The priesthood is like a rocket which is designed to deliver the blessings of salvation though Christ as it’s payload.
If the priesthood fails to deliver the Savior’s atoning power then there is no purpose in the atonement that Christ provided for all men.
“Priesthood is not an amorphous source of autonomous power.”
You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to appreciate that an expensive global communications satellite is of little value sitting in a warehouse. The rocket’s mission is simply to deliver a payload.
This evening I would like to compare the priesthood that we hold to a rocket and the opportunity to benefit from the Savior’s atoning power to the payload that a rocket delivers.
The atoning power of Jesus Christ is essential because none of us can return to our heavenly home without help. In mortality, we invariably make mistakes and violate God’s laws. We become stained by sin and cannot be allowed back to live in God’s presence. We need the Savior’s atoning power so that we can be reconciled to Heavenly Father.
The opportunity to benefit from the Savior’s atoning power is creation’s most important payload.
For Heavenly Father’s purposes to be accomplished, Christ’s atoning power needs to be made available to God’s children. The priesthood delivers these opportunities. It is the rocket. Priesthood is essential because necessary ordinances and covenants on earth are administered only by its authority. If the priesthood fails to deliver the opportunity to benefit from the Savior’s atoning power, what would be its purpose? Would it just be a complex, attention-grabbing firecracker? God intends priesthood to be used for more than just a class on Sunday or as a service opportunity. He intends for it to deliver the payload.
… To guard the priesthood from, metaphorically, brittle seals and material fatigue, God protects both its conferral and use. Priesthood conferral is safeguarded by priesthood keys, which are the rights of presidency given to man. Priesthood use is likewise safeguarded by priesthood keys but also by covenants that the priesthood holder makes. The use of the priesthood is consequently governed by both priesthood keys and covenants. A man’s priesthood commission is individually given and does not exist independent of him; priesthood is not an amorphous source of autonomous power.
What a great description of the boundaries of priesthood authority.
Covenants with God are serious and solemn. A man should prepare for, learn about, and enter such covenants with the intent to honor them. A covenant becomes a pledge of self. Paraphrasing the English playwright Robert Bolt, a man makes a covenant only when he wants to commit himself quite exceptionally to a promise. He makes an identity between the truth of the promise and his own virtue. When a man makes a covenant, he is holding himself, like water, in his cupped hands. And if he opens his fingers, he need not hope to find himself again. A covenant-breaker no longer has a self to commit or a guarantee to offer.
An Aaronic Priesthood holder covenants to avoid evil, help others be reconciled to God, and prepare to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood. These sacred responsibilities are fulfilled as he teaches, baptizes, strengthens Church members, and invites others to accept the gospel. These are his “rocket” functions. In return, God promises hope, forgiveness, the ministering of angels, and the keys of the gospel of repentance and baptism.
A Melchizedek Priesthood holder covenants to fulfill the responsibilities associated with the Aaronic Priesthood and to magnify his calling in the Melchizedek Priesthood. He does so by keeping the commandments associated with the covenant. These commandments include giving “diligent heed to the words of eternal life” by living by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, bearing testimony of Jesus Christ and His latter-day work, not boasting of himself, and becoming the Savior’s friend, trusting Him as a friend would.
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To each man who receives the Melchizedek Priesthood, God affirms His covenant promises with an oath. This oath pertains only to the Melchizedek Priesthood, and it is God who swears the oath, not the priesthood holder. Because this unique situation involves His divine power and authority, God uses an oath, employing the most forceful language He can, to assure us of the binding and irreversible nature of His promises.
This 30-year-old man had joined the Church in his late teens. He served an honorable mission. But when he returned home, he lost his way, and he lost his membership in the Church. …
During our interview, I showed him the letter explaining that President Thomas S. Monson had personally reviewed his application and authorized the interview. This otherwise stoic young man wept. I then told him that the date of our interview would have no official meaning in his life. He looked puzzled. I informed him that after I restored his blessings, his membership record would show only his original baptism, confirmation, priesthood ordination, and endowment dates. He choked up again.
I asked him to read from the Doctrine and Covenants:
“Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more.
“By this ye may know if a man repenteth of his sins—behold, he will confess them and forsake them.”
Tears filled his eyes a third time. Then I placed my hands on his head, and in the name of Jesus Christ and by the authority of the Melchizedek Priesthood, and with the authorization of the President of the Church, I restored his priesthood and temple blessings.
The joy that came over us was profound. He knew he was once again authorized to hold and exercise the priesthood of God. He knew that his temple blessings were again fully operative. He had a bounce in his step and a radiant light about him. I was so proud of him, and I sensed how proud Heavenly Father was of him too.
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