Human beings did not preexist as spirits in heaven. Rather, God created us as physical beings “in his image” (Genesis 1:27), meaning that God created us to serve as his image-bearers, his representatives, in this physical world. God endowed us as his image-bearers with a moral and spiritual capacity that transcends the material and that is unique among all living things on earth. This transcendent capacity includes the ability to make morally and spiritually significant choices. Human beings have a faculty of choice, of being able to act intentionally, that separates them from the animal kingdom.

Since we did not exist as spirits prior to the beginning of our physical lives as human beings, it is not true that “we began to make choices as spirit children in our Heavenly Father’s presence.” Nor is it true that “our choices there made us worthy to come to earth” (Gospel Principles, 19). Nothing about us was or is “worthy” when we begin our lives on earth. Nor did we choose “to follow Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father” before we were born (Gospel Principles, 16). Each of us begins our earthly lives with neither good nor evil deeds to our account. For example, the apostle Paul tells us that when Rebekah was pregnant with her twins Esau and Jacob, they “were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad” (Romans 9:11). Such choices of good and evil begin only sometime after we are born.