Genesis 3-4; Moses 4-5

(The decision to partake of the fruit and open the door to fallen mortal life, The Fall, was addressed in the previous post. I have also linked two excellent articles on The Fall at the end of this post.)

GOD'S COUNSEL TO ADAM AND EVE

After Adam and Eve made the decision to partake of the fruit and were being sent off to start their life together in the fallen world of mortal life, God gave each of them personal counsel.

God’s words to Eve:

“I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” (Moses 4:22 & Genesis 3:16, King James Version)

Or is that what He said? There are differing opinions about how the last part of that sentence should be translated.

English Standard Version: “…your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.”

New Revised Standard Version: “…yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”

New Living Translation: “…and you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.”

Wow! These are greatly different meanings! 

The original stories of the first books of the Old Testament were passed on verbally by the religious leaders. Later the Hebrew scripture was written from those stories and various transcriptions and translations since then each interpreted it the way that fit their culture and understanding. But all three of these interpretations carries some truth: Eve would have opinions contrary to her husband’s, Eve would desire to be with her husband, and at some times Eve would desire to control her husband. And Eve represents all women. These are accurate statements about all female-male relationships.

In all of these translations, however, God warns that husbands will rule over wives.

Let’s note that God never says, “I want your husband to rule over you.” He is just giving advance notice that this is what will happen. And history has born this out: men have dominated over women.

God’s words to Adam are consistent in all versions:

“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 3:17, NRSV).

This is not a condemnation from God. He doesn't say "I will curse the ground because of you." It is the natural consequence of Adam following his wife’s counsel to take the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge and open the door to mortality. God is giving these first humans foreknowledge about life on earth. “Don’t be surprised when you discover it’s really hard, Adam and Eve. That’s the consequence of being a mortal.” We also should not be shocked when we find out life is hard, even for faithful people; that’s how we grow. 

Adam and Eve found out very quickly that being parents could be very, very hard.

THE FALL OF CAIN

Eve's heart was filled with joy when she gave birth to her first child, Cain. She said, "I have gotten a man from the Lord; wherefore [I expect that] he may not reject his words" (Moses 5:16).  

Clearly she hoped Cain would be a righteous son. We all expect that of our sweet, heaven-sent infants, don’t we?  

But within the same verse we find that, "Cain hearkened not, saying: Who is the Lord that I should know him?"

Adam and Eve had another son named Abel. Eve also expected that he would be righteous. This expectation was met; Abel chose obedience to God.

Cain kept up appearances for a while. He offered sacrifice to God like the rest of the family, but he offered a sacrifice of plants rather than animals.  In the Book of Genesis, there is no explanation as to what is wrong with this, but the inspired book of Moses in the Pearl of Great Price, fills in the blanks.

The Lord had given unto Adam and Eve "commandments, that they should worship the Lord their God, and should offer the firstlings of their flocks, for an offering unto the Lord. And Adam was obedient unto the commandments of the Lord.  And after many days an angel of the Lord appeared unto Adam, saying: Why dost thou offer sacrifices unto the Lord? And Adam said unto him: I know not, save the Lord commanded me. And then the angel spake, saying: This thing is a similitude of the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth. Wherefore, thou shalt do all that thou doest in the name of the Son, and thou shalt repent and call upon God in the name of the Son forevermore" (Moses 5:5-8).  

"And Adam and Eve blessed the name of God, and they made all things known unto their sons and their daughters" (Moses 5:12). 

Cain had been taught by his parents that a sacrifice of the firstborn lamb was an expression of faith in the coming Savior.  His sacrifice of "the fruit of the earth" was his own invention and expressed clearly his disobedience and disregard for the Christ. Why did he do this? Perhaps he was jealous of his shepherd brother. Perhaps he didn’t like the mess of meat and blood. Perhaps he wanted all the other sons and daughters of man to buy their sacrificial offerings from him so he could get more money. Perhaps he just didn’t believe in Christ and thought the command to use a lamb was arbitrary and unfair. Perhaps he was being purposely sacrilegious.

