What Jesus Really Did For Us
(Many Christians and Non-Christians Don't Even Know)

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It’s a shame that so many Christians (as well as non-Christians) don’t really know what Jesus actually did for us. I had a friend ask me once, “whats the big deal that Jesus died for us? Firemen, police officers and members of the military die for us all the time. But we don’t remember them for 2000 years with strange meetings and ceremonies once a week.” I’ve even asked other Christians on a number of occasions what it was that Jesus did for us, just to see their responses. Often they reply by saying, “He saved us”. But many people, including some who even provided that answer, can’t really explain what “saved” means.

In order to clarify what it is that Jesus did for us, it helps to start at the beginning. Or rather, before “the beginning”; before the Earth was created.

We are all children of God. He is the Father of our spirits and we lived with Him before we were born on Earth. As our Father, He loves us and wants the best for us, so His goal is for us to become like Him.

We are different from God in two ways. One, He has a perfect body, and we were only spirits without bodies. Two, He is spiritually perfect, meaning He never makes a wrong choice, He never makes a mistake, He never commits a crime against spiritual laws (i.e. He never sins) and He has absolute knowledge and power. We on the other hand, still make mistakes and wrong choices, and we certainly don’t have absolute knowledge and power.

In order to accomplish His goal for us to become like Him, both physically and spiritually, God made a plan for us to learn and gain experience. This plan consisted of creating a world (the Earth), providing us with bodies, placing us in a life and environment where we can be tested, and giving us the ability to choose between right and wrong, along with the liberty to make that choice. The ability and liberty to choose right over wrong, in the midst of trial and temptation, is the key that would allow us to become like Him. As God, He chooses right over wrong, and He is never forced.

God presented this plan to all His children in a grand council. However, there was one dilemma that needed to be dealt with. There is a law that states that no unclean thing can dwell in the presence of God. If we were to be sent to Earth to learn and grow, with the ability and liberty to choose between right and wrong, on occasion we would make the wrong choice. This would mean that after our experience on Earth, we would be unclean, and we would not be able to return to the presence of our Father, having lost the purity and innocence that we had as children.

There are spiritual, or eternal laws which must always be kept. “Eternal” means the law has always existed, and always will exist. They are absolute laws, which God, as a perfect being keeps and enforces. One of these laws has already been mentioned: “no unclean thing can dwell in the presence of God.”

Another law is the Law of Justice. The Law of Justice means that when a crime is committed against spiritual law, or when we make a mistake or commit sin, we must pay for that sin. We must somehow balance the scale that we have tipped or make up for what we did that was wrong.

According to the Law of Justice, sending imperfect beings, such as ourselves, to an Earth, with the ability and liberty to choose between right and wrong, would be sentencing us to hell (or separation from God). As imperfect beings, we would make more mistakes than we were able to make up for, and we would forever be unclean and unable to dwell in the presence of God.

There is another law known as the Law of Mercy. The law of Mercy means that God must somehow be forgiving of our imperfections. A merciful God certainly wouldn’t place us in a position where we are sentenced to hell without escape. His plan would include a way for us to be cleansed again. The Law of Mercy seems to be the one that most people like, since we all know that we’re imperfect. However, the Law of Justice cannot be overlooked. Mercy cannot rob Justice. These are two laws which contradict each other. One says that we must pay for our mistakes; the other says that we must be forgiven of our mistakes. God must keep and enforce both of these laws if He is to remain perfect, and thus remain God.

When God’s plan was presented before us in the grand council, there was one known as the “son of the morning”, who proposed that we should not be given the ability and liberty to choose between right and wrong, which would force all of us to be clean and thus able to return the presence of God. The son of the morning also wanted the glory of God for himself for coming up with this idea. (The “glory” of God is God’s reward for making His children like Himself. In other words, His “glory” is when He accomplishes His goal that we’ve been discussing).

The idea from the son of the morning was very appealing to one third of the children, or “hosts of heaven”, since they thought it meant that they would automatically be able to return to God’s presence. It would also mean that while on Earth, we wouldn’t be able to hurt each other through our wrong choices. If we were all forced to be good, one could not beat or kill the other out of anger. There would never be war. There would never be hunger since we would be forced to work and share with each other. The miseries that we see in the newspaper every day wouldn’t exist.

However, the idea completely undermined the purpose of God’s plan. If we are to become like God, we must have the ability and liberty to choose good over evil, just as God has the ability and liberty to choose. If we are forced, and God is not forced, then we will not be like God. An environment without the element of opposition will never present the option of a choice. True happiness cannot be known, unless we experience misery.

