Divine Nature

Last night I was reading my scriptures and came upon 2 Peter 1:4, "...that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust." The word "partakers" struck me. Meaning, we can choose to partake of our divine nature. It (potential) is something that we are born with. We have to work to allow it to become our natural nature. Let me jump to the flip side...if we aren't giving in to our divine nature, then we are giving in to our human nature, or the natural man.

We know that the natural man is an enemy to God. Mosiah 3:19, "for the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man..."We have two natures at play, human nature and divine nature. How do we feed our divine nature to make it our natural personal nature? Thankfully, the scriptures have answers.

2 Peter 1:4-7, "Be partakers of the divine nature. ... Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity." I love this answer. When we extend brotherly (sisterly) kindness and charity to others, we are partaking of our divine nature.

The middle part of Mosiah 3:19 outlines for us how we can shut down our human nature. "...[P]utteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord." Allowing the Atonement to work in our lives allows us to "becom[e] a saint"!! (Am I the only one excited to have the title 'saint' added to my name?!?!) Mosiah 3:19 is a verse of hope! The Atonement of Jesus Christ can save us, even from ourselves. This is what the Atonement is all about. It is Christ's invitation to us to become like him. To make his nature our nature. To walk with him on the path of improvement and perfecting. To give up what is easy and human and to start to embrace who we really are, divine spirit daughters of our Heavenly Father.

Jessica Przybyla