#4 "Because of My Transgression My Eyes are Opened"

Moses 4; 5:1-15; 6:48-62

Because of the depth and seriousness of this topic I don’t have any great object lessons or games to be played today. I feel this lesson is so important that we should discuss and learn our part in it by just learning straight through the scriptures. We are going to be discussing the fall, its affects, and how we fix the consequences of this transgression in our personal lives. We know that Adam and Eve transgressed, and that is what brought all this mortality into effect. 1st I feel I need to clarify the difference between transgression and sin. In Mormon Doctrine, it explains that sin and transgression is the same thing; going against what you know is right. It’s the same in that way but there is 1 big difference. Sin is called a transgression if the person transgressing has never known the difference between right and wrong. We know that Adam and Eve in the garden were innocent, not knowing the difference between good and evil.

Now that we know the reason Adam and Eve ‘transgressed’ instead of ‘sinned’, and we know about the fall we go to Moses 6:58 where we are given a commandment of what we are to do with this information: To teach these things freely unto your children.
How many of you could teach your children the importance of the fall in their lives, and not just how important, but how crucial to their personal existences, in this life and the next? Well if you are like me and you know the basics, but don’t necessarily know in-depth the importance in your lives enough that you can testify of its power in your personal lives, then stay with me and we will go through this together.

Moses 6:59-61 teaches us the steps we should be teaching; after we go through the steps we are going to go through them again in more detail.
Before we begin we need to understand where this all started. We know that Adam and Eve were put on earth in the garden of Eden; Brigham Young tells us in the Journal of Discourses 17:143 that, “when the earth was framed and brought into existence and man was placed upon it, it was near the throne of our Father in Heaven and when man fell…the earth fell into space and took upon its abode in this planetary system and the sun became our light…This is the glory the earth came from and when it is glorified it will return again into the presence of the Father, and it will dwell there, and these intelligent beings that I am looking at, if they live worthy of it, will dwell upon this earth…”
Write on board vertically connected by arrows FALL (spiritual/physical death)----born of water, blood, spirit(our birth)----water (baptism)----spirit (holy ghost)----Blood (of Christ)---Immortal (bodies/glory)
Everything on this earth, including the earth and everything on it has to go through this process in order to return to the Lord’s presence physically and spiritually. Now we know the steps we need to find out how to execute them daily; because we should be going through some of these steps daily so we can come one step closer to our Father.

Step 1- v59 so the 1st step is the FALL=sin (spiritual death)
In Moses 2:28 God gave Adam and Eve their 1st commandment to multiply and replenish the earth. In Moses 3:17 He gave them their 2nd commandment; to not partake of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. However we notice 2 things: 1-they couldn’t obey the 1st command without breaking the 2nd commandment. 2-The Lord knows this so He put a phrase in 3:17 “Nevertheless thou mayest choose for thyself-it is given unto thee.” This is the only commandment given that He gives them a choice. The choices 1-stay in the garden forever partaking of our presence, and living in a state of innocence or 2-partake of mortality-meaning Physical and spiritual death so you can keep the 1st commandment. We know they lived in the garden a long time enjoying and living in the Lord’s presence until satan came by. Somehow I believe Eve came to see that she had made a commitment-she had been foreordained for this purpose-of bringing all of us into mortality. She used her agency to choose to live her commitment; her life’s purpose. We know the whole earth with them on it fell out from the Lord’s presence which brought 2 kinds of death 1-physical-our physical forms changed so that we would die, also the earth died, it was no longer green and lush. 2-They (we) also experienced spiritual death-being taken from the Lord’s presence.

So because of their fall we were born into that consequence so because of that we too get to go through this process. Moses 6:59 tells us we must enter through the same process to get back into the Father’s presence physically and spiritually.

Step 2-Moses 6:59 We were born (going by the order in the scriptures-not by what the world is arguing about- if the spirit comes first or after life is created) by WATER in the womb, by BLOOD(blood vessels, cardiac system etc.), then SPIRIT. Our physical bodies combined with our spirits. We know that through Adam and Eve’s birth process, many things came about:
1-Moses 5:11 we receive mortal bodies and have children
2-Mosese 6:48 Physical death
3-Moses 6:49 Spiritual death (Separation from God’s presence)
4-Moses 6:48 partakers of misery and woe.
5-Moses 6:49 Capable of sinning
6-Moses 4:23-25 Ground is cursed, causing us to work
7-Moses 4:28 we learn to recognize good and evil
8-Moses 5:10 we can have joy in mortality
9-Moses 5:11 we can know joy of our redemption
10-Moses 5:11 we can obtain eternal life

