Weekly Family History Activities

Doctrine and Covenants 129-132

“I Have Seen Your Sacrifices in Obedience”

From Come, Follow Me:

What is heaven like? “That same sociality which exists among us here will exist among us there” (Doctrine and Covenants 130:22, 2). In fact, one of the most joyous truths about heaven is that it can include our cherished family relationships, if sealed by the proper authority. Truths like these can make heaven feel less distant—glorious yet reachable.

See The Plan of Salvation Activity to help your family understand that Heavenly Father prepared a plan of salvation that teaches us where we came from, why we are here, and where we are going after mortality. Understanding our place in the plan of salvation helps us develop faith and find joy in a world with many inequities. We can use our knowledge of the plan of salvation to help us in our earthly challenges.” Read more here. 

Doctrine and Covenants 132:13–21

From Come, Follow Me:

Through the Prophet Joseph Smith, the Lord restored the truth that marriage and family relationships can be eternal.

Our Family Can Be Together Forever

Even when your ancestor lines get complicated, with challenging problems to solve, it's all about family and holding on tight.

Gather the family to share your family “falling in love” and marriage stories, or the stories of other living friends or leaders.. You can also remotely share this experience. Write these stories down or audio record them, add photos, and  upload to FamilySearch. Share photo albums, videos, and keepsakes. You could print the stories and place them in your home where they can be easily seen, and consider posting them on your family social media sites.

Talk about the marriages of your ancestors and read any that have been uploaded to FamilySearch. Find them using the FamilySearch Fan Chart, the All The Stories site, or any of the resources in this list of 10 Ways to Find Ancestor's Stories. Be sure to check your relationships to them in FamilySearch as you get to know these stories.

• You could make a book of the love stories of your ancestors (a nice family history gift).
• Plan to go to the temple to perform sealings if possible. Work as a family to find missing marriage certificates. Check out record hints and research helps on the fan chart.
• Use the FamilySearch timeline of each ancestor, and locate the places where family marriages took place. Read about those places as you study the stories and view the related details and documents.
• Another idea is to mark these places on a wall map.
• Marking the temples in which ancestors were sealed or where proxy work was done would be a fun activity also. Check out My Ancestor's Temples.

(Click to enlarge)

A fun activity is to record the reading of The Family: A Proclamation to the World (individually or with your family taking turns reading a portion). Record audio using the FamilySearch Memories Audio App, or the "Record My Story" feature on FamilySearch Discovery, or from FamilySearch Memories on your computer (see this link). This reading could also be video-recorded. Share it with your family and friends.

Memorize The Proclamation as a family. Find free printable memory cue cards here—Memorize The Family: A Proclamation to the World. You could also create your own cards with visual memory cues, or simply divide the proclamation into sections and put them (page-by-page) into a notebook.

Have family members sign a copy of the Proclamation to display in your home and possibly share on social media, along with your feelings about marriage and family.

Creating a book with family pictures correlated to parts of The Family: A Proclamation to the World would make a beautiful gift and heirloom to pass on.

Read more here—The Family: A Proclamation to the World.

“The divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave. Sacred ordinances and covenants available in holy temples make it possible for individuals to return to the presence of God and for families to be united eternally.” (The Family: A Proclamation to the World) “Some ordinances are essential to our exaltation. These ordinances are called saving ordinances….With each of these ordinances, we enter into solemn covenants with the Lord.” (Ordinances)

Find family members that need some temple ordinances performed on their behalf and do it.

• Ordinances Ready is a FamilySearch tool that simplifies finding names for the temple. See Ordinances Ready on the FamilySearch App.
• Temple Opportunities—See "Recommended Tasks" on the FamilySearch home page and click the Temple tab for a list of names for possible ordinances. Be sure to check each name for possible duplicates or other issues before reserving them.
• Descendancy Research—Find descendants of ancestors (such as distant cousins) who need temple work done. 
• See also: Latter-day Saint Youth: Take Ancestors To The Temple 

President Henry B. Eyring shared this counsel he received when he was worried about his family situation: “You just live worthy of the celestial kingdom, and the family arrangements will be more wonderful than you can imagine” A Home Where the Spirit of the Lord Dwells

See also the hymn Families Can Be Together Forever

Our ancestors and others are being taught the gospel in the spirit world, and they need our help. 

While the gospel may be accepted by spirits in the spirit world, the ordinances of salvation must be performed for them by those who are living here on earth.

Watch this video from President Nelson: "You cannot imagine, my son, how many spirits there are in the spirit world who have not yet received the gospel ... But many are receiving it, and a great work is being accomplished. Many are anxiously looking forth to their friends who are still living to administer for them in the temples."

Read more about the story here. President Nelson invites us to gather Israel on both sides of the veil. Watch his General Conference talk to us all and his broadcast to the youth in which he states: "My dear extraordinary youth, you were sent to earth at this precise time, the most crucial time in the history of the world, to help gather Israel. There is nothing happening on this earth right now that is more important than that. There is nothing of greater consequence. Absolutely nothing.This gathering should mean everything to you. This is the mission for which you were sent to earth."

When you exercise faith, you will receive inspiration to find the information needed for the temple. As Quentin L. Cook taught, you should not "underestimate the influence of the deceased in assisting your efforts."

Read more about proxy work for the dead here, and decide how you and your family can do your part and receive the promised blessings for helping those who cannot do this work for themselves.

From FamilySearch: "Establishing family traditions that unite family members is important, but those traditions can be made eternally significant when they involve gathering your family to, around, or in the temple ... You can establish temple family traditions that create special bonds between your living family members and connect them with their ancestors." Creating Family Temple Traditions shares some ideas of creating meaningful temple traditions, such as:

• Plan monthly temple trips with others
• Strengthen family ties through memory storybooks which serve as reminder that families are forever
• Learn about a temple's history
• Make a list of temples that your ancestors were married in
• Create a temple experiences book
• Record thoughts and impressions about attending the temple (especially for the first time)
• Color pictures of the temple and talk about the temple with your family
• Another idea is to visit a temple (if you live close enough) to talk about the peace being in the temple can bring, and how doing work there for the dead blesses those on both sides of the veil. Share stories from your family history about the temple and how it has blessed your ancestors, your living family, and you. Enjoy watching videos of temples or seeing pictures of temples, and talking about ways to increase temple blessings in your lives. 

Identify promises the Lord has promised in Doctrine and Covenants 129–132. Write or audio-record about their influence in your life.