Is there any intelligent reason that I should marry if I am perfectly content as a single adult?

Question

Dear Gramps,

I am a 26 year old male. I have no desire for a wife. Im not sinning in a sexual way at all. Is it a sin to simply go through life without a mate? I’m a very independent person and the thought of constant company of another person depresses me. I hate the thought of someone else to answer to. It’s not about finding the right girl for me. If you are a strong person, there is no intelligent reason for marriage. Its all emotional and spiritual. I cannot get over that. What should I do?

Michael

Answer

Dear Michael,

One intelligent reason for marriage, especially between men and women in the Mormon Church, is that it is a commandment of God! If you don’t belong to the Mormon Church and have your religious inclinations in other directions, then the intelligent reasons for marrying are less compelling.

The reason is this. As the Savior said in John 14:2—

In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

After the restoration of the original gospel of Jesus Christ through the Prophet Joseph Smith in 1830, that dictum of the Savior was repeated in these words—

Let not your hearts be troubled; for in my Father’s house are many mansions, and I have prepared a place for you; and where my Father and I am, there ye shall be also (D&C 98:18).

You will note the future tense in the first declaration and the past tense in the second.

So the truth is that there is not just one ill-defined heaven and one hell, as generally preached in the sectarian world, but after death and resurrection, and after the end of the Millennium, with its final judgement, the children of men will be consigned to various degrees of glory, consistent with their obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel of Jesus Christ during their mortal sojourn. These degrees of glory are defined in significant detail in Sections 76 and 132 of the Doctrine and Covenants.

In brief, the wicked of the earth, those who have by and large been under the domination of the adversary, will not be resurrected at the beginning of the Millennium, but will be consigned to the realm of Satan until the end of the Millennium. They will then be resurrected and will inherit the lowest of the three general degrees of glory, called the telestial kingdom. This kingdom will exist under the natural laws that obtain in the world we now inhabit. However, it is said that the glory of that telestial kingdom surpasses all understanding (D&C 76:89).

Those who are the good people of the earth, of whom it could be said that they obey the Law of Moses, but who have not participated in the saving ordinances of the gospel of Jesus Christ, will be brought forth in the first resurrection and will inherit a terrestrial kingdom. That terrestrial kingdom will exist under the natural laws that obtained in the Garden of Eden before the fall of Adam.

Those who have accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ in all ages of the world and who have been baptized for the remission of sins from which they have fully repented, and who have maintained their covenants of obedience to the gospel, will inherit the Celestial kingdom, where God and Christ dwell, as recorded in D&C 76:51-52—

They are they who received the testimony of Jesus, and believed on his name and were baptized after the manner of his burial, being buried in the water in his name, and this according to the commandment which he has given–

 

That by keeping the commandments they might be washed and cleansed from all their sins, and receive the Holy Spirit by the laying on of the hands of him who is ordained and sealed unto this power.

In this celestial kingdom, however, there are also three gradations, or degrees. As recorded in D&C 131:1-4—

In the celestial glory there are three heavens or degrees;

 

And in order to obtain the highest, a man must enter into this order of the priesthood [meaning the new and everlasting covenant of marriage];

 

And if he does not, he cannot obtain it.

 

He may enter into the other, but that is the end of his kingdom; he cannot have an increase.

By increase is meant an eternal posterity. This is the key to the doctrine of eternal marriage in the Mormon Church. In the sacred precincts of the holy temple a man and a woman may be sealed to one another as husband and wife by the power of the holy priesthood for all eternity! As revealed in Section 132 of the Doctrine & Covenants—

And again, verily I say unto you, if a man marry a wife by my word, which is my law, and by the new and everlasting covenant, and it is sealed unto them by the Holy Spirit of promise, by him who is anointed, unto whom I have appointed this power and the keys of this priesthood….it shall be done unto them in all things whatsoever my servant hath put upon them, in time, and through all eternity; and shall be of full force when they are out of the world; and they shall pass by the angels, and the gods, which are set there, to their exaltation and glory in all things, as hath been sealed upon their heads, which glory shall be a fulness and a continuation of the seeds forever and ever. Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject unto them. Then shall they be gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject unto them. (D&C 132:19-20)

If one does not marry in the proving ground of mortality, he foregoes the greatest blessings that the Father has in store for His children–to rule and reign with Him in the kingdoms of glory.

Gramps