Hey there everybody, welcome out.
It's another podcast.
I have Dave here with me.
Good day.
We're here.
It's starting to feel a little fallish, more than fallish.
A little winterish and it's going to be a good season, holiday seasons up on us now.
We can start listening to Christmas songs soon.
Basketball season starts, that makes you happy.
Oh man, basketball.
We got everything, football, baseball, hockey, all going on at once here.
Yeah, this is the sweet spot.
Good time of the year, wonderful time of the year and so many things to be thankful for.
Yeah.
Thankful to be here.
Not the least of which is we actually will have snow coming here soon too.
In fact, we have a little bit of snow here on the Wasatch Front in the mountains of course,
but I have my ski pass Dave, I'm ready to go.
Oh cool.
I'm going to, I don't know what I'm going to do Scott without golf.
I've been golfing quite a bit this summer.
And I don't know how I'm going to, I got to do something physically active.
I'm going to have to go join a gym or something and play some racquetball or something.
I don't know.
Yeah.
I figure that out.
That's a blast from the past for you Dave.
I got invited to join a bowling league and I was grateful for the invitation, but last
time I went bowling, I did something to my knee and it popped and I-
Yeah.
That's a pretty rough sport.
You should probably avoid bowling.
So I can't even do bowling.
So I don't know what I'm going to do.
I don't either.
Well, I can always take you skiing with me or you could go-
Oh yeah.
That would really be good for me.
Or you could head south and do some golfing.
Just make sure you come back on the days that we record podcasts.
Speaking of podcasts, we've got another one I think planned that's going to be great today.
So let's just dive in Dave.
Why don't you, I'm going to let you kind of intro.
I want to take a little time today if we can answer some questions that have been asked
recently and some in the past.
I won't necessarily read every question.
We've had several and I won't read every question, but I'll just try to answer some of the questions
that I've been pondering for a while.
Maybe start with the most recent, because I've had multiple people that I know personally
who have texted me or who have emailed us or communicated with us.
I shared a story a few episodes ago, Scott, that kind of I guess hit a nerve with people
about patriarchal blessings and talked about the young man who wasn't worthy to come on
his mission and he went home and thankfully he came back after repenting and really learning
how to access the atonement of Jesus Christ in his life and completely changed and I knew
his countenance had changed and I knew he was going to be a powerful missionary and
he goes out on his mission and we write a few letters back and forth to each other.
I was his branch president at the Missionary Training Center and he wrote me a letter,
this has been several years ago, years before I was ever ordained a patriarch, and he asked
the question, do I need to get another patriarchal blessing?
Because when I got my patriarchal blessing I wasn't worthy to get it.
And I answered back then a little bit of what I understood about it, which was no, you don't
need to get another blessing.
But now as an ordained patriarch, you know, I would answer that question probably more
completely, I would answer it probably more effectively.
And anyway, I want to just answer that question for everyone who feels that they either weren't
worthy when they got their patriarchal blessing or they were extenuating circumstances when
they got their patriarchal blessing or they didn't really feel the Spirit of the Lord
maybe as much as they should have or could have or would have when they got their patriarchal
blessing for whatever reasons.
And I've contemplated that a lot and I know I've had different people that I've given
patriarchal blessings with.
I have known on occasion that some weren't worthy to receive it.
But I'm not their bishop and I'm not going to paint them into a corner and tell them
that they're not worthy.
I knew they weren't worthy.
But I knew the Lord had a blessing for them.
I wasn't their judge, so I wasn't going to say anything.
And I never felt like the Lord was going to hold back on any blessings He was going to
give His children.
And the reason is, Scott, is because this is really important, that the Lord sees all
things at once.
He sees the beginning to the end.
And He doesn't base one patriarchal blessing upon such a small amount of time, even if
it was a person, let's say, gets their blessing when they're 17 or 18.
He's not going to base that blessing upon the first 18 years of their life as bad or
as good as they might be.
He's going to base that blessing upon their pre-mortal existence.
I think that affects their blessing even more than their first 18 years of this life.
And then He's going to base that blessing upon their life after they get their patriarchal
blessing for the rest of their mortal life, and even into post-mortality, that a patriarchal
blessing takes in all three of those periods of our life—pre-mortal life, mortality,
and post-mortal.
So, I know that God, who sees all things from beginning to end, is not limiting His blessing
upon an individual's worthiness or not worthiness.
I know what it does affect is whether that individual feels the Spirit or the power of
the blessing when they receive it.
But that does not mean that year or years or months, whatever, that they can't feel
the power of that blessing as they repent and get the Holy Ghost.
And that blessing, even if they weren't worthy when they received it, when they were
18, that blessing is their personal liahona, according to President Thomas S. Monson.
Patriarchal blessing is a liahona.
And that that liahona will work as their guide throughout their journey in life when, just
like the liahona in Lehi's day, it worked based upon their faith and their diligence.
So, based upon their faith and diligence, any patriarchal blessing an individual receives,
whether they're worthy or not worthy, can be a guide to them throughout their life as
they become worthy and qualify for the Spirit and influence of the Holy Ghost.
