Saturday Afternoon Session
Divine Authority, Sublime Young Men
Excerpts
This January, as I sat in sacrament meeting, over a dozen young men were sustained to be advanced in the Aaronic Priesthood. I felt the world changing beneath our feet.
It struck me that all around the world, time zone by time zone, in sacrament meetings like that one, tens of thousands of deacons, teachers, and priests … were being sustained to be ordained into lifelong priesthood ministries that would span the length and breadth of the gathering of Israel. …
These ordinations launch these young men into lifetimes of service as they will find themselves in consequential times and places where their presence and prayers and the powers of the priesthood of God they hold will profoundly matter. …
The Lord entrusts today’s bearers of the priesthood of Aaron to do very much the same things they did anciently: to teach and to administer ordinances—all to remind us of His Atonement.
When deacons, teachers, and priests help with the sacrament, they receive its blessings just like everyone else: by keeping the covenant they make as they individually partake of the bread and the water. But in the performance of these sacred duties, they also learn more about their priesthood roles and responsibilities. …
Such serious expectations require serious preparation. …
I am forever grateful that holders of the Aaronic Priesthood, with its powers, ordinances, and duties, do bless all of us through the keys of the very “ministering of angels, and of the gospel of repentance, and of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins” (Doctrine and Covenants 13:1).