God has designed an intriguing eternal placement program for all of us.
When I started college, I was sure that I should be an electrical engineer. I loved all my little projects including building a crystal radio, walkie-talkies, and various devices of my own design. Then I went on my mission. Like most missionaries, my love for the gospel of Jesus Christ exploded! I loved teaching and testifying of Jesus.
When I returned from my mission, I combined my love of science with my love of people and got a secondary teaching degree in physics and math. I really enjoyed teaching high school. But something was missing. As much as I valued the students and the teaching, I was hungry to learn new things myself. I wanted to be stretched.
I took an Extension class from Utah State University that surveyed various family topics that were being researched by faculty in Family and Child Development. I was hooked! So, we sold our house and went to graduate school where I got a PhD in Family and Human Development. I loved the vast vistas of learning, and I loved the application to my life and my family.
When I graduated, I was offered a job as an Extension specialist at Auburn University in Alabama. My job was to know the research on families and use it to create programs for the good people of Alabama. I traveled the state teaching and encouraging. I wrote essays that later became a book. We researched youth and their challenges. I had never been happier.
There are more chapters in my career development. However, my point is not really about where I ended up in my career. My path may serve as an analogy regarding God’s remarkable placement program for helping all of us discover ourselves and our place in eternity.
So, let’s go back to the beginning—long before we came to earth. We may have thought we knew who we were and what we wanted in the eternities. But many of those ideas were untested and naïve. So, God created a world where we could try our hand at all kinds of things. We get to learn by our own experience to know exactly what we want to be and do in eternity. We learn about the relationships we aspire to have with Our Father, His other children, His Son, and our own family members. We discover to what extent we desire to partner with God in accomplishing His work.
Here on earth, we try out how we like to serve, how we like to learn, what we value and what makes us happy. In the course of a lifetime, we accumulate thousands, maybe millions—of experiences.
For example, my beloved wife Nancy has discovered that she loves serving. She never would have guessed when she was a child or a bashful young adult that reaching out to people would make her so happy!
I love to create! When I was a child, I created electronic devices but now I find immeasurable joy in creating family programs, family history displays, and gospel articles. I love learning and I love combining ideas into coherent programs.
Some people have a knack for fine arts or library work or teaching children or construction or leadership. There are as many ways to use our remarkable talents as there are diverse talents.
In the course of a lifetime, you will probably find that several things you thought you would enjoy do not satisfy you. And you may be surprised to find some things you never thought of that enrich your life. It is only through experience that we come to fully understand our deepest desires.
Let me jump ahead. Many Latter-day Saints assume that God’s children will only be happy if they end up in exaltation in the Celestial kingdom. Anything else would be a severe disappointment and a form of failure.
There are a couple of faulty assumptions behind that belief. One assumption being that there is one eternal placement that is right for all of God’s children. But exaltation is a very specific kind of eternity that is best suited for people with certain desires and dispositions. For someone who does not want to do that kind of work, exaltation would not represent eternal joy.
The other faulty assumption is that the lesser degrees of glory will be a big disappointment. But God described the glory of the telestial—the lowest kingdom—as surpassing all understanding (D&C 76:89). Think about that! If we dreamed up the loveliest, most amazing experience imaginable, it could not be as good as the glory of the telestial kingdom! Despite God’s revelations, we keep trying to make the telestial kingdom into a lesser hell instead of a lesser heaven; it is a degree of unimaginable GLORY!
By the way, the telestials “are they who are liars, and sorcerers, and adulterers, and whoremongers, and whosoever loves and makes a lie” (D&C 76:103). These were dedicated sinners in mortality. Yet God still created a place for them that will provide immense joy!
We also need to acknowledge the mercy built into the Lord’s placement plan. As we are learning by our experiences on earth, we sometimes take wrong turns. We sin and make regrettable mistakes. By the time we are ready for our eternal placement, none of us can qualify for the celestial kingdom on our own merits. We all fall short. But instead of disqualifying us, the Lord provided us with a Savior. If we desire exaltation and follow Jesus, we are judged in partnership with Him and He offers His merits on our behalf (see D&C 45:3-5). And, when we choose to repent, Jesus gladly removes our sins. If we refuse to repent, we still have the opportunity to pay for our own sins in the spirit world. “But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I; Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore” (D&C 19:17-18). When we head to our eternal placement, we will all be clean whether by our own suffering or His atonement.
