MR says: What does the temple mean to you? How can you see this beautiful house of God in a new way?
In sharing Matthew 8:20, which reads, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head,” Brad R. Wilcox explained that because the temple had been desecrated, there was no “home,” or house of the Lord.
However, if Jesus were to come today, Brother Wilcox continued, “He’d say, ‘Foxes have holes, birds have nests, and I do have a home. In fact, I’ve got about 150 all over the world.’”
In his class titled “You’re Not Alone: Come to the House of the Lord,” during BYU Campus Education Week on August 21, Brother Wilcox, an associate professor at Brigham Young University, shared the “Five S’s” of the temple for Latter-day Saints to remember about the house of the Lord.
1. Sanctuary
The first “S” of the temple is sanctuary.
The temple, he explained, is a spiritual sanctuary. “We can go there and escape the cruelness of the world and the pollution of the world and the evil of the world. … Our spirits feel like they’re going home.”
Brother Wilcox quoted President Ezra Taft Benson, who said when he was weighed down with a problem he would go to the temple, where he could put himself into an environment where he could receive personal revelation. “What a blessing to have a place where we can do that,” Brother Wilcox said, “to have a place to escape the world.”