A princess doll or a picture of a princess or a tiara
Beautifully wrapped gift, with a picture of Christ inside
Write on the board, “And they lived happily ever after”
INTRODUCTION
Hand out the following story segments from the fairy tale
“Cinderella” to class members. Have them read in random order.
Once
there was a lovely young girl named Cinderella. She lived in a mansion
with her father and mother, who loved her very, very much.
Sadly, Cinderella's mother died and her father remarried after which her father also died.
Cinderella, her stepmother and stepsisters became poor and moved to a cottage.
Although
Cinderella's stepmother treated her unkindly and forced her to work all
day like a slave, Cinderella maintained her kind and loving character.
One day the Prince held a ball in order to find a suitable wife.
Cinderella's stepmother and stepsisters went to the ball without her. Cinderella had no way to get there, and no dress to wear.
In
the midst of her despair, Cinderella's Fairy Godmother appeared, turned
mice into horses, and a pumpkin into a golden carriage so that she
could get to ball.
Then she dressed Cinderella in a beautiful gown with jewels, and sent her to the palace.
At the ball, Cinderella won the Prince's heart.
Cinderella had to leave the ball without revealing her identity.
On the way out of the castle, she lost one of her glass slippers.
The Prince found the glass slipper and searched the kingdom, looking for its owner.
Finally
the Prince found Cinderella. Although she was in servant's clothing,
he knew she was the right girl because she fit the slipper.
The Prince took Cinderella to his castle where they were married. And they lived happily ever after.
If you take one piece of the story out of context of the
whole plot, it makes very little sense, doesn't it? Even if we put these segments in order,
it wouldn’t make too much sense without the beginning and the end of the story.
The beginning of the story is that Cinderella’s mother and father loved her
dearly, but her mother died, and her father remarried. After he died the true
nature of the mean and selfish stepmother was revealed in her treatment of
Cinderella. And the end of the story is that Cinderella, having kept the kind
and noble character her father blessed her with, met and married Prince Charming
and lived with him in the castle, happily ever after.
Just like this story, or like a three-act play, our
existence has three parts. We are in the middle part, right now, here on earth.
As President Packer says, “The
one in which you will be tested by temptation, by trials, and perhaps by
tragedy.” And then he says, “Remember this! The line ‘And they all lived happily ever after’ is
never written into the second act. That line belongs in the third act, when the mysteries are solved
and everything is put right.” (The
Play and the Plan Satellite Broadcast May 7, 1995. Quoted in manual p. 108)
So, let’s very briefly look at the whole play, all three
acts of the story of our existence.
THE STAGE SETTINGS
(Draw the classic map of “the plan of salvation” with
pre-existence, veil & birth, earth life, veil & death, spirit world,
divided into paradise and prison, judgment, and the three kingdoms.) Now, we
tend to label this little diagram, “The Plan of Salvation,” but this is not the
plan of salvation. Let me say that one more time: this is not the plan of salvation. This is merely the chronology of our
existence, the framework within which the plan of salvation works, or, we could
say, the stage settings for the play. (Label the chart “Chronology of
Existence.”
We could just as well draw the stage settings for the
fairy tale of Cinderella. (Draw boxes labeled “mansion” under the preexistence,
“cottage” under earth life, and “castle” under the three kingdoms.)
THE PLAN OF SALVATION
So if this is not the plan of salvation, what is? Moses 6:58-62 --
So if this is not the plan of salvation, what is? Moses 6:58-62 --
“Therefore I give unto you a
commandment, to teach these things freely unto your children, saying:
That by reason of transgression
cometh the fall, which fall bringeth death, and inasmuch as ye were born into
the world by water, and blood, and the spirit, which I have made, and so became
of dust a living soul, even so ye must be born again into the kingdom of
heaven, of water, and of the Spirit, and be cleansed by blood, even the blood
of mine Only Begotten; that ye might be sanctified from all sin, and enjoy the
words of eternal life in this world, and eternal life in the world to come,
even immortal glory;
For by the water ye keep the
commandment; by the Spirit ye are justified, and by the blood ye are
sanctified;
Therefore it is given to abide in
you; the record of heaven; the Comforter; the peaceable things of immortal glory;
the truth of all things; that which quickeneth all things, which maketh alive
all things; that which knoweth all things, and hath all power according to
wisdom, mercy, truth, justice, and judgment.
