forfeited all claim thereto. But Salvation as a graded state provided
for all who have not sinned unto the incurring of the dread penalty of
the second death is far exceeded by the Exaltation provided for the
valiant righteous. Of such as are worthy of a measure of salvation, yet
who have failed to lay hold on the higher blessings and privileges of
eternal life, including the perpetuity of the family relation through
the sealing ordinances administered under the authority of the Holy
Priesthood, title to which is to be won by individual effort by and
through the laws and ordinances of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Lord
has spoken in this dispensation, saying that they "are appointed angels
in heaven, which angels are ministering servants, to minister for those
who are worthy of a far more, and an exceeding, and an eternal weight
of glory. For these angels did not abide my law, therefore they cannot
not be enlarged, but remain separately and singly, without exaltation,
in their saved condition, to all eternity, and from henceforth are not
Gods, but are angels of God, for ever and ever." (D&C 132:16-17.)
Progression in eternity is to be along well defined lines; and thus
the inheritors of any specific order or kingdom of glory may advance
forever without attaining the particular exaltation belonging to a
different kingdom or order. Of those who shall belong to the Telestial
or lowest kingdom of glory we read:
"But behold, and lo, we saw the glory and the inhabitants of the
Telestial world, that they were as innumerable as the stars in the
firmament of heaven, or as the sand upon the sea shore; and heard the
voice of the Lord, saying: These all shall bow the knee, and every
tongue shall confess to him who sits upon the throne for ever and ever.
For they shall be judged according to their works, and every man shall
receive according to his own works, his own dominion, in the mansions
which are prepared. And they shall be servants of the Most High, but
where God and Christ dwell they cannot come, worlds without end."
(76:109-112.)
-- 76 --
DEITY AS EXALTED HUMANITY
Man Is a God in Embryo
WE read of our Lord's presence at a winter festival in Jerusalem, the
Feast of Dedication. As He stood in Solomon's Porch He was assailed
with questions from some of the more prominent Jews; and His answers so
stirred their priestly wrath that they essayed to stone Him to death.
Read John 10:22-42. The chief cause of their anger lay in Christ's
affirmation of His actual relationship to the Father as the veritable
Son of God. To the assault of the infuriated and sin-blinded Jews Jesus
responded with these words: "Many good works have I showed you from my
Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?" And the answering
howl of the mob was: "For a good work we stone thee not; but for
blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God."
Blasphemy was the blackest crime in the Mosaic category; and the
prescribed penalty was death by stoning. The essence of this capital
offense lay in falsely claiming for one's self or attributing to man
the authority belonging to God, or in ascribing to Deity unworthy
attributes. Jesus had proclaimed to the angry Jews His inherent power
to grant eternal life unto all who would believe on Him and do the
things He taught. Hence the frightful charge of blasphemy hurled at the
Son of God, who spake as the Father gave commandment.
Our Lord reminded them that even human judges of their own,
being empowered by Divine authority and therefore acting in the
administration of justice as representatives of Deity, were called gods
(see Psalm 82:1, 6); and then, with sublime pertinence asked: "Say ye
of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou
blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?"
The actuality of the relationship between Jesus the Son and God the
Father as set forth in the Scriptures cited is in accord with Scripture
in its entirety; and that humankind are veritably children of that same
Father, Jesus Christ being the Firstborn of the spirits, and therefore
our Elder Brother, is attested by the same high and unquestionable
authority.
The Jews denied and blasphemously decried the Godship of Christ because
He was to them a man, the reputed son of a carpenter, and His mother,
brothers and sisters were known to them as familiar townsfolk. Christ
emphatically affirmed that He was following His Father's footsteps,
as witness His words on another occasion, when the Jews tried to kill
Him because He had said "that God was his Father, making himself equal
with God. Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I
say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the
Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son
likewise." Read John 5:17-23. In the verse following, Jesus declared
that unto Him the Father showed all things that He, the Father, did.
