Introduction

Today we have heard about Alice and some of the things she did while here. She was anxiously engaged in doing good. She was faithful to the covenants she made and endured to the end of this life.

When the decision came in the hospital on how to proceed, either to be very aggressive in the treatment or to choose hospice, she would not give us an answer. She was delaying. Putting off the hard decision. I went to her and asked, “Do you want to be aggressive and possibly in more pain, or would you like to go see grandpa.”

At those words her face lit up with the biggest smile I’ve seen from her in a very long time. She didn’t say a word, but I think we had her answer. Free from pain and with her sweetheart? I’m not sure it was even a fair question.

She passed away that night, reunited with her husband on the other side.

To understand what is happening to Alice right now, we need to start at the beginning. We need to start with our lives before there was even an earth.

Pre-mortal Life

Before this life we lived with our Heavenly Father.  Before this earth was created he gathered together all His children and told them of a plan He had for them. His goal was to help us, His children, to become like Him.

To become like Him we needed a few things.

First, we needed to obtain physical bodies. While His was immortal and eternal, the ones we would obtain would be mortal. Something we would learn how to use and care for before we eventually received the immortal bodies we would have for eternity.

Second, we needed to learn how to distinguish between right and wrong .We needed to learn how to exercise faith in Him and how to develop some of the basic attributes He possesses. Things like charity, hope, reverence, patience, meekness, and humility. And we had to do all this on our own, without a knowledge of our Father. It would be something of a laboratory where we could learn and grow from mistakes, but eventually, we could become much like Him. All we had to do was be obedient to His commandments.

But there were a couple problems with this as it stood.

Inevitably we would not be obedient. There were going to be times when we would choose incorrectly. There would be times when we were disobedient. There would also be those who would just not know what was right and would choose incorrectly just because they had not been taught what was right or wrong.

Another challenge is that God can not tolerate sin in any degree. Sin can not be in His presence, and when we are disobedient, it means we can not be in His presence or become like Him.

But, there was a solution to both of these obstacles. We would have a Savior come to the earth. He would come and be without sin. He would live a perfect life and thus be able to live with our Heavenly Father. Our Heavenly Father knew that we all would make a mistake at some point, except this one. Only this one would make it on his own.

While it would nice for our Heavenly Father to have one child with Him, He wants all of us with Him. So he proposed that this Savior come to earth and take all the sins of the rest of us on himself. Christ would pay the price for the sins of all the rest of God’s children. He would suffer more than any other person on the earth so the rest of the children of God could return to our Father’s presence.

Jehovah, our elder brother, volunteered for this task in that great family meeting and Heavenly Father agreed. Jehovah therefore became the Promised Messiah and most of God’s children accepted this plan. Each and every one of us who is now on this earth are a part of this first group. Those of use who accepted this plan will yet receive a physical body and will keep this body forever. We’ll put it off for a while, but eventually it is ours for eternity because we accepted our Heavenly Father’s plan.

To help us learn how to manage this body and help us become more like God by the things we experience in mortality, this earth was created.  God then placed two of His children on the planet and Adam and Eve became the first two of God’s children to start this mortal experience.

Mortality

I don’t plan on spending much time talking about mortality except to say that this is where we find ourselves right now. We have trials, tribulations, choices, consequences, pain and afflictions. We also have joy, happiness, eternal friendships and greater understanding of what mortality is like than we could ever have had while we were just a spirit. In all of this we are being tested to “see if we will do all that we are commanded to do.” And to see if we will make and keep sacred covenants.

We are here to grow and develop godly attributes. We are here to learn how to use this body we have been given. How to take care of it, how to treat it and treat others with respect. And finally we are here to learn how to recognize the promptings of the Holy Ghost as it communicates with us while we are in this physical body.

Eventually we reach the limit of what we can do here in mortality. We fulfill some of the specific tasks and callings God has for us here and then we pass to the other side of mortality.

The same spirit that was with God in while in the pre-mortal life is the same spirit which inhabits our bodies at this time, right now. We’ve changed through our experiences but the same core person who lived there, is the same person who is here now. When we die this same spirit leaves the body and moves into what we call the “Spirit World.” Nothing will change with the spirit. The same spirit that is here in this mortal body will be the same spirit that passed through to the other side. The only thing that changes is that we leave the body behind for a while.