And now, behold, I say unto you:
This is the plan of salvation unto all men, through the blood of mine Only
Begotten, who shall come in the meridian of time.”
So, what did it say? “This is the plan of salvation,” and
the entire thing operates “through the blood of mine Only Begotten who shall
come in the meridian of time.” Obviously, after reading that, we can see that
this chart here on the board is not the plan of salvation because the whole
thing operates through the blood of Christ and he isn’t even mentioned here.
And the three essential elements to the plan, water, blood, and spirit, are
also not noted on this chart. There is nothing wrong with this chart, unless we are going to label it the Plan
of Salvation.
But it is the stage setting for the plot, which includes
the Plan of Salvation.
The plot, very briefly, as noted in Moses 6 is this: In
the pre-existence, we were all spirit children of our Father. He wanted us to
be able to progress to be like him and to be with him, where we could be happy.
(That’s why the plan is also called the Plan of Happiness.) This required our
gaining knowledge and experience. It also required placing us in a perilous
position from which we could not recover on our own, that of mortal existence
with its failings and temptations. To remedy this problem, he planned that a Savior
would pay the price to enable us to succeed. That solution is the Plan of Salvation. We could also call it the
Gospel, as it is called in 3 Nephi 27.
“Behold I have given unto you my
gospel, and this is the gospel which I have given unto you—that I came into the
world to do the will of my Father, because my Father sent me.
And my Father sent me that I
might be lifted up upon the cross; and after that I had been lifted up upon the
cross, that I might draw all men unto me, that as I have been lifted up by men
even so should men be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged
of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil—”
And for this cause have I been
lifted up; therefore, according to the power of the Father I will draw all men
unto me, that they may be judged according to their works. (3 Nephi 27:13-15)
Even
if we have been members of the Church all our lives, we sometimes do not
understand the gospel (the plan of salvation). There are some
who think that there is no way that they will ever be good enough to get
into
the Celestial Kingdom. They have learned this chart on the board very well, but
this chart is missing the essential element of the plan of salvation. If
at the end of the lesson, any of you still think that there is no
chance you will gain
exaltation, I will have failed as a teacher. And I don’t want to fail,
so
listen up!
SALVATION IS A GIFT OF GRACE
Let’s take a look at someone who did not feel that way. Moroni (before he became an angel) was very
certain that he would “make it” to heaven.
“And now I bid unto all,
farewell. I soon go to rest in the paradise of God, until my spirit and body
shall again reunite, and I am brought forth triumphant through the air, to meet
you before the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah, the Eternal Judge of both
quick and dead. Amen.” (Moroni 10:34)
Moroni was a good guy, but he lived in a very wicked world
and he even fought in wars that did not have just causes, and that troubled
him; he wasn’t sure that he should. He had suffered many evils and he was not
perfect because he was mortal like us, yet he was absolutely certain that he
would be “brought forth triumphant through the air.” Why? Right before these
last mortal words of his, he shared his reason. The key to it is found in a
word we don’t use too often as Latter-day Saints, but we most certainly should.
He uses this word 5 times in these two verses. See if you can identify it.
“Yea, come unto Christ, and be
perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny
yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and
strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect
in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in
nowise deny the power of God.
And again, if ye by the grace of
God are perfect in Christ, and deny not his power, then are ye sanctified in
Christ by the grace of God, through the shedding of the blood of Christ, which
is in the covenant of the Father unto the remission of your sins, that ye
become holy, without spot.
And now I bid unto all, farewell.
I soon go to rest in the paradise of God, until my spirit and body shall again
reunite, and I am brought forth triumphant through the air, to meet you before
the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah, the Eternal Judge of both quick and
dead. Amen.” (Moroni 10:32-34)
What is the key word? Grace!
All of this perfection is done, not by not making any mistakes, and not
even by keeping all of the commandments, but by the grace of Christ. “By his grace ye may be perfect in Christ.” It is not possible to become
perfect by yourself, we only become perfect through the grace of Christ.
Unfortunately, it is beyond us to comprehend grace.
