[Jacob 2:50 – 59]

2:50 O all ye that are pure in heart, lift up your heads and receive the pleasing word of God, and feast upon his love; for ye may, if your minds are firm for ever.

2:51 But wo, wo, unto you that are not pure in heart; that are filthy this day before God; for except ye repent, the land is cursed for your sakes;

2:52 And the Lamanites which are not filthy like unto you, (nevertheless, they are cursed with a sore cursing,) shall scourge you even unto destruction.

2:53 And the time speedily cometh, that except ye repent, they shall possess the land of your inheritance, and the Lord God will lead away the righteous out from among you.

2:54 Behold, the Lamanites, your brethren, whom ye hate, because of their filthiness and the cursings which hath come upon their skins, are more righteous than you;

2:55 For they have not forgotten the commandments of the Lord, which were given unto our fathers, that they should have, save it were one wife: and concubines they should have none; and there should not be whoredoms committed among them.

2:56 And now this commandment they observe to keep; wherefore because of this observance in keeping this commandment, the Lord God will not destroy them, but will be merciful unto them; and one day they shall become a blessed people.

2:57 Behold, their husbands love their wives, and their wives love their husbands, and their husbands and their wives love their children;

2:58 And their unbelief and their hatred towards you, is because of the iniquity of their fathers; wherefore, how much better are you than they, in the sight of your great Creator?

2:59 O my brethren, I fear, that unless ye shall repent of your sins, that their skins will be whiter than yours, when ye shall be brought with them before the throne of God.

Repentance is something that we can never say that we are done with. The more we recognize the power of God and are given an increase in the knowledge of Him, we have need of repentance.

“Repentance is a conscious, positive response to an ever-increasing revelation of God.”

 We often as a people grow so comfortable where we are, that we begin to backslide, and it is not until we are far from Him that we recognize we have grown away from His redemptive power. It is because, we have not fully been a repentant people; we have said “all is well” and are satisfied.

Satisfaction leads to slothfulness.

Sometimes, we slide far behind even those whom we had previously seen as sinners and they have become more righteous than we are.

The lesson here is, even the most vile of sinner, if they are able to hold onto a single commandment given by God, sometimes has more of a life-line than the most pious among us because we have become comfortable in our relationship with God, to the point we are no longer growing that relationship.

When we are no longer growing our relationship with God, we are backsliding.