Hey there everybody, happy new year. Here we are, a brand new year and a brand new season of podcasts. My name's Scott Durfey. This is Redeemed Through His Blood. In this podcast, we focus on the redemption and the healing that comes through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Just to give you a little background real quickly, and then I'm going to let my partner in crime here, Dave Durfey, talk about what we're going to be talking about during this season.
But my name's Scott Durfey, as I said, I've been a member of the church all my life, but for a portion of my life, I was wandering. And currently, I'm a recovering alcoholic. I have 24 years of continuous sobriety, very active in addiction recovery programs, but very active in the church and in my ward as well. So I'm joined with and partnered up with by my uncle, my uncle David Durfey. He's just a few years, five or six or seven or eight. I'm not sure I don't remember, but years older than me.
I look younger though. Much younger than you used to. Oh, you mean younger than me? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I see. So Dave's here. Dave has just recently, when I say recently a couple of years ago, completed about a 40 year career in the church education system, where he had every role you can imagine, and finalized his assignment there as the director of the Institute of the University, Utah Valley, rather, university.
And while he was there, he developed a curriculum, a class called the Divine Gift of Forgiveness, or actually it was just forgiveness, repentance and forgiveness and a class that caught the attention of many and many of his students we've had on our last season as interviews and actually caught the attention of Veldor Anderson, Neil L. Anderson as well. And we'll be actually using a lot of what Dave taught and developed and so on for this coming chapter for this new season.
So I'm going to let Dave talk a little bit about that and tell us where we're going to go from here. Yeah. Thanks, Scott. This is our second season and we're excited about being able to share with you some of our thoughts and feelings that are hopefully even a little more refined than they were in the first season. This will be based upon a course that was called Repentance and Forgiveness at Utah Valley University.
I received a request from priesthood leaders to design a course helping them with young adults who were in the process of repentance.
And so I designed the course, I put it together, I sent it to Salt Lake for curriculum to review it and it was approved and I began teaching it several years ago and it became a very successful course, a popular course and we started to teach more units than I could teach and so we had another teacher to help in the teaching of the course and Elder Anderson did become aware of it.
Anyway, that's another story for another time and just asked me to help him to kind of organize this book on the course which he had felt impressed that he needed to write several years before we met and he already knew the title many years before we started to work on it together called The Divine Gift of Forgiveness and I just helped him to kind of organize it. We followed a similar outline, the book follows a similar outline as the course.
The course has now been developed into a worldwide institute class and is now taught throughout the world.
The Elder Anderson's book, The Divine Gift of Forgiveness has been translated in multiple languages and will continue to be translated in other languages and is the student manual really for the course that is taught in institutes throughout the world and it's been really a humbling thing for me, Scott, to kind of be involved in that and then you and Deb taught it one semester at BYU and continue to kind of use it in your teaching institute for BYU students.
Yeah, actually we actually did teach it but it was four semesters that we teach it to believe it or not. It went crazy fast, right? But yeah. And you know, what we're going to be talking about is kind of that book as our basis or our jumping off spot or our foundation. Just so much hope and so much healing and just a different perspective on Jesus Christ and his power that comes through the Atonement. Well and you had a lot of success teaching that course. I mean it got pretty large.
Yeah, it did. Yeah, we... We grew from just a handful of students and then they had to...they moved us into the chapel because we had outgrown every other...and it's not because...and that's a testament to the course and that has nothing to do with it. No, right. It doesn't matter who teaches it. Right, that's right. That's right.
It's become an important course because of the times that we live in and the need of young adults and old adults and everyone in between who really need to learn about how the Atonement of Jesus Christ works, how we can access the power of Christ through his redeeming blood and Atonement, how repentance works in that process, in the ability to access that power and grace and mercy in our life.
And so it has been a popular course and we recommend to all of our readers to buy Elder Anderson's book. Elder Anderson, who I testify is a prophet, seer, revelator, apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, did an amazing thing working that book.
And as I would review chapters that he was kind enough to send to me, kind of following outlines of the course and he would write, he's a beautiful writer, it was really impressive and very sweet for me to kind of get a glimpse of how an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ teaches repentance and teaches the power and the gift of forgiveness that's available to us through Christ.
The thing, Dave, that has really been impressive to Deb and myself and when I say Deb, that's my wife, my sweetheart of 20 plus years now and you'll be hearing more about her as we go for those of you who have been with us for a while, no Deb, because we did a interview with her and if you're new, encourage you to go back and look at that in our season one.
