brief thoughts from the week

More challenges came from my friend, who insists The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is not Christian. He still sees the church as teaching that people can "earn" their way to heaven.
This could not be further from the truth. Without the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, obedience yields nothing!
Yet, a thought came to me today. If Jesus endured the torturous ordeal of Gethsemane through Golgotha, more than man could suffer, could we not accept of this wonderful, merciful atonement by simply obeying his commandments? The scales of judgment are thus eternally tipped in our favor. He has done for us what we could not do for ourselves: make a way to overcome sin and death. King Benjamin explains this uneven arrangement in his speech in the first few chapters of Mosiah, saying that every time we obey God, he rewards us so abundantly that we are eternally indebted to him. Jesus proclaimed that he came "not to destroy, but to fulfill." He came to do what had been prophesied and looked to for centuries, for millenia. He came to cleanse us from all iniquity. This would require active faith on our part. In Leviticus, where Christ's atonement was foreshadowed in animal sacrifice, the children of Israel were required to do certain things to receive forgiveness for their sins. If a person touched or ate an animal that died on its own, that person was unclean. Yet, if he washed himself and his clothes, he would become clean by evening. "But if he wash them not, nor bathe his flesh; then he shall bear his iniquity" (Levitcus 17:16). Without physically going through this physical washing, the person would remain unclean.
Though Christ had no need of baptism, "he showeth unto the children of men that, according to the flesh he humbleth himself before the Father, and witnesseth unto the Father that he would be obedient unto him in keeping his commandments" (2 Nephi 31:4-7). Christ was without spot, and therefore had no sin that needed to be washed away. Nevertheless, he was baptized to show us that being obedient to God was paramount. After Christ's atonement, sacrifice by the shedding of blood ended. We are now commanded to bring forth the sacrifice of a broken heart and a contrite spirit, to receive of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. "Behold, he offereth himself a sacrifice for sin, to answer the ends of the law, unto all those who have a broken heart and a contrite spirit; and unto none else can the ends of the law be answered" (2 Nephi 2:7). If we only seek our own will, is our heart really broken and our spirit truly contrite?
Submission to God does not "earn" us a spot in heaven, it simply opens our hearts to receive the grace and mercy he has so benevolently bestowed upon us by the merits of his son. Except for this magnificent atonement, we could not repent and turn to God, we would be lost forever. When we obey the commandment to lose our lives for Christ's sake, we will find ourselves with God in the end.