Step 3-We as well as the earth must go through the same things to get back but He switches the order of a couple of things. WATER (baptism) is the 1st thing we need to make covenants and Moses 6:60 tells us that by being baptized and making covenants then keeping those covenants or commandments we can move onto the next step.
*The earth has to be able to return too so it too needs to be baptized (The Flood) (Genesis 6:17)
Back in 5:10 Adam had repented of all his sins and transgressions in Moses 6:52 The Lord tells him that it is because of the Saviors sacrifice that He is forgiven so now Adam asks the Lord in 6:53 why must men repent and be baptized in water? I can see why he asked this. He says well now that I’ve repented why can’t things just go back to the way they were, where we can live in Thy presence? The Lord answers him in verse 55 That between the time He (Adam) had lived had children and received forgiveness, His children had sinned and done things that kept them from Him, as well as the most important reason, in verse 56 we are all agents unto ourselves and need to have the opportunity to decide if we want to live in the Lord’s presence or not. Not to mention that Christ has yet to be born and His blood yet to be spilt, even though the atonement was infinite and spiritual in nature, it still had to be perfected through the physical form of it.

Which brings us to the next step, 4- through the SPIRIT Moses 6:60 says through the spirit we are justified-meaning the spirit is what takes away the sin and guilt of sin. The spirit is the cleansing agent. (PofGP manual p. 21) Does anyone feel comfortable sharing with us how this works for you in your life, what do you do physically or spiritually that brings the spirit to cleaning you out? Moses 5:14 gives us a clue as to how this works. “Lord God called upon men by the Holy Ghost everywhere and commanded them that they should repent.” So we should constantly be repenting. Everyday we should be repenting of everything we do that would keep us from coming to Christ—so what happens when we fall into bed and forget to repent? Or we fall into bed 5-6 days or months in a row. Well those sins build up don’t they; no wonder we feel like it gets harder and harder to hear the spirit at times. So what happens when we get to that point? That is where the Holy Ghost comes in; He can help us remember what we need to repent of just by praying and asking what we should repent of. He is the only thing that is in our hearts deep enough to know exactly what it is we should repent of and where to find the guilt to cleanse it away.
I’ve been praying for things like this lately, going through daily repentance but also praying to rid myself of past sins that I hadn’t taken care of. Well, one day I woke up very angry at Keith I didn’t know why, but as I continued through my day mean thoughts about him and past situations came and I started to feel bad about them, knowing that they were unjustified, I told myself I don’t feel like this anymore, I thought I was past these thoughts, well it was then I realized that I was being shown what I hadn’t repented of in the past. There might have been a day or couple of days that I forgot to repent of those bad thoughts. I knelt right then and there and asked for forgiveness. I asked if what I felt was correct. I knew that it was right. I felt the effects of its truthfulness right away. Guess what those thoughts were gone and I didn’t think of them the rest of the day. That’s how that works for me. I understood through that why it is so important not to hold onto past fights and mean thoughts in a marriage, and definitely not ‘go to bed angry’ and not praying for forgiveness about those feelings.

Step 5-Moses 6:60 through the BLOOD OF CHRIST we are sanctified. So is the earth. (2 Nephi 28:10; Mormon 8:27; D&C 87:7 & 135:7) says that through the blood of the innocent the ground (earth) cried out. We know that when the innocent are martyred the earth feels it, and it cries out and begs the Lord to end the suffering, but will always be obedient to the commandments.
We too are sanctified; sanctification means that we are purified so that we are able to stand in the Lord’s presence. (PofGP manual p. 21) This needs to happen physically through the resurrection (1 Cor. 15:20; 2 Nephi 2:8 & 9:6) as well as spiritually (Article of Faith 4; Helaman 14:15-18, D&C 19:15-19) Through Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Holy Ghost, and Keeping the commandments.
So how have you done this in your lives, what are some things you’ve done that implements the Blood of Christ in your life? How can this be done?
Some people write letters and burn them to symbolize their sacrifice, some people use prayer and their sincere words to invoke the atonement, one thing that we do every Sunday, partaking of the sacrament and mentally picturing the atonement cleansing your soul. There are many ways you may find that help you physically and spiritually bring you to this point. But this is the one of the most crucial (Moses 6:52) because it is only through Christ’s name that we can gain salvation.

Step 7 Moses 6:61 Here is the reward for going through all the steps successfully and many times until it is enough. The reward consists of knowing all the things recorded in heaven, having constant comfort, having truth of all things, etc. These are some great promises, here is the question can we enjoy these blessings in our lives today? Adam and Eve answer this for us in Moses 5:10-11 Adam was filled with all these things and he began to prophecy-“my eyes are opened to everything! In this life I shall have joy-in the flesh (resurrection) I shall see God. And Eve said in verse 11 she too was glad it (the fall) had happened. Her fall had been tough and full of some woe and misery especially considering all the babies she birthed-however because she went through this whole process- she was able to have seed, she now knows good and evil but because of that knows what true joy is and what being redeemed feels like. So what did they do with this information?
Moses 5:12 They made all these things known to their sons and daughters-just as we are commanded to do. We too need to get ourselves going through this process everyday until we are at the same point that Adam and Eve got to. I know this is possible and I am working on it, in the name of Jesus Christ amen.