“Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?”

Early in Jesus’ ministry, a “ruler of the Jews,” Nicodemus, “came to Jesus by night” (John 3:2) with a “genuine desire to learn more” of the Master. Addressing Him “by the title he himself bore, and which he regarded as one of honor and respect,”[1] Nicodemus entreats, “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.”

“Verily, verily, I say unto thee,” Jesus answered, “except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” But “how can a man be born when he is old,” Nicodemus wonders aloud? “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God,” Jesus responds (John 3:3-5). As Elder Talmage summarizes in his account of this event, the Lord teaches him the first principles and ordinances of the gospel: faith in Jesus Christ “through whom alone men may gain eternal life;” repentance; baptism by immersion (“since otherwise the figure of a birth would be meaningless”); and “baptism by the Sprit.”[2] 

Indeed, implicitly Jesus invites him to believe and follow Him into the waters of baptism.

All, however, to no avail. Notwithstanding, Talmage notes, that as a scholar of the Law these “fundamental principles of the gospel had been before accessible” to him,[3] Nicodemus just does not understand. “How can these things be?” he asks. In a rebuke that we should all take to heart, the Master responds, “Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?” (John 3:9-10)

For me, there is not a more telling admonition in all of scripture about our Master’s high expectations for His followers when it comes to studying and seeking to understand the gospel that He taught.[4] Endowed members of the Church are, or should be, “masters” when it comes to the doctrine of Christ and the mysteries of His kingdom (in other words, truths God reveals through scripture and the words of living apostles and prophets). In our dispensation, the Lord reiterated the importance of “knowing” or “understanding” the basic truths of the gospel. “It is impossible for a man to be saved in ignorance.” (D&C 131:6) 

Indeed, President Nelson has urged us repeatedly to study, especially the doctrines and ordinance of the holy temple. For example, to his “reticent friends and relatives” who had declined to accept the crowning ordinances of the gospel, President Nelson pled: “Make time to study His words. Really study! If you truly love your family and if you desire to be exalted with them throughout eternity, pay the price now—through serious study and fervent prayer—to know these eternal truths and then to abide by them.” (“Come, Follow Me”, April 2019, emphasis added)

To the sisters in 2019 President Nelson put this imperative in stark relief when he identified who does NOT want us to understand the truths of the gospel and the temple: “The adversary does not want you to understand the covenant you made at baptism or the profound endowment of knowledge and power you have received or will receive in the temple—the house of the Lord. And Satan certainly does not want you to understand that every time you worthily serve and worship in the temple, you leave armed with God’s power and with His angels having ‘charge over’ you.” 

The Lord, on the other hand, is anxious to help us in our search to understand the blessings or spiritual treasures available to us through His ordinances and covenants: “Unto him that keepeth my commandments I will give the mysteries of my kingdom, and the same shall be in him a well of living water, springing up unto everlasting life.” (D&C 63:23) Indeed, President Nelson has taught that the priesthood power and authority with which men and women are endowed in the temple includes a “gift of knowledge to know how to draw upon that power.” (“Spiritual Treasures,” October 2019, emphasis added) 

The Lord affirmed this truth in two grand revelations about the priesthood, Sections 84 and 107:

• The “greater priesthood . . . holdeth the key of the mysteries of the  kingdom, even the key of the knowledge of God.” (D&C 84:19)

• “The power and authority of the higher, or Melchizedek Priesthood, is to hold the keys of all the spiritual blessings of the church—To have the privilege of receiving the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven . . ..” (D&C 107:18-19)
  

Significantly, President Oaks teaches, we do not fully take upon us the name, or authority, of Jesus Christ—and thus receive this treasured key of knowledge—when we are baptized, nor when we renew our baptismal covenants in the sacrament. In the sacrament, he taught, “we do not witness that we take upon us the name of Jesus Christ. We witness that we are willing to do so. (See Doctrine and Covenants 20:77.) The fact that we only witness to our willingness suggests that something else must happen before we actually take that sacred name upon us.” That something else is the endowment ordinance. “Willingness to take upon us the name of Jesus Christ can therefore be understood as willingness to take upon us the authority of Jesus Christ. According to this meaning, by partaking of the sacrament we witness our willingness to participate in the sacred ordinances of the temple and to receive the highest blessings available through the name and by the authority of the Savior when he chooses to confer them upon us.”[5] 

“Thus, an important part of our baptismal covenant, as it is renewed in the ordinance of the sacrament, involves a willingness to prepare ourselves to go to the temple and receive the sacred ordinances that are only administered there and keep the covenants made in those ordinances. In short, ‘we are signifying our commitment to do all that we can to achieve eternal life in the kingdom of our Father. We are expressing our candidacy—our determination to strive for—exaltation in the celestial kingdom.’” (Stephen Fluckiger, Drawing Upon the Spiritual Treasures of the Temple, 144, citing President Oaks, “Taking upon Us the Name of Jesus Christ”)

Our preparation does not end when we receive the ordinances of the temple. Implicit in our temple covenants is a continuous desire and effort to seek and live by the “words of eternal life” (John 6:68) to “live by every word that proceedeth forth from the mouth of God” (D&C 84:44). May God bless our efforts to do so, to study the gospel consistently, day in and day out. As we do so, we will reap the reward promised, even increased power to do and be good, to have “peace in this world and eternal life in the world to come” (D&C 59:23).

[1] James E. Talmage, Jesus the Christ, 161. [2] Ibid. 162. [3] Ibid. 161. [4] Abinadi applied a similarly telling rebuke to the priests of Noah: “Ye have not applied your hearts to understanding” (Mosiah 12:27). [5] Dallin H. Oaks, Ensign, May 1985, 81.