And I tell individuals who receive patriarchal blessing, Scott, that they should see that
blessing as a personal revelation to them, worthy or not worthy, and that that blessing
is from their Heavenly Father, and that they should not just focus on the words of the
blessing, the black ink on the white paper, they should focus on the white parts of their
blessing.
In other words, they, the Spirit, can actually reveal to them things in between the lines
of their blessing.
And He can take a thought in their blessing, which may not mean a lot to them now, and
He can expand on that, and it will mean so much to them later in their life.
So, I gave a blessing Sunday night to a young man who was just so, so good, Scott.
I mean, the youth today really are so amazing.
I am just so touched by the power of the youth, and a lot of that power is a result of the
opposition that they face.
They have to be good.
You and I, we were okay, but we didn't have to be as strong as they have to be now.
And this young man was just so good in his desires and striving, struggling to be so
good.
And wow, what a powerful blessing.
I asked him afterwards if he had any expressions or feelings that he wanted to verbalize, and
he got emotional and he said, I felt as though I was in the presence of God.
Wow.
How sweet.
That is so sweet.
And it did feel that way, Scott.
Yeah, I'm sure it did.
It did feel that way.
And that was because of his preparation and his worthiness.
And not everyone has that experience, but it doesn't mean they can't have that experience
and that that blessing was given to them not based upon where they were at, but where they
had been in their pre-mortal life, how valiant they were there, how God sees them, not only
now, but before and after and into eternity.
So live to be worthy.
If you weren't worthy when you got your blessing, live to be worthy of that blessing.
But God doesn't hold back on giving blessings and promises based upon a short time or, in
His mind, a short time of unworthiness.
Why do you think that it is that we take on those beliefs of those types of things?
Because of my unworthiness, I don't have the ability to receive this revelation.
And, you know, we can expand that into so many other things, but why do you think that
we do that, David?
I know there are multiple reasons, Scott, but I honestly, I think the biggest reason
is we don't understand God.
We don't comprehend His nature.
We don't really understand His mercy, His love.
We see this immortal, sovereign God, all-powerful, all-wisdom, all-knowing, all...
And we try to...I don't know, we put Him into kind of a box where we think that His emotions
are like human.
Yeah, we talked about that, you know, and if we go back to like, I think, episodes two
and three when we talk about who we really are, and we get a glimpse of who we are...
And how God sees us.
And how He sees us, that only can come.
And then you said it, you know, through preparation, you just talked about how this young man prepared
to receive his patriarchal blessing Sunday.
And you know, last podcast, we talked about preparing to receive the sacrament and how
that can be such a sacred experience that as we do that, I wonder how his preparation
for taking the sacrament was last Sunday.
That would have been just a sweet experience to have privy to have part in that.
But we can, we can have part in that in our own lives.
And I wonder how many people of our listeners just took a big sigh, like, oh, I'm so glad
to hear this.
I hope so.
Because, you know, as we qualify for the effects of the atonement of Jesus Christ to be in
our lives, that's not a one time we do something and now we're qualified for the rest of our
lives.
It's a process and it's an ongoing experience.
When I say process, it's not a difficult to strenuous, arduous experience.
It's a sweet, loving, come to me experience.
We do begin to learn the nature of God.
Yes.
We do see ourselves as we truly are.
And as we do that, then we have that experience.
What a great experience for that young man, too.
Well, I just, you and I have talked about this in many episodes, Scott, but the bottom
line really for all of us, when we talk of redemption and when we talk of joy and happiness
and peace, I really think it is centered in knowing God.
And this is life eternal, or we could say, and this is a happy life, and we could say,
and this is a peaceful life, that they might know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou hast sent.
Right?
John 17.
And that's Jesus saying that.
And this is life eternal, or we could say, and this is an abundant life, or this is a
happy life, that they know God.
Because if we could comprehend God, His nature, His character, His love, His mercy, His compassion,
it not only would change how we see God, Scott, it would change how we see ourselves.
Yeah, it would.
And it would change how we see the world.
In fact, Joseph Smith said, man cannot comprehend himself until he first comprehends God.
And it really is the great secret of life, and the joy, peace of life is to know that
we have a loving, compassionate, real Heavenly Father who lives and who loves us and will
do everything for us.
And He is not unmerciful.
He's not one who's quick to judge us.
When he speaks to Moses in the Pearl of Great Price, chapter 1, he says something about
who Moses is, but mostly he's trying to tell Moses who he is.
And this is verse 6, where he says, And I have a work for thee, Moses, my son, and thou
art in the similitude of mine only begotten.
And mine only begotten is and shall be the Savior, for He is full of grace and truth.
But there is no God besides Me, and all things are present with Me, for I know them all.
So that goes into your question about if I get a patriarchal blessing and I'm not necessarily
worthy, that scripture proves out what you just said.
God sees stuff, everything, from the beginning to the end.
All things are present with Him.
All things are now.
There is no past.
I know we can't comprehend this.
This is not a mortal thing that we can comprehend.
There is no time with God's God.
No, Elder Maxwell referred to that as God's eternal now.
There's no past.
There's no future.
There's no time that God, all things God sees at once, or all things He says here, is present.
So he tells Moses, Okay, you're my son.
You're in the similitude of my Savior, and I know all things.
All things are present before Me.
