Have you wondered about the significance of the human body and spirit together? What does the Savior, Jesus Christ's experience on this earth, teach us about the importance of embodiment? Tune in as we explore Savannah Eccles Johnston's piece "Embodiment of a Core Doctrine" to learn more about our roles as women in the Plan of Salvation.
The full article is found on Squaretwo.org
Thanks for listening! I'm on Instagram as deardaughtersofgod. Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/invites/contact/?i=1iyjqx0cq4kbk&utm_content=qr66nqv
Have you wondered about the significance of the human body and spirit together? What does the Savior, Jesus Christ's experience on this earth, teach us about the importance of embodiment? Tune in as we explore Savannah Eccles Johnston's piece "Embodiment of a Core Doctrine" to learn more about our roles as women in the Plan of Salvation.
The full article is found on Squaretwo.org
Thanks for listening! I'm on Instagram as deardaughtersofgod. Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/invites/contact/?i=1iyjqx0cq4kbk&utm_content=qr66nqv
I am Stephanie Eccles. This is Dear Daughters of God, Episode 6, Going Forward with Faith. We are inspired by the true life experiences of those around us. My name is Stephanie Eccles. I'm an educator, counselor, school administrator, and natural storyteller. From my perspective as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, I share a variety of life experiences that bring us hope and joy in our Savior, Jesus Christ. Welcome, dear daughters of God. I address you that way because that's what you are to Him. To our Heavenly Father. You are dear. I offer a special welcome to the brothers that are joining us today. We have a guest today. Her name is Savannah Eccles Johnston, and she is a professor of political science at the Salt Lake Community College She earned her PhD in political science from Claremont Graduate University. She's taught American politics at Pepperdine, Brigham Young University, Cal State Long Beach, and Providence College. While Savannah was a Ph. D. student, she taught early morning seminary for four years in Los Angeles. she's currently a board member and contributor at Square Two, a journal of social, political, and philosophical thought from the perspective of the restored gospel. She writes about issues related to women and the church religion and politics.
Stephanie:She is married. with three children. Welcome Savannah. Thank you. It's a pleasure to have you. I am Savannah's mom and so I have a little advantage of knowing her her whole life and so I'm gonna tell you a sweet story of her as a little one. Savannah was always very social, ready to communicate before she could even put together a sentence. She wanted to make friends immediately. We would be at a soccer game for one of her older siblings and when she was maybe 15 months old, she'd be walking around the crowd and walking right up to strangers. And smiling right in their face and they just didn't even know what to do with her and her, that was her way of saying hello, I want to be your friend. We learned very quickly, she, is a social little girl. now she can talk to anybody. Give her anybody and she can make a friend with that person and keep them completely entertained in conversation. When she was about four years old, she was in preschool and the fireman came to visit the preschool. Do you remember this, Savannah?
Savannah:Yes. No, no. I remember you telling me about it. You don't remember it yourself. Okay.
Stephanie:at the end of preschool, I came to pick her up and she was in a very serious mood and she said to me,
Savannah:Mom,
Stephanie:we learned that no one can play with matches. No one. I said, That's a good lesson to learn. That's right, no one can play with matches. I just said, Mom, can you play with matches? And I said, No, I can't play with matches So... You can't play with matches, and dad can't play with matches, no one can play with matches, right? None of us can play with matches. I decided to just be absolute with this. Black and white for a four year old was just best. And then she said, what about Jesus? Can Jesus play with matches? And I hesitated, I said, well, because Jesus isn't here, he's not going to play with matches. So Jesus is not going to play with matches. Okay. Then she went home and she. Went away into her playroom for a minute and came back with a very somber look with her head down and she was holding something in her hand. It was a little box. She brought it to me. And she said, This is for you. I said, This is your box of Scooby Doo cards. Your favorite game. And she said,
mom, this is a match game. No one can play with matches.
Stephanie:Cute.
Savannah, now that everyone knows you just a little bit better, let's move on and talk about your Journey of becoming a gospel scholar. You've learned a great deal about the embodiment doctrine, and many of us don't fully understand the embodiment doctrine. So before we get into that doctrine and the piece that you've recently written, four square two, I'm wondering if you'll share the story that helped you get to this place where you are now.
Stephanie:Yeah.
