Ancient Symbols That Point to Christ with Jasmin Rappleye

What happens inside a Latter-day Saint temple, and why does it matter?

In this episode of Temple Bound, host Will Humphreys sits down with Jasmin Rappleye, a trusted voice in the Latter-day Saint digital space, for a conversation on temple preparation, ancient symbolism, sacred garments, and finding Jesus Christ throughout the temple endowment.

Whether you're preparing for your first temple visit, returning after a difficult experience, or looking for deeper meaning in worship, this episode offers practical guidance and spiritual insight.

What You'll Learn in This Episode:

• Why the Lord uses ancient rituals and symbols in temples, and how they connect to the Old Testament, the Abrahamic Covenant, and Jesus Christ
• How to prepare for a first temple visit with realistic expectations and practical guidance
• The meaning behind the temple garment through Adam & Eve, the Hebrew word kippur (“to cover”), and Christ’s Atonement
• What “tokens” symbolize and how they represent our journey back to God
• Why repetition deepens temple understanding over time
• How the temple narrative centers on mercy, redemption, and the Atonement of Jesus Christ
• How to support someone who had a difficult first temple experience
• Connections between sacred clothing in ancient religions and Latter-day Saint temple worship
• Why Christ is central to the endowment, even when not directly named

Subscribe to Temple Bound for more conversations on faith, temples, and discipleship. If this episode strengthened your testimony, leave a comment sharing one thing that helped you love the temple.

Transcript

A Quick Favor And A Warning

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Before we start the episode, I have a small favor to ask. If Temple Bound has meant something to you, would you take a moment right now and follow the podcast and leave a comment on the app that you're listening to? When you follow and leave a comment, it helps the podcast show up for more people who are trying to learn, grow, and come closer to the teachings of the temple. It's free and it's simple, but it really makes a big difference. Thank you so much for being here. If you've ever scrolled past a video calling our temple worship culty, weird or worse, and felt that quiet sting in your chest, this episode is for you. Jasmine Rapley has built her entire platform and standing in that gap. She takes the things people whisper about and answers them out loud with history, scholarship, and a love for the Lord's house that runs so deep. So today we're going to talk about why the Lord uses ancient symbols, what garments really mean, and the one truth that she wants every member of the church to take to the temple with them. Enjoy

Meet Jasmine Rapley And Her Work

SPEAKER_00 1:01

the show. Well, Jasmine Rapley, I am so excited to have you uh on Temple Bound today. You're one of those people that when I was starting out, I was looking up to and still do. Could you please set the table for the few of those who don't know you in my audience?

SPEAKER_01 1:14

So my name is Jasmine Rapley, and I have a channel called Jasmine Rapley on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, wherever you consume your social media. And I love talking about the Church of Jesus Christ. I try to help Latter-day Saints make sense of their beliefs and have confidence in being a member of the church by talking about controversial issues. So whether that's um Joseph Smith's polygamy or whatever current event is headline is in the news about the church, Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, or church finances, or whatever might be controversial, I really enjoy taking those hard topics and breaking them down in hopefully a simple and clear way and contextualizing it in a way that can be faith-affirming.

SPEAKER_00 1:52

Yes. As a matter of fact, that's who you're exactly who I follow on those things because we were talking about this before we hit record, the importance of members of the church to stand up and to have a voice to some of these things. We appreciate the brethren and how the church is being run, and there's a space for us to step in and talk about these elements. For you, as you talk about the temple, you obviously have this great passion for the temple. Where did that come from?

SPEAKER_01 2:16

That I think I was just born that way sometimes in some way. I I have always loved ritual and I've always loved history. And so I found even from a young age, the rituals of like the Catholic Church, the architecture of Gothic Europe just fascinated me and how they have all of these beautiful symbols that requires digging deeper and uncovering layers and like really forcing you to think critically about your entire worship experience. And it makes it so immersive that when I went to the temple for the first time, I had a pretty positive experience, and it unlocked this whole new side of the church that I had never experienced before, that has all of these layers of symbolism, that has all of this ritual, and has all of this beautiful architecture and all of these things that force me to think much much harder about my faith and makes me connect to God in a new way because I'm not just accessing him through beautiful music or through beautiful pr uh sermons about Christ, but rather it's forcing me to contemplate symbols about Christ and forcing me to really dig in and think about him in a new way. And so I've always loved that. Um, but I w became pretty passionate about sharing ancient connections to the temple on my channels. I started a YouTube channel called Temple Light, where I did a lot of temple prep lessons because I would see a lot of people come out of the temple with a negative experience or say that the temple is culty or say that the Mormon church worships Satan because they do all these weird things in their temple. And that was not my experience, but I can understand why people would feel disoriented by a very different experience than our everyday Sunday worship uh services. And so I felt like, well, this is something that I can contribute. I love the ancient world, I've studied a lot of history, I'm not an expert, but I've seen so many connections with my own temple worship and with things I've read about in history books and art history books and religious texts that I wanted a place where I could share those so the people could be more prepared so that when they went to the temple or when they're preparing to go to the temple and they're searching on YouTube, like Latter-day Saint Temple, what happens inside, amongst the many negative and antagonistic exposes, there might be like a few videos of hopefully mine and others that are positively explaining the temple in a way that makes sense and contextualize it in the way that it was intended to be, not with a sinister, shaky pen camera, but rather in its sacred context and being able to help people prepare for what can be a really beautiful, life-changing experience. And even more so the more you go back and experience it over and over and over. So that's how I started with like my Temple Light channel, and now that I have my Jasmine Rapley channel, I love talking about the temple because it is one of the most misunderstood doctrines in our church, and it is one of the most exposed of things we do in the church. People love to display sacred temple clothing, sacred symbols of our temple worship on the internet because they think it's going to be shocking and it'll get them views and clicks. But it is something that, you know, is very offensive to me. And I want people who are preparing for the temple to find positive content that can help them contextualize the temple. And with the Salt Lake Temple dedication coming up next year, I'm very excited to have renewed interest around the temple from both members within the church and without of the church. I imagine a lot of people are going to be interested about what happens inside Latter-day Saint temples, and so I'm all for it. Like let's let's talk about it all day, every day.

SPEAKER_00 5:47

Yeah, it's such a welcome like thought the way that you're talking about it so openly, because I I understandably know why culturally we haven't wanted to bridge those topics. In the temple, we're taught these things are sacred, and so there's almost been this overcorrection to make sure that we're super careful in what we say. But like you said, though, with technology and social media, people are leveraging these sacred things for clicks. And it's interesting that that thought about how a lie can make its way around the world and the time it takes the truth to tie its shoes. It's so amazing how many of those um elements are being displayed in a very offensive and sad way. And it's interesting because because they're ceremonial, to me, it's very clear that that those things are going to be very different and come across in that light as cultish. I get that perspective when that's what you're being exposed to. So it means a lot to see when I'm going through my feed, you standing up and talking about those things. So for me, I get now why you're passionate about it. I see that you've always had a propensity for these ancient things. And so when you were in the temple, you had one of those connective moments.