Grace, like the atonement it is linked with, defies definition. But maybe we
can come fairly close if we say that grace
is God’s mercy and love as shown in everything that exists, but especially as
manifested in the atonement. Grace is a gift, freely given from Christ.
Elder Todd Christofferson says,
“Given
the magnitude of the gift of grace, we would never suppose, even with all the
good we could possibly do in this life, that we had earned it. It is just too
great.” (June 2001 Ensign, p. 22)
D&C 14:7 -- “And, if you keep
my commandments and endure to the end you shall have eternal life, which gift is the greatest of all the gifts of
God.” We sometimes think that keeping the commandments and enduring to
the end alone is what qualifies us
for eternal life, and that’s why we are afraid we are not going to make the
grade, but this scripture clearly tells us that eternal life is a gift, not an achievement. Romans 6:23 – “…the gift
of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” So why does
D&C 14 tell us that we have to keep the commandments and endure to the end,
if eternal life is given freely through the grace of Jesus Christ? This is what
confuses our born-again friends.
RECEIVING THE GIFT
Suppose it was my birthday and my friend Janet who always
gives delightful little gifts, brought a package and left it on my doorstep.
But suppose that I was out of town, and didn’t see it there, and the neighbor
who was watching over our house put it on the worktable in the garage with the
mail and the newspapers, but our cat knocked it off and it was lost forever
(which you would find very easy to believe if you had ever been in our garage).
Janet had freely given the gift, but I
did not receive it, and therefore never opened it. The gift did me no good.
Christ gives us the gift of his grace freely, but we must
accept it and open it. How do we open it? Through the first principles and
ordinances of the gospel. We learn about Christ and exercise faith in him to
repent of our sins. Then we are baptized and receive the Gift of the Holy
Ghost, and at that point, we have opened the gift. (Open gift to show picture
of Christ.) We are removed from our sinful state through the grace of Christ.
I remember so clearly the year that my dad figured out
how to pick out an excellent Mother’s Day gift for my mother. When she opened
it, I loved it too. It was an adorable little crystal basket, with a little
handle—too small to be good for anything, but so cute. My mom was delighted and
amazed. My dad confessed how he picked out a gift that she liked so well. He
said that he simply went into the store and picked the item that looked the
least useful.
The gift of grace is not like that kind of gift, however.
It is not meant to be opened and then set on a shelf. It is more like a bread
mixer, or a scroll saw, or a vacuum cleaner—it is meant to be used every day. When we fall short
because of our human nature and the faults of the world we live in, we can call
upon Christ’s grace to save us. This is the part of the plan of salvation that
is called “enduring to the end.” We simply continue to exercise those principles
that we used to open the gift in the first place: We exercise enough faith in
Christ to repent of our sins and be filled once again with the Holy Ghost,
through renewing our covenants at sacrament meeting.
JUSTIFICATION AND SANCTIFICATION
Elder Christofferson tells us that the fruits of the
Atonement’s infinite virtue (that is, grace) are justification and
sanctification. It is important to understand the difference between these two concepts because it helps us understand
what the atonement (grace) does for us. Those of us who worry that we will not
“make it into the Celestial Kingdom” maybe understand the concept of
justification, but not the concept of sanctification.
Just as in Moses 6:59 it said that the elements of water and
blood and spirit are all present at our mortal birth, and so we became of mere
dust, living souls, we also must be born again into the Kingdom of God, and
that way we can become of mere mortals, exalted beings. “For by the water ye keep the commandment; by the Spirit ye
are justified, and by the blood ye are sanctified.” (Moses 6:60)
THE GIFT OF GRACE
I hope that I am not making light of the atonement by
referring back to the fairy tale of Cinderella, but it occurred to me that Walt
Disney, in his animated version of the story, illustrated beautifully the
concepts of justification and sanctification. Cinderella longed to leave behind
her position as a scullery maid and go to the ball at the palace, but it was
absolutely impossible for her. There was no way for her to get there. It was
just as impossible as it is for us to get to heaven. But then her fairy
godmother appeared and provided for her the transportation by turning some mice
and a pumpkin into a beautiful golden carriage. That is something like
justification. We have all broken the laws of God and those sins keep us out of
heaven. Justification is Christ providing transportation for us into the
Celestial Kingdom because we don’t have the ability to get there on our own.
