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Repentance
The Bible plainly teaches us to repent. Teachers and preachers of the Bible command us to repent, a deep heartfelt sorrowful repentance. All I could muster was to change my ways. I reasoned with the amount of knowledge that I had of God^s ways and accepted it as a better way than what I had been practicing. It is difficult to muster up genuine sorrow for wrongdoing when it was never taught by genuine people that what I was doing was wrongdoing. I was just trying to take care of number one. I didn^t realize just how poorly I was doing by letting nature take it^s course.
Make no provisions for the flesh the Bible teaches. What a contrast to get it when you can or whatever my modus operandi was.
I once wept. It is the only time I remember crying in my life. I wept for over twelve hours straight as I recall, overnight. I must have lost ten pounds or more. My bath towel was soaked and very heavy. The sad thing was that I didn^t even know what I was weeping about for sure. Looking back I had quit taking drugs, had changed universities, had left all my friends behind, was failing, had just stopped a very brief relationship with a girl that I didn^t like much, felt that I had lost contact with God, had no hope of ever learning at university who God was, what He was doing or what was expected of me, had no idea or motivation to make something of myself and didn^t know what I wanted to do in life. Basically I think I was just feeling sorry for myself or was completely disillusioned. This didn^t comprise of repentance since I continued to sin.
I didn^t understand back then the difference between my imagination and God^s Spirit. I tried to capture every thought and I had good thoughts mixed with bad actions. I had no awareness that God was calling me. I knew that there were many religious hypocrites who taught one thing and did something different, who didn^t follow the teachings of the Bible, and I would have nothing to do with them. But I was not doing anything constructive about it only deteriorating, self destruction.
Years later I turned to searching for God by first reading the Bible for myself then studying it and searching for people who understood it and were teaching and practicing it. I found them in the Church Of God. I learned much truth and applied it to my life. I was baptized and ever since then I have tried to stay on the course of righteousness, holding fast to knowledge as I learned it. It doesn^t seem like much but what I am doing is allowing Christ to save me and if my example is noticed and followed by anyone then perhaps they too will be changed and saved by Jesus.
I believe that true repentance occurs if you change your ways to God^s ways, otherwise it is not true repentance.
Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. 2 Corinthians 7:10
For I will declare mine iniquity; I will be sorry for my sin. Psalm 38:18
2007 Jacques Gauvin
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