Why God Teaches With Symbols

SPEAKER_00 6:53

Why do you think the Lord uses these ancient rituals and symbols in his holy temples? I'm I'm I'm sure you have thought about it. Why do you think the Lord uses those?

SPEAKER_01 7:04

Well, certainly the Lord can teach us in a variety of ways. I don't know that there's anything completely sacrosanct about the format that eternal covenants are made in. I think if the Lord really wanted to, we could do temple ceremonies in our chapels and just make them sermons if we really wanted to, but I do think the Lord sees something important about connecting us to the past because that is the foundation of the temple covenant that we're trying to participate in. This new and everlasting covenant that we're being ushered into is the Abrahamic covenant. It is the covenant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And by doing participating in that, we are being part of this ancient legacy. We're becoming part of the house of Israel in a very tangible way. And so I think the Lord sees value in drawing on these same patterns and the same covenants that would have been familiar to our ancient forebears and instituting that in our modern days as well. And there is something to the fact that these aren't modern ceremonies. Yes, God can speak to us in our language and unto our understanding, He can change symbols to make it accessible to us. But this, the temple endowment wasn't instituted in 1842 with Joseph Smith. There's a sense that at least the core principles, the core ideas of making covenants with God, of learning to enter his presence, of trying, of learning how to become a king and a priest unto him are not modern. They are ancient concepts. And so God teaches us through those ancient concepts. Well, you want to learn how to become a king and a priest unto God. Well, we're going to use patterns that ancient kings and ancient priests used in order to teach you what it means to have this power and to have this authority and to enter into this new relationship with God. Symbols are beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

Yeah, and I think there's we learn a lot through the scriptures, obviously, in parables, there's a lot of ways that the Lord likes to teach us so that it requires effort and intention to un unlock the meaning for us in this way. And so, you know, when you talk about people who've had negative experiences, people who go through and maybe they feel confused or a little bit disconnected from the temple experience. Um I'm sure there's

When The Temple Feels Overwhelming

SPEAKER_00 9:20

lots of reasons for that. But what do you usually say to those individuals? You you seem to me like someone who's had those conversations. What do you or what would you say to those people who maybe went for the first time and they they weren't necessarily prepared in a way that they were able to feel the the temple? What how do you help them get back on track and understanding what it is and feeling the love of the savior in it?

SPEAKER_01 9:41

Well, the best uh remedy usually is prevention. So I I try very hard to help people understand before they go to the temple. But if they've gone to the temple and they didn't receive the preparation that they could have, um whether their parents didn't tell them or they didn't feel like they understood what they were getting themselves into, and they come out feeling disoriented. I mean, first of all, you just validate that, like, yes, of course, this is a very different experience. It is understandable to feel overwhelmed, it's understandable to feel that this is different, and maybe to feel dissonance at that difference because it is very foreign to our everyday experience. And so you don't want them to feel like they're the only one, they're the odd one out. Like many people have gone to the temple and have felt that sense of, whoa, what's going on here? Now I think the church has come a long way in helping people prepare for the temple. They have a fantastic website. Church of Jesus Christ.org/slash temples has like several a handful of articles that are really descriptive and very clear and are super helpful. They've come out with several videos. I understand that they're working on even more materials to help people prepare for that experience. Um, and so I think we see it a lot less today than we did even 10 years ago. But even still, people will come through that experience and feel that dissonance, and especially because a lot of them are getting their temple prep through TikTok. Many people are seeing the exposes of temple materials online before they ever walk through the door. And maybe they're not like maliciously or not intentionally, but it's just popping into their feed. And so that's their impression of what the temple is, whether or not it's accurate or whether or not it's accurately representing the spirit that's supposed to be accompanied with that. And so if they have an uncomfortable experience in the temple, yeah, validate that of course it can be hard. I'm so sorry that that wasn't as positive an experience as you were expecting. But generally, I feel like some of the best ways to overcome that is repetition. So I mean it's a little bit of being able to un the more you understand something, the more familiar it can be become. And the more you're familiar you are with it, the more you can understand and see what they're trying to do and embrace it. So repetition is a huge piece. Go back to the temple and it with your parents, with your friends, with your family if that is helpful, or go back by yourself if you need like processing time in solitude. But I think the more you immerse yourself in that experience, the more things are gonna start to come out to you about, oh, I thought that was really strange, but now that I've seen it a few times, maybe it's not as jarring as I thought. Or now that I've the more you go to the temple, I think the more there the potential is to feel the spirit. And once you feel the spirit, you can see beauty where you may have seen confusion before. And of course, study. I think studying is the number one way to help contextualize the things we see in the temple. Because I think some of the things that get people confused are sacred clothing that we don't normally wear in our temples or our Sunday services. Sure. Um, the covenants that we make. Now the church has made very clear what those covenants are, but before a lot of people felt confused that, like, wait, I didn't know what I was signing up for. Um, some of the ritual gestures and some of the ritual prayer that we do, I think are some of the big things that confuse people about that experience being new. And so all of those things, if they confuse you, there are wonderful resources that can help at least contextualize. Now, I can't guarantee that if you do all of this study that you're gonna come out lovely the temple as much as I do. I mean, everyone, everyone's gonna go through their own experience, but I I can promise that doing additional study can help at least contextualize what its intended purpose is so you can just see it on its own terms and not through a sinister lens of an ex-Mormon who thinks that the church is the worst thing in the world and wants you to leave. But rather through informed consent. This is its intended purpose. So study it, learn it. Um, make sure that you understand what it's intending to do so that when you experience it for yourself, it actually can be a really beautiful experience and you can feel that spirit. Um, I remember the first time I went through, the matron of the temple said, you know, don't worry about all the information. It's gonna be a lot, just focus on what you feel. And I kept thinking, like, but what if what I'm feeling is anxiety? Like, what if what I'm feeling is apprehension because there's so much? Like it's really hard to filter through that. And so, like, yes, it's okay to feel confused, but the more you go, the more familiar it will be and the less overwhelming it will be, just like sensorily. And also the more you study, go to the resources. I mean, I've got stuff on my channel, but Farms has published a number of books on the ancient temple that I think are fantastic in helping contextualize how sacred clothing was used in the ancient world, what the symbolism is of the ancient high priest's clothing, what ritual gestures exist in the Bible that are actually not super well noticed. A lot of people don't realize that most of the gestures we do in the temple are found in the Bible. If you're looking really closely, they're in there and they're used in ritual context to help people draw them closer to God. And so just understanding that so much of the temple is actually deeply biblical, I have found has helped me to become a lot more comfortable with what we do there because I see, like, oh, this is not new, this is not culty, this is not strange, this is ancient. We have been doing this for thousands and thousands of years as a way to symbolically help us become closer to God.