In connection with the same occurrence He declared, "My Father worketh
hitherto, and I work."
It is plain that Jesus Christ recognized the literal relationship of
Sonship which He bore to the Father; and moreover, that He was pursuing
a course leading to His own exaltation, a state then future, which
course was essentially that which His Father had trodden aforetime. To
the Father's supremacy He repeatedly testified, and expressly stated,
"My Father is greater than I." (John 14:28.)
Jesus Christ lived and died a mortal Being, though distinguished in
certain essential attributes from all other mortals because of His
status as the Only Begotten of God His Father in the flesh. Yet Jesus
Christ has attained the supreme exaltation of Godship, and has won His
place at the right hand of the Eternal Father. Ponder the significance
of His words: "For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given
to the Son to have life in himself." (John 5:26.) The teachings of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on this affirmation by the
Lord Jesus were set forth by Joseph Smith the prophet in this wise:
"As the Father hath power in Himself, so hath the Son power in Himself,
to lay down His life and take it again, so He has a body of His own.
The Son doeth what He hath seen the Father do: then the Father hath
some day laid down His life and taken it again; so He has a body of His
own."
And further: "God Himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted
Man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens. That is the great secret. If
the veil was rent to-day, and the Great God who holds this world in its
orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by His power, was to
make Himself visible--I say, if you were to see Him to-day, you would
see Him like a man in form--like yourselves in all the person, image,
and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion,
image, and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked,
talked and conversed with Him, as one man talks and communes with
another."
We read further: "The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible
as man's; the Son also." (D&C 130:22.)
Our belief as to the relationship of humanity to Deity is thus
expressed:
"As man is God once was; as God is man may be."
-- 77 --
BE YE PERFECT
Is It Possible?
SOME knowledge of the attributes of God is essential to intelligent
worship. Granted that finite man cannot comprehend infinity; yet
consistency forbids us carrying this self-evident truth to the extent
of saying that because God is infinite man can have no conception of
His nature or character.
If God be but a vast formless nonentity, filling all space and
therefore illimitable, substanceless, devoid of body and parts,
incapable of emotions and passions, He is not my Father, I am not His
son. To the contrary, the Scriptures affirm that humankind are the
children of God, fashioned after His likeness in both spirit and body;
and conversely, He must be of definite form and feature, possessed of a
body perfect in all its parts, and He likewise perfect in all His acts.
On the night of the betrayal, while comforting the sorrow-stricken
Eleven by solemn and lofty discourse, Jesus said unto them: "Ye believe
in God, believe also in me. . . . If ye had known me, ye should have
known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen
him."
The faithful Philip broke in with an appealing request: "Lord, shew
us the Father, and it sufficeth us." The Lord's response was an
unequivocal avowal that He was His Father's exact presentment, so that
whosoever had seen Him had seen unto what and whom the Father was
like. Note the explicit and withal pathetic words of the heavy-hearted
Christ: "Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known
me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest
thou then, Shew us the Father?" See John 14:1-10.
Jesus Christ, the Man, was and is in the express likeness of His
Father's Person; and, since the consummation of His mission in the
flesh and His victory over death whereby comes the resurrection, He has
been exalted to the Father's state of glory and perfection. See Heb.
1:1-4.
Though the thoughts and activities of God be as far above the ways
of men as the heavens are above the earth, they are nevertheless of
a kind with human yearnings and aspirations, so far as these be the
fruitage of holiness, purity, and righteous endeavor. Though our planet
be but as a drop of the ocean compared with the many greater orbs,
it is not the least of all; and what we have come to know of other
worlds is primarily based on analogy with the phenomena of our own.
Notwithstanding that Deity is perfect and humanity grossly imperfect,
we may learn much of the Higher by a study of the lower in its true and
normal phases.
As an impressive and profound climax to one division of the sublime
discourse, The Sermon on the Mount, the Master said: "Be ye therefore
perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." (Matt.
