All Things Bear Record of Me

Following the account of creation in Moses 2, what God created each day is a symbol used for the Savior. On the first day, “And I, God, said: Let there be light; and there was light. And I, God, saw the light; and that light was good. And I, God, divided the light from the darkness” (Moses 2:3-4). He created light and divided it from darkness. Later the Savior declared, “And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not” (John 1:5). He also said, “I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness” (John 12:46). He likewise proclaimed, “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). Just as He created physical light and separated it from darkness, He is spiritual light and brings us out of darkness. On the second day, “And again, I, God, said: Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water, and it was so, even as I spake; and I said: Let it divide the waters from the waters; and it was done; And I, God, made the firmament and divided the waters, yea, the great waters under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament, and it was so even as I spake” (Moses 2:6-7). And just as He made and organized the water, so too is water a symbol of Him. He declared to the woman at the well, “But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14). He also announced to the people at the feast of tabernacles, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7:37-38). He is Living Water.

               On the next two days we see similar symbolism. On the third day of creation “the earth brought forth grass, every herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed should be in itself” (Moses 2:12). And just as the Lord made the plants and that which provides food for man, so too is the Savior Himself the personification of that nourishment. He declared to the Jews, “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst…. I am that bread of life…. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die” (John 6:35, 48, 50). He created plants that would provide physical nourishment, and He is spiritual nourishment to man. On the fourth day we read, “And I, God, made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night, and the greater light was the sun, and the lesser light was the moon; and the stars also were made even according to my word. And I, God, set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, And the sun to rule over the day, and the moon to rule over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness” (Moses 2:17-18). A revelation from our dispensation reads, “This is the light of Christ. As also he is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made. As also he is in the moon, and is the light of the moon, and the power thereof by which it was made; As also the light of the stars, and the power thereof by which they were made” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:7-9). The sun and the moon and the stars are a representation of Him. Isaiah also declared what would eventually happen to these celestial bodies: “The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the Lord shall be thine everlasting light” (Isaiah 60:19-20). Ultimately the sun and moon will be replaced by Him for He is to be our light forever.

               In the final two days of creation, we can also symbolically see the Savior. On the fifth day, “And I, God, made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and cattle after their kind, and everything which creepeth upon the earth after his kind” (Moses 2:25). Among those cattle that He made were sheep, and he chose to be known as the Lamb of God. John declared of Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Nephi similarly also gave the Savior that name: “And I looked, and I beheld the Lamb of God going forth among the children of men. And I beheld multitudes of people who were sick, and who were afflicted with all manner of diseases, and with devils and unclean spirits; and the angel spake and showed all these things unto me. And they were healed by the power of the Lamb of God” (1 Nephi 11:31). Just as He created the lambs (and all the beasts), so too would He condescend to become as a lamb and ultimately to be “brought as a lamb to the slaughter” in order to take upon Him the sins of the world. On the final day of creation we read, “And I, God, created man in mine own image, in the image of mine Only Begotten created I him; male and female created I them” (Moses 2:27). He created man and then chose to come down in the form of a man Himself to experience mortality and show us the way. When Pilate brought Jesus forth wearing a crown of thorns and purple robe he declared to the people, “Behold the man!” He perhaps did not know it, but this was the Man who had created all men and chose to give up His life to save them all. All the days of creation can remind us of Him, just as He declared in the beginning to Adam, “And behold, all things have their likeness, and all things are created and made to bear record of me, both things which are temporal, and things which are spiritual; things which are in the heavens above, and things which are on the earth, and things which are in the earth, and things which are under the earth, both above and beneath: all things bear record of me” (Moses 6:63).