When I gave this patriarchal blessing Sunday, Scott, it was so sweet, because I never said
anything in that patriarchal blessing about this individual being a great leader, but
after the blessing was over and I asked him kind of his thoughts and feelings about the
blessing, this sweet boy, and I could tell kind of quiet and reflective and other characteristics,
which I don't need to describe here, but I asked him what he heard in his blessing.
And he sat there for a minute and he looked up at me and he said, I'm a leader.
I never said anything about that in his blessing.
So revelation came to him.
While he was receiving the blessing that he needed to step up and that he was called,
that he was called, that he was foreordained to do some important things.
And in his words, that meant he was to be a leader.
I mentioned to him my wife, who's my scribe, and she was actually there that evening.
She didn't sit in on the blessing, but she was here after the discussion that we were
having after the blessing.
And after they left, after he and his parents left, I said to her, I wonder how his day
is gonna be different tomorrow.
I wonder how he's gonna be different at school tomorrow because of what he learned tonight.
I just think we should all ponder that, the way God sees us, the blessings and the promises
he desires to bless us with, not because we're worthy or not worthy, but because of who we
are in relationship to him and how he sees us.
And even maybe even more important than who we are, but whose we are.
We talk about God through the episodes of this podcast, but we are his because we have
been redeemed and purchased through the blood of Jesus Christ.
That his only begotten Son in the flesh, he sacrificed for our benefit, for our benefit.
And if we could just understand that, Scott, and see not just who we are, but even maybe
more important to see who God is, it changes how we see everything.
I just think that's just so important.
So I hope and pray that those who have received patriarchal blessings will see them as an
instrument of revelation in their life and use them that way, read them as their personal
scripture.
And I pray that those who don't have patriarchal blessings will desire to receive one to go
find out how they're not only related to their Heavenly Father and who they are and whose
they are, but they'll also, Scott, find out how they're related to Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob.
I just think that's a really important part of their blessing, is to find out how they're
related to Abraham, and I shared, I think, a story about that several episodes ago about
the girl from Congo who I gave the blessing to.
Yeah, you know what?
Share that again, though, because that was so many episodes ago that...
Share that again.
Well, the sweet girl from Congo who had come here as a refugee, who had lost many members
of her family and had lost her tribe, and she came here and after being questioned by
an immigration officer, the immigration officer said to her, you sound religious, and I hear
Utah is religious, so I'm gonna send you to Utah.
I forgot about that part.
And so she came to Utah and she was adopted by a family in our stake.
I think at the time she was only 18 years old, but she already had a two-year-old daughter.
And anyway, she ended up joining the church after being adopted.
She joined the church like a year later, was baptized, and then she came to get a patriarchal
blessing.
And I had pondered and I had prayed and fasted about her and, you know, the week before she
came and I knew before she came by revelation that she was, who she was a descendant of,
and that she was of the blood of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
And when I pronounced her tribe, which was Naphtali, she started to weep.
I could feel her kind of, you know, shaking, her whole body shaking after I had told her
that she was a descendant of Naphtali and a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
through the tribe of Naphtali.
And afterwards she said, Brother Durfey, can I pray?
And I said, sure, Julie, you want to pray?
Yeah, we can pray.
And she went to kneel down and I said, wait a minute, Julie, we'll kneel down with you.
Her parents were there and so we kneeled down.
And she said, can I pray in my language?
Whatever, I'm not even sure what language that was.
They spoke in Congo, I think they have several.
But anyway, she started to pray in her language and I didn't understand, and it was a loud
prayer, energetic prayer, and a praising prayer, and weeping, weeping, and a loud voice crying
out to God.
Anyway, I didn't understand any of it except the name Naphtali.
And she kept saying, Naphtali, Naphtali, Naphtali.
And after the prayer, we stood up and her sweet parents said to me, I think, Brother
Durfey, you need to understand that she lost her tribe and that in Africa, a tribe is everything.
It's really important to her.
That was a restoration for her.
And now she has a tribe.
And I don't think we understand and appreciate that in our culture.
I know I don't.
And it's really critical, I think, that we try to appreciate not only that we are sons
and daughters of God, but that we are sons and daughters of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
through the covenant and that we are covenant children.
I love the scripture in 3 Nephi that says that.
You are children of the covenant.
We could even say we are the children of prophets and patriarchs.
And we need to see ourselves that way, Scott.
I think it really makes a difference in how we not just see ourselves, but how we live,
how we see the world.
So I hope everyone will love their blessing.
But if they don't, repent.
Repent and come to love your blessing because that blessing is full of promises.
I just pulled mine out.
I keep it very close by me.
I refer to it pretty frequently.
This was given to me on August 22, 1982 by, you know him, and he's past, so I can say
his name, Stanley D. Roberts.
What a wonderful man.
He was my stake present when I went on a mission, Scott.
I know he was.
Love President Roberts.
And this was patriarchal blessing number 114.
That's really sweet.
And those things can be such a guidepost, what they're intended to be.
It's so important, that personal revelation and that relationship that we gain.
You know, so much of what we have talked about over the past 30 some odd episodes has been
about relationship.
Relationship with our Savior, a relationship with the Holy Spirit, the Holy Ghost.