SPEAKER_00 14:48

Yes, and there's power in those things that we talked about. All those things that you mentioned, there's actual power that gets unlocked, but for now, for people to go through and just feel validated is huge. You know, not just for us, but for the people we love, whether it's a child, a friend, or parent. When anyone goes through the temple, I loved how you said, What if the thing I'm feeling is anxiety? I, for example, a connection I felt to you on that one, Jasmine, was when I went to the MTC, um, I didn't like it. I was there, like, I was like, I'm gonna be a missionary, I love the church, I'm gonna talk, you know, about the church and teach the gospel. The two weeks in, I'm like, this is hard. I don't like this. I want to leave. Like that was my experience. And the hardest thing for me was that I thought, I just assumed it was a safe place to bring those feelings up. And so I'd be in my MTC district being like, hey, well, as you guys know, this is miserable. And um, and I and they're like, What are you talking about? We love it here. And one guy, there, these are kids, you know, this isn't the church. This is another 19-year-old boy was like, Hey man, why are you even here if you're feeling this way? You should go home. And it was so invalidating. And and so, yeah, and it's you know, it's one of those things where I just think we have to be so aware that, like, you know, the covenant path gives us idea that like we're all doing it the same way at the same time. It is so individualistic that as we go through the temple, as we're going to prepare people for the temple, there are resources there that need to be customized. And so when someone goes through, I love that advice that you had with just validating their feelings and just recognizing that whatever they feel is okay. And we don't need to worry if it's not this like strongly positive thing. It's what their process and their path, the savior is aware of what they need to go through, and there's reasons for what they have. So we don't need to own those or feel like we failed. That being said, clearly, Jasmine, there's a lot we can do to prepare people for it. As uh Mark Matthew said on our show once, he goes, uh he's the author of the book, Understanding Your Temple Endowment. It's like a lot of times if we don't prepare people, this gift that we're given is wrapped in Old Testament wrapping paper. And so, you know, that can get in the way of understanding the gift. You obviously organically have this like passion and understanding of those things before you even entered the temple. So, how do you approach preparing other people to go receive their Old Testament wrapped gift from the Lord?

Tokens Through Scripture And Everyday Life

SPEAKER_01 17:03

Well, I generally find it very useful to connect it to the Old Testament because while a lot of things in the Old Testament are strange and weird, and out of all of our scriptures, that's probably the one that Latter-day Saints maybe feel the weakest on because we study the Book of Mormon all the time, and the Doctrine of Covenants is super short, and the Pearl of Great Price is super short, and the New Testament is love and Jesus, and then the Old Testament is huge. And so it's one that we maybe feel is is a little bit more impenetrable, but there is something very reassuring and comforting about knowing that what you are doing has um consistency through time and is coming from a familiar source. So many people feel this uncertainty about the temple because it feels like, oh, Joseph Smith stole this from Freemasonry, or oh, this is this culty thing that is totally new and different and it's not biblical and it's not Christian at all. But I feel like it is so helpful when you drill down to what is really concerning them to be able to point back to something they're already comfortable with, which is the scriptures in many cases. We already do this, or this idea of having certain symbols that are accompanied with covenants, being able to tie that back to something they're already familiar with, like the idea that every week we partake of tokens of Christ's sacrifice that is reminding us of a covenant we made at baptism. That's just a simple way to say the sacrament is a token and a sign of a covenant we made. You are already doing this every single week. So when you go to the temple and there are new covenants and new symbols and signs, this is just a continuation of that. This is something that Jesus Christ established in the New Testament that this is going to be a token of my sacrifice. And in the Old Testament, he used tokens as signs of covenants, and he used tokens as signs of identity, such as in the, I mean, with the Abrahamic covenant, he made a covenant and there was accompanied with it a name and a token. There was Abram, you are now going to be called Abraham. You are receiving a new name because you have a new identity, and the token of this covenant is going to be circumcision. And that is a very strange, bizarre token, way weirder than anything we do in the temple.

SPEAKER_00 19:05

Yeah, can we think about that for a second? Like that when we whenever people get wrapped up in that piece, it's like, yeah, I think that might win. That's one of those tokens that is the most different, but it's so old, every religion that has any sort of draw to the old testament just understands it because it's it's it's common. At this point now, it's comfortable because they've grown up knowing about it. But if you were to see that for the first time, if that was like nuanced in a new church of a restored gospel and it was on TikTok, think about the light that that would give. It could be very tainted very easily.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

Oh, absolutely. And then in the Old Testament, the um in the Exodus, it said that as they were doing the final plague, the Lord was going to send the angel of death, and so they had to have the blood of the lamb on their lintels, and that was a sign. The the scripture says it's a token that my angel will pass over you. And so, in that sense, it's serving as a very symbolic thing that is supposed to identify you as a one of the covenant children of Israel. And tokens are used throughout scripture. We already talked about Abraham in the New Testament. Uh, Jesus Christ uses his own hands as tokens of identity. His disciples, after he's resurrected, they don't necessarily recognize him or they have a hard time believing that he's really him and that he's really alive. And so, as a token that he really is who he says he is, he extends his hands and he says, Feel the prince in my hands and in my feet, and thrust your hand into my side, and that is how you are going to know that I am who I say I am. And so as children of, as children of the covenant, we're taking upon ourselves a new identity, and hopefully through that process, we're becoming better, we're becoming more Christ-like. The whole point is to receive the countenance of Christ, to receive the image of Christ in our countenance, so that we can become more like him, we can resemble him more. So, how is God going to know that we've really achieved that? By receiving, by exchanging tokens that we have taken upon ourselves very seriously a covenant to become more like Jesus Christ. So those are just little small ways that you can point to rituals we already do on a very regular basis or scriptures that they may already be familiar with to say, this is continuous, this is nothing radically new, this is just a new way to present all of these ancient principles and all of these eternal principles that I think we can all get on board with, that we want to become more like Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ is our savior, and that there's nothing we can do, that there's no way to achieve salvation without him, and that we can have symbols in our lives that remind us of Jesus Christ and help us become more like him. With the sacrament, we literally are ingesting that token. We are taking it in ourselves as a way to say, like, Christ is a part of me now. He is in me, he's around me, he's on me, he's everything. And in the temple, there are similar ways that symbols are taken upon us so that our countenance is changing, our visage is changing. We're taking Christ in our hands, in our hearts, in our face, and in our clothing. Everything we are resembles Christ a little. Bit more if we're living the covenant temple lifestyle.

