“If we want healing from God, thorough repentance is the way to receive it… It is not enough that we see our sins and feel bad about them. It is not enough even to stop sinning. True repentance comes all the way back to God, back to our original relationship with him, back to our first love, back to the basics of the gospel, back to the daily disciplines of holiness. We leave the world behind, including worldly Christianity, and go hard after God until we rediscover how to live in his nearness.
– Ray Ortlund
The very idea of “returning” tells us to go back the way we came. Retracing our wayward steps, we must undo what we have done, dismantle our idolatries, own up to our foolish judgment calls, recant our wrong ideas. Then we reassemble the life, personally and institution- ally, that is pleasing to God, according to the Scriptures. We start to think more carefully about how we live. We get tough on ourselves and make some long-overdue, hard decisions. We prize God alone as our great delight and reward. This is real repentance. It is costly, inconvenient, and embarrassing. But it is the only way to healing. Anything less is humbug.”
Reflection:
Generally we equate repentance with feeling bad. And there is an element of feeling bad in repentance becuase we must acknoweldge that we have turned away from God.
But repentance is a sweet pain that leads us all the way back to God. The Bible uses the word “return” over and over to describe repentance, and this is very helpful for us. It reminds us that what true repentance is, is a journey back home to God the Father. God wants us to come back to Him, and this means retracing our steps.
Repentance is costly, but not because we have to pay something in order to return. It is costly like having cancer removed from our body is costly. Removing something that is toxic will mean a certain measure of cutting away. But when we are at home with God again, whatever inconvenience repentance cost us will be more than worth it.
