The New and Everlasting Covenant of Marriage

The New and Everlasting Covenant of Marriage

President Gordon B. Hinckley: “The most important step you have made or will make in your life is marriage. Its consequences are many, so important and so everlasting. No other decision will have such tremendous consequences for the future” (BYU Commencement, April 27, 1995. Church News, Sept. 30, 1995, 2).
READ D&C 131:1-4

What is the New and Everlasting Covenant??
The marriage covenant had, for many centuries, been considered valid only ‘till death doth us part’; now a new covenant was about to be revealed, which would cover both eternity and time. It would be everlasting as well as new. It is new; and yet, it is as old as the gospel. It is as old as the plan of salvation adopted in the Council of Heaven, before the foundations of the world were laid…It is part of that plan, that covenant, of which Jesus Christ is the Representative and Mediator” (Hyrum M. Smith and Jane M. Sjodahl, The doctrine and Covenants Commentary, rev. ed. (1972), 822).

Joseph Fielding Smith
“The new and everlasting covenant…is everything – the fullness of the gospel. So marriage properly performed, baptism, ordination to the priesthood, everything else – every contract, every obligation, every performance that pertains to the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise according to his law…, is part of the new and everlasting covenant… Therefore, all who seek a place in the kingdom of God are under the obligation and commandment to abide in the new and everlasting covenant, which is the fullness of the gospel with all of its rites, covenant, gifts, and obligations.” (Doctrines of Salvation, 1954-1956, 1: 158-59)

Elder Robert D. Hales
“How we conduct ourselves in this life will determine what we will be in all the eternities to come. To receive the blessings of sealing that our Heavenly Father has given to us, we have to keep the commandments and conduct ourselves in such a way that our families will want to live with us in the eternities…” (Ensign, Nov 1996, 64-68; manual, p. 101)

Elder Bruce R. McConkie Having One's Calling and Election Made Sure Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, Vol. 3, pp. 331-332
 
To have one's calling and election made sure is
To be sealed up unto eternal life;
It is to have the unconditional guarantee of exaltation in the highest heaven of the celestial world;
It is to receive the assurance of godhood;
It is, in effect, to have the day of judgment advanced, so that an inheritance of all the glory and honor of the Father's kingdom is assured prior to the day when the faithful actually enter into the divine presence...

Possible Scenarios Under the New and Everlasting Covenant of Marriage (D&C 132)

        Scenario #1:          Righteous couple, married "till death do us part"          but not married by the Lord's word, i.e. the NECM (D&C 132:15-17)
Such marriage is not recognized in eternity; the parties will become separate and forever single after this life
Parties in the earthly marriage relationship cannot be "enlarged" (Abraham 3:26)
They are saved, but not exalted; by definition, they don't have eternal life (D&C 131:4; 132:22)
They become angels--ministering servants for exalted beings

Scenario #2:
                Somewhat righteous couple, married for time and eternity but without ratifying seal of the Holy Ghost (D&C 132:18)
The marriage relationship becomes void in the next world--probably because these individuals were not valiant in their testimonies, or in other words, they never lived the high standards required by this order of the priesthood (D&C 76:79)

Scenario #3:
                Righteous couple, married by the Lord's word and ratified by the Holy Ghost (D&C 132:19-20)
Marriage is recognized in eternity; parties in the relationship on earth will still be together as a couple in the celestial kingdom
They become exalted beings-gods--inheriting "thrones, kingdoms, principalities, and powers, dominions, all heights and depths"
All things will be subject to them (see also D&C 76:58-60)

Scenario #4:
        Unrighteous couple, married by the Lord's word and previously ratified by the Holy Ghost (D&C 132:26)
Marriage is recognized in eternity; parties in the relationship will still be together as a couple in the celestial kingdom
However, because of their serious wickedness in mortality first they will be "destroyed in the flesh" and be subjected to the "buffetings of Satan" until full repentance is achieved

Restoration Personages

Moroni
John the Baptist
Peter, James, John
Moses
Elias
Elijah
Moses
Moses restored the authority to go anywhere on the earth to gather the Lord’s people, to establish Zion. We have God’s authority to teach God’s children anywhere they live. Who doesn’t know we have that authority? Many world leaders! We have been praying for years to get our missionaries into their countries. Peter, James, and John restored the authority to do missionary work, but Moses restored a special key that allows us to cover the earth and gather Israel into branches, wards, districts and stakes, worldwide.

Elias (restored the blessings of Abraham)
“Now what was the gospel of Abraham (restored by Elias)? It was the commission, the mission, the endowment and power, the message of salvation, given to Abraham. It was a divine promise that both in the world and out of the world his seed should continue “as innumerable as the stars; or, if ye were to count the sand upon the seashore ye could not number them.’ (D&C 132:30; Gen. 17; Abr. 2:1-12). Thus the gospel of Abraham restored by Elias was one of Celestial marriage; it was a gospel or commission to provide a lineage for the elect portion of the premortal spirits.”

ELIJAH
When a couple marries by priesthood authority (restored by Elijah), are faithful to their covenants, develop the attributes of Christ in their nature, and love each other, they are entitled to come forth in the resurrection with immortality and eternal lives---they retain the capacity to bear children. “Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue” (D&C 132:20).

