THE LIGHT OF CHRIST

 

 

I was intrigued with Joseph Fielding Smith’s quote I used in my last post about the Light of Christ being withdrawn from the world.

One comment I received to this post was about the Light of Christ being a conscience and that everyone is born with it, so the suggestion was, how could it be taken from the earth? I pondered all day about it and did some research which made me understand this at a greater level. This is what I found in the Gospel Library Topics and Questions:

“The Light of Christ is the divine energy, power or influence that proceeds from God through Christ and gives life and light to all things. The Light of Christ influences people for good and prepares them to receive the Holy Ghost.”

The definition continues to point out that ‘conscience’ is only one manifestation of the Light of Christ but certainly not the only one. Another manifestation is that the Light of Christ is an influence for good in the lives of all people. I think this is what Joseph Fielding Smith was referring to.

And here is the sad part…..conscience can be lost……just as much as the Light of Christ as an influence……through consistent sinning and yielding our hearts to evil. The scriptures are clear: he that repents not, from him shall be taken even the light which he has received (D&C 1:33). This I believe, is the condition of our world. The conscience has been lost to many besides the influence of the Spirit of Christ.

Other names for the Light of Christ are identified in the scriptures as: the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ or the Light of Life. And….it should not be confused with the Holy Ghost.

All these names denote immense power. A thorough description of the Light of Christ is found in D&C 88:6-13. Reading these scriptures leaves me in awe of the man we call Jesus Christ, Redeemer, Saviour, King of Kings, Son of God, Creator of Heaven and Earth…..

Basically, His light is in the sun, in the moon, in the stars, in the earth. He is the light which shines, which gives us light and enlightens our minds and our understanding, the light which gives life to all things, and which is the law by which all things are governed.

I cannot conceive such power in my mind but I can feel it in my heart. I stand in awe of Him now and forever.

I cannot fathom

The greatness of Thy Godhood.

I can scarce contain who You are

In the hollow of my lacking heart.

I am so small

And you are so vast;

Endow me with wisdom,

Endow me with might,

Help me to comprehend

Beyond the ages of the wise.

 

-  CATHRYNE ALLEN 

(Art: The Creator by Chris Brazelton)

THE POWER OF CHOICE

 

 

I continue to be amazed by the tolerance and longsuffering of our God. How patiently He waits for us to turn ourselves around, to make the right choice, to forsake our path to destruction. How it must pain His merciful heart when that right choice that would lead us to our better end never eventuates!

Reflect on how the principle of the Saviour’s longsuffering played out in Nephites’ time. Their demise and unfortunate end did not happen in 400 A.D. but in 360 A.D. when they made the choice that guaranteed their end. Between 327-50 A.D. the Saviour suffered their wickedness and spared them three times granting them three victories over the Lamanites through which they could recognize His protection (Mormon 2:16,25,27). It did not work.

The second chance came by peace. According to the Mosaic observance of the Jubilee year which happened every 50 years, the land was allowed to rest and was restored to its original inherited line of ownership (see Leviticus 25). During the three hundred and forty ninth year, heading into the Jubilee year, a 10 year peace treaty was made between the Nephites and the Lamanites as the land of their inheritance was divided (Mormon 2:28,29).

During the ten years of peace Mormon was commanded by the Lord to call the people to repentance so they can be spared when the time of peace ended (Mormon 3:1,2). Mormon did so but the people did not recognize that ‘it was the Lord that had spared them, and granted unto them a chance for repentance’ (v 3). What could have been a quite time of contemplation and retrospection, turned into a comfort zone of negligence and pride.

Even though they were granted three more victories over the Lamanites, they still refused to repent ‘boasting in their own strength’ (Mormon 3:13).  From there their thirst for killing headed them into the direction of death as they ‘delighted in the shedding of blood continually’ (v 8,10; 4:11).

And so in 360 A.D. the Lord declared that the Nephites ‘shall be cut off from the face of the earth’ (Mormon 3:15). It was not that they had exhausted the Saviour’s abundance of mercy but that they had made a choice from which there was no return. When we make a choice and intently pursue it to the end, we eventually reap its reward.

As it happened with the Nephites, very often we don’t recognize our opportunities and chances for repentance. And very often we don’t realise that there is such a thing as a point of no return. Mormon realized 40 years before the end that ‘the day of grace was passed’ with his people and the story was finished (Mormon 2:15). Nephites had learnt the worst lesson of all: that it is possible for time to run out as the Spirit of God will not always strive with man (D&C 1:33).

This is the lesson we can take away from this sad part of history, the day of repentance can pass: “…..sin is intensely habit-forming and sometimes moves men to the tragic point of no return…As the transgressor moves deeper and deeper in his sin, and the error is entrenched more deeply and the will to change is weakened, it becomes increasingly near-hopeless, and he skids down and down until either he does not want to climb back or he has lost the power to do so” (President Spencer W. Kimball, The Miracle of Forgiveness, [1969], p 117)

Did Your heart break

As on the cross You hung

Knowing many lambs will go astray?

Did you know they will reject

Your blood and all You had to pay?

