Covenants keep us new

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Sunday Afternoon Session of the April 1995 Conference.

I like little babies so much. And sometimes I get a bit discouraged thinking about how after coming from heaven and being so sweet and pure and trusting and innocent, they basically just…go downhill for the rest of their lives. I include myself in that number. I was quite a good and sweet and cute little girl! A less good and sweet teenager. And NOW I am hardly good and sweet at all! Ha!

I'm…mostly…joking, obviously, because I know we have to go through some growing pains as we learn to think and act and choose for ourselves. I know Heavenly Father designed His plan perfectly for our good. I'm not really doubting that…I just find it hard to see, sometimes, our progression—when it feels like we are mostly regressing from our childhood innocence. So I liked this quote from Sister Bonnie D. Parkin's talk about covenants:

The sacrament enables us to renew our covenants. Thus, if we keep those covenants with honor and exactness, we can feel as fresh and as pure as we did when we were first baptized. We can feel as committed to a temple sealing as we did as a new bride or groom. We can feel as loved of God as our sweet little Jordan did when she received her name and blessing. Covenants keep us new.

I know I probably can't ever go back to being as uncomplicated-ly sweet as baby Clementine! (If I ever WAS that sweet. Which seems unlikely.) But I like the idea that our covenants help us renew those parts of ourselves us that are good and that want to be good—while helping us grow out of and leave behind the bad kinds of childishness and selfishness.