SPEAKER_00 22:04

I I love all that you said because I think the thing that we it's important for us to remember is that we're in this temporal existence. We're celestial beings having a temporal ex experience, right? Spiritual beings having a worldly experience. Is that there's something about the tokens. I mean, it's I think that's cool that you can show people that this is a pattern of heaven that we can look at in the old testament, the new testament. And when I think about this as well, I think about tokens that maybe aren't directly tied to God in a way that to help me understand. Um we had a guest on our show, Tanya Kimball, who um lost two of her children and her spouse. And when her first son passed away, the people at Phoenix Children's Hospital, the doctors, they they gave her a heart-shaped rock that she talks about. And they put one of those in the coffin. And the reason I bring this up is because I have been thinking about that rock for about two months now since I met her. And she talks about how for ye for the last year and a half she has that rock in her pocket, and how that rock, how she rubs it, how it makes her feel. There's power. And this isn't even a priesthood, you know, ordinance or anything that's church specific. I just want to highlight the power of a token, something that we can touch and feel and see, and how that unlocks for us in this temporal world something deeply meaningful and personal for us. And so we all have little little tokens in our world, whether it's a book that was given to us by someone we love, whether it's uh an heirloom from a grandparent. You know, we talk about temple in conjunction with family history, and and the reason being is because that connection to our lineage is part of the Abrahamic covenant and in our love for them, as we deepen our love and understanding of them, that's where we can find Christ in our love for him. And so as we look at tokens in that light, it demystifies them in the way that I've never, honestly, that you're talking, I'm I'm making these connections in real time and just having this experience right now of like love. All these little symbols. They tie us to different meanings and they they unlock things, of course, and there's actual power in them as we learn. But more than anything else, it's just that reminder of home, that little like heart-shaped rock that we can rub love and rub and feel the love of our savior.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

So it's really beautiful. And one of the in the ancient world, they there was this concept of tokens. So the word symbol in Greek comes from the word symbolon, and it's a reference to knucklebones. So in the ancient world, you had this concept of hospitality where you would take like a sheep's knucklebone, split it in half, and then you would keep one and you can give it to someone else. And in a variety of contexts, whether you're like a guest in someone's home and you want to give them a token so that if you ever meet up again, you recognize them, or if you're sending someone to meet a group of people that and they don't know that person, you can send them with a token so that they know like they're coming from me. This happens in um Jason and Medea. There's a scene where Jason says, Oh, I have these friends, I'll send you to them, and I'll send you with a token. And what he means is this physical object that kind of certifies that this is Jason's friend. And that's how it was used in the ancient world in pretty mundane settings. But it's the similar concept of like, if you ever saw Disney's The Parent trap from the 90s, where they like each twin was split at birth and they each got like one half of a photograph. And once they've like happened to meet up at summer camp one year, they both realize that they had both halves of the photograph. They put them together and they're like, oh my gosh, we're sisters. Or the same thing happens in the movie Anastasia from the 90s, where the long-lost orphaned daughter only has this token. She has a little necklace that is like this token of her past. That's all she knows. And it's not until she meets her grandma, who doesn't know who she is, when she sees that token, she realizes, you are my long-lost daughter, my granddaughter. And it's that beautiful moment of connection because of a symbol that represents a family lineage. And I tend to see the temple tokens and symbols as a very similar thing that we are children of God. And because we are in mortality, we are on this long-lost path. We're in the lone and dreary world and we're trying to make our way back home. And the way that we can make it back home is by receiving these tokens so that when we approach our maker at the end of our lives, he will recognize us and be like, Yes, you are my child. Welcome home. I'm so glad to see you in this beautiful embrace.

SPEAKER_00 26:20

Yeah, I I love my the way I see tokens now is connection after what you just said. I'm gonna think of token connection. I'm gonna think of, you know, heart-shaped rocks, I'm gonna think of lockets, I'm gonna think of, you know, any, but but I love the idea of also, and I love the idea of going to the old testament because that's where it's founded. So it's what you've taught me is that when we're preparing people for the temple, the importance of going back and showing them the contextual pattern that's a that exists from the Old Testament and how these are things that have occurred forever in different ways gives us some understanding. And in starting in the Old Testament, it's nice, like the sheep knuckle. I didn't know that. That's a really interesting thing to know. So if we can draw those parallels and then draw bring it into the modern world as like, hey, but it's all about connection. These things are are symbolic because when we take effort to learn and receive revelation, we're learning the pattern of heaven, we're learning who we're becoming by receiving that light, then we can understand it all boils down to love and connection. So that's really neat how you um will frame those elements of the symbolism and the the

Garments As Christ Covering Us

SPEAKER_00 27:25

tokens. How do you approach garments? How do you how do you teach garments to people who have who are preparing to go to the temple for the first time?

