Digital Only: Answers from an Apostle
What Does It Mean to Truly Repent?
Here are three fundamental truths to help you better understand repentance.
From an address given at the mission leadership seminar on June 27, 2020
Repenting is the first and natural consequence of placing our trust and confidence in the Savior. Described most simply, repentance is turning away from evil and turning to God. As we exercise faith in and on the Lord, we turn toward, come unto, and depend upon Him. Thus, repentance is trusting in and relying upon the Redeemer to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves.
I now want to highlight three fundamental truths.
Truth #1: Repentance requires the Redeemer.
Repentance produces changes in attitudes and behavior, but simply changing attitudes and behavior is not repentance.
During my service as the president of Brigham Young University–Idaho, I talked one Sunday afternoon with a campus bishop. Without disclosing the identity of the individual, he explained to me that he had received a confession from a young person who made the following statement: “Bishop, I violated the law of chastity Friday night. Talking with you is the last thing on my list of things to do to repent. Now that I have confessed, I feel great.”
Recognizing and forsaking sin; feeling remorse and making restitution for sin; and confessing sins to God and, when needed, to our priesthood leaders are all necessary and important elements in the repentance process. However, these essential steps do not constitute a mere behavioral checklist we can mechanically, quickly, and casually complete. If we do these things and fail to recognize and depend upon the Redeemer and His atoning sacrifice, then even our best efforts are in vain.
I have sometimes wondered if we as members of the Church memorize the various steps of repentance—such as recognition, remorse, and restitution—and omit the most important consideration of all: the Redeemer. Turning away from evil does not bring spiritual healing without turning to Christ.
The Savior is often referred to as the Great Physician, and this title has great symbolic significance.
Please consider sin as a spiritual wound that causes guilt or, as described by Alma to his son Corianton, “remorse of conscience.” Pain is to our body what guilt is to our spirit—a warning of danger and a protection from additional damage. From the Savior and His Atonement flows the soothing salve that can heal our spiritual wounds and remove guilt. However, this salve can only be applied through the principles of faith in the Lord and repentance. The results of sincere repentance are peace, comfort, and spiritual healing and renewing.
Stake, mission, and district presidents; bishops; and branch presidents, acting in the authority of the priesthood keys they received when they were set apart, are commissioned representatives of the Redeemer, who provide essential help in the repentance and healing processes. These leaders are physician’s assistants who can diagnose spiritual illnesses and prescribe necessary medications and treatments.
Serious spiritual wounds take both sustained effort and time to heal completely and fully. And the healing process itself can be painful.
How grateful we should be as we ponder the scriptural promises that Christ “shall rise from the dead, with healing in his wings; and all those who shall believe on his name shall be saved in the kingdom of God.”
Truth #2: Repentance requires an honest heart and real intent.
As we repent and turn to the Lord, it is important that we are honest with ourselves. We must work to overcome the excuse making, blaming, and rationalizing that can divert us from truly turning to the Lord.
And as we repent and turn to the Lord, we must have real intent and be honest with Him whose forgiveness we seek. Genuine confession to God, and when necessary to priesthood leaders, must be full and complete.
Some people who lack understanding about the nature of repentance believe they can sin in a calculated and planned way, expecting to conveniently confess to the bishop and then proceed to the temple, to the mission field, and to other spiritual destinations.
As leaders in the Lord’s restored Church, we have a solemn obligation to teach members to not be seduced by such false thinking. How can a person repent and seek forgiveness with real intent when in fact his or her real intent was to sin? How can a person turn to the Lord with full purpose of heart when repentance is casual, superficial, or timed to avoid public embarrassment? Such premeditated and planned prodigality mocks the Atonement of Christ. Forgiveness from such sin surely is possible, but the pathway one must follow is not easy, and the journey is not short.
Truth #3: Repentance, sacred covenants and ordinances, and the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost make it possible to always retain a remission of sins.
Emphasized repeatedly in the scriptures is the consistent connectedness among the principle of repentance, the importance of sacred covenants and ordinances, the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost, and the glorious blessing of always retaining a remission of sins.
As members of the Lord’s restored Church, we are blessed by our initial cleansing from sin associated with baptism and receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost. And that first blessing is magnified by the potential for an ongoing cleansing from sin made possible through the constant companionship and sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost—even the third member of the Godhead. These joyous blessings are vital because “no unclean thing can dwell with God.”
The ordinance of the sacrament is a holy and repeated invitation to repent sincerely and be renewed spiritually; it is central in the process of ongoing sanctification.
The act of partaking of the sacrament in and of itself does not remit sins. But as we repent, prepare conscientiously, and participate in this holy ordinance with a broken heart and a contrite spirit, the promise is that we may always have the Spirit of the Lord to be with us. And then, by the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost, we can always retain a remission of our sins.
Our Heavenly Father and His Beloved Son do not intend for us to experience spiritual renewal, refreshment, and restoration just once in our lives as we are baptized, receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, and are confirmed as members of the Lord’s restored Church. Baptism by immersion, laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the sacrament are not isolated and discrete ordinances.
Rather, they are elements in an interrelated and additive pattern of redemptive progress. Each successive covenant and ordinance elevates and enlarges our spiritual purpose, desire, and performance.
The sequence of discipleship is simple and straightforward: exercise faith in the Savior, repent, receive essential covenants and ordinances, change, strive to always retain a remission of sins, and press forward faithfully on the covenant path. The Father’s plan, the Savior’s Atonement, and the first principles and ordinances of the gospel provide the grace we need to progress line upon line and precept upon precept toward our eternal destiny.
Testimony
Repentance and remission of sins are supernal blessings made possible through the infinite and eternal atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. These principles are real, and they are true. I bear witness of the Savior’s divinity, living reality, and matchless love for us.