MOSES LAKE — “Holiness to the Lord,” reads the sign over the door. “The House of the Lord.”

Those words are engraved above the front entrance of every temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints across the world, said Elder Shayne Bowen.

Bowen is a General Authority Seventy in the church, a member of a body of church leaders based in Salt Lake City, Utah. He and Elder Gary Sabin, another General Authority Seventy, were in Moses Lake Monday to lead the first tour of the Moses Lake temple, which will be dedicated Sept. 17, according to church representatives. Once it’s dedicated, only church members in good standing will be allowed inside, so the church has invited the public to come and have a look.

The building is hard to miss, rising to a height of 117 feet 6 inches counting the spire. It’s situated on a 17-acre patch of land on Yonezawa Boulevard, not far from I-90. It’s a dream that’s been a long time in the making, said Judy Miller, a local member of the church who spoke at the tour Monday.

“Over 50 years ago, I moved to Washington state from Boise, Idaho,” Miller said. “Yet I was still in the Idaho Temple District, over 900 miles away. Over the next few years, my family and I were excited to welcome temples in Seattle and later, Columbia River in Richland, shrinking the distance that we had to drive for temple worship. This new temple in Moses Lake is one hour away from where I live in Ellensburg, so that is quite exciting to us.”

In the Latter-day Saints tradition, the function of a temple is very different from other church buildings, Bowen explained. Latter-day Saints hold their Sunday services at meetinghouses, which are open to anyone to attend. At the temple, church members participate in vicarious baptisms for the dead. The temple is also the venue for many Latter-day Saint weddings, as members believe a marriage solemnized in the temple seals the couple and their children together for all eternity.

The church first announced that the temple was coming in April 2019, and ground was broken in October 2020. Moses Lake’s temple is the 181st to open, according to information from the church, and the fourth in Washington. Church members currently use the Columbia River Temple in Richland, and there are also temples in Seattle and Spokane.

“Most temples make a nod to the community (in their design),” Bowen said. In the Moses Lake temple, he said, carpets and ceilings are decorated with motifs of apple and cherry blossoms in recognition of Central Washington’s agricultural character.

The interior of the building is brightly lit and airy, with tall doors and windows. There is a desk at the entrance where members are expected to show their temple recommend — a card that denotes their good standing in the church — before entering. There is a small, comfortable room nearby that is open to non-members who may be waiting for a family member who’s inside, Bowen explained.

Beyond that is the baptistry, a pool borne on the backs of a dozen sculpted oxen, in imitation of the Biblical Temple of Solomon. Latter-day Saints believe that baptism can be done on behalf of family members who have died and may not have had the opportunity to be baptized into the church in life, Bowen explained.

“Here we see the Savior’s example,” Bowen said. “Jesus did something for us we couldn’t do.”

Baptism is symbolic of death, burial and resurrection, Sabin said.

“It would not be fair or just if only those who are alive could be baptized,” he said.

The ancestor for whom the baptism is offered has the option to accept or refuse that baptism, Sabin explained.

Paintings of scenes from the Bible are everywhere in the temple, many of them tied to the function of a particular room. Outside the room where a bride prepares for her wedding, there is a painting depicting the Old Testament story of Ruth, a widow whose second marriage made her an ancestor of Jesus. Having a special bride’s room reflects the church’s position on the status of women, Bowen said.

“In many countries, women are treated like property and not like daughters of God,” he said.

Bridegrooms aren’t as fortunate, said his wife Lynette Bowen.

“The groom just gets a locker,” she said.

The marriages are sealed in the sealing room, where chairs are ringed on three sides around an altar with kneelers on either side for the couple being married, or sealed. On opposite walls of the room are large mirrors reflecting each other infinitely, which reminds the looker of the eternal nature of man, and of marriage, Bowen explained.

“If you look into the mirror by yourself, you see only yourself,” he said. “If you look with your spouse, you see eternity.”

The temple is not just a beautiful building, Bowen and Miller both emphasized.

“The temple is a place of peace,” Miller said. “It's an ideal place to petition the Lord for answers to perplexing life questions, perhaps to heal a loved one, to help with a relationship or any number of things that are close to your heart.”

“The temples that are built worldwide are … the home of our Father in Heaven, and as we go there, we will feel that and we will become better people,” Bowen said. “Moses Lake will be a better place because of this temple, because the spirit of the Lord will be felt more strongly in this area.”

Joel Martin may be reached at [email protected]. To read more of his work, download the Columbia Basin Herald app.