"Let the Fire of the Covenant Burn in Your Hearts"
Fall 2004

Susan W. Tanner
Young Women General President

Reminders and announcements about the Young Women program:

1. Curriculum

Many leaders say we need improvement with our current manuals. We share your concern. To offer current help, let me refer you to the "Resource Guide" in the May and November Ensigns and the "Sunday Lesson Helps" on the back pages of the New Era. We feel the magazines are stepping up to help us with material that is current and Church approved. The Resource Guide is new and improved since this past conference, with not only talk suggestions but also possible discussion questions to ask, as well as songs, scriptures, and Personal Progress value experiences that correlate with the specific lessons.

2. Camp

Over the years most of the statistics we have seen show that one of the most powerful places for girls to strengthen their testimonies is at camp. We are aware that some wards and stakes, even right here on the Wasatch Front, are not holding camp. We urge you to talk with your priesthood leaders about the importance of it in the lives and testimonies of the girls and find a way to do it. When I visited Portugal about two years ago, a Young Women presidency told me their camp story. Every possible obstacle lay in their path. They had no place to have it, no money for it, no experience with what to do, objections from parents, etc. But the Young Women president had a vision for what could happen because she had been to Utah and attended a Young Women camp in Vernal, Utah. So she persisted. I asked how it went. They exulted that they never would not have camp again. It was now a must on a yearly basis because of its power in the lives of their girls. So please make sure every girl has the chance to go to camp and there strengthen her testimony.

3. Standards

For the Strength of Youth: Teach the good by showing the good. This invites the Spirit, which is the greatest teacher. Too often we see leaders who try to teach a certain standard by showing the bad example. For instance, if you want to teach modesty in dress and appearance, don’t begin by showing all the immodest styles. Youth see the bad every day in their lives. We show them the good. A nice example of this came when David Warner of the Church’s Cultural Arts Division was working with a group of youth who were to help in a satellite youth discussion. He opened the For the Strength of Youth booklet and showed them a picture of some attractively dressed youth and said, “Come looking like this.” We must teach them to be good, as he did, by showing them the good.

4. Young Women Theme

The theme needs no embellishment. It is not preceded by statements or charges. We don’t hold hands. We just stand and say it. It is powerful in and of itself in the hearts of the girls. Last spring when I visited individual girls in Brazil, I saw the complete range of activity, from total estrangement to extremely valiant, and in every temporal circumstance as well. In each case I asked them if they could say the Young Women theme for me and tell me what their favorite part of it was. Without exception they responded with the memorization and usually with depth and sincerity in their answers. So please stand and say the theme without embellishment, and let it sink deep into the girls’ hearts.

5. Web Site

Serving in the Church: We now have a Web site that provides the structure and foundation for the Church’s official source of information. I, the nontechnological woman, will introduce you, if you haven’t already explored it. Let’s just click on lds.org, then click on Serving in the Church, then Young Women. Here you can learn about the new Mutual theme, or about Young Women programs, or about our history, etc. We know this will be a great blessing and resource to leaders.

6. Transition

Who remembers the March 19, 2003, letter from the First Presidency? What were the six points? Who has successfully tried to incorporate one of these points? Who is responsible for these young people? The family, the priesthood, and the auxiliaries. The key is working together and remembering President Hinckley’s three points of retention: a friend, a responsibility, and nurturing with the good word of God.

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Thank you for being wonderful leaders. You are the ones who are in a position to influence and bless each young woman. And you do it so well. We love hearing of your successes. We know Heavenly Father has called you to succeed with His precious daughters. We pray for you every day with the prayer of Alma: “Behold, O Lord, their souls are precious . . . ; therefore, give unto us, O Lord, power and wisdom that we may bring these, our [young women], again unto thee” (Alma 31:35). Now let’s look to where that power and wisdom that we need comes from.

