No Coincidences

Tag: mortality

Pondering on Death, Eternity, Growth, and Mortality

Emma Smith, the wife of the prophet, was once given a promise that is worth pondering.

Emma had a 14-month-old child die.

As a father of three, the thought is unimaginable. Reading through the list of Smith children that died in infanthood is heartbreaking.

According to Alexander Smith, Emma’s son who made it to adulthood, shortly before her death in 1879 she had a vision where Joseph Smith visited her and promised her she would raise all her children who had not lived to adulthood after her mortality ended.

What are the implications of this?

I believe what can be gleaned from this is powerful, comforting, and gives a look into the truly magnificent love and power of a Father in Heaven. I believe the truths restored by Joseph Smith to be awe-inspiring. I believe the truths revealed by Joseph Smith should be awe-inspiring if he truly was a prophet of God. I believe that to be truth.

I’ve read near-death experiences that describe young children playing in heaven. I still wonder about, and don’t comprehend, age, mortality, “childhood and adulthood”, maturity, time, and the importance of our bodies.

Those categories: age, mortality, childhood and adulthood, maturity, time, and our bodies seem like a wide-ranging and somewhat unrelated group of topics.

But what was shared with Emma Smith makes those topics intertwined.

What is age? In mortality, I am 30 years older than my children. But in the eternities their spirits are eternal, they never had a beginning. Who I am to say that I am any more “mature” than my two sweet daughters? My two young girls teach me and inspire me daily. I believe I came to earth before them to guide them, lead them, watch over them – a great and marvelous calling and responsibility – but they’re also here to guide, lead, and watch over me. It’s the great circular of life (not to be confused with, though very similar to, the Circle of Life in the Lion King).

In this sense, what is childhood and adulthood?

It is one eternal round.

But that experience – of me raising my children and the humility that brings – and my children being raised – and the humility that takes – clearly has significance and importance to our eternal progression. This explains why Emma was given this promise that she would one day raise the children she lost. She missed that opportunity, but in God’s Plan, nothing is truly missed. It’s all one eternal round. It all comes back. This should be a great comfort to anyone who has lost any loved ones, to anyone who’s felt they missed any mortal opportunity – to raise children, get married, or have any mortal experience – this should be a great comfort to all.

Another significant message to take from this vision given to Emma is the importance of the family unit. Just because Emma’s children died as infants didn’t mean they weren’t her children. They would always be her children. She would always be their mother. The family unit is important. The family unit is eternal.

I’ve touched on age, mortality, childhood and adulthood, maturity, and time – 5 of the 6 seemingly random topics. What of our bodies?

Our bodies have eternal significance and their growth has eternal significance. We can not be like our Father in Heaven until we are resurrected and have bodies like His. I’ve been pondering on this a lot lately. The elements are eternal. Element can not be destroyed. When God created Adam and Eve’s bodies from the dust of the earth, He was taking eternal element and making a tabernacle for them. Our eternal spirits are housed in eternal element. There is something extraordinary and significant about our bodies. We cannot be properly resurrected beings, we cannot be like our Heavenly Father, without attaining our bodies.

After our resurrection we will attain our bodies for the rest of eternity and therefore be more like our Father.

Finally, the biggest thing to take away from Emma’s experience is how ignorant we are of the complete workings of God. We can rest assured that a perfect and all-loving Father in heaven will make ALL things right. Every last item that is a concern to us – death, raising children, marriage, relationships, family – all of it will be understood and made right in a perfect way.

I have no doubt that my Heavenly Father, and your Heavenly Father, loves all of us in such a deep and incomprehensible way. I have faith in His love and His character. I have faith in His Plan. I know all our concerns are but the concerns of a child wanting a chocolate bar at a store. The child can’t see the grand scheme and can’t see how the world can be right while leaving the store without a chocolate bar. One day our eyes will be opened and we will see that the chocolate bar wasn’t as important as we thought, for our Father had created a plan to give us all the chocolate our heart could desire.

If we follow Him and trust Him, it all will be made right.

June 19, 2025
One Eternal Round

I started making some bad decisions in high school. These decisions nearly derailed my life.

During that time I was becoming friendly with a girl. She knew about some of my bad decision-making.

