"Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit he cannot enter the
kingdom of God." (John III; 5.) This sweeping declaration was made
by Jesus Christ to Nicodemus, when that prominent Israelite visited
the Savior at night. The Apostle Peter said concerning Jesus Christ:
"Neither is there salvation in any other; for there is none other
name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." (Acts
IV; 12.) The words of Peter were spoken when he was "filled with the
Holy Ghost." The words of Jesus came from him as the Son of God. They
vitally affect the whole human family. They being true, not a soul can
enter into the kingdom of God unless he or she is a true believer in
Jesus Christ, and has been born of the water and of the spirit. Even
Christ himself had to comply with this law, in order to "fulfill all
righteousness." He was born of the water in His burial by baptism in
Jordan, and His coming forth from the womb of waters; he was then born
of the spirit by the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Here is the example for
all mankind, who are required to "follow in His steps." This is the
"strait and narrow way."
The question which naturally arises in the thoughtful mind on hearing
these declarations is, "How could people believe in Jesus Christ when
His name was not preached to them?" And coupled with that comes the
query: "What has become of the many millions of earth's inhabitants who
died without the opportunity of being born of water and of the spirit?"
The heathen nations, worshiping false gods, knew nothing of Jesus as
the Savior of mankind. Even the chosen people Israel who were under the
Mosaic law, did not walk in that way of salvation. Since the days when
the Apostles and other authorized servants of Christ administered the
ordinances of the Gospel, and during the times when "darkness covered
the earth and gross darkness the people," down to the present age when
it is claimed by the Latter-day Saints that the Church of Christ, the
Holy Apostleship, and the fulness of the Gospel have been restored,
myriads of {248} good people have passed away without receiving that
new birth in the manner that Christ declared to be essential. Have they
all perished? Is it possible that they are doomed to destruction? Will
the Eternal Father reject all these His children because they did not
obey a law which was not made known to them?
Justice, mercy, reason, and common sense revolt at such an idea. As
Paul has it: "How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not
believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not
heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they
preach except they be sent?" (Rom. X; 14.) Yet the word of God must
stand. It endureth forever, and He is no respecter of persons. "And
He is to judge the secrets of all men by Jesus Christ according to
His Gospel." It is for that reason that the Gospel was to be preached
to "every creature." According to the notion prevalent in modern
Christendom, there will be many millions of people shut out of the
kingdom of heaven, because they did not believe in a Savior about whom
they knew nothing. And it is taught that there is no possible chance of
salvation for those who die without faith in Christ. Sectarians sing:
"There's no repentance in the grave, nor pardon offered to the dead."
The preachers of the sects limit the mercy of God to this probation.
They teach that at death the soul goes either to heaven or to hell,
and its state and condition is fixed forever. If this awful doctrine
were true, Satan would gain the victory over Christ, claiming as his a
vast and overwhelming proportion of the human family, leaving to our
great Redeemer but a small and trifling troop out of the immense and
countless hosts of the armies of humanity.
The solution of this, to many, puzzling problem is simple in the light
of the true Gospel of Christ restored in the latter days. "The mercy of
God endureth forever." It is not confined to the narrow boundaries of
this little earth, nor tied up within the limits of time. The spirits
of men and women are His sons and daughters, whether if the body or
out of the body. "His tender mercies are over ALL HIS WORKS." No one
can be justly or mercifully judged by the Gospel without hearing that
Gospel, and having the opportunity to receive or reject it. Why, then,
should not the Gospel of Jesus Christ be made known to those who never
heard it in the flesh, after they have left the body and dwell in
another sphere? Do not all the sects of Christendom, almost without
exception, believe that the spirit of man is immortal, and {249} is
therefore living and sentient when the body is dead? And if that is
true, are not the spirits of men and women able to receive instruction
and information when out of the body? Is it not the spirit of man
that receives and stores up intelligence conveyed through the bodily
senses? Why should the change called death, which is the separation of
the body and the spirit, cut off all means of divine communication to
the living, immortal intelligent being that has simply "shuffled off
the mortal coil?" There is no good reason why the spirit thus advanced
one stage in its experience should not be capable of still further
progress and of receiving light, knowledge, wisdom and religious
teaching, especially if information essential to its eternal welfare
was withheld while it dwelt in the body. Revelation as well as reason
bears testimony that the word of God can be preached to the departed
as well in the sphere to which they have gone, as on any part of this
earthly globe.
"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust,
that He might bring us to God. Being put to death in the flesh, but
quickened by the spirit, by which also He went and preached unto the
spirits in prison, which sometime were disobedient when once the
long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah; while the ark was
a preparing, wherein few, that is eight souls, were saved by water."
(I Peter III; 18-20). Here is a declaration which like a ray from the
sun of righteousness, puts to flight the fogs and mists of modern
eschatology and opens up to view a vast field of understanding, wherein
the justice, wisdom and mercy of God are displayed in glorious review.
