Therefore, the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy and holiness shall be upon their heads; and they shall obtain gladness and joy; sorrow and mourning shall flee away.
2 Nephi 8:11
A Song of Zion
Sing a song of Zion And of hearts washed pure Sing of holy temples And of joy made sure Gathered with the righteous Sharing all we gain We sing a song of gladness And the end of pain We will dwell in Zion Wherever we abide Singing songs of glory From dawn ’til eventide
A few days after I received the call to write this book, I wrote this entry in my journal:
Q: Father, why are so many people leaving the Church now?
A: “They are weak in their faith and cannot withstand the world.”
Q: Is this a winnowing?
A: “Yes. Those who remain must be strong for the trials ahead.”
Q: Will some who leave return?
A: “Some. Not many.”
Q: Oh, Father, it pains my heart!
A: “The heavens weep for them.”
Q: Will my book help at all?
A: “Yes, it will help.”
[And the next morning:]
A: “That is why I want you to write it quickly.”
On November 16, 2022, I watched a podcast about the Old Testament prophet Ezekiel, which prompted another question on the same subject:
Q: Father, are all the challenges to faith in these last days a “shaking” that will test our faith to the utmost, leaving only the strongest still standing in Thy Church?
A: “Yes, certainly. I will use these things to my own purposes. I am making you into a Zion people.”
—Thank you, Father.
And here’s an entry from the next day:
Morning prayer:
…bless me and strengthen me that I may one day live in Zion myself…
A: [Interrupting] “You are in Zion.”
—Thank you, Father! I did not know that.
A: “Everyone who lives as you do, with faith and obedience, is part of Zion.”
—That’s wonderful! Thank you for that knowledge!
A: “All knowledge will be given to you.”
—Thank you, Father!
Many of the early Latter-day Saints thought of Zion as a particular place on the map, or in heaven, in the case of Enoch’s righteous city. But, as Heavenly Father has made clear, Zion isn’t only a place; more importantly, Zion is in our hearts.
And the Lord called his people Zion, because they were of one heart and one mind, and dwelt in righteousness; and there was no poor among them.
Moses 7:18
Among numerous other references in the scriptures to Zion as both a place and a state of being, we find this:
Therefore, verily, thus saith the Lord, let Zion rejoice, for this is Zion — the pure in heart; therefore, let Zion rejoice, while all the wicked mourn.
Doctrine and Covenants 97:21
So, if Zion is the pure in heart, how can we purify our hearts and then ensure that we remain pure enough to enter Zion’s gates and dwell there forever in righteousness and joy?
First, let me assure you of one thing: I’m far from perfect. Just ask my sisters! If I dwell in Zion it’s because I’m constantly trying to be better than I am. It’s because I study the scriptures every day and strive to obey my Father’s commandments and the covenants I have made with Him in His holy temple. It’s because I pray to Him for help and strength every morning and every night and often in between. It’s because I love my Heavenly Father and His gracious Son with all my heart, might, mind, and strength, to the very depths of my soul, and I pour out my heart in gratitude to Them for my many blessings.
It’s because I strive to follow the teachings of the prophets and take any doubts to my Heavenly Father, not the clamoring voices of the world. It’s because I go to His holy house often to serve the spirits waiting across the veil and because I take the Sacrament every Sunday to renew my baptismal covenant in humility and faith.
None of these things requires superhuman effort. They’re simply what we’re asked to do as faithful children of a loving Heavenly Father. The blessings that come from doing these simple things are myriad and amazing.
And I would add one more simple thing: It’s because I keep a spiritual journal. Our dear prophet, Russell M. Nelson, urges us to write down the experiences we have in prayer:
Pray in the name of Jesus Christ about your concerns, your fears, your weaknesses — yes, the very longings of your heart. And then listen! Write the thoughts that come to your mind. Record your feelings and follow through with actions that you are prompted to take. As you repeat this process day after day, month after month, year after year, you will ‘grow into the principle of revelation.’
“Revelation for the Church, Revelation for Our Lives,” April 2018 General Conference
It was those words of the prophet that prompted me to begin keeping a spiritual journal, and it was after I started faithfully recording the things of my soul that personal revelation began to pour out on me in abundance.
