Coming Into the Presence of the Lord in Mortality

At the risk of sounding like an evangelical Christian,  I want to testify that in this mortal life, nothing is more important than developing a personal relationship with our Savior, Jesus Christ.  This is not a distant or impersonal or relationship of feelings.  This is an actual, literal relationship with an actual, literal person.  So I ask this, how can you have a relationship with someone if you don't actually meet them in person?

The Lord is so loving, so kind, so compassionate, so GREAT, that we would shrink from His presence if He came to us without setting aside His glory.  Nevertheless, He wants to interact with us.  He wants us to be in His presence.  And He makes a way for it to be possible.  Not only that, He expects it of us.  And He commands us in scripture.

I take literally the admonition in the scriptures that we should seek the face of the Lord.  This is not something to be deferred into the eternal world.  To wait until then to seek His face would show a lack of valiance, which may very well consign me to a lesser glory hereafter (D&C 76:79). 

I want to KNOW my God.  I want to be in His presence, in actual, literal fact.  I want to heed His commandments that I do so.  The scriptures have a lot to say about this:

D&C 93:1 

Verily, thus saith the Lord: It shall come to pass that every soul who forsaketh his sins and cometh unto me, and calleth on my name, and obeyeth my voice, and keepeth my commandments, shall see my face and know that I am;

Matthew 5:8 

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

John 14:21 

He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

D&C 50:45 

And the day cometh that you shall hear my voice and see me, and know that I am. 

There are many others, many of which are personal eyewitnesses who saw Christ.  Moses, Nephi, his brother Jacob, Moroni, Mormon, Joseph Smith, Job, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Alma the Younger, and so many others.  These are EYEWITNESS testimonies.

The Book of Mormon is an instruction manual on how to obtain a relationship with Christ and how to actually come into His presence.  Not only are we given tools to come into His presence, but He commands us that we should.  

When I learned of this idea a few years ago, I was stunned.  I had never been taught that this was something that could happen to me.  And yet I found testimonies of people who DID have it happen to them.  If they can do it, why can't I?  Why can't you?

Not only are we commanded to seek Jesus Christ and have a personal relationship with Him, we MUST DO SO IF WE WANT TO HAVE ETERNAL LIFE!!!!  When D&C 76 says that those who are celestial receive the testimony of Jesus IN THE FLESH.  The flesh is this mortal life.  We receive a testimony when we hear it.  Who do we hear it from other than Jesus?  It is His testimony of us, not our testimony of Him.  Even Satan has a testimony of Jesus, but it doesn't do him any good.  We must receive testimony from Him that we are sealed as His children if we are to have the faith to have eternal life.

I share this because it is the most important thing I have ever learned.  The Spirit sings to me in my soul that it is true.  YOU can know Jesus, literally and actually.  I urge you with all my soul to seek Him.  Do not let others get it your way.   Do not listen to those who would tell you that such things are not necessary, who would tell you to avoid the "mysteries" of the gospel.  We are COMMANDED to seek the mysteries, and Alma tells us that if we don't know the mysteries we are bound down by the chains of hell (Alma 11).  SEEK THIS JESUS!  He wants to have a personal relationship with you, me, and everyone who will do what is required to gain it.