The Good News of 'No Do Overs'

You've probably done it at least once in your life - ruefully considered a past event in your life, and thought, "If I could go back and do that again, I'd sure do it differently."

Humans seem to enjoy indulging in 'what ifs' from time to time, and thanks to that quirky little 2004 film, Napoleon Dynamite, I like to call it the Uncle Ricco syndrome. Uncle Ricco was Napoleon's uncle who was so hung up on the botched play in the Big Game of his high school football career, he was certain his life needed a do over to right the terrible wrong.

This seems to be one of the adversary's best strategies to cripple our progress. Because all the adversary's strategies center around obfuscating the brilliant, comforting reality of Jesus Christ, looking back and thinking 'what if' only keeps us from looking forward and trying again. The truth is stated like this: "There is no fixing this without Jesus' help." But Satan croons only the first part of that: "There is no fixing this."

Mistakes are vital to our progress; apparently, they were so vital a part of our mortal curriculum, Father allowed His perfect Son to suffer the infinite pain of the atoning sacrifice to put everything right that goes wrong in this fallen sphere. You heard me. Everything. Let me repeat:

Every. Single. Thing.

Jesus Christ's pain in Gethsemane and on the cross corrects every stupid act, every vile act, every harsh and unkind word - whether deliberate or unwitting. It soothes and heals every snub, every exclusion, every injustice, every betrayal.

He felt the pain of unresolved illnesses and pains, the ache of empty arms - be they the empty arms of the infertile or those who put babies to rest, having barely said welcome to them. He experienced the ache of those whose partners left them too soon in death, or too cavalierly in divorce. He mourned - and mourns - with those who never had a partner to begin with, who wonder if there is a safe place for them anywhere in this wilderness of a world.

Our dear Savior, who deserved none of eternal justice, paid all of our debt to eternal justice so that He could truly be with us as we suffer. He paid our debt so we wouldn't have to if we ask for His advocacy. He paid our debt so we can feel the sweet relief of the comforted or forgiven, and can learn to feel compelled to give it to others.

There are do overs with learning to shoot foul shots or nail a scale in a Chopin nocturne. There's simply a lot of repetition as consistent, intentional practice builds higher proficiency. Buried inside the arduous work of countless repetitions is the subtle message - not of do over - but of do again.

It's repentance.

In a fallen world with deeply flawed humans, repentance is rarely a one-and-done event. It nearly always has the feel of mastering those foul shots or scales. It involves a lot of practice and do agains.

Do it again.

Again.

Getting a do over is a fantasy for movies. Getting a do again is the mystical yet raw reality of Father's generous plan of "grace for grace" (D&C 93:12). In April 2024 Elder Renlund called it "repeatedly and iteratively applying the other elements of the doctrine of Christ [faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the Holy Ghost], creating the 'powerful virtuous cycle’..." (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2024/04/43renlund?lang=eng)

The beauty of do agains is the beauty of intentional practice of any desired ability: while there may be far too many repetitions where it looks like absolutely no change is taking place, eventually, thanks to natural law (D&C 130:21-22), and that beautiful enabling, transforming grace offered us by Jesus Christ, we change.

We become holy. And in that process, the stones we stumbled over, the pits we fell into and maybe lived in for a while, the seemingly inescapable circumstances we used to wistfully look back on will also become holy. Because that was the training ground that truly introduced us to our God.

C.S. Lewis wrote:

"Ye cannot in your present state understand eternity...That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say "Let me have but this and I'll take the consequences": little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death. The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man's past already conforms to his badness and is filled only with dreariness. And that is why...the Blessed will say "We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven, : and the Lost, "We were always in Hell." And both will speak truly.” (C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce)

I don't know about you, but in a world where we have the privilege of experiencing both, I want to make the intentional choice of heaven and glory. Because He is there, and in all my blundering repetitions, I've humbly discovered I really can't live without Him.