Psalm 32:5

New International Version (NIV)

Then I acknowledged my sin to you
and did not cover up my iniquity.
I said, “I will confess
my transgressions to the Lord.”
And you forgave
the guilt of my sin.

For meditation

Unrepentant Christians! That’s what we have become!

We get into sin and enjoy it. The Holy Spirit is grieved. We feel the heat and we can’t stand it. We run to God on our knees, crying, “Lord, forgive me!” A merciful and compassionate God that He is; He forgives us. Ten minutes after, we are back to our old selves again, and the cycle continues. Remember the Israelites in the time of the judges? But we never learn, do we? Yet, we want to be a person after God’s heart!

David was human like us. He stepped out of line and muddied himself in a terrible way(2 Sam. 11). He thought he had outsmarted everybody, until the prophet Nathan confronted him in his palace with the evidence.

“You are the man!”

“I have sinned against the LORD.”

“The Lord has taken away your sin.” Simple!

After that we never hear David in that way again. He had made the hundred and eighty degree turn towards God, and the sanctifying power of God had finished its work with him in that area. That’s real repentance, folks!

1. But what do we hear among Christians today?
2. Has God not said, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness (1 Jn. 1:9)”? And that is absolutely true; for the blood never dries at Calvary. So, we walk away forgetting how we looked before the mirror of God (James 1:22-25).
3. Is that what God wants for us? Did Jesus intend His Gethsemane saying, “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak (Mk. 14:38)” to be our excuse to not resist sin, but readily give in to it? What then was the use of the first part of the verse?
4. Did the Spirit of God propose Romans 5:20 as freedom to sin and remain in it so that grace may abound to us? Why then did Paul preemptively address it in the opening verses of chapter 6?
5. So why do we say we have repented when our hearts are far from its real meaning – walking away from the sin in holy fear, determined not to return to it anymore?

I pray we will all walk away from the throne of grace, as David did, forgiven and empowered to “go, and sin no more (Jn. 8:11)”.

May the joy of the Lord become our strength as we walk into the flow of things today; and may the grace of God uphold us in Christ, as we boldly confront our weaknesses; giving ourselves no excuses.

A heart that seeks after holiness commends a person to God’s heart.

Shalom