Why I Need a Savior

by Gay N. Blanchard - (Sept. 1999)

I appreciate all those who are willing to open their hearts to things of the spirit, things beyond mere reason, and to consider them thoughtfully.

Beyond reason
is where the answers lie.

Theories
preached long enough
subtly evolve into “facts”
which sidetrack truth.

Logic
dead ends itself
with finite conclusions.

The Scientific Method
is starched stiff
in the provable now.

Faith is the passageway.

Move into the wide dimension
beyond reason

Where a good God makes miracles
and is willing to show us how.

Since I was very small, the spiritual dimension has been as real for me as the physical dimension. This has made me somewhat of a misfit in the world, where serious spirituality is ridiculed as a weakness, and in the Mormon church where it is viewed as apostasy. When I sit through a three-hour Mormon marathon meeting though, and watch the bored faces, the heads nodding-off, it becomes obvious that lay Mormons are starving for some spiritual food which might lift them up our of their lethargy.

Popularity of the “New Age” or metaphysical movement is evidence that many people in the world are looking for more than the temporal, scientific answers, and want to believe in a dimension beyond mere intellectualism.

One of the first New Age books I read was Shirley MacClaine’s “Out on a Limb.” It surprised me to learn that she, and probably a great many others, had grown up with no knowledge of a spirit world, a pre-existence, or an after life. This realization caused me to intensely appreciate my own heritage. Mormonism had given me from Day One a vision of God’s Big Picture, which made sense out of mortality.
Since then I have read other New Age books, in an attempt to understand the philosophy which so many people seem attracted to. Most recently I read the best-selling “Conversations With God” -- book three. The thing that first impresses me in New Age books is how many things I agree with. The second thing that hits me is how many things repel me. I have taken a long, hard look at the whole picture presented in the Conversations-with-God books and have come to the conclusion that the person speaking through Neal Donald Walsch is NOT my God – is even the enemy of the God I worship. He cleverly presents just enough truth to seduce us into trusting his words, and then methodically cuts down every principle of Christianity, every truth of love, even telling us that we don’t need a savior. It is a diabolically clever maneuver, and it is ambushing more souls than I want to think about.

We have some information about a war in Heaven which was fought over two plans presented by two of God’s most intelligent children – Christ and Lucifer. Lucifer’s idea was to save everyone by forcing them into the same mold, which he would prescribe. Then as a reward he would be given God’s glory. It seems to me his motive was selfishness. He has never cared how many people get hurt or how many remain unfulfilled; he only cares about his own power and glory.

Christ does care about us. His idea was to give everyone the freedom to choose his or her own way, and if we chose to experience the difference between good and evil, He would rescue us from the down-side of that lesson, so we could continue to progress. Christ’s motive was love. He loved us enough to pay an infinite ransom for us in order that we might find fulfillment. And He loved God enough to give Him the glory.

God gave us the freedom to choose between the two plans. I believe the so-called “war in Heaven” was not a mass conflict, but a battle which each child of God fought alone: will I choose forced guaranteed security, or responsible freedom? Will I choose selfishness or love? We made our choice without the knowledge that one of them was good and one evil. Mormons believe that the fact of our being on earth in physical bodies is evidence that we chose Christ’s plan. Lucifer and those who chose his plan left God’s presence and gave up the option to experience physical reality – except through us.

At some point each of us who followed Christ made another choice – to partake of the fruit of the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil. Now, here, we are living that choice. The Earth is our arena; physical bodies are our instruments of learning. The true, loving God provides the lessons in what is good; the false, selfish god provides the opposition, the evil. Our challenge, the reason we are here, is to decide which we want to BECOME. Our choices for good bring us closer to the full potential of our divine nature; our choices for evil take us further from it.

We should be keenly aware that each of us, alone, is again fighting that same war we fought in Heaven, but in a new dimension with higher stakes. Lucifer hasn’t given up on us. He still wants our souls, he still wants us to worship him as god. He is clever enough to use the most subtle, enticing forms of seduction. He pretends to offer the things mortals want – peace, freedom, love. He takes upon himself the name “god” and tells us that we, too, are god and our purpose on earth is to make that discovery and give ours souls to him. This, he claims is the only reality; everything else is illusion. Through the “New” New-Age movement he is convincing millions of people that the devil does not exist, that there is no such thing as evil, and so there is no such thing as sin. Everything we do, good or bad, is O.K. – is necessary to the whole picture and contributes to our becoming “who we really are.” Nothing we do matters. The cunning strategy in this teaching is that by taking evil out of the picture, Lucifer takes himself out as an enemy of whom we need be aware.

Another thing in Walsch’s book which repels me is the doctrine that there are no individuals. His god would have us believe that we are all, in whatever form we are currently recycling, merely a dispensable part of one great glob of everythingness-with-no-personality called “god.” He says it is just an “ego trip” for anyone to imagine he or she is different from the mass.

From my point of view, this is an insult to the unique beauty of each one of Heavenly Mother and Father’s DIFFERENT children, and certainly an insult to the Beings who in fact ARE GOD. I am confused at why so many people seem willing to give up their freedom-to-be-individuals in favor of standing by the seashore intoning “I am God: and seeing themselves as part of a great river flowing nowhere. When I was taught that men and women could become Gods, I saw that picture as an option – not a given. There is certainly more responsibility in Godhood than just “going with the flow.” I am not willing to give up my soul – the intelligence and personality which is my I AM – to become part of a nonentity.

