Good morning!
Welcome to your morning coffee! May our Heavenly Father call us back to repent. Father help us repent. Help us to confess to you daily our sin so that we might be washed clean. You have saved us from the power of sin, but the presence remains! You have washed us once, head to toe. And for all other washing your son has said the feet will do, until such washing is forever no longer needed. Father, in the name of Jesus, by the Spirit within us, convict us of our sin and joyfully cleanse us when we come to you and repent of it! Help us Father. Amen!
Your Morning Song: "I Will Call Upon the Lord" by Petra
Your Morning Scripture: 1 John 1:9
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just
and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
So. What do you think about repentance? If you're anything like me, it's a word I understand like an old friend that I see from afar, but cannot hear or touch. I go no closer. And if he comes towards me, then perhaps I have something to do in the other direction. I am a pastor and a father and husband, so my day is quite full. Perhaps tomorrow.
What is repentance? It is, quite simply, admitting wrong for the purpose of being right with someone.
What about with God? When Jesus came to us and offered us salvation, did we repent? I surely hope so. But what about after that? Did you ever do it again?
God, through John here and others in other verses, is calling us not only to the repentance of salvation. But He is calling us to live a life of repentance. A life of daily repentance.
Our situation is this. We have declared with our mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord and believed with our hearts that our Father raised Him from the dead (Romans 10:9). And so the power of sin in us has been eternally defeated! But...
But the presence of sin, for a time, remains. What do we do?
Repent.
Church. Our daily life ought to be marked by repentance. The reason why David was called a man after God's own heart was because of the way in which he repented. Daily! Deeply! With great determination! Our daily prayers should like David's, full of repentance, both of specific sins, but also for sins that he didn't even know that he'd done! (Psalm 19:12)
Try it out. Know that as you repent, God is eager to forgive you and purify you from all unrighteousness (for a real life example, see John 13:1-17). This is, in itself not something heavy or laborious. It is the lifting of such a thing, our sin which remains present in us. It is the daily lifting of burden, and ought to bring rejoicing.
Before you start your day, pray and repent.
Before you eat, pray and repent.
Before you worship, pray and repent.
Before you meet up with someone, pray and repent.
Before you go to sleep, pray and repent.
Try it for a day, or a week, and see what happens. I promise you with full confidence in our Father in Heaven, He will eagerly rush to cleanse you, to wash you, to rejoice over you and with you, and will bring to places of worship and relationship and peace and rest and healing beyond anything you have ever experienced.
Repent. Daily. Desperately. And brace yourself to be filled with God's joy, which He loves to share with us when we please Him above ourselves.
God loves you church. May your cup be filled to overflowing! Repent!
