Genesis 3-4; Moses 4-5 - The Fortunate Fall

"When the Son of man cometh shall he find faith on the earth?" "Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief." May our testimonies be as deep and as strong as that of Jacob who were confronted by one who sought to destroy his faith declared, "I could not be shaken." Hello on Shaken Saints, Jared Halverson here, glad to have you back from our scripture study. For you who are new to the channel, if you want to click on the subscribe button and then hit the little bell next to it, that will give you notifications whenever a new video comes out and you won't miss a thing. And to any of you who like or share or comment or rate the podcast or anything like that, thank you for interacting with the channel. It does help move things forward and get it out to other people. In fact, it's in hopes of doing even more of that that I've enlisted the help of my daughter. She is a young single adult and she knows her generation well and always warns me that a two or three hour video is a non starter for most of my generation. So let me help you. And she's going through the videos and trying to pull out brief or segments that can become little standalone shorts on YouTube or Instagram or TikTok if we can get that far. So that's her pet project to try to help to move the work forward. And so if any of you want to check out, it's called Becoming Unshaken. And if you want to look it up and subscribe to it or follow it on Instagram or Facebook, I think Twitter, I think she's even starting. That would do a lot for her to help her work and to move things forward like that. It's a great opportunity to try to engage other people in learning the gospel. And even if a short three or four minute segment of a video helps wet their appetite for deeper understanding of the scriptures or maybe checking out these longer lessons than I'm all for it. And we could use your help on that. So Becoming Unshaken, check it out on the other platforms. Now today we have, again, we have our work cut out for us. We talked about we created Heaven and Earth last week and today we have to accomplish the fall of humanity. So we'll see how that goes. I actually wanted to start by, as many of you know this, when my family was young, we lived in Tennessee. We were there in Nashville for eight years when my kids were little. We always joked that our job was to put a book of Mormon buckle on the Bible belt and we did our best. Now, but we loved our time there, especially among just wonderful evangelical Christians. And we learned because of the age of our children that the best preschools were run by other churches. So our second son, we had, we had enrolled him in a preschool run by the Church of Christ, which was wonderful. And I remember one day he came home. Bible study was part of the day, and I loved that. But he came home one day with his little illustrated Bible. And Tottenham's arm, he came home and said, Dad, and he looked really serious and said, I got to read my Bible so Jesus can save me. And I just laughed and I'm like, Hallelujah son, I got myself a little born again Mormon on my hands. This is great. Well, he loved his Bible study, but I remember one day he came home and this time he had kind of a scared look on his face and he said, Dad, because I was asking him, so would you learn Bible study today? And he'd say, Dad, Eve did a bad thing. And I just smiled and I thought, Ah, you talked about the fall today. Well, this is a good chance to correct some false doctrine. Let's talk about the fortunate fall, shall we? And so my son and I went through and talked about the fact that Eve had not made a bad choice, that she had made an incredibly courageous one, that it moved God's plan forward. Downward, yes, but also forward. Orson F. Whitney, a member of the Corps of the Twelve Years ago, said that the fall had a twofold direction. Downward and forward, that it set man's foot upon progressions highway. And so yes, we have to grapple with the downward dimension. But it's the forward thrust of the fall that I find so important. In fact, perhaps as a way to introduce the material today, let me back up and give you something big picture. As many of you know, I work a lot with people that are struggling in their faith. My PhD was in an anti-religious rhetoric, so I studied for years how people lose their faith. And my hope was to help people regain it or navigate those faith crises themselves. And whatever their question might be, I'm happy to go directly to their question. But there are two bigger picture items that I almost always bring up with them. One is stages of faith, and the other is proving countries, which we've talked about both last week and the week before. We'll probably talk about it frequently. We'll hit it again today. When it comes to stages of faith though, there's a lot of scholarly literature on human development. And it started years ago with cognitive development, kind of psychologically and sociologically, of how do children grow up and progress and see the world? And then in 1981, there was a Methodist theologian in Georgia that wrote a book called "Stages of Faith." So we took like that cognitive model of stage development and christened it, turned it into faith. And if this is how children grow up and view the world, well, how do children grow up and view the church or view the life of faith? That was '81. In 2015, a Latter-day Saint, who was an expert on stage models, Thomas McConkey's name, wrote a book called "Navigating Mormon Faith Crisis," and he took Fowler and basically baptized it and saw this faith model or this stage model of faith and what would that look like for a Latter-day Saint, especially one who seems to be struggling in their faith and feels like they've lost it. It's a great book. Then in 2019, Elder Brucey Haifin and his wife Marie wrote a book called "Faith Is Not Blind." It was actually built on 40 years of work because back in 1979, Elder Haifin gave a talk called "Love Is Not Blind." And it wasn't romance, he was talking about. It was about faith crisis and how to deal with ambiguity and doubt and so on. And then 40 years later, "Love Is Not Blind," becomes faith is not blind. But it's a stage model as well. He talks about simplicity, complexity, and then on to simplicity on the other side of complexity. And it's a great approach to navigating these things because it's in that complexity stage that things seem to fall apart. In fact, all of those Fowler and McConkey and Haifin and others, it always seems to boil down to three main stages. The first, everything is simple and straightforward, crystal clear. It's important for children to start in that stage because it lets them feel secure and safe in the world around them. And so, in stage one, your parents know everything. And doctors can always make you feel better. And politicians are true statesmen that can always be trusted. And if it's on the internet, it must be true. And so on. You get the idea. Well, we typically grow out of that stage and go into stage two where things get a lot more messy. Yes, we're more open-minded in many ways, but we're also more skeptical and sometimes even cynical. In stage one, parents know everything. Well, in stage two, parents are idiots. Do any of you have teenagers that are now in stage two? Probably. Because usually it hits in teenagehood or early young adulthood. That's when most people go into that second stage. And parents don't know what they're talking about. And doctors, diagnostics is just guesswork. And politicians, oh, they're just in it for themselves and they're corrupt. And the internet can't be trusted at all. It's all fake news. And so you hit that stage too, pretty hard. Now unfortunately, a lot of times people stay in stage two not knowing that there's a stage three ahead. And stage three is when things kind of fall back into place. You've outgrown the naivete of stage one. But you've also matured beyond the cynicism of stage two. And so stage three is a much healthier place to stay. What ends up happening is children who grew up thinking parents were perfect and then thought their parents were idiots, finally come through on the other side, often when they have children of their own. And realize, you know, my parents weren't perfect, but they did the best they could. And they did have my best interests at heart. And no doctors aren't omniscient, but they are incredibly well trained. And I can get second opinions and where else am I going to go? And no politicians aren't always perfect either, but there's checks and balances in the government. And I can be an informed and engaged citizen and try to make a difference. You understand what I'm getting at? This third stage is the best place to be. Now, I've done a lot of study through those stage models of development. And to me, the greatest breakthrough came with a simple whisper from the spirit that said, "Charred, you've understood these things a long time. It's just creation, fall, atonement." And then the light book came on for me and I realized that is the stage model. It's the pillars of eternity. It's the story arc of life. I mean, that's the plan of salvation, creation, fall, atonement. And that stage, one stage, two stage, three. That in the creation stage, in Eden, things are so simple. It's a wonderful place. It's just very secure, right? The animals come to you to be named. You eat whatever fruit you want. Everything is wonderful. No sin, no sorrow, no death. Great. You just can't stay there forever. And typically you outgrow Eden and move on to this second stage. In fact, it usually comes when you partake of the fruit of knowledge. Not just good and evil, but you just learn and realize how my view was important for its time. It's just a little close-minded or it's a little simplistic and it's time to grow into the next stage. Now that doesn't have to be angry, although sometimes sadly it is. The fall stage is where things fall apart. Especially when you only can look backwards at creation and cannot yet look forward to atonement. You see, what ends up happening in the fall stage? First you tend to look back at creation with nostalgia. You think, "Oh, I wish I still felt like I did on my mission. I wish I still had the testimony of my youth." Sadly then, nostalgia can't last very long. And so often it turns into bitterness. Do you have friends or family members that have left the church and they're in that stage? They're in the fall stage and they're angry. And they don't like anything about the church. They have mean things to say about it. They feel like they've been lied to or betrayed or it's this sense of, "Oh, great, yeah. God sets me up for this with these contradictory commandments in Eden." And then he sets up cherubin, the flaming sorgis to keep me out. So now I'm stuck. Ooh, there's some anger there. There's some bitterness. Until they come to realize, "Yes, there's no going back." But there is going forward. And the atonement stage, far surpasses the elevation of Eden. You just can't go straight from Eden to atonement. You have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death on the way. You ever climbed a mountain and thought you got to the top and when you got there you realized, "Oh, this is just the summit of a flit hill." And the real mountain was further back. I just couldn't see it from the valley. But I can't get from this summit to the higher summit. There's an intervening valley that I have to pass through all along the way. That's the stage of faith. That's growing up in God. And as we discuss the fall today, I hope you see some personal relevance. Because for us, we're the only church that believes in a fortune at fall. And I hope we can apply that to people who are struggling in their faith because I think we all know someone who is, and probably not just one someone. It's one of the defining signs of the times is to watch people struggle in this. And the information age/missinformation age is definitely facilitating that. But I love sitting now with people that are wrestling with things and feeling like they're totally off the path and just saying, "Welcome to stage two. How's the fall working out for you? How are you liking life east of Eden?" And they're like, "What are you talking about?" And I explain this creation fall atonement model and they realize, "Wait, I'm still on the path. It doesn't feel like it." Well, Adam and Eve might have felt that way for a while too. And yes, there's no going back, but there is going forward. See, the problem is often people in stage one and stage two can't stand each other. Because they're on opposite ends of an extreme. Instead of correcting, they tend to over-correct when you get into stage two. And that leads to some bitterness towards those in stage one. And honestly, people in each group, they do have a leg to stand on as far as the sense of superiority is concerned. You see, like Elder Whitney said, the fall has a two-fold direction. Downward is the vertical dimension. But forward is the horizontal dimension. And so people in stage one tend to look down on people in stage two and say, "Where's your faith?" But people in stage two tend to look back at people in stage one and say, "Where's your brain?" You see, well, one group wants to stay in Eden where things are safe and secure. Others? I want to move forward, or whether they wanted to or not, they're there, East of Eden. And instead of the two of them fighting one another, for their lack of faith or their lack of intelligence, no, can we just keep both, keep progressing and simultaneously head onward and upward? In fact, that phrase is how I end up almost every email, onward and upward. And to me, it's not just a sign off, it's an invitation, a beckoning to wherever you happen to be on the journey, no matter how low in the fall stage you feel. Onward and upward is up to guess how many, and the atonement. It's the way you come home. And honestly, there is such hope in inviting people along that journey. We will see that today. In fact, if last week was creation, and this week is fall, then the rest of this year, and every year beyond, the rest of Scripture is atonement. That's how do we navigate the rest of our journey? Remember last week we talked about the four rivers that flow out of Eden, and the four different types of soil in the parable of the sower, and the four different groups in Lehigh's dream. As you emerge from creation to fall, where will the rest of your journey take you? Because the goal is still the tree of life. It's just not going back to it in the Garden of Eden. It's going onward and upward towards it in the Garden of Gethsemane. That's where the real tree of life will be found. And I think if we can help people take those steps and navigate forward, they'll be in, I mean, again, the parable of the sower, how does it end? What's the fourth type of soil? Good ground. That's growing what? A tree that brings forth fruit in Lehigh's dream. What's the goal of the dream? It's the tree of life. Alma 32, your planting seeds of faith, and hoping to move forward along the pathway of faith. And where does chapter 32 end with a tree of life? We're all trying to return to God's presence. And in a way that is coming home to Eden, but not going back to it. It's going forward, back into the presence of God. And so my prayer today, as we study fall, is that we can make sense of where we happen to be even in times where we feel that we've gone downward, and we're outside of God's presence. That's not the end of our story. In some ways, it's now pointing us in higher directions yet to come. And that leads to the second issue. If I always bring up stages of faith with people that are struggling, I also tend to bring up proving contraries every chance that I can. And the beauty of combining those two models is that in reality, stage one and stage two are just contraries of each other. You were holding to one side without the other in stage one. And instead of correcting, you over corrected. And in stage two, you held to the opposite contrary at the expense of the first. One way you can know you've come to stage three atonement is when you can prove the contraries of the stages that preceded it. Often it's, it's a sense of justice in stage one. That's why little kids, whenever they're watching movies, they're always asking, "Who's the bad guy? Who's the good guy?" Because it is black and white straight forward. As stage two is often the mercy side, but without any justice. And no wonder our teenagers and young adults are so caught up in this world of moral relativism, where you do you and no judgment for me and you can do no wrong, and it doesn't really matter, well, they've just over corrected from the first stage. And when they can combine justice and mercy, in harmony divine, as Eliza Arsnos said, and they can prove that contrary, well, welcome to stage three atonement, where you're balancing justice and mercy, where you're balancing law and love and truth and tolerance and community and individuality and all of those kinds of things. We will see today as we study the fall, not just our progression through the faith, but also we will see a new set of contraries. We've already discussed the contrary of the infinite and the intimate when we talked about God. We discussed the contrary of dust and divinity when we studied human nature. Today we will talk about contraries of the two trees. The two main trees in the Garden of Eden are just a set of contraries to prove. Life, our love and knowledge, that's the contrary of the head and the heart. And if the head is what draws you to the tree of knowledge, and the heart is what draws you to the tree of life, well, how do we prove the two? Since God does want us to develop both body parts. His aim for revelation, after all, I will speak to the mind and the heart. I'm giving you both fruit, the fruit of both trees. We will see the contrary of, well, last week we saw it in the country of work and rest. We saw it in the countries of the atmosphere and keeping some things in and some things out in the world, but not of the world. We will see it today in contraries of male and female. And especially the way males and females try to do the will of God, because the first and second great commandments, those that's a set of contraries to. How do I love God with all my heart might mind and strength? That's what Adam was trying to do. And at the same time, love my neighbor as myself. That's what Eve was trying to do. You'll get that, to me, that's the cross. The vertical is loving God and the horizontal is loving neighbor. And we first set that vertical post in the ground to connect ourselves with heaven, first great commandment. But then we have something to put our horizontal cross beam on, that lifts our love of others higher than just ground level. It lifts that love heavenward, but we need both aspects. So again, there's so much we're going to need to wrap our brains around today. We have Moses chapter 4 and 5, which is the Joseph's matronzlation of Genesis 3 and 4. Chapter 3 of Genesis is the false story and then 4 is Canaanable. And we'll see both of those stories today in both Genesis and Moses. Now the way it begins is fascinating, because in the Genesis version, chapter 2 ended with the marriage of Adam and Eve as they both find themselves naked and not ashamed. They expose to the all seen I have God and nothing to hide, I haven't done anything wrong. Innocence, which defines stage 1 pretty well. But then Genesis 3 begins by introducing us to the serpent, this subtle serpent who slithers his way into the Garden of Eden. And subtle is the word that's used to describe him, more subtle than all the beasts of the field. Now if we were reading this in the original Hebrew, we'd get a chuckle out of that, because when you go from the last verse of chapter 2, speaking of Adam and Eve being naked to the first verse of chapter 3, speaking of the serpent being subtle, it's the same root word. So we're getting a play on words here and there's no chapter heading to break up the story. We go from naked man and woman to subtle serpent and it just goes from, you just change the pronunciation of the word, you switch out a vowel and that's it. Which suggests something here when we come to meet the serpent. I mean, subtlety is more of this cunning, this cleverness, this deception, which he's going to be an expert in. But couple that with nakedness, of being exposed to the eye of God, oh, you might be subtle