Rooted in the Grace of Repentance

Good morning, good morning, my name is dan. I’m one of the four elders here. If I haven’t met you, welcome to Sword Church, we’re glad you’re here. You hope that you connect with us and give us a chance to get to know you maybe hear your story, you learn a little bit about our story and we figure out how we can help you to know christ, more encourage you and your walk with christ and help you to become all that christ has made you to be, I’m excited for our time this morning, this is um Week three of the rhythms of rooted. The first week we looked at the rhythm of daily devotions and last week, pastor mike covered the rhythm of prayer and this week we’re gonna look at the rhythm of repentance and I’ve entitled this teaching rooted in the grace of repentance. I believe there is a grace that is deeply connected tied to and associated with the concept of repentance, so rooted in the grace of repentance. As I was thinking about how to intro this teaching, I was reminded of my experience as a college athlete. Um very early on, probably the first week of my experience into that experience, I was physically worn out, I was sore, I was hurting all over the place and there was the look on someone’s face who is physically tired, sore and beat up right and I remember after one of the team workouts and older teammate put his arms around me and he kinda smiled and chuckled a bit and he said coach is gonna get you right man, coach is gonna get you right, what he meant by that coach getting me right was that coach was going to, through this process of training was gonna help me to become stronger than I had ever been in my life, helped me to run faster than I’d ever ran in my life and helped me to be more agile as an athlete than I had ever been in my life. But it was a process and early on it was a painful process and I was thinking about that today as it relates to the subject of repentance. God the holy spirit, your coach, your teacher wants to get you right and early on in that process and at various times in that process, it may not feel good, it may seem hard, it may be challenging at times, but God’s gonna get you right and I think it’s our desire to be right with God to be right with him, to live right for him to grow in christ, to grow with christ and to make all of our lives about him glorifying him, honoring him in the various ways that we can, that’s why our vision here is to make authentic disciples who love and worship him and all that they do and guess what God’s gonna get you right, if you stay with the process, he’s gonna get you right. And so as I said, um the first week, we looked at daily devotions last week, Pastor mike covered prayer. And if you’re working through the rooted curriculum, which if you are unfamiliar with that, none of what I said, that makes any sense. There’s a table out back after the service, you can pick up a rooted book or you can buy a pdf copy of the book for about $5 I think. What is it with $5? We’re like five below here, right, we’ve, we’ve taken over or something. Anyway, um you can pick up a copy of that and you’ll see um in the context of community groups, we go into the various applications of these rhythms to the rhythm of daily devotion, the rhythm of prayer and today the rhythm of repentance. Right. And so I like to say that faith, prayer and repentance all live in the same house. You cannot kick one of them out of the house, you cannot close the door on one of them. They live together in the same house. Repentance and faith are coupled together and prayer is the instrument by which both of those things pour forth from the heart of the believer. So we pray in faith, we pray prayers of repentance. They live in the same house. You cannot separate any of those graces that God has given us any of these great virtues. And so our subject today being rooted in the grace of repentance needs to come from an understanding of the scriptures and we like to teach the scriptures here. So open your bibles to Matthew Chapter three, I want you to take a look at what God’s word has to say is it talks about this process, the ministry of proclaiming repentance and us as followers of christ wanting to live a life rooted in this grace of repentance. So I’m gonna do something a little different today. I’m gonna read verses one through 12 in chapter three and then I’m gonna jump over to chapter four and I’m gonna read verses 12 through 17 there and then afterwards I’m gonna show you how they all fit together and give you God’s word and some instruction on what it means to be rooted in the grace of repentance. Alright now on the passage In Matthew Chapter 3: verse one. In those days john the baptist came preaching in the wilderness of judea repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand for this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord make his paths straight now john wore a garment of camel’s hair and a leather belt around his waist and his food was Locusts and wild honey, then Jerusalem and all judea and all the region about the jordans were going out to him and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and saggy sees coming to his baptism, he