The Spirit World

When we die we enter what is called the spirit world. It is a place where the spirits of those who have passed through the portals of death are gathered. When we arrive there we are greeted by friends and family. President Brigham Young said the following about this experience:

We have more friends behind the veil than on this side, and they will hail us more joyfully than you were ever welcomed by your parents and friends in this world; and you will rejoice more when you meet them than you ever rejoiced to see a friend in this life; and then we shall go on from step to step, from rejoicing to rejoicing, and from one intelligence and power to another, our happiness becoming more and more exquisite and sensible…(DBY, 379–80).

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young, p. 282)

I believe Alice and Phil had a great reunion when she passed over last week. Can you imagine the joy and the happiness she experienced? Once again reunited with her love after so many years apart? Then to see other family and friends. I can see in my minds eye what it would be like for her to be reunited with her mother and then turn and see her good friend Janet Tilton. What a great reunion! I know they had a great many happy times here in mortality and now…now they have the greater joy knowing each other again in another sphere.

And then, besides this happiness and joy, there are so many other advantages piled on top. Brigham Young talks about a couple:

When we pass into the spirit world we shall possess a measure of his power. Here, we are continually troubled with ills and ailments of various kinds. In the spirit world we are free from all this and enjoy life, glory, and intelligence; and we have the Father to speak to us, Jesus to speak to us, and angels to speak to us, and we shall enjoy the society of the just and the pure who are in the spirit world until the resurrection (DBY, 380–81).

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young, p. 282)

Can you picture it? Alice, free from pain and ailments she suffered for the last few years, now able to talk with angels? Enjoying the “society of the just and the pure…until the resurrection?” Ya, I think she’s in heaven in a number of different meanings of the word.

So, once reunited with her friends and family, what would she do then?

When you are in the spirit world, everything there will appear as natural as things now do. Spirits will be familiar with spirits in the spirit world–will converse, behold, and exercise every variety of communication with one another as familiarly and naturally as while here in tabernacles. There, as here, all things will be natural, and you will understand them as you now understand natural things. You will there see that those spirits we are speaking of are active; they sleep not. And you will learn that they are striving with all their might–laboring and toiling diligently as any individual would to accomplish an act in this world (DBY, 380).

Spirits are just as familiar with spirits as bodies are with bodies, though spirits are composed of matter so refined as not to be tangible to this coarser organization. They walk, converse, and have their meetings; and the spirits of good men like Joseph and the Elders, who have left this Church on earth for a season to operate in another sphere, are rallying all their powers and going from place to place preaching the Gospel

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young, p. 281)

Father Smith [Joseph Smith Sr.] and Carlos [Smith] and Brother [Edward] Partridge, yes, and every other good Saint, are just as busy in the spirit world as you and I are here. They can see us, but we cannot see them unless our eyes were opened. What are they doing there? They are preaching, preaching all the time, and preparing the way for us to hasten our work in building temples here and elsewhere (DBY, 378).

The spirits that dwell in these tabernacles on this earth, when they leave them go directly into this world of spirits. What! A congregated mass of inhabitants there in spirit, mingling with each other, as they do here? Yes, brethren, they are there together, and if they associate together, and collect together, in clans and in societies as they do here, it is their privilege. No doubt they yet, more or less, see, hear, converse and have to do with each other, both good and bad. If the Elders of Israel in these latter times go and preach to the spirits in prison, they associate with them, precisely as our Elders associate with the wicked in the flesh, when they go to preach to them (DBY, 378).

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young, p. 280)

Terry talked about how there was a time of pioneers in New England and how Alice had a part in that work. I suspect she will have assignments related to what she had been doing here in life already. Working with relatives she had done research for. Working with people from New England. Working to help the work progress and making the way possible for us to continue the work here on this side. I expect that she has tackled the challenge with the same enthusiasm and vigor that marked her life when she was here in mortality.

After being so constrained by her mortal body, can you see what she would be doing? Reunited with her husband and friends and family who have passed on before? Having access to some of the great spiritual giants who ever walked the earth and having a mission to fulfill on the other side, I suspect she is very much enjoying her stay in the spirit world.  I bet the only thing she really misses are steamers and lobster.

The fact is, however, that she won’t have to miss those things forever.

