What is salvation?
Salvation refers to deliverance from death and hell. Death is the cessation of life, which can refer to mortal life or eternal life. Through being born, we inherit physical death. Through choosing to sin, we each suffer spiritual death, which is separation from the presence of God.1 We are delivered from physical death through resurrection,2 where our bodies and spirits will reunite in immortality. We are delivered from spiritual death through aligning ourselves with God to the extent that we understand him to be,3 which reopens the living connection through which we receive eternal life. Hell is a condition of torment caused by exposure to ideas and circumstances that overwhelm one’s ability and willingness to live joyfully aligned with God as far as you understand him to be in spite of opposition. You are saved from hell by learning and living the principles required to overcome what would otherwise overcome you while recognizing and using the protection God offers from situations beyond your capacity.4
Most people who are saved from physical death will still suffer spiritual death, as resurrection does not free you from the penalty of the sins that you have not forsaken.5 The one and only way to be saved from spiritual death is by reconciling to your understanding of how God is and faithfully following his example until you die.6
Resurrection does not provide you with any extra capacity in death to overcome what overcame you in life. What causes you sorrow, grief, pain, and suffering here will cause you the same there,7 if not more, because you will not be able to lie to yourself or distract yourself there as you can here.8 Meanwhile, the conditions necessary to encounter the tools needed to conquer or qualify for shelter from what overcomes you here are not possible in the afterlife. The one and only way to be saved from hell is by seeking for, perceiving, believing, and living the principles needed to overcome what overcomes you. The Lord Jesus created the world to provide us with the opportunity to obtain and live these principles, having possessed them before the foundation of the world, and coming here to live in order to demonstrate them to us.9
Footnotes
- 1. Therefore, as the soul could never die, and the fall had brought upon all mankind a spiritual death as well as a temporal, that is, they were cut off from the presence of the Lord, it was expedient that mankind should be reclaimed from this spiritual death. (Alma 42:9) ↩
- 2. Yea, behold, [the death of Christ] bringeth to pass the resurrection, and redeemeth all mankind from the first death—that spiritual death; for all mankind, by the fall of Adam being cut off from the presence of the Lord, are considered as dead, both as to things temporal and to things spiritual. (Helaman 14:16) ↩
- 3. Yea, and it bringeth to pass the condition of repentance, that whosoever repenteth the same is not hewn down and cast into the fire; but whosoever repenteth not is hewn down and cast into the fire; and there cometh upon them again a spiritual death, yea, a second death, for they are cut off again as to things pertaining to righteousness. Therefore repent ye, repent ye, lest by knowing these things and not doing them ye shall suffer yourselves to come under condemnation, and ye are brought down unto this second death. (Helaman 14:18-19) ↩
- 4. “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” (1 Corinthians 10:13) These protections include commandments, warnings, and miraculous power from God or through his servants. For example, see the Lord's protective role over the apostles while he was with them, and what they were subjected to thereafter. “While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.” (John 17:12) ↩
- 5. And, in fine, wo unto all those who die in their sins; for they shall return to God, and behold his face, and remain in their sins. (2 Nephi 9:38) Then said Jesus again unto them, I go my way, and ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sins: whither I go, ye cannot come. (John 8:21) ↩
- 6. I say unto you, if ye have come to a knowledge of the goodness of God, and his matchless power, and his wisdom, and his patience, and his long-suffering towards the children of men; and also, the atonement which has been prepared from the foundation of the world, that thereby salvation might come to him that should put his trust in the Lord, and should be diligent in keeping his commandments, and continue in the faith even unto the end of his life, I mean the life of the mortal body—I say, that this is the man who receiveth salvation, through the atonement which was prepared from the foundation of the world for all mankind, which ever were since the fall of Adam, or who are, or who ever shall be, even unto the end of the world. And this is the means whereby salvation cometh. And there is none other salvation save this which hath been spoken of; neither are there any conditions whereby man can be saved except the conditions which I have told you. (Mosiah 4:6-8) ↩
- 7. And then cometh the judgment of the Holy One upon them; and then cometh the time that he that is filthy shall be filthy still; and he that is righteous shall be righteous still; he that is happy shall be happy still; and he that is unhappy shall be unhappy still. (Mormon 9:14) ↩
- 8. O how great the plan of our God! For on the other hand, the paradise of God must deliver up the spirits of the righteous, and the grave deliver up the body of the righteous; and the spirit and the body is restored to itself again, and all men become incorruptible, and immortal, and they are living souls, having a perfect knowledge like unto us in the flesh, save it be that our knowledge shall be perfect. Wherefore, we shall have a perfect knowledge of all our guilt, and our uncleanness, and our nakedness; and the righteous shall have a perfect knowledge of their enjoyment, and their righteousness, being clothed with purity, yea, even with the robe of righteousness. (2 Nephi 9:13-14) ↩
- 9. For [God] is the same yesterday, today, and forever; and the way is prepared for all men from the foundation of the world, if it so be that they repent and come unto him. (1 Nephi 10:18) ↩