Elder Patrick Kearon was born on 18 July 1961 in Carlisle, England. He married Jennifer Carole Hulme in January 1991. They are the parents of 4 children.

Elder Kearon joined the Church on Christmas Eve 1987 and has served in numerous Church callings. He was a member of the Presidency of the Seventy from 2017 to 2023 and was ordained an apostle on 7 December 2023.

I would like to express gratitude for your prayers as I have started the process of adjusting to the call, through President Nelson, to serve as an Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ. You can probably well imagine how humbling this has felt, and it has been a time of extraordinary upheaval and sobering self-examination. It is, however, indeed a great honour to serve the Saviour, in any capacity, and to be engaged with you in sharing the good news of His gospel of hope.

(Notice that as a good Englishman, Elder Kearon uses English spelling, for example, ‘honour’ and ‘Saviour’.)

Beyond that, it has been said that behind every new Apostle stands an astonished mother-in-law. I don’t know if that has actually been said, but in this case, it certainly could be. And I suspect that the fact that my mother-in-law is no longer with us does nothing to reduce her astonishment.

Story

Several months ago, when my wife and I were visiting another country for various Church assignments, I woke up early one morning and looked blearily outside our hotel window. Down below on the busy street, I saw that a roadblock had been set up with a policeman stationed nearby to turn cars around as they reached the barrier. At first, only a few cars traveled along the road and were turned back. But as time went by and traffic increased, queues of cars began to build up.

From the window above, I watched as the policeman seemed to take satisfaction in his power to block the flow of traffic and turn people away. In fact, he seemed to develop a spring in his step, as if he might start doing a little jig, as each car approached the barrier. If a driver got frustrated about the roadblock, the policeman did not appear helpful or sympathetic. He just shook his head repeatedly and pointed in the opposite direction.

Promise

My friends, my fellow disciples on the road of mortal life, our Father’s beautiful plan, even His “fabulous” plan, is designed to bring you home, not to keep you out. No one has built a roadblock and stationed someone there to turn you around and send you away. In fact, it is the exact opposite. God is in relentless pursuit of you. He “wants all of His children to choose to return to Him,” and He employs every possible measure to bring you back.

‘God is in relentless pursuit of you.’ Isn’t that a wonderful phrase? What images does that phrase convey to you?

Our loving Father oversaw the Creation of this very earth for the express purpose of providing an opportunity for you and for me to have the stretching and refining experiences of mortality, the chance to use our God-given moral agency to choose Him, to learn and grow, to make mistakes, to repent, to love God and our neighbour, and to one day return home to Him.

What are the stretching and refining experiences of mortality? How is moral agency central to the purpose behind the creation of the earth?

He sent His precious Beloved Son to this fallen world to live the full range of the human experience, to provide an example for the rest of His children to follow, and to atone and redeem. Christ’s great atoning gift removes every roadblock of physical and spiritual death that would separate us from our eternal home.

Everything about the Father’s plan for His beloved children is designed to bring everyone home.

Why do so many of us seem to find it so difficult to accept or believe this?

What do God’s messengers, His prophets, call this plan in Restoration scripture? They call it the plan of redemption, the plan of mercy, the great plan of happiness, and the plan of salvation, which is unto all, “through the blood of mine Only Begotten.”

Which of these titles for God’s Plan is most meaningful to you?

The intent of the Father’s great plan of happiness is your happiness, right here, right now, and in the eternities. It is not to prevent your happiness and cause you instead worry and fear.

Elder Uchtdorf, in his talk ‘A Higher Joy’ given at this same General Conference said:

“Our Father in Heaven has not hidden the path to happiness. It is not a secret. It is available to all!”

The intent of the Father’s plan of redemption is in fact your redemption, your being rescued through the sufferings and death of Jesus Christ, freed from the captivity of sin and death. It is not to leave you as you are.

