‍Spirit Children of Heavenly Parents

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God is not only our Ruler and Creator; He is also our Heavenly Father. All men and women are literally the sons and daughters of God. “Man, as a spirit, was begotten and born of heavenly parents, and reared to maturity in the eternal mansions of the Father, prior to coming upon the earth in a temporal [physical] body” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph F. Smith [1998], 335).

Every person who was ever born on earth is our spirit brother or sister. Because we are the spirit children of God, we have inherited the potential to develop His divine qualities. Through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, we can become like our Heavenly Father and receive a fulness of joy.

We were not all alike in heaven. We know, for example, that we were sons and daughters of heavenly parents—males and females. We possessed different talents and abilities, and we were called to do different things on earth.

A veil covers our memories of our premortal life, but our Father in Heaven knows who we are and what we did before we came here. He has chosen the time and place for each of us to be born so we can learn the lessons we personally need and do the most good with our individual talents and personalities.

Moses 6:51

51 And he called upon our father Adam by his own voice, saying: I am God; I made the world, and men before they were in the flesh.

Doctrine and Covenants 76:24

24 That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God.

1 Nephi 17:36

36 Behold, the Lord hath created the earth that it should be inhabited; and he hath created his children that they should possess it.

Alma 40:11

11 Now, concerning the state of the soul between death and the resurrection—Behold, it has been made known unto me by an angel, that the spirits of all men, as soon as they are departed from this mortal body, yea, the spirits of all men, whether they be good or evil, are taken home to that God who gave them life.

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