Alma 22

King Lamoni's father, who is king of all the Lamanites, asks Aaron to teach him. After he has been taught, the king offers a prayer that is amazing to me because it is so similar in part to the prayer that I offered up before I left for school in Chicago. What he says that is similar is, "... if there is a God, and if thou art God, wilt thou make thyself known unto me." The king then makes this promise, "and I will give away all my sins to know thee." There is the great key to knowing if God exists and to knowing that he is very much involved in our lives and loves us with a perfect love. It asks that we give something of ourselves, and in giving we receive in return is far greater than the price we pay. The king realized this and told Aaron that he was willing to give up all he possessed just to receive the joy of this knowledge.

What has brought King Lamoni and his father to this point is the realization of the most important thing that we can learn in this life, that we are in a fallen and mortal existence. When we understand this this, then we can know understand we are here and what the purpose of our life is. When we truly understand what our fallen nature means, then we realize how much we need a Savior. In verse 14, Aaron says, "And since man had fallen he could not merit anything of himself." No amount of good works, good thoughts and good intentions can help us to live again after death, let alone live in the Celestial Kingdom. There is nothing we can do to remove the eternal consequences of our sins. This can only come through a Savior. As Aaron states in the same verse, "the sufferings and death of Christ atone for [our] sins, through faith and repentance, and he breaketh the bands of death, that the grave shall have no victory, and that the sting of death should be swallowed up in the hopes of glory." That is the only way our fallen state can be overcome. It is also the only way that we can find the happiness and peace that surpasses all understanding. It is a small price we have to pay compared to what we receive in return.