Recently President Hinckley has asked us how we can put fire in the hearts of our people. What do you think he meant by putting fire in our hearts? Fire is powerful and strong. In its negative sense, it can cause great destruction. But it is also equally powerful in its good purposes. It provides light, warmth, and sustenance. Through the ages it has literally sustained life. Fire in our hearts is light, warmth, sustenance, spiritual power, and testimony. In Jeremiah it says, “His word was in mine heart as a burning fire” (Jeremiah 20:9). In ancient America, when the Father testified of His beloved Son to the multitude, it “did cause their hearts to burn” (3 Nephi 11:3). I think “fire in our hearts” describes testimony—conversion that comes by keeping covenants and being blessed with the Spirit.

Brigham Young also used the symbol of fire to describe testimony. He said, “Let the candle of the Lord be lighted up within you” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young [1997], 320). As I think of the early Saints of this dispensation, I think of their powerful, blazing testimonies that endured through persecution and hardship. Many of these strong people faithfully moved with the Church from Kirtland to Missouri to Nauvoo and then to Utah. In Nauvoo, as they built a temple, persecutions increased. But the Saints were determined not to leave their city before they received ordinances and made covenants in that holy place. Brigham Young charged them, “Let the fire of the covenant which you made in the House of the Lord, burn in your hearts, like a flame unquenchable” (Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Sept. 28, 1846, 5). Herein was the power they derived that strengthened them for the long difficulties ahead. Those covenants burned like unquenchable fire in their hearts.

Do our young women have burning testimonies in their hearts? Do they know what it means to “make and keep sacred covenants”? Do we as leaders teach them the power and strength and blessings derived from covenant keeping? Do testimonies from covenant keeping burn like an unquenchable fire in their hearts and ours?

In the coming year we can build those burning testimonies as we concentrate on the 2005 Mutual theme, “A Great and a Marvelous Work.” In 1 Nephi 14:7 the Lamb of God says, “I will work a great and a marvelous work among the children of men; a work which shall be everlasting.” Next year the whole Church will remember that great and marvelous work—the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We will celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Joseph Smith and the 175th anniversary of the organization of the Church.

I feel an unquenchable fire in my heart for this great and marvelous work. I hope we understand the significance of the Restoration. Joseph Smith tried to teach a handful of priesthood bearers who were very young in the gospel of its significance. They were gathered together in a small log schoolhouse in Kirtland, Ohio, “to bear testimony of this work. . . . When they got through the Prophet said: ‘Brethren I have been very much edified and instructed in your testimonies here tonight, but I want to say to you before the Lord, that you know no more concerning the destinies of this Church and kingdom than a babe upon its mother’s lap. You don’t comprehend it. . . . It is only a little handfull of Priesthood you see here tonight, but this Church will [grow until it will] fill North and South America—it will fill the world’ ” (Wilford Woodruff, in Conference Report, Apr. 1898, 57). And as it grows to fill the world, our testimonies should grow to fill our hearts.

If our young women understand the Restoration and feel a flaming testimony in their hearts for this work, they will have the strength of the early Saints to face all of the challenges of their lives. There are six points about the Restoration I would like every young woman to know. They are

1. Joseph Smith was the Lord’s instrument in restoring His Church upon the earth.
2. His First Vision and subsequent revelations established basic, fundamental truths.
3. Under inspiration, Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon.
4. Priesthood authority and keys were returned to the earth.
5. Temple ordinances and covenants provide eternal blessings for individuals and families.
6. Each of us can make and keep covenants.

1. Joseph Smith was the Lord’s instrument in restoring His Church upon the earth.

Joseph Smith was a righteous and humble young man who was taught by his parents to work hard, to pray, to be honest and upright. He was prepared not only in his home by his earthly parents but also in the premortal existence before the foundation of this world to usher in the long-promised dispensation of the fulness of times.

President James E. Faust told of a lecturer at a London University named Joseph Hamstead, who was teaching his fellow lecturers about some of the programs of our Church. “One of them said [to him]: ‘I like all of this, what is being done for families, etc. If you could take out that bit about an angel appearing to Joseph Smith, I could belong to your church.’ Brother Hamstead replied, ‘Ah, but if you take away the angel appearing to the Prophet Joseph, then I couldn’t belong to the Church because that is its foundation’ ” (in Conference Report, Oct. 2003, 19; or Ensign, Nov. 2003, 19–20).

