My Covenant Path
Help Ancestors Receive Sacred Ordinances
Family history brings blessings to all family members.
Our Heavenly Father loves all His children and has prepared a way for our deceased family members to receive the blessings of the gospel. Many wards and branches have family history classes that teach members how to gather family names and information.
Sister Dolly Nyandeni, from the Dobsonville Ward in the Soweto Stake, loves family history and explains how she got started: “I attended the family history class at church and learned more about the filling of the pedigree chart and other important aspects about my family.”
“Through fasting and prayer, the Holy Ghost guided me to know other things such as names and dates that were needed for my ancestors. Also, family gatherings helped me to obtain more information.”
“I gained more insight in Malachi 4:5–6. The prophet Elijah taught about the turning the hearts of children to their fathers and of fathers to their children, before the coming of the dreadful day of the Lord. That gave me insight into the bond and love we have with our ancestors. They are with us in spirit.”
There are many resources in the Church to help you get started in collecting your family names. The My Family booklet and FamilySearch.org are two ways to start. Have a friend or family member help you in filling out your family names. Then you can set a date to attend the temple with family and friends and do baptisms for your deceased family members.
President Russell M. Nelson said, “While temple and family history work has the power to bless those beyond the veil, it has an equal power to bless the living. It has a refining influence on those who are engaged in it. They are literally helping to exalt their families.”1
As you prayerfully consider which family ancestors to take to the temple, you will have the Spirit to guide you as you serve them.
“While performing the necessary ordinances at the temple,” Sister Dolly recounts, “I felt Heavenly Father’s presence, His joy and love as we were united in spirit with my ancestors. We will be blessed abundantly and them as well will have that joy as released from the spirit prison as we are nothing without them and them without us.”
President Russell M. Nelson has told us: “The Lord is hastening His work to gather Israel. That gathering is the most important thing taking place on earth today. . . . If you choose to, if you want to, you can be a big part of it. You can be a big part of something big, something grand, something majestic!”2
Let’s follow President Nelson’s counsel and become part of something big, grand, and majestic by doing our family history.