How Many Priesthoods are there?
Orders of Priesthood:
Joseph Smith said: “all priesthood is Melchizedek, but there are different portions or degrees of it" (Joseph Fielding Smith, Jr., selected. and arranged. Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 1972, 180).
The Prophet Joseph Smith referred to these ‘portions’ or divisions of priesthood as ‘degrees’ or “grand orders“ (ibid, 322). He said: “There are three grand orders of priesthood. . .” (Teachings, 322).



Melchizedek Priesthood




Elder Bruce R. McConkie said of the patriarchal order, "[a couple] can enter an order of the priesthood named the new and everlasting covenant of marriage (See D&C 131:2), named also the patriarchal order, because of which order we can create for ourselves eternal family units of our own, patterned after the family of God our Heavenly Father."
("Priesthood Activation," Ensign, May 1982 p. 34.)

Elder McConkie: “I went to the temple, and I took my wife [to be] with me, and we kneeled at the altar. There on that occasion we entered, the two of us, into an 'order of the priesthood.' When we did it, we had sealed upon us, on a conditional basis, every blessing that God promised Father Abraham--the blessings of exaltation and eternal increase. The name of that order of priesthood, which is patriarchal in nature, because Abraham was a natural patriarch to his posterity, is the New and Everlasting Covenant of marriage."



("The Eternal Family Concept," devotional address at the Second Annual Priesthood Genealogical Research Seminar, BYU, 23 June 1967; see also Conference Report, Oct. 1977, 50, 51, italics added.)

President Boyd K. Packer explained the role of women in the family organization:

“No man receives the fulness of the priesthood without a woman at his side. For no man, the Prophet [Joseph Smith] said, can obtain the fulness of the priesthood outside the temple of the Lord (D&C 131:1-4). And she is there beside him in that sacred place. She shares in all that he receives. The man and the woman individually receive the ordinances encompassed in the endowment. But the man cannot ascend to the highest ordinances--the sealing ordinances--without her at his side. No man achieves the supernal exalting status of worthy fatherhood except as a gift from his wife. In the home and in the Church, sisters should be esteemed for their very nature.” (D&C 132:63)

(“The Relief Society,” Ensign, May 1998, 73.)


Men who marry in the temple and gain exaltation will be “priests and kings, who have received of his fullness, and of his glory” (D&C 76:56).

“Those who endure in perfect faith, who receive the Melchizedek Priesthood, and who gain the blessings of the temple (including celestial marriage) are eventually (anointed now to become) anointed [or ordained] kings and priests. These are offices given faithful holders of the Melchizedek Priesthood, and in them they will bear rule as exalted beings during the millennium and in eternity.”

(Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed. [SLC: Bookcraft, 1966], 599.)

Wives have callings similar to husbands. Elder McConkie explained:

“If righteous men have power through the gospel and the crowning ordinance of celestial marriage to become kings and priests to rule in exaltation forever, it follows that the women by their side (without whom they cannot attain exaltation) will be queens and priestesses. (Rev. 1:6; 5:10.) Exaltation grows out of the eternal union of a man and his wife. Of those whose marriage endures in eternity, the Lord says, “Then shall they be gods” (D&C 132:20); that is each of them, the man and the woman, will be a god. As such they will rule over their dominions forever.”


(Mormon Doctrine, 613).

Foreordination
To carry forward his own purposes among men and nations, the Lord foreordained chosen spirit children in pre-mortal life and assigned them to come to earth at particular times and places so that they might aid [Him] in furthering the divine will. ...Alma taught the great truth that every person who holds the Melchizedek Priesthood was foreordained to receive that high and holy order in the pre-existent councils of eternity.

(McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed., 290-291 – topic “foreordination.“)

An earlier First Presidency explained the meaning of ‘eternal lives:’


Orson Pratt
A Saint, who is one in deed and in truth, does not look for an immaterial heaven, but he expects a heaven with lands, houses, cities, vegetation, rivers, and animals; with thrones, temples, palaces, kings, princes, priests, and angels; with food, raiment, musical instruments…; all of which are material. Indeed, the Saints’ heaven is a redeemed, glorified, celestial, material creation, inhabited by glorified material beings, male and female, organized into families, embracing all the relationships of husbands and wives, parents and children where sorrow, crying, pain, and death will be no more. Or to speak still more definitely, this earth, when glorified, is the Saints’ eternal heaven. On it they expect to live, with body, parts, and holy passions: on it they expect to move and have their being; to eat, drink, converse, worship, sing, play on musical instruments, engage in joyful, innocent, social amusements, visit neighboring towns and neighboring worlds” (Orson Pratt, Millennial Star, Vol. 28, p. 722, November 17, 1866).

“We have long heard, and believed, that the Lord has reserved special spirits to come forth in the last days of the last dispensation. The Church’s rising generation of young men and women are a part of that vanguard. Reserved by the Lord for this time, they must now be preserved by parents and prepared for their special moment in human history! They have been held back to come forth at this time, but now they need to be pushed forward to meet their rendezvous. . .
One final thought: just as the rising generation is here, now, by divine design—so are we who have been placed just ahead of them. Our lives and theirs have and will intersect many times before it is all over, and not by accident.”


(“Unto the Rising Generation,” Ensign, Apr. 1985, 8, 11.)