But you know, the thing about that course that has been just so helpful, you know, as we've been and you did too, Dave, taking it to college students first, that's a pretty impressionable time of life, that's a time of life when we leave mom and dad and we get into the real world and we try to start figuring things out and we remember the teachings from our past and all of those things, but that seems to be sort of a time of general confusion
if you will and we've noticed that as we have brought the message of that book or the message behind the Atonement of Jesus Christ, it's interesting how a lot of us have not really understood the Atonement of Jesus Christ like we thought we did or like we thought we were taught or maybe even in some cases like we actually were taught. Absolutely.
But as that changes and it probably will, I can almost promise most listeners that are involved with this that there may be some differences in the way that you actually view the Atonement of Jesus Christ as we go through this course. For me, how it helped me was as I began to see the Atonement of Jesus Christ as a loving invitation rather than a executioner's indictment.
Yeah, well, it not only changes how we see the Atonement of Jesus Christ, Scott, but I think what's a really critical part of this course is to see our need, our absolute, complete, eternal dependence upon the Atonement of Jesus Christ, not just here mortally, but also premortally and post mortally and what the phrase we use so often in the church because of the Book of Mormon, it's unique in that Book of Scripture, it's Nephi uses it and then again Amulet uses it.
And then we can raise infinite Atonement, what does that really mean for us? And they're just, I mean, it's right, the Atonement of Jesus Christ is incomprehensible, but it is infinite and to seek to understand it will really be, I think, the goal or the objective of this course and how we can get, again, there's no power in the Atonement. It's really important for all of us as President Nelson has encouraged us to not speak of the Atonement as if it is an entity by itself.
It should always be associated, the term Atonement, with Jesus Christ and Him crucified with our Savior and Redeemer. So really the way it works is it is the power of Jesus Christ that we seek in our life through His Atonement and how we can access that Atonement through the instruments of grace that God has given us, such as the Scriptures and prayer and ordinances and covenants and commandments and all of the things that God has given us, divine gifts He's given us.
To know how to access the power of Christ through the Atonement, that's really the objective of this course. And you know, you mentioned the need that college students have for it, but you know what was surprising to me, Scott, in the many years that I taught that course was that most of those in my course were return missionaries. They weren't freshmen, although I think it is a great missionary prep course.
So if you have any young people in your family that are getting ready for mission prep, this is an amazing course because I think it completely changes their approach to how they see missionary work and their own preparation to be a missionary. But return missionaries would come to me all the time and say, man, I wish I would have known this before my mission. I wish I would have known this on my mission so I could have taught it better. So I think it's a, and we're still learning.
I'm still learning. I am so thankful for the blessings and the things that I've learned teaching the course and I still seek to better comprehend, better understand how the Atonement, Jesus Christ works in my own life and the life of my family. So with all of that kind of as an introduction, Scott, I think we should jump into lesson number one, so to speak.
And that is always that you must begin, I believe, in almost any course as President Boyd K. Packer used to teach to really understand the plan of redemption generally. And that includes how it began, all began in the pre-mortal existence. So I'd like to talk about our pre-earth life today and about who we really are and kind of work on our identity a little bit. Scott, I think identity determines eternity.
I think identity is so critical to really be able to work out our salvation and our redemption, to understand our relationship with our Heavenly Father as our literal Father of our spirits, to understand that we had heavenly parents, to understand our role as their children and our role in the war in heaven, and to understand our relationship and our dependence upon Jesus Christ not only here in mortality, but also in our pre-mortal existence.
So when we begin to talk about who we are, and it begins with that pre-mortal existence, there's a really important reason that we're doing this. If we understand really who we are and we come to a conclusion of what we hope to come to that conclusion of here today and as we go through this podcast.
But once we come to that conclusion, then it positions us to where all of the things in our life that come against us, and all of the things in our life that come against us are anecdoted or are taken care of by the Atonement or by Jesus Christ power through His Atonement. And as we begin to learn who we are, that really begins to help us to understand better who He is. In fact, Dave, you want to read that to, can I read the quote from Joseph Smith right now?
So, you know, Joseph Smith, when Joseph Smith would give the King Follett discourse, this was one of the little gems that came from that. This was given in Nauvoo a short time before his martyrdom, and it's kind of the apex or the zenith of his teaching and his doctrine.
The King Follett discourse, given at the funeral of King Follett, who had, King was actually his first name, this man who had, who was digging a well or something and died, fell in the well and died a kind of a tragic death because of an accident. And Joseph Smith gave this amazing discourse on especially the character of God, the nature of God, how we can come to know God. And yeah, I think that's a critical quote. So if you want to read that.
Yeah, so this is really step one in getting to know ourselves if you want to take it that way. And this is what Joseph Smith said. He said, if men do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves. Yeah, so Scott, if we say that we are children of heavenly parents, if we say that we are a son or daughter of God, we sing I am a child of God. What does that even mean if we don't know God?
