10 Comments

  1. I’m glad you brought this up. I taught the lesson and we were fortunate enough to go into Joseph’s teachings on Calling and Election. I think the one part of the lesson that will stick with me and the relation it has to the teachings later in the lesson comes from the last line of “From the Life of…” Paraphrasing, it says “When the Lord commands, do it.” (That is unless you disagree, just kidding) If we do all everything the Lord commands, then we will eventually find ourselves promised eternal life while still in the flesh. A great gift indeed.

  2. Excellent observation. I taught this lesson as well. For some reason this is my favorite quote in the lesson: “These promises, when obtained, if ever by us, will not be because Peter, John, and the other Apostles … walked in the fear of God and had power and faith to prevail and obtain them; but it will be because we, ourselves, have faith and approach God in the name of His Son Jesus Christ, even as they did; … .”

    I discuss these principles in a very recent blog essay entitled “Exaltation Requires Mastery of Principles,” including some respectfully handled quotes on Church of the Firstborn.

  3. I was reading in Alma 32 this morning, and almost the whole chapter has pertinence to this discussion, but I particularly liked the last four verses:

    40 And thus, if ye will not nourish the word, looking forward with an eye of faith to the fruit thereof, ye can never pluck of the fruit of the tree of life.
    41 But if ye will nourish the word, yea, nourish the tree as it beginneth to grow, by your faith with great diligence, and with patience, looking forward to the fruit thereof, it shall take root; and behold it shall be a tree springing up unto everlasting life.
    42 And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst.
    43 Then, my brethren, ye shall reap the rewards of your faith, and your diligence, and patience, and long-suffering, waiting for the tree to bring forth fruit unto you. (Alma 32:40-43)

  4. James Nielson

    Thanks for all your insights….please keep it coming. Its good for us to help teach each other understand important ideas.

  5. Sometimes the things we discuss in the Gospel seem to all click at the same time. In relation to what we have been discussing here, earlier this evening I was going through an old book that I hadn’t looked at since my mission.

    I found a letter from my Mission President dated on my birthday in 2001. I must have placed it in the book as I have a habit of doing that. I read through his birthday note to me and then noticed this line of counsel. “Remember obedience and success are in direct proportion to each other.” It really hit home again what we have been talking about here, that through faith and obedience, we will eventually attain membership in the Church of the Firstborn.

    Again, one of those ironies of the Gospel but I have seen too much to take something like this as happenstance.

  6. Thanks Hans for sharing. I really should do a post about synchronicity, as it seems to have been experienced by several of our readers here. There are many things in our lives that can’t be explained by mere coincidence, and I believe it is evidence of a higher hand taking part.

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