5:48.)
What led up to this utterance, calling for the explanatory "therefore"
by which the relation of premises and conclusion is expressed? A
studious reading of the entire chapter gives answer. Following the
Beatitudes and certain well defined admonitions and precepts, the
Lord made plain the distinction between the Law under which Israel
had professedly lived from Moses down, and the higher requirements of
the Gospel taught by Christ. Again and again the introductory, "Ye
have heard that it was said by them of old time," is followed by the
authoritative, "But I say unto you." Obedience to the Gospel, which
comprises all the essentials of the Law, was enjoined as the means by
which man may become perfect, even in the sense in which the Father in
heaven is perfect.
It is a significant fact that when Jesus Christ, a resurrected and
glorified Being, visited the Nephite branch of the House of Israel
on the Western Continent, He included Himself with the Father as the
existent ideal of perfection, as thus appears: "Therefore I would that
ye should be perfect even as I, or your Father who is in heaven is
perfect." (Book of Mormon, 3 Nephi 12:48).
The road to exaltation and perfection is opened through the Gospel of
Christ. We cannot rationally construe our Lord's admonition as implying
an impossibility. We are not required to assume that man in mortality
can attain the perfection of an exalted and glorified personage, such
as either the Father or Jesus Christ. However, man may be perfect in
his sphere as more advanced intelligences may be in their several
spheres; yet the relative perfection of the lower is vastly inferior
to that of the higher. We can conceive of a college freshman attaining
perfection in his class; yet the honors of the upper classman are
beyond; and graduation, though to him remote, is assured if be do but
maintain his high standing to the end.
After all, individual perfection is relative and must be gaged by the
law operative upon us. In 1832 the Lord thus spake through His prophet
Joseph Smith: "And again, verily I say unto you, that which is governed
by law is also preserved by law, and perfected and sanctified by the
same." (D&C 88:34.)
The law of the Gospel is a perfect law; and the sure effect of full
obedience thereto is perfection. Of those who attain exaltation in the
celestial kingdom Christ has declared: "These are they who are just
men made perfect through Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, who
wrought out this perfect Atonement through the shedding of his own
blood." (76:69.)
-- 78 --
THE GLORY OF GOD IS INTELLIGENCE
Knowledge Is Power in Heaven as on Earth
IN a revelation to Abraham the Lord made known the existence of spirits
appointed to take bodies upon the earth. These spirits were designated
as "the intelligences that were organized before the world was"; and
elsewhere in the same record spirits are called intelligences. See
Pearl of Great Price, pp. 65, 66.
This usage of the term has gained a place in modern English, as
lexicographers agree. The Standard Dictionary gives us the following as
one of the specific definitions of intelligence: "An intelligent being,
especially a spirit not embodied; as the intelligences of the unseen
world; the Supreme Intelligence."
The word is current as connoting (1) the mental capacity to know and
understand; (2) knowledge itself, or the thing that is known and
understood; and (3) the person who knows and understands. Beside these
there are other minor usages.
In the revelation above cited the Lord impressed upon His ancient
prophet and seer the fact that some of the spirits were more
intelligent than others; and then proclaimed His own Divine supremacy
by the declaration: "I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than
they all. . . . I rule in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath,
in all wisdom and prudence, over all the intelligences thine eyes have
seen from the beginning. I came down in the beginning in the midst of
all the intelligences thou hast seen."
In such wise did God make known anciently the power by virtue of which
He is supreme over all the intelligences that exist--the fact that He
is more intelligent than any and all others. In the heavens as upon the
earth the aphorism holds good that Knowledge is Power, providing that
by "knowledge" we mean application, and not merely mental possession,
of truth. In a revelation through Joseph Smith the prophet given in
1833, the character of Divine authority and power is thus sublimely
summarized: "The Glory of God is Intelligence." (D&C 93:36.)