What is, I mean, we can't really appreciate that him, and we can't appreciate that truth unless we have some idea, some good idea, understanding in our mind and heart of who God is. Once you know who God is, and you know your father in heaven, and you know that you are the offspring of God, as Paul taught, that we are literally the offspring of God. Well, it absolutely changes that we have spiritual DNA of deity. It totally changes how you see yourself.
And it is the key to know who he is, is the key to knowing who we are.
Yeah, by contrast, for example, if we were to see God as a vindictive, vengeful, you know, what we might associate human characteristics to, you know, if we were to see God that way, that would have a completely different, we would have a completely different experience with God, than if we see him how he really is as a loving, gentle, kind father in heaven who is interested in our well-being, not just eternally, but here too.
I mean, often we just kind of get that a little bit confused, you know, but he actually cares about how our life is going here too. And you know, once we comprehend that, once we begin to understand that, it really does. Joseph Smith has a lot of wisdom in that comment, because it really does begin to help us comprehend ourselves better.
Because if I understand that about myself, that I am really spiritual DNA, and I understand that God's characteristics are not what the world would have me think sometimes, right? And they're also not as gentle sometimes as what the other part of the world might have. But to have a real, a real concise depiction of the character of God, and his, and my relationship with him, or his love towards me, man, that sure changes a lot of things in the way I approach life.
Not only it changes our identity, knowing who we are, but it changes our faith in him. I mean, knowing the character of God is one of the three steps of really obtaining the faith of power, which we'll talk about later on, and that's, that'll be another one of our lessons, another podcast.
But it's one of the essential elements of obtaining faith in God, is you must know the character, attributes, and perfections of God, and the characters of God, they're actually listed in the lectures on faith, seven lectures that were given in the School of Prophets in Kirtland, so, then the characters, the characteristics that they focused on in that lecture, which I think we can see and focus on as we read the scriptures, especially this year as we
do, you know, the New Testament, we study the life of Jesus Christ, and, and, and Philip asked Jesus Christ, you know, in the upper room, Philip the apostle, asked Jesus Christ in the upper room, just hours before he went to get 70, show us the Father, and Jesus said, Philip, how long have I been with you? If you've seen me, you've seen the Father.
So the real, the great way we can learn the character of God is to know the character of his son, and if we know the character of Jesus Christ, who is in the, how does Hebrews put it, in the exact image of God, and his statement to Philip, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father, well, if we can learn the character of God, of Christ, then we, we can say we know the character of God.
Jesus Christ said he did nothing except he saw his Father do it, and some of those characteristics listed in the lectures on faith are love, of course, and mercy, and unchangeable, and I love, I actually love the characteristic listed just. He's just, he's fair. He, this is not one of the characteristics, but this is, I think, connected to it, is that he will discipline, he disciplines, he's in control, that all things will be made right and fair.
Anyway, if we can understand and learn this year, as we do season two, and as we do come follow me, the character of God and the character of Christ, it, it really does change how we not just see ourselves, Scott, it changes how we see our world. Yeah. So, with that kind of as an introduction, let's talk a little bit about our, our premortal existence. There was one plan there, Scott, there weren't two. There was one plan given, we all knew it, we all accepted it, we all loved it.
In the Book of Mormon, it's interesting that the Book of Mormon talks, use the word plan 34 times, I don't know how, I don't know the exact number of how many times the word plan is in the Book of Mormon, but a good number. And 14 times alone, it's called the plan of redemption. Couple of times, it's called the plan of salvation. A few times, it's called the plan of happiness. A few times, it's called the plan of mercy, the plan of God, the great plan of happiness, even.
And God had a plan and we all knew it, and at one point it was presented to us, there was a grand council in heaven, and over time, and we have no idea what the concept of time was even like there in the premortal existence, but there was a, there was sin and there was rebellion that broke out. And Satan proposed his rebellion based upon destroying agency, and I believe that included destroying accountability.
And without agency, without accountability, there would be no need for a savior and redeemer. At the very heart of this counter, what would be the words, got a counter rebellion is the best word I can think of to describe it. But this rebellion was, in essence, Satan's attempt to destroy the role of Jesus Christ, the mission of Jesus Christ.
I think he had been extremely jealous because he had proposed that he would help carry out the plan of the Father, and then the firstborn, Jesus stepped forward and said, Father, here am I, send me, and Jesus said, or the Father said, I will send the first. And that created, I think, a great jealousy. The Prophet Joseph Smith talks about that a little bit too, the great jealousy of Satan or Lucifer, and that he sought to be excellent or foremost or the most important.