This book you’re reading wouldn’t exist if I hadn’t written the answers to my prayers in a special journal set aside for that purpose. I testify to the spiritual power of this sacred practice. Buy a journal. Keep it on your bedside table. Open it in front of you as you kneel in prayer, and follow the prophet’s instructions. By recording the promptings of the Holy Spirit, you will demonstrate to Heavenly Father that you value His will for you above all else, and desire to hear His voice always. He will richly bless you for it.
After every prayer of my heart, I ask my Heavenly Father if He wants to tell me anything, and then I listen carefully and prayerfully. Sometimes I feel His peace in my heart. Sometimes I hear a simple message of love. Sometimes I hear the answer to a fervent prayer over some thorny personal matter. Sometimes the answer is “Yes.” Sometimes it’s “No.” Sometimes it’s “Not now.” And sometimes, as you’ve seen in this book, my Father instructs me in detail as to what I should do. Frequently those instructions come as a complete surprise.
In volume two of my “Hear Him” journal is this entry dated February 9, 2023:
During prayer— I was thanking my Father for the opportunity to attend the temple every week when I heard:
“Go more.” Impression: Do initiatories every Friday.
Q: Father, is this correct?
A: “Yes. You have the time, and it is needed. Spirits are waiting.”
—I see. Then, yes, I will!
Immediately I opened the app on my phone to make an appointment and found there were none available for that week, so I went back to my Father:
Q: This Friday is full. Shall I start next week?
A: “Yes.”
…
—I’m set for Feb. 17.
A: “It is good.”
—I’m also set for Feb. 24.
A: “It is good. Well done.”
—Thank you, Father.
It’s Friday, February 17, as I write this. This afternoon at 4 p.m. I will obey Father’s instructions and perform initiatories for the dead.
I wish we had another word for “dead.” The waiting spirits for whom we perform sacred ordinances are “dead” only as to the mortal body; they’re very much alive beyond the veil. I sometimes feel the joyful presence of the person whose temple work I’m doing. As I sit in the initiatory or endowment presentation, I hold the name card reverently in both hands and imagine my spirit sister seeing through my eyes and hearing through my ears as those sacred ordinances are performed, whether for a relative or someone else.
And sometimes, as I sit in the celestial room, pondering and praying on my temple experience that day or the recent events of my life, I am greatly blessed with a glimpse beyond the veil.
In the celestial room on December 22, 2022, about a week after my homeless, schizophrenic brother Alan collapsed on the street and then died in a hospital bed, I asked to know how he was doing after his mortal ordeal and was granted a vision of him being helped to stand by our mother and other family members. I was given to know that he was still weak but getting stronger, with family to help him.
The day before Alan died I had asked to know the purpose of his troubled life and received this answer: “To provide trials for his family.” When I asked if he had agreed to his life circumstances before he came here, the Spirit told me, “Of course. No one is forced.” Knowing this helped me see my dear brother Alan as the brave and noble soul he always was underneath his illness.
Now and then the Holy Spirit tells me sweetly that the spirit for whom I’ve performed an ordinance is grateful and waits to greet me on the other side of the veil. Once, He showed me. Here’s my journal entry from January 25, 2023:
Today I performed my mother-in-law’s endowment. In the celestial room, I asked to know if she had accepted her ordinances and covenants and I saw (in my mind’s eye) a glimpse of David standing between his parents! Thank you, Father!
Now, as instructed by the Spirit, I’m going to do a little exhorting regarding the temple.
The holy temple is the beating heart of our faith. I imagine the temple of the Lord as a living spiritual machine God uses to draw us to Him and endow us with priesthood power. A vital aspect of that power is our obligation to perform ordinances for those who have gone before; to connect the living and the dead in an unbroken chain stretching all the way back to Father Adam and Mother Eve.
There is no “rugged individualism” in the City of Zion. We will only rise toward exaltation as we help others on both sides of the veil rise with us. If we’re not one family in Christ, we’re not His.
The temple experience is so rich that it will feed your soul for a lifetime if you’ll let it. Over time, with faithful attendance, the rituals and symbols that at first might seem odd and opaque will reward your patient study, pondering, and prayer with layer upon layer of meaning. Your spirit will be added upon, your life blessed with riches of faith you can’t even imagine now.