SPEAKER_01 27:32

Well, I have I I've loved that our conversation around garments has evolved over time. And I've loved that a lot of people are grasping and embracing this Christological symbolism. Um that is one of the things that a lot of people find strange because it's one of the easiest things to mock that our magic underwear, that weird stuff that the Mormons have to wear, that they're, you know, policing your clothing and they're policing your underwear and how terrible that sounds. But it is a sacred vestment. And I and other religions wear sacred vestments. They even wear sacred underclothing at times. And so I'd like to think that we can have the same level of respect for the temple garment that others get for their clothing. But when it comes to understanding its symbolism, it really comes down to the story of Adam and Eve. That's the primary narrative that we're taught in the temple. We're taught about creation, the fall of Adam and Eve, and how the atonement of Jesus Christ brings us back into God's presence. And it's supposed to be an archetypal message about our journey that we were all created and we all fall and make mistakes, and it's through the atonement that we can return back to Christ. And the garment is such a potent symbol of Christ covering us. In the story of Adam and Eve, they are naked. And in the ancient world, nakedness is a sign of shame. It's a sign of innocence also of being, you know, childlike. And Adam and Eve were childlike in the Garden of Eden, but then once they partook of the fruit, they had shame about their nakedness. And whereas clothing are signs of authority, they can be signs of glory. They can be there are ancient myths. There's this uh ancient, uh, what's it called? The oh, this is an ancient text called The Descent of Ishtar, which talks about this goddess who was clothed in glory and beauty, but she had to descend to the underworld. And as she descends to the different layers of the underworld, she has to take off a piece of her clothing. And it's at the crux of the story is when she's completely naked and she has to, you know, save the day and defeat the monster and all of those things. And then once that process is over, she re-ascends to become a goddess again, and that happens through getting back her layers of clothing, her her robe, her bracelet, her necklace, her crown. All of these things are added on her, and as she's ascending, it is being symbolized by the layers of clothing she's receiving. And so Adam and Eve, when they partake of the fruit, they are at their lowest of low. If you're thinking of a traditional story arc, the hero's journey. They cross that threshold, they're in the abyss, they're in the ordeal, they have to overcome, and it's symbolized by that nakedness. And the way that they're able to overcome and emerge victorious is through the atonement of Jesus Christ. It says that the Lord took coats of skins and clothed them. A lot of people have pointed this out that, like, well, where do you get coats of skins? It obviously has to come from some kind of animal. So there may have been some kind of sacrifice in order to make clothing for Adam and Eve. And then in Moses chapter 5, particularly, Latter-day Saints have this section in the Pearl of Great Price that teaches us that the sacrifices that Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve had to make were symbolic of the only begotten son who was going to come and sacrifice his sins to save the world, or to sacrifice himself to save us from our sins. And so those coats of skins is vaguely evocative of this idea that there is going to be a sacrifice, and that sacrifice is going to cover your nakedness, it's going to cover your sins. And in Hebrew, the word for atonement is kippur, and kippur means very literally to cover. And so there's this, it's an idea that atonement, reconciling yourself to God, is about covering your sins. It's about covering you in glory, about covering you in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ from a Christian perspective. And so when Adam and Eve get those coats of skins, it is symbolic of Jesus Christ coming to save them. It's symbolic of Jesus Christ saying, I've got you covered, very literally. And we're taught that the garment represents those coats of skins. And so they're a different color. They're not like brown, leather, whatever. They're white. And I that's very intentional because they're supposed to represent that purity. It's like in the book of Isaiah that though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow. Just like snow covers a multitude of sins in our ugly landscape in the winter, um, the atonement of Jesus Christ can cover things that are even as bred as scarlet. And so when we put the garment upon us, it's not saying that we're perfect. Rather, it's saying that because we are trying, we're gonna take the atonement upon us to cover our sins. We can still, we're still gonna make lots of mistakes, but that garment is a reminder every single day that Jesus Christ is covering us, that he's got our back. And that it's also a reminder, a preventative reminder to um know that we're representatives of Jesus Christ and we need to always be behaving as best as we can to be a disciple. But when we mess up, it's not something that's gonna crush us, it's something that can elevate us because now we're being covered in glory. It's our first layer of clothing. And those who proceed through the rest of the endowment know that there are additional layers of vestments that are involved in the endowment ceremony. And that's because it's evocative of glory. It's evocative of us becoming more like a priestess or a queen, a priest or a king. And we're becoming more like God as we add those sacred layers.

SPEAKER_00 32:54

Yes, so powerful. You know, it's interesting. I didn't hear you mention at all the thing that I grew up saying, which is that when we wear garments, because you know, other religions they have paid clergy, and so they have the external wearing, ours is internal because we're all serving in that way. I like your answer way better.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

Well, mine's way more long-winded. Yours was great, nice and succinct.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Well, no, I I like for me, I recently was at a business trip in Mexico and I was in Mexico City last week, and I I had this table of people, and they're like, Why do you wear garments? And actually they said magical underwear. And so I started with that element of it, and then that like all this podcasting in this space was like, I can do better than that. So I didn't, I love, I love the um kapoor is the word you use, is that right? That kind of language, I think again, there's something magical about magical, there's something very important about tying it to the old testament and understanding how it all goes back to the Abrahamic covenant in terms of its origin necessarily, but how it really is about, you know, Christ and how we tie those things together. Because when I feel like Christ has my back, that is very special. And I think being able to communicate that to people would it would land very clear. People who are in or out of our faith, especially if you're preparing to go to the temple. It's like you are always this is a this is to remind you every second of every day that Christ has your back and he loves you. When I think about my boys leaving the home, which is this really interesting moment as a parent, seeing those young men go and you know, try to do college or a mission or anything else, but when they leave that home, the most important thing I want as a parent for them to remember is how important they are and how much they are loved. Like no matter how much they fail, no matter what mistakes they make, that who they are at the end of the day is mine, and that they could never do anything that would change the way I feel for them. So I can only imagine, in in Helling Father's perspective, of sending us to this war ground, this testing ground, knowing that we would be okay because Christ stepped into it, but just that idea of like all these things we do are just I can see a parent in it. I see a parent, okay, just so you never forget how much I've got you, how never forget how much I love you. All these things tie to that.

SPEAKER_01 35:08

I love that, and it reminds me of how empowering I feel the temple is for the idea of repentance, and there's like, you know, there's no depth you can go that Christ won't reach, kind of thing. Yeah. When we when

Repentance As The Plan

SPEAKER_01 35:20

we go to the temple, we make covenants to live a higher and holier way, and so there is a sense of responsibility that comes with that. But I remember being very intimidated by that, that oh, I can't mess up anymore, I can't make any more mistakes, because if I do, like I'll j I'll ruin it, I'll get excommunicated, I'll have my temple recommended taken away if I mess up in any way. And certainly there is a standard that we need to reach to be worthy to enter the temple and participate in those covenants and ordinances. But I the more I studied the temple and what it was trying to do, the more I realized that I had I'd been unnecessarily intimidated and that the message of the temple is so much more merciful than I ever thought it was. I thought it was about, you know, becoming holier, becoming higher and becoming like better, and you have to like do all these things and you have to measure up. And if you don't measure up, you're gonna be, you know, damned forever. And yet the story is about people who messed up. Like that is the whole point. It's about a couple who fell, who transgressed, and it was Jesus Christ who saved them. And that is the entire message of the temple. Not that you have to be perfect. The message is you are supposed to fall. You are supposed to make mistakes because it's only Jesus Christ who can save you. And the covenants help us learn how to emulate Jesus Christ better, learn so we can learn how to be more obedient, so we can learn how to be more self-sacrificing, so we can learn how to be more consecrated in what we do. But the symbols of the temple, the clothing we wear, the tokens we receive, and all of the ritual gestures we make are all symbols of Christ that remind us that it is only through him that we are able to overcome. And so when I make mistakes, I no longer see it as this like, oh, I had a status quo of righteousness and I just dipped down and now I've got to use repentance to get back up to square one. But rather I see it as a progression that every time I make a mistake and use the atonement, I'm being lifted up a little bit higher. It's this cycle where I'm just spiraling closer to God the further I go. And so mistakes are not the, you know, Christ isn't the backup plan, it is the plan.

