Adam and Eve: The Great Premortal Debate — A Doctrinal Prelude (Episode Two)

God knew that not all of His spirit children would accept the Plan of Happiness presented in the great heavenly council before life on Earth. Some would rebel and refuse the further instruction that Earth life provides.

Honoring our divine right to choose, Heavenly Father allowed events in heaven to unfold according to our desires. The agency to act morally—made possible through Jesus Christ’s Atonement—is humanity’s greatest gift: the ability to make mistakes, repent, and be forgiven without suffering eternal consequences.

Adam and Eve: A Doctrinal Prelude to the Story of Adam and Eve (Episode 1) I Lived in Heaven, So Did You. introduces God’s Plan of Salvation, affirming that all humans lived as spirits—offspring of God—before birth into mortality. The sections below explore moral agency, Lucifer’s counterfeit “plan,” and God’s eternal design.

What Is Moral Agency? The Power Behind God’s Plan of Happiness

The largest part of our training in heaven was learning to accept the plan for mortality and to keep our first estate—our spiritual heritage and test. Graduation to Earth life marked our progression from spirit existence toward becoming like God the Father.

The First Estate

This is the term Abraham used to describe our premortal existence. Each “estate” of life comes with its own set of challenges and tests we must overcome to progress toward exaltation—becoming perfect in both body and spirit, like Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

God revealed to Abraham:

"They who keep their first estate shall be added upon; and they who keep not their first estate shall not have glory in the same kingdom with those who keep their first estate; and they who keep their second estate shall have glory added upon their heads forever and ever." (Abraham 3:26)

The Second Estate

This is our mortal life. Accepting God’s plan in mortality—because of the inherent goodness of our souls—as we face trials, pain, and spiritual hardship is one of the many tests required to keep this estate. Success in this life prepares us to receive our Third Estate. During this second estate, repentance is essential. Christ made it possible for us to repent, change, and return to Him.

Modern apostle Elder Neil L. Andersen taught:

“The invitation to repent is rarely a voice of chastisement but rather a loving appeal to turn around and to ‘re-turn’ toward God. It is the beckoning of a loving Father and His Only Begotten Son to be more than we are, to reach up to a higher way of life, to change, and to feel the happiness of keeping the commandments. Being disciples of Christ, we rejoice in the blessing of repenting and the joy of being forgiven. They become part of us, shaping the way we think and feel.” [1]

The Third Estate

This estate begins after the Final Judgment. All people will be assigned to one of the many mansions in heaven that Jesus Christ prepares for those who receive Him. The Third Estate refers to our eternal reward in a Celestial, Terrestrial, or Telestial state of existence—each with a glorified body and permanent condition, determined by the laws we chose to live and the desires we embraced. (D&C 76:50–112; 88:20–24, 28–31; Alma 41:3–5; D&C 137:9; 2 Cor. 5:10) [2]

Lucifer disapproved of the possibility that any of us might fail to return to our celestial home with God. His major concern was the reality that all of humanity would forget their heavenly home during our mortal sojourn, our second estate. He believed it unjust that anyone could conceivably never return to heaven.

Keeping the first estate of life meant agreeing to a plan where many might not return to live with God.
Keeping the second estate meant repenting and accepting Christ in order to become like God.
The third estate is the eternal reward for following Christ—becoming joint-heirs with Him of all the Father possesses, Heaven.

To Lucifer, it was a risk not worth taking. The veil of forgetting made mortality too dangerous. He rejected the plan Jehovah presented on the Father's behalf. According to scripture, a third of the hosts of heaven agreed with him. Lucifer swore he could bring every soul back into God's presence—if the Father would give him the glory (power or ability) immediately. With that power, Lucifer would ensure none of us forgot our heavenly home or ever transgressed God’s law. There would be no need for death.

But Lucifer’s plan was self-serving.

He sought the power of God the Father and was jealous of Jehovah, who had progressed to become the foremost among us—even like unto God. Though Lucifer held a noble and influential position as one of the Sons of the Morning, he had not attained a glory comparable to Jehovah’s.

Wielding tremendous influence, he sought the admiration of his fellows and the power that came with it. Power—not love—was his ambition from the beginning. Ambition clouded his understanding of the Father’s plan.

