The spirit of Jesus and that of the repentant sinner left their crucified bodies and went to the same place in the spirit world. But neither of them at that time went to Heaven, the abode of the Eternal Father; for, on the third day following, Jesus, then a resurrected Being, positively stated to the weeping Magdalene: "I am not yet ascended to my Father," and added as to an event then future, "but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." (John 20:17). Christ and the contrite thief went to Paradise; but Paradise is not the distinctive abode of God. To infer that the crucified transgressor was saved by his dying confession, and was granted a special passport to Heaven with sins unexpiated and without his compliance with "the laws and ordinances of the Gospel" is to disregard both letter and spirit of Scripture, and to ignore both reason and the sense of justice. We find here no warrant for belief in the efficacy of death-bed confession as a means of grace. Only through individual faith, repentance, and works can remission of sins be obtained. The dying malefactor who won from the Christ the comforting promise of a place in Paradise had manifested both faith and repentance. The blessing promised him was to the effect that he should that day hear the Gospel preached in Paradise. In the acceptance or rejection of the message of salvation he would be left an agent unto himself. The requirement of obedience to "the laws and ordinances of the Gospel" was not waived, suspended, or superseded in his case, nor shall it be for any soul. For the dead who have lived and died in ignorance of the requirements of salvation, as, in another sense, for the disobedient who later come to repentance, the plan of God provides for the vicarious administration of the essential ordinances to the living posterity in behalf of their dead progenitors. Of this saving labor Malachi prophesied in solemn plainness (Malachi 4:5, 6); and the glorious fulfilment has been witnessed in this modern age. The great Temples reared by the Latter-day Saints are maintained in large part for the service of the living in behalf of the dead. -- 18 -- WHY ARE THEY BAPTIZED FOR THE DEAD? Elijah the Prophet on the American Continent