"Cain loved Satan more than God. And Satan commanded him, saying: Make an offering unto the Lord" (Moses 5:18). But that offering was not acceptable to God. And his jealousy and anger festered.

In the Genesis account, “Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him” (ESV Genesis 4:8). It sounds like a fit of anger got the best of him, but Joseph Smith’s translation, recorded in the Pearl of Great Price, paints a much bigger story. God prophesied to Cain that because he couldn’t take the correction offered to him, he would become “the father of lies” (Moses 5:24). 

Others of the sons of God followed Cain and “Adam and his wife mourned before the Lord, because of Cain and his brethren” (Moses 5:27).

Cain turned his conversations away from God now and toward Satan and he set up a secret society of haters who joined him in trying to get wealth and power. And “he gloried in his wickedness” (Moses 5:29-31). Cain (or a combination of men from his secret society) plotted to murder Abel in cold blood and succeeded.

But they didn’t get away with it, because God knew. God told Cain that the consequence of his actions would be life as a vagabond. No one really wants to be a neighbor to the world’s first murderer, especially not Abel’s family, so Cain and his band would have to move in haste to a less ideal land. And possibly move again and again. Cain feared that other men would condemn him and hate him because he was not a landowner able to produce his own food, and they would kill him because of what he had done.

It’s so very instructive that God did not pronounce capital punishment upon Cain. He did not command the victim's family to kill the murderer. He did not want the righteous to have blood on their hands and in their hearts. God warned that “whosoever slayeth thee, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold” and he set a mark upon Cain to protect him. 

God loved Cain! He didn’t love Cain more than those who might have good reason to hate Cain—Abel’s family comes to mind—but He didn’t want more suffering in the family of Adam. Those who seek vengeance suffer their whole lives! Their only path to peace is to forgive and allow the Atonement to heal them.

This truth will be taught many more times in the Old Testament.

ADAH AND ZILLAH

After telling of Cain's sad fall into darkness, the writers insert a descendancy chart from Cain:  Cain begat Enoch (not the famous Enoch), who begat Irad, etc. Only the men are named, as is common through most of the Bible. But then, when his great-great-great-grandson is listed (Lamach), so are his wives! Their names are Adah and Zillah. Each of them had two children who are also named, even the one who was a girl, Naamah! (Genesis 4:19-24.)

Whenever women’s names appear in the Old Testament, there’s going to be an interesting story! As God foretold, the history of the world is the history of men ruling over women. And those who tell and write the stories are men. If they suddenly tell the story of women, they must have been highly impressive women. 

Why have the storytellers bothered to mention this family so specifically? The Book of Genesis doesn't tell us. To find the answer, we have to go to Joseph Smith’s inspired translation in Moses 5 beginning with verse 47:

“And Lamech said unto his wives, Adah and Zillah: Hear my voice, ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech; for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt.”

Lamech had followed his ancestor’s footsteps and entered into a secret society, doing evil deeds with other gang members. One of his older relatives found out about this and was going to expose him to his elders. (The other sons of Adam and Eve were still alive because they all lived so long back then.) But Lamech killed him, “not for the sake of getting gain, but…for the oath’s sake,” to protect his status in the secret club. He then asked his wives to cover for him, concerned not about the death and sorrow he had caused, but about the “wounding” and “hurt” it would do to him.

Because of Lamech’s deeds, more “works [of] abominations…began to spread among all the sons of men. And it was among the sons of men” (Moses 4: 52, emphasis added).

And here is where Adah and Zillah become the heroines: “And among the daughters of men these things were not spoken because that Lamech had spoken the secret unto his wives, and they rebelled against him, and declared these things abroad, and had not compassion [for Lamech’s trouble]; wherefore Lamech was despised, and cast out, and came not among the sons of men, lest he should die” (Moses 4:54).

Lamech tried to rule over Adah and Zillah, but they refused to step into the darkness with him. And although he lived the rest of his life on the run because of his crime, we can presume his children lived on with their mothers in righteousness. And we never find a story about a secret society of women doing evil deeds in the Old Testament (or in the Book of Mormon) because these women would not pass on the tradition of darkness. It's only found "among the sons of men." 

