Section 88 Revelation given through Joseph Smith the Prophet at Kirtland, Ohio, December 27 and 28, 1832, and January 3, 1833. The Prophet designated it as the “‘olive leaf’ … plucked from the Tree of Paradise, the Lord’s message of peace to us.” The revelation was given after high priests at a conference prayed “separately and vocally to the Lord to reveal his will unto us concerning the upbuilding of Zion.”
Light and Law Come from Jesus Christ.
Doctrine and Covenants 88:6–67
The words light and law are repeated many times in section 88. These words have been used in other scriptures to describe Jesus Christ and His gospel. Mark or note verses where you find these words and write down what you learn about the Savior, light, and law. (Come, Follow Me—For Individuals and Families “Doctrine and Covenants 2021 “Doctrine and Covenants 88”)
For the Strength of Youth August 2021 “The Light of Christ”
Friend February 2008 “Gospel Light” The scriptures teach about the light of the gospel. Fill in the missing words in these scriptures about light. The picture next to each scripture stands for the circled letter. When you know what letter each picture stands for, fill in the secret code at the bottom of the page to discover the greatest light of all. (Answer: “Jesus Christ”)
Heavenly Father gives good gifts.
33 For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift.
Come, Follow Me—For Home and Church: Doctrine and Covenants 2025
- You could start a discussion about Doctrine and Covenants 88:33 by asking your children to talk about gifts they have been given—both those they received joyfully and others they did not. Maybe they could act out receiving a gift with joy. Then you could talk about gifts Heavenly Father gives us (such as the gift of the Holy Ghost). How do we receive these gifts with joy?
The Red Crystal In a wrapped box you could put items such as a picture of the prophet, a blanket (you can share how that is like the Holy Ghost), the scriptures, and a picture of your family. How can we receive these gifts with joy? How can we show God we are grateful for these gifts? Then, let the children share additional gifts that God has given us.
Resurrection
Doctrine and Covenants 88:14–33, 95–101.
What do we learn about the Resurrection from these verses? How might these truths influence the choices we make?
God Wants Me to Be Close to Him.
63 Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you; seek me diligently and ye shall find me; ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
If I seek the Savior, I will find Him.
Come, Follow Me—For Home and Church: Doctrine and Covenants 2025 & Come, Follow Me—For Primary: Doctrine and Covenants 2021 “Doctrine and Covenants 88”
- Doctrine and Covenants 88:63 contains action words that might inspire some fun activities to encourage your children to seek the Lord’s presence in their lives. For instance, can you and your children think of a game for discussing the phrase “seek me diligently and ye shall find me” (emphasis added) or “knock, and it shall be opened”? (For example, you might hide a small picture of the Savior in the room and have them seek diligently for him.)
- To emphasize the Savior’s invitation to “draw near unto me,” you could ask one child to hold a picture of Jesus (like the picture at the end of this outline) on one side of the room while the other children stand on the other side. As your children think of things they can do to come closer to the Savior, they can take a step toward the picture, and the child holding the picture could take a step toward the other children. Talk with your children about how you draw near to the Savior and how He draws near to you. You could also sing with them a song about this topic, like “I Feel My Savior’s Love” (Children’s Songbook, 74–75).
Friend August 2010 “Bright Idea”
Mormon Channel Blog “Daily Quote: Seek and You Will Find”
Latter Day Kids Lesson ideas
Jesus Christ Can Make Me Clean From Sin.
Doctrine and Covenants 88:68, 74
Come, Follow Me—For Primary: Doctrine and Covenants 2021 “Doctrine and Covenants 88”
To be sanctified means to be made clean and pure. How can you help the children you teach understand that they can be sanctified when they follow Jesus Christ?
- Invite one child to read Doctrine and Covenants 88:68 aloud and another to read verse 74. Ask the children to listen for a phrase that is in both of these verses. How do we “sanctify” ourselves? (If needed, help the children look up “Sanctification” in the Guide to the Scriptures.) Draw a picture of a heart, a hand, and a foot on the board. Help the children think of what it might mean to “purify” and “cleanse” our hearts, hands, and feet. How does the Savior help us do this? How can we use our hearts, hands, and feet to become more like Jesus?
- Explain that the Lord wanted His people to be sanctified before they could go into the temple. Consider inviting a young man or young woman who has a temple recommend to visit the class. Invite him or her to show the children what a recommend looks like, discuss what they do to live worthy of it, and share why it’s important to have a temple recommend even if we don’t live close to a temple.
Friend February 1996 “Matt and Mandy”
Below: Object Lesson from Teaching LDS Children
Show the children the white shirt you brought, and lay it on top of a spread out plastic garbage bag. Explain to the children that sin is like dirt and stains. Apply staining items to the shirt as you mention sins that stain our spirits, such as lying, stealing, hate, etc. (The garbage bag is to help prevent spills on the carpet.) Ask the children how they would feel if they had to wear the dirty shirt and how they would feel if they could never change the shirt or take a shower.
• Would it be difficult going out among people in that state? Would we feel comfortable in heaven being among spiritually clean people if we have stains of sin upon us?
Show the children the soap and explain that just like we have soap to clean our bodies and our clothes, Heavenly Father has provided a way for us to become clean from our sins. He provided a Savior for us who took upon himself our sins.
Heavenly Father Wants Me to Learn.
