Repentance as a gift

This is an attempt to reconstruct my talk from last week, and should at least give the gist.

While I did not open with a joke about trying to avoid speaking, I did mention some things about my callings, and pointed out that while there are sometimes difficulties with our responsibilities, they lead to insight and learning and relationships. There are gifts.

I was asked to speak about the gift of repentance, and it was that specifically. With forgiveness it is easy to see the gift in receiving it, but it may be less obvious that repentance, which is often uncomfortable, can also be a gift.

It's something we are commanded to do, and it is one of the earliest commandments. Adam and Eve were commanded to offer sacrifice, and as they did so an angel came and asked them if they knew why they did it, and they did not.

"And then the angel spake, saying: This thing is a similitude of the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth.

Wherefore, thou shalt do all that thou doest in the name of the Son, and thou shalt repent and call upon God in the name of the Son forevermore." (Moses 5:7-8)

They performed sacrifices to look forward to the time when Christ would come, we take the sacrament and remember that He has come, but always the common thread is repenting and calling upon God. We need to remember that we need Him.

Things work better when we are repenting on a regular basis. A few weeks ago we had some plumbing problems, and in addition to resolving what we called him for, he also cleaned out the aerator on our bathroom faucet. There is sand in water, and so there is a filter to trap the sand, but it builds up and can get clogged. Cleaning it is fairly simple - I went and cleaned the aerators on the other two faucets later - and it made an amazing difference. There was all that buildup suddenly gone, and water was flowing freely and powerfully.

It reminded me of Doctrine and Covenants 121:45-46

"Let thy bowels also be full of charity towards all men, and to the household of faith, and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven.

The Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion, and thy scepter an unchanging scepter of righteousness and truth; and thy dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever."


That sounds wonderful. It requires repentance. I think there are a couple of things that can get in the way.

One is that we forget that we need to. Most of us, here in church on Sunday, aren't knocking over banks. We may forget that we need repentance, that we are still imperfect. Often it may be more a matter of what we are like than what we do. Someone needed me to listen, and I was listening, but not as patiently as I should have, or someone had good intentions but they irritated me and I did not care about their good intentions - that was just last week. Things happen where we have too little love or too much judgment. When they are always telling us that we need charity, that's why - it's what will keep us from things like that, but until then there is still repentance, which we are commanded to do.

I think the other obstacle is at the opposite end, where instead of thinking we don't need repentance we think we don't deserve it. I find this with many people that they can believe in the worth and merits of anyone else, except they are all like that, so they don't believe each other when they are encouraging each other. But again, we are commanded to repent, so it gets us past the debate over whether we should or not, and takes us there.

I know there can be fear because of our own feelings of unworthiness, but my experience is that God is only really harsh with us when we avoid repenting, and He is trying to get our attention. When we come to Him on our own He is kind and gentle.

I have spoken on repentance once before, when I was getting ready to leave on my mission. My first thought was that I had no idea what to say about repentance, but you find things because that's what we do, but my biggest repentance came a few months later.

After being out a few months I got a companion who started having some problems. She had been sexually abused when she was younger, and she had done some therapy and dealt with it then, but one of our investigators reminded her a little of her abuser, and it started bringing things back up.

She did some more counseling and got a blessing, but the big turning point happened one morning when she prayed and it was just lifted off of her. Suddenly she was lighter and happier and she could move on.

I was happy for her, but I was also really disturbed. It looked so much like repentance, and I knew she hadn't sinned, so it bothered me that it looked that way.

I don't remember how long it took me to figure it out, but it did eventually come to me that it was because her healing had come through the Atonement.  When Christ suffered in Gethsemane He took all of our sins and all of our pains. That's why it works and how it balances. He doesn't just take the punishment for the wrongdoer, but also the pain of the wronged.

We know that the Atonement doesn't leave much out, and that is an amazing thing. I cannot think of many things lower than abusing a child, but repentance is open to them. He wants them too.

It is amazing how scriptures can mean different things. There is one phrase that comes up three times in Isaiah, and all three are repeated in Second Nephi:

"For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still."

It generally comes after a description of destruction, and I have taken it to mean that tribulations have come but they are not over, which is a perfectly reasonable way of reading it, but one day I saw another possible interpretation.

I am still angry. This is still sin. But I am still reaching out to you. I still want you.

And we can still come to him.

"And in that day thou shalt say: O Lord, I will praise thee; though thou wast angry with me thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me.

Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; he also has become my salvation.

Therefore, with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation."
(2 Nephi 22:1-3)