This is a transcript of a talk that I gave to my ward, my local congregation of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, earlier today. Ward leaders asked me to talk about making and keeping covenants. So I’ve been thinking and praying about the topic. And I hope my comments will also be helpful for you. Of course, the topic of covenants is always relevant at Church. But, to me, the topic seems particularly relevant now, given the challenges that we’re all facing. It’s been a difficult time. Fear and mistrust have strained every aspect of society. They’ve strained our respect for institutions and leaders. They’ve even strained our empathy for ordinary people around us. And that’s not just in the world out there. We’ve also felt this strain in the Church. Too often, we’ve expressed disagreements, and we’ve responded to disagreements, too carelessly. And the resulting words and feelings have separated some of us. So what do covenants have to do with any of this? I’m going to propose to you that making and keeping covenants is a necessary part of overcoming the challenges we now face. And I’d also like to propose an expanded vision of what it means to keep our covenants. Two Kinds of Unity Generally speaking, there are two ways to overcome social division. One’s more superficial and the other more profound. The superficial way is compulsion. The profound way is cooperation. Compulsion is force. It destroys agency. It hoards power. And it doesn’t need trust. The scriptures associate compulsion and hoarding with Satan. They say that Satan “will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.” The scriptures also say that Satan seeks to destroy our agency. The form of social unity that one achieves alone, through compulsion, is ultimately slavery. We might think of it as the chains of hell. Or maybe it’s the zombie apocalypse. Either way, I’m pretty sure most of us don’t really want to live in that world. Cooperation works differently. It creates agency. It shares power. And it requires trust. The scriptures associate cooperation and sharing with Christ. They say that we’re “heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” The scriptures also say that Christ seeks to make us “ equal in power, and in might, and in dominion.” But be careful. This is a different kind of dominion. The scriptures continue, “Thy dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever.” Again, that’s without compulsory means. Then by what other means? The scriptures don’t make us guess. “By persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned; by kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile.” In other words, the power that Christ seeks to share with us arises naturally from cooperation rather than compulsion. And the form of social unity that we achieve together, through such cooperation, is ultimately friendship. Jesus says, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant doesn’t know his master’s business. Instead, I’ve called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I’ve made known to you.” This seems to me to be the kind of relationship that most of us want to have with God and with each other. Covenant and Atonement So let’s return to covenants. I was surprised. And maybe you’ll be too. But it turns out that the words “covenant” and “atonement” mean pretty much the same thing. “Covenant” comes to English from old French. The old French word was a form of “covenir.” And that simply meant something like “agree,” or more literally “come together.” The word “atonement” is a contraction of “at-one-ment.” And it means just what it sounds like. That’s to “make one” or “unify.” So “covenant” and “atonement” ...