followHIM - Easter -- Part 1 : Elder Bruce C. Hafen & Sister Marie K. Hafen

Episode Date: April 8, 2022

Elder Bruce C. Hafen and Sister Marie Hafen join us for a special Easter Episode about the Atonement of Jesus Christ through a discussion of Adam and Eve, their reception of the Atonement, and the temple ordinances.Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.co/old-testament/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Executive Producers/SponsorsDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: MarketingLisa Spice: Client Relations, Show Notes/TranscriptsJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Rough Video EditorKrystal Roberts: Transcripts/Language Team/French TranscriptsAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsIgor Willians: Portuguese Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-pianoPlease rate and review the podcast.

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith. And I'm John, by the way. We love to learn. We love to laugh. We want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow Him. Hello, everyone. Welcome to Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith. I'm your host, and I'm here with my springy co-host, John, by the way. Hello, John, by the way. I need an office chair that reflects that adjective. Springy, yes, because, John, spring is in the air, and it is the holidays. It is our spring holiday. It is Easter. What a great day. Your kids love it as much as my kids.

My kids love the Easter holidays. It's getting warm. They're excited to be outside and to have some fun. John, I just don't know how to express how excited we are. So I'm just going to say, John, tell our audience how blessed we are today, how lucky, blessed, and excited we are. We have Elder Bruce C. Hafen and Sister Marie K. Hafen. And Hank, I have a personal story. I don't know if Elder Hafen will even remember this, but when he was the provost at BYU, I didn't know what provost meant. I thought if BYU were in Orem, maybe that title would be the Oremst.

In Burley, Idaho, it means the Burliest. The Burliest. There you go. If it were in Idaho. I was reading something from Elder Hafen, and he talked about young adults going through kind of a Kirtland era of their lives, excitement and building and growth and kind of a Nauvoo period where things just aren't going right. And he talked about the experience of falling in love. I was intensely curious about that because it wasn't happening for me. And I

don't remember how I must have called Elder Hafen's office and said, can I ask you some questions about that? And he met me at the Deseret Towers cafeteria there and spent a whole lunch with me. The fact that he would take a random student and take a whole hour and talk with me during that lunch, it says a lot more than the bio I'm going to read about who Elder Hafen is. So I will never forget that kindness that you showed me that day. And you fixed all of my problems in a matter of... So anyway, then let me read a more formal biography. Elder Bruce C. Hafen was called to the first quorum of the 70 in 1996, has been a General Authority Emeritus since 2010, an internationally recognized family law scholar.

And I know that because he spoke at the World Congress on Families in Switzerland in 1999. And the report that I heard was that it was interrupted by eight standing ovations. He served as president of BYU-Idaho. I make all of my students read the finest talk I've ever heard for young single adults called The Gospel and Romantic Love that was reprinted in the 2002 New Era during a Valentine's issue. President of BYU-Idaho, Dean of the BYU Law School, Provost at BYU, two of his past books, won the year's Best Book Award from Deseret Book, The Broken Heart, in 1989. Many of our listeners will have read that. A Disciple's Life, a biography of Neal A. Maxwell in 2002, and recently served as president of the St. George, Utah Temple.

Now, Marie K. Hafen has taught at BYU-Idaho, the University of Utah, and BYU-Provo, classes in Shakespeare, writing, and the Book of Mormon. She's been a contributing author to several books, including with her husband, Covenant Hearts, Why Marriage Matters, How to Make it Last, and The Contrite Spirit, How the Temple Helps Us Apply Christ's Atonement. She has served on the Young Women General Board, on the Deseret News Board of Directors,

and as matron of the St. George, Utah Temple. moment. She has served on the Young Women General Board, on the Deseret News Board of Directors, and as matron of the St. George, Utah Temple. And this part you may need to update us on. The Hafens are most grateful to be the parents of seven children and grandparents of 46. Yep. And I think that's the end. We've introduced a new product line. We now have great grandchildren. No kidding. That's wonderful. And I read that bio from one of my favorite new books, Faith is Not Blind. And you can see my bookmarks. Those are all legit bookmarks for wonderful things that I've used in my classes. This book has been a real blessing to me in my Book of Mormon and New Testament classes, some of the insights that are there.

Very rarely, John, do they have the entire religion faculty at BYU read a book, but they did on that one. Really? Yeah, the entire religion faculty. I think one of the greatest insights in here that's blessed me and hopefully my students, we all know the Moroni's promise of verse four, but verse three is, ponder how merciful God has been since the creation of Adam down until this time and ponder it in your hearts. This fill you with gratitude. And this idea that gratitude is the gateway to revelation was a beautiful thought to me. Appreciate so much the insights in here. Elder and Sister Hafen, welcome.

