1 March 1979
Repentance in the Restored Gospel can be viewed as the process of change. Specifically, it is the change from being a natural man to being as Christ. To endure to the end is to repent so completely that we become new creatures, just men made perfect, even as our Father in Heaven is perfect.
Seen this way, repentance is an educational process. It involves comprehending something that is better, then achieving that better condition. Line upon line, precept upon precept, the servant of Christ is taught to understand and then to exemplify a new way of living.
To construe repentance as education is not to construe all education as repentance, for one can learn to become evil as well as good. But viewing education in this manner does help us better to promote repentance. We see clearly that repentance is the process wherein gospel principles are progressively taught and learned, thus enabling the faithful to govern themselves correctly.
The principal reason for the existence of the Church of Jesus Christ in every dispensation is to promote repentance. It does this by first teaching and preaching the Gospel to all to whom the Savior sends them. The Gospel is the basic message as to how to repent. Then, for those who accept the gospel, the Church assumes the responsibility of perfecting the saints, that all who will, may endure to the end. Everything in this world that is virtuous, lovely, of good report, or praiseworthy is sought after in order that all persons may come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
While it is the principal responsibility of Church leaders to promote repentance, Gospel education in the full sense, that opportunity is shared by every member of the kingdom. Apostles, prophets, and presidents are set to teach, preach, expound, exhort as they lead the house of Israel to become like the Savior. But it is a wicked and slothful servant that must be commanded in all things. Each covenant servant has within him the gift of the Holy Ghost, that precious pearl of great price which empowers each to be an agent himself, to receive knowledge and direction from heavenly sources and to bring to pass much righteousness by careful, repentant obedience thereunto.
Every faithful person in the Church of Jesus Christ thus ought to be engaged in the process of education. Each one should be seeking, searching, learning from those who are above him in the stewardship structure of the kingdom, including for everyone divine sources, but always being attentive to presiding authorities. Each one should be appropriately teaching, encouraging, correcting, commending all those who come within his stewardship, even if that stewardship includes only one’s self. And each person should be humble enough to learn from those under him in stewardship.
The thesis of this paper is that repentance will be enhanced in the Church by seeing it as a species of education, and that education will be enhanced in the Church by seeing it as a species of repentance. Such a view would promote the following consequences:
- It would be plain that knowing the Gospel is not enough; that it is doing what we know which fulfills both repentance and education.
- It would be more easily recognized that telling people what they ought to do is only the first step of leadership; helping them to learn to do what they ought to do is also required for repentance and for education.
- Seen this way, repentance would lose the negative connotation it has for some (that which immoral people must do) and would become the way of life for all Church members who are not yet perfect.
- Seen this way, education would become a life-long way of living for all Church members, learning to know and to be able to do every good thing, thus to become able to bless others as did the Savior.
- Just as repentance is seen to be a means, not an end, linking it with education would help all to see that education is not an end but a means to greater service to others, a preparation for righteousness. This would tend to cure one of the persistent perversions of the “civilized” world: the idea that education is an end, sometimes held to be the ultimate end, in itself.
- If the additional idea of hungering after excellence is added to education, quality added to quantity, then education, as repentance, clearly centers on the Savior. For it is He who is the spirit of truth and light in the world, showing the world a more excellent way. Only in and through Jesus Christ is quality education fulfilled, just as only in and through Him is repentance fulfilled. He is the fountain of all righteousness.