WE LIVED BEFORE WE WERE BORN

Our Primeval Childhood

IT is a grievous error to assume that mortal birth marks the beginning of one's individual existence. Quite as reasonable is it to hold that death means annihilation of the soul. The preexistent or antemortal state of man is as plainly affirmed by Scripture as is the fact of life beyond the grave.

We are too prone to regard the body as the man, and this mistake breeds the thought that life in the flesh is all there is to existence. There is in man an immortal spirit that existed as an intelligent being before the body was begotten, and that shall continue to exist as the same immortal individual after the body has gone to decay. Divine revelation attests the solemn truth that man is eternal.

No one who accepts the Holy Bible as the word of God can consistently deny the preexistence of the Lord Jesus Christ. In the first chapter of the Gospel written by John, Christ is designated as the Word, and the Savior's preexistence and primeval Godship are thus set forth: "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." We read further: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." (John 1:1 and 14.)

Our Lord's personal testimony is to the same effect. Of the disciples he asked: "What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before?" (John 6:62.) And on another occasion He averred "I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father." (John 16:28.) In solemn prayer He implored, "And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." (John 17:5.)

Nevertheless, as to earthly birth Christ was born a Child and lived to maturity as a Man among men. Even as His bodily birth was the union of a preexistent spirit with a tabernacle of flesh and bones, such also is the birth of every human being.

Everyone of us was known by name and character to the Father, who is "the God of the spirits of all flesh" (Numbers 16:22; 27:16), in our antemortal or primeval childhood; and from among the hosts of His unembodied children God chose for special service on earth such as were best suited to the accomplishment of His purposes. In illustration consider the Lord's definite revelation to Jeremiah the prophet: "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations." (Jer. 1:5.)

More than twelve centuries before Jeremiah's time God had revealed unto Abraham the fact of the preexistence of the spirits of mankind, as also the diverse capacities of those spirits, and the Divine purpose in preparing the earth for their habitation. Thus runs the record:

"Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was; and among all these there were many of the noble and great ones; And God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, and he saw that they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast chosen before thou wast born. And there stood one among them that was like unto God, and he said unto those who were with him: We will go down, for there is space there, and we will take of these materials, and we will make an earth whereon these may dwell; And we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them; And they who keep their first estate shall be added upon; and they who keep not their first estate shall not have glory in the same kingdom with those who keep their first estate; and they who keep their second estate shall have glory added upon their heads forever and ever." (Pearl of Great Price, pp. 65-66.)

Our life in the flesh is but one stage in the course of the soul's eternal progress, a link connecting the eternities past with the eternities yet to come. The purpose of our mortal probation is that of education, training, trial, and test, whereby we demonstrate whether we will obey the commandments of the Lord our God and so lay hold on the boundless opportunities of advancement in the eternal worlds, or elect to do evil and forfeit the boon of citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven.

The condition upon which mankind may have place in that Kingdom is compliance with the requirements laid down by Jesus Christ the Redeemer and Savior of the world, whose name is "the only name which shall be given under heaven, whereby salvation shall come unto the children of men." (Pearl of Great Price, p. 33.)