The Resurrection and Eternal Life

Eventually the time will come when we will have fulfilled our missions on the other side. We will have prepared the earth on both sides of the veil and it will be time for another great group of resurrections, much as what happened when Christ was resurrected. When this time comes, our spirits will once again be clothed in flesh, only this time the two were never again be separated. We will be immortal. Brigham Young and Joseph Smith described this best:

Here is Brigham Young:

After the spirit leaves the body, it remains without a tabernacle in the spirit world until the Lord, by his law that he has ordained, brings to pass the resurrection of the dead [see D&C 93:33–34]. When the angel who holds the keys of the resurrection shall sound his trumpet, then the peculiar fundamental particles that organized our bodies here, if we do honor to them, though they be deposited in the depths of the sea, and though one particle is in the north, another in the south, another in the east, and another in the west, will be brought together again in the twinkling of an eye, and our spirits will take possession of them.

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young, p. 276)

Joseph Smith described the resurrection in this way:

“So plain was the vision, that I actually saw men, before they had ascended from the tomb, as though they were getting up slowly. They took each other by the hand and said to each other, ‘My father, my son, my mother, my daughter, my brother, my sister.’ And when the voice calls for the dead to arise, suppose I am laid by the side of my father, what would be the first joy of my heart? To meet my father, my mother, my brother, my sister; and when they are by my side, I embrace them and they me. …

(Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, p. )

When the time comes we receive the very same body we had here in mortality. President Wilford Woodruff said he was “very glad to have the same body in the resurrection with which [he] waded swamps, swam rivers and travelled and labored to build up the kingdom of God here on the earth.” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Wilford Woodruff, (2004), 77–88)

Not only shall we have the same body, but it shall be perfect. In Alma 11 we read:

 43 The spirit and the body shall be reunited again in its perfect form; both limb and joint shall be restored to its proper frame, even as we now are at this time; and we shall be brought to stand before God, knowing even as we know now, and have a bright recollection of all our guilt.

44 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, as it is now, or in the body, and shall be brought and be arraigned before the bar of Christ the Son, and God the Father, and the Holy Spirit, which is one Eternal God, to be judged according to their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil.

45 Now, behold, I have spoken unto you concerning the death of the mortal body, and also concerning the resurrection of the mortal body. I say unto you that this mortal body is raised to an immortal body, that is from death, even from the first death unto life, that they can die no more; their spirits uniting with their bodies, never to be divided; thus the whole becoming spiritual and immortal, that they can no more see corruption.

All of us will eventually be resurrected. It’s part of the plan of our Heavenly Father. It’s been a part of the plan since the beginning, before the earth was even created. All we have to do is be true and faithful until the end. Elder Bruce R. McConkie said it this way:

“Ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ,” Nephi said to members of the Church, “having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternal life.” (2 Ne. 31:20.) That is to say–all the faithful Saints, all of those who have endured to the end, depart this life with the absolute guarantee of eternal life.

There is no equivocation, no doubt, no uncertainty in our minds. Those who have been true and faithful in this life will not fall by the wayside in the life to come. If they keep their covenants here and now and depart this life firm and true in the testimony of our blessed Lord, they shall come forth with an inheritance of eternal life.

We do not mean to say that those who die in the Lord, and who are true and faithful in this life, must be perfect in all things when they go into the next sphere of existence. There was only one perfect man–the Lord Jesus whose Father was God.

…

…what we are saying is that when the saints of God chart a course of righteousness, when they gain sure testimonies of the truth and divinity of the Lord’s work, when they keep the commandments, when they overcome the world, when they put first in their lives the things of God’s kingdom: when they do all these things, and then depart this life–though they have not yet become perfect–they shall nonetheless gain eternal life in our Father’s kingdom; and eventually they shall be perfect as God their Father and Christ His Son are perfect.

(Ensign Nov 1976, “The Dead Who Die in the Lord”, Bruce R. McConkie)

Death was sweet to Alice. She was true to her testimony and firm in her faith of Jesus Christ. There was no dread or fear of death, but a resolute determination to remain faithful to the end of her days.

How this is all possible

Earlier I spoke about the pre-mortal life. We existed before we came here to earth. Listened to the plan of life and accepted it. Due to our faithfulness to the plan then, we were blessed with physical bodies and came to the families we did.

The key point to all of this: Pre-mortal life, mortality and beyond is that we become like our Heavenly Father. Moses was told by the Father: “For behold, this is my work and my glory–to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39). That is the sum and capstone of our existence here. To receive immortality and eternal life. But we can only hope to obtain these gifts through the sacrifice of the one perfect person who has ever lived: Jesus Christ.

He paid the ultimate price. He suffered for the sins of all mankind, so that those who repent and come unto him would not have to suffer, but that they might be partakers of the eternal gift. So great was his suffering that he bled from every pour. The guilt, the suffering, the sicknesses and the pains of us all were laid upon this sinless man so that we, the unworthy people we are, could enjoy the blessings that only he truly merited.

