After reviewing a large number of stories of faith from prior generations, the author of Hebrews brings us into the story:
These all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:
God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
Hebrews 11:39-40
How could it be that Abraham and Sarah, Moses, and numerous other spiritual giants would need us in order to achieve their full potential?
Joseph Smith extended the assertion by making it reciprocal:
Their salvation is necessary and essential to our salvation, as Paul says concerning the fathers—that they without us cannot be made perfect—neither can we without our dead be made perfect.
Doctrine and Covenants 128:15
They need us, and we need them.
Abraham received peace and power from God after learning about the spiritual lives of his ancestors. (See Abraham 1:2-4.) The promises he received from God were intergenerational: His descendants would be as numerous as the stars (Genesis 15:5), and they would bless all people, everywhere (Genesis 12:3).
Nephi similarly attributed his spiritual growth to faithful parents (1 Nephi 1:1) who taught him about the experiences of ancient prophets (1 Nephi 5:21-22). His rift with his brothers caused him grief, but his greatest sorrow was the knowledge that his descendants would reject the truth and be destroyed (1 Nephi 15:4-5).
In the Garden of Eden, God taught Adam that it isn’t good to be alone (Genesis 2:18), which is not to say that we must always be with other people. Jesus found opportunities for quiet solitude, to ponder and to commune with God (Matthew 14:13, 23, Mark 6:46-47; John 6:15), including in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:36; Mark 14:32-34; Luke 22:39-41). But He was with thousands of people at the temple in Bountiful when He said, “My joy is full” (3 Nephi 17:20, 25).
Joseph F. Smith saw a community of joyful saints in the next life, including Adam and Eve, Abraham, Moses, his uncle Joseph Smith, and his father Hyrum. (See Doctrine and Covenants 138:38-53.) Their joy was inseparably linked with belonging to a covenant community. An essential component of our happiness is seeing the people we love prosper and flourish. No wonder Joseph Smith described exaltation in communal terms:
That same sociality which exists among us here will exist among us there, only it will be coupled with eternal glory, which glory we do not now enjoy.
Doctrine and Covenants 130:2
We cannot become perfect alone, because perfect joy is relational. We can only achieve our highest state of growth and happiness together.
Today, I will strengthen my relationships with other people, beginning with my own family. I will be grateful for them, enjoy spending time with them, and remember that our best relationships in mortality are a precursor to the perfected relationships we will experience in eternity.