VISITING TEACHING MESSAGE FOR AUGUST (Edited from the August 2010 Ensign)

RESPONSIBILITY TO BE WORTHY OF TEMPLE WORSHIP

...The Lord invites those who have not yet received the blessings of the temple to do whatever may be necessary to qualify to receive them. He invites those who have already received these blessings to return as often as possible to enjoy again the experience, to increase their vision and understanding of His eternal plan.

President Gordon B. Hinckley (1910-2008) taught that Relief Society grew out of sisters' desire to worship in temples.

"During the construction of the Kirtland Temple the women were called upon to grind their china into small particles to be mixed with the plaster used on the walls of the temple, which would catch the light of the sun and moon and reflect that light to beautify the appearance of the building."

In those times, when there was very little money but an abundance of faith, the workmen gave of their strength and resources to the construction of the Lord's house. The women supplied them with food, the best they could prepare. Edward W. Tullidge reported that while the women were sewing the temple veils, Joseph Smith, observing them, said, 'Well, sisters, you are always on hand. The sisters are always first and foremost in all good works. Mary was the first at the resurrection, and the sisters now are the first to work on the inside of the temple'...

Again in Nauvoo, when the temple was under construction, a few women joined together to make shirts for the workmen. It was out of these circumstances that twenty of them gathered on Thursday, 17 March 1842, in the upper room of the Prophet's store."