Was there a beginning?
Question
Dear Gramps,
I really appreciate the time and effort you put in answers all those questions. And I again want to thank you on behalf of all those thousands and thousands who I know are following your answers almost on a daily basis. I have been following you almost since the beginning. Talking about the beginning my question is about the beginning. In our lesson of religion (The Pearl of Great Price) a couple of questions were raised:
(1) Was there a beginning?
(2) And how are the spiritual children of our Heavenly Father “organized?”
I have an idea, but I’d rather not speculate on Church matters. I want to thank you for providing some light on these matters.
FA
Answer
Dear FA,
Thank you for your vote of confidence. I’m not sure if it will still be extended by the end of my answer.
There absolutely was a beginning. “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). This beginning included not just creation, but councils as well (Abr. 3:22-28). I suspect, though, that you were looking for something a bit more. Moses learned the answer to that as well. The Lord tells the curious prophet: “Only an account of this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, give I unto you” (Moses 1:35).
I haven’t found anything authoritative on the particular organization of intelligence mentioned in Abraham 3. Any elaboration I could give on this subject would either be my speculation or a repetition of another’s.
Gramps
2 Nephi 2
11 For it must needs be, that there is an aopposition in all things. If not so, my firstborn in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.
12 Wherefore, it must needs have been created for a thing of naught; wherefore there would have been no apurpose in the end of its creation. Wherefore, this thing must needs destroy the wisdom of God and his eternal purposes, and also the power, and the mercy, and the bjustice of God.
13 And if ye shall say there is ano law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not bthere is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away.
14 And now, my sons, I speak unto you these things for your profit and alearning; for there is a God, and he hath bcreated all things, both the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are, both things to act and things to be cacted upon.
Everything came into existence when the opposition Lehi is talking about took place
And the opposition came from??
Heavenly Father