enough to trick Adam and Eve, but you're not going to trick or deceive God. You might, Adam and Eve might be exposed to the view of God, but no one is more exposed to the demands of justice than he who offended it from pre-mortality on. So as we meet this subtle serpent, be aware of just how uncovered before God he is. We get to see his plan unfold. Now to do that, we actually have a greater benefit in the book of Moses than we do in Genesis. Because like I said, you start with the serpent in verse 1 and it goes straight into him trying to deceive Eve, whereas in the Moses version you get four beautiful verses before the serpent slithers in. And what you see here is rather than serpent in the garden, you get to see the dragon in pre-mortality. You get to see the fall of Lucifer in pre-mortality that precipitates and kind of gives us a preview of everything he's going to try to accomplish in this life beyond. So look at Moses chapter 4 verse 1, 2, 3, 4. In some ways, if we were going to, I've sometimes taught the fall and said, can we just call it the jump instead? Because as we'll see today, it didn't seem like Adam and Eve just tripped up over something and just fell on their face. This was a conscious decision to move forward in faith. And that doesn't seem like a fall to me. That seems more like a jump. Now they didn't know exactly what they were landing on or in. And so yes, there's some wake up call there. But if I wanted to talk about Adam and Eve, I'd call it jump. If I wanted to talk about Lucifer, no, there's a fall for you. And then if you want to talk about Cain and Abel, which we'll end with today, now there's a fall when it comes to Cain as well. But let's look at this fall of Lucifer first. Moses chapter 4 verse 1, "And I the Lord God spaken to Moses saying that Satan." Now Satan is just a Hebrew word that means it's a title, not a name, and it means the adversary. So let's talk about what you're up against. Let's talk about your adversary. That Satan who now has commanded in the name of my only begotten. Remember when you cast him out back in chapter 1? He is the same, which was from the beginning. And he came before me saying, "Behold, here am I, send me." Now with that, we're back to the end of Abraham chapter 3, which we studied two weeks ago. This grand council in heaven, the noble and great ones there with Christ and the Father, and whom shall I send? Well, here am I sent me versus here am I sent me, and I will choose the first. But that's our shortest version of that. You want a fuller account, then add Revelation 5 and Revelation 12, and the JST of Luke 3, and there's a beautiful place to study this from a bigger perspective. But this is one of them. Because more than just here am I sent me, this isn't just Lucifer echoing Jehovah. Instead, rather than an echo, it's an altercation. It's an opposition in all things. And everything that you see from Lucifer has a better equivalent from Christ, from Jehovah. So notice them one by one. After saying, "Here am I, send me," he says, "I will be thy son." Now that's ironic, since he wanted to be the Father, not the Son. Isaiah 14 helps us with that, that he wanted to usurp the throne of God. So I will be thy son when I really want to be the Father. Now compare that to Jehovah's perspective. For Jehovah, he could say, "Well, I don't have to claim to be thy son. I know I already am." He was the first born of God in the Spirit. He was the one closest to God. He was a colab equals Christ, right? And so there's no question mark on his part. And there's no desire for usurpation of the Father's throne, either. I'm content to be the Son of God, and to keep it at that. Well, go on in verse 1. I will be thy son, and I will redeem all mankind that not one soul shall be lost. Now, Jehovah couldn't make the same boast. He couldn't say that no soul shall be lost, because he was there to honor agency. In fact, more than honor it, he was there to mitigate its misuse. I will make it possible for people to have agency and be able to compensate for their misuse of it. That I will help them learn from their mistakes instead of being condemned by them. But those who choose not to repent, I cannot force them into heaven. Now, the irony here is when Lucifer is saying, "I'll redeem all mankind." Well, none will be lost, I guess, but really none will be gained either. You're having them, "I what's the point of the trip if they don't learn anything along the way?" Yes, they'll come back to be with God, but they'll never be able to grow up and become like God. Back to God's work in glory, being twofold immortality and eternal life. Lucifer could only guarantee immortality, but at a guaranteed loss of eternal life. Christ, on the other hand, could guarantee immortality through his resurrection and make a promise of eternal life for any who would repent of their sins, which he also was making possible at incredible personal cost, I might add. So when Lucifer says, "I will redeem all mankind," oh, truth and advertising, he would have said, "and at no cost to me, because if you think about a removal of agency, and remember here that removing agency is not just removing choice, it can also mean removing consequence of choice." See, too often I think we think of Satan's war against agency as he's going to force you to choose the right. Well, he doesn't do that to me very often, he'd rather have me choose the wrong, but what he typically does is try to get me to eliminate the consequence of my decision, or at least forget that it's going to come. You see, if Satan could say, "Well, would you say there's no law?" And then there's no sin, and then there's no consequence, and nobody is rejected from heaven. And if he was being honest with himself, he would have said, "And there's nothing for me to pay for and guess how many." With no agency and therefore no consequence, no. See, here's another set of countries, choice and consequence, or agency and accountability. We will see both of those take pride of place in the story of the fall today. But if Satan can divorce choice from consequence, and trumpet choice at the expense of consequence, tell you you can do anything you want, and then give you false reassurances that you'll never have to pay the piper. Then again, there's nothing for him to pay for. Guessemony would be a literal walk in the garden for Lucifer. When for Christ, in Guessemony, it was the exact opposite. It was, no wonder he fell on his face. There was a fall in Guessemony because there was a fall in Eden. And Jesus was willing to absorb all of the consequences of that fall. All of the sin and suffering and sorrow and death and disease and everything else that would result from Adam and Eve's choice. Jehovah was willing to say, "Here am I, and I will accept all of that." Again, what you see in verse 1 are so many counterfeits from Lucifer of the higher and holier volunteer that Jesus was willing to become. One of the most obvious, you see at the end of verse 1, when Lucifer says, "And surely I will do it. Wherefore give me vine honor." That's what he was after all along. What's in this for me? Whereas Jesus Christ was the exact opposite. Yes, he could promise, surely I will do it. But he wanted no glory for himself. You see that more clearly in verse 2 that behold my beloved son, which was my beloved and chosen from the beginning. See, he didn't have to run around like Lucifer did. Saying, "I am a son of God," like he did to Moses, like he's doing here. No, Jesus was the beloved and chosen from the very beginning. When the Father asked whom shall I send, we all knew the right answer. He was just honoring our agency and honoring his beloved sons. You've been prepared for this. You've been chosen for this from the beginning. But will you accept it yourself? Now's the chance to truly volunteer. We'll see the same thing today with Adam and Eve. You accepted the plan. You fought for it in pre-mortality. But now that you're there on earth, will you choose to move the plan forward? Again, another one of those here am I send me kind of experiences. But back to Jehovah, he said unto me, "Father thy will be done and the glory be vain forever." To juxtapose verse 1's description of Lucifer with verse 2's description of Jehovah, no wonder we chose and fought for the right to follow Jesus. Now verse 3, "Wherefore, because that Satan rebelled against me, compared that to a Christ, submitting always to the will of the Father, and sought to destroy the agency of man, compared that to Christ, who again mitigated its misuse, who preserved and protected that agency." And then notice this phrase, "which I, the Lord God, had given him." Now that's ironic. Sometimes we assume that, "Oh yeah, Satan was fighting against agency, and God was offering it to us." And there we were deciding if we wanted to have it or not. No, in reality, it was whether or not we wanted to keep it, because God had already given us agency, where there is existence, there is agency, as far as intelligence is concerned. And so, "which I, the Lord, had already given him?" I mean, think about Alma 13, think about Dr. and Kevin as 93, that we had the power to choose in pre-mortality. Why else would God say, "Humor, I send?" How else would there be a war of words and tumult of opinions? Right? This contest over ideologies. We're choosing. We were choosing all along. And God had already given that to us. And according to Alma 13, we were forgiven from our pre-mortal poor decisions by a preparatory redemption through Christ. The NC 93 tells us that when we were born in infancy, we were innocent again. We had it. We lost it. We regained it at birth. All of that was through Jesus Christ. And so Christ, in fact, let me, let me say this, when we talk about the stages of faith being creation, fall atonement, that's chronology. Creation happened first, then the fall took place, and then thousands of years later, the atonement occurred and guess how many? Well, that's the chronology. But logically, guess what came first? Atonement. The atonement was what was fixed in place. My chosen might be loved from the beginning. There will be an atonement made so that everyone can come back to be with and be like God. There's no way to do it without the atonement. Now, to point people toward the atonement, there must needs be a fall. That will, is what President Benson used to say. You don't need food until you feel hungry. You don't know you need the atonement until you realize you're fallen. And so what we're, what the point of all of this is atonement. There must needs be a fall to point people in that divine direction. And then the other question is, well, where are we going to do it? Well, let's create an earth. Remember the Abraham 3 account? We'll, we'll take of these materials and create an earth where upon these made dwell so that we can see if they will do all things whatsoever they are commanded. Now, we know that they won't. That's human nature. That's fallen nature. So again, that will drive them back to the atonement. So chronologically, creation fall atonement. But logically, atonement fall, creation. And that atonement was in place, infinite and eternal, even in pre-mortality, guarding us against the consequences of the agency we had already been given. It's amazing. Keep going in verse 3. And also that I might give unto him my own power is what the devil was after. By the power of my only begotten, I cause it he should be cast down. Now that should let us know why Lucifer has had it out for Jesus ever since. You're the one that kicked me out of pre-mortality. It was by your power that I was cast down. I honestly think that sometimes we take too much credit for our victory in the war in heaven. That yes, we fought and we overcame. Well, yeah, we did, but at the end of the day, who really overcame Jesus did. We even do that sometimes when we think of millennium and think, "Well, how will Satan be bound that thousand years?" Oh, well, the wicked will be gone, only the righteous will remain, and the righteous won't listen to him. So he is bound because we give him no power. Now Nephi does hint at that at the end of the first Nephi, but he also adds the holy one of Israel reigneth. Oh, yeah, that's not just an afterthought. That's really how Satan is bound. Yes, our righteous use of agency, I guess, deserves some token praise. But who really deserves the glory for all of this, the only begotten Son of God? And then, of course, even he would say, "Oh, no, I don't want the glory. Give it back to the Father." It was his plan from the beginning. That was true of pre-mortality. That will be true of millennial reign. It's true of everything in between. Yes, flex your spiritual muscles and resist temptation. But as Moses learned, and as we learned two weeks ago, it's only by invoking the name and power of Jesus Christ, that we're ever really going to accomplish anything. And we're starting to see that. Then last verse, verse four, and he became Satan, the ultimate adversary of everything good that God is trying to accomplish. Ye, even the devil, the Father of all lies to deceive and to blind men and to lead them captive at his will, even as many as would not harken unto my voice. Another great place to juxtapose light and darkness. Satan on one side, the adversary, and Christ on the other, the anointed. The devil versus the Savior. The Father of all lies versus the Son of truth personified. To deceive, as opposed to what Christ always does, to reveal truth. To blind men, no wonder he's called the Prince of Darkness, as opposed to Christ who is the light of the world. To lead them captive at his will, as opposed to Christ who is there to free us from the consequences of sin. Even those addictive ones that trap people. It's a great description of what the adversary is after. And he'll do it to as many as will not harken to God's voice. Is the answer as simple as that? Just harken? It was in Lehigh's dream, according to the Nephi, that's what Dad said. All it takes is don't give heed to the adversary's voice. Harken to the voice of the Father instead. And here now, we're almost set up perfectly for Adam and Eve back in the garden being pulled into different directions. Who will you listen to? Who will you harken unto? Well, as now we transition into the serpent, more subtle, more naked, more exposed than anyone else. Well, notice what he's about to do. In verse 6, we see that Satan is going to use the serpent as his voice, so to speak. And perhaps this is just one big symbol of how the adversary is trying to insinuate himself into the desires of mortal men and women. But it says that he knew not the mind of God, wherefore he sought to destroy the world. Now, important detail, he didn't know what God was planning in here. And so I imagine in some ways that his desire to be guile, Eve, to lead to the fall of Adam and Eve was, oh, this is going to destroy everything. It's going to destroy the world. It will mess up God's plan without realizing, oh, wait a minute. This actually helps move God's plan forward. I am providing some of that necessary opposition in all things. We'll see it later in this chapter when the crucifixion is foreshadowed. And again, Lucifer probably thinks he's beating God because he's having his only begotten son crucified. Well, again, sorry to break it to you, Lucifer. That actually helps move the plan forward too. Oh, if you hadn't helped, I'm sure we would have come up with a different way to do it. But God can take even your rebellion and turn it into steps in the right direction for the rest of humanity. That's exactly what he does here. Now, we could keep reading right here in Moses chapter 4. But I actually want to take you back to Genesis chapter 3 and use the Genesis account as our home base. Yes, we'll be taking frequent field trips back to Moses. But in order to do our best at building on common beliefs with our Jewish and Christian neighbors, I think it's helpful to see just how much truth is right here on the page in Genesis and then where can restore Scripture add to the conversation. So, Genesis chapter 3 verse 1, here's the serpent, more subtle than anyone else. And notice how he begins. He says, "And he said unto the woman." Now, even before we finish the verse, I'm wondering where's Adam in all of this? Now, we can get some additional insight from the endowment. But even just sticking with that, he says to the woman, so Adam doesn't seem to be anywhere present. That should tell us something first and foremost about the adversary's attacks. He tends to approach us when we are alone. He did the same thing with Joseph and Potiphar's wife. He waited for a time when there was no one else. It's interesting that often, but in surrounded by other people, keeps us on better behavior. So, no wonder he attacks when they are alone. We'll come back to that thought later. And then he says this, "Yea, hath God said ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" Now, that's another great insight into the strategies of Satan. What's he doing here? He's trying to get Eve to question the commandments of God. Did he really say that? It's interesting how often that's our first step in the wrong direction. As we start to second guess, divine direction. We start to wonder, does that commandment really come from God? Or does that really matter? Does it really matter what happens between two consenting adults? Who cares? It's not my issue. Does God really care what I put into my body, or on my body, or do with my body? It's mine, after all. Does it really, why would the prophet waste time telling us about these minor things? When aren't there bigger, more important things to worry about than my personal behavior? It's just interesting how he gets us to question commandments first. Notice also the adversary is focused on the perceived negative ones, the restrictive ones. Let's focus on that. Eve flips it and she focuses on the more positive, not on the restrictions of God, but rather on the permissions of God. That's a good thing for us to do, too. Especially on the Sabbath, for example. We tend to turn it into a day of don'ts and focus on the restrictions when as far as God was concerned. Oh no, the Sabbath was made for man to give you a chance to rest and grow up in God and step into a fullness of my glory. It's a day of do's, and that's how Eve sees these commandments. Verse two, the woman said unto the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden." So God has given us that our agency wide open. Now she does realize an exception to that. Verse three, "But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'" Now interesting what she adds there at the end. Not just don't eat it, but don't touch it. Now, would touching the fruit really have led to the fall of Adam and Eve? I doubt it. I mean, in some ways she probably could have outtouched it and squeezed it and thumped it and smelled it, and then all the other weird things that we do in the produce section of the supermarket to try to guess what the best fruit would be. You can do whatever you want with it. Just don't eat the thing. Well, I love the fact that God gives them a preliminary commandment. That this one came in pairs, and there was an ultimate line not to cross, and then a preliminary line that would keep them from even getting close to the second one. That sounds like why is parenting to me? If there's a lookout over the Grand Canyon, for example, or the edge of a cliff, a parent's not going to say, "Oh, hey kids, you can play along the edge as much as you want. Just make sure you don't fall over." No, there's going to be some literal or metaphorical line in the sand further back from the edge, and saying, "Do not cross line number one, because then you'll never have a chance to cross line number two." I think there's mercy and wisdom in God's preliminary commandments. He's keeping us away from the edge. I had a student years ago that said, "You know, I always thought the church was so restrictive until I realized that when I go to the zoo, I'm grateful for the bars." I just laughed and said, "That's genius." He finally realized that the bars weren't keeping me out of the cage. They were keeping the adversaries in it. And to see God's commandments as protection instead of restriction is important. I actually used to do that test in seminary when I taught this lesson. I put a piece of candy on a student's desk and say, "You can eat it. Just don't touch it." And they're like, "What?" And there they are salivating as I'm tempting them. And they're like, "Oh, I can do that." And they usually would roll out down their sleeves and then pick up the wrapper with their shirt. So they're not actually touching it with their skin. And they start to unwrap it and move it up to their mouth. And I say, "Well, don't touch it." And I'm not. And I said, "Oh, with your mouth, you're about to." And I'm like, "Seriously?" I said, "Yeah, you can eat it. You just can't touch it with anything." And then they roll their eyes and say, "I can't eat it if I can't touch it." I get it now. God is trying to keep me. Hold me back from that. Here we need to add one thing that we only find in the book of Moses. And we read it last week, actually. But I've saved it for this week because it has more to do with fall than it does with creation. And it's the recognition of agency, even there. You see, if we go back to the story in Moses, this time we have to go back to Moses, chapter 3. But when God is presenting the Garden of Eden to Adam and Eve, bringing them in, He says to them in verse 16, "Either Lord God commanded the men, saying of every tree of the garden, thou mayest freely eat." So again, God leads out with permission, the do's, before there's any don'ts. Then 17, here's the one don't. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. That's in Genesis also. But then here's the phrase that's only in Moses. In the Joseph's matranslation of the Genesis account. Right on the heels of saying, "Don't eat of it," he then adds, "Nevertheless," so here's an exception to this rule. "Thou mayest choose for thyself, for it is given unto thee." Then he gets back to Genesis. But remember that I forbid it for in the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Now you see what God is doing there? He's honoring agency, but also emphasizing accountability. And that's the contrary that God always tries to prove. Satan wants to eliminate either one. He either wants to say there's no agency. You have no choice in a matter. Or he wants to overemphasize agency and minimize the possibility of consequence. No accountability. God is honoring both. I will let you choose for yourself. It's given unto thee. This tree is right here in the midst of the Garden of Eden for a reason. And the choice is yours. Just understand that the consequence is yours too. And if you want to stay here eternally, or as long as you want, in the Garden of Eden, then I have to forbid you from partaking of that fruit. Because the consequence will be an expulsion. You can't stay in the Garden once you've outgrown it intellectually. When you've left stage one, there's no going back to it. And it's knowledge that typically leads people out. So I'm warning you about that consequence. Now we don't all understand all the reasons why it had to be a transgression that would lead them to leave the Garden. Why it had to be a breaking of some kind of law to precipitate that. But what's interesting about this whole account is that it forces the decision back on Adam and Eve. Now as I hinted at earlier, they'd already made the decision in pre-mortality. We all had. At least the two-thirds of the host of heaven that sided with the Father and the Son at the expense of the adversary. But now they have to decide all over again. And this time it's harder. You see, people always complain that God had set Adam and Eve up with these contradictory commands. Commandment one was multiplying replenish the earth. But Commandment two was don't eat the fruit. And I can't do number one unless I break number two. So what am I supposed to do here? But again, you see what the inspired version changes. It corrects. It clarifies. You can choose either way. Agency is eternal. You had it before. It was protected and preserved by Christ. The same is happening here. Do you want to stay in Eden? Or do you want to move forward along progressions highway? It is forward. That's the goodness. But it's downward. That's the bad news. Choice is totally yours. Now you chose before. But I really want to honor your agency. Not by giving contradictory commands, but by giving you a second choice. Or a second chance, I should say, to decide. You see, it's one thing to decide when it's all in theory. It's another thing to decide when it's in actual fact. In the book of Job, when it describes the Council in heaven, it says that the sons of God shouted for joy. But then Elder Maxwell used to joke that said, "Yeah, but then we came to earth and sometimes wonder what all the shouting was about." It's like, "Really? I signed up for this. My life is way harder than I thought." Again, it's one thing when you think it's, "Oh, yes, just this trip down to earth. You know, my turn on earth is going to be wonderful. I get a physical body, whatever that is." And it's so careful. You're going to feel pain, physical pain in that physical body. "Oh, okay. Hey, anybody know what that pain thing is? He keeps talking about." I don't know. I've never felt any. "Oh, whatever. It can't be as bad as what they say." Okay, sure enough. And yeah, death isn't in our vocabulary. We don't understand really any of those things, but we agreed because we knew it was the best way to come back to be with and like God. But now Adam and Eve have bodies. Yes, they're immortal, but boy, we're just a bite of fruit away from mortality. And when you're staring down the barrel of those kinds of consequences, boy, does that do the consequences of the decision loom larger than before? This is not theoretical anymore. This is real. Now, it's one thing to say, I hope they call me an omission when I have grown a foot or two. It's another thing to have grown that foot or two, and you've got the paperwork in front of you or an appointment with the bishop. And am I really going to do this? I don't know. It was so much easier to make the choice when it was just something in some imaginary future. Am I going forward and going through with it? I love that God has enough faith and trust in Adam and Eve to let them choose a second time when it meant a lot more. See, this is how Lehi explains it in 2nd Nephi 2, which is such a great chapter to make, to give additional insight into the fall. He says, "And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field, and the fowls of the air, and in find all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition. Even the forbidden fruit and opposition to the tree of life, the one being sweet and the other bitter. There is our contrary to prove. "Wherefore the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Here's your agency. Nevertheless, it is given unto thee." That way they may have choose for thyself. "Wherefore, man could not act for himself, say that it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other." "And boy, would there be enticements on both sides, because both life and love and knowledge." They're both so important. Both the head and the heart are pulling them, but they're being pulled in opposite directions. A life of ease with God and Eden, or a life of toil and suffering and sorrow, but also one of progress and growth. And an ability to multiply and replenish the earth, which is what God not just commanded us, but blessed us to be able to do. And we saw that last time, a blessing not just to command. Oh, they're between a rock and a heart place, not contradictory commandments, but mutually exclusive choices, and which will accomplish the greater good. I need you, Adam and Eve, to make that decision. Now, Satan doesn't know the mind of God. He doesn't understand that it's a win-win. He wants to turn it into a lose-lose. And so he begins to question the command, like I said before. Notice what he does next. In verse 4, the serpent said unto the woman, "Ah, ye shall not surely die." Now, that's a falsehood. That's a lie. But then, verse 5, he does say the truth. Tell the truth here. For God does know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. Now, if we couple the lie in four with the truth in five, what do we have? We have a half-truth, and boy is Satan good at using those. If he can smuggle in a falsehood under the guise of something true, and if we swallow the whole thing without being discerning, then he can get us to fall. But in this case, again, notice what he does. There's a positive and a negative side of these consequences. But what he does in four is deny the negative. Oh, you're not going to die. And then, overemphasize the positive. Oh, you'll be like God. You'll know good and evil. This is the best thing that could ever happen to you. Isn't that true to form? Doesn't he still do that? When we have a choice before us, that's going to have some positive and negative results. If Satan wants us to make the wrong decision, typically what does it literally do? Over-emphasize the positives and under-emphasize the negatives. It's actually interesting here, by the way, when he says it in verse five, oh, God knows that you'll become like him. You sense a subtle insinuation there. A little accusation like, oh, and of course God's going to tell you don't eat the fruit because he doesn't want you to be like him. He doesn't want you to know like he knows. Believe me, he does not want you to become like him. Now, the irony of that is the whole plan is trying to help us become like him. There's just a right way to do it, and a wrong way to do it, and Satan had the wrong way. But what was Satan after? I wanted to be like God. I wanted to be the father. I wanted to usurp the throne, and God said no to me. See, he doesn't want you to become like him. No, Lucifer. You just have to do it in the right way. Remember the oath and cover of the priesthood? What's the final blessing? And all that the father hath shall be given unto thee. He wants to give us all things. It just has to be come in a way that we can, something has to broaden our shoulders so that we can bear up under that weight of glory. Satan's plan would never work. It was a logical impossibility. But here he's accusing God of selfishness, when really it was selfishness himself that was making the accusation. Well, once four and five are behind them, then notice what happens in verses six. Because verse six is where the fall actually takes place. And if you take verb by verb by verb, you can watch this descent downward into the fall. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, let's just the first step. She started looking at it. She saw it. And she began to see it in a certain way. She thought of some redeeming feature. Oh, it can't be all bad. It must at least be good for food. I mean, she's looking at the nutrition facts on the side of the box. And yeah, let's not talk about fat content and sugar content. There's a lot of fiber and that's good for you. I mean, we need a rough age, right? So she sees it. Now, she's looking at it long enough. She starts to rationalize that there might, there's probably some, some positive that would come as a result. And then what happens? That it was pleasant to the eyes. Now, I like the verb in the book of Moses even better. Genesis said it was pleasant. In Moses, it says it became pleasant to the eye. And that seems to be true or to the way things actually work. The longer you look at something and the more that you rationalize, something good that would come from, from, oh, had you in our bets on this one or lowering our standards on this one, then no wonder that object that at first was so repellent. It starts to become pleasant to our eye. In the 1700s Alexander Pope, the great English poet, wrote this epic poem called an essay on man. And one of the more famous phrases in it describes this process perfectly. He said, "Vice is a monster of so frightful mean as to be hated needs but to be seen. Yet, seen too oft, familiar with her face, we first endure, then pity, then embrace." And that's what Satan is banking on. Keep looking at that, Eve. Keep rationalizing. Keep justifying. Keep focusing on the positive. Minimize the negative. And pretty soon it will become pleasant to the eye. What's the next phrase, then? It was a tree to be desired to make one wise. Oh, now she's desiring it. That's where wisdom will come from. Next step, she took of the fruit thereof. Oh, so she just crossed the preliminary precaution. She stepped past the first line. She hasn't fallen yet, but she's only a bite away. And now she's actually holding the fruit. What happens then next? Well, you can guess. After taking of the fruit thereof, she did eat. Now she's fallen. But the irony of Satan wanting to tempt you when you're in isolation. He then wants to push you back into community in hopes that you'll be contagious. Well, if I can lead them away on their own and then re-inject them into society to bring the other people down with them, then all be better. And that's exactly what happens. So she touches and then eats and then gives and her husband eats too. Now we're going to talk all about the consequences in just a moment. But before we do, I want to emphasize Adam's act right alongside Eve's act. Because as we wrestle with the fall, and we'll see that it was an act of faith and courage and obedience to a higher law, accepting the consequences of their transgression. Like I said before, it makes Eve's act in Eden so much more meaningful than her choice in premortality. You see, in premortality, of course, I accept the plan. But now coming down and staring mortality in the face, looking just outside the borders of Eden going, Yikes, that looks like central Nevada, no offense to Univadaans. But that's not exactly the Garden of Eden. Yikes, fallen life, do we really want this? And she chooses. She accepts the consequences of a difficult choice. Now, if that showed her faith, what I love at the end of verse 6 from Adam's perspective is his willingness to follow her example, knowing what it would cost him. He could have stayed in the Garden. Oh, you did it. You have to be expelled, but I'm still good. Instead, it was a matter of, no, if you're going, then I'm going with you. If you are ready to live a higher law, then I'm ready to live that as well. You see, part of the challenge here, part of the wrestle for both Adam and Eve is again wondering which commandment will I keep? Which one do I prioritize? I've often heard this. And yes, male and female differences, important contrary to proof, can be oversimplified or over generalized. I don't want to descend into stereotypes. But the fact stereotypes exist, usually they're there for a reason. There's some kernel of truth at the court. And the interesting thing about men is often they want to be right. Whereas women often want to do right. Men want to prioritize the first great commandment. I want to be right with God. Whereas women often want to prioritize the second great commandment. I want to be right with with fellow man and fellow woman. What will do the most good for the most people? That's a very feminine perspective. Whereas a masculine is not right and wrong cut and dried. And this is just how it's supposed to be. I'm thinking with my head and God said, don't do it. And Eve, I'm thinking with my heart. And how will we have children without taking this step? Well, like I said, in Eve's case, her decision to partake of the fruit was echoing her decision in premortality. It just meant more now. And Eve and Adam's choice to follow Eve into a fallen world echoed the marriage that we saw at the end of chapter two. It's just so much more romantic now. I've sometimes joked with with my institute students as they're talking about or thinking about marriage all the time that I don't know how romantic the proposal was in Genesis chapter two. Can you picture Adam getting down on one knee and looking up at Eve and saying, Eve, how you're the only girl in the world for me? Literally, I got no choice in the matter. Believe me, I just named every animal and they all came in pairs and I accept me until you showed up. And none of them are helps meet for me except you. So, will you marry me? Since I'm the only option and you're my only option, it's like it's the flip side of the. If you were the last person on earth, well, this one is. If you were the first person on earth, well, I guess I'd be stuck marrying you. There's nobody else to choose from. Again, not a lot of real man's there because there's not a lot of choice. But now Adam does have a choice. It's not between what girl will I marry. It's what life will I lead and will. Will my life entwine with Eve's? Will I be alone, man? I know God said it's not good for me to be alone, but I assume it's not good to be fallen either. What do I do here? And I love that Adam saw the higher good. Forget about Adam on one knee saying, "Hey, you're the only girl in the world." Imagine Eve on one knee in chapter three, proposing to Adam. Not will you marry me, but will you stay married to me? Despite my fall. You see, back to the stage model of faith, it's the fall where everything falls apart. When Converge to the Church, have their Eden experience at conversion. But then run up against things that are hard. It's during the fall stage that they leave the Church. When in a marriage you started in honeymoon creation stage, it's when things get hard in the fall that divorce happens. It's in the fall stage that people commit suicide because they don't think there's any way forward and they know now there's no way back. And I cannot stay east of Eden. I just can't do this. We have to have faith to move forward beyond the fall. And again, what amazes me about Eve's proposal to Adam and the romance behind Adam's partaking of the fruit is it was a choice to stay married in the face of difficulty. It was the choice of descending hand in hand together. And to me that speaks volumes of their love. I love what Mark Twain and Twain had some hilarious things to say about Adam and Eve. He wrote whole like pseudo diaries of each and they. And he was ripping on the two and they just couldn't get along and all these things were hilarious. But when all was said and done, and this he's reflecting upon his own wife who had recently passed away. In the voice of Adam, Twain says of Eve, wherever she was, there was Eden. And to see that in terms of our relationships, in terms of our endurance of the fall stage, wherever we go, I know I can find a better Eden ahead. If she's there, we'll make it in Eden. If God is with me, we can make. We can make a heaven out of any hell. And they had the faith to move forward. There's something beautiful there. Now all of that being said, we only know that because of our restoration scripture. That it was a choice, that there was wisdom and courage and moving forward. Otherwise, there is no fortunate fall. And Eve did a bad thing as my son was taught in preschool. Well, we have more than that preschool understanding, and I am grateful for it. Because without it, we are left with the unfortunate fall. And we're left cursing Adam and Eve, especially Eve, because she's the one that started it. Years ago, there was an article in the Washington Post about the fall. And it argued correctly that the story of Eve in the book of Genesis, so without the book of Moses' help, has had a more profoundly negative impact on women throughout history than any other. And that's tragic. That a story that should elevate women in our eyes because of the courage and faith of Mother Eve instead has her come crashing down to earth to a point of laying the blame for all the world's woes at her feet. She does not deserve it. She deserves to be put on a pedestal, not thrown down into a pit because of the courage and for decision. Now, how do we make sense of that? Part of it is what we just studied in that honoring of agency and that recognition of consequence that it is given unto thee. Oh, may us choose for myself. Part of it comes from our from help with the second article of faith, what we studied back in last year. That differentiates between us being punished for our own sins and not for Adams or Eve's transgression. Now, we have to be careful about distinguishing sins and transgressions because often in scripture they're used synonymously. But if you want to use technical definitions of each, then there is a differentiation between sin and transgression. Elder Oaks, with his incisive legal mind, has clarified the difference, saying that sin is something that's inherently evil. It's wrong even if nobody says it from. Whereas a transgression is simply wrong because somebody said you shouldn't do something and there's a consequence attached. When we talked