Exaltation

Exaltation

Create and People Worlds

Brigham Young

All those who are counted worthy to be exalted and to become Gods, even the sons of God, will go forth and have earths and worlds like those who framed this and millions on millions of others.

Journal of Discourses 17:143

Having fought the good fight we then shall be prepared to lay our bodies down to rest to await the morning of the resurrection when they will come forth and be reunited with the spirits, the faithful, as it is said, receiving crowns, glory, immortality and eternal lives, even a fulness with the Father, when Jesus shall present His work to the Father, saying, ‘Father, here is the work thou gavest me to do.’ Then will they become Gods, even the sons of God; then will they become eternal fathers, eternal mothers, eternal sons and eternal daughters; being eternal in their organization they go from glory to glory, from power to power; they will never cease to increase and to multiply, worlds without end. When they receive their crowns, their dominions, they then will be prepared to frame earths like unto ours and to people them in the same manner as we have been brought forth by our parents, by our Father and God

Discourses of Brigham Young, p. 283; Journal of Discourses 18:259, October 8, 1876

Bruce R. McConkie

Exalted parents are to their children as our Eternal Parents are to us. Eternal increase, a continuation of the seeds forever and ever, eternal lives — these comprise the eternal family of those who gain eternal life. For them new earths are created, and thus the on-rolling purposes of the Gods of Heaven go forward from eternity to eternity.

Bruce R. McConkie, The Millennial Messiah, 23, 1982

Joseph Fielding Smith

That great blessing of celestial glory could never have come to us without a period of time in mortality, and so we came here in this mortal world. We are in school, the mortal school, to gain the experiences, the training, the joys, and the sufferings that we partake of, that we might be educated in all these things and be prepared, if we are faithful and true to the commandments of the Lord, to become sons and daughters of God, joint heirs with Jesus Christ; and in His presence to go on to a fulness and a continuation of the seeds forever, and perhaps through our faithfulness to have the opportunity of building worlds and peopling them.

Joseph Fielding Smith, “Adam’s Role in Bringing Us Mortality,” General Conference, Oct. 1976, reprinted in Liahona, Jan. 2006.

The Father has promised us that through our faithfulness we shall be blessed with the fullness of his kingdom. In other words, we will have the privilege of becoming like him. To become like him we must have all the powers of godhood; thus a man and his wife when glorified will have spirit children who eventually will go on an earth like this one we are on and pass through the same kind of experiences, being subject to mortal conditions, and if faithful, then they also will receive the fullness of exaltation and partake of the same blessings. There is no end to this development; it will go on forever. We will become gods and have jurisdiction over worlds, and these worlds will be peopled by our own offspring.

Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation 2:48, quoted in Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual, 1976, p.132

L. Tom Perry

In an October, 1997 conference address titled, “Receive Truth,” Apostle L. Tom Perry cited 12th President Spencer W. Kimball who taught, “Peter and John had little secular learning, being termed ignorant. But they knew the vital things of life, that God lives and that the crucified, resurrected Lord is the Son of God. They knew the path to eternal life. This they learned in a few decades of their mortal life. Their righteous lives opened the door to godhood for them and creation of worlds with eternal increase.”

President Kimball Speaks Out [1981], 91). (See Ensign, November 1997, p. 60

Lorenzo Snow

Only a short time before his death, President Snow visited the Brigham Young University [then Brigham Young Academy], at Provo. President Brimhall escorted the party through one of the buildings; he wanted to reach the assembly room as soon as possible, as the students had already gathered. They were going through one of the kindergarten rooms; President Brimhall had reached the door and was about to open it and go on when President Snow said: ‘Wait a moment, President Brimhall, I want to see these children at work; what are they doing?’ Brother Brimhall replied that they were making clay spheres. ‘That is very interesting,’ the President said. ‘I want to watch them.’ He quietly watched the children for several minutes and then lifted a little girl, perhaps six years of age, and stood her on a table. He then took the clay sphere from her hand, and, turning to Brother Brimhall, said: ‘President Brimhall, these children are now at play, making mud worlds, the time will come when some of these boys, through their faithfulness to the gospel, will progress and develop in knowledge, intelligence and power, in future eternities, until they shall be able to go out into space where there is unorganized matter and call together the necessary elements, and through their knowledge of and control over the laws and powers of nature, to organize matter into worlds on which their posterity may dwell, and over which they shall rule as gods.’ 

Lorenzo Snow, Improvement Era, June 1919, 658–59

We are the offspring of God, born with the same faculties and powers as He possesses, capable of enlargement through the experience that we are now passing through in our second estate… He has begotten us in His own image. He has given us faculties and powers that are capable of enlargement until His fullness is reached which He has promised — until we shall sit upon thrones, governing and controlling our posterity from eternity to eternity, and increasing eternally.

