With the departure of Judas to betray the Lord to the Church leaders, Christ gives the remaining eleven Apostles one last master discourse.
I AM the Way
READ John 14:1-6
Why
does Christ say there are “many mansions”?
Either He is referring to the fact that
in the Celestial Kingdom, not all joint-heirs are equal or at least at the same
place of glory.
Or a better
translation of “many mansions” would have been “In the journey through my
Father’s realms are many stages with temporary abodes. If it were not so, I
would have told you. I go to prepare an abode for your upward journey.”
It is possible
that both interpretations are correct.
We’ve
already discussed where Christ is going (to the Father in the Celestial
Kingdom); how does one get there?
Only through Christ – He is the Way – and
He will show you the way to go home (see 2 Nephi 32:6).
One cannot enter the presence of the
Father unless you’ve been ministered to by the Son – being made by Him a Son
yourself, “having part of” Him (think about the symbolism in both the sacrament
and Washing of the Feet rite).
He is the gatekeeper to give us entrance,
if we know Him and He knows us.
He is the sanctifier to make us clean, in
His own blood.
He is the testator before the Father of
our cleanliness and ability to stand in His presence (see D&C 88:75 and
D&C 76:51).
What
is the Way?
Christ is both the example of
successfully following the Way and the enabler of the Way for us, when we
attempt to walk it.
The Way is to do the works of Christ; He
made it home and is the prototype of the saved being – He is our example and
has “blazed the trail” back to Heaven (see LoF 7:9, 16).
No one comes to the Throne of the Father
without Christ but if we follow Him, we will come to the Father’s Throne and
will be like Him forever.
READ John 14:7-11
What
did Christ mean when He said, “he that hath seen me hath seen the Father”?
When Christ subjected Himself entirely to
the will of the Father, He was in every deed, thought and action “the
Father”—though flesh and blood living among us.
They were “one.” If you beheld Christ, you would see the precise
image of His Father.
The words of the Son are the words of the
Father – they come directly from the Father as they share the same mind (the
Holy Spirit).
The Father is IN the Son and the Son is
IN the Father.
And henceforth, or from here on out,
Christ IS the Father in Heaven to all who come unto Him and through Him are
saved.
How
is Christ in the Father and the Father is in Him and how can we become one with
Them?
Christ subjected Himself to the Holy
Spirit, or “mind of the Father” which swallowed His will into the will of the
Father. He models what He asked us to do. He prayed we would allow the Spirit
to make us “one” with them, so we become “perfect” as They are perfect.
Divine persons exist in a unity that
includes loving, interconnecting with, and intimate knowledge of another who is
also in Them; the love (energy belonging to a person – in a similar way in
which the Holy Spirit is part of God and also emanates from Him/Them to fill
the immensity of space) abounding in the divine relationship is given freely to
another self, so that the other is “in” one’s self and one’s self is “in” the
other.
Divine persons are divine and possess
Godhood as one, because they are one in loving unity; the corollary to this
insight is that the divine persons can leave behind their divinity by becoming
alienated (from each other – the Gods) and individually take upon themselves
the human condition of estrangement and become the Word made flesh (this is
true until they attain to the resurrection themselves, after which their
glorious spirits and bodies can’t be separated again).
The key to why the Father would allow the
Son to be “in Him” (and it being more than just a “top down” relationship where
the Father is “in Christ” but Christ is not “in the Father”), is that Christ is
inherently or intrinsically valuable as a “Thou” entity.
But the truly amazing thing is that
because we are also non-created, eternal intelligence or beings of light that
have always existed, and are one with God, we are also intrinsically valuable
and the Gods want us to be one “in Them” as much as they want us to invite them
to be one in us. Remember, we are also
Gods (see Psalms 82:6; John 10:34).
If we have His (Christ’s Spirit) then we
have the Father’s Spirit; or according to the Lectures on Faith, we have the Holy
Spirit to be with us. This Holy Spirit is “a personage of Spirit” which dwells
within us. Or, in other words, when we receive the “mind of the Father and the
Son” by listening to the Holy Spirit, we become sanctified by Their presence
within us. We become “one” with them and our spirits become holy, like they are.