And because he wasn't, his pride took over, and this rebellion breaks out, and there's a war. There's a war. And we all fought in that war, and I think it is so interesting how John the Revelator, in the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation, chapter 12, verses 9 through 11, describes the war in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent called the devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world. He was cast out into the earth, and his angels cast out with him.
And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now has come salvation and strength in the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ, for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accuse them before our God day and night. Interesting title, Husqa. The Accuser. That's the only place that he's called the accuser in scripture. I think so. Yeah. And it's a perfect title for Satan.
He not only, he's the accuser of our brethren, meaning, meaning, that he not only accused Christ of probably not being able to do what Christ was commissioned to do, or what he, uh, was willing to do, but he also accused us of our inability to be able to be redeemed, our ability to be saved, our ability to return to our heavenly home, if given agency, or accusing Christ that he wouldn't have the power, or that he wouldn't be sinless, or that he
wouldn't be able to suffer what he, I mean, I think of all the things Satan could have, the accusations that could have been made in the premoral existence to convince one third of the host of father's children to follow him. There must have been some real terrible accusations, lies, rumors, and by line upon line and precept upon precepts, Satan had this huge following which caused this war. But what really interests me in this passage in Revelation 12 is the last verse, verse 11.
And this is at a powerful description, Scott, of who we were, those of us who have a body, all of those who came to this earth, uh, how we were able to defeat Satan there, and I think it gives us a great, uh, kind of insight and clue on how we can defeat Satan here, knowing our identity.
So listen carefully to this, and they, meaning us, and those who have bodies and came to earth, and they overcame him, the accuser or Satan, by the blood of the lamb, and by the word of their testimony, and they loved up their lives unto the death. Wow. So what does that say about us, Scott?
Well, you know, I think that, uh, maybe most of, if not all of our problems as individuals and as as societies and as cultures, etc., are really messed up because of we don't see ourselves as truly who we are.
If I think, David, if we all knew really who we are, and if we all really knew that we had been redeemed through the blood of Jesus Christ and understand fully what that means, there would be so much less contention, there would be so much less adversity and so forth that we face here, but we don't.
We do face it, and because, because we don't have that clear picture yet, but as we gain that clear picture, David, and as we, first off, you know, and you just read it in verse 11 there, as we begin to understand what the blood of the Savior has done for us through the atonement, through His atonement, then we begin, I think, to feel not just empowered, but to, to understand that this is really who we have been born to be.
You know, we, the fact that we're here shows what side of the, the, the battle that we were on. Yeah, and, and not only, not only will it be through the blood of the Lamb, that we overcome Satan here, but it was through the atonement of Jesus Christ, premortally, that we were over, that we overcame Satan there. So you know, when we talk about the infinite atonement, we need to understand it covers us, it covered us premortally.
We learned of it there, we learned, we must have, I don't know, watched the video or, or somehow had got the vision or know and what Jesus was willing to do for us there. And we were taught the doctrine and the absolute need that we would have on Christ, that there would be nothing we could merit of ourselves in our redemption and salvation as taught in the Book of Mormon, but that we would have to rely upon him, that he would be the author and the finisher of our faith and our salvation.
And it was through that faith and the power of Christ through his blood, even in the premoral existence that we were able to progress to come here. And then it also says, right, that it's through our testimonies in the premoral existence, we had testimonies. You know, I occasionally giving patriarchal blessings will, will say, you were born with a testimony.
And I think that's a little bit of a shock to maybe a teenager who's struggling to get a testimony to think, to hear that, that they were born with testimonies. But I believe that's got, I believe most of us were, and then it goes back to our premoral existence that we knew the truth and we get a glimpse of it here. And we, you know, the, really the goal here in mortality is not to get a testimony, but to try to recall or remember the testimonies that we had there.
Yeah. And I think that's important when, um, now's probably a good time to just say this, you know, for much of my life, um, I was raised in the gospel and, but, but when I became a teenager because of a lot of things that were going on and, you know, I'm not going to get into all of that. And ultimately the onus is on me. It's my choices. But I started making decisions that led me further and further away from the spirit.
And as that is, I started making those decisions that led me further and further away from the spirit, so did my view of who I was and how all of this related to me become extremely blurry almost to the point where I couldn't even see through the fog. But, and I remember grandma, you know, your mom telling me this when it came time for me to give my children blessings when they were first born, you know, when we bless, you know, kind of as a tradition in the church.
And she told me, she says, God, you should bless them with a testimony, bless them to have a testimony. And I think my dad must have done that for me, you know, when grandma was giving my dad probably advice on what he should say when he gave me a blessing. I don't know. I can't remember, obviously, and there's no recording. And I don't even think he would remember if I were to ask him.