said to them, you brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath to come bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, we have abraham as our father, for I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up Children for Abraham. Even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance. But he, who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn. But the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. Then Matthew four verses 12 through 17 says. Now when he speaking of jesus heard that john had been arrested, he withdrew into galilee and leaving Nazareth. He went and lived in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulon and Naftali, so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled. The Land of Zeppelin and the Land of Naftali, the way of the sea beyond the Jordan galilee of the gentiles, the people dwelling in darkness has seen a great light, and for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death on them, A light has dawned from that time Jesus began to preach saying, repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Let us pray father in heaven. I thank you for this, your word to your people. God. I pray that in the moments that we have today as your gathered people, God that you would make much of the man, jesus christ through this teaching and that you would enrich our understanding of this grace of repentance and God Also, I pray that you would lose whatever chords or bounds that sin might have placed on our thinking and on our living that we might be the Children of God completely free because of the power that is available to us in christ. I pray this in jesus name. Amen! I want to return again to the first six verses that I read to you. Bear with me, I’m gonna read them again. How often do you get to hear the word of God read in public? It’s a beautiful thing. It’s a good thing. Even if you’re not convinced of it. It’s a tradition of God’s people in those days john the baptist came preaching in the wilderness of judea repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord make his paths straight, john wore a garment of camel’s hair and a leather belt around his waist and his food was Locusts and wild honey in Jerusalem and all judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins. It’s interesting here. The author of this gospel is Matthew, He was a former tax collector who was converted to Christ through the personal invitation of Christ to him. He was one of the original 12 disciples and he writes this gospel account primarily to a Jewish audience. With that in mind. He wants to make a few things particularly clear to his jewish brethren and so his gospel account has some different flavor from the gospel according to Mark and luke. That would be the other two synoptic gospels. And then of course john’s gospel account is completely different because it focuses on the deity of christ. But the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and luke. They are very similar though directed to different audiences. This audience is primarily a jewish audience that he writes to. So right away he does some things that indicate this like the use of the phrase the Kingdom of Heaven. Another gospel accounts you might read the Kingdom of God. They are one and the same. But Matthew writing to a jewish audience wants to be clear that he reveres the name of God as his jewish brethren would most likely want him to do, they are keeping in mind the third commandment, Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain. By the way, if you’ve ever read in the old Testament Lord as it is translated in english and it is all caps as a reference to a changing of the name of the Lord to Adonai so that we might not take the name of the Lord in vain. And so the jewish people are very careful to make those distinctions and Matthew is walking with the same kinds of reverence in his writing. Also of note, he uses this phrase, the Kingdom of Heaven 32 times in this gospel account. It’s worth mentioning If it uses it 32 times, that means he’s trying to communicate a message about this particular subject, the Kingdom of God. Secondly, because he’s dealing with a primarily jewish audience, he quotes heavily old testament prophecies. He wants to show jesus as the fulfillment of these prophecies, even as he’s introducing john the baptist, he highlights the fact that even john is a fulfillment of old testament prophecy as it is related to christ And so he begins chapter three quoting from Isaiah 40 indicating that john the baptist was the voice that was crying out in the wilderness, that Isaiah saw one that would prepare the people for the arrival of God’s messiah and then he does something else that if when you, when you heard me read it, you were like, why is that in the bible? He gives a physical description of john the baptist imagine john the baptist having an instagram account. Well actually he probably would not have, there would have been a parody john the baptist instagram account in his days because john was quite a simple man. But john wearing camels clothes, eating Locusts and wild honey, not likely to win any fashion contest. Right. He’s an odd