Below are the excerpts I read in class from a talk that Elder Dallin H. Oaks gave at a BYU Devotional. Click here to go to the full text of the talk. Click here to download the mp3 audio of the talk. This is a wonderful talk entitled, Sin and Suffering. I encourage everyone to read it who is interested in better understanding the repentance process.
Elder Oaks taught:
“The repentant sinner who comes to Christ with a broken heart and a contrite spirit has been through a process of personal pain and suffering for sin. He understands the meaning of Alma's statement that ‘none but the truly penitent are saved’ (Alma 42:24).”
“I am suggesting that there is a relationship between sin and suffering that is not understood by people who knowingly sin in the expectation that all the burden of suffering will be borne by another, that the sin is all theirs, but the suffering is all his. That is not the way. Repentance, which is an assured passage to an eternal destination, is nevertheless not a free ride.”
“We often think of the results of repentance as simply cleansing us from sin. But that is an incomplete view of the matter. A person who sins is like a tree that bends easily in the wind. On a windy and rainy day the tree bends so deeply against the ground that the leaves become soiled with mud, like sin. If we only focus on cleaning the leaves, the weakness in the tree that allowed it to bend and soil its leaves may remain. Merely cleaning the leaves does not strengthen the tree. Similarly, a person who is merely sorry to be soiled by sin will sin again in the next high wind. The susceptibility to repetition continues until the tree has been strengthened.”
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