READ John 14:12-14
What
does it mean that the works Christ does will also be done by His followers –
including greater works?
Those who trust in Christ will accomplish
the same works He did during His mortal life; healing the sick, casting out
devils, raising the dead, teaching saving doctrine, keeping all of the
commandments, etc.
They will also accomplish the “greater
works” He was about to do; the atonement, His sacrificial death, and glorious
resurrection.
Christ did nothing that He had not seen
His Father already do in a prior eternity – the path to godhood is the same for
all who would take it (see TPJS 390-393).
As the Father helped Christ, so Christ
will help you to complete the path to godhood.
The First Comforter
READ John 14:15-17, 24-26
What
will you do if you truly love Christ?
You will keep His commandments.
You will stand ready, watching for every
communication Christ will send to you – like a sentinel on guard.
It will be your deepest desire and you
will devote all your energy to keeping His commandments; not out of fear or for
a reward, but out of love for Him.
If
you don’t keep Christ’s commandments, what is implied?
You don’t truly love Christ.
Or you love other things more.
What
is implied by the use of the word “comforter”?
On earth we will be in great need of
comfort from God.
This need will be particularly true at
the time we are visited.
What
is this “comforter” that the Father will give?
One who will abide with us FOREVER.
The Spirit of Truth – the revealer of the
truth of all things.
Dwells with us.
Shall be in us.
It is the Holy Spirit or mind of God.
Is the record of heaven.
READ John 15:26-27 and John 16:5-16
What
is the role of this First Comforter?
Testifies of Christ.
It will lead us on the upward path and
guides us to all truth; the light is given to shine upon the pathway, to expose
wrongdoing and let you decide matters correctly.
Speak the words of God directly from His
mouth – it is the means to communicate Christ’s words and pour knowledge into
you.
Show us things to come.
Glorifies Christ.
Will sanctify us or make our spirits holy.
What
is implied by the fact that the Lord still had many things to teach the
Apostles?
Becoming like God requires the acquiring
or learning of much knowledge (understatement…).
It will not or cannot all be given or
comprehended in this life (see TPJS 390-393) but it will require a long time –
from eternity to eternity – to learn all that is needed and apply that
knowledge wisely – until we attain to the resurrection of the dead (which is
not to be confused with being resurrected by Christ after this earth life).
For example, if the Lord had shown Moses
all of His creations, Moses would not have been able to continue in the flesh –
he would have gained too much light for a telestial body to contain and he
would have been translated (see Moses 1:5).
The Holy Spirit is required for people to
be able to comprehend these things – we must be changed (body and spirit) or
filled with more light – sanctified – to understand them.
The Second Comforter
READ John 14:18-22
How
will Christ Himself comfort us?
He will come to you Himself in the flesh.
He will manifest Himself unto you – He
will show us who He is – the God of Israel and worker of the Atonement – that
He lives again (see 3 Nephi 11:14-17).
He and the Father will abide or stay with
you (see John 14:23).
READ D&C 130:3
So,
is this an actual visitation in the mortal flesh?
Yes.
The idea that the Father and the Son “dwell
in a man’s heart” only is false.
Part of receiving the Second Comforter is
the “comfort” that comes with the sure knowledge that He lives and is the God of
the whole earth (see 3 Nephi 11:10-17).
READ TPJS 171:2 and TPJS 172:5
What
is the purpose of the Second Comforter?
To KNOW that Jesus is the Christ – to
KNOW CHRIST (which is eternal life).
To be taught by Christ things that cannot
be taught by anyone else but we need to know if we are to enter the presence of
the Father to be sealed up to eternal life.
To give a perfect knowledge of the
mysteries of the Kingdom of God.
To open the visions of heaven.
It is not calling and election – that
happens first and is a precondition of receiving the Second Comforter.
READ TPJS 170:6
Who
has the privilege of knowing the Lord in this way?
Even the least Saint.
As fast as they are able to bear them.
A Habitation with God
READ John 14:23
How
can you know someone if you only meet them once?
You can know with a surety that they live
or exist (see 3 Nephi 11:14-15).
