“Adam fell that men might be;” (2 Nephi 2:25)
B. H. Roberts wrote the following about this scripture and the doctrine of the Fall that springs from it:
“The effect of this doctrine upon the ideas of men concerning the great Patriarch of our race will be revolutionary. It seems to be the fashion of those assuming to teach the Christian religion to denounce Adam in unmeasured terms; as if the fall of man had surprised, if indeed, it did not altogether thwart, the original plan of God respecting the existence of man in the earth … it logically follows that the fall no less than the Atonement or redemption must have been part of God’s plan respecting the earth probation of men. The Fall, undoubtedly, was a fact as much present to the foreknowledge of God as was the Atonement, and the act which encompassed it must be regarded as more praiseworthy than blameworthy, since it was essential to the accomplishment of the divine purpose.”
Elder Brigham Henry Roberts
The Seventy’s Course in Theology, Fourth Year, p. 37
Yesterday, I was asked to speak on the topic, “Why We Need a Savior,” as part of our church Christmas Program. I was happy to receive the request because this question is at the heart of the Atonement.
I was asked to take no more than 7 minutes on this subject. This raised an interesting challenge. I can talk about the Atonement for 30 minutes, an hour, two hours or more without difficulty. However, how could I speak about the essential elements of the Atonement in 7 minutes?
Following is what resulted after quite a number of drafts:
At this time of year, we remember some of the titles Isaiah used to identify the Messiah – Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6).
Many other words also describe Christ and his countless attributes, but, for me, two sacred titles stand above all others – Savior and Redeemer.
But why do we need a Savior?
Our Savior and Redeemer holds those exalted titles because His Atonement saves us from sin and the consequences of mortality and allows us to return to our heavenly home.
We cannot understand the Atonement unless we understand the Fall.
When Adam and Eve were placed into the Garden of Eden, their bodies were immortal – they would never age or die. Those bodies were also incapable of having children.
In the Garden, Adam and Eve enjoyed the presence of Heavenly Father. They could see God with their eyes and hear Him with their ears. That association made a strong spiritual connection easy and natural.
When Adam and Eve transgressed the law and ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, four things happened:
1. Their bodies became mortal and subject to mortal death.
2. They could no longer remain in the presence of Heavenly Father. That separation is spiritual death.
3. They understood the difference between good and evil and were accountable for their choices.
4. They were able to have children so God’s spirit children could come to earth.
After the Fall, “Eve . . . was glad, saying: Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.” (Moses 5:11)
The Fall was not a mistake, it was a choice. Just as Adam and Eve chose to live in mortal bodies, each of us made that same choice — we chose to come to earth and gain mortal bodies, knowing we would be separated from our Father.
Elder Bruce R. McConkie said, “The atonement is the child of the fall, and the fall is the father of the atonement. Neither of them, without the other, could have brought to pass the eternal purposes of the Father.
“The fall of Adam brought temporal and spiritual death into the world, and the atonement of Christ ransomed men from these two deaths.” (Elder Bruce R. McConkie, The Three Pillars of Eternity, devotional address at Brigham Young University on 17 February 1981)
Two scriptures encapsulate our mortal lives and describe why a Savior is essential.
1. “No unclean thing can dwell with God” – 1 Nephi 10:21
2. “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;” – Romans 3:2
A) We cannot sin and be with God and
B) We all have sinned.
We need a Savior.
The Atonement is key to everything Heavenly Father does and all He has created. “This is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39)
These two terms may sound the same, but have different meanings.
Immortality is how the Atonement saves us from physical death.
Eternal Life is how the Atonement can save us from spiritual death, depending upon our faithfulness.
Amulek describes how Christ saves us from the death of our body and gives us immortality:
“Now, there is a death which is called a temporal death; and the death of Christ shall loose the bands of this temporal death . . . . The spirit and the body shall be reunited again in its perfect form; both limb and joint shall be restored to its proper frame . . . . Now, this restoration shall come to all, both old and young, both bond and free, both male and female, both the wicked and the righteous; and even there shall not so much as a hair of their heads be lost; but every thing shall be restored to its perfect frame . . . .” (Alma 11:42-44)
Virtually everyone who will ever be born on this earth will receive immortality through the Atonement of Christ. Their bodies will be resurrected from the grave and returned to a perfect form, then their spirits and bodies will be reunited and never die. Worlds and time without end, they will live. Mortal death will be permanently defeated.
What about Eternal Life?
Eternal Life is the kind of life that Heavenly Father lives. Through the Atonement, immortality comes to all men, righteous or wicked. Eternal Life is “the greatest of all the gifts of God.” (D&C 14:7.) We obtain Eternal Life, according to the Lord, “if you keep my commandments and endure to the end.” If we do this, He promises, “you shall have eternal life.” (D&C 14:7.)
