John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea and saying "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near." (Matthew 3:1-2)
Repentance was the central theme of Jesus and His disciples. Repenting is not something that you do one time and are done with it. It is a way of life.
Q: Who do you know today that is an expert in repenting?
Q: Who would say that repentance is one of the things I am best at in the world?
Repentance is a starting place. It's simply being honest and as specific as possible about what I did wrong.
Here is what repenting is not...it is not excusing my sin, minimizing my sin, it's not rationalizing my sin, it's not blaming my sin on somebody else. Those are all things that by its nature, sin inclines us to do.
Adam knew this well. After he had eaten the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he blamed his wife.
Adam doesn't want to admit that he did it because he chose to do it. He doesn't want to own up to his sin. And that is what sin does to us.
David said, "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away...your hand was heavy upon me;...then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said 'I will confess my transgressions to the Lord' and you forgave the guilt of my sin." Psalms 32:3-5
God can forgive a "big pile" of sins at one time...but it brings cleansing and healing to my life when I confess each sin to Him one at a time. Repentance means getting painfully honest with God.
Example: "God I told those people I was late for a meeting because the traffic was bad. The reality was that I just procrastinated. The reality was that I just didn't give myself enough time to get there and I knew that I was going to be rushed when I left. That was a lie. I am a liar. Please forgive me."
I think it's important to ask yourself WHY did I commit sin? What was the reason? In the above example, the reason that I lied was that I wanted to control their impression and have them think better of me. The result is that now I am living in an image rather than a reality. In the process of repentance, it's generally a read good idea to ask, "what's the reason?"
Why did I sin? Very often what sin involves is an ILLEGITIMATE way of tyring to meet a LEGITIMATE need. Therefore it is essential to identify what the need is and find out a God-honoring way of meeting it otherwise I am going to keep falling into the same sin traps.
Another question to ask is "What's the result of my having sinned?" "What damage did I do?" When you ask yourself these questions, you now begin to realize the problem with sin.
James writes these words..."Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up." James 4:7-10
James' words aren't dark and dreary...he's teaching us something important about our responsibility to the effects our sin caused. God doesn't want me to grovel before Him before He will forgive me. The point is...part of the process of repentance is to change my emotions about my greed, or lying or lust or gossip or pride or whatever.
God wants me to see sin the way He sees it and feel about it the same way He feels about it. If so, I will see it for the rotten, messed up, junky stuff that it is and I don't want to do it anymore. So, it involves a new way of feeling. The next step in the repentance process is to seek to make AMENDS as far as is possible. Try to set things right.
This is one of the main ways that you tell the difference between if somebody is genuinely repentant, are they really, or are they just trying to do damage control. Are they just upset because they got in trouble?
When I really repent, my concern is not just how do I minimize pain. It is how do I set things right in my soul and with the people I have hurt or wronged? Or the community that I am a part of? How do I make things right?
A classic example of this is Zacchaeus, the tax collector. After he hears the good news from Jesus, the people all around are grumbling how come Jesus wants to go be with Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus say to Jesus, "...Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount." (Luke 19:8)
Part of what repentance includes is the promise of a sincere intent to change. To set things right.
Jesus is the greatest forgiver and transformer and grace dispenser the world has ever known. He is never shocked, He has never turned anybody away.
God is more than willing to forgive. When He does...we receive His forgiveness and own up to our part. Our part is to make things right with others and accept the consequences that our sin caused...NOT seek to justify ourselves and claim "don't judge me...I'm under grace."
Grace doesn't give me a license to sin. Grace simply frees me from the condemnation of sin. It's the exchange I need to rid myself from guilt and self condemnation. God loves us. He is willing and able to forgive us of our sins.
The key to maturity is acknowledging my sin, it's effects on others and being willing to face the consequences - regardless of what it costs.
Sure, we could pull out the "don't judge me card" and claim God's forgiveness is all that matters...but honestly, even though He forgives us, we are still required to make a crooked path straight and clean up the mess we caused.
A repentant heart will accept responsibility for it's actions, walk in humility, stay under cover, submit to restoration and learn from it's mistakes while setting an example to others on how to act when one repents.
Unfortunately, we live in a culture that wants to cling to the ideology that "it's OK to sin...God will forgive me." We justify sin by saying, "everybody sins...no ones perfect...I'm just a sinner saved by grace."
While parts of that statement has a ring of truth...the REAL TRUTH is you must look at the ROOT of that mindset. Friends, we have a promise that God is faithful and just to forgive us of sin. However, a sanctified heart has already dug out the root of sin (desire to sin) and cast it far from them. When you live free from the domination of sin then you also live free from it's condemnation.
There are sins of OMISSION - sin that was unknowingly done or unplanned for. In other words, you didn't premeditate to sin. Yes...God forgives us "sinners saved by grace."
There are sins of COMMISSION - something that is done by desire and by design. It's something willingly done. Like stealing - the person planned and wanted to steal. It wasn't an automatic response, it was done by a conscious effort. A person knows right from wrong, what's lawful and illegal. To go ahead and do such things is sinful too.
Jesus forgives us of both. However, when you're living a sanctified life, THE DESIRE TO SIN is uprooted and you are less likely to commit sins of commission (premeditated sin).
Let's set the standard HIGH instead of LOW. I choose to believe that we can live closer to Jesus than the world. He is our standard setter. The real issue for sin boils down to the DESIRE TO SIN within us. Uproot the desire to sin and you'll discover freedom in Christ