We talked a lot about that in the last two episodes, all culminating in directing us
to the ultimate relationship because no man cometh to the Father but by me.
But with the Father.
To have that relationship with the Father, to understand His depth of love to the best
that we can even begin to understand it.
And to have those experiences and to go back and revisit those experiences.
I don't know if...
I may have been one of those guys that probably wasn't that worthy to get my patriarchal blessing.
Well, I don't think any of us were, Scott.
If we were a teenager, we probably weren't worthy to get a blessing.
I know I wasn't in 1982.
I know I wasn't either.
I know that was a big struggle in my life and I probably, you know, maybe even fabricated
answers to a couple of the questions so that I could get it.
But I've had that confirmation, not just because of conversations that I've had with you.
I had that confirmation for me back a long time ago when all my blessings were restored,
when I was rebaptized and all those types of things.
For me, that was, okay, everything's on.
But what I...
You have to get things back on, including every promise and blessing you were given
in your patriarchal blessing.
But we don't have to have that experience to have that experience.
We don't have to have our memberships lifted.
We don't have to excuse ourselves or make decisions that alienate or separate ourselves
from the fold or from any of that.
We don't have to have those experiences and then have things restored in order to have
all of those things brought back to us.
Again, and we talked about this last week in some detail, and Deb and I will be talking
about it tonight in a lot of detail as we teach Institute, but the sacrament.
That's when we partake of the sacrament, that 20 minutes of the 10,080 minutes in the week
that we commit to renewing those covenants, all those covenants and blessings are restored
and come back and we renew.
Including the Abrahamic covenant.
It's amazing to me how little most people know about the Abrahamic covenant.
In fact, before I give a blessing, I will read it with the recipient of the blessing
and their parents and review with them what the Abrahamic covenant is.
And it's something that we should make another podcast on sometime, is what is really the
Abrahamic covenant.
But as children of that covenant, that includes so much, Scott, that we should be thankful
for.
And it is not based upon a little period that we call teenage years, whether we're worthy
or not.
Thank goodness.
Holy smokes.
I know.
Yeah.
So, anyway, I hope that helps everyone to know not just about their patriarchal blessing,
but being able to perhaps understand better the nature and love and compassion of God
and who He is and how He sees us.
Yeah, that will have application in our lives in so many other areas additionally, in addition
to our patriarchal blessings.
I hope so.
Other questions that we have received, Scott, that I think deserve little attention is kind
of the nature of Jesus Christ and His Atonement.
We've kind of held on to these questions for a while because we were trying to get through
a course on repentance and forgiveness, but I am really grateful for those who have asked
questions about Jesus Christ and His Atonement and kind of how it works and kind of what
it is.
And I don't feel like I'm a great authority to necessarily answer those questions, but
I have made the Atonement of Jesus Christ a great study, I don't know, throughout the
last probably 30 or 40 years of my life.
And for some reason, I've been super sensitive to the questions that have been asked by myself
concerning the Atonement of Jesus Christ, the questions that students have asked me
in the 40 years that I taught in seminaries and institutes, and I'm really grateful for
those individuals who are asking us questions as we do this podcast.
And maybe we can just talk a little bit about the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
And I'd like to kind of begin by saying that there are different theories on how the Atonement
of Jesus Christ works and what it covers and kind of what it's all about.
And I'm not always comfortable teaching theories.
Some of these are theories, Scott, that are taught by Christianity, not just by the Church
of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints, but Christianity.
And I don't consider myself any expert or authority on that, but I have enjoyed throughout
the years really studying how others kind of see the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
And I think that there are probably three major theories.
I think there are as many as seven.
There are some fairly new ones, modern theories of the Atonement of Jesus Christ based on,
I think, our culture.
And yet, some of these theories are like ancients.
They were taught by some of the ancient Christian fathers of the Church.
And I think that they were somewhat based upon their culture at the time, too.
However, let me just review these three theories of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, or maybe
we should call them models of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
Well, before you do that, too, let's make clear that we are not advocating for or saying
that this is what we believe.
We're just simply laying out what these theories are.
We will tie into it how it relates to our restored beliefs, our restored doctrine about
this as well.
Well, I think what's amazing, Scott, is while we don't ascribe to all of them exactly, what's
amazing is how much truth they really did receive from the Bible and from the light
of Christ.
And I even believe the Holy Spirit.
Not necessarily as the gift of the Holy Ghost, but the Holy Spirit teaches truth to anyone
who seeks it.
So I think it's pretty amazing how much we do have in common with these, even though,
again, we need to understand some things a little differently.
But one of the first models or theories of the Atonement of Jesus Christ is known as
the Christus Victor theory or model.
And this is the idea that Jesus Christ and His Atonement completely overcame death and
evil and conquered Satan, that man was completely helpless to defeat those things, sin in our
life and death in our life and Satan and his influence, and that what Jesus did in His
infinite Atonement was to disarm Satan, to defeat Satan, and it gave man power, the Atonement
of Jesus Christ, that through His suffering and all that took place in Gethsemane and
on the cross, that it gave man power to crush the head of Satan.
And you know, that's something that we hear in the Scriptures and even in the temple,
that Christ's Atonement, while the fall and while Satan may have power to bruise our heel,
that we have power to crush His head.
