2.310 The Keys are Real

In Matthew 5:13, Jesus calls us the salt of the earth, a bold reminder that our lives are meant to carry his flavor, his truth, and his love to the world. Join me each day to explore one verse of scripture and one thought, striving to stay full of savor and truly live as savory salt. Hello my friends.

It's great to have you with me. Today let's be anxiously engaged in a good cause and bring to pass much righteousness. Let's talk about the keys and what do they open?

We're reading this week Doctrine and Covenants sections 125 through 128 as well as 3 Nephi chapters 24 through 28. We're going to stay inside of Doctrine and Covenants section 127 as we started there yesterday. Okay, although we're going to shift gears.

Yesterday was about Joseph's letter and how he sees tribulation and challenges and how he knows that the Lord's going to help him. If you haven't listened to that one, go back and listen to that. Today we're going to shift gears as Joseph directs the saints to make sure that they are recording any of the baptisms for the dead that they're doing.

Baptisms for the Dead. As Joseph kind of revealing it and going forward, he emphasizes the need for it to be recorded and the need to make sure that those recordings go into the records of the church. And it's inside of this direction that we get an interesting phrase that we really see a couple of times throughout scripture, but I want to point one out and see if you recognize it as well.

We're going to look at Doctrine and Covenants, section 127, verse 7 today. It says that in all your recordings it may be recorded in heaven. Whatsoever you bind on earth may be bound in heaven.

Whatsoever you loose on earth may be loosed in heaven. Now that's only the first half of the sentence. You know now to go and read the rest of that sentence.

But are you familiar with those phrases? This idea of binding on earth and binding in heaven and loosing on earth and then loosing it in heaven as well. After doing a little bit of research we see these phrases in some interesting places in scripture.

We know that today in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as the sealing power is what we call it today. The ability to seal families together for eternity. This is where the concept of the baptisms for the dead as well as other ordinances for the dead and the work for the dead really come about.

You see, we believe that Peter, who was given the authority from Jesus Christ, that through Peter and the other apostles as they passed away, were martyred, killed, died, that that priesthood power was lost and those keys were lost. We also see the same phraseology inside of the Book of Mormon in a very specific way. We see Nephi in the later Nephi, right?

Not the first Nephi. But we see Nephi having this ability and he actually is able to bring the entire civilization to repentance through drought and famine. So we see this sealing power here at play.

My friends, today as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we believe in the sealing power, the power, the keys of our Heavenly Father. What an amazing blessing we have! It totally changes the perspective we have on family relationships when we look at things through an eternal lens.

All of a sudden the little things at home that maybe can build up in annoyances, the little open cupboards here or the toys on the floor over there or whatever it is, that's all for today my friends. Lift up your hearts and rejoice. Cleave unto the covenants you have made and together we will be savory salt. Hurrah!