It's a privilege to be here. Elder and Sister Hafen, welcome. It's a privilege to be here. Oh, you're kind. We feel like we're on the privileged side. What we want to do here today, Elder and Sister Hafen, is really hand the reins over to you both. What would you like our audience to know, to feel, and to hear? Well, thank you, Hank. We're very grateful to be here. We have the greatest respect for both of you. You have a conversational format for your show. We hope you will interrupt, ask a question, make a comment as we go along. And so please feel free to do that. When you invited us to come and talk on the Easter show, we thought, hmm, what does the Old Testament have to say about Easter other than prophecies of Christ's coming? And then we remembered when we started this course at the beginning of the year,

the first part of it was not the Old Testament as such. It was Joseph Smith's translation of Genesis, which has become the book of Moses. And that is full of doctrine and perspective about Easter. That has prompted us to want to focus on the story of Adam and Eve coming from the book of Moses, which is a great treasure for the church. It's probably the most significant collection of doctrines about the atonement, as we will try to just scratch the surface on today, that we have. It isn't as appreciated and known as much as it should be. So we encourage that and hope that what we say will nudge people to get into the book

of Moses. Maybe I could just talk about our interest in the Easter and the book of Moses and the Savior. We've noticed in recent years, a lot of people are talking about the atonement, much more so than in the Easter and the book of Moses and the Savior. We've noticed in recent years, a lot of people are talking about the atonement, much more so than in the past. We talk about it on and on, and that's how it should be. We talk of Christ. We rejoice in Christ. But as we have listened to this over the years, first of all, we're really grateful because it's in the hearts and minds of the Latter-day Saints. It's beautiful,

and we cheer for that. As we've listened, however, occasionally we detect that we're kind of skimming across the surface in believing that the atonement is somehow a word that brings everything else in the gospel together. And if you say the atonement did this, that's really all you need to know. And it's certainly not bad, but there is so much more. We would like to talk about what that more is and our basis for it. It's the story of Adam and Eve, and that connects us to the temple. So we will have a lot to say about the temple today. You asked earlier about the experiences on Easter. One of my favorite ones is being invited when I was a teenager to go with some other kids about six o'clock in the morning on Easter Sunday. We're invited inside the St. George Temple. We took all the back alleys, so to speak, and we were invited

to go up through a couple of dressing rooms, up some stairs, and up some other stairs. And I thought we were being taken captive. I didn't know what was happening. But then we opened a little door that took us out on the balcony. We were outside, and I've never seen that view of St. George before. And the sun was just coming up in the east. We sang to the kids that were on the temple grounds way below, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoso believeth in him might have eternal life. And you can see that affects me even after all these years. It was beautiful. It was memorable.

And we will include some things about the St. George Temple today. Those of us from St. George know that it's the one true temple and that all other temples are appendages to the St. George Temple because I grew up in St. George. And so when you start talking about that building, that's my childhood. That's me going for baptisms for the dead. That's me as a teenager going to sit outside the temple grounds and just kind of ponder and think. And so any stories that you can tell about the St. George Temple, please share. I always say, we had Kirtland, we had Nauvoo. Those were both warm-ups to the third one.

And it got the complete deal. When we were called to go to that temple in 2010, we didn't realize what was in store for us. Some years ago, I was talking with a good friend, I can't remember the general subject, but he was always thoughtful and asking good questions. And he said, the temples contain all these pictures of Christ. Christ is the center of the gospel. He's the center of the temple.

But the temple's endowment is all about Adam and Eve. Well, who are Adam and Eve? Why doesn't the temple endowment focus on the life of Christ? Here we are, Easter, and we're going to talk about Adam and Eve, but it's because of the connection between Adam and Eve and the Savior in this sense. The story of the life of Christ is the story of giving the atonement. The story of Adam and Eve is the story of receiving the atonement. Let me say that again. The story of the life of Christ is the story of giving the atonement. The story of Adam and Eve is the story of receiving the atonement. That's us. We can look at them in the temple over and over and say, that's me. That's the story of my life. Good, because we're in the temple to receive

the atonement. It's blessings, the insights, the perspective. And so let's talk about that a little bit. I think somewhere we will have a visual that shows a picture of the St. George Temple. That's for Hank's benefit. Oh, beautiful. We will refer to that picture and some that kind of go with it. That's where my wife and I were sealed. I should probably add that to the list of great things that happened there. She's going to say, what about that one? Marie and I were sealed there too, Hank.