Thousands of years later, thanks to one his wives, the line of Lamech would produce a great man named Joseph, who would become the husband of Mary, the Mother of God. (See Luke 3:23, 36-38.)

WOMEN WHO CHOOSE RIGHTEOUSNESS 

The first three women named in the Old Testament, Eve, Adah, and Zillah, were all women who took the initiative to do what was right, even when it was hard, even when it caused pain. They also suffered great sorrow because of the sins of a family member. Yet they put their trust in Christ and his Atonement, offering their sacrifices literally and figuratively on the altar of God, and because of that, they could know "the joy of [their] redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient" (Moses 5:11). 

These women's wounds would be healed and their tears wiped away through the power of Christ's word and the strength of His love. Their troubled family members would hear the gospel preached and have another chance at redemption in the next life.

"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah... (1 Peter 4:6).

Christ has told us, "In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33).

Latter-day women who choose righteousness: My friend Cecile Eden (right) with Relief Society sisters in South Korea. Photo used with permission.

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For more about Eve and the Fall, please see Elder Dallin H. Oaks, "The Great Plan of Happiness," General Conference Address, October 1993, and Valerie M. Hudson, "I Am a Mormon Because I Am a Feminist," Meridian Magazine, April 22, 2013

Creation: Genesis 1-2; Moses 2-3; Abraham 4-5

 THE HARMONY OF THE CREATION ACCOUNTS

The photos in this post are of bas-relief art depicting the Creation on the outside of Saint Chappelle in Paris, France. I took these photos and you are welcome to copy them.

There are three locations of scriptural accounts of the Creation:  Genesis 1-2 (two separate accounts here), Moses 2-3 and Abraham 4-5.  The same sequence takes place in all of them.  Moses and Abraham verify the truth of the King James Version, as well as clarifying it with additional information.  Some examples follow:

• THERE WERE MULTIPLE CREATORS. Although Genesis uses the singular word "God" as the Creator of the earth, it switches to plural, letting us know it may have been a committee of gods. "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness"(Genesis 1:26).  In addition to revealing the story of the pre-earth existence and the plan of salvation, the Book of Moses gives a preface that clarifies who the Creators were.  "And it came to pass that the Lord spake unto Moses, saying: Behold, I reveal unto you concerning this heaven, and this earth; write the words which I speak. I am the Beginning and the End, the Almighty God; by mine Only Begotten I created these things; yea, in the beginning I created the heaven, and the earth upon which thou standest" (Moses 2:1).  Abraham uses the plural all the way through: "And they went down at the beginning, and they, that is the Gods, organized and formed the heavens and the earth." (Abraham 4:1).
• CREATION IS ORGANIZATION AND BEAUTIFICATION. Moses and Abraham both make it clear that the earth was not created from nothing; rather it was organized from existing matter.  "They, that is the Gods, organized and formed the heavens and the earth" (Abraham 4:1).
• GOD CREATES WITH HIS WORD. Abraham and Moses emphasize that the creation was done by the power of God's word.
• “GOOD” MEANS “OBEDIENT.” While Genesis reads that each day was pronounced "good" by God, Moses reads that each day God said that all He had created so far was good, and Abraham reads, "The Gods saw that they were obeyed" (Abraham 4:10).
• DAYS CAN MEAN TIMES, EXPERIENCES, PROJECTS. Abraham uses the word "times" rather than "days." Since time as we know it hadn’t really started yet, perhaps days and times are just ways of describing separate project areas.
• BLUEPRINTS WERE USED. Just as an architect works from a blueprint design, all three stories state that there was a plan first, a spiritual creation before the physical.  (See Gen. 2:5, Moses 3:5, Abr. 5:5.)