One night when we were hanging out I told her I would never get married anywhere but a temple. This interested her. Why, she wondered, would someone like me, who seemingly cared nothing for this religion that I was raised with, care about a temple marriage?

I explained to her that I believed my church was true. If my church was true, then it held the authority to marry couples for eternity. That church, therefore, sealed families for eternity. I told her if I married someone I didn’t want it to end after we died. If I were to ever get married, I wanted it to be for eternity.

When I was in college my decision making had gotten increasingly worse.

On a night I don’t remember, it was later told to me that I bore my testimony to a girl at a party. I don’t remember any of this. Apparently, religion came up and I told her I knew the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was Jesus Christ’s church on the earth.

This girl asked the obvious question, “If you know it’s true, why are you doing the things you’re doing?”

I’m told I said that even though I wasn’t living the standards of the church, I couldn’t deny what I knew to be true.

That testimony that I don’t remember had a big impact on that girl.

Years later that first girl from high school sent me a postcard. That girl from high school had gotten baptized. Her postcard was one of a few critical moments that helped me come back to church and changed my life.

A month after that postcard, in the midst of my difficult journey back to church, I stumbled upon a Facebook message that had gotten blocked and I’d never seen. It was from years prior. It was from the girl at the college party, the girl I bore a drunken testimony to.

She told me she’d gotten baptized. She told me she had never let me know how big an impact that testimony had on her ultimately getting baptized. I visited her and her budding family. She was sealed in the temple. She had an eternal family. She was happy. It gave me strength to continue on the path of repentance that was so, so hard.

The girl from high school got married in the temple and now has three kids. She has an eternal family. She is happy.

A patriarchal blessing is extremely sacred. I share a short line from my blessing with the utmost reverence:

“Trouble not yourself over lost days, for you are an eternal being”

I can’t tell you how comforting those words were when I was trying to find strength to stay faithful, and how important those words continue to be to me.

It is all one eternal round to God (D&C 3:2). He knew I would stumble. What did He do when I stumbled? Put two people in my path that I could somehow, inexplicably, impact at my lowest, during my most degraded behaviors.

What did He do?

He put those two people back in my path when they could help me back. He put two people back into my life to help me remember what I always knew, what I was getting dangerously close to forgetting. He put two people in my path to remind me who I was. I am nothing special of myself, but I am a son of God. That is special.

I marvel at the workings of God. That He loves us so much that He gave us a world so we could leave our Heavenly home, just as children leave their homes here on earth to go out and learn, and grow, and fall. He gave us an earth to fall. But He allowed us a way back.

I know there is a way back.

I know that Jesus Christ allows that way back.

I know that God planned for everything. We are His work and His glory.

I can never deny what I know.

May 22, 2025
Discussion Before I Came to Earth
“Now, you’re going to get a lot of attention. A LOT. You will be the center of their world for years. This will give you a huge advantage in life. That early love will carry you for your entire mortal experience.”

My upcoming birth and place in life were being discussed.

“But, there is a downside. Your parents are young, inexperienced. They can barely take care of themselves. Now they’ll have to take care of you. They will make mistakes. Every mistake they make will be made up for by the outpouring of love you receive, but there will still be mistakes. You will have to grow up as they learn to take care of a child.

“Also, being the first-born will be a huge responsibility. If things go according to plan, and they always do, you will be the first of many children. Your younger siblings will be as much your responsibility in life as your parents. You will have to answer to how you treated them, how you watched over them, how you protected them, how you supported them. It will start at a young age, but it will be for your entire mortal life. You will have to watch over them.”

I loved each of them so much already. Of course, I would do that.

“Being the oldest will provide many unique opportunities. Sometimes you will be a bully. This will be to teach you something later in life and to teach your siblings. Over time your relationship with them will grow and develop. You all will mature mortally and spiritually.

“It won’t be easy. But being the first-born child will set you up to achieve your highest potential. It’s what He has in store for you. It will help you become who you can become.”

This is how I imagine the conversation in heaven was before I came here. It would continue,

“You will have a bumpy path. You’ve always had to learn things through trial and error. You will taste much of the bitter to realize how sweet obedience is.

“Eventually we believe you will come back. Of course, that will be up to you. But Father doesn’t misread these things. When you come back you will find a companion from the devoted women of the kingdom. You know her already.

