Urban Reformation

This is something I’m asking God to show me at a deeper level. How many times to we say “I’m sorry only to do the same thing again?” I think of myself and my children. I think of my eating habits and how easy it is for me to justify myself and blame my circumstance, and not take responsibility for my life.  What sin in my life, do I do again and again, only to say….”I’m sorry, and I’m sorry…….” without any true repentance? Do we secretly believe that our “I’m sorry’s” over sin, are the brokenness needed to be conformed to the image of Christ? only to be a Peter and betray him when the cock crows? When we face temptation under pressure?

When was the last time we sought God to be granted repentance…..true repentance? The turning away from sin and the turning toward God “for good”.

And all of this said, the repentance of a nation must start with the repentance of “me.” The revival of a church must start with the revival of me? The prayer life of my family must start with the prayer life of me. And the “broken and contrite spirit” must start with mine. Oh that God would grant it, for me, for my family, for our church, and for His People……

Oswald Chambers’ classic daily devotional ‘My Utmost for His Highest’

December 7th.

REPENTANCE
“For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation.” 2 Corinthians 7:10

Conviction of sin is best portrayed in the words -

“My sins, my sins, my Saviour, How sad on Thee they fall.”
Conviction of sin is one of the rarest things that ever strikes a man. It is the threshold of an understanding of God. Jesus Christ said that when the Holy Spirit came He would convict of sin, and when the Holy Spirit rouses a man’s conscience and brings him into the presence of God, it is not his relationship with men that bothers him, but his relationship with God – “against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight.” The marvels of conviction of sin, forgiveness, and holiness are so interwoven that it is only the forgiven man who is the holy man, he proves he is forgiven by being the opposite to what he was, by God’s grace. Repentance always brings a man to this point: I have sinned. The surest sign that God is at work is when a man says that and means it. Anything less than this is remorse for having made blunders, the reflex action of disgust at himself.

The entrance into the Kingdom is through the panging pains of repentance crashing into a man’s respectable goodness; then the Holy Ghost, Who produces these agonies, begins the formation of the Son of God in the life. The new life will manifest itself in conscious repentance and unconscious holiness, never the other way about. The bedrock of Christianity is repentance. Strictly speaking, a man cannot repent when he chooses; repentance is a gift of God. The old Puritans used to pray for “the gift of tears.” If ever you cease to know the virtue of repentance, you are in darkness. Examine yourself and see if you have forgotten how to be sorry.

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