God's Plan For You: Jesus the Christ Part 1

This is one of the most sacred yet challenging topics in the gospel of Jesus Christ to discuss, not because it's controversial, but because it is hard to put in words much less text the suffering, agony, and death of Jesus Christ in our lowly behalf. The prophet Joseph Smith said, "The fundamental principles of our religion are the testimony of the Apostles and Prophets, concerning Jesus Christ, that He died, was buried, and rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven; and all other things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it."This will be a three part blog because of the doctrinal importance and fundemental principles that need to be understood about Christ's Atonement.

The first part of this great atonement started in the Garden of Gethsemane, it was here that Jesus of Nazereth suffered for our sins, it was there that the Lamb of God bled from every poor, it was there that Jehovah from the Old Testament suffered and trembled insomuch that an angel came to assist Him, it was there that He faced the wrath of the Almighty God in our behalf. We don't have a whole lot of knowledge about what occured in that Garden 2,000 years ago, but nearing the Garden Christ told His disciples, "I am exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death..." That is hard to comprehend that one could become that sorrowful, to the point where your soul is in so much anguish that you would want to die, much less to feel that way for something you didn't do.

Just how bad did the Savior of the world suffer in Gethsemane? Christ says this, "Repent, lest I smite you by the rod of my mouth, and by my wrath, and by my anger, and your sufferings be sore—how sore you know not, how exquisite you know not, yea, how hard to bear you know not. For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent; But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I; Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit—and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink..."