Joseph Smith on Eternal Progression

Joseph Smith

Here, then, is eternal life⁠—to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you, namely, by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.

Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pages 346-347, Joseph Fielding Smith, comp., Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1976

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More from Joseph Smith

If a skillful mechanic, in taking a welding heat, uses borax, alum, etc., and succeeds in welding together iron or steel more perfectly than any other mechanic, is he not deserving of praise? And if by the principles of truth I succeed in uniting men of all denominations in the bonds of love, shall I not have attained a good object?

‘Do you believe Joseph Smith, Jun., to be a Prophet?’ Yes, and every other man who has the testimony of Jesus. For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

God was once as we are now, and is an exalted person, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret.

Happiness is the object and design of our existence; and will be the end thereof, if we pursue the path that leads to it; and this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping all the commandments of God. But we cannot keep all the commandments without first knowing them, and we cannot expect to know all, or more than we now know unless we comply with or keep those we have already received.

This morning I read German and visited with a brother and sister from Michigan, who thought that ‘a prophet is always a prophet;” but I told them that a prophet was a prophet only when he was acting as such.