Savannah:I would say it started. Eight and a half years ago, when I went through the temple for the first time, and came away with a lot of questions. soul stretching, difficult, wrestling type questions. and God took me on a journey. And it was a journey that... Was, eight and a half years long and still going. It was really difficult at certain points But it's led me to a place of being reconverted to Jesus Christ and Hopeful and happy about the place of women which I was not at the temple eight and a half years ago I wondered, what is this to do with Jesus Christ? What am I to make of the status of women? what is my religion? and now I feel much, much happier. Some steps in that process included teaching early morning seminary and, having to get up every morning, when I had a newborn baby and was doing my PhD and get there at 5. 30 to stand in front of these students and testify every single day that I believed this. and that I was committed to it, and have to explain to them, and answer their really difficult questions, and be as honest as I could be. I was very lucky in that I stumbled into the writings of Valerie Hudson Kassler, she has wonderful writings on the temple that helped me kind of, survive spiritually for a couple of years. And then, the great blessing came when I moved to Boston, and I started working in the temple. and this coincided with, starting a book project with Valerie Hudson and our wonderful friend Holly Hamilton Bleakley on a related but different topic. but through these conversations and these calls, and this time in the temple and personal study, I felt like eight years was all coming together and God was knitting my heart back together and was giving me new eyes. And was saying, here's what you've been looking for. I'm helping you out. It's been long enough.
Stephanie:And helping you feel that indeed you were loved and valued in the sight of your Heavenly Father and your Savior, Jesus Christ. I see. All right. Thank you for helping us understand how you come to this point now As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. before we go into your piece, called Embodiment as a Core Doctrine. I think there are core pieces of doctrine that we should explain for overall listeners so they understand. One is the doctrine of the Godhead, which we talk about in our faith As compared to The doctrine of the trinity, which is understood in many other religions and followed in other religions. Can you address those two concepts? Yes. So.
Savannah:I think a basic level way to understand this, when we speak about the Godhead, we're speaking about God the Father and Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost as distinct beings with physical bodies with the exception of the Holy Ghost, of course. Heavenly Father has a body of flesh and bone, we read in Doctrine and Covenants, and as a result, he is distinct from Jesus Christ, who has a resurrected body of flesh and bones. And then there's the Holy Ghost, who is a personage of spirit. They are one in purpose, unified, but they are in fact distinct. Now how does this relate to the trinity? One way to understand the trinity, trinity meaning three in one, is to think of a dice. There are different faces of a dice, and when you roll a dice, any one may land, but it's one dice, or, I read this somewhere, you can think of an egg. An egg has a shell, the yolk, and the white, but it's one egg.
Stephanie:That's a helpful analogy. Yeah.
Savannah:The egg analogy. Yeah. Thanks to some guy on Google. That's a helpful analogy. Oh, okay.
Stephanie:Two different analogies. The dice and the egg. Okay. now that we have a basic understanding of the Godhead as compared to the Trinity, let's go into your piece, the embodiment as a core doctrine.
Savannah:Right. So, we've been reminded, frequently by church leaders to focus on core doctrines, to focus our testimonies on core doctrines, and I feel that embodiment is one core doctrine that we underemphasize. And for me, the story starts with the first vision. Joseph Smith has burning questions. The year is 1820. He goes into the sacred grove to pray, and two personages appear to him, God the Father and Jesus Christ. And this event kicks off the restoration of the gospel. And we learn two things from this event. We learn that God the Father and Jesus Christ have physical bodies. Yes. And because they have physical bodies. They're distinct. They're separate. We are non trinitarian as a result. So we focus a lot on the, we don't believe in the trinity part, we believe in the godhead. But we don't focus enough on the no god has a body. God has a body. These two things together really make us heretics of the Christian tradition.