That was probably before you had started this show before he started his life that may be may have been a while before me but not too bad too far i don't think one of the perspectives that we took from our being in the temple and thinking about some of the questions we had was realizing realizing that the temple gives us a kind of cosmic, eternal perspective when young people or older people would come for their own endowment. And each of us had the opportunity to talk alone with either the brother or the sister, to introduce them to the temple and ask them their questions before they began their endowment. And I would often ask people if they had read the book of Moses,

most had not, and I would encourage them to read it. And it starts with this incredible perspective that Moses was given, where he sees all the creations and he talks to the Lord. And nobody was talking about specifics like, what are the dimensions of my temple clothing, and it was a cosmic perspective. So not long ago, one of our grandchildren was going to go on a mission, and she asked if we would be available to talk to her for a few minutes just to give her some clues about getting ready for the temple. And she's a wonderful girl. She's full of fun and very bright. We knew that would be a great conversation. As we were talking, we decided to tell her, you know, in a word, what we had seen with that perspective we discovered in the temple. I asked her, let's just start off with, we want to talk about the cosmos.

You probably don't know what the cosmos is unless you think of Cosmo at BYU. But then we used this as an adjective. Do you know what cosmic means? And she said, hmm, you know, I work at a little bakery and we have some cosmic brownies. Does that help? Probably not exactly what you were thinking, but okay. She said, well, yeah, there are other brownies, but those are good ones. We told her what we've just said to you about the story of Adam and Eve is the story of receiving the atonement.

But it's a story told from a cosmic point of view, which means sort of the eternal perspective. When we look at our difficulties in our lives, from that huge eternal perspective, they look very differently. It's like looking back on your early childhood, or whatever it was that was hard, or you couldn't understand it. You'll think about it differently as you get older, as the gospel becomes more clear. We can look at Adam and Eve, since that's the story of receiving the atonement, and say, look at that. Oh, they had so many hard problems. And then we watch how the temple helps them deal with those problems and understand what to do about them and with them and the role of the Savior in helping them with them. Adam and Eve sort of go with us through the endowment. I'd encourage people to

think about that. When they go through the temple, how often do you hear about Adam and Eve? It's all the time, including right to the end of the temple endowment. We are Adam and Eve. Let's go back to the story of Adam and Eve as we see it in the book of Moses. To stress again, it's the story of receiving the atonement. How do we receive the atonement? We watch our first parents and how they received it and do what they did. And that story is what the endowment is about. We talked to several people during our time at the temple about architecture and the original design of that temple. Well, that temple was the, as you've said, Hank, was the first one to be built after the saints left Nauvoo. It was before Manti or Logan or Salt Lake. As one of the church architecture

consultants said to us when he was there looking at the temple, this is Joseph's temple. And every dimension, it's extremely close to the design of the Nauvoo Temple. And it shows, in the way it's put together, the path that Adam and Eve are going to walk. Somebody coming to the temple back in the early days started with a baptism, of course. Now we have baptisms in fonts for most people. But I was baptized in the St. George Temple. And when one is baptized for the dead, you start and you mentioned it, Hank. You did those baptisms for the dead. That's the first ordinance done in the temple.

And it's in the basement. It's in the basement. Yeah, that's symbolic and important. Because every step we take after that baptism is an ascending step. President McKay once said of the temple ordinances, it's a step-by-step ascent into the eternal presence. We're going to walk back home. How does the walk go? Well, we go to the initiatory ordinances, and then we go to the endowment, and then we go to the sealing room, and so it is. We'll talk about each of those

steps. Let's look now, specifically, diving a little deeper, when was the doctrine of baptism first explained by the Lord? He taught it to Adam. It's right there in the Pearl of Great Price. As we said, they were the first ones to receive it, and Adam was wonderfully inquisitive. When he was told to baptize his family and other people, he said, why? Why do we do this? And the Lord said to him, this is in Moses 6, verses 48 and what follows, why is it that men must repent and be baptized? And the Lord answered him, this is in 6, 53 to 55, I have forgiven thee thy transgression in the garden of Eden. The Son of God hath atoned for original guilt, wherein the sins of the parents cannot be

answered upon the heads of the children, for they are whole, W-H-O-L-E, whole, from the foundation of the world. That is just packed with significant doctrine. We'll come back to that. The easy version of understanding those sentences is in the second article of faith. For Hank and John, who are still working on the articles of faith, this is the one that starts, we believe. We're all still working on them. The we believe one. I remember this one, the we believe.

