“It thus appears that the declaration of lineage by patriarchs is as such a statement as to who and what we were, as it is who we are now and what we may become. There are those, of course, who believe otherwise. Those who propose that premortality has little or nothing to do with mortality, that there is no tie between faithfulness there and lineage and station here; to believe in any other way, they contend, is racist or exclusivistic. In my view, if there is no relationship between the first estate and the second, why should I believe there is any relationship between what I do here and what I will receive here after?
Those who come to the earth through the lineage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob do so with an inner attraction toward light and truth; they have a predisposition to receive the truth and abide by that truth. They may, in fact, choose in mortality to turn a deaf ear to the message of the gospel or to the principles of righteousness; they may harden their hearts and close their minds and thereby live beneath their spiritual privileges. But if they hearken to the LIght of Christ and follow their conscience, they shall, either in this or in the next, be led to the higher light of the Holy Ghost found in the covenant gospel. Robert Millet: Professor of ancient scriptures