It’s like he has paid our bail to get us out of jail. Our sins are forgiven,
but their effects upon us remain.
If you recall the Disney movie, the next thing that happened
was that Cinderella looked down at herself and realized that it didn’t matter
whether she had a golden carriage or not; she was completely unfit for the
ball. She was dirty and dressed in rags. She would be miserable in the palace,
and would be much more comfortable staying home, sitting in the corner by the
chimney than going in the state she was. When the fairy godmother noticed that,
she not only changed Cinderella’s clothing to a beautiful gown, she changed
Cinderella herself from a
soot-covered slave dressed in rags to a beautiful princess, perfectly fit for
the royal extravaganza. That is something like sanctification. Sanctification
is Christ transforming us so that we belong
in heaven with him—our rags are changed into bejeweled robes, our faces our
washed clean, a crown is placed upon our heads, and even our lineage is changed to that of royalty as children of
Christ.
Another place we can find a clarification between
justification and sanctification is in the song “Away in a Manger.” There are
several versions of the third verse of this song. When I was in Primary, the
Primary song book had this version:
Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask thee to stay
Close by me forever, and love me, I pray.
Bless all the dear children in thy tender care,
And take us to heaven to live with thee there.
But now, as you look in the current hymnbook, there is a different version which says:
Bless all the dear children in thy tender care,
And fit us for heaven to live with thee there.
Both versions are doctrinally correct. The first version
describes justification; the second describes sanctification. Maybe we should
just add a repeat sign to that measure of the song and sing
And take us to heaven and fit us for heaven to live with
thee there.
CONCLUSION
In review, the plan of salvation, or the gospel, is the
plan for us to be saved and exalted with Heavenly Father and live “happily ever
after.” This plan operates through the infinite virtue of the atonement of
Christ, which virtue is also known as grace. Grace consists of two parts:
Justification, or the removal of sins, and
sanctification, or the purifying of
the soul. And all of this is a gift, a wonderful gift that we open when we are
baptized into the kingdom. Unlike Cinderella’s experience, though, the changing
of the soul into royalty is a long-term project, once again accomplished through the grace of Christ, but bit by
bit, as we continue along in life, trying to do our best, trying to keep our
covenants. As the scriptures say, we must grow in grace. (D&C 50:40.)
Bruce R. McConkie, the pickiest and most perfectionist of
all the apostles I remember, and the most well-versed in the doctrines of
Christ, (for you younger people who don’t remember him, he was kind of like
Dallin Oaks, only more so), and even as perfectionist as he was, he said,
“Everyone
in the Church who is on the straight and narrow path, who is striving and
struggling and desiring to do what is right, though far from perfect in this
life; if he passes out of this life while he’s on the straight and narrow, he’s
going to go on to eternal reward in his Father’s kingdom." ("The Probationary Test of Mortality," address given at University of Utah, Jan. 1982, p. 2, also found in Joseph McConkie, The Bruce R. McConkie Story, p. 293. See more of this talk on this blog and this website)
“And for this cause have I been
lifted up; therefore, according to the power of the Father I will draw all men
unto me, that they may be judged according to their works.
And it shall come to pass, that
whoso repenteth and is baptized in my name shall be filled; and if he endureth
to the end, behold, him will I hold guiltless before my Father at that day when
I shall stand to judge the world.” (3 Nephi 27:15-16)
Have you repented and been baptized? Have you been filled
(with the Gift of the Holy Ghost)? Then all that remains for you to do is to
endure to the end. And what does that mean? It simply means to continue. Continue to exercise faith in
Christ unto repentance, so that you have the Spirit with you more and more to
sanctify your souls, as we are promised in the sacramental prayers.
You
may like to close with the beautiful and inspiring song “Amazing
Grace,” which has my vote for the next hymnbook. It’s doctrinally
correct, even including
Celestial Glory and Eternal life – it just doesn’t mention the
ordinances. (But
neither does “I Stand All Amazed”) You can have a class member sing it,
play a Mormon Tabernacle Choir version off YouTube, or play my favorite
from a Logan East Stake native, Christina England Hale, available for
free online with this link. (Thanks, Christina!!!! What a lovely resource!)
Additional resource: Teachings from
the D&C Video, “The Plan of Salvation,” 4:24 minutes.