But you cannot truly “know” them; you must
spend time with someone, interact with them, and see them in many different
situations to really know them.
But it’s pretty clear that you cannot
know someone at all if you’ve never even met them once – you can know about
them but not know them.
What
is a “habitation” with God?
It is to have the Lord and the Father
abide with you constantly.
In addition to the Holy Spirit, you can
have the Lord as your constant companion.
It is different from the Second
Comforter, which is an event – a manifestation or visitation from the Lord; a
habitation is way beyond a single or occasional visit.
Those with a habitation with God see and
speak with the Lord every time they pray (see Acts 2:25).
This is what
it means to be one with God or to be “in God” and have God be “in you”; Christ
and the Father have this kind of relationship – they are always together or
connected (perhaps not in person but remember that the Holy Spirit or Light
which fills the immensity of space comes from God and fills all things – God
and Christ are one with each other in this respect; and we have the same
opportunity.
How
do we gain a habitation with God in this life?
We love Him and keep His words.
We claim the inheritance of the Saints or
servants of God – and God is calling us to awake and arise to experience the
blessings He has made available to us (see 1 Corinthians 2:9).
READ John 14:27-31
What
is Christ’s peace and how is it different from the world’s peace?
Christ’s peace is the sure knowledge of
your standing before the Lord – specifically the acceptance of your sacrifice
and His promise to you of eternal life (see LoF 6).
The world’s peace is a lack of war; while
this is a very good thing, it is temporary and will be completely irrelevant
after you are dead.
The True Vine
READ John 15:1-8
What
does it mean that Christ is the true vine and His Father is the husbandman?
Christ is the “vine” or the head of the
Father’s family.
The Father is the “gardener” or the one
who planted the vine.
We are the branches; we are alive if we
are directly connected to the vine – if we are part of the vine itself; we are
dead and withered if we are severed from the vine.
What
does the husbandman do to the vine?
He plants it (organizes it – puts it in a
place to fulfill the measure of its creation – this is not the same as creating
it out of nothing).
He nourishes it so that it grows up
strong (with light and truth).
He prunes it so that it will bear as much
fruit as it can – to attain to the full measure of its creation.
Through trial, suffering and affliction
of mortal probation he enables it to attain perfection.
He will remove all branches that do not
produce fruit.
What
is the relationship between the vine and the branch?
They are part of the same plant, the
branch is just an extension of the vine.
The vine, or root and trunk, is where
life lies – the branch without the vine will die, but it is possible for a
branch to die without the vine dying.
The branch is where the fruit grows.
The vine enables the branch to grow the
fruit.
How
are the disciples “clean” through the “word” which Christ has spoken unto them?
It’s not the commandments – they aren’t
clean through the commandments because they are not able to keep all of them perfectly,
all of the time – not at this stage of their eternal progression, at least.
The “word” that makes them “clean” is a)
Christ as the word and b) His testimony to them that their sins are cleansed
through His grace – He decrees them clean before the Father (see D&C
88:75); which means they ARE clean, as He is a god of truth and cannot lie –
and His atonement enables this sanctification that He can bestow upon all He
decides to grant it to.
How
might a branch not abide in the vine?
It could get diseased and wither away –
only killing itself, not the vine (but requiring it be cut off and separated
from the vine).
This happens if the Lord’s words do not
abide in the person (v 7).
What
happens when a branch abides in the vine and how is this done?
If you stay connected to Christ, and His
words live in you, you will ask according to His will, and you will be given
the ability to accomplish His will.
It will please and vindicate the Father
if you produce abundant fruit, and that will prove you follow Christ.
Just like the Father has loved Christ, Christ
has in turn likewise loved you. Therefore, remain connected with Christ and His
love will be with you.
If you practice His teachings, you will
always remain connected with Him; just as He has kept His Father’s teachings
and has remained connected with Him.
What
is the “fruit of the branches”?
His work and glory is to bring to pass
our immortality and eternal life.
The fruit symbolizes our (the branch’s)
eternal life.
The branch must bear fruit that adds
glory to the Father = the fruit is ultimately the immortality and eternal lives
of those we enable by inheriting eternal lives ourselves through the grace of
the Vine (Christ).