But I think that those things, that, that remembrance is really our quest, that remembrance of those experiences. And when I say those experiences, those spiritual identity experiences of who we really are, that is, can actually affect our lives and change it for the better or the worse. If we don't see ourselves as who we really are, then it can have a detrimental effect as well, David.
Well, and think how it does change how not only you see yourself, but how you see your children and how you see the individual in the car next to you, or how you see the individual wherever, the stranger, the brother or sister in church, we are all children of God. And we all once knew this amazing plan, and we all fought for it in this war. And the third thing given in that verse in Revelation 12, verse 11, is that we were willing to go to the wall, so to speak, to paraphrase.
We were willing to die for that, Scott, in the premortal existence. We went to war for that testimony and to defend that plan of redemption. Made me just recall, I gave a blessing just a few weeks ago to a young woman and in her patriarchal blessing, and I had seen this. I had got a glimpse of this a few hours before I gave her her blessing that she was an organizer.
She organized, I think something, her blessing said something to the effect she organized, helped to organize the forces of Christ in the premortal existence, and that she would help to organize them here to defeat Satan. And we all had a different role over there in this war, but that we were willing to do whatever it took. We knew that our love and our lives were all centered in Christ and depended on winning this war in heaven.
And I think it's interesting how the Bible dictionary teaches it, Scott. I just, I know there's been different things that have been said about the war in heaven. I don't think we have enough details to really know, but this is, I think, so great, the perspective that the Bible dictionary gives us. I want to just read from, it's under the title, War in Heaven in the Bible dictionary.
The war was primarily over how and in what manner the plan of salvation would be administered to the forthcoming human family upon the earth. The issues involved, the issues in the war, involved such things as agency, how to gain salvation, and who should be the redeemer. The war broke out because one-third of the spirits refused to accept the appointment of Jesus Christ as the Savior. Such a refusal was a rebellion against the Father's plan of redemption.
There was one plan and it was the Father's plan of redemption. It was evident that if given agency, persons would fall short of complete salvation. Lucifer and his followers, this is really key, I think here, kind of changes how you see it. Lucifer and his followers wanted salvation to come automatically to all who pass through mortality without regard to individual preference, agency, or voluntary dedication.
Now what that says to me, Scott, is that Satan basically said, there doesn't need to be commandments. I don't think Satan was trying to teach us that there were going to be commandments or ordinances or covenants or that there were going to be laws or that there were going to be a covenant path or way that we had to follow to return to God. I think Satan, which would have been really appealing, I think, because I don't think any of us would have loved to have been forced into this.
I just don't think, as sons or daughters of God, that force is or coercion, and I know those words have been used in the past, but I don't think force and coercion is something that would really appeal to most spirits, and I don't think that Satan probably used those words in the premortal existence. I think what he said is, hey, I'll save you no matter what you do. You don't have to rely on me or anyone or anything else. Anything you do, it won't matter. I will save you. Anything goes.
You can go down and party. You can do this. You can do that. And I'll save you. And then the catch. And I will get all the glory. That's what Satan wanted. He ultimately wanted all the glory to overthrow God and to overthrow Jesus Christ, and I don't know if he believed he could really do it or not, and I don't think that was his point, actually.
I think his point was to just destroy, and I think that's still his objective, is to destroy and create chaos and make everyone miserable, as the Doctrine and Covenants section 3 and section 10 teaches, that he wants misery and chaos and destruction. Was even what he was proposing possible? I don't think it was. I don't either. I just don't. Elton MacConkey said no. Right. It was not philosophically even possible. But that's what he proposed. And think how appealing that would be.
And Scott, what do we see in the world today? Yeah. I mean, the war is alive and well. It's being reenacted. Yeah. And it may have even escalated. I mean, in fact, I know it's escalated because here as the war continues, David, we have the ability to carry out so much more because of our mortal status, because we actually have a body to carry out all of those things.
And not only that, but the adversary can also use that as a tool against us because it's not easy for us to always remember what took place there. In fact, I don't remember anything about what took place there. I get spiritual probably inklings or reminders or tender mercies that come from my Heavenly Father. If I have a spiritual connection that's in good harmony with Him, I'll get some of those reminders.
But that's why it was so important that I received that blessing if I did to always have that testimony because those things, even though it gets cloudy, even though it gets blurry, those things help me to still try to remember what took place there and to not believe the lie. I believe me. Those kinds of lies are really tempting. Those kinds of lies of, hey, it's easy. Hey, you can get this for nothing or that for little. We hear them here. We hear them.