If we are to gain Eternal Life, this greatest of all gifts, it will be because we become like God. God is perfectly clean and pure and we must become the same way.
How can imperfect people possibly do that?
“We believe that through the Atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.” (Third Article of Faith)
This brings us to justice and mercy. One of the most important ways in which Heavenly Father is perfect is that He is perfectly just and perfectly merciful.
Perfect justice is not terribly difficult for us to understand. Any time a law of God is violated, justice imposes an appropriate penalty.
Our problem arises because of that scripture we mentioned earlier, “No unclean thing can dwell with God” (1 Nephi 10:21)
Does justice make us clean?
No, justice ensures that a proper penalty is paid when a law is violated. It does not remove the effects of sin upon the individual who is punished. When prisoners are released from the penitentiary after having served their sentences, we say they have “paid their debt to society.” Prison has not made them clean and pure.
One way to be perfectly clean and pure is to never sin at all. That describes our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and no one else. He is the key to perfect mercy. Christ is the only way to recover from our sins.
Lehi tells us, “[R]edemption cometh in and through the Holy Messiah; for he is full of grace and truth. Behold, he offereth himself a sacrifice for sin, to answer the ends of the law, unto all those who have a broken heart and a contrite spirit; and unto none else can the ends of the law be answered.” (2 Nephi 2:6-7)
A perfectly sinless Christ took upon Himself all the sins of all the people who will ever live on this world. At Gethsemane and Calvary, he paid the full price that justice imposed for every one of those sins, great or small.
Christ “satisfied the demands of justice by His own suffering, ‘the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God’ (1 Peter 3:18). He removes our condemnation without removing the law. We are pardoned and placed in a condition of righteousness with Him. We become, like Him, without sin.” (Elder D. Todd Christofferson, “Justification and Sanctification,” Ensign, Jun 2001, 18)
In place of the demands of justice, Christ provides merciful commandments that ordinary people can obey. He allows us to repent of our sins without being condemned by them. Describing His commandments, Jesus said, “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 27:16)
Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. We celebrate the Manger because of what Christ did on the Cross.
David P. Vandagriff
Alma speaking to his son, Corianton:
6 But behold, it was appointed unto man to die—therefore, as they were cut off from the tree of life they should be cut off from the face of the earth—and man became lost forever, yea, they became fallen man.
7 And now, ye see by this that our first parents were cut off both temporally and spiritually from the presence of the Lord; and thus we see they became subjects to follow after their own will.
8 Now behold, it was not expedient that man should be reclaimed from this temporal death, for that would destroy the great plan of happiness.
9 Therefore, as the soul could never die, and the fall had brought upon all mankind a spiritual death as well as a temporal, that is, they were cut off from the presence of the Lord, it was expedient that mankind should be reclaimed from this spiritual death.
10 Therefore, as they had become carnal, sensual, and devilish, by nature, this probationary state became a state for them to prepare; it became a preparatory state.
11 And now remember, my son, if it were not for the plan of redemption, (laying it aside) as soon as they were dead their souls were miserable, being cut off from the presence of the Lord.
12 And now, there was no means to reclaim men from this fallen state, which man had brought upon himself because of his own disobedience;
13 Therefore, according to justice, the plan of redemption could not be brought about, only on conditions of repentance of men in this probationary state, yea, this preparatory state; for except it were for these conditions, mercy could not take effect except it should destroy the work of justice. Now the work of justice could not be destroyed; if so, God would cease to be God.
14 And thus we see that all mankind were fallen, and they were in the grasp of justice; yea, the justice of God, which consigned them forever to be cut off from his presence.
15 And now, the plan of mercy could not be brought about except an atonement should be made; therefore God himself atoneth for the sins of the world, to bring about the plan of mercy, to appease the demands of justice, that God might be a perfect, just God, and a merciful God also.
Thus, we further the Savior’s work of atonement when we live together in a state of at-one-ment. We do atonement work when we marry and work at that marriage. Without the commitment to marriage, the Lord’s atoning work could not go forward on the earth. The purposes of creation would have been wasted.
Eternal marriage, after all, is both a type and a function of at-one-ment. It is a type in that it constitutes two separate, fallen beings-a man and a woman-brought into oneness with each other and with God through the grace and power of Jesus Christ. It is a function of atonement in that, through the divine enabling power of the Atonement, a man and woman make their marriage eternal.
The Savior said, “Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” (Matthew 19:4-6; emphasis added.)