Nothing else in your life will bless you so abundantly as time spent in the House of the Lord. The temple is where we seek our crown of glory. It’s where we learn how to enter our Father’s celestial kingdom. It’s the earthly gate through which we must pass to approach the highest realm of heaven.
Temple attendance is the first thing we should write on our calendars. It’s the event around which we should plan everything else. What better example could you set for your children and grandchildren, your colleagues, friends, and neighbors? Qualifying for a temple recommend and using it often is the most important thing you can do on earth. All else of value — marriage, home, family, magnifying your calling — flows from your worthiness and commitment to do God’s work in His holy temple.
Time is short. The temple is calling. Will you answer?
On August 23, 2022, Heavenly Father instructed me to write poems about the temple experience. I started the next day. Here are some of those poems:
God’s Table
You are entering God’s house. Shake the dust of the world from your feet. Bring your sorrows and cares and place them on God’s table. Leave them there while holy things fill your heart and give you rest, while the things of God add to you strength upon strength, blessing upon blessing, peace upon peace. When you leave, gather your sorrows and cares from God’s table. See how much lighter they feel?
Endowment
Clothed in the white robes of angels We walk on holy ground Lifted toward heaven On the Good Word of God
The Captives
They wait and hope and pray Those who have gone before And yearn for brighter days And open prison doors They cannot rise alone The task is ours to bear To roll away the stone And free the captives there For this are temples made For this our hearts made pure To hurry to their aid Together to endure
Moroni’s Call
Look to the temple spire And heed Moroni’s call Let your soul be filled with fire To give your all in all Our kindred dead await Among the eager throng For our work to loose the gate And fill their hearts with song For this we are endowed With power from above To set free the captive crowd And welcome them in love
Joy Awaits
Temples point the way to heaven. Is it any wonder they are bathed in holy light, or that angels, both earthly and heavenly, tarry there? Feet tread softly. Voices whisper. Smiles abound. Realms of glory fill the soaring spaces. Beyond the veil, celestial joy awaits.
Gate of Heaven
Gate of heaven Temple dear God bless all Who enter here To walk these halls Arrayed in white My heart’s pure joy My soul’s delight
I Dream of Temples
I dreamed I saw thousands of temples They dotted the face of the earth Their value was far above rubies For God was the source of their worth And Saints of all races and nations Arrayed in their heavenly white Stood patiently waiting to enter From dawn ’til far into the night Above, in the precincts of heaven Eager spirits stood watch at a gate Would this be their day of rejoicing Or would they continue to wait? Oh, the joy when the good news was spoken! The clamor of cymbals and bells! When a spirit once battered and broken Rose up and departed those cells! Only we can build thousands of temples As we walk in the path Jesus trod Only we can be saviors in Zion And aspire to be partners with God
During prayer on August 26, 2022, I was impressed with this insight:
Every time someone joins the Church on earth, all of his or her ancestors across the veil are added to the rolls of potential converts! So one is not one; one becomes many!
The spirit world teems with people awaiting their saving ordinances, and only those of us still in mortality can help them progress. To drive home this truth to my soul and the souls of others, on the morning of September 26, 2022, the Holy Spirit inspired me to write the following.
Excerpts from the Journal of a Waiting Spirit
I don’t know how long I’ve been here, whether it’s been only a day or many years. Time seems not to exist in this place. I know I died, and yet I live on in this realm that is neither heaven nor hell. I’m not happy or unhappy, I merely am. Something seems to be missing, some power I should have or some progress I should be making.
***
I miss my body. I miss the Earth — the sights, the sounds, the scents. It’s pleasant enough here, but what should be bright seems dim, and what should be sweet seems bland. I’m sure I’m meant to be somewhere else, but I don’t know where to go or how to get there.
***
I’ve been talking to others here. We all feel the same sense of incompleteness, of waiting for something to happen, or someone to come and tell us what it all means.
