February 19, 2009 Blessings from the Atonement

D&C 18: 11-12
The Lord suffered pain of all mankind. This translates to, in my opinion, He suffered all the pain that is suffered at any time by anyone including the pain of death. He did this so we could repent.

This brings me to a question. I know that it is emotional and spiritual agony to go through repentance especially for something serious. If it weren't for Christ's atonement would this agony have been physical pain as well had we been required to atone for our own sins? And would we have been strong enough to do so? I think not. The natural man is weak and it is so much easier now to do something wrong and brush it aside than it is to go through the embarrasment, fess up, make things right, apologize and change our being in order to fully repent. But the rewards of doing so are incredible and wonderful and liberating. Would we have learned that and known it well enough to go through a physical pain of atoning for our own sins?

He was resurrected from the dead so that He could bring us to Him as long as we repent.

D&C 19: 16-17 & 20

This seems to answer my question above:

16 For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent;
17 But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I;

It seems also that if we don't use the gift Christ has given us, that is the atonement, then we will end up suffering anyway.

Verse 20 says that we may have felt that suffering in the smallest degree if there was a time that He withdrew Himself from us. This also hints that the suffering is more of a spiritual anguish which in my opinion does affect the physical body as well. Anyone who anguishes over something long enough does indeed get physically sick. So if we are suffering in the smallest degree, even enough to make us ill, imagine if we were suffering in the greatest degree - even as Christ had suffered. I believe that would cause both tremendous spiritual and physical pain.

Christ really has done a wonderful thing for us in atoning for our sins and taking that great degree of pain from us, as long as we repent.

D&C 58:42
If we repent we will be forgiven. But that isn't all, the Lord will forget it. It won't ever be an issue again.

This also means we need to forgive ourselves. Trust Christ's words here. If he can "remember them no more" then we must also put them aside and not ever let their memory bring us down.

D&C 76: 62-70

Other blessings of repentance:
We will dwell with God and Jesus Christ for ever
We will be in attendance with Christ on His second coming.
We will have part in the first resurrection and come forth in the resurrection of the just
Our names will be written in Heaven
Just men (and women) are made perfect through Christ

And others are contained in this section.