character. So why then does Matthew highlight this physical description of john? Is he making fun of john no, he’s not. Does he find it interesting that john dressed it in this particular way? Yes, he did. Why? Because it is related to old testament prophecy. There was a prophet in the old testament named Elijah. If you’re unfamiliar with your bible, you can read about the life of Elijah in the account of the kings in the old testament, Elijah did not die. God took him with a chair to fire the ultimate uber service from heaven. Came, took him from the earth, carried him into heaven. There’s only one other person in the bible that experienced that kind of experience Enoch and Elijah where they didn’t go the way of death. But maliki a prophet Malachi one of the minor prophets in chapter four, verses five and six said that Elijah would return before the messiah comes and guess what? Elijah dressed in camel’s hair ate Locusts and wild honey. Matthew is drawing attention to this too for his jewish audience. The last thing Matthew does is slightly different from the other synoptic gospels is that he continues throughout his references to john in calling him, john the baptist or john the baptize er that’s also significant and we’ll come back to that one later. But all of these details, they are important for us. If we’re to understand more deeply the subject of repentance, because john’s message, all of the teachings, all of the sermons, everything that john did could be summarized in the one phrase that Matthew gives us repent for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand, all of these things somehow are related to a biblical understanding of repentance. Secondly, john’s ministry philosophy was itself rooted in an understanding of the grace of repentance and that’s evidenced by three factors that I want to point out to you first. His ministry takes place in the wilderness. Ever wondered about that? Why isn’t john speaking in the synagogue or in the temple or on the streets of a crowded city like Jerusalem in the marketplace, why isn’t he crying out there? No, he is in the wilderness. This the notes, a transition of sorts. If you’re again familiar with the old testament, the Children of Israel being enslaved in Egypt, they’ve got to get to a promised land, but before they could get to that promised land, they’ve got to go through what wilderness and your growth in christ, it necessitates you leaving one place of thinking and doing and living and moving through a wilderness that becomes eventually the steps of a promised land, which is a life of grace before him where you now get it, you now understand it. You now have the ability to walk in what he commands of you again, john conduct his ministry and wilderness. A second point about his ministry philosophy as it relates to repentance. His teaching was a call to make their lives like smooth and straight roads for the king to travel on. This was a very real thing for ancient cultures. If a king was to visit some city, smaller city or village, the people, we’ll go through great pains to smooth out to clear a path to make the travel easy and smooth for the king and john here in his teaching and everything that he has to say everything that he’s calling people to. He’s saying that your life like a path that a king must travel upon must be smooth and straight. And so there are some bumps. There’s some rocks. There’s some not so smooth parts of our lives that God wants to smooth out. There’s some thinking that isn’t straight. There’s some behavior patterns that aren’t straight and God wants to straighten them out. John’s teaching is rooted in this understanding of the grace of repentance. He challenges the people to amend their ways to drop their sinful habits and to pick up new spiritual disciplines to embrace God’s truth and God’s ways. So his ministry is in the wilderness. He calls the people to make their lives smooth and straight for the king to travel upon. And then thirdly, he administered water baptism, john said that his baptism was a baptism of repentance. This is why I say to you that you cannot separate repentance from faith and you cannot move it out of the house of prayer. They all live together. If his baptism is a baptism of repentance, then that repentance is coupled with a faith, a looking to the mercies of God, a looking and and and anticipating of God coming to supply. What is needed. What is lacking in their walk with God to repent requires having faith in a merciful loving God. And when there is repentance and faith, the prayer just pours forth from the heart seamlessly. It may not be the most articulate. It may not be the deepest theological prayer, but it’s a seamless prayer of love, devotion, understanding and gratitude. God and people were coming to john and being baptized by them saying that by this act, hi understand, I need God in this way. I believe that if I respond to his call to repentance, he will meet me. So john’s ministry philosophy is saturated with an understanding of the grace of repentance God wants to move you from the place that is like in Egypt, bring you to the place of a promising which is deep communion with christ, God wants to grow you up