“Lesson 92—Doctrine and Covenants 82:8–24: ‘I, the Lord, Am Bound When Ye Do What I Say,’” Doctrine and Covenants Seminary Teacher Manual (2025)
“Doctrine and Covenants 82:8–24,” Doctrine and Covenants Seminary Teacher Manual
Lesson 92: Doctrine and Covenants 81–83
Doctrine and Covenants 82:8–24
“I, the Lord, Am Bound When Ye Do What I Say”
The Savior invited members of the United Firm to bind themselves by covenant to govern the affairs of His Church. He gave them commandments and promised to bless them when they obeyed. When we covenant to obey Jesus Christ’s commandments, He promises to bless us. This lesson can help students understand how to keep the covenants we make with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
Possible Learning Activities
Bound to the Lord
The following object lesson can help students reflect on their relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Show students two magnets. A student could demonstrate how when the magnets get close together, they will either attract or repel one another. Ask students to imagine that one of the magnets represents Jesus Christ and the other represents them.
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What can we learn about our relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ from these magnets?
Invite students to think about their relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. As students study Doctrine and Covenants 82, encourage them to seek personal revelation about how they can strengthen their relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
“I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say”
In Doctrine and Covenants 82, the Lord repeated instructions given in an earlier revelation (see Doctrine and Covenants 78). The instructions were to establish the United Firm to manage the temporal affairs of the Church and build Zion.
Doctrine and Covenants 82:10 is a doctrinal mastery passage. Consider inviting students to mark doctrinal mastery passages in a distinctive way so they can locate them easily.
Read Doctrine and Covenants 82:8–10, looking for what the Lord taught about His commandments.
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What is the Savior’s reason for giving us commandments?
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What does the Savior promise if we keep His commandments?
Invite students to restate a truth from these verses in their own words. They could also write it in their journal or on the board. Students may identify truths similar to this: When we obey the Lord’s commandments, He promises to bless us.
What do these verses teach you about the character of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ?
To help students recognize when they have seen the fulfillment of this truth, you may want to do an activity like the following:
Divide the class into small groups. Ask each group to find examples of the Savior blessing people for obeying His commandments. Students can list examples from the scriptures, their own lives, or the lives of people they know. After sufficient time, you could invite the groups to take turns sharing examples. You might discuss what we can learn from these examples about the Savior’s willingness to keep His promises.
Bound by covenant
You may want to help students see how verse 1 can teach about our covenant relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Through covenants, we make promises with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, and They makes promises with us.
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What do you think verse 10 teaches about the covenants we make with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ?
Read the following statement by President Russell M. Nelson, looking for what he taught about covenants.
Once we make a covenant with God, we leave neutral ground forever. God will not abandon His relationship with those who have forged such a bond with Him. In fact, all those who have made a covenant with God have access to a special kind of love and mercy. …
Once you and I have made a covenant with God, our relationship with Him becomes much closer than before our covenant. Now we are bound together. Because of our covenant with God, He will never tire in His efforts to help us, and we will never exhaust His merciful patience with us. Each of us has a special place in God’s heart. He has high hopes for us. (Russell M. Nelson, “The Everlasting Covenant,” Liahona, Oct. 2022, 5, 6).
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What do you think is important to remember from this statement?
Keeping covenants brings blessings
As part of the Lord’s instruction to leaders of the United Firm, He counseled Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, Edward Partridge, and others to be “bound together by a bond and covenant” (Doctrine and Covenants 82:11) to manage the Church’s temporal affairs. As covenant children of God, we also covenant to do certain things as we follow Jesus Christ.
Consider dividing the class into two groups and inviting each group to compile one of the following lists. Students could write their lists on the board.
Read Doctrine and Covenants 82:12–19 and make a list of what the Lord asked members of the United Firm to covenant to do.
Read Mosiah 18:8–10 and Doctrine and Covenants 20:77 and make a list of what the Lord asks us to covenant to do today.
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What stands out to you from these lists?
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How are these covenant responsibilities similar?
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How do you think keeping our covenants can help us become like the Savior?
Read Doctrine and Covenants 82:24, looking for what the Lord promises to those who keep their covenants with Him.
Consider showing the connected magnets. Invite students to share what they learned from this lesson about their relationship with Jesus Christ. You could also share your feelings about the blessings you have received from making and keeping covenants with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
Memorize doctrinal mastery
During this lesson, you may want to help students memorize Doctrine and Covenants 82:10 and the key scripture phrase “I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say.” You can then review it in future lessons. Ideas for memorization activities are in the appendix materials under “Doctrinal Mastery Review Activities.”