So I think that's an important model and theory of what the Atonement of Jesus Christ did.
A second one is the Satisfaction theory, it's called, and this is where people believe,
and it's been taught, that Christ met the demands of God, and this is kind of where
we're different, is that most Christians, and I'm again speaking in generalities here,
not representing any, not really representing them, speaking as someone who's not an authority
and can't speak for other churches, but Christ, they believe, met the demands of a just God
and fulfilled His wrath by paying humanity's death, thus making reconciliation possible.
They believe that Jesus paid our obligation to what we owe to God and that it somehow
appeased His wrath.
Now we don't quite, we know that definitely Jesus Christ made a payment that fulfilled
the demands of justice or the law.
We don't believe that what Jesus suffered was the result of God's wrath.
I think that's just a fundamental difference between ancient Christian theories of the
atonement and what we believe, our model of the atonement of Jesus Christ and what's taught
in the Book of Mormon, is that there is a law that God's laws were fulfilled, and that
God's laws were appeased, that justice was appeased, that the demands of justice were
fulfilled by the plan and power of mercy.
Some people in, I know, in Christianity, I've read about this in some of their studies,
are really troubled by this theory of the atonement of Jesus Christ because they believe
that God was almost like abusing His own Son because of His wrath, because of the sin of
others.
And when you think about that, that could really be troubling and disturbing.
That's not the God we know, or the God that we've talked about at all.
I mean, you know, because first off, it's the law that Christ is satisfying, not an
angry ticked-off dad, you know, who is, you know, by golly, this has got to be paid for
one way or the other.
You go do it.
That's not what this is, you know.
But what we do realize, too, is that it is God's law, but God gave us the law because
He loves us.
His law equals love to us.
When Jesus Christ was sacrificed, Scott, when He suffered, when He bled from every pore,
and when it went dark in Gethsemane, and when again these pains and the sufferings of Gethsemane
reoccurred on the cross, as we've taught and as the prophets have taught, all of that pain
and suffering that took place on the cross, and even worse on the cross because there
were no angels that were sent to strengthen Him.
And God eventually...
And He cries out.
...will be there by Himself.
Right.
And He cries out.
Why hast thou forsaken me?
I love...
Elder Scott...
I still remember Elder Scott teaching about that in that statement, why hast thou forsaken
me?
And describing a heavenly Father who just had to like turn His face, not because He was
wrathful or that His wrath was being appeased.
It was just so painful for the Father as well to see His Son have to meet the demands of
the law and to meet the demands of justice.
And that's the way I see it.
And I know that's how the Restoration in the Book of Mormon teaches it.
So anyway, that's another theory or model of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
And a third one is in Christianity called penal substitution, which is that Christ was
punished on our behalf, that there needed to be a punishment.
This is kind of the judicial view or theory, model of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, and
that the Court of God was... that the Court of God meted out certain punishment, and that
Christ was the sacrificial Lamb that fulfilled the punishment.
This is kind of where the propitiation and the advocation of Jesus Christ kind of comes
in where He pays the price or the punishment, fulfills the punishment for, again, God and
the Court of God, which demands that there be a punishment, not just a payment.
So those are the three major models of the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the theories
of what the Atonement of Jesus Christ did.
I think as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we are so indebted
to and grateful for the Restoration because we learn in greater detail, because especially
in the Book of Mormon, how redemption works and what Christ did to redeem us through His
blood.
Living prophets continue to teach this.
I mean, we heard so much about Christ and His Atonement and redemption for those who
were really listening and who were willing to study the words of the prophets from conference.
Anyway, it's true that the finite mind of man cannot fully comprehend the infinite Atonement
of Jesus Christ.
I mean, it's incomprehensible, Scott, really.
And for whatever reason, and I think it's because we're mortal and because we can't
really fully comprehend it, but for whatever reason, other than that, God has chosen not
to reveal everything to us about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and really how it all works.
But we've been blessed with revelations enough and Scripture enough to know how we can apply
it, access it, how we should enjoy it, how we should receive joy from it, how it was
fulfilled in joy, even Hebrews teaches that Jesus was able to carry out the Atonement
of Jesus Christ because of His joy and His love.
And so, those are the things that I think need to be focused on even more than the different
theories of what the Atonement did for us is how we can apply it.
And I love, again, what we learned from the Restoration because we know that not only
did Jesus Christ and His Atonement overcome evil, which is again the Christus Victor theory,
and not only did He pay for our sins, which is the satisfaction theory, and not only did
He take upon Himself our punishment for sin, which is the penal substitution theory, but
we know the Atonement of Jesus Christ and our Savior enables us, strengthens us, comforts
and covers us, cleanses and heals us, protects and perfects us.
We know that through the Atonement of Jesus Christ there was reconciliation for the breach
of the law and reconciliation in our relationship with the Father.
We know that the Atonement of Jesus Christ offers compensatory blessings, that it transforms
us, that it changes us, that it ransoms, rescues, and redeems us.
We know that because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ that He felt divine empathy for us,
that He advocates and mediates for us, that He offers expiation, reconciliation, and propitiation.
The Atonement of Jesus Christ did all of that for us and more.
It's infinite.
Ultimately, we know Jesus Christ redeemed and saved us and that He purchased us with
His blood.
