Persons on this earth have spirits that are the literal offspring of God the Father. Animals, though I believe they have spirits, are not the offspring of God. Our spirits, as the spirit children of God, still have an eternal component that they were created from which is their intelligence. Intelligences of all things were not created or made an neither indeed can be. They are self-existent. Because of the self-existent nature of our intelligences, God could not create us to be perfect. We could only be created to be what we are to the extent that our intelligences have progressed to become through eternity past. God, knowing that our intelligences are subject to progression saw fit to help us to progress to become more like Himself. The only caveat would be that a person would need to choose to be a good being of his own free will and choice. God would provide a means of gaining knowledge and wisdom and goodness by experiencing good and evil but one would have to choose to abide by these principals of his/her own free will and choice to truly be a good being in and of oneself. Only in this way could they progress to become a truly good being. So God created a temporary world where man could come to and experience a fallen nature and come to know and understand first hand the difference between good and evil and decide for themselves what manner of being they would become. God knowing that mankind in their weakness would need a means of repentance and forgiveness as they struggle with good and evil. Thus God called a member of the Godhead who did not have an immortal resurrected body of flesh and bones yet to be the redeemer of the world to give mankind the chance to overcome his weaknesses and progress into one who understands the evils of bad choices and the goodness and joy of choosing the right. God called Jesus to become the Savior of the world before the foundation of this world. Through Him mankind would have the opportunity, if they made mistakes, to overcome those mistakes and find forgiveness and love from the Almighty.
Mankind has the potential to become perfect, even as our Father in Heaven is perfect. We have the potential to become one with God even as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is one with God the Father. It is really up to us to choose to become such. It is critical that we learn to choose good over evil of our own free will and choice to truly become good beings. If we were forced to be good beings, we would always need to be forced and would not be good beings in and of ourselves. God is a being of free will. He does all that he does of his own free will and choice. For us to be like him, we too must learn to be good beings of our own free will and choice. Thus we are given the opportunity to come to a fallen world to experience good and evil and are allowed to choose in and of ourselves to do good or evil. At times we will make mistakes because of our less than perfect nature but we can progress and become strong and best of all we can repent and be forgiven and put behind us our short comings and overcome. Mortality is a temporary learning ground for us to make choices of what manner of mankind we will become. Eventually this earth will no longer be a fallen world and will become a celestial world of glory. Those who learn to choose good over evil will eventually inherit the earth in its celestial glory. All mankind will eventually obtain an immortal resurrected body that will never suffer the frailties of a mortal body again. But we will all stand before the judgement seat of the Great Jehovah and be judged for the choices we made in this world. The vast majority of all mankind will resurrect to kingdoms of glory. The highest kingdom of glory is celestial but there will be those who are resurrected to terrestrial and telestial glories. Unfortunately there will be those who choose extreme wickedness in this world and they will be consigned to what is known as outer darkness. This is the lake of fire and brimstone mentioned in the Bible. This is where Lucifer, aka Satan or Perdition and all who sided with him in the war in heaven will reside. All who go to outer darkness are they who became sons of Perdition.
It was important that in order or us to make our own free will choices, that a veil be placed over our foreknowledge of our premortal existence in the presence of God. This way we would have to learn to walk by faith and learn to choose good over evil without the influence of our premortal existence. We would not be influenced by our knowledge of God and our valiance in the war in heaven. We would have to choose based on what learn and know only here on this earth. We would thus need to walk by faith and learn to choose good based on our experience of good and evil here on this earth without any other influence. We could learn of our premortal existence and of God and his Word but we would have to take it on faith. We would have to learn to follow goodness for goodness sake. When we all stand before the judgment bar of God, we will all regain a bright recollection of our eternal existence. We will all have the opportunity to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ whether in this world or as the spirits of the dead. For this reason was the gospel also preached to those who are dead (see 1 Peter 4:6). So may we all come to the faith and make good choices in our lives here on earth and in the world of the spirits of the dead. We all get to choose what manner of mankind we will be.
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