environment, the capacity to choose and to act, the measure of knowledge to which the subject has attained, the meed of truth he has accepted or rejected, the opportunities he has used aright or wrongly spurned, the fidelity with which he walked in the light or the depravity through which he wandered in the forbidden paths of darkness,—these and every other fact and circumstance entering into the individual life will be duly weighed and considered. At the bar of God the distinguishing feature of Divine mercy will be, as in the affairs of mortal life it now is, not an arbitrary forgiveness of sin nor unearned annulment of the debts of guilt, but the providing of a way whereby the sinner may be enabled to meet the requirements of the Gospel, and so in due course pass from the prison house of sin to the glorious freedom of a righteous life.
There is but one price set on forgiveness for individual transgression, and this is alike to all,—to poor and rich, to bond and free, to illiterate and learned; it knows no fluctuations, it changes not with time; it was the same yesterday as today it is, and even so shall be forever,—and that price, at which may be bought the pearl beyond all price, is obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.
Hear this further declaration of faith taught by the restored Church:
"We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are:—(1) Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; (2) Repentance; (-2) Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; (4) Laying-on of hands for the Gift of the Holy Ghost."[1]
- ↑ See the author's "The Articles of Faith," Lectures V — VIII with references therein given.
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