All of this, all of this according to the conditions that we are born into, the conditions
of our mortality.
Dr. Ingekevitz, 4615.
Yep.
So, I am just so grateful.
And some of the questions that we have received about is someone once asked in an email about,
every time I sin, is Jesus bleeding for me?
Now, again.
Yeah.
Is He, every time I sin, am I hurting Jesus?
And again, we may have said that.
I think in the email, they said something to the effect that maybe I taught that or
you taught that.
Well, what we sometimes say, Dave, is that we need to consider how our sins make Him
bleed, make Him hurt.
And I'm not quoting it exactly, but that's the idea.
That when we sin, we need to consider...
That we cost Him pain or we...
We need to consider what...
We caused Him pain.
What pain that causes Him.
And I think sometimes that that's been misinterpreted to...
Not sometimes.
In maybe one situation here, I think it was misinterpreted that we were inferring that
Jesus is still paying that price, that He's still bleeding.
For what... if I make a mistake today, that it hurts Him today.
Yeah.
So, we just need to be really clear that we know that, again, because of the nature, the
character, the power of God, that Jesus paid for all the sin or sins of all the world through
His atoning sacrifice in Gethsemane and on the cross, and that all of that was paid for
there, on conditions of our faith and repentance.
And I believe, as Elder Bateman and others have taught, that when Jesus was in Gethsemane...
I mean, this is recorded in Abinadi's teachings in Mosiah chapter 15, that Christ saw His
seed, and some people have interpreted that to mean that He saw what He was paying for.
Now only a God could do that.
It would take too much time for that to happen in a few moments, and only a God could see
all of that all at once, as He does.
There's no past or future to God.
There's no time to God.
Only a God, meaning Jesus Christ, could see all of that at once, what He was suffering
for, but that all of the sins and all of the injustices—not only sins, but injustices,
all of the inequities, all of the pain suffered by the sins of others, all of the consequences
of all of the sins of the world...
Well, Alma 7, He descended below all things.
Well, that He...
Exactly.
All things.
That He suffered for not only our sins, but our sicknesses.
Our infirmities.
All of that, Scott.
And that He saw it all at once, and that He made all the injustices, all of the inequities
and inequities, that it all came back into a perfect harmony based upon our willingness
to be faithful, to have a relationship with Him, and to repent.
Just qualify.
To qualify for the effects in our own lives.
When we sin now, right, we're not causing it new or any fresh pain or any fresh suffering
for Him.
He saw it and He contemplated it all at once, on the cross and in Gethsemane.
However, somebody in one of their emails say, when you talk about the suffering that we
caused Jesus, it causes me to feel worse about myself.
And I'm sorry if it causes an individual shame, because I think shame is something that goes
inward.
What I hope that in our discussion of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, it causes others
to think outward as to what did Christ suffer for me?
And it should cause us a broken heart and a contrite spirit when we contemplate the
Atonement of Jesus Christ.
In fact, we taught, and the Book of Mormon teaches, that is the conditions of repentance,
that we experience a broken heart and a contrite spirit, that we experience godly sorrow, that
we experience guilt, and guilt causes us to feel pain.
There's no getting around that, and that pain does nothing to pay for our sins, but that
pain protects us.
It keeps us from sinning over and over and over again.
Guilt is not the same as shame.
Guilt protects us.
Shame actually goes inward, and it causes us such negative feelings about ourselves.
Shame's demonic.
It just is.
Shame?
Shame is not from Heavenly Father.
It's nothing to do with anything to help us be better.
It's strictly a tool of the devil.
To beat ourselves up or to flog ourselves or to try to punish ourselves over and over
again because of our sins is not pleasing to God.
And that's shame.
Guilt.
Guilt causes us to run to our Savior.
It causes us to go to Him.
It causes us to throw ourselves at His feet and to try to express in our remorse and in
our great gratitude our feelings for His atoning sacrifice.
That's what guilt causes.
And that's what a broken heart and contrite...
And that's not comfortable.
That's not always comfortable, Scott.
A broken heart, it can hurt.
A contrite spirit isn't always convenient, casual, or comfortable.
There is some pain and suffering in repentance, and there should be, so that we don't repeat
it.
But the real price was paid and the punishment was fulfilled and the demands and appeasement
... All of that took place only through Jesus Christ, through His merits.
Man can merit nothing of himself when it comes to meeting the demands of justice and working
out the price of our sins.
And all of that happened in the true Meridian of Time while He was in Gethsemane, while
He was on the cross and culminated in the resurrection.
And that's when it took place.
It doesn't continue to take place for Him.
Exactly.
Right.
Exactly.
So, I just think that it's important that we kind of clarify that question or viewpoint
that was expressed to us in an email.
I think another one that we received, which is interesting that I've reflected on just
recently, is the thought that, well, what about those who really do abuse?
What about those who really do hurt others?
What about those individuals who repent and they access the atonement of Jesus Christ,
but they've caused all of this pain for others to suffer with?
Do we really believe that the atonement that lifts all of the justice of those individuals
who caused all of that pain?
And if we accept that, how can I ever forgive them?
Or how can anything be made right if they don't have to pay for it?
I think I can summarize that question.
