The Glory of God is Intelligence

"The glory of God is intelligence," the Lord has declared, "or, in other words, light and truth" (D&C 93:36). If it is our goal to be admitted into his presence and thereby obtain his glory, we must pursue light and truth with the decisions that we make.

We will not always be successful in our pursuits, individually or collectively. The Lord taught Joseph Smith that "the wicked one cometh and taketh away light and truth, through disobedience, from the children of men, and because of the tradition of their fathers" (D&C 93:39). As a missionary in Germany I often spoke with people who were unwilling to hear about the restored gospel because of their ingrained family traditions, regardless of whether they were active in those traditions or spiritually uplifted by them. Likewise, most of us have experienced the absence of light in our lives that follows when we fail to study the scriptures or pray regularly.

There are more ways that we could disobey than would be worthwhile to list, but it is particularly germane here to consider those things that have become habit or tradition. Are there traditions in your life that take away light and truth rather than helping you or your family to grow in light and truth? This might include the movies and television shows we choose to watch, when and what types of activities we choose to do as a family, our Sabbath-day worship, the social and political causes we support, and how we fill our spare time.

Of course, each of us has agency and many of these decisions are between us and the Lord; but that doesn't mean that what we're comfortable doing is what the Lord would have us do. Abraham grew up in a family that worshiped idols and may have become an influential man in that society had he followed in the footsteps of his father. Yet, he decided to break the tradition to seek after "greater happiness and peace and rest" through the priesthood covenant (Abraham 1:2). We do well when we use our agency as Abraham did: to break the traditions that separate us from God and replace them with those that bring greater light and truth into our lives.

The Lord explains how this can be done:

Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you... And if your eye be single to my glory, your whole bodies shall be filled with light, and there shall be no darkness in you; and that body which is filled with light and comprehendeth all things. Therefore, sanctify yourselves that your minds become single to God, and the days will come that you shall see him; for he will unveil his face unto you, and it shall be in his own time, and in his own way, and according to his own will (D&C 88:53, 67-68).

As we seek to sanctify our lives of those traditions that may be robbing us of the light and truth God desires to send into our lives-- including those that may be good but are not better or best-- the Lord will prepare us to see his face and abide his glory.

Intelligence: A Speculation

With my apologies for diverting away from the core principles of the gospel, I spoke this week with a highly educated person on the subject of chemistry. He reminded me of the construction and scope of atoms. In brief, if a person were to model the nucleus of an atom with his fists clenched together, the nearest electron would be about four miles away with nothing, not even air, in between. He went on to say that chemists now believe that even if you were to travel that four miles, and even if you knew where the electron would be, the electron would be gone. That is to say that there is some evidence that electrons are only an idea-- that we are simply the composition of ideas.

This is an abstract, philosophical idea that I initially considered absurd. I'm still not sure I believe it. But what if it were? Whose idea would we be? And what are the terms of that changed existence?

Again, I found this idea hard to believe. But it led me to consider statements the Lord has made about intelligences. There is no evidence that people were 'intelligences' prior to their life in the spirit world, despite the frequent mention of that idea in priesthood meetings worldwide. At best, we can refer to Abraham chapter 3, where the Lord refers to the intelligences of the premortal world but clarifies in the same or following verse that those to whom he was referring were indeed spirits.

Regardless of the form of the people in the premortal meeting mentioned in Abraham, the Lord was referring to them, to many of us, as intelligences. In Doctrine and Covenants 93, the Lord says that the "glory of God is intelligence, or in other words, light and truth." Is that us? Are we the glory of God?

If so, then intelligence would not only refer to our pre-spirit, premortal condition, but it would refer to each of us all of the time. It wouldn't be that we were intelligence, but rather that we are, and we bring glory to God inasmuch as we choose to live a life of light and truth.

I'm not sure how things play out with the chemistry. Perhaps we are a piece of some intelligence, or perhaps that analysis is thinking too much. Thoughts?