The spirits of those rebellious people who were destroyed by the
flood, after suffering about 2,000 years in their prison house, were
visited by the Son of God while His body was lying in the sepulchre.
This was in fulfillment of the prophecies of Isaiah concerning Him;
for instance: "The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord
hath anointed me to preach tidings unto the meek; He hath sent me to
bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and
the opening of the prison to them that are bound." (Isaiah LXI; 1). And
further: "To open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the
prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house." (Isaiah
XLII; 7). And again: "That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth.
To them that are in darkness, show yourselves." (Isaiah XLIX; 9).
The common notion is that when Christ on the cross bowed his head and
gave up the ghost, he went direct to {250} heaven, as it is supposed
all good people do, but on the third day after this, when Christ
appeared to Mary, he said unto her: "Touch me not, for I am not yet
ascended to my Father." (John XX; 17). The time spent by the Savior
between His death and His resurrection, instead of being in heaven was
among the "spirits in prison," the captives whom He went to deliver.
Thus Jesus could preach without His body, and the spirits whom He
visited could hear also without their bodies. But what was the nature
of His preaching to those who were held in captivity? Let Peter answer
this question. "For, for this cause was the Gospel preached also to
them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the
flesh, but live according to God in the spirit." (I Peter IV; 6.) Thus
it appears that the same Gospel which was preached to men in the body
was also preached to men out of the body, so that all might be judged
by the same Gospel, which is to be preached to "every creature." That
the message of deliverance to the captives and the opening of the
prison to them that were bound was successful is evident from the
scriptural statement concerning Christ: "He led captivity captive."
(Eph. IV; 8).
Jesus promised His disciples that the works which he did, they should
do also. The mission and Priesthood which His Father gave to Him He
gave to them also. It is therefore clear that the work of redemption
commenced on earth will be carried on in the sphere beyond the veil.
And that it will be performed in the latter times, may be learned
without doubt from the prophecy of Isaiah concerning the end of the
world, in which he foretells as one of the events of that period: "And
it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall punish the host
of the high ones that are on high and the kings of the earth upon the
earth, and they shall be gathered together as prisoners are gathered in
the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall
they be visited." (Isaiah XXIV; 20-22).
The spirit of man when out of the body, being an intelligent entity,
a thinking, progressive and responsible being, capable of hearing and
believing or rejecting truth, must be also capable of repenting of
evil and learning to do well. Thus the mercy of God can reach such a
being independent of the mortal structure in which it was permitted
to dwell on earth. The idea that the eternal future of man is fixed
at death comes from a mistaken notion concerning "the judgment day."
Both Christ and His Apostles taught that the time of judgment was set
by the Father to take place "when the Son of Man shall {251} come in
His glory, and all the holy angels with Him." (Matt. XXV; 31-46). Paul
declared that Christ would come to judge the quick and the dead "at His
appearing and His kingdom." (2 Tim. IV; 1). It was at that day that
Paul expected to obtain "a crown of righteousness." (Verse 8.) And the
time of the judgment is fixed in the book of Revelation to be after the
resurrection from the dead, when "the small and the great shall stand
before God, and the books shall be opened, and the dead shall be judged
out of the things written in the books according to their works." (Rev.
XX).
The popular notion that final judgment takes place at the death of each
individual, and that he is then and there exalted to heaven or thrust
down to hell, is utterly wrong and unscriptural. Yet it has prevailed
in Christendom for many centuries, and it remained for the Prophet of
the 19th century, Joseph Smith, by divine inspiration to bring forth
the glorious light in the midst of dense spiritual darkness, and show
forth the mercy and goodness of Almighty God in providing means by
which every soul of Adam's race, either in the body or out of the
body, may learn the way of the Lord, the everlasting Gospel, the only
plan of salvation. It is to be preached to all them that are dead who
could not hear it while living in the flesh, and they can repent and
turn unto God and be taught the things of His kingdom. The doctrine of
purgatory, which is part of the Roman Catholic creed, is a perversion
of this doctrine of Christ, but the idea of the former came from a
misunderstanding of the latter. There is an intermediate state in which
the spirits of the departed remain between death and the resurrection
of the body, and, as will be pointed out in a succeeding tract, there
are works which may be performed by the living in behalf of the dead,
but only such as are impossible of performance in the spirit world.
The Apostle Paul declared that Jesus Christ "gave Himself a ransom for
ALL, to be testified in due time." (1 Tim. II; 6). The time has now
come. The testimony of this great truth is proclaimed by Prophets and
Apostles raised up in these latter days, and by the voice of Angles
from Heaven, and by the witness of the Holy Ghost, which bears record
of the Father and the Son. Let all people rejoice and praise the Lord
for this new revelation of his loving kindness and tender mercies
extended over all His works, and let His light shine to the uttermost
parts of the earth and penetrate to the darkest abode of the regions
behind the veil, that truth may triumph everywhere and God be glorified
in the obedience and salvation of His children.
{252}