In contradiction to the “no individuals” idea, the book then presents the supreme lesson in selfishness by saying that we have no responsibility to anyone but ourSELF, who is really not a self, but merely a part of the whole glob. The person the conversations are with, who calls himself “god,” experiences life through us, as we “pretend” to be individuals; in other words we are used as pawns to do things it (the great glob) can’t do.

The whole book is full of glaring contradictions, which the writer soothingly calls paradoxes. To me, even a paradox has to make some sense, has to complete a picture, not distort it.

The most insidious thing being taught in the New Age (and New New Age) books, the thing that Lucifer hopes will win the war for him, is that we don’t need a Savior. I quote from “Metaphysical Primer” written by Robertson and Hughes:

“Jesus was an advanced soul, who showed us that we can all become advanced souls.
His life was an example of how to do this through unconditional love, service to humanity,
and understanding the deep inner meaning of life and God. By this interpretation of Jesus’
work, metaphysicians feel humanity does not need a Savior. Each of us is our own savior
through the process of coming to know the god-self within.”

All the New Age books I have read acknowledge Christ as a great teacher – even as the example we can follow to become our own saviors, but they don’t give him any power we don’t have.

While most Mormons would deny it, this philosophy is very much like their own. They preach that Christ is our Savior, but in practice they reject the power of Christ’s grace in favor of the power of their own works. Mormons are taught that we can and must follow Christ’s example in order to perfect ourselves.

From what I have read, heard and observed, most people in the world do not live as if they need a Savior, and don’t seriously believe in a literal resurrection. But I DO NEED A SAVIOR! I want to try and tell you why. I will cover three crucial needs.

1. I need my sins to be atoned for.
2. I need divine help in my struggle to progress.
3. I need to be resurrected.

Let’s start with atonement for sin. Yes, I believe “sin” is a reality. I have a conscience that is keenly aware of right and wrong. But while most people would define “sin” as breaking God’s commandments, I have come up with a different definition, because the God I worship does not command us, but only counsels us, and then gives us the freedom to pay attention or not. Sin to me, and perhaps to God, who does care about our individual feelings, is anything we do which harms ourself or harms someone else. I believe all the so-called “commandments” are designed to keep us from hurting one another, or to help us in blessing one another.

I can’t remember ever pre-meditating a sin, but I have hurt a lot of people – not meaning to – but just because I was ignorant, or tactless or angry or proud or selfish – or because they were carrying burdens I had no way of comprehending. Numerous times in my struggle I have offended those whom I love most. And just being mortal I have stumbled over my own ego often enough to do myself a lot of damage. You have sinned in those ways too. All of us are sinners.

All of us who are Mormons have probably been exposed to the lesson on the four R’s of repentance:

l. Recognize the sin.
2. Feel Remorse.
3. Make Restitution.
4. Refrain from repeating the sin.

I came to detest that lesson, because I have never been able to actually do any of them except feel Remorse; I am always sorry when I learn that I have hurt someone. Astrologists say that you can walk into a roomful of people and recognize a Sagittarian because whenever she opens he mouth, she says something that hurts somebody, and when she learns she has hurt them, she is terribly sorry and says something that hurts even worse. When I heard that, I didn’t want to believe in astrology, because my sign is Sagittarius. But I’ve hurt a lot of people, and been sorry a lot. I do feel remorse for my sins.

But as to Recognizing my sins – I can’t do that very often. Sometimes, of course, I know immediately that I have done something wrong, something stupid. But most often when I hurt people, I don’t even know I have done it. I have come to understand that Jesus Christ, my Savior, does know when I sin, because in Gethsemane He felt the pain of the people I hurt, and He felt my pain – both my pain for sinning, and my pain when sinned against. He grieves because we hurt one another, but He understands that we can’t always help it, given the environment we are in. He does not condemn us or want to punish us. He wants to heal us.

That’s what atonement for sin is – healing or Restitution. I really need a Savior to cover that “R” for me. There is no way I can undo a hurt once it has happened; I wish I could! I have tried. But I simply do not have the power to “make it all better.” Christ does have the power. His LOVE can heal and make right the damage I have done! This miracle occurs, of course, only if the injured person receives Christ’s healing. But I know it is there, freeing me from a burden I can’t carry.

And No. 4 – as much as I want to, I can’t guarantee that I will Refrain from making the same mistakes again, especially the ones I haven’t been able to recognize. I understand that in a world where evil exists, I am always vulnerable. Christ understands that too, and pours His great love through me to give me strength.

Another church lesson you probably remember is the one comparing your life to a nice clean board, and every time you sin, a nail is hammered into the board. If you repent, you can pull the nail out, but you can never get rid of the hole. I hate that story too! First of all, because the one telling it always imagines he has a clean board, which of course is a lie, and secondly because it lays a hopeless guilt trip on every honest person.

Christ’s love saves me from all such guilt trips. Because of His grace, instead of a board full of holes, I see my life as a well-ventilated garden, with pure love breathing through all the dark corners to lighten them. Christ’s gift of grace frees me from the impossible task of trying to perfect myself. It opens up for me a vision of myself as Christ sees me – already perfect, beautiful and whole. As I accept that Christ already has overcome the world for me, I can forgive myself for my inability to do it. I need the Savior’s grace to atone for my sins!

