Maybe I am missing something...so by doing works that we are commanded to do...we are scrambling for a better spot in heaven?
No. We are glorifying God with our bodies.
We are testifying to the work of redemption that God has worked in our lives for an unbelieving world to see.
What happened with me with an acquaintance of mine, was that I worked with him at one job, then took another job and found that he had started there just before I did. I knew him at the first job before he accepted Christ, and I saw the incredible change in him at the second job after accepting Christ (sometime between jobs).
I was stunned and I remember the people at work were all sneering about how he had *found religion*, and yet when I saw the change in him I remember thinking *I don't know what he's got but I sure want it.*
They will know we are followers of Christ by our love for one another. It's proof of the reality of the spiritual birth. That rewards are given for it is secondary.
Matter of fact, I'm not even sure what rewards I'll get if any. But one thing I'm feel pretty confident of, is if I'm doing the works to earn the reward, I WON'T get it because the motivation was not right.
That's what Mormonism teaches...
Ya pays yer money and ya takes yer chances.
AFTERLIFE: The Mormon afterlife is divided up into four levels. From the lowest to the highest they are: hell, and then three levels of heaven: the telestial, the terrestrial, and the place where God dwells, the celestial (also called the kingdom of God). The celestial is also divided, the highest level being "exaltation," or becoming a God.
HEAVEN-The Mormon church teaches there are three levels of heaven (three "degrees of glory"):
HELL: A place of torment from which the worst of sinners are resurrected (if they repent) into the Telestial kingdom; only a limited number remain in hell forever, - the devil and the demons and apostates who consciously reject and work against Mormonism.
Mormonism has taught that those in the Telestial kingdom will have paid for their own sins in spirit prison, a temporary hell which serves as a place of purging before entrance into heaven (cf. D&C 138: 58-59).
Orson F. Whitney preached:
"But those who reject the Gospel altogether and are besotted and crimestained---what of them? It is written that they will be thrust down to hell; even the murderer, the liar, the sorcerer, and the whoremonger. They will, in short, be damned. But they will only be damned to the extent justified by their sins. Even for them there is hope, after they have 'paid the uttermost farthing.' They will be punished, as all men must be, for neglect of duty, for transgression of the laws of God; but after they have been punished sufficiently, they will be brought forth and saved in a glory of which the stars in heaven are typical." ("The Three Great Teachers", May 8, 1898; Brian H. Stuy, ed., Collected Discourses 1886-1898, v. 5)
Chapter 41 of the 2009 Gospel Principles manual quotes D&C 19 and concurs the same:
"Also in the spirit prison are those who rejected the gospel after it was preached to them on earth or in the spirit prison. These spirits suffer in a condition known as hell. They have removed themselves from the mercy of Jesus Christ, who said, 'Behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent; but if they would not repent they must suffer even as I; which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit' (D&C 19:16-18). After suffering in full for their sins, they will be allowed, through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, to inherit the lowest degree of glory, which is the telestial kingdom" (Gospel Principles, 2009, p. 244).