I think it was, so if somebody harms me, but I've sinned too, but because of the sin of
somebody else, I get harmed, but I haven't repented yet.
The other person repents before I do, then how are they paying for it?
Where's the justice come to them?
And I don't think that one has to do with the other.
I think these are two things that stand alone.
My relationship, so let's say me and somebody else is in this scenario, and I'm the one
that feels like I've been harmed or abused or victimized in some way somehow, and you
all know how we feel about victimization and that word in general, but I'll use it anyway.
Let's say that I've been victimized somehow, but I'm not repenting, and that other person
repents and they are taking advantage of the offerings of the atonement of Jesus Christ
that come through the administration of the Holy Spirit, and they start to participate
and feel that, but I'm not.
What we're seeing here, we're seeing two separate relationships, David.
I have a relationship with Jesus.
That person has a relationship with Jesus.
That relationship that that person has with Jesus is independent of the relationship I
have, even though maybe there have been things perpetuated against me by that person, but
because of the covering and the redemption of Jesus Christ for that person, Jesus actually
paid for that.
He doesn't need to continue to pay for that.
I don't need to wonder, has he been or she, have they been adequately punished?
Have they been adequately exacted restitution or anything along those lines?
I need to be worried mostly about my relationship with Jesus.
Well, and to really understand the atonement of Jesus Christ and to have peace and to have
the power to forgive someone else and to, as Elder Anderson puts in his book, to remember
in peace, you have to understand the doctrine again of the atonement as far as what it covered.
And it not only covered the perpetrators' sins, the atonement of Jesus Christ covers
the victims' pain that they suffered as a result of the perpetrators' sin.
Now it may take great faith in the atonement of Jesus Christ to be able to feel the spirit
of that, Scott, but that is unconditional.
Jesus suffered the pains of all of those who are abused and victimized unconditionally,
but they may not feel it if they don't exercise faith in the atonement of Jesus Christ or
understand that doctrine.
And if they did, they would be able to forgive because their focus is on Jesus Christ, not
on the perpetrator.
And I think that is a fundamental difference in how one should see the sins that we all
suffer as a result of others.
We should let it go because of our understanding of and our faith in the atonement of Jesus
Christ.
I'm not worried that somebody is going to be able to pay for it, and I don't think no
perpetrator could in this life pay for some of the pains that they've caused.
And even if the death penalty were given and people were to die and be killed because of
the pain of others, or if they had murdered someone else, even their own life won't pay
for that, Scott, for that sin.
I mean, a knife for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, that's the law of Moses.
And the law of Moses is not the law of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and even in the law
of Moses it pointed people to Christ, that He would suffer, that He would die, that He
would suffer for all of that.
No human can.
Yeah.
In our podcast here, in episodes 18 through 21, so there's three or four, whatever that
is, three episodes there, or four episodes there that can be very beneficial in helping
us as we go back.
We spend about four hours in total time, not just on that one subject, but in other things
that help speak to that to kind of help us wrap our hearts and our minds around that
concept with better grace and ease, really, I think, David.
And so, you know, Gang, I'm going to point, if you have questions about that still, and
if you're, if you have any kind of, if we have any kind of struggle within us about
the concept of forgiveness and forgiving others and, you know, what about them paying, you
know, where's the cost, how do they pay, you know, and when we get caught up in worrying
about, you know, the perpetrator against me, making sure he gets his due, and we do, and
that's human, that's part of the human condition, that's part of the natural man sometimes that
we deal with.
So, let's go back, we invite you to go back to those episodes, 18 through 21, and maybe
a title on any of those would stand out to you, but go back and review those.
You know, maybe to finish that thought off and to finish answering that question about
what about the perpetrators, I also want to make another important point, and that is
that we do not believe in cheap grace.
We do not believe that repentance is easy or breezy in these cases.
We know that repentance does take great effort, that there is suffering and there is some
pain in a broken heart, contrite spirit, as we have described, and that there may be some
suffering in the process of repentance, that God's grace is not cheap, that the thought
of cheap grace was, I think, first kind of taught by a great Lutheran minister, I love
reading his works, D. Drift Bonhoeffer, and he talks about, you know, Christians, as Christians,
we don't believe in a cheap grace, and his latter-day members of the Church of Jesus
Christ, later-day saints, we don't either.
We don't believe in a cheap grace, but that God is the judge and that Jesus Christ did
suffer for even the worst of sinners, and that we should focus on that, not upon us
being the judge, not upon us being the jury, that God's the judge and God has paid the
price through his Son, Jesus Christ, and that the demands of justice have been met and the
plan of mercy will be fulfilled for the perpetrator and for the victims, and the Atonement of
Jesus Christ does all of that.
And praise be to God and how grateful we should be.
If we would focus more upon the gratitude that we should all feel for that, it would
relieve so much of our pains and distress.
We've said before, gratitude is the beginning of desire, and I believe it is, and I also
believe gratitude is the beginning of peace in our life, gratitude for the Atonement of
Jesus Christ and the plan of redemption.
Yeah, I'm so grateful we know that.
And here's the thing too about victims and perpetrators, we're all victims, but we're
also all perpetrators.
We're all guilty.
We don't ever sit in a bubble.
No, no.