My experience with grace leads me into the next reason I need a Savior – because without His help I have been unable to progress into higher levels of law. Eternal progress is a big rallying cry of the Mormons, who claim to believe that by following the prophet we can progress to a level of law, a “Kingdom of Glory,” where we may live with God.

I was glad to believe that, because I wanted to progress. I worked hard for forty years to be the perfect Mormon. Maybe I even was the perfect Mormon – I carried that slightly superior attitude that a member of “the only true church” is entitled to carry. But I was not a perfect Christian. Inside, where my heart was honest, I was a hypocrite, empty and unfulfilled. I suppose it was my deep yearning for more spirituality and my innate honesty that finally forced me to recognize that after all that work of being the perfect Mormon, I wasn’t truly any closer to God than when I started. That admission broke my heart and humbled me to a place where, instead of voicing my usual lament, “I’m not worthy; I must work harder!” I quietly said “Help,” and waited – listening. Really listening. And then I heard quite clearly,
“You are worthy! You have always been worthy. You are worth my life!” And suddenly, that quickly, my heart was changed. Here is a poem I wrote about that mighty change of heart.

It is a paradox –
the simple secret of that mighty change
the mighty secret of that simple change.

We work and work and work
pretending our goal is to achieve it.
Really our goal is to work
not change.

The secret is
that the mighty change of heart
is a gift from Christ,
a gift of love,
offered to those who seek truth.
Gifts cannot be achieved.
Gifts must be received.

We fear and fear and fear
that we will disappear
if we trade
achieve
for
receive.
And we will
disappear.

The old letter-of-the-law workhorse will
disappear.

Good riddance.

See who emerges from the ashes –
the young creator
beautiful, clean, new.
changed.
“ . . . with no more desire to do evil
but to do good continually . . . “

That is a mighty change!

And such a simple change –
the desire for good rather than evil.

Mighty, because we can’t achieve it.
Simple, if we reach our and receive it.

Do you dare trust Christ that much?

After I trusted Christ that much, I was a new person. I felt worthy, loved, forgiven! And part of the miracle was that I was also able to forgive.

There must be a lot of people who believe they can discipline themselves to forgive others, but I was never able to do it. I couldn’t honestly say, “I forgive,” and feel it. The thing I finally did do which changed the whole picture for me, was receive Christ’s grace. I came to recognize that what I had been calling my “works” was actually pride. I had been putting my faith in myself. When I let go of that arrogance and turned to Christ for help, He performed in me the true miracle of forgiveness. He changed my heart to feel that God forgives me of all my sins – past sins and sins I will yet commit.

That feeling precipitated two more miracles: it was easy for me to feel real forgiveness for people who had hurt me, and I could truly forgive myself of the many imperfections which had haunted me with guilt all my life. I had actually progressed.

You may be relieved to learn that when I received Christ’s grace I didn’t also suddenly stop working. That seems to be a Mormon’s greatest fear, that he’ll stop working and start sinning if he dares look at grace. I didn’t stop working. I did stop trying, and struggling, and aspiring, and competing, and setting goals and coveting rewards. There were no more personal achievement ambitions in my picture. The whole scenario of being obedient so I could obtain rewards, and keeping the commandments so I could avoid punishment, vanished. My faith was in Christ, not in myself; my works were for others instead of for myself. Without even trying I did the right things for the right reasons.

The real experience of being born again is exactly what King Benjamin’s people said, “The spirit of the Lord has wrought a mighty change in us, or in our hearts, that we have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually.” I used to read that story in the Book of Mormon carrying a sinful measure of jealousy, because I thought those lucky people had worked hard enough to perfect themselves. Now, having myself experienced grace, I know that for King Benjamin’s people and for myself, it was one of God’s miracles which our hearts were willing to receive, a gracious gift of love. To be born of the spirit is to have all desire to sin washed away, permanently. One does not need to maintain a vigilant struggle to keep from backsliding. Grace is a gift which abides. To receive it is progress into higher law.

Mormons are taught that the three degrees of glory are separate worlds where people go when they die; this may be true. However, it is also true that the laws which govern the kingdoms we call Telestial, Terrestrial, and Celestial, and the laws which govern “Hell” are all functioning on the Earth now. Each of us is living the law of one of those places now. That puts progress (or the regression of going to hell) in present tense. Part of our challenge here is to recognize the different laws and decide which one we want to live. Part of our confusion is that each of us is coming from the point of view to which he or she has progressed. If we assume others can see our picture, when they can’t, misunderstandings result.

It is helpful to look at the signs and tokens we give each other. The words we use and the behavior we manifest indicate which law we are living. We won’t recognize signs and tokens from laws higher than we are living, but we will recognize those from the law we are in and from laws where we’ve been. Gradual growth occurs within each law, if we keep asking questions and seeking more truth. But real progress happens when we move from a lesser law into a higher law. That is an experience which changes us in a dramatic and permanent way.

All of us have watched, or felt, progress happen. When we see people who are converted from lone-and-dreary-world law to the law of obedience and sacrifice, from godlessness to Christianity, we marvel at how their hearts have been changed in ways which enable a whole new lifestyle. However, their associates back in the law of “survival-of-the-meanest” can’t understand a word they say anymore. They are labeled as loonies or religious fanatics.