CREATIVITY IS A DIVINE CHARACTERISTIC

General Relief Society President Mary Ellen Smoot taught, 

"Creation is one of the characteristics that defines God.  He takes matter without form and molds it into stars, planets, and solar systems...Brothers and sisters, we are children of God.  Shouldn't we be about our Father's business?  Shouldn't we be creators as well?...The raw materials of creation are all around us.  President David O. McKay taught: 'Sculptors of life are we, with our uncarved souls before us...' Do we prize the gifts, talents, and choice spirits that God has given us?  Do we share the creations of our hearts, minds, and hands with others?" (Ensign, May 2000)

President Dieter F. Uchtdorf said that creating contributes to our Heavenly Father's perfect happiness, and can increase our happiness as well. "The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul...Creation means bringing into existence something that did not exist before--colorful gardens, harmonious homes, family memories, flowing laughter...Try to see how many smiles you can create, write a letter of appreciation, learn a new skill, identify a space and beautify it...The more you trust and rely upon the Spirit, the greater your capacity to create.  That is your opportunity in this life and your destiny in the life to come...Trust and rely on the Spirit.  As you take the normal opportunities of your daily life and create something of beauty and helpfulness, you improve not only the world around you but also the world within you" (General Conference, October 2008).

THE CREATION OF HUMANS

I often listen to the “Follow Him” podcast by Hank Smith and John Bytheway. This week, their guest, Dr. Rebekah Call, a professor of history and religious studies at Utah State University, taught such interesting ideas about the creation of Adam and Eve using her extensive knowledge of ancient languages. Here are some of her points:

·         The name Adam refers not just to males but to humankind.

·         Man and woman are meant to “rule” over creation together.

·         Man is never commanded to rule over woman, but is warned that this will happen in the fallen word.

·         Woman was not created from a part of man. The word translated as “rib” is not a body part in the original text. It is a construction term. Woman and man were created when the human was split in two pieces, that then are meant to choose to come back together and become united (Genesis 2:24).

 (I highly recommend listening to this! Episode 3 of 2026. Here it is on YouTube but you can also find the audio on your podcast platform.)

THE FALL AND THE NEXT CREATION

In our most recent General Conference, Elder Matthew Holland said, “We don’t often speak of a testimony of the Fall. But having a doctrinal understanding and spiritual witness of why every single one of us struggles with moral, physical, and situational challenges is a great blessing. Here on earth, ugly weeds grow, even strong bones break, and all ‘come short of the glory of God.’ But this mortal condition—a result of choices made by Adam and Eve—is essential to the very reason we exist: ‘that [we] might have joy’!” (General Conference, October 2025).

Our Father in Heaven and His Beloved Son Jesus Christ were not finished creating on Day 7 of the earth’s genesis—they were just beginning! They had created a beautiful earth out of a formless void, out of chaotic materials as a stage for co-creating beautiful lives for and with us, their children. To get us onto that stage, there had to be a fall into chaos, where choices could really mean something, where agency could really come into play.

In the “Follow Him” podcast, Rebekah Call made a point that hit me like a ton of bricks: “Creation is messy!” She pointed out that if you go into a potter’s studio, an artist’s studio, a construction site, anyplace where something is being created, you are going to find a mess!

Imagine a kitchen that is pristine. All the cooking implements are put away in the cupboard. The counter or table is clear of food. The sink is clean and shiny. This is a kitchen where no cooking is taking place. There isn’t going to be any dinner if someone doesn’t start messing it up!

When Beethoven wrote his masterpieces, his apartment was a disaster with scraps of paper covering everything. When the paper ran out, he wrote music on the walls or the shutters. It looked like a cyclone had been in the room!

Dr. Call compares our own ward or branch to a human laboratory, a messy place where Zion is being created. “Charity is not the easy kind of love. Charity suffers long! That means there’s something to be suffered…Charity is the hard kind of love, when there is every justification to not do it. We get to go to church to learn to be charitable...If we are serious disciples of Christ, then having an annoying ward is not a reason to walk away from the church.” The host, Hank Smith, added, “The Lord told us He wants us to love our enemies, so he put them in our ward…” to which John Bytheway replied, “Lots of enemies, one convenient location!”

Thanks to the Fall, we are all now a part of the creation process! We are creating our own lives, with the help of the Godhead. We are creating Zion in our wards and branches. We are creating eternal families using the family members we have been given. We are creating societies where people can flourish. We are creating beauty and order around us. We are creating health for ourselves and others. All of these creations should be done with “the power of God’s word,” only we might capitalize Word—the power of Jesus Christ. We can follow the blueprints that God has given us and “Think Celestial,” as President Russell M. Nelson counseled. But then we need to remember our testimony of The Fall: Things are supposed to “fall” apart in our lives, so that we can co-create with Christ something new, something that brings us closer to God.