Stephanie:I see what you're saying. your point is To put a little more emphasis on the fact that God the Father and our Savior Jesus Christ each have a body. Yes. Not only are they distinct human beings, of course, they have to be if they each have their own body, but they each have a body. Yeah,
Savannah:yes, the body. We have to bring things back to the body. our whole, theology comes back to the body. As it turns out. Okay. in fact, this question of embodiment, this idea of embodiment, the corporeal nature of God can answer some really fundamental religious questions that we have. who is God? What is the purpose of this life? Why is Jesus Christ necessary, and how am I to view this body that I exist in? Embodiment can answer those questions for us, and if we fail to embrace our theology of embodiment, we really squander one of the gifts of the Restoration. So first to that question of who is God, well, we do not believe in a God without body, parts and passions. We believe in a God who is embodied. Now, some people would say this is limiting to God. If you put God in a physical body, then you're limiting his powers, right? The body is viewed as kind of degraded and limiting because it's time and space limited, right? But Joseph Smith taught a radically different idea of glory. He said, That which is without body, parts, and passions is nothing. There is no other God in heaven, but that God, who has flesh and bones, all beings who have bodies have power over those who have not. So, God's embodiment is the source of his power and glory, and this includes his ability to feel passionately. we learn this in, there's a wonderful story in the book of Moses, Moses 7, where Enoch, sees God weep, and I'll read from it here. This is Moses 7, 28. And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept. And Enoch said unto the Lord, How is it that thou canst weep, seeing thou art holy, and from all eternity to all eternity? Again, this question of how can you be a God if you feel? Aren't feelings, passions linked to the body and isn't the body lowly, human, degraded? No, God is an embodied being who feels all the passions that we feel and yet he is perfect. He is perfect in that passion. We believe, as the Gibbons have said, in a weeping God. A passionate God. An embodied God.
Stephanie:Which makes his state of being perfect even more remarkable. Because he does feel the passion, the pain, the emotion, like we do.
Savannah:Yes, this is a God I can worship. Yes.
Stephanie:This is a personal God. Yes. Let's review. I don't know if we were really clear for all of our listeners as to... Who is the person Joseph Smith? We've talked about him a little bit. Would you like to describe Joseph Smith? Yeah,
Savannah:Joseph Smith is the prophet of the restoration. so all the priesthood keys were returned to Joseph Smith that had been lost on the earth. He restored, The Church of Jesus Christ, which Christ himself had first set up and had been lost over time and He brought forth the Book of Mormon which clarifies these doctrines as well as other books of scripture the Pearl of Great Price and the Doctrine and Covenants So he's the first prophet of the Restoration.
Stephanie:Thank you. All right, let's go on from there So from the scripture where Enoch asks God, how is it that you can be? With Emotion with passion.
Savannah:Let's go from there. so this idea that God is embodied and that this is the source of his power can be found in the Book of Mormon, it can be found in the Doctrine and Covenants, and it can be found in a most beautiful way in the Pearl of Great Price in that scripture in Moses 7. Because God is embodied it changes how we can view our own bodies. That other question, how am I to view my own body? Yes. Plato spoke of our bodies as wretched prisons. Our
Stephanie:bodies, specifically women's bodies.
Savannah:all bodies, but women as being particularly, at fault because women are the embodyers. Women imprison us in these wretched prisons. They're the prison guards because we give birth. And then to make it worse, we degrade men through seduction. To their physical natures. So we're twice at fault. There
Stephanie:it is. I thought he put us at a greater fault.
Savannah:oh, doubly at fault. No, no. Women are not in good standing with Plato. or really with much of the Western tradition. but we believe something different. We believe that, our bodies are not prisons, but prized gifts. In fact, they are literally the point. of this life. again Joseph Smith taught that the great principle of happiness consists in having a body. Again, I'll say that. The great principle of happiness consists in having a body. and in fact, we understand a soul to be a spirit and a body combined. That is a living soul for us. So, you don't, own your body. You are your body. You are your body. This is testified of in the New Testament. There's a wonderful story in Mark 5. Where Jesus casts devils out of a man. And the devils ask that he allow them to go and inhabit the bodies of the swine. Because it is better to live artificially, superficially, in some kind of false way. Inhabit the body of a pig. Then to be disembodied. This was the great price that was paid by the followers of Satan in the premortal existence. They did not get to have a body. Can there be any greater consequence? They would rather embody a pig or take on the body of a pig. How telling. How
Stephanie:telling, right? how important it is that we have bodies. So why not? Our God and our Savior. To have bodies.
Savannah:Right. The body is the gift. That's why we came to earth, is so that we could get a body, and have experiences in this body. And then as Joseph Smith said, present it back before God, pure.
Stephanie:I was going to ask, how does this relate to women?
