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Epiloguer*
A Testimony
"You have your testimony, and you can give that, but I have mine, and while you are not bound by my testimony, I am bound by it, and I would like to bear it to you if the Lord will give me strength.
"I know that God lives. The first article of our faith begins, as I recall it, 'We believe in God, the Eternal Father ...' I believe in him as a personal being. I do not think he is an immaterial substance. I do not think that, as a person, he fills the immensity of space and at the same time is so small that he can dwell in my heart. I believe that his spirit can be in my heart, but I believe that God is my Father, a person. I believe with all my soul that he appeared personally with the Savior to the Prophet Joseph Smith in the grove and talked to him. At least he introduced the Savior to the boy Prophet in that great revelation and vision which opened this last dispensation. I believe we were born to him and to our mother in heaven. I do not know the process, but I do know we are born to our fathers and mothers in this earth and that is the way I think about it. I feel that there is a similar relationship between him and me that I feel toward my earthly father, or that I did feel toward him when he was here. I have always thought about God in this way. I believe I was born to him as a spirit child in the spirit world before I was born here, and what I say about myself-and you will pardon the personal reference-I feel about every other human soul that lives in the earth. I believe we all lived with him before we came here.
*, Given at April conference, 1948. ~
"I likewise believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. With all my soul I believe in him, and I put my hope of peace in this life and of exaltation and happiness in the life to come in the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe he was a Son of God in the same sense that we were sons and daughters of God in the spirit, and I believe that he was and is the Son of God in the flesh. I do not believe that Joseph was the father of Jesus Christ, although I do believe that he was a good and great man. I believe that Mary was the mother of Jesus as my mother was my mother, and I believe that the father of Jesus Christ in the flesh was Elohim, my Eternal and Heavenly Father.
"I believe that Jesus came into the world with a very definite mission. I do not regard him merely as a great teacher nor as a profound philosopher, nor do I merely profess to believe in him, as is the case with many so-called Christian people of the day. .... [I believe] that Jesus Christ was the Son of the Living God, sent by him to save the world. I believe that, with all my soul I believe it, and I believe that in Gethsemane and on the cross Jesus suffered for the sins of all men, good and bad, that they might be resurrected from the dead and have immortal life. I believe that through his atonement, Jesus paid for the sins of every human soul who has lived or will live upon the earth, upon condition of repentance and acceptance of the gospel. I believe that by living the gospel we may be washed clean through his atoning blood and come back into the presence of God, our Eternal Father, when life is over; and live with him eternally in his celestial presence.