Blogging Through the Book of Mormon

Before we get into the actual scriptural account of what happened in Gethsemane, I’d like to go through a few more over-arching principles that touch on all aspects of the atonement. The first goes along with what we talked about yesterday about the transformative power of repentance. Like we said yesterday, if we were forced to suffer for our own sins, then we might have eventually become sinless, but we wouldn’t have become God-like in our attributes which is what is exactly necessary for us to be with Him again. We can be sinless, through our own purging, but if I lived a miserable existence, then had to suffer for a significant amount of time, after that, I wouldn’t want to be with the God who created me just so that I could experience all that suffering. There would very much be an “eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die,” attitude because it doesn’t matter what you do, there will anguish whether or not you try to be good or do whatever you...

The Atonement has always been a big mystery to me, especially when I was younger. You hear about “the atonement” and that because Jesus performed the “atonement” we can repent of our sins, but what does that mean? If we are indebted to justice because of our sins, then what currency did Jesus use to pay justice back for our debt? It took me a long time of thinking to just realize that, I’m not going to fully understand the atonement during this life and that I just needed to stop focusing on the how and start focusing on the why. It doesn’t matter how the atonement works if I don’t repent and use it, then it’s like it never happened, so I decided to work on the obedience part first, and then came the lesson, and I still learn more and more about it all the time. So anything I say on this subject is “gospel by Amy” only. The IM points out that the word “atonement” is literally “at-one-ment” or to make o...