Doctrine and Covenants 88:77–80, 118
Primary 5: Doctrine and Covenants and Church History “Lesson 24: The School of the Prophets and the Word of Wisdom,” The School of the Prophets Is Organized
In Doctrine and Covenants 88 the Lord instructed Joseph Smith to form a school to teach the leaders of the Church about the gospel and prepare them to serve the members of the Church. In this school, called the School of the Prophets, Church leaders were to teach one another about the gospel and other important subjects (see D&C 88:77–80). Leaders of the Church in the Kirtland area began attending the School of the Prophets at the end of January 1833. The school was held in the evenings, in an upstairs room of Newel K. Whitney’s store. The Prophet taught the men about the importance of learning and preaching the gospel and of learning about the world around them. In addition to studying the scriptures and the principles of the gospel, the men also studied Hebrew and Greek.
In 1831 the Lord had commanded Oliver Cowdery and W. W. Phelps to write and select textbooks for children (see D&C 55:4). After Joseph Smith organized the School of the Prophets for the priesthood leaders of the Church, he organized a school for children. Classes were held in the attic of the Kirtland Temple. One hundred forty children attended the school.
Come, Follow Me—For Home and Church: Doctrine and Covenants 2025
- Ask your children to tell you about what they are learning in school or Primary. You might also share some things you are learning. Then you could show your children the words what, why, and how. Help them search Doctrine and Covenants 88:77–79 to find out what the Lord wants us to learn about. Then look together in verse 80 to find out why He wants us to learn and in verse 118 to find out how we should learn.
Come, Follow Me—For Primary: Doctrine and Covenants 2021 “Doctrine and Covenants 88”
“Education is an important part of Heavenly Father’s plan to help you become more like Him. … The education you gain will be valuable to you during mortality and in the life to come” (For the Strength of Youth, 9).
- Display a picture of a school, or draw one on the board, and invite the children to explain what a school is and what happens there. Show the children pictures of a home, a church, and a temple, and ask them how these places are also like schools.
Come Follow Me Kid See link for additional lesson ideas
Friend August 2017 “Three Classrooms” There are three different classrooms in life.
- Read Doctrine and Covenants 88:118, and emphasize the phrase “teach one another.” Share some wisdom that you have learned from each of the children in your class, and invite them to share wisdom they have learned.
- Display a map of the world, and read together Doctrine and Covenants 88:79. Why is it important for us to learn about other countries and cultures? If you or the children you teach have visited or lived in another country, show items that represent the culture, and share things you learned.
Bright Idea Poster: “Seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith.”(May 2013 Friend)
Family Evening Resource Book: “Learning” Learning Is Important
Discuss the following ideas to show the importance of gaining knowledge:
- Perfect knowledge is one of God’s attributes (see 2 Nephi 9:20).
- The commandment to study and learn is repeated many times in the Doctrine and Covenants (D&C 88:118, 130:18–19, and D&C 131:6).
- Peter said knowledge was necessary to become like Heavenly Father (2 Peter 1:5–9).
Discuss how learning can help us become more like our Father in Heaven.
“Learn!” (September 2011 Friend)
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf tells of how he loved learning as a child and how it is important for everyone to learn as much as they can.
Friend August 2021 “Scripture Time Fun for Little Ones” Help your littles ones say, “Heavenly Father wants me to learn.” Talk about good things we learn at church and school. Have your little ones draw something they have learned.
“Establish … a House of God.”
Our home can be holy like the temple.
119 Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing; and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God;
Come, Follow Me—For Home and Church: Doctrine and Covenants 2025
- As you read Doctrine and Covenants 88:119 to your children, they could make a temple spire with their arms every time they hear the word “house.” Explain that Heavenly Father wanted Joseph Smith and the Saints to build a temple, or a “house of God.”
- You could ask your children to choose seven words that describe their home. Then help them find, in Doctrine and Covenants 88:119, the seven words the Lord uses to describe His house. How can we make our home a “house of God”?
Come, Follow Me—For Primary: Doctrine and Covenants 2021 “Doctrine and Covenants 88”
Doctrine and Covenants 88:119–26
- Give each child a phrase from Doctrine and Covenants 88:119–26 to draw. When they show their pictures to each other, let the children search the verses to guess what phrase each picture represents.
- Write on the board Do and Don’t. Invite the children to read Doctrine and Covenants 88:119–26 and list things the Lord wanted the Saints to do or not do to prepare to learn in the temple. They could look up unfamiliar words in a dictionary. Invite the children to choose something that they will start doing or something they will stop doing.
Liahona August 2021 Organize Yourselves
Our homes can follow this pattern: “Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing; and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:119).
Organize means to arrange things in order or to prepare an activity or event.
Organize your family in different ways:
- Have them stand in line from oldest to youngest.
- Have them stand in alphabetical order, according to their first name.
- Have them line up according to the month of their birth.
Discussion: How does the Savior want us to organize ourselves (1) in our household jobs, (2) in our spiritual study, (3) in our worship at church and in the temple?
What goals can your family set to create a “house of God”?
To inspire your family to make your home like the description in verse 119, try something like this: Write phrases from this verse on strips of paper, and use them to cover a picture of the temple. Read Doctrine and Covenants 88:119 together, and let family members remove each strip of paper as they hear the corresponding phrase in the verse. What can we do to make our home a “house of God”? (verse 119).
Friend August 2021 “Scripture Time Fun: Building a Happy Home”
- Sing “Home Can Be a Heaven on Earth” (Hymns, no. 298).
- Heavenly Father wants us to “establish … a house of God” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:119). He wants us to make our homes holy places like the temple, where we can feel the Holy Ghost.
- Read “The Important Guest” on page 4. Then build a house out of blocks, sticks, or other items you can find. Every time you add a piece to the house, say something you can do to make your home a place where the Holy Ghost feels welcome.
Additional Resources
Doctrine and Covenants Historical Resources “Doctrine and Covenants 88”
Come Follow Me Kid Lesson ideas