Only though his mercy can we be saved from sin and death. All of us will be resurrected. What is up to us now is how good of a life we wish to have when we are resurrected. Christ asks us to be obedient to his commandments. He asks us to repent and become like Him and our Father in Heaven. He even helps us along in so many ways. He offers us the chance to be cleansed from sin every week through the sacrament. He offers us the gift of his spirit to help us in our choices and to strengthen us from moment to moment. He offers us peace in this life and eternal joy and happiness in the world to come.

May we make the choices which will allow us to lay hold on these and the many other gifts he has in store for us. That we may, when reunited with our loved ones on the other side, be participants in a joyous reunion not only because we are with them again, but also because we know we have been true and faithful to the Lord Jesus Christ and have truly become his disciples, is my hope and prayer.

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Download it here.

You can get the update from the market place or from here.

• Decreased database download times, using compression on files being downloaded. Initial data indicates a decrease in file sizes by as much as 4x for both LDS and KJV scriptures. Hopefully that will reduce the time for downloads as well.
• The bookmark now saves where in the scroll view you have created the bookmark instead of just being based on the chapter.
• fixed bug: After opening the bookmark page and selecting a bookmark, when you click on a history button you are taken back to the bookmark page instead of a scripture listing.
• Enabled the “use screen orientation” preference

• Can move a bookmark from one chapter to another. Just select the “move bookmark” menu item, then select the bookmark in the list, and the bookmark will be updated to the new location you’re at.
• Added a new spot for a preference that will (but does not yet), allow you to turn off the screen orientation switching
• I’m still working on the bookmark nav button issue I mentioned in the previous version update.
• Other minor improvements

There was an incremental release between this beta and the previous beta that I’ve been running on my personal phone which I did not let out…mostly because it involved a total refactoring of the scripture listing activities and I didn’t want to blowup everybody’s scripture program. I’ve been running it for a couple weeks now, and I’m including the changes in this version. There should not be any change in functionality, but if there are changes from what you remember, please comment. There is one fix from that incremental version to this:

• Clicking the back button when browsing the scripture listings will now move back in the history instead of quitting the app. (This is what it should be like before the code refactoring)

Stuff to still to fix from this version before releasing on the market:

• After opening the bookmark page and selecting a bookmark, when you click on a history button you are taken back to the bookmark page instead of a scripture listing.
• Enable the “use screen orientation” preference
• Decrease database download times, using compression on files being downloaded. Initial data indicates a decrease in file sizes by as much as 4x for both LDS and KJV scriptures. Hopefully that will reduce the time for downloads as well.

Once the 0.3.0 version is complete, then the following is the feature/release plan:

• 0.4.0: Search
• 0.5.0: Highlighting, Notes
• 0.6.0: Update checker feature (is that even English?) (may or may not be included)
• 1.0 Touch up, a license screen, an about screen

Once the 1.0 version is out, then the serious work on the import utility will begin. The goal is to allow people to create their own content and read it on their own devices using the Scripture program. If they so desire, it could be submitted and included in the listing for general download via the Scripture program itself.

• (bug) After the phone locks and you unlock it, the next and previous buttons (and swipe across to see the next chapter) would not work. It caused a force close.
• (new) Bookmarks can be created, edited, deleted and navigated to. There is a known issue with the navigation buttons once you navigate to a chapter, and it is being worked on, but this will at least get some bookmark features out there and future beta updates will fix the top nav button issue. The issue? You are taken back to the bookmark page instead of the specific home, volume or book location.

Non – Commercial

Non-commercial use is defined as the opposite of the definition of commercial use given above and generally means free provision of the medium in which the NIV, TNIV, and NIrV text is used. Most usage by local churches would fall into this category.   

 

All non-commercial requests must be directed to and approved by:

 

International Bible Society

1820 Jet Stream Drive

Colorado Springs, CO 80921-3969

I’m hopeful but it looks like the process with take some time.

FYI: It may take some time before the version on the market place acually changes to 0.2.7. Sometimes it’s a bit slow.

The following features will be added in the next versions, in order they are:

1. Bookmarks
2. Search
3. Notes
4. Highlighting/Underlining/”Marking”
5. Refinement on “Import” tool, allowing people to either create their own versions or add additional books to their current database. This could include the apocrypha, to just name one. The tool will read OSIS initially and then include support for ThML.