“It is for the benefit of God’s sons and daughters that, while on earth, we become acquainted with evil as well as good…. The contrasts, that we experience in this world, a world of mingled sorrow and joy are educational in nature, and they will be the means of raising all humanity to a full appreciation of all that is, eternally, and universally right, true and good.” ‘God, doubtless, could avert war, prevent crime, destroy poverty, overcome error, and make all things bright, beautiful and joyful. But this would involve the destruction of a fundamental attribute in man — our agency’.” (First Presidency) I have often paused to thank God, for the restoration of the Gospel because of the joy I feel for it’s simple but penetrating truths, truths that have been revealed in these last days through the Holy Ghost to good, humble men, and even boys, such as Joseph Smith, at the time of his first vision. Parley P. Pratt voiced his emotions, regarding the light of revelation given in this dispensation of time. He wrote;
“The morning breaks; the shadows flee;
Lo, Zion’s standard is unfurled!
The dawning of a brighter day,
Majestic rises on the world.
The clouds of error disappear
Before the rays of truth divine;
The glory bursting from afar,
Wide o’er the nations soon will shine.”
By revelation we can understand our duty and by agency we can do that duty. I believe that all that we have done and all that we are doing in this church in these last days is a direct result of revelation received from on high.
I believe that Christians, generally, including the LDS church, believe that our spirits or souls live on after death and that our souls retain their understanding and consciousness of self. Too, we believe that certain sacred ordinances are required to obtain salvation, or life eternal in God the father’s presence.
For example; The scriptures clearly express the Christian belief that none can enter into the gates of heaven without the ordinance of baptism by water and by the spirit. Baptism simulates a rebirth, a putting off of the natural man and coming forth after, ‘a new person’. Christ Himself was baptized both by water and by the Spirit. We also believe that families are ordained of God as eternal units, not only while we sojourn on earth but also, in and through all eternity. Therefore, they must be sealed together, as man and wife, and as son or daughter to parents. These are all basic truths revealed to man through revelation. The Temple, A Holy place, is designated for those ordinances to be performed by an authorized Priesthood bearer of our God. In our pre-earth state we were all spirit offspring of God, we progressed there to a degree that we were ready to advance. This beautiful planet, that we call earth, was created, furnished and otherwise prepared for us in order to do that. No! It never came about by a ‘Big Bang’ as some scientist may think. That would only create chaos. It was organized by a very careful plan based on our Father’s vision for the advancement of his children. When it was ready for us, we began populating this earth, Adam and Eve were first. Our purpose here is to experience earth, to grow, to develop and to prove ourselves. To see if we will be faithful in doing all things the Father has commanded us.
Our ultimate Goal, as His children, is “perfection’. “A tough one to contemplate”. The scriptures describe only a few perfect ones; We read in Genesis where; “Noah was a just man and perfect”, Gen. 6:9. Job also was referred to as a perfect man. There are several scriptures which suggest that we must sometime become perfect; Jesus Himself said, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect” (Matt. 5:48.) Don’t worry! No one is going to expect perfection out of us, not in this life! But perfection is and always will be our eternal goal. There might be a few things we can become perfect at, but perfection for us, God’s very own offspring, is a journey, not an expectation, while we are here on earth.
President Joseph F. Smith said. (I’m paraphrasing) “…after we leave this life we will go on – into eternity, always progressing, and at some point in the eons of time we may possibly become perfect, even as our Father in Heaven is perfect.” But this life, is the time for us to prepare to meet God. Alma in the Book of Mormon, states that there will be a fairly thorough accounting of what we do and have done, while we are sojourning here on earth.
One of our primary purposes and growth challenges is to learn to love, to love God and to love and care for, our beautiful planet earth, to love life, especially to love one another.
My wife and I were listening to the radio while driving home the other day and listened to Barbra Streisand sing; “People who need people,” It went something like this; “People who need people, Are the luckiest people in the world, Lovers, very special people, They’re the luckiest people in the world, …People who like people, Are the luckiest people in the world.” I, for one, like people and because of that I feel that I am one of the luckiest people. And yes! We all need people! And the best place to find loving people is in our very own families, People in families are the luckiest people.
Years ago I was asked to speak at another ward, to a group of 14 year old teachers, in the Aaronic Priesthood, my subject was to be on Family History. The Youth Leader ask me to take about ten minutes, Family History is usually a half hour subject, at least. When I arrived at the given place and time, and even while walking in the door, I had no idea what I was going to say to them! I was introduced and the group was informed that I would be talking about Family History. They were obviously bored before I had said anything. The first thing that came out of my mouth was, “Do you love your mother and Father”? Their response was, Yea! I then asked them, Why? Surprisingly, I received many positive answers. General answers were; ‘They love us and they do things for us, etc.’ To make a long story short- I then asked them if they thought that their mother and father loved their parents? Most of them knew their grandparents. The answers were the same, as expected. I then asked, “Did your grandparents love their parents? They had never thought about their grandparents having parents. To these youth, Grandparents aren’t born, they don’t have parents they are just there! But, before I left, they were thinking about generations, generation after generation of families and how love was found in all their homes for centuries and for all the same reasons, there is love in homes, family homes and there always has been. ‘That my friends, is family history’. The following, loving poem, was written by an ‘anon’.
“I think of times as the night draws nigh
Of an old house on the hill
Of a yard all wide and blossomed starred
Where children played at will
And when the night at last came down
Hushing the merry din,
Mother would look around and ask?
“Are all the children in?”
