As it got into about mid November and I decided that after blessing the sacrament for a few weeks now I pretty much understood what this priesthood thing was about I decided I needed to go to the temple. During my trip in October to General Conference we had walked around temple square and I had often heard people talk about how wonderful and great the temple was. Most of the LDS people I knew said they wanted to get married in the temple or had been married in the Temple. When I was up at temple square I was informed that I couldn't enter the temple unless I was a member of the Church.
Well guess what? Now I was a member of the church and very much planned on entering the temple to see what was so great about it and why it had to be kept a secret from the rest of the world. So I went to my good friend Bishop Donaldson and asked him if I could a recommend(that's what I was told I had to get to be allowed inside the temple) to go to the temple. He then told me that I couldn't go to the temple until I had been a member a year. This upset me pretty bad. I asked Bishop why I couldn't go... I was a member now and had been baptized and made clean wasn't I worthy enough to enter the temple. Bishop Donaldson told me that it was church policy that new converts had to wait a year to enter the temple. Well that just didn't cut it for me as far as an explanation went. However Bishop Donaldson being the inspired and wonderful man that he is then mention to me why I might not be able to go to every part of the temple right now there was something that I could do.
Guess what... that night I received my first temple recommend so that I could go and do baptisms for the dead.( I was happy and relieved to know that we weren't going to go and dig up graves so that we could baptise people but I still wondered how the whole thing worked.) That weekend I went up to Vernal to meet more of Sheena's family I had met her Father, Mother, and two of her sisters at the Miss Carbon Pageant but there were still some brothers and sisters I hadn't met. But what I was really looking forward to was the opportunity to go to the Vernal Temple.
When we arrived at the Vernal temple we went to a door that seemed to lead down to the basement. However when we opened the door I saw a medium sized shelf with many pairs of shoes on it. The elderly gentlemen then asked me to take off my shoes because I was standing on holy ground. I quickly took off my shoes and put them with the others and went into the rest of the temple following the cute old man.
Participating in the saving ordinances for those who didn't have the chance to be baptized in this life or to receive the Holy Ghost is one of the most amazing experiences a person can have in this life. To know that you are helping a fellow brother or sister do something that they didn't have the opportunity to receive is wonderful. It made sense to me then and now that if God requires that men be baptized to enter into the Kingdom of God what happens to those who never get baptized or those who don't even get to learn about Christ. It didn't seem like a loving or merciful God in Heaven who would damn over half his children when they didn't even get a fair swing at being a part of his kingdom. So baptisms for the dead made sense to me as it provided those who didn't get to be baptized in this life and opportunity to get it done in the next.
Going into the temple of the Lord is like floating above the ground. It is a place where the cares of the world simply washed away from me as I entered onto that holy ground. When I feel the spirit strongly I can't help but smile and throughout my time doing baptisms there in the Vernal temple I couldn't stop smiling and being filled with joy. It truly was a house of God and I am glad that I went to it so soon.
Going to the temple helped me to understand more of what the Gospel was about and why somethings that happen in the temple are so sacred and wonderful that it almost makes them somehow less special to talk about them outside of those holy walls.
After going to the temple my desire to go was somewhat lessened because I had felt why the temple was important and amazing. If you can't tell by now I like to experience the gospel first hand and don't like taking someone else's word for how amazing something is when I can learn for myself why it is so wonderful.
In early December as we prepared for final exams I decided that I really needed to have the Melkzidech Priesthood. I felt like the gospel was something to sucked up and once I had sucked up everything that I had I simply wanted more. I had developed an appetite for gospel knowledge that was unwavering. It seemed the more I learned and gained the more I desired. As I learned line upon line I only wanted to have more lines. I didn't want this light and truth to suddenly dry up without me getting all that I could. The more I learned about the temple the more often I wanted to go and do baptisms. When I was informed one day at the temple that I didn't have the right priesthood to perform ordinances in the temple I made it a personal mission to obtain that priesthood so that I might more fully understand the temple and it blessings.
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