The context of the passage shows that the intelligence therein referred
to as an attribute of Deity is spiritual light and truth; and that
man may attain to a measure of this exalting light and truth is thus
made certain: "He that keepeth His commandments receiveth truth and
light, until he is glorified in truth and knoweth all things. . . .
Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither
indeed can be. All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has
placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also."
The antithesis of light and truth is darkness and falsehood; the
former is summarized as righteousness, the latter as evil. Reverting
to the figure of mortality as a school for embodied spirits, we must
admit that every pupil who ignores or rejects the truth as presented
to him through the revealed word and his own experience is culpably
responsible for his ignorance.
Not all knowledge is of equal worth. The knowledge that constitutes the
wisdom of the heavens is all embraced in the Gospel as taught by Jesus
Christ; and wilful ignorance of this, the highest type of knowledge,
will relegate its victim to the inferior order of intelligences.
Another latter-day Scripture may be cited as an inspired generalization
embodying an eternal truth relating to our subject: "It is impossible
for a man to be saved in ignorance." (D&C 131:6.)
Can it be otherwise? If a man be ignorant of the terms on which
salvation is predicated he is unable to comply therewith, and
consequently fails to attain what otherwise might have been his eternal
gain. The ignorance that thus condemns is responsible ignorance,
involving wilful and sinful neglect. Lack of the saving knowledge that
one has had no opportunity to acquire is but a temporary deficiency;
for Eternal Justice provides means of education beyond the grave. Every
one of us will be judged according to the measure of light and truth
we have had opportunity to acquire. Even the untutored heathen who
has lived up to his highest conceptions of right shall find means of
progression. Part of the blessing to follow the second advent of Christ
is thus stated: "And then shall the heathen nations be redeemed, and
they that knew no law shall have part in the first resurrection; and it
shall be tolerable for them." (45:54.)
The intelligence that saves comprises knowing and doing what is
required by the Gospel of Christ; and such intelligence will endure
beyond death. "Whatever principle of intelligence we attain unto
in this life, it will rise with us in the resurrection. And if a
person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through
his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the
advantage in the world to come." (130:18, 19.)
Intelligence as to Godly things, which are summarized in the Gospel
of Jesus Christ, leads to an ever increasing understanding and
comprehension of God Himself, and this is knowledge supreme; for as the
praying Christ affirmed: "This is life eternal, that they might know
thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." (John
17:3.)
-- 79 --
WHEN IGNORANCE IS SIN
Opportunity Entails Accountability
IT is an aphorism of the courts that ignorance of the law is no valid
excuse for crime. If this rule be just it must rest upon the assumption
that knowledge of what the law demands or forbids is an inherent and
natural possession, or that it is so readily accessible that no one is
justified in failing to become informed.
The normal individual of a civilized community requires no specific
instruction to know that theft, falsification, drunkenness, adultery
or murder is fundamentally wrong, since each of these crimes is
a violation of his conscience and a pronounced offense against
public weal. If, however, he enter restricted territory within
which registration is legally demanded, and he, not knowing of the
requirement, fails to register, he is technically a law-breaker subject
to the penalties prescribed. True, his offense is that of omission or
non-compliance and his ignorance may or may not be taken into account
as a mitigating circumstance, this depending, perhaps, upon local
conditions and the discretion of the magistrate as warranting leniency
or demanding the full measure of punishment.
As thus in the ordinary affairs of men so with regard to the laws
of God, framed for the governance of souls and providing for their
salvation. One's inherent consciousness warns him against criminal
actions but fails to inform him of certain definite requirements,
without compliance with which he is debarred from admission to the
Kingdom of God. There is no inborn knowledge by which man knows
that baptism by immersion in water, and the higher baptism of the
Spirit through the imposition of hands are essential to salvation;
nevertheless our Lord's words to Nicodemus are alike binding upon every
soul: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter
into the Kingdom of God." (John 3:5.)
