Joseph was affirming the fact that heaven is constructed out of a web of human relationships that extend in every direction. By the time his work was done, he had laid the groundwork for men to be sealed to their wives across the eternities; for parents to be sealed to their children and their children’s children and to their parents and their parents’ parents across infinite generations; and for friends to be bound to friends in a great assembly and Church of the Firstborn. Parley Pratt singled out this dimension to Joseph’s teachings as a supreme contribution:

'It was Joseph Smith who taught me how to prize the endearing relationships of father and mother, husband and wife; of brother and sister, son and daughter.

It was from him that I learned that the wife of my bosom might be secured to me for time and all eternity; and that the refined sympathies and affections which endeared us to each other emanated from the fountain of divine eternal love. . . .

I had loved before, but I knew not why. But now I loved—with a pureness—an intensity of elevated, exalted feeling, which would lift my soul from the transitory things of this grovelling sphere and expand it as the ocean.'

The privileged status of personal relationships was not just incidental to the Restoration; it was a primary focus. As Joseph wrote, “It was my endeavor to so organize the Church, that the brethren might eventually be independent of every incumbrance beneath the celestial kingdom, by bonds and covenants of mutual friendship, and mutual love.”When he later stated, with striking brevity, “Friendship is one of the grand fundamental principles of ‘Mormonism,’” he was saying something about the deepest underpinnings of Mormon theology. Joseph rejoiced in his relationships to God, family, and friends, and he articulated a system that both revealed their eternal dimension and—this is key—provided the principles, ordinances, and knowledge to render them eternal.

Make sure the path for your own feet to walk to eternal life, and take as many with you as you can. Take them as they are, understand them as they are, and deal with them as they are; look at them as God looks at them.

That's what we do to each other- all of us- we mistreat each other, and especially those we live with, for we have more opportunities to mistreat them than anyone else...Being mistreated is the most important condition of mortality, for eternity itself depends on how we view those who mistreat us.

I’ve loved all the people I’ve ever met. Until I feel indifference setting in and all hope for love is lost.

What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you will do with your evenings, how you will spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love; stay in love, and it will decide everything.

Friendship in a marriage is so important. It blows away the chaff and takes the kernel, rejoices in the uniqueness of the other, listens patiently, gives generously, forgives freely. Friendship will motivate one to cross the room one day and say, “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean that.” It will not pretend perfection nor demand it. It will not insist that both respond exactly the same in every thought and feeling, but it will bring to the union honesty, integrity. There will be repentance and forgiveness in every marriage—every good marriage—and respect and trust.

And all these and other elements we are not able to mention eloquently declare that such a union doesn’t just happen.

So the need becomes clear for careful, thoughtful preparation, selection, and courtship. No one should be unwise enough to count on an across-the-crowded-room romanticized live-happily- ever-after marriage made without proper thoughtfulness, preparation, and prayer. Marriage is an everyday and every-way relationship in which honesty and character and shared convictions and objectives and views about finances and family and life-style are more important than moonlight and music and an attractive profile.

Married people should be best friends; no relationship on earth needs friendship as much as marriage.

I have in my possession a letter written by a young widowed immigrant in the early days of the Church. It was written in 1848 in Honeycreek, Missouri, to her husband’s mother and sister in England. He had died on the sailing vessel en route, leaving her and the two boys to make their way west with the Saints, heartsick and alone. She wrote the letter that changed my life a little. Maybe it will yours.

She began, “Dear Mother and dear Hannah, your dearly beloved son and my best friend has gone the way of all the earth. Dearer to me in life than life itself, he’s gone. Oh Mother, Mother, what am I to do?”

And then she told of her love for this, her best friend, and that she would rear these two boys in the kingdom and in his image and in the admonition of the Lord.

A tear came as I asked myself if that letter could have been written at my house.

If you want something to last forever, you treat it differently. You shield it and protect it. You never abuse it. You don’t expose it to the elements. You don’t make it common or ordinary. If it ever becomes tarnished, you lovingly polish it until it gleams like new. It becomes special because you have made it so, and it grows more beautiful and precious as time goes by.

I know that the gospel of Jesus Christ holds the answer to every social and political and ecomomic problem this world has ever faced. And I know we can each to something, however small that act may be. We can pay an honest tithe and give our fast and free-will offerings, according to our circumstances. And we can watch for other ways to help. To worthy causes and needy people, we can give time if we don't have money, and we can give love when our time runs out.