This one says, men will be punished for their own sins and not for Adam's transgression. A lot of us memorized that growing up, and the deeper dive says, what does that mean? Why is it significant? The other Christian churches, they're doing the best they can with what they have. Their understanding of the nature of mankind, men or women, the nature of man when people are born is that they are evil because they are stained with the sin of Adam and Eve. And that's why some churches believe that the children have to be baptized immediately. If they die without being baptized, then they may be lost forever because of the stain. The Lord told Adam, there is no stain. You can see how that helps us understand our doctrine relates to other churches.

So how's the restoration view of the atonement? How do we see the purpose of the atonement differently? The Lord used the word whole. The Doctrine and Covenants in section 93 says that all of us are innocent when we're born. Put those words together, whole, innocent, it's unique. And it's very different from evil. And it's different from good, I might say. We need the atonement.

But why? Why do we need it if Adam's stain has been removed from us, as the Lord told Adam? Well, in the book of Moses, he talks about the children. They grow up and they experience a world that's subject to sin, and we all experience it. We do sinful things. Usually, when we're young, without even knowing it, that's why we're not accountable before we're eight. Then the Lord offers this further explanation, speaking of Adam's children, they taste the bitter that they may know to prize the good. The point there is that we learn and grow from experience. The atonement is not just about erasing black marks. It's developmental. And so Adam and Eve, as they go through the rooms in the

temple, it's developmental. They're learning. They're growing. When they understand the sin in the garden and they repent, do they go back to the basement of the temple and start over? No, they keep going because this is part of the overall experience until they go on to celestial life. So I guess I could summarize with this one. Because of the atonement of Christ, we can learn from our experience without being condemned by it. We can learn from our experience without being condemned by it. In fact, mistakes and adversity can promote growth if we engage the Lord in helping us learn from those mistakes. There's a word on this visual that talks about confirmation. We're going through the steps. You have Adam's baptism,

then he's confirmed. He receives the gift of the Holy Ghost. That's right there in the book of Moses. It says, Adam thus was baptized, was born of the Spirit, became quickened in the inner man, and the Lord said, Thou art baptized with fire and with the Holy Ghost. So Adam became a disciple of Christ. And this goes on, this same verse, or the next one says that Adam, because of his confirmation, he's a disciple of Christ, quote, after the order of the Son of God, which suggests to me that he also received the priesthood. So, Adam is now ready to begin to walk the covenant path. And we really like what King Benjamin says about discipleship, walking that covenant path, because he explained to his people when they wanted to make their covenants to become the children of Christ and walk that path.

Here's what King Benjamin said to them. They will enter into a relationship with Christ. He's the father of their progression. You know, they're new creatures in Christ. So now, what's going to happen? In Benjamin's counsel to his people, he tells them that they are going to experience hard things. I won't try to go into all that, but when we read it, we learn about what we have come to identify as three categories of blessings for the atonement. The first, of course, is redemption, redemption from

death, redemption from sin, but there's more. I love the way we can read an Old Testament verse that's really clear and strong about that. In Isaiah 43, Jehovah says, I have redeemed thee, thou art mine. And then because we are his, he says in 41 and 10, I will strengthen thee, I will help thee. The strengthening blessings of the atonement come along with and after the redeeming blessings. And then the final category in our growth and in what we see with Adam and Eve, as we will explain, the strengthening blessings lead to our being perfected in Him if we meet the conditions. These are conditional blessings. Moroni tells us most plainly how the perfecting blessings are connected to this process.

Come unto Christ and be perfected in him. That's from the closing verses of the Book of Mormon. It's just so powerful. But he states the conditions of these blessings of the atonement. So if we meet the conditions, we receive those blessings. Come unto Christ, be perfected in him. By his grace, ye may be perfect in Christ. So on that path, if we're faithful to our part of the covenants, because of his atonement,

he extends these blessings through our relationship with him. That's a point really worth making. Where does all this come from? Is this new stuff with the Savior? No, it's just part of what happens when we walk the covenant path. President Nelson understands and teaches this so clearly. He said in one of his conference talks just a few years ago, there is no amorphous entity called the atonement upon which we may call for succor, healing, forgiveness, or power. Jesus Christ is the source. His atoning power is best understood and appreciated when we express and clearly connect it to him. That's the end of that quote from President Nelson. It's beautiful. I would just add, the atonement is what qualifies Christ to give his followers these blessings. The point is that it's because he