SPEAKER_00 37:16

Right. Repentance isn't a correction to the path. Repentance is the path. And I get that same sense from you know, going more often. The more I go to the temple, the more I'm reminded of this, like, yeah, you've got an infinite runway with me. Just keep coming back. I mean, there is that agency thing that we do have to keep applying. And so that's the danger, I think. I see the adversary. One of the greatest testimonies I've gained in my temple-bound journey is this idea of as I've learned more and trusted more in the savior, the more I've learned and trusted in the existence of an adversary. Like it's it's very real to me. And that's a major theme of the temple is this idea that there's an actual adversary. And understanding and believing his existence actually helps us discern and go through these experiences differently. So I think where I see him playing a big role in this whole thing called preparing for the temple, he's leveraging social media, like you said. I think there's that first attack of like making it look weird and different because at a certain light you can make it look different. Then the second attack is what you said, which is this idea that like it's a club. You have to be worthy and qualify because that's the world. If there's a country club, you have to have a financial status. You have to be better than to qualify for that. That's not what a temple recommends about, right? It's about people being ready to receive that because it's so special, being able to go and really get the most from that. But then there's that piece of like, well, if you do go, then shame on you if you ever sin again. And it's the message of our savior is the opposite. And it takes some repetition. I don't think that's something that if you're paying, you know, I have to ask you, Jasmine. You know, you were saying how people are like, just go in there and pay attention to how you feel. So what would you say? What would you say to your daughter who's going for the first time? Would you use similar language or would you say something different on their first on her first experience?

SPEAKER_01 39:04

I would probably use similar language. I mean, I'd I'd hope. I mean, she's really, really little now, but I'd hope that as she grows up, we're having experiences where I'm teaching her about the ancient scripture, the the ancient world scriptures that help contextualize some of this stuff, but also teach her about the atonement and how she can interpret the story of Adam and Eve. And we were just actually reading that last night. We were in scripture study doing the Adam and Eve story with her. And I was thinking to myself, I wonder like, I mean, she's so young, but I wonder what she's absorbing through this. Because I remember learning at the youngest age, thinking about like, wait, they transgressed, but they were supposed to, but it was the commandment not to, but they did it anyway. And it was just like such a confusing story, and it still is when you go to the temple to some extent, though the temple clarifies some of that confusion. And so I'm wondering, like, what is she understanding about this? And like at what point do I need to start clarifying and teaching? And so I don't know. I'm not gonna be, I'm not a perfect parrot, but I'd like to think that we'll have some good conversations to help understand both the principles of repentance and the atonement and some of the symbols that are in the temple.

SPEAKER_00 40:04

Yeah, I mean, and then that's I think that's part of the value of when we live that law of consecration. Like right now, I don't want to embarrass you, but as you've really consecrated your life to doing all these things, you know, professionally and personally, there's no separation for you on your ministry. I think that's one of those many, many blessings. And one of the greatest gifts we're given is knowledge. And so you receiving that knowledge is, I think, going to be great. It's interesting from my perspective because um, as I was working hard to prepare one of my sons for the temple, um, he's on the end of his mission. He jokingly now tells us, he's like, Yeah, I you tried. You tried all that you could. And um he goes, honestly, my first month of my mission, if you had asked me to open to the book of open the uh book of Mosiah, I probably would have flipped to the Old Testament first. I was like, I was like, oh, okay. Because it's interesting just because again, the Lord meets us where we are, and it's ultimately as we as we learn and grow, it helps us prepare uh and receive when we're ready those things.

SPEAKER_01 40:56

Um sometimes I th I think that your temple experience can be likened unto like the process of giving birth a little bit. Like I mean, no, and you're you've never given birth yourself, I assume, but at the same time, you know what when you're you're preparing to be a mom for the first time, you're like doing all the research, you're trying to like be as healthy as you can and like do all the diet and you're trying to like prepare your body and do all the yoga, do all the breathing exercise, and you're like, okay, I've got this, I'm gonna do this, it's gonna be great. But no one can really prepare you for that completely different and life-shattering experience of giving birth. And now all of a sudden you're like holding a new life in your arms and you're trying to process that um for better or for worse. Some people have great experiences giving birth, and some people have terrible experiences giving birth. And um, I had a mostly positive experience, but like it's still very overwhelming. And it's not like the love and the endorphins hit infant instantly. It's like a process of like sacrificing and sleepless nights and realizing that, oh, I love this thing a lot, but it's kind of taking me a while to get there. I think sometimes that can be very similar to our temple experience. Some people can have a fantastic experience and feel like it's like coming home, that this was always meant to be and they just loved it. And other people can prepare all they want and it's still going to feel immersive, maybe overwhelming and distracting, and it's going to take time before you realize and can find that love that your savior has for you and is just waiting for you to accept.

SPEAKER_00 42:16

I think, I think what you just said is so powerful. I think preparing people mentally, there's mindsets that go into things, right? Our emotions are nothing more than reactions to thoughts. So if we can help prepare them from a thinking perspective of like, hey, this is tying it back to the old testament, like you've already said, but also recognizing the repetitious nature. Like it was built to be something that was to be revisited. This idea that like when we're so I think that's something I'm gonna do moving forward is is really prepare my boys in in helping them understand the importance of just being in there. Yes, pay attention to your emotions, and there's no wrong emotion. I think that's something I'm gonna add. Is there's no wrong emotion. So whatever you feel, just pay attention to it because either you're adapting to something new and exciting, and that may not like anything new, that may not land in in in any any other way that anyone else will feel that. You might come in and just feel the spirit of the Lord. But either way, the secret the secret and the intended purpose in the creation of this experience was to be relived repeatedly so that we can evolve with each repetition. That we can, and I think I'm also gonna take what you just said too and and really make sure it's clear to them hey, when you go, you're gonna have these experiences and you're gonna continue to make a lot of mistakes afterwards. And that's the plan. And that's not that that's okay, that is the plan. Like it's it's standardized and normal. So yeah, I

The Step By Step First Visit Walkthrough

SPEAKER_00 43:33

love that. What else do you cover when you're thinking about helping people prepare to the for the temple experience?