We also understand through the Plan of Salvation that those who did not know Jesus on earth, will still be given that opportunity in the spirit world.
After cleaning up sinners in the spirit world, God places them in a glory that is beyond comprehension! That is a great latter-day testimony that God is a gracious father!
God has designed His plan so that we can fill the measure of our creation and have joy therein. God is the perfect placement counselor! He does not make architects of those who always wanted to be gardeners. He does not push into criminology those who always wanted to be homemakers. If someone does not love the role and blessings of celestial living, that person will experience a different kind of unimaginable glory in the terrestrial or telestial kingdoms.
We cannot imagine that there are some who will wake up in one of the kingdoms saying, “Doggone it! If I had just done one more good deed (or one less bad deed), I might have slipped into the next-higher kingdom. I doomed myself.” No! To believe that dismisses God’s plan and Christ’s atonement. God is helping us find our true calling and Jesus is making it possible! Every person in every kingdom will wake up every morning and shout “Hallelujah! God has gotten me to the perfect place for me! God is amazing!”
As Brad Wilcox beautifully taught: “The more I understand this wonderful plan of redemption, the more I realize that in the final judgment it will not be the unrepentant sinner begging Jesus, ‘Let me stay.’…Knowing Christ’s character, I believe that if anyone is going to be begging on that occasion, it would probably be Jesus begging the unrepentant sinner, ‘Please, choose to stay. Please, use my Atonement—not just to be cleansed but to be changed so that you want to stay.’ The miracle of the Atonement is not just that we can go home but that—miraculously—we can feel at home there.” (“His Grace is Sufficient, BYU Speeches, July 12, 2011)
Why, when I have found the perfect career for me, would I be anxious to do something different? In the same sense, if someone does not choose to live a Celestial life working hand in hand with God in His work of redemption, our wise and merciful Father offers alternatives. He created three kingdoms in which all can find a place where they will feel at home and fulfilled in their eternal roles. There will be everlasting opportunities for all to express themselves and to grow while using the gifts they possess. When God has finished the work of helping us discover and define our unique roles in eternity, we will all proclaim, “God has done right!”
How do we respond to this knowledge? Returning to the analogy of my career progression, we can invest our time on earth discovering ourselves and our desired purposes in eternity. If we aspire to the blessings of exaltation in the celestial kingdom, we should devote our lives to preparing for the role that awaits us there. We follow Jesus. We engage in an ever-deepening relationship with Him so that we know Him and He knows us. We seek His guidance and mentoring. We engage in the service He invites us to. We regularly repent and allow Him to empower us to change our hearts and our actions so that we become more like Him. We learn the celestial kingdom by thinking celestially.
And, if we aspire to exaltation, we can trust God to prepare us. We can be peaceful knowing that we have an all-wise Father who is all-in on His love for each of us, presiding over our placement for eternity. We recognize that His placement process was designed with wisdom and love to ensure that each of us will end up where we belong and where we will feel joy. We can avail ourselves of the Savior trusting that we can qualify for exaltation in partnership with Him.
Unlike the most prestigious universities or medical schools or Fortune 50 companies who admit only a very small percentage of applicants, we can rejoice that our Father glories in loving abundance. He wants all of His children in the place that is perfect for them.
“The Father’s design, His plan, His purpose, His intent, His wish, and His hope are all to heal you, all to give you peace, all to bring you, and those you love, home.” (Elder Patrick Kearon, God’s Intent Is to Bring You Home, General Conference, April 2024)
Invitation: Would you like to learn how to apply the Gospel of Jesus Christ and good research to enriching and strengthening your marriage? Join me and Nancy for a marriage retreat on April 12 or September 13 in Alpine, Utah. Normally $199 per couple, we still have a few seats for the April retreat at the early bird price of $149! To get more information and register for one of the retreats, go to: Dr. Wally Goddard
Thanks to Barbara Keil for her substantive contributions to this article.
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