This week, look around you for chaos and mess. What can you create from it with Christ’s help? Where can you create unity, love, order and beauty? If we stay close to God and trust in Him, our chaos can be the raw materials of something even more amazing than we had ever imagined.

Abraham 3: Our Place in the Cosmos

 ABRAHAM 3, PEARL OF GREAT PRICE

Carl Sagan, the famous atheistic scientist, stated, “A religion old or new, that stressed the magnificence of the universe as revealed by modern science, might be able to draw forth reserves of reverence and awe hardly tapped by the conventional faiths. Sooner or later such a religion will emerge (Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan (2011) “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space”, p.71).

Well, Carl needed to read Abraham 3.

By ESA/Hubble, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8788068

THE RELATIVITY OF TIME

As Abraham was using the Urim and Thummim to study the stars in the night sky, God spoke to him and taught him a bit about the relativity of time in the cosmos. Abraham noticed that there were some huge stars near God’s throne.

v. 3 “And the Lord said unto me: These are the governing ones; and the name of the great one is Kolob, because it is near unto me, for I am the Lord thy God: I have set this one to govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.” Whether great or small, all the celestial bodies stand in a relationship to each other, an order. The greater ones govern the lesser ones.

v. 6-8 “And the Lord said unto me: Now Abraham, these two facts exist, behold thine eyes see it; it is given unto thee to know the times of reckoning, and the set time, yea, the set time of the earth…and of the [sun]…and of the [moon].” Each planet’s time is different, but is relative to other celestial bodies’ times. They are connected in a system.

God teaches Abraham that the sun’s time is longer than the moon’s, which is longer than the earth’s time. Today’s science bears this out: Earth completes a rotation in about 24 hours, while the Moon takes roughly 27.3 days to rotate once. The moon’s speed is perfectly synchronized with its orbit around Earth due to tidal locking, which is why we always see the same side of the moon. The Sun is spinning faster on its own axis than the Moon is on its axis (Google A.I.). He also teaches him the times of all the stars between earth and Kolob.

v. 12 “And he said unto me: My son, my son (and his hand was stretched out), behold I will show you all these.” Following the same pattern as He used with Moses (Moses 1:4), God impressed upon Abraham how powerful He was; then immediately emphasized that Abraham was His son. What an empowering message!

v. 15 “And the Lord said unto me: Abraham, I show these things unto thee before ye go into Egypt, that ye may declare all these words.” Because of famine, Abraham and his family had to flee to Egypt (Genesis 12). The Egyptians were amazing students of the stars and planets. They knew the earth was round and had accurately calculated its size! Google A.I. tells me, “Ancient Egyptians were meticulous astronomers, using star observations for their 365-day calendar, religious festivals, temple alignment (like pyramids), and predicting the Nile's flood, developing concepts like Decans (star groups for timekeeping) and tracking planets, linking the cosmos to deities like Nut (sky goddess) and Sirius (Sopdet). They created star charts (diagonal star tables) for navigation and the afterlife, mapping constellations and even noting the variability of stars like Algol millennia before Western science.”

God loves seekers! Perhaps He wanted His prophet to give more to the seeking Egyptian scientists. Likely He wanted them to know Him as the Constructor of the cosmos and give up their worship of Nut and Sirius. And maybe He wanted Abraham to be recognized as a source of knowledge, so He could teach them of the one true God. We have little information about his sojourn in Egypt, but we do know about the nature of God and prophets.

v. 16 “If two things exist, and there be one above the other, there shall be greater things above them; therefore Kolob is the greatest of all the [stars] that thou hast seen, because it is nearest unto me.”

So there is an ascendancy of stars, each with relatively slower time. Kolob is the greatest, its time is the slowest, and it is the closest to God. Why do we need to know whether time slows as you get closer to God? So that we can know that “there is nothing that the Lord thy God shall take in his heart to do but what he will [or can] do it” (v. 17).