SPEAKER_01 43:39

Well, when it comes to preparing people for the temple, one of the most helpful things I have found is not the the theological or the ancient symbolism stuff. It's just easing their anxiety by walking them through the process step by step. Um when I teach temple prep, I'll like kind of ask them like, okay, we're gonna actually cover the material in about six lessons. For so for lesson seven, like here's a bunch of options of things we can cover, topics we can cover. And every single time they've been like, Yes, I want the walkthrough. Get me the step-by-step walkthrough of what's going to happen on my first day. And it usually takes us the whole time because it is a long, elaborate process when you go through for the first time because you're also doing your initiatory. You're also having to make sure you check in with the temple recorder and things like that. So we just sit down and go through the whole thing. You're going to wake up you that morning. You want to make sure you have your temple back. You want to make sure you have your temple recommend. You want to make sure you eat and drink well because it's a long, several hour process. So, like you don't want to be hungry in there. And then you go to the temple recommend desk. You're going to show them your recommend. And then they're going to take you here. And then you're going to go to the locker room. And then you're going to sit down with the temple matron or the president. And then they're going to explain what's going to happen. And then you're going to do the initiatory. And here's kind of vaguely what happens there. And then you're going to go to this room, which is the instruction room, and then you're going to have the endowment. And then you're going to, at a certain point, we've talked about all of these principles. Here's where that happens. There's going to be, you know, a film that they show. And then you're going to have the ritual clothing. You're going to have the covenants. At the end, we pass through the veil. And then it's a celestial room. And after that, you go back to the locker room. And just like the bare brass tack logistics of what they're supposed to do, I have found is so helpful in relieving anxiety. Now it can add anxiety because I didn't realize how many steps there actually were part of it. But and I have made that mistake where I've gone too into detail and I could just see their faces like, whoa, what are we getting ourselves into? Thinking about the same time.

SPEAKER_00 45:24

And you're on the 30th step. They're like, what are you doing? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

Right. But at the same time, there can be something just so helpful in having a roadmap, knowing, like, okay, we're in step three of 17 or whatever it is. And I I can I know what's going to happen after this. I don't have to freak out about like what's going to happen next, what's going to happen next. Like, you already know a basic idea of what to expect, what you need to be doing. You have your escort with you to help you every step of the way. And I have found that that can be immensely helpful in just taking the pressure off. You don't, most things don't have to be a mystery. You've got to be respectful about things we're not supposed to disclose and treat the temple sacredly. But for someone who is sincerely preparing to go in a private setting, help them understand exactly what's going to happen.

SPEAKER_00 46:08

Yeah, I think we forget those details. You know, it's funny, I was at a con a business conference unrelated to this topic, but it's an interesting connection I saw in my mind when you were talking is I was at this business conference and they were talking about onboarding employees. And it was like, what's the there was this expert, this expert, she is like the guru in the world on like how to make a new employee culturally adapted and really love the company first. And so people are like, Yeah, so when do you go over the metrics? How do you teach them? How do you train them? She's like, guys, guys, guys, the first thing you do before they ever show up is you teach them where to put their where to park. Oh, interesting. He's like, if you can be the kind of company that's like, all right, so listen, we're so excited to see you next Tuesday. You've been here for the interview, or or if they're coming for their interview, that that's the first time they they experience the location. It's like, here's where you park, here's your options, here's where you put your stuff, here's where you go to the bathroom, here's where you put your lunch, here's where you heat your lunch and eat your lunch. The the walkthrough, I remember this was recently. I just I was sitting there going, that is so smart because I think we're so focused on the big picture and the outcomes and there are feelings as people preparing people for the temple. Because it is so big and it's so amazing and all these things. But people just want to know the basics on their first day. So if we can relieve that, if we can give them mental clarity, and you know, all in the business world, there's all these things now, like software is that you can show pictures and videos of where to put your stuff. So if we can leverage pictures uh appropriately and and help people walk through that and give them a real like kinesthetic sense of everything, the visual and and the feeling of it, when they go through, it will feel like another repetition of something they already know. And they're not physically and mentally just processing, oh wow, look at that painting. You know, because that's where their heads are gonna be. Oh, I never this is where a locker room looks like. You know, that's their first time to go into the locker room.

SPEAKER_01 47:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:59

So maybe that's where we should go. I I think um I think it's interesting because on that first introductory step, there's those elements, and then you talked about all those different pieces of tokens and understanding on the far other end, the bigger picture end, Jasmine. I would

Finding Jesus In Every Temple Element

SPEAKER_00 48:13

love to hear from you whether it's someone who's going from the temple for the first time or someone who's been going repeatedly, how do you help them find Jesus in all of it? Um, how do you like to talk about or think about that?

SPEAKER_01 48:26

Well, I think the church itself has done a lot of great things to help bring Jesus out more explicitly in the commentary within the endowment. They've adjusted some of the language to explicitly call out where Christ shows up. But I just always love to just look for symbols of him. We already talked about some of the tokens and how they can point us to Jesus Christ and identify as him. But even the clothing I see is very Christological because it's the temple's about helping us become like a king or a queen, a priest or a priestess unto God. And we know that Christ is our great high priest. And so studying the ancient high priest's clothing can be a helpful way to understand the the clothing that we wear in the temple. That and every single part of it had different pieces of symbolism. We don't know all of what it symbolized because that was never explicitly laid out in the Bible, but we know that the high priest was set apart to represent Israel before God. Israel was not prepared to enter God's presence. God wanted to make them a kingdom of priests, that was his intention, but they weren't prepared for that. So instead, he instituted a system where there would be a high priest that would represent Israel before God and enter his presence on an annual basis. He would be in charge of the sacrifice, and then on the day of the atonement, he goes into the Holy of Holies, which represents God's presence, and reconciles Israel back to God. In fact, he very um very viscerally represents that physically by having the names of the tribes of Israel on his breastplate. There were set twelve stones, and on each stone was the names of the tribes of Israel, and on each shoulder were there was a stone, and on each stone was six of the tribes of Israel. And so he is literally bearing their names before the Lord. He is taking upon himself uh new names that represent a different identity of someone he's representing before God to reconcile them to him. And so I think about Christ and how he is our advocate before the Father, he is our intercessor with him, and he is the one who enters into God's presence and intercedes on our behalf so that we can enter God's presence. And then we take that identity on ourselves as well. We take upon ourselves uh very physical symbols of Christ and also symbols of priesthood, of being a high priest, so that we can then go enter boldly into the throne of grace, as it says in the epistle to the Hebrews, and partake of Christ's mercy and his love for us. So in every symbol of the temple, I see Christ, but also the narrative of the temple is all about how it's about the atonement. The mistakes you make are part of the plan. Adam and Eve's transgression was part of the plan, and it's Jesus Christ. Now we don't really see Jesus Christ a lot in the narrative of the endowment, but he is the driving mechanism of that entire narrative and that whole story arc, and it's our story arc that all that we do is about relying on the Savior to bring us into his presence. We make covenants so that we can become more like him, so we can be more Christ-like, and then we take upon ourselves clothing, symbols, covenants, um narratives that help us see that we can become like Jesus Christ and become more like him as we take his atonement upon us symbolically. We take his countenance, we take his visage upon us, and we can say, like in the book of Alma, have you not received his image in your countenance? Or in the epistle of first John, it says, When we see him, we shall be like him. And he shall he shall see us for we shall see him as he is, I think it says, and for we shall be like him. It's this idea that when we see our Maker at the end of our lives, everyone's gonna come face to face with their Maker. We hope that He will recognize us because we are not just His children that He loves, but we are His covenant children, that we have tried to become more Christ-like and to take symbols of Christ upon ourselves so that we can be reconciled to him in a new way.