Savannah:Yes, it directly relates to women. If our bodies are no longer wretched prisons, but prized gifts, this dramatically changes how we view women. And like the temple, When you go through the endowment ceremony, It it starts at the creation, but the bulk of it is in the garden. Why do we start in the garden? What's the point of that? Well, as it turns out, if the body is a good thing, then the traditional view of Eve has to be flipped on its head. Eve makes the bold and courageous choice. to embody us. She takes us figuratively through the veil into this pre mortal life. She leaves a place where she knew happiness or some kind of version of it, but life was very good and easy, and chose to leave in order that she might know evil. So that she might know joy, and to quote from Moses 511, Were it not for our transgression, we should never have had seed, And never should have known good and evil. That key is we should never have had seed. We would not exist. We would not have bodies. In other words, it's worth the cost to get a body. And women, of course, now step into the Eve role, because they embody us. I finally understand why we start here. So thank
Stephanie:goodness for Eve's wisdom.
Savannah:Thank goodness for Eve's wisdom, right. Eve took mankind through the veil just as our mothers take us through the veil, through childbirth. We are literally bringing someone through the veil. Every human being who has ever walked this earth has one thing in common. And that is that they came to this earth via a woman. They crossed the veil because of a woman. And every... Every human being who has ever walked this earth will also have to die. Their body will decay. So women have two things going for them. They embody us. They give us these bodies. The whole point of this whole plan is to get a body. And then we're also told in the family proclamation that women have, charge as well as their husbands of the nurture of these souls. Problem. Women embody us, but then we die. We're supposed to nurture these children who will inevitably sin and fall short, spiritually die and fall from the presence of the Father. The plan has failed. The work of women has failed. What's the point of embodying something that will decay and die? of bringing someone into this world where they will then be held accountable for spiritual death through sin. What's the point? It's hopeless. So now we see something. To understand the body is to understand the role of women. And to understand women is to understand Jesus Christ. The role of Jesus Christ. The role of Jesus Christ. Because it's the answer. Jesus Christ is the hope of women. And Eve tells us this. She gives a wonderful declaration in 511. I'm going to read it again, Moses 511. And Eve, his wife, heard all these things, and was glad. This is after she's been kicked out of the garden. Saying, were it not for our transgression, we should never have had seed, and never should have known good and evil. Here's the key point. And the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all. The obedient. Adam agrees and says, Blessed be the name of God. For because of my transgression, my eyes are opened. And in this life I shall have joy. And again in the flesh I shall see God. Key. In the flesh. I shall see God. This is the point of Jesus Christ. If bodies are the gift, and women embody us, they stand as guardians of the first veil, as Valerie Hudson teaches very beautifully, then Jesus Christ is the hope of women. He is the security of that gift. Because Jesus Christ does two things. Jesus Christ literally re embodies us. Because Jesus Christ was resurrected, each of us will be resurrected. Our mother's work does not fail. The body which dies will be, lifted up again, but perfected. Step two. Though each of us will sin and fall short, Jesus Christ will provide us with a perfect nurture through his grace, which you can understand as divine help. Divine help. Divine help. So through the divine help of Jesus Christ, the perfect nurture of Jesus Christ, our sins can be forgiven, our souls can be purified, and we can be brought back into the presence of the Father. Resurrected beings purified through the grace of Jesus Christ.
Stephanie:This is why when President Nelson says, The answer is always Jesus Christ, that statement fits perfectly here. The answer is always Jesus Christ. Yes.
Savannah:Yes. Absolutely. Everything leads to Jesus Christ. To think about the body. Jesus Christ's body. is to think about women, is to think about Jesus Christ. The temple is all about Jesus Christ. Creation, the garden, the fall, our embodiment. How do we get back through the veil into the celestial room, into the celestial kingdom? Jesus Christ stands as guardian. With the help of men who hold priesthood keys, again this comes from Valerie Hudson, to be welcomed back into the presence of the Father. Everything leads to Jesus Christ. And I would add as a side note, when thinking about issues related to women, the status of women, the role of women, which I fully advocate thinking about, if it does not lead you to Jesus Christ, then you're doing something wrong. one other thing that I would add, there's been a lot of discussion recently about Heavenly Mother, again, which I am fully supportive of. It is only our doctrine of embodiment which provides the logic for the existence of Heavenly Mother. Right. So again, the body. It is a core doctrine. It's one of the first two given to us. in the sacred grove. It has to go back to the body. Because to understand the body is to understand the whole solar system of our beliefs. And the center point of that solar system being Jesus Christ. The thing that holds it all together. Jesus Christ.