The second estate is not about guaranteed safety—it was about learning and transformation. It was about becoming as benevolent as God so that humanity could one day live as God lives: a perfected, physical being who governs creation through both justice and mercy. All creation obeys God because all creation loves Him. Lucifer did not possess that kind of love or influence over the elements.

God would have willingly given Lucifer divine power—just as He offers it to all who keep His commandments—because such beings would use it to further His eternal purposes. Unlike in fictional portrayals, divine power cannot be used for selfish ends, because the very elements of existence refuse to obey selfish intent.

Lucifer did not want to risk forgetting his premortal life or failing to return. He deceived himself into thinking he could take a shortcut to salvation and power. But God’s glory is not just about power—it is about love, experience, and obedience. Jehovah earned His glory by becoming perfect through experience. Lucifer, unwilling to walk the same path, wanted power without mastery and glory without love. He could not succeed.

God gave humanity the divine gift of agency from the beginning and would not revoke it.

Lucifer’s proposed alternative—though appealing to many—was built on a lie and an impossibility. Under his plan, humanity would have no choice but to follow God. Mortality would be a forced journey, void of agency, and we would return to God unchanged and unproven.

Lucifer’s offer had emotional appeal but no doctrinal foundation. He had no real plan—only ambition cloaked in illusion. That is why he fell.

By contrast, Jesus Christ offered Himself as the foundation of God’s plan, grounded in love—His love and the love of the Father.

Lucifer simply did not want to risk the possibility of failing to return to heaven. As mentioned earlier, he feared the veil of forgetting and the uncertainty of mortality.

But God, patient and sovereign, heard Lucifer’s proposal and rejected it. He upheld His original plan—that each soul would freely choose their eternal path, as had always been the divine pattern.

Lucifer, a Son of the Morning like many others, sought to grasp more glory than he was ready to receive. Rather than progress from grace to grace and from glory to glory, as Christ had done, he demanded the Father’s glory to be handed to him without the journey of obedience. His attempt to usurp divine authority failed, and the council continued without him.

Jesus Christ—known as Jehovah in the pre-mortal realm—is the firstborn spirit child of Heavenly Father and the greatest of all His children. He is a member of the Godhead: the divine counsel of Three we call God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost.

Under the direction of the Father, Jesus Christ created the heavens, the Earth, and the physical bodies of Adam and Eve. He created all things. Gender is not a mortal invention—it was divinely assigned. Each of us was created as either male or female spirits before the world began, just as God spiritually created all things before physically organizing them.

Affirming the divine plan and rejecting any notion that Lucifer’s proposal held sway, Jesus Christ declared: “We will go down, for there is space there, and we will take of these materials, and we will make an earth whereon these [referring to all of us] may dwell; and we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them.” (Abraham 3:24–25)

Jesus also revealed that He would not accomplish the plan alone.

Adam—known as Michael before his mortal birth—assisted in the creation of the Earth. It is fitting that the man who would become the father of the human family helped prepare the world that his posterity would inherit. Alongside Eve, Adam became a vital partner in the Father’s plan to bring God’s children into mortality and guide them back to Him.

Eve, the mother of all living, was equally righteous and valiant before her mortal life. Though her pre-mortal name is not revealed in scripture, she was chosen and prepared for a divine role. Her body, like Adam’s, was created in the image of God. She knew her sacred purpose—to be the mother of humankind—and embraced it with strength and divine clarity.

The diagram above provides a visual representation of the plan presented in the great heavenly council. This divine plan outlines our birth on Earth as mortals—intentionally veiled from memory of our life with Heavenly Father. During mortality, we are to discover and live the principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and make and keep sacred covenants with God that enable our return to His presence.

The veil of forgetfulness exists to give us an authentic opportunity to act by faith—choosing good over evil without the influence of premortal memory. Only in such conditions can our choices be truly our own.

The Plan of Salvation is a pathway to divine unity with God and harmony with all of creation. Each child of God is granted the chance to experience good and evil and decide which they will embrace. The decisions we make in mortality shape our eternal destiny and determine the glory we will inherit throughout the eternities.