Last post: Adam and Eve partook of the forbidden fruit and by so doing allowed each of us to come into this world in a "fallen condition".
As mentioned briefly before, spiritual death is separation from the presence of God, and physical death is the separation of our spirit from our body. In order to become like Our Father after we die we need to a) have our physical body, and b) return to His presence.
When Our Father laid out this plan he called for a Saviour. Jesus Christ volunteered His life for each and every one of us.
He came to the earth in the humblest of settings, born to a carpenter's wife in a stable with farm animals. Not a whole lot is known about His life between 12 and 30 years of age, but when He was 30 he began to teach the Jews (He lived in Jerusalem). He taught many things that upset the local religious leaders, the two greatest of which being that He was the a literal Son of God and that He was Jehovah of the Old Testament. (We may or may not talk about that second one later on, but not here).
The offense taken by the church leaders, and the threat they felt at seeing His influence over so many people led them to drastic actions. When he was 33 they had him arrested, and twisted Jewish and Roman laws to have Him killed.
Before He was taken, however, He went to a grove of olive trees with His apostles. He told them to wait at the gate, and he went in alone. There he knelt down to pray to His Father. Here began the first part of the Atonement. Some of His words to The Father are these:
"And he said, Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt." (St. Mark 14:36)
He pleaded with The Father, saying: 'if there is any other way for your plan to move forward, please, let us do it that way. If not, I will do what you need me to.'
Then he suffered.
The shortness of that sentence is such an injustice to the description of what he experienced, yet I have no better way to describe what happened.
He took upon Himself everything that we have ever, ever experienced. He felt every time we are hurt physically. Every time we are bruised emotionally. Every time we are battered mentally and spiritually. When we feel depressed. When we feel alone. When we feel lost or hopeless. When we feel discouraged, scared, stressed, anxious, sick, dizzy, overwhelmed. Most of all He felt when we feel the heavy weight of guilt for things we should not have done, but did.
In the Book of Mormon it says:
Even on this earth Christ was begotten by God, and so had the powers of God. Many people suggest that because of His elevated nature He was able to endure this trial with greater ease than any of us could. This is not true. In a book called The Infinite Atonement by Tad R. Callister (a member of our church) he discusses something most people to do not consider.
Here it is:
Here it is:
The pain that Jesus endured was well beyond what it would take to knock out and kill a mortal man. It was because he was descended from God that he could hold death and unconsciousness at bay and experience the whole of the suffering. Our weak bodies would flee to sweet comatose and escape the pain. His semi-immortal body was equipped to remain alive and awake for the duration of His torture.
Immediately after enduring this, He leaves the garden to be betrayed by Judas, one of his chosen followers, and arrested. Over the next 24 hours He is put on trial, spat upon, hit, stripped, whipped, crowned with thorns and dragged through the streets.
He was then nailed to a wooden cross to hang 'til death. After the atonement was complete, Christ allowed His mortal body to die.
Continuing the scripture from above:
"And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities." (Alma 7:12)
And so Christ suffered and died for us.
His suffering before the cross had a two-fold purpose. 1) to pay the price of our enormous list of shortcomings. 2) to understand every last ounce of our suffering so that we might go to Him and seek comfort.
We are not and will never be worthy to enter God's Kingdom on our own. Christ suffered so that He may stand for us and declare that we are His. He bought us with his blood and He will bring us in with Him.
And so he repaired our Spiritual Death.
He died on the cross, both as part of the suffering of our pains and our sins, and so that He could cross death's barrier and break its bands.
Three days after his crucifixion He rose from the dead, in a flawless, perfect, glorified, immortal body. He paved the way across the land of the dead into immortal ressurection.
And so he repaired our Physical Death.
Because of what Jesus Christ did we can all return to God's presence and progress forever with perfect immortal bodies.
I know that Jesus Christ is my Saviour and that He suffered and died for me. I know that He did so for each and every one of us and that He is always there to comfort us in difficult times.
I testify that He lives and that He is the Son of God.
I share these things in His name, even Jesus Christ.
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Next post: Now what? What do we do now that we know this?