In the October 2016 General Conference, Elder Brian K Ashton taught:

“Because Jesus was a God in the premortal existence, lived a sinless life, and during His Atonement satisfied all the demands of justice for you and me, He has the power and keys to bring about the resurrection of all men, and He made it possible for mercy to overpower justice upon conditions of repentance. Once we understand that we can obtain mercy through Christ’s merits, we are able to “have faith unto repentance.” To rely wholly upon Christ’s merits then is to trust that He did what was necessary to save us and then to act upon our belief.”

What do you understand by the word ‘redemption’ as used here by Elder Kearon?

The intent of the Father’s plan of mercy is to extend mercy as you turn back to Him and honour your covenant of fidelity to Him. It is not to deny mercy and inflict pain and sorrow.

The LDS Topical Guide defines mercy as: ‘the compassionate treatment of a person greater than what is deserved, and it is made possible through the Atonement of Jesus Christ.’

This definition tells us that in the context of the Gospel, mercy has 3 elements:

1. It is borne out of compassion
2. We don’t deserve it
3. It is made possible through the Atonement of Jesus Christ
   

The intent of the Father’s plan of salvation is in fact your salvation in the celestial kingdom of glory as you receive “the testimony of Jesus” and offer your whole soul to Him. It is not to keep you out.

Have you noticed that in the General Handbook the phrase ‘Work of salvation and exaltation’ has been replaced with the phrase ‘God’s work of salvation and exaltation’? What is the significance of this change?

Warning

Does this mean anything goes with regard to how we live our lives? That the way we choose to use our agency doesn’t matter? That we can take or leave God’s commandments? No, of course not. Surely one of Jesus’s most consistent invitations and pleas during His mortal ministry was that we change and repent and come unto Him. Fundamentally implicit in all of His teachings to live on a higher plane of moral conduct is a call to personal progression, to transformative faith in Christ, to a mighty change of heart.

In the footnotes to his talk, Elder Kearon writes:
‘In order for the mercy of Jesus Christ to be able to come into play in our lives, we must turn back to Him. Alma the Younger teaches that this glorious “plan of redemption could not be brought about, only on conditions of repentance … ; for except it were for these conditions, mercy could not take effect” (Alma 42:13).’

What might be considered evidence of ‘a mighty change of heart’?

God wants for us a radical reorientation of our selfish and prideful impulses, the eviction of the natural man, for us to “go, and sin no more.”

If we believe the intent of the Father’s all-reaching plan is to save us, redeem us, extend mercy to us, and thereby bring us happiness, what is the intent of the Son through whom this great plan is brought about?

The Son tells us Himself: “For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.”

How can we know what the will of the Father is? Is there a conflict between doing the will of the Father and agency?

Jesus’s will is the benevolent Father’s will! He wants to make it possible for every last one of His Father’s children to receive the end goal of the plan—eternal life with Them. None is excluded from this divine potential.

Promise

If you are prone to worry that you will never measure up, or that the loving reach of Christ’s infinite Atonement mercifully covers everyone else but not you, then you misunderstand. Infinite means infinite. Infinite covers you and those you love.

In the footnotes Elder Kearon quotes President Nelson:

“His Atonement is infinite—without an end. It was also infinite in that all humankind would be saved from never-ending death. It was infinite in terms of His immense suffering. It was infinite in time, putting an end to the preceding prototype of animal sacrifice. It was infinite in scope—it was to be done once for all. And the mercy of the Atonement extends not only to an infinite number of people, but also to an infinite number of worlds created by Him. It was infinite beyond any human scale of measurement or mortal comprehension.”

Bruce R. McConkie wrote: “When the prophets speak of an infinite atonement, they mean just that. Its effects cover all men, the earth itself and all forms of life thereon, and reach out into the endless expanses of eternity….Now our Lord’s jurisdiction and power extend far beyond the limits of this one small earth on which we dwell. He is under the Father, the creator of worlds without number (Moses 1:33). And through the power of his atonement the inhabitants of these worlds, the revelation says, ‘are begotten sons and daughters unto God’ (D&C 76:24), which means that the atonement of Christ, being literally and truly infinite, applies to an infinite number of earths.” (Mormon Doctrine, pp. 64-5?