“When the time is right, we will send you His choicest spirit. She will enter in much the same position you entered this world. Your wife and you will have much to learn, and she will teach you. You will be sent a strong, powerful, spiritual, kind, gentle, intelligent spirit to be a cornerstone of your family. She will be followed by another choice spirit, one who even now can’t wait for her experience to start. She will bring a spark and a light to your family. Your family will be stronger for the two pillars sent to expand it. You will be greatly blessed by your daughters.”
Doesn’t this bring so much meaning to life? The truth of premortal existence speaks to my soul. I know it to be a fact. It is too sweet for my spirit to deny. I know its truth. I knew where I was coming, I knew who I was joining, I knew my wife and daughters before I came here. I was guided and trained for my time here on earth. I was sent for a purpose. I believe I’m still learning that purpose. Every mortal experience I’ve had has led me to the purposes I’m finding in life.

“Your purpose will be to come to Him. Because you will taste so much bitter, you will be able to help others find Him. This will be your purpose.”

I’m grateful for this truth of premortality. I know it’s true. I feel it. I know there’s a reason I’m here. I’m grateful for that.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/premortality?lang=eng
August 31, 2023
Infant baptisms, Salvation, and the Atonement of Jesus Christ

One of the great fallacies of Christian belief is what happens to people who die without being baptized, especially those who never, in mortal life, had an opportunity to be baptized.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is sometimes accused of diminishing God through the beliefs He has revealed to us. For example, the idea that we can become like Him. Other Christian sects look at this as some sort of disrespect towards God. Like us trying to be like our Father is an insult to Him. We’re similarly criticized for diminishing Christ’s Atonement in the faith and works discussion.

What of children who die without baptism? How many children have died without the opportunity to be baptized?

We’re criticized for diminishing Christ’s Atonement.

What’s more disrespectful to the price Christ paid for ALL of us than saying Christ’s Atonement doesn’t cover the billions of people – billions of babies and children, that have died without baptism? What a corrupt and sad view of the Atonement of Jesus Christ to say that it doesn’t protect innocent children who never could be baptized. He died for all of us.

So, I would like to share beautiful truths as revealed by God to his prophets in this dispensation that pertain to little children, salvation, the resurrection, and Christ’s Atonement.

The following are some frequently asked questions concerning the status of children who die before the age of accountability.

Are they automatically saved?

Elder Bruce R. McConkie wrote: “To this question the answer is a thunderous yes, which echoes and re-echoes from one end of heaven to the other. Jesus taught it to his disciples. Mormon said it over and over again. Many of the prophets have spoken about it, and it is implicit in the whole plan of salvation. If it were not so the redemption would not be infinite in its application. And so, as we would expect, Joseph Smith’s Vision of the Celestial Kingdom contains this statement: ‘And I also beheld that all children who die before they arrive at the years of accountability are saved in the celestial kingdom of heaven.’ [D&C 137:10.]

“It is sometimes asked if this applies to children of all races, and of course the answer is that when the revelation says all children it means all children. There is no restriction as to race, kindred, or tongue. Little children are little children and they are all alive in Christ, and all are saved by him, through and because of the atonement. …

“They are saved through the atonement and because they are free from sin. They come from God in purity; no sin or taint attaches to them in this life; and they return in purity to their Maker. Accountable persons must become pure through repentance and baptism and obedience. Those who are not accountable for sins never fall spiritually and need not be redeemed from a spiritual fall which they never experienced. Hence the expression that little children are alive in Christ.…

“Truly it is one of the sweetest and most soul-satisfying doctrines of the gospel! It is also one of the great evidences of the divine mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith. In his day the fiery evangelists of Christendom were thundering from their pulpits that the road to hell is paved with the skulls of infants not a span long because careless parents had neglected to have their offspring baptized. Joseph Smith’s statements, as recorded in the Book of Mormon and latter-day revelation, came as a refreshing breeze of pure truth: little children shall be saved. Thanks be to God for the revelations of his mind where these innocent and pure souls are concerned!” (“The Salvation of Little Children,” Ensign, Apr. 1977, pp. 4, 7.)

Even though little children will be saved, does that mean they will have eternal life?