Is it less reasonable with respect to spiritual requirements than in
secular matters to expect of every one an acquaintance with the law
as it applies to himself, providing, of course, such knowledge is
accessible to all? But some may honestly assert inability to apprehend
the necessity of obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel,
even though they had informed themselves as to the letter of the
prescribed conditions. Such may ask: Are men to suffer penalty in the
hereafter because they cannot understand what is required of them in
mortality? The degree of their culpability is to be determined by the
fundamental cause of their ineptitude in matters spiritual. Failure to
comprehend may be due to bias or to lack of desire to know. The record
of our Lord's ministry presents an instance in point, coupled with a
remedy for the spiritual disorder by which ignorance was fostered and
truth ignored.
It was at the Feast of Tabernacles. Read John 7:14-18. The Jews were
greatly troubled over His teachings; a few believed, more doubted and
questioned, and some were so resentful as to want to kill Him. The
more honest in the multitude desired to know for themselves whether
the Master spoke by the power and authority of God or as a man, for as
a man only was He generally regarded. "Jesus answered them, and said,
My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. If any man will do his
will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I
speak of myself."
Are you unable to realize that baptism is essential to salvation?
Perhaps the cause lies in the fact that you have never developed the
essential condition of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; or, perchance,
you have never repented of your sins. Faith and repentance, as the
Scriptures aver, are prerequisites to effective baptism; and it is as
unreasonable to expect a faithless unrepentant sinner to comprehend the
essentiality of baptism as to expect one untrained in the rudiments of
arithmetic to understand algebra.
Wilful ignorance of Gospel requirements is sin. Man is untrue to his
Divine lineage and birthright of reason when he turns away from the
truth, or deliberately chooses to walk in darkness while the illumined
path is open to his tread. Positive rejection of the truth is even
graver than passive inattention or neglect. Yet to every one is given
the right of choice and the power of agency, with the certainty of his
meeting the natural and inevitable consequence.
We learn of three principal states or graded kingdoms into which souls
shall enter under Divine judgment--the Celestial, the Terrestrial, and
the Telestial--and the inheritance of each soul shall be determined by
his measure of obedience to the laws of God, as the Lord's revelation
through the prophet Joseph Smith attests: "For he who is not able to
abide the law of a celestial kingdom cannot abide a celestial glory.
And he who cannot abide the law of a terrestrial kingdom cannot abide a
terrestrial glory. He who cannot abide the law of a telestial kingdom
cannot abide a telestial glory; therefore he is not meet for a kingdom
of glory." (D&C 88:22-24.)
-- 80 --
KNOWING AND DOING
Knowledge May Help to Condemn of Save
BY way of summary and climax to His lofty yet simple, and withal
unparalleled discourse, since named The Sermon on the Mount, Jesus
Christ thus spake: "Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine,
and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house
upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds
blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded
upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and
doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his
house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and
the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was
the fall of it." (Matt. 7:24-27; compare Luke 6:47-49.)
This Sermon has stood through the centuries in a class of its own. The
address is before us as a living preceptor thrilled with the spirit
of sincerity and action as opposed to wordy profession and careless
neglect. The closing sentences quoted above express, in language suited
alike to child and sage, a generalization of deep import--that actions
not words alone, works not empty belief, doing not merely knowing what
to do, are conditions indispensable to the salvation of the soul.
Many of those who were so signally privileged and blessed as to
personally hear the Master were astonished at His doctrine and deeply
moved by the simple and convincing presentation: "For he taught them
as one having authority, and not as the scribes." (Matt. 7:29.) Our
Lord was qualified to teach as He did, not only, by reason of the
sufficing fact that He bore the Father's commission, but because He had
done and was doing just what He required of others. The authority of
Divine precept was united in Him with that of unimpeachable example.
The burden of all scriptural direction relating to the attainment of a
place in the Kingdom of God is: Do the works that are prescribed.