Gloryteller

No, I’m not thinking about whether or not I should repent, haha, I’m thinking about what repenting means – what it means when a person repents, and more to the point, my position on its importance in the walk of faith.
      There are a few different definitions of the word repent, from the mundane “feeling bad or sorry about your failings”, to “showing sincere remorse for one’s wrongdoings”, to “changing one’s mind and lifestyle”, to the more Biblical “turning away from sin to obtain forgiveness”.
      God’s Word makes it clear that repentance – turning away from sin and sin nature – is one of His requirements for salvation and eternal life. However, in the nest of my puny mind, an idea fledges, ready for flight, that simply regretting one’s past, changing ones mind, or lifestyle, or even turning away from sin is not enough. It is not the depth of what is required.
      After much thought, research, and scripture reading, I agree that repentance is a turning, but it is not only a turning away, but also a turning toward. Going a step further, I maintain that it is, or should be, more a turning toward Jesus than just a turning away from sin.
      We can’t depend on ourselves to do any of that serious kind of turning, can we? We are completely inadequate for it. So how do we turn? We believe in, and trust, and have faith in Jesus for our turning!
He said it: “Apart from Me you can do nothing.” We are incapable without Him! How can we turn away from sin without the grace by which He enables our faith in Him?

Ephesians 2: 8-9
⁸ For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— ⁹ not by works, so that no one can boast.

Turning from sin on our own and thus receiving salvation would be like saving ourselves, would it not? It would be of our own works. Impossible!
I believe that all our well-being hinges on our relationship with Jesus, and that begins with the gift of faith, undeserved but given through God’s grace. I believe that the moment one believes, and has trust and faith in Jesus; the moment we turn to Him as Lord of our lives, is the moment, by His grace, that we find it possible, and highly desirable, to turn away from our sins, and our sin. That repentance, that turning is of the heart. It seems to me that it is not simply a “one-and-done” either. It is a turning toward Him again, every moment. In this broken world, it has to be.

That’s my opinion on repentance. It is fully fledged and has taken wing. I believe it and I’m sticking to it (until, by His grace and for His glory, He sets me straight according to His Truth).
I’m Gloryteller. Talk with you later. : )

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