And I'm not going to get into all of the areas that raises all kinds of controversy when we do. We hear the areas where we hear this stuff, but it's continuing and it's becoming perfected. And what's the word? Sophisticated beyond our mortal comprehension. Well, it's so prevalent. Yeah. It's so prevalent.
And the war really basically, Scott, here in mortality that we, I think, are ultimately engaged in is this false philosophical belief that everything is relative, that do your own thing and you'll be saved. That truth is relative. The law of relativity is what's killing so many of our brothers and sisters here on the earth, this great philosophical lie of being, everything's relative. And I know that goes back to the war in heaven.
And that was probably the great lie that was promulgated there was that it doesn't matter. Everything, just go do your thing. Live your own truth. You don't need ordinances and covenants. What are we hearing here? We don't need ordinances and covenants. We both have somebody that we love who believes that even though they've left the church, that no loving God would not allow my family to be together forever. Right? That's just believing the law of relativity that it doesn't matter what I do.
It doesn't matter what I believe. It doesn't matter how I live, that God is love and that God, but see, here we go again. They don't understand the character of God, that God is not only a God of love, that he is a God of laws, that he is a God of order. And Satan tried to destroy all of that truth and perspective in the premoral existence. And he's doing a pretty darn good job of teaching it and persuading people to believe it here. Yeah, that's exactly right.
We see a lot of folks, and you know as many as I do, maybe more because of your exposure to it, but we see a lot of folks that are just making a decision not to come anymore, not to participate, not to be a part of. And those little subtle lies that are leading our loved ones and heaven forbid if we ever were to enter into that ourselves in any form. I mean, I'm not worried about the grand scheme, but even the little tiny things where we believe truth is relative.
You know, it's been so important that Elder Uchtdorf gave a talk recently, you know, maybe within the last year about truth and how it's not relative. And then President Nelson gave a talk recently in this last conference on what is truth. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he touched on that. And Elder Christopher has talked about it as well. Yeah. The prophets and apostles are all warning us and exposing the great lie of Satan, which is that everyone's going to be saved. I'm going to save everybody.
There's when you when you really get down to the heart of that philosophy, Scott, of relativity, that all truth is relative and that all of us are going to be saved and the love of God is anyway. It all comes down to one thing, which is to destroy our agency, because if you take away accountability, you destroy agency. If you take away accountability, then we didn't need an atonement of Jesus Christ and we lose our agency.
So think about these, these three words that begin with a and I know that someone gave a great talk and I love the title, you know, called agency, accountability and atonement. And all three of those are inextricably related. And if you take away one of those agents, accountability, then you destroy agency. If you take away agency, then there's no accountability.
If you take away a tone of Jesus Christ, then there's no hope for any of us as far as our agency and accountability because of the way the plan of redemption has been laid out for us. And I just, I just think it's really important that we understand what the issues were in the premoral existence and what the war was over and that we are right in the middle of that war still today. That's not a surprise, Heavenly Father. It's not. He gave us prophets, seers and revelators. He gave us scriptures.
He's exposed the law through their teachings, but it is, uh, what's the word? It's more than comforting. It's more than easy. It's, um, it's just so appealing to so many to think that it doesn't matter what I do. I can do anything I want or anything that I please and I know God will save me. Yeah. As long as I'm a good person, as long as I'm trying. Yeah. As long as I'm treating everybody nice as long, and I hear that. Uh, yeah, I've heard that recently.
I had a conversation just recently and, you know, this isn't with somebody. I often talk about a lot of the conversations and stuff that I have with people in recovery, but, you know, I'm having these, these conversations with people and I won't get into the issue because it's not important, but the concept is, and the concept is this, the issue that we were talking about is an important issue and it is, and it is a truth. It either is or it isn't.
And if, and knowing that truth is important and if it's not true, then that's also important. But this person said, well, to me, and as soon as somebody says to me, you know, in quotation marks, the words to me, then I'll, I'll automatically just know that we have a misalignment here because when somebody says to me, that's not true. Well, you don't get to decide. At least there's a good chance it's not true. Okay. Sometimes, sometimes, sometimes they may be lucky and they, they got it right.
Maybe. But here's the thing about that. We don't get to decide what's true. I mean, what that's the thing about the point, the point, the thing with that model, David, is if I, if I just love God, and that's easy to say, because how do we measure that? You know, you and I know, I mean, I have a method by which I measure my devotion and my love to God. You do too. And so do others, disciples of Jesus Christ. It's called discipline. That's where the word disciple comes from, et cetera.