President Gordon B. Hinckley confirms that testimony. He said: “We declare without equivocation that God the Father and His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, appeared in person to the boy Joseph Smith. . . . Without that history we have nothing. The truth of that unique, singular, and remarkable event is the pivotal substance of our faith” (in Conference Report, Oct. 2002, 85–86; or Ensign, Nov. 2002, 80).

The spirit of all of our work rests upon our testimonies of Joseph Smith as the prophet of the Restoration. David O. McKay’s father, Bishop David McKay, learned this as he served a mission in Scotland in 1881. He faced much bitterness and antagonism as a missionary, so he decided that the best way to reach the people was to concentrate on the Atonement of Jesus Christ and on the first principles of the gospel but to avoid mentioning the Restoration. President McKay tells his story: In a month he felt oppressed with gloom. He lacked the spirit of the work, but didn’t know the cause of his depression. Weighed down with such heaviness, "he went to the Lord and said, ‘Unless I can get this feeling removed, I shall have to go home. I can’t continue having my work thus hampered.’ The discouragement continued for some time." One morning, following a sleepless night, he felt to retire to a cave near the ocean and pray. "He heard a voice [distinctly] say, ‘Testify that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God.’ " He then remembered what he had tacitly decided six weeks or more before. Being overwhelmed with the thought, he realized he had not given the Prophet’s special mission the attention it deserved. "He cried . .nbsp;. ‘Lord, it is enough’ ” (Cherished Experiences from the Writings of President David O. McKay, comp. Clare Middlemiss [1976], 11–12). I know that Joseph Smith was the prophet of the Restoration. In a recent visit to Palmyra, I felt a renewed witness of his mission burn itself into my soul.

2. His First Vision and subsequent revelations established basic, fundamental truths.

Soon after I received this calling, I was sitting in a sacrament meeting in France. In a powerful way, the Spirit burned within me, witnessing of this again to my heart, perhaps in preparation for this very time of remembrance and celebration. From Joseph’s sincere inquiry in the Sacred Grove came important fundamental truths. We learn the nature of God the Eternal Father and His Son, that we are made in Their image, that we are sons and daughters of God. We also learn that He knows us individually by name, that He will answer our prayers, that the fulness of His gospel had been taken from the earth but in His great love for us it would soon be restored again. I testify that we can each have our own experience, that our prayers are answered, that we are children of God, and that He knows each one of us.

3. Under inspiration, Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon.

The coming forth of the Book of Mormon is also an integral part of this great and marvelous Restoration. Isn’t it glorious that the prophet Moroni, who sealed up the ancient records, talked face-to-face with the modern prophet who opened the records in this dispensation? Joseph also exults over this astounding miracle. He says: “What do we hear? Glad tidings from Cumorah! Moroni, an angel from heaven, declaring the fulfilment of the prophets—the book to be revealed” (D&C 128:20). The Bible declares that “in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established” (Matthew 18:16). The Book of Mormon is another testament or witness of Jesus Christ. Through living the precepts taught in this great volume of scripture, we can draw nearer to God than in any other way (Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith [1976], 194). The Book of Mormon contains a promise that we can know of its truthfulness through the power of the Holy Ghost, if sought in prayer. The Spirit has borne witness to my heart that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, and through striving to live its doctrines, I have felt His presence near.

4. Priesthood authority and keys were returned to the earth.

Ancient prophets appeared at different times to Joseph Smith to restore all the authority and keys of the priesthood. John the Baptist restored the Aaronic Priesthood (Joseph Smith—History 1:68–69). Peter, James, and John restored the Melchizedek Priesthood (D&C 27:12). Moses, Elias, and Elijah restored priesthood keys—the keys of the gathering of Israel and establishing families and sealing blessings (D&C 110:11–16). In these is reflected the mission of the Church: to proclaim the gospel, to perfect the Saints, and to redeem the dead.

President Boyd K. Packer said as he addressed the brethren of the Church: “We are all ordinary men with weaknesses." "We . . . have been called and sustained and ordained to an office in the Melchizedek Priesthood” (Worldwide Leadership Training Meeting, Jan. 2003, 1). The Apostle Paul says, “We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us” (2 Corinthians 4:7).

