Run to Repent
As men of God we believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. Jesus commended Peter when he said, “Thou art the Christ the son of the living God.” We encourage men to make Jesus Lord of their lives. We exhort men to gather together as like minded men chasing after our brothers who are chasing after Jesus. Our mission is to raise up men of God who love Jesus Christ and who want to spend the rest of their lives learning to become just like Jesus. Men of God in whom the spirit of the Lord is…for such a time as this.
Christian churches are filled with people filled with sin consciousness. However we have been delivered from the power of sin and have been given the righteousness of Christ. Because of the price Jesus paid for our sin by his death on our behalf, God has exchanged the guilt of our sin for the righteousness of Christ.
When a man of God sins, how does God restore him back into fellowship? Repentance is the inflection point, the change of direction when a man of God returns his heart to the Lord. The story of David and Bathsheba in 2 Samuel 11 and 12 is the story of repentance. King David was called to lead God’s armies against Israel’s enemies. However David decided to take some time away from the battlefield. When David left the battle, he also forsook his fellowship with the Lord. An idle mind is the devil’s playground. While David was relaxing in his palace, he noticed his neighbor Bathsheba taking a bath on her roof. David lusted after her. Lust is anything that we love and long for over our desire for God. David gave into his lust and committed adultery with Bathsheba. As a result, Bathsheba became pregnant. Since David was no longer walking with God, he decided to cover up his sin. Uriah was Bathsheba’s husband who served in David’s army. As commander in Chief, David ordered Uriah to take a leave of absence from the battlefield and spend some intimate time with his wife. However, Uriah refused to sleep with his wife. Uriah was so committed to fight against Israel’s enemies that he slept outside of David’s palace so that he could rejoin his brothers-in-arms at a moment’s notice. David told his generals, “put Uriah on the front line of the battle. When the enemy attacks, have everyone retreat and leave Uriah alone exposed to enemy fire.” The generals did as David commanded and Uriah was killed as a result of David’s murderous plot.
David had walked away from fellowship to the point that he no longer feared the Lord God Jehovah. God spoke to his prophet Nathan and told him to confront David about his sin. Nathan was reluctant to confront David because he knew that he had Uriah murdered. God gave Nathan a story to tell David. Nathan told David about a poor man in his kingdom whose only possession was a precious little ewe lamb whom he cherished and loved like his own daughter. There was also a rich man in David’s kingdom who owned many flocks of sheep and herds of cattle. A traveler came to the rich man’s house for dinner. Instead of taking one from his own flock, the rich man stole the poor man’s precious little ewe lamb, butchered her, and served her to his rich guest.” David had been a shepherd as a boy so this story moved him deeply. The penalty for stealing a man’s sheep is to pay him back four times over. However David pronounced the death penalty when he said, “the man that did this thing must die.” Then Nathan stuck his finger in David’s chest and said, “You are the man.”
David was broken. When we fall from fellowship, God will call a brother to reprove and correct us. If you don’t find Nathan, then Nathan will find you. Correction is to restore to an upright position. Those who are ready to repent run TO the Lord not FROM the Lord. Jesus said, He who loses his life shall find it and he who finds his life shall lose it.
Psalm 51 is David’s prayer of repentance. This Psalm begins, “HAVE mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.” The beauty of David’s confession is that he did not hide from his sin. As he ran back to his Lord, he approached God’s throne of grace and mercy with a broken and a contrite heart. The new nature of Christ in us the hope of glory will convict our hearts when we sin. The Holy Spirit will shed the light of reproof and correction when we fall from fellowship. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit, the comforter, will teach us all things that are true according to His word.
David’s prayer continues in Psalm 51:2-4: “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.
Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.”
The consequences of sin allows us to focus our hearts on the solution from sin. Part of repentance is to make it right with the ones we’ve wronged. An unforgiving heart is an unrepentant heart. Another part of forgiveness is forgiving those who have wronged us. That’s why the Lord’s Prayer says, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
Sometimes repentance requires us to “turn the other cheek” so that we can understand the meaning of humility. The greatest freedom is freedom from the “insidious preoccupation with self.” When we repent, we can confess, “I have found the enemy and he is me.”
Verses 5 and 6 continue David’s prayer, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.
Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.”
The secret to repentance is in John 3:20-21, for he that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought of God.
David’s prayer in Psalm 51 concludes, “Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.”
To know the Grace and mercy of God requires that we approach him with a broken and a contrite heart. He is gracious and merciful to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. According to Isaiah, “though your sins be as scarlet, ye shall be as white as snow.” To win the battle and keep our place standing on the wall, we must approach our Commander in Chief according to his terms…For if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
May we ever live to the praise of the glory of his grace!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael