Help on Deciding About Endowment Choice


Beccabee2
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This question is mostly for those who are already endowed...I'm at a crossroads between deciding to receive my endowments, or not. I've always had a struggle with physical intimacy (not in ways that have risked my membership or needed disciplinary actions) but enough that I've had times of talking to the bishop and discussing steps to take on this weakness, as well as receiving the full forgiveness needed for those mistakes. I work really hard at not putting myself in those situations where my judgment lacks and I don't listen to the spirit, but of course I'm imperfect and there are times where I still make that mistake. (and I do know that it's a natural feeling to have, just not in the right circumstances). 

With that little piece of background, I've felt recently that I need to prepare to receive my endowments....but I'm scared to make sure a huge promise to the Lord with such a weakness on my shoulders. I have grown in that weakness and am a completely different person than I was when I first realized that it was my weakness, but I'm fully aware of my ability to mess up again if I put myself in those situations where it can happen. I'm stuck between knowing of that huge covenant I will make and the repercussions that can come if I make that mistake after that promise, or knowing that with that endowment, I can have much more strength and protection because of the physical garments I will be wearing and the understanding I will gain from going through the Temple. I don't know...I feel like at times it will be such a strength for me and will help me conquer that weakness until the time comes where I'm married in the temple and that weakness will no longer be a problem (in the form it is now). Or I'll just make a mistake again and the consequences will be more intense and the guilt will be much more because I've made a very serious covenant to the Lord. 

I guess the general point of this post is: I'm afraid to make such a covenant too early and make that commitment before I'm ready. But I've also felt like it's something I've needed to do (and here comes another worry.....that I personally have felt like that, but don't know if it's me telling myself that, or the Spirit).

 

Lots of worry/anxiety in this post. It's my life. Thanks for the help. 

Edited by Beccabee2
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Simply  stated, I believe you shouldn't go until you are ready. I don't know the rules any more but it used to be that you didn't go until you were leaving on a mission or getting married.  Then they changed the rules for singles to go, but I thought they still had to be fairly senior (over 30). If you are that old and not ready, for the reasons you stated above, I would say a healthy dose of maturity is in order. Cut whatever strings are holding you back and - no offense here, since I don't know you - grow up.

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No there's no set age limit for receiving your endowments. I've spoken with my Bishop about it already and it's simply a choice between you and the Lord when you feel like it's the next step in your life, which I've had a few promptings about it. I'm fairly mature (emotionally and spiritually) for my age (21) and a mission is not for me, nor is marriage anywhere close in my future. But for some reason this step in my life has been at the helm of my gospel studying and what I have been focusing on recently. My worries about not being "ready" is more so about not wanting to make a mistake after I make such a commitment. But I've started to attribute those worries and anxieties (which I deal with a lot) to Satan trying to keep me from making that next step....I'm kind of talking out my own answer to my question, but I still like to hear from those who are endowed and their experience about the temple garments being a protective power from temptations/weaknesses. 

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Beccabee,

The endowment can bless your life with an added measure of the spirit if you are prepared. However, going through the temple itself does not make a person into a saint. It will not take all your problems and wash them away. Instead it is more about allowing the temple to go through you, or about allowing the temple to change you. The spirit in that place must become part of you, both while your in and out of the temple. So let me ask you a few questions:

 

1. If you are relatively close to the temple how often do you go to do baptisms?

2. Does it seem a chore or are you anxious to attend and loathe to leave? 

3. If you receive a full recommend, how often do you plan to attend?

4. Also, based on your previous post, why are you not going on a mission? 

 

I think the above questions will be extremely helpful in gauging your readiness.

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The endowment is another ordinance whereby you are taught a specific path, which is found throughout the Book of Mormon, and where you make covenants to walk that path. If you have been baptized a member of the church and also confirmed, where you were told to "receive" the Holy Ghost, I believe your first priority is to "receive" it. If you have not experienced that mighty change of heart explained by Alma in Alma chapter 5, then may I suggest beginning there? Once you know that you have been baptized with fire, you will be ready to continue receiving further light and knowledge. Until then, work on what is on your plate now before going on to the next course. 

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I think that's the whole reason I want to go receive my endowments. That my experience going through the temple is the changing experience I feel like I'm ready to make and want to have. I want that added measure of the Spirit in my life. I want to progress spiritually. In a year I will be graduating college and moving to graduate school, where I'll be in a city alone with no family anywhere close by. The step of receiving my endowments feels like the most comforting decision to make knowing that I'll be moving somewhere away from those I love and away from what I'm "used" to. It's hard for me to explain because I don't know how to put it in words. 