performed the atonement that he was given, I would just say, the power to extend these blessings to us. That's his role. And on this foundation, here's another phrase, and you'll notice that this one will be an echo of the temple. Mosiah tells his people that if they will stay on this covenant path and be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in good works, the Lord God will seal you His. What? We're going to be sealed to Christ? Yes, that's a temple word. Now listen for this echo that's kind of in the mirror. The inverse image is given to us in the Book of Mormon, but we stumbled across this a few years ago. Amulek is teaching the people, and he teaches them that if they choose to love Satan more than God, they will become—they aren't born this way,

but they will become carnal, sensual, and devilish, Amulek said eventually, then, Satan doth seal you his. Striking to us that the same words would be said. I just, somehow it's really chilling to me. That is chilling. I've brought that up in my classes before. Who would you rather be sealed to when you look at that? That's Alma 34, right? That's-

Yeah. Yes, exactly. The devil doth seal you his. I'm like, whoa, that doesn't sound like what anybody would want. Well, and it's a description of the life we'll have, John. Satan wants us to be miserable as he is. So it's a life of misery. And what does the Savior wants?

To become a saint through the atonement. That's different from carnal, sensual, and devilish. Complete opposite. And then the nature of our life is joy. Can I go back for a second? Oh, the end of Moses 6 here. That is so great. Verse 66, thou art baptized with fire and with the Holy Ghost.

Verse 67, thou art after the order of him. And that's priesthood language, the holy priesthood after the order of the Son of God. But then verse 68, behold, thou art one in me. And when I saw that, I thought that word that my understanding is the King James translators kind of invented, of atonement, at-one-ment. Thou art one with me, and ties it all up right there in verse 68. Thou art one in me, so here's the atonement of Jesus Christ working. Thank you for that one, John. To me, that's what it means, to be sealed to him at one.

And if Adam and Eve are receiving the atonement to its fullest, they are following Christ because he is the father of. And where do we go? We're following him until. Follow him. I think that has some echoes, doesn't it, for you? Follow him. I like the sound of that. Yeah.

Yeah. It's interesting. Are we just going to follow him forever? Well, there's a destination to follow him until what? Until we are sealed to him. And with our own sealings, then we're at one with each other, at one with him. And of course, then new worlds open up. Yeah.

And then we're like him. Yeah. Now, Marie likes to say, if we aren't like him, we can't be with him. And the way we're like him over we'll make sure that all of these graphics are available to you so those of you who are driving hands on the wheel look straight forward come find us we'll describe what we're seeing for you but you if you want to come later to the website come on over and we'll we'll provide these for you well we've just kind of alluded to this about where the journey goes where it ends and when we compare that to what we were saying when Adam was baptized and when we're baptized at eight, what is this journey all about?

They didn't understand Adam and Eve. They understood so little, really. And then through a lifetime of learning and discovering and obeying and all that goes with it, they reached the point we just were talking about. That makes me think of those memorable lines from T.S. Eliot, We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. I think that's how it must have felt to Adam and Eve. They'd been in the Lord's presence to begin with. They didn't know where they were, just like I didn't know where we were in the St.

George Temple as we rode our bikes around the temple. But then you get inside of it, and you have that eternal perspective, the cosmic perspective. You rejoice. And the spirit, the feeling. Absolutely, yeah. That's a kind of witness to you, what you're seeing the spirit, the feeling. Absolutely, yeah. That's a kind of witness to you, what you're seeing. Okay, keep going with a few more. So we're trying to show all of the steps that Adam and Eve take on their way. The ascendings.

In the St. George Temple and in really all of the temples. I've tried to notice as I've been in various temples. We ascend, we step up. Sometimes it's only a few inches. You'll walk up a little path. But in the pioneer temples, you would walk up a few steps to another room. You know, you go from the world room to the garden room, and then it's terrestrial and celestial.

It's sequential, and we climb. Elder Hafen, we just did this a few weeks ago with jeff chadwick he talked about jacob's ladder and the idea of ascending up to god and taking those steps the jacob staircase we called it and you only have to take one at a time yeah one at a time just a step at a time hopeful for me well to look specifically one of the steps as you mentioned a few minutes ago we read in the lord's teachings to adam he entered specifically, one of the steps, as you mentioned a few minutes ago, we read in the Lord's teachings to Adam, he entered into the order of the priesthood. The temple shows that we start with the Aaronic priesthood. Of course, that's what we know.

