[CHAPTER XVIII.]
REPENTANCE.
Something of the importance of the subject of repentance, as connected with the Gospel, may be learned from the stress laid upon it by those who have been sent of God to instruct the people in the ways of life. The burden of John the Baptist's teaching was, "Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."[A] Jesus also told the people of Jerusalem, that except they repented, they should perish.[B] When upon the Western hemisphere, among the Nephites, he also taught repentance as one of the conditions of salvation, saying to them, "Whosoever will hearken to my words, and repenteth and is baptized, the same shall be saved."[C] And of course it follows that those who repented not, and were not baptized, could not be saved.
[Footnote A: Matt. iii: 2.]
[Footnote B: Luke xiii: 1-5.]
[Footnote C: III. Nephi xxiii: 5.]
When the apostles, that were chosen in Judea, began the execution of the commission given them, viz., to go and teach all nations, the very first thing they required the people who received their words to do was that they should repent.[D] Paul bears witness, that though in the days of ignorance God winked at sins, when the Gospel was declared unto the people, he commanded men everywhere to repent. And in this last dispensation, the Lord inspired his servant Joseph Smith to say, "We know that all men must repent, and believe on the name of Jesus Christ, * * * or they cannot be saved in the kingdom of God."[E]
[Footnote D: Luke xiii: 1-5.]
[Footnote E: Doc. and Cov., sec. xx: 29.]
From these scriptures it is evident that repentance is one of the conditions of salvation, and, indeed, reason, no less forcibly than revelation, would teach us that it is one of the conditions on which salvation is predicated. It must forever precede a forgiveness of sins. He who is impenitent is in no condition to receive a forgiveness of sins; he does not desire it; he would not receive it; he refuses to surrender, and however much men and angels may deplore his state of mind, one cannot conceive how God would forgive anyone in open rebellion to him and his laws, and who persists in that rebellion. Not until the spirit is humbled, not until the heart throbs with genuine sorrow for repeated violation of God's holy laws, not until the citadel of sin is surrendered, can man hope for forgiveness, or expect salvation.
But what is repentance? I shall venture as a definition this, Repentance is a deep and heartfelt sorrow for sin, producing a reformation of life. That is the significance of the word to my mind as associated with the Gospel; and I think such a definition arises from the spirit, and, I may say, the letter of the scriptures.