“Seeking the Blessings of the Patriarchal Order,” Liahona, February 2022
Come, Follow Me
Seeking the Blessings of the Patriarchal Order
Photograph of couple outside the Ogden Utah Temple by Cody Bell
The summary for Abraham chapter 1 says, “Abraham seeks the blessings of the patriarchal order.” Consider the following teachings from latter-day Church leaders about the patriarchal order. When and how do we enter into the patriarchal order in our day?
Continues through Eternity
“The Priesthood was originally exercised in the patriarchal order; those who held it exercised their powers firstly by right of their fatherhood. It is so with the great Elohim. … The patriarchal order is of divine origin and will continue throughout time and eternity.”
Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph F. Smith (1998), 139, 140.
Patterned after the Family of God
“We can enter an order of the priesthood named the new and everlasting covenant of marriage (see D&C 131:2), named also the patriarchal order, because of which order we can create for ourselves eternal family units of our own, patterned after the family of God our Heavenly Father.”
Elder Bruce R. McConkie (1915–85) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, “The Doctrine of the Priesthood,” Ensign, May 1982, 34.
For Husband and Wife
“Adam held the priesthood. Eve served in matriarchal partnership with the patriarchal priesthood. So today, each wife may join with her husband as a partner unified in purpose. Scriptures state clearly, ‘Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord’ (1 Corinthians 11:11).”
President Russell M. Nelson, “Lessons from Eve,” Ensign, Nov. 1987, 87.
Sealed for Eternity
“The order of priesthood spoken of in the scriptures is sometimes referred to as the patriarchal order because it came down from father to son. But this order is otherwise described in modern revelation as an order of family government where a man and woman enter into a covenant with God—just as did Adam and Eve—to be sealed for eternity, to have posterity, and to do the will and work of God throughout their mortality.
“If a couple are true to their covenants, they are entitled to the blessing of the highest degree of the celestial kingdom. These covenants today can only be entered into by going to the House of the Lord.”