The eldest of us all, Jesus Christ, who was then known as Jehovah, spoke at the grand council and said that He would do the Father’s will and that the glory would always be the Father’s.

The dilemma of satisfying the laws of Justice and Mercy still persisted. In order for us to fulfill God’s plan to come to Earth, grow to be like Him by choosing to be like Him, and still be clean so that we could return to God’s presence, someone else would have to make the sacrifice and pay our debt to Justice. Someone who was always clean and didn’t make mistakes Himself, would have to pay for every sin committed which we could not pay for. Remember, as imperfect beings, we commit more spiritual crimes than we are able to make up for ourselves. For justice to be satisfied, one perfect being, who had no debt would have to pay our debt for us.

There was also another dilemma. While a sacrifice for sin, as described above, allows us to have the opportunity to become like God spiritually, by choosing good over evil, remember that God also has a perfect body and never dies. Our experience on this Earth with the imperfect bodies we now possess is only a temporary experience. As we all know, there will come a time when each of us dies, and our spirit is separated from the imperfect bodies we once received. The One who offered the sacrifice for sin, must also bridge the gap of our physical distinction from God, and reunite our spirits with perfect bodies like the one that God has.

During the grand council, God the Father asked who He should send to be this sacrifice, to pay the debt for our sins, and also reunite us with perfect physical bodies. Jesus, then known as Jehovah, spoke and said “here am I, send me.” The son of the morning also spoke and said “here am I, send me.” And God the Father said, “I will send the first”.

The son of the morning, (who was Lucifer, Satan, the dragon, or the serpent), having been defeated in his plot to steal God’s glory, was cast out of God’s presence in a struggle known as the “war in heaven.” Michael, the arch angel, led the armies of God in casting Lucifer out along with the one third of the hosts of heaven that followed Lucifer. Satan and his followers will never be granted physical bodies. As a demonstration of their continual desire to have bodies, a legion of them possessed a man during Jesus’ ministry on Earth. When Jesus commanded them to depart from the man, they plead with Jesus to allow them to possess a local herd of swine, showing that even the body of a pig, is better than no body at all.

After the grand council, Jesus created the Earth under the direction of the Father. Satan and his followers, who will never be granted physical bodies, fled there. Michael was also placed on the Earth as Adam, along with his wife Eve. Adam and Eve were placed on the Earth in a state of innocence, not having the ability to die, not knowing good from evil (thus lacking the ability to choose at a higher-than-child-like level), and they were not able to have children. By “partaking of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil”, they gained knowledge of good and evil, and along with the opposition which Satan will always provide, Adam and Eve and their posterity will always have the ability and liberty to choose between good and evil. Partaking of the fruit, which is symbolic and not necessarily literal, caused that they should be cast out of the Garden of Eden. This gave them the ability to have children and started the process by which all of the Father’s children, who did not follow Satan at the grand council, will be granted a physical body. Partaking of the fruit also gave them the ability to die as declared by God.

The posterity of Adam and Eve multiplied. The ages passed. And finally, the event long-foretold by prophets occurred. Jesus Christ, Jehovah, the Son of God, a Messiah and Savior, was born to the virgin Mary. After growing to adulthood, He led a three-year ministry teaching us how we must fulfill our part of the Father’s plan. Jesus also provided a perfect example of how to do it. He was always in open communication with the Father. He never made a mistake. He always did exactly what the Father wanted Him to do in every situation. He was completely sinless and pure. He was God’s “lamb without blemish” which the sacrifices in the Law of Moses represented.

At the end of His ministry, one night Jesus went up a hill near Jerusalem to an olive garden where He knelt and prayed to His Father to commence the “atonement”. The atonement was the sacrifice that was required so that we could be placed on this Earth to become like God by choosing to be like Him, and still have the opportunity to be cleansed from our wrong choices. In a manner incomprehensible to a mortal mind, Jesus took upon himself the sins of the world. These were your sins and mine. These were the sins of every generation that has ever lived on the Earth and that ever will live on the Earth. Whenever anyone who has ever committed or ever will commit an act against spiritual law, the punishment equal to that act was placed upon Jesus at this time. All the miseries of murder, loss of loved ones, hunger, addiction, jealousy, and all types of emotional and physical pain were placed upon Him. The garden where this took place was aptly named “Gethsemane”, which means “wine press”. Wine was made by applying great pressure on olives so that their juice would be secreted and collected. When the sins of the world were placed upon Jesus, the pressure was so great that it caused Him to bleed from every pore.