So it was with me when I was lifted by Christ’s grace from the law of obedience into the law of the gospel of Jesus Christ – from works to grace. My old friends interpreted my words to be heretical.
I was labeled all kinds of things, the most common label – used first by priesthood leaders and then by all their obedient followers – was “deceived.” Progress is measured by some Mormons by upward movement in the church hierarchy. Most all lay Mormons look up to their leaders as men who have progressed further than they have. The bishops are respected, the stake presidents are honored, the general authorities are revered, and the prophets are worshipped. When an ordinary person like myself, a woman even, was lifted by Christ into higher law, I knew that true progress could not be measured by church status. In fact my experience has been that church leaders discourage progress past the law of obedience. This, to me, is a sign that they are living that law; surely if they understood higher law, they would teach it and would rejoice with those who progress, instead of rejecting them. As it is, they require that Mormons-in-good-standing not progress. A “good Mormon” is expected to endure to the end of this life by staying active in the law of works trying to follow Christ’s example.

New Age philosophers teach from a different angle, use different words, but come to the same conclusion: we have to discipline ourselves by hard work and sacrifice to rise to the highest level of consciousness. They believe that Jesus set an example which we can follow, and that Christ is a state-of-being which we can achieve. I quote again from the Metaphysical Primer.

“Christ is a principle, an initiation into a higher consciousness of perfect attunement
with the Diety. It is attained by complete devotion to serving humanity and recognition
of our true nature as Beings of Light. Jesus became “The Christ” when he gave up
focusing on his personality self and focused entirely on his Divine Presence within.
This initiation was also an act whereby he demonstrated to us that we too, have within
us the power to become ‘The Christed Principle’.”

Apparently there are a great many New-Agers who think they have become or can become Christ. I continue to question whether they have become Christ-centered or just self-centered, but I am in no position to judge that. I can only speak for myself.

Before New-Age philosophy had been invented, I was born and raised a Mormon and always understood that we are children of God (Beings of Light) who have the potential to become like God. I was taught that I must work hard and follow Christ’s example. As a sincere, active Mormon, I tried. I was lulled into the pretense that doing everything the brethren told me to do was the same as following Christ’s example, until I followed their advice to read the scriptures with real intent. Nowhere in the scriptures did I find Christ doing the things I was doing, and quite honestly I was not doing anything that the scriptures said He did.

I did not change water into wine. I did not walk on water or calm storms. I did not heal the sick, make the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, or cleanse the lepers. I could not look into a woman’s eyes and fill her with peace, or touch a man and make him whole. I certainly could not bring a dead person back to life. I could not speak the wisdom of eternal truths, or reach people’s hearts with words to feed their deepest longings. What’s more, no matter how hard I worked, I was not capable of doing those things.

The more I studied about Christ, the more clearly I knew that I could not follow His example. In fact I came to believe that if Christ came now and did the same things the scriptures say He did, the Mormon leaders would reject Him just as His own church leaders did. The brethren would expect Christ to follow their example, which is what they really expect of all church members.

Joseph Smith’s insight that God the Father was literally (after the manner of the flesh) Christ’s Father helped me understand why it is impossible for any of us to follow Christ’s example, or for any of us to become “the Christ.” Christ’s genetic inheritance was half God; He had bred into Him the power to do things that we who are all mortal simply cannot do, no matter how hard we try. It was like a great burden lifting, when I came to understand that God does not expect me, a mortal, to do things that only a God can do. I was not able under my own power to climb into a higher law. Christ lifted me there; my part was to let Him. It was humbling and glorifying at once. A paradox. But real progress.

Living in Terrestrial law, or the law of mercy, is a comforting experience. It is a time of peace and healing, a place to learn the ways of compassion and of giving with joy. Many of the scriptures take on new meaning, because they are interpreted in the spirit of the law, which is so much kinder and more sensible than the letter of the law. Lucifer’s power is greatly diminished, which brings truth into clearer perspective. Feelings become more refined and perceptions more accurate.

My manner of prayer changed too, in this peaceful law. Every silent thought reaching to the heavens became a prayer; communion with God became an ongoing process instead of a formal ritual ceremony. Still, I had not progressed to the place of understanding Love – by God’s definition – which had been my quest for many years.

Both the Mormons and the New-Agers teach that we must love unconditionally. Both of them teach that it is possible to discipline ourselves to do that. I could never discover how. When I tried to discipline myself to do good things, my efforts felt forced and unreal, felt more like pretenses at loving than like real love. To love with an honest feeling that flowed from the heart, to love even my enemies, was something I could not discipline myself to do.

Once again Christ came to my rescue and lifted me into a higher law – the law of love. He changed my heart so that it was filled with pure love instead of with conditional love. This mighty change was another joyous paradox. One thing that had prevented me from loving was a fear that I would have to embrace all of a person’s negative attributes in order to prove that my love was unconditional. Christ showed me that I must stand against the evil behavior of a person in order to truthfully stand with and love his or her divine self. That is the paradox of unconditional love. One has to have made enough choices for good and against evil to be able to tell the difference. Then it is easy to recognize goodness in a person and love that reality, at the same time one recognizes evil behavior and rejects it.

When Christ drove the money-changers from the temple, when He called the Pharisees hypocrites, He was standing against unrighteous behavior; He still loved the perpetrators of those crimes. On the cross He asked forgiveness for the people who tortured Him. He forgave those who betrayed Him – but He certainly felt the pains of their evil behavior and didn’t condone that.

When the serpent told Eve that partaking of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil would make her wise, he told the truth. One of Lucifer’s most effective ways of deceiving mortals is to tell some truth along with the lies he tells. Separating the truth from the lies is one of our crucial challenges. Until we can clearly discern good from evil, we are not wise enough to love purely, unconditionally, as God loves.

My experience has proved to me that when one is lifted into a higher law, the differences between good and evil become more dramatic. What was good in a lesser law may become evil in a higher law. To go backward, into a law where one was once comfortable would be “hell.” Even our perception of God changes as we progress. Pagans see God as fearsome, wrathful. Converts to the law of obedience want their God to mete out justice – punishment and reward. God is seen as merciful in the law of the gospel of Jesus Christ. In the highest law God becomes the Source of pure love, which is the energy of creation.

Now in my life I worship the God who is Love. From this viewpoint I see that one cannot learn to love unconditionally by adhering to any discipline. The nature to love purely is a state-of-being to which one must be lifted by Christ. I need a Savior to do that for me.

The third reason I need a Savior is because I want to be resurrected. I’ve had a lot of questions about what resurrection really is. I wrote this poem once:

Why didn’t Mary recognize Jesus
in the tomb garden?
Why didn’t His disciples know it was Jesus
on the road?
Why did Thomas doubt he saw the Lord?

After all, they were His best friends.

People laugh when I say,
in Heaven
I’m going to have longer legs
and curly hair
and dance like the wind.

But maybe
the flawed body we lay down
doesn’t
rise in the resurrection.

Maybe we are entirely
new and beautiful,
and no one will say
she looks just like her mother
or father
of great-aunt Edna,
But only that she looks just like
herself!

Maybe the resurrection is
the uniting of
our own personal spirit
with our own body-of-choice.

Maybe
we will only be recognized
by those who have enough faith
and enough
love.

Yes, I want to be resurrected. I like having a body. The body I have now is not perfect for my longings. Still, it has proven to me that a physical body is a great blessing.

My hands, which are now stiff with arthritis, have brought me great joy as I have used them to play the piano, sew for my loved ones, plant flowers, sooth a fevered brow, write music and poetry. My hands have allowed me all the fabulous expressions of touch, have enabled me to create.

My ears, which are now getting quite deaf, have heard children’s laughter, masterpieces of music, words of love, lessons of importance, the variously exotic sounds of nature. My eyes, now failing, have seen wonders! -- books to read, loved faces, all the colors of the rainbow, beauty, light, skies full of stars, natures creations.

And I have danced with my whole body. Dancing has been one of my great joys. Movement. Running, whirling, skipping to the rhythm of my own heart’s dreams.

I do like having a physical body. It is terribly painful to me to have my faculties diminishing so that I can’t do the things I used to do, so that I can’t remember the things I want to remember. I would like to have a body that stays beautiful and perfectly useful, a mind that is always astute.

For people who only just discovered that there is a spiritual dimension, the unseen aspect of life is surely fascinating. Having spirits use you for a channeling devise, or learning how to cause your own spirit to leave your body, have become popular with the new-age movement. It is good to understand that the spiritual dimension is real, as it gives more meaning to the physical dimension. I am acutely aware though, of one of the hazard which many people apparently don’t take into account. Just because a person has died and moved into the spiritual realm doesn’t mean that person knows everything. It is a mistake to assume that all the information which comes from a spirit-being is truth. As Joseph Smith pointed out, we arrive in the spirit world with the same attitudes and knowledge with which we left mortality. A person’s spirit will abide in the same law the mortal was living; he or she will understand only what was familiar here. Frustrated authors will be glad to find someone through whom they can channel the “best-selling book” they never got around to writing. Power-hungry spirits will look for humans they can control. Lucifer and his followers will try to inhabit mortals’ bodies so they can experience physicalness. It is important that we utilize the connections to God which are planted in our own hearts, to discern whether or not the things that come to us from the spirit world are really things we choose to embrace.

Being by nature sincere in my yearning to get back to God, it has never been hard for me to picture my life with Father and Mother in Heaven before I came here. It is easy for me to imagine that I wanted to learn how to become like Them – resurrected beings. I can believe that in my innocence I said, “Sure, I want to go to earth and get a body and learn about good and evil.” How could I have any way of knowing what it meant to “die”?

Now I know. I know the feelings of living with all my senses active, and I know the feelings of dying, a little at a time. I am not afraid of death itself, because I know the spirit is eternal and simply goes on to other things. The process of dying though, is not fun.

To some New-Agers, Christ’s resurrection may be interpreted to mean that they can be reincarnated as many times as they want to be. For me though, reincarnation has nothing to do with eternal life. It simply guarantees another slow death. I would like to live in a physical body that wouldn’t deteriorate or die. For me that means resurrection through Christ.

