Jesus Christ 07: Repentance

We started talking about the fact that the planet salvation, Jesus is the star of the planet salvation. And we love to say, okay, he's the center of the planet salvation, but for whom was the plan written? Why is there a planet salvation? We didn't come about so that he could have someone to save. He was chosen because the plan was written for us. We are the stars of the planet salvation. We are here to learn how to obtain a kingdom of glory. We're here to decide what we want. And so what we need is a fallen world where we can choose for ourselves. Not with mom and dad looking over your shoulders. I mean, anyone live with mom and dad. It's okay if you do, but it's a little bit harder to be yourself and mom and dad's house, right? Yeah, it is. Now, as soon as you move out, you live on your own. You live with mom and dad? No, I live with my brother. Okay, a little bit better, but still living with your brother, right? Anyone live on your own? Mom and dad gone, right? Mom and dad gone. I can choose for myself. You see the difference? So why do we leave pre-mortality? We came to a place that even the memory of them was taken away so that we could be free to choose for ourselves. Now, the problem is the laws of justice demand punishment for sin. But we need to be able to choose. And so if that punishment was immediately imposed, our whole life would be about paying the penalty and not about learning and growing. So in order to give us the place that we need, in order to give us a life in which we could choose and be free, someone had to pay for all of those mistakes. The analogy I use, my son works for Arctic Circle. He got hired by Arctic Circle and they asked him to make a nice cream cone. Can you picture what, can you imagine what he's 17? Can you imagine what a 17-year-olds first ice cream cone looked like? Now they didn't fire him when he made a horrible ice cream cone because why? They're okay with a lousy ice cream cone because you're learning and you're growing, right? Did they give it to a customer? Did they charge him for it? What did they do? They just ate it and throw it away. But someone had to pay for that ice cream cone. You and I are here to learn for ourselves. And instead of immediately having to pay the penalty, someone pays the penalty for all of the mistakes. Someone says, I'll pay the penalty for all mistakes so that they don't have to immediately suggest us is satisfied because the payment was made but I don't have to make the payment and I don't have to pay it in full. And that's what the atonement is all about. He frees us from the immediate payment we would have to make for every sin we made. So instead, sin can be a learning thing. I can learn from it and move on and not have to pay the penalty. So he paid the full penalty. So then we talked about what does that look like? What does his payment look like? And we explored exactly what it cost him. But now the question is what are the conditions for which he will pay my debt? So he has this bank, he's paid the debt. He's paid this infinite debt at what point does he pull it out of his account and put it into mine so that my debt is paid? Well, he has given the conditions. Long story short, we won't go back and go there but he has said, if you do these five things, I will pay the penalty. I will pay the penalty and your sins are erased. If you don't do these things, you're gonna have to pay the penalty. But what are the five things? You learned them in primary. We've talked about them your whole life. If you want his payment to count for you, if you want him to cleanse your sins with the payment he made, you must have faith in him. So what he asks, so we talked about that last week. Next, you must repent. And then, baptism, covenants, temple, holy ghost, and endure to the end. Those are the things he has said you do these things, I will take my payment, apply it in your behalf and your payment is paid in full. You owe nothing to justice. Now learn from your mistakes and move on. So we've talked about faith. Faith is the act of holding on to what you know is true even in your fears. And there's the moment. That's the reward for doing so is I will cleanse. If you hold on to the promises that I've given, even in your fears, faith can wipe away sins. There's numerous scriptures where the Lord wipes away sins like enus, your sins are forgiven you. And he says, "How is this done Lord?" You remember what the answer was? Your faith. Your faith has clung to you. So today we're gonna talk about this one. And forgive me, this is one of the most misunderstood gospel concepts. Repentance is one of the most misunderstood principles. And I think I have identified why. So let me start with the problem we've got to correct. Here's the problem as I see it. There is what we call church repentance. Church repentance kind of gets into our brain and we think that all repentance is church repentance and we don't separate the two. And that's our problem. We see repentance as church repentance. So I'm gonna make, I'm gonna be so bold as to say, I don't think I'm gonna assume no one in this room needs church repentance. If you do, you go talk to your bishop. But I'm gonna make the assumption that no one needs church