THE RELATIVITY OF INTELLIGENCES

God then teaches Abraham that people are like stars. Their spirits are of different intelligences. They are eternal. And again, one will be more intelligent than another. “I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than they all” (v. 19). For example, He was so powerful that he could rescue Abraham from a deadly situation (v. 20).

v. 21 “I dwell in the midst of them all…my wisdom excelleth them all, for I rule in the heavens…and in the earth…in all wisdom and prudence over all the intelligences…”

v. 22-23 “Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was; and among all these there were many of the noble and great ones. And God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said, These I will make my rulers…” As the stars relate to and govern each other in a system, so do the spirits.

v. 24-26 “And there stood one among them that was like unto God…” and He had a plan to make an earth and let the spirits become humans and use their agency to grow and learn and gain glory (great knowledge and joy).

v. 27 “And the Lord said: Whom shall I send? And one answered like unto the Son of Man [Man is capitalized; it’s one of the names of Christ]: Here am I, send me. And another answered and said: Here am I, send me. And the Lord said: I will send the first.” If we read on into the next chapter, we will see that this question seems to be about who is willing to create the earth. (Remember that Abraham didn’t divide the book into chapters.) No Atonement is mentioned here!

In the corresponding story in Moses’ writings (Moses 4:1-3) we find out “That Satan…came before me, saying—Behold, here am I, send me, I will be thy son, and I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost, and surely I will do it; wherefore give me thine honor.”

And God’s Beloved Son offered, “Father, thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever.”

Jesus is closest to the Father, just as Kolob is closest to His throne. Jesus “understood the assignment” because He shared the Father’s vision for us. Does Beloved Son mean Favorite Son? Well, maybe, but also godly love is unity with the Father. Jesus was the Son who was filled with Love.

THE IMPORTANCE OF ORBITING

I love how S. Michael Wilcox taught about this great vision of Abraham. I’m paraphrasing him here. To teach us about the stars and their light and their relationship to Kolob and Kolob’s relationship to God is to teach us about ourselves and our intelligence and our relationship to God’s prophets, our leaders, who have greater light, and who orbit Christ, who is a twin star with Heavenly Father. Each time we look at the light of the stars in the heavens, it will be a reminder that we also are beings of light. (Remember light = intelligence.) We have our place, we should stay close to our leaders, who will stay close to Christ. By following the stars of God, our apostles, we will be able to “hie to Kolob” or come unto Christ.

Christus statue in Rome, Italy Temple visitor's center, encircled by the 12 apostles. My photo: feel free to copy.

The sun offers clarifying light, the moon offers gentle light, the stars offer guiding light. God sends all these types of light out to His children in the world, literally and metaphorically. That’s why many of our temples have these depicted on their walls, doors, and furnishings.

“Lucifer’s great mistake,” Brother Wilcox taught, “was that he could not orbit” (“The Great Visions of the Pearl of Great Price,” BYU Education Week lecture, August 2015, personal notes).

Images of sun, moon, and stars on doors of Washington, D.C. Temple

SCIENTIFIC THEORIES OF GOD’S SYSTEMS

No one understands the physics of our world and universe. Nor do we understand time. No one has been able to explain gravity. No one really understands how the theory of relativity actually works. Quantum mechanics baffles everyone. (Look up quantum entanglement, just for fun!) Everything Einstein discovered left him with even more questions. There are even experiments that show time seeming to loop or fold where measurements in the present seem to effect the past of an entangled particle! Clearly there is a lot about the cosmos that we don’t know. Yet God found it was important to show Abraham (and us) that time is relative and slows down the closer it gets to Him.

You may have watched or read science fiction where the relativity of time is shown. Someone goes to Mars and ages at a much slower rate because the time is slower, while their friends and family age at the earth rate and will be dead when they return. Time is not the same everywhere and if you travel at the speed of light, it disappears altogether.

Light traveling from the sun to the earth takes 8 minutes according to earth’s time. But the light itself would experience it differently, like the man on Mars only more so. It would arrive on the earth at the exact same time it “left” the sun. It would be in both places at the same time.

WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH THE GOSPEL?

God is a Being filled with Light. This makes Him Omnipresent (present everywhere at once). And being Omnipresent makes Him also Omniscient (all-knowing). This also gives us a tiny clue about how the great Atonement may have been wrought.

Surprisingly, the first time that an Atonement is mentioned in the Creation stories in scripture is in Moses 5:6-9, after Adam and Eve have left the Garden of Eden. Adam follows God’s directive to offer animal sacrifices and an angel comes to explain that they are symbolic of “the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth.” The angel tells Adam he must act in the name of the Son of God and repent and pray in His name. Then the Holy Ghost fell upon Adam and told him that, “as thou hast fallen thou mayest be redeemed, and all mankind, even as many as will.”

The damage experienced in our “time” on earth by the mistakes of ourselves and others can be repaired by an infinite experience of healing and reunification performed for each one—an Atonement suffered by a Being so full of Light that He could experience extremely slow or even nonexistent time! 

Knowing about Jesus’ time and His intelligence in relation to our time and our intelligence (or lack of it) helps us understand His great power and helps us trust in Him and His ability to save.

As C.S. Lewis said, “God is not hurried along in the time stream of this universe…He has infinite time to spend with each one of us…When Christ died for you he died just as much as if you had been the only person in the world” (from his book, Mere Christianity).

Moses 1: Judging Between Good and Evil

 

MOSES 1, PEARL OF GREAT PRICE

Many Bible scholars are divided on how we got the book of Genesis. The reason for the question is that the first chapter of Genesis, which explains the authorship, is missing from the Bible.  This problem was solved in June of 1830 when the Lord gave that chapter back to us as Joseph Smith began work on his Bible translation.  It now can be found in the Pearl of Great Price as Moses chapter 1. 
But why would it have been missing in the first place?  Moses 1:23 gives us the answer:  "And now of this thing Moses bore record; but because of wickedness it is not had among the children of men."  The devil had chapter one removed from the Bible.

Why?

Satan wanted the first chapter of the Bible removed because it is the book of instructions for beating him.

Moses 1 teaches us the Battle Plan:

1) Who our Leader is and what his characteristics are
2) What the battle objective is
3) Who we are and how we fit in
4) Who the Enemy is, and what his main tactic is
5) That he is less powerful than God
6) How he can be defeated
7) How extensive the Lord's commitment is, and how great His help will be

The Book of Moses is an amazing tool to help us overcome any of the snares of the devil.  As an example, we can see how to avoid or escape pornography addiction in Moses 1.

Moses shares with us his first-hand experience with God. He was elevated to an exceedingly high mountain, transfigured, introduced to God and His character, and shown a glorious vision of God’s creations. Then he was told that he would have a part in God’s plans.

v. 6  "I have a work for thee, Moses, my son."  Heavenly Father has a great work for each of us and the devil knows it.  He'd love to derail it, just as he wished to stop Moses from being worthy of his great calling.

v. 12  "But now mine own eyes have beheld God; but not my natural, but my spiritual eyes, for my natural eyes could not have beheld; for I should have withered and died in his presence; but his glory was upon me; and I beheld his face, for I was transfigured before him.” The experience of being in the presence of God was electrifying and overwhelming! “And it came to pass that when Moses had said these words, behold, Satan came tempting him, saying: Moses, son of man, worship me."  Moses was still standing on holy ground, where he had had such a wonderful vision, when the devil showed up. The same thing happened to Joseph Smith in the Sacred Grove.  There are some people that Satan knows will never go out and get in trouble, so he tries to bring trouble to them. Accidentally seeing pornography will happen to most of us.

v. 12 Heavenly Father called Moses his son, a son of God.  What did the devil call him?  "Son of man."  The devil would say, "You're only human...It's only natural to desire porn (or commit any other sin)."  But we know the natural man is an enemy to God.  We are to rise above that to our true potential.

v. 13 "And it came to pass that Moses looked upon Satan and said: Who art thou? For behold, I am a son of God, in the similitude of his Only Begotten."  So are we! The Young Men and Women recite it every Sunday.

