The Mission of Elijah
“Many of your ancestors died never having the chance to accept
the gospel and to receive the blessings and promises you have received. The
Lord is fair and He is loving. And so He prepared for you and me a way for us
to have the desire of our hearts to offer to our ancestors all the blessings He
has offered us.
“The plan to make that possible has been in place from the
beginning. The Lord gave promises to His children long ago. …
“'Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming
of the great and dreadful day of the Lord:
“'And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children,
and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth
with a curse' (Malachi 4:5-6).”
Blessings for the Dead
“Many of your deceased ancestors will have received a testimony
that the message of the missionaries is true. When you received that testimony
you could ask the missionaries for baptism. But those who are in the spirit
world cannot. The ordinances you so cherish are offered only in this world.
Someone in this world must go to a holy temple and accept the covenants on
behalf of the person in the spirit world. That is why we are under obligation
to find the names of our ancestors and ensure that they are offered by us what
they cannot receive there without our help. …
“Remember that the names which will be so difficult to find are
of real people to whom you owe your existence in this world and whom you will
meet again in the spirit world. When you were baptized, your ancestors looked
down on you with hope. Perhaps after centuries, they rejoiced to see one of
their descendants make a covenant to find them and to offer them freedom. In
your reunion, you will see in their eyes either gratitude or terrible disappointment.
Their hearts are bound to you. Their hope is in your hands. You will have more
than your own strength as you choose to labor on to find them.”
Blessings for the Living
“We must accomplish the priesthood temple ordinance work
necessary for our own exaltation; then we must do the necessary work for those
who did not have the opportunity to accept the gospel in life. Doing work for
others is accomplished in two steps: first, by family history research to
ascertain our progenitors; and second, by performing the temple ordinances to
give them the same opportunities afforded to the living.
“Yet there are many members of the Church who have only limited
access to the temples. They do the best they can. They pursue family history
research and have the temple ordinance work done by others. Conversely, there
are some members who engage in temple work but fail to do family history
research on their own family lines. Although they perform a divine service in
assisting others, they lose a blessing by not seeking their own kindred dead as
divinely directed by latter-day prophets. …
“I have learned that those who engage in family history research
and then perform the temple ordinance work for those whose names they have
found will know the additional joy of receiving both halves of the blessing.”
Learn to Save Our Own Dead
“Thousands of our faithful people seldom go to the temple, and
of those who do go, most are not working on their own ancestral lines. They are
not saving their own dead. They seem to believe they are fulfilling their
responsibilities by merely attending the temple occasionally. This is simply
not so.
“We all must learn that to save our own dead we must
properly identify them so that we can then perform the work for them in the
temples. …
“Saints in every temple district must be taught to provide their
own names. Japanese people should provide the names for their own Tokyo temple.
South American people should provide the names for their own Sao Paulo temple.
Likewise in Mexico and Seattle and in every other established area. If they do
so, then they will save their own dead. If they do not, and depend on Salt Lake
City to send names…, they do not save their own dead, but instead they work on
other people’s ancestry.”
—Spencer W. Kimball,
regional representatives seminar, Sept. 30, 1976
