I Am a Repenter

I am a repenter.

Yes, I am a Christian.
Yes, I am a man.
Yes, I am a student.
Yes, I am a boyfriend.
Yes, I am a barista.
Yes, I am a soccer player.
Yes, I am... a lot of things.
But I am a repenter.

   It is very weird to find my identity in turning away from something, because every human wants to have a secure identity. Every human wants to find meaning in something that is firm. Nobody wants to repent. Nobody wants to admit that they are no good. But that is the essence of repentance. It is saying that I am no good, and I am turning around and walking toward what is good, even though it may be hard to get to. How do you find identity in that?

   King David - the guy who killed a giant; the man who unified the nation of ancient Israel; the man who trained the mightiest fighting men in the world; and yes, the murderous, adulterous liar who stole the wife of one of his soldiers, killed her husband, and then lied about it - was known as a "man after God's own heart" (Acts 13:22). So how in THE WORLD did he ever get the identity as a man after God's heart? He first found his identity in repenting. And so must every Christian. Get used to it. You sin. You are not perfect. But God calls you to live a holy life. So when you don't, you can't just give up. It doesn't work like that. You must learn the habit of repenting.

The essence of repentance is
turning around and walking
toward what is good.

turning around and walking toward what is good   This is why I say that I am a repenter. I sincerely and desperately want to be close to the heart of God. But so often my life doens't reflect this desire. So I must repent. Frenquently. And openly. It does nobody (especially those affected by your sin) any good to pretend that you have nothing to repent about or that you already repented a long time ago. You sin all the time. You must learn to repent all the time. The man (or woman) after God's own heart isn't perfect. He is just really familiar with the discipline repenting.

   "The Cost of Discipleship" is trending on Twitter right now. I think that is so sweet. It is nice to see every once in a while that there enough Christians populating the Twitter-sphere that things that I see as vitally important are also seen that way by a lot of other Tweeters. However, I am not excited that this phrase - and title of an amazing book by Dietrich Bonhoeffer - is trending just because others can see Christianese up on Twitter. i am excited because people are talking about what it means to be a disciple of Jesus... in a "secular environment"! Though being a disciple means a lot of things, part of the cost of discipleship is frequent and open repentance. Frequent. Open. Repentance. Sounds simple, but difficult, doesn't it? It is. It is not any fun at all. But if you are up for a challenge, here is one I will give you.

Repent.
Frequently.
Openly.

When you do, you open up the door for Grace to get behind your steering wheel, and drive you into the heart of God.