“Principles of True Repentance”
Ezra Taft Benson #5
given by
Chris C.
The other day my 7 yr. old
came to me and asked, “Mommy, do you repent?”.
It made me stop and think.
President Benson says, “For
those who pay the price required by true repentance, the promise is sure. You can be clean again. The despair can be lifted. The sweet peace of forgiveness will flow into
your lives.”
President Smith says,
“Repentance will be the only panacea for the ills of this world.”
We all know the four steps of
repentance:
1.
Recognizing error
2.
Forsaking bad behavior
3.
Confessing sins
to the Lord or Bishop
4.
Making
restitution to right the wrong
Pres. Benson admonishes us, “It is better to prepare
and prevent than it is to repair and repent!”.
It is daunting to realize that we all need to
repent. Elder Nelson said, “While the
Lord insists on our repentance, most people don’t feel such a compelling
need. They include themselves among
those who try to be good. They have no
evil intent. Yet the Lord is clear in
His message that all need to repent – not only from sins of commission but from
sins of omission as well.”
Although we haven’t murdered anyone today or stolen
anything etc. we all have sins of omission – perhaps writing our personal
history, doing genealogy research, perhaps daily scripture study, temple
worship etc. We have good intentions
and we know what to do, but somehow do not get around to doing it. We need to take these things on one by one
and repent of our procrastination. Inner
peace and blessings will flow.
The Lord works from the inside out. The world works from the outside in. The world would take people out of the
slums. Christ takes the slums out of the
people, and then they take themselves out of the slums. The world would mold men by changing their
environment. Christ changes men, who
then change their environment. The world
would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature. Yes, Christ changes men, and changed men can
change the world.
Alma 5:12-14 asks:
12 And
according to his faith, there was a mighty change wrought in his heart. Behold, I say unto you that this is all
true.
13 And behold,
he preached the word unto your fathers, and a mighty change was also wrought in
their hearts, and they humbled themselves and put their trust in the true and
living God. And behold, they were
faithful until the end; therefore they were saved.
14 And now behold,
I ask of you, my brethren of the church, have ye spiritually been born of God? Have ye received his image in your
countenances? Have ye experienced this mighty
change in your hearts?
Three times we notice “mighty
change of heart”. What does that mean?
Mosiah 5:2 answers:
2 And they all cried with one voice, saying;
Yea, we believe all the words which thou hast spoken unto us; and also, we know
of their surety and truth, because of the Spirit of the Lord Omnipotent, which
has wrought a might change in us, or in our hearts, that we have no more
disposition to do evil, but to do good continually.
As we pursue this mighty
change by implementing the four steps to repentance, we will experience Godly
sorrow which is the deep realization that our actions have offended our Father
and our God. It is the sharp and keen
awareness that our behavior caused the Savior, He who knew no sin, even the
greatest of all, to endure agony and suffering.
Our sins caused him to bleed at every pore. This very real mental and spiritual anguish
is what the scriptures refer to as having a broken heart and a contrite
spirit.
But there is hope!
President Benson teaches that
we must not lose hope as we seek to become Christ like. We can profit by the experiences of the
past. But let us not spend our time
worrying about decisions that have been
made, mistakes that have been made.
Let us live in the present and in the future.
Behold, he who has repented
of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I the Lord, remember them no more. (D&C 58:42)
This is the beginning of a
new day. God has given me this day to
use as I will. I can waste it – or use
it for good, but what I do today is important, because I am exchanging a day of
my life for it. When tomorrow comes,
this day will be gone forever, leaving in its place something that I have
traded for it. I want it to be gain, and
not loss, good and not evil; success and not failure; in order that I shall not
regret the price that I have paid for it.
(H. Wilson)
In conclusion I hope we will
each embrace the words of Spencer W. Kimball when he taught;” There is a
prevalent, perhaps subconscious feeling that the Lord designed repentance only
for those who commit murder or adultery or theft or other heinous crimes. This is of course not so. If we are humble and desirous of living the
gospel, we will come to think of repentance as applying to everything we do in
life, whether it be spiritual or temporal in nature. Repentance is for every soul who has not yet
reached perfection”.
