Week 3 – Earthly Roles
By Linda and Richard Eyre

Note: Each week this column provides a short essay on one particular aspect or facet of the Lord’s personality and character.  It is intended that the reader focus on this facet while partaking of the sacrament this Sunday.  (Click here to read full introductory column .)

It may be that even before Christ was the life of this world he was the light of this world.  The one thing all men have in common is the light of Christ – the deep-seated, subconsciously remembered connection of our spirits to his.  This light separates right from wrong, inherent good from inherent evil.  Some call it conscience, some call it inborn morality, some deny it altogether, but all of us have it (at least until it is snuffed out by sustained evil or intentional wickedness).

Jesus Christ is, has always been, and will always be the God of the earth that he created (always with his loyalty to and his direction from his Father and our Father).  He was (and is) Jehovah, the God of the Old Testament, who spoke with Moses and Abraham and who gave us the ten items of loving counsel from a wise Father, ten ways to live together successfully and be happy: the Ten Commandments.

Then, in the meridian of time, the God of this world came to live on this world – to take on flesh, to take on the joys and difficulties and choices, and to take upon himself our sins.  He came as the literal Son of God, the Only Begotten of the Father.

What did he do during his short lifetime – or, more important, what did he give?

1.       The singular example of a perfect life.
2.       The answers to life’s eternal question of who we are.
3.       The simple, pure, and revolutionary doctrines of love and charity.
4.       The organization of a church to perpetuate and preserve those doctrines.
5.       His life for our sins.

            But can a list of what Christ gave us really be made?  No matter how we think of it, he gave all for us.  Because of his mortal mother, the Lord possessed the characteristics of a mortal during his earthly lifetime.  He was, as we are, subject to pain, to difficulty, to temptation, to the weaknesses of the flesh.  But because of his immortal father and his perfect existence, Jesus also possessed control over his life and death so that his life could not be taken.  It could only be given.

            Join us next week for a look at Christ’s “after-Resurrection roles.”