The word cleave is an atonement word that means “to cling to closely, tightly.” Paul wrote to the Corinthians, countering currents of asceticism already gaining momentum in the Church: “Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord. For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all . . . [are] of God.” (1 Corinthians 11:11-12.) Conversely, when we put relationships asunder, we violate this spirit of at-one-ment.
M. Catherine Thomas
The Restoration of the Doctrines of Marriage and Atonement
Women and Christ: Living the Abundant Life: Talks Selected from the 1992 Women’s Conference
Sponsored by Brigham Young University and the Relief Society
Edited by Dawn Hall Anderson, Susette Fletcher Green, and Marie Cornwall
Deseret Book Company (1993)
(paragraph breaks added to enhance online readibility)
The story of Adam and Eve teaches us that the Atonement is for all of life, each day of our lives. The Savior’s gracious power not only heals and comforts but is also a source of personal growth and development, leading to an understanding of life and a fullness of joy. The Atonement is thus developmental and practical, not static and abstract.
According to Lehi, “If Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden.” He and Eve “would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.” (2 Nephi 2:22-23.) This passage seems to say what many parents have long suspected-if they had no children, they would have no misery. Yet without children and without misery, they would also have no joy. But, taught Lehi, the Fall-with its misery, its sorrow, and even its sin-was not a mistake or an accident. The Fall was consciously designed, misery and all, to bring us joy and freedom: “Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy. And the Messiah cometh in the fulness of time . . . that they . . . become free forever, knowing good from evil; to act for themselves.” (2 Nephi 2:25-26.)
The Lord taught Adam this same understanding of life. He said Adam’s children would experience the bitterness of mortality, but “they taste the bitter, that they may know to prize the good.” (Moses 6:55.) Indeed, “If they never should have bitter they could not know the sweet.” (D&C 29:39) And the role of the Atonement in that process is to compensate for-to heal us from-the effects of the bitter, after we do all we can do by ourselves: “It is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do.” (2 Nephi 25:23.)
Thus does the grace of Christ, unlocked by his atoning sacrifice, heal us from the wounds of our sins and all our other infirmities. As we repent of our conscious sins, accept the gospel, and do all else we can do, we enter into a holy relationship with our Savior based on the two-way covenants made possible by his atonement. Through our covenant relationship with him, celebrated each week by the sacrament, he heals us in at least four distinct ways.
First, he satisfies the eternal law of justice, relieving us of the burden of paying for our sins, so long as we repent of them.
Second, his influence interacts with our righteous yearnings and our repentance to change our hearts until we desire goodness continually.
Third, he bridges any chasm that separates and estranges us from God. Many things can create this sense of alienation-unintentional mistakes or undeserved discouragement and confusion, as well as sin. Regardless of whether his sheep run away or lose their way or are stolen away, the Good Shepherd will search for them when they are lost, pick them up, and carry them home, making them “at one” with him and his Father. That is the work of the great “at-one-ment.”
And, fourth, once we have done all we can do to make restitution, the Savior will help to compensate for the harm we may have done or the harms done to us, repairing and restoring our spiritual and psychic losses, whether caused by sin or other factors.
Elder Bruce C. Hafen and Marie K. Hafen
“Eve Heard All These Things and Was Glad”: Grace and Learning By Experience
published in Women in the Covenant of Grace, Edited by Dawn Hall Anderson
and Susette Fletcher Green
Talks Selected from the 1993 Women’s Conference Sponsored by
Brigham Young University and the Relief Society
Deseret Book Company, 1994
Not just any person may invoke mercy on behalf of another: “Now there is not any man that can sacrifice his own blood which will atone for the sins of another…therefore there can be nothing which is short of an infinite Atonement which will suffice for the sins of the world” (Alma 34:11-12). Jesus Christ alone can achieve such an infinite Atonement “once for all” (Hebrews 10:10) because of his nature as the actual son of God in the flesh and because he was himself without sin (see Atonement of Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ: Only Begotten in the Flesh).
Mercy is not extended arbitrarily. To protect individuals from the undeserved effects of sins for which they are not responsible, the Atonement unconditionally paid the penalty for the transgression of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. It pays similarly for sins committed in ignorance (Mosiah 3:11; see also Moses 6:54). However, the Atonement removes the penalty for personal sins for which one is accountable only on the condition of individual repentance.
In this way, the concepts of justice, mercy, and the Atonement retain both a specific integrity and a logically consistent relationship: “The plan of mercy could not be brought about except an Atonement should be made; therefore God himself atoneth for the sins of the world, to bring about the plan of mercy, to appease the demands of justice, that God might be a perfect, just God, and merciful God also…. But there is a law given, and a punishment affixed, and a repentance granted; which repentance mercy claimeth; otherwise, justice claimeth the creature…. For behold, justice exerciseth all his demands, and also mercy claimeth all which is her own; and thus, none but the truly penitent are saved” (Alma 42:13, 15, 22, 24).