Lorenzo Snow, Millennial Star 56:772, October 5, 1894

When two Latter-day Saints are united together in marriage, promises are made to them concerning their offspring that reach from eternity to eternity. They are promised that they shall have the power and the right to govern and control and administer salvation and exaltation and glory to their offspring, worlds without end. And what offspring they do not have here, undoubtedly there will be opportunities to have them hereafter. What else could man wish? A man and a woman, in the other life, having celestial bodies, free from sickness and disease, glorified and beautified beyond description, standing in the midst of their posterity, governing and controlling them, administering life, exaltation and glory worlds without end.

Deseret News, 13 Mar. 1897; quoted by Spencer W. Kimball in The Miracle of Forgiveness [1969], 246;  See also Lesson 10 of The Latter-day Saint Woman: Basic Manual for Women, Part A

Moses Thatcher

There is a spirit in man and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth it understanding; the sinful who listen and obey are led to repentance, and, through the doors of baptism of the water and spirit are brought out of wickedness to the enlightenment of pure knowledge, until in obedience to heavenly law they secure the keys of power authorizing them to pass by the angels, inherit glory, become heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ; and, having abiding in them eternal lives shall beget, throughout the endless ages of eternity, the souls of the children of men to the honor and glory of God, and create and have dominion over worlds.

Moses Thatcher, Journal of Discourses 26:305

Orson Pratt

But another and still greater object the Lord had in view in sending us down from yonder world to this is, that we might be redeemed in due time, by keeping the celestial law, and have our tabernacles restored to us in all the beauty of immortality. Then we will be able to multiply and extend forth our posterity and the increase of our dominion without end. Can spirits do this? No, they remain single. There are no marriages among spirits, no coupling together of the males and females among them; but when they rise from the grave, after being tabernacled in mortal bodies, they have all the functions that are necessary to people worlds. As our Father and God begat us, sons and daughters, so will we rise immortal, males and females, and beget children, and, in our turn, form and create worlds, and send forth our spirit children to inherit those worlds, the same as we were sent here, and thus will the works of God continue, and not only God himself, and His Son Jesus Christ have the power of endless lives, but all of His redeemed offspring.

Orson Pratt, Journal of Discourses 14:242

Each God, through his wife or wives, raises up a numerous family of sons and daughters; indeed, there will be no end to the increase of his own children: for each father and mother will be in a condition to multiply forever and ever. As soon as each God has begotten many millions of male and female spirits, and his Heavenly inheritance becomes too small, to comfortably accommodate his great family, he, in connection with his sons, organizes a new world, after a similar order to the one which we now inhabit, where he sends both the male and female spirits to inhabit tabernacles of flesh and bones. Thus each God forms a world for the accommodation of his own sons and daughters who are sent forth in their times and seasons, and generations to be born into the same. The inhabitants of each world are required to reverence, adore, and worship their own personal father who dwells in the Heaven which they formerly inhabited.

Orson Pratt, The Seer, 37, March 1853

Spencer W. Kimball

Desirable as is secular knowledge, one is not truly educated unless he has the spiritual with the secular. The secular knowledge is to be desired; the spiritual knowledge is an absolute necessity. We shall need all of the accumulated secular knowledge in order to create worlds and to furnish them, but only through the ‘mysteries of God’ and these hidden treasures of knowledge may we arrive at the place and condition where we may use that knowledge in creation and exaltation

Spencer W. Kimball, Conference Reports, October 1968, p.131

Each one of you has it within the realm of his possibility to develop a kingdom over which you will preside as its king and god. You will need to develop yourself and grow in ability and power and worthiness, to govern such a world with all of its people.

Spencer W Kimball, Matter of Marriage, address delivered at University of Utah Institute of Religion, 22 Oct. 1976, See also church manuals, Chapter 4: Teaching Children: from Four to Eleven Years,” A Parent’s Guide., Doctrine and Covenants and Church History Seminary Teacher Resource Manual – Introduction: Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual – Chapter 10..

We educate ourselves in the secular field and in the spiritual field so that we may one day create worlds, people and govern them.

The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball, ed. Edward L. Kimball [1982], 386)

Brethren, 225,000 of you are here tonight. I suppose 225,000 of you may become gods. There seems to be plenty of space out there in the universe. And the Lord has proved that he knows how to do it. I think he could make, or probably have us help make, worlds for all of us, for every one of us 225,000

Spencer W. Kimball, “The Privilege of Holding the Priesthood,” Ensign (Conference Edition), November 1975, p. 80. Quoted in Doctrine and Covenants Institute Student Manual

Commentary

Orthodox Mormonism

Growing up Mormon, I had great confidence in a theology that, in most ways, remained consistent and unshaken. For me, there was a steadiness in the Mormon church.