v. 13-15 "Where is thy glory, that I should worship thee? For behold, I could not look upon God, except his glory should come upon me, and I were transfigured before him. But I can look upon thee in the natural man. Is it not so, surely?  Blessed be the name of my God, for his Spirit hath not altogether withdrawn from me, or else where is thy glory, for it is darkness unto me? And I can judge between thee and God."  Moses had never met the devil, but he confidently said, “You are not someone worthy of worship." The difference between his experience with the devil and with the Lord was vastly different.  A former bishop told me that every person who has come into his office to seek help because they were over their head in sin has said, "I knew it was wrong when I started, but..."  Every person has the Light of Christ, or what we call a conscience--even people who know nothing about Christ. 

v. 15 "God said unto me: Worship God, for him only shalt thou serve."  We cannot live a dual life.  We may think that we can view pornography and do everything else right and that it will be okay.  It will not work. The Spirit will not stay with us. But this does not mean we should stop going to church! Overcoming pornography and replacing it with holy stress-relieving habits takes time and it takes more exposure to the Spirit, not less!

v. 16  "Get thee hence, Satan; deceive me not; for God said unto me: Thou art after the similitude of mine Only Begotten."  Moses said God told him he was made to be like Jesus Christ. We likewise can say to the devil, "I have taken upon me the name of Christ, and I will not be sidetracked from my goal of becoming like Him.

v. 18 Moses said, "I will not cease to call upon God, I have other things to inquire of him."  No matter whether any other ill effects ever should come of viewing pornography, the loss of the Spirit would be so disastrous, that reason alone should make us want to stay as far away from it as possible.

v. 19   "And now, when Moses had said these words, Satan cried with a loud voice, and ranted upon the earth, and commanded, saying: I am the Only Begotten, worship me."  After Moses made it clear that Jesus Christ was the most important thing in his life, Satan said, "I am the Only Begotten, worship me."  This is what he does: he will try to find out what is important to each of us, and then he'll say, “I have that!” And then he introduces a harmful counterfeit.

But this tactic only works for people who know nothing about the gospel, and who ignore the Spirit of Christ within them.  Moses knew that the devil was not Christ, because he already knew Christ!  If we study the truth, we will recognize lies. 

v. 20-22  "And it came to pass that Moses began to fear exceedingly; and as he began to fear, he saw the bitterness of hell. Nevertheless, calling upon God, he received strength, and he commanded, saying: Depart from me, Satan, for this one God only will I worship, which is the God of glory. And now Satan began to tremble, and the earth shook; and Moses received strength, and called upon God, saying: In the name of the Only Begotten, depart hence, Satan.  And it came to pass that Satan cried with a loud voice, with weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth; and he departed hence, even from the presence of Moses, that he beheld him not.” The devil's stellar characteristic is tenacity.  He never gives up. We have to be more tenacious! We may find, like Moses, that we need Priesthood help if we are embroiled in a fight with the devil.  It may be beyond what we can do, but it is never beyond Christ.  Who is his representative? The bishop.

v. 24-25 "And it came to pass that when Satan had departed from the presence of Moses, that Moses lifted up his eyes unto heaven, being filled with the Holy Ghost, which beareth record of the Father and the Son;  And calling upon the name of God, he beheld his glory again, for it was upon him; and he heard a voice, saying: Blessed art thou, Moses, for I, the Almighty, have chosen thee, and thou shalt be made stronger than many waters; for they shall obey thy command as if thou wert God."  When Moses won the battle, he once again was filled with the Spirit.  After we have repented, calling upon the name of Christ, we can leave it in the past. God will again be with us, “even unto the end of thy days” (v. 26).

Then Moses, once again, was able to talk with God, face to face, and behold even greater visions than before. His mission was not removed. And the truth he learned was earth-shattering.

vs. 39 “For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” Imagine how much fear and misery the Judeo-Christian religions could have been spared had this singular truth remained in the first pages of the Old Testament: God’s goal is not our condemnation or our damnation; it is our immortality and eternal growth! God wants us to win and will help us to succeed!

I wish I could remember the name of this artist. She offers her work freely online. If you know it, please drop it in the comments.