Tis many and many a year since then
And the old house on the hill
No longer echoes to childish feet
And the yard is still, so still
But I see it all, as the shadows creep
And though many the years have been
since then, I can still hear mother ask,
“Are all the children in?”
I think of a mother before my own
who also cared for and loved
A young man, a child, and even a babe
Sent by a kind God above.
Their names not yet found, discovered or seen
As though they had never been,
But their mother asks from a far off place,
“Please…are all my children in????”
All mortal beings who have ever lived on earth, have both a spirit body and a physical or mortal body. Our pre-earth spirits, were adult spirits that looked as we do here, that is evidenced by Christ’s appearance to the Brother of Jared. You all know the story in the account of Ether, in the Book of Mormon: At the time the people were building the tower to heaven. The Lord caused that they could no longer communicate with each other. The prophet Ether tells about Jared and his family and friends, who were instructed to build peculiar vessels to carry them across the sea to a land of promise. After the ships were built they realized that there was no light for them to see. Jared ask his brother, Mahonri Moriancumer to enquire of the Lord as to what they could use for light. The brother of Jared went to the mountain and obtained 16 stones. He then petitioned the Lord to touch each of the stones that they may give off light for their journey. As the lord put forth his finger to touch the stones, the brother of Jared saw his finger. The Lord realizing the great faith of that man, and showed him, his full person and said. “… never have I showed myself unto man whom I have created, for never has man believed in me as thou hast. “Seest thou that ye are created after mine own image?…Behold, this body, which ye now behold, is the body of my spirit; … and even as I appear unto thee to be in the spirit will I appear unto my people in the flesh.” (Ether 3:15-16). We were created in His image, therefore, our spirits, before birth into this world, looked as we do in life. Just as the spirit of Christ appeared to the brother of Jared, before having been born to earth in the meridian of time.
So it is when we die, our spirits leave our mortal bodies and go to the spirit world, and they will appear just as they did when they were in our pre-earth state. Let’s say, that a grandfather who passed to the other side, could appear to his grandson, he might say something like this; ‘Behold, this body, which ye now behold, is the body of my spirit and even as I appeared unto thee in the flesh during my life (mortality), I now appear unto you in the spirit.’ In other words our spirit bodies appear the same as our physical bodies, in all stages of life and existence. At least until the resurrection, at which time our bodies and spirits will be united and we become immortal, as our Father in Heaven and Christ are immortal, meaning that we will no longer be subject to death.
All those who pass from this life, after having accepted the Gospel and completed all of the essential ordinances, will find themselves in a spiritual state of happiness, referred to as Paradise. Those who have, lived on this earth and who have not accepted the Gospel of Jesus Christ, with everything that that entails, including sacred ordinances, will, when they pass away, reside in a place, the scriptures, refer to as ‘Spirit Prison’. …Whether Paradise, is a totally separate place from the Spirit Prison, we are not sure. However, we do know that there are missionaries going among those assigned to the Spirit Prison and teaching them the Gospel. …Some leaders of the church have suggested that we are all together in the same spiritual realm, the difference is not in the location but rather in our individual attitude and the progressive options that we will each have.
There are a lot of questions about the spirit world that have not been answered, though we are not totally in the dark. In the New Testament Christ mentioned ‘Paradise’ and the Apostle Paul went further by mentioning the ‘Spirit Prison’….we may have to wait until we get there ourselves, to really understand it. But! President Joseph F. Smith, (Who was President of the church during the early part of the last century.) elaborated on both Christ’s and Paul’s statement’s. His vision is found in the 138th section of the Doctrine and Covenants. I believe that vision is the most comprehensive information we have on the spirit world.
Both the Spirit Prison and Paradise are temporary places. When it is time for the first resurrection, the repentant and righteous will be advanced to one of the three degrees of glory. The Celestial is where God, the Father, Himself dwells.
I know that there are some members of the church, who believe that those who had not accepted the Gospel while in this life, after having had an opportunity to hear it, would not accept it when they are taught in the spirit world, either. Not True! Based on a statement by President Lorenzo Snow, who said, “I believe that when the Gospel is preached to the spirits in prison…There will be very few indeed of those spirits who will not gladly receive the Gospel when it is carried to them. Why, because the circumstances there will be a thousand times more favorable.”
Based on the above information members should not be selective in their ancestral research nor in their temple work. We should assume that all of our ancestors will accept the Gospel and that we should turn our hearts to each of them with love and compassion.
As stated in the opening remarks; “God, doubtless, could avert war, prevent crime, destroy poverty. “He could even do all our research and temple work” (wouldn’t that be nice)–But, as the brethren have said, this would involve the destruction of a vital and fundamental attribute in man. Man’s agency. It is for the benefit of His sons and daughters that they become acquainted with all of His laws and commandments including ancestral research and the purposes and nature of temple work, by doing it, ourselves.
Family history and Temple work is not really a ‘take it or leave it’ type work, the Prophet Joseph Smith stated, “…the greatest responsibility in this world that God has laid upon us, is to seek after our dead. Because we cannot be saved without them, it is necessary that those who have gone before and those who come after us should have salvation in common with us, and thus hath God made it obligatory to man,” (Times and Seasons 5:616.) This work should be a reflection of testimonies.
An early Christian writer (not LDS) stated that; “Maybe one day all Christian people will praise the Mormons for having done this great work for all of our kindred dead.” Therefore brothers and sisters; “We must love them, find them, and do their work in the Temples! And we must make sure that all of Eve’s children are in.”