We start with the lesser priesthood. The scriptures explain quite fully what that's about. And then we go to the Melchizedek priesthood. Stepping up again. Stepping up, yeah. The Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances are essential to the disciple's journey for both men and women. I would point that out and underline it. How do women experience the blessings of the Melchizedek Priesthood? Well, in the ordinances of the Melchizedek Priesthood, and the temple ordinances are among the main ones for everybody.

We read in the Doctrine and Covenants, Section 88. Through those ordinances in the temple and other Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances, the power of godliness is manifest. And without these ordinances, no man can see the face of God and live. Then the other thing we will see on the visuals as we kind of go up the ladder and look across, we've just divided these categories just to help us see the connections. The next one is principles. Looking here at the relationship between principles and ordinances, the fourth article of faith says the first principles and ordinances of the gospel are First, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Second, repentance. John, do you know the third one? And it's principles and ordinances. So faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Second, repentance. Now ordinances on baptism by immersion for the remission of sins. Those three are Aaronic priesthood. They're called.

The first because there are more. There are principles beyond that, and the temple is teaching those to us. What are the principles that could be lined up next to the higher ordinances of the Melchizedek priesthood? Let's just take a couple of examples. Sacrifice, consecration, those are the principles that we think line up next to the ordinances of the Melchizedek priesthood. So as we go through the temple, we're seeing this interaction between the principles and ordinances of both at the Aaronic level and then at the Melchizedek

level. Elder Hafen, that is just great. This idea of first principles and ordinances, meaning there's going to be some second, some third, some more principles ordinances. These are your beginning ones, but there's more. They're foundational that the rest of them all grow from faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. That clears up so much. I just, I love the articles of faith in that idea of there's so many principles of the gospel, which ones are the first principles and that he would state it that way? Well, let's talk about the first principles and faith in Christ. What did Elder Ballard say is a power to be reckoned with in this world and in individual lives? What's his book?

Our Search for Happiness. Faith in Christ is a power to be reckoned with, but it's the first principle. Then everything else follows. I love it. But these other ones, yeah, temple, I'm so glad you said that. Maybe we could say sacrifice and consecration are to the endowment what the principles of faith and repentance are to baptism. You just sort of see the principles and then see the ordinances, and they relate to each other. They're linked and they keep ascending. So there's ordinances connected with the next principles that come, just like the first two principles have first two ordinances. There's going to be more principles that come with more

ordinances. I keep thinking of, was it Joseph Smith that said, being born again comes by the spirit of God through ordinances? I would just say as a kind of summary of where we've come to this point, we've been looking at the journey of Adam and Eve as represented through the symbolic steps and developments as they grow in understanding, they grow in the receipt of more power, is reflected in the ordinances, and as shown in the way they live their lives. We go to the temple to receive the ordinances and as shown in the way they live their lives. You know, we go to the temple to receive the ordinances and we leave the temple to live them. Same about the covenant of sacrifice.

We learn it in the temple, then we leave the temple and we go try to practice and live by the covenant of sacrifice in our families and beyond. And so that is how we are following the pattern of Adam and Eve, which is part of receiving the atonement. Those are our practice sessions. We learn the principles and then we go work on them as if you're taking piano lessons. And it's a kind of lifelong process, but the growth is real. Well, I just like this idea of leaving the temple doesn't mean you leave what you've learned. Don't leave everything you've learned. And sometimes we go to the temple and we leave, we're like, okay, back to real life, right? Back to life. Yeah, back to what I was doing before, where Isaiah would say, no, in the temple, you beat your sword into a plowshare. We're changing. We're becoming something.

Oh, I want to restate this. This is too good. The story of Christ is the story of giving the atonement. The story of Adam-Eve is the story of receiving the atonement. And then we go to receive these ordinances and principles. We leave to live them. That's really good stuff. And Hank, this reminds me of a quick story I may have told before. Elder John H. Groberg said when

he was temple president in Idaho Falls that he would hear people get to the front doors as they were leaving after a beautiful session and would say things like, back to the real world. And he said, I knew what they meant, but it bothered me. And so one time when somebody was coming out and said, back to the real world, he ran up to him and he said, wrong, only that which is permanent is real. You are leaving the real world and you are going back to a temporary world. That world out there is going to end. So come back soon to the real world. They're like, okay, thanks, President. Yeah, Sister Haven, let's turn it over to you now and let you take it away.

What I'd like to do is talk a little bit more about Adam and Eve's experience, but a little more from Eve's point of view. Because I've thought about her a lot. And if you think about them in the Garden of Eden, then at least they can talk with God and ask him questions and learn from him. And their relationship is, I would say, it's not surface, of course, but they haven't had hard things yet to really help them come together in a melded way.