I have no sure knowledge of exactly how resurrection works. I have come to believe that it has something to do with the substance that runs through our veins. When Christ lived on earth, He had blood flowing through His veins inherited from His mortal mother, and pure love flowing through His veins, inherited from His Heavenly Father. When He died on the cross, He shed His blood, the ingredient that made Him mortal. But pure love, the ingredient that made Him immortal, brought Him back to life.

It is my belief that by another miracle, when we are ready to be resurrected, Christ’s love for us will somehow gather together all the elements to make up a perfect physical body for us. Christ will pour into the veins of that body God’s pure love-energy which cannot be destroyed. The long-searched-for fountain of youth may be found only through Christ’s resurrection, and His love, which will resurrect us – if that’s what we choose.

As I have said, moving into higher law gave me a vastly wider perspective than I had when I was the perfect Mormon. It now seems feasible to me that we might choose to come back to the earth to learn some things we missed the first or second or third time around. And it certainly seems feasible that God, who lives the principle of free agency, would give us that option. Maybe we’ll choose to go to some other library-in-the-sky, or some other planet or universe or galaxy to find new adventure. But at some point, I believe, every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ – the only one through whom we may be lifted to our highest potential, the only one through whom we may be resurrected. If I have lived other lives here on earth, this is my last time around. I have learned the ultimate lesson: Christ did not come to lay on us heavy burdens of guilt, or demand that we discipline ourselves to become like Him. He came to lift us up beyond our own abilities and to quicken us with energies we lack. He came because He loves us enough to do for us things we cannot do for ourselves. Christ did not come to be our example; He came to be our Savior.

And I need a Savior.

The Fullness of the Gospel

by Gay N. Blanchard – Fall 2014

“Which is the true church – which one should I join?” This simple prayer was the beginning of God’s revelations, through Joseph Smith, which restored the fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. “ And for this cause, that men might be made partakers of the glories which were to be revealed, the Lord sent forth the fulness of his gospel, his everlasting covenant”. ( D.&C.133:57)

I was born into a family that belonged to the resultant Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, with a heritage on both sides of the family of pioneers who crossed oceans, dusty plains, and sacrificed much in their quest for Zion. I inherited some of their zeal. Even as a child, I was more spiritually oriented than most people in the church, where all of us lived in the law of obedience and sacrifice, or the telestial law of justice. I first learned about this law when I went to the temple to be married at age 20. As the temple ceremony proceeded through different rooms, I learned about other progressively important laws, and I took the whole ritual seriously. I needed to understand what all those strange symbols meant.

I tried diligently to keep all the commandments and obey all the lessons that were taught in church classes and sermons which I attended regularly. I eagerly accepted all church callings made by the bishop, and in each one I endeavored to go “the second mile” in living and preaching the gospel as I understood it. At this time in my life, the only relationship I had with Christ was the fear that I wasn’t good enough yet to have a relationship with Him. Still, I was wholeheartedly committed in my desire to get back home to God. I asked the hard questions.

THE MYSTERIES

Don’t delve into the mysteries,

thy counseled.

I tried to be obedient,

but questions kept popping into my mind --

questions that didn’t seem

mysterious at all,

but simply necessary

to one’s progress

in the eternal plan.

Don’t delve into the mysteries,

they warned.

Why not?

What are the mysteries?

popped into my mind.

Isn’t every question a mystery

until one has studied out the answer?

And then isn’t that mystery

transformed into knowledge?

And they counseled me to

seek knowledge.

One of the things my teachers kept reiterating was the need to work hard enough to make myself worthy of promised blessings; to work hard enough to earn the Lord’s grace. Many long years into this struggle I faced the fact that no matter how hard I worked, no matter how hard I tried to make myself worthy, I still didn’t feel any closer to God (depression in Mormon women?). It was a losing battle. I was a failure.

“I can’t do it!” I said to God. “Help me!”

Soon after that, as I was simply going about my daily housework, a miracle happened.I heard a voice say, “You are worthy! You are worth my life!” I knew it was Jesus Christ, and suddenly I felt his love wash through me and quicken me with light. I felt worthy. I felt how much Christ loves me as an individual; in return I felt an overwhelming love for Him. It changed my life. (“We love him, because he first loved us).” (I John 4:19)

One insight which came to me was that I had finally received the gift of grace that Jesus Christ had been offering me all my life, but which I had been taught I had to work to attain. Part of the miracle of this experience was to understand that you can’t earn a gift. You can earn wages, good grades, reputations. But gifts must be received. Faith, hope, forgiveness, grace, love -- all the gifts of God -- must be received first; then we can give purely. It was a revelation to me that the whole purpose of the law of obedience is to prove to us that we can’t keep all of it. Realizing this, after years of struggle, will bring us to our knees with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Only then can the Lord lift us into His higher law.

I was so filled with joy and enthusiasm at learning these things that I wanted to share my new insights with others. Surely all my Mormon friends would want to hear this good news. The whole world would want to hear it. In 1973 I had a book published with the hope that it would appeal to what we then called the hippie generation; the gist of it was that if they seriously wanted the peace, freedom, and love their banners proclaimed, they should turn to Christ. There they would find the truths they sought. The book was marketed by the LDS publisher Bookcraft. The first edition quickly sold out. I received a letter from the publisher saying that they wanted to print another edition and put it as an alternate on their Book Club list.

