On the Importance of Making Covenants

While growing up as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I had heard many, many times that when I married, I should make sure that it was in our faith's temple. I was told that the reason it was so important that I married in the temple was because only there would I be able to be married for time and all eternity--that marrying in the temple was the only way I would be able to be with my spouse forever, literally.

I heard that speech so many times. So many. But it wasn't until after I got married that I understood the gravity of that teaching.

One week before Jake and I were to be married (in a temple, as it would turn out), I took him in to have his first colonoscopy. We learned that day that he did, in fact, have an ulcer in his colon. Upon receiving that news, I remember being completely overwhelmed. I was about to make the biggest decision of my life, and on top of that I had just learned that my twenty-one year old fiance was sick. I'd be lying if I said I never once considered calling off the marriage. But I didn't, and a week later was one of the best days of my life.

It was almost one month to the day, after we got married that we received more earth-shattering news. Not only did my husband have an ulcer, but he also had a failing liver... and the only course of treatment would be a transplant...quite possibly within seven years. Seven years. We were both twenty-one, in college, and heart broken knowing that Jake might not make it past the age of 28. Words cannot describe the anguish we felt.

It's been almost two years now and there have been numerous miracles occur to help soften the blow of such a devastating diagnosis--the most comforting and miraculous of all being that I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that our marriage is eternal. I didn't marry Jake because I thought he would make me happy for a couple of months, or because I wanted him as my husband for a couple of years. I married him because he is my truest friend, my confidant, and a much better man than I could ever dream of. I married him because I wanted to spend my life with him, and my eternity.

I will forever be grateful for the decision that we made to be sealed in the temple of our God. There, we made promises to each other and to God that we would be dedicated to our marriage; and there, God promised us that if we do our part, He will let us be together, even after we die. I know God will keep that promise, because He is God and keeping promises is his nature. That promise of eternity is the one thing that has kept me going. It has brought so much more strength and comfort than I could ever imagine. It has been the calm in the storm.

I will forever be grateful to God for allowing me to reap the blessings of the temple. And I will always be glad that we decided to get married there so we could have those blessings. Receiving ordinances and making covenants isn't just for old people like I used to think... it's for everyone.