Repentance is nasty business

"If my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land," 2 Chronicles 7:14.

Repentance is a nasty business. An election has brought us a new president and a new administration. The last four years have been quite unsettling. Some of it the result of the former president's behavior and some of it the behavior of his opposition. The Wall Street Journal, while agreeing with many of Trump's policies, was no admirer of the former president's behavior. However, the Journal editorialized on Nov. 8, 2020 that the use of ". . . the FBI in 2016 to subvert his (Trump's) candidacy and then undermine his ability to govern" was the dirtiest trick in American presidential history.

Nevertheless, Trump and other Republican leader's rhetoric concerning the election results are, by any fair-minded standard, out of bounds and betrays our deepest values and ordered liberty. There is plenty of guilt and responsibility to pass around. "There is none righteous, no, not one . . ." (Romans 3:10a). The pointing of fingers is endless and useless. Only humility, prayer and repentance will heal our land.

The Chronicler cries out in the midst of the brokenness of the land to those who are indifferent to their sin. They don't acknowledge it. All who hear the cry blithely exempt themselves from this Word because the "call" isn't addressed to them. They are smug in their own righteousness, their own "correctness," their own justification. This word isn't for "me" it is for "them."

Repentance is a nasty business. The Greek word (metanoia) found in the New Testament, involves a change of one's mind and turning from sin to God. (See the parable of the Prodigal Son, Luke 15:11-32)

Indeed, the "crier's" call to humility is not an appeal to virtue but a condition for repentance. To humble oneself is to admit that I am not the source of my own rightness. That even the best I have to offer is tainted by my own brokenness. That my eyes are blinded to God's purpose for us and our lives together.

Repentance is a nasty business. To repent is to let go; to let go of every care that keeps me from turning to God.

Repentance is a nasty business. To repent is to confess my own willfulness, my own participation in the brokenness of our land, my own self-chosen righteousness, my own sin.

The healing of our land will not take place because of lofty political rhetoric. Rhetoric without humility is a false word. Rhetoric without repentance is hollow. Rhetoric without prayer is useless.

The healing of our land will only take place when we humble ourselves and pray and seek God's face and turn from our wicked ways.

Repentance is a nasty business.