Rejoicing in repentance
The alternative to being swallowed whole by shame
My mind was racing. My heart was beating rapidly. I was burning up– all the effects my body feels when spiraling in deep shame.
My eyes had just been opened to a specific flawed pattern in my character that I was unaware of. And it left me in shock. Not because I all of a sudden realized I was flawed. Believe me, I know that through and through. But rather because I was committing this sin against my Friend all this time and had no idea.
The only thing I could think to do was to go on a walk and cry out to Him and ask if it was true. And as I did, He gently brought to mind one by one all of the times I had fallen short in this particular area. But instead of rising and rejoicing with this wonderful opportunity to repent, I got home and collapsed in a heap on the floor and wept bitterly. I felt like I needed to shower and scrub my skin as hard as I could. I felt so wicked. So unclean. So disgusting. And so full of shame.
Once my friends got home, we sat down on the couch and I brokenly whispered, “I am so ashamed.” I hung my head and confessed everything the Lord had revealed to me.
When I finished and looked up through my tears, the disappointment I expected to see on their faces wasn’t there. Rather, I was met with the same compassionate grace and love the Lord predetermined to give me in abundance.
As they prayed for me, one of my friends said something along the lines of,
“God, help her to receive the opportunity to repent with joy and not with this shame that she now carries.”
The words stuck out to me at the time, but I didn’t truly sit with them until a week or so later...
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I woke up an hour before my alarm went off and felt the Lord say, “Rise and spend time with me.” So, instead of fighting for more sleep as I typically do, I got up and immediately the melody playing in my mind was a song based on Psalm 139– a very beautiful song for a very wonderful Psalm.
As I settled in to begin with my gratitude journal and devotional book as I generally do before opening my Bible, I felt the Lord leading me to open His Word before I did anything else. So I naturally opened it to Psalm 139.
As I read, I saw the heart of David rejoicing because he was fully known. The first five verses testify to the incredibility of this fact:
“You discern my thoughts from afar.”
“[You] are acquainted with all my ways.”
“Before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.”
After these verses, he says, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it.”
I think it would be fair to conclude that one of the things David means by this is that knowing himself as fully as the Lord does is impossible! Which stunned me at first and then fear mingled with shame started to creep in as it normally does whenever I am reminded of this reality.
The Lord knows me. All of me. All of my wickedness. All of my darkness. All of the ways I have sinned and all of the ways I will sin. He knows it all. Even more than I know it myself.
But, these intense thoughts are always hushed when the comforting arms of my Father wrap around me. Despite knowing all there is to know about Kate, He reminds me that it is His delight to keep and care for His beloved daughter. Which without fail, leaves me incredibly thankful that the character of God is not at all dependent on the character of Kate.
Additionally, on this particular morning, the Lord opened my eyes to something new to be thankful for. I realized I am so grateful that it is He who knows me completely and not myself.
I would like to think it'd be nice to have all of my cards on the table so I could have the opportunity to be "on top of my sin." But, in reality, I think if I did, I would die from the suffocation of my sin being on top of me.
So, I’m thankful it’s not me who knows. It’s Him. And His response is not to shun me, abandon me, or turn away in disgust. Rather, it’s to hold me all the closer in the finished work of His perfect Son.
And along with that, to graciously call out– little by little– the sin that shackles me in darkness so I might step into the light and reflect His likeness more and more!
As I was meditating on all of this, my friend’s prayer came to mind. "...help her to receive the opportunity to repent with joy..."
The idea of rejoicing after being confronted with sin absolutely baffled me. How could I lift up my eyes after letting Him down? How could I send up a shout of joy after grieving Him so? When conviction comes, in the 22 years I've lived so far, the only thing I can manage to do is collapse under the weight of my shame– making the idea of rising and rejoicing as I repent sound pretty impossible.
But as I meditated on this idea of rejoicing in repentance, God started to reveal all of my reasons to do so. Two particularly stood out:
The opportunity to repent is the Lord’s way of calling me “further up and further in” as C.S. Lewis said. Up and into the light and life marked for me. And down and out of the darkness and sin that wish to chain me. Repentance gives reason for rejoicing because He desires something more– something far greater for me!
The reminder repentance brings is this: I am a helpless sinner in desperate need of a perfect Savior. And in Jesus, my need is met and my help has come! If that doesn’t give me cause to rejoice, I don’t know what will! For every sin, His grace abounds all the more.
I realized- with these reasons and more at the forefront- that rejoicing in repentance should be as natural as breathing!
Soon after, Psalm 16 came to mind-- affirming the truth of what the Lord was teaching me.
“I bless the Lord who gives me counsel, in the night also my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.
Therefore my heart is glad and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure. For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption.”
He will never leave me to my own devices! His very counsel testifies to this fact. He is committed to watching over me. Despite all of my sin- both the sin I am and am not aware of- that wages war against the Spirit within me, I dwell secure. And for that, my whole being rejoices!
I will and will always be able to take refuge in the Lord. And in the shadow of His wings, I will sing for joy!
Repentance is necessary and repentance should be frequent in our fallen state. But instead of letting this fact shackle me to fear as I await the shame lurking around the corner to swallow me whole, I will rise and rejoice because He has made known that repentance gives me reason to do so!
“Rejoice in the Lord always*: again I will say, rejoice.”
- Philippians 4:4
*Including times of repentance
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