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Repentance
Brings Freedom
“This
is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: "In repentance and
rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would
have none of it.”
Isaiah 30:15 NIV
The subject of repentance is not widely preached
today with the exception of reaching the unsaved. It’s unpopular.
We’d rather hear about the love of God.
Many
Christians cling to the notion that the born again experience is the beginning
and end of salvation as
2
Corinthians 5:17 says: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new
creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
However, notice the scripture says, “in Christ.”
To be in Christ is to be
dead to our fallen nature, and resurrected in the nature and character of
Christ. Although much may fall away in our conversion experience, but we still,
for the most part, operate out of our fallen nature. Think of being born again
as receiving the embryo of all the characteristics of God. We must be
sanctified (or mature spiritually) before any of us experience the fullness of
Christ.
The
apostle Paul speaks of salvation and sanctification as a process. “But we are
bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord,
because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification
by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which He called you by our gospel,
for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
2 Thessalonians: 13-14
The
apostle Paul knew this well. “I want to know Christ and the power of his
resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him
in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing
I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on
toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in
Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:10-15
NIV
Paul was going for the full glory of being in
Christ and was willing
to pay the price.
Paul
preached repentance to the church of Corinth. Although gifted, its saints were
immature. The church had been infiltrated by false teachers and there was
division and immorality. In correction, Paul tells us that repentance,
understood through the carnal nature, does not bring union with God. “Godly
sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but
worldly sorrow brings death.”
2
Corinthians
7:10 Notice Paul talks about
worldly sorrow bringing death, yet godly sorrow leads to salvation. There
are two kinds of sorrow. Worldly sorrow does not bring change, nor does it
bring rest. So, there is a false repentance (a counterfeit) and true
repentance.
False or Counterfeit Repentance
Harry, a Christian man, is frequently viewing pornography on the internet. He
knows he is in sin, but his lust for this overrules, so he indulges himself. He
is married to a wonderful woman, but when it comes to intimacy she has
difficulty. So does Harry, but, he is not tuned into that. He rationalizes
that if his wife was only passionate, he would not have to turn to this for an
outlet. In reality, by viewing a picture, he can experience pleasure without
the risk of vulnerability. One day, his wife catches him and Harry is totally
mortified. With his marriage at stake, he begs forgiveness and swears it will
never happen again. He weeps and wails in sorrow. But Harry’s sorrow is for
himself. He is weeping in self-pity at the prospect of loss.
False
repentance can be characterized by a sorrow for self, accompanied by guilt and
remorse for having either done something wrong, had evil thoughts or hurt someone
close. We may deny ourselves, but we have no genuine desire to give it up. We
have no change of heart. We experience abstinence as denial of pleasure. Even
if self-will is strong enough to deny ourselves for years, peace remains
elusive. In his carnal nature, man eats from the tree of knowledge of good and
evil. As such, flipping from evil to good can appear like true repentance, both
to others and even to ourselves. This applies to all our selfish desires; all
the idols we worship, not just grossly unacceptable sins. We can falsely repent
for anything or anyone that we have put before God. If we do, we remain in
bondage.
True Repentance
True repentance
comes as a result of taking full responsibility for our sin. It’s a place of
knowing we have sinned against God and possibly our brother. We no longer
justify, minimize or rationalize our actions, and know we deserve to take a
hit. We become willing to suffer the consequences of our actions. “Oh Lord,
have mercy on my soul!” We are far more concerned with our eternal damnation
than escaping punishment. We want to give this up and turn from it with no
regrets. We die to self.
King David modeled true
repentance. “And David said to God, “Was it not I who commanded the people
to be numbered? I am the one who has sinned and done evil indeed; but these
sheep, what have they done? Let Your hand, I pray, O LORD my God, be against me
and my father’s house, but not against Your people that they should be plagued.”
1 Chronicles
21:17
David did not seek to escape suffering.
When
we truly repent, God showers His mercy and grace upon us. What a God we serve
that would forgive the undeserving. This is the cross. Jesus willingly took
responsibility for the world’s sin, not so we could escape consequences, but to
provide the way and show us the face of true repentance. If this does not
prove, He is the Son of God, I don’t know what would. We deserve it. He did
not. That’s love! Jesus tells us to follow him in
Mathew 10:38 NKJV…
follow after him through the cross.
The
fruit of true repentance is peace, joy and freedom from sin. Not only do we
lose interest in sin, but are repulsed by it. To repent is to release; to die to; to forgive. When we die to
self, we rise with Christ. This is God’s promise. It’s a paradox. We
surrender and win. We connect with the Almighty, omnipotent God. True
repentance is a pain free environment.
So why do we counterfeit
repentance if the real deal is so sweet? We don’t want to share in his
suffering and we don’t trust God. It’s really that simple. We fear loss,
humiliation, rejection, the unknown and so on. We want the glory without the
pain. Satan says we can have it, but he lies. Satan will give us a short-term
fix, and keep us striving for more. “Now if we are children, then we are
heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his
sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.”
Romans
8:17 NIV Notice that the sufferings of Christ were before he went to the
cross.
When we are suffering,
our natural reaction is to want to reconcile it by ourselves; independent of
God. We want control. “ I WANT THE POWER ”!!
If
something is out of control, we will press in harder to fix it. The more out of
control things get, the more we suffer. And the Lord lets us. This is what His
discipline looks like. It’s not that He wants us to suffer, but until we
recognize that we cannot do without Him and relinquish control, we cannot unite
with Him. The Lord knows our carnal nature. He knows that until we come to the
end of ourselves, we won’t give it up. Stubborn lot, aren’t we? And this is
after we’re born again!
Here’s the lie. We believe that we have power that we really don’t have, and
can’t see it.
Praise you Lord for
giving us Your Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth and show us what to repent
of in any given situation. So often, what we think is our problem is not
the heart of the matter, so we need God's Holy Spirit to reveal it. We can even
count on the Lord to put us into a pressure cooker to bring out that which needs
to die. We don’t even need to look for issues. He loves us that much. The
Lord provides!
But, we do need to be open and willing to allow God to work in our lives. If we
are willing, the Lord will take us deeper and deeper into Him. He will take us
to ever increasing levels of glory. Halleluiah! God is love!
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