SPEAKER_00 51:58

Oh, that is so beautiful, Jasmine. Thank you for sharing that. I feel um, yeah, I just feel so connected to all of it. I think when we keep Christ at the center, we work backwards from him. It's really fun at that point for me to see how these things all line up and just point to him in that way. And I love these. I remember the first time I went through an endowment session after the changes where it was a lot more literal with Christ and the words on the screen, which by the way, the word whoever that was so divinely instructed. The words are so helpful. I was reading them going, uh I remember that first time that was probably the most I'd ever gotten out of a temple in terms of learning was that time. Just reading on the screen. It was mind-blowing. And and um, yes, I think as we get to more literal in this, I we can tell that we're in the latter days. Things are speeding up. We're getting the symbolism is becoming a little bit more clear, people are getting a little bit more um re getting more revealed for sure. And so as all these things happen, it's a reminder that it's it's coming, he's coming back. And if we are prepared, if we can keep uh learning what these things are, we don't have to be perfect by any means, but if we keep trying to learn and we keep learning here and there, line upon line, when he returns, we'll be like the apostles who will be able to recognize him because we've been paying attention to these things and trying our best. Uh Jasmine,

Rapid Fire Stories And Final Witness

SPEAKER_00 53:10

it's been so great to have you on the show. I am so grateful for this time. I would love to wrap things up with a rapid fire if you're open to it. Sure. Okay. Favorite temple.

SPEAKER_01 53:20

Hartford, Connecticut.

SPEAKER_00 53:22

I know okay. So why Hartford, Connecticut?

SPEAKER_01 53:24

Well, I'm from Connecticut.

SPEAKER_00 53:26

Yes. Um, okay. Was it something close to your house? Was it on a drive for you? Tell me a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 53:31

So it wasn't built until after I moved to Utah, but you know, there's just something about home that you're like, yes, we finally got a temple.

SPEAKER_00 53:38

I love that. Your your home, your earthly home, right next to your celestial home, so to speak. That's great. Somewhere in the world that you've been that you've loved, and somewhere that you or somewhere you'd like to go.

SPEAKER_01 53:47

Oh, I would love to go to uh England or Spain one day, uh, both for like family history reasons, but also because they're so cool. But I I loved going to Jerusalem. That was a fun place to connect my savior a little bit more. I did a semester at the Jerusalem Center, so I learned a ton there, and it's just fascinating to get exposed to so many religious traditions and so much history from a variety of cultures all at once.

SPEAKER_00 54:09

Jasmine, that's so on brand for you, by the way. Because like you have this passion and love of all things, you know, ancient growing up. You're into history and all these things, and then you go to Jerusalem. That must have been very like uh awesome just to be able to have all those things connect for you. All right. So uh this is more family history now. Who's someone in your family, who's a leader in your family, whether living or dead, that has had a huge impact on you and why?

SPEAKER_01 54:34

Oh, that's a hard one to pick, just one. But I'll highlight my great-grandmother. She was a uh uh she she was born in like the 1890s, I think. And wait, I don't know, that's not right. But she but she was a second wife, but she was after the manifesto when she got sealed. So there's the first manifesto in the 1890, and then there was a second one in 1905. So she got sealed in that in-between time when it was like she was in Mexico, so it was legal to do so, but she was still trying to live that commitment, and she had a such a hard life. She had she lost, she had five children, and all of them died except one, and she was in poverty. She lived separated from her actual husband for a l for many, many years because he had multiple families to take care of, and there was the persecution in the United States from the federal government, and so they were living in Mexico, and then there the Mexican Revolution kicked them out. And so, like she was just displaced, constantly in poverty, constantly grieving children that she lost. Um, but she um was just so faithful and she never complained, and she was just such a example of stalwartness. And eventually she her patriarchal blessings said that her posterity would be, you know, so bountiful as a cluster of grapes. And it was hard to see that in her life when all of her children had died and she only had this one like very sickly child. But that child, sickly child, grew up to have 12 children, 76 grandchildren, 100 plus great grandchildren. And so, like that prophecy has come true. Um, but it just took time. And I just see her as such an example of faith to me.

SPEAKER_00 56:01

I love that. Thank you for sharing. Um, and now we're gonna go to your posterity. I ask always finish on this exact question, which is unusual in your case because you have so many videos of you now. Usually when I ask this question, I always remind people hey, this is gonna be out there forever. Your kids, your grandkids, your great grandkids are gonna see this. And in your case, you're you're they're gonna have plenty of material to go through. But I don't know if you ever get a chance to talk to them directly. So this is your chance to talk to your descendants. What would you want to know? What would you want them to know about the temple and your love for the temple?

SPEAKER_01 56:33

That God is real and he loves you, and that is the whole purpose of the temple. No matter what cool symbolism there may or may not be, at the end of the day, the whole purpose is for God to show his love for you and that he wants you in his house.

SPEAKER_00 56:45

Jasmine, thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you. It was a wonderful share.

SPEAKER_01 56:49

Thank you so much for having me. This is a wonderful conversation.

SPEAKER_00 56:52

Oh, and before I wrap up, I was about to do my exit. We I do want to just highlight for people who've made it this far that this bonus of being able to see you in person. Could you talk a little bit about what you're speaking at in August?

SPEAKER_01 57:03

Oh, sure. In August, I will be presenting at the Fair Conference all about the temple, specifically the culty aspects of the temple and demystifying that. So talking about how all the things people point to online as being part of a cult are actually biblical, they can be ancient, and they can be profoundly meaningful in your spiritual life.

SPEAKER_00 57:20

All right. Well, guys, thank you so much for tuning into Temple Bound. I am so grateful that you made it to this part of our show. Um, as always, please remember that what makes you special is that you exist. You are lovable, and the and our savior loves you. Never give up until next time. Temple Bound is brought to you by the Light on a Hill Foundation, a nonprofit aimed at building and strengthening families across the globe. Produced by Heather Humphreys, edited by Seth Patubo, with show notes and social media managed by Isabel Dizon and Kimberly Simbahon. Wardrobe by Anne Collar. These views and opinions expressed by the host and guests are on their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Thank you for joining us today as we continue learning, growing, and striving to bind our lives closer to Savior. Until next time.