On the topic of your questions....I live about an hour away from the temple. I go when I have the opportunity to (usually with a group of single adults for an activity--since doing baptisms isn't as easy to do as going to do an endowment session), and I feel like my attendance at the temple is in accordance with my desire to be there. I don't ever, and will not ever, put a number on how many days I feel like I should be attending the temple. I believe it is a personal decision, between you and the Lord, of how often you go. The times I go to the temple are filled with immense spiritual comfort and a greater understanding of my purpose in life. As much as I love doing baptisms (and have ever since I was young enough to go) I want more out of my temple experience. I want deeply to understand more about the ordinances that happen there. To know more about my purpose and my relationship with God. 

And in answer to your question about my decision to not serve a mission, that was a very personal decision. One that was discovered through much prayer and pondering. In the end, I realized it was not even my decision. It was the Lord's. He wanted me elsewhere (elsewhere being school). And I've listened to the Spirit and done what He has guided me to do. 

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The endowment ceremony isn't going to change your heart. If your heart isn't changed already, you might come away feeling even more guilt if you relapse. We all sin. Neither baptism nor the endowment session fixes that or makes you magically worthy. It's the mighty change of heart-that broken heart and contrite spirit that enables Christ to heal you. 

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Maybe my way of writing is coming off wrong. I'm not looking to go to the Temple to be healed. Or changed. The changing experience I want to have is not that kind of change that comes from Christ. The changing experience I want to have is the greater understanding and knowledge of this gospel and it's pertinence to my eternal life. Although from most of the preparation I've done and the individuals I've talked to, none of the information in the temple will be "new" information per say, but more solidifying in what I've learned and how I'm growing spiritually to the daughter of God I want to be. 

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Well, the advantage we have of living in a telestial world is we are already spiritually dead. So making mistakes and learning from them BEFORE going into a terrestrial or celestial world is why we're here. We get to make mistakes and learn from them on a free pass paid for by  Jesus Christ. As long as we keep moving forward and relying on His merits, then I believe we'll be fine. :)

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I think that's the whole reason I want to go receive my endowments. That my experience going through the temple is the changing experience I feel like I'm ready to make and want to have. I want that added measure of the Spirit in my life. I want to progress spiritually. In a year I will be graduating college and moving to graduate school, where I'll be in a city alone with no family anywhere close by. The step of receiving my endowments feels like the most comforting decision to make knowing that I'll be moving somewhere away from those I love and away from what I'm "used" to. It's hard for me to explain because I don't know how to put it in words. 

On the topic of your questions....I live about an hour away from the temple. I go when I have the opportunity to (usually with a group of single adults for an activity--since doing baptisms isn't as easy to do as going to do an endowment session), and I feel like my attendance at the temple is in accordance with my desire to be there. I don't ever, and will not ever, put a number on how many days I feel like I should be attending the temple. I believe it is a personal decision, between you and the Lord, of how often you go. The times I go to the temple are filled with immense spiritual comfort and a greater understanding of my purpose in life. As much as I love doing baptisms (and have ever since I was young enough to go) I want more out of my temple experience. I want deeply to understand more about the ordinances that happen there. To know more about my purpose and my relationship with God. 

And in answer to your question about my decision to not serve a mission, that was a very personal decision. One that was discovered through much prayer and pondering. In the end, I realized it was not even my decision. It was the Lord's. He wanted me elsewhere (elsewhere being school). And I've listened to the Spirit and done what He has guided me to do. 

Based on the information you have provided I would suggest you wait.

 

- Use the time to take advantage of your limited use recommend and grow to love the temple for what it is. 

- Work on hearing and following the Lord's voice in your personal life. 

- Learn what it means to make an acceptable offering to the Lord and how sacrifice will allow the Lord to pour down blessings on your head.

 

If you do these things when you do take out your endowment it will be all you hoped it would be and more. I'm afraid going right now will not allow you to see what is there nor cause the change you are hoping for.

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Guest LiterateParakeet

Becca you said you have been feeling the need to prepare for this step...perhaps that is the Holy Ghost?

If I were you I would fast and pray to confirm or disprove that. IF the e Holy Ghost is nudging you to take that step then you have your answer. :)

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Guest LiterateParakeet

Becca you said you have been feeling the need to prepare for this step...perhaps that is the Holy Ghost?

If I were you I would fast and pray to confirm or disprove that. IF the e Holy Ghost is nudging you to take that step then you have your answer. :)

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Based on the information you have provided I would suggest you wait.

 

- Use the time to take advantage of your limited use recommend and grow to love the temple for what it is. 

- Work on hearing and following the Lord's voice in your personal life. 

- Learn what it means to make an acceptable offering to the Lord and how sacrifice will allow the Lord to pour down blessings on your head.

 

If you do these things when you do take out your endowment it will be all you hoped it would be and more. I'm afraid going right now will not allow you to see what is there nor cause the change you are hoping for.