How should these explanations of scope of the infinite Atonement affect our worries that we ‘will never measure up’?

Nephi explains this beautiful truth: “He doeth not anything save it be for the benefit of the world; for he loveth the world, even that he layeth down his own life that he may draw all men unto him. Wherefore, he commandeth none that they shall not partake of his salvation.”

Why did Jesus give himself up to so many trials and persecution?

What, to you, is the significance of the phrase ‘that he may draw all men unto him’?

Promise

The Saviour, the Good Shepherd, goes in search of His lost sheep until He finds them. He is “not willing that any should perish.”

Would a shepherd really leave the rest of the flock? If a risk assessment was carried out it would say stay with the 99. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, 99 sheep in the fold are worth more than one in the wilderness. But this is the Good Shepherd who is full of mercy and compassion.

“Mine arm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive.”

Elder Jeffrey R Holland: “Whoever we are and whatever we reply [Christ’s] response is always the same: ‘Come,’ He says lovingly. ‘Come, follow me.’ Wherever you are going first come and see what I do, see where and how I spend my time. Learn of me, walk with me, talk with me, believe. Listen to me pray. In turn you will find answers to your own prayers. God will bring rest to your souls. Come follow me.” (He Hath Filled the Hungry With Good Things, page 65.)

“Have ye any that are sick among you? Bring them hither. Have ye any that are lame, or blind, or halt, or maimed, or leprous, or that are withered, or that are deaf, or that are afflicted in any manner? Bring them hither and I will heal them, for I have compassion upon you.”

He did not cast away the woman with the issue of blood; He did not recoil from the leper; He did not reject the woman taken in adultery; He did not refuse the penitent—no matter their sin. And He will not refuse you or those you love when you bring to Him your broken hearts and contrite spirits. That is not His intent or His design, nor His plan, purpose, wish, or hope.

In what ways have you experienced the Saviour’s healing power?

No, He does not put up roadblocks and barriers; He removes them. He does not keep you out; He welcomes you in. His entire ministry was a living declaration of this intent.

Then of course there is His atoning sacrifice itself, which is harder for us to understand, beyond our mortal capacity to comprehend. But, and this is an important “but,” we do understand, can comprehend, the holy, saving intent of His atoning sacrifice.

When we try to comprehend the infinite it can be overwhelming. Elder Merrill J Bateman, however, reminded us that the Atonement was intimate as well as infinite:

“The Savior’s atonement in the garden and on the cross is intimate as well as infinite. Infinite in that it spans the eternities. Intimate in that the Savior felt each person’s pains, sufferings and sicknesses.”

The veil of the temple was rent in twain when Jesus died upon the cross, symbolising that access back to the presence of the Father had been ripped wide open—to all who will turn to Him, trust Him, cast their burdens on Him, and take His yoke upon them in a covenant bond.

In other words, the Father’s plan is not about roadblocks. It never was; it never will be. Are there things we need to do, commandments to keep, aspects of our natures to change? Yes. But with His grace, those are within our reach, not beyond our grasp.

The Saviour removes roadblocks – how do we sometimes restore them?

This is the good news! I am unspeakably grateful for these simple truths. The Father’s design, His plan, His purpose, His intent, His wish, and His hope are all to heal you, all to give you peace, all to bring you, and those you love, home. Of this I am a witness in the name of Jesus Christ, His Son, amen.

What key message will you take away from Elder Kearon’s talk?

NB: Passages in italics are direct quotes from Elder Kearon’s talk.

You can watch Elder Kearon’s talk here.

If this has been helpful to you, please leave a like or a comment. Thank you!