Greater Love Hath No Man Than This
READ John 15:9-17
What
is implied about the love the Father has for Christ?
It is just like Christ’s love for us; just
like the Father has loved Christ, he in turn, likewise has loved us.
Christ first loved us and showed that
love by suffering that He might redeem us.
If the Father
loved Christ in the same way Christ loved us, then the Father also showed His
love by suffering that He might redeem Jesus (see TPJS 390).
What
happens if we remain connected to Christ?
We will have His love with us.
We will be “alive in Christ”.
How
can we remain connected to Christ?
Practice His teachings.
Keep His commandments.
Which presupposes that we love Him (see
John 14:15).
That is how Christ has remained connected
to the Father – even throughout His mortal life.
What
is implied about how we are connected to God and to each other?
We are connected by love (see D&C
88:125, 133; D&C 78:11; D&C 82:11).
Love may be an
element or energy, like light or virtue, that gives nourishment and binds us
together.
In
the context of this discussion of the true vine, what did Christ mean when He
said “that my joy might remain in you”?
If we remain connected to Christ and
filled with His love by following His teachings and overcoming all obstacles,
we will “bear fruit” or gain eternal life.
And Christ will rejoice at our triumph.
We will be animated by His Spirit (joy)
forever.
Why
is loving one another a commandment?
Like all of God’s commandments, this one
is not arbitrary.
If we are not filled with unconditional
love such that we love one another, we are not, by definition, like Christ – in
fact, we’re very much NOT like Christ.
And we must be PRECISELY like Christ to
be saved (see LoF 7:9).
So, being filled with love such that we
love one another is an eternal law – which is why it is a commandment; in fact,
it’s the first and second greatest commandments – the foundation upon which all
of the other commandments are built (see Matthew 22:36-40).
How
can you recognize God’s love in someone?
When they are willing to sacrifice all
things for another, even their own lives; that level of love is completely
selfless.
How
are we to love each other as Christ loved us?
We must love unconditionally – love
everyone that we meet and without regard for receiving any love in return –
extend love before proof that it will be returned.
We must be willing to lay down our lives
in sacrifice to save our “friends” – and as Christ did that for everyone
(making it possible for them to become His friends if they abide by His will),
we must do the same.
Ultimately, we
must follow His example and work out an atonement for all those who are
depending upon us to save them in some far future eternity – to actually
sacrifice our lives to save our friends.
What
is implied by the phrase “greater love hath no man that this”?
That there are different degrees or
magnitudes of love.
That selfless, unconditional love that
involves the sacrifice of one’s will and life, demonstrate the highest form of
love.
As God has a fullness of love, this
magnitude of love is what God has.
If
God’s friends do everything they are told to do, what is the difference between
a “friend” and a “servant”?
While both friend and servant do God’s
will…
A servant does not share his Lord’s life.
A friend shares in everything – nothing
is held back.
The Lord wants to share everything He has
received from His Father – all the light and knowledge required to save us and
give us eternal life.
In addition to learning what is decided
in heaven and then doing it on earth, the “friend” has the opportunity to
influence what happens in heaven (see Genesis 18:22-33; James 5:16).
How
can Christ have chosen a select few without violating their agency, as they did
not choose Him?
He loved them first, then they loved Him.
He chose them first, then they chose to
follow Him.
He ordained or sealed them up to eternal
life, but they must walk the path to get there.
They always had their agency, as Judas Iscariot
so sadly demonstrated.
What
ordination is Christ referencing here?
Not the ordination to the Apostleship –
that had taken place years ago.
This is an ordination to progress and
become “fruitful branches”; it is to be sealed up to eternal life – they have
received their calling and election and it has been made sure by Christ’s
promise – they can now ask the Father for blessings and He will grant them, for
they will ask whatever Christ directs them to ask for through His Spirit that
now animates them.
READ John 15:18-25
If
Christ and those who follow Him are so filled with light and love, why does the
world hate them?
The world hates them BECAUSE they are so
filled with light.
The light is blinding to those who live
in darkness and the darkness causes them not to be able to comprehend or value
the light when they come across it.
