Hi everyone! This week I loved reading the talk from Elder Bruce C. Hafen titled “Covenant Marriage”. It talks about the differences between an eternal companionship and contract companionship. A couple that is in a contract companionship will say that they are only going to stay in the relationship if things are going well. They feel that if their relationship doesn’t get better right away that getting a divorce will solve all of their problems. It says that these people only give 50% in their relationship because they would be willing to give up on their spouse that quickly. On the other hand, those that are in an eternal companionship are going to work through their problems and give 100% to their spouse no matter what. I feel that keeping your temple covenants, using effective communication, being on the same page, and working together as a partnership will help you keep your relationship eternal. I feel that a lot of the world has a temporal mindset and not an eternal perspective. If they would understand God’s plan for them and that they married the person they did for a reason, they would be less quick to give up on their relationship. In the talk by Elder Hafen, it talks about three wolves that will continuously test your marriage. The one I feel that is most detrimental to our society and relationships throughout the world is how imperfections will test them. It’s easy to be critical of other people and it can be hard when others are critical of you. In a marriage you are together all the time. You cook meals together, spend free time together, and sleep in the same bed. When you spend that much time with a person you can start to see things that you want them to do differently or criticize the way they are. In the talk it says that if someone is told something negative enough they could start to believe it and lose their self-worth. This is not healthy in a relationship. We need to be willing to be humble, not be so hard on the other person, and help each other to be better. I think it’s important to be able to let little things go and not allow them to tear our relationship apart. We shouldn’t throw out the good traits, the nice things that our spouse does, and the love that we have for each other because of little faults. I know in my relationship I am far from perfect, but I try and look for the good in my wife rather than the small things that might bug me. If my wife doesn’t like something that I do, we try and communicate to one another and change our behavior. If the world could work on those things in their marriages, see the eternal perspective, and know that their family could be together forever we would see the divorce rate go down tremendously.

I also loved reading the talk by President Ezra Taft Benson titled, “What I Hope You Would Teach Your Children about the Temple”. He tells us that we should not only teach our children gospel principles, but we should teach them about things that go on in the temple. As a kid I always remember seeing the song, “I love to see the Temple”, but I never knew what happened in the temple other than baptisms for the dead. I knew I wanted to go their someday and that I wanted to get married in the temple when I found the right person but everything else seemed to be a mystery to me. When I have children someday, I want to teach them about family history, and how the temple can seal our whole entire family together through temple covenants. I want to be a good example to them of going to the temple and share my testimony with them often.

The most important lesson I learned from the genogram assignment was the importance of doing family history. My dad has been very dedicated to genealogy since he joined the church. He really caught the spirit of Elijah and has helped be a tool in the Lord’s hands to bring families together. He has been a great example to me of that. I learned that there is so much more work to be done and we can help others do their genealogy and capture that same spirit of Elijah. I also learned that my family has been fortunate to have little divorce and split families. I know that that is not a norm throughout the world and I am grateful of the examples that I have seen in my life and that my parents saw through their families. I want to keep that trend in my family and for many generations to come.

May 1 at 9:50pmManage Discussion Entry

Hi everyone! I grew up observing how my parents conducted their marriage. They have been married for 32 years now and I admire that a lot. I rarely saw them get into arguments in front of us kids, they taught us how to treat others, taught us gospel principles, and were good examples of putting your spouse first and loving unconditionally. Not saying they were perfect by all means, but I was blessed with some pretty great parents. My mom told that her parents fought all the time and that there was always contention in their home. Because she grew up that way she wanted to break that and not have any part of that in her home. I have been married for two years now to my beautiful wife, Alyssa. We have always talked about how we are going to do things when are parents and we both decided to pick and choose things that our parents did or didn’t do when we are parents. I love that about the plan of salvation that we are able to make our own choices that bring us happiness.

With all of the wickedness and evil in the world I want to be able to teach my children gospel principles and right from wrong. I want to teach them that even if they make a mistake a fall into temptation that they can always turn to our Savior, Jesus Christ and be forgiven of their sins. I want them to know that they are never alone and always know that Heavenly Father loves them. I feel like a lot of the world is missing these concepts in their life and it would help them tremendously just to know those great truths. 

If someone asked me my position on divorce I would say that it’s always best to try and work things out. I loved what Elder Dallin H. Oaks said about divorce. He said, “I strongly urge you and those who advise you, to face up to the reality that, for most marriage problems, the remedy is not divorce, but repentance.” This was profound to me. Nobody is perfect in a marriage. It requires a lot of patience, communication, and love. We all have bad days, and times where we don’t agree with one another, but it’s important to remember that it’s just a bad day, not a bad life. When we use the atonement in our marriage Heavenly Father will bless us and our marriage will be strengthened. It might not happen all at once, but I know that he will help us because I’ve seen it in my own marriage. It’s such a powerful principle!

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton