Accountability

Nephi, the second prophet of the Book of Mormon, foresaw our time and described it with unnerving accuracy. His portrayal of it is accurate because it was shown to him by God. The Book of Mormon was written for our day—the people of the Book of Mormon, other than the prophets who kept the records, didn’t have it. Nephi offered the prophecies in a talk to his people as warnings to them for their own day as well, but preserved the talk for us, because it was really us he was talking to.

One challenge Nephi warns us of is the relaxing of standards in our day. Not only would society tune out the commandments of God, but even some churches would try to minimize the importance of the commandments.

And there shall also be many which shall say: Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God—he will justify in committing a little sin; yea, lie a little, take the advantage of one because of his words, dig a pit for thy neighbor; there is no harm in this; and do all these things, for tomorrow we die; and if it so be that we are guilty, God will beat us with a few stripes, and at last we shall be saved in the kingdom of God. (2 Nephi 28:8)

The Bible makes it very clear that we have to obey God’s commandments, and try our very best to live a Christ-like life. The Savior said that those who didn’t keep His commandments didn’t really love Him. (See John 14:15) He also made clear there were consequences to disobedience. In modern times, however, many prefer to ignore the scriptures about obedience and consequence and instead teach only the initial moment of conversion, as if a moment of conversion were all that were expected—giving a moment out of our lives to God and then doing anything we want all the other moments.

God requires us to obey His laws, and He has certain guidelines for handling those times when we transgress. If we can sin and just go on our way, there isn’t accountability. When you raise a child, do you let him do anything he wants, ignoring his disobedience? Of course not. If you did, your child would never grow to be a responsible, disciplined person. God, being a perfect parent, also knows we need to do certain things in order to grow.

The process of handling our sins is called repentance. Repentance helps us to deal with our sins, be accountable for what we’ve done, and to heal from the sorrow that comes when someone who truly loves God sins.

The first step is to confess the sin. We have to tell God what we’ve done, even though he already knows, just as you might insist your child confess to you when you’ve already uncovered his wrongdoing. This is a humbling experience, and there can’t be spiritual growth without humility. We have to offer this confession with true sorrow for wrongdoing—it can’t just be a matter of going through the motions. We also have to confess to anyone else we’ve harmed through our actions, and in the case of certain serious sins, we need to go to our spiritual leaders as well.

We also have to try to make restitution where possible. A stolen item must be returned or paid for. An unkind word could be replaced with great kindness. Although not everything can be fixed, we do as much as we can to pay for our sins.

We must be truly sorry for what we’ve done, a sorrow so deep it can bring about change. Repentance must be sincere. This is easiest when we’ve put a great deal of time into our relationship with God and trust Him with our faults. When we know we can be forgiven and loved even after sin, it’s easier to face God.

The final step is to completely forsake the sin. If we are unable, or worse, unwilling, to give it up, we haven’t traveled deeply enough through the repentance process and must begin again.

Going through the repentance process each time we sin allows us to be accountable for our own choices. It brings the peace of knowing we’ve made things right with God and are back safely on the path home to Him.