Once they and she partook of the fruit, and we don't know how much time it took between the time that Adam said, I don't think I'm going to do that. And she could see they weren't going to have any kids if they were still in the garden. They had two principles. They had two commandments they had to decide between.

And she decided, yes, we've got to do this somehow. I've got to make that choice. And again, we don't know how much she knew exactly when she chose, but she had to know enough for it to be a free agency decision, right? Exactly. Sister Hafen, I think 2 Nephi 2 makes this clear right uh yes yes lehi says they could not have they would have had no children right wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence we go past it so fast in second nephi 2 but that is theological dynamite

the whole christian world needs to know it's not that we could all be living in paradise today if they hadn't messed up. So that and Moses 5 too. So I've thought about Eve because they were cast out into a telestial world. That had to be an enormous fall. I don't think we understand how much of a fall that was for them. So here she is out there in the world. They were given a few things to cover their bodies. They must have had something that they could make a fire with. They

must have figured that out. But she's looking around thinking, food? We've got to eat? We need to fix the food? This is just entirely foreign. And I think we, as following their example, kind of grow up. Again, it's ascending. We grow up being sheltered and being nurtured. And then eventually we have to go out into the world, but hopefully with our armor on. So we have talked about Adam's baptism already. And Lehi, you've mentioned it. Let's go into that just a little bit more, because Lehi taught them in 2 Nephi chapter 2. It's 22 to 24 that are probably central. But the context for their experience and ours in the telestial world, there's that same Adam and Eve look again. So let's look at 2 Nephi 2.

You've already quoted, they would have had no children, wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence. That's kind of neutral, right? We get to start out neutral. And then we make our choices to go one direction or the other. So they would have had no joy, for they knew no misery. Oh, I get it. No children, no misery. Sometimes you feel like that. We had one especially that we felt like that. You don't have any like that, do you? Yeah. Oh, of course. You too need to tell the story

that you share in one of your books about someone who said, yay, I'm engaged. I'm at the end of my troubles. You got to finish that one. Yeah. But then you have to ask which end, which end of your troubles as you're getting married, which end of your troubles now that I'm married. Sister Ethan, I've always said Joseph Smith is a prophet for that one verse. If you don't have children, you don't know joy. And that is part of some of the greatest joys of my life. If not the greatest joys of my life, I've found in my children. If they'd known children, they would have had no misery. And some of the most miserable experiences of my life have been involved to my children. I hate to say that. I hope they're not listening, but it's that verse right there sums it up, doesn't it?

Well, and we have experienced the rejoy, if you want to put it that way, because we have our first few great-grandchildren and two of our granddaughters who are both the oldest in their family. One is in her early 30s, and the other one is almost 28. They each had their first little baby girl. And to see the joy for both of them, is this makes this verse just live, when you see the joy that they have

in those little children. But it reminds me too of the doctor who delivered our first son, who was not exactly easy to deliver. And I was just gingerly walking down the hall, and he was our obstetrician as well, this uncle. And he said to me, well, how does it feel to have the easy part over with? And I said, you've got to be kidding. That was not easy. And he said, the next 20 years are going to be the determining harder part. And I think Lehi had some clue about that because he said, having no joy for they knew no misery, but doing no good for they knew no sin.

So they didn't have the oppositions. There was no way that they could make choices. Now, Marie has kindled a memory of a conversation between the two of us years ago when that very child she just talked about- We won't mention his name. Was driving us up the walls. He was really a challenge our obstetrician had properly predicted. And I was just so frustrated. One day I said to Marie, the Lord put Adam and Eve on the earth as full-grown people. Why couldn't he have done that with this child? And Marie, with that wonderful gift of a mother's insight, said, I think the Lord gave us that child to make Christians out of us. Yeah, I don't know where that came from, but we found increasingly

that that was correct. So that was part of Adam and Eve's progression. We often say, Adam fell, that men might be mortal, and men are mortal, that they might have joy. So this earth is to prepare us to have joy with both the mortality of it, the joy that we've talked about, but also through the sin, we learn without being condemned by it, if we are willing, if we make those choices. So we do taste the bitter so that we can understand and prize the good. I like how Moses 6.48 says, it sounds so much like 2 Nephi 2, but it takes a different turn. Maybe you were going here anyway, but in 2 Nephi, Adam fell that men might be, men are that they might have joy. But then in Moses 6.48, it says,

