My commentary yesterday may have been jumbled. In this entry, I'm going to cover the same content as yesterday's post, except instead of an analysis, this will only be what we believe, in the language that we would explain it, and the emphasis on the things we actually care about.
We believe that God is literally our Heavenly Father, and we are all His spirit sons and daughters. We lived with Him in heaven as spirits before we were born on the earth. As children of Heavenly Parents, we have the potential to become like them. (See Romans 8:17)
Heavenly Father is different than us in two important ways: He has an immortal physical body, and He is perfect. After progressing as far as we could as just spirits, Heavenly Father presented to us the Plan of Salvation which would allow us to come to earth and receive a physical body, and to have experiences where we could grow spiritually by choosing good over evil.
However, Heavenly Father knew that during our earth life, our bodies would be mortal, and we would be imperfect. We would sin during our lives, and our bodies would get old and die. Our spirits would be separated from our bodies, and separated from God.
In order to overcome sin and death, the plan requires a Savior. Jesus Christ, firstborn spirit of the Father, was chosen to be our Savior. He would pay the price for our sins, and would break the bands of death. Through him, we would all live again, and we would be able to be perfected in Him and return to Heavenly Father's presence.
There was another spirit there named Lucifer. He proposed a different plan. He wanted to take the place of the Savior and take all the glory for himself. He said, "I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost, and surely I will do it; wherefore give me thine honor." Jesus said, "Father, thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever." Lucifer convinced one-third of God's children that his was the better plan. But his plan would destroy our agency. Lucifer and his followers were cast out of Heaven and became Satan and his devils. (See Moses 4:1-4)
Adam and Eve were created, and when they were temped and ate the forbidden fruit, they became mortal and capable of sin. But sin and mortality were already prepared for as part of the Plan of Salvation. God spoke to Adam, Noah, Moses--all the prophets-- and taught them His gospel plan. They all looked forward to the day that Christ would come into the world.
That day eventually came, and Jesus Christ was born to the virgin Mary. Jesus Christ is the "only begotten Son of the Father in the flesh," meaning that He is the only one who can say that his Heavenly Father is also his earthly father.
During Jesus Christ's ministry, He performed miracles, taught the people, and set up His Church. He is also our perfect example for our lives.
At the end of His mortal ministry, he allowed himself to suffer and
die. He is the only perfect person to ever live, the only mortal who
was also divine. He suffered the price we would have had to pay for our
sins. For everyone who ever lived and who will ever live so that we
would not have to suffer if we put our faith in Christ and follow Him.
Christ also triumphed over death and was resurrected on the third
day. His resurrection unlocked the gates of death so that all may live
again -- our spirits will not be separated from our bodies forever. This immortality is a free gift to everyone who ever lived, righteous or wicked.
However, in order to receive eternal life (living forever with God), we need to follow the principles and ordinances of the Gospel, the first four of which are: faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism, and receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost.
After Christ ascended into heaven, He continued to guide His church through the apostles. Unfortunately, because of wickedness both inside and outside the Church, the apostles were killed and were not replaced, while the Church fell into apostasy. They were no longer led by Christ through prophets and apostles. Good people were still around and tried to follow the Gospel as best they knew how, but there was no longer that direct revelation from God to a prophet. People had to rely on their own interpretations of the Bible, and eventually there became many churches because of that.
In the early 1800's, there were a lot of revivals in upstate New York, and one young boy, Joseph Smith Jr. wanted to know which church was Christ's true church. Even though they all taught about Jesus Christ, other doctrines disagreed and contradicted each other. After some time, Joseph was studying the Bible when he read James 1:5, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." When he read that verse, he felt the spirit, and knew that this was the only way that he could find out which church was true.
In the spring of 1820, 14-year-old Joseph Smith went into a grove of trees behind his family's farm, where he knelt and prayed. In answer to his prayer, Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appeared to him. When Joseph asked which church was true and which he should join, Jesus told him that he "must join none of them, for they were all wrong; ... all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: 'they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.'" (See Joseph Smith History 1:5-20)
Over three years later, an Angel appeared to Joseph Smith one night and told him of an ancient book written on metal plates that were hidden in a nearby hill. Four years later, he was able to receive the plates and was able to translate the book by the gift and power of God.
The book tells the story of a small group of people who escaped Jerusalem before it was captured by the Babylonians. These people were led by God to the Americas. They had prophets just like in the old world who also taught the gospel. After Christ's death and resurrection, Jesus Christ descended from heaven and taught the people in the new world the same things He taught in the old. He healed their sick, blessed their children, and established His Church.
The people lived righteously for a long time, but nearly 400 years later, they had all fallen into wickedness. Mormon and his son Moroni were the last prophets. God commanded Mormon to write an abridgement of the history of his people, and this is why it is called the Book of Mormon. Additions were made by Moroni after Mormon's death. Those that had faith in Christ were being hunted down by the wicked. Before his death, Moroni buried the plates in the hill where Joseph found them much later.
Through Joseph Smith, Jesus Christ again restored His church with the same organization that it had in His days with prophets and apostles. Many new doctrines were restored, and others clarified. Christ once again leads His church with revelation through prophets and apostles. The same gospel is taught today as it was in His day: faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism, and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. After that, we need to stay on the path by keeping God's commandments.
After baptism and receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, worthy members of the church may go into temples and make other sacred covenants with our Heavenly Father. We promise God to keep His commandments, and He, in turn, promises that we will be clean and be able to return to live with Him again. Also through the power of Jesus Christ, husbands and wives may go to the temple and be "sealed" for eternity, meaning that if we live worthily, our marriages will not end when we die, but that we will remain married even after we are dead.
Those that receive and keep all these covenants will return to live with God. Those that also receive and keep this marriage covenant will receive exhalation in the highest degree of God's kingdom. They will have become like God.
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