in christ as you make that commitment to walk with him. He wants to conform you more into the image of christ, that’s God’s moving out and straightening out your life and your ways and your thinking. And then that’s why it’s the church today. We baptize because we believe that that is a sign, this incredible work that God does in our hearts, that he has done in our hearts, that he has cleansed us. He has made us new has a grace of repentance. Reading on in the passage of Verse seven, it says, but when he saw many of the Pharisees and saddest is coming to his baptism, he said to them, you brood of vipers, john, you’re so politically correct man, You’ve got this large church growing and you’re just running people off john, what are you doing? That’s me being sarcastic there, Right. You understand that, what john is saying here is true, this is you brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath to come, bear fruit in keeping with repentance and do not presume to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father, I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up Children for Abraham. That is a remarkable statement that is not john simply just rubbing dirt in the face of these Pharisees. That is a statement of incredible faith reading on, he says. Even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance, but he, who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I’m not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn. But the chaff, he will burn with unquenchable fire and he uses fire in various ways. In that passage. Some have to do with the reality of judgment and others have to do God’s energizing truth and presence in our lives. What’s the difference? Faith and repentance is the difference where there is faith and repentance, The spirit supplies the energy and the passion and the commitment to be sustained on this path of obedience. Whether isn’t faith and repentance, threat, judgment, because we don’t know when our time on this planet will be up interesting enough, the religious elite were coming out to jOHn to be baptized all the guys with doctorates, seminary degrees, they were coming to john, seemingly nobody to be baptized a guy dressed in some ways very awkward. A guy of whom the pastor says, a voice crying out in the wilderness. Guess what they are actually saying there, john is a loudmouth preacher, He’s loud, he raises his voice and the religious elite, the more polished those with the finer clothes are now coming out to him to be baptized. Here’s a little bit on these guys. Okay, so Matthew says that both Pharisees and saddest days were coming to him. The Pharisees, they were experts in the law and they were the propagator of the tradition of the elders. When you look at the sermon on the mount that Jesus preached, he would often say, you have heard it said that’s the tradition of the elders, that’s their take on God’s law, That’s there adding to God’s law for example, it says honor the sabbath. Their take on that was if you walked a certain amount of steps, you violated the sabbath, you walked a certain amount of steps on the sabbath day, you were guilty of violating the sabbath. God didn’t say that they did. And so jesus constantly trying to help the people be delivered and set free from these heavy legalistic burdens that the Pharisees would place on them. And then the saddest days, they claim to be the purest the religious purists, They only held to the teachings of moses and those teachings that could be completely verified as having been from a profit, but they denied life after death. And so they had some interesting conversations with jesus, some would say they didn’t believe in the resurrection, the resurrection. So they were sad, right? That’s why they were sad disease, you guys will get there. The agencies were actually the wealthy religious aristocrats. They had money. I mean the pharmacies, there were some in the parasitical party that had money but the side that she’s, they were incredibly wealthy and these two religious parties, they fought for power and influence over the temple and over the synagogues and so john is suspicious of these guys, he is suspicious of them and you know what, his suspicion was proved to be correct by jesus. When you look at Matthew 21 25 jesus is being questioned by the high priest and jesus turns it on the high priest and says, hey what do you think about john’s baptism? Was it from heaven or did it come from man? And they refused to answer him because the people were watching and listening and the people believed that john was a prophet sent from God and so they said, we don’t want to give an answer to this. And so Jesus confirmed what john suspicion to be true of these guys that they were only coming to get baptized with a just in case attitude. You guys know what a, just in case attitude is, right, let me pack an extra t shirt, let me bring an umbrella, let me pack a rain jacket, let me bring some extra cash just in case. So they were coming to john just in case, loud mouth were dressed guy is right, but just in case won’t suffice for God. The only appropriate response to God’s truth. The only God satisfying and God glorifying response