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Nothing is Impossible
for Those Who Believe

A Christian Perspective on Wallace D. Wattles 1910 classic The Science of Getting Rich. This is Wattles' 1910 classic with a forward written by Marnie L. Pehrson and her commentary throughout. A fresh look at this classic from which many self-help books were taken. (Adobe Acrobat needed)

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You've Read
"The Secret."
You've Seen the DVD.
Now How Do You Reconcile the 
Law of Attraction with Your Christian Beliefs?

Learn How!

Core Belief #9: 
We Are Eternal Beings in a Mortal Training Ground

by Marnie L. Pehrson

The Lord told Jeremiah, "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations" (Jeremiah 1:5).

Just as Jeremiah was known before his mortal birth and sanctified and ordained to be a prophet, you were known to God before your mortal birth and are here for your own unique purpose. Your spirit – the eternal part of you – came from God's presence. Ecclesiastes 12:7 tells us what happens upon our mortal death: "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it."

Job 38:7 tells us that before the foundations of the earth were established, "the sons [and daughters] of God shouted for joy." You were there before the foundations of the world were laid. You shouted for joy at the prospect of coming to this planet.

This may be a new concept to you or it may be one that rings very familiar. In either case, suppose with me for a moment that this is true – that you existed before you came to this earth; that God literally is the Father of your spirit. You are His offspring (Acts 17:28-29).

1. If this is true, then you are very special. You are made in His image just as a mortal son is fashioned in the image of his father. "For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, for we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device" (Acts 17:28-29).

2. Assuming you spent some time as a spirit child of your Heavenly Father in His royal courts on high, it logically follows that you had some say in coming to this planet, for not once have I ever seen God violate our free will to choose. Any punishment ever inflicted upon mankind is because they made a choice. Any blessing bestowed also comes as a result of a choice. Even Adam and Eve were given an opportunity to choose whether they wanted to eat the fruit or not (Genesis 2:16-17). They were not forced into a fallen world. They chose, and it follows that God did not force you here either.

3. If we chose to come here, then there must be some benefit to our being here – some benefit that we could not have gained if we had remained a "spirit being" in a perfect heavenly realm. Evidently, there is a benefit to this bodily form we have taken upon us.

Even the "Word was made flesh" (John 1:14). The great I Am, the mighty Jehovah, came to earth, took a bodily form, and rose again on the 3rd day to become a perfect immortal being of flesh and bone. The Son of God is our great Exemplar and model. He "marked the path and led the way and every point defined." If we look to Him as the model for our own existence, we find a spiritual being taking a mortal form, dying a mortal death, and rising from the grave as a resurrected immortal being. He now stands on the right hand of God the Father (Acts 7:55-56).

When the resurrected Lord appeared to his disciples he said, "Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have." (Luke 24: 39) And then he sat down to eat with them. The separation of our spirits from our bodies upon death is only a temporary state. Ezekiel 37 gives a graphic description of the reuniting of the body and spirit during the resurrection at the end of the earth's existence (see also Revelations 20).

4. Since we have chosen to be here, to obtain a body, we must have believed that this mortal sojourn was worth leaving our heavenly home. In this place we walk by faith and not by sight. I believe this is one of the primary reasons we are on this planet. Faith is so important that Hebrews 11:3 tells us that "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear."

Where is a better place to learn faith? Would it be in a heavenly world where we see the "unseen"… where God is ever present and all the spirit matter of the universe is visible to our spiritual eyes? Or would we better learn faith in a mortal world where we see the evidences of God, but cannot literally see Him? Might we better learn faith in a world where we cannot see the spiritual substance of the universe, where our vision is limited to the natural world? It is here where we must step out into the darkness and hope the light appears ahead of us.

I believe that this mortal life is a school ground, a place to not only gain a resurrected body, but also to learn faith. For without faith, we are nothing. If we wish to be "joint heirs with Christ" (Romans 8:17) we must follow Him through this process and walk by faith, knowing that "faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)

And so in a nutshell, the only way home is through faith in Jesus Christ, by following Him, by walking in His footsteps. Only He can lead us safely home. This life is but a small moment. The Bible tells us that a day to God is 1,000 years to man (2 Peter 3:8). From a spiritual perspective, mortality is only about 2.5 to 3 hours of time. I often wonder if before we took the leap of faith to enter this world, we didn't say, "Oh sure, I can do anything for 2-3 hours." :)

And so I'll conclude with a quote I found this evening:

"We talk about our trials and troubles here in this life but suppose that you could see yourselves thousands and millions of years after you have proved faithful during the few short years in this time, and have obtained eternal salvation and a crown of glory in the presence of God; then look back upon your lives here, and see the losses, crosses, and disappointments, the sorrows ..., you would be constrained to exclaim, 'But what of all that? Those things were but for a moment, and we are now here. We have been faithful during a few moments in our mortality, and now we enjoy eternal life and glory.'" (Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, 7:275).

If you like this, you'll probably like You're Here for a Reason: Discover & Live Your Purpose. Get the first fifty pages for FREE here.

  1. You Can Tap a Power that Makes You Extraordinary
  2. We Are All Connected
  3. Look for the Good
  4. There's Always a Silver Lining
  5. There is No Scarcity, Only Abundance
  6. Cast Your Bread Upon the Waters
  7. Everything Happens for a Purpose
  8. Ask and You Shall Receive
  9. We Are Eternal Beings in a Mortal Training Ground

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