I really appreciate your input and what you have to say. I'll take some of that advice and apply it to my life, but I'm going to move forward with the impressions I've felt about preparing to enter the Temple. I've felt like there were firm spiritual impressions in the past that have pushed me towards preparing to receive my endowments. When that will happen, I do not know yet, but I do know that I'm supposed to be preparing for them. So I'lll take your advice into my preparation for that next step. 

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Becca you said you have been feeling the need to prepare for this step...perhaps that is the Holy Ghost?

If I were you I would fast and pray to confirm or disprove that. IF the e Holy Ghost is nudging you to take that step then you have your answer. :)

Thanks! I've done a lot of praying but I really haven't put any efforts towards truly fasting and showing the Lord my real desire to know the answer to this. I will definitely start relying on that :)

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No there's no set age limit for receiving your endowments. I've spoken with my Bishop about it already and it's simply a choice between you and the Lord when you feel like it's the next step in your life, which I've had a few promptings about it. I'm fairly mature (emotionally and spiritually) for my age (21) and a mission is not for me, nor is marriage anywhere close in my future. But for some reason this step in my life has been at the helm of my gospel studying and what I have been focusing on recently. My worries about not being "ready" is more so about not wanting to make a mistake after I make such a commitment. But I've started to attribute those worries and anxieties (which I deal with a lot) to Satan trying to keep me from making that next step....I'm kind of talking out my own answer to my question, but I still like to hear from those who are endowed and their experience about the temple garments being a protective power from temptations/weaknesses.

It sounds like you are planning on the temple garments somehow magically protecting you from the temptations that you have been unable to resist in the past. Like you are trying to remove the responsibility of your repeated wrong choices from your own shoulders.. If that is your motivation for wanting to receive your endowment now - that the garments will somehow be responsible for protecting you from your own chosen behaviors - then I don't think you understand what receiving your endowment is really about.

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It sounds like you are planning on the temple garments somehow magically protecting you from the temptations that you have been unable to resist in the past. Like you are trying to remove the responsibility of your repeated wrong choices from your own shoulders.. If that is your motivation for wanting to receive your endowment now - that the garments will somehow be responsible for protecting you from your own chosen behaviors - then I don't think you understand what receiving your endowment is really about.

I appreciate your response. No, I'll clarify because I didn't really go into depth about my explanation. My mistakes are my own. And I take full and complete responsibility (sometimes so much so that I am way too hard on myself) for the things that I do. I expect myself to be perfect, even when I know that's not possible, and when I make a mistake I know that it was 100% me who did it. And it was me who could have prevented it. With my growing and progressing within my weakness, I've found many ways to find strength in it (like is said in Ether 12:27). And when I think about the promises I have the opportunity to make in the Temple to stay even more firm in my conviction to be pure and chaste in my life, the garments feel like a physical symbol of that promise that I will wear every day that will be a constant reminder of my ability to be better each and every day. And you know maybe I am looking at the temple garments in the wrong way. But from the many experiences I've heard from other individuals feeling like their temple garments were a great reminder, in the midst of a choice for temptation, of what path they should choose. And while I feel like I have grown so much in being able to choose that path on my own (and fall short here and there in every aspect of life because I'm not perfect) I have felt a great calm and reassurance of the ability to have that physical garment to wear as a reminder of the promises that I will have made and a reminder of the person I want/can be. Hopefully if that makes sense.

Obviously I would never want to go receive my endowments for the wrong reasons. And I appreciate all the responses I've received from everyone, but please understand that you've read only a few hundred words of my life. I didn't give you the full details of my testimony or understanding of this gospel or the details of my conversion and change of heart to turn to The Lord completely in all things. I haven't shared my full feelings of this experience so far about preparing for this next step in my life or the personal revelation I have received for it. So I know it's hard to get a full glimpse of "why" I want to go to the Temple, because you haven't seen who I am. Just read a few hundred words of the few things I've willingly shared. I have a very firm understanding of this gospel, including the aspects of repentance, the atonement, and forgiveness. So please know that this "worry" I am having about making a mistake after I receive my endowments is not from a place of wanting someone else or something else to take responsibility for my actions. It is and will always be MY choice to sin. This was more so my way of wanting to know if this idea in my head from hearing other experiences of temple garments being a protecting reminder of those promises, and a way to strengthen your Spirit, was along the right path. Not me seeing them as a way to take responsibility off of my shoulders for my own weakness. 

I hope that made sense. If not, then don't worry about it. These are my own worries that come from a lot of my own struggles with anxiety problems that I'm sure are manifesting themselves into this decision. 

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Well, the advantage we have of living in a telestial world is we are already spiritually dead. So making mistakes and learning from them BEFORE going into a terrestrial or celestial world is why we're here. We get to make mistakes and learn from them on a free pass paid for by  Jesus Christ. As long as we keep moving forward and relying on His merits, then I believe we'll be fine. :)

I and a whole lot of other people sure hope so! :)

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