Elder McConkie explained: “Eternal life is life in the highest heaven of the celestial world; it is exaltation; it is the name of the kind of life God lives. It consists of a continuation of the family unity in eternity. … children will be saved in the celestial kingdom. Salvation means eternal life; the two terms are synonymous; they mean exactly the same thing. Joseph Smith said, ‘Salvation consists in the glory, authority, majesty, power and dominion which Jehovah possesses and in nothing else.’ (Lectures on Faith, pp. 63–67.) We have come to speak of this salvation as exaltation—which it is—but all of the scriptures in all of the standard works call it salvation. I know of only three passages in all our scriptures which use salvation to mean something other and less than exaltation.” (“Salvation of Little Children,” p. 5.)

President Joseph Fielding Smith added:

“The Lord will grant unto these children the privilege of all the sealing blessings which pertain to the exaltation.

“We were all mature spirits before we were born, and the bodies of little children will grow after the resurrection to the full stature of the spirit, and all the blessings will be theirs through their obedience, the same as if they had lived to maturity and received them on the earth.

“The Lord is just and will not deprive any person of a blessing, simply because he dies before that blessing can be received. It would be manifestly unfair to deprive a little child of the privilege of receiving all the blessings of exaltation in the world to come simply because it died in infancy.…

“Children who die in childhood will not be deprived of any blessing. When they grow, after the resurrection, to the full maturity of the spirit, they will be entitled to all the blessings which they would have been entitled to had they been privileged to tarry here and receive them.” (Doctrines of Salvation, 2:54; see also Mosiah 15:25.)

Why do some children die and others live? Are those who die better off than those who remain in mortality?

Elder McConkie wrote:

“We may rest assured that all things are controlled and governed by Him whose spirit children we are. He knows the end from the beginning, and he provides for each of us the testings and trials which He knows we need. President Joseph Fielding Smith once told me that we must assume that the Lord knows and arranges beforehand who shall be taken in infancy and who shall remain on earth to undergo whatever tests are needed in their cases. This accords with Joseph Smith’s statement: ‘The Lord takes many away, even in infancy, that they may escape the envy of man, and the sorrows and evils of this present world; they were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth.’ (Teachings, pp. 196–97.) It is implicit in the whole scheme of things that those of us who have arrived at the years of accountability need the tests and trials to which we are subject and that our problem is to overcome the world and attain that spotless and pure state which little children already possess.” (“Salvation of Little Children,” p. 6.)

Will children who die before the years of accountability ever be tested in the way that other mortals are tested?

President Joseph Fielding Smith said: “Satan cannot tempt little children in this life, nor in the spirit world, nor after their resurrection. Little children who die before reaching the years of accountability will not be tempted.” (Doctrines of Salvation, 2:57; see also D&C 29:47; 45:58.)

What will happen to children in the Resurrection?

President Joseph F. Smith wrote: “Joseph Smith taught the doctrine that the infant child that was laid away in death would come up in the resurrection as a child; and, pointing to the mother of a lifeless child, he said to her: ‘You will have the joy, the pleasure, and satisfaction of nurturing this child, after its resurrection, until it reaches the full stature of its spirit.’ There is restitution, there is growth, there is development, after the resurrection from death. I love this truth. It speaks volumes of happiness, of joy and gratitude to my soul. Thank the Lord he has revealed these principles to us.” (Gospel Doctrine, pp. 455–56.)

Thank the Lord He has revealed these principles to us. Amen.

August 24, 2023
The Greatest Gift Man can Receive in Mortality

The Holy Ghost is the Holy Spirit; he is the Holy Spirit promised the saints at baptism, or in other words the Holy Spirit of Promise, this exalted name-title signifying that the promised receipt of the Holy Spirit, as on the day of Pentecost, is the greatest gift man can receive in mortality.
Bruce R. McConkie

I recently read this quote and the truth of the statement hit me. This seemed a fitting thought after last week’s post talking about the gift the gospel has been in my life. I believe that quote is a powerful reminder for those of us who have been blessed with this great gift. The gospel is a blessing in part due to this great gift, the gift of the Holy Ghost.

I can’t wait to teach Ivy of this most extraordinary gift and to watch her receive it for herself. I know the Holy Ghost is a guiding force and has blessed my life more than I will ever understand while on this earth. One day I will know.

I’m grateful for this constant companion (D&C 121:46), this friend, this comforter. I am never alone when the Holy Ghost is within me. What a blessing that gift is. The greatest in this life.

December 9, 2021