Calling and Election Made Sure
The personal assurance of exaltation — what it is and how it is received
Most Christians are familiar with the concept of assurance of salvation — the conviction that one is saved. Protestant traditions handle this differently: some teach that genuine believers can know they are saved; others teach that such assurance is presumptuous. The debate has been alive since the Reformation.
LDS doctrine addresses a more specific and more exalted concept: not merely assurance that one is saved, but a divine seal — an actual communication from God through the Holy Ghost or through the voice of the Lord — confirming that one's exaltation is sure. This is what the scriptures call having one's calling and election made sure.
It is not an ordinary spiritual experience. It is not simply feeling peaceful in sacrament meeting. It is a specific, declared, sealed promise from God Himself. And the scriptures are clear that it can be received in this life.
What "Calling and Election Made Sure" Means
To understand the phrase, separate its two parts. "Calling" refers to the divine invitation to exaltation extended through the ordinances of the gospel — baptism, confirmation, priesthood ordination, endowment, sealing. Every person who receives these ordinances in faith is "called." The calling is conditional on faithfulness.
"Election made sure" refers to the point at which the conditionality is removed — at which the Lord, through the Holy Spirit of Promise, seals the ordinances and makes the promise unconditional. This is not a reward for perfect performance. It is a divine declaration that the person's heart is so thoroughly turned to God that the outcome is sealed.
D&C 131:5–6
“The more sure word of prophecy means a man's knowing that he is sealed up unto eternal life, by revelation and the spirit of prophecy, through the power of the Holy Priesthood. It is impossible for a man to be saved in ignorance.”
The phrase "more sure word of prophecy" comes directly from Peter's second epistle and is here defined with precision: it is knowledge, received by revelation, sealed by priesthood authority, that one's eternal life is secured. Not hoped for. Known.
Peter's Teaching
The scriptural foundation is found in Peter's second letter, which is among the least-read of the New Testament epistles and one of the most doctrinally dense. Peter opens by listing the virtues that must be added to faith: virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, charity. Then he writes:
2 Peter 1:10–11
“Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall: For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”
Peter is commanding something. He says give diligence to make it sure — implying it is something to be actively sought and obtained, not merely hoped for passively. And he continues in the same chapter to describe the "more sure word of prophecy" as something he and the other apostles had received personally (2 Peter 1:19).
This is apostolic teaching. Peter is not describing a state of spiritual reassurance available to all believers without distinction. He is describing a specific divine transaction that the diligent may receive.
The Second Comforter
Closely related to calling and election made sure is the doctrine of the Second Comforter. Christ promised His disciples a Comforter — the Holy Ghost — which Latter-day Saints identify as the First Comforter. But in John 14, Christ makes a second promise:
John 14:18–23
“I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. … He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him. … If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.”
Joseph Smith taught that the Second Comforter is Christ Himself — that the promise "I will come to you" and "we will come unto him" is not metaphorical. It is a promise of a literal visit by the Lord to those who have made their calling and election sure.
D&C 130:3
“John 14:23 — The appearing of the Father and the Son, in that verse, is a personal appearance; and the idea that the Father and the Son dwell in a man's heart is an old sectarian notion, and is false.”
Joseph Smith is correcting a well-established Protestant interpretation. The appearing of the Father and Son in John 14:23 is personal, not metaphorical. This is the Second Comforter. This is what has one's calling and election made sure looks like at its fullest expression.
How It Is Received
There is no shortcut. The path described in Peter's epistle — faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, charity — is not decoration. It is the actual process. Years of genuine discipleship, faithful obedience to ordinances, and a heart fully consecrated to God are the conditions on the human side.
On the divine side, the sealing is done by the Holy Spirit of Promise — the Holy Ghost acting in His capacity to ratify ordinances and confirm divine promises. D&C 132:7 establishes that all covenants not sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise are of no force after death. The sealing is the difference between an ordinance that is conditional and one that is permanent.
Key Scriptures
- 2 Peter 1:10–11 — Give diligence to make your calling and election sure
- D&C 131:5–6 — The more sure word of prophecy defined
- D&C 132:49 — The Lord's promise sealed on an individual who has received it
- John 14:18–23 — Christ's promise to manifest Himself to the faithful
- D&C 130:3 — The appearing is personal, not metaphorical
Why This Is Not Presumption
The standard Protestant objection to assurance of salvation is that claiming it is presumptuous — that it mistakes confidence in one's own righteousness for confidence in God's grace. This is a legitimate concern and worth taking seriously. People who claim to be saved because they feel good about themselves are not describing the biblical concept.
But calling and election made sure is not a self-assessment. It is a divine communication. God tells the person. It is not the individual deciding they are worthy — it is the Lord declaring, through the Holy Ghost, that the seal is placed. The difference between presumption and revelation is the difference between self-confidence and obedience to a specific divine word.
Moreover, those who have received it are not described as spiritually complacent. They are described as among the most diligently faithful — those who have given everything and hold nothing back. Presumption is claiming what you have not received. This doctrine is about receiving what God gives to those who have fully consecrated themselves to Him.
Joseph Smith's Teachings on This Doctrine
Joseph Smith returned to this doctrine repeatedly in the Nauvoo period, particularly in the King Follett Discourse and the sermons recorded in the History of the Church. He taught that making one's calling and election sure was the summit of the spiritual life — not merely a nice achievement, but the proper goal of every Latter-day Saint.
He taught that it was possible to receive the Second Comforter — to have a personal manifestation of Christ — in this life. He taught that Paul, John, and Peter had received it. He taught that it was available to the faithful in the latter days through the restored priesthood and the ordinances of the temple.
This is not a fringe doctrine carefully hidden from investigators. It is the summit of what the Restoration restored: the possibility of an actual relationship with God, not just a reported one — a relationship intimate enough that God Himself speaks the declaration of your eternal worth directly to your soul. Peter commanded the faithful to seek it. The question is whether you will.