But for those of us who choose not to, those of our brothers and sisters and friends and relatives, et cetera, who choose not to do that, you know, they, they will say that it's relative. Well, it can't be, you know, that the truth and relativity, they're, they're, they're they're, it's either one or the other. Right. It's either true or it's relative. Well there is absolute truth. Yeah. And that's what we're talking about. And that's the character of God. And that's exactly. That's why I'm.
If there was not absolute truth, there wouldn't be a God. And we wouldn't need a God. He is a God of absolutes. And that's the realm within, I'm speaking right now. It's just about that relationship and the character of God understanding him is so important and it is not relative to our own experience. It's relative to his experience and it's our job to learn what that is and to align ourselves with it. Yeah, absolutely. Scott. Uh, and Jesus, you know, Jesus is the way to God.
That is an absolute. And if people are not receiving the ordinances and covenants and not entering in to a relationship with Jesus Christ, they can never return to the presence of God. I mean, I mean, listen to what I'm going back to what this conversation is. Sweet little conversation in the upper room between Jesus and Philip and give us a reference. So this is John chapter 14 and John chapter 14.
Jesus says this verse six, Jesus sayeth unto him, and this is actually saying he's talking to Thomas who Thomas says, how can we know the way? Thomas asked Jesus the question in the upper room. How can we know the way? And Jesus says, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto me, but by, I'm sorry, no man cometh unto the father, but by me. So Jesus says, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life. I mean, that's the heart of what this war in heaven was about.
And the war that we fight here is about is who is Jesus? Who's he? If we know him, we know the father. And if we know him and know the father, we should know that they are the way, they are the truth, and they are the life. And anything that is outside of them, it's not the way, it's not the truth, and it will be dead. Even if I'm just a good person? There's no life in just doing good things without having a relationship with Jesus Christ and God the Father.
I know, I know that, I know there's lots of great people in this world who aren't Christians and who haven't even heard about Jesus Christ. I know that, and I know that because of the equity and justice of God, that they'll have an opportunity, God is just, he's fair, everyone's going to have the opportunity, Scott. But this is absolute truth. When Jesus says, I am the way, I am the truth, and I am the life, and no man cometh unto the Father, or returned back to their heavenly home, but by me.
And then this is where he says, if he had known me, he should have known my Father. And Philip says, show us the Father. And Jesus says unto him, I have been so long time with you, Philip, and yet thou hast not known me, he that has seen me has seen the Father. Believe us thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me.
So I, I just, this is the, this is the whole key to the plan of redemption, Scott, redemption through the blood of Christ, which is what got us through the premortal existence and the war in heaven, which is the absolute key to getting us through mortality, returning back to our heavenly home, and progressing throughout our post mortal existence, is our understanding, our knowledge, and our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and knowing him,
knowing the Father, and when we know that, we can then begin to comprehend ourselves. And when we know who we are, we will have power to become like they are. This is so important to what we're talking about. And this is something I believe that is difficult for a lot of people right now, David.
You know, so the question that we may address for just a minute then would be, okay, I believe you and I've read and studied and learned all these things in my youth and throughout my life or whatever the case may be for the individuals that are listening to us. But some of us may be struggling with our eternal identity. What can we do?
There's got to be some things that we can do that you and I can talk about that we can do that will help us remember who we are because there really is no other way. There really is no other way. If we desire joy, which we all do, it's a human, it's innate. If we desire joy, if we desire love, if we desire all of the things that are heaven sent or gifts to us, but we've forgotten, you know, that can create a problem. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I was there, you know, right?
It's it can, it can be such a power to not only know the character of God, but to also know our relationship with God, the relationship we had with him in the premortal existence before we were born and our purpose in this life and obtaining a relationship with him here.
So as a patriarch, the amazing blessing and gift words can't really describe it to be able to see, get a glimpse of the premortal existence of some of Heavenly Father's children than to see them there and to see him and the love that he has for his children there. And the great relationship that we enjoyed with him there.
You know, I've been able to, I've never seen myself in the premortal existence, Scott, my patriarchal blessing, my personal blessing that I got when I was 18 years old and say or 19 years old, I think I got in April right before I left on my mission in June. So I just turned 19.
Anyway, I don't, I've never seen that my patriarchal blessing doesn't talk about it, but I have as a patriarch received a glimpse from time to time of individuals in the premortal existence and and it's not only affected me, I know, but I know it's really affected those individuals who have received that blessing and we probably don't have time to share that here.
So I think that maybe next time I'll share that experience a little bit of that about that and and maybe we can talk about next time about what we can do here in mortality to get a glimpse, a personal glimpse of what we were like or who we were in the premortal existence and that we are that we are engaged in the in the war and that we have a purpose to fulfill and a role to fulfill in carrying out the plan of redemption in this life into the next.
