sideration of the matter, however, will show that this
doctrine affords no reason for such objection. To reject or ignore in any degree a gift of God is to forfeit to the corresponding extent one's claim upon that gift. To the soul that has wilfully neglected the opportunities for repentance here offered, repentance in the hereafter may be, and indeed it is reasonable to believe will be, so difficult as to be long unattainable. This conception is justified by scripture, as witness the words of Amulek, a Nephite prophet, who thus admonished the Church on the western continent four score years before the birth of Christ:
"For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet God; * * * therefore, I beseech of you, that ye do not procrastinate the day of your repentance until the end ; * * * Ye cannot say, when ye are brought to that awful crisis, that I will repent, that I will return to my God. Nay, ye cannot say this; for that same spirit which doth possess your bodies at the time that ye go out of this life, that same spirit will have power to possess your body in that eternal world. For behold, if ye have procrastinated the day of your repentance, even until death, behold, ye have become subjected to the spirit of the devil, and he doth seal you his."[1]
Baptism by water is taught by the Church in this dispensation as an essential ordinance of the Gospel. Baptism is the gateway leading into the fold of Christ, the portal to the Church, the established rite of naturalization in the Kingdom of God. The candidate for admission into the Church, having obtained and professed faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and having sincerely repented of his sins, is properly required to give evidence of this spiritual sanctification by some outward ordinance, pre-
- ↑ Book of Mormon, Alma 34:32-35.