Often in our own wards, a neighbor or a friend whom we know as an individual with strengths and weaknesses is called to serve as our bishop for a season. We need to respect his office. I know a bright young mother who wanted her nursery-age child to advance to Primary before the set age. She talked to the Primary president, who didn’t feel good about authorizing this. So she referred the mother to the bishop. Likewise the bishop did not allow it. The mother felt that the bishop was not as competent as she was and did not understand her situation and her child, and she said as much to a few people. Then once again she entreated the bishop. He again declined her wish and then said to her that he was aware of his deficiencies as a person but that in this case he was speaking to her as her bishop and he hoped she would honor that. At the moment he said that, an almost electrical shock went through her. She started to cry because she felt the Spirit teaching her about the righteous authority of this man who was called of God to serve as her bishop. She realized her need to repent of her negative feelings and respect him in his office.

I know the authority and keys of the priesthood have been restored to the earth. Men who are called to preside in priesthood callings have keys conferred upon them. Women receive callings in auxiliaries under authority from those who hold the keys of the priesthood. I testify that I have felt that power and strength blessing me in this sweet service. I hope with all of my heart that all women and all young women understand and know as I do that all the blessings of the priesthood are available to both men and women. We learn this most profoundly in the temple.

5. Temple ordinances and covenants provide eternal blessings for individuals and families.

It is the restoration of the priesthood which provides the privilege of participating in all the saving ordinances and making covenants that bind us eternally to Heavenly Father’s family and to our earthly families. President Boyd K. Packer said, “The very purpose for the Restoration centers on the sealing authority, the temple ordinances, baptism for the dead, eternal marriage, eternal increase—centers on the family!” ("The One Pure Defense," address to CES religious educators, Feb. 6, 2004, 4).

Last spring my husband and I had the opportunity to travel to many cities in southern Brazil. We felt the power of the temple ordinances blessing that land. We visited three temples and the building site for a fourth one. In those holy places I learned again of the many blessings obtained there. The ordinances bless us in our immediate families, with our extended families, and as members of Heavenly Father’s family. I saw two beautiful little girls in pretty white dresses waiting to be sealed to their parents. I was thrilled to see the baptistry full of youth waiting to be baptized for their own ancestors. I learned that youth leaders are making the temple the focus of everything they do and teach. The young men and young women take temple trips often. They must earn their own money for the bus, whether they come from rich or poor circumstances. They must research their family lines to bring names of their own ancestors. They must be worthy to receive a recommend to enter that holy place. And they have a burning desire in their hearts to do this work.

People now, like the early Saints, come forth from the temples fortified with the fire of their covenants burning in their hearts like a flame unquenchable. In the Doctrine and Covenants it says: “Yea the hearts of thousands . . . shall greatly rejoice in consequence of the blessings which shall be poured out, and the endowment with which my servants have been endowed in this house. And the fame of this house shall spread to foreign lands; and this is the beginning of the blessing which shall be poured out upon the heads of my people” (D&C 110:9–10).

My husband served his mission over 30 years ago in some of the very cities we visited. At that time there were no temples there. He learned several years after he returned home that the faithful Klein family whom he had baptized sold literally everything they owned to travel to the Sao Paulo Temple as soon as it was built. What a sweet reunion we had as we unexpectedly met Sister Klein and her faithful, married children in one of our meetings. They now have a temple in Porto Alegre, a city nearer to her, where she is a temple worker. It takes four bus rides and two hours each way for her to get there every day. But serving in the temple continues to mean everything to her. The fire of her covenant burns in her heart like a flame unquenchable.

6. Each of us can make and keep covenants.

Keeping covenants does not solve nor obliterate all of our earthly problems, but it gives us power and strength to deal with them. Great promises come to those who keep covenants. The Lord promises that we will always have His Spirit to be with us (D&C 20:77). We are also promised personal revelation if we keep the commandments. He says, “I will appear unto my servants, and speak unto them with mine own voice” (D&C 110:8). Elder Eyring said in a leadership training that “the Lord sets His standards so that He can bless us.” He said, “Your happiest moments, and mine, have been when someone we loved and served rose up to live the Lord’s standards of worthiness and reaped blessings from it” (Worldwide Leadership Training Meeting, Jan. 2003, 10). And we as Young Women leaders are all well aware of the promises to youth in For the Strength of Youth if they keep the commandments. It promises, among other things, that they will have greater wisdom, skills, and abilities to bear trials.

