In the divine economy, as in nature, the man "is the head of the woman," and it is written that "he is the savior of the body." But "the man is not without the woman" any more than the woman is without the man, in the Lord. Adam was first formed, then Eve. In the resurrection they stand side by side and hold dominion together. Every man who overcomes all things and is thereby entitled to inherit all things, receives power to bring up his wife to join him in the possession and enjoyment thereof.
In the case of a man marrying a wife in the everlasting covenant who dies while he continues in the flesh and marries another by the same divine law, each wife will come forth in her order and enter with him into his glory. Is there any reason why this should not be so? Is not each of these wives entitled to her position in eternity, by virtue of the sealing power which made her part of the man? Why should one enter into the exaltation of the celestial world, and the other be relegated to singleness and servitude? They all become one in the patriarchal order of family government. And if this be the case in heaven, why should not similar conditions so far as possible exist on earth? Is earth holier than heaven? If a man receives from the Lord more wives than one under the sealing ordinances of celestial marriage, where is the moral wrong? They belong to no other man, but are his by mutual consent of all the interested parties, and they live together in the marriage state, one as much as the other.
In this position there are occasions for the exercise of patience, forbearance, charity, self-sacrifice and the exercise of all the virtues to a far greater degree than in any other. In this plural family relation, an experience can be gained that no other condition in life affords, and the parties who so live and keep the law will be, in the very nature of things, prepared for a wider sphere of dominion, and power, and dignity, and might in the eternal world, than those who have only experienced the monogamic condition. They will, therefore, if they endure unto the end, go forward into the highest degree of exaltation, while their posterity will multiply in an ever-increasing ratio, until worlds will be filled by their generations and they will ascend to the majesty and splendor of the Gods on high.
Herein is our Eternal Father glorified and His dominions extended. By the continuation of the seeds of the righteous forever, the multiplication of His sons and daughters creates the needs for worlds and systems, to be brought forth according to eternal laws, to occupy their position in the universe as dwelling places for spirits, and embodied mortals, and perfected souls, in the various grades on the path of progress towards the perfection of the celestial order; as orbs of light and splendor, or globes of trial, punishment or correction, each in its allotted sphere in the galaxy of suns and stars and planets, and in the vast and wondrous plans of the Mighty Architect, the Eternal Parent of organized intelligencies.
In obedience to His laws, there is present peace and future joy. They who are in harmony with Him are in affinity with the source of all pleasure and power. His commandments are found in the laws of continuing life, which regulate as permanent things; and they who reject Him and His counsels shut the gate against their own happiness and advancement. But, for them who receive His gospel and conform to all its ordinances and teachings, the door is open to the highest courts in the heavenly mansions, and while they are helped through the ordeals of mortal life, they gain the keys to all the glories of that existence in which the family relation is perfected and perpetuated, and every power of the whole being, refined, intensified and developed, finds exercise, in its true sphere, to the complete and unalloyed bliss of each one in the endless family circle, and the glory of Him who is the Patriarch and Ruler of all.
TWELFTH LEAF.
Christ's Work Continued After His Death—The Perfect Science of Human Redemption—What was Lost in the Fall—What is to be Regained in the Restoration—Justice Tempered with Mercy—Loss Sustained by the Disobedient—Doom of the Sons of Perdition—The Celestial, Terrestrial and Telestial Glories—Redemption and Glorification of the Earth—Salvation of the Whole Race—The Finished Work of Christ—Universal Dominion of the Father.
The mission of Christ was to save that which was lost. It was not completed when He hung upon the cross. His dying exclamation, "It is finished!" referred to His sufferings for sin, the ordeals of mortality, His labors in the flesh. As we have seen, He continued His work of salvation when out of the body, by preaching to the dead. After His resurrection He met, on several occasions, with His disciples, and instructed them in the plan of redemption and sent them to all nations, that the work He had commenced on earth might be continued. He ministered to other nations, uttered His voice to other sheep which were not of the fold in Palestine, that the lost tribes of Israel and all who could not be reached by His Jewish Apostles might hear the glad tidings of salvation. This, however, not fully revealed in the Bible, is made clear in the Book of Mormon. After His ascension, to fulfill His own promise, He went to prepare a place for His faithful disciples, that when they left the earth they might be able to abide with Him.
But all this was only a small part of the perfect scheme of redemption. That which was lost in Adam is to be regained in Christ. Through the commission of crime, death came into the world. Satan gained dominion. The earth trembled under the curse. Eden bloomed no more upon its face. The tree of life was removed. Thorns and briers and noxious weeds came up in the place of the flowers and fruits of paradise. Deity was hidden from the sight of man. Sorrow and pain and toil and travail became the heritage of mortals. Enmity arose between man and beast. Venom entered the serpent's fangs, and rage the hearts of brute and fowl and aqueous creature. Strife dwelt in the very elements and death brooded over the face of the smitten globe.
What, then, was lost? The immortality of man; the blessed tree of life; communion with Jehovah; the companionship of angels; the purity of paradise; man's dominion over inferior creatures; freedom from satanic influence; exemption from toil and pain; earth's affinity with perfected realms on high.