Thoughts on Creation

According to Joseph Smith, matter, spirit (more refined matter), and intelligence are all co-eternal with God. This is in harmony with the observed laws of science, namely the 1st law of thermodynamics—matter/energy can neither be created nor destroyed (fundamentally), but have always existed and always will. And so when we talk of the creation of the world, we do not mean ex-nihilo (out of nothing) as the rest of the Christian world does; but by “creation,” it’s meant that God took of this eternal and unorganized matter and created/organized (in the creative sense) the Heavens and the Earth.

Now we also have no quarrel with the 2nd law of thermodynamics, which talks about entropy and the breakdown of matter. For the natural state of things is chaos and disorder. Things die, decay and break down from greater or heavier to lesser or lighter according to the 2nd law. All particles naturally break down over time and spread apart. Long ago everything should have broken down and scattered throughout the universe. But scientists see another force which they don't understand working against this natural destructive force. For we find the universe in a completely unnatural state of order. And even things in the very process of creation. If you walk into a previously disordered room and find everything cleaned up the natural assumption is not that time is going backwards but that someone has been by to clean it up. If you find a page with the letters of the alphabet ordered into a beautiful sonnet, you do not deduce that teams of monkeys have been strumming at typewriters for thousands of years, but rather that Shakespeare has passed that way.

Seeing that there is order and creation, there must also be an opposing force which creates, organizes, and maintains order—namely God. This is also observed in science. But even so, we see things (the world, men, lives, matter, etc.) breaking down—corruptible and fallen.

Jacob in the Book of Mormon speaks about this subject: 2 Nephi 9:6-7
6 For as death hath passed upon all men, to fulfill the merciful plan of the great Creator, there must needs be a power of resurrection, and the resurrection must needs come unto man by reason of the fall; and the fall came by reason of transgression; and because man became fallen they were cut off from the presence of the Lord.
7 Wherefore, it must needs be an infinite atonement—save it should be an infinite atonement this corruption could not put on incorruption. Wherefore, the first judgment which came upon man must needs have remained to an endless duration. And if so, this flesh must have laid down to rot and to crumble to its mother earth, to rise no more.

And so there would be no reversal if there wasn’t a similar force to the creative one which could restore, redeem and atone things back to their original orderly and proper state. That is the role of the infinite atonement performed by Jesus Christ which restores all things physically and spiritually to their natural state (and thus the need for us to repent and have our natures changed by the Holy Ghost through the mercy and grace of Christ so that when we are restored it is unto righteousness and not filthiness) bringing all things back to a perfect state and thus our corruption puts on incorruption and death is conquered, etc.

Through the Atonement of Christ all men and indeed all of God’s creations will be resurrected physically: cleansed from all imperfections, renewed and restored back to God’s presence. All things will be saved from the destructive forces of nature—death and men who repent and accept Jesus Christ will also be saved from Hell—spiritual death or separation from God, for being cleansed through the grace of Christ, we will be perfected in Him and live forever in the presence of God.

Note: This view of creation from already existing eternal matter is also consistent with the findings of science; for when they try to date this material—who knows what state it would have been in when God started forming the Earth, or how His creative works affected the observable age of such things. New molecules forged together would start a new timeline as traced by science. Layers of the Earth could have been made and shaped in violent, drastic ways that our experience and understanding can’t comprehend, etc.