More Than a Signature
From “Take Upon Us His Name,” by Elder James G. O. Fantone · Sunday morning session, October 2026 General Conference
The big idea
The Savior invites us not merely to add His name to ours but to take it upon us by covenant, and we do that by serving Him through lifting, loving, and serving others, which changes our hearts.
Objective
Learners will explain the difference between adding the Savior’s name and taking it upon them, and will choose one specific person to serve this week as a way of keeping that covenant.
Before you teach
- Read Elder Fantone’s talk, Take upon Us His Name, and mark the three stories: the school form, his parents’ home, and the missionaries.
- Write two headings on the board: Add His name / Take upon us His name.
- Bring paper and pens for silent writing.
- Pray by name for the people you will teach and ask what they need from this lesson.
Lesson plan
Thirty minutes in 6 parts. Times are a guide; let the Spirit and the learners set the pace.
What is in a name?
- Begin with prayer. Then ask learners to turn to a neighbor and answer the first question below. Give them two minutes.
- Briefly retell Elder Fantone’s story: at a school registrar’s office he was asked to write his daughter’s name, wrote his own by mistake, and fixed it by adding Amanda in front, because her name is Amanda James Fantone.
- Explain that later, in a quiet moment, he saw a contrast between that quick fix and the Savior’s invitation. Tell the class that today’s lesson explores that contrast.
- Think of a name you carry, such as a family name or a name you were given to honor someone. What does carrying that name ask of you?
Add or take upon?
- Invite someone to read the first two key quotes below aloud, one after the other.
- Divide into groups of three or four. Assign each group one passage: Moroni 6:3; Mosiah 5:8; or 3 Nephi 27:5. Ask them to read it and look for what taking the Savior’s name involves.
- Ask each group to send one person to the board to write a few words under the heading where their discovery belongs.
- Discuss the questions below. Let learners do most of the talking.
- Elder Fantone says the invitation is not to wear His name like a badge of religious affiliation. In ordinary life, what is the difference between a badge and a becoming?
- What word or phrase in your passage shows that taking His name is something we keep doing, not something we did once?
A home with open doors
- Read Mosiah 2:17 together. Point out that Elder Fantone calls this verse the divine key to serving the Lord.
- Retell the story of his parents. They lived in a modest three-bedroom bungalow. When his mother, a public school teacher, learned that a recently graduated student could not continue his vocational studies because his family could not afford housing near the school, his parents gave the student the boys’ room. In another season, when the ward Relief Society president spoke of a vulnerable family whose children needed a safe place to stay, his parents opened their doors and some of the children moved into his sisters’ room.
- Share Elder Fantone’s conviction that if Joseph and Mary had knocked on their door, and both rooms were already taken, his parents would have gladly offered their own room.
- Read President Romney’s words from the aligned quotes, then ask the questions below.
- What did these parents’ choices teach their son about whose name they had taken upon them?
- President Romney says service is not something we endure to earn a reward. How does that change the way you see the service already in your week?
- When has someone made room for you? What did it show you about the Savior?
Time did not change
- Tell the story of the missionaries. As a mission president, Elder Fantone met some in their first months who were in tears, sad, lonely, and homesick. They prayed, put on their name tags, and went out to serve anyway. A year later the same missionaries sat in his office with glowing faces and did not want their missions to end.
- Read the third key quote below. Then read Alma 5:14 and Mosiah 5:13 aloud.
- Give everyone paper. Invite two minutes of silent writing on the first question below, then invite a few to share what they are willing to share.
- Read the quote from President Farnes in the aligned quotes as a second witness that people are the Lord’s work.
- When has serving someone changed you, even though your circumstances stayed the same?
- According to Mosiah 5:13, what happens to our relationship with the Master when we do not serve Him? What does that suggest about how we come to know Him?
Choose one name
- Read the last key quote below, Elder Fantone’s testimony of what we find when we lose our lives in the Savior’s service.
- Invite learners to write the name of one person the Spirit brings to mind and one specific thing they will do for that person before next Sunday.
- As a check for understanding, ask two or three learners to finish this sentence in their own words: Adding His name is different from taking it upon me because...
- Who is knocking at your door right now, and what would it look like to open it?
Witness and follow-up
- Bear your testimony that the Savior lives and that we come to know Him as we serve Him.
- Tell the class that next week you will begin by asking what happened when they served the person whose name they wrote, and what they noticed in themselves.
Key passages from the talk
“The Savior’s invitation is not merely for us to add His name to our name like a badge of religious affiliation.”
“His invitation is for us to take upon us His name. It is an invitation to become more like Him through covenant keeping.”
“Time did not change—the missionaries did.”
“as we lose our lives in His service, we will find Him and we will find ourselves.”
Scriptures
- Moroni 6:3 Read in a small group; look for what those who were baptized were determined to do, and for how long.
- Mosiah 5:8, 13 One group reads verse 8 for what taking the name means; the whole class reads verse 13 later and discusses how we come to know the Master.
- Mosiah 2:17 Read together before the story of Elder Fantone’s parents; ask how this verse turns ordinary help into service to God.
- Alma 5:14 Read aloud after the missionary story; ask learners to name the change the missionaries experienced.
Other voices that agree
“Service is not something we endure on this earth so we can earn the right to live in the celestial kingdom. Service is the very fiber of which an exalted life in the celestial kingdom is made”
“To Jesus, these people were not interrupting His mission. They were His mission.”
Three things to remember
- The Savior asks me to take His name upon me, not just add it to mine.
- I take His name by serving Him to the end, and I serve Him by serving the people around me.
- Service changes me: as I lose my life in His service, I find Him and I find myself.
Ways to act this week
- Serve the one person whose name you wrote down, in the specific way you chose, before next Sunday.
- During the sacrament, listen for the words about His name and silently tell Heavenly Father one way you will serve His Son this week.
- On a day you do not feel like serving, pray first and then go anyway, as the missionaries did. Notice what changes in you.
- Ask your family or a friend: who needs room made for them right now? Decide together what to do.
Suggestions written for this lesson, not the speaker’s words.
Music
- Lord, I Would Follow Thee
- Have I Done Any Good?
Adapting the lesson
- At home: skip the groups. Read Moroni 6:3 and Mosiah 2:17 together, tell the story of the open home, and choose one person to serve as a household.
- Large class: have pairs, not groups, read the passages, and take only one comment per question so you still reach the silent writing.
- Short on time: keep Add or take upon, the story of the parents, and Choose one name.
This lesson is an independent study aid written for this site. It is not an official lesson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Quotations are word for word from the official talk; paragraph numbers count the paragraphs of the talk as published at churchofjesuschrist.org, not counting headings or picture captions. The activities, questions and ideas for acting are suggestions; follow the Spirit and adapt them to those you teach.