repentance. So can we throw that out the window and stop assuming that all repentance is church repentance and ask what does repentance look like for normal people whose membership is not in jeopardy? We let this small little piece of repentance which may be applies once in a while. Dominate our understanding of all repentance. So let's talk about church repentance and then please throw it out the window. And then let's ask what is daily repentance? What is the, the blessing of this as I get to stay a member of the church? I wanna ask, when does repentance cleanse my sins? When does my repentance cause my sins to be erased? And you need to throw this one out the window, okay? So let's have a brief discussion about church repentance. Let me point out that on the side of every church building, every single church building has a sign at the bottom of the sign it says what? All are welcome, visitors welcome. Everyone can come, but if you're gonna join this church, there is a bar too clear. So let me just kinda put it like a graph. You cannot be a member of the church if your life is below that line. I would say this is the telestial terrestrial line. You cannot be a member of the church and live the telestial law. You can't. Now you can come to sacrament and you can be with us, but you cannot enter the waters of baptism and become a member if your life is dipping below that line. I don't know if you know how this works, but in the mission field before anyone gets baptized, they have a baptismal interview. I was a zone leader, I was a district leader, I did hundreds of those interviews. I interviewed hundreds of people for baptism. And guess what, sometimes I said no. I said no, you cannot be baptized. And guess what, what was the reason? - They weren't ready. - Sin. [BLANK_AUDIO] We're doing something that you cannot do and be a member of the church. If a man and a woman are living together outside of marriage, you cannot be baptized. You can't. You go to church every, I'm sorry, you can't be baptized if you're not married. Sometimes the missionaries didn't know that and they would come and they'd, you know, I'd interview them and I'd say, "You married?" No, I'm not married. "Oh, okay, we have a problem. You can't be baptized." I became an expert on how to get married in Mexico. There's all over the country called me because I got, I was an expert on how to get married in Mexico. Mexico has some pretty weird requirements when it comes to marriage and you cannot get baptized. You cannot get baptized if you have a word of wisdom problem. And so to enter the church, your life has to be above that bar. Now, quite often in those interviews when the answer was no, they came back a little bit later and they'll answer was yes because they had cleared the bar. That makes sense. Now, here's the question. What if you enter the church above the bar but then your life dips below that bar? You've done something as a member that you couldn't have been baptized having done that. Now what? Your membership is in jeopardy. Maybe you shouldn't be a member because your life has dipped below the membership bar. Maybe we should take your membership away. Now you can't decide that. The only way that gets decided is you, just like the missionary, you have to meet with a representative of the church to say, "Here's what I've done, here's how I've repented, here's how I feel." And that representative can say, "You know what? You can stay a member." Or you can stay a member under these conditions or sometimes guess what we have to say. You can't be a member. You can't and they get excommunicated. So a human being that represents the church has to make a decision about you staying a member or not. Now how can human beings do that? Well we measure things that human beings can measure. Like for example, confession. So all of a sudden we begin to compile a list. Here's how human beings know that your repentant and that your trajectory is upward and that you can stay a member of the church. So we have all these little measuring tools that human beings can use to measure things like remorse and sorrow and all of the things and confession. But here's the problem. We begin to think that those things are repentance. Heavenly Father needs none of those things. Human beings need those things because they have to decide if you're going to stay a member. But that's church repentance. And the only purpose of that is to make sure that someone whose life has dipped below that line can still be a member. Human beings have to make that decision and that's hard. And so we do our very best to say here's how human beings measure that. Do you see what I'm saying, church repentance? Now can I freely admit there's a little bit of shame in church repentance? There's a little bit of embarrassment in church repentance. There's privation. You can't protect the sacrament. And bless our hearts, we begin to think that that's repentance, it's not. That is church repentance where a human being has to decide about your membership. And we throw that out and ask, what does everyday repentance look like? What does it look like? Well, let me read this to you. Years ago there was, there are certain general authorities. So if you get excommunicated and you want to