I had that brought to my attention just this past week of a situation where I had harmed
somebody in my ward.
Unbeknownst to me, I have a leadership position in my ward, and so does this other person
who I love dearly.
And apparently I had said something, or not said something, but I had not met the expectations
of the other person.
I didn't know what those expectations were.
Doesn't excuse me, I should have known.
But I had been a perpetrator in that situation.
I didn't mean to be.
I didn't do it because I didn't like that person.
I didn't do it because they don't mean an awful lot to me because they do.
And they serve in a way that nobody else could in that position in our ward right now.
Well, the bishop asked me, he says, Scott, how do you feel about making amends?
And I says, I can do that.
And they explained to me what had happened.
And I got that opportunity yesterday.
I had been a perpetrator.
And I didn't mean to be.
So we all need to take a look at that.
I have that conversation just yesterday too with a member of Alcoholics Anonymous that
I sponsor that sometimes when we focus so much on that I'm a victim that we'd miss
where we have made others victims to our own selfishness or whatever the case may be.
And I'm not going to expound on that.
But nonetheless, it's important that we realize that not only are we victims, but we are sometimes
and none of us are immune to this, but sometimes we are also the perpetrator.
And so for that too, the Savior paid that price.
For my perpetration, He paid for that.
It's so sad, Scott, how there's this cycle of sin.
And I remember appearing before a judge in the court of law and trying to advocate for
my son as a sex offender.
We talked about that, this wonderful blessing in my life of this son who I love, who we
adopted, who has feel alcoholism, who has bipolar, who has Asperger's, who was extremely
bullied as a child in school and has so many challenges.
And standing in front of this judge in court telling him, you know, we're brokenhearted
by the things that our son has done.
But Your Honor, he is also a victim.
He didn't choose to be a fetal alcohol baby.
He didn't choose bipolar.
He didn't choose Asperger's.
He didn't choose to be bullied.
He didn't choose any of the conditions that were working against him.
And I think there's this cycle of sin that the atonement of Jesus Christ can stop.
It can break.
And if we don't forgive others or we expect retribution and punishment in the lives of
others, it is going to come back to haunt us because we're all sinners and we're all
victims.
And sinners are victims, and victims are usually sinners if the atonement of Jesus Christ does
not come in and break that cycle.
And that's the power of the atonement of Jesus Christ, is that we can overcome, not necessarily
on our own.
For sure not on our own.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
Never on our own.
It's really about the atonement of Jesus Christ.
It's not really about us changing, but about us being changed.
Through Him.
Who is mighty to change.
Mighty to save.
Mighty to change.
Mighty to redeem.
And I'm so grateful for that.
Let that be our challenge for this week.
Let's look for areas in our lives where we can see the atonement of Jesus Christ not
only healing us from the sins that are perpetrated against us, but also where are we seeing the
atonement of Jesus Christ heal us in the areas where we have maybe been the one that has
caused the pain.
As Alma taught in Alma chapter 5, the atonement of Jesus Christ has the power to change our
hearts.
And that's what we need.
And that's why he felt to sing the song of redeeming love later in that chapter.
We need that power.
We cannot do that based on our own merits.
It's a miracle.
Yeah.
The miracle of forgiveness and the miracle to forgive is all possible through the atonement
of Jesus Christ.
God bless you, everybody.
Yeah.
Thanks for being with us today.
Time has gone by too fast.
And we'll...
Always does.
We can talk more about some of the theories of the atonement of Jesus Christ maybe a little
later.
There's a few things I didn't mention that I'd like to, and we'll do that another time.
Well, and as you can see, folks, as we've been able to sort of come to the conclusion
of the curriculum, if you will, of the course that we kind of set out to accomplish, we've
pretty much done that.
And so this will now lead us into a different type of a phase, if you will, of this podcast
where we will be able to spend more time doing things like we've done today.
We plan to go back and talk about a lot of the topics specifically and maybe take a little
bit deeper dive in some of those things or even just a review on some of those things
because that can be extremely valuable as well.
But a great opportunity for you now to continue to, and if you haven't done before because
you haven't thought to or whatever the reason, go ahead and send us those emails with your
questions.
Here redeems us at gmail.com.
That's where we can receive those, send those to us, and we'll do our best as we...
Because I think we'll be doing more of...
We have a little more time probably to do that.
We've kind of gone through all the chapters of Elder Anderson's book.
And we've kind of completed the course, which I taught for many years.
However, the course is never completed, and the application of the Atonement of Jesus
Christ is never complete, and there's just so much more we can share and I think review
and kind of expand upon.
We might even start it over again.
I think every time I would teach, for example, I would maybe teach six classes in two days,
the same lesson, Scott, and none of those lessons were exactly the same.
And they were all different according to the individuals.
And if we repeat the course, I'm sure it'll be some of the same, but it won't be completely
the same and we'll continue to learn along with our listeners.
So I hope that that's something that we can have the time to do.
I think we will.
And I look forward to this phase of the podcast as we go.
Don't forget to share with your friends and those that you love.
Don't forget that we love you, we care about you.
That's why we do this.
But most importantly, we hope that you understand that you have been redeemed through His blood.
Thanks for being with us today.
God bless everybody and we'll see you next week.