The Lord has said it is His work and glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. Apparently, even for a God, His work is not without its difficulties. Consider the following verse of scripture:

...they will not repent...the cup of mine indignation is full; for behold, my blood shall not cleanse them if they hear me not. D&C 29:17

Who is the Lord speaking to in this verse?

Alma teaches that the Lord speaks by way of command to those who belong to the church, and by way of invitation to those who do not belong to the church (Alma 5:62).

The above verse of scripture is a universal plea for all mankind to come unto Christ. It is directed at:

1.  Those that belong to the church

2.  Those who do not belong to the church

When the Lord says “they will not repent” because “they hear me not” He is speaking to members of the church by way of command, and by way of invitation to those who do not belong to the church. The Savior seems to be lamenting: saying in essence, “I died for you and you won’t hear me. My sacrifice, My blood, My suffering won’t cleanse you unless you hear Me and repent."

The Lord also says that “the cup of my indignation is full”. This conveys the idea that the Lord is angry with those “who hear me not”. In another verse of scripture we learn more about this from the perspective of God the Father:

Thou art angry, O Lord, with this people, because they will not understand thy mercies which thou hast bestowed upon them because of thy Son. Alma 33:16

This verse is an attention grabber! It makes us think more deeply about what the Lord wants us to understand. What is it we're missing? The Lord answers this question saying we don't understand the mercies made available to us because of the atonement.

I used to think these verses of scripture didn't apply to members of the church. After all, church members take the sacrament each week, serve in our callings, and work hard at keeping the commandments. Aren't we're basically in a perpetual state of repentance?

I’m sure a book could be written on this subject. Oh, come to think of it there has been. That's a subject for another post.

For this post,I’m going to point out one thing I think is vitally important for each of us to make sure we understand. The following verse explains what I have in mind.

And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins. 2 Nephi 25:26

I believe we need to focus our attention on understanding what a remission of our sins means. I believe this is what the Lord is referring to. We are baptized by water for a remission of our sins, but we don’t receive a remission of our sins until we’re baptized by the Spirit. No one has trouble remembering that they were baptized in water, but how many can recall being baptized by the Spirit?

The “mercies which the Lord has bestowed upon us" is found when we receive a remission of our sins.

I typed the words: “remission of sins” in to my scripture search software and the results are shown below:

Old Testament              0

New Testament            9

Book of Mormon        28

D& C                              19

Pearl of Great Price     3

The doctrine of "remission of sins" is taught over and over in the scripture, especially in the Book of Mormon.

This is my first post for 2010. I would like to explore this subject in greater depth during the year using the scriptures and teachings of the prophets. If you have or know of information that would be useful in this study I hope you will share it.