Question: You’ve mentioned that in the temple certain elements of the Davidic Covenant used to be more obvious prior to some changes. Was that part of the sealing or the endowment? If I’m married in the temple, am I already supposed to be acting as a father under the terms of the Davidic Covenant? Is there a procedure to enter such a covenant outside of the temple?
Answer: LDS temple covenants fulfill all requirements of the Davidic Covenant on lower and higher levels. What makes them effectual is the knowledge of how they function based on the principle of proxy salvation that Jesus himself exemplified. Such knowledge—deriving from the certainty of God’s promise that if you do your part he will do his—creates moral strength and desire in the person making temple covenants to keep them at all costs. Thus he grows into the principle of proxy salvation that blesses those to whom he ministers and that forms the basis of patriarchy.
Expanding into the role of a proxy savior to many under the terms of the Davidic Covenant, he participates in the end-time restoration of the house of Israel—the Jews, Lamanites, and Ten Tribes. Serving as a spiritual king who answers for the disloyalties to God of those to whom he ministers, he obtains their temporal salvation or divine protection at the time God’s judgments come upon the world. Under the terms of the Davidic Covenant, when he keeps God’s law and when those to whom he ministers keep his law, God is obliged to deliver him and them from a mortal threat.
Other than temple covenants, no formal ordinance or procedure exists to enter into the Davidic Covenant. However, one may reaffirm one’s covenants with God in personal prayers. It is also important to remember that all covenants with God possess penalties or curses, which are the opposite of the covenants’ blessings and which may damn a person the more easily.