***
Today — only long habit that makes me call it that, for there’s no sunrise, no sunset, no moonrise here to mark the passage of time — someone came! A bright personage entered our realm, talking of wonderful things I’ve never heard before, of a Heavenly Father who loves us, and His Son, whom He sent to Earth to suffer for all our sins and sorrows, all our infirmities, even to die for us, so we could live forever!
This shining being told us our souls could be washed clean if we would only beg forgiveness and accept the Son’s sacrifice into our hearts. I can’t describe the joy I felt at this astonishing news! Many fell to their knees and repented with great sincerity, and I joined them gladly. As I prayed, a heavy weight was lifted from my shoulders. I felt lighter than air!
***
The bright personage visited us again, telling of the wonders our Heavenly Father has in store for us if we will only follow His Son. Most of us believed everything he said, but a few turned their backs. I don’t know how they can reject such glorious news! I pitied them as they slunk away while the rest of us thronged our beloved messenger, eager to hear his words.
***
Our messenger finally revealed to us how we can move on from this realm: Back on Earth, mortal souls must live worthy to enter holy temples, perform sacred ordinances, and make eternal covenants in our names. This is the only way we can progress. We must depend on our children and our children’s children, or even kind strangers, down through the generations, to find our names and do this work for us. And so we wait, in joyful anticipation, but also in frustration and anxiety, for the families we left behind to do for us what we can never do for ourselves.
***
I don’t know how long it’s been since my last entry, but it feels like an eternity. Countless spirits — many of them my friends and companions — have heard their names called and moved on with great rejoicing. I rejoice with them, and yet I wonder why I’ve been left behind, wonder why my family on Earth hasn’t freed me yet. Ever hopeful, I stand at the gate, watching and waiting, repeating this prayer: Heavenly Father, please let their hearts turn toward me soon.
In the celestial room of the Payson, Utah temple on December 22, 2022, immediately after that sweet vision of my brother Alan I recounted earlier, I was granted a further glimpse beyond the veil, one that so moved and inspired me that I’ll spend the rest of my mortal life striving toward it. Here’s the rest of that journal entry:
Then I asked how many spirits would be there to greet me when I arrive, and I saw hundreds of spirits, all in white, forming two lines reaching into the distance. I couldn’t see their faces, but I knew they were people who loved me, people I had helped on earth and across the veil, including [the spirit] whose endowment I had just completed.
I started walking along the aisle they made, toward a figure in the distance. His face and figure were clear: It was Jesus! He was waiting to greet me!
I can’t describe how wonderful, how joyous it was!
Thank you, Father! Thank you, my brother Jesus, for letting me see this miraculous sight! I wept with joy then, and I’m weeping now, as I write this in my journal.
I know this from my own life: No matter how long you’ve been away, whether you’ve left the Church or are teetering on the brink, you can find your way back. You can let go of the stubborn pride, fear, anger, doubt, or confusion that led you off the path, as I did. If sins and transgressions stand in your way, you can repent of them and be forgiven by a loving Heavenly Father, as I was. The road home starts with a single step.
On the morning of December 2, 2022, while I was writing this book, I prayed for strength after a night troubled by insomnia and back pain and received this beautiful personal revelation:
“Take two steps and I will give thee three. Take four steps and I will give thee eight. Take eight steps and I will give thee a hundred. I am always with thee.”
I believe this is God’s promise to all of His children. I testify that if you have strayed from the covenant path, it’s never too late to return. You only need to turn around and take one small step, and then another, and your merciful Heavenly Father and His gracious Son will grant you the power to make it the rest of the way back. They will lend you a portion of Their divine strength.
Here, at the end of these words, is my prayer for you: If you’re not already there in your heart, come to Zion. If your faith has been wavering, draw strength from that well of living water and come all the way back to His true Church. If you still have doubts, carry them alongside your faith until that bright day when all knowledge will be yours.
Take this truth into your heart and cherish it: Your Savior and Redeemer waits with open arms to welcome you home. You are loved, and you are needed for the vital work of gathering Israel and building up Zion in these last days.
I offer these words in the sacred name of Jesus Christ, the Atoning One. Amen.
Doubt
Place your doubts In a knapsack And carry them On your back As you walk The covenant path Toward God Shed them One by one As you grow In knowledge And in faith Enduring at last To the end
Memoirs of a Prodigal Daughter 