We talk of becoming like God. What does he do? He governs
this and other worlds, regulates all the systems and gives them their nations
and revolutions; He preserves them in their various orbits, and governs them by
unerring, unchangeable laws, as they traverse the immensity of space. In our
world he gives day and night, summer and winter, seed-time and harvest; He
adapts man, the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air and the fishes of the
sea, to their various climates and elements. He takes care of and provides for,
not only the hundreds of millions of the human family, but the myriads of
beasts, fowls and fishes; He feeds and provides for them day by day, giving
them their breakfast, dinner and supper; He takes care of the reptiles and
other creeping things, and feeds the myriads of animalculae, which crowd earth,
air and water. His hand is over all and His providence sustains all. "The
hairs of our head are numbered, and a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without
our heavenly Father's notice; He clothes the lilies of the valleys and feeds
the ravens when they cry."
"His wisdom's vast and knows no bound,
A deep where all our thoughts are drowned."
We would be like him! Be kings and priests unto God and
rule with him, and yet we are obliged to have guardians placed over us to teach
us how to take care of a bushel of wheat. We are far behind, but we have time
for improvement; and I think we shall have to make some important changes for
the better in our proceedings, before we become like our Father who dwells in
the heavens. (John Taylor, “The Confidence of the Saints in the Ultimate
Triumph of the Kingdom of God—the Condition of the Nations,” October 10, 1863, Journal
of Discourses, 26 vols. [Liverpool: Daniel H. Wells, 1865], 10:260)
Notice also how John Taylor teaches we will rule with God the Father; we will never become "independent deities" (a caricature of our theology of theosis).
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