Stephanie:In that discussion, I'm hearing that there is a role for women. That is, every human being that comes to earth comes through that veil, so to say, that birth through women. The embodiment process happens. With the help of women. Then, you mentioned in the temple, when we return or prepare to return to our Heavenly Father. We do that with the help of men. that hold the priesthood. That's through priesthood keys that help us return to our Heavenly Father. And that the Savior, Jesus Christ, represents the veil, Himself. My point is that The whole process of returning to our salvation cannot happen without a man and a
woman.
Savannah:Oh, exactly. And what's wonderful about it is no woman, with the exception, well, actually no woman, brings a child to this earth without a man's involvement. so, a man's involved in the first veil, just as a woman is involved in the second veil. So we're both at both veils. The question is, who's kind of in charge of each veil? There's a wonderful article I would, recommend here from Square Two called The Two Trees, again by Valerie Hudson, where this is coming from. so there is a role. Now, in between those two veils, men and women work together.
Stephanie:We'll put the link to the Square 2 article of the Two Trees in our show notes.
Savannah:Excellent. I would like to, to add here that we have so much evidence in our practice for our theology of embodiment.
Savannah, will you share with us examples of this evidence?
Savannah:Yes, I would love to. So, first evidence, the sacrament. Every Sunday we go and partake of the sacrament. What does the sacrament represent? Well, the water symbolizes the blood of Jesus Christ. The bread symbolizes the literal body of Jesus Christ. first, these are physical things. Now, we don't believe that the bread and water literally transfigure into the blood and body of Jesus Christ. but we do believe that it is representing something that is real. The resurrected body of Jesus Christ. That because Jesus Christ has a body, we too will be resurrected or re embodied. We're not asked to remember our favorite teachings of Jesus Christ or moral stances. We're asked to remember the literal body. of Jesus Christ. We promise to always remember the literal body of Jesus Christ. you're talking
Stephanie:about during the ordination
Savannah:of the sacrament. During the ordinance of the sacrament, that's right. So remembering the literal, physical, embodied reality of the Savior. Next, starting with birth and progressing to baptism, we go through a series of physical ordinances. Baptism, our bodies are literally submersed in water. The initiatory focuses on the blessing of our resurrected body in hyper detail, This is the resurrected body that it's focusing on. We learn the plan of salvation in a physical way during the endowment, and I think most telling of all, proxy ordinances are all done physically. One by one by one. It would be so much easier if we could just get a big stack of family cards and just drop them in the water. Just dunk them in the water and just do like a mass baptism for them. No, no. Every single person must be baptized either for themselves or by proxy by a physical body. That's how important embodiment is.
Stephanie:It seems like such a nuisance. But it speaks to the importance of doing the proxy ordination As if the person were present themselves, doing the ordination with their own body. Right, These are not metaphorical
Savannah:things. This is literal. And of course, where does this proxy idea come from? Well, the greatest proxy ever done was the atonement of Jesus Christ. So now we stand in proxy for our deceased ancestors. It has to be done by someone embodied. It cannot be done. By a spirit in the next world who has been disembodied temporarily. Cannot be done. That is so telling. The initiatory, is particularly interesting. the individual is figuratively cleaned. The initiatory. Now that's another ordination done in the temple. Yes. Another ordinance done in the temple. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So first baptism, and then you go to the temple, and receive, the initiatory, which is, you are figuratively cleaned and anointed on your body in preparation to receive your endowment. So first the initiatory, Various parts of your body are blessed for specific ends. The body is then clothed in the garments of the holy priesthood. All of this, again, is done physically. The initiatory is our most physical, I mean, other than baptism, where you're literally dunked in water, is our most physical ordinance. You are dressed. You are cleaned. You are anointed. All in your body. Hyper focused on the body. The gift. Our next evidence comes from our view of chastity. I think this is wonderful. I have such a testimony of the law of chastity.
Stephanie:Now, the initiatory it's not literally cleaned, it's only representatively
Savannah:cleaned. Yeah, figuratively cleaned. Figuratively. Yeah, thank you. But again, focused on the body. Yes. Fair enough. So, embodiment, how does it relate to the law of chastity? Well, sexual relations are confined to marriage between a man and a woman for, I think, two essential purposes. Both related to embodiment. First, embodiment is really sacred. Every civilization that has ever existed has had rules on how people come into this world and how people leave this world. For example, murder is in most cultures the most serious crime.