I was confident that I could, by obeying the laws and ordinances of the Mormon gospel, someday become a god like all gods before me. I had been taught that polygamy was an eternal principle even if it was no longer practiced in the world. I fully believed that I, like the god I worshiped, would receive a harem of celestialized wives with whom I would enjoy eternal sex. I was confident that the day would come when I would create a world of my own and people it with millions or billions of my future offspring, and that I would be their god.

For me, the best part was the promise of everlasting and unlimited sex. Boys will be boys I suppose.

Shifting Sands of Doctrine

Then Gordon B. Hinckley became the prophet of the church and the practice of throwing previous prophets and doctrines under the bus became commonplace. This practice has continued in earnest since the late nineties.

Q: Just another related question that comes up is the statements in the King Follet discourse by the Prophet.

A: Yeah.

Q: … about that, God the Father was once a man as we were. This is something that Christian writers are always addressing. Is this the teaching of the church today, that God the Father was once a man like we are?

A: I don’t know that we teach it. I don’t know that we emphasize it. I haven’t heard it discussed for a long time in public discourse. I don’t know. I don’t know all the circumstances under which that statement was made. I understand the philosophical background behind it. But I don’t know a lot about it and I don’t know that others know a lot about it.

Transcript from the interview of David van Biema, reported in “Kingdom Come,” TIME Magazine (4 August 1997): 56, ellipsis in original.

Q: There are some significant differences in your beliefs. For instance, don’t Mormons believe that God was once a man?

A: I wouldn’t say that. There was a little couplet coined, “As man is, God once was. As God is, man may become.” Now that’s more of a couplet than anything else. That gets into some pretty deep theology that we don’t know very much about.

Don Lattin, “Musings of the Main Mormon,” San Francisco Chronicle, 13 April 1997.

I have come to understand that today’s new-age Mormonism has no resemblance to the church I once knew. Borrowing from Psalm 130:12, I declare that as far as the east is from the west, so hath the modern Mormon church removed orthodox Mormonism from itself.

Most in the church accept the shifting sands of Mormonism with no thought or care. However, as a Mormon and even now as a biblical Christian I believe this passage from the Book of Mormon.

For I know that God is not a partial God, neither a changeable being; but he is unchangeable from all eternity to all eternity.

Book of Mormon, Moroni 8:18

Today, the Mormon church denies what its prophets and apostles taught from 1820 until the end of the twentieth century. Because they teach an opposite and contradictory theology, then one or both must be heretics. One may be right, but they cannot all be right together. The Mormon church teaches that they were all prophets and apostles of God, even as they published this.

Do Latter-day Saints believe that they will “get their own planet”?

No. This idea is not taught in Latter-day Saint scripture, nor is it a doctrine of the Church. This misunderstanding stems from speculative comments unreflective of scriptural doctrine. Mormons believe that we are all sons and daughters of God and that all of us have the potential to grow during and after this life to become like our Heavenly Father (see Romans 8:16-17). The Church does not and has never purported to fully understand the specifics of Christ’s statement that “in my Father’s house are many mansions” (John 14:2).

Mormonism 101: Frequently Asked Questions, https://news-uk.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/mormonism-101–faq

Many of the forgoing quotations were delivered by Mormon prophets and apostles in general conferences. Once again, what I was taught and what is now being taught are altogether different things.

President Joseph Fielding Smith (1876–1972) taught about latter-day scripture:

When one of the brethren stands before a congregation of the people today, and the inspiration of the Lord is upon him, he speaks that which the Lord would have him speak. It is just as much scripture as anything you will find written in any of these records, and yet we call these the standard works of the Church. We depend, of course, upon the guidance of the brethren who are entitled to inspiration.

TEACHINGS OF THE LIVING PROPHETS STUDENT MANUAL Chapter 6: General Conference,” Teachings of the Living Prophets Student Manual (2010), 70–83

In the wake of these old and new teachings, confusion troubles the human mind.

For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.

1 Corinthians 14:33, KJV

Theology Built on the Rock

When the Mormon church rejected Moroni 8:18, I turned away and became a true disciple of Christ. In this new reality, certain things are true today as they have always been and will always be.

Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

Isaiah 43:10, KJV

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.

Hebrews 13:8, KJV

¹If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, ²And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; ³Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

Deuteronomy 13:1-3, KJV