It is like the teenagers watching TV in a
dark room when the parent comes in and turns on the light – they say “turn the
light off, we can’t see!” Their eyes
have become adjusted to the dark and the light is now blinding – prohibiting
their ability to see, instead of enabling it.
It is a divine paradox…
The world is infested with devils who
love the darkness that those souls have within them – they were cursed to have
a constant, tormenting hunger that can only be temporarily satisfied by feeding
on the evil acts of men – they try to influence people through placing thoughts
in their heads via proximity.
The light within Christ and His followers
is blinding to demons and many of them flee from it (see Acts 5:15-16); those
who are in the demons’ grasp are influenced to hate those that are filled with
light – the demons want to continue to feed off of the person, so rather than
being cast out or off of the person, they try to illicit a fight or flight
response, as they (the demon, and to the degree that the mortal host is
consensual with the possession or influence of the demon the mortal too) will
either seek to destroy or escape from the person filled with light.
If
Christ’s example made the Jews accountable – and angry, because they could no
longer sin without guilt, why did Christ come to teach them?
Christ still loves them – He is not into
“gotcha” situations, but He will give us what we say we want and what we
deserve.
They were religious – they pretended to
love and worship God, so God sent His Son to teach them the truth.
But their religion was to set themselves
up as a light – it lacked faith and they rejected Christ and the Father who
sent Him.
Casting Out God’s Messengers
READ John 16:1-4
What
does it mean that “they shall put you out of the synagogues”?
They will be excommunicated from the
Church.
What
does it mean that those that kill them will think they are doing God’s work?
They will believe so strongly that Christ’s
disciples are wrong – that they are dangerous, faith-destroying heretical
apostates, that they will think that it must be God’s will to kill them to
“protect the faith”.
So
why did these very religious people fight so vehemently against Christ and
later His Apostles?
Because their hearts were not open to the
Spirit of Truth that testifies of the Father and the Son, and their points of
true doctrine, so that they didn’t recognize Him when He came to them…despite
their excessive, standard-keeping obedience to the Law.
This is a sad case where the focus on
“keeping the commandments” took over their hearts and kept the individuals from
doing the one thing that the “law of carnal commandments” was intended to do,
which was to lead them back to Christ – to fill them with enough light gained
via adherence to true principles to enable them to recognize Him and His greater
words when He came to minister to them, even if He did not come in a way they
were expecting (see D&C 84:19-27 and Galatians 3:24-25).
These people will never awake and arise;
they cannot do or will never choose to do what Christ and the Father have done.
Ascending to God
READ John 16:17-21
What
does it mean that Christ will depart briefly, then when He has ascended to the
Father, He will be by the Apostles’ side?
Once ascended to heaven, He had the
ability to guide each person by His voice in a much more intimate and specific
way than He could have when He was a mortal upon the earth – if they would open
their ears to hear Him.
Through the Holy Spirit or the light of
Christ which emanates from God to fill the immensity of space and is within and
through all things, Christ knows and controls every aspect of this creation
(see D&C 88:6-13).
Until He attained to the resurrection,
Christ was careful not to refer to Himself as perfect; when He had ascended to
the Father, He had become even more powerful than He had been before (see
Matthew 5:48; 3 Nephi 12:48; TPJS 390-393).
Christ would still have the ability to
descend again to the earth, at any time, to minister, either seen or unseen, to
whomever He wishes.
How
is a woman’s giving birth to a baby a good metaphor for Christ’s resurrection
or for our birth of the spirit?
Before the glorious resurrection, Christ
had to suffer through the terrible pains of the atonement and crucifixion which
enabled it.
Prior to our receiving the birth of the
spirit or baptism of fire and the Holy Ghost, we must experience godly sorrow –
seeing our true standing before the Lord and the great chasm between where we
are and the Kingdom of God.
In both cases, the joy of the blessing
(the resurrection and the mighty change from being born again) will never leave
us, while the pain required to enable those blessings is finite in time.
Eternal law requires opposition in all
things – so for blessings to be received, they must be earned; also, when
change happens, there is always a great struggle to adjust to it.
