The Importance of Temples | "The Temple Is the Real World" — John H. Groberg, BYU-Idaho 2006 (LDS)

Send us Fan MailWhen you leave the temple, do you say "back to the real world"? President John H. Groberg — former member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, temple president of the Idaho Falls Temple, and author of The Other Side of Heaven — asks you to reconsider: the temple IS the real world. What is real, he teaches, is that which lasts forever — truth, love, covenants, Christ's Atonement — and everything in the temple deals in these eternal realities. What most people call the "real world" — careers, possessions, even sickness and death — are temporal and passing, illusionary by comparison. In this BYU-Idaho devotional (October 2006), President Groberg unfolds a framework built on one principle: selfishness ends, unselfishness doesn't. "Charity never faileth" means it never ceases, it has no end — and the temple is built on unselfish service, making it the basis of all good. He traces three steps the Lord has designed: the world exists so that people can enter the Church, the Church exists so that members can enter the temple, and the temple exists to prepare us to enter the celestial kingdom. Everything points to the temple. Along the way: the story of a Tongan family who waited all day with seven children outside the temple, never complaining, never asking — their paperwork lost under a paper clip — until a prompting led to the discovery and their sealing as an eternal family. President Howard W. Hunter's promise that "no blessing, including that of eternal marriage and an eternal family, will be denied any worthy individual." President Hinckley's charge to attend more regularly and his promise that you will leave better than when you came. And President Groberg's own witness from the Idaho Falls Temple: "The temple is our way to perfection. How can we expect to feel comfortable in His presence in eternity if we don't feel comfortable in His house on earth?""The temple is the real world. The world we go out to is the illusionary world, because it won't last." — John H. GrobergQ: Why does President Groberg say the temple is the real world?A: Because "real" means that which lasts forever — truth, love, covenants, the Atonement of Jesus Christ — and everything in the temple deals in these eternal realities. The temporal world, including careers, possessions, sickness, and even death, is passing and therefore illusionary by comparison. The temple is where we learn what is permanently true.Q: What are the three steps the Lord designed leading to the celestial kingdom?A: President Groberg teaches: (1) the world exists so that people can enter the Church, through baptism; (2) everything in the Church exists to prepare members to worthily enter the temple; (3) everything in the temple exists to prepare and purify us to enter the celestial kingdom of God. "The world prepared so we can enter the Church, the Church prepared so we can enter the temple, the temple prepared so we can enter the celestial kingdom."Q: How does temple attendance help with everyday life and problems?A: President Gordon B. Hinckley promised: "Every time you go to the temple you will be a better man or woman when you leave than when you came." President Groberg adds that problems don't disappear, but "the solutions become more apparent." He likens it to a teeter-totter: attend the temple more, and problems become fewer; attend less, and they increase. "You'll be a better student, a better teacher, a better researcher, because you'll see things more clearly."Q: What happened to the Tongan family who waited all day at the temple?A: After the Tonga Temple dedication, a family with seven young children arrived early in the morning, submitted their paperwork, and were told to wait until called. They waited all day — the children sitting outside in white, with nothing to eat, never complaining. Their paperwork had been accidentally caught under a paper clip on another family's forms. When a prompting led to the discovery, the family was sealed that evening. "Their waiting all day seemed nothing to them. The only thing that mattered was that they were now an eternal family."📚 SOURCES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODEJohn H. Groberg, "The Importance of Temples," BYU-Idaho Devotional, October 2006D&C 1:15–16; D&C 93:24Ether 12:11President Howard W. Hunter on eternal marriage blessingsPresident Gordon B. 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