Our old bishop gave a talk about what the Savior meant by the scripture "Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:39)

This is a scripture that every Christian knows about and the Savior was very straight forward in his teaching of the principle. It is one of the hardest things in life to do. When someone has hurt you, purposefully or not, to respond, not by slapping back, but by turning your face to the other side and offering the only thing that they could not take, your free will.

Why would the Savior ask his disciples to do this? Does he want us to be victims of martyr like punishment at the hands of others who maybe more powerful or emotional than we are? I don't think so...in fact I believe just the opposite. By restraining our retaliation we choose to show not only the person that is offending, but to our Savior that we respond only to our covenants and to our love of the Savior. We know where we are going and we will not allow those who choose to try to disuade from our covenant path. Not easy to do however. Second only in difficulty to forgiving those who have hurt us...but both seem necessary to become like the Savior.