The Mystery, Privilege, and Joy of Repentance
The last few weeks have been a time of reorganization. We moved into our new house and began unpacking boxes, finding places to put all of the stuff, and shopping for the pieces of furniture that we need to fill this place. God has a sense of humor. We sold a house, got rid of most of our furniture, moved into a small condo thinking that would be the place where we would spend the rest of our lives. And then God moved us to NC. And into another house! Bigger than the one we sold in Houston!! What is going on?? Fortunately, NC has a lot of resale shops.
Anyway, it has been a busy time. The other day I was talking with Joey who reminded me that the Jewish Day of Atonement – Yom Kippur – is just around the corner. It begins at sunset on September 22 and ends at nightfall on September 23. Jewish tradition ties this holy day back to the day when Moses descended from Mount Sinai with the tablets containing the 10 commandments given to Him by God. When he got down, he found that the Israelites led by Aaron, of all people, had built and were worshiping a Golden Calf. Enraged, Moses smashed the tablets and then proceeded to intercede with God on behalf of Israel. God, in His great mercy, forgave the Jews (but not before He sent a great plague among them). Since then, this time has been memorialized by Yom Kippur as a time of repentance.
While Yom Kippur is basically September 23, the 9 days leading up to Yom Kippur, also known as the days of awe, are part of this holy time. For 10 days Jews around the world will perform teshuva, or repentance. Ten days, one day for each commandment in the decalogue. Repentance culminates on September 23 with the final commandment, the one that is the most difficult and on which all the others rest – thou shall not covet. We covet as we live in the kingdom of self. Not only is covetousness about wanting what we do not have, it is also about wanting more than others have. I read about a study recently in which this question was asked: “Would you rather have $100,000 if others around you had $50,000 or would you rather have $200,000 if others around you had $400,000”. That answer seems obvious. You would want more money – take the $200,000. But the offer most chosen was the former. Most people would rather have less money ($100,000) if it meant they would have more than others. As this study indicated “it is not so much what we haven’t, but what others have that makes us unhappy.”
As I said in a previous post, repentance is not so much about turning away from what we have done (it is that, but more) as it is turning away from who we are. In the kingdom of self, we not only want more, but we want others to have less than us. It is out of this heart that we release evil into the world. This is why repentance is so important.
Referring to the command to perform teshuva or repentance and be restored Moses tells Israel in Deuteronomy 30: 11-14 “Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, ‘who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it?’ Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, ‘who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it?’ No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.”
Moses goes on to warn Israel in the same chapter that turning back (repent) to God is the path to life and prosperity; but turning away from God will lead to death and destruction. He expressly warns them to not turn away from God to other gods and worship them. Moses hammers this warning home with the famous passage in Deuteronomy 30: 19, 20 “This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him. For the Lord is your life, and He will give you many years in the land He swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
These are serious words. And in Deuteronomy 30 they are all about the importance of repentance. As Moses points out, we have the ‘word’ very near us, it is in our mouth and in our heart. Paul picks up on this and writes in Romans 10: 8-10 “The word is near you, it is in your mouth and in your heart, that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: that if you confess with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.”
Is Paul connecting this passage in Romans 10 to the importance of repentance described in Deuteronomy 30? I believe he is. Therefore, is repentance a life and death matter? God’s grace and God’s love for us are expressed in Jesus Christ and His atoning death on the cross. But God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Has He changed His mind about the importance of repentance?
What if we joined our Jewish neighbors and followed their lead in September? Beginning on September 14, begin with the first commandment “you shall have no other gods before me”, ask God to show you the other gods in your life. Confess them to Him. And then ask for the Power of God to begin turning away from these other gods. As I said in a previous post, these are generally the things we have chosen in the kingdom of self (kingdom of the world) to find our value and acceptance. These are the things we worship. Ask God to show you what they are. You might be surprised.
And I suspect that you and I will find out that as we move through these days the overwhelming emotion we feel will be sorrow. Not just a sorrow about what we have done, who we have hurt, how we have wasted out time, etc. But a deeper sorrow – a sorrow at how over and over again we have broken the Heart of our Father who loves us. “Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation” (2 Corinthians 7: 10). Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads deep into the Kingdom of Heaven. Hallelujah.
Each day, mediate on the next commandment and ask God to show you where you fall short. Remember, in your heart is the power to turn, to change. But for us, for Christians, that power is not just our will. It is also “Christ in us, the hope of glory”. This is the great mystery of repentance. Repentance is not just feeling sorry for what we have done. It is changing who we are; it is changing our heart. Or maybe a better way to say it is repentance leads to a changed heart. “Don’t you know that your yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you”. We must repent. Jesus tells us that plainly. It is our ‘work’. But how that happens – that is the great mystery because Christ in us, God’s Spirit in our hearts and minds (you have the mind of Christ) joins our heart and our mind to bring about the change. We must repent, our heart and our mind must cry out for change; and then in some crazy, unfathomable way we begin to notice a difference. We are less angry, not so tempted, not so easily offended, not so fearful, we covet less. Wow, we say “it really works.” Rivers of living water really will flow out of us. Maybe a trickle at first, but it’s a start.
Here is the difference between the Deuteronomy Israelites and Christians today. Jesus said “the Kingdom of God is at hand, near, among us” depending upon the scripture passage you read. Jesus tells us that the good news, the Gospel, is that the Kingdom of God is here (but not in its fullness – we must always add that qualifier). Before Jesus, there was only one kingdom on earth, the kingdom of Satan, and everyone lives in a kingdom. Pre-Jesus there was no choice. Now there is, thanks to God’s grace and mercy. And because of the death of Jesus and His atoning blood, you and I have the right and the privilege of entering and living in that Kingdom. Jesus called it the Kingdom of Heaven for a reason. To enter into the Kingdom of Heaven or the Kingdom of God is to be saved. That is where we find salvation, we find it now, and it lasts for eternity.
What a privilege, what a gift. Life now. Rescued, redeemed, set free from the tyranny of Satan. Restored back to the relationship we had with God before the Fall. We don’t earn our way into the Kingdom through repentance. Jesus is the door into the Kingdom and the only reason we can enter the Kingdom is His work. But to live the Kingdom life, we must repent. Because to repent is to turn away from finding our value in other gods and worshiping them – living in the other kingdom. And not just outwardly – it is a turning of our heart from self (pride) to God (humility). We cannot hold dual citizenship. Jesus tells us to choose – there are two gates. The narrow gate leads to Kingdom life; Jesus is that gate. The broad gate leads to destruction. Choose the narrow gate.
Lets do this together. Beginning on September 14 and ending on the evening of September 23 meditate on each commandment. “Search me thoroughly, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there is any wicked or hurtful way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139: 23, 24, Amplified Bible).
There are many tangible manifestations of Kingdom life. Humility, unoffendableness, and peace for starters. But one of the greatest Kingdom gifts is joy – “the Joy of the Lord is my strength”. Joy for every twist and turn in life, joy in the midst of strife, struggle, suffering, and sorrow, and joy for each glorious day that the Lord has prepared for and given to us. We enter into His joy and His Kingdom life as we repent.