Forever Indebted and Grateful

Our Sunday School lesson last Sunday was on Mosiah chapters 1-3. Scott and I have made a great effort to read the chapters together before we receive the lesson each week to be more prepared for personal inspiration and understanding. It has made all the difference.

The concept that stuck out to me this last week was one that I have always known, but saw in a different light.

We are forever indebted to God.

Of course we are. I already knew this. He performed the atonement for us and gave of His life so that we might be able to repent.

Our indebtedness, however, goes much deeper than that. It says in Mosiah 2:23... "... in the first place, he hath created you, and granted unto you your lives, for which ye are indebted unto him."

So before the atonement was performed, He first gave us of our life and breath to begin with.

In Mosiah 2:24 it says... "And secondly, he doth require that ye should do as he hath commanded you; for which if ye do, he doth immediately bless you; and therefore he hath paid you. And ye are still indebted unto him, and are, and will be, forever and ever..."

It's rather ironic. We try to repay our Savior by doing as He has commanded us to do, but every time we keep His commandments, He immediately blesses us, therefore increasing our debt to him. One might look at being in debt to someone as a negative thing, but in this case, the debt is good. We keep His commandments, He blesses us ten fold. We keep another commandment and our blessing thus increase.

So in a way, the more in debt we are, the better. It means we are doing as the Lord commands and He is blessing us in return. It's a win, win situation. The best part of the deal is that the Lord doesn't expect us to make good on the debt, because that is impossible. Does a parent keep tally of all they do for a child as they are growing up and expect the debt to be repaid? No. A parent gets repaid by having the child make wise choices and living a righteous and worthy life. All we must do is keep trying to repay the debt and we will be blessed beyond our wildest dreams.

I am a child in this life... a child to my Heavenly Father. I am grateful that I will be forever indebted to Him.