Stephanie:As an example of the rule in which ways that are acceptable to
Savannah:leave the world. In ways that are acceptable to leave the world, right. Is it any surprise then that the process by which we enter this world, the process by which we gain a body, the great gift, the point of this whole plan of salvation, would be so heavily guarded? It needs to be done in the right place, at the right time, right people. that's what's necessary. The best possible. Possible way. So the creative powers involved in sex should never be taken lightly because they involve the embodiment of another person, another spirit, son or daughter of Heavenly Father.
Savannah, will you give an explanation of the plan of salvation? I think it will help our listeners understand at a higher level why the law of chastity is so vital within the embodiment doctrine, especially in this next part, as we're headed into the topic about our heavenly parents.
Savannah:Right. So the Plan of Salvation. In a nutshell, is, why do we come to this earth? What is the purpose of Jesus Christ, and how do we return to the presence of the Father? It is, we came to this earth to get a body, and to be tested. Our bodies will die. We will have to learn, which means certain failures. Jesus Christ came to this earth to, give us a perfect example. To, pay the ultimate price for our sins, to feel all our pains, to re embody us, to bring us back into the presence of the Father. The plan of salvation is, how do we allow all the spirit sons and daughters of our heavenly parents who want to, that two thirds who went with the Father's plan, to come to this earth To gain a body, to become like our Heavenly Parents, and to return to the presence of our Heavenly
Stephanie:Parents. I'm so glad you added that part. And to become like our Heavenly Parents. Not just to return to them, but to become like them. Exactly. Exactly. To become Heavenly Parents ourselves.
Savannah:To become like our Heavenly Parents. So there's the plan of salvation. The second reason, Why I believe the law of chastity is as serious as it is, is that we believe that the soul is a spirit plus a body. Does that make sense? So a soul is a spirit plus a body. You are a living soul and you are a combination of those two. So every time you are coming into contact, physical contact with another person, you are touching their soul.
Stephanie:that's a very interesting way to look at it. But it is true, when you look at this whole story of the plan of salvation, isn't it?
Savannah:Yes. no matter how hard we might try to strip sex of any significance, It can't be done. It cannot be done because souls are always involved. No matter how hard you try, sex can never be a purely physical act because the soul is the spirit plus the body. Souls are involved. No matter how hard you try. And of course it might lead to the creation of more living souls. More embodiment. from this perspective, sex is significant. consent is a necessary but Insufficient condition for sexual engagement. Something else has to come into play, including mutual obligations, certain fulfilled preconditions. That's a much longer topic, but the point is... It's the law of chastity is serious for two key reasons one because it involves the process of embodiment and two Because it involves souls the soul being understood as the spirit plus the body It's significant because your body is significant.
I can see how humankind would put greater significance on the body if we viewed it as part of the human soul. It gives us reason to approach relationships with more gentleness, with more respect. Let's look at that second obligation that's needed in sexual relations in addition to consent. That would be marriage.
Savannah:Yeah, a mutual obligation understood as marriage, right? that you will, raise these children that could come from these unions, together. emotional obligations to each other, physical obligations to each other as your bodies decay. there's so much there that goes into the marriage contract. All of which is necessary for kind of the safe practice of sexual relations. In a way that benefits both men and women in their very distinct understandings of sexuality.
Stephanie:Okay. So marriage is the answer on how you deal with these different two sexualities.
Savannah:Yeah, different experiences of sexuality between men and women. but I, I'd like to, I know we're running out of time. I'd like to move just a little bit on this concept of marriage and sex differences because it touches on, Our understanding of Heavenly Mother, which is totally unique to... Let's go into that. Yeah, to the restored gospel. in Moses 2, 27, we learn that, God teaches us, and I, God, created man in mine own image, male and female, created I them. If God is literally male, because God is literally embodied... Then, there must be a God the Mother. It is the only logical explanation. If God is embodied, and we are created in the image of God, male and female, created I them, then there must be an embodied God the Mother. That's the logic behind Eliza R. Snow's Oh My Father hymn, which is used as a reference at the footnote of, the Gospel Topics essays on the church website on Heavenly Mother. This is the logic involved. male and female. So
Stephanie:this is how we can be sure there is a heavenly mother. Yes,
Savannah:yes. when I say heavenly father, my implication, and I should have just corrected myself, I should always say heavenly parents. Because the two together are an exalted pair. Together, they are God. God must be understood as a divine male and a divine female, united as heavenly parents. Exaltation is the combination of the two. Heavenly parents is how we need to think about God. now of course the pattern in heaven matches the pattern on earth. Male and female are necessary for creation in this life, that's just basic biology. Marriage is an essential ordinance, because we are all sexed individuals, by which I mean we are all biologically male or biologically female, created after the image of a divine male and a divine female, united together, exalted together. we are all male or female, radically insufficient on our own, who need the other half to be exalted. I'm with you. And all of this comes from embodiment. The only way this makes sense is if you bring it back to embodiment. Again, how important is the embodiment doctrine? Right. Final one, the word of wisdom. The Word of Wisdom is an excellent evidence for our doctrine of embodiment, because it teaches us a really important truth. What we do to our bodies, we do to our spirits.