This never happened. Instead, the bishop called in my husband and told him I was writing “Fawn-Brodie-type books. When my husband asked, “Have you read any of the things my wife has written?” the bishop answered, “No.” I’m sure he had never read Ms. Brodie’s books either, or he couldn’t have made such a ridiculous comparison. In this interview my husband told the bishop that it would be unnecessary and wrong to discipline me.

This was the first clue I had that General Authorities were aware of my existence, since they are the ones who control what church-oriented presses, even theoretically independent companies like Bookcraft are allowed to publish. I deduced that they had given Bookcraftinstructions not to reprint my book, and notified my stake president to keep an eye on me. He would have delegated that job to my bishop.

The second clue I had was when an influential (but manic-depressive) friend told me that she had gone to Apostle Mark E. Petersen to repent of her sins, and at his request had given him the names and writings of her close friends.

The bishop called me in a couple of times and asked me about a “group” I belonged to. I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about, which was the truth. In these interviews I fervently bore my testimony of Jesus Christ; the bishop repeatedly told me I was deceived.

When my father, who lived in the same ward as my husband and me, learned that the bishop was investigating me, he requested an interview to inform the bishop of my loyalty to the church and tell him that to convene a court would be a mistake. He came away from that meeting assured that the bishop had valued his reasoning and would not hold a court.

However, when Christ lifted me from the law of obedience and sacrifice into the law of His gospel, the sacrifice I had to make was my good standing in the church. The bishop sent me a summons to a bishop’s court on the grounds of (1) not sustaining the Brethren, (2) preaching false doctrine, and (3) claiming revelation for others -- three things that were listed in the bishop’s manual as excommunicable offenses. The court, however, did not directly address any of the three charges. Instead the bishop brought in ward members to testify that I had upset them in one way or another. He also read a paper I had written about our love for Christ,and asked me if I had written it. I said, “Yes.” He didn’t pursue it any further. But I knew he must have gotten the paper from Mark E. Petersen, since my manic-depressive friend was one of the only two people I had given it to.

I received the verdict in another letter: excommunication. It was not really a surprise, since my accuser was also my judge. My father was the church’s landscape architect, had served as a bishop, as a stake president, and was then a stake patriarch. At the time of this court he was in Washington D.C. landscaping the grounds of the new temple. He flew home immediately, and along with my husband, whose callings had included bishop and stake high councilman, wrote an appeal, which they gave to the bishop.

When the bishop ignored the counsel of these two faithful experienced men, both of them were bitterly disappointed. I, myself, would never have appealed the bishop’s decision, since I believed that he investigated me at the request of at least one witch-hunting apostle, so an appeal would be fruitless. When I questioned the bishop and stake president about where their instructions came from, they always protected their higher-in-authority priesthood brethren with the reply, “That’s confidential.”

In those days excommunications were announced in priesthood meeting, but not if an appeal was pending. Nevertheless, the following Sunday the bishop got up and announced that I had been excommunicated, “for behavior unbecoming a member of the church.” That announcement activated the Mormon grapevine. By that afternoon the whole stake was buzzing with speculation about what I might have said or done. Some of the ridiculous gossip that got back to me was that I had started my own church; that I belonged to a polygamist cult; that I was telling the apostles how to run the church; and of course, that I had committed adultery.

The bishop’s handbook of instructions specified that the high council court should be held within two weeks to hear the appeal. In fact it was not held for six months. The stake president seemed unsure of how to proceed, but tried to pay attention to my complaints about how the bishop’s court had been handled.

The appeal court lasted three tense nights. At this court I gave a long impassioned defense of myself, refuting the bishop’s accusations. Many relatives testified on my behalf. My husband, who felt that his priesthood authority was as valid as anyone’s, was sure his brothers in the priesthood would believe his testimony that I was innocent, and would exonerate me. My father gave a lengthy diatribe against the bishop, and praised me. My daughter reminded the court of Joseph Smith’s warning that it would be better to let ten guilty men go free than to convict one innocent one. My cousin recalled that one of his ancestors had quarreled with Brigham Young and been excommunicated, and how a large posterity had fallen away from the church in consequence; he urged the court not to do that to my family. My unstable friend, who had testified against me at the bishop’s court, testified for me at this one. The stake president, of course, called witnesses of his own, who told their own stories.

Ultimately my sentence was changed from excommunication to disfellowshipment. This change in the verdict was never announced. I am still shunned by people who gloated over rumors they had gladly shared and passed on, often with embellishments, in 1976.

My father, whose personal identity depended on the integrity of the General Authorities, still believed that only the bishop was to blame. Taking the position “he doesn’t deserve to be called by that sacred name,” my father refused to attend our same ward. Until his death ten years later, he, as a widower, attended a Single’s Ward that met in the same building. My husband, a practical man who had never before questioned that it was right and safe to follow his priesthood leaders, was so shaken by what had happened that, until his death 28 years later, he never paid another cent of tithing, and gradually became almost inactive.

I had moved into the terrestrial room, not symbolically but actually, in real life. I gratefully found myself serving under the law of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the law of mercy. It was a wonderful place to be, but lonely at first, since my familiar life of church activity was gone. After awhile though, the empty places were filled, as I learned more about this new law.

