought to be avoided altogether, even if it is only as a foolish temptation contemplating the possibility of a plural wife. We all need greater light and knowledge. The only way it can be acquired is by heed and diligence to the commandments of God. Any other path is a diversion, intended to waylay you and prevent you from developing as God intends.

Peter urged in his second letter: “And besides this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge, temperance, and to temperance, patience, and to patience, godliness, and to godliness, brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness, charity. For if these things be in you and abound, they make you neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (NC 2 Peter 1:2) Peter explained the required steps for our progression. As soon as you acquire the faith to act, you next must add virtue. Virtue in turn leads to knowledge, because it is only through heed and diligence we gain knowledge.

As the people of King Benjamin demonstrated by their conversion to the truth, and their covenantal commitment to obey the truth, they gained the strength to do good. They no longer had any desire for evil:  “Yea, we believe all the words which thou hast spoken unto us! And also, we know of their surety and truth because of the spirit of the Lord Omnipotent, which has wrought a mighty change in us, or in our hearts, that we have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually.” (NC Mosiah 3:1) A person who has the disposition to do evil and commit adultery is NOT yet converted. They are NOT yet redeemed. They still must repent and turn to God.

Joseph Smith explained that the gospel path requires us to increase in obedience to God. There is nothing static or stationary about the gospel. We must increase our obedience to participate in gospel conversion, “We consider that God has created man with a mind capable of instruction, and a faculty which may be enlarged in proportion to the heed and diligence given to the light communicated from heaven to the intellect: and that the nearer man approaches perfection, the clearer are his views, and the greater his enjoyments, till he has overcome the evils of his life and lost every desire for sin; and like the ancients, arrives at that point where he is wrapped in the power and glory of his Master and is caught up to dwell with Him.” (TJPS p. 51) If you remain attracted to adultery and fornication, you have not yet lost every desire for sin. Your views of right and wrong cannot be clear if you fail to see the evil in such disobedience.

There is a revelation for our day that says, “And that which does not edify is not of God, and is darkness. That which is of God is light, and he that receives light and continues in God, receives more light, and that light grows brighter and brighter until the perfect day.” (T&C 36:4) Light grows if you are in the gospel path. It grows brighter and brighter only when you forsake sin and give heed and diligence to the commandments. Adultery destroys that progress and robs you of light.

Alma explained, “[H]e that will harden his heart, the same receiveth the lesser portion of the word. And he that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word, until it is given unto him to know the mysteries of God, until they know them in full. And they that will harden their hearts, to them is given the lesser portion of the word until they know nothing concerning his mysteries; and then they are taken captive by the Devil and led by his will down to destruction. Now this is what is meant by the chains of hell.” (NC Alma 9:3)

Those who think they can follow God and yet commit adultery are deceived and giving heed to a false spirit. It is impossible to be both on the path to greater light and also engaged in such a serious sin.

Add to your faith virtue. It is perilous to do otherwise. You open yourself to deception and being led by false spirits and false prophets when you choose to ignore the commandment “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”

I got emails and phone calls asking about Christ’s statement in 3 Nephi: “there shall be no disputations among you, as there hath hitherto been, neither shall there be disputations among you concerning the points of my doctrine, as there hath hitherto been. For verily, verily I say unto you, he that hath the spirit of contention is not of me, but is of the Devil, who is the father of contention; and he stirreth up the hearts of men to contend with anger, one with another.”

I replied that you can disagree without an angry disputation. You can have good humor even while you detect a false spirit and reject it. You can wish people well as they go on their way, while altogether condemning their message as originating in a malignant source.

It is not required that you attempt to persuade every person of their errors. If you make it clear you do not want to participate in their errors, that is enough.

And you can do all those things without ever becoming angry and allowing your heart to become stirred up to contention and argument.

If you refuse to make your rejection of false spirits clear, then you are contributing to evil. It is impossible to stand for the truth without rejecting errors and false spirits when they come to confront you. Christ expected us to do that. He even rebuked Peter, telling him: “Get thee behind me, Satan” when Peter opposed the will of the Father. Yet the same Christ announced the doctrine that we are not supposed to “contend” in “anger” with one another. The only conclusion we can reach is that Christ followed the principle He taught, and we can do so also while standing firm and detecting a false spirit when confronted by it.

Two emissaries from a Canadian fellow who I’ve been informed is an advocate of plural wivery, just left my office. They delivered a written message from Joseph Rockwell and Dean Taylor. Joseph Rockwell was the author of the “Escape to Polygamy” website. On that site on September 5, 2010 he wrote a post titled “Engagement” in which he said his wife wanted him to take another wife and so he was now engaged to marry again. Another post on September 11, 2010 “Into the Light” wrote about the “deep longing to bring more wives into our family and have our family grow.” So he’s an adulterer.

The message is couched in “Thus Saith the Lord” and commands me to not fight against the work of some “Father” that Rockwell submits to obey. The whole contains a spirit that I recognize. It is false. It seeks to portray wickedness as righteousness, and to gain control and authority over others.

I am now commanded by this false spirit to “repent” and not fight against this Rockwellian foolishness. I don’t intend to obey.

I’m not supposed to “seek to destroy that which the Father has commanded.” But, since I have no part in obedience to this deceiving “Father” I plan to give it no heed.

It occurred to me that, for whatever entertainment value this has, I would put this note up on my website.

I’ve been invited to speak in South Carolina at a conference being organized there to take place January 12th and 13th. I plan to attend and talk. An announcement about the details will be made soon through the event calendar on the Restoration Archives site. I wanted to make it known as early as possible.

I also plan to give a talk in Centerville, Utah sometime in February.

A new video in the Christian Restoration series is now available either through the christianreformation500years.info or on YouTube through this link:

Christian Restoration Part 3: Early Attempts

This is the third installment in a seven-part series.

I have put up a new paper that contains the Answer: Build a House and my present initial understanding of the meaning of the Answer. It is on the downloads page and can be reached through this link:

Build a House

My initial interpretation begins following the Answer on page 3 of the document. Of course it is not an attempt to extract all the meaning of the Answer, but only the most obvious initial meaning that is apparent to me.

The talk I gave at the conference last weekend is now available to read or download as a paper. It is titled (and linked): Keep the Covenant: Do the Work.

A conference is underway in Layton, Utah. The information about the event is at this website: Preserving the Hope of Zion.  I have been invited to talk by the organizers, and will be speaking tomorrow afternoon.

Also, a new recording addressing Christians is now on the “ChristianReformation500years” website and can be accessed by clicking on that name. If you know any Christians who would be interested in the talk please bring it to their attention.