And I think if we could just really get a glimpse of that, Scott, it it does it not only changes how we see ourselves, of course, it changes. It changes who we are. It changes. It changes not only how I see myself, but how I see the world. It changes what I do. It changes how I think changes how I walk. It changes how I talk. I mean, if you can really just get a glimpse of who you are and remember it, wow, changes everything.
Yeah. When I first got sober and I had left, you know, kind of a wake behind me of disruption, disruption, disruption and problems. I had also left behind with me my devotion, not my testimony, but my devotion to these things that we're talking about. And as I did that, I forgot who I was. I really did. I forgot who I was. And, and you know, and spiritual amnesia at big time.
And I think next week too, we talk about that as well, because, you know, I think this isn't just unique to Scott, but I think this is and it's not just unique to those that are struggling with sin or alcoholism or drug addiction or whatever. I think that oftentimes anybody in the mortal existence will struggle with that eternal identity. And so we should talk about several things, maybe a handful of things that we can do or incorporate as, you know, habits or as who we are, who we become.
If we can maybe talk about some of those things next week too, to kind of help our remembering to help that, because that's going to be super important as we move into the Atonement of the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ or the Jesus Christ power, power as is manifested to us through the Atonement. That's going to be important for us to really have a solid idea and concept and belief of who we really are. Identity is everything, Scott.
And if, if we can get a glimpse this year as we do come follow me, I mean, this is a perfect time of the year to be talking about it, right? We're, we're starting a new course of study in the church. Come follow me. As we study it, we should have, we should have a couple of goals in mind. And one of them should be to come to know Jesus, to know his character, attributes and perfections and to make the connection that if we know him, we know the father.
And if we know him and we know the father, we know ourselves. We know ourselves. I know me. I know something about my spiritual DNA. Something about my eternal identity and destiny and who not only, not only who I was, not only who I am, but who I want to be. Identity is everything and it determines our eternity. So important.
Well, as we begin this new season, you can see that we do have a lot to talk about, but there's so much of this, this is so important to each of us in our, not just our eternal life. So, you know, we mentioned this earlier, but these things that we talked about Heavenly Father has given, given us these things so that we might have joy. That's why we were created. Men are that they might have joy and He's given us these things so that we might.
And in order for us to have that, we have to disengage from the war or at least get back on the other side because we're all affected by the war. We call it the war in heaven, but it's just. Well, unfortunately, unfortunately, Scott, we are not going to be able to get out of that war. It's going to go on and on. And we, you know, what I worry about is that we don't see it. We don't see it. We don't see that we are in a war and we become disengaged. That's what I worry about.
You can't become disengaged in this war. We're in the middle of it. It's going to be with us. And you, you got to stand up and make a stand and you got to fight through the blood of the lamb, through the word of your testimony and under the death. I mean, really spiritually speaking, right?
Yeah. That, that, that we have to give our all and give our whole heart and, and be more mindful, give more attention and stop believing the lie that Satan continues to broadcast throughout the world and especially media and other ways that all roads lead to heaven, that it doesn't really matter that anything goes, do your own thing and God who loves you will save you. I honestly, Scott, it's, it's that, that philosophy is a little bit sickening to me.
And I think it's, I think it actually mocks God and is total evidence that people don't know God or know Jesus Christ. I mean, you're going to learn this this year and come follow me. Jesus Christ meant what he said and he meant what he taught and, and he, and he was pretty firm about those things. And I think that, that we have to know in our hearts and minds, God is a God of love and he is a God of laws and he loves order and there is an order to his kingdom.
He is not only a God of love, he's a God of laws and order. And that's what it takes for us to be able to really progress and to become like him. And so I hope as we go through this, this season and this course together that all of us can strengthen each other as we do. So hopefully our listeners, if they have any questions, we'll email those to us at G-Mail.com, you can email any questions or suggestions too as we begin a new season here.
We're open to your thoughts, but he, he redeems us at gmail.com. He redeems us at gmail.com. You know, just in closing, if I might just extend an invitation to really contemplate and consider in our lives where our identity may be lacking, where our true identity, where we may be seeing ourselves not completely accurate or not in complete harmony with the Spirit. And, and you know, and if we pray for it and if we seek the Spirit, the Spirit of the Holy Ghost will bear witness to us who we are.
And so I would extend that invitation. I'm going to accept it myself. I know that, you know, there may be areas in my own little life here that maybe not as a whole, but there may be little components in my life that may be lacking in this area. And I, and I think that if we will each just kind of take that into consideration, we might be better off for having done so. Hey, thanks for being with us today. Happy New Year to everybody. We look forward to being with you again next week.
And until then, take care and we look forward to seeing you then.