get rebabtized, you have to appeal to the first presidency. The first presidency decides whether or not your membership can be restored. So can you imagine the people who prepare those documents and go in and present to the first presidency? One of those general authorities who must have seen all of this confusion about church repentance and real repentance, creeping into these documents, he finally wrote an article for the enzyme that said, we've got to stop. And I just, I love this. So his name was Theodore Embert and he was Elder Burton. He said, as a general authority, I have prepared information for the first presidency to use in considering applications to re-admit repentant transgressors into the church and to restore priesthood and temple blessings. Anytime a bishop will write, I feel he has suffered enough, but suffering is not repentance. Suffering is not repentance. Suffering comes from a lack of repentance. Don't measure your repentance by how much you've suffered. That's a bad measurement and yet it's a human measurement for church repentance. A state president will write, I feel he's been punished enough. We took the saccharinamoe, blah, blah, blah, all these things that we took away. He's been punished enough, but punishment is not repentance. Don't measure repentance by how much they've been punished. It's a horrible measurement. Punishment is not repentance. Punishment follows disobedience and precedes repentance. A husband will write, my wife has confessed everything, but confession is not repentance. Don't measure repentance by confession. Confession is an admission of guilt that occurs as repentance begins again. We confess to convince a human who can't know anything else that I should stay a member of the church. I get that at the most basic lowest level, but that is not the highest level of repentance. Confession is not repentance. Confession because you confess doesn't mean you're repented and just because you didn't confess doesn't mean you didn't repent. If your life dips below that line, go see your bishop, but don't go see your bishop for every sin you commit. Get that out of your head. A wife will write, my husband is filled with remorse, but remorse is not repentance. Versus how human beings measure repentance. I can see how sorry you are. Children learn that. What got you out of time when you were a kid? How did you get out of time out? You said you were sorry, right? Remorse is how human beings measure repentance. My son got smart enough to, on the way to time out, I'm sorry dad, I'm really sorry. No, no son, it doesn't work that way. You're just trying to play the sorry card to get out of punishment. Being sorry isn't repentance. That is a horrible way to measure repentance. Get it out of your head. Remorse and sorrow continue because a person has not yet fully repented. Now listen, suffering, punishment, confession, remorse, and sorrow may, what is this word here? Sometimes a company repentance, but they are not repentance. You've got to get church repentance out of your head. That is the lowest level of repentance. So what is get your sins forgiven repentance? If suffering, punishment, confession, remorse, and sorrow are, you can stay a member of the church repentance. And I don't mean to belittle that, I don't think I hope you don't think I'm belittling that. I just think we so often mistake the lowest level of repentance for what repentance really is. When does repentance cleanse your sins? It has changed a part. But even that, can you change and not repent? Yeah. What is repentance? What is repentance? And when does it qualify for a forgiveness of sins? So let's answer that question. Let's throw church repentance out. I don't mean to be disrespectful, but what is real repentance? May I testify, and then we're going to turn to the scriptures. Repentance is about restoring a relationship. Repentance is about restoring a damaged relationship. It's about fixing the relationship that you damaged. It's not about sorrow and confession. It's about a relationship, a relationship with a divine being, and you have damaged that relationship. Repentance is about fixing the relationship. Now, let's turn to the Book of Mormon. Let's say the Book of Mormon is the standard on how to repent. There are at least two scriptures in the Book of Mormon that say faith is. Nowhere in the Book of Mormon will you ever find repentance is and then a description. It doesn't say repentance is. Instead, what it does is it illustrates repentance over and over and over again. Now, here's the funny thing. Does everyone in the Book of Mormon who repents do the same thing? Do they go through the same actions? There's a lesson in that. They don't do the same things. But may I suggest for the sake of our discussion that we'll jump in and take a look at. May I suggest that the two things, everyone who repents in the Book of Mormon, there's two things they have in common. Number one, they fix the relationship with the Savior that they damaged. They get the Savior back into their life. They repair the relationship and number two, they change. But what's the point of their change? What's the why change? So that they stop damaging the relationship. They fix a relationship that's been damaged and they