Rev. David Holwick
First Baptist Church
West Lafayette, Ohio
April 20, 1986
Repentance Or Just Guilt?
2 Corinthians 7:8-11, NIV
This morning I am going to talk about guilt. It's a touchy subject.
Preachers are often accused of using guilt to manipulate people. By exposing your vile sin, we beat you down till you are nothing but a whimpering slug, useless and dejected.
Guilt has gotten a bad name. A cute cartoon in the New Yorker magazine slows a psychiatrist's office. A middle-aged woman is stretched out on the sofa while the psychiatrist looks up from his notepad, "Mrs. Smith, after all these years you still feel guilt? You should be ashamed of yourself!"
There is less to feel guilty about these days. Thirty years ago a person would rather die than admit they were homosexual. Now they march in parades. About the only thing left to feel guilty about is banana-splits with the whipped cream slithering over the sides. Guilt has been put-down, ignored and trivialized but that won't make it go away. We can never escape the fact that any society which has values and standards of decency is going to have guilt as well.
Guilt cannot be forced on someone. It only occurs when you have violated your own personal set of values. If you don't believe something is wrong someone else can't make you feel guilty for doing it. It will just roll off.
Even psychiatrists see the value of guilt. Dr. Willard Gaylin is the professor of psychiatry at Columbia University. In a recent article he wrote; "When you have actually done something really wrong, it is always good to experience guilt - always."
If you never experience guilt, you do have not standards of decency. These people are called psychopaths. Like the Nebraska boy who killed his grandmother, decapitated her, then used her head as a dartboard. He thought it was funny but a normal person would feel a twinge of guilt doing this.
When I talk about guilt I am making an assumption. I am assuming people not only have personal standards of decency but also that they break them. Few people would disagree with me here. Whether you believe in God or not, you do not live up to your personal standards. You sin - and sin affects your life. If you are promiscuous, you stand a good chance of getting pregnant or contracting a disease. If you dabble in drugs, you can become physically or emotionally dependent on them. It will affect your job, your family - even your health.
When the consequences sink in, your reaction may go beyond pangs of guilt. You may begin to feel a deep sorrow for what you have done. You would do anything to undo the damage but you can't. If this describes how you feel about disobedience in your life right now, then good. It's the first step to repentance.
The book of James tells us if we want to get back to God we must be afflicted, and mourn, and weep. He says;
"Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up." (James 4:9-10)
A sense of guilt is not enough. God wants to know if you care to the point of having a broken spirit. But this still isn't repentance. Some people can feel miserable for what they have done - for what they are doing - but they can't get beyond the misery. For the best example; in the Bible, turn to Matthew 27. Judas had betrayed Jesus. Verse 3 says;
"When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders."
When Judas saw the consequences of his action he was genuinely sorry. (That's what the King James Version means when it uses the word "repent" here.] He was sorry but that's as far as it went. Instead of following it up with a positive action, he went and hanged himself. This is what the Apostle Paul calls worldly sorrow [2 Cor. 7:10]. Worldly sorrow is a deep regret over the consequences of sin but nothing is done about it.
Guilt and sorrow by themselves are useless. Some people are wise in the ways of the world. They've been around. If a sin exists, they've done it. They know first hand what depravity can do to a person. These people often have a much deeper appreciation for sin than the average milk-and-cookie Christian but experience by itself proves nothing; it's your response to God - that matters.
The opposite of worldly sorrow is Godly sorrow. At first they look the same - you do something wrong and you regret it but in 2 Corinthians 7:9 Paul adds the distinction - godly sorrow produces repentance. You feel bad and then you stop doing the sin. You replace it with positive actions that honor God. Godly sorrow is literally sorrow "according to God." This means two things at once. First, it means we should turn around and go back to God. True repentance involves thinking God's thoughts and doing what he wants you to do. This decision can only be made by us.
When the Prodigal Son came to realize how deep he had sunk, he decided to return to his father and hope for the best. Real repentance always brings you back to God. You can't go part-way - you either repent or you don't. People who wallow in guilt are not being spiritual. They're just putting off what they need to do.
We must turn back to God because he is really the one who is hurt the most by our sin. The consequences of sin are not just broken families and ruined health but also a separation from God. King David knew this. When he was caught in adultery with Bathsheba, he wrote a psalm of repentance. In this psalm he tells God:
"Against you, you only, have I sinned." (Psalm 51:4)
Godly sorrow turns us back to God and shows us how we have hurt him but there is a second aspect. Repentance, "according to God" means God is also reaching out to us, even before we ever turn to him. God does not sit on his hands. When we feel guilt in our heart, God has put it there. He uses his Spirit to send conviction on us. Many verses in the Bible show that repentance begins with God and is a gift to us. Like Paul says; while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Repentance means we must change our thoughts and our actions. In one sense, it is a single event. The moment we accept Christ, we are supposed to turn away from sin and toward God.
But it is also a continuing need. When Paul wrote about godly repentance he was talking to people who were already Christians. Following Jesus requires a constant assessment of our lives and we have to be concerned not just for our own failings. In 2 Corinthians, Paul is upset that they were wishy-washy toward a trouble-maker. He warns them to be concerned about the condition of others - not to tear them down but to bring them back.
Godly repentance is a real need today. Churches have lost their reputation for distinctiveness because the quality of our lives is so low. You can do just about anything and no one will criticize it, or even mention it.
The problem is not just the presence of sin - we'll always have this - the problem is our failure to respond to it, what we're going to do about it. We have people even in this church who are indifferent to sin. They don't care. We have others who feel guilty, are utterly sincere in their hearts but won't do anything about it. And then there are those who can face up to their sin and cast it before God. They don't wallow in guilt. They deal with the problem. Which category do you fall in?
________
Typed on July 13, 2005, by Sharon Lesko of Ledgewood Baptist Church, New Jersey
Copyright © 2024 by Rev. David Holwick
Created with the Freeware Edition of HelpNDoc: Free PDF documentation generator