Caught Sinning
Jesus is the one whom God exalted to His right hand as a Prince and a Savior, to grant repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins. Acts 5:31
The Lord pointedly told me I had an attitude in my heart which was wholly unacceptable to Him and to His Kingdom life. I wanted to plead innocence, extenuating circumstances or some other justifications. But how can you fool God, how can you pretend or presume in His presence, under the watchfulness of His loving grace?
I was caught. I was a sinner. I was wrong.
The sin isn’t easy to describe or relate—not because I am embarrassed to speak of it, but because I do not yet fully understand it. In other words, I do not even have a name for my sin, nor do I see it clearly enough to describe Iit to you in words that either of us would understand.
It’s still sin, though. Conviction does not mean explanation. Conviction means the Lord has fingered some attitude, action or feeling of death in our lives. Many of us use “not understanding exactly what God means” as an excuse for delaying our repentance. Sometimes our desire to better understand our sin merely excuses our desire to continue unabated in that sin.
But back to me and my sin: it has shown up in my communication with people for many years—a sentence out of place, a tone of voice, too vivid descriptions and other inconsistencies with the intent of my heart. My wife and others have been sometimes wounded by this shadowy, unidentified sin which only occasionally manifests itself.
The closest description I can give is of a “harshness” which tends to drive my words too deeply, too authoritatively into vulnerable areas of others’ hearts. And the Father won’t have it. He’s told me to stop it.
A million thoughts crowd my mind: How? What do I do? I can’t! I don’t do it that much! I’m less guilty than others! It was my upbringing! It’s not what I mean to do!
His answer remains simple. Repent. Keep on repenting. Repent in hope of change. Repent in the welcome of My arms and My love. Repent as though life depends on it. Repent and be forgiven. Repent so that I may send times of refreshing to you. I love you. Repent. I love you. Repent. I love you…
With my repenting I find an amazing change. I start to become upset more with the presence of the sin in my life than I am with the conviction. I come to want to repent as desperately as God wants me to. I want no harshness in my heart.
So my repenting has led me to agree with God, who was the first to want that sin out of me altogether.
