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What Does a Temple Marriage Sealing Actually Do?
What Does a Temple Sealing Mean?
You may know that Latter-day Saints are married in temples because families can be eternal, but still wonder what a sealing actually means. Is it simply a promise to stay together forever? Does being sealed guarantee that a marriage will last eternally?
Those are important questions. To understand a sealing, it helps to start with the authority Jesus Christ gave His Apostles.
A temple sealing joins a man and a woman in a marriage covenant through priesthood authority. It makes an eternal marriage possible, but the blessings of that covenant depend on how the couple lives after the sealing. Being sealed is not an automatic guarantee that a marriage will become eternal regardless of the choices the husband and wife make.
Jesus Christ Gave Authority to Bind on Earth and in Heaven
In Matthew 16:13–19, Peter testifies that Jesus is “the Christ.” The Savior then gives Peter keys and teaches that what is bound on earth can also be bound in heaven.
Jesus was preparing His Apostles for the work they would continue after His Resurrection. The authority He gave them was more than permission to make religious promises. It was priesthood authority to perform ordinances that would be recognized in heaven.
That is what makes a temple sealing different from a civil wedding. A couple is not simply promising to stay together. They are entering a marriage covenant through authority restored by Jesus Christ.
A Sealing Begins a Covenant Marriage
A sealing begins a covenant marriage, but it does not complete the work of building one.
In Doctrine and Covenants 132:19, the Lord describes a husband and wife who are sealed by proper authority and who “abide” in the covenant. To abide means to remain faithful to the covenant and continue living according to its promises.
That requires more than attending the temple on a wedding day. A covenant marriage requires faithfulness, repentance, forgiveness, humility, sacrifice, patience, and love. Husband and wife make daily choices that either strengthen or weaken their relationship.
The sealing provides the authority and covenant foundation for an eternal marriage. The way the couple lives afterward matters because a covenant is not fulfilled by receiving an ordinance alone.
What the Family Proclamation Teaches
The Family: A Proclamation to the World teaches that temple ordinances make it possible for families to be “united eternally.”
This helps explain why a temple sealing matters beyond the wedding day. It places a husband and wife within God’s plan for marriage and family and gives them a covenant relationship in which they can learn how to live together.
The proclamation does not describe an eternal family as one created by a ceremony alone. It teaches that strong families are built through faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, love, service, and other daily choices. A sealing gives a couple the opportunity to build that kind of family with Jesus Christ at the center.
Two Common Misunderstandings
Sometimes people think of a sealing as only a religious wedding ceremony. In that view, the couple makes promises, but the ordinance does not affect their lives much after the day they receive it.
Other people treat a sealing as an automatic guarantee. In that view, once a couple has been sealed, the outcome is fixed no matter how they treat each other or whether they remain faithful to their covenants.
Neither view explains the sealing completely.
A sealing is a sacred ordinance performed through priesthood authority. It gives a couple covenant blessings that an ordinary marriage does not provide. But the couple still has to live the covenant. Husband and wife cannot disregard their commitments over time and assume that the ordinance alone guarantees an eternal marriage.
This does not mean that temple marriage should make you anxious. It means that the sealing has real meaning. God is not asking a couple to attend a ceremony and then simply hope everything works out. He is inviting them to build their marriage with Jesus Christ and to rely on His help.
What Research Helps Us Notice
David C. Dollahite and Loren D. Marks were part of a study of 28 Latter-day Saint families. The researchers found that belief in eternal marriage and eternal family was an important theme in the families they studied. Participants connected those beliefs with hope, purpose, forgiveness, humility, and patience.
The study cannot measure the power of temple sealing. It does show how an eternal view of marriage can affect everyday behavior. When couples see marriage as a covenant with lasting meaning, they may be more willing to forgive, remain patient, and keep working through problems.
That is one reason a sealing matters now, not only in the next life. What a couple believes about marriage can influence how they treat each other today.
Questions Worth Considering
- Do I think of temple marriage mainly as a wedding ceremony or as the beginning of a covenant way of life?
- What would it mean for me to “abide” in a marriage covenant?
- What habits of faithfulness, forgiveness, repentance, and love would strengthen my marriage?
A temple sealing does not remove the need for daily effort. It gives a husband and wife a covenant foundation as they work with Jesus Christ to build a faithful marriage and prepare for eternal family life.