about the second article of faith, I use the example of red octagons on the side of the road. There's nothing inherently evil about driving past signs on the side of the road. But if it does happen to be red and eight sided, then that's a transgression of a law. Because there's a consequence that you want to avoid, namely accidents at intersections. So you need to stop. Now, if I'm rushing to the hospital, for example, and I make sure nobody's coming the other way, then it's probably be who's me to transgress that law. Trans just means across and grass means go. So you're just going across a line. Nothing inherently wrong here. I'm just taking a step forward. Aware of the consequences that will fall. And that's what Adam and Eve did in the Garden of Eden. They transgressed a law. Now, that begs the question, well, how much did they know? And again, if they've already been told to multiply and replenish the earth, if they've been blessed with that, but they know they cannot have children. Now, some have asked people of other faith, like, what do you mean? Why can't they have children? Their view of Eden was, that's the way life was supposed to be. We were sent to earth, and we were supposed to all enjoy this Edenic experience in mortality. But no, Adam and Eve had to screw the whole thing up. To which I say, really? Then if the if the if the follow was a mistake, then what was the atonement? A quick fix, an afterthought? No, remember creation, fall atonement logically is reversed with atonement, fall creation. The atonement is the most important thing, and it's the fall that points us towards it. I mean, Paul even teaches that in the book of Romans. Thank heavens for the law, because the law introduces us to the fact that we are fallen, and that's what wakes us up to our recognition of our need for the atonement. So thank heavens for for broken rules, because it introduces us to the Redeemer, who can change all of that. We'll see more of that in a verse in just a moment. So they must have understood something. God is not up there pacing heaven going, "Oh, I blew it. Why did I put the tree there?" I thought at least Adam and Eve would make it, but no, first generation, they've already screwed it up. No, that is not God. He's not back to the drawing board wondering, "What am I going to do now?" He knew that it was all based on the atonement. So one can assume that Adam and Eve must have learned at least some things before this occurred, that there is going to be a way to move forward, and it's going to involve partaking of this fruit. By the way, when people say, "No, they could have had kids." I had one non-member. I was on splits of the missionaries in Tennessee, and this pastor was like, "What do you mean they couldn't have children?" Where does it say that? And I realized, "Oh, it only says that in 2nd Nephi too, that they couldn't have had children according to Lehigh." And so I talked about, "Well, innocence, and would they have understood procreation if they were in a state of complete innocence?" But I said to them, admittedly, the real reason that I know they couldn't have had children is because I believe that Lehigh was a prophet of God. And Lehigh says they couldn't, and so I'm sticking with that. "They would have had no children," he said. "Wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy for they knew no misery, doing no good for they knew no sin." And so then that more famous verse from Lehigh, "Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they might have joy." Elder Oaks, in fact, built on that and gave us this statement. It was Eve who first transgressed the limits of Eden in order to initiate the conditions of mortality. Her act, whatever its nature, so there he's allowing for a symbolic interpretation of partaking of the fruit, whatever that might mean, it was formerly a transgression, but eternally a glorious necessity to open the doorway toward eternal life. Adam showed his wisdom by doing the same, and thus even Adam fell that men might be. Now Elder Oaks goes on, "Some Christians condemn Eve for her act, and they've been doing that ever since, blaming women for the woes of the world. And concluding that she and her daughters are somehow flawed by it. But not the latter day saints. Informed by revelation, we celebrate Eve's act, and honor her wisdom and courage in the great episode called The Fall." Joseph Smith taught that it was not a sin, because God had decreed it. Bring him young declared, "We should never blame Mother Eve, not the least." Elder Joseph, feeling Smith said, "I never speak of the part Eve took in this fall as a sin." Nor do I accuse Adam of a sin. This was a transgression of the law, but not a sin, for it was something that Adam and Eve had to do. Most simple is the statement from President Nelson, who said, "We and all mankind are forever blessed because of Eve's great courage and wisdom." By partaking of the fruit first, she did what needed to be done. Adam was wise enough to do likewise. I love that. Eve showed courage. Adam showed wisdom by following Eve's example. This was a time where someone had to have the guts to live into the second great commandment. And then Adam finally realized, "Oh, I guess this is still honoring the first, but in a higher and holier way." I don't know if you've ever been caught between the first and the second great commandment. It's a tough one. It really is. And I'm not saying it always has to be one at the expense of the other, because only the spirit is going to help you navigate that. My wife and I were in a situation like that where we were caught between doing something right and doing something good. And it had to do with family with different standards than we typically follow. And what we do or don't do on the Sabbath, but what would this mean for them versus what would it mean for us? And I just remember being frustrated and say, "I hate when I can't be right and good at the same time." In that instance, we chose to be good and felt that God was honoring our decision. In a tiny way, maybe that was indicative of what Adam and Eve were going through as they wrestled with this choice and its consequences. Now, like I said, because of our doctrine of the fortune of fall, we believe in the courage and faith and righteousness of Adam and Eve in this courageous decision. But it does beg the question, "Well, how can we keep talking about Beguilin then?" There does seem to be some, in fact, Eve even admits it later on in the same chapter, "Well, the serpent beguiled me." And Beguilin is, "He tricked me. He deceived me, and I fell for it." And that idea of being beguiled, Paul repeats it in his epistles. Abinadi repeats that phrase to the priest of Noah, the book of Ether mentions it as well. It always talks about Eve being beguiled, deceived. So, how do you balance the two? That this was a decision made with eyes open and a decision they were tricked into? Well, in some ways, maybe it goes back to what we saw earlier that Satan's half-truths include truth and error, that he maximizes positives and minimizes negatives, and maybe that was part of his deception of Eve. Maybe Eve went into this thinking, "Oh, the consequences couldn't possibly be as bad as they say." And it is a step forward that we need to take, and so I'm going to do this. Maybe that's part of her being beguiled. There's another possibility. The simple fact that Satan convinced her to do this on her own, and then later she had to go to Adam and convince him to do likewise. Like I said earlier, Satan attacks you often when you're on your own, but that was especially beguiling here, because Eve ended up making a unilateral decision, the consequences of which were anything but unilateral. You understand what I mean by that? She made a decision on her own that didn't affect only herself. They affected Adam. And so if you know this is the right thing to do, talk about it together. Decide together. See, too often in couples, they think they're compromising by taking turns not compromising. And now you've got to pick last time, so I get to pick this time. Well, yeah, I guess I'm only mad half the time, but one of us is mad all the time, and that's a horrible way to have a relationship. No decisions have to be made together. I talked about this last year in our lesson on section 107, that decisions have to be made in unanimity, just like the presiding forums of the church, that they are equal in authority. And so unanimity has to prevail, and how do you get to your unanimous decision by walking the path of Christ-like attributes? That's how your decision gets its calling and election made sure. If this isn't ringing any bells, go back and rewatch the lesson on 107. I told that story of a friend of mine who was making a decision that would affect his whole family, but he was trying to make it unilaterally. Remember this story? He asked me for a blessing, and the Lord had already told me before he asked me for it, he's going to ask you for a blessing, and you're not allowed to give him one. And when I realized why he was asking it, then I understood why I wasn't to give it to him. And I said to him, "You married your blessing. The two of you have to make your decision together, because it affects the two of you. It's a family consequence. It needs to be a family choice in a family council. You married your blessing. Eve, talk it over with him. Between the two of you, prove the contraries of male and female, prove the contraries of vertical and horizontal and obeying God, but honoring neighbor, and prove the contraries of agency and accountability and choice and consequence. You're going to have to come up with a balance here. And the fact that you made the right decision, but perhaps made it in the wrong way, well, there's some beguiling going on there too. Now there's one other thing to think about here, and it's one I often bring up to my students when it's like, "Well, how much did Eve really know? She knew enough to make a courageous wise decision, but lacked enough knowledge that there was some beguiling going on. How's that possible?" And I always say to them, "Well, anybody serve a mission?" They're like, "Yeah," said, "Well, did you know what you were getting yourself into?" And I go, "Of course I did. Oh, no, I didn't. I mean, I knew enough about a mission that I knew was the right thing to do, but man, when I got to the field, it was way harder than anybody told me about." Well, they actually probably told you. You just weren't paying attention to the hard part. And then I'll say, "Anybody married in here? Well, yeah. Did you know what you were getting yourself into?" Well, yeah, we loved each other. "Oh, no. We knew it was the right thing to do, but we had no idea how hard marriage could be." "Anybody here have kids? Did you know what you were getting yourself into?" Well, of course we know. And do you get it now? Adam and Eve, did you know what they were in for? Oh, of course, no. Yes, it was a jump forward, but it was kind of a crash landing in terms of just how real the realities of the fall would be. It's no more theoretical. It's actual. And this is hard. Again, this balance of knowledge and ignorance. Well, welcome to human existence, my friends. And not just in the religious realm. We all take leaps of faith and don't totally know, though we know in part, what we're doing. In fact, that helps explain the trickiest passage in Revelation chapter 12, verse 11. See, in that verse, it talks about how we overcame the adversary in the war in heaven. So we could couple that with what we studied at the beginning of Moses chapter 4. It says that, first of all, it calls Satan the accuser of our brethren. It's the only place in scripture he's given that nickname. And it's interesting to think about what kind of accusations would he have leveled in the war in heaven? Well, first, you can, you can picture him accusing the, the accusing Christ of an inability to save us. Say, well, wait, wait. See, he's trying to leverage risk for his own reward. Yes, he's the one that his platform is no one will be lost. And so, of course, he's going to leverage our fear of being one that slips through the cracks on the Father's plan. Because what does it require? It requires Christ to live a perfect life and to affect a perfect atonement. And then second, it requires us to follow his example, true discipleship. So can you picture the two parties and therefore the two accusations that must have come out of the accuser of our brethren? First, Jesus isn't going to be able to do it. He will not save you. He can't live a perfect life. And number two, even if he could, you're not going to live a perfect life. You're not going to be able to follow his example. Believe me, I've grown up with you in pre-mortality forever. You're going to blow it. Well, if those are the accusations, Revelation 12-11 tells us how we overcame three statements. Number one, we overcame him by the word of our testimonies. Number two, we overcame him by the blood of the lamb. Now, those two would go together with those accusations. Jesus isn't going to be able to save you. How do we overcome that? The word of our testimony. I know he'll be able to save me. He's the chosen from the beginning, prepared from pre-mortality. And what about me? I won't be able to follow him. There, you're actually probably right. I will screw up in life. Not as bad as you're screwing up right now, Lucifer. But yes, I will make mistakes. But that's where the blood of the lamb comes in. That's where the atomement of Christ will bring forgiveness to me. So how did we overcome the accusations? Through the word of our testimony and the blood of the lamb. But there's a third statement in that verse that's always confusing. It says, "And they love not their lives unto the death." Oh, what does that mean? They loved not their lives unto the death. Oh, that explains how they were able to overcome their fear of risk. As Satan is leveraging that fear that some of you might not come home. It's like, "Well, yeah, but in your plan will all come home, but for no purpose will be no different than the day we left." The Father's plan, yes, has risk, but it's all mitigated by the atomement of Jesus Christ. Now, don't get me wrong. I love my life here in pre-mortality with my Father. But I don't love it so much that I'm not willing to risk it in the face of death itself with a promise of a greater life on the other side of it. So this goes back to creation, fall, atonement. I had something good. It was terrestrial, at least. But do I love it so much I'm not willing to descend into a telestial existence that eventually can culminate in a celestial existence? Or am I just going to hold on to what I've got? Do I love my life so much that I'm scared of losing it? That would have stopped us from following the Father's plan in pre-mortality. It would have stopped Adam and Eve from stepping forward into the unknown when it came to the fall. It would stop you from serving a mission or getting married or having children. Because life before a mission, I mean, you're finally emerging into your own and kind of doing your own thing and having some freedom. You can love that life. Unfortunately, you can love it to the point you'll never let it die. And you miss a mission. Some of you young adults that have never been married. And maybe you've been single long enough that, yes, there's a loneliness there, but also there's an incredible independence and freedom there that I don't have to worry about anybody but me. And I'm not trying to minimize anyone's challenges if that's what you're going through. But for those that, I have met some that that verse pops into my head when I see their situation and think, you love your single life too much to risk it. And step into the unknown of marriage or for some of your young couples that don't have children yet for your own choice. But those who cannot yet have children through no choice of their own. But there are some and there's a part of me that looks back to my early marriage. We want to have children immediately. They just wouldn't come. So surgeries later in miracles and we finally had children of our own. But I look back at that and sometimes my wife and I say, why didn't we go on dates every single night? We could have. Well, we loved our life as just husband and wife, but we didn't love it so much that we postponed its death with the coming of children. Again, I love that phrased from Revelation 12. And that describes Adam and Eve perfectly. That's what makes their choice so much more meaningful in Eden than in premortality. It's what makes Eve's proposal so much more romantic than Adam's. We're choosing here. And those are the kinds of decisions that you and I are forced to make all the time. Last week when we were talking about creation, I mentioned a book by Beverly Campbell called Eve and the choice made in Eden. It's a masterpiece. Beautiful research. So many quotes from other prophets and apostles and Sister Campbell herself says some amazing things. Here's one example. Discernment. The ability to see beyond the literal to the divine essential has ever been God's gift to women since Eve was the one who saw it first. Since Eve, women have faced the challenge of ambiguous choices that carry with them wholly life altering consequences. On the correct resolution of these ambiguities hangs the future of generations, the civilizing of society, the basic dignity of the human race and mortal life itself. Daily, women must make decisions based on things not seen or even known clearly. Often these decisions require great leaps of faith. Frequently, these decisions must be based on what serves the greater good for the greatest number. Often such decisions require women to set aside their own well-being in favor of another's. The very process of bearing children illustrates this truth dramatically. It is a source of strength and comfort to many women to know that inherent in their divine nature is this innate ability to be in tune with God's purposes. Eve was indeed in tune with God's purposes and Adam showed that he was in tune with them as well. Their eyes were open at least to some degree to those consequences and with faith they move forward. In fact, open eyes is what we see right on the heels of the fall. Back in Genesis 3, verse 7, as soon as they ate of the fruit, the eyes of them both were opened. And what's the first thing they see? And they knew that they were naked. And so they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons. Now the irony here is they've been naked all along. Now back in the end of chapter 2, they were naked and not ashamed. So here what's changed, not their nakedness, just their lack of being ashamed by it. Like I said before, the beauty of the fall is it tells us how desperately we need the atonement. The beauty of the law is the fact that it holds a mirror up to our imperfections and shows us where we're falling short. It points out the fact we've always been naked. We've always been uncovered and never lived the perfect life. Their eyes are now open to that. But the irony here is they try to take changing that reality into their own hands. And so they make these makeshift aprons out of fig leaves and try to cover their nakedness. Now to me the irony of this is how pathetic fig leaf clothing would be, especially when compared with what ultimately covers their nakedness, which we'll see at the end of this chapter is a coat of skins that the Lord provides for them. Now I'm going to try to be sensitive the way I say this, but I'd want you to think about even when we are ultimately clothed by God and covered by His atoning grace, there is power in being reminded at our pathetic attempts at covering ourselves. We cannot cleanse ourselves from sin. It's beyond us. We cannot work out our own forgiveness. It comes as a gift of grace. And no matter how hard we try, no matter how many fig leaves we sow together, it will never be sufficient to purify our hearts or cleanse the blood from our garments. It takes a holy garment from God to do that. He has to provide for us the robes of His righteousness, because compared to that, as Isaiah says, all our righteousness is as filthy rex, or as Adam and Eve would say, there nothing more than fig leaves. I am grateful that even when I am covered by Christ, I am forced to remember my own individual attempts to clean myself up, to make myself presentable to God, because it's insufficient. And when I can see the two side by side, I