is faith and repentance. So john warns these guys, he says the ax is laid to the root. It warns them, he warns them because he knows they do not possess, they do not possess a good understanding of repentance, they do not grasp the grace of repentance. We know this because of how he responds to them. He says, you’re coming because just in case I’m right, you won’t suffer any of the consequences that God might pour out. And so when you think about repentance in that way, if repentance for you is simply, I don’t want the consequences of my bad behavior. That’s not faith and repentance, that’s separating faith from repentance. And that’s not true repentance. And when you get that kind of poor understanding of repentance, you’re likely to have a very warped faith. Your faith is likely to be warped and we know this because john is anticipating that in the Pharisees and the saddest days when he says, don’t you dare think that you could say that we are descendants of Abraham. So we’re covered and paul makes this even more clear in romans in the book of romans in chapter four verse 16 when he says that the promise of salvation are for those who have the faith of abraham faith delivery, they are the true descendants of Abraham. So john says to them, he warns them the ax is laid to the root. Now that’s an odd depiction, right? Because when you think of chopping down a tree, you don’t think of the ax, chopping it, chopping it down at the root. But it’s intentional because he’s wanting them to understand the urgency and the severity, the kingdom of God is at hand. Why are you playing these games? And this is it, This is it, this is it for you as a people. God has already allowed you to be taken into captivity for hundreds of years. And now the kingdom has come. It’s drawing near quit playing these games. There’s an urgency and a severity that john is trying to communicate by that phrase, the access laid to the root. And then it goes on to use another analogy talking about the threshing of wheat and just as grains are tossed in the air and the chaff being blown away by the wind and the weightier substance falling to the ground which is valuable to the owner is gathered, cherished stored, john wants him to know that God allows circumstances to come in life. That does that for people. In fact, many of you are here today knowing that you experience such a moment in life, you went through an experience like that where you didn’t have your feet underneath you, your circumstances overwhelmed you. It was hard, you were worried about the future. Look, you fell into the arms of a loving state, he kept you. But likewise, we all know at least one person who experienced that same type of being tossed and they turned her back on the moon, walked away from the faith and it grieves us. It breaks our hearts. We pray for their return. But we know that they’re not in a good place, not in a good place in their walk with God. There is no walk with God. And this is why as pastors, we have to look at passages like this, we have to come to text like this. We have to draw your attention to the text in this way, john is doing the same thing to the Pharisees and the that’s grace him speaking this way to them because if they got it, they would be met by a loving God full of mercy embracing them. And guess what? Some of them did later on, Some of them did. But we have to as pastors talk about this because your life will be filled with these moments and experiences where you’re gonna feel like the enemy is just tossing you around and you don’t have your feet underneath you. Faith repentance prayer. They all live in the same house and we get through those moments, We go through that wilderness and we come out of it as Peter says, our faith being tested like gold that passes through the fire. Our faith being proven to be more precious than that being more precious than the purest goal. And then john adds even more grace to his speech by saying that what I am declaring to you is to prepare you for the one who will baptize you in the Holy Spirit. And guess what? When that happens when the spirit comes upon you, the presence of God? The truth of God God giving you the ability to now walk in his commands. The grace of God, you being empowered to be his witness. He says he will baptize you in the Spirit and with fire, your life will be marked by this, this life of dependence on God and moments where you felt yourself be incredibly weak, you were able to get through it and do more than you ever expected because of the spirit of God in you, john understands the grace of repentance and though he called them a brood of vipers, he was trying to help the Pharisees and Stratasys understand the grace of repentance. We’re moving on to Matthew four Verse 12 and 17 again, we have Matthew quoting Isaiah, We have him referencing prophecy again, I told you he’s writing to a primarily jewish audience and he wants them to be aware of how many prophecies of jesus that Jesus fulfilled, every single one of the Messianic prophecies fulfilled and every chance he can, he wants to highlight that for them. But he goes on there in verse 17, he says from that time, Jesus began to preach saying repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. The same message that john is proclaiming, Jesus is also proclaiming, it didn’t matter what Jesus was using as an illustration. It came back to the Kingdom of God, it came back to the Kingdom of Heaven if he was talking about money, it came back to the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Heaven, if he was talking about banquets and eating and food and celebrating, it came back to the Kingdom of God, he was talking about relationships. It came back to the kingdom of God, that was what he was proclaiming because he himself is the king and he was proclaiming his kingdom and so what does that mean for you and I his kingdom. It means the rule and reign of christ in us. You know why that’s important? Do you know why that’s important? That’s important because number one, God knows that he’s in charge. God has never ever thought to himself, hey, I’m not in charge here. Hey, I’m not really the king here. God knows that he is the king and there are spiritual creatures in heaven, We call them angels, they know that God is the king and there are saints gathered around the throne in heaven worshiping him as king. Even the rebellious spiritual creatures know that he is in charge, he is the king, Do you know who forgets that being you, we forget that we live like we’re the kings, we live like we’re the jam. Nobody says that expression anymore. I get it. Hopefully the point was well taken and he says this to people awaiting a kingdom awaiting an heir to David Stronach, He’s saying to them, it’s not gonna be through a political upheaval, is not going to be through force. My kingdom is not of this world, is what he said to Pilate, which means, look, my kingdom does not operate like this world operates. My kingdom did not originate in this world. It is of God and it needs to take hold in your soul and then manifests itself in your life. He must rule and reign through you. And so jesus preached, repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand. I mentioned earlier when it comes back to the subject of what does it mean to repent? Because I think there’s a way in which we can cheapen the grace of repentance. We can cheapen it by conflating it with asking for forgiveness, asking for forgiveness is a part of it, but it is not the total the sum of it. Sometimes, you know, you talk to someone you say, you know, did you repent of that thing? Yes, I asked God to forgive me now. That’s not repenting you. That’s that’s not repentance, right? That’s and in many ways that’s worldly sorrow. I’m sorry that I got caught or that it was exposed that I did wrong. And paul in his letter to the Corinthians says that worldly sorrow leads to death. Another way in which we cheapen repentance is we are not specific about what it is we’re repenting of. Now, I get it when you come into the faith, you understand that you were born with a nature that is bent towards sin. And so there is a sense where a general repentance is needed. Like man, my whole life, God is against you opposite of the direction of which you want me to go. So I repent and I turn to you. But now as you begin to walk into the faith and this is where the grace of repentance is important for the new christian or the christian who’s been walking with God for decades. Because as you begin that process of walking and the cross comes into higher definition in your soul, you begin to see sins that you didn’t know were there, you begin to notice behaviors that you kind of excuse that you realize that man that is sinful in God’s sight. And so now what do you do in response to that? Well, the grace of repentance is that you walk away from that you repent of it. You are specific that that thing right there God that you have shown me by your grace. It offends you, I don’t know, I don’t want to do that anymore. I no longer want to do that. You turn from it and you’re very specific about it a third way in which we cheapen the grace of repentance as we focus too much on our own inability to change rather than God’s power and promise to change it. And I know this can be frustrating for a lot of saints. You know, your life was maybe shaped before christ by the sinful pattern, this sinful behavior and you want so badly to be separated from it, right? But sometimes if we’re not careful, we can be in that cycle of sin just constantly being more enamored, more overwhelmed with our inability and less of a faith towards God and his ability to change to separate us from that, to give us new ability to live differently. We want to hate our sins, despise them because they are offensive to God. We also want to have faith in God. God will pull me out of that. And you know what the proverb says that a righteous man falls seven times and he gets back up again. Now for you literalists out there, it doesn’t mean that if when you get to the eighth time of falling, that the game’s over. No, the idea is that as you keep on putting distance between you and that sin, eventually you’re gonna pick up momentum. The last thing I want to say about cheapening the grace of repentance. Don’t add your own form of penance to repentance. Sometimes we you know, there are situations