Mosiah 4

So when King Benjamin finished quoting his angel, his audience was bent over, thoughtful, maybe tired, maybe fearful. In his judgment—and he knew these people—they had taken heart to his “molecules” comment. Some of them were crying, some even wailing like true Hebrews. He could only catch words here till someone started up a responsorial chant: one shouted a line and everyone repeated it. The chant went like this:

We believe in Jesus. He is the Son of God. He is our Creator. We need his mercy. Please pour on us that blood he’ll lose in dying. Let it purify us.

This was a more extreme response than Benjamin expected, as was the follow up: a kind of post-catharsis exhaustion; a crowd-sweeping peace in which people sat transfixed at the thought they’d been forgiven by God through the Christ that was still long to arrive on earth.

But Benjamin was actually not done with his sermon yet. When the crowd had settled down, he started up again:

Please don’t go. I’ve got more to say. If you’ve felt the fragility of your existence through my comments thus far and considered all the good things you owe God for, and point by point reviewed in your mind my remarks thus far, and now acknowledge your need to improve and to trust in Jesus, you are indeed on the road to a Great Reconciliation with your Creator. These are the steps that everyone from Adam on must take. And you’ve begun to take them. My fellow Nephites, there simply is no other way.

You have to believe in God, and all the ramifications of that title—not only him as Creator but also as the channel for all absolute virtues by which we judge conduct. Not only that, you have to believe that there’s more to believe than you can yet believe.

You have to turn from your sins, give them up, ask God to forgive them. You’ve gotten a taste of what that feels like, how it affects your attitude toward life.

I personally have a checklist I review in my mind each day:

—Remember God’s greatness

—Remember my own smallness

—Remember how good God has been to me

—Keep the faith in all I do

If you follow a daily checklist like that, you’ll stay happy and forgiven and aware of your status in the cosmos.

Which brings me to my next topic. If you have the proper awareness, you’ll find it offsets any tendency to hurt or cheat other people.

It disallows you from letting children starve or go unprotected. It impels you to teach and lead them in peaceful ways. It keeps you awake to the incursions of the devil into your hearts. It focuses your minds on civility and mutual service.

People need relief. You’ll give it. People need food. You’ll give it. People need an answer. You’ll give it. You won’t let death overcome the poor.

Human nature teaches you to say, It’s your own fault. Get a job. I’m not going to waste my hard-earned pay on lazy people. I’m not going to share the fruit I’ve broken my back to pick. Fair’s fair.

If that’s your attitude you’re going to hell. I’m serious. If you don’t change your heart, you’re damned forever. Your lease in heaven’s been cancelled.

You think you’re not a beggar? The nerve. Don’t you depend on God and whatever fates he doles out for every blessed thing you own, or think you own? Food? You made that? Gold? You made that? Please.

Go deeper. Think of your sins and how blatantly you’ve defied God in small things or big things. You go on your knees begging forgiveness. What if he acted toward you like you act toward others? Fortunately, you’ll never know. Because he’s not that way. You beg and he rains mercy on your head like a summer shower. You can’t even find words to say how good he’s been to you. And yet you deserve exactly zero.

I think my point is made. You treat people like crap, so God will treat you like crap. How’s that for “justice”?

If you’re rich, you’ve got the most reason to be afraid. Because God can squash everything you own in an instant. Then who’ll be begging? “Fair’s fair”? That’s not what you’ll be saying then.

If you’re not rich, make sure you always say in your heart, “I wish I owned more so I could give away more.” If you can really feel that way, you’re on the road to bliss.

All I’ve just been saying is my answer to that cathartic spiritual episode you had after the first part of my address. If you want to keep feeling forgiven you have to feed people, clothe them, visit them when they’re sick, do their laundry, fix their plumbing—do whatever you see needs doing that you can do.

Now don’t kill yourself. Sometimes zealots overreact to counsel like mine. But that won’t get you to heaven any more definitively, though it may get you there faster. You have to proceed wisely, patiently. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

May I add this: Lending is great. It’s part of the whole social attitude I’ve outlined. But not returning what you’ve borrowed is a sin. And that failure may excite the lender to commit his own sin, if you know what I mean.

I could go on. Sin is as endless as love or destiny. How can one attempt to inventory all its varieties? If you want to imagine infinity, try to imagine all the ways you can act badly. So I’ll just summarize by saying: watch yourselves. Inspect your thoughts from time to time. Root out the bad. And look for the good, especially the good thoughts of the coming of Jesus. Nourish that good with all the skill you can develop.