As we participate in the ordinances of the temple, we receive a gift from our Heavenly Father. We also learn about our natural capacities. We receive power—and Heavenly Father increases our abilities. We are reminded of the role of Jesus Christ in our lives. We are reminded that through His atoning sacrifice we can cleanse and purify ourselves and prepare ourselves to enter back into His presence.

I suppose that we can divide the realm of inquiry into an intellectual field and a spiritual field. While we are in school we are seeking knowledge primarily in the intellectual field, which knowledge probably comes in most instances by reason and through the senses.

This is a tremendously vital and important thing—we encourage it and we urge it upon all people who desire to progress and have enlightenment and advancement in their lives.

But my suggestion is that we need to devote an increasingly large portion of our time in the actual pursuit of knowledge in the spiritual realm. When we deal with spiritual realities, we are not talking about gaining something by reason alone, we are not talking about conveying in some way knowledge to the mind or the spirit that is within us through the senses alone, but we are talking about revelation. We are talking about learning how to come to a knowledge of the things of God by attuning the spirit that we have to the eternal Spirit of God. Such a course, primarily, is the channel and way that revelation comes to an individual.

It does not concern me very much that somebody writes or evaluates or analyzes either a doctrinal or a Church problem of any sort when he does it from the standpoint of the intellect alone. No one questions that everything in the spiritual realm is in total and complete accord with the intellectual realities that we arrive at through reason, but when the two are compared and evaluated and weighed as to their relative merits, the things that are important are in the spiritual realm and not the intellectual. The things of God are known only by the Spirit of God.

It is true that you can reason about doctrinal matters, but you do not get religion into your life until it becomes a matter of personal experience—until you feel something in your soul, until there has been a change made in your heart, until you become a new creature of the Holy Ghost. Providentially, every member of the Church has the opportunity to do this because, in connection with baptism, every member of the Church has the hands of a legal administrator placed on his head, and he is given the promise, “Receive the Holy Ghost.” He thus obtains “the gift of the Holy Ghost” which, by definition, means that he then has the right to the constant companionship of this member of the Godhead, based upon his personal righteousness and faithfulness.

For each of us, a transcendent blessing is available when we make the right moral choices. It is much easier for those who have a righteous balance to yield “to the enticings of the Holy Spirit” (Mosiah 3:19). Then we can leave behind the attributes of the natural man or woman and become someone much more enlightened. Alma counseled his brethren to “contend no more against the Holy Ghost” (Alma 34:38). The gifts of the Holy Ghost have special strengths for those who study and learn. “He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance” (John 14:26). Yes, “the Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion” (D&C 121:46).

How do these marvelous gifts of the Holy Ghost function? Elder Parley P. Pratt (1807–57) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles stated: “It quickens all the intellectual faculties; increases, enlarges, expands and purifies all the natural passions and affections; and adapts them, by the gift of wisdom, to their lawful use. … It inspires virtue, kindness, goodness, tenderness, gentleness and charity. It develops beauty of person, form and features. … It develops and invigorates all the faculties of the physical and intellectual man. It strengthens, invigorates, and gives tone to the nerves. In short, it is, as it were, marrow to the bone, joy to the heart, light to the eyes, music to the ears, and life to the whole being.” Persons enjoying these gifts have “light of their countenances,” and their presence is “a warm glow of pure gladness and sympathy.”

Let me suggest that hands are made clean through the process of putting off the natural man and by overcoming sin and the evil influences in our lives through the Savior’s Atonement. Hearts are purified as we receive His strengthening power to do good and become better. All of our worthy desires and good works, as necessary as they are, can never produce clean hands and a pure heart. It is the Atonement of Jesus Christ that provides both a cleansing and redeeming power that helps us to overcome sin and a sanctifying and strengthening power that helps us to become better than we ever could by relying only upon our own strength. The infinite Atonement is for both the sinner and for the saint in each of us.

The irony of this is that, although we may make a difference in the lives of those we help, we who give charitable service are often the ones who benefit the most. When we sacrifice our time, talents, and resources for the sake of others, we refine our character and thereby become more fit for the kingdom. The Savior said the poor would always be with us (see John 12:8). And it is a good thing too because we cannot become exalted without them. We need the poor as much as the poor need us.

I believe that the Lord is anxious to put into our hands inventions of which we laymen have hardly had a glimpse.

Most of all, I think eternal marriage cannot be achieved without a commitment to make it work. Most of what I know about this I have learned from my companion. We have been married for almost 47 years now. From the beginning she knew what kind of marriage she wanted.

We started as poor college students, but her vision for our marriage was exemplified by a set of silverware.... I noticed that the silverware never went to the many ward dinners she cooked, or never accompanied the many meals she made and sent to others who were sick or needy. It never went on picnics and never went camping. In fact it never went anywhere; and, as time went by, it didn’t even come to the table very often. Some of our friends were weighed in the balance, found wanting, and didn’t even know it. They got the stainless when they came to dinner.

The time came when we were called to go on a mission. I arrived home one day and was told that I had to rent a safe-deposit box for the silver. She didn’t want to take it with us. She didn’t want to leave it behind. And she didn’t want to lose it.

For years I thought she was just a little bit eccentric, and then one day I realized that she had known for a long time something that I was just beginning to understand. If you want something to last forever, you treat it differently. You shield it and protect it. You never abuse it. You don’t expose it to the elements. You don’t make it common or ordinary. If it ever becomes tarnished, you lovingly polish it until it gleams like new. It becomes special because you have made it so, and it grows more beautiful and precious as time goes by.

Eternal marriage is just like that. We need to treat it just that way. I pray that we may see it for the priceless gift that it is.