where we need to be reconciled, we need to make restitution. We’ve taken something. If our sin is directly injured someone, we need to be reconciled. We need to be, we need to make restitution. And there are other times where even after we’ve done that, we think we still need to do something good now so that we can have the confidence to go into God’s presence. But that is cheapening the grace of repentance. No, once you you you realize it and you despise it and you hate it and you realize, hey, if I need to make restitution, you go make restitution. You then you turn towards christ and you let those change those burdens that way you let them fall to the ground you say, even though I don’t feel it, I know I’m forgiven, I know I’m loved and I know you said in your word so I’m clinging to you, jesus clinging to you. I’m not gonna hide from you. I’m not gonna pretend like I gotta do some good things to make you like me. So don’t cheapen repentance in that way. The word repent comes from a greek term meta noia, meta is a prefix that some of you are probably familiar with metaphysics. I think there’s a social media thing now it’s called what’s the metaverse or something like that meta means beyond. But in the original sense, it can also mean with beside or after. And then Oyo has to do with the mind when you combine the two together. The connotation is that you put behind you. That which you realize is deeply offensive to God and you turn to him as a repentance implies a deep regret, a deep remorse, a ruling of that which I realize is offensive to God and then turning with faith to a merciful God and moving in that direction. Biblical repentance is about changing how we think and feel about past ideas and behaviors and choosing to embrace God’s way of doing things. Turning from sin turning to God. And one of the things I’m thankful for is that the Holy Spirit, who is our coach been sent to get us right. It doesn’t overwhelm us with the full weight and depth of our sin. If he did that, it would indeed crush us. No one would be able to hold their head up, live or or move forward in life. There were a couple of times in scripture where you see a person getting a little taste of the weight of their sin, I think of Isaiah six when he sees the throne room, the trinity making plans of redemption, He gets a vision of it and just being that close, he feels the weight of his sin and it cries out, woe is me as in who I’m a dead man in the presence of this holy God God and his mercy. Holy Spirit invites us into this lifelong commitment of walking with God growing in christ. So he’ll put his finger on one or two things at a time and he’ll begin to rub out those knots in your life. To begin to straighten up the thinking and the walking so that the path is smooth for King Jesus will be glorified in you. So church, this is what we mean by the grace of repentance. I want to leave you with this. Okay, Jesus preached, repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, the kingdom and this grace of repentance. It involves your redemption, your restoration and a reclaiming of your lives for the glory of God, your redemption from the curse of sin and the judgment of sin, your restoration. In terms of your relationship with God and a reclaiming of your lives for the glory of God. You must be rooted in this grace of repentance. You’ll see it. So right now I want to take a couple moments. I’m trusting that the Holy Spirit is at work in your life. There are areas of your life, there are behaviors, there are thought patterns, there are things in your life right now that the Holy Spirit is putting his finger on. He wants to rub them out. He wants to straighten you up in that way. And so I want to give you a moment to pull out your notebook or your smartphone. Whatever ubiquitous note capturing device you own specify it be very specific, this is it. If it’s a relationship, this relationship call. No, you’re putting your finger on it. This behavior, you write it down, you type it up. Go ahead, take a moment and do that. You don’t need to fill up the whole journal right now or the whole page or the note app or whatever. Just be specific. Write the word, the name, the behavior just just type it up and then after you do that, why don’t you take a moment in your heart before the Lord faith penitence prayer. They live together in the same house. This is the moment. Now you pray about that thing, You take a moment and you pray about it Heavenly father, We’re so grateful for you and your grace and your mercy that is available to us this morning romans 24 says that your loving kindness leads us to repentance. I pray God that your fatherly heart, your love and kindness is what your people here in this moment as they think about the area of their life. They know calling them to embrace this grace of repentance and to turn away from that thing. I pray that they would hear your fatherly voice, They would sense your love for us in christ and Lord jesus. You said that your sheep hear your voice and I know that you’re praying for us in this moment. There’s no one here, there’s nothing here that escapes your notice. We commit all of this to you. Have your way in jesus name.