because that Adam fell, we are, and by his fall came death, and we are made partakers of misery and woe. So, I like to say sometimes we have 2 Nephi 2.24 days, and sometimes we have Moses 6.48 days. That we might have joy, this one says, so that we might have misery and woe. And I think it's so beautifully significant that 2 Nephi 2 was Lehi talking to Jacob. Jacob, you've never seen Jerusalem. You've seen your family fighting all your life. Let me explain opposition in all things. Let me explain the origin of the fall and why there had to be opposition. And I think that's really wonderful that Lehi's talking to Jacob, and that's where this amazing doctrine comes out. Yes. And sometimes we'll have both the misery and the joy in the same day. I mean, yeah, yeah. So I'd like to share an illustration of exactly what we've been talking about. And this is from Eve's point of view, again,

as she is experiencing what the atonement is coming to mean in her life. What does it mean to follow Christ? Try to remember what God taught them. And yes, they can pray to him. And what do they do when they first are able? They build an altar so that they can pray. But here's an illustration that shows Eve through a poem by Arda Romney Balliff, who was President Mary N.G. Romney's sister, both an artist and a poet. And she was trying to imagine what it was like for Eve through the experience of Cain and Abel and her honest questions, her honest experience trying to work things through. So as I read this poem, we see her wondering about her relationship to God, although she's always sure that he's there, but she's willing to ask honest, hard questions.

And it's interesting that Sister Beloff calls this poem Lamentation. So notice there are some symbols in this poem and layers of meaning. Symbols such as the fruit, the fruit of her body, the fruit of the earth, the seed, you know, the seed that will become their generations, a storm, and multiply sorrow. Lots of layers of meaning. So let me share it. And God said, be fruitful and multiply. God said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow. Thy sorrow, sorrow, sorrow. I have gotten a man from the Lord. I have traded the fruit of the garden for the fruit of my body, for a laughing bundle of humanity. And now another one who looks like Adam. We shall call this one Abel. It is a lovely name, Abel. Cain, Abel, the world is yours. God set the sun in the heavens to light your days, to warm the flocks, to kernel the grain.

He illuminated your nights with stars. He made the trees and the fruit thereof yielding seed. He made every living thing, the wheat, the sheep, the cattle, for your enjoyment. And behold, it is very good. Adam, Adam, where art thou? Where are the boys? The sky darkens with clouds. Adam, Adam, is that you? Where is Abel? He's long caring for his flocks. The sky is black and the rain hammers. Are the ewes lambing in this storm? Why your troubled face, Adam? Are you ill? Why so pale, so agitated? The wind will pass, the lambs will birth with Abel's help. Dead? What is dead? Merciful God, hurry, bring warm water.

I'll bathe his wounds. Bring clean clothes. Bring herbs. I'll heal him. I am trying to understand. You said Abel is dead, but I'm skilled with herbs. Remember when he was seven, the fever? Remember how herbs will not heal? Dead? But Cain, where is Cain? Listen to that thunder. Cain? Cursed? What has happened to him? God said, a fugitive and a vagabond? But how can he do that? They are my sons, too. I gave them birth in the valley of pain. Adam, try to understand. In the valley of pain I bore them. Fugitive? Vagabond?

But this is his home. This is the soil he loathed, where he toiled for golden wheat, for tasseled corn. To the hill country, but there are rocks in the hill country. Cain can't work in the hill country. The nights are cold, cold and lonely, and the wind gales. Quick, we must find him, a basket of bread in his coat.

I worry, thinking of him wandering with no place to lay his head. Cain? Cursed? A wanderer? A roamer? Who will bake his bread and mend his coat? Abel, my son, dead? And Cain, my son, a fugitive? Two sons, Adam. We had two sons. Both, oh Adam, multiply.

Sorrow. Dear God, why? Tell me again about the fruit. Why? Please tell me again. Why? Thank you, Sister Beloff, and thank you, Eve. She was willing to ask those honest questions. I think she kind of knew, if I can't ask the questions of God, how can I find the answers? So I think we have this experience of Eve both wanting to know the answers, but also being willing to go out after she has the questions and live through the answers, even though they are really difficult. So I'm looking forward to meeting her someday, to finding out from her perspective, face to face, how did she feel about living through those answers, living through those questions? Although we do have a couple of clues.

But I think what she says also in this poem especially is that we can have these really hard and even these searing experiences and that we can find the answers through living our lives, if you want to say outside the temple, in the way that the temple teaches. Please join us for part two of this podcast.