REPENT

It’s such a hated word.  Honestly, when I hear the word “repent” or see it in capital letters, my mind immediately goes to the fire and brimstone preachers of the deep south, the crazed evangelical movements that give the Holy Spirit a bad rap for being more about people rolling on the floor barking and laughing than about changing people’s lives and hearts, and a few crazies I’ve known who decide they know the year and date of our Savior’s return, spend a short time living like their breaths are numbered, pushing their hypotheses down people’s throats, and then revert back to lukewarm-ness (or at least normalcy) soon after.  I think most people probably feel the same.  I mean, if my mind goes there initially, me, having grown up in church, having loved Jesus since before I can remember, then I can only imagine what other, less inculcated people think when they hear “repent”. 

 

The truth remains, repentance is Biblical.  And the churches that pedal a cheaper, easier, less sacrificial version of salvation are prostituting the Gospel, and it ceases to be the Gospel at all.

 

I was reminded of this last night when I read Psalm 51.  Most of us church goers will know it because of the song that comes from it:  Create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me…

 

But I wasn’t super aware of the rest of the Psalm, the beginning where David admits pretty forthrightly that there’s nothing he can do to separate himself from his sin, that it’s so built in and natural to him that his sin is “always before” him.  He acknowledges again that we’re born into iniquity and again pleads to be saved from himself.

 

I realized I haven’t said any of this to God recently.  It’s so easy to apologize to God for injustices against our fellow man.  We can see those.  We remember them if we look back over our day.  A bitter thought here, a divisive comment there, whole conversations of gossip started or not stopped.  However, I haven’t apologized for those things and asked for forgiveness in regards to my sins against God Himself.  David says, “Against You, You only, have I sinned and one what is evil in Your sight.” 

 

Now I don’t think that God sits up on His throne with a check sheet going “Hmm, well she apologized for her sins against man.  Check.  But what about her sins against ME?!”

 

He’s more gracious than that.  He IS grace. 

 

What I do know, though, is that for God to be glorified in my life, I must be humbled.  And repentance humbles.  Knowing that no matter what I’ve done for, against, in regards to others, my sins are all against the Father of light, knowing that every infraction of the law of Heaven is a direct violation Love, knowing that every sin is treason against a holy King, and I deserve death; knowing these things and feeling them again makes me feel much more acutely my need for Jesus, for His pain, blood, death, and victory.  I’m utterly helpless on my own.

 

Repent cannot be allowed to be a dirty word to us.

 

In fact, though I don’t claim to be prophetic and speak “thus sayeth the Lord” into your life about this, I’d be willing to bet you should take some time to repent right now.  Because whether you are soaring high above the cares of Earth right now, God speaking into your life each moment of His glory and mercy and of your purpose and holiness as part of His royal priesthood, or if you’re keenly aware of your fallen-ness and are being humbled again and again, in a semi-constant state of asking for forgiveness, our repentance lifts Him up.  It sets Jesus, our brother and God and King, in the highest place, where He should be, glittering and crystal for all to see. 

 

Do it again.  Do it now.  Acknowledge your blasphemy because it’s the truth, and the acceptance that our hands are tied for saving ourselves is the linchpin of Belief. 

 

Remember that the word used in Psalm 51 and then in the song is CREATE in me a clean heart, oh God.  Not fashion or temper or some use of change.  Create, meaning to make or design out of materials not yet existent.  This is not some ritual cleansing like a carpet cleaning where God takes what we already have that’s ours and removes some stuff and then leaves us A-okay.  It’s a GIFT.  New and sparkly and ours from Jehovah!

 

The sooner we acknowledge this and the more often we truly acknowledge this, humbling ourselves as the fallen, ever-selfish creatures we are, the closer we’ll be to knowing God in all His mystery and perfection.