My talk on Eternal Marriage from church
Good
morning everyone! For those of who you may not know me, my maiden name is
Alicia Brown, and my recently married name is Alicia Harbison. I used to attend
the Erie 2nd ward during my first two years of medical school at
LECOM. For the past year I have been living in Horseheads, NY rotating at Arnot
Ogden Medical Center. I am currently a 4th year medical student, who
is back in Erie to study for my next big board exam that I will be taking at
the beginning of July. I am very thankful to the different families that have
opened up their homes for me and Tim to stay in for the past 4 weeks. We are so
thankful for your generosity.
I was
given the topic of talking on “Eternal Marriage” and since Tim and I have
almost been married for two months now, I thought I would start with a little
bit on our story. At the beginning of my 3rd year of medical school
I moved to Horseheads, NY to start my rotations. I was attending the nearby
ward, and trying to make friends. One of the young women that I met encouraged
me to try to attend the YSA ward of the stake that met in Ithaca. I knew that
this may be a bit difficult since I wasn’t living in the ward boundaries of the
YSA. However, I got in contact with the branch President and started to attend
FHE, institute, and then was officially allowed to go to the meeting that
Sunday. I am very thankful to Bishop Duke and President Kreuger for allowing me
to do this.
Tim and
I technically met that Monday at FHE where we watched “Frozen”. It wasn’t until
the following Sunday during church that we ended up talking, since Tim had
given a talk on Father’s Day, and I only knew his name because his name was in
the program. I asked him where to go for the next part of church, and then
asked if I could join him on a planned movie trip that he was attempting to do.
We exchanged phone numbers, and as he puts it, I never stopped texting him
since. By that Wednesday we were officially dating. Tim was in Ithaca for the
summer due to an internship working on particle accelerators at Cornell
University. He grew up in Dallas, TX and was about to start his senior year at
BYU-Idaho majoring in physics. We had about 8 weeks of dating while in NY. Then
he headed back to Idaho to finish school.
We
started talking about marriage and the importance of it early on. By the time
Tim left, we knew that we wanted to get married, both sets of parents knew, and
we knew it would only be a long waiting game until Tim graduated for us to get
married. Thankfully, I had already set up a rotation in Idaho and then had a
break month afterwards which allowed us to be reunited in the fall when Tim
proposed, and Tim spent Christmas with my family and me. Then we had about 4
months until I saw him after he graduated. We were sealed in the Palmyra, NY
temple on April 25, 2015. It has been extremely hard, meshing two different
lives and points of views together, but it has been very worthwhile. Neither of
us knew how hard it would be, but we both agree that this is one of the best
decisions we have ever made.
Keeping
Christ and the temple in the center of our relationship from the beginning is
what made this relationship different for me from any other relationship. We
knew of the eternal potential, and wanted us to go the distance together, with
Christ at the head. I’ve been in other relationships in the past where one or
both of us had different views on God, and that definitely led to their demise.
Having a solid foundation in the gospel and its truths helped nurture us.
From
the Bible Dictionary on the topic of marriage, it reads, “Latter-day revelation
tells us that marriage under the law of the gospel and the holy priesthood is
for eternity, and that men and women thus sealed in marriage continue to have
children throughout eternity.” And from Preach my Gospel, “Marriage between a
man and a woman is ordained of God and is central to God’s eternal plan for the
salvation of His children….[this] enables family relationships to endure beyond
the grave.” It goes on to say that the marriage can only be eternal when
performed with the sealing power in the temple and if the couple follows the
covenants that they have made both together and individually.
This is
what makes marriages in our church significantly different from other people’s
marriages. It deals some with wording, a lot with covenants, and what the
person believes. For example, I have been to a couple of non LDS weddings after
joining the church and it felt so sad to me to hear the words, “til death do us
part”. The marriages that those couples have entered into is only temporal, and
I have a good guess that most of them would want to be with their spouse
forever, but they weren’t sealed. In Matthew 16: 19 Christ is talking to Peter
saying, “And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and
whatsoever thou shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever
thou shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” And later on in Kirtland,
OH, Elijah appeared to Joseph Smith and gave him the key to the same sealing
power, to once again bind people together for all eternity. This has been
passed down through the priesthood to various sealers in different places
through the years. That’s why we talk about being married for time and all
eternity. For those of us who have been sealed to our spouse, we know that we
will stay united forever.
Eternal
marriage is not only to keep love birds together, but it is also essential for
our eternal progression. In Doctrine and Covenants 131: 1-4, “In the celestial
glory there are three heavens or degrees: And in order to obtain the highest, a
man must enter into this order of the priesthood [meaning the new and
everlasting covenant of marriage]: And if he does not, he cannot obtain it. He
may enter into the other, but that is the end of his kingdom; he cannot have an
increase.” What this passage is saying is that through the eternal covenant of
marriage, we help each other make it to the highest degree of the celestial
kingdom. By loving each other, following the commandments, and keeping true to
the covenants we entered into, we exalt each other. I am as important to Tim’s
salvation as Tim is to mine.
Another
interesting part of marriage is the melding together of two separate people
into one whole. This is talked about in Matthew 19: 4-6, “Have ye not read,
that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said,
For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his
wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but
one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”
Tim did exactly this. He moved from one side of the country to another, without
knowing anybody else really at all, just so that he and I could start our lives
together. It has been an interesting change, going from just thinking about how
something would affect one person’s life to how it affects both. Trying to put
the other person ahead of yourself, just like how Christ taught us to love each
other. This is done through a lot of talking, trust, and communication.
With
eternal marriage comes eternal families. Where we are put into family units
that are started originally in heaven, come down to earth, meet up, start having
children, and then can continue to have children in the eternities. It is one
of the earliest commandments, “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be
fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it” (Gen 1:26-28).
We were given a wonderful commandment to bear children and rear them up in the
way of the Lord. A good description of this comes from Sermons and Missionary Services, “There is a passage in our
Scriptures which the Latter-Day Saints accept as divine: ‘This is the glory of God
– to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man’. Likewise we could
say that this is the glory of men and women – to bring to pass the mortality of the sons and daughters of
God, to give earth-life, through honorable marriage, to the waiting spirits,
our Father’s spirit children who anxiously desire to come to dwell here in this
mortal state. All the honor and glory that can come to men or women by the
development of their talents, the homage and the praise they may receive from
an applauding world, worshipping at their shrine of genius, is but a dim thing
whose luster shall fade in comparison to the high honor, the eternal glory, the
ever-enduring happiness that shall come to the woman who fulfils the first
great duty and mission that devolves upon her to become the mother of the sons
and daughters of God.” What a spectacular glory that will be. I know that Tim
and I eagerly anticipate that day.
I would
like to conclude my talk by bearing my testimony. I know that this gospel is
true. I know that God has a plan in mind for each of us, one better than we
could have ever imagined. That’s what led Tim and I to each other a little over
a year ago, and we are both eternally better for it. I know of the truthfulness
of eternal marriages, the struggles that come, but that we can grow better and
closer to each other as we follow our covenants and commandments of God. I
would also like to thank this ward who first took a shy girl into their arms
back in October 2012 when I first joined the church. You all made this
transition so much better. I say all these things in the name of Jesus Christ,
amen.