Jesus said that He didn’t come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. Fulfillment means to come to fruition. The letter of the law comes to fruition in the spirit of the law; the hard seed ripens into sweet, mellow fruit. Where the letter is harsh, the spirit is kind. Where the letter is demanding, the spirit is generous. Where the letter is condemning, the spirit is forgiving. Where the letter insists on works, the spirit understands faith. Where the letter is controlled by fear(obey or you won’t go to heaven), the spirit is sustained by love (you are free to be your beautiful self). In letter-of-the-law actions we try hard to follow Christ’s example, but always fail. In the spirit it becomes our nature to be merciful, and that is as close as mortals can come to following Christ’s example.

After about a year had passed, and my youngest son was preparing to go on a mission, I asked to be reinstated, because I wanted to go to the temple with him. Perhaps some of the people involved were ashamed of what they had done to me, because I was reinstated without question and given a temple recommend by the new bishop. That is the last time I was in the temple. I understand the ceremony has been changed some since then, but I believe it still symbolically includes progress through several kingdoms, each with its own laws.

After this experience I tried a few times to go back to church, but found it extremely difficult to sit through letter-of-the-law sermons, when I understood a higher law. I tried to keep my thoughts to myself, but couldn’t always succeed. A friend told me that one of the Relief Society teachers had said, “Every time that --------raises her hand, I am just terrified!” At that point I withdrew from activity, because I am not the kind of person who likes to terrify others. I continued to ask the hard questions and to pray that the mysteries would become knowledge for me.

BLIND OBEDIENCE

I find something

frightening

in the admonition to

Follow the prophet!

If he leads you astray,

he’ll be accountable

not you.

Maybe he’d be accountable.

But I’d be

a                         a

      s     t                    y

                    r                     

That’s not where I want to be.

And another thing:

Since the Prophet admits he is not infallible,

how can we know when to separate

the Prophet

from

the arm of flesh

in whom we are

not

supposed to put our trust?

If to follow blindly were good advice,

where would be agency?

How would a virgin get any

oil in her lamp?

I couldn’t now say that I whole-heartedly sustained the brethren. I sustained them in righteousness, but I believed it to be my responsibility to determine what of their counsel was right or wrong for me. I wanted oil in my lamp. I could love them, as good men trying to do the best they knew how. But I could not sustain their behavior in insisting that all acceptable members of the church remain, literally, in the telestial room, when I knew from experience that there was so much more to the gospel of Jesus Christ than that. Remembering how eager I was to share my spiritual experiences with others, I decided that the men who ruled the church must all be stuck in the law of obedience; otherwise, they would surely preach sermons on how to let Christ lift us into higher law.

I would never knowingly teach false doctrine. But it now felt false to have taught that church ordinances are necessary to seal blessings – since I had experienced that those physical ordinances are only symbolic of actual spiritual happenings, which are sealed only by the pure love of Christ. Many of the other things I had believed and taught when in the law of obedience now felt less than true. It frightened me that the brethren saw the wonderful new things I had learned as false doctrine.

I have never been an active “feminist,” but I am a thinking, feeling, questioning woman. This is what I learned about women and the priesthood: There are two kinds of priesthood power; the first is temporal letter-of-the-law authority, which is corruptible; the second is spiritual love-energy, which is not. In this world it is easier for men to obtain (and corrupt) the former, but it is easier for women to receive the latter. The priesthood power I have received is sacred to me.

TO ADAM

Adam, Adam,

you left the garden in too much haste,

shamed, looking down,

in too much dread and fear.

You left too quickly, guiltily,

not noticing that shades of Eden still were near.

By the sweat of thy face

all the days of thy life!

was ringing in your ear,

so when in tenderness God spoke

you’d gone too far to hear.

But Eve,

lingering to smell one rose

to touch with love one soft-nosed deer

and listen to the singing voices one last time

heard the voice clear . . .

heard the anguished cry a Father breathes,

sending His beloved children forth

to learn of joy through learning trials.

Eve felt the shudder sob through Eden’s aisles

as God cried out His promise of reprieve,

Here is the key. Oh, use it, please receive

the pure love that will bring you home.

Lo, I am with you ‘til the end of time.

Oh Adam,

if only you had heard.

If even now you’d listen to His word,

and stop your sweat-stained labors to look up,

perhaps you’d dare to drink from His full cup,

and use the key He tenders to your hand,

to open by His love the Promised Land.

At this time in my life I knew myself to be a true follower of Christ (not the pretend follower I had been under the law of obedience), and Mormon’s words, where he elaborated on Paul’s sermon about faith, hope and charity, became vital to me.

“But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. Wherefore, my beloved . . .
pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love,
which He hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of His son, Jesus Christ . . .”
(Moroni 7:47-48)


I did pray with all the energy of my heart to be filled with the pure love of Christ, and true to His word, the Father bestowed it upon me. Now I live in the celestial law of love. My home is a holy place where God’s love radiates. As of this writing, I have 53 direct descendants. Only eleven of them are active in the Mormon church, (my cousin’s prediction came true) but every one of them knows what it feels like to be loved unconditionally!

For me, this is experiencing the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I have reached the Zion which my forebears sought.

SACRAMENT

In remembrance of thy love, oh Lord,

all bread is holy bread of life to me.

Each sip of wine becomes a vein of light

flowing into my being, part of Thee.

Always remembering Thee is more than thought;

becomes a vital force, a living breath,

a joyous source of infinite energy,

embracing life, denying death.