Our Heavenly Family, (GP 2)

Gospel Principles Lesson 2

God is our Heavenly Father. We are all His spirit children; and, therefore, we are all brothers and sisters. God is our Ruler and Creator. We are born in His image, and we can develop His divine qualities. Because of Jesus's sacrifice and atonement for us, we can all become like our Heavenly Father. We will be able to live in His presence again and have eternal joy. 

We developed gifts and talents before this life. Many were foreordained to perform specific missions here on earth. They qualified to do so because of their previous preparation before our earth life. (See Abraham 3:22-24) A few of these people who were foreordained were Jesus, Adam, and Abraham. Joseph Smith said, "Every man who has a calling to minister to the inhabitants of the world was [fore]ordained to that very purpose." 

We have a veil of forgetfulness in this life, so that we can walk by faith, but God knows who we are and what gifts and talents we had developed before this earth life. God places us on earth at specific times and in specific places so that we can use these gifts to serve Him and so that we can learn from the experiences that await us. 

To become like our Heavenly Father, we needed to receive a body and be tested. 

Heavenly Father presented His plan in the Grand Council in heaven. He would give us agency, the power to choose right or wrong, and we would have to live by faith, because we would no longer be in His presence. Our experiences would teach us patience and charity as we learned to endure them well. 

Because all of us would sin and fall short of the glory of God, a Savior would be provided to atone for us. Through faith, repentance, and obedience, we could progress and return to Heavenly Father and become like Him.