READ John 16:22-27 (including JST
footnote) and D&C 88:75
What
joy comes to mankind from Christ that no one can take from them?
It is the joy that comes from hope.
Hope is the knowledge or promise from
God’s own mouth of their being sealed up to eternal life (see 2 Nephi 31:20).
What
power must one possess to be able to ask God and be guaranteed that it will be
given?
The Holy Priesthood After the Order of
the Son of God (see D&C 107:3 and D&C 84:19-25, 33-42).
Why
will Christ not “pray unto the Father” for them after that day?
After Christ has testified of them before
the Father (see D&C 88:75 and Mosiah 5:15), God will communicate with them
directly, face to face, because He will love them as He loves Christ – and they
will be able to abide His presence because they will be like Him, purified even
as He is pure – and they will be one, as Christ is in the Father and the Father
is in Christ, so will the Father also be in us.
This Is Life Eternal
READ John 17:1-3
What
is implied by Christ’s prayer?
That Christ needed to pray and ask the
Father to be filled with His light.
That Christ did not have a fullness of
that light all of the time, as a mortal – that it wasn’t inherently within Him
as a fullness at this point (see D&C 93:12-17).
How
did Christ gain the power to heal all weaknesses and redeem all creation?
The Father taught Him how to overcome the
weaknesses of the flesh until He was called to be a Son of God (see TPJS
390-393; D&C 93:12-14).
It was not like He had a fullness of it
within Him inherently from the beginning – He had to gain that ability; going
from a small capacity to a great one – from eternity to eternity.
Having said that, Christ had ascended to
the level of a God before the foundation of this world – after His death, He
returned to the Father to be with the Father, as He was before He was born; the
difference was that He when He returned, He had attained to the resurrection of
the dead Himself, as His Father had previously done.
What
is life eternal?
To know God the Father and Jesus Christ
(see 1 John 5:12).
And to truly know someone, you must be
able to fully comprehend them.
To comprehend someone, you must have the
mental capability (enlightenment or quickening) to fully understand them; this
really only comes when you have experienced what they have been through.
READ Ether 3:19-20
What
is knowledge?
It is beyond faith.
It comes from practical experience.
It cannot be denied without lying.
READ 1 John 4:7-8
What
are the first steps to knowing God?
Loving one another with the pure love of
Christ.
That you might be born of God and enter
in by the Gate.
READ Mosiah 4:11-16 and Mosiah 5:12-13
After
you have been born of God and received His name, what must you do next to know
God?
Serve Him by…
Feeding His sheep – relieve the suffering
of the beggar.
Keeping His commandments – obedience is
the way to grow in light.
Always remembering Him.
READ 2 Nephi 32:6-7 and 3 Nephi 11:14-17
When
we have been tried and found true, how does Christ introduce Himself to us?
By coming to us personally to minister to
us – to give us knowledge that must be taught and received but cannot be shared
between mortals (see 2 Nephi 32:6).
By witnessing for ourselves through our
own senses, the tokens He bears that prove that He has done the work God sent
Him to do.
READ D&C 132:21-24
When
must this happen?
In this world – in the flesh (see D&C
76:74).
Knowing God is literal and must be
accomplished in the flesh (see Genesis 32:30; Exodus 24:9-10; Deuteronomy 5:4;
1 John 1; John 14:23; Matthew 5:8; 2 Nephi 9:41).
There is a reason that a perfect,
resurrected Christ continues to bare physical tokens in His body which a mortal
can feel.
READ TPJS 394:4
When
will this happen to us?
When we are ready – when we qualify –
when we have submitted our whole souls and walked in His way such that He comes
to us.
The smallness of the number of mortals
who have accomplished this is down to our lack of understanding of what is
required and/or our desire to do them, not to an unwillingness on His part to
save us (Hosea 5:6, 9, 15) or the specialness of a few “chosen ones.”
If
eternal life is to know God and knowing God means to meet Him in the flesh,
what is implied if you have not yet had an audience with Christ?
If you have not yet had an audience with
Christ, you have not yet qualified for eternal life.
Either you are not living all of the
commandments you have received.