stop damaging the relationship. So it's not that they change. It's not that they change. It's that they stop damaging the relationship. Otherwise, they just keep doing the same thing and kicking Christ out of their life. Every single one that repents in the Book of Mormon is trying to restore a relationship. And then they ask, "What can I do to no longer damage that relationship?" Should we see a few of them? Let me show you some obvious ones. Let's talk about King Lemona's dad. Here's kind of a classic. Now, this guy has not been a good man, right? Let me set this stage. What kind of man has this been? Here's the man that shows that he meets Lemona, Lemona and Ammon, right? I'll be King Lemona's dad. There's Lemona and my son and there's Ammon. When I see my son, what do I say? Where have you been and why are you with a Nephite? You should kill him. You should kill the Nephite. And then Ammon says, "I'm not going to kill the Nephite." So tell me what this man says. Then I'm going to kill, not the Nephite, I'm going to kill you, my son. What kind of man is this? This is a horrible man who says, "If you don't want to kill that Nephite, then you're my enemy and I'm going to kill you." And then he repents, he repents, now listen to the heart and soul of his repentance. And tell me if you can see the two elements. My behavior has pushed God out of my life and I want him back in. And I want to stop doing what kicks him out. See if you can see him both. Ready? Oh, God. Aaron has told me that there is a God. See if there is a God and if thou art God, will thou do what? Come back into my life, make thyself known unto me. And I will do what? I'll stop doing the things that push you away. You see the two elements? Don't thou make thyself known unto me and I will give away all my sins to know thee. This isn't about sorrow and confession. He didn't run to his bishop. He fixed a damaged relationship. That does the Lord honor that repentance. Does the man get forgiveness? He does. This is a horrible man or do I all agree this is against God is a horrible man. But his repentance qualifies him for a forgiveness of sin. And the atonement pays the penalty and his sins are wiped out. Repentance becomes an active thing when we get the relation and we get the savior back into our lives. We restore the relationship that I damage by what I thought or said or dead. I push them away and now I want him back. How about Alma? Alma's been a pretty horrible person, right? Would y'all agree, persecuting the church, trying to destroy it? He even says, I had rebelled against my God, I had not kept his commandments, I had murdered many of his children, at least spiritually, I deliberately led people into destruction. So great had been my iniquities, I didn't even want to face God. Tell me what he did. In my pain, I remembered my father to have prophesied unto the people concerning the coming of Jesus Christ, a son of God to atone for the sins of the world. And as my mind caught hold upon this thought, did he run to his bishop? Where did he run? He ran to the savior. Oh, Jesus, thou son of God, have mercy on me. You see what he's doing? He's fixing a damaged relationship. Come back. Then what does he say? I have done what? From that moment to the present I've done what I have tried to maintain the relationship. I changed my behavior so that I could fix the relationship and not keep pushing it out. Do you see those two elements? Let me show you a weird one. Ready? No one repents like this. And yet it worked. The Lord honors the repentance. Let me show it to you. Helaman chapter five. Do you remember the, how many is it? 400? 300? It's 300. Come into the jail. Is it the 300 that come into the jail? Sorry, I lost the book of Mormon. Let's go back. Helaman chapter five, 300 people come into the jail trying to hurt out. Those are pretty bad people, right? They're coming into the jail to harm Nephi and Lehi. They want to kill the prophets. And then a darkness overshadows them. They were overshadowed with a darkness and an awful solemn feel came upon them. And then they hear a voice that says repent. And then a dissenter, someone who knew better, they say to him, what shall we do that this cloud of darkness may be removed from overshadowing us? How do I, how do I repent? How do I get the darkness to go away? In a minute, Ab, who was one of them, one of the bad guys, but he knows better. He's been in the church. He was a dissenter. He says you must repent and then tell me what he does. Cry unto the voice, even until you shall have faith in Christ. You want to repent? You've got to talk to Him. You've got to get close to Him. You've got to talk. You don't need a bishop as much as you need Him. Cry into the voice. Cry into the voice until you have faith. And so they do. They did all begin to cry unto the voice of Him who had shaken the earth. And then what happens? The darkness is dispelled. The fire that was encircling Nephi and Lehi now encircles them. And what does it say? Did God honor their repentance? Did any of them go see their bishops? Did they go six months without taking the sacrament? You see my point? I don't mean to be facetious, but what did they do? They fixed a damage relationship. They cried unto the Him. And when you