 

And still You hoped

And still You sorrowed

Over godly well-known fears

For all they’ll have to suffer

To pay the ransom for

Your sacred tears.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

(Art: Gentle Saviour by Greg Collins)

A THIEF OF GLORY

 

The similitude that comes to mind when we think of Satan is a snake but John the Revelator describes Satan more aptly from his vision. What could be more deadly and more powerful than a snake? A dragon. The dragon that John saw was red, a colour that represents fury. And how well he painted the scene of the dragon who drew with ‘his tail the third part of the stars of heaven’! (Revelation 12:4).

The Book of Revelation calls Satan ‘an accuser’ who accused us of our sins to the Father, day and night (Revelation 12:10). I can only imagine the glee with which he relentlessly and craftily complained about us, claiming that we were beyond redemption and would all be lost if the Father did not accept his plan. No mercy and no genuine concern for our welfare. But then the Saviour stepped forward and offered both and hope was born. But ‘the accuser’ picked up another tactic and sought to destroy our faith in Christ without ceasing. A war ensued….”the same kind that prevails on earth; the only kind Satan and spirit beings can wage – a war of words, a tumult of opinions, a conflict of ideologies; a war between truth and error, between light and darkness…”(Elder Bruce R. McConkie, Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, 3:518).

This is how we won the war in heaven. When the Saviour stepped forward to take responsibility for us He sealed His fate as our Redeemer. So sure was the foundation of His commitment that the Atonement in mortality was really just a formality. So iron clad was His destiny as our Saviour that it became our reality long before the earth was made. The scriptures confirm that ‘the Lamb was slain from the foundation of the world’ meaning the power of the Atonement was already in place in pre-mortal world enabling all God’s children, from the beginning, to be born innocent (Revelation 13:8, 1 Peter 1:18-20; Mosiah 3:13; 4:7; D&C 93:38). Because the Atonement was such a surety, it was as if it had already happened and consequently we could draw upon its’ blessings and power before we were even born. It is this power and our testimonies by which we defeated Lucifer and his followers in the war in heaven (see the New Testament Institute Manual commentary on Revelation 12:11; 13:8, By Blood and Testimony)

The name ‘Lucifer’ means ‘light bearer’. He was so great once, ‘he was in authority in the presence of God’ (D&C 76:25). So great was he that we wept when he was lost (76:26). We too are great with enormous potential but we can find ourselves lost too under his influence. His fury will not spare one soul. He will use every tactic and every tool to steal our spiritual identity, to kill our faith in God and to destroy our commitment to Christ (John 10:10) . We of the last days cannot allow this to happen. We will not allow the red dragon to win. We already know the outcome. The only question remaining is who will be among the survivors. The war has not ended. In the words of Elder McConkie: “……..the battle lines are still drawn. It is now on earth as it was then in heaven; every man must choose which general he will follow” (Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, 3:518).

These are the tools Satan uses that are so prevalent in our society:

HIS THREE DOCTRINES:

No punishment for sin

Nothing after death

He does not exist

HIS LIES THROUGH RATIONALISATION:

Just once won't hurt

No one will know

Everybody is doing it

HIS VALUE SYSTEM:

Selifshness

Self-indulgence

Immediate gratification

HIS SALES TECHNIQUES:

Pacifying

Flattering 

Lulling 

Like a thief in the night,

He seeks to steal, kill and destroy.

He is the collector of ruined lives,

The Master of ravaged souls.

 

He is the Son of the Morning,

His pride yielded irreversible cost

In the beginning we sorely wept

When his soul was forever lost.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

(Art: AI generated by NightCafe Creator)

THE PATH OF GRACE

 

 

The greatest threat to Paul’s Gentile converts who started to embrace false teachings came not from outsiders but from a group of Jewish Christians called Judaizers. These Jewish Christians made it their mission to travel to places Paul had success in establishing the Church, to oppose his teachings and to convince the Gentile converts that they still needed to adhere to the law of Moses as well, most especially circumcision.

Paul spoke a lot about ‘the law’ vs the gospel. He claimed that by the law of Moses no man can be ‘justified’, that ‘justification’, or being brought back into alignment with God, can only come through grace for if righteousness came by the law, then Christ died in vain (Galatians 2:16-21). Very often, we as latter-day saints are focused on obedience more than on the enabling grace of Christ whom we follow. You might say, that we, like the early Jewish Christians, have more faith in the law of the gospel and our obedience than in the author of our salvation.

Because we presently live in the condition of weakness, meaning mortality, perfect obedience to the laws we live under is an impossibility. The whole purpose of this weakened condition of mortality is to bring us to Christ and His grace by which salvation comes (Ether 12:27). If we were capable of perfect obedience, there would have been no necessity for a saviour. Lest we think that we are good enough as we are (the narrative the world teaches) and need no improvement, it is imperative that we understand that grace is an enabling power of Christ which enables us to continue to repent and improve and which saves us after all we can do (2 Nephi 25:23; Moroni 10:32,33).

General Conference is upon us. There is only one reason why we should flock to hear the leaders of the Church and that is to be edified through the teachings of the Saviour of the world and to be brought to the foot of His throne. Salvation does not come by President Nelson or anyone else we listen to, it comes by the way they bring us to Christ. When we come to Christ, obedience springs from motivation which comes by the Holy Ghost and the love of Him who has suffered that we might be saved, now and forever, in the Kingdom of our God.  

- CATHRYNE ALLEN

(Art: I Came to Call the Sinners to Repentance by Greg Collins)