Alma is preaching and he basically says this:
I told you this before, and you have had many people tell you also, so please, PLEASE do not procrastinate your repentance until the very end. This life is temporary, and it's given to us to prepare for eternity, and if we don't spend our time improving our decisions while we are here, then afterward we will not have the chance to do so, because we can't do anything after we die.
It sounds like Alma is saying that the dead cannot repent.
We know that the dead can at least partially repent, or accept vicarious ordinances done for them. It's true that they themselves cannot perform those ordinances (they're dead). "The dead who repent will be redeemed by obedience to the ordinances of the house of God." Doctrine and Covenants 138:58. I even made up a little tune to go with this verse and my kids have it memorized - the reason is because this principle is very important to me, and I wanted a scriptural basis for it.
Things about this life that we have that we did not have in our premortal life and will not have in our immediate postmortal life:
- a body
- agency <-- we had some agency, and we will continue to have some agency, but what I mean is this: the veil which surrounds us, which forces us to walk by faith, that also imparts the gift of agency to us. We have to rely on our own experience to distinguish good from evil.
- the chance to create families
- living on a terrestrial planet
- sin <-- reliance on the Savior
Someday we will be reunited with a perfect version of our body. This is the resurrection. It is a gift to all humanity given to us by Jesus Christ. It is not limited to just his righteous followers. But for some reason we need to experience trials and repentance before the resurrection.
Answer:
I think all of these factors are tied into the first one: a body. It is our physical bodies that make these other things possible.
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