Now bearing the weight of the sins of the world, in a series of political and social events, encouraged by a group of religious leaders who were jealous and threatened by the truths which Jesus had taught, Jesus was arrested and eventually sentenced to execution by crucifixion. When on the cross, Jesus declared to the Father that “it is finished”. This meant that the Law of Justice had been satisfied. The sins had been placed on the lamb and the lamb was sacrificed, allowing God to be perfectly just, and merciful also.

Jesus has satisfied the Law of Justice. Since He has paid the price for our debt, He now has the option to set new terms for the law as it pertains to us.

If we do not accept Jesus as our Savior, that means that we do not accept what He has done for us and we will be responsible to pay the price of our own debt in order to satisfy the demands of Justice, which we are incapable of doing.

Just to put things in perspective, it would be like having the personal responsibility to pay off the United States national debt. Could any one person do that in a lifetime? There are more spiritual laws than we can even imagine and we brake them all the time. Some may feel that they never did anything wrong in this life, but it is wrong if they never did anything right. Even when considering a person that has a high spiritual consciousness, does that person make every right choice every second of the day? No. Even if that person made good choices, they are the wrong choices unless they are the best choices. Jesus said, “be ye therefore perfect, even as your father which is in Heaven is perfect.” The very fact that we are imperfect makes us incapable of paying our own debt. So if we do not accept Jesus’ sacrifice for us, we will forever be unclean and unable to return to the presence of our Father in Heaven.

So, assuming we decide to accept Jesus’ sacrifice, His terms are that we do our best to follow all spiritual laws to the best of our knowledge. If we make a mistake, we do our best to make up for that mistake (repent, recognize the mistake and never do it again), and once we’ve done our best, then Jesus will make up for the difference. If we do anything less than our best, then Jesus will know it, and He will judge us accordingly.

Accepting Jesus means a lot more than simply professing that He is your Lord and Savior. Really accepting Jesus means accepting the entire Jesus package. If you want to accept His sacrifice and receive His payment for your debt, you must also accept His teachings, and the teachings of His prophets and apostles. Its not enough to say you believe in Jesus, and then choose not to be baptized by someone who has the authority to baptize. In order to set an example, Jesus was baptized by immersion to “fulfill all righteousness” (righteousness means justice). He was baptized by John the Baptist, who was one that had authority. Not only are we commanded to follow Jesus’ example, Jesus also taught that we must be “born of water and of the spirit”. Baptism is just an example. All of His teachings must be followed in order to accept Him. If one is to truly accept Jesus, then he or she must find the church which Jesus established, and make that church his or her religion, in the practicing, engaged sense of the word.

Jesus’ sacrifice has given us the opportunity to become like God spiritually. While on Earth, we have the ability and liberty to choose good over evil. By satisfying the demands of Justice, Jesus is able to cleanse us of our wrong choices so that we may return to the presence of our Father. The words “saved”, “exaltation”, “entering the kingdom” and “eternal life” all mean to live with God and be like Him.

The word “immortality” simply means “to live forever”. On the third day after Jesus was crucified, He was resurrected. This bridged the gap of our physical distinction from God. By breaking the bonds of death, Jesus grants immortality, or the resurrection, to each of us. This will reunite our spirits with perfect bodies never to be separated again. Immortality is a free gift that Jesus extends to everyone; Eternal Life is the prize that Jesus has opened the door for us to earn.

After we die, there will come a time when we are brought before God to be judged of our works on Earth. Jesus, having suffered for each of our individual sins, trials and afflictions, and thus knowing our individual faults and weaknesses, will act as our perfect advocate and mediator with the Father. If we had done our best to follow Jesus and His teachings, then Jesus will claim us as His own, pay our debt to satisfy the demands of Justice, and allow us to enter into the presence of God to live with Him and be like Him.

Children of God, Father of our Spirits
Glory of God
God has a body
God is perfect
Spiritual Laws
No Unclean thing can dwell in the presence of God
Plan of Salvation
Law of Justice
Law of Mercy
Grand Council, War in Heaven
"Here am I, send me"
Son of the Morning
Ability and Liberty to choose (Free will, or Agency)
Creation
Adam and Eve
Jesus' coming foretold by prophets
Jesus' perfect example
Jesus, Advocate
Jesus, Mediator
Atonement
Resurrection
Gethsemane, Bled from every pore
"It is finished"
"Be ye therefore perfect"
Baptism of Jesus
Authority to Baptize
Follow the commandments
Judged by our works
Exaltation, Salvation, Eternal Life, etc.
Immortality
Church of Jesus
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