Or you have not yet received all of the
commandments you need to enable you to abide in His presence.
Or your faith is being negatively
affected by believing things about Him and your standing before Him that are
wrong.
Or He is proving you and you must be
patient and wait on Him.
READ John 17:4-14
What
does it mean that the Father gave certain souls to Christ that were formerly
His (the Father’s)?
The Father “gave” Christ certain souls to
be His “seed” or Sons and Daughters, if they would come unto Him (Jesus) and
receive Him in the mortal world and then not betray Him.
The implication is that these souls were
the Father’s seed or Sons and Daughters in a prior eternity, that they had
chosen Him when He (Ahman, the Father) was in the role of Christ; and if they
were His seed then, Christ likely was, too – this might make Christ’s statement
that He did what He saw the Father do even more literal, particularly if Jesus
Christ were a mortal disciple of Ahman Christ (the Father) during that mortal
ministry – although that is not required, as Jesus could have seen Ahman’s
atonement in vision at any time (and most likely did see it again when a mortal
on this earth, as the veil would have been drawn over His mind when He was born
of Mary).
And the implication of all of this on the
doctrine of Christ being both the Father and the Son, or of the Adoption of any
of us as Sons and Daughters of God, is interesting – to be redeemed from a mortal
probation we are completely dependent upon the one (the Christ or anointed one)
who has been prepared to condescend and offer the sacrifice required to atone
for all those who have entered into that mortality in that eternity and are therefore
spiritually dead, or everything that we have gained in all prior eternities
will be lost – and to be saved, each soul must covenant in mortality with that
Christ, becoming His Son or Daughter; even as they may have done in prior
eternities with others who had been sent as the Christ; thus they have many
Fathers in Heaven and will continue to “collect” or have more as they
condescend to additional mortalities in future eternities, until they
themselves have attained to the resurrection of the dead by enacting the role
of Christ themselves, becoming precisely as He is now (see LoF 7:9, 15-16) and
are able to dwell in everlasting burnings with a resurrected body from which
their spirit can never again, worlds without end, be separated from…(see also
TPJS 390-393).
In the World but Not of the World
READ John 17:15-16
What
does it mean to be “not of” the world vs. being “of” the world?
Physically, we are all “of” this world as
our bodies are constructed of element that is unrefined or telestial in nature
– they are “avatars” made from the “dust” or unified field or particles of this
lower frequency/energy/light dimension.
Spiritually, none of us on this earth are
“of” this world – we are all infinite beings having a finite, mortal experience.
But most of us (spiritual beings) are
spiritually dead – living without God in this world (not connected to Him) –
cast out of His presence and unable to reenter it without being incinerated
physically and experiencing a consciousness of guilt that is like a flame of
unquenchable fire, spiritually (see Mormon 9:3-5).
To be “spiritually alive” (or in God’s
presence and spiritually connected to Him) is to be a stranger and foreigner in
this telestial world.
Why
does the Lord pray that the Father does not take the disciples out of the world
but protects them from the evil in it?
We are down here in this world to do a
job – either to be proven or to execute a rescue mission – but either way we
have the opportunity to acquire more light through our obedience and sacrifice
in a world where we can suffer and die, and actually lose light gained
previously (the stakes are high).
Be One
READ John 17:17-26
How
are we sanctified?
Through receiving (believing, accepting
into one’s mind, being changed by, and acting on) the truth = God’s word =
Eternal Law = pure intelligence = glory/light, when it is offered us by the Son
or the Father or in other words, receiving a fullness of the Holy Spirit.
How
are the Father and Son one?
The Son received glory given Him from the
Father.
Glory = intelligence, light and truth.
The Son became precisely like the Father
by doing the things He saw the Father had done in a prior eternity (see LoF
7:9, 15-16; D&C 93:12-14; John 5:19).
What
enables us to become one with God or with each other?
Receiving the light or glory given us by
Christ – His Spirit, which is the mind of God (see LoF 5:2).
The light will lead all who follow it to
become perfect like the Father and Christ are; perfect in one.
If we receive the light, we may ascend to
live with Christ, following the journey that was established before the
foundation of this creation.