Stephanie:Ah, what we do to our bodies, we do to our spirits.
Savannah:To take care of the body is a spiritual task as much as scripture reading is. no wonder then that the Word of Wisdom is included in the Temple Recommend interview. The body is the gift. What are you doing to your body? And how does it impact your spirit? Because again, the body plus the spirit, together are a living soul. So learning to live well in our bodies, with all of their natural defaults and defects, is a lifelong task with eternal implications.
Stephanie:And without the care of one, the other cannot be
Savannah:well. Yeah. Or at least it's much more difficult. Yes. So we see so many evidences of embodiment in our practice, don't we? Yes. Everything from the sacrament to the word of wisdom. The temple, marriage, the emphasis we place on it, the law of chastity, embodiment, embodiment, embodiment. The body is the gift. Jesus Christ is the guarantor of that gift. If you think about the body, you think about Jesus Christ. They are connected, inseparably.
Stephanie:If you think about the body, then you think about
Savannah:Jesus
Stephanie:Christ.
Savannah:Yeah, and you could add one step to that. To think about the body is to think about women. Is to think about Jesus Christ. Is to think about the body. Is to think about the woman who gave it to you. And how Jesus Christ assures the success of that Embodiment through our resurrection. Which brings us back to that key point. To think about women. To understand the role and the status of women as equals with men. Must lead us to Jesus Christ. The divine mission of Jesus Christ. or at least, that has been my experience, is this desperate journey to understand who am I, what does God think of me as a female, how can I understand my role, has led me to a deeper belief in Jesus Christ, ultimately, through a lot of pain and trouble, but as fierce of an advocate as I am of women. Is only because of a renewed understanding of Jesus Christ, a new insight into embodiment. Everything has brought me back to Jesus Christ.
Stephanie:Ah. What a journey. Yeah. What a journey. What a journey. I'm grateful that you shared this with us. Thank you for helping us understand the process that you've been through in coming to the point that you understand how vitally important our role is as women, not just yours, but through your understanding, you're helping all of us understand our role in the plan of salvation. And that it could not happen without us, women. Nor could it happen without men. We're both vitally important. As you said it. Terribly insufficient alone.
Savannah:Radically insufficient alone. Oh, that's
Stephanie:the word Savannah would choose. Radically, of course. Radically insufficient alone. Yes. Thank you, Savannah. Thank you. It's been inspiring.
Savannah:Thank you for letting me come. This was really nice.
Stephanie:Oh, it was so good to hear from you. I'm so grateful for this journey. That you took through all of those years, determined to find your way. You kept forward, going forward with faith. Thank you for being faithful. I'm grateful for that example.
Savannah:Thank you for letting me come.
I want to thank Savannah Eccles. One more time for joining us for an interview on dear Daughters of God you can find her article on the online journal called square2. org. That's square2. org. I want to give a special thank you to the husbands that were behind the scenes watching the children, Savannah's husband, Sam Johnston, and my husband, Richard Eccles. By the time we finished the interview, there were about 20 family members in the house waiting for Sunday dinner to begin. So that was a lot of people to keep quiet. Thank you to Sam and Richard. You can find Dear Daughters of God on Instagram and Facebook. these are the two platforms where I post the pictures of the wonderful people whose stories I've shared. I hope you'll look us up. Since I'm a one person team and do everything for Dear Daughters of God, from the hosting and writing to all the technical work and publishing, I'm asking for your help. Would you please share these episodes with your family and friends? I'd be so grateful if you'd help me spread the good word by rating and sharing these episodes with those you love. Thank you. I appreciate your help. For now, I will say farewell until we meet again.