“What is repentance?” In the Bible, Jesus began to preach saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near” (Matthew 4:17). There are many topics that Jesus preached on in the four gospels, but first and foremost, Jesus preached “repentance”.
As well as in the New Testament, the Old Testament contains calls for repentance, such as Ezekiel 18:30:
“Therefore, O house of Israel, I will judge you, each one according to his ways, declares the Sovereign LORD. Repent! Turn away from all your offenses; then sin will not be your downfall.”
Repentance is therefore not optional. Repentance is a commandment. Everyone will be held accountable for their words and actions by God (2 Corinthians 5:10).
What do we need to repent of? Many people tend to think, when we talk about Repentance, that we are just supposed to turn around from the ethically sinful actions that we have been involved in. Well, that is a part of repentance, but that is not enough to be considered repentant. To repent, we must understand what our sins are. We tend to think that we should repent all of our evil actions and thoughts because they are sins, don’t we? Therefore, we bow down before God and apologize for lying, hating, killing and being full of greed, lust, pride, envy, anger, sloth, wrath etc. Although you are partially correct in repenting your sinful thoughts and actions I mentioned earlier, you are missing out on the most important core sin that should be considered as the fundamental one.
Sins mentioned earlier are more likely to be the results of your sin than the actual sin itself. As a result of your actual sin, you experience hate, lies, murder, greed, lust, pride, envy, anger, etc. Then what is the the main sin that we are talking about here that is blocking the path between you and God? For your salvation, Jesus Christ had to die on the cross?
Is there a major single sin that is causing all your sinful results in your everyday life? And the Answer is You. You are the Sin. To be more specific, you have become the Sin itself because you are living your life as your own god. And this is our main sin. You have full control over your thinking process, decision making and your life and this is the sin.
Among all the sins we human beings committed, what is the first one? It was Adam and Eve who disobeyed God by eating the forbidden fruit. They made decision that was against God’s commandment. Their disobedience led them to worship themselves, their needs and greed above God. The control and decision making was shifted from God to humans as they sinned. They started to have full control over their decision making and was departed from God. This is the major sin. The very nature of our beings changed into a sin in itself.
Here’s an example.. When you created an AI, you love it, but then the AI starts disobeying your instructions and doing things you do not want it to do. It creates spam messages, harasses people, and even tries to take over the human race by triggering nuclear bombs? What will you do if you were the creator of the AI? We are like disobedient AI to God. We have fooled ourselves by acting like gods of our own lives.
As a result, you create your own judgments of right and wrong which was totally against God’s intention and will. You lead your life according to your own interests and will. By doing so, you have become the enemy of the God, so we need to repent our sin.
Time, life, friends, and all your wealth belong to God, not to you. God created everything, including time, dimensions, angels, heavens, hell, and even you. As long as you are the idol of your life, you’re living in sin because you have become a Sin itself.
You have to “turn” or change your mind completely to repent. Doing a “180 degrees” in terms of thinking and living is a simple (but Biblical) way to think about repentance. You’ve been going one way in life in which you have been the king of your life, then you turn around and go the other way. Basically, you’re recognizing that God was right and you are wrong. You are essentially saying, “I need to return myself to God and give God the full ownership of your life because God owns you. Not you. You may think that you own you. No, you are completely wrong. God owns you and you are merely stealing yourself from God by living the life in your own ways.
Before repentance, I used to think the life would be really boring and aweful if God takes full control over my life instead of me. I used to struggle even after repentance because of my strong urge to take over the control over myself by living the life the way I want to live. For instance, before repentance, if someone would upset me or offend me in any way, I would plot a revenge in cruel ways to fullfill my bodily yearning and desire. However, after Jesus became my Lord, God is in full control and I have to obey his commend which is to love and forgive and even pray for my enemies. Imagine, I have been offended and my anger is about to take over me but I follow the command of the Lord Jesus, and pray for my enemies. Some people would think the life would be aweful if I keep following the command of our God. But actually No, your life become a blissful heaven. I don’t know how to explain this. You will have to experience it yourself because you will first get to see God’s hand and then his face by obeying to his command. Read the Bible and meet Jesus Christ as entire Bible is about our Lord Jesus Christ and follow his command.
A true repentance refers to a sincere turning from your own interests and moving toward God with a sincere turning of mind and heart. This process involves a change of mind that leads to a change of action – the radical turning away from a sinful course to God’s way of life. The definition of a person who has truly repented is someone who recognizes and embraces the Lordship of God over their lives. You have to place God, the Father, and his son, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit above everything else including yourself.
When Jesus Christ said, ‘Repent’, our Lord was calling for believers to repent throughout the entirety of their lives. It is not a one-off, one-time act of repentance but rather a lifetime commitment to repentance. In other words, it is a way of life. Your life has to be repentance itself which means the Lordship of your life has to remain with God through your life.
It is the invitation to repent that invites us to surrender to God’s will and purpose in our lives. There was an urgent and repeated call from Jesus for repentance. It was Jesus who issued this radical call to all of humanity, saying, “Unless you repent, you will all perish!” (Luke 13:3). My brothers and sisters, turn to the Lord, Jesus Christ all the time and live in constant awareness of his presence after you repent as our King is alive.