realize that my hope is not in self, it's only in Savior. I can only come clean through Christ. They will come to know that. But in the meantime, verse 8, they heard the voice of the Lord God. He's walking through the garden, and Adam and Eve hide themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. Now, ask Jonah about how successful we can be when we try to hide from God. He can see all the way to Tarshish. Believe me, he can see through the trees. He planted the garden after all. There's even an irony there of your hiding among the trees, when in reality, the trees are your ultimate hope and destination. The tree of life is the one thing that will save you. Can't you see that? Don't hide behind it. Come unto it. Hide from God? No, it's come unto Christ. Yes, he'll show you your nakedness, but then he'll provide the garment to cover your nakedness. Understand, again, the irony here, God is not the problem. God is the solution. So don't hide from God. Come to Him. Don't hide your sins. Fully expose those sins to Him. Confess of your sins. Let Him see. He's aware of them. You see, when I was a little boy, every once in a while, I would do something wrong. And my mom would warn me, "Just you wait till your father comes home." I don't know if that was her, just not wanting to have to deal with it or just to prolong my penitence until at least dad got home, but those words struck fear into my soul. And my dad was not the violent type. I didn't fear self-destruction, but boy did I fear his disappointment, because he never seemed to do anything wrong. In fact, later when I was in high school, I was on a road trip with his dad, my grandpa and I said, "So what did dad do wrong when he was young?" I was looking for some black male, at least some leverage when dad knew that I'd done stupid things. Well, grandpa scratched his head and he said, "You know, that's the weird thing about your dad. It never crossed his mind to do anything wrong." And I'm like, "Oh, I'm so dead, because it does cross my mind." And if I've got nothing to work on, then I'm toast. Well, I felt like toast when I was a little kid. And when dad comes home, I believe me, I wasn't singing. I'm so glad when daddy comes home on those days. I was scared to death. Now, we had this end table in a living room next to the couch. It was pretty small. We would keep all of the old church magazines in there after we'd read them. But I knew pretty well around the time the daddy came home from work. And on those days where I was scared to death of punishment, I would take out all the church magazines from the end table, hide them underneath the couch, and then squeeze my little body into that tiny little claustrophobic end table. If I got my rear end in and then kind of scrunched my back and pulled my legs in after me, and then I could grab the screw that held the knob on and then close myself back into welcome oblivion. I just didn't want my dad to know where I was. I wanted to cease to exist as Alma said. But you know what? I totally misjudged my father. Was there some disappointment? No, sure. But there was love, and there was forgiveness, and there was a desire to teach me how to do a better job of growing up. And yes, he knew that better from personal experience. I think when we hide from God, instead of coming to Him, it's because we don't know Him. We misjudge Him. We fear retribution when we should be asking for redemption, because that's always what He's coming to offer us. The solution is right here. Tree of life. Learn to come, partake of its fruit. Don't hide from God. Come to God. It's sin you should have been scared of. Well, verse 9, God plays dumb, which is interesting. I think priesthood leaders sometimes do that. I know parents often do to try to give people a chance to confess instead of to extract a confession from them. So the Lord God calls to Adam, and he says unto him, "Where art thou?" Now the Genesis version, it's where art thou. The Moses version, it's where goest thou. And I think both of those can be right. And I love both questions. As if he's saying, "Adam, forget geographically. I know exactly what tree you're hiding behind in the garden. The fig leaves don't match the other shrubbery. But do you know where you are? And do you know where you're going? Do you have any idea the position you are placed in at the edge of Eden, the cusp of creation and ready to descend into the fall? You're about to move downward, but forward." I think if God could just reassure us, I know where you are. I know where you're going in positive ways. And beware, I know that you might be headed in negative ways. Do you know where you're headed as you're making these decisions? Well, verse 10, Adam responds, "I heard thy voice in the garden. I was afraid because I was naked. I hid myself." Remember Satan plays on fear all the time with Moses? That's what led Moses to see the bitterness of hell. Well, here it's what leads Adam and Eve to see their own shame and to fear God instead of having faith in Him. Verse 11, "God says to Adam, "Who told thee that thou was naked?" In other words, whose judgment are you fear Him here? Has thou eaten of the tree, where have I commanded thee that thou shalt not eat?" So again, I'm plain dumb to give you the opportunity to confess, to speak up, to act instead of be acted upon. And so Adam does. Now these next few verses, unfortunately, a lot of people interpret as Adam passing the buck to Eve and then Eve passing the buck to the serpent. So like, "Well, it's not my fault, it's it's." Well, that's one way to read it. But I read it instead not as a passing of the buck, but as a taking of accountability and explaining the situation. This is what the situation I was in. This is the decision I made. Here's some of the reasons I made it. In Adam's case, he says, "The woman whom thou gave us to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat." And in the Moses version, it adds, "And commandist that she should remain with me." Now, you see what he's acknowledging there? God, you gave me this help meat for me. And she is suitable. She's meat. She's equal. And she is an enabling power, enabling us both to move forward on this plant. You gave her to me. You commanded her to remain with me, which I assume also meant commanding me to remain with her. And so this higher law I lived. And when she partook of the fruit and gave it to me, I made a choice to remain with her. Then its eaves turn, as the Lord turns to her. What is this thou hast done? The woman responds, "The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat." Which isn't blaming the serpent as much as it is acknowledging, "I fell for some of his cunning ways. I should have thought more about both the negative and the positive consequences. I really should have waited to make the decision alongside my help meat, as equal partners." Well, the Lord then started with Adam, then to Eve, and then the serpent. And now God is going to go in reverse. And pronounce a punishment upon, or I should say a consequence on the serpent, and then on Eve, and then on Adam. Now, I hold back the word punishment, or even the word curse, although that word is used, because each of these punishments were blessings in disguise. Now, curse may be, if you want to see it that way, but a curse that pointed to a greater blessing. You'll see what I mean. Verse 14, "The Lord God said unto the serpent, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, above every beast of the field. Upon thy belly shall thou go, and dust shall thou eat all the days of thy life." So far, that's all curse, no, and no blessing. But the punishment does fit the crime. Lucifer, "You have tried to ascend above all, so instead you will have to descend below all on your belly, thou shalt go." "You have wanted to live into the divinity side, at the expense of the dust side, and so dust thou shalt eat all the days of my life." Now, the blessing comes in 15. "I will put enmity," which is conflict or animosity, opposition. "Enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed, it shall bruise thy head, thou shalt bruise his heel." Now, this enmity between, this is not women being afraid of snakes. This is far more theological than that. This is an inborn animosity between women and evil. No, I'm not trying to hold women to a higher standard, nor am I trying to let men off easy, 'cause, well, you're just, you're not maven the same way. But there is something beautiful here about how the natural animosity, that at their best, God's daughters feel towards anything that draws them away from their heavenly parents. I'm grateful for Eve's example in that. I'm grateful for my wife's and my daughters and my mothers and my grandmothers and my sisters. The women I have seen in life do such a natural job of overcoming the natural man. It's an amazing thing. And then when he says, "between thy seed and her seed," now, the seed of the woman could just mean all of posterity. But there is one who is uniquely qualified for that title, the seed of the woman in the absence of man. And that's Jesus Christ. He is the seed of Mary mortally, in the way that he is not the seed of any mortal man. So he is uniquely the seed of the woman. We want to talk about enmity between Lucifer and Jehovah. Well, we saw that earlier. That goes back a long way. And how will that enmity be manifest? Satan, this serpent will try to attack Jesus. We'll try to sink its fangs and poison him. But what's it going to amount to? A bruised heel that comes in the very act of the Savior crushing the head of the serpent. That's what I hinted at earlier about Satan not knowing the mind of God. And kicking Adam and Eve out of the garden of Eden was actually kicking them forward. And pushing for the crucifixion of Christ. Oh, yeah, you got him. You bruised his heel all right. And then he ascended up on high and took captivity captive and banished the death itself. Boy, did you get crushed? Lucifer. And again, moving the plan forward. Now that's the serpent's curse slash blessing pointing to the atonement of Jesus Christ. Then how about 16? Here's the woman's unto the woman. He said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. Now that word sorrow is a poor translation. Now the original Hebrew would be better translated as pain or suffering or labor or why do you think we call childbirth labor? Okay, toil, travail, all of that pain and suffering. So I will multiply that kind of pain and anguish in your conception. And then he adds in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children. So the irony here is yes, there's a curse, so to speak, but the curse will actually be a blessing because that pain will bind you to that infant like nothing else could. Even in our day when when pain can be mitigated by epidurals, my wife always joked that epidurals are the compensation for having to live in the last days. We have to deal with so many spiritual trials that we can at least have some, this is an epidural when we give birth. And after I saw my wife went through even with an epidural after our first birth, I told her, honey, one of us is always going to get an epidural. If it's not you, then dibs for me, but one of us is going to do it. And those that have gone through it without epidural, my hat's off to you. But either way there is pain, there is labor, there is suffering, and yet there is such joy that comes as a result. Multiply and replenish. Oh yeah, what a blessing that is. Even when there is pain attached, the verse then ends, and I desire shall be to thy husband and he shall rule over thee. Now, if the Washington Post was right that the fall account has done more harm to women than anything else, well, that is exhibit a, because that verse has been used for centuries to justify misogyny and unrighteous dominion and everything else. See, we're men are supposed to rule over woman. It says some of the Bible. And your desire is supposed to be to me. Well, there's a couple of ways this verse has been interpreted. It can, is it meant to be descriptive or prescriptive? In other words, is this describing in a negative light, worst case scenario, how things are going to end up being? Or is this prescribing in a more positive light the way things ought to be? Now, let's grapple with both for a moment. On the descriptive side, it may be that he's simply saying, you know what, you're going to want, your desires are going to be his direction, but his desires are going to begin yours. And both way, it's going to become kind of a domineering one against a domineering other. You see, even there's even a new, a more modern translation of this that takes that approach and says, and you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you. Talk about a lack of equal partnership. Talk about a lack of recognizing one another as helps meet for each other. Let's go back to what we were talking about with DNC 107 that you're making unilateral decisions. You're taking turns not compromising, and that's your view of compromise. That's not the way it works. Now, if that's the description of, this is the way things are going to end up in worst case scenario, if you two don't figure this out, there's your curse, Eve. Or on the other hand, is this the blessing, a prescriptive, this is how things need to be, there needs to be desire for one another. Instead of you wanting to just call the shots on your own, I need your desire to be to your husband and his desire to be toward you. That's what equal partners are for. That's what that's what help meets are. And then what about that, he shall rule over thee. Now, President Kimball said a better word would have been preside to preside over you. See, even in the proclamation of the family, when it says that men are called to preside in the home, well, is that a ruling over? Well, it also says equal partners. So there's a set of countries that needs to be proven. Yes, I guess somebody needs to make a final decision. There is one steering wheel in the car. But the other person should have equal access to the map. And I said this last year in that same conversation about DNC 107. Imagine if one side had the steering wheel and the other side of the car had the brakes and the gas. Boy, you would have to come to a unanimous decision before you decided to move forward or you wouldn't go anywhere. Well, I think there's truth to that. And again, DNC 107 balances the countries of equal in authority and under the direction of as it refers to the three presiding forums of the church, First Presidency Cormons 12 Cormons of 70. Again, that's the lesson to go review that. And so in a couple is there under the direction of seems like it is there equal in authority there better be. What kind of an organizational model is that? Well, it's one that unanimity has to reign. And so this is not a presiding authority barking out orders and delegating to do lists. It's a presiding authority coaxing out of every member of the council. They're peace of the revelatory puzzle that God has scattered among them all. Okay, that's how decision to be made in the home and in the family elder Elton Perry said the wife is not the vice president. She's not second in command. It's equal partnership here. Which makes me wonder again about that phrase and he shall rule over the now when I was in an undergrad in college, I was taking Old Testament and beginning Hebrew from Dr. Donald Perry. Now, Don Perry is, he knows his stuff. He was on the international Dead Sea Scrolls team. So yes, expert in Hebrew. At one point in class, he described the conversation he had recently had with a young apostle or at least younger, his name, Russell and Nelson. Now, if you know anything about President Nelson, he loves words, loves etymology. He's gifted at learning languages himself. But at one point, probably preparing to talk, he called Dr. Perry and said, can we talk about Genesis 316 and that phrase rule over the is there anything the Hebrew would give us to help us understand that better. And Dr. Perry went back to the Hebrew and saw, yeah, okay, and he shall rule over the yep, that is what it says. Ooh, but is that the only thing it could say? Hmm, because we've, you see what it consists of is a verb and a preposition and a pronoun rule over V. Now, rule is Michal in Hebrew and every time it's used in the Old Testament, it's describing a ruler in terms of like a king over his kingdom or an emperor over his empire. And so what's the preposition that's always used over because kings rule over kingdoms and purers rule over empires. If you're going to use a preposition with rule, of course, it's always going to be over and so it always is. But is that the only way to translate that preposition? Actually no, Hebrew prepositions can typically be translated in a lot of different things depending on context. Again, this context would always assume over. Makes sense. But kind of like por and pada in Spanish or day in Spanish, it could be of, it could be from, it could be several different things, you just have to read it in context. Well, in this one, as he was telling us this story, by the way, our students, our minds were racing because we learned a bunch, we had already learned a bunch of the prep, the prepositions. And the one that we saw on the page was the letter B, B, just B, and the B sound and then connect it to the pronoun would be over her or over the, over them, over the kingdom, whatever. But when I looked at B and realized, wait a minute, like our first week of Hebrew, when we learned the prepositions, the most common translation of B as a preposition is not over, it's with. And boy, did that open our eyes. And that's one of the things that Brother Perry shared with President Nelson. Now, that's not to say that it has to be that over rule over her is a correct translation. And I know of other Latter-day Saint Hebrew scholars that would push back and go, no, it still needs to be over because every other instance is. But again, part of the challenge is, this could be a unique situation because it's not talking about a king over his subjects or an emperor over his empire. And not just good or bad grammar, it's better theology to make it with. Because if you think about it, what's the only place, where's the only place that a man will rule over anything? The highest degree of the celestial kingdom. And what's the only way to get there is to have a companion to rule with our only access to the highest degree of the celestial kingdom. Where there is some sense of rulership with eternal increase and eternal progression, it requires the new and everlasting covenant of marriage, it requires and help meet for the. And so, take it however you'd like in Genesis 3 16 and be strict in your translation of the Hebrew and find. Just make sure that you're ruling over in righteousness, in gentleness and weakness and love unfained. But with the possibility, the intriguing possibility of a ruling with, since this is no king or emperor, this is husband and wife meant to be equal partners in the family of God. It's amazing. Not quite the curse we sometimes think, we'll talk about a blessing. And then same with Adam. His curse slash blessing in 17 is beautiful as well. To Adam God says, because thou hast harkened unto the voice of thy wife and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying thou shalt not eat of it. Here's the result, the consequence. Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Notice he didn't say Adam, you are cursed. He said the ground is cursed, but the ground is cursed for thy sake. That sounds like a blessing in disguise. And what is that blessing? It's the fact that you're going to have to work and work will be a blessing for you. When he says in sorrow, you'll eat of the ground all the days of your life. That's the same word that Eve was given. Not just sorrow, but rather suffering, rather toil and pain and labor work. Like we saw in the creation in the in the seventh day, that rest is a spiritual necessity, even if it's not a biological one, since God's don't get tired. Well, in this case, work is a spiritual reality, even when it's not an economic reality. Even if you don't have to work to pay the bills, because you have enough already, you need to work to feed the soul. And that's exactly what Adam is being blessed to do. See, in some ways, there's a beautiful parallel between Adam and Eve here. Eve, you are going to suffer to bring life out of the womb, just like Adam is going to suffer to bring life out of the ground. You're both going to grow and progress and bring life forth in your own way. And in both instances, it will be a blessing to you. He then says, interesting phrase in 18 and 19. "Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; thou shalt eat the error of the field; in the sweat of thy face shall thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground, for out of it was thou taken; thus thou art unto dust thou shalt return." And there's the end of Adam's curse/blessing. Now, I was thinking about this because there's so much symbolism here that all seems to point forward to Christ, that the enmity between the seed of the woman and the serpent, and the bruised head and the crushed head and the bruised heel. That's all pointing to the Savior. To think of a mother in labor and anguish, Isaiah uses that imagery to speak of the love of God. There's so many things pointing forward to Jesus, and I wondered about that with Adam's, the language that was given to Adam as well, and then it hit me once. "Thorns and thistles and sweat and bread can those be—those can those elements be symbolic of greater glories yet ahead?" And then it hit me in the sermon on the Mount. Jesus says, "By their fruits you shall know them." And then he says this, "Because will men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles?" That's a rhetorical question. The answer is, of course not. If you've got a thorn, a grape's never going to come of that. If you have a thistle, it's never going to grow a fig tree. And yet, symbolically they do, through Jesus Christ. If you think about the crown of thorns being rewoven into a crown of glory and the blood of Christ providing the symbolism of that sacramental wine, "Oh, the atonement of Christ does bring grapes out of thorns." And what about figs, figs from thistles? In the New Testament, the fig tree is used as a symbol for the second coming, when Christ will make every wrong thing right again. "Oh, so even out of thistles Christ through his atoning grace can bring forth figs, and all will be well. By the sweat of thy face, thou shalt eat bread." What's Luke say about the atonement of Christ? The Christ's sweat, great drops of blood, in order to give us what? The bread of life, to eat my body and drink my blood and never hunger nor thirst again. There's that great line in the Christmas Carol, joy to the world, where we sing, "He'll come and make the blessings flow far as the curse was found." Oh, these curses, to serpent and eve and aton. Christ will come to make the blessings flow far as that curse was found. The Lord will bring beauty from ashes, and the fall, when pursued correctly, will always culminate in the atonement. Beautiful promises here. Well, verse 20, then Adam calls his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. That seems almost out of place after all of these slams, right? These curses, oh no, they get it. They see the blessing inside. And right then, this also seems out of place in terms of, is this a little late? Haven't we been calling her Eve all along? No, this is where we first learn her name. Number earlier, Adam just said, "She shall be called woman, for she was taken out of men." Now, last week when we discussed that verse, we realized that he's not exercising dominion over her by defining her the way he defined the animals. Remember when we named something, we defined it, we exercised some dominion over it, I get to call you what you are. But in the case of woman, she's simply, she's the same as me. So I'm Isha, she's Isha. It's man, woman, it's the same term. I'm recognizing that. But now it takes it up another notch. Now I'm recognizing really who she is in terms of identity and divine purpose. This is Eve. This is Hava, which in Hebrew is Eve, and also its life. It's lives. She is the mother of all living. And don't forget the fact she still hasn't had any kids. Sherry Dew pointed this out, and what a blessing that it came from her, since she's still waiting for that blessing herself. When will I have children of my own? I don't know, but in the meantime, I know I'm a mother, because I'm a daughter of God. And even before she gave birth, Eve is recognized for not just what she was meant to do, but rather who she was intended to be. Motherhood is a matter of identity far more than activity. It's far more a matter of nurturing than just giving birth. In fact, it's so interesting that we call it mothering. Oh, she's mothering a child. Sadly, what do we say about dads? When we say, oh, he's fathered, he's fathering a child. That's confined or reduced down to the sexual act itself and alone. That's tragic. I'm offended by that, obviously. What does it mean to father a child? Oh, it means to engage in the act of procreation and help a woman conceive. Yeah, you're done. You're done, fathering. It's not what we say to mother. To mother a child is to give birth. No, we say to mother a child is to nurture them to raise them. Well, that should be the equivalent of fathering to. I'm still fathering my children. I'm still trying to raise them. And I'll never graduate from that responsibility because it's more than responsibility. It's identity. That's beautifully clarified there in verse 20. By the way, Joseph Smith once taught then that when God breathed the breath of life into Adam, he did the same with Eve, but the word ruach, which means breath or spirit, should have been translated not breath of life, but rather lives. That for her, as opposed to Adam, oh, I am a multitude, you could say. Then, verse 21, we see the Lord making coats of skins and clothing, Adam and Eve. And like we said earlier, what a difference, what a glorious difference than those fig leaf aprons that they had tried to fashion for themselves. Now, let me give you something far better, coats of skins, let me clothe you with them, or another word that could be used, let me cover you with them. When we talk about robes of righteous, we talk about clothing, covering someone's nakedness. It's important to realize that in Hebrew, the word to cover, which is afar, is the word that's always used for atonement, a covering of our sins. Yom Kippur is the day of atonement. Yom means day. Kippur means it comes from kefar. It's the same root. It's the day of covering the day of atonement. The covering of the ark of the covenant is called the throne of atonement, because that lid covers the covenant within. Any time in the Old Testament, when you see something covering something else, look out for atonement symbolism. It will probably be waiting in the wings, and that's true of this one, particularly. I will give you something to cover your nakedness. And what will it be? You can pull some fig leaves off, and the tree will just grow more leaves to replace them. But to take a coat of skins, this is not the serpent skin. He's not shedding skin and going on living. For an animal to give you skin to use, it will cost the animal its life. This is a sacrifice. And so for the Lamb of God, to make clothing, to cover the sins of each of us, would require an act of sacrifice. In Christ's case of self-sacrifice, beautiful imagery there. Well, verse 22, the Lord then says, "Behold, the man has become as one of us, to no good and evil." Now, he didn't say that gelously. He didn't say it angrily. He didn't say it bitterly. Son and daughter, you're growing up in me. You're taking steps forward. Now, I want to make sure they remain steps forward, and therefore they can never be steps back. I have to move you out of Eden, and then block the way of an unauthorized return. The only way to come back is to come full circle. It's up and over and beyond, onward and upward to atonement. And so what does he do at the end of 22? Lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever, and we would add in their sins, since they haven't had time to repent or to change or to learn from them. Then what will we do? Well, let's give them that time. Let's assure them that time. Here's how we'll do it. Verse 23, "Therefore, the Lord God sent him forth from the Garden of Eden, to till the ground from once he was taken." So, first off, you're going to go do the things I asked you to do all along. I asked you to till and keep the Garden of Eden. Well, now you're going to till and keep a much larger Garden, the earth itself, but work. Step into that blessing/curse that I just mentioned. Just live. In fact, it's interesting when it talks about, we saw that earlier in the fistles and the thorns and the bread and the sweat and everything else. "To till the dust, because thou art dust, you came from it, dust thou art, the to dust thou shalt return." I love that thought of work with whatever you're made of. It's one thing to plow the soil, but it's another thing to plow the soul. And just like you're out there working in the dirt, how you really need to work in the dust from which you're made, learn to conquer it, learn to subdue the flesh, learn to put off the natural man and become a saint through the Atonement of Christ, learn to bring growth and beauty and life out of the dust that you're made of. You've got some tillion to do Adam, and so Adam and Eve move forward and begin to do that. They're engaged in the work that they've been given. And then one other thing, 24, he drove out the man and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden, Cherubim, and a flaming sword, which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life. Now, Cherubim are simply some kind of heavenly creature, and it was Cherubim that were carved into the wood of the door of the temple and embroidered into the fabric of the veil, passing Cherubim to come back into God's presence, the symbolic tree of life. A flaming sword, in the armor of God imagery, the sword is the spirit and the word. If fire purifies and cleanses, then the picture of this pure word of God that is saying, "You can't come home this way, my son and my daughter." There's a higher, holier way. It's not backwards, it's forward, onward and upward to atonement. And what I'm trying to do here is not to foreclose the possibility of your return. Anything but, I'm trying to ensure that you have time to prepare to come home in the right way. You see, all I'm doing now is closing off shortcuts. The sword is not waving back and forth, saying, "Nunchelpaz." It's pointing at him and he forward to pursue a life of labor, of work, of repentance, of redemption. You see, verse 23 was giving them something to do in the meantime. Go work. But 24 was giving them the meantime. You have time to do this. You see, if there were some way for you to rush your way back into the garden of Eden and partake of the fruit of the tree of life right now, it short circuits the entire plan through that shortcut. Because you jumped straight from immortality with a token nod to mortality that didn't have any time to do anything for you onto eternal life beyond. You haven't changed at all. It's like Jesus saying to the woman taken an adultery, "I don't condemn you right now, but I can't forgive you right now either. You need time to change. So I'm not going to condemn. I'm not going to condone. I'm just going to tell you to go and sin no more." In a similar way, Adam and Eve, I'm not condemning nor condoning. I'm carving out space between the beginning of a mortal life and the end of one which then begins an eternal life. Take advantage of the time in between. You see, there's an interesting passage in Alma chapter 12. Lehigh has been working us through a lot of this already. In fact, in chapter 2, that same chapter we've been quoting several times, he says this, "The days of the children of men were prolonged according to the will of God that they might repent while in the flesh." See, that's what Cherubin and the Flaming Sword were for. To guarantee that Adam and Eve's time would be prolonged. You're going to have a space of time before you can come back to this fruit, to partake of eternal life. And that time is meant to prepare you. It's time to repent while in the flesh. So keep going with Lehigh. Wherefore, their state became a state of probation. And their time was lengthened according to the commandments which the Lord God gave unto the children of men. Now, if there was ever a good student of Lehigh, it's Alma. Because when Alma and Amulet go to M&I, how to preach? So much of what Alma teaches in chapter 12 are things that Lehigh taught back in second effect, too. Including this one. See, it's fascinating. He's talked about, he and Amulet have talked about resurrection and eternal life on the other side. And this ruler among the people whose name is Antiona raises his hand and says, "Well, well, wait. You keep talking about this eternal life. But if I remember my story correctly, in the Garden of Eden, after Adam and Eve partook of the fruit, they were cast out of the garden, God placed cherubum and the flaming sword there to keep them from eating the fruit of the tree of life. So they couldn't live forever. So, based on my read of that narrative, eternal life is not an option for us. Now, pretty insightful has scripture study on Antiona's part. But Alma's response is glorious. He says, "Oh, good question. In fact, it's one I was hoping someone would raise because there's an answer I need you all to understand." And Alma answers it this way. "There was a space granted unto man in which he might repent. Therefore, this life became a probationary state." So, unlike what Lehigh just taught, "A time to prepare to meet God." That's one of my favorite things about Alma. Every time she brings up probation, he changes it to preparation because it sounds better. It's a softer, truer term. God is not some angry probation officer looking for you to slip up so we can throw you back in prison. He is a kind coach, a helpful mentor that's trying to help you prepare for better things. And so, Charibum stands there forcing time upon us. Don't short-circuit the system. Take advantage of time. Use your preparatory state. It's like this. God is saying, "I must keep my word." And my word was warning you that in the day thou eatest thou shalt surely die. And so you will die. In fact, you'll die today in terms of spiritual death. You'll be cast out of the Garden of Eden today. And physical death? Well, if a thousand years with man is a day with God, Adam lived to be 930. So yeah, today, in my view, you'll die today physically as well. But the idea here is I'll keep my word. You will die just not yet because I also need to keep my plan, which was to bring you immortality and eternal life. But not yet there, either. You need to die, but not yet. You need to have eternal life, but not yet. So what's happening? I need to carve out space between these two trees. They're placed in opposition to another. One starts the clock ticking. The clock of mortality. The other starts the clock of immortality. But in doing so, it stops the clock of mortality. There has to be a beginning and an end to this mortal probation better said this mortal preparation. If you want to dig into this deeper, then go back to the lesson on Almuch 12, the year we studied the Book of Mormon. Now we go into that at length. But it's amazing to see the purpose of these two trees, both necessary for God's eternal plan. But Cherubim and the Flaming Sword making sure that time has its time to perform its saving work. I remember what James says, let patients have her perfect work. Cherubim and the Flaming Sword were ensuring that Adam and Eve, we want you to come home the right way. And now is not the right time. So go and work at it and repent of your sins. Now Adam and Eve are going to move forward in life. And in chapter 4, verse 1, and 2, we see the birth of Cain and Abel. But this is another instance where it is such a blessing to see what God gives us in addition to that in the Book of Moses. And here's why. Back in Almuch 12, when he says, yes, there had to be time. There also had to be instructions so they knew how to use that time well. If it's preparation after all, I need to know how I should be preparing. And so in the midst of that chapter, Almuch also says this, after God had appointed that these things should come into man, namely death, and not yet eternal life. Behold, then he saw that it was expedient that man should know concerning the things where he had appointed unto them. I mean, if this is going to be a test, there needs to be some instruction in preparation for the test, right? Therefore, he sent angels to converse with them, who caused men to behold of his glory. That's not all. They began from that time forth to call on his name, therefore God conversed with men, and made known unto them the plan of redemption which had been prepared from the foundation of the world. You see, both Lehigh and Second Efi 2 and Almuch in Almuch 12 taught that a key, an essential ingredient of agency is not just choice and consequence. It also has to include instruction. If we're going to hold on to some standard, we have to teach them what the standard is. So let's fill this time for them not only with work, but also with learning. That way faith and repentance can come as a result of all of this. They can take advantage of this prolonged time. You see, in the Genesis account, it just goes from being closed off from Eden, cast out of God's presence to, well, I guess we're just going to multiply and replenish the earth now since that's all we know to do. And we meet out of a cane and able, and then really all hell breaks loose. And you see some real falling going on. But again, this is where the book of Moses, the inspired version, provides such a helpful hint of what's really going on here. You see, in the Genesis account, you meet cane and able in verse 1 and 2. In the Moses account, you don't meet cane and able until verse 16 and 17, which means we have 15 beautiful verses added to the account to help us understand what's going really going on. And they are so powerful. Verse 1, "Can the past after I, the Lord God, had driven them out that Adam began to till the earth, to have dominion over all the beasts of the field, to eat his bread by the sweat of his brow as I, the Lord, had commanded him." He's doing exactly as commanded. And Eve also, his wife, did labor with him. They are equal partners. They are true companions, helps meet for one another. Verse 2, "Adam knew his wife, and she bear unto him sons and daughters. So often in Hebrew, the verb "to know" is the word that's used as a use of euphemism for sexual intimacy. "To know each other so intimately that life comes as a result." That verb will be important later on. So Adam knew his wife, he bear him sons and daughters, and they began to multiply and to replenish the earth. Now that doesn't include cane and able yet. We're not going to meet them till verse 16 and 17. So in the Genesis version, it seems like cane's the firstborn son or firstborn child of Adam and Eve, and ables the second. In this version, no, they're much later. And that difference is going to make a difference in just a moment. Verse 3, "From that time forth, the sons and daughters of Adam began to divide two and two in the land, to till the land to ten flocks. They also began sons and daughters." So wow, it seems like a lot of time is passing before cane and able come onto the same. "To the point that not only are Adam and Eve moving forward with the plan of God, but their children are too. And their children are working the land, their children are following the examples of both Adam and Eve. In terms of bringing life from the ground and life from the womb. By the end of verse 3, Adam and Eve have grandkids and cane and able still are born." I mean, this is like those stereotypical jokes you hear about big LDS families that have a long array of children where the oldest kids are so old that they're having kids by the time that the mom and dad are still having the youngest children. It's one of those instances where the nephew and niece can be older than their uncle or their aunt. And that seems to be what happens with cane and able to. So I'm younger than some of my nephews and nieces. That's weird. Well, regardless. Look at verse 4, "Adam and Eve, his wife, called upon the name of the Lord, which suggests how much they missed him, having been removed from his presence. They're calling upon his name, and evidently God missed them too, because they heard the voice of the Lord from the way toward the Garden of Eden speaking unto them. They saw him not. They were shut out from his presence. But I'd love that the God almost