"The eternal nature of the marriage covenant and the promise of everlasting family associations are among the most beautiful and essential doctrines of the restored Gospel.  In fact, the purpose of the Gospel and the Church is to exalt the family" (Judd, 2012).  

 

Elder Hugh B. Brown stated:  "The family concept is one of the major and most important of the whole theological doctrine.  In fact, our very concept of heaven itself is the projection of the home into eternity.  Salvation, then is essentially a family affair, and full participation in the plan of salvation can be had only in family units" (Brown, 1966). Our purpose is eternal life, which is to become like our Heavenly Father and to live in families in happiness and joy forever.

 

Preparing to Be an Eternal Family

"Just as Jesus used a child in His mortal ministry as an example for the people of the pure love they must and could have to be like Him, He has offered us the family as an example of an ideal setting in which we can learn how to love as He loves. That is because the greatest joys and the greatest sorrows we experience are in family relationships. The joys come from putting the welfare of others above our own. That is what love is" (Eyring, 2009).

 

“There can be no genuine happiness separate and apart from the home and any effort made to sanctify and preserve its influence is uplifting to those who toil and sacrifice for its establishment. Men and women often seek to substitute some other life for that of the home. They would make themselves believe that the home means restraint, that the highest liberty is the opportunity to move about at will. There is no happiness without service and there is no service greater than that which converts the home into a divine institution and which promotes and preserves family life.”

 

"The main aim is not to heap up material wealth, which generally draws further and further from the true, the ideal, the spiritual life; but it is rather to create soul-wealth, consciousness of noble achievement, an outflow of love and helpfulness...It is rather beauty of soul, cultivated, loving, faithful, true spirits; hands that help and hearts that sympathize; love that seeks not its own, thoughts and acts that touch our lives to finer issues—these lie at the foundation of the ideal home."

 

"Feed your spiritual selves at home, as well as in public places. Let love, and peace, and the Spirit of the Lord, kindness, charity, sacrifice for others, abound in your families. Teach to your children these things, in spirit and power, sustained and strengthened by personal practice. Let them see that you are earnest, and practice what you preach. Teach them to be pure in their lives—in their habits, that they may be holy temples in which the Spirit of the living God may dwell and find congenial habitation."

 

"Our [family] associations are not exclusively intended for this life, for time, as we distinguish it from eternity. We live for time and for eternity. We form associations and relations for time and all eternity. Our affections and our desires are found fitted and prepared to endure not only throughout the temporal or mortal life, but through all eternity. I have the glorious promise of the association of my loved ones throughout all eternity" (Smith, 2011).