get Jesus back in your life, He brings forgiveness. Now you want to see step number two? They restored the relationship. And then what did they do? They were bitten to go forth, to marvel and not, and to go tell all the people as many as were convinced did lay down their weapons of war and also their hatred and their traditions. And they did yield up to the Nephites, the lands of their possession. I'm going to stop damaging the relationship. You see where repentance is? Over and over and over. You study the Book of Mormon. Anti-Nephi, Lehi's? What do they do to prove to God that they're changed, that they don't want to hurt the relationship anymore? They bury their weapons of war. Listen to the language. Why do they bury their weapons of war? Listen, and you'll see that whole element at time and time again, all these sinners that repent. This is Lamonai's brother, anti-Nephi, Lehi is his name. We've done all that we could do to repent. Let us stain our swords no more. Now listen to the plea here. Oh how merciful is our God. Since it has been all that we could do to get our stains taken away from us and our swords are made bright, let us hide them away that we kept bright as a testimony to our God that we have not stained our swords in the blood of our brethren since he imparted his word unto us and has made us clean thereby. Let us hide our swords. Let us bury them away as a testimony that we have never used them and we won't use them. You see what they're saying? I don't want to damage the relationship anymore. I want to stop pushing him away. You go throughout the Book of Mormon and everyone who repents in the Book of Mormon, they have those two things in common. What can I do to fix the relationship? How can I get the Savior back in my life? And then how can I change so that I stop pushing him away? Words is about getting Jesus back into your life. Sometimes all you need to do is to reach out, reach out to Heavenly Father, connect with the people you pushed away and invite them to come back into your life and commit to stop doing the things that pushed them away. You see, that's a totally different level of repentance. Let me summarize this with C.S. Lewis. Now he wasn't a member of our faith, but man, I think he caught the vision of repentance. He said repentance can be on very different levels. At the lowest, what you might call pagan penitents, there is simply the attempt to placate a supposedly angry power. I'm sorry, I won't do it again, let me off this time. At the highest level of repentance, the attempt is rather to restore and infinitely valued and yet vulnerable personal relationship, which has been shattered by an act of one's own. I pushed him away by something I said or thought or did. I pushed him away, I pushed him out of my life. The highest level is to restore that infinitely valued and yet vulnerable personal relationship. If forgiveness in the crude sense of remission of penalty comes, this is valued chiefly as a symptom or a seal or even a byproduct of the reconciliation. I want his forgiveness. I want him to forgive me, but you know what I want more than that? I want him, I want him in my life. If he forgives me great, but I just want him back. That is the kind of repentance that brings forgiveness of sin because when he comes, he cleanses his sins. He runs back. The moment I invite him back, repentance is what we do to get him to come back. It's not a matter of just doing the things, it's I want him back. So let's take, for example, the sons of Mosiah, they offended the Lord. One of the ways they wanted him back, look what they did. So like Alma, they repent, and look what they do. Look at verse 35. What is one of the ways I can show Jesus I want him back in my life? Tell me what they do here. Zealously striving to repair the injuries which they had done to the church. Now that's not a check it off, I did that. That's a Lord that I want to show you, I want you in my life. So I'm going to fix what I broke. Here's an interesting thing. They're trying to fix what they broke in this relationship to fix which relationship. See that? One of the best ways to invite him back in is to reconcile here. But there are other ways. However you get Jesus back in your life, whatever you do, invite him back. And then stop pushing him away. That's repentance. And when he comes, he cleanses his sins. You can have your sins forgiven whenever you want. It can be on a daily basis. Just get him back in your life. Get him back in your life. And that's repentance. Now that being said, if your life is dipped into the celestial level and your memberships in jeopardy, fix your relationship with Christ first and then go fix your relationship with the church so that you can maintain your membership. But one of the best ways to show them that your repentant is to fix this relationship. I testify he is willing at any moment. How quickly was Alma forgiven? How quickly were these people who did horrible things forgiven? For Mona's dad, not a good man, Alma the younger, not a good man. And yet? He's willing to erase all those sins if we fix the relationship. Would you ponder what you can do today to fix your relationship with the Savior? I say that in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.