I have developed a personal motto in this calling. It is “I can do hard things.” Youth face hard things, and they need to know they can do them. As they keep their covenants, “the Lord [will] strengthen them that they [can] bear up their burdens with ease” (Mosiah 24:15), as he did with Alma’s people. “The Lord came to them in their afflictions, saying: Lift up your heads and be of good comfort, for I know of the covenant which ye have made unto me; and I will covenant with my people and deliver them out of bondage” (Mosiah 24:13).

I live in a wonderful ward with many fine examples of covenant-keeping people who have been strengthened by the Lord so they could bear their trials. We have seen cancer, death, accidental disabilities, out-of-wedlock babies, homosexuality, divorce, never marrying, and childless couples. Trials have not embittered them, but tutored them.

What are some of the universal challenges or “hard things” that youth face? They are concerned about their identity (Who am I?), about isolation and feeling alone, about the wicked world in which they live, and about uncertain times and conditions. Their baptismal covenants can help them know that by taking His name upon them, they belong to the covenant family of God. By keeping their covenants and living righteously, they can know eternal joy and peace and assurance.

A group of fine youth from a wide variety of circumstances visited with us in Palmyra, New York, recently. Marcella, a Bolivian girl, joined the Church when she was adopted at age 12. Her many physical disabilities made it nearly impossible for her to walk. John, a Cambodian immigrant, was the only Latter-day Saint in his family. And there were others, each with their own stories and challenges. But it was apparent in their appearance and in their countenances that each of them carried His name upon them; they kept the standards of the gospel; they remembered Him in all they did. They were Spirit-filled. They came to us prepared to share their testimonies of the Restoration. They had studied the Joseph Smith History and memorized the hymn "Joseph Smith’s First Prayer." As we shared favorite scriptures and favorite hymns in the Sacred Grove, we felt the fire of covenant in their hearts.

Each of us, like King Benjamin’s people, can light this fire by covenanting with “God to do his will, and to be obedient to his commandments in all things that he shall command us.” Then we “shall be called the children of Christ,” and our “hearts are changed through faith on his name.” Thus we may be “born of him and . . . become his sons and his daughters” (Mosiah 5:5, 7). It may then be said of us that “the Spirit . . . 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 . . . whereby we do rejoice with such exceedingly great joy” (Mosiah 5:2, 4). The fire of covenant changes us forever; it motivates our every action and desire.

Conclusion

We, as leaders, have a solemn calling and responsibility to light the fire of testimony in our young women. That fire has the power to light their way in decision-making, to sustain them through their trials, and to warm their souls with eternal joy. My charge to you as leaders is to “put your trust in that Spirit which leadeth to do good—yea, to do justly, to walk humbly, to judge righteously.” And His promise to you if you do this is “I will impart unto you of my Spirit, which shall enlighten your mind, which shall fill your soul with joy; and then shall ye know, or by this shall you know, all things whatsoever you desire of me, which are pertaining unto things of righteousness, in faith believing in me that you shall receive” (D&C 11:12–14).

I bear my burning testimony of this great and marvelous work. I know the Church of Jesus Christ has been restored through Joseph Smith to the earth in these latter days. I know we have a prophet of God leading His Church and that through him, and also through ancient scriptures, we can know the will of the Lord for us and of His great love for us. Every day I taste the sweetness and know the joy and feel the flame unquenchable of being in His service. “[Sisters], shall we not go on in so great a cause? Go forward and not backward. Courage . . . and on, on to victory! Let your hearts rejoice, and be exceedingly glad” for this “voice of gladness,” this “voice of mercy from heaven,” this “voice of truth out of the earth,” and these “glad tidings of great joy” (D&C 128:19, 22), in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.