can't hold himself back. "Oh, I know I can't be with you the way we were before, but can we stay in touch? Will you call on me? I want to call on you." So he responds to their prayer with revelation of his own. Verse 5, "He gave unto them commandments that they should worship the Lord their God, and then notice this, and should offer the first lens of their flocks for an offering unto the Lord. And how does Adam respond to that commandment with immediate obedience?" Adam was obedient unto the commandments of the Lord. Now, this is where it gets interesting, because in verse 6, after many days, so we have prolonged and persistent obedience. And then an angel comes, appears to Adam and asks, "Why does thou offer sacrifices unto the Lord?" And Adam responds, "I don't know. I know not save the Lord commanded me." Now, tragically, some people have an accused Adam of blind obedience here. And I'll admit, he did seem to be blind to the why, but he was anything but blind to the who, and anything but blind to the consequences of not obeying that who, regardless of the reasons why he was giving them commandments. Again, if all the people that should never be accused of blindness, it's someone whose eyes were wide open after the fall. Someone who didn't pass through a veil after partaking of the fruit. So Adam knows full well the voice of God, knows the importance of obeying his commandments, is reaping the consequences of the choice that he and Eve had made in Eden. So even if I don't know the why, the who is enough for me, and I will obey, and with that prolonged obedience in the absence of full understanding, what does God eventually give him, fuller understanding? We live, and then we understand. We receive no witness until after the trial of our faith. Well, that's what's happening for him. But here comes the explanation of verse 7. The angel spakes saying, "This thing is a similitude of the sacrifice of the only begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth." That can most of us one we learn that Jesus himself is full of grace and truth. Well, no wonder that his atonement would be as well. And these animal offerings, these first leans of your flocks, where do you think your coat of skins came from, Adam and Eve? This is a similitude of my only begotten, my precious lamb, and he will be offered to cover to atone for your sins. Wherefore, verse 8, thou shalt do all that thou doest in the name of the Son, and thou shalt repent and call upon God in the name of the Son forevermore. Christ will do everything for you. And so, fittingly, everything you do should be for him. In his name, repenting, calling upon his name. In verse 9, once he understands that, the Holy Ghost falls upon Adam and bears record of all those truths he just learned. He bears record of the Father and the Son. It says, "I am the only begotten of the Father from the beginning, henceforth and forever, and then the best news Adam and Eve could have possibly heard. That as thou hast fallen, thou mayest be redeemed, and all mankind, even as many as will." You talk about good news. Adam, that space that is filled with the time that you have now can be filled with. It can be filled with work, but also filled with worship, because it's filled with repentance and forgiveness. This is our time to prepare, and I want to be a part of that preparation. And when you fall, just get back up again. I'll dust you off, Mr. Dustivier. How the stains in your garments I will wash clean with a new coat of skins any time you come into me and ask for one. That's what this is all for. Now, with eyes wide open to that reality, notice how Adam responds in 10 and how Eve responds in 11. I think, again, it's so indicative of the difference between men and women. And the first great commandment, the vertical male one, and the second great commandment, the horizontal female one. And yes, we're supposed to keep them both, okay? So men and women both take up the cross daily, both vertical and horizontal. But notice the difference. First, in that day, Adam blessed God and was filled and began to prophesy concerning all the families of the earth, his posterity, and this is what he said. Blessed be the name of God for because of my transgression, my eyes are opened. And in this life, I shall have joy. And again, in the flesh, I shall see God. Being cast out of his presence isn't the end of feeling joy. It's not the end of seeing him being east of Eden. Isn't isn't a permanent condemnation. It's not life on the chain gang. I can find joy here. But notice all of those eyes because of my transgression, my eyes are open. I shall have joy. I shall see God. We saw all those eyes in Lucifer back in Moses chapter four, President Boykay Packer called it an eye problem. And I had nothing to do with his vision, although Prince of Darkness had some issues there too. It was the pronoun problem, I. Well, Adams is different because he's not trying to glory. He's not trying to usurp the throne of God. But it is interesting that it's back to him and his relationship with Heaven. I'm going to be back with God. This vertical relationship can still remain intact. That's the best news ever. I can still be right with God because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Well, how does Eve consider things as she looks horizontally to the effect of her choice on others? Her response in 11 is so perfect. And Eve, his wife, heard all these things and was glad saying, were it not for our transgression? So let me give you a little gentle correction, honey. Adam said, my transgression, Eve could have said, technically it was mine before it was yours. But I'm not even going to mention that. Let's just go with ours from the very start. Let's go with plural pronouns, honey. If it weren't for our transgression, we never should have had seed. So again, her focus is on posterity. I mean, no wonder she was drawn to the fruit of the tree. She was drawn to the fruit of the womb. It's who she was, the mother of all living. So we shouldn't have had seed. We never should have known good and evil and the joy of our redemption and the eternal life, which God given them to all the obedient. Honestly, as much as I love Adam's response in 10, I love Eve's even better. Sorry. It's so inclusive. It's not just that we can be right with God. We can do right by others. And we collectively, all the obedient can have eternal life. We can joy in our collective redemption, individuality and community. There's a concept of contrary to prove. Be right and do right. The vertical, the horizontal, the male, the female. It's all coming together here. And best of all, it doesn't stop with that first generation. Verse 12 is key to what follows. And Adam and Eve bless the name of God and they made all things known unto their sons and their daughters. So those kids and grandkids, we met back in the first few verses. They know they have been taught by mom and dad, by grandma and grandpa. Can you imagine some of those family who leave me lessons? Let's tell you some old stories about the Garden of Eden. Let's let's tell you what it was like to make that gut-wrenching decision and what a relief it was when the promise of redemption came. Why do you think we offer the first lines of our flocks? Because we know that God will do likewise with His beloved lamb. That's how we're going to come home to Eden. Oh, if you could only see the glories of that garden. We can't go back the short-tut way, but we will return as we come full circle through a toolment. I would have loved to be one of those kids or grandkids in verse 12. And yet that's what makes verse 13 so devastating. Because it begins with Satan who came among them saying, I am also a son of God. Sound familiar from Moses one. Soon as Moses has this incredible experience of really understanding who he is and how to return to God. He's left to himself and Satan comes right on the heels of that experience, ready to nip the reality in the bud. So Satan comes and what did Satan say to Moses? I'm a son of God. Well, he says the same thing here. I'm a son of God too. And then he commanded them saying, believe it not. And sadly, they believed it not. It's like one line in that passage. That's it. It didn't seem to take much convincing on Satan's part. Oh, don't believe that. Okay, we won't. Now, why was it so easy? Well, because Satan was offering them the easy way. The downward slope. That's what fall was for rather than the upward climb to atonement. He was saying, why take things on faith? You got a whole world in front of you. Go take advantage of it. I mean, at least grandpa Adam taught you how to till the earth. You can get wealthy with all of that. Now, bring forth that kind of life. We're going to we're going to really push that to its limits later when we meet Cain and Abel. But here, don't believe in some future promise of salvation because it requires present sacrifice. And who wants to do that? All those first lens of flocks could be yours. Yours for the taking, yours for the using. So don't believe that. Sadly, next line, they loved Satan more than God and then began from that time forth to be carnal, sensual and devilish. If you had to force me to write the word fall next to one verse of scripture to say to pinpoint when it took place, it wouldn't be in the Garden of Eden. And it would have nothing to do with Adam and Eve. Again, that to me was a jump. This to me is the fall. Even after Adam and Eve left the Garden, did they seem very fallen? Did they seem very carnal, sensual or devilish? No, they understand. They are obeying as they always did. They are moving forward along the plan as they had an Eden, even when decisions were difficult. It's this next generation who chooses to be fallen themselves because they choose Satan instead of choosing God. Now, 14 God doesn't give up on them and neither will Adam and Eve. The Lord God called upon men by the Holy Ghost everywhere and commanded them that they should repent. Now, notice the three ways God has been trying to teach redemption in this mortal probation. He speaks to them in his own voice, calling from the midst of the Garden. But as close as he can, he sends angels to minister unto them and to teach truth, and he gives the Holy Ghost to bear record of truth that has been taught. Here that spirit is commanding people to repent. In 15, he's promising that as many as believe in the Son and repent of their sins will be saved. Those that don't must be damned, their progress will stop. And the words went forth out of the mouth of God in a firm decree, wherefore they must be fulfilled. Now, verse 16 is where we get back to the Genesis account. All this somehow was lost from the record. But now we meet Cain and Abel, and they're timing as they come onto the scene. To me, speaks volumes of Adams and especially Eve's faith and their resilience and their hope in the promised atonement of Jesus Christ. Because what have the results of their parenting been so far? I don't know if it was all of their children. But we don't have any record of any righteous exceptions to a wicked rule. It's me, it is tragic that the first parents, their first generations seemed to be the opposite of what their parents intended. And yet, despite all of that, Eve doesn't have buyers remorse over the fall. In fact, she doesn't have buyers remorse or mothers remorse over bringing children into this fall in the world. I said earlier that it was so much easier to accept the fall when it was theory instead of fact. Well, when fact was staring them in the face, they still move forward. Well, now fact is really staring them in the face. And the facts have been primarily negative. I know what suffering is now. I know what sin is now. I've seen my children choose it. Will, do I have the courage to bring another child into this kind of world? I hear people talk about that in our day that the world is too wicked for me to bring a child into it. Well, Adam and Eve would have felt that clearly by the time you get to verse 16. And yet, what do they do? Adam and Eve's wife ceased not to call upon God. They didn't lose faith in him, nor in their plan because Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bear cane. And said, I have gotten a man from the Lord. Wherefore, he may not reject his words. That last line, by the way, is missing from the Genesis account. It's simply, and she had cane because she got a man from the Lord. But here it's maybe this one will be different. Hope springs eternal. Well, it sprung up when cane was born, which makes the next line all the more devastating. Eve didn't even make it through a whole verse with that hope intact, because on the heels of that he may not reject his words, the verse continues, but behold, cane, arc and not. He did reject those words. What a tragedy. In fact, the way he said it, who is the Lord that I should know him? Again, that's that same no verb in Hebrew that describes some sense of intimacy. Now with husband and wife, it's pro-creative intimacy. In knowing God, it's balancing that infinite with the intimate of truly becoming one with God in attribute, in likeness, and wanting to grow up in him. And cane isn't interested in that. Who's the Lord? Why should I care? Why should I want to connect with him? By the way, he's not the first to ask that question. When you look at Pharaoh, when he first meets Moses, and Moses says God says, let my people go, that's Pharaoh's response. Who's God? And in fact, who are you, Moses? When Abinadi goes to talk with King Noah, King Noah says, who's God? And by the way, who are you, Abinadi? When Alma preaches to the people of Aminahad, the people of Aminahad say, who's God? And while we're at it, who are you? Alma. And the same thing's happening here. Cain's first question, who is God? And we will see later, and why should I care about Abel? God's servant. Who's he? No brother of mine. Well, that brother comes onto the scene in verse 17. She again conceived and bear his brother Abel. And he can't every time having another child is an incredible leap of faith in the face of evidence to the contrary. Did doubt have a leg to stand on for Eve and for Adam? You better believe it did. But faith marched forward despite that. President Packer used to say that every time a child is born, the world is renewed in innocence. I love that because it's a parent, a set of parents proclaiming, I still have faith in the future. Oh, I'm still moving forward in this. And here comes Abel. And thankfully, the next line, an Abel harkened unto the voice of the Lord. Oh, finally, if you, if any of you parents or grandparents out there are ringing your hands and wedding your pillow over children who are struggling in their faith, don't lose hope. The story's not over. God's plan is still in effect. There is hope and healing and wholeness ahead. I believe in a God of happy endings and new beginnings and and keep on trying. And that's exactly what Adam and Eve are doing and Abel lived up to that. It describes him as a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. Now there's nothing wrong with telling the ground. That was Adam's role, right? But keeper of sheep, maybe that's one thing that helped Abel stay faithful, that he was more physically engaged in the sacrifices. I'm taking care of these flocks. I am offering the first leans. Mom and dad, I trust what you taught me about this promised Lamb of God. I believe that that he will be sacrificed for our salvation. And so I will make those crefices myself in similitude of that promise. Now, verse 18, Cain loved Satan more than God, like some of his brothers and sisters before him, like some of his nephews and nieces before him. And Satan commanded him, saying, "Make an offering unto the Lord." Now it's interesting that Satan would be behind this. Does Satan ever tell us to do something right? Well, if he can get something wrong out of it, then yeah, he'll risk that. And in this case, if I can get Cain to offer a sacrifice, but to do it in the wrong way, or within the wrong motive, then that's the kind God can't accept. And once God rejects Cain's curfice, perhaps Cain will feel rejected himself and then reject God even further in return. It sounds like a good plan. In verse 19, in process of time, it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground and offered unto the Lord. So in process of time, did it take a while to beat down Cain's defenses? I don't know. Did it come in process of time until Cain brought himself to this state of full rejection of the teachings of his parents, and the plan of his father in heaven, because he brings for a sacrifice the fruit of the ground. Now, I've had students in the past to say, so is that what was wrong with it? It was just like dirty fruit that had fallen to the ground. He just kind of scooped it up and said, "Here you go, mom and dad." Well, not quite. It's something worse than that. And the fact that it was fruit of the ground, it's interesting because later in the Old Testament, there will be all kinds of different sacrifices, and sin offerings, and burnt offerings, and wave offerings, and heave offerings, and drink offerings, and not just first leans, but also first fruits. You see, it was the sacrificial offerings that allowed the priests and their families to survive day-to-day, since they weren't given land to till or flocks to care for. That was other people. They had to live on, and hope that people would live the gospel, so that they could live physically. Well, that is in the future. Right here, the only kind of sacrifice that has been revealed is the offering of the first laying on the flock. And why? Because that's the most perfect similitude of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It involves the shedding of blood, the death of that first laying. And giving fruit doesn't do that. The land will just keep producing. The trees will keep burying fruit. I mean, yeah, it's a sacrifice, but it's not a life and death one. This is what Joseph Smith explained. What was wrong with Cain's sacrifice is it showed no faith, and where there's no faith, there is sin. And so this faithless sacrifice, it's as if Cain was throwing it in the face of his parents and you want sacrifice fine, take some fruit, take some grain, take what I grow. Am I not as good as my little brother with his precious flocks, or better yet, take what I give you, because I have no faith in some future promise of a Lamb of God that's going to sacrifice his life and shed his blood for us. I'm not by in it, Mom and Dad. And so I'm not giving it. I will not offer sacrifice in some millitude of that, because I don't believe in that. Now, that is rejection. That is rebellion, especially in the face of what these parents who knew with a perfect knowledge had been teaching since the beginning of chapter 5. Well, what happens here? Verse 20, able, brought of the first lane of his flock, of the fat thereof, and the Lord had respect unto able into his offering. Of course, because able had respect for God and his offering, you are giving me your own, I will give you my own, you are shedding blood, I will do the same. I understand the symbolism, and I have faith in it. Meanwhile, 21 unto Cain and to his offering, God had not respect. Satan knew this, and it pleased him, and Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. You want to talk about sick and twisted that Lucifer rejoices in our sorrow, in our anger. When we feel those negative emotions, it causes him positive emotions, that's the opposite of compassion. Now, verse 22, the Lord says to Cain, "Why are the wroth? Why has that countenance fallen? What white? Are you surprised by this?" He says in 23, "If thou doest well, thou shalt be accepted." You know that. Watch your brother, watch your parents. And yet, you also know this, if thou doest not well, sin, lieth at the door. It's right outside. If you stay within the household of faith, sin can't come to you, but it's right outside. And if you will leave the confines of covenant, if you'll leave the protective embrace of my home, the household of faith, sin, lieth at the door, Satan desires to have thee. And except thou shalt harken unto my commandments, I will deliver thee up. I can't have power when you leave my presence. And it shall be unto thee, according to his desire and thou shalt rule over him. Similar language to what we saw with Adam and Eve, desire and ruling. But this time, this odd couple is Cain and Lucifer. I seem to be cut from similar cloth. Verse 24, "From this time