Mercy is thus rehabilitative, not retributive or arbitrary. The Lord asks repentance from a transgressor, not to compensate the Savior for paying the debt of justice, but to induce the transgressor to undertake a meaningful process of personal development toward a Christlike nature.
At the same time, mercy depends ultimately on the Lord’s extension of unmerited grace. Even though conditioned on repentance for personal sins, mercy is never fully “earned” by its recipients. Repentance is a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition of salvation and exaltation. “For we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do” (2 Ne. 25:23). The unearned nature of mercy is demonstrated by the Atonement’s having unconditionally compensated for the disabilities imposed on mankind by the Fall of Adam. Adam and Eve and their posterity were utterly powerless to overcome the physical and spiritual deaths that were introduced by the Fall. Moreover, transgressors do not “pay” fully for their sins through the process of repentance. Even though repentance requires restitution to the extent of one’s ability, most forms of restitution are beyond any person’s ability to achieve. No matter how complete our repentance, it would all be to no avail without a mediator willing and able to pay our debt to justice, on condition of our repentance. Thus, even with sincere and complete repentance, all are utterly dependent on Jesus Christ.
Through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, justice and mercy are interdependent and interactive, demonstrating that God cannot be just without being merciful, nor merciful without being just.
Topic: Justice and Mercy
Encyclopedia of Mormonism
Edited by Daniel H. Ludlow
The History, Scripture, Doctrine, and Procedure of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Macmillan Publishing Company (1992)
In LDS teachings, the Fall of Adam made Christ’s redemption necessary, but not because the Fall by itself made man evil. Because of transgression, Adam and Eve were expelled from Eden into a world that was subject to death and evil influences. However, the Lord revealed to Adam upon his entry into mortality that “the Son of God hath atoned for original guilt”; therefore, Adam’s children were not evil, but were “whole from the foundation of the world” (Moses 6:54). Thus, “every spirit of man was innocent in the beginning; and God having redeemed man from the fall, men became again, in their infant state, innocent before God” (D&C 93:38).
As the descendants of Adam and Eve then become accountable for their own sins at age eight, all of them taste sin as the result of their own free choice. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). One whose cumulative experience leads her or him to love “Satan more than God” (Moses 5:28) will eventually become “carnal, sensual, and devilish” (Moses 5:13;6:49) by nature. On the other hand, one who consciously accepts Christ’s grace through the Atonement by faith, repentance, and baptism yields to “the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the Atonement of Christ the Lord” (Mosiah 3:19). In this way, the individual takes the initiative to accept the grace made available by the Atonement, exercising faith through a willing “desire to believe” (Alma 32:27). That desire is often kindled by hearing others bear testimony of Christ. When this word of Christ is planted and then nourished through obedience interacting with grace, as summarized below, the individual may “become a saint” by nature, thereby enjoying eternal (meaning godlike) life.
Grace is thus the source of three categories of blessings related to mankind’s salvation. First, many blessings of grace are unconditional -free and unmerited gifts requiring no individual action. God’s grace in this sense is a factor in the Creation, the Fall, the Atonement, and the Plan of Salvation. Specifically regarding the Fall, and despite death and other conditions resulting from Adam’s transgression, Christ’s grace has atoned for original sin and has assured the resurrection of all humankind: “We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgression” (A of F 2).
Second, the Savior has also atoned conditionally for personal sins. The application of grace to personal sins is conditional because it is available only when an individual repents, which can be a demanding form of works. Because of this condition, mercy is able to satisfy the demands of justice with neither mercy nor justice robbing the other. Personal repentance is therefore a necessary condition of salvation, but it is not by itself sufficient to assure salvation (see Justice and Mercy). In addition, one must accept the ordinances of baptism and the laying-on of hands to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, by which one is born again as the spirit child of Christ and may eventually become sanctified (cf. D&C 76:51-52; see also Gospel of Jesus Christ).
Third, after one has received Christ’s gospel of faith, repentance, and baptism unto forgiveness of sin, relying “wholly upon the merits of him who is mighty to save,” one has only “entered in by the gate” to the “strait and narrow path which leads to eternal life” (2 Ne. 31:17-20). In this postbaptism stage of spiritual development, one’s best efforts-further works-are required to “endure to the end” (2 Ne. 31:20). These efforts include obeying the Lord’s commandments and receiving the higher ordinances performed in the temples, and continuing a repentance process as needed “to retain a remission of your sins” (Mosiah 4:12).
Grace, Encyclopedia of Mormonism