forth, thou shalt be the father of his lies. He's where they come from, but you are the one that will pass them on to subsequent generations. That shall be called perdition, not just son of perdition. You're joining him as perdition itself, because you know better. That was before the world. In 25, it shall be said in time to come that these abominations were had from Cain, for he rejected the greater counsel which was had from God. And this is a cursing which I will put upon thee, except that repent. Now, good news at the end. You can still repent, Cain. It's all it takes. Why do you think I've been offering these first leans? Because the death of Jesus Christ makes that possible, even for you. It's not too late. But if you'll harken not, if you refuse to repent, then you will be known forever after as the mortal source of these falsehoods. They will speak of these as the abominations that were had from Cain. And so it would be. In the Book of Helaman, for example, it talks about the Gadiant and Roberts. We'll see some secret combinations here in just a moment. But when it talks about who inspired these secret combinations, these false oaths and covenants, and that's where the Book of Helaman clarifies, it comes from the same being that beguiled our first parents, or more accurately here, that same being who did plot with Cain. But if he would murder his brother Abel, it should not be known unto the world. And he did plot with Cain and his followers from that time forth. And that's the story you see in the next few verses. He's given the chance to repent at the end of 25, but at the beginning of 26, Cain's just more angry than ever. He was Roth. He listened not any more to the voice of the Lord, who's he, neither to Abel, his brother, who walked in holiness before the Lord, so who's he, same inability, or I would say unwillingness to come to know God or his servants. Verse 27, Adam and his wife mourned before the Lord because of Cain and his brother. These are their children, after all. While Cain then takes one of his brother's daughters to wife, and they loved Satan more than God. Well, if light cleaveeth to light, then sure darkness cleaves to darkness. And then 29, here comes this original secret combination. Satan said to Cain, "Swear unto me by thy throat, and if thou tell it thou shalt die, and swear thy brethren by their heads, and by the living God that they tell it not, for if they tell it they shall surely die, and this that thy father may not know it. And this day I will deliver thy brother Abel into thy hands." Now, that's where you get the secret in secret combination. No one's ever going to know about this, which is such a brutal act of deception, since here we are 6,000 years later still reading about it. Everybody knows. And yet, their Cain is rejoicing in verse 31, that I am the master of this great secret. And what's the secret? Well, here's the combination. I can murder and get Gain, and no one will know. That was the secret combinations among the Gadiant and robbers. Here's the origin of it. There will be secrecy. There will be threat of punishment if you ever divulge. It's almost being trapped within gangs, for example, and there's no escaping. What's the point and purpose of it to use violence or the threats of violence to get what we want? Which in this case is temporal gain. In this case, it has to do with Abel's flocks. Among the Gadiant and robbers, it had to do with all kinds of other things. And in our day, the secret combinations that still exist are still out to murder and get Gain to power and prestige and prominence, popularity, prosperity. Well, verse 32, Cain goes out into the field. He talks with Abel, his brother. He came to pass it while they were in the field. Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and slew him. Notice every time that Abel is mentioned, his relationship to Cain is mentioned to. That's your brother. That's your brother. But Cain didn't care. He rose up and slew him. And then 33 Cain gloried in that which he had done. And I am free. And never was he in greater bondage. Shortly, the flocks of my brother fall into my hands. And yet something was about to fall. And that was Cain. In fact, notice verse 34, the Lord says to Cain, so his secret didn't last for long. Where is Abel, my brother, again playing stupid, giving Cain a chance to confess? He doesn't. He says, I know not. Am I my brother's keeper? Interesting word there. When Adam and Eve were first told to dress until and keep the Garden of Eden, same word. When cherubrum and the flaming sword were placed to keep the way of the tree of life, same word. Here, can you not keep? Can you not guard? Can you not protect your own brother? And even if you can't be your brother's keeper, could you at least be your brother's brother? How could you do this? In 35, the Lord says, what has thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood cries unto me from the ground. And then, thou shalt be cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from my hand. And remember, the earth was cursed for Adam's sake. With enough labor it will bring forth life for you. Well, now the earth is cursed, and it's not for Cain's sake. It's to his punishment. It will not yield fruit and grain like it would for your father, like it had for you. In 37, when thou tillest the ground it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength. As a result, a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth, because if you can't grow crops, you can't stay settled. A farm won't work for you. So a situated place, you're going to be wandering, fugitive, vagabond, just trying to make ends meet. And 38 Cain tries to pass the buck. Satan tempted me because of my brother's flocks. I was wrought also because his offering that is to accept and not mine. My punishment is greater than I can bear. This is Satan's fault. This is your fault. You wouldn't accept what I gave you. No, this is Cain. There is accountability to go along with your agency. 39 Behold thou has driven me out this day from the face of the Lord. No, actually you drove yourself away. I promised and offered repentance earlier. But now you've gone too far. From thy face shall I be hid, Cain says, I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth, and shall come to pass that he that findeth me will slay me because of my niquities, for these things are not hid from the Lord. Again, no secret in this secret combination. While the Lord responds to him in verse 40, that whoever slayeth the vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold, and either Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him. Now, unfortunately, throughout history, this idea of a curse on Cain and a mark on Cain has been used, misused, I should say, to justify slavery of Africans. This has nothing to do with skin color. There's no evidence of that here. It has nothing to do with Africa. There's no evidence of this here either. It's just people that wanted to do that anyway are searching for biblical justification, resting the scriptures to their own destruction. And so they come up with this so-called curse of Cain, and later they'll use the same thinking for the so-called curse of ham. And sadly, there have been times even in church history where church leaders who were raised on that misunderstanding of scripture through their Protestant upbringing came to the table with that same misunderstanding. And feeling for whatever reason that there needed to be a restriction on priesthood for African Americans decided to restrict priesthood and to sometimes use Cain and or ham as justification too. We talked about that a few weeks ago when we discussed the second official declaration, but here's the verse that is sometimes taken as rationalization for it. And yet, surprisingly, the mark placed on Cain was to protect him. It was almost to offset the curse, to allow the curse to have its time just like chairman was to give Adam and Eve and their posterity time to repent. Well, this perhaps is a time for Cain to recognize and realize what he's done and what the consequences of his decision will be. Well, he never did repent. As you go through the next few verses, it's interesting that Cain continues to have children. He ends up having a son named Enic, and that Enic builds a city. Verse 42 is fascinating because it's this counterfeit for the city of Zion that a real Enic would later build. Enic from the descendants of Seth, which was Abel's replacement. We'll see that more next week. The interesting thing here is again this counterfeit city of Enic. It's the opposite of Zion. If Zion is one heart and one mind, where's the unity where you would become your brother's keeper? There was none of that on Cain's side. What about dwelling in righteousness? Oh, no, he preferred the sequel combination. And no poor among them? Hardly. This was a matter of impoverishing someone else of both life and livelihood in order to enrich himself. Cain and his posterity, Enic and that city is a false Zion. We're watching counterfeiting taking place all throughout. Well, Father Son and Father Son goes on. The next big name you meet is a man named Lamek, who is still part of Cain's posterity. And in some ways becomes a second Cain. If Seth is a second abable, then Lamek is a second Cain. He also engages in the same secret combination. He also wants to get gain. He also ends up murdering. He's also involved in secrecy to the point that he has two wives and he tells them both that no one can know. He revels in his iniquity and but tries to keep it in darkness. We see that in verse 51. For from the days of Cain, there was a secret combination and their works were in the dark, and they knew every man his brother. Now, that's a tough one because when it uses that word, no, which kind of intimacy are we talking about? Some have interpreted that verse to speak of homosexuality. That this secret combination, they knew the men knew their brothers in an intimate way. But it doesn't necessarily have to be that. It could also simply be that secret combination. We know each other in this in this secret intimacy of all never divulge your sins if you don't divulge mine. We don't we don't know which one is being described here. But one interesting thing about it is what they're doing begins to spread throughout the sons of men according to verse 52. But notice the last line, it was among the sons of men. He says that twice emphatically and then by way of differentiation 53 and among the daughters of men, these things were not spoken. So this is gender specific sin that some for some reason these particular secret combinations, this these particular particular actions of evil were confined to to the to the males and not among the females. And it's interesting that the wives of Lamick had a part to play in all of that. The end of 53 is fascinating. Among the daughters of men, these things were not spoken because that Lamick had spoken the secret unto his wives. And they rebelled against him and declared these things abroad and had not compassion. I love that language. This is rebellion in the face of rebellion. And so this is two wrongs making a right. If you rebel against a rebel, then I guess you're on the right side again. And these wives of Lamick are exactly that. Better yet, they declare these things abroad. No better way to burst a secret combination than to tell the secret and to expose it, to expose this darkness to the light of day where people have to to fess up to their sins. It's known now. If you won't confess, then I will expose. And that's what these righteous women end up doing. And the last line, they had not compassion. That seems like a negative thing. In this case, this is a negative compassion that they didn't have. This is a counterfeit compassion. We could call that enabling someone. This could be called codependency in our day. This could be the victims of abuse that will never rat out their abusers, that will not expose evil, even when they know it, and even when they're being destroyed by it themselves. No, that is a false compassion. And the more truly compassionate thing would to do, would be to call attention to these sins in hopes that the guilty parties would change. Well, these people didn't change. And as a result, 55, thus the works of darkness began to prevail among all the sons of men. 55 is a tragic end of this chapter, but thankfully it's not quite over yet. 56, the wickedness continues. God cursed the earth with a sore curse and was angry with the wicked, with all the sons of men whom he had made. Why, 57, because they wouldn't harken to his voice? Nor believe on his only begotten Son, no faith in that sacrifice of Samilitude. Even him whom he declared should come in the meridian of time who was prepared from before the foundation of the world. 55, 6, 7, that's the tragic sight, but 58 and 59 end on a better note, because you still have Adam and Eve still crying repentance. You still have firstlings of the flocks being offered as sacrifice, because people still have faith in the promised Son of God. So sure enough, 58, thus the gospel began to be preached from the beginning, being declared by holy angels sent forth from the presence of God and by his own voice and by the gift of the Holy Ghost. Those were the three sources of truth that we saw earlier in this chapter. God's speaking from the garden, angels ministering unto men, and the Holy Ghost coming to confirm truth upon anyone worthy of His companionship. Verse 59, "And thus all things were confirmed unto Adam by an holy ordinance, which would have been the ordinance of sacrifice." That's confirmation that all these things are true, that there is still hope ahead. The gospel was preached, decree was sent forth, that it should be in the world until the end thereof, and thus it was, amen. We have to end our conversation about the fall with a reminder of the atonement. Like I said, creation was last week, fall is this week, atonement is everything yet to come. Even that famous verse in 2nd Nephi 2, "Adam fell that men might be and men are that they might have joy." I wish we would keep reading, because what is the next verse? And the Messiah comeeth in the fullness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall. Any time you think fall, think atonement in the same breath. Adam did. Eve did. We were child after we were child. Eve still held on to hope. She lost two sons that day. She lost able physically. She lost cane spiritually, but she never lost hope or faith in Christ. And pretty soon, and yet another son came, Seth, and the express image of his father, Adam, who was in the image of his father, God. We're trying again, and we have faith to move forward. Eve and Adam always had that kind of faith. I want to end our discussion today with two masterpieces of art. One shows two women facing each other, surrounded by trees and fruit. The woman on the left is Eve. The woman on the right is Mary. And as they're facing each other, surrounded by symbolism, Eve with this tree of knowledge of good and evil, and Mary with the tree of life. Again, in many ways, she was that tree, bearing the fruit of her womb, which evidenced the love of God. That was the angel's explanation. Do you understand condescension? No, I just want to see the tree. Fine, let me kill two birds with one stone. Let me show you Christmas. Let me show you Mary. Now, in this painting, wrapped around the feet of Eve is the serpent that beguiled her. Still, clutched in one hand is the forbidden fruit. As Eve looks down, probably pressed under the weight of sorrow for the consequences. That would not come into her, but would come upon humanity. Her posterity. But where's her other hand? Mary is clasping it and holding it against her own womb. As this handmade of the Lord is great with child. With the other hand, she cradles Eve's head. As if to comfort her, it's going to be okay, because although the serpent is entwined around your feet, look for its head, it's crushed under mine. While it may bruise a heel or two, but its hand, its head will be crushed by the fruit of my womb. It's as if Mother Mary is saying to Mother Eve, all will be well. As in Adam, all die, so in Christ shall all made alive, or put in a more soprano register. As in Eve, all die. So in Mary shall all be made alive. That was the courage and faith that Eve and Adam had in the Garden of Eden, which then makes me think of the second masterpiece I want to show you. This one came from a student of mine, Kylie, who's an incredible artist. Her sister Jessica was an incredible musician. And between the two of them and their angel mother, I got to teach them at Institute. This tiny little class we had at Westminster College in Salt Lake City. It was a class on women in the scriptures, and we learned to discipleship from God's daughters throughout scriptures. It was a glorious experience. And at the end of that semester, Kylie gave me a gift. It was this painting that I want to show to you. I kept telling her, "I can't accept this. This is way too much work." And she said, "Well, it just represents what I learned this semester. The things that we learned from Mother Eve, for example, I just wanted to put on to canvas, and I want you to have it. I want to show you the making of this masterpiece." Thankfully, Kylie created a time-lapse video of her creating this work of art, and the music in the background was composed by her sister Jessica. These are two celestial sister saints, daughters of glorious Mother Eve, that the bear witness that her hope was not in vain, that her faith to move forward, despite the loss of so many of her own posterity, was worth the sacrifice and struggle. Now, I'll let Kylie provide the caption. She said, "Thanks to modern scripture, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has a slightly different view of Eve than many in the world today." Again, my son was wrong. Eve did not do a bad thing. We believe Eve was one of the noblest and greatest women to ever live, and her conflict in the garden was more of a struggle than we sometimes realize. I personally believe that her decision to predict of the fruit was something she wrestled with for a long time, before Lucifer provided the tipping point. But Eve's transgression had been part of God's plan all along, and the end it was Satan who was truly beguiled. In the ultimate act of motherhood, Eve placed literally everyone else's well-being above her own. She sacrificed the ease, beauty, and immortality of Eden for a cursed world full of sickness, sin, uncertainty, death, and all manner of trials. She did this so that each of us had the opportunity to be born and ultimately returned to our Father in Heaven. In my opinion, this was one of the greatest sacrifices of all time, perhaps second only to the atonement of Jesus Christ. Our Savior willingly chose to suffer and die so that each of us could live, without diminishing what He did for us. Eve also made the choice to suffer and die so that each of us could live, and so did Adam. What transpired in the garden of Eden was a great foreshadowing for what would eventually happen in the garden of Gethsemane. Throughout the ages there has too often been an error of foolishness or even depravity in the way Eve was depicted in art. Because of that I wanted to do something a little different, to portray her conflict, her wrestle, her fear of the unknown, her goodness, and her strength. I painted her with her back toward Lucifer, portrayed hereby a serpent, and her eyes toward the light. I see this as almost a prayer. This was the moment she realized there really was no other way to keep that first commandment. In order to multiply and replenish the earth, she would have to officially claim her agency by transgressing a lesser law. This painting still hangs in my office at the institute, and I look at that and see not only the courage of Eve, but the strength of so many of her daughters. My friends, I bear testimony that the fall was a fortunate step forward along progressions highway. I pray that we can navigate whatever pathwise ahead and go onward and upward to the atonement. I testify that waiting at the end is not cherubim and aflaming sword, keeping the way of the tree of life, but rather, the gardener of Gethsemane himself, beckoning us to come home. Whatever